Auf Wiedersehen - the Last Letter

Hey everyone!

This is nuts! This week has been incredibly trying. I didn't know that I could feel so many emotions at once. But I am happy because I can say that I made every day count and I did my best to serve the Lord. I love being a missionary and I will never regret a day of my mission. This was the best decision I have made for my life and I am excited to apply the things I know into other phases of life. 

I know that the gospel is true. It is the center-point of my life. Jesus Christ is our redeemer and he loves us. Joseph Smith was the Mighty Prophet of the Restoration. I have loved watching the lights turn on in other people's heads as they hear the things he taught and did. I have come to love the scriptures with all my heart. I get excited to read about Christ and the other prophets. 

I love my mission dearly and I am sad to come home. But luckily I have a loving family and great friends to make it a softer landing. I love you all and am grateful for your support! I'll see you on Friday!

Elder Eldredge

Mission Conference

Hey!

This week was awesome! There were sooo many missionaries at our conference in Munich! I basically got to see all of my friends that I haven't seen in a while. There were also a lot of missionaries that I didn't know because I have been in the Vienna zone for so long. I learned a lot and it is always fun to be in long train rides with other missionaries. 

We also had a lot of appointments this week so we kept ourselves busy. This last week just flew by so fast I can barely remember it. I am really enjoying my time though. This week will also be really quick. We are getting a good amount of invites and our friends are wanting to meet more regularly. I will also be giving a talk on Sunday.

Today we are playing Frisbee together as all the Elders in Vienna. I am really excited. I will send you a picture of our group from last time we played. 

It is a good life as a missionary. It is going to be a good week. I'm glad you all had a good time at Bryce canyon! Can't wait to go with you next year!

Love you all!

Elder Eldredge

Cold and Snow

Hey!

This week was great! We have been having a lot of snow in the last few days. When we woke up this morning there wasn't any snow left on the ground but then it started snowing really hard and now we have a few inches! The wind is soooo cold! It has been pretty fun though. We're considering making a snow man today.

We have been trying really hard to work with some of our less-active members and we are having real success with them. We had three of them in church this last Sunday! We still have a lot of work to do with them though. The Europe area has a goal of doubling the active membership in 2015. Our ward is really motivated and we are given a lot of support in teaching them. 

This week we have a good amount of eating appointments coming up, plus a HUGE mission tour meeting this Thursday! Most of the mission is going to be there so I will get to see lots of my friends. We get to take a train at 6.30 in the morning. We will start the meeting at ten, it will go for a few hours and then we travel home again. We should get back to Vienna at around 9.30. I can't wait. 

Elder Nelson and I are doing great. We get along no problem and we really enjoy our time together. He is awesome. Everything in life is going just great. I love being here. 

I hope that you all have a good time at Ruby's inn! Stay warm! I love you all!

Elder Eldredge

Abinadi and Joseph Smith

Hey!

This week was a lot of fun. We spent a lot of time in members homes, which always makes the day better. We really have a wonderful ward here. We also spent a lot of time on the streets and in the trains just talking to people. 

On tuesday night we left the youth center and on our way home we met a nice lady named A-----. She was really interested in learning about us so we made an appointment for the next day. She came early and we had a really great lesson. She was very touched and asked thoughtful questions. She is gone for the next month on a trip so I won't see her again but I am excited for her to learn more later. 

As I was reading in the Book of Mormon the other day I was impressed by the prophet Abinadi. He told the priests and king Noah to not touch him because the lord would not suffer that he should be destroyed "at this time"(Mosiah 13:3). This, plus what he says in verse 10, shows that he knew that he would eventually be killed for preaching these things to the wicked priests. He showed great faith by doing it anyways. This reminded me of the prophet Joseph Smith. I am thankful that he was willing to do everything that he did in spite of all the persecution. 

I hope that you all have a great week! I love you all!

Elder Eldredge

Cafe Rio and Spicy Rice

Hey family!

This week was really really great. We had a lot of success and the weather was nice until yesterday when it snowed a ton. But we are happy campers. We ate home-made Cafe Rio at the Cleavinger's home yesterday. It was delicious! We have a wonderful ward. I am really happy that I am staying here until I go home. 

We met a new guy named K-----. He is from Nigeria, and we met at his home yesterday and taught about the restoration. He was really interested and he listened well to what we said. He also seems to have spent a lot of time thoughtfully reading the Bible. He understands it fairly well. We hope to meet with him this week again. 

We had a really funny eating appointment on saturday. We met with a less-active member and his family. They are from Nigeria and they fed us this really spicy rice with chicken. It tasted good but it was funny because they had us eat off of the same plate, and they had already eaten so they just watched us. It was hard not to laugh a bit. 

We are doing really well and the work is going good. I hope that you all have a great week! I love you all!

Elder Eldredge

A Baptism

Hey everybody!

Thanks for all of the photos! It is good to see you all so happy. I had a really great week as well. Our friend, A-----, who was being taught by the sisters here was baptized into our ward on Saturday. She is really awesome and we all really excited for her. She let me baptize her as well. I felt very privileged. We spent a good part of our week preparing for the baptism and it all worked out great.

L---- is also doing really good. He is very excited about the scriptures and his testimony is growing deeper and deeper. The ward absolutely loves him. They talk about him all the time and he has a lot of friends in the ward. 

We all ate at Herb's before transfers again as a group of us friends here in Vienna. Elder Worthen got sent to Konstanz. We were all sad to see him leave, but we will see him again in a few weeks. We took a photo together outside after Herb's. 

We are having a good week already. Today we are playing Ultimate with the other Elders so I have nothing to complain about. I hope that you all have another great week! I love you all!

Elder Eldredge

Staying Put for the Last Transfer

Hey everyone!

We had a great week over here. We had transfer calls, but not surprisingly, Elder Nelson and I are staying together for my last transfer. I am really happy about that. I would have been sad to go somewhere else. Elder Nelson is awesome as well so I am happy that he will by my last companion. 

We had a really good zone training meeting last Tuesday. Elder Nelson and I got to teach for a few minutes about the pre-earth life. It went well and people were taking notes so we took that as a good sign. The mission has also started a new rule that we speak German from nine in the morning until nine at night. It is really fun to "have" to speak German all day. I already feel more confident than I did before while speaking German. 

It is a pretty strange feeling being in my last transfer already. This month is already flying by and I can barely keep track of the days anymore. I am really optimistic about it all and I am happy to work my hardest. 

We ate dinner with one of the members of our ward this week and we were sharing favorite scriptures with each other. I was really impressed with what he shared with us. He comes from a difficult background and was chased out of his country a long time ago. He shared Fourth Nephi 1:17

 17 There were no robbers, nor murderers, neither were there Lamanites, nor any manner of -ites; but they were in one, the children of Christ, and heirs to the kingdom of God.

He said that he can't wait until the time with this becomes a reality with us. I think that even though we need to be patient for the time when we are all one again, we can try our best to create Zion in our own homes. I am glad to have a family where life is about as close to perfect as it gets in this life, and where we are all together.

I hope that you all have a great week! I love you all!

Elder Eldredge

Happy New Year!

Hey everybody!

It sounds and looks like you had quite the week! I sure wish I could have been in Mexico with you all. Whenever members ask what we do for Christmas traditions they are always pretty shocked by what we do. They always want to do it as well. 

My week wasn't quite as busy and crazy as yours but it was still a lot of fun. It wasn't as cold this week but it was still pretty cold. We spent a lot of time on the streets talking to people. Here it is still in the middle of the Christmas holiday so nobody really cares much for us. We had a good new years though! We were still supposed to go to bed at 10.30 and work like a normal day so as we were out and about things started to explode at around four o'clock. They like to throw fire-crackers into trash cans to make it extra loud. Luckily we still hadn't done our studies in the evening so we went in before it got too nuts. All night we could hear loud explosions. The next day was absolutely dead. Everybody was way to tired and wasted to dare coming outside. 

I went on exchange to work in Wiener Neustadt with Elder Durrant. Weiner Neustadt is a lot like St. Pölten. It was really great to get some fresh air! I never realize how gross the air is here until I go work in a small place. I got to do a service project in the evening loading wood and stacking it. It felt great to be out in the quiet and work with my hands a bit. 

The next few weeks are going to be great! Our friends that we are teaching are all coming back from trips for Christmas. We will get to see them again and we will have more work to do. 

I hope that you have a great week! I would love to see a picture of Finn! I love you all!

Elder Eldredge

Ready for Christmas

Hey!

This week was awesome! All of our members have been giving us tons of candy and things for Christmas! We got tons more Oreos yesterday and the other Elders got a lot of chocolate. It is going to be an unhealthy week. Luckily Elder Nelson and I run a lot!

Our Christmas week is going to be a lot of fun as well! We will be with the Picard family on Christmas eve, the Cleavingers on Christmas, the Bakers on the 26th, and another family wants to invite us over as well. It is going to be a great time. And so that you know, I will be skyping you at about four in the afternoon, so around eight in the morning for you if I am not wrong. I hope that you get my package before Christmas. I spoke with Bro. Cleavinger and he said that he sent it so it should get there soon. 

 

I bet you are all really excited for going to Mexico! It would be fun to come with you! I love that trip. 

Elder Nelson and I are working great together. It is really fun to be his companion. The work is going well and we are having a good time. You have probably already seen the video that the church has put out for Christmas, but if not, it is really great and you should see it. 

I hope that you all have a great week! I will see you on Christmas! Can't wait to talk to you! Love you!

Elder Eldredge

Conference in Salzburg and a Christmas Party

Hey everybody!

We had a great week! The highlight was our conference in Salzburg. We had a gift exchange and watched "Meet the Mormons!" It was really great! At the conference I got to see some people that I hadn't seen in a while too so it was really fun. I got to see Elder Ringger as well but it had only been a week. Our train ride was fun too. 

We also had our ward Christmas party on Saturday! That was a blast. There were tons of people there! The members really did a good job of inviting their friends and families. There were some awesome performances as well. It was fun to see all of the different cultures and Christmas traditions that come together in an international ward. There were drum dances and African Christmas songs, as well as a really cool shadow play of Christ's birth. Luis was supposed to play Gabriel but ended up not being able to come. He was pretty sad about it. One of our members brought 150 pieces of chicken, and they were all huge! I've never seen so much chicken in my life. Someone also gave us some peanut butter jars from america, plus some peanut butter Oreos! That is close to impossible to find around here so it was really nice. 

The work is going well. We are talking to a lot of people about Christmas time, and they are more open to talking with us about that. Our amount of appointments is going a bit down but that is normal as we approach Christmas. It will be easier to meet with people when they aren't so busy getting ready for Christmas. Speaking of Christmas, Bro Cleavinger is sending off my package today so it should be there before Christmas. Sorry that there isn't tons of candy and goodies in there. I made sure to put in some. But I sent my journal home that is from the first six transfers or so. Feel free to reed that. 

I love you all!

Elder Eldredge

Staying in Vienna

Hey!

This week was really really great! I haven't eaten so much food in just one week before. We had three thanksgivings throughout the week so I was about as stuffed as the turkey I ate. We also ate at our favorite schnitzel place again with a lot of the other missionaries. That is always a great time. 

 

We got transfer calls on saturday and Elder Ringger is heading off to Innsbruck and I will work with Elder Nelson from AF. I've talked to him once before and he is really nice. I am excited to work with him. He has been on his mission for about six months. He came with Elder Ringger. 

This Leica camera is apparently worth over $60,000

Yesterday was also really fun. We had a party after church with the ward just because it was the fifth sunday. There was lots of food and the kids were running around like crazy. We eat a lot with our members. It is always fun. Today we are going to eat at the Picard home and they are vegan. They make some of the most delicious food ever, plus you can eat all you want and you go home feeling awesome! If meat wasn't so darn tasty I would eat a lot more salad. 

We already have a good week planned. It should be busy and a lot of fun. I hope you all have a great first week of december! Love you all!

Elder Eldredge

Mashed Potatoes

Hey everyone!

We had a really good week last week! I am writing later than usual because we had a big thanksgiving lunch with all of the missionaries here in Vienna. It was fun to hang out with everybody and to play some games. The food was also great! I made ten pounds of mashed potatoes this morning! They were delicious. We should have a really great week because we already have three thanksgiving appointments. Luckily they aren't all on the same day. 

We had interviews with President Kohler on Saturday. It was good to talk to him. This Saturday we are going to get transfer calls! There will probably be a change because I have been with Elder Ringger for two transfers now. I am excited to see who my possibly last companion is. 

The people we are teaching are doing great! They can't always meet as often as we would really like to but it is still ok. What is important is that people that we are teaching, less-active or non-members, are coming regularly to church. The few hours at church are the busiest. It's almost like a game to see how many people we can try to make appointments with for the week. luckily our ward members are pretty happy to have us over. We see them often and they take good care of us. 

Studies have been going great lately. I can't stress the importance of trying to increase our knowledge of the scriptures. We really should be taking every opportunity we get to learn something new and something spiritual. As members of the church we have a much larger capability to learn about God and how He works and I am really thankful for that. 

I hope you are all doing great! Have another good week! Love you all!

Elder Eldredge

Christmas Markets and Speaking German

Hey everybody!

This week was great! It was a bit slower than usual but we still had a good time. For some reason we couldn't get as many appointments as usual. It caused for some long days out on the streets but I guess I am used to that now. This week is already much busier and I am happy about that. 

The Christmas markets are starting up around here. Last night we got to walk through one on our way to an appointment and it was amazing how many people were there! They sell lots of cool toys and really tasty looking pastries. They really really like Christmas here. I think there are about 20 markets here in Vienna! 

We have already gotten about three invites for thanksgiving. Well two of them are only possible invites so we aren't really sure what is going to happen. We might get a lot of thanksgiving this year. I am hoping that our ward will try and organize some flag football in the morning so that we can play. 

I went on exchange with some other missionaries here in Vienna. It was really fun because I worked in their area so I got to teach in german! We visited some members of their ward and it was really refreshing to speak german, and just the way they think is different. I will really miss the little austrian homes when I come home. I also ate a lot of austrian pastries this week. Too bad we don't have this stuff in Utah. They're so fancy with their donuts here.

We have interviews with our mission president this saturday. It should be really good because he plans to spend a lot of time with each one of us. It will be nice to have some extra time with him. Sometimes interviews are just way to short and you don't feel like you really had an interview. We are also going to eat some awesome schnitzel tomorrow for lunch. They are really big! 

So life is great here. I love Vienna a lot. Have another great week! Love you all!

Elder Eldredge

Vienna is the place to be!

Hey family!

It's been another awesome week! Vienna is the place to be! It is fun to be a missionary over here. We have seen a lot of progress with the people that we are meeting with. We have been meeting with a girl named Wanni. She is a member in our ward and we are just helping her prepare for a temple prep. class. When we started she wasn't coming to church often and she never read her scriptures but now she really loves coming to church and we don't even need to remind her to read every day. She is also more excited to meet and she asks really good questions that show that she is really thinking about things more. It is fun to watch our friends really make progress in the gospel. 

The Elders that we live with are really great. Elder Pugmire will go home in three weeks so we are all pretty sad about that. He is a really close friend. Elder Brady is awesome too. He really likes to dance a lot. I couldn't have better roommates. The greatest thing about living in Vienna is that you are constantly around other missionaries. We see our friends almost everyday and it is just nice to have a big support system. 

It has been really warm and partially sunny for the last few days. It is really pretty with all of the leaves changing. We are preparing to be pretty cold in the next few weeks. 

Things are going great. We work hard and we are having success. I never have anything to complain about and life is just plain good. I am glad to see that everybody else is happy too! I'm especially happy to hear that Emily and Geoff are having a little girl! I can't wait to see her!

Have a great week! I love you all!

Elder Eldredge

Happy Halloween!

Hey! 

This week was really great! It has been really good weather. I like it when it is cold a lot more than wearing a tie in the summer! Halloween was fun even though they don't really celebrate it here. We had a fun Halloween party at the YSA center with all of the YSA people and some other missionaries. All of the people from here got to try candy corn for the first time and I don't think anybody liked it. More for us I guess. 

Ainsley's wings on her costume are awesome! Good job to whoever made them. All the kids are looking pretty cute in their costumes! I dressed up like a hogwarts student. I kept trying to find a nice stick for a wand but I didn't see one all day. 

Work-wise it was a bit of a slow week because the people we are teaching were mostly all out of town. But we are having a lot of fun and success. I am happy about the work here. We have a good list of contacts and they are all really interested and want to meet often. 

We had an awesome eating appointment at our ward mission leader's home. We ate J-dawgs with the sauce and everything! It was tons of fun. They live in a neighborhood where there are mostly Americans so there were tons of american kids running around and jumping on the tramp. You would have never known you were in Austria. It was also great because they let us eat tons of their left-over american candy from Halloween! 

Tomorrow we are going to eat lunch with a man in our ward who is going to bring his old Leica cameras to show me. I am really excited. We are going to eat at his tennis club with six other missionaries. Should be a blast. 

Thanks for the Halloween pictures! I hope that you all have a great week! Love you all!

Elder Eldredge

Business as Usual

Hey everyone! 

Look at that cute baby! I can't wait to hold her! It is good to have another baby girl. It's only been like 11 years. Happy birthday Ainsley!

We had a great week over here! I think I mentioned last week that we were teaching a sixteen year-old girl from Alaska. We taught her again and she has gained a testimony of the Book of Mormon and of Joseph Smith! She is really cool and she comes to the activities at the youth center so we see her pretty often. She also came to our stake conference yesterday and I think she really enjoys being around the other missionaries and she really feels welcome. She is doing really great and she is a good friend.

We are also teaching a man named M-----. He is a bit of a tough case. He has a problem that he can't trust anything. He doubts pretty much everything and it stops him from making any progress and becoming happier. It has made me reflect a lot about how we need to trust the spiritual confirmations that we've received. We can't panic at every question that we don't understand the answer to. If we approach our questions with patience and trust that the Lord will teach us when He knows is best, we will be much more peaceful and we will learn faster. 

There is no news about transfers. We are both staying for the next transfer. I am excited about it. I really love Vienna. It was a bit of a sad transfer call because a lot of my friends are leaving, but luckily our apartment is staying the same. 

Today we are going to go and see the cemetery! Elder Ringger says it is one of the biggest ones in Europe. There is also an LDS section so we are going to see that. 

Thanks for the pictures of Piper! She is pretty darn cute! Tell her I love her! I love you all too!

Elder Eldredge 

YSA Center

Hi everyone!

Sounds like a really fun week back home! We were also really busy this week. It was possibly the busiest week of my mission. It is really fun getting to teach someone everyday. The missionary couple that is in charge of the YSA center were out of town on a conference this week so we had to run the center and make sure all of the classes were being taught. It was a lot of work but everything worked out. They are still going to be gone until tuesday so we get to keep watching over the center. Tonight we are running the FHE activity, and on wednesday I get to teach institute. I am really excited for that. I get to teach about the first five chapters in the book of Mormon. 

Church was pretty crazy yesterday! L--- brought his parents to church. They wanted to see what he was getting into. They didn't seem to have a problem with us so that went well. W---- and G------ both came as well. We are helping them prepare themselves for the temple. Ever since we started meeting with them there has been a lot of progress. There was also three child baptisms right after church! It was great because most of the ward stayed and there was lots of food. They said there would be refreshments but it was a full meal for everyone. 

This wednesday we will find out about transfers. We had a seven week transfer and our next one will be a five week transfer. I will almost surely be "dying" here in Vienna. We will see though if Elder Ringger and I stay together. We probably will be.

You all need to let me know what I should put in this package for christmas or I am just going to need to shove it full of stuff I don't want to carry home in a few months. Just let me know!

I love you all and I hope that everything is going great!

Elder Eldredge

Enjoying Vienna

Hey everybody! 

There isn't ever a boring day in Vienna! We have lots of fun. This week especially. We had a double zone conference in Salzburg on Saturday. We had two other missionaries stay in our apartment over night on Friday so we had to wake up at 5 o'clock to leave our apartment at 6:30. We brought a lot of scones with us on the train for breakfast and the sisters made some no-bake cookies. It was a lot of fun to sit and talk with them for a few hours. The conference was really great but I barely knew anybody from the Salzburg zone because they are all so young. I got to talk to G-----(from Haag) on the phone when he called the Haag elders. It was nice to hear from him. We took a train back home and got to our apartment at about 9 o'clock and that was our day. I really liked it. 

We had a great time yesterday as well. We ate with a family from Fiji. They are really excited about missionary work and we should do family home evening with them and their friends in a few weeks. They also played the Ukelele for us and sang in Fijian. 

The new window on the house looks great mom! And those kids are all getting so big! 

L--- is doing really well! He is really looking forward to getting the priesthood and his parents are coming with him to church this Sunday. They just want to see what he is getting into but we hope to make a good impression so that they want to learn more. 

We are also working with a new convert named G-----. She is from Italy. We are good friends with her and she really wants to prepare to go to the temple. She was sick for a while but now she can start coming again. 

Everything here is great. My roommates and companion are all awesome. We make sure to have a lot of fun and work really hard. Thanks for the pictures! I love you all!

Elder Eldredge

General Conference

Greetings from Vienna!

We had a great week as always but general conference was definitely the highlight. I loved not only hearing the uplifting talks, but it was also a great time to be together with the other missionaries in Vienna. I love being able to see my friends so often. On Saturday night we had all four st. Pölten elders with us in our apartment so that they could see general conference. We had eight elders in our apartment. It was fun. We made around 60 scones for breakfast and sang a lot of hymns for fun. We still haven't seen the Sunday afternoon session but that should happen sometime this week. 

L--- also came to two sessions on Sunday with us and hung out with us and the rest of the missionaries in between the sessions. He really liked conference. N--- also came and watched in Spanish, but she also brought her boy friend with her to the second session and introduced us to him because we talked about doing missionary work in our last lesson with her. She wants to invite another friend to church as well. She really enjoyed listening to a talk in Spanish that didn't need to be translated. 

Today we went to a park and played Ultimate for a while. It felt really good to go outside and play. It also made me miss my cleats because I fell over on the wet grass all day. The weather here is perfect. The leaves are turning and falling and there is always a slight cool breeze. I really like the fall.

Glad to hear that everybody had a good time at conference! I sure miss that chicken chili every time conference comes around. Have another great week!

Love you all!

Elder Eldredge

P.S. Dad, I got my card in the mail last week. It took a while but it is here. 

Pictures!

Hey everybody! 

This week was really great! On monday we had a fun p-day with the other elders and some sisters. We played Ultimate in a park! It was one of my favorite p-days. Just as we started playing, it began to rain really hard for about 10 minutes and then it was really nice weather for the rest of the time. Today we are going to by ice cream and then go to Schönbrunn and have a picnic. 

There were a lot of great moments this week. I have told you about L--- before. We met with him on friday and he wants to be baptized in the summer! He also came up to me on sunday and asked what he needs to do to go to the temple. He is such an awesome kid. We have been working with a girl from china named W---

 She is a member since about two years ago and we are just helping her to understand the gospel more because she is from a different background. She is really funny and plays the piano really really well.

We had an eating appointment on saturday with a family in our ward that only eats vegan food. It was delicious! It was also funny because the family also invited a few members of our ward who are from Fiji, and they were really surprised that there wasn't any chicken or beef. But they told me all about the different kinds of bananas that they like to eat in Fiji.

We also went to Herbs (that schnitzel place) as a district on Tuesday. I am really going to miss schnitzel when I am not here anymore. 

Everything here is going great. It is good to hear that you are all doing well too! Thanks for writing. I love you all!

Elder Eldredge