Emails 7-28-08

The Mommy-I am trying my best to stay out of trouble and let myself heal, but it is so hard cause you know me I like to play. Yeah the award was sweet. The people that come and inspect said that our apartment was the cleanest it had ever been, even when the sisters lived there. So that was a cool thing to hear.I cannot believe it that Mickell is already in the MTC! I am so excited for the kid, he will be awesome I know it. I will have to get his email address from him and his mission address so I get him some letters. I can actually email him right now if I had his address. The baptism went really well. Things were a little hectic for a little while cause it was kinda short notice, but it went good. He was found through the other Elders in Lincoln. They were teaching an investigator and he wanted to give a BOM to a friend. Well that friend was this kids older brother and he did not want it so he gave it to his little brother. He than started taking the lessons with the other Elders than it slowly transitioned over to us and then he got baptized.The fires here are all fairly far away now. Yosemite is a couple hours away, but there are a lot of other fires that are just as close if not closer. It has been fun to be apart of the highest fires in California ever and the driest months that California has ever had. I think that I might be bad luck for wherever I am, oh well I guess.My comp is still really excited and doing really well. I cannot believe how fast and much he has grown in the last 6 weeks. I cannot believe that I have already been with him for 6 weeks. My bike is doing really well actually. One of the missionaries used it the other day and almost wrecked because he was not use to disc brakes on a bike so that was funny. I took two towels. I alternate them weeks and that way if I do not get all my laundry done in time for showering I have a back up. Everything else is holding up well. I would however like some more pictures of the family, any kind any sort. The dinner thing is finally working and we are getting fed pretty well. There have been a few dinners though that I won't lie have been pretty terrible but I eat anyways and like always help stack up and clean up. I was getting the hang of being the DL but I am now no longer the DL. They combined the English missionaries into one district and there is a missionary that is older (in mission wise) than me so he is DL.Well things are going well here in Cali and in Lincoln itself. We are still doing a lot of tracting and it is definitely humbling. Things are going well though and the work is going forward so that is really good. I hope that things are going well for you and the family. Thank you mom for all your love and support. I cannot thank you enough for everything that you do for me. I love you.Love your son,Elder Brickey

Curley Family-The baptism went really well. Things were a little hectic for a little while cause it was kinda short notice, but it went good. He was found through the other Elders in Lincoln. They were teaching an investigator and he wanted to give a BOM to a friend. Well that friend was this kids older brother and he did not want it so he gave it to his little brother. He than started taking the lessons with the other Elders than it slowly transitioned over to us and then he got baptized. I actually got a letter the other day from two of the investigators that I was working with in Mount Shasta. They have decided to get baptized and they were hoping that I would be able to attend, but I will not be able to seeing that I am 4 hours away. Though it is awesome to hear that they are getting baptized, we worked so hard with the two of them, it is good to hear that they are finally to the point where they can take the step into the waters of baptism. That is cool that the girl decided to get baptized, congratulations!We do not eat out much. I HATE fast food because of working on Wendy's. We do eat at Mimi's Cafe, Chili's, and Applebee's every now and than.So far on the mission I have not really gotten to terribly sick. I got kinda sick in Mount Shasta but I got taken care of by all the Ward mom's that I had there.I do agree with you Shan about having to call people. EVERY Wednesday and Thursday is exchanges. Wed is High Priests and Thurs is Elders and I get to call the night before and remind these people that they have exchanges with us. It sucks having to babysit these grown men. I do agree that the Brickey bullheadedness is very strong, though I have tried to work through it.I think that it is interesting the different things that you both deal with throughout your days and life. I look forward to the many WONDERFUL opportunities that I will have here on the mission and when I return home. I won't lie though I do like the mission life it is really nice and very relaxed in a lot of ways. Well things are just going on a usual in the life of a missionary. We are still doing a lot of tracting which is fun. I guess we keep doing the sweaty things and the blessings will come. Well not much has really been happening other than the baptism, so yeah. Well I hope that all is going well for you and that you are all safe and okay.Well take care and I will talk to you all later. Love you.Love,Elder Brickey

Award

Here is another award. As you might be able to see they got 1ST!!!!!

Emails 7-21-08

The Mommy-My wrist and shoulder are doing well. I have been doing my exercises and strengthening my shoulder up so that is good. I have decided that I am going to keep that up so I can see if maybe I can get my shoulder back and able to throw again, but not like I use to no worries. That is interesting about Russia, I have heard that things were getting weird and harder over there. I bet that it would be a real pain to have to leave at least every three months to renew your visa. I am glad to be in the USA were I do not have to deal with that kind of stuff. Though I am fortunate to deal with a lot of other weird and annoying things. I have emailed Brad a few times but I do not know if he is to busy to email be back or what so I am not to terribly depressed by that. Though it would be nice to hear from the punk.What box did they put in the yard? And why the heck did the put it in the yard? I would be really ticked off and tell them that they cannot put it in my yard. That or if they did they should not have left a pile of garbage in the yard or where ever. Stinking city workers.Transfers were today, but I am staying and so is my companion. I am pretty excited that I am staying because we have a baptism this Saturday! It is a 14 year old boy and he really likes the church and the different things that the church has to offer so that is pretty cool. One of the young men that helped us teach him is going to baptize him so that will be an awesome experience for both of them. That is cool that Grandma and Grandpa are going to extend their mission. I know that it has been an awesome experience for them both. I hope that things keep going well for them. Well I do not know if I will be able to see the space station, but I will give it a try. Thanks for the info. Well things are going well here in Lincoln, it is actually only suppose to get up to like 84 today but back up into the 90s for the rest of the week. Oh well I just get to work on my tan. Well I hope all is going well for you and that you are doing well. I love you and wish you the best mom. Take care and stay out of trouble.Love your son,Elder Brickey


Hello there Curley Family-Well the person that would come and knock on our door was a member. She is or was less active and was a little nuts to put it nicely. She actually lived down the block in another set of apartments, but supposedly there were evil spirits and other stuff there so she was staying with her care taker who lived above us. At first we would just hear them fight and such, then we met her one day and she asked us if we would be able to help her move and help her get back to God and church. She than knew that we lived below her and so sometimes she would just show up at the door at random times and POUND on the door. One time at 11:30 pm she started pounding on the door yelling at her care taker and I just looked through the peep hole and than made sure that the door was locked then went back to bed. She than came to church one Sunday and since she is crazy she showed up at our door at 8:00 am. She said that when she got ready to leave the apartment that she tripped some alarm and that "they", no clue who they are though, were not going to let her leave. The only way that she would be able to leave is if we would escort her to the church, because they would not do anything to us for some reason. I guess that the easiest way to tell who "they" were was to look at the cars and which ever one had a green or yellow sponge, I do not remember which color, on the mid of the dash that was them. There was a TON of other weird things but I do not remember them all and am not so sure that I want to remember them. She now lives in Rocklin and out of my hair so sad to say, sort of but not really, not my problem anymore!It sounds like you get to deal with a bunch of crazies too. We are twiners, well sort of. I am definitely glad that I do not have to deal with that anymore. Though there are a few other interesting people in the area it is okay because I do not have to deal with them. You do seem to work in a very interesting environment though Ryan, glad that I do not work there thought the stories are pretty funny. I do agree that Dallin, Shanna, and Saedy are all the good kind of special. I think that all my family is the good kind of special. I love all my family and hope that they are all doing well. I miss and love you all so freaking much. I think that I may have helped Saedy in being opinionated, well I may take the credit but may not be the full cause. I just loved coming home and being able to play with both of your kids. Mainly Saedy though cause Dallin did not like me that much.Hey Shan I have been going to the Chiro too! Though the one I go and see is FREE which is sweet. He is a member and he adjusted my neck and then some of my back. I am suppose to go in again and see if everything is staying together and get the rest fixed. He was pretty funny when he was doing my back he found one and he told me that he felt it half way up my back and it HURT when he was messing with it, now though it feels really good and I feel like I have more energy and am doing better all together.It is true that no matter what you do you are going to eventually run into relations if you go far enough back. It means that you are going to make it very difficult for me to date when I get home! Oh well we are all eventually related going back to Adam so oh well I guess.I have been doing really well. My wrist is healing and my ankle is still healing too. I have actually been learning some new tricks. I can now lay on the ground a jump up onto my feet. I am learning how to do a back flip on the ground and a few other cool things. Yeah I know smart things to do when I seem to get myself hurt a lot, oh well it is FUN!Transfers were TODAY! But nothing has changed I am staying with my companion here in Lincoln for another 6 weeks. I was a little bit nervous that things would change but nothing did! The work has been going really good here though. We actually have a baptism this Saturday! Things seem to be going well so that is really nice! That is cool that there is missionary work going on back at home! Well I am glad to hear that things are going well. Take care of yourselves and each other and I LOVE YOU ALL VERY VERY MUCH!Love,Elder Brickey

Emails 7-14-08

Hello Hello!Well some things that my comp does not buy that he says sounds good at times is steaks, meat in general is expensive, and a few other things that I am not exactly sure of. It is a good idea to teach your kids all about shopping so they can do it when the time calls for it. I have been so many times with mom and dad that it was not bad at all when I had to do it for myself. I am not going to lie, I am pretty jealous that we have a pool. Especially now that I AM GONE! What is with that? Get all these cool toys when I leave, that is not fair! Just kidding that means I will have to make up for lost time when I get home. I cannot believe that Mom saw that kid just pee on her flowers. I would have probably killed him, no lies. I do agree though that they should not be over to the house if they are going to disrespect the house and our stuff. Anyways sounds like an interesting memory for sure.Well it sounds like things are going well for your kids and that they are just a growing. I cannot believe how big they are getting and how old. It just means that I am getting older to which is not a fun thought. I want to be a kid again. The new mission Pres is pretty cool. He is a nice guy and seems to be full of energy and excitement. It is a new regime and I am still getting use to it, but so far so good.Goodness it seems like Grandpa is going into the hospital a lot lately. I hope that things are okay with him. I still do not want to lose a grandparent while I am on the mission. Things have already changed a lot from when I was home. Things just keep changing and I do not know how excited I am about all the changes and such.Well things are going pretty good here in Lincoln. I won't lie that this last week was real disheartening. I had quite the crappy day on Friday. (when I found out) Anyways I love you and hope that things are going well for you all. Take care and I will talk to you later. Thanks for all your love and support. I can always rely on the family and that is a great support and help to me.Love,Elder Brickey

The Mommy-I had to get onto the computer to check on an email for district meeting and I was able to email you really fast, no worries I had permission. We did get with the McGraws and had a pretty good time. It was actually really weird to see them and Sister McGraw said that she did not care if she is not suppose to give me a hug cause she was doing it for you, and a little for herself. Thank you for the goodies I really appreciate them. They came at a very needful time for me.When I threw out my shoulder I did something to my wrist and so I had to go in and see if I had pinched a nerve or something, which did not happen I am A-O-K! What is a stimulus check? And where did it come from?Zone Conference was pretty cool. The new mission President seems to be really enthusiastic about the work and is a really nice guy all together, so far. I had a personal interview with him on Saturday. It was a lot different than the way that Pres Perry did it, but hey they are completely different people so that is okay. The fires are actually slowing down. The last I heard it was down from the 1200 to like 400 so that is good. They are all over the place though. We have a lot of fires all around us so that is really interesting and it means that we have to make sure that we pray a lot to keep the fires away. I guess that Mount Shasta actually has a lot of fires up in there so that is no good.Well things here in Lincoln are going pretty good. We have been doing a lot of work in finding and also with the members. We had quite the interesting week though. We had a member, less active member, staying above us with her care taker, and she was really a "special" person. It was really weird to have her knock on our door at 8 in the morning or at 11 at night. She now is living in Rocklin so not our problem anymore, so that is nice.Well I hope that things are going well for you and that you are okay. I miss you and love you mom. Take care.Love your son,Elder Brickey

Emails 7-7-08

The Mommy-My shoulder is doing a little bit better. I have my rubber bands(tubing) and that is all that I really need I think. Though on a side note my right arm has been in a lot of pain lately. I talked to a member that is a nurse and she told me that it is because of my shoulder and that if it is not doing good in about 6 or so weeks I need to go and see a doctor about it. So that is pretty fun. I do remember my exercises and am trying to do them every morning, sometimes though I just do not feel like it even though I know that I should. The new pillow is awesome! It is firm, yet it is also soft which is really nice and I sleep well with it. It is also REALLY heavy so in a pillow fight it does REALLY well! I do not know if I need a bike tool, in some ways yes in others no. I learned from dad how to be a really good MacGyver and use weird things to get the job done. Though I did take my bike in and get it tuned by a professional, which sucks in a way because that is not cheap at all. The new thing for the dinner calender is that a ward missionary calls less actives and part member families and tries to get us dinner with them. It is a real pain because a lot of those people come up with a lot of excuses and they also cancel a lot. Though so far it is sort of working, sort of being the key. I actually do not have a hard time calling people up anymore and asking for things. I guess being a missionary has changed me. I am so use to asking investigators for commitments and such that asking members to feed us is pretty easy. Also the members here are very nice and take really good care of us. Than again it also helps that they absolutely LOVE us!Yeah standing on the kid booster thing has gotten me pretty famous. I still have people laugh at it or say that I am not that short when I am standing next to them. It is something that I will always be remembered for that is for sure. I know that before my mission I could not have just started talking in front of people like I did. It is weird to think about how much that the mission has changed that though. I have to put myself into awkward situations everyday and than to stand in front of people that I know and I know believe the same things that I do is SO much easier. I have talked three times so far. It is kinda random on when they ask us to talk, but now I kinda enjoy it. I still have the nervous right before where I am all fidgety and all hyper tensive, but when I stand up I calm down and have total control. I did get the calendar from Shan and I can think of one word to describe it...AMAZING! She did a very very good job. All the other Elders see it and ask where I got it from, they are all really jealous!From what I know if the McGraw's were to stop by they could take us out to dinner or something. Though on the 11th I do have Zone Conference. It will be over by around 3 or 4, depending on long winded President Pendleton is. On the 4th we did our usual missionary thing until 6 pm then we were able to just go to members houses and "hang out" but keep it missionary minded. We got to see the Lincoln fireworks which were really cool actually so that was fun. It did make me homesick though, I missed the firework light off at grandma and grandpa's house.On my comps bike the crank arm where the pedal attaches the threads stripped out so he needed a new crank arm for his bike. It sounds like you are having fun with that construction there though. I am glad that I do not have to deal with that.Well things are going well here in Cali for the most part. There are a lot of fires though burning right now, like 1100. The air keeps getting smoky and nasty but it has kept it cooler, just really unhealthy. Well how are things going for you and how are you doing in general. I love you and hope all is well. Take care mommy.Love,Elder Brickey

Hello Hello!Yeah it is really funny to see him try and figure out what he wants to buy with the money that we get. I sometimes give him advice, but usually let him just figure it out himself. He is doing a really good job so far. I think it is funny to see some of the things that he thinks about and than decides not to because of how much it costs. The fourth was okay. We did get to stop proselyting at 6 and just go over to a members house and such which was nice. We did get to see the fireworks that Lincoln city put on which was pretty cool. It sounds like you had a loaded 4th with work and play. I do however want to know since when do we have a pool and how big is it? It really sounds like you have quite the interesting work place. I think you are going to be getting quite the interesting stories while working there. Good luck with that.That is cool that mom is going to let dad build the shop. I think that will be cool to have when I get home. I cannot believe that someone peed on mom's flowers though. I hope she never finds out or that person is DEAD!A new hair cut, that is cool. I say whatever makes you happy that is what matters. That is really cool that you were able to donate your hair to locks of love. I have always been impressed with that organization. Jacqui Starker.......I think that is all that I have to say on that subject. It sounds like your kids are keeping you on your toes and are doing well so that is good. I cannot believe how fast they are all growing up.The past week has been okay. We lost two investigators which sucked, but that is missionary work. We have been doing a lot of tracting and less active work to find new people to teach. I love my comp still and he is doing really well. I cannot believe how fast he is learning and how well actually. I guess I must be doing something right after all. I have not met the new Pres yet but I will see him Friday and Saturday! A double dose may be to much, oh wells what can you do? Other than that nothing much has been going on. I will definitely let you know if anything comes up though. Well I love you all and hope you are doing well. Take care and stay safe.Love,Elder Brickey