11/9/09

Hey!

Thanks for the email and letter this week. Dont worry
ive gotten your letters every week. Thanks for the
gift cards! Sounds like everyone is doing really well!
Im glad you and joey went to the missionary prep class.
What did you learn from it? How was the big party? Im
excited to read your letter. Sorry i havent written Joey
yet. youve told me a bunch of times and i keep forgetting.
Ill try to do it this week. Youre getting another dog?!
Sweet! Sounds like youll be rollin in the dough by the
time i get back. Just in time to buy me a season ski pass!
haha just kidding, but seriously...i wouldnt mind.

This week has been pretty good. Its been a really
 good learning week of what i need to work on to be
 better. We are fine tuning our door approach again.
 We had a zone meeting this morning for studies which
 was really inspiring. Despite the fact that i wasnt
 too excited to do it on pday. We listened to Elder
Hollands talk from last conference which of course
was awesome! Actually i wouldnt mind that for Christmas
or something, the audio cds of the last general
conference.
Thanks for keeping up on my loans for me. I
was actually going to look at them today because
i just remembered some payments might be due. Thanks!
Just so you know transfers will be the week of
thamksgiving so if you were planning on sending
something i would do it the week before. Funny and
gross story- I was in the shower one morning this
week washing my face and when i wiped the water
out of my eyes i looked down just as a 4 inch lomg
millipede crawls up out of the drain and scurries
between my feet! Nasty! As it tried to crawl up
the wall i jumped out of the shower, and remembering
that there was a hammer in the cupboard, i grabbed
it and beat it till it was chopped in half. Now
every time i shower i am paranoid and stare at the
floor the whole time watching for more! AHHH!!!

We have some plans to go to a part members house
for thanksgiving. They are eating at noon that day
but i dont know if ill get to go or not. Actually
im not sure if ill even get to have a thanksgiving
dinner cause transfers are that day. Maybe theyll
be move to a different day though.

Pray for Jose this week. He couldnt be confirmed
because he didnt make it to church sunday. He went
to work sat with some other guys and after they all
drove to someones house in the woods where they
were all drinking, which was the habit he just
overcame. He didnt have a way to get home and they
pressured him really hard to drink until he gave in.
After a bit though he said he felt really bad and
decided to just walk away. He walked part way home
and ended up having to sleep in the forest. Then he
woke up the next day and walked for 2 hours to get
home but church was half way done by then. He felt
really bad and we had a good talk about how to avoid
those situations all together and he really wants to
keep changing his life. I have no doubt that he be
able to be confirmed this week.

You have been talking to Daniel Johansen? Sweet! He
is awesome! He is a really good missionary and a
really good friend. Ill definitely be keeping up
with him after my mission. Well i cant think of too
much more to say except thanks for all the love and
support. And have another great week!

Love,
Elder Carty

11/2/09

Good morning everyone,

AND HAPPY 18TH BIRTHDAY RACHEL!!!
I sent you a little something on Friday for your birthday so
it should be there by tues or wed. Sorry its a couple days
late.

This week was a great week for us! We had 2 more baptisms
and confirmed 4 people! The mom of the boys who were baptized
last week who got sick was baptized on tues. Then all 3 of
them and Alejandro were confirmed. He was my first confirmation
in Spanish! I was a bit nervous but it went really well. Our
other baptism this week was Jose Flores. He is a really good
friend of Alejandro and they work together. Last saturday he
happened to be at his house and we invited him to church to
watch Alejandro's baptism and he came and really enjoyed it.
Then we had a lesson with him on tues. and he asked when was
the soonest he could be baptized! It was awesome! On sunday
Alejandro also received the priesthood and after church got
to baptize Jose! He did an incredible job! Now that these
people are baptized we are going to have to do a lot of
finding this week. We have a couple good people but none
of them can be baptized this weekend. The mission has a goal
for a hundred baptisms this week so please pray that we will
be able to find someone else to baptize this weekend.

I am really sad to hear about timber. He has lived for a long
time though. Its interesting because i was talking about him
to my companion last week and felt like he didnt have much
time left cause he was getting so old. Sounds like you had
a neat funeral for him though.

We never got to go gator hunting last week cause half
the family was sick. It was a pretty realxed pday which was
good. We may go kick a soccer ball around today for a bit.
Man daylight savings is really going to hurt the missionary
work. It gets dark at 6:15 now! So if we dont have appointments
im not sure what we're going to do till 9 cause tracting doesnt
really work after dark. Today we are going to work from 3-6
instead of 6-9 cause we dont have any appointments. I really
need to get some pictures developed for my album and make a
cd for you guys. I dont think ive sent pictures home since
Gainesville. I have taken almost 900 pictures! My comp and
i have gotten pretty close. We have a lot of fun and talk about
a lot of stuff. Everything else is going really well here.

Sounds like your job is crazy busy dad! That building in Denver
sounds awesome! A park inside a skyscraper?! Crazy! I dont have
much time left on the comp but im glad your job is going so well.
Keep up the good work! I never got to carve a pumpkin but oh well.
Those frogs sound really cool Aaron and Caleb! Hunting up there
sounds like a blast! A lot of people here love hunting. The deer
arent nearly as big here though. I think i made some of them
jealous when i told them what kind of animals walk by our house.
They go hog hunting with dogs here as well. Which ive heard is
actually really dangerous for the dogs. Can you hunt in the
national forest by our house? It sounds like everyone had a
pretty fun week with halloween and the football game. I love
all of you and hope your is great!

Love,
Elder Carty

Buenas dias!

Hows it goin? This week was just ok... Except for the
fact that we baptized 3 people!!! This week was sweet!
And we have on on tuesday!We are seeing miracle after
miracle here in Live Oak. We baptized a guy from Mexico
named Alejandro and then 2 kids of a lady we found last
week. She was really sick yesterday so we just baptized
her 11 and 8 year old kids and she will be on tuesday.
We are also working on her mom who lives with her. The
mom is Jolena, the grandma is Joanna and the kids are
Tino and Gabriel. She also has a 4, 3, 1, and 2 month
old kids. Its chaos trying to teach them!

So we found out that all the trees in our backyard are
pecan trees. All the nuts fall to the ground in the fall
and there is a place that buys the nuts from you. We each
collecting a whole sackful this morning and are going to
go see if its worth much money. We'll probably only get
like 5 bucks but we might buy a Little Caesars with it.
I looked up a recipe for pecan pie and am going to try
it out. I made pumpkin pie last night and we had it for
breakfast this morning. Delicious! Some hispanics drove
up to our house and started walking around the backyard
collecting nuts right after we did. Thats the second time
we've seen people out there so we called the owner and we
had to tell them to leave.

Are you excited for your birthday next monday Rachel? Any
sweet plans? Oh what i would give to still be in high
school. I miss a lot of things about it. Hows school goin?
Ill write more in a letter for you this week.

Be careful on that pogo stick dad! Sheesh! Thats crazy
about the flight that went 150 miles too far! haha. Today
we are going up to White Springs to a part member family
and the guy is going to take us gator hunting! At least
thats what he said. I think we are just catching the really
young gators that are small. Maybe we'll have some gator tail!
Ive heard its actually pretty good. Ive had to do some
translating this week for one of our zone leaders investigators
and for Alejandro's interview. The Lord is helping me out a lot!
How is work going dad? Anything exciting going on at the
hospital or a lot the same? I have missed home a lot the past
few weeks. A lot of things here keep reminding me of home.
Everything else is going very well though. The mission is
pushing really hard to try and reach our goal for 1050 baptisms
this year. I think we are almost to 900 right now. Sometimes i
feel like we push so hard the first few days of the week that
its hard to keep up the same desire to work as hard on fri and
sat. On wed we tracted for almost 5 hours straight and literally
ran from door to door. I was exhausted! This week really wore me
out cause i was dragging a bit at the end. Its a lot of work
getting baptisms together and still squeezing in enough time
to visit everyone and tract. We did a lot of Spanish work this
week also which drained me quite a bit. Its hard to teach a whole
lesson in Spanish without help. But i think i am learning and
growing a lot in this area. Hope everything goes well this week!
And Happy Halloween! I really want to carve a pumkin but im not
sure if my comp really does. I still might anyways! Love you all!

Elder Carty

Hows it goin y'all? I am back in the country of
Live Oak, FL! Here's my new address:

10208 109th Dr.
Live Oak, FL 32064

Its in north-western florida almost to Talahasee and is a
pretty small town. Everyone here has pretty thick southern
country accents. I love it here though! Its so nice to get
away from the city. Our place here is sweet! We live
outside of town in our own house on like 50 acres! You
can only see one other house from ours. Crazy sweet! The
ward mission leader owns the house and all the land and
lets the missionaries stay there. Its not too big of a
place but its decent size still. Theres a lot of trees
out here to so i almost feel like im at home. Theres a
barn, a chicken coup and a big shed that are either empty
or filled with junk by the house and then a giant tower
with a windmill out back that you climb up. Its like 60
ft! Apparently previous missionaries have named it the
Rameumptom (from the Book of Mormon). haha. Our area is
huge because we cover all the small towns around it. It
covers like 30-40 miles in all directions and touches the
Georgia border. You can tell Doug that there is a big
mining community up in Jasper, FL. My new companion is
Elder Smith. Hes from Seattle, WA. My third comp from
Washington! I like him a lot. He gets pretty excited about
the work and is excited to get a good comp he said cause
his last one didnt like to work much. Oh ya and hes an
english missionary so we are a bilingual companionship!
Im the only Spanish missionary in the entire zone here.
i was pretty nervous about that but im discovering that
i know a lot more Spanish than i thought. Its really going
to be good for me not having a comp to rely on because
then im forced to speak it a lot and listen more carefully.
They havent had Spanish missionaries here for a couple
transfers. Last transfer the english work didnt see much
success but i think it was probably because of his last
comp. We are already seeing some miracles though. We found
a guy that had been taught 1 lesson last time there was
Spanish here and we set a pretty solid baptism date with
him. His name is Alejandro. We also found a sweet family
with lots of kids! Only 2 kids are baptism age, 11 & 8,
and theres the mom and grandma that live there. The dad
is Mexican and lives in Mexico for now so shes going down
there to marry him in a couple week (interesting situation).
The kids are awesome though! The oldest reminds me a lot
of Aaron and the 5 yr old reminds me a lot of Caleb! Then
theres a 3 yr old girl and a 3 month old boy. I feel really
bad for the kids cause they all live in a small trailer
which is disgusting. There barely room to walk and the whole
thing is really filthy. I worry about them getting sick
there. I think they all just moved in though. Please pray
for them all and especially that the mom and grandma will
be able to come to church. We brought a ride for them
yesterday but only the 5, 8, and 11 year old came so we
had to watch them for half of church. lol. It was a blast!
I also had to translate half of sacrament for Alejandro
till the guy who usually does it got the translator device
working. Translating is really hard. I basically just
summarized what the speakers said cause i couldnt think
fast enough. The weather out here has been much cooler
since i got here. Actually, the last to night have been
freezing! The humidity makes it a lot colder than normal.
It has been really nice the past few days except the heater
at the house doesnt really work well and i discovered that
my one blanket was not sufficiently warm. I might have to
ask a ward member for one. I can probably get socks at the
store here. My garments are all mediums, tops and bottoms.
And i couldnt take it with me cause it would have sat in my
suitcase for like five hours in the sun. Its alright though,
i used some of it before i left. Well its about time to get
going. Today has been pretty relaxed which is always nice.
Have a great week! Oh and i may need some extra prayers if
you dont mind. Just that i will be able to speak Spanish
very well. Oh yeah and congratulations to the undefeated soccer
champs Aaron and Steve Carty whose team is clearly Superior!
Ha! Ha!  Get it!  Okay, bad joke. . . .Great job!!!

Thanks!

Love,
Elder Carty