19th P-Day (12th in France)

A lot of hard work went into this week, but results were eventually shown! Oh and for all of you lazy readers out there, today is your lucky day! This email is way shorter! Consider it my Christmas gift to you ;)

We started the week off with exchanges in St. Die with the District Leaders. Me and a missionary named Elder Melanson were together. We went street contacting in the morning and got a few peoples' numbers which was really nice. Afterwards, we went knocking on doors before a rendezvous with an investigator that they had scheduled. It was freezing and we weren't seeing any immediate success, but we kept going. The last man we encountered was a strong Muslim, but let us in to help him move a HUGE table he just built into another room. He was really nice and gave us Coke afterward and sat us down to talk about religion. It was really cool and he was really grateful for our help. By this point, we were already 15 minutes late to our rendezvous with their investigator, so we rushed over to his apartment. Elder Melanson had previously warned me that this guy is sometimes really weird during lessons, but I still had no idea what to expect. When we got there, him and his girlfriend were smoking some weed. Then he proceeded to roll a blunt during our lesson LOL! He was also drinking coffee... Does caffeine even mix well with other drugs haha? But he basically didn't care about our lesson and Elder Melanson was really mad. He has been their investigator for a while and hasn't progressed. Up until this point, Elder Melanson had a lot of hope. Eventually, Elder Melanson just got up and said, "We're leaving". And we left. It was awkward, but Elder Melanson was so frustrated with the situation. He ended up dropping him as an investigator. After that, we still had a lot of time before mine and Elder Payne's train back to Epinal, so we did more knocking. One guy that we knocked on was a Jehovah's Witness. It was really peaceful on his porch for the first 20ish minutes, but then he invited us inside his house. Oh boy. Not the right situation to be in for a missionary who just had to drop an investigator. It was really just a peaceful bashing, but eyes got watery and faces turned red.  Me and the guy's daughter were just looking around, feeling awkward haha. What an experience! Elder Melanson is so powerful in his words that I think everyone present felt the spirit so strongly. 

The next day me and Elder Payne decorated the Church for Christmas Sunday to surprise the Branch. Look for it in my picture album!

On Friday, me and Elder Payne went knocking as per usual. We were at it for HOURS when we finally found an old woman that was willing to talk. We talked to her FOREVER and she was so nice. Hopefully we can make her an official investigator soon, but either way I love talking with her. Then we went back to the church to do some things. While there, we got three texts. One of them was from this guy I met in Paris several weeks ago. He's one of the investigators in the Paris area. I'll attach a pic of his text. It was so funny and made me feel so good knowing that he wants me to get transferred to Paris to be his next missionary. I've only met the guy once, so it obviously made me feel good! Then we got a text from the Branch President saying that Frere Courage's (the man from England who has helped translate for me in the past; AKA: Only English speaker in the Branch) mom just died and he wanted us to email him our condolences. So sad! Then we got a text from a new investigator family me and Elder Payne found! My first official investigators in this ville, yay! But the text was to cancel our rendezvous with them, so I'm hoping that they're not just flakes and that they continue to be our investigators. 

Saturday me and Elder Payne traveled to this small ville named Le Thillot to visit two in-active members and invite them to Christmas Sunday the next day. Le Thillot is so small that we had to take an hour train ride and then an hour bus ride, because there is no direct train line there. When we got there, it was freezing and there was a blizzard out! Again, the addresses on our sheets were WRONG! The Branch clerk really did a bad job, for this is like the 100th person I've tried visiting that has a wrong address/phone number haha. How annoying! Anyway, after a while of searching for the first man, we had no luck and decided to leave an invitation at a house that was potentially his. Then it was on to a woman. We searched for literally HOURS. There was no house with her address, but we found her street! That meant that all we had to do was knock all the doors. The problem? That street would be a comparison to State Street in Utah. It went on for MILES, through the whole ville as a matter of fact. As it was getting dark, we were getting frustrated. We wanted to find this woman before our bus out of the ville so that we didn't just come all this way for nothing. Eventually, we decided to ask people. To our surprise, people knew her! They pointed us in the right direction and we got to her house! Why didn't we think of doing that earlier haha? Anyway, when she opened the door, I realized that it was a lady that the Branch President took me and Elder Asato to meet when I first got here. I just acted like I didn't know her and invited her to church. She said she couldn't. I'm not gonna lie, that day was painful. We put in a ton of effort for people who weren't going to come. Oh well, what's done is done haha. 

SUNDAY! My favorite part of this week by far! So when me and Elder Payne first showed up at the church, no one was there. But one by one, they all started coming. I was kind of bummed though, because this past month Elder Payne and I had been working every day to invite the in-actives to come and none of them were showing up. Then, there he was. In the back row sat the old man me and Elder Ludwig drove to see on exchanges in that small farm town. He had previously told us that he had heart conditions so he couldn't go to church. I had no clue he was going to show up of all the people we invited... And with his wife (who's not a member) and they brought food for our feast afterward. How cool! They were the only non-active people to come to actual church, but more people showed up for the feast (I'd probably do that too if I was inactive haha). The gypsy family from Serbia, the Nikocevics, that we visited a few weeks ago came with a HUGE homemade cake in hand. Only the mom is actually a member, but everyone from her family came with. No one in the branch even knew who they were, but they were all socializing with them! The Nikocevics even said that they'd try to come back next week, even though they have to drive here illegally. The mom was also wanting me to e-mail Justin Trudeau for her to gain her entry into Canada, yet again. Haha! Then Soeur LaForge showed up (the one with the mom with Alzheimer's) with her mom and her daughter. Her mom was so out of it, that the Branch Presidency all sat her on a chair and carried her up to the 2nd level of the church where we were having the feast. I'm talking like 40, small, windy steps (small apartment building). What a service. Everyone was eating a lot, talking a lot, and laughing a lot. Even though only two inactives showed up, they brought their families, food (which nobody asked of them), and a lot of fun. What a success. All the countless people we visited that didn't show up really missed out. The branch was so proud of our decorations and gave us all the leftovers. And I'm talking leftovers of basically a Thanksgiving feast. I was literally so stuffed that it hurt to walk afterward. Can't remember the last time I ate that well. Frere and Soeur Courage even showed up, even though his mom just died. They also brought a lot. People are great! I'm glad that these inactives enjoyed their time and may become activated again. It really was a good day! The fruits of our labor really did show. Not in quantity as we were hoping, but in quality. 

Today I got a haircut by a barber who did it almost entirely with a straight razor. I'll probs be posting a new profile pic, so look out for it there haha.

This week taught me a lot. Know that God knows your labors and he will bless you for them. 

I love you all so much. Thanks for all the love and support you send every week. I cannot thank you enough! Oh and shout out to my Nanny for the Christmas package. Whether it's handwritten notes, packages, or emails, they all mean so much to me. You have no idea. 

Love, Elder Anderson

Me & Elder Payne

Catching a nap on the train

Package from Nanny

Gifts from my mom

Text from investigator in Paris

Decorations at the Church

Preparing the feast

Our awesome branch

18th P-Day (11th in France)

This was another productive week, but I'll try to keep this email brief yet again LOL. 

To start off the week, we had district meeting and interviews with our mission president. It was just like any other interview, but then he had to bring up my previous companion, Elder Asato. I'm guessing that Elder Asato didn't take the news well that I was the reason for him being sent to a new ville, because President asked me if I've received any "death threats" from him. I don't know if I should be worried, so please pray for me haha. 

The rest of that day was very interesting. On the way back, we had some college-aged guys talk to us on the train who all seemed really interested in our message. We were so excited! Maybe we had just found some new investigators! Then their interest went away when we replied to their question about premarital sex and said that we abstain from it. Too bad haha. We then had a mangez-vous planned with Alhin this night, so we had to take a bus to get to his house. While at the bus stop, some middle-aged women hit on us haha! They were so loud that everyone at the bus stop was listening in. They asked us for our ages and when I replied, "18", the main woman said, "I'm 22". What a lie! Then she said, "I like guys with blue eyes but never get with them" and "I have a man and a kid, but I'm still open to fooling around". Dozens of people were listening in and cringing so hard! We were so happy when our bus arrived lol! Why do so many old women hit on us in this Ville?

The next day me and Elder Payne went on a hunt for a woman he had met with last week on exchanges. She lived in this apartment on the top of the mountain. Because I wasn't there, I didn't know which apartment it was and he had forgotten but didn't want to tell me, so he just chose an apartment at random. The front door was locked, so we decided to ring doorbells and lie to someone saying that we were the "Post Office". While we were doing this, the real post office lady came and Elder Payne said, "I got a plan". He decided to lie to her and tell her that he forgot his key and couldn't get into the apartment. She proceeded to ask him security questions, all of which he gave really bad replies to haha. Then he changed his story and said that a friend invited us over and he couldn't remember her name to ring her doorbell. The lady was so suspicious, but finally, let us in. It ended up being the wrong apartment complex. Then we got to the right one. It, too, was locked. Elder Payne didn't want to lie again but didn't know how to get in. I rang someone's doorbell and said, "S'il vous plaît, ouvrir la porte" to which they opened the door. No lying necessary haha. She ended up not being home though. Lots of work for nothing lol, but it's all good. 

That night was family home evening with the members of the branch. It was small, but it was good. I made Madeleine cakes (a French favorite) and everyone enjoyed them. However, me and Elder Payne left all of our teaching tools back at the apartment, so we had to wing our lesson. It ended up going okay and the night was good!

The next day, Elder Payne wanted to do a "Companionship Inventory". Basically, you tell your comp all the good things about them, then all the bad. The "bad" he said for me was, "you like to have too much fun. There's always a time and place for fun and when we're out of the apartment it is not the time for it"..... There's definitely no such thing as too much fun. People can fight me on this haha. If you're not having fun every second possible, are you even living? haha 

After that, I made a HUGE batch of Leslie Lawson's cinnamon chocolate chip cookies to invite the in-actives to Christmas Sunday with. They were so good, so shout out to her for having a bomb recipe. 

The next day we had exchanges with the ZLs from Strasbourg. I got a lot of street contacting in with my exchange comp before we took a train out to another ville to find some in-actives and invite them to church. This was an interesting experience. The first person in the ville we were supposed to invite had a wrong address/phone number. The second person lived an hour walk away from the train station, but to make our trip worth it, we walked. The problem was that this other person didn't have an address with a house number. They only had the name of their street and it was one big street, let me tell ya. So we decided to look on everyone's mailbox and look for a name. If the house had no name, we'd knock on the door to figure out if it was right. How convenient for us that his house was the second to last one on this long street. We were in a rush because we were an hour from the train station and our return train was leaving in 55 minutes. As we were approaching the right house, a cop car pulled me over! I was on the opposite side of the street than my exchange companion, as we were looking for the right house on different sides to save us time. When he pulled me over, I yelled to my comp to get over and help me out. He told us that we can't proselyte in a ville without first contacting their city hall. My comp called him out and said that that was a lie, and he said, "in small ville it's not". Then my comp asked, "if we call city hall, do they give us like a code or something to prove that we called?" to which he replied, "no".... so we honestly don't need to call anyone, because even if we do, there's no proof haha. Then he asked to see our IDs and wrote down all of our information. Halfway through his pen ran out of ink and he was writing nonsense. Then he left. He made us miss our train too! haha. What a joke. Then the city had cop cars following us all the way back to the train station. We were definitely being watched haha. 

The next day was really good and fulfilling. Me and Elder Payne decided to go out into Centreville and scrape the ice and snow off of people's cars for 3 hours. It was cold and hard, but we did it. 50 cars in three hours! I felt so accomplished. The rest of our day was pretty planned out, but then we received a call from a woman in the branch who wanted us to give her mom, with Alzheimer's, a Priesthood blessing. She picked us up and took her to her house. It was so sad. Her mom was barely conscious and kept moving her head. It was really hard to keep our hands on her fragile head, as she kept it moving. Then the daughter asked for a blessing herself. Her blessing had a lot of instruction in it, and on the way out she asked me a question that I clearly did not understand. She asked, "There was so much instruction in that prayer. Does that mean that I'm not good enough?" to which I replied, "yes". The look on her face was priceless. Oops. Luckily, my companion did some damage control and all was well. It was really special to see her love for her mom so much. She takes such great care of her and the fact that she asks us to help when it gets too hard is amazing. What a cool experience! 

Yesterday was a pretty laid back and nice Sunday. Only 5 people came to church! But Soeur LaForge (the woman who had us give the blessing) came late with her mom to partake of the Sacrament. The mom's condition was even worse. It took 3 people just to get her into the building. She can't even walk. Giving them a special sacrament afterward was such a cool experience. After that, me and Elder Payne were invited to a Catholic Christmas Concert at a very historical Basilica in Epinal. It was really good. Huge crowd and the choir performed songs like "Jingle Bells", "Hallelujah (so good btw)", and "The Harry Potter theme". All of the songs were in French, but it was so cool to be able to see that. 

The week was good. I think everything is only getting better, and for that I am so grateful. Thanks to all of you for your love and support. I encourage all of you to get out there and find someone to serve this month. For those of you in Utah, Silver Rush is a perfect opportunity. Donate. Give. That's what Christ would want. I gave this week and I saw how positive it made me. I know that if you serve, you too will feel happy!

Thanks for all the emails and love. Love you all! 

Elder Connor Anderson

Weird freak show in Centreville

Service with the cars

17th P-Day (10th in France)

This was a long week, but at least it was productive. 

On Tuesday night, we got a text from our Branch President saying that he got work off the next morning and wanted us to schedule a rendezvous with an ami for then. Well, the tricky thing is that we don't have any investigators, so we were scrambling to call inactive members the whole night. No success for the next morning, but we did call an inactive family that asked us to come over on Saturday which was nice. 

Luckily the President found us a rendezvous himself and that was good. He asked us what we were doing for Christmas while he was driving us, and we hesitantly said we were going to the Cuche's. He surprisingly didn't get mad. 

Later that night, I spent 30€ to buy ingredients for some cookies for the less active. Chocolate chips here are not cheap, let me tell ya! I then got to baking. Come at me, Martha Stewart. 

The next day was the Sabin Conference in Paris. Our train left here at 6, so that was stressful. Especially because I was baking cookies until about 1 in the morning. Then we got to Paris, but because me and my comp are both pretty new missionaries, it was hard to navigate the stupid metro (AKA the worst thing about Paris). Anyway, we had to rely on my memory from months ago about how to buy tickets and find the right train. And how convenient that our stop was blocked off for construction, so we had to get off a stop late and walk all the way to the chapel. It wasn't too bad though, because we got to see Notre Dame for a quick second on the way. The Sabin Conference was both good and long. It was about 7 hours of talks from the same 4 people (Elder and Sister Sabin and Pres and Sister Sorensen). They were all really good, just long. I also finally received my Halloween package from my mom haha. It kinda sucked though, because I had to carry it through the metro and have it "inspected" by all the security. Oh well. Life is still good.

The next day we had exchanges with the Elders of St. Die. They came to Epinal. I was paired with another Elder who was in my MTC group, so I was really nervous. Both of us are not good at French at all and it wasn't a pleasant situation haha. But they have a car, so me and him took the car to visit and invite the less active to Christmas Sunday that we can't get to via public transportation. I now know why. All 3 people we tried to visit live in little villages in the mountains. We had to drive on windy dirt roads forever. The other Elder was really nervous that we would be stranded in the mountain for awhile because the sun was going down and we weren't familiar with the area. It was pretty though, so I'll attach pictures below. The first person we went to was this old man. He was really nice, but prob won't come back to church because of a "heart condition". Then we drove to two other mountain villages. Neither of the other two had correct addresses, and so we never found them. It was a lot of driving for nothing haha. Then we went proselyting for 2 hours in the freezing cold. We rewarded ourselves by spending 30€ on KFC. American food is worth every penny, let me tell ya!

The next day we had our rendezvous with the less active family. They live about an hour away and are Slovakian, so they have a very strong accent. Because of this, they were bad at French too, which you'd think would be a bad thing... But it was good! We both only know basic French, so I understood everything they said. They also only talked to me and not Elder Payne which is funny, because he's the better one in French. Two whole hours of only me speaking. Not my comp at all. What a family! They're super poor and don't go to church because it's an hour away and too expensive to take the train. The dad says that he can only drive short distances in his car, because he never got a French license, so he could be jailed if he's pulled over lol. Both of them don't work either, so they are just living off of government money. Then the mom told me to email President Monson and ask the church to send them money. I'm not sure that's how it works, Afrodita. Then she found out that my mom was Canadian and said that it's her favorite country because it's beautiful and everyone smiles. She then asked me to email my mom to help her get Canadian legality. Who are these people? I def think they're gypsies, but at least they were nice to us. They actually agreed to come up and come to Christmas Sunday, so that's nice. 

That night there was a Noël Parade in Épinal. It was HUGE, but Elder Payne wouldn't let us go, because it was a "big crowd" and he didn't want to be in a bombing LOL. Just like Maria Cuche said, "who would want to bomb Epinal? That wouldn't make the news at all. No one would care". Hahah. Anyway, it looked fun and that made me sad that I couldn't go to it. Everyone was out in the -4 degree temperature because it was so lit. After the mission, I'll be back and I'll be able to see it in its full glory. 

Sunday was a good day. Something happened recently and now this branch is trying to help us a little more. This random lady in the branch who never talks to us set up a Family Home Evening with the Branch on Wednesday for us. Everyone was also asking us for extra Christmas invites to hand out to their friends. People are actually working with us now and I'm so happy!!! Maybe it's because of all of your prayers for me!

Well, that was my week for ya. Stressful and long, but it had a good ending. 

Thanks for all the emails and love this week. I really needed it. I get more and more appreciative as time goes on. I truly love and miss everyone back home, but I know that this is where I need to be right now. 

Love, 

Elder Connor Anderson

canderson@myldsmail.net

An old cemetery

30 euros of cookie ingredients

Halloween Package

In front of Notre Dame

Snow in Vosges

Christmas time in Epinal

16th P-Day (9th in France)

Hello everyone, it's me again! It's been an eventful week, but I'll try to keep it short lol. 

So this week we did A LOT of porting (Knocking on doors. Doors are called "portes" in French) and other things to spread our message. My new companion, Elder Payne, has only served his mission in big villes up until this point, so he is not used to the slowness of a small ville. He's always trying to find something else to do to be productive with our time, even after we've done 3+ hours of porting/contacting and accomplished all of our studies. There is no resting with this companion haha. I definitely wanted to be out working when Elder Asato was around, but this is a bit too much. Sometimes the free time is good and necessary. I've found myself constantly tired this week, so I hope I either get used to this new schedule or my companion allows free time pretty soon. 

Wednesday was district meeting. Elder Asato fought for a Thanksgiving feast with our district, so it was kinda sad that he got moved before it actually happened. My mom sent me some canned pumpkin (they literally don't sell that stuff in France), so I offered to make a pumpkin pie for it. The ingredients here are a lot different, but I had to work with what I could find. I also didn't use a recipe... The crust and the top layer of the pie were both completely burnt, so I decided to just put whipped cream over the whole thing to hide it. It worked! It ended up being DELICIOUS. It was a hit and everyone kept wanting more! I'm #Proud right now. Martha Stewart's got nothing on Elder Anderson. 

The next couple of days were filled with porting. They were all so slow. We definitely need to get more investigators soon so that we can actually teach lessons. We also need the branch members to have us over for rendez-vous. Life gets hard when you're just walking door to door every day for a whole week haha. 

I don't know if I already told you guys, but Elder Payne isn't good at French at all either. He's only been out in the field for a few months longer than me. Everything we've been doing this week has also made me really nervous because now I don't have a more experienced companion to lean on. We both don't understand or speak well. I'm trying to view this experience as a time to grow and learn and not to be scared... But it happens. Keep me in your prayers, people. I'm gonna need all I can get!

We had two rendez-vous this week. One with Alhin and one with the Cuche's, as per usual. Alhin was upset that Elder Asato never told him he was leaving because he liked him so much. It was actually kind of sad. Anyway, the rendez-vous with him was decent. It was still bad because neither of us understood a lot and Alhin had to really dumb himself down for us. But the food was good and that's all the matters, right? Haha.

The Cuche's was really good this week. Because it's Winter, the service is getting easier. We went over early and had a small breakfast with Maria and Emmanuel (the parents). Then we raked leaves off of their lawn. After that, Maria had made a wonderful lunch and we sat and joked around for a while. They also told us about Christmas at their house. They say it will be a big feast with lots of presents, done the Irish way (apparently it's the right way haha). Then the missionaries always play Call of Duty on the PlayStation with the boys and then watch a Disney movie and Skype their parents. Elder Payne (being as strict as he is) told Maria about how this mission president won't let us watch a Disney movie this year. Then she said, "that's so sad! It's supposed to be your day off. At least you'll still get to play Call of Duty". Then Elder Payne pulled up the missionary handbook to prove her wrong. Oh no. The funny thing is that all it says is, "No worldly entertainment". Maria joked to us about how that's open to interpretation and to her, it's not worldly haha. This year, as I previously mentioned, no Disney movie will be allowed. Also, we have to proselyte all day long and member visits can only be 2 hours max.  Anyway, then we set up some Christmas decorations. After most were set up, the dad needed something and wanted us to go with him to the store. However, we started talking to Maria and the conversation lasted a couple of hours until our train! We started by talking about her glory days and international fame in Europe. Then she let us know that she's writing a book! Big publishers have already picked her up in both France and America. Be sure to look out for it in 2018! Then her and Emmanuel started talking about why they're inactive. I had been waiting to hear their side of the story since I arrived, but I never knew how to approach the situation. Buckle up, because this is when my email is about to get good. 

So apparently the branch here in Epinal used to have 50 active members. It now has about 10. Emmanuel Cuche was the Branch Mission Leader and the missionaries had a car! Emmanuel would set up rendez-vous with inactives/members/investigators and the missionaries would go to all of them. He really helped them out a lot. Missionary work here was THRIVING! Well, one time this woman had just gotten baptized into the branch. Emmanuel set up an appointment with her and the missionaries. The missionaries went to her house for a visit, but one of the missionaries was apparently "super obedient" and refused to go inside her house because there wasn't another "male figure present". This made the old lady cry and she went inactive, because she felt like the missionaries didn't care about her. Emmanuel heard about it and yelled at the missionary for being rude to the woman. The missionary emailed the Mission President (because his feelings were hurt) and the Cuches were "blacklisted" from having the missionaries over. The missionary's companion at the time loved the Cuches and for MONTHS the two wouldn't talk to each other because of what the one did to the Cuches. They communicated only through sticky notes. Then the Branch President emailed Emmanuel and told him, "missionary work isn't important in our branch. You are being released from your calling". Guess what? There's still not a Branch Mission Leader to this very day and there have only been a handful of baptisms since then... That was YEARS ago! The Cuches were blacklisted for four years and didn't even know (this is when the missionaries are forbidden to come to your house). This really hurt Maria, because their family had been having the missionaries over since her and Emmanuel were married in the 80s. They used to come over before church and feed her babies each time she had a kid and a bunch of other stuff. Missionaries have always been a part of their family. Once they found out that they were blacklisted, Maria was so mad. She called up the Mission President and the Branch President and demanded a meeting with the both of them. Apparently the meeting got really heated and everyone was yelling, but they eventually removed the blacklisting. During this 4 year period of being blacklisted, the branch rapidly declined in active members and investigators. Missionary work was at an all time low. Maria also mentioned how the ward never once recognized her and her family's talents (which seems like a really dumb concern), and how if they lived in Utah they would probably be like the Osmonds haha (it's true. People in Utah would LOVE them). She also said that they were all rude to her husband because of the situation with the missionary. The whole branch took the missionary's side in what should've been a personal argument. They all turned on Emmanuel. She said that her and the kids kept going to church, but after months of hearing gossip and rude remarks about her husband she had finally had enough. That's what's so sad... They all have strong testimonies about the gospel... They just feel hated at church. They said that a member of the church actually came to their house and said, "how are you guys so happy? You're inactive!" and "I still love you, even though you don't love God enough". The story continues. 

The next day at church was very stressful. I had to give the sacrament prayer on the water and give the second hour lesson with Elder Payne. The prayer was good, the lesson was not. Anyway, after church was Branch Council. During our "missionary minute" in sacrament meeting, I mentioned that we went to the Cuche's house on Saturday. The Branch President brought that up and asked what we do there. We told him that we do service. He told us that he doesn't want us going over anymore unless it's for a "spiritual purpose". I swear this branch wants to lose all communication with this family. Then nearly everyone just started bashing the Cuches, including the Branch President and his wife. That's when Elder Payne said, "I don't know what they did, but you guys need to forgive them".... THEY BLEW UP. They were yelling at us saying, "they're unrepentant and unprogressing" and "they're a very Worldly family". It was awful. The members were turning on us for sticking up for the Cuches. Their rantings went on for like another 30 mins. Later in the meeting, the Branch President asked us, "do you guys get help from the branch"? I replied, "yes, you guys are great to us", only because they were already mad at us and I needed to do some damage control. In reality, I wanted to say, "nope, not anyone besides the Cuches, Alhin, Soeur LaForge, and Frere and Soeur Erhardt". IT'S RIDICULOUS. They really hate the Cuches for some reason and instead of wanting them to come back, they want them to stay inactive. I think some of it is basic jealousy. The Cuches are writing a NY Times Bestseller, Maria was a contestant on The Voice, their kids are extremely well known in France for their talents, and so much more. 

Now I know why this branch is so small. The active members are not accepting of anyone but themselves. Any tips on this issue? I hear it's not as uncommon as I may think. We have over 40 inactive people, all because the branch isn't accepting. The fact that we don't have a mission leader anymore because "missionary work isn't important" in Epinal is ridiculous as well. We need help!! haha. 

Me and Elder Payne have both decided that this transfer (and the ones to come), we are going to help reactivate all these inactive people and restore the branch to its original glory. I just hope that our kindness can make up for the horrible branch in their eyes. All we can do is show everyone love. I just wish there was a way to fix this problem dead on. Branch council has been all we've been able to think about since Sunday. It's awful. This branch really needs some changing. I just wish we weren't trying to do it all on our own. 

Today me and Elder Payne did grocery shopping, looked at the Black Friday deals (yes, they do that here too LOL), and went to the ruins of the old chateau. They've also started setting up the Christmas Marches on the street, so the holiday cheer is well on its way! My lovely mother also sent me lots of packages this week and some of them had the nicest Christmas decorations within. I also got a package from Cassie Knight for Christmas and I can't wait to open it. I feel so loved. Everyone needs to know how great my mom and Cassie Knight are for doing that. IF you want a shout out, you know what to do ;) haha 

Big thanks to everyone for the love and support you've been showing me each week. It really means a lot. Sorry if this email was really scatterbrained, but I don't have much time haha. Please remember to keep me updated on all of your lives. I always love hearing about your adventures and I'll always respond to anyone! Miss you all! Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving!

Elder Connor Anderson

canderson@myldsmail.net

Thanksgiving Feast

My pumpkin pie

I invested in a 20 Euro fryer. Very nice purchase.

Christmas Tree that my mom made

Me at the Chateau