Who's the Trainer here?

As I said last week, I am now training! Woohoo! Elder Barker is my companion's name. He's a boss kid from Clinton, Utah. He like to draw and do other things too. I'm not entirely sure what those other things are, but I'm sure I will eventually find out.

I wish I had some great and wonderful stories this week to tell you all about. Especially some stories about how I slew a dragon, but no one would believe that, would they? There are a couple of things I can tell you about, though.

The big thing that Elder Barker and I did this week was contact former investigators! It was tons of fun. We just looked at the list of pretty much everybody taught in this area from the past few years and went to go see if they wouldn't mind meeting with missionaries again. Quite a few of them said they wouldn't mind, so hopefully this week will be full of teaching appointments.

Another thing is that the ward I'm serving in, Pioneer Ward, had 2 baptisms on Saturday! The other Elders in the ward, Elder Summerhays and Elder Weaver, were teaching Sabrina and her son Andrew and they got baptized this last week. It was certainly great.

Other than that, my companion and I have just been trying to get things going. We would like to meet with more members, but for the most part the members live in the east half of the ward, while we cover the west. So we do what we can. 

It has been really great being with a companion who is excited to do all things "missionary." It is certainly a good experience so far. Hopefully we will start to see some bombastic miracles here in our little corner of the vineyard.

Have a great week. Remember, don't ever take any wooden nickels.

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Now go, and be Golden,

Elder R. Sage Taylor

My greenie, Elder Barker, and Elder Alba and his greenie, Elder Frost. Elder Taylor posterity!

Elder Saxton all Jedi status

Elder Barker climbing a rock wall on today's hike

Me standing under a waterfall on today's hike

Today, I am a Man of Few Words

I've only got a few things to mention for this week.

1. I am excited to say that I am going to continue to serve in the Pioneer Ward in the Redlands Stake for another six weeks. Elder Saxton is getting transferred and I am going to be training a new missionary. Woohoo!

2. An investigator I taught in San Bernardino, Faye, got baptized on Saturday. That was a great experience. I love baptisms!

3. I went on exchanges in to "Spanish Land" on Friday. I was companions with Elder Richins for the day in the Lugonia Spanish Branch. I didn't understand pretty much everything from that day, but it was neat.

4. Last night was a pretty sweet new member potluck for the ward. All the recent converts were invited over to someone's house to eat dinner. It went well and was tons of fun.

5. Until next week!

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Now go, and be Golden,

Elder R. Sage Taylor

Faye's Baptism!

Jet Deer 2.0. An awesome conglomeration of my room mates and me creating something awesome

A Good Time

So sorry, chaps, for my lack of emailing last week. With it being Labor Day and all that, I only got an hour to email last Tuesday, so it was barely enough time to fill you in on my goings on. 

Last week was a pretty good week. On Sunday September 1st my investigator, Donnie, got baptized! Elder Saxton and I met with him every day last week so that we could teach him all of the good things we needed to so that he would be prepared for baptism. It was pretty much great. Here's the funny thing about Donnie's baptism, after the font was filled up the plug to the drain wasn't completely plugged, so the water started to leak out during the first part of the service. So when it came time to do the actual ordinance the water was pretty low. So Donnie actually sat down to be baptized. It was a great time.

This past week was also a pretty decent week.

Last Tuesday was kind of a funny day. I was on exchanges with my ward mate, Elder Summerhays. We had District meeting in the morning, then after that we were heading to a library to email home. That took up a large portion of the day. While emailing, the elders that drove us to the library got a call asking to help a family in their ward move, so we helped as well. It was really strange because the people we were helping move weren't even there helping us. That took up most of the rest of the day, then we had dinner with some members in a different ward. So that whole day we didn't even proselyte in the area we were supposed to. Oh well. It was fun.

Wednesday was great! I finally went to the temple again. About time. 6 months is WAY too long of a time to go without going to the temple. After the temple we did my usual "Cafe Rio Run." Some person came up to us and offered to pay for my meal. It was super cool. Then we went to a frozen yogurt place and another person paid for my yogurt! How cool is that? I certainly get neat blessings being a missionary.

The rest of the week was just average. We taught Donnie the 5th missionary lesson, which I have never taught before. It was pretty much awesome. Elder Saxton and I have just been going around the area trying to talk to former investigators and see if they're interested. We have a couple of return appointments for this next week, so hopefully that means some new investigators as well! 

Well, it's time for me to go to McDonald's. I actually haven't even been once the whole time I've been in Redlands. Can you believe that? I will certainly be enjoying my afternoon.

Stay awesome, my ever-loyal fan club. 

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Now go, and be Golden,

Elder R. Sage Taylor

Donnie's baptism, Elder Harline is the one who baptized him

Redlands Temple trip. Elder Saxton & Me

Elder Weaver, me, Elder Saxton & Elder Summerhays my ward mates.

 The Chaffees came down here to go to the temple and take Elder Saxton & me out to breakfast.

This is right before I got a hair cut. Look at how long my hair is! Yikes.

I was in a little mountain town called Angelus Oaks while I was on exchanges. 

 It was cool.