Monday, August 21, 2017

Last email

Hey Mom!
Last email! I can't believe it! I've been doing the same thing today, just procrastinating when to write everybody for the last time. It's been so weird, reading "see you next week" from everybody!
Sounds like you guys had a pretty awesome week! Surprise trip to AZ, that's way fun. I'm a little bummed that I just barely missed Caleb's baptism on the way out, and Nolan's on the way back haha. Oh, well, I'm glad everybody had a fun time. I just remembered that I got the Melchizedek priesthood out in AZ at Hayden's baptism! Val was there, too! If I remember right, we were trying to cram everything in before the LA temple closed on August 1st. Speaking of which, we'll have to make some time pretty soon for a temple trip. Maybe on Saturday? I'm not really sure what the schedule is gonna look like when we're in Provo, but I would be game to wake up early to go. I'll leave it up to you haha!
Luke made the team! Haha that's super exciting from him. Noah said he pretty much had nothing to worry about, but I remember being pretty stressed out for the tryouts. I'm happy for him. It'll be fun to watch them all play this season!
The homecoming date sounds good! Haha it's gonna be sweet to do it the same time as Kai, I'm excited to hear all about his mission. I would anticipate that the European missions are pretty similar to each other. He's probably got a few good stories.
We had a really awesome week. Started things off well, we had a really good district meeting where we were able to set some goals for the rest of the transfer. Everybody was pretty pumped. Preparing a district meeting again was pretty weird, President has me as district leader here til I go. It's been a good throwback for me haha. On Tuesday, we took a train out to Wrocław for zone conference. It was awesome to see the city again! I almost forgot how much I loved the place! The conference was awesome. Elder Sabin from the Area Presidency came to visit. He prepared an awesome conference for us. Told some amazing stories, it was pretty easy to tell that he was an incredible missionary. There was a lot of talk about how we need to do better in letting our light shine. It's true, as members of the Church, we are the only people in the world who are promised the constant presence of the Holy Ghost. If we're worthy and willing, we should always stand out. It's been something I've focused on my entire mission: being a light for others. Part of that means making the choice to be happy, no matter what is going on around you. 
That was kinda the basis for my last testimony in zone conference. President always invites the departing missionaries to speak one more time for everybody. I talked a lot about finding joy in everything. If we keep the commandments, we're meant to be happy. Period. I've tried to be better at believing in that, and then looking for that joy. It was cool that my last conference revolved around joy, it summed up everything very well.
We brought the fire back to Kielce! Haha when we got back we were able to put in some work, and we found some cool people to teach. It's been fun.
On Sunday I gave a talk. It was my last time in church here in Kielce, so it was an opportunity to say goodbye and leave some last words with them. It was pretty cool. 
I guess, to answer your question, I'll be in Warsaw around noon on Sunday. I'm gonna miss church, but I'll get there right as 3rd hour ends, so I get to say one last goodbye to everyone! I'm really excited! I've already gotten in contact with pretty much everyone, so we're gonna have a little party to end things right haha.
We spend about half of this week in Kielce, then on exchange in Kato for the rest. It's a weird way to end the transfer, but it means that I'll get one last goodbye in Katowice, too. That's pretty cool. Elder Liechty and I will travel up to Warsaw together, which is gonna be awesome haha.
This will be the last email, which means that it's time to sign off! I want you guys to know that I have loved every minute of my mission! Sometimes it was hard to see in the moment, but looking back on it all, I can see God's hand my mission. The people here in Poland have had such an impact on the way I look at life. Being with them has made it a lot easier to see how blessed I've been. We are all so blessed to be a part of this church. I know it's true. I have seen miracles and heard answers to prayers here in Poland that I cannot deny. I can't deny the joy I've felt here either. Keeping the commandments is a sure way to be happy, no matter what else happens in life. I'm so grateful for my mission. It's changed who I am. It's going to be so hard to say goodbye, I know it. I want you guys to know that I'm excited to see you again. I've missed you a ton, but there's always been a peace that comes with missing you. I'm grateful that God has looked after things at home for me haha. He's blessing me, and He's blessing you. I love you all so much. I'll see you in a week.
Elder Haskett

Monday, August 14, 2017

August 14th

Goodbyes are tough

August 14th

Hey Mom!
Haha sounds like you've had a really busy week! I'm glad to hear that you guys got everything done with Nema and Grandpa B's house though! It's weird to think that they're gonna be somewhere else now! I'm gonna miss their old place haha. I'm excited to see what the new place is gonna be like though!
Haha Caleb might just be the most vocal about how he isn't excited for school. I don't think that any of us were particularly excited for August to roll around, at the very least, I wasn't haha. What grade is he going into now?
It's super weird to think that Elders Einfeldt and Alvarez are already home! Haha when they left it was a really weird day! 
Last week was a pretty weird one for me in a lot of ways. The goodbye to Warsaw was pretty tough. I can't believe how much that place has turned into home for me. You already heard about the last day in Church, but the days after were pretty similar. We were jam packed with meetings that were pretty much all goodbyes haha. On Monday, we had our last dinner over at the Reese's. They're an awesome family, I'm gonna miss those guys. They're making a plan for me to move out to Warsaw haha. I think she sent you an email with a picture?
Tuesday we had a few more meetings, mostly with members, which was really cool. It was just awesome to see how much everyone has changed and grown in the last year. The branch has made some huge steps, which is awesome. 
Wednesday we had a meeting for every hour of the working day, which was awesome. We met with some investigators, some Jehovah's Witnesses that tracted into our apartment (a story for another time haha), and had one last English class. They were fun, a lot of the students brought little treats to say goodbye haha. We sang a goodbye song and everything! After class we watched Ephraim's Rescue with Bart and Wasyl. It was really cool. They are super good guys. It's been cool to work with Wasyl for so long, I've learned a lot from him. Bart is getting really excited for the States! I think he's more trunky than me!
My train was early Thursday morning, and since then we've had a lot of time to meet with a few of the members! Kielce is tiny! Like we can walk from one end of the city to the other in a couple hours! It's really quiet compared with Warsaw. So it's quite the adjustment haha! It's been good though. The members are pretty cool. There's not too many of them haha! Like 4 in church last week! It was a lot different! Funny to be back somewhere, where the missionaries do pretty much everything in sacrament meeting! 
One thing that was rough, the apartment. Man, I don't think I've ever seen a place so dirty. It was rank! I've put about 6 hours of cleaning into it already, so it's liveable now, but the place still needs some serious work. 
We met this really cool guy the other day from Morocco! He's a boss, we actually met him playing basketball! I took that tradition from Warsaw with me haha! He's pretty good, and he's down to meet with us, which is awesome. He's gonna be out of town for the week, but we're hoping that when he comes back we'll be able to have some meetings, and maybe set up a couple games with him and his friends!
We're also doing a really cool service project at this farm outside of the city! They love the missionaries, so we're there once a week! The family that works it is super nice. We actually had to walk about halfway there (about 2 hours!) last week with a lady that was going to help there too. She's super nice, and the sisters are gonna get to meet with her next week! Kind of a weird miracle, but we'll take it haha.
Love you Mom! Have an awesome week, and good luck with the new calling!
Elder Haskett

Monday, August 7, 2017


July 30th

Hey Mom!
Haha writing to Powell again, you've got me a little jealous! The weather has picked up here though, so at least we're warm!
It sounds like the boys had an awesome week! Fun that the tournaments and camps all went well. That's awesome you got to talk to someone about  You did find my people! Volleyball players like Jeeps, it's only natural! I miss the Jeep haha, it's gonna be fun to go for a drive again. There's a significant difference between a Jeep Wrangler and a Hyundai i20...
Haha, that's way cool you got to talk to someone from the team about the mission and everything. I think everyone in the world thinks that a mission is just building houses haha. We met a group of guys from the South just like that a few hours ago, they're doing a bunch of volunteer work here in Poland for about 10 days. Cool stuff! A little different from our idea of a mission, but they were awesome people, and they were excited to meet some fellow Americans haha.
The work really has been going well lately. The run thing was awesome haha! It was a really different way to get our name out there, but I think different is exactly what we need right now. We're teaching a little family because of that! And a ton of people came to check out our English class, which was awesome.
The work on our end is going really well. This week we had a lot of lessons. Right off the bat we met with this one investigator who I've been working with since coming to Warsaw. He's been making a lot of progress lately, and during our meeting on Tuesday, we talked again about enduring to the end. He was asking how it's even possible to keep making progress, and learning for your entire life, and we just talked about how reading the Book of Mormon over and over again always teaches you something new. It got him pretty hyped, and then we all got hyped, and then we decided to all read the Book of Mormon from start to finish before I go home! Haha then later that day, we met with some other people that joined us in the Book of Mormon challenge. Now we've got most of Warsaw's YSA, the missionaries, and other members all over Poland joining in with us! Haha we started a little movement. It's been going really well though. I've been keeping up with all the people that started with us, and everybody's having positive experiences. We'll see what happens! 
Another cool meeting with that same investigator, we were talking about specific commandments later in the week and we got pretty deep into prayer. We were discussing what prayer should actually look like, and the question came up, "If Heavenly Father already knows everything, then why do I even have to ask for blessings?" As we were talking about it, he kinda came to the conclusion himself, that he's just gotta be more humble, and accept that even if not everything makes sense to him, it's what Heavenly Father asked us to do, so we do it. Then he was just so happy that all of the sudden, things made sense. Overall, this guy understands the gospel so well, it's incredible. I feel like he's grasped other, more complicated topics and principles that I didn't figure out until the MTC. It's cool, we just imagine how wise this guy is gonna be 10 years down the road with the gift of the Holy Ghost. It's cool stuff.
Pretty awesome meeting with a member the other day that got baptized in 1988, before the Poland Warsaw Mission even existed! Haha he's got the very first edition of the Book of Mormon, and remembers meeting in some of the building that most missionaries have only seen pictures of haha. He's a fossil! Super cool, impressive guy. When he walked into the room, he just kinda had like this leaderly impression. You couldn't help but respect the guy haha. We're excited to keep meeting.
Our Saturday was pretty much unbelievable. I think I already told you that we got into an international basketball tournament. So we showed up to find out that our team got booted for some reason. That was a real bummer, but I think it was all part of the plan haha. After being there for about 5 minutes, the announcer was like, "OH HEY, looks like we've got some Americans here with us today!" And then he came over and had us introduce ourselves. That got us a chance to talk to pretty much everyone there, players and spectators. Then the guy gave me the mike and asked me to do some commentary on the games in English! Haha it was so funny, I had a blast. Turns out this MC guy is a famous rapper, and we got his number cause he wants to meet! He also shared our English class on Facebook, and talked our church up too! So random! The pictures were hilarious haha!
The plan is still for me to go to Kielce. It's gonna be cool, but I'm definitely gonna miss Warsaw a lot. It's my home in Poland haha. It's been really cool to be here so long, get close with the members, and see the city and branch change. I'm definitely grateful for the time I've had here. But yeah, it'll be interesting to see what the new city brings!
I hope you guys have a great time at Lake Powell! Love you Mom!
Elder Haskett

August 6th

August 6th

Hey Mom!
Haha I had the same thoughts this last Sunday at fast and testimony meeting. As I got up I think I finally realized how long I've been in the branch here. I didn't really ever expect to say goodbye. I don't think the members were expecting it either, everybody thought I was a permanent fixture here haha.
Anyways, I'm glad Lake Powell went so well, haha what else was I expecting? Not one person sent me any pictures, I'll be waiting on those next week!
Wow, I can't believe summer is already over for the boys! It went by really fast haha. Is Luke pretty excited for West Ranch? I guess the orientation stuff is probably already done, it's getting real haha! I can't wait to see him get into sports and all that stuff. I was actually just thinking the other day that it would be fun to drive Noah and Luke to school one of these days just for old time's sake. I get updates from Kati every once in a while that confirm that the life lessons I taught Noah on the way to school his freshman year have stuck with him, for better or for worse haha. It's crazy to think he's a senior now.
The sushi surprise last week was awesome haha! We met the family last week in church, they were visiting, and they invited us out! We had some pretty adventurous foods there, try raw salmon with raw egg on top for example, and pretty much just had a good time. They were super nice.
Things are still going really well here in Warsaw. We had a crazy week last week. Just trying to meet with all the people we've met the last few days has been nuts, but also awesome. We got out to see that family the other day, which was awesome! They're doing really well. Only problem is they live way out of Warsaw, so it's hard for them to get to us, and for us to get to them, but we'll see what we can do.
We also met with this girl the other day we met at the basketball tournament. We met this awesome group of students, and she was one of them. At first, she didn't seem so interested, but she started messaging us, asking all these questions, and it sounded like she was doing a ton of research. We had a meeting last night, and it was really powerful. She pretty much soaked up everything like a sponge, and the whole time was just like, "Wow, this is so different. I've never felt like this before". Then later that night she said she couldn't stop thinking about it all, and felt an overwhelming urge to start making changes in her life. She read the Book and other stuff we gave her all night long. Crazy stuff!
Last Saturday we had another race! This one was right in front of the chapel, so we got a bunch of the members, and all of the missionaries involved. It was awesome! President even ran with us! Haha, we had a good time, and we actually placed really well! Kriser, Wood, Mandla, and I all placed top ten for our age group, and Bart placed top ten as well! Wood actually came in first out of everyone for our heat, which was awesome hahaha. We've all got medals and some cool shirts and stuff.  The race was also a really cool opportunity to talk to people about the church and then invite them in. We lead tours for the rest of the afternoon, and then 2 new people were in sacrament meeting yesterday because of it! Really cool!
Other good news, me leaving meant that a bunch of members wanted to feed us last week, and we're set up a few times this week too! Haha yesterday we were at this American family's house. They were way awesome. Had some amazing homeade bread and lasagna. That's a rare treat in Poland haha. It was also kinda weird, because their daughter and her friend were visitng from home, they go to university in the States, so we were just talking about school and stuff. One of them is going to BYU, so we might run into eachother sometime. It was weird talking about classes and stuff though, kinda reminded me that it's all coming up soon.
The goodbye part of this week has already been rough. Like I said, the members weren't expecting it. It was hard, Warsaw has pretty much become my home branch haha. I did promise them we'd be coming back though, so we've gotta make that happen! They're pretty excited haha!
I'll be heading off for Kielce on Thursday pretty early in the morning. It's bittersweet for sure. I definitely don't want to say goodbye to Warsaw, but I'm excited to make some things happen in Kielce. I feel good about it. I know that time is going to fly there though, I think I've only got like 16 days there? Crazy fast.
Elders Einfeldt and Alvarez go home on Friday! It's insane! I'm gonna miss those guys!
Welp, I hope you have an awesome week, Mom! This is me signing off in Warsaw:,)
Love you Mom!
Elder Haskett

Tuesday, July 25, 2017

July 23rd

Hey Mom!
First of all, HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!! Haha as per usual, I sang a song. Elders Kriser and Wood were good sports and jumped in with me. That's part of the reason why we all busted up laughing towards the end, but hey, we weren't called to be in MoTab. Haha Elder Kriser would be proud of you for getting your country on though, he's a big time country boy haha. I'm glad to hear you celebrated in style though, it sounded like a good time. 
It also sounds like you guys have a pretty crazy week coming up haha! I'm excited to hear how it all goes. Have fun with the fam!
We had another pretty crazy week. It's been fun to be so busy so often haha, it's something I'm not used to! We're learning some new time management skills haha, that chapter of Preach My Gospel is finally coming in handy! Kidding, it's always been good, but prioritizing meetings is a new one for us all haha.
I guess to start it off, Elder Kriser took off for the north zone conference on Monday. We were missing him for a couple days while we were on exchange. In the meantime, we started meeting with an investigator on the Stop Smoking Program. Addictions are really hard, but it's so cool to help people work through problems that they've been struggling with their whole lives. Christ really can break those chains. Monday night we met this really cool guy that also happens to be really good at basketball. To make a long story short, I destroyed him in a game of 21, and now we're playing together this Saturday in a FIBA basketball tournament. 
That's not the end of our sports contacting for the week! On Tuesday, Elder Wood and I entered into a 5k! Haha we ran in our white shirts and ties, which obviously attracted a lot of attention. We wrote the Church website on our backs, and handed out pass-along-cards along the way! Haha we finished pretty well, but I was definitely out of shape! Still some of the most fun I've had on the mission though. I almost forgot how nice the cross-country crowd is! Everyone was willing to talk to us after the race! We also got interviewed by a news crew! Haha there were professional photographers taking pics of us and everything! Crazy! We're looking to do the exact same thing on Saturday, but we're hoping to actually win in basketball!
Elder Kriser came back on Wednesday, and Elder Wood took off for the south (and I was a little jealous haha). Elder Kriser and I had quite a few meetings. One of our investigators is doing really well. He's actually been around ever since I came to Warsaw. He's pretty much a homie, but lately, he's gotten serious about changing his life. We're going over the lessons again, and he's just getting everything. It's pretty cool to be a part of. 
We had our own zone conference on Thursday, that was a solid one. Sister Hansen made us some M&M cookies, which pretty much made the meeting hahaha.
On Friday we met with a really, really cool couple. They took us out for ice cream (get it, cool? I'm kidding, that was terrible), and we talked about their experience with the Church. She's done quite a bit of research, and actually listens to General Conference talks every morning. That's not something you hear every day haha, we were pretty blown away. He's not as familiar with the Church, but they're both super interested, and they are so excited for more meetings.
Saturday was kind of an interesting day. Some of the other elders were meant to have a baptism scheduled, but it got postponed that day. We were all pretty bummed, but used the time as an opportunity to meet with all the investigators in the city and talk about the Restoration. We watched the video, answered questions, and pretty much just got real with them. It turned out to be a pretty cool day. We had sports with them after, and I taught them all how to shoot a basketball. Form here is pretty poor, but we're making progress haha.
All in all a pretty good week. We're excited to see what happens next week, especially with that bball tournament!
Love you Mom, hope you had an awesome day yesterday!
Elder Haskett

Monday, July 17, 2017

July 17th

Hey Mom!
Haha I bet you and Caleb are gonna have a pretty fun week all by yourselves! I'm sure he's got nothing against Hurricane Harbor and McD's every day. Is he still as crazy about McNuggets as he was when I left? I guess we all were at some point, but Noah and Luke had definitely gotten out of it. Either way, get a Reese's McFlurry for me!
That's super cool to hear that Josh's mom has taken some interest in the Church! It's interesting to think of all the missionary commitments from the perspective of a missionary. I remember them always asking us to do our member missionary work, and I never really thought about how that would all actually work. It's so different from full-time missionary work, but it's also so much more effective. President Turek described it as the difference between fishing with a huge net, and with a fishing rod. The full-time missionaries are fishing with a net, we have to be a little more active, and we don't really even have to think about who to talk to. But member missionaries can be patient, and look in places where they know people will one day be ready. It's more effective, more personal, just better. I hope you guys have some opportunities to talk to someone about the Church!
Weird to think about WR Volleyball without Nate. Who's the new coach? Have you guys heard anything yet?
On our side of things, the work has taken off! Last week we had a baptism for our investigator! It was awesome. She was just so ready, and the ordinance was so important to her. She told us it was a scary step, and that she was nervous coming into it, but so happy she finally made the decision! The service itself was awesome. There were quite a few investigators there, which is really, really cool. I read a statistic that said 85% of investigators that attend a baptismal service are one day baptized themselves. So you'd better believe we invited everyone haha! Seeing it for themselves really helped to understand what we really mean when we talk about baptism. It's pretty laid back, not too scary, but people are really changed by the whole thing. 
Some other investigators are getting serious about the decision as well. One goal we've got in Warsaw to keep the ball rolling is to have a baptism a week. The mission has been maintaining that goal for 2 months now, which is huge, but we want to step up our game. With all the miracles we've been seeing lately, it's definitely possible. 
We had two more exchanges last week, and both went well. We met a few new investigators, visited some referrals, all that jazz. Two cool things that happened: so we got a referral from Cali, apparently some guy visited the Temple Visitor's Center and requested a visit from us. We drove way out to this guy's address, only to find that it was wrong. So we started asking around on the street to see if anyone knew this guy. We knocked on a door to ask, and this younger guy was like, "What the heck" haha, he was really confused as to why 3 young guys in suits showed up at his door. He had his whole fam come check us out, they took selfies with us, and even called some of their friends to see us. We were like celebrities visiting a town in the middle of nowhere. Anyways, one of these guys that showed up was like, "Wait a second, that name sounds familiar", and gave some guy a call. Well, this guy calls some other guy, who calls some other guy, and so on and so forth until some older guy shows up to this house and is like, "You guys looking for me?" He had the same name as our referral, but it was just a total coincidence! Haha, he had no clue what we were talking about! But in the meantime, we had gotten so tight with all these other people that showed up, that we're set up to go back and visit. We're gonna do a little sermon on the Book of Mormon for the whole town!
Another little miracle. We were playing ball with this cool kid from France last week, and he left his ball behind. We knew the general whereabouts of where he lived, so we wanted to see if we could find him and get him his ball back. We got to the area of town where he was, and saw him out playing ball on the first basketball court we walked by! Haha we actually played with him for a while (I ripped a hole in the seat of my pants about 6 inches wide), and then were able to give him a Book of Mormon in French! It was super cool.
It's been a good week, I'm really impressed by how this transfer has started. We're waiting for the miracles to get bigger and better!
Love you Mom!
Elder Haskett

Monday, July 10, 2017

July 10th

Our week was honestly nuts. It's hard for me to believe that it's only been a week since transfers started, so much has happened. I'll break it up by day.
To start us off, Tuesday, the Fourth of July! We had a really solid day, and got to listen to quite a bit of American classics along the way. We had one last meeting with an investigator that'll be in the Ukraine for the summer. He committed to go to church every week while he's gone, and really plan on getting baptized when he gets back. We'll see what happens, we're gonna keep contact through email! Later that day we found a sweet library to study at. There's a huge rooftop library that was just really chill. To end the night we had a real patriotic celebration that consisted of grilling burgers, wings, fries, milkshakes, and strawberry lemonade. We yelled freedom off the balcony to go out with a bang hahaha.
Wednesday was a little more toned down. We had a meeting with President to start planning for MLC, and then after that English class. That was fun, we sang for the class again. Most of the students actually stayed behind for our religion course! We started a new program this transfer, with each class based off of one of the Articles of Faith. It's cool, because spending about 30-45 mins on each one covers pretty much every aspect of the gospel and missionary discussions. Perfect!
Thursday was my last MLC:) Haha we did well, and ate a lot of pizza, no complaints there. The elders from Katowice stayed with us for an exchange that night. Elders Sommerfeldt and Huffman, they're good guys so we had a good time. 
Friday was nuts. We had 5 meetings, so it was good that we had so many elders in the apartment, we were on splits the whole time. A couple with members, and then a couple with investigators. One member took us to a vegan bar to meet a friend of his. It was really cool, his friend and her boyfriend want to see us again! The vegan food wasn't so cool... That night Elder Huffman and I had a really awesome meeting with an old friend. He's working on changing his life, and we want to help him out haha. He's looking for better work, and wants to get baptized too. We're gonna meet once or twice a week to hook him up. 
Saturday was even crazier than Friday. We had a meeting with the brother of that other guy that went to Ukraine in the morning. We're hoping that he and his bro work together on being baptized! We'll see what happens when he gets back! Then I jumped in with Elder Mandla and we met with a family that we met in Katowice. They're the super nice people that took us out for a PDay trip that one time! It was awesome, they're super cool, and they got us food again! It was nice to see them. We met another lady on the street who invited us in to her home. She had a homeless man living in the other room, and she wanted us to try to help him to believe in Jesus again. He was completely closed off to us, but she was really open! We're going over tonight to do service for her! Then at the end of the night this girl from Germany met with us and Bart. She had met with the missionaries a year ago, and is ready to go now! She'll be baptized this Saturday! I can't believe it haha, it was a total miracle!
Really cool week, and we're hoping to keep the fire burning! It's been sweet, pray for all the people we're working with, there's honestly a ton now!
Love you Mom!
Elder Haskett 




July 3rd

Hey Mom!
That's way awesome Noah did so well at his basketball tournament! Haha it's good to hear that he's getting a lot of playing time, and that he's still breaking ankles at point haha. I'm excited to see his games. I gotta say though, it's weird to think that when I come home him, and probably even Luke are gonna whoop up on me in basketball. I've been trying to at least sorta keep my jump shot up here in Poland, but it's rough. They're gonna be a ways ahead of me haha.
Sounds like you guys have a sweet Fourth of July party planned! I'm a little jealous! We're gonna do our best to make the 4th as American as possible. We're gonna grill burgers out on our balcony, eat some watermelon, make some lemonade, the works! No fireworks, but we're still gonna get in the spirit!
Good luck with the BoM challenge. Haha I'll jump in on it with you over here. Gotta get in one more time before the end of the mission!
Things in Warsaw are going well! For one, we had transfers this week! What we had planned earlier stuck, I'll be in Warsaw with Elder Kriser again as AP. We're gonna be a trio again, this transfer Elder Wood will be joining the fun haha. He's from Idaho, and we're ready to have a good time. There is one small surprise: since Elders Einfeldt and Alvarez are going home a bit earlier than us, President is probably going to send me to a little city called Kielce for my last two weeks. It's not set in stone, and kinda top secret, but that's what I'm expecting. I think I'm gonna leave my suitcases here in Warsaw and just take a little duffel full of clothes haha. Do you think I could buy a duffel bag some time in the next month?
Our last week was pretty sweet. We did get fed again haha, Elder Jeffs came back to Poland with his family, and they took us out. It was really nice of them, and we ate well haha. I actually just put to use the Reeses that I got from the DeMordaunts a couple days ago to make a Reeses peanut butter milkshake. It was so good haha, I was dying. To keep the magic going, I got the package you sent! I started opening it, but I saw all of the wrapping paper and remembered that it was probably a Bday package, so I'm gonna wait till next week! Thank you so much though!
The work is going really well lately. We were pretty busy last week with transfers and everything, but we still had some time for a few cool meetings. One of our most solid investigators finally talked to his family about us. I don't think that we're gonna have a giant family baptism any time soon, but they weren't against it and he still wants to be baptized. We fasted with him and President Turek yesterday, which was way cool. I don't think I've ever been so wiped out on a fast Sunday, but it was a really spiritual experience. We broke the fast at the same time and I gave him a call to see how things went. He said that he felt the Spirit very strongly during the day, and thinks that he is ready to get serious about a date!
We've got an English class still, and it's going well. We're still finding people to teach through it, although I've been slacking on my English class stories lately haha. I'll use a funny one from last transfer. There's this old guy in our class who is a total riot. He barely speaks English, but we love him haha. He walks up to Elder Bebel at the very beginning of class and kinda just awkwardly was like, "Shut up?" And then he said it again and again. Bebel was so confused, and Elder Einfeldt and I were dying. English class doesn't disappoint. Last week our class gave us a bunch of food and treats and stuff, I guess they love us haha.
The branch here all leaves for the summer, too. It's a bummer, but we're still doing pretty well. We're still finding people to teach, so we've got no problems haha. We're taking Elder Andersen's advice to get creative to heart. Elder Kriser and I love basketball, so we'll go out sometimes and just ball with random people at the park. Just last Saturday we had a really good game with a group of people, some from the States, some from Poland, and one from China. It was fun, and I totally broke the Chinese guy's ankles. Then we just got to talk after about why we're here, we got their numbers, and they'll be coming to our English class and stuff in the future! It's a pretty cool way to meet big groups of people all at once, and they're always way more open to talk. After our game the other day, I got invited to play on some international team with a couple of the guys haha. Season doesn't start until September, too late:(
I'm excited for the rooming situation, thanks for taking care of all that! Also, I saw my flight plans in the office the other day. I don't know when you guys were expecting me, but I'll be landing at like 3:50 on the 28th. I was thinking it would be the 29th? I guess that means we have a whole day at home! Disneyland?
We're having a lot of fun lately, and I'm excited for my last transfer. I can't believe it's the last one! I'm sad, but excited. It's kinda like senior year sports, it's time to shine haha. We're gonna make it rock. Also, this being the last couple months, it's high time to start buying souvenirs. What have you heard about in Poland that you would want me to check out? I know a lot of people like the Polish pottery, the amber stuff, what should I keep my eyes open for?
Love you tons Mom, we're doing well over here. Have a happy 4th of July!
Elder Haskett

Monday, June 26, 2017

June 25th

Hey Mom!
Haha sounds like you guys had a good time at girl's camp! I'm glad you made it through another one, even though you're tired. Hopefully there will be some chill time for you at some point this summer!
Haha that's awesome that Noah's doing well with basketball. Good thing he's finally started shooting haha, I was worried he was gonna spend his whole senior year breaking people's ankles for nothing haha. Caleb's getting big too, it's weird to think that he's already playing competitive ball. He's about as old as I was when we first moved to Cali. It's been a while I guess haha.
That's sweet you met another RM from Poland! We are a rare sort, but there's a good few of us now. There have been a ton of missionaries coming through Warsaw lately vacationing, so we've gotten to meet a bunch of people. Two weeks ago a guy came through with his wife, he had served 20 years ago. Then an old friend, Elder Jones visited last week (also with his wife). He went home at the same time as Elder Park. It's fun to see all these missionaries. All they ever want to talk about anymore is me going home though haha. And I'll make sure I keep my Polish haha! I've set a goal to pick Spanish back up though. The plan is to be able to read Harry Potter in English, Polish, and Spanish within a year of finishing the mission haha. We'll see how it goes.
We had a pretty sweet week. Ever since visiting with the Tureks on Monday, Elder Kriser and I have been making their German potato pancakes haha. Basically they taste a lot like hash browns, but hey, hash browns are sweet. 
We had a meeting with one of the recent converts last week. He was baptized on Christmas Eve, I think you guys remember that one. Anyways, he had his first talk in sacrament meeting yesterday, and he was way nervous haha. We went over to his place for the first time, and it was awesome! Haha he's got all these cool souvenirs from the States from all the times he's traveled, and we got to check the place out. He made us crepes, another bonus, and then we buckled down on his talk. I told him that if he was really nervous on Sunday, that he should open up with a joke to lighten the mood, and he did it! Haha the tradition will live on after I leave in Poland. It was a great talk, we were very proud haha.
Another pretty cool set up, we met a girl from Texas last week who's working in Poland as a nanny. She's a really cool girl, and she's looking for her help in learning Polish. We set up for last week, and it went pretty well. Later we met her friend. Apparently there's a bunch of Americans here trying to learn Polish, but all the classes are pretty lame. We're hoping to be able to meet a bunch of new people and see if we can help out with the Polish class.
Our English class last week was pretty bumping, too. We had a bunch of young students. The lesson went pretty well, and then at the end we taught them the song Hallelujah, and then sang the Penatonix arrangement for them haha. It was sweet, and I'm pretty dang sure they're all gonna come back for more heh.
We had another really cool meeting with an investigator. Since he's started getting serious about studying the Church, he says that things in his life are just opening up. He was able to quit smoking cold turkey with almost no problems. He's getting over alcohol, and recently stopped swearing as well. It's been really cool to see the small steps he's made add up. It reminded me of a talk from Conference, where the missionaries started meeting with a beach bum. After their first meeting, he shaved his beard and cleaned up, just because he felt it was the right thing to do. Then he cleaned his place, stopped drinking, and step by step got his life together and became pretty successful. Obviously our story wasn't nearly as drastic of a change, but it's cool to see people change their lives, no matter how small the changes are. When we're trying to do what's right, God will show us the next step to take, or the next thing to do. 
We changed the time we play sports on Saturdays to later in the day so we could meet more people, and it worked! We played a group of 8 old guys in basketball last week haha! It was really fun, and some of them were pretty good. It's fun to put some handles on every once in a while, and see what they'll do. There are some good shooters in Poland, and plenty of athletes, but no one can dribble. We can dance around these guys when they play defense. I'll have to film a game one of these days, it's fun stuff.
You were right, transfers are next week! Weird enough, I don't actually know for sure yet where I'm going. We were supposed to finish up the transfer board last week, but things got busy and we weren't able to do it. I think I'll be staying, but we'll see. I guess you'll all find out when everybody else does next week!
We've got culture night tonight with the district. It'll be bowling! Then for the rest of the week we've got transfers and meetings! It'll be fun!
Have an awesome week Mom! I love you!
Elder Haskett

June 19th

Hey Mom!
Haha I can imagine that the prep for Girl's Camp has been crazy as ever! I hope that you guys have at least been able to enjoy the beginning of summer a little bit! Either way, I know you're gonna have fun at camp, you always do!
I took a look at the schedule, it looks pretty good, but honestly I have no idea what good actually looks like haha! Thanks for getting it all done! And thanks for looking into the housing thing, let me know what happens there!
I'm working on the pictures thing haha. Lately we've been emailing at the chapel, and the connection here is so slow it takes about a half hour for a picture to load. Once we get to the office again, I'll have some good stuff to send to you. A few videos too haha.
Our week was pretty sweet! I guess the first thing was MLC, which went well. We talked a lot about the Elder Andersen meeting again, and then really talked a lot about baptism. Found a ton of scriptures in the Book of Mormon that I've been able to use in teaching, which was pretty cool. One of my favorites was Moroni 6, which talks about the requirements for baptism, but then a lot about what happens after, too. I've been using that one a lot with members lately. One of the other things we talked about is that as missionaries there's often a separation between baptism and the Gift of the Holy Ghost, when there shouldn't be. I guess it's easy to catch yourself doing that, because baptism is the hardest part, but most of the blessings come from the Holy Ghost. It's the Spirit that gives us a remission of sins, and we know that we're doing the right thing worthily when we have the accompaniment of the Holy Ghost. Baptism is a symbol of willingness to follow Christ, and it's necessary, but the ordinance mostly prepares us for the blessings that come after.
Right after MLC we went to Łódź for an exchange! If you're wondering about pronunciation, it's wooj. Haha pretty easy. We spent the day there with the elders. First thing in the morning we did a service project raking about an acre of land and clearing rocks. Then after Elder Blackwell and I taught a lesson. The lesson was good, and the guy is preparing to be baptized, which was awesome, but the coolest thing was the member that helped us teach. She's an older lady, in her 80s. She's a WWII concentration camp survivor. While she was there, she told us her story. She lost her whole family in the camp, and then again lost her husband and children in an accident later, but the whole time has remained faithful. She talked about how she's confident she'll see them again because they're sealed for time and all eternity. She's had a lot of powerful spiritual experiences because of her faith, and she bore a powerful testimony about the importance of keeping the commandments and going to the temple.
I had another exchange right after that with Elder Mandla! It was crazy, he hit his year mark this week! Haha my son is all grown up. Sure did make me feel old here though haha. We had a good time, and we were able to catch up a bit and talk about how things have been since we served together.
Our investigator that was supposed to move really did move this week. It was pretty sad. He'll be living in Berlin, trying to get something going there. We're in touch with the missionaries there, and we're praying that everything works out for him in the end. He's had a tough life, I think it's about time he gets a break. We'll see, it's in God's hands!
I'm excited for this week! We're starting off right, Sister Turek is gonna teach us how to make some German food! We're excited haha! 
I hope you have an awesome week at Girl's Camp! It'll be a blast!
Love you Mom!
Elder Haskett

Tuesday, June 13, 2017

June 11th

Last week was honestly super awesome! Everything started out with our PDay with the DeMordaunts haha. That was way fun, they took us to the Jewish History Museum and then the Jewish Cemetary. Really cool place, it's honestly crazy though to think about all the stuff that happened here during World War II. Poland has been through a lot. The DeMordaunts were super nice though, and we had a blast.
Piano Guys on Tuesday! It was awesome haha! We took an investigator and Bart, and then President and Sister Turek brought a family that they're close friends with. We had a great time. The concert was super fun. They're so good live haha! The one that plays the piano, Jon Schmidt played a song from underneath the piano, it was insane haha.
We had so many meetings this week! It was super cool. Things got kinda interesting with our investigator with the baptismal date. We'd been fasting for him to find a job, and instead, he got offered a free plane ticket to fly to Denmark to start a new life there on Thursday. We prayed about it, gave him a blessing, and came to the conclusion that it was the right choice. That was hard. I filled out a referral to the other missionaries there, and then we bought him lunch before he was supposed to leave. The next morning, he said that he felt something was holding him here, so he didn't get on the plane. We're interested to see what God has in store for him here. 
Tuesday night we had probably the most powerful lesson I've ever been on with a guy named Janek. He's the writer that I had an interview with. We told you about how he had a spiritual experience on the Elder Andersen meeting. He had us over at his place, and then we just kinda talked about how things are going in his life right now. He's a deeply religious guy, but lately, things have been going badly for him. He fell back into smoking and drinking after quitting. He stopped praying, and now feels a scary, dark power whenever he tries to. We talked and talked and talked about the Book of Mormon, about life, about God, and it was honestly incredible how powerfully we felt the Spirit. We were coming close to the end of the meeting, and I asked him to take a minute to think about what he could do to overcome his fears. He sat quietly for a while and then started to cry. We waited for a bit, and then he said that he could stop thinking about wanting to see Christ again. He said that for the first time in a long time, he felt His presence in his life again. I asked if we could kneel and pray, and then asked if he would say it. He was still afraid, but we told him that he could take however he wants, and wait until the Spirit helped him to pray. We waited a while, and he started crying again. Then he said the most sincere prayer I've ever heard, and stood up and said that he knows, without a doubt, that God loves him again. It was intense. We're gonna have another meeting tomorrow in the chapel.
On Saturday we got challenged by a group of people to play basketball. That was a bad call. I was wearing flip flops (we were planning on playing some sand volleyball), and we still demolished them. I'm not sure if the hoops were low or if my desire to protect my pride was just really strong, but I was dunking in my sandals. Bart threw me an alley-oop and everything (let's talk about missionary-convert connection though). Later we had to switch up the teams cause it was just bad haha. There was one girl playing with them, and she was definitely the best player they had. She plays for Warsaw University. Next time we play, she's gonna have her whole team come for a rematch haha! It was sweet though, they all want to meet us again, and the one girl actually wants to learn about the church! Sports rule!
We're talking about the upcoming transfer with President now. It looks like I'm gonna be staying as AP in Warsaw for now, but we'll see. I really hope I get to stay here till the end, but a break from the leadership stuff would be kinda nice to end the mission on fire. We'll see what happens!
I've got a request! Last week I had a dream that I went to Disneyland in a suit, and that made me realize that we're not gonna get to go to Disneyland before BYU! So I was wondering, would it be possible to go straight from the airport to Disneyland, ride a ride, and get a corndog before going home? We could make the dream a reality? It could make for a pretty classic picture haha.
Haha things are going great for us right now, we're loving the work. I hope you guys have an awesome week, that everyone feels better soon, and that Girl's Camp will be a success! Love you Mom!
Elder Haskett

Monday, June 5, 2017

The crew

Church

June 4th

Hey Mom!
Haha I can't believe it's June either, summer is already here! It's so nice though haha, we were getting pretty tired of the cold. Pres wants us to try studying outside the apartment, and one of the best options is in the parks. Not so fun when it's freezing haha!
The Lip Sync was a success! Haha nice work, it sounds like you kinda put the team on your back this year! I expect videos at some point. I'm hoping that the snowman costume was more fun than all the preparation haha. Either way, feel better soon! Have Noah go and get your Diet Coke today haha!
It was way fun to see the DeMordaunts yesterday! They were awesome haha, super fun, chill family, and made sure to get pictures for all the moms, and they brought some Kraft Mac n Cheese and Reeses. What more could you want? They're actually gonna be hooking it up again today, they're taking Elder Kriser and I to the Jewish History Museum and then out for lunch. Haha we're super excited, they're awesome!
Our week was pretty sweet. We were able to have a good bit of meetings with a lot of investigators. It's pretty crazy how busy we've been lately, it's almost hard to keep track of everyone. But it's been great, and our lessons have been sweet. We're working with one guy, trying to help him get a job. He's just a really humble dude, but he's had a lot of problems with work ever since he moved to Poland. This week we got the members involved, and they just took over! It's sweet, they just took him right in. Taking fellowshipping to the max haha.
Going back to what I said earlier about studying outside, basically the idea is to be seen by as many people as possible, as often as possible. We're working on getting our name out there, and we're specifically focusing on young people. Lately we've spent a ton of time on the Warsaw University campus. It's been pretty sweet, we've been talking to a ton of people that are just chill. Usually when we're out doing regular finding, we stop people on the street, and they want you to get to the point really quick. Lately we've basically just been chatting with people, and they get to know us and the Church, but we also get to know them. It's weird, cause most of them are about my age, and if we weren't missionaries, we could honestly be hanging out with some of these people. Just last week there was this girl playing the ukulele on the street and we sat down and talked for a while. Since she was playing the uke, it got a ton of people's attention, and we talked to a bunch of people that came over to listen. Same thing happened on Saturday, a guy was singing in front of the uni, and we just handed out flyers for our English class. A lot of people stuck around for a while, and we were able to have some cool conversations (plus we basically got a free concert, the guy was good haha).
Speaking of concerts, we are in for a treat this week! The Piano Guys are gonna be in Warsaw tomorrow, and Elder Kriser got us VIP tickets through family connections. President Turek is gonna be there too, and we even got to invite some investigators. It's honestly awesome, I can't believe we got so lucky! We're going to a concert with our Mission President!
This week Elder Kriser and I got started on a thing called the Bring Sally Up pushup challenge. We're doing it twice a day. It's pretty brutal, you should have the boys try it haha!
That's pretty much all I got this week, love you Mom! Once again, feel better soon!
Elder Haskett

Monday, May 29, 2017

May 28th

Hey Mom!
It's kinda funny how often the scriptures show us how things work, how we gain our testimonies, and how often we usually miss it haha. The natural follow-up to feeling the Spirit is trying to share it. That's how God's love works, He doesn't just pour it all into one person, and that's the end haha, it's meant to be passed on. I think that's part of what Moroni is getting at when he says "sincere desire" and "real intent" in chapter 10. The real intent means that you're gonna act on the testimony you receive, meaning keeping the commandments and sharing the gospel. Cool lesson from the missionaries!
So our week was pretty much nuts. I'll start with the big one, the Elder Andersen meeting! Wednesday morning, we talked with security, got the logistics of the meeting set up and then pretty much just waited for him to arrive. Turns out he got caught in traffic and was late by about an hour. Haha, happens to the best of us apparently! The meeting for the missionaries was really cool though. Elder Andersen is a BOSS! He was super real with us, chill, funny, and obviously just a spiritual giant. 
There's three parts I'd like to share. 
1. I got roasted by an Apostle of the Lord. Let me explain haha. We were talking about changing the way the mission thinks about baptisms, and Elder Andersen was like, "Where are my assistants?" Elder Kriser and I pretty tentatively raised our hands, haha. Then he asked how many baptisms we've had this year. And I had no clue haha! I took a total shot in the dark and went for 16 (and I was right! Holy Ghost!). I guess he could hear the hesitation in my voice, but he took it for embarrassment, and was like, "Elder Haskett, there's nothing to be ashamed of!" Then he turns to the other missionaries and is all like, "Listen to him, '16, sorry'" and we all laughed. Then later, he asked us what kind of goals we'd like to have as a mission for monthly baptisms. I brought up the fact that we'd set the goal of 121 in the year, so about 10 a month would do it, and I gotta say, I did not expect the reply I got haha. He was like, "Alright, let's be real, we're averaging about 3 a month so far. 10 would be nice, but that's not gonna happen for a while. You set goals to grow, not be perfect all at once!" It was pretty cool. He was super spiritual, super faithful, but also super realistic. It was so different from what they tell you in the MTC, or in the worldwide missionary broadcasts. He was real, and made everything he said sound really possible. He finished that segment with a promise, that we might not get 121 baptisms within this year, but guaranteed that there are easily 121 people to find this year that will be baptized someday. It was good to look at it from that perspective.
2. The next thing I wanted to share was just some of the things that were said that hit me pretty hard. 
-"Every mission in the world is different, in some places it is definitely harder to grow the Church than in others. But regardless of where you are, it is never going to be easy. It is always hard. We aren't here to talk about what is hard. We talk about what we can do, and what we are going to do, now." Cool little thought. It does nothing for you to dwell on your circumstances or problems, all you can do is work, and try to make it better.
-"Try to answer your own prayers." That was an interesting line to hear from a General Authority. He said it and then moved on. I thought about it a lot. God does everything on His own timetable. We know that we have to do our part, and that He'll do the rest. But how can we be sure how much of it is our part? We'll never know until it happens. Act, act, and act until you get the job done, and then look back to see what God has done to make it all possible.
-"No matter what your goal is for baptisms, or lessons, or whatever, the fact remains that it is going to take an enormous amount of faith to grow the Church in Poland. Even if the goal is one baptism a month mission-wide, it will take miracles for that one baptism to happen. The same thing goes for 10." We believe in miracles, and every little conversion, every step in the right direction is a miracle in it's own right.
3. Lastly has to do with a major change in plans haha. During the meeting we started talking about the meeting for the members later that night. The missionaries were not supposed to be there, and Elder Andersen was like, "You know, I'd really like for them to come. Do what you gotta do to make that happen". Welp. What an Apostle says, goes haha. We cancelled all the missionaries trains, and then I was in charge of making sure that everybody got dinner, a toothbrush, and a place to sleep. You'd better believe that was a hot mess haha. Dinner was at a grocery store, and then we had about 10 missionaries to an apartment for the night before everybody could catch their trains in the morning. The missionaries weren't in their apartments until about 1 in the morning haha.
It was worth it though! The member meeting was awesome. I got a chance to shake Elder Andersen's hand, and then talk a little more about our goals. He told me, "Elder Haskett, I want you to do me a favor and prove me wrong". Haha I wasn't expecting that, but I'm going for it! We already have 8 planned baptisms for the month of June! Right after our little chat, a member who's not exactly all there ran up to him and started talking to him about a bunch of sketchy stuff. We're talking about visions for the Church, fortune-tellers, voodoo doll stuff. Things started getting pretty weird, and before I knew it I was a human shield for an Apostle, while he got away haha. Wild!
That's all for Elder Andersen though! The rest of the week was good. The sister's investigator asked me to baptize her on Saturday! It was really cool. She's solid, and we're actually gonna start meeting with her friend that came to the service. The next day we set a baptismal date of our own for the 17th of June. It's been a really cool transfer. We went through and found that we're meeting with about 16 serious people right now. It's been a serious blessing.
The home plans sound good! We'll make it work! I can't imagine I'm actually gonna want to go to the orientation stuff, but I guess we'll see haha. We'll worry about it later. I do want to make sure to see Val that Tuesday night though before we go up to Provo!
Thanks for taking care of the driver's license! That'll be huge, now we don't have to go spend our one day at the DMV! Thanks!
Love you Mom, have an awesome week!
Elder Haskett

Monday, May 22, 2017

Summer finally


Food


Friends


Skype


Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day Mom! Love you so much! It was so good talking to you guys today! I can't believe that the next time we see each other, it'll be face to face! Time really has flown. It's been a real ride haha! 
Take care this week, love you!
Elder Haskett

May 21st

Our week was honestly awesome. Started off strong, with the Skype call on Monday. That night, we started our first ZL exchange with Elders Alvarez and Rowley. It was really fun, we got to teach English at a university together, and we also had a bunch of meetings set up. The next day we taught our own English class, which was cool, cause like all of the students said that they'd come to the meeting with Elder Andersen! That night, Elders McMaster and Reid came in for their exchange. We spent the entire next day with them. 
First thing, I passed my driver's test that morning! Haha it was kinda weird, everything was directly translated from Polish to English, so it was a little tough to understand, but we made it through haha. I am officially street legal. One more thing about that, I got an email of a receipt for a CA DMV Driver's License renewal? I wasn't sure if you did that, or if me getting my Polish license changed something?
The rest of the day we had an activity where we met this really cool girl from Saudi Arabia who spoke phenomenal English. We talked a while, and she actually came to church! Then we baked some cookies to take to some less-active families in the branch, which turned out to be an inspired activity. One of the people we visited had passed away, and we gave the cookies to them as a condolence. We also met another family that I had never even met before. The husband and daughter were baptized about 16 years ago, and stopped coming for one reason or another. We spent a really long time talking about all the problems they had, different doubts that kept them from having faith, and honestly just got to know one another. It was a really cool meeting. They're gonna come to the Andersen meeting as well. We'll see what happens!
The next day we dropped them off and had a lesson right away with an investigator. President Turek was on the lesson. It went really well, naturally haha. President is just a boss. He's gonna come to the lesson next week as well. After that we picked up Elders Liechty and Sommerfeldt for our last exchange! Spent the day with them mostly handing out pass-along cards. The next morning we had sports like usual. I scored a pretty gnarly goal from midfield that hit the upper left post. I also took a shot from one of the other elders that put me out of commission for about 15 minutes... At the end of the day we had this activity in the chapel. We basically just had a ton of members there that invited everybody on the street in to talk to us. About 45 people came in, and we were able to teach and talk with a ton of them. A bunch of really cool people want to start meeting in the future!
Yesterday was interesting. First of all, Kris fed us again! He's honestly the best. Super cool guy. He introduced us to a friend that might start taking the lessons! We also had an interview with a book writer that's been trying to write a book about Mormons for the last 3ish years. It was cool, I'm gonna be excited to get a hold of that book haha!
You'd be proud of me this week, we cooked like mad! I kinda made up a recipe for a goulash that tasted awesome. We did a mexican food night, made some chinese, some pasta, and topped it all off with your maple glazed salmon recipe! It was so good haha. We're gonna go for it again this week since we have some leftovers haha.
Super excited for the Elder Andersen meeting this Wednesday! I'll be sure to tell you all about it!
Love you Mom!
Elder Haskett

Monday, May 8, 2017

May 7

I can't believe I forgot to add this! On May 24th, Elder Anderson from the Quorum of the 12 is coming to Warsaw! All the missionaries are gonna come in for a mission conference! We're working with President on the planning, which means that we're probably gonna get to spend some time with him! Super cool!
Love you!

May 8th

Hey Mom!
I guess we can start with all the Mother's Day stuff! First of all, I'm way excited to see you guys too! Monday works fine, President said that we're good to go. We can definitely do 6:30 your time. I guess as a warning though, President wants everybody to keep their Skype calls to a half hour. Sorry! We'll pack as much in as we can!
Glad to hear that you guys got all freshed up for the cruise haha. "Matching sweat suits, flip flops, necklaces, nails, and sunglasses to name a few items" makes it sound like you are gonna be a pretty easy group to spot on that boat haha. Should be way fun. Let me know how it goes!
Noah told me about the APUSH exam, haha going to the midnight premier of Guardians the night before probably wasn't the best way to prepare, but hey, you do what you gotta do! I'm sure he killed it, same as the ACT.
I still can't believe it's already May! The boys are gonna be finishing up school soon, then it's time for summer and all that jazz. Then I get home! Ahh it's still so weird for me. Once again, I don't have a concrete time for you guys, but I'll let you know as soon as we find out.
Life is good over here still. I'm super tired after last week, and a particularly intense soccer game on Saturday didn't help haha. It's cool though, we got a ton of work done. Being AP without the trio has been a little different, but good. I will say, it's a lot easier to figure out cooking now. I made it a goal to get creative this transfer, and so far I've already figured out how to make Chinese food and made up a  pretty dope pork taco recipe. One of these days throwing things into a pan and hoping it works is gonna bite me in the butt, but we're doing good so far!
Our investigators are doing well! Since Elder Bebel and Einfeldt left behind all the people they'd met here to me, I've made it a primary focus to build good relationships in the last few days and I think it's going pretty well. One of the guys that we're meeting with fasted this week for a baptismal date, and he's thinking the last week of May! Awesome!
Right now I'm interviewing with a news reporter and a writer about the Church and life as a missionary. It's been kinda weird and official, they record everything and have witnesses present and all this stuff, but it's really cool. There's gonna be something in the newspaper, on the news, and then a book written by this pretty famous religious writer pretty soon here, so we're hoping to use the opportunity to spread the Church around in new ways. We'll see what happens!
Elder Kriser and I are doing great. He's adjusting to the new responsibility pretty fast, and has a great attitude about it all. We're hoping to make some big things happen this transfer.
Love you Mom! I'll see you next week!
Elder Haskett

Monday, April 24, 2017

April 23

Other than that, there was Poznań this week. Cool little city, and I got to spend some time with Elders McMaster and Rowley, as well as meet Elders Groseclose and Dickson. Good guys, we had some fun. During a finding activity, we met this guy from Florida who was like super hyped to meet other Americans. He kept saying "It's been so long since I've gotten to speak English with anyone, let's hang out!" and we kept saying, "Dude, you could talk to American missionaries for the rest of your life here if you came to church every week!". He was a funny guy haha, he was wearing Nike Pro Combat shorts with a matching shirt. He said it's the warmest stuff he owned, since he's from Florida. I believed him, considering he was also wearing socks and sandals. That night we ordered 4 large pizzas for the 3 of us. It was a pretty awesome exchange.
On the way back we had a miracle! As I got on to the train, I noticed that some lady was sitting in my seat, and my first thought was, 'oh great, I'm gonna have to tell this lady to get up'. When I got closer I saw that it was the cousin of the less-active family that we'd been working with! She randomly happened to decide to come in to Warsaw that day to look for some work, and we just happen to be on the same train, in the same wagon, in the same row. Insane. We talked for the 3 hour ride about pretty much everything. She immediately said, "I know this is a miracle. I was nervous about the job search, so I prayed for help. Ten minutes later you sat next to me on the train!" It was honestly so cool. She is going to be returning to Warsaw in about a month to stay, and then she wants to start meeting with us! 
Next week is gonna be interesting. With transfers coming up, it'll be really busy, and add that to the fact that Elders Einfeldt and Bebel are out of here, we're in for a lot of fun haha. Should be something. Starting it all off right though at the trampoline park tonight haha,
That's pretty much all I got this week, we don't have a ton of time today! Love you Mom!
Elder Haskett