November 26, 2012

Wow Markel's call is so cool Houston Texas Spanish speaking!!!That is sweet!! Its going to be a struggle for mom since she is always tempted to see her children ha ha.... but we all know mom won't do it ha ha!!! and Kelsey's call is super cool too!! New York Spanish speaking.... hopefully Markel and her aren't in the same Spanish class in the mtc ha ha that would be a rough one on the teacher.. also Markel can now find her brother a Texas girl...just kidding y'all! :)

So first things first, this week was a really good week. How was everyone's Thanksgiving? I had a interesting one.... probably the first and last Thanksgiving that I will have like this! ha ha. We had Duck instead of turkey and no potatoes and gravy ha ha but it was a really good one!! I mean Thanksgiving is Thanksgiving right?

So this week was the Hmong New Year and as you see from the pictures it was crazy!! There were so many people there and the cloths that we are wearing are the traditional clothes that the Hmong wear.. They're pretty cool. I'm gonna have to get some before I leave! This event marks the end of the harvest season and its been going on for over 1000 years. When they lived in China, Thailand and Laos and they do this celebration here in America too, so its pretty cool! There were so many people, I say around 30,000 to 40,000 so it was cool that's for sure. Sorry i took mostly videos and I can't send videos over the email because they're to big so you will just have to see when I get home! At the Hmong New Years they have a pageant that they do, like Miss Hmong America or whatever it's called so that's the main purpose  of the event.
 I met a guy from Thailand, he was pretty cool and was like.... " wow you speak Hmong?" he was surprised a tall white guy could speak Hmong ha ha but it was funny. I got allot of weird looks with the Hmong clothes on but allot of compliments because I was white and wearing Hmong clothes.
 So another cool thing too was there was a Hmong girl from China. There are allot of Hmong people in China and she actually is Mormon and is living in SLC right now. She is promoting a CD and a family from SLC sponsored her to come to America and study and sing and stuff. She was really cool, she asked me what part of Utah I lived in and told her the Provo area. She was like okay cool when do you get home from your mission? I told her next November, she was like awesome I will give you my phone number and when you get home you can come up to SLC and I will cook for you and you can bring your friends. It was cool because now I got a Hmong friend in Utah!! She speaks Hmong, Chinese, and I assume English but I'm not sure about English because I didn't talk to her in English. :) so that was a really cool experience her name is Ling Lee so you all can check her music out but it will be in Hmong.


I wished you all could have came to the Hmong New Years! It was an event I definitely want to come back to.

This week was great and looking forward to the next... its so cold here ah ha but luckily I only have to survive one winter yeaaaaay!!  

Well I love you all! Have a great week.
 
Love always, 
Elder Crandall 

     

November 19, 2012

HOLY MOLY!!! I'm just astonished at Hunter's Mission Call. It's going to be a very great experience for him. I am so excited for him to go to GHANA and teach the Africans.... It's kinda cool because Minneapolis and St.Paul are really diverse there are people here from all over. In our Zone there are 5 languages spoken and our Mission was the first Mission ever to receive a native missionary from the country of Napal!! Most of the missionaries in Napal go and serve in India so it's cool! There are allot of Africans from all the African countries over here, I have met a couple of people from Ghana so it's really cool... they are really nice and humble people so it will be just perfect for Hunter!!

I'm ready to hear the Mission Call of Markel as well!!! I'm excited to hear where she is going.... it's going to be awesome! Oh and also Kelsey! It just boosts my desire to serve when I hear other peoples calls and where they are going especially people I love like my brother, sister and Kelsey... they are close to me and it truly brings me joy!!

So this week was Mission Conference. It was really good! Elder Gaverett from the Presidency of the 70's cam. he is a great man and I received allot of revelation for myself and for the work here. I'm excited to get to work and find those people! 

This week when I was on exchanges in St. Paul and Elder Ly and Elder Abbott were in my area. I asked Elder Ly to go see this girl that's in a part member family. Her older sister is a member... so they went. I had met her a couple of weeks ago but we just couldn't get back in with her. Elder Ly and Abbott got back in and she had just recently got baptized in a different church as her sister and they were attending that church. The family had fallen away from the church and had recently just started their faith up again and they just went to that church. But we invited her to baptism and she was like, "so does that mean my baptism didn't count?" and we were like uhhh............ "it was a good experience because that's all the truth you had at the time, but it was not done by proper authority." she was like "oh okay sure I will be baptized again if mine wasn't done by the proper authority then why not?" We were so relieved and she is scheduled to be baptized on the 15 of December!!

 
So hmong people do celebrate Thanksgiving but not like we do. It will be interesting knowing how they eat a turkey dinner with potatoes... they never eat potatoes its always rice, so it will be interesting ha ha!! It is the big big hmong New Years celebration too, it last three days and we will be going two of the three days. We are excited for that! Hopefully we can find some people and I can experience their culture more!! 

Anyways... not to much else going on this week just working hard and doing the Lords will!! I love you all and wish you to have a Happy Thanksgiving..
Love,
Elder Crandall  

November 12, 2012

Well, well, well, its beginning to look allot like Christmas that's for sure! Last night was super cold and it snowed but it didn't stick but it is still snowing...today it is only 9 degrees and it only November!!!It's crazy haha! As you drive and with the humidity here, you can actually see it freezing in the air!! It's like sparkles in the air and it is actually kinda cool!! 

This week just went by so fast for me....its crazy how fast a mission goes...

Elder Gavaret from the Seventy will be coming up to speak to us all. We are excited for that it should be a great experience for us. This will be my first Mission Conference. 
 
This week has been goo..., me and Elder Ly,  my new companion who is from Sacramento California, we are doing good and we get along well. We have met some cool people already. Elder Ly's dad is the Bishop of the Hmong ward in Sacramento. There are 2 wards and a branch there so he is Bishop of one of the wards in North Sacramento. 

This week we went down to south Minneapolis, we live in north Minneapolis which is the ghetto of Minneapolis.... there are shootings and gangsters here all the time so its was really different going from north Minneapolis to south, but while we were down there we ran into this huge community of native Americans and it was actually kinda cool because I had just got done reading from our family history from the Crandall side about how we are part native American so I was like, I need to teach all these people!!! They are all Lamanites and we have the Book of their ancestors....it was cool.. 
        
 We have found some new investigators, two couples so we are excited to teach them. They are really cool too. We have been trying to find part members so we are working with all the part members. This coming week will be a good one with the Mission Conference and we are planning for the Hmong New Years Celebration again. This one is in St. Paul and is the biggest one. So we are preparing for that and are excited for it!! Allot of preparing in the next week. I am hoping to receive revelation at Mission Conference our theme will be prayers of faith so I'm excited and ready to receive revelation for myself and for my area!!

Anyway, I love you all and hope you all have a wonderful week..
Love always,

Elder Crandall 

   

November 5, 2012

Whaoozzers this week has gone by so quickly. I can not believe how fast it's going but its been good so far... so last week was my birthday and I had a great birthday and it was very fun!

 First we went to a members house and learned how to make egg rolls... because egg rolls are the best!!!!! They also baked me a cake and we had cake as well so it was good!! also that day was the big hmong New Years celebration. It was one of two that they have. The next one is in 2 weeks and will be held in St. Paul so we are excited for that but it was really fun and cool to go to. We had some traditional hmong vests on! It was cool... I am trying to find someone who will make me some traditional hmong cloths because they're awesome! It was held at the Metro Dome where the Vikings play so we got to go on the field ha ha!! It was allot of sports and traditional hmong dancing and it was a great experience that's for sure. I'm excited to go to the next its supposed to be the biggest one so it will be fun!!!

This week we did allot of service for people. We raked allot of leaves and had fun doing it! We were at a members house raking leaves and they had so many leaves that we had a pile that was about 6 feet tall. It was crazy! I took a video of me jumping into it ha ha but it took us allot of time to rake all of their leaves and Elder Abbott lost his camera when we jumped into it and it took us about 2 hrs to find his camera. It wasn't until the next day though that we found it...

   So yesterday we were tracting and we were walking up to this door and it was a young couple and they were taking in a desk and so we offered to help. As Elder Abbott was helping him take it in I was talking with the wife and she was saying how lately she has had an yearning for some kind of faith that she could rely on and at that moment I just felt  Heavenly Fathers love for me and for her and I just wanted her to hear what we had to say and feel the spirit and joy from it.. so we got the desk in and all moved and the husband invited us in and we sat down and had a chance to share with them a spiritual thought it was really awesome.. After we had a very heart felt spiritual lesson with them we asked if we could come back but they didn't give a specific day and didn't give their phone number to me and it broke my heart. I just want these people to accept and learn more of the gospel! But we will not give up there!! We will be persistent and go back!! It really increased my testimony on the love of Heavenly Father and how we are all his children seeking for truth.. I felt a little bit like Alma in Alma 13:27. He describes his feelings when the people wouldn't accept the gospel.. I could relate to his feeling that night!!

Well today was transfers as well. I will be staying here in Minneapolis and Elder Abbott will be going to St.Paul. My new companion is Elder Ly from Sacramento, California. I'm excited to work with him and to stay here in Minneapolis. It's a great place to do missionary work!!

Well I hope you all have a great week! Thank you all for your birthday wishes to me and letters and packages!!

Love always,
Elder Crandall

PS- Shout out to Darci for writing me a sweet letter!! Thank you very much cousin and love you loads!