June 22 My body is much better now!!

Drew and his favorite book buddy...

Well, this week we were not able to find 5 new people to teach... We did a lot of service and trying to find people to teach, like tracting and street contacting and just asking around but didn't get anyone that was super interested. Normally we get at least one person who lets us in and is willing to hear what we have to share. But that's okay. We still got to help random people move boxes to and from U-hauls and bring groceries in and all that random good stuff that we do.


We coordinated with our Ward Mission leader this past Wednesday and we set up a missionary oriented activity for July 10th at 6:30 PM. We came up with an activity where you watch a movie and have s'mores. We named it Meet the S'Mormons, but we later came to find out that our Ward mission leaders wife didn't like the name so it just got changed to Meet the Mormons +dessert night... I am still bummed we didn't get to keep the name but it will always be that name in my heart. So wish us luck on that activity!!!

We are bringing Cole Nimmo (A young man going to Maputo Mozambique on his mission) out with us teaching. He taught 2 lessons to investigators and helped us with service! he is a great kid and i know he will rock it out there in Africa!

A big highlight from my week was just being a good person to the community. We didn't get to teach a lot of lessons about Jesus Christ, but we were great examples of Him. That is my favorite part about the gospel actually. I enjoy being a righteous/honest example of Jesus Christ way more than knocking on peoples doors asking them if they would like to hear a message about Him. I love to serve people and i know this quality will stick with me forever. Even after the mission.

That is it for this week. Our baptismal dates are Joan B**** and Tyler D**** on July 11th.

All Smiles,

Elder Dahlberg

A cool fish pond behind Joan's house.

  

On a hike for P-day

June 15 Nasty medical Issues this week...

As you can see from the subject of this message, i got something called a hemorrhoid! Its been a pain in the butt!! HAHA get it! Well all im going to say is that its really gross and you can research it on google to get more information if you would like. Also, Elder Gray got some sort of Poison Ivy on his arm and it spread to his head and legs and stomach and it got really really bad. Bad enough that we went to Urgent Care to get it checked out. Now he is on literal steroids to help his body fight this rash/problem.

Elder Gray's Poison Ivy Rash...

(We'll be grateful that he didn't send a picture of HIS problem.   hahaha)










This past Tuesday Elder Gray and I attended a big Mission Leadership Training and learned more about becoming successful and effective leaders, not only in the mission, but in life. I really liked that meeting despite it going from 9am-5pm. One principle i  learned a lot about was delegation of a job or assignment. I learned how to extend an invitation to someone to do something without it being a commandment that must be done or ELSE! I learned how to delegate effectively and simply so that the job can get done in good timing and having the job be well done.

I was also able to host an exchange with a district leader named Elder Poe. We got along so great because we both come from similar backgrounds. We had the same amount of siblings and same desires in life. So we did a lot of great teaching together and we learned a lot from each other. We had a member meal that taught us how to cook plantains, (those gigantic banana like things you see in Latin America) After frying it 2 times and adding salt and dipping it into maple syrup it tasted okay.... So that goes to show how tasty it is before all that unhealthy stuff.

They climbed a rock that had a good view of Manchester...

On Saturday we helped a member of our ward move a bunch of furniture out of her house so that it could be ready to be sold. And we invited one of our investigators named Tyler D**** who is a single guy and he came to help us in that project! It was great being able to serve alongside of him. We currently have a baptism date set for Tyler of July 11th. So we hope that he can prepare himself to make it to that day.

SPEAKING OF BAPTISMS. *Cool story incoming*

One night about 2 months ago, elder Wadsworth and I were walking and this man approached us and we started talking about the Book of Mormon and he told us that he had read it multiple times, 6 to be exact. We were blown away and we invited him to meet with us and he accepted. We came to find out he lived in the other Elders area so we handed him over to them to teach. His name is Gary Madigan and he just got baptized this past Sunday and i was able to speak at it. Although I didn't participate in teaching Gary, it was cool to be a part of his conversion and to be the one to get him from not learning about Christ to being a disciple of Christ.

That's all i have for this week! I was able to eat at Chipotle this week and i got my Mexican burrito craving filled!

Our goal for this upcoming week is to find 5 new people to teach, since we haven't been able to find new people recently. WISH US LUCK!!!

All Smiles, 

Elder Dahlberg

 They went back to visit Jacques bakery with the cool cakes and delicious pastries...

June 8 My mission motto is, if you see a U-haul, you haul your butt over there and help them.

I got a new companion this week! Its Elder Gray. This Elder is going home on July 15th so i will be his last companion in the mission field. he is completely hairless. he has something called Alopecia (How ever you spell it) Basically, his body thinks that hair is bad so his immune system just kicks them out. He never has to shave or get haircuts. He doesn't mind it at all. He is From Salt Lake city Utah, and wants to become a Marine when he gets home, as well as go to flight school since he already has his pilot's licence. And then, long term  he wants to become an astronaut if that is possible to do still. He is a great Elder, and works very hard so these next 5 weeks with him will be very busy and we will get a lot of good work in.

Elders Dahlberg and Gray in their apartment

The plant is telling him it is finally Spring!

This week we were able to help a family move in across the street from us and they were a young couple that had a 1 year old son. We found them by seeing a U-haul and my mission motto is, if you see a U-haul, you haul your butt over there and help them. So we took that seriously and they actually let us help! Its such a relief when people allow you to help them. That is a quality that i think we all need to work on. In the end they were not interested in religion but they insisted on taking us to the local pizza place and getting us lunch. Nice people.

This week we also were able to go out teaching with a starting pitcher for the AA minor league team of the Toronto Blue Jays, named Taylor Cole. He came teaching with us to Saikou, our 17 year old investigator, and it was really cool to see how excited he was to do missionary work. Yes, he is a professional baseball player. yes, he drives an Audi. Yes, he is awesome. But he was so sincere when he talked about Jesus Christ and how much he wants to be like him.

I know i didn't include a ton about what we did this week but we did a lot of missionary work that is hard to put into words. We invited a lot of people to learn about Christ, we handed out Book of Mormons that teach about Christ, we showed videos to people on our iPads while out walking, we served anyone and everyone we could while out walking.

We also helped a young man in our ward, Cole Nimmo, who is going to Maputo Mozambique on his mission. We taught him about Preach my Gospel and how it helps us teach more simply and clearly about Christ.

To finish i want to thank everyone for their emails. I haven't gotten letters, but boy have i gotten emails. So thank you for your support on my mission and, i will be coming back home in 4 months! Crazy huh!!!!!! I have learned so much and i wouldn't trade this mission experience for anything.

All Smiles,
Elder Dahlberg

P.S John 16:33 These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.

June 1 Trip to the Boston Temple!

So its been over a week since i have been able to email you and i have so many pictures to send, hopefully you can get something out of this email besides all the pictures that i am going to send. 

I found out that my trainee, Elder Dylan Sholer, from Battle Ground Washington went home on Saturday. I dont know the reasons but i hope he can come back out sometime in the future. 

This past memorial day, we helped Noah Hughes (Tall 14 year old) with his EAGLE SCOUT Project. what we did was go to the local cemetery and replaced name plaques that were put on the trees. there was a lot of hand drills and reaching to new heights that was associated with this project. While there Elder Wadsworth and I bumped into a group of 5 hobos that were proud of us for doing something positive in the world. I took out 5 pictures of Jesus and gave them each one and they were so happy. Despite having beer cans and cigarettes all around them, i thought the pictures of Jesus would lift their spirits up. 
















One of our investigators named Saikou Bah just moved into live with the Hughes Family. He is 17 years old and is a junior in High School. He plays football and track and just got 2nd in the state of New hampshire for the 100Meter dash. He reminds me of Usane Bolt, except he is buffer than him. 

I am so happy that it is hot in New England now. This past winter was SO BAD. Apparently this winter was the worst one they have had in decades.... So that just makes the sunshine and heat that much more appealing to me. The heat here is different than in California though. It rains a lot here and so when you have heat+ water it creates humidity. I am not a huge fan of humidity but i would choose that over snow and cold anyday. 

Our transfer calls just came and i will be staying in this Bedford area for another 6 weeks. and i will stay as Zone leader and get a new companion tomorrow. So wish me luck!!! 

We now officially have iPads in our mission. we are still just using them as tools for videos and studying and another resource. We should be (this transfer)  using them to start updating our area book (where we keep information on the people we teach) and to do daily planning. I'm getting used to having an iPad now, they are really good tools. 

As for the missionary work in the area. We have been helping a lot of people out in their personal trials. Examples: someone unexpectedly dies, evicted from their house, court cases going bad. We have been doing a lot of what this scripture explains. 

Mosiah 18:9
Yea, and are willing to mourn with those that mourn; yea, and comfort those that stand in need of comfort, and to stand as witnesses of God at all times and in all things, and in all places that ye may be in, even until death, that ye may be redeemed of God, and be numbered with those of the first resurrection, that ye may have eternal life—

 We have been doing alot of that, as well as serving them. Doing their dishes, or helping set up their Air conditioning unit. taking out the trash. All the little things that take no time at all. 

Thats all i got for this week. Enjoy all the pictures!!!!

All Smiles

Elder Dahlberg

Elder Wadsworth's birthday 

A member bought him a cake that literally had real gold on it. No joke!!!!!! I ATE REAL GOLD!!!!!!!

They got to go to the Boston Temple!

His plant is growing really fast!!

(May 23) We are getting iPads!

This week in the mission we are having a big mission conference on Wednesday from 9AM-1PM about iPads! We are getting them! Its crazy! All of the iPad's for the mission are already here in New England, in the mission office to be exact! Its crazy! I have no idea what and how this is all going to happen but i will keep you updated on what exactly changes and how missionary work is changing.

This past week we weren't able to teach a ton of lessons again it was about 14 but still much better than most weeks in my mission.

I went on exchange to Canterbury this week and was with Elder Betts. He is from New Mexico and is going home July 15th (same day as Elder Wadsworth). During our exchange we stopped by a bakery named Jacques Pastries. A member of the church owns it and what they do is make custom cakes for big events. That place puts Cake boss to shame! The owner actually declined a TV offer because it would just take away from the business and they wouldn't get all that they needed to done. They bake over 1000 custom cakes a year. They sent us on our way with eight  pastries that are $15 each. And they weren't big either so those pastries didn't make it out of the car a second time haha.

Wow!  That is QUITE the cake!!!
http://www.jacquespastries.com/

I was also asked a question this week that i want to share my answer with you.
Q- What do I hope to gain from the rest of my mission?
A- I hope to establish Christlike attributes that i can use for the rest of my life. I hope that what i have learned already and what i will learn can stay with me so i can use it to help others and myself in the future. Sometimes i get into this mindset of "look at my scriptures, aren't they all beat up, marked, and worn. That means i have learned a lot and searched them and i know them well!" that mindset goes the same for my tracting shoes so when i get home everyone can see hard hard i worked, based on how worn my shoes got. Whenever i have that mindset I lack the charity and love that Jesus Christ has. He didn't care how faded his clothes got while out walking and performing miracles. He cared for the people, not the praise. SO all in all, what i hope to gain from the rest of my mission experience is to walk as Jesus walked, not walk where He walked and call it good. 

We also had a zone meeting this week. As a zone leader i got to teach 2 separate groups for about an hour each. SO that was fun being able to prepare a good message to share and i tried my best to leave a lasting lesson that can help lift, inspire, encourage, and bless their individual lives.
I had an interview with President Stoker, we pretty much talked about my answer to the question i talked about earlier in this email.

That's all i have for this week!!! I have been trying hard to stay focused and making these last 5 months count. I appreciate any letters i do get and i am going to reply to everyone of them that i get. SO WRITE ME :)

All Smiles,
Elder Dahlberg

P.S Answer to 'Why couldn't the bike stand up?' It was two tired!!!!  [ba dum bum]

This is a plant he is growing from a bulb...

They came across a little pond somewhere that had a sort of "beach"  He had to make a sand angel...

On exchanges with Elder Betts

BBQ Season with lots of BBQ sauce

Here's a picture of our Skype screen with other family members hooked in...  Happy Mother's Day!!!!

If you are wondering what the weather is like here in New England. It is Springtime and all the trees are now full of baby leaves and all the colors are out and about. I can see purple, orange, yellow, white, red, green, blue, black, brown, and pink! The colors are really vivid and I didn't get any good pictures of them this week but i will keep that in mind for next week. So look forward to next week and i will get some for you!!!

With it being spring, that means there are tons and tons of little bugs. There is something called black fly's up here and they are very comparable to the flies you see on the beach that are sitting on top of the dried out seaweed. You know how when you get close to the seaweed there are hundreds of those flies that buzz around? Well imagine that all around you, while your outside. They are the worst out in the outskirts of the city of Manchester where all the trees are but still, they can get pretty annoying, especially when they get in your eye and you accidentally consume one through your eye socket!

This week in Bedford, we weren't able to get up to 20 lessons because we had 3 of our investigators drop us. Meaning they wouldn't like us to come back anymore. We still have a total teaching pool of 7 people. Which is much higher than most areas in the mission.

This week i was able to host an exchange here in Bedford and I had an elder named Elder Andrew! Isn't that funny that for the day my companion was Elder Andrew and than you have me Elder Dahlberg! Well he is on his 9th week as a missionary and we did a lot of teaching and he did a great job at teaching. We taught out of the bible and out of the book of mormon. I really liked his teaching style that is very similar, if not identical to mine. Which is to make sure during the lesson the investigator or person you are teaching is talking more than you are. I like to make lessons engaging and more like a conversation rather than a lecture of knowledge from one person to the other. Also while on exchange with Elder Andrew we were tracting some houses right after a dinner appointment and we get to a house where there is a family outside, so we go up and talk to them about the gigantic bbq they had outside their garage. Turned out the father figure, Dana Prive is a world famous bbq man. He makes his own BBQ sauce and does it competitively. He was talking about his most recent BBQ sauce and how he is going to enter it into the next competition. Both Elder Andrew and I, respond with "Well where could we get some of this sauce?" He goes over to his car and opens the trunk and gets out 6 bottles of his BBQ Sauce. 2 bottles of each of his 3 flavors and said to us "you got room in your bag for all these?". i than  took my scriptures and shoved them to one side and made the room!  HE GAVE THEM TO US FOR FREE!! How nice was that! He wasn't interested in hearing a message about Jesus Christ, but i feel like he has a lot of Christlike traits already. And im not just saying that because he gave us free bbq sauce. He was a man that I hope I can turn out to be like one day. To just be so friendly and open to strangers.

Elder Dahlberg & Elder Andrew  with their BBQ sauce haul

I think Jesus Christ put it best when he told his disciples in John Chapter 15," this is my commandment, that you love one another as i have loved you." That sentence alone, if heeded, would change this world and the people on it.

Also there is a family out here named the Hines family that will be moving to Eastlake. Just across from the Olympic training center. We helped them paint and prepare their house to get on the housing market. Kurt Hines will be an assistant football coach for Christian High School. its a christian private school. They have a son named Brock who is 18 and a daughter named Sophia or Sofia (not sure on how to spell it) who is 16 and will be a senior next year.
They are a really cool family and i will keep you posted on if they could use some help or not. (They seem to be pretty well set with help)

I enjoyed skyping my family this week, so much so that at the end of the call all that i could muster up to say was "I am grateful to have you as my family." Which is all that i needed to say. I am grateful to have such a great family that not only loves me, but wants me to be the best i can. I cant ask for anything better than that. :)

ALL SMILES

ELDER DAHLBERG

I got to play baseball with this 14 year old named Noah Hughes. Keep that name in your head because this kid has some great potential to be in the MLB! He is awesome! I also got to hit and pitch with him. Then after that I learned how to make dried banana slices! SO GOOD!

 We had to drive all the missionaries back up to Montpelier Vermont which took us from 5-11PM. So my butt was sore after that day. Here are pictures from our drive

Elder Sholer, my past companion was in the area for the day because his companion was going to the temple. So we were in a trio for the day.

Wow, you'd think he'd gone to the Amazon or something...

You may be wondering what those green nets are around our faces? The black flies are so bad that we needed those in order to work outside without having to swat at flies every 2 seconds. These nets may look goofy, but i would rather look like a goof than have all those flies goof my face with their gross little black bodies.

(May 4) GO AND DO, DON'T SIT AND STEW!

Springtime is definitely here. No more snow anywhere and the sun is out on the daily now. ITS SO GREAT! Its how life should be. People out here are now coming out of the wood works and now the streets are full of people going here and there and doing yard work and having BBQ's and talking with their neighbors. Its so nice to see.

Tuesday- We were able to bring our Mission President and his wife out teaching with us to a lesson with Bill and Rose G****. That's the eor pajama man. He was wearing it while we taught him as well. It was great having President right alongside us teaching and he added a great testimony to the lesson which was great to hear and see. Sadly Bill and Rose G**** told us not to come by anymore after this visit. So that will be the last of them, unless they want us back.

Wednesday- We had a great district meeting where i got a cool quote. It says
GO AND DO, DON'T SIT AND STEW! and in order to get the full effect of this quote you have to read the "don't sit and stew"  out loud with a squinted face as if you just sucked on a lemon. That is a good quote to help you get out of those moods where you don't feel like doing anything or talking to anyone.

Thursday- We had a dinner at a less-actives home named Sister G***** and she taught us how to make fried rice and general tsao chicken. Its super tasty but it is totally not good for you haha. I had a little bit to much which required me to run 5.1 miles the next morning haha. We taught a lot of lessons this week.  25 total lessons to Investigators and Less-active members.

Friday- We visited with a man who was extremely over weight. At one point he went over the 500 lb barrier! He is currently 350ish and is stuck in a bed all day every day. Just being there in the room with him made me grateful for the physical condition i am in. I am so happy to be able to just walk outside and feel the sun, and to be able to go places without worrying about my physical problems.

Saturday- We tracted this day a good amount and no one in specific was interested in learning about Jesus Christ and his teachings. But one man named Dave put those teachings into practice during our visit. We knocked on this door and he comes around the side and tells us how he is never going to convert to the LDS religion but he really wanted to talk to us as people and get to know us. We talked to him for a good 10 minutes telling him about our personal reasons for doing a mission as well as how our lives are going to pan out after the mission. He was so nice and at the end of our talk he went inside his house and got us some water bottles and fruit snacks and sent us on our way, wishing us luck at that. It was SO great to just meet a person that was willing to open his heart and just talk to us. So unselfish and it really opened my eyes and helped me to remember that i want to be as kind and nice as he was.

Sunday- It was a perfect Sunday with the sun shining and it was 75 degrees. I was so happy with the weather. We fasted for another missionaries investigator and i guess it worked because they are getting baptized this Saturday unexpectedly... We were able to meet up and teach Saikou, the 17 year old Senior in high school whose friend is a member of the ward and we went over to their house, (the Hughes) and read Alma 32. Which talks about faith being compared to a seed.


I am so excited for the Skype this Sunday and come with questions to ask me because i want to make this hour worth it!!!! love you all!!!!!!!

all smiles

Elder Dahlberg

Fried Rice & General Tsao Chicken

What a goofball!!