July Happenings 2016

 quick weekend trip to NYC with the beautiful Morgan to see Waitress, American in Paris, Matilda and She Loves Me on Broadway.   Ana went to EFY Provo with Isabelle.  Swimming with cousins,
trying for green hair, bear lake, Tanya came down from Idaho for the weekend, farmington creek walk about and a little fishing.

 Phones, spent the day with Nash (his mom, Tricia, was in charge of stake girls camp!)

 Boys hit the green river, Troy and I attended the spring orchestra concert at the conference center with Stacey and Darren.  The ____ singers from Europe performed and did a wonderful job.  Si and Grant Foster invited us up with some other families to their cabin for dinner and archery.  Ethan and Troy had gone up to the Uintas to backpack with friends and Ethan passed out and fell face fist down a slide of rocks, breaking his jaw.... Lucky for him it seemed to move back into position on it's own and he didn't have to have it wired shut.  He wasn't in pain so we sent him off to EFY Provo with his friends.  Good Times!  The weekend before we found out we were going to be grandparents and that Victor and MJ were going to get married.

 While Ethan was at EFY Troy took the girls backpacking in the Uintas, I stayed as my dad headed to the hospital the night before.  He had pain in his left hand and numbness in his face and was worried he was having a stroke or heart attack, so they kept him overnight.  All cleared up and after a lot of tests and a clean bill of health the next day they let him go home.  I did make a quick trip to Provo to pull Ethan out of EFY to see the oral surgeon in Heber to make sure the jaw was moving back on it's own.  All looked well, so I dropped him back off in Provo.

 Morgan took Hayden out to lunch in the trex the second week of July, then to the 21 Pilots concert.

 Life caught up to me and I had a little melt down so Troy and I took a break from the kiddos and drove out to antelope island.  A couple weeks earlier there had been a fire on the island and a good 1/3 of the island is burned.
For Morgan's 17th birthday she wanted to take friends up to Bear Lake, sounded like they had a wonderful time.  So a day late we celebrated with her and my dad (a few days early, his 70th) their birthdays.  My parent's left on my dads birthday for Puerto Rico with the Flakes.

learning me some early morning hair styles (the rest are on video), for I've been called to teach early morning seminary! 5:45...

Letter from Grant - July 25, 2016

Sent: Monday, July 25, 2016 8:15 AM
Subject: Geneva week 5

So Tuesday we went on an exchange with the Gex elders. I went with
elder Bryce, he finishes his mission this next week. It was strange
talking with him about everything. I had dreams all that night of
going home and seeing family. Anywho, the highlight of Tuesday was
going to eat at the Aaragon families house. We showed up and they had
invited two neighbors and some extended family. We played some
basketball with the neighbor boys and had a super Portuguese BBQ
thing. They made some weird popcorn but it was way good! We shared a

spiritual thought by playing the guitar :P I played two sort of up
beat songs and than we all sang a pour way faring man of grief and all
sang together. Music is such a great way to bring the spirit into a
place like that!

We painted some walls for a sister. We painted her white walls white.
I couldn't tell a difference between the coats of paint but she was
just so happy to have them painted. Elder Wade was super sick so he
just slept on the floor in the middle of the room while we painted. It
was pretty funny.

We did transfer recommendations. That took way longer than I thought
it would. It was good though. I hope we helped.

We had a district finding day in annecy. That was great fun! Annecy is
probably the prettiest city I have ever seen. Literally it is just
like the cutest most adorable place. Go look up pictures. It could
easily be the Most photogenic city on the face of the earth.

Ali - he is basically making zero progression. We are stuck waiting to
see if he I going to quit smoking or not. We are just going to have to
keep seeing him and helping him progress.

Serge - Serge we didn't see this week. He Promised again that he was
going to come to church but didn't. We are going to need to change
something to get him there. I was thinking maybe daily contact?

Those seem to be our investigators for the moment. I don't know how
the days flies by so fast. We are just so busy doing stuff. We talk to
a good number of people each day too.

Anywho, have a good week. Peace, love, and eternal Marriage

Avec amour,
Elder Keller

Letter from Grant - July 18, 2016

So this week was wild. We went to the old part of Geneva for Pday and
looked at some cool old things. Saw the old cathedral and even went
underground where they were excavating.
We had an exchange with some elders and got some good missionary work done.
At the end of Tuesday we had to present in front of the stake leaders.
They were having stake high counsel and we were asked to present on
the missionary work that's happening in the stake. It was super scary
but we talked about some important things that need to get sorted out.
Later that week we had zone finding day which was a blast! We all
exchanged companions for four hours and just went out to different
parts of Geneva and tried to find as many people as possible. It was
fairly effective. Some teams we found playing chess at the park.
Friday we presented in front of four zones. Oh boy, that's scary
stuff. It was good though. Presenting is as about as fun as it is
scary.
Saturday we went on exchange with the assistants. That was more
different than I thought it would have been. Good still, I took notes.
We finished our week in Genva and didn't really have any investigators
come to church. It was kinda sad. But I guess when you don't see them
for half the week they don't really feel the need to come. Looking
forward to fixing that for this next week.

Now for the part you have all been waiting for.

 Exchanges.

Avec  Amour,
Elder Keller

pictures in my letter from his zone conference

 Tia Xan, who Grant baptized a few months ago.  They ran into her on the streets of Lyon while on splits with Elder Huntsman.

 mtc companion

Grant is second row from the front on the far left in this last picture.

To Grant From Dad - July 17th, 2016

Grant, 

I'm writing this from a dingy motel room in Dutch John, Utah.  Ethan and I are going to float the Green River tomorrow!  We went to church this morning, did some indexing for the WW indexing event and then jumped in the car and drove down here.  We will be using my little one-man pontoons.  First time for Ethan to use one.  Should be exciting! 

McCall comes home later this week.  Incredible.  You're next!  I know it all feels weird, but try to focus on your last months in the field--enjoy every last day.  It will all be great when you are done. 

This week I noticed something in the Book of Mormon I hadn't before, and I always love it when that happens.  If you go to Alma 27:25-26 you read where Ammon returns to the lamanites he and his brethren had converted with the answer from the Nephites to the question of whether the Nephites would let the Anti-Nephi Lehis come live in their land and have their protection.  The answer is in the affirmative.  But I had never noticed how Ammon's pal from their rebellious youth, Alma, goes with him.  Earlier in the chapter, Alma had run into Ammon and his brethren 17 years after they parted to do their respective missions, and their joy had been huge meeting together.  Alma then travels with Ammon down to meet Ammon's converts, and Alma shares with them the story of his and Ammon's conversion.  What a neat moment that must have been, for Alma just to share in the goodness that had been wrought by Ammon's faith and sacrifice over many years.  Alma had also had great success among the Nephites, but it had been coupled with tragedy and civil war involving the Zoramites.  The converted Lamanites experienced their own tragedies when the more wicked lamanites kill many of them without resistance.  This time period in the Book of Mormon shows what great good can be accomplished by faith and sacrifice, but it also shows the evil that rises to try to match it.  I suspect you have seen that in the lives of the investigators who try to change, but the World doesn't like them to do that and puts up roadblocks and challenges.  We see that in our lives when we want to be and do better, it takes sacrifice.   

Love you, 

Dad 

Letter from Grant - July 12th 2016

Geneve week two

Hello, we only managed to email for a few minuets yesterday due to
scheduling so we are just wrapping emails up today. Anywho, this last
Monday for preparation day the district leader Elder Brady Haug held a
district P-day where we celebrated Fourth of July with a BBQ. It was
pretty sweet, especially because Elder Brady Haug is half German and
half Mexican! He did find us some pretty tasty sausages though.

Ali hasn't really made any progression. We saw him twice this last
week and talked to him about quitting cigarettes but he's pretty
stuck. The worst is that he believes that one day he will stop but
that that day is not any time soon. We are headed over later today to
see what the doctor said about it. He should have gotten his medical
report in by now.

Jamel, we had a picnic with her and her family this last Saturday! It
was really cool to finally meet everyone. She has a baptismal date but
it's in like six months or something. After she turns 18. We were
kinda hoping that once we met her parents that they would be more open
to her getting baptized while she was still 17. Anywho, she is doing
good.

Serge, he should have gotten baptized this last Saturday but we pushed
his date out because his wife is making him second guess everything.
We finally had a lesson with the whole family and not just Serge
alone. So that was sweet, we mainly taught the wife and answered her
questions. One of which was that some one told her that after getting
baptized in our church you have night mares and strange dreams all the
time. Who comes up with this garbage? Haha, anywho, we are praying
that he will be able to make it to church this upcoming week.

Seline and family, Seline is an Italian mom of five kids. They just
walked into the church like half way through one of our lessons
wanting to talk to the bishop. We told her if she came Sunday she
could talk with him. So she came Sunday, the kids made a ton of noise
during sacrament meeting and she talked to the first counselor after
church. Apparently she needs food and something else. It wasn't super
clear what they wanted exactly other than they need help. Then
yesterday the first counselor brought a bunch of non perishable foods
and diapers for her. We kinda taught her about the church. Like half
of a lesson. Anywho, we will have to see if she turns up next Sunday.

Well, voila have a good week!

Avec amour,
Elder Keller

Letter from Grant - July 4, 2016

So we had a solid week. We went on an exchange with the English elders
which happen to be two huge Tahitians that are both learning English
haha! They are sweet. We went and passed some old investigators in the
area book and ended up fixing two appointments for their team even
though they were people from our area book. Pretty funny how things
work out.

So Serge is struggling. His baptismal date is set for this next week
but his wife is Super against him changing. She even got him to not
come to church this week so we called him and talked to him. Looks
like we will be pushing his date off a few weeks. Sigh, women.

Ali is going into the hospital again today actually to get his Final
"big" exam done. Hopefully he does all right. His entire digestive
system is super damaged. Anywho, his daughters(they are recent
converts) are doing just great. The one kinda takes a back seat at
church while the other is super into it and comes to help us teach.

Julian, I met Julian for the first time this last Thursday. She has a
baptismal date as well. Anywho, she also will be in the hospital this
week a cause to viruses. Anywho, she is awesome. Haven't really taught
her yet but apparently she has had all the lessons we are just waiting
until she turns 18 or her mom gives her approval.

This week we had Mission leadership council. That was incredible!
President I just one of the greatest people ever. I loved having him
give us just super helpful and inspired revelation. I felt that it was
more applicable and personal.

Anywho,

Us after the exchange.Avec amour,Elder Keller