Video of the SURPRISE he heard moms voice and came to investigate....

Nov 27th SURPRISING ELDER QUINTON

Nov 27th

Brad and I flew to Reno and Drove 4 hours to Elko. As far as Elder Q knew we were meeting in Reno Nov 30th ......The following is our trip heading there, our SURPRISE church show up some families Elder Q introduced us to, heading home and  welcome home open house!!

Week 102

Nov 28th

Hi Everyone,

Happy late thanksgiving! :) 

My last email before I return home. Thats weird to say haha. 

We had a great week though! lots of people taught and were able to meet some new people. We had several new people come to church and a couple that are members but havent been in awhile. 

For thanksgiving we were told to go and eat lots of dinners and hang out with members so thats what we did. It was weird to just hang out, since we are always so busy as missionaries. 

My email will be short today. I get home later this week.

Serving a mission has been great though Ive learned so many things about God and the scriptures and whatnot. Its been super awesome. Definitely the best thing I could have ever done, I totally encourage any and all to go serve also! :) 

 Love you all! :) 

--

Elder Quinton

Week 101

Nov. 21, 2016

For those who had never heard of Elko, Nevada where I am serving right now... 

you probably heard about it this past week as a medical evac plane crash landed. 

I'm still alive by the way. Interesting fact for you though is that I was about 150 yards away from where that happened when it did happen. I was in the trailer park right by that and there was a super loud noise and the whole trailer started shaking and we were like WHAT THE HECK?! and the mexican guys we were teaching didn't say anything and we were like WHAT WAS THAT?!?! and they said we don't know and played it off like it was nothing. then like 2 minutes later this guy comes into the trailer and held up a piece of metal and was like "a trailer exploded!" and I was thinking hmmmm that seemed bigger than a trailer exploding. and them we started to hear lots of small explosions also. So then we go outside. 5 minutes later emergency vehicles arrive and there was just flames everywhere it was crazy. Some people we know that lived right there were actually the first people on scene. The video of the real close up fire that was all over national news and the kid swearing, Luis,  (there was beeping to censor it haha), they were the first ones there and trying to see if anyone was hurt they could help. 

We had zone conference so I was able to see elder Bido, one of my old companions again! that was cool. 

Its been sad to see other missionaries that are going home soon lose their focus on the work and lose all care of what they are doing now and just think about home and whatnot. I'm doing good still. MY companion and basically everyone we see remind me i'm going home soon but i'm still going strong. 

pics: elder Bido, Johnson, and I.

an elder and sister who go home with me

the spanish missionaries from the 3 zones that came to our zone conference. we are the next closest ones are an hour 45minutes away

--

Elder Quinton

                                                 Elder Johnson, Bido and I

Week 100

Nov 14th, 2016

We went to this super fancy basque restaurant this past week with the Williams family. Its called, The Star, its apparently known nation wide for its food. and yet. its in a town of roughly 18,000 people and I've never heard of it... hahahahhaa. It was super good food though. While we were there this dude was intoxicated and got escorted out because he was saying really "unkind things" to the waitress .weird 

Last monday we went to a gun museum owned by some members out here, he said, he has over a million dollars worth of guns in the museum and said once we finished our missions and when we come back he will take us out shooting his Barrett .50 cal. which is a sniper rifle that shoots over a mile for those who don't know guns. 

We were able to meet quite a few new people and that was good. currently we don't have anyone with a baptismal date, we stopped teaching those that did because they just werent interested. We are trying to find new people to teach. 

I had my last interview with my mission president yesterday. that was pretty weird haha. It was good though. I felt like I've done all I can in my mission and I've worked hard. He gave me council for when I return home and different things I should do and whatnot. It was all good though. 

I'm doing my best to stay working hard and focused until the end. It feels so surreal that I

get home in 2 weeks.

pics: us with the williams at the star

the gun behind is the barret .50 cal

the other one is a .338 lapua

--

Elder Quinton

Week 99

Nov 7, 2016

 We had a great week! Oliva got baptized and that was awesome. We had a lot of people there for her and she was really happy. Her oldest daughter decided to come and she brought her 2 sons, one of who got baptized in march in california (hes 12) so that was cool. It was a great day. The night before it too we went to someones house we just started teahcing and we invited them to the baptism and turns out she knew oliva and was good friends with her so that was cool. Small world. She came to the baptism also. 

I finally am for the most part feeling better. my voice came back like.. 2 days ago. towards the end of the night it sounds really "horse" or rough though. but for the most part its better. 

Rene, our convert of about 3 and a half months met with the branch president to recieve the melchizedek priesthood and should be meeting with the stake president this week! 

I was reading in the bible this past week and found a funny verse. I bet you didnt know there was a prophet from Elko. That is the town im serving in. Nahum 1:1 in the old testament. I accidentally came accross that verse when I was looking for something else and I laughed. "the Elkoshite" hahaha. Too funny. 

We had several good appointments with Melo this past week. He told us basically hwo impressed he is that 2 young guys would leave everything for two years to teach about god and how we worked before to save money to pay to be missionaries. He said we werent wasting our time with him and how special he felt that we would do that for the lord. He was supposed to have his interview for baptism yesterday. except it was weird because he didnt show up and then we were trying to call him and text him and finally like 2 hours later we got a reply and he said he found a new church the night before haha so that was kind of weird. Hes tested us several times during appointments though to see how we act and answer so I almost wonder if thats what hes doing now to see if we will still treat him nicely and whatnot. Who knows though. Im being optomistiic about it haha. 

We got a call from some sisters asking us to come give a blessing to someone they recently met. Turns out it was a lady I knew that had cussed me out several times for parking by her house hahaha. it was kind of funny. We walked up to the house and I was like hahaha I know this lady! She recognized me and apologized. We had a nice conversation with her and I guess she had been struggling a lot in her life. 

This one guy we teach, ramon, we went to his house to teach him and after he asked if people are normally nice to us or if lots are mean. we have normally about half and half but he laughed and said he was at his brothers house and we knocked on the door and his brother was like quick be quite, the mormons are here! hahahahaha. we laughed about that. Then ramon said its said that people do that because The people arent rejecting us, they are rejecting Christ. too true. If only people realized that though. 

great week though!

the pictures are of the baptism. and then also service that we do every other saturday. my comp and I, then the other 2 sets of missionaries that do service with us 

--

Elder Quinton

                                                                Olivia's baptism

Week 98

Oct 31, 2016

The week went pretty well! Every day my companion reminds me how many days I have left haha. He goes home 3 months after me. I think that he is getting more nervous than I am though its pretty funny. On Tuesday of this past week I started getting pretty sick. My throat started hurting and then I got a really bad headache and then I got a fever etc. it was terrrible. I'm better now for the most part. Except that my throat is still sore and it sounds like I've been smoking for like 30 years because my voice is gone. Which sucks because I have to give a 90 minute training every tuesday for the missionaries here haha! Oh well though. 

Ernesto from Carson was out here in Elko working for a couple days so he gave us a call. It was pretty fun. While we were with him he called one of my old companions (Tex also trained my current companion) from when I was in Carson, Elder Teixeira (thadeus is his name) and that was funny. He was video chatting us during lunch and then he was like hey i'll introduce you to my girlfriend. then she wasnt home but her roommate was and he started walking away and I said 'WAIT! you didn't even introduce your girlfriends roommate to my companion!" So he ran back and she gave her email to him to give to my companion Elder Denton it was super funny. 

Another funny thing. Some people around here knew I am going home soon buttttttt on sunday like 5 people threw me under the bus and announced it to our entire branch sooooooo that was awkward haha. the cat is out of the bag I suppose :p 

On Friday we ate 5 meals. breakfast, lunch. Right after lunch we went to a part member families house and she made sandwiches. We went out to Olivas house who is getting baptized in 5 days and after the appointment ended at about 4:10 she said she made some food for us and I was like crud! because we had dinner at 5. It was so much food that day. 

That same night, Melo and my companion got into an argument over something stupid while I sat there and stayed silent and then Melo asked why I wasnt talking and I simply told them that it was pointless to argue because thats not how jesus taught and you cant argue and have the spirit. and then they both felt a little dumb and sat there silently for a minute and then we prayed again and started back over and it went well from there. 

Good week overall though! :)( 

--

Elder Quinton

Week 97

10-24-16

We've had another really long week of knocking on tons and tons of doors haha. It was good though. Thats basically just what we've been doing a lot lately. We are trying to find new people to teach. We found tons but most weren't interested so we stopped visiting them. 

Oliva, who is getting baptized soon (shes 62) told us her family (her kids especially) have told her basically that they don't want anything to do for her if she joins our church, to the extent that her youngest son was like. my birthday is tomorrow and youre not invited to the party. and he literally lives right next door. So that was really sad and very dramatic of her family. She wants to change and be better and they are content with wasting away their lives. She told us She met some missionaries in our church several years ago in california and she always has known she needed to get baptized in our church since then so that was super cool. She told us she is going to get baptized anyways and that its sad they will do that but she knows its the right thing. We also read Matthew 19:29 with her which comforted her some. Shes awesome. It was really inspiring to hear how strong her faith is and her courage.

Then there is Melo, that guy we started teaching alst week he is also super solid. He asked us to get baptized and will be getting baptized on Nov. 12th. I dont think i've ever met someone that wasnt a member that really realized just how important our message is. Its pretty cool to see. Every time we teach him he is like WOWWWW is that right am i understanding this correctly? when he started reading the BOM and we told him its a story of his ancestors (he's from mexico and is a native down there) he told us hes always heard stories about what were in the Book Of Mormon and how he knew it as true. so that was pretty sweet lol. he also has been sharing what hes learned with his friends and calling his family in mexico to read the Book of Mormon with them. 

'Also we had a nice suprise this past week. Some missionaries here in Elko texted me calling me by my first name and said that Tyler Cody, someone ive been friends with basically my whole life, had ran into them (hes here selling alarm systems) and they said what mission they were in and he asked if they knew elder quinton and they were like. yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaa hes here in Elko. So that was cool. 

pics: found the "man van" as it says. 

Tyler and I

--

Elder Quinton

Week 96

10/17/16

I am staying in Elko for my last transfer! Elder Denton and I are staying together. I had the opportunity to train at a zone conference this past week. 

Oliva gets baptized in 2 weeks! She told us she woke up in the middle of the night a couple times and she was praying really hard if she should get baptized and she said she saw a really bright light (she literally lives in the middle of no where) and she said she thought she was imagining it so she went back to sleep and then when she woke up an hour later asked the same question and the same thing happened. 

We found another guy this past week named Melo that is really cool and asked us if he can get baptized in our church so that was cool. 

We, the missionaries, did a 10 minute plank work out that I have (that is literally 10 minutes of different planking positions) and that was fun. 

Weve been knocking on so many doors this past week. its been exhausting haha. 

We were knocking on an inactives door and as we were walking away we saw this drunk guy passed out (it was like 3pm) and sitting in a chair by the back of the house under a covered area so i dared my companion to go put a word of wisdom pamphlet on his lap. as he went up to do it the guy woke up. Turns out its a guy we know. He said he can stop drinking any time he wants and he had no idea where he was. So we told him he should pour out his alcohol he was holding and he did which was cool. Then like an hour later we got another guy to do the same thing haha! 

We got a new branch presidency here. Turns out the new branch president, Wayne Beckstead, went to college with my aunt haha! small world. 

pics: we saw this on the wall and took a picture with it. 

my companion eating a chicken foot hahaha

--

Elder Quinton

                                                   MLC  Mission Leadership Conference

Week 95

10-10-16

We had a great Week! Roberto got baptized by Rene who was baptized 2 months ago, it was pretty awesome. 

I was in different areas for 3 days thouh this past week. I was with my zone leader, Elder Hawkes who is awesome and then I was on the road 5ish hour drive to Reno for a leadership conference for 2 days. It was fun. I was able to see a lot of friends and whatnot so that was great! :) 

I got thrown under he bus metaphorically this past week. It was funny though. I did a baptismal interview and the girl afterwards said how my companion and I are super opposite and how he's always cracking jokes and I'm more serious (which is false), but I just was like well since I'm in leadership I am tring to be a little more serious and whatnot and my companion was just like. "yea OKAY you crack jokes all day long!" hahaha it was funny. 

On the way to Reno, it was one of my zone leaders birthdays. We went to lunch with them and we asked the waitress in spanish if they could do something for his birthday. then they put a sombrero on him it was so funny. then at dinner that night we went to texas road house and I got the waitress to do something. he sat on a saddle and had to swing a napkin like it was a lasso and she said if he stopped she would start the song over hahahahahaha. THEN. the next day on the way back from Reno we stopped at Wingers for dinner and I secretly got the waitress to do something. she put a chiken hat on him and they all sang. he was so mad hahahahahaha :) it was hioarous though. I've never heard of a misisonary ever having so much birthday wishes in one day ;) 

Pics: I saw elder Leon! I stayed the night with him then I went to sparks. 

baptism. our recent convert and the guy getting baptized. 

Dinner at Wingers. the elder right next to me is the one thats birthday it was :) 

we keep hearing all these weird stories about clowns.. so.. I saw one and took a picture ;) 

--

Elder Quinton