Morgans Letter 15th in 2013

Aloha Family!!

So I'm writing this letter Tuesday afternoon because yesterday was too busy doing service, so i get to email today. Yesterday on Monday, we drove to Kona, and then did service at the temple. The temple is closed for 2 weeks for its Bi-Annual deep cleaning. Its closed for 2 weeks after every General Conference for cleaning, that's something i did not know before. The whole zone was there, so all 18 missionaries. We got there in the morning, and then immediately got to work. We did about 6-7 hours of service in the Temple. I have never done service in the Temple before, so it was a new experience. It was wonderful there, a special feeling of peace and love and happiness i was able to feel the whole 6-7 hours of working. We moved chairs around a lot, vacuumed rooms, dusted rooms, wiped down all the walls and ceilings of all the rooms (avoiding the gold leafing so it doesn't flake off). We also scrubbed the tiles, cleaned the bathrooms, cleaned lockers, and drawers in the locker room, took down lights and cleaned the glass. And a few other things. They provided an awesome lunch for all of us to eat. By the end of it i was tired but very fulfilled and glad to have been able to help. Then we played basketball for an hour or two, we didn't get to email because their was 18 missionaries trying to email in Kona and only a couple computers, we usually email in Waimea. Then we headed home for our dinner.

Conference on Saturday and Sunday was awesome! On Saturday we went over to the Jones, a members from our ward to watch Conference. Since the morning session starts at 6 Am here, we didn't watch that one til after the 2nd session. We went over at 10Am and watched the 2nd Saturday Morning Session, and then at 12:30 we replayed the 1st Session, because they had recorded it on TV. Then at 6pm we watched the Priesthood Session. It was played at 2pm live Utah time, and then re-broadcasted at 6pm, so we watched the later one. Priesthood Session was my favorite session of General Conference, maybe there was just a special feeling about it, and ability to pay attention since it was in the Chapel, on Hard Benches haha. Then the Ward provided Ice cream Sundaes for everyone that came.

Sunday morning we woke up at 5AM, and got ready, and then headed off to Bishop Casuga's home. They were watching General Conference live, so we watched it at 6AM, and then the next session at 10AM. In between the sessions we made breakfast, and then made Lau Lau. Lau Lau is a Hawaiian food where you get huge taro leaves, and then put pork and sweet potato in it, and then wrap it up, cover it in tin foil, and then steam it for 4-5 hours. After 4-5 hours you get a delicious meal where you eat the leaf, pork and potato. After conference we had a General Conference treasure hunt, which was really fun, and then we played some games with their family. Then we helped set up for their 10th Bi-Annual General Conference Trivia Bowl! We made food, set up tables and chairs, made banners and signs. There was about 30 people that came for the Trivia Bowl. We split into 3 teams, and we asked questions about conference. That whole day was a blast, we had so much fun with them.

The rest of the week was kinda slow nothing else happened that i can think of. love you all, thanks for all the letters from everyone i really appreciate it, i don't have time to respond to everyone, ill try to respond next week.

Elder Durocher

Happy Easter

This was my letter TO Morgan.....

Hello Elder!

HAPPY EASTER!

I hope you had another great week!  When I start writing about the week here, I can't recall much happening at the front of the week, so it usually ends up to be what happen on weekends! 

David got Friday off at work (company wide) so he came down to Utah county again and has been able to see Gemily quite a bit!  He's glad about that, because she's a pretty cool girl!  She's off to England tomorrow to babysit for a sibling who lives there for 2 weeks.  Sounds pretty fun! 

Saturday I got my hair pretties done while Ethan and David went to Ernies and then to Aaron Furr's house to work on Ethans motorcycle.  Aaron is going to help fix it and see why it's running 'rich'. ???  I went to Costco after my hair appt, and got a few more things for Easter then did housework and cooked food for Sunday.

After church Ethan, David, Kwinn and I drove out to Nicks house in Tooele and had a great dinner!  Nick & Michelle cooked a ham and potatoes and I added a pasta salad, homemade wheat rolls, and Cornflake Gooies.  Yep, we were stuffed!  Michelle and I went on a nice walk around her neighborhood and then she and I staged a few....150 pictures of Hayden.  The one I attached here was real cute and the Bear was Nicks when he was young.  Jack and Signe gave my kids 2 of these bears when he was young and he still had it!  Wow!

Hayden at 6 Months old

Nick took us to Durocher Lane so ....MORE PICTURES!  While there, we were getting Cambree to walk up the street to a better lit sign and she got upset over the cracks in the road, and much like a cow with cattle guard, refused to cross the cracks!  It was hilarious!!!

The weather was so nice today and being outside was awesome!  So what if it calls for rain tomorrow, today was great!

Cambree trying to overcome the crack in the road!  So funny!

Weekends are just too short!  So much to do and play!  I was so surprised to get a text from a number in Hawaii on Saturday!  At first I wondered if someone had bent the rules and sent the Mama a picture.?  But after I text back, "Sweet", a Sister Clayton on the Big Island said that you were helping her move.  That's awesome!  Great pictures and I put them on Facebook for your friends to see.

So, another great week and here it is, Sunday night and I love writing you letters.  I look forward to your letters so much as I get to here how you are doing and what experiences you are having.  I mostly love to get a peek into your heart and hear what matters most to you.  What matters most to me are my children and each of their lives, loves and challenges.  What a great blessing you are all to me.  Have a terrific week out there and know you are loved and supported at home.  It has been a wonderous blessing to pray and read scriptures with Ethan each day and night and know he is getting ready more and more to serve his mission.  He got his passport papers done and now will wait for it to come back to then send in the Visa papers to SLC.  General Conference will be awesome this weekend for all of us. 

This week is Spring break for Ethan and Kwinn so they are excited to sleep in for the next few days!  Darn, wish I could do something fun with them!  Mike will be down this coming weekend so it will be fun to see him and Gavin!

Love always,  Mom

I still cant seem to get these pictures to rotate......sorry!

Durocher Lane in Tooele, Utah!

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Morgan's Letter 14th from 2013 - Photos

Family & Friends,

So this week has had so many random things happen. On Friday we were on a District Exchange. On Friday it was raining really hard all day long. 2 of the Elders were heading up to Kohala to do service, and they got in an accident. They were going 20 mph over the speed limit, they were going 40 mph around a sharp turn and lost traction and ran into some poles. The Bumper and right front fender got all messed up, and the tire got popped. They were able to get it home on the spare tire, but cant drive it anymore til it gets fixed. So we have been sharing a car until they can get it fixed. Its been fun, but also a inconvenience too.

Also on Friday we had a lesson with our Chuukese Investigators. They forgot to read The Book of Mormon, so instead of giving the lesson we planned out, we read 2 Nephi 31 with them. They felt the Spirit very strongly and accepted the Invitation to be Baptized. They are going to be baptized on April 27 in a few more weeks. They are a very nice family, and i love visiting with them. We have so much work to do in our Area! We have so much potential, there are so many people who can be baptized, so we have been working like crazy trying to teach them, and visit with them so we can help them progress to the waters of baptism. We are so busy in this area, way more busy than i have ever been. Its been awesome. Its sad that we are going to have to split up our area on April 24. Since our ward split and we are covering 2 wards now, Misison President is going to send 2 more missionaries to our area so that we have 1 ward each. I dont know if Me and Elder Richards are going to stay together and be in 1 ward, or if they split us up and put 1 of us in each ward. The Latter option is the most Logical to me, cuz then they wouldnt have to have 2 bran new missionaries to the area, we would already know the Ward.

Saturday morning we helped a lady move. Her name is Sister Clayson, or Clayton. She is single with 1 son who lives with her. She was moving to Hilo, and so we packed up all of her stuff into a Moving Truck. That took a couple hours, and then after she wanted to show us her Jackson Chameleons. They are wild and live in her bushes around her house, we finally found them in the branches. They have really good camouflage, so they were hard to find. After we found them we held them, and they would climb around our hands and climb up our arms. Sister Clayton took some pictures, and asked us if we wanted her to send them to our parents. So i told her Mom and Dads cell phone number and so she suprised them with a text and a picture of me. Then Sister Clayton wanted to buy us lunch, so we went to Dominoes for lunch.

Jackson Camillian at Sister Claytons house

Checking out Jackson Camillians with Elder Dzieman

Sunday was awesome, since we are covering 2 wards we were at church all day long. We have 9am church and 1pm church, so we were at the Chapel until 4 pm that night. It was really awesome though, and very spiritual. All the Members recieved their new callings for the 2 new wards, so there was lots of callings given. Then the testimonies were wonderful, and very spiritual. We were supposed to teach gospel principles, but no one showed up for our class, so that was fine with us. We participated in Primary to help them with an Easter Activity they were doing, that was lots of fun. After church we headed off to a Easter Party with a member. Two different members of our ward wanted us to come over for dinner on Easter Sunday, so we had to go to 2 dinners. The first dinner had more Hawaiian local food for Easter, which was very delicous. After Stuffing ourselves there, (because Hawaiians like to make you eat a lot)  we headed off to another members who was having an Easter Party, and ate more food there. The 2nd dinner had more American Food so it was cool to get both sides. By the end of the night i was stuffed to the Brim, one of the fullest i have probably ever been in my life. Then we headed home for the night.

For P-Day today first thing in the morning we went out to breakfast with a member. Bro McMillan always takes the members to breakfast at "Hawaiian Style" on the 1st P-Day of the month. He took our whole district to breakfast. The place has delicious Local food, and gives out huge portions. My pancakes were like 18 inches acrossed and i had 2 pancakes plus a huge omlet and hashbrowns.Then we went on a hike at 10 AM. Its a tourist hike thats called Pololu hike, where you hike a few miles to a Isolated Beach that you can only get to by hiking. The beach wasnt sand, but the beach was made up of rocks and boulders, so we were allowed to go on the beach, as long as we stayed away from the water. There was a giant swing we had fun swinging on, made up of a giant rope, probably like an anchor rope for a huge ship.  3 other Elders all tried balancing on the swing, but lost balance and all landed on their backs, it was really funny! Then we headed back to the missionaries house where we had lunch there. And now im here Emailing the Family.

I got the news of Ethans Mission call to Argentina and that made me super excited. Im so proud of Ethan for going on a mission! Crazy we will be 1 year apart on our missions. I also got a letter from a  non-member friend, Cierra, who told me she read the Book of Mormon and is getting baptized on April 16!!

Well thanks for reading everybody, have a great week! Love you all!

Love Elder Morgan Durocher

Missionaries from the Kona Zone

North Shore Beach on the Big Island

Huge rope swing on the beach