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