August 18, 2014

Had some pretty gnarly experineces this week! We had that incredible teach on monday and the week continued getting better. We only had like 3 real days in our area so it was a little wierd and took me our of my groove but it was still way good and we were able to have some solid teaches this week. We also had a beastly planning session that helped is keep track of all our peeps. Its tough though because the only definite thing with planning as a missionary is that it wont go according to plans. Its all good though because the spirit has helps us out and keeps us doing the lord's will. I love be a missionary still. This week was incredible because we took a Pday in Oslo. It was unfortunately a little rainy but we still had a good time playing all sorts of different sports form ultimate frisbee to capture the flag. There was a ton of missionaries so it was a little tough for us to get every one on the same page but I hope they all had a good time. My favorite part of the day though was getting to cruise around oslo. I didn't end up buying anything but I saw alot of cool suits and clothes. I was looking for some amazing deals but I didn't find anything. I'm pretty good at resisting unlike Elder Halvorsen. So the Pday in Oslo was pretty sweet.

 I ended up staying the night in Sandvika in Elder Holdens apartment. We were also working in the evening time so we got to go on splits. I worked with Elder Crook from oregon and we had some good experiences finding and teaching 2 people that night. We were in a competition of who could teach most in an hour and so we won some american Lucky Charms.. (why did I ever think that stuff was good??) Its super fun to go all over Norway and work with different missionaries and be constantly guided to people to share the gospel with no matter what city your in.

 I was super pumped for the conference with Elder Dyches the next day. He had two different meetings and they were super spiritual. The first was focused on responsibility and leadership. I'd say the second one was more broad and all over the place but there were all sorts of important principles of planning and teaching that were really helpful. He was a mission president in oregon and so he had all sorts of insights as to how we could improve as a mission. I got all sorts of good stuff lot out of those meetings and i'm excited to start applying what I learned so that I can keep getting better and better as a missionary.

On saturday we drove down to Porsgrunn for some splits there and to do a baptismal interview for one of their investigators. It was a lot of fun being down there. Elder Cheney is from las Vegas and is incredible at beatboxing, he's also played a computer game called Runescape for a total elapsed time of a year and a half. Thats a lot of hours. Kids these days... I'm super happy he's on a mission, hopefully he and elder Ankenman had some fun with us and learned alot. 

Cool story of the week. We were knocking on doors and almost done with the day. As we were walking back to the car I felt prompted to knock on one more door as we passed it. So we turned around and ended up talking to this skeptical norwegian guy at his doorstep. I was really bold and persistant with him (what we were focusing on) and he eventually begin to be curious and really didn't have a reason to not learn... so he let us in. I thought it was going to be one of those miracle stories you read about in the ensign but the dude's wife kicked us out in about 15 seconds. Not cool. Funny story though.

This week we're going to be doing a training meeting again in Tønsberg. So I'll be leading a lot of discussion on how we can change the game here in Norway and keep going forward.  We're constantly refining and adjusting. The training meeting will be like 6 hours long with a split focus on planning and working with members. We'll try to make it fun and spiritually uplifting. Sorry you guys aren't missionaries here in Norway getting to be a part of this. Anyways, I'm sure my life sounds super boring to you guys right now but.. its not. Always good things happening, make sure to ask me about them when I get back. haha. Love you guys. Keep working hard, have fun at work and school.

Here's a picture of me and Elder Matti Jouttenus.. he knows the Friströms:)

Eldste Skinner