Message I received from Luisa

Hope you are doing great! I also hope your missionary is doing great to!!! Its pretty cool to see an old member come back to church who was inactive because he was in the world, but when I asked him what made him decide to come back and have that desire to make things right with the Lord and serve his mission he said Elder Robison gave me a blessing. Your son has been doing great work! He started coming back I think right before your son left...I believe...he has been making those steps to be able to go on his mission. he is very excited but i was really curious on what made him come back so I asked him and that is when he told me Elder Robison had given him a blessing

Letter 12/1/11

Dear family, this week has been great.  Well to start everything off we had a bi-zone conference.  Where 2 of our zones got together and an area seventy came.  His name was Elder Haleck.  He was a very good speaker and gave everyone that boost of energy everyone needed.  It was a great day.  Well our companionship is on fire right now.  We have been reaching our goals and stretching out and getting baptism dates.  Jeff is still on for his date he is doing solid.  He just needs to quit smoking.  We have also been teaching this older lady, Gloria, she is a sweet heart.  Well when we go over there her friend Vivian is there.  She is a nice lady as well.  Gloria cancelled on us one day for good reasons so we decided to call up Vivian.  She told us to come on over.  We went over there with a member.  Elder Harwood went on a split with another member so it was Guest and I.  We taught her the Plan of Salvation.  She loved it.  Well she asked some questions about the priesthood.  She asked if other churches had the priesthood.  Well the member told her boldly that the other churches did not have the Priesthood.  He also told her they were false.  Well her face looked shocked so I explained it to her nicely then committed her for December 10th.  She accepted and was so excited.  She has told everyone and she can't wait for church.  We are excited for her.  We had lunch with her today.  We are going over to Sister Brown's to have lunch and a lesson.  Well everything is going great over here and the work pressing forward.  Everyone keep praying for Vivian.  She will get baptized.  We found out today that Elder Guest is leaving this Wednesday.  He is a great Elder.  I'm going to miss him not being around.  Well tonight was interesting we went over too a less active house to teach them a short lesson.  They offered us a drink.  This drink was made out of pineapple skin.  Well we drank it and after we all left we felt a little funny.  We think there was a little alcohol in it.  It must have fermented or something.

This has been a great time up here in Pleasant Ridge the people are great and willing to work.  The people we live with are great help as well.  The Nichol's took us out to dinner tonight.  We had a great time.  We went to a Chinese buffet.  They are close friends with the owners there.  Sister Nichol's is so sweet.  She knows a whole bunch of languages.  Her first language is Chinese.  She spoke it quite a bit tonight.  She also is helping us with our diet's she uses a lot of nut's, herbs, and a whole bunch of Chinese food.  I'm excited to try this out.  She also makes a lot of tea.  She showed us the stuff that is good for you.

Well I just looked in this tablet and found this letter I forgot to send so I figured I will keep writing.  Some more events that have went on this past week.  Well we moved Vivian's date up to November 30th.  She is excited and ready.  She went with us to a baptism tonight.  She really enjoyed it and felt the spirit.  The spirit was strong and great.  We have also been working with Vivian's friend Gloria.  She is the old 75 year old lady who is a sweet heart but really busy with her autistic grandson so I understand.  She will be getting prepared for baptism soon.  The field is white and ready to harvest so the work is still moving along.  We'll y'all take it easy and love y'all.  Elder Robison

PS I forgot to tell you about Thanksgiving.  It was great we went over to Jim Reynolds ex wife house.  She is a great cook.  It was the best food I've ever had for Thanksgiving.  I was so full leaving there and then 2 hours later we had another appointment with the Richmans.  It was a great day.

Alli's letter
Well this week has been so awesome!!:)  I will first start off with all the good churchy stuff.  Well we had a great Turkey day.  We had an all day Pday which was sweet because we woke up and went and played in the turkey bowl.  There was about 60-80 people there so we had 7 on 7 per team.  Well my team kicked trash.  I had 10 touchdowns.  We ended up losing our last game because the other team recruited people off another team.  So we lost by 2 touch downs.  Than for the rest of that day we went to a members house which she was an excellent cook.  I over ate.  Then after that whole night we went over the the other elders apartment and played cards there was 4 sets of Elders and 1 set of sisters.  We had a lot of fun. 

Letter 11/17/11

Dear family, well everything is going great here in Pleasant Ridge.  We committed one more for baptism.  His name is Jeff he is pretty legit.  Our other baptism dates we either had to cancel or change their date.  A lot of them are on probation or have problems but we'll get a couple in the water here shortly.  I like the new area.  It is nice and the people are easier to talk to they seem to be nicer.  Everyone here smokes it is nut's I'm going to say 80% of them do.  We ended up going out with Jim Reynolds again last night to go teach his employee.  Her name is Inez.  She is from Costa Rica.  She is great.  She is about 30 year's old and not married.  I don't know why she is not married because she is a great cook and a great girl.  Well we taught about temples and why they're so important.  Jim was a great help.  Oh I wish y'all could meet Jim.  We went with Jim at 5 o'clock to go to the mall.  He took us there to go help a member close her shop.  The members shop was full of Thailand stuff because that is were she is from.  Well Jim just wanted to make her feel good and help her out so he bought some pillow elephants that were $40 a piece.  He bought 2 of them for his house.  He also bought some hair things so we could give them to our mothers.  He spent $120 in 2 seconds then on the way out he saw some See's Chocolates.  He bought a huge box for Inez.  This guy is great.  Well I have seen more crazy things in this last 2 weeks than I think in my whole mission.  We go over to Elvis Presley's house and he will sing for us.  I requested In The Ghetto and Daddy Don't Cry.  he is a great singer.  We even got him in his Elvis suit.  We had the music going and he came down stairs and started to sing for us.  He is a character.  I will try to send you a video.  Well this has been a great time and opportunity to serve with both Guest & Harwood.  They are both pretty cool guys.  Well sorry it's short but it's sweet.  Love Elder Robison  PS the planes and choppers looked great I think I'm still planning on getting my license when I get home.

Dear family, well a lot has happened since the last letter if you could imagine.  Well I'm in a new area.  I'm in Pleasant Ridge North, basically Knoxville TN.  It is beautiful here.  The trees are all sorts of colors.  It reminds me of a movie.  Well I'm up here in a tri comp.  I'm training one fresh out of the MTC, Elder Guest.  he is from Oregon.  He is a cool kid the other Elder is tight too.  His name is Elder Harwood he is also pretty new he has been out for 3 months.  Well the work here is going like crazy.  When I got here the past Elders had 2 investigators with a date now we have 5 so we will definitely get some baptisms coming up.  The new Elder has already had some journal filling opportunities.  We ran into an old man that dresses like Elvis Presley and sang just like him.  He has black hair and big old chops.  The people are different here then in Dalton.  This area is a whole new mission for me.  It's huge and more like a city.  We definitely have been lost quite a bit.  It was pretty hard to leave Dalton.  My last day there we had 7 dinner appointments with the Griggs, Charley, Finily's, Keyaundra, Degollado's, Delacruz's and the Cox.  Well we cancelled 4 of them and kept 3.  We went out with Keyaundra then over to Delecruz.  Sister Delacruz is such a sweet lady.  She bought me a really nice hat and told me she loved me.  She told us that she has been trying to go to the temple for years.  Well she went 3 weeks ago.  She said we helped her out more than ever.  I kind of teared up.  She is a great lady.  After that I went and packed then that night we went to the Degollado's.  They fed us, their new rule is all the missionaries that leave have to be tazed.  So I was tazed but I got to taze all of them too.  Well when I left there Victor got me a shirt then we left.  These people turned in to pretty good friends all the people from Dalton.  So everything is going well.  The time is flying and the works good.  Sorry I have not got a letter out quicker.  We live in the basement of a members house.  It is pretty cool.  Well I will write y'all in a couple days so no worries.  So be safe have fun Love Elder Robison


ANOTHER LETTER that Alli received this week
This was a first for Elder Guest to go tracting he did great.  It's kind of weird because I'm the only one that speaks Spanish and when we knock into hispanics I'm the only one who speaks.  My spanish has definitely got a boost of help from up above.  I really like the guys I'm serving with.  We knocked into a girl today that was all tatted up and pierced up.  She said she was Satanist.  Elder Guest did not know what to say so I took over and was like really well that's cool and then she was really nice to us and invited us back.  Well my second night here and something interesting happened.  Well I was sleeping on an air mattress because there is 3 of us.  Well to make the story short Harwood had a box of candy by my head.  Well this past month I wake up at 5:30 every morning for some unknown reason.  Well I was sitting there listening to everything and I heard something in the box of candy and it was chewing on something.  Well I knew it was a rat so I was going to get up fast and turn the lights on to get it.  Well I jump up and the air mattress threw me off balance and I fell and then I got the light on.  The new missionary his eyes where so huge and he looked at me like he had no clue what was going on at 6 in the morning.  Well I go over there and the rat was gone so it was a pretty interesting morning but really funny. 

Brenan's email questions

Tell me about your companion what he is like, do you like, him where is he from, how long he has been out everything you can think of?
well actually i have 2 comps they are way tight i like them alot. elder Guest is from Oregon and elder Harwood is from Arizona elder Guest is a new elder he has 4 days in the field and the other has about 3 months
Tell me about the town you are in, big, small, spanish, do you like it?
well it is definitely bigger than Dalton but not huge. um not much spanish here but we are hoping to change that. we have a branch and only a family shows up every Sunday and it is about to close down so we are here to save it.
Tell me about your apartment do you live with members if so do you like them? 
ya we live with members in their basement but we never see them yesterday i helped him mow his lawn.
Tell me about the ward I think someone told me it is called Pleasant Ridge?  Are you just over one ward?
um the ward i have not met yet because the branch starts at the same time. so we went to the branch
Is it a poor area or a rich area?
it is richer than Dalton by far but there are still some low areas and some projects
Are there lots of members?
um there is like 3 wards in our building but in our ward im not for sure
How big is the area that is your area?
not very big but we have two areas a spanish and a english
What restaurants are in your area?
um everything
What zone are you in?
um we have 12 members in our zone and I'm back with Kryling and sister Maynes they were in my old zone
Who is your district leaders and your zone leaders?um cant think of his name right now he is pretty tight guy i like him
How many missionaries are in your zone?
12
Do you still teach spanish people?
um we are trying too so i might loose some spanish here but I'm studying more
Do you have lots of investigators?
um ya but they fill like all duds
Do you have any potential investigators?
um ya we have a couple with a dates but they are all duds i committed 3 of them and they accepted but they have alot of problems we have to work out
Are you going to like your area?
ya i love it but my comp does not know this area very well after 3  months here so it gets frustrating
Do you still ride bikes or do you have a car?
um ya we have a car right now but the mission is loosing cars so we will be in a car share in a couple of weeks
Tell me your address for sure?
5306 Ballard Dr Knoxville, TN 37918
Has it been a successful missionary area?
um I'm not for sure i know the missionaries in the other areas have not
Does the ward like and help its missionaries?
um we have had some meal appointments and the people are different here even just the distance fm here to Dalton

Letter 11/3/11

Dear family well this week we have been waiting to see who is leaving.  I'm finally leaving and everyone else is staying the same.  I will be training again so we'll see who I get this Wednesday.  Well this week our District had the opportunity to see the power of fasting.  We fasted as a zone and it is truly a miracle how strong it was.  We fasted for baptisms.  The mission has been struggling for baptisms.  Last month our mission had 6 total and only one in our zone.  Well after our fast the other Elders in our District committed 2 unsuspected investigators for baptism.  The next day the sisters committed 2 as well.  Our district is doing great.  For Elder Crofts and I we are planning on committing Henry for baptism so this fast has helped us out a lot.  Well this past week has been very spiritual for me.  We had some great lessons with some investigators.  One great experience we had was when Sister Black had called and asked us to come over to give her son a blessing.  His name Christ.  He reminds me of Casey Lance.  We talked to him for awhile and I talked to him about hunting.  He is 24 and is deciding to go on a mission but is having a hard time because he does not want to leave his mom because I guess her relationship with her husband is rocky right now.  We got to share our testimonies and had a very good night.  He asked me to give him a blessing so I did and he gave me a hug which was weird because I don't know him to well but he was crying and the spirit was strong.  Well at church it was a little hard to say good bye.  It felt like I was leaving home again.  The members here are great.  I will miss them all and would like to come back one day.  Right now I am about to go pack and it's going to be weird because I've been in this apartment for 9 months.  I have stuff everywhere.  This is going to be different training this time because we will be white washing an area which means we won't know anyone including the members.  I'm excited though to see who I get and where I go.  I love y'all and will write you more later but I will have a new address soon.  Love Elder Robison

PS... I think Brenan ended up being in Fountain City which is in Northern Knoxville.  I think his companion is an Elder Harwood and they also have a visa waiter who is going to Brazil.  I got this info from my friends in Dalton so I guess we'll know more on Monday when he emails.

Letter from Jerry and Jamie Scriver

My husband and I moved to Georgia in 2006. I had been a member of the Church for about 2 years but was not active (my husband would not have anything to do with the church and was not a member) I would try and have the Sister Missionaries come over while he was at work but when he found out he said he did not want them in our home. He would not tell me why at that time. Fast forward to 2011... One of my best friends from high school who lives in Oregon became very ill. We knew a specialist who could help her so I invited her to come and stay with us so she could get the medical treatment she needed. What I didn't know was that she was LDS. When I found out, I told my husband. I knew how he felt about the church but she needed to go while she was here and it was our responsibility to make sure she got there no matter how he felt. He went to the church with us for the first time that Sunday. It happened to be a fast and testimony meeting. I was so excited and just kept praying. He met Elder Crofts, Elder Robison, Elder Taggart, Elder Howell, and the sisters too. Immediately he felt a bond to them and he has been attending ever since. He was baptized on October 13, 2011. Elder Crofts and him bonded over football. Elder Robison and him bonded over hunting. Each one of the missionaries and him have found some kind of connection. We now think of them all as our adopted kids while they are away from home. We try to have them over to the house for dinner at least once a week. We try and sign up for them on Mondays so we can have Family Home Evening with them because they are so much fun. We learn daily from them. I learned tonight that Elder Crofts loves dogs. Our American Bulldog LOVES him and she normally does not take to men because she was abused by her previous owners. I am so thankful that y'all have allowed your sons to come on a mission and be such a blessing and example to my family. My husband and I will be going to the temple to do baptisms next month for the first time together. We are planning on being sealed in the temple on our anniversary next year in December 2012. Your sons are such blessings to us. There are no words to adequately express the love we feel for them. They helped to make being an eternal family a possibility for my family.