Week 84: YSA

My Epic Zone

Hey everyone!

I'm having a hard time figuring out how to start this email, so I'm just gonna start. 

I might've mentioned this place before, but it's worth mentioning again, but there's this Mexican market off 1200 W in Orem that has a chicken taco place and it's so good. They have a family chicken meal where you get a whole rotisserie chicken and as many tortillas as you want, with rice and salsa too. Between the 4 of us, it's like $6 each, but the place is kind enough to give it to us for free cuz we're missionaries. But still, I'd pay for a deal like that cuz I ate like 8 tacos. It's a beautiful place. 

Elder Barney and I got to do a couple baptismal interviews this week. There's 2 other YSA areas in our zone, so it's cool to interview someone my age, or even younger than me too. The guy I interviewed was named Daniel, and he moved here to Orem from LA before his senior year of high school. After going to UVU for a bit and spending lots of time with members of the Church, he decided it was time to meet with the missionaries, and after about a month of being taught he decided to get baptized! He was super smart and really knew his stuff. Missionaries are supposed to go over the questions with them beforehand anyway, so people getting interviewed aren't usually caught off-guard. I always say that the most important interview question (which isn't actually one of the listed questions) is, "Do you want to get baptized?" If they can answer yes to that, then everything else will come over time.  

Thursday we had zone conference, and it was yet another banger. President Evanson taught a lot about how to teach the plan of salvation better, and I definitely had my mind blown a couple times. Always a good thing to happen at zone conference. Clarified a lot of things about the Fall of Adam and Eve and the resurrection. I got to say goodbye to some of my homies that are going home soon too. This mission has shrunk a lot since pretty much everyone has gone to their original assignments, and almost everyone that comes in is an OG and there's not very many that do. I'm grateful that I could serve in this mission while it was really big, because I always think having more people is more fun, and it's the best mission ever.

We've also finally got some new people to teach or at least try to start teaching too. So many of the people we were teaching just ghosted us, completely disappeared, or have only texted us back to cancel. We just started teaching a guy named Adrian though. He runs track for UVU, and we met him through his next door neighbor, the Elders Quorum President. When we went to his place on Saturday he was cleaning out his garage, so we helped him with that for a while, then taught the Restoration. He was very appreciative that we just started helping him, so he was happy to sit down for a message. He's been getting invited out to stuff now, and lots of people already know him because he's lived there for a bit. He honestly doesn't show a lot of potential, but we're happy to just be homies. 

The cool thing about YSA is that the people you're teaching don't have to like be "being taught." You really can just be homies, and then their friends can help with the spiritual stuff too. It's not just us. Every Sunday one of our wards does a BBQ and Come Follow Me, and there are several nonmembers that come for the BBQ at the beginning that we get to meet because people just invite their friends.  

Elder Barney and I were sitting outside at a park for a sec one day and this older lady came up to us and started talking to us. She was visiting from Arizona, and she legit was saying things like "Oh serving in Utah would be so hard, and I've heard some missionaries serve in singles wards too! That would be so terrible." In my mind I was thinking "I'm about to end this man's career." Elder Barney and I legit had to convince her that we love serving here and that YSA is an area that people wish they were in in our mission. I thank the Lord every day for the wonderful place I get to serve. I love it here in Utah, and I think I'm gonna start loving it even more now that spring is here. 

I love you all!

Elder Snyder

This guy was my 2nd DL ever and I saw him at the Institute building

Leatherbonk's

Week 83: Donny's with the President

MLC and Chick-fil-A

Hey everyeone!

This was a great week. I think I always start these off with boring things like the weather, so why should this week be any different? I'm beginning to remember that UT spring isn't the release from winter everyone wants. It's more of an awkward phase out of winter. And then one day it's summer, which I'm very excited for (and don't call me trunky at that....)

But yeah, as the subject line suggests, we did in fact go to Don Joaquin's with President Evanson. He'd heard a lot about it, for better or for worse, so I invited him to come with us and he very much enjoyed it. It was fun to just chat with him over the yummiest tacos in the world. 

Things with Toby lately have been wack. He totally wanted to get baptized a few weeks ago, and he was on date a couple of times, but this week he told us that he moved to West Jordan! He said he stormed out on his roommates cuz he got mad at them, and is now living with a friend up there. He said he might be back in Orem soon though, but Toby never plans ahead very much so we just have to keep hitting him up for information like him moving haha. 

We had MLC this week too which was good. It was super long though, but the lunch was Chick-fil-a! They had those little squirt bottles of Chick-fil-a sauce and I rolled out of there with like 4 of them. Pretty epic. Also Elder Barney is converting me to Burger King. Not like from one thing to another, but just to the idea that Burger King can actually be good. What sold me was their 8-pc nuggets for $1.61. Or you can get 2 legit burgers for $5. The senior couple for our zone took us out to lunch at Kneaders one of these days, then when we got back in the car Elder Barney and I looked at each other and said, "I'm still hungry. Burger King?" Needless to say, Elder Barney and I get along great. 

I got to go on exchanges in my old area again too! I went with Elder Thompson and got to hit up some of the old member homie families. Some of them remembered me like immediately and they were like "ya know we were just talking about you!" Gotta love Vineyard. This is my 2nd time being a ZL over an area I used to serve in, and going back to pull up on the homies is always so fun. 

President also told us at Don Joaquin's that our mission got some tickets to go to General Conference in 2 weeks! He sent out an email about it too, but since I didn't read it, I didn't find out until President told us. He said he'd legit just have to decide who gets them and who don't. I jokingly asked him "So how're you gonna decide? Seniority?" and he said "Yeah probably." I was like "Epic." There's legit like 10 missionaries in this mission that have been out longer than me, and Sunday night we got an email saying Elder Barney and I are going to the Sunday afternoon session!! It will be epicccccc.

But yeah, YSA is so lit. We're always going to activities, classes, game nights, BBQs, and straight kickin' it and getting good work done. We meet lots of less-actives and nonmembers at these too and we just get to hang out with them which is cool. There's always food at these events too, cuz it's YSA haha. I'm having a grand old time as a missionary and it's been so good. 

Love you all!

Elder Snyder

Donny's with the President

Barney and Me

Saw Sonia Smith from the home stake on Sunday

This car was painted like Appa from Avatar

MLC

Week 82: Rock Me Amadeus

Zone Temple Trip

Hey everyone!

This was a long week, but also an epic week. It started off cold, but then towards the end got better. Today for pday was gorgeous, and we stayed busy too. We always finish our shopping by like 9am, and then we played pickleball for 2 hours, then had lunch at home, then lifted for like an hour, then played spikeball for another hour. Pretty great. 

Tuesday we got to go to the temple with our zone which was really great. It's always a good experience to feel the Spirit there, and it's a good bonding experience for the zone too. Afterward we went to Joe's Cafe on State St in Orem. It was very delicious, and we even got to meet Joe! I ordered Joe's omelet off the menu, and he came out with my food and yelled "Who's got my omelet??" across the whole diner. He was super funny and kept roasting one of the other Elders that was with us. 

Wednesday we got to have interviews with President Evanson, and then I went on an exchange with the Elders that cover the Orem Park stake. Their area has that huge apartment complex called Midtown 360 on State St in Orem, or as we call it in the UOM, the great and spacious building. We had a lesson with someone there and we went to the roof and took some pics there too. A very interesting view of Orem, but you could see all the way to BYU in Provo! First time I've been able to see it on my whole mission haha. 

I also went on exchanges with the Elders that cover the Orem YSA 2nd stake. Our area is the 1st stake. I went with Elder Davenport who is super cool and like the nicest person ever. He's from Payson, UT and is originally assigned to this mission but he has a lot of medical issues so he can't be too far away from home. It's awesome that he still gets to serve. 

This week was a little stressful getting everything together for what we thought was going to be 2 baptisms. Toby didn't end up getting baptized this week, but his will be this Saturday now. He's just been working a ton so we haven't seen him in a while. We still got everything together for Amadeus' baptism though! It went really well and was actually a really good baptism. Amadeus is one of the funniest people I have ever met. It's like unreal how funny he is. He seriously is like a cartoon character with just how animated he is and some of the stuff he says. While the ward mission leader was giving a talk on the Holy Ghost, the draining font started making a lot of noise, and it was pretty distracting, but Amadeus said "It's my sins going down the drain!" He's super outgoing and goes up and meets people in the ward by himself! We usually have to get some people to come and meet the people we bring, but Amadeus does it anyway! 

Sunday night we were planning on going to a Brad Wilcox devotional in Orem at one of the buildings by Costco. Some of the Elders in our zone asked us if they could leave their district so they could go, and we said only if we can come too haha. We thought it was going to be packed so we all got their pretty early. We all thought it was going to be a Brad Wilcox devotional, but it ended up being a concert for this choir of old ladies called the Chauntenettes, with Brad Wilcox giving a spiritual thought in the middle haha. He only spoke for like 20 minutes but it was really good. We got to meet him after too, and he actually remembered running into a group of missionaries at Mo Bettah's like a year ago, which was me! 

But yeah, life is good. The mission lately has been an absolute dream. It's been so much fun and I love it so much. Every bit. I was biking down State St in Orem on exchanges this week and couldn't stop smiling and kept thinking, "This is iconic." There literally is so much to be enjoyed about the mission. It's literally so fun. Parts of it I won't miss obviously, but parts of it I don't want to end. And the best part is that the message we share is the way to real happiness in life. An all-knowing Father in heaven is helping His children to live better lives and be protected from pain and suffering. He lays out His plans and His desires pretty clear. All we have to do is obey. Literally all of it is true. Every bit. 

Love you all!

Elder Snyder

Amadeus' Baptism

Iglesia

Back on a bike

On top of the Great and Spacious Building

Big B Willy

With Elder Barney at the Temple

Provo Temple from Midtown 360

Week 81: Its Not Quite Spring yet...

Elder Barney's Birthday celebration at Texas Roadhouse

Hey everyone! 

This was an epic week for sure. It started off with me thinking spring had legit sprung because it was like 66 out here. We had the windows down and I thinking winter was finally done, but then it snowed by the end of the week and I was like bruh 

We had a couple fire lessons with Amadeus this week. He is one of the funniest guys I've ever met. He just has Elder Barney and I cracking up like the whole time. He's really smart and understands the scriptures really well. He has really good insights and doesn't really need a lot of explaining of things to him in the Book of Mormon. We had exchanges with the APs this week too, but since their area is a Spanish ward and neither Elder Barney or myself speak Spanish, all 4 of us worked in mine and Elder Barney's area. I went with Elder Stratton, who was actually my district leader way back in Lehi so it was cool to be on exchanges with him again. All 4 of us met with Amadeus that night and he had all 4 of us going. He's so funny, and he's so ready to get baptized. He's getting interviewed tonight and then he's getting baptized on Saturday, and he actually asked me to baptized him.

This week was also Elder Barney's birthday, so we ate good to say the least. We went to Leatherby's and he and I destroyed their biggest ice cream sundae. Then a couple days after that we went to Texas Roadhouse and I made sure the waitress had everyone give their loudest Texas hoot and holler for Elder Barney's birthday. They didn't get out the saddle though which was kinda sad. We also went to the Mexican market for chicken tacos too. 

Saturday and Sunday we had stake conference, and we were actually getting a new stake president so that was kinda cool. There was a general authority who spoke and he was from Nigeria. He gave really good talks both Saturday night and Sunday morning. Both very snowy meetings but very good meetings. It was weird only having 2 hours of church Sunday, cuz covering 11 wards we usually go to like 4 or 5 every Sunday. 

Pday today was really fun. Our homie Conner in one of our wards that goes to hair school in Provo did some haircuts for us for free, then we were gonna go lift like we've usually done on pday, but instead we went to the UVU Institute building and played some good pickleball. 

Everybody be asking me lately if I'm trunky when I say I've been out 19 months. I like to say I think I'm a healthy amount of trunky. There's an old legend of good ol' President Treadway saying, "If you've served a good and honorable mission, you'll be looking forward to going home and giving your mother a hug." So yeah, one day it'll be great to play pickleball more than just on Mondays, but for now I'm really enjoying myself. Elder Barney legit is so awesome and we're always laughing our heads off with each other. I love my area, I love my comp, I love my zone, I love Vineyard, and spring is coming too. So my mindset right now is along the lines of "ya know if it ain't broke....."

Love you all!

Elder Snyder

One of our Bishops has a indoor bball court in his basement

Held an ugly cat

Exchanges with Elder Stratton

Got to see Ropka again!

Leatherby's 

A sunrise for a change