Christmas Party at the Beach!

12-23-13

All the missionaries in the Florida Tampa Mission (the South part) had a Christmas party on the Siesta Key Beach.  It's suppose to be the #1 beach in the US.  Austin said the sand felt like baby powder.  He really enjoyed it.  This was his first time being on the beach!  He took some sand with him in a bottle.

Elder Barnett and Elder Whaley

Elder Whaley pointing to the water!

Elder Austin Whaley and his District?

Elder Whaley's Sandman!

Elder Whaley, Elder Barnett, and
President and Sister Cusick

New Companion

12-16-13

Well, I got a companion.  His name is Elder Barnett and he is from Farmington, Utah.  His birthday was this Saturday and he just turned 19.  He is such a dedicated missionary and follows the rules down to a T.  He got out here the transfer after me, so I am the senior companion and I take the lead in everything.  As of right now, we don't have any solid investigators, so we are just trying to figure out new ways that we can find people to teach.  We are working with a few people right now, the Parkers, but they won't really commit to anything.  We gave them the Savior's peace and blessing, and they loved it, and for some reason, it inspired them to go back to the Methodist church.  So, we have been going over there and teaching the lessons whenever we can.  They said that they won't join the church, but whenever we talk to them, everything they need at this time is found in the Gospel and Church.  We just need to make them see it, also.  So you could pray for them to understand that this is what they need.  This last week, we had some other elders move in with us into our tiny apartment.  It has been crammed, but fun.  One of them has a guitar and it's fun to play a little bit again.  I was thinking of buying one out here, but our president said no, so that stunk.  I wish I could, then I would be pro by the time I got home-haha.  Maybe I can ask for permission and he will let me get a cheap one, because that is what this Elder did.  I sent home a bunch of stuff with Sis. Brooks, so hopefully, she can get all of it to you.  There are a bunch of books and some souveniers that I've collected out here, so could you just put it in my closet, or you can use or read some of it.  Just keep track of it so it's not lost or misplaced.  Thanks.  I can't wait to see you for Christmas!

Love,
Elder A. Whaley

A picture a lady texted to
us.  She ran into them
in the store.

Not liking the sidebag!

12-9-13

First off, I'm sorry, but I already opened the package because I knew that it was going to be a side bag, so I needed to make sure that it would work.  I think I will end up having to send it back to you because I don't think that it will meet the standard of what we are suppose to get.  It looks like a hiking pack, and we are only suppose to have conservative colors like gray and black.  Thanks for going to the effort to get it for me, though.  I just ended up buying one out here that will work.  I don't know how women carry purses!  It is so annoying carrying a sidebag around.  I haven't biked with it yet, but I don't think it will be fun.  Elder Lott is leaving and I am staying, so I will take over the area and get a new companion.  I don't know who it will be until tomorrow when I get him.  I won't be training, though.  I am going to try and send some things home with Jennifer Brooks tomorrow, so hopefully, that will work out.  If not, then I guess I will just ship it out to you. I wish it was that cold up here!  I miss the cold.  There is like a 60 degree difference between here and there.  Everyone says that it gets way nice in the winter, but there have only been a few days where it has gotten down into the 60s.  All of last week was in the mid 80s.  It's still hot and humid.  I understand why some people say that it is an endless summer down here.  The work is slow right now, as it has been for the last little while, but we are always looking and working, so we are bound to find something eventually.  Love you!

Love, Elder Whaley

Austin with Elder Lott

Austin and his District

Elder ?, Elder Lott, and Elder Whaley

Elder Whaley hit the 1000 mile mark 5 months
into his mission!  

Austin's take on priorities for his
sister in high school.

Questions answered (finally) :)

12-2-13

I was looking back through some previous letters that you have sent and was looking for questions that I hadn't answered yet, so here they are:

-People who have influenced me to be where I am now: You (mom), Dad, Bro. Stewart, Bro. Chalmers, Bro. Taylor, Bishop Galbraith, Bishop Bean, Keegan, Taylor, all aunts and uncles.

-Yes, we have Walmart here, and it is a SuperWalmart.  I normally eat at restaurants like McDonalds and Wendy's.  This week we ate at Red Lobster and it was so good, and some mystery person paid our bill, so we got like $100 worth of food for free.

-Christmas: Don't send things like nerf guns, they will just be left behind whenever I'm transfered.  President doesn't want us having games and stuff.  I don't know what treats I would like.  Maybe you could send some easy recipes that have variety, because I need to eat better.  I just get a bunch of junk food.  haha.  A couple pair of garments would be nice and some music.

-Don't send any books, we are not allowed to have any that are not in the missionary library.  Someone left "Jesus the Christ" and "Our Search for Happiness" out here, so I have those.  We also have transfers on the 10th, but I won't know if I'm being transfered till the 7th, so I'll let you know next Monday for sure.

-If I were to send back my Ipod sometime, would you or dad or someone be able to put all the new Bible videos and other Church Message videos on it for me?

-Well, this last week was great.  It dropped to a low of 48 degrees in the morning on Thanksgiving and it felt so nice.  Everyone else was wearing sweaters and jackets, but I thought if felt so good.  Thanksgiving just felt like another day, except we ate a ton of food.  The Arsenaults (who we baptized in August) had us over for lunch and another member in the ward, had us over for dinner, and that was all we did all day.  It was kind of nice to relax and just visit with people.  The family that we went to for dinner, has a son named Brady and he is a little genius.  He is 11 years old, and he was asking all of these questions about the Book of Revelations and things about ancient Egyptian writing.  None of which was really necessary or important to know, but it was fun.  We haven't had that much going on in our area right now since we've stopped tracting and we have to work with the members in finding people to teach.  It's just been tough trying to get the members going, but it's picking up a little.  We've found a bunch of people to teach, but for some reason, we always have to hand them over to the sister missionaries because they live in their boundaries.  So, we've just been trying to find people we can work with, but it's been fun.  I still feel really inadequate when I teach.  I wish I was a better speaker, but oh well, I guess it will just come over time, hopefully.  Things are great here and I'm learning all the time.  I wish I could just study the scriptures all day long.  It seems like 2 hours int he morning just isn't enough. I hope that your week goes well with work and at home.  Love you.

Love,
Elder A. Whaley

Elder Whaley and Elder Lott's Thankful tree

Elder Whaley and Elder Lott holding
their Thankful tree GQ style!

Happy Thanksgiving!

11-25-13

I'm sorry I haven't sent or written anything.  Our email time was cut short again and I've been so busy throughout the week.  We had 3 exchanges this week where we basically swap companions for the day so that the Zone Leaders can review our progress and how we work.  So, I took the lead for those days and I've been either working, eating, or sleeping.  I got your letter last week and I will try to write one and send it this week answering your questions.  I don't know how much longer I'll be with elder Lott.  The transfer ends on the 10th, so I will know on the 8th.  I'm guessing he will leave and I will take over the area.  I just hope I don't have to be District Leader.  I hope you have a great Thanksgiving and I will send a letter with events over the week.  We have a few people that have invited us to come over for Thanksgiving so that will be good, but I have a thankful tree with a lot of things on it, so I will take a picture of that and send it to you guys sometime.  I thought of another thing you could send.  It's called Doctrine and Covenants Church History DVDs and it's just a pack of DVDs with a bunch of church videos and teaching tools.  I think you might be able to get it at Deseret Book or wherever you get garments at.  If not there, you might be able to get it online or something.  In Dad's last letter, he said he was jealous of our weather here.  I wouldn't be that jealous.  It's still somehow hot here and it's messing with me.  It still feels like it's Summer here, but it's almost Thanksgiving.  It just doesn't feel like Winter at all.  It's still hot when we ride our bikes.  I need to work on being healthier.  I haven't gained any weight, but I have been eating nothing but junk food pretty much since I've been out here.  I just see something I want at the store and I buy it.  I think all of the energy I have is from sugar and I eat enough of it to keep me on a sugar high all of the time.  I honestly don't know how I'm still functioning.  I am going to try and just buy healthy foods like chicken, fish, and veggies.  I hope things are going well at home and that there aren't any problems.  Let me know.  Love you.

Elder A. Whaley

Healthy Food!

Luau?

Mmmm good!

Luau Elder Whaley

Full tummy and happy!

Snowbird Migration and Blessings!!!

11-12-13

This week was really great!  I have had some really good studies in the morning and I've started a study journal so that I can stay more focused and remember the things that I learn.  Last week I studied Kolob and the Pre-existence and that was mind blowing.  Haha.  I understand a lot more about it now, but sadly I still don't know the coordinates to Kolob-haha.  I can probably get some pictures of me on my bike (I have been asking for a picture of him on his bike), but no longer the car because as of Wednesday, we got put on full bike, and the sisters get full car.  So no more car for us!  I have an odometer on my bike that I got when I first got out here and I have biked almost 800 miles since coming here.  That's pretty crazy!  We also had dinner with Katie Dalling (Mr. Tolman's daughter) and her family with a nonmemeber friend and it went well.  We just did a little family home evening lesson and we had crab for dinner.  It tastes a lot like fish.  But, that was my first time ever eating it and it was good.  We also painted a thankful tree there and took it home.  She gave us leaves to write things that we are thankful for and put them on the tree everyday of the month.  Last Saturday, we also went to an outdoor food market to see if we could find some people to teach.  We met  a few people, but they were not interested.  There were a lot of weird things that people were trying to sell and a lot of it had to do with making you look younger, since Naples consists of super old people.  Traffic has gotten really scary here since none of them know how to drive and it's the season of the snowbirds and they are all migrating down here!  We have already had a few close calls with getting hit, but we are being careful. At the market, there was a lady giving free massages, and I was going to get one, but I didn't because I wasn't sure if we were allowed to or not, but I'm guessing not.  I don't think that I have ever gotten a massage, and maybe that is good.  That way, I won't know how good it feels and I won't ever really feel like I need one.  After the market, when we were at an intersection, some guy rolled down his window and asked if we teach about the "Book of Moroni".  I said, "Do you mean the Book of Mormon?"  He said, "Yes!  Come meet me at Bermuda Isles in building 7 tomorrow..." then he drove off since the light was green.  So, hopefully, we can find him sometime.  We have gone by the building at random times, but we haven't seen him.  He didn't give us a name or apartment number.
Over the past weeks, I have been thinking a little bit about careers and how a lot of the members in our ward are going to the anesthesia program through BYUI and said that it only takes a total of 5 years if you take the fast track to get your Master's.  It sounds really interesting and it is really good pay to start with.  So, that is a possibility of a career that I have been considering.  Maybe that is one reason why I was sent to this are-haha.  (Bill recently wrote the boys about an experience of giving a lady a blessing in our ward and the miracle her saw from it)  I have had the opportunity to be a part in many blessings and be the mouthpiece for some as well.  I still get really nervous, but it goes away when I start the blessing.  One cool experience that I had two weeks ago was that we got to do "The Saviors Peace and Blessing" in one of the member's home.  It is a prayer that we leave by the authority of the priesthood with the family and we include anything they want us to in the prayer.  The father was looking for work, and we included that in the blessing.  I offered it and next week at church, the dad came up to us and told us that he got 3 job offers that week.  It was really cool to hear that.  The priesthood power is miraculous!
One evening, I found out that we have a deep fryer, and I decided to deep fry everything that we had.  We deep fried some pineapple, an oreo, some carrots, a pice of bread, a chocolate chip cookie, some cauliflower, a mento, Cheez-its, and some peanut butter.  Most of it was pretty good, but some of it was nasty!   We are going to get some Twinkies today and do those because I've had that before and it's really good!
That was the excitement for the week.

Love,
Elder A. Whaley

Haha-I think this is for Elderly people, not missionary
Elders!

Austin's deep fryer experiment!

Fisher of Men (and fish)

11-4-13

Yes, I got my Halloween package.  Thank you so much for that!  I loved it!!!!!!!!  I've pretty much eaten all of the goodies in it, and I forgot to take a picture before, sorry!  Got a little too excited I guess. I can still take a picture of the wrappers and box if you want.  Haha.  Also, thanks for sending the Ipod with the music and the videos.  I showed Elder Lott those videos and he thought they were really funny!  Especially the one of Cody falling into the lake.  I don't know what I could use for Christmas other than church related material like some books or articles.  I don't know.  I don't really want you to send that much because it will cost to ship stuff.
It sounds like a fun weekend in Utah and I hope that Dad is still doing well.  I'm not surprised to hear that Uncle Ben didn't appreciate that trick you played on him.  It sounds like he takes his ice cream very seriously.
That is also a great experience about tithing.  I'm pretty sure that the explanation for that blessing is laid out in D & C 82:10 and 130:20-21.  You had asked me if you need to send money for some more food-but I'm ok.  The dinner thing is not a punishment.  Our mission Pres. just wants us to be more effective with the time that we have because a lot of missionaries will just go to members' homes and sit there and do nothing for hours, so he is trying to stop things like that.  Anyway, I'm fine.  I've been able to live off of $5 for the past two weeks by buying Ramen noodles and macaroni.  But, we get money today, so now I can actually get some groceries.  Yesterday, we got to go fishing for about 5 minutes in one of the member's backyard and have some s'mores after dinner.  I  caught two large mouth bass in about 2 minutes.  It was so fun!  I fished in my church clothes, so luckily, I didn't get them dirty.  Last night was great because after that we got to go to the CES devotional and it talked about how we can truly give our Will to the Lord.  That is so important in missionary work, because if we wanted to, we could get away with a lot of things, but it is that integrity and our willingness to be obedient that allows blessing and miracles in the work.  I love you and I hope all is going well at home!

Love,
Elder A. Whaley

Austin the fisherman.

Got one!

Thumbs up!

The two large mouth bass Austin caught.

A Wonderful Surprise

10-30-13

*I got an unexpected letter in the mail!  It was a wonderful surprise that I wasn't expecting!

Mom,

Those stories you shared are so funny.  I could just imagine the whole Relief Society crying.  (I told him about the sister missionaries teaching the lesson and then talking about the sacrifices they've had to make as missionaries and how almost the entire Relief Society was in tears-it was almost comical).  Hopefully, Daniel is doing fine (a young man he used to rogue potatoes with).  I'm sure he is because he is a super hard worker.  Katelyn's story is funny, as well.  (She's a young lady in our ward serving in Colorado.  She sent a letter telling about a guy only believing in his Marijuana, not God).  So many people down here do drugs.  You can always tell who drug dealers are because they always drive Lincoln Navigators in really poor apartment complexes.  They get busted on a daily basis.  Here's my week:

Worst:  Some other missionaries had a baptism lined up for a Haitian lady on Saturday evening, but it got cancelled about an hour before because she had a massive seizure right before and ended up in the hospital.  However, she is fine now and they are going to reschedule her baptism.

Funniest:  Every Tuesday we go and sing hymns at a resting home full of people who have Alzheimers and a less-active lives there (Maggie).  Some other lady, who use to be a Baptist, was singing along with us, but she was practically screaming the words.  So Maggie got mad and started to chew her out and tell her to stop singing.  The lady kept singing and Maggie slapped her!  After that we took Maggie and made sure that she stayed right next to us the rest of the time.

Best:  We went to the Skunk-Ape Museum out in the Everglades for P-day.  I held some pretty big pythons, boas, an alligator, and some birds.  It was so much fun, and we stopped by the smallest post office in the U.S.  I hope you got the post card from it.  Sorry my handwriting is hard to read.  I was writing in a moving car.  I got a bunch of pictures of it all, so I'll post them soon.

Most Spiritual:  This last Sunday was really nice.  I've been studying in the book of Abraham, and there is a lot of cool things in there that I didn't know about.  Also, the last District meeting we had was really good, but awkward.  We did "I love you because..." where everyone takes a turn standing in the middle and everyone else says why they love that person.  It took quite awhile, too.  When it was my turn, everyone said that I was too quiet (surprise, surprise), but they all had good things to say about my work ethic and my knowledge of the gospel.  I'm not so sure about that second thing because I feel like I hardly know anything compared to almost everyone in our District.  I have learned a lot about it, though, since I've been out.

Love,
Elder A. Whaley

Elder Whaley, the next Steve Irwin!

  10-28-13

Having you write and send letters during the week is working well.  I LOVE getting letters.  It's like a birthday whenever I receive something in the mail.  The lady who sent the animal pictures is going to get baptized next month, but she is pretty much a millionaire and she has been around mormons all her life.  She has a house in Utah, so she has tons of mormon friends.  I heard from Jenifer and she said that they were going to drop off the ipod sometime today.  I'll try to get some pictures of us biking or in the car, but I've taken plenty of pictures of other things.  We swap car/bikes every week, so it's half and half.  This last week has finally cooled down and we are now in the low 80's.  We haven't been eating at members' homes for awhile since our mission president made the rule that we can only go over if there is an investigator or less active there.  But, the Dyers in our ward bought us a few groceries this week so we didn't starve.  When they came over, Bro. Dyer asked if I would give a 5 minute talk in Sacrament the next day.  The talk was on prayer, and I prepared it the morning of on a little 3 x 5 card.  It went really well and a lot of people complimented me on it.  Sister Brower (Senior couple Sister) came up and was so proud of me.  It was funny.  She was like, "Oh, I'm just so full of pride.  I wish your mother could have seen it!"  transfers are this Tuesday, and I got a good companion.  His name is Elder Lott, from Idaho Falls, and I will be serving in the Vanderbilt Beach A.  Haha.  So, in other words, both of us are staying here.  We haven't carved pumpkins, but I did, however, carve an avacado, and it looks sweet.  I'll put a picture of it on Dropbox.  This week we also got to go play sand volleyball right next to the beach, but not on it, which stinks, but it was still fun!  As you saw already, we also went to the Skunk Ape Museum and saw some alligators, snakes, and birds.  We stopped by the World's smallest post office and got a post card.  Hopefully, you got it already.  It was a great P-day!  I held many of the animals and took plenty of pictures.  The guy at the museum even put the head of the snake in his mouth and kissed the mouth of the alligator.  It was crazy, but I wasn't nervous to hold any of the animals.  It was pretty cool.  All is good here.  Love you guys!

Love,
Elder A. Whaley

*We got an email last Wednesday from a lady who is apparently getting baptized next month.  She took the missionaries to the Skunk ape Museum and said they all had a great time.  She then proceded to say what a fine young man Austin is and that we should be very proud of him.  Here are the pictures she sent us.

A cool moth that they found.

The moth with "eyes."

The smallest Post Office in the U.S.  ( in Ochopee, FL)

Future alligator wrestler.

Elder Whaley holding an albino snake.

Elder Whaley and his pet bird.

Elder Whaley and his "other" pet bird.

Crazy missionaries holding a python!

That python is huge and scary!

Elder Whaley looks like he's enjoying holding
that python a little too much!

Mmmmm-Kangaroo!

....and Alligator?  Tasty!

The Everglades

Here, let me help you with this huge, scary, snake!

Beautiful Florida Sunset!

Volleyball fun!

The start of the carving of the avacado!

Step 1

Step 2

Step 3

Add some color

Insert a minion