**Tanner had to have a plantar wart removed off of the bottom of his foot last week. He is supposed to have the other foot worked on in the next couple of weeks.

This is what serious missionary work does to your feet.

The surgery went well. It is healing at a crazy ridiculous rate. I will send pictures soon, just forgot the camera today. I had a nickle sized hole in my left foot and it was a good couple inches deep. The hole is already filled up. Its not healed yet but the hole is filled in less than a week. Pretty crazy!! I have not even had any pain, even after the numbness wore off. Its uncomfortable to walk on so i have been wearing slippers haha pretty funny but hey no one has even said anything or if they did i just said I had surgery and then its all good!

This was a very long long week. Had surgery and then couldn't do a whole lot for a couple days. We worked and I just got yelled at the whole time for being out and on my foot. Oh well no problems with it and I'm fine! So don't worry! Still waiting for that get well soon package hahaha just kidding. I don't need anything I'm doing great.

 The rest of the weekend was spent mostly packing and cleaning the apartment. We visited some people in between but that apartment was wild! It has been a 4 man apartment for around 3 or 4 years so there was so much random junk!!

I have bad news :( because we were moving and I'm tight with the AP's they told me who was leaving this transfer. Klus is gone and I am staying here for another one. So basically I have a feeling I will be senior companion for the rest of my mission and the "easy life" is totally gone. No crutches, just me trying not screw up the freshly trained kids.

 I am very sad Klus is leaving me. He was really starting to come along. Open up and talk to people. Such a  good kid He is like a little brother to me. I am going to miss him and worry about him when he leaves.

Armies of the Lord?

I did realize something though. Well was thinking about it the other night. That God puts all these people and experiences in our way to shape and mold us, also to shape and mold other people. So it is my goal to always do what God wants. Be shaped and to shape and help others the way God wants me to. To "give and take" what God wants from me. Its not easy. My own selfish desires get in the way. I think we all struggle with that. I have said it many times before though God will always give us what we need not what we want. If we align our lives with God though we will understand and everything can be "easier" not easy but easier. The mission is not easy at all. It is simple though. Very direct and straight forward what we need to do what our job is and how to get it done. As "men" we get in the way of that and complicate it. Life is not that complicated either though when you think about it. Its when we make it a big deal that we get overwhelmed. One day at a time and it will all work out. I will be feeding myself my own advice all of this next Transfer.....Wish me luck!!!

Jared good job in California. Sorry you had a couple rough patches. Keep working though its going to be alright!

Glad you all got back safe. I love you

Dad consider getting a real GPS its so worth it. Trust me!!

ps... I also forgot to mention the crazy weather we had!! We had Tornado's warnings all Friday night. It was insane. Sirens going off all over. A Tornado touched down in the town next to us and there was all this warning going on people were hiding in shelters and everything. Then the storm shifted up north it was headed straight for us at full speed Tornados and everything then it just went north and the cold front dropped and took most the momentum with it so the storm calmed big time, the only thing we got was tons and tons of rain that night it poured. The lighting stuff is really cool though its purple and lights up the whole sky and well its a little bit scary when they announced to seek shelter Klus and I went on our deck to watch it. He said he was pretty worried I just thought it was cool! haha we all survived didn't even have to hide in the bath tub!!!

I really am not a huge fan of the South, I'll be honest... I'll stick my my west coast weather please!

Love Elder Charlesworth

Papa Bear

This week was really slow. Elder Klus was very, very sick with the flu or something like that. So we spent almost the whole week in the apartment. We did get out a little bit are were able to do some service for the L Family. We painted the walls that we sanded a couple weeks ago, We did it green and brown it actually looks really good!

 

Just a Warning this one will probably be really short. It was a very tolling last couple days. I'll explain why.

After Elder Klus started feeling a bit better we went to church. It was a pretty decent Sunday, very calm the usual slow Sunday (especially with 5 hours of church) During Sunday school Aunt R texted us and said the Papa bear (her dad Gene) still was not feeling better from last night. He was Parkinsons and Lou body Demensia. He said he was feeling really dizzy, he didn't get up until 12 pm he is normally awake at 4am. So we told her we would leave the second class was over. We ran over there and he just didn't look right. Aunt T started to clean out his ears with peroxide to help make him not so dizzy. Soon after she finished his eyes glazed over and I knew instantly what it was from seeing Brennen have them so much, he went into a seizure. It only lasted about 2 minutes until he fully came out of it. The first thing he said when that happened was "where's my boys at?" he calls us missionaries his boys. We called an ambulance and they were going to take him to the Rome hospital about 25 miles away then R said oh shoot he can't go there, if he gets there and realizes his missionaries are not there he will flip. He needs his boys.

We got there shortly after he had got into a room and there we stayed until late that night. He has never had a seizure before so they are trying to figure out what caused it. All the tests have come back with nothing so far.

 

Even after all this has happened G is still in there making us all laugh our heads off. He is so witty at times, its so funny. We sure love our Papa Bear.

 

The Hospital did bring some very interesting experiences though. We walked out into the waiting room to let a couple more people go in to visit him. The first thing we see and hear when we walk out is a doctor trying to talk to two spanish guys. He asked if they speak english and he said "no" so I said "hey I speak spanish" the Doctor got kinda freaked out like what the white kid speaking spanish? So I translated for him. His hip joint hurt so bad he couldn't walk and he has not had an injury to cause it. As we were sitting in the waiting room still, they got called up to check in so iasked if they wanted help again. The kid who was hurt has been here from Guatemala for less than two months, he  speaks zero english.

 

We started walking back towards the room when a guy grabbed us and asked what church we were from. We told him and he asked if we could say a prayer with his wife. A horse had fallen on her and she shattered her ankle. She said the horse hit a ditch and then just rolled on her. She told us she needed our help real bad because she has 3 kids to take care of that are in elementary school. She asked for a blessing. We explained the two parts and what the priesthood is and then gave her a blessing. Its interesting to me how people turn to God mostly in time of need. We are all guilty of it. Something goes wrong then its "oh,hey I need help, I guess I'll start praying, start relying no God now" He will always help us no matter how much we have not looked to him leading up to that time of need. She thanked us and we went on out way to get back to G.

 

The hospital was a great experience despite what took us there. We went by to see him this morning and he had been telling all the nurses about us starting at about 6 am he says "the men in black will be here soon" "those are my boys" "they call me Papa Bear" He is such a strong saint. He is doing well and he is ready to get out of the hospital as of last night. He is such a brute.

Spreading the "light of the Gospel?"

Cute cake made by a member

Keep Papa Bear in your prayers please. And Elder Klus, he goes in for an Echo Cardiogram today. He has been having chest pains really bad and based on his family health history they want to make sure its nothing serious.

We are doing good though.He is not sick anymore and we are still working hard (well trying too, this week was rough) it is so much harder to stay in the apartment all week than it is to work all week. Working is so much better.

 

Love you all, Jared go kick some butt in Cali at that meet of yours. Tell him he had better win so I can brag about him!!

Send my love to everyone

Love Elder Charlesworth

 

I think I am beginning to see a trend here.

This last week was so long. So aggravating. A lot of things happened. A lot of things that I can't really go into detail with.

It was a great week, a hard week, But really good.

 We had those up and down moments. Someone we have been working a lot decided that life was too hard and that smoking and drinking are something they needed. So we did everything we could to help. After a very long hard day I hit my knees. Prayed honestly like I never have prayed and My prayers were answered. It was a very spiritual and uplifting experience. Very personal as well. Last week at this point seems so far away I am having trouble remembering everything that happened. Cartersville is just one big blur as soon as that week passes it just thrown into the Cartersville Pile in my mind haha.

 

Yea! It's a package from home

We made a big "quit smoking pack" for some one else we have been working with a lot. We got a ton of tic tacs, life savers and made 40 signs that say "today I decide to not smoke" and made a GIANT poster board one. Slowly but surely she started cutting back. Some days are better than others but slowly and surely she progressively cutting back. Today (Wednesday) she called us over and handed me her last pack that only had 4 smoked out of it and she said take them I don't want them. Get them out of here. A lot of things lead up to this. We had the chance this week to give like 5 blessings. Each one was very powerful. That is one of my favorite things to do. You are able to feel God's love for that person. One blessing stood out to me the most. It was for the lady we made the stop smoking pack for. She asked for help. She was having a really rough time with a lot of things in her life. The blessing was so powerful, and since then she has really started to cut back.

 

I have always said you know God loves you when He answers your prayers, You know god trusts you when you are the answer to someones prayers. Helping people and making even just a little  difference makes all of these rough hard times here so worth it. Every day is rough, every day also has an experience that gets me through it.

 

I hope every one is doing great. Sorry its so short Just too much to talk about and not enough time.

Love you all

 Lots of ups and downs in Cartersville

Love Elder Charlesworth

Just one of those weeks

Everyone has those weeks that when it gets to the end you go "finally, end of the week is here this week sucked" well this was one of those weeks. It was not horrible, nothing terrible happened, that is it though. NOTHING happened good or bad.
I was still pretty sick all week. So working was tough. We started working early in the day everyday and kept working to no avail. No one was home or no one would open the door. We had a Car Fast on the 1st and I will be honest these are kind of pointless for Spanish Elders, but we do them anyways. No Hispanics are home during the day. It started poring rain as we were walking. I made a list of about 30 or so people to go see and well one person opened the door and the Lady we were looking for was "in the shower" I don't think people realize how unoriginal that is. Just tell us you don't want us to come by that's all it will take. Two people did stop and ask to gives us a ride tho one of them was a random guy, not even a member he was trying to do a good deed. We were at the street we were a block away from the street we were going to knock so we declined but thank him so much for being nice haha.

And thus the week continued no one was home, couldn't get any appointments. No one returned calls. We did have a high light of the week though. A girl in the English Cassville ward that I am over got baptized. I did the interview on Thursday and it went great. She said " I feel like I was prepared by God for this church" and I said "yes, I know you were." She had already told her job she can't work on Sundays. The baptism went really well. We showed up and then they asked us to teach the restoration. Well I have never really taught that in English, but I think it went pretty well. Elder Klus and I did a decent job. He then bore his testimony of joining the church only a year and a half ago. The girl who was getting baptized, her parents were there and I think it really made a difference to them. The spirit was very strong the whole time.

We have come to the conclusion that we do not have the support we thought we had for the Spanish members Yes I agree they should learn English, That however does not solve any problems for why they don't want to attend church right now. they just get nothing out of it other than taking the sacrament. I have a few ideas and have been asking members what the ward could to help them and what they could do to help them selves. They are getting a Spanish temple prep class going so that will be great. I have a few ideas that we are going to start doing these next couple weeks we will see how they go.

The week was tough, but we are doing good. We ended up getting a couple lessons and a new person to teach yesterday. Hopefully this week will be a little easier for us. If not oh well we will work anyways. Klus is really starting to come out of his shell in lessons. He will do good. I know it. It just takes time. We have fun together and get along great so it will be really good once he really opens up. He has a hard time getting comfortable around new people, Especially in Spanish. He is making progress though. Love the Kid.

I hope everyone is doing great at home. I miss you all.
Love Tanner

First week as Senior

Some good hard work feels goods

Elder Klus,I think

I'm officially senior companion. It does make things a little easier to be senior and District Leader.
This week was both really good and really hard. After Elder Klus got his stuff in the house I said okay lets get to work. I didn't even let him unpack. I felt kinda bad but we had stuff to do.
 Thursday we went over to A and had a really good lesson about Jesus and the second coming. We had to be a little fast because we had an appointment to help La Familia Lopez sand the sheet rock in the new addition to their house. I asked A son A if he wanted to come help us. He was very excited, in fact the other two boys there

wanted to come as well. Wish we could have taken all of them. A had a great time and we saw them again the next day and he said he had a good time. He also said he wants to come to church with us and be baptized. He is such a great kid.
 We had a really good lesson with Los L as well. Their dad is not a member and has never listened to a lesson before. He just walked in on his own and listened to what we were teaching the kids about.

Saturday was one of those days. We started working early that day. I was determined to find some old investigators and maybe a couple new people. First we couldn't find an address (it didn't exist) and then no one was home. Out of about 8 people we were trying to locate no one was home (a couple just wouldn't open the door) We did have a great lunch with la Familia J.
 The last two days I have been fighting a horrible Head Cold ( pretty sure its a sinus infection) so on top of this day getting tougher and tougher i felt worse and worse. We kept working though. I started calling people trying to set up appointments and it was Friday night so no one was home. So we hit the streets starting going through the area book. No one was home. So I said Elder Klus lets pray. We prayed where we needed to go. A name came to find and so we went. They had moved and the number we had was for some white lady. So we tried it again. Prayed. A name came to mind.... and no one was home. So we kept trying to find some people. Well nothing happened. No one was home or they had moved.  Rough day.
 Woke up the next day feeling just as sick. Didn't wanna get up or move but fought through it and we got to work. Started the day with Stake conference. It was a broadcast from Salt Lake with Elder Gonzalez someone form the primary and bishop rick and Elder Ballard. The wards had not set up a Spanish room which is very frustrating some times it feels like they just don't care about the Spanish members. Me and Jaime translated. Its so hard to do. White people talk so fast I can't keep up. La Familia M that We have been teaching since I go here finally came to church. They are members who moved here from Chicago and they had not been to church in a very long time. We tried going over a couple times this week and they were not home. So they showed up to church by taking a taxi and they came at 9. They didn't know it was stake conference. I felt bad but they were there so we set up an appointment for that night. We taught the plan of salvation. I think it was a big eye opener for her. She couldn't remember a lot of it. She is determined to start coming back to church now and wants us to help them start Family home evenings. We got on LDS.org and showed her all the temples. Hopefully that will be there next goal.
 We ended finding a couple people on Sunday that we tried finding Saturday it was a good day, just a very long one. Its interesting I thought for sure the praying would work. I don't think it was a lack of faith. Its just funny how when we pray for something and then God gives us what we need not what we want. Rough days like that only make you stronger. It only makes your roots grow deeper and well we will have more hard ships to face and they will be easier, or because we made it through the last one we know it will turn out okay and we will be fine. Just trust in the Lord.
Still can't believe I'm senior already. Elder Klus is really shy(only around new people and lessons) and does not like to talk he has only been out 4 months. I hope I don't screw him up. haha. Its hard not having someone else to fall back on in a lesson. He will talk if I turn to him and said Elder Klus will explain this. He will learn though I promise that. I will make sure of it. He is such a bear, I love him. We get a long great he's from Oakley. We like all the same stuff. We have fun. Its going to be great.


Guppy thanks for the video I loved it!! you have not teeth where did they all go?
Miss you all... Love Elder Charlesworth
*** Here is the link to see the video that Kaydie made for Tanner. She taped this all on her own.
http://youtu.be/oeiRol9c3SQ

Last Week of Transfer

Tanner's version of Plan of Salvation

Birthday cupcakes for a "mom"

It was a really good week. We were really busy. Teaching all week. It was very strange having an English elder with us. Had an extra companion with us for 10 days. We still had to work his area and ours so it got tricky at times but turned out great.
We had a great lesson with M and her family we took a member with us. Brother Q. He speaks spanish so it really helps us out. He is crazy bold though. He told her. There is only one true church on earth and the catholic church is not it.( this was right after she said she is catholic and didn't   want to change) He then explained that there are great people in the other churches that are trying to do good. and that she is fantastic and has a great family they just were not in the true church. Then he invited her to come to his house for dinner and a lesson and it was all going great to plan that Sunday until sister Q got sick and then M ended up not coming to church anyways. Next week though.

We got calls for Transfers on Saturday that we needed a ride. Then Monday they said that Benedict is out and I was staying here and staying DL. Well he has been here 7 and a half months so it was hard for him to leave. My poor new comp is going to get torn apart by aunt Randi she dislikes new missionaries and is so mean to them (she says I threw her off guard and she really likes me so I got lucky) she won't talk to or even acknowledge new missionaries. Poor new comp. haha

I had to speak in church on Sunday. This ward likes me for some reason I keep having to do stuff in it haha. And now Beni is gone so I will have to do everything. I am Senior Companion now. At  7 months (that never happens in spanish) My new Companion is Elder Klus he is from Oakley I served by Him In Chamblee. I loved him then so we are gonna get along great! He had a class with Alisha his Freshman year. Funny huh!!

So this will be a great transfer. Just harder I will be doing most the talking and teaching and DL and all that cool stuff. But Iwill learn a lot so that is great. Looking forward to it.

Hope everyone's week went great.
Love Elder Charlesworth
pictues (The cupcakes I made for Cronweld's mom's Birthday, The plan of salvation pics i made)

Craziest Week Ever

I don't even know where to start. This week was out of control!! To start things off I went on exchanges with Cassville Elders, Elder F went here with Benedict and then I went with S to his area. We went and ate dinner at a Less actives house who's son just decided he needed to go on a mission. We ate GIANT shrimp and you all know how much i love sea food, especially shrimp they were like the size of my hand i wish i would have taken a picture!! Then things went back to normal for a couple of days well like one DAY.

 Friday I had to go down to Peach Tree city for a Training meeting so I slept over at the zone leaders house with Elder Wood my first comp. He is a district leader in Rome the next town over about 25 miles away. We all stayed up way to late talking and catching up we woke up at six and left at six thirty and drove to Acworth to meet another District Leader and get a ride down with a member in that ward, GUESS WHAT?? I met Santa Clause!! The man who drove us is a real Santa Clause he does stuff for the biggest malls in America has posters up in malls around the world, he is like the real deal, Beard, Tummy, Everything! So he told us about being Santa the WHOLE two hours down to Peach Tree which was interesting but he talked sooo much haha. That was not all the craziness. During our meeting President Gonzalez from the 70 decided to show up to our meeting and teach us a little bit. (general authorities can do whatever they want) so after a meeting that went from 9 to 4 we left with the APs to do a few errands. I never want to be AP that would suck, so much errand running, dealing with stupid missionaries, so not for me!! We ran around town for awhile and then finally about 7 we left for home again, The APs had to come up because of some crazy stuff that went down in my District.

I've known it was possible for awhile but it finally happened. This Elder in my district had to go home for some medical issues which cause an ET (emergency transfer) to happen in my District. Elder Foote went to another district his companion came with me and Benedict (he is english so he just sits there and says nothing, poor guy) and another elder came up to file the Elder who left spot. Its been a crazy one let me tell you!

 I talked C into coming up for the long weekend,s one drove all the way back up from Athens (3 hours away) so its been a good weekend none the less, got some lessons in, taught A. That Lady just totally gets it. Her boyfriend won't listen to us at all, or even listen to her. He asked her why she reads this book (BOM) because its not the bible and she said because it teaches me abut Christ more, it only teaches me good things, how could it be bad then she tried to read it to him and he left the room. she was telling us how people need to pay attention to us, she says she knows how hard we work and how ignorant and rude people are that we get doors slammed in our face and etc. but that what we are doing is good and she will keep investigating because she loves learning! she just gets it, she is so awesome!!! I love teaching her because she reads, and she says if she does not understand something she reads it again, she is already in 2nd Nephi on her own, we have not put any pressure on her at all. She Is the best!

 We were informed yesterday at church we were doing a youth fireside for the Cassville Ward( Elder F forgot to tell us before he left)

so we went over, they had us share where we were before the mission and what influenced us to get on the mission. It was really good, we took two prospective elders with us, C and J they both loved it. They also did a question panel they all wrote a question and then then we pulled it from a bowl and answered it. It was actually a lot of fun. I hope that it helped some of the youth.

So right now I am still exhausted from this hectic week and so glad its P-day! Time to Dormirme thats for sure.

I did have a pleasant surprise this week, the Dustin's from home took us to BBQ street(way good place) thanks to an email sent to them they knew i was really close (thanks mom) it was a lot of fun chatting with them. Talked about his mission, whats going on here with our mission and just about random stuff. It was such a good breathe of air after the crazy week, just got to unwind and eat the Spare ribs and Big Sweet potato (you know i love those) it was great! 

Giddy to see Elder H

  A fantastic dinner with the Dustins, Elder Benedict and Saavedra

"what's up guys?"