Living That SoCal Kinda Life With a Thankful Heart‏

Hey Everyone!

Well this week has been pretty eventful to say the very least. Whitewashing is an adventure and a half, and its really a miracle that I have any form of an idea of what's going on. Stay tuned and I'll give you a quick synopsis of the week.

So first and foremost, let me give you an idea of where I'm at. So Dos Vientos is the suburb of Newbury Park, which is a suburb of Thousand Oaks, which is a suburb of LA. I know, suburb-ception. Pretty needless to say, this area is high end. But that's not as bad as I though it would be! A lot of areas in this part of the mission really struggle work wise, but this area seems to be an exception. They've had 2 baptisms already this year (which is a lot for Newbury. One area hasn't seen a baptism in almost 3 years), and we have another planned for this Saturday!! Woooohoooo!! It's this really awesome family who just got reactivated in the past few months and their 9 and 8 year old sons are getting baptized. Their name is the Koeppells, and we were able to meet with them for the first time last night and I'm really excited to work with them more. Every area I've had I always seem to find that one nerdy family that I relate to really well, and for here that's them. But they're not the only awesome ones here. The members here are on fire. They're all excited about missionary work and are looking for ways to help us in any way that they can, so we're really hoping to capitalize on that. We are also the first Elders that this ward has seen in over 3 years. Could be longer, it depends on who you ask, but 3 seems to be the general consensus :) There is actually one kid in the ward that didn't know that there were "boy missionaries" and was pretty awestruck when he saw us haha! So yeah, so far, I'm liking it here :) I've been very blessed to have worked in amazing wards my whole mission, and Dos Vientos is no exception.

As for my comp, Elder Elliott is also pretty cool. He's from Kansas, and he's been out for about 4 months now. He's spent the entirety of those 4 months in Santa Barbara, and he's pretty excited to work in a new area. He went to a year of college before the mission, and his interests include uni-cycling, sewing, and making some pretty bomb omelets. Needles to say, we're getting along just fine:)

Now this week, we celebrate Thanksgiving, which has always been one of my favorite holidays. But until this year it hasn't really been for the right reasons. I can honestly tell you that the main reason I've love thanksgiving for the past 18 years has been for the food. I mean come on, who doesn't like stuffing their face with copious quantities of carbohydrates and poultry?? And I'm being entirely honest here. But all that aside, I've had a very bad habit of being ungrateful for a good majority of my life. Luckily I recognized that pretty early on in my mission, so for the past 6 months or so I've really been trying to cultivate and "attitude of gratitude." And, yes, I know how cliche that sounds, but bear with me. I received some council at one point in my life that if I focused on what I had, not what I didn't, and I devoted my time to serving the Lord, I would never want for anything. At first I thought that meant that I would be so abundantly blessed by the Lord that I couldn't possibly want for anything. But now I've come to realize that, as I do those things, I realize how abundantly the Lord has already blessed me and I can't want for anything. I encourage all of you to do the same :)

That's all for this week! I hope all of you have a very happy thanksgiving!! I love you all, and I'm very grateful for all of you :)

Love,
Elder Brennan Jon Rosenlof

He didn't send a picture, but I got this on Thanksgiving.

Transfers (Week of 11/16)

Hello everyone!!

Well to be honest this week was fairly uneventful, but it was good nonetheless! Let me fill you in:

1.) Kyle is doing great! We were actually super impressed with him this week. We had some great lessons with him, and he's really progressing. He loves the Book of Mormon and has been reading it daily. But, we think, most impressive is that he came to church yesterday after having been in the ER this Saturday. He's pretty dedicated.

2.) The biggest thing that happened this week was transfer news. Unfortunately, I'm going to be leaving Atascadero :( Can't say that we didn't see this coming though. They're sending me down to the Dos Vientos Ward in the Newbury Park Stake, and I'm actually going to be bluewashing in. For those of you who don't know what that means, my companion and I are going to be replacing Sisters in that area. My new comp will be Elder Elliot. They're also going to be pinkwashing (Sisters replacing Elders) Atown 1st and just have the Sisters in the ward just north of us take over this ward's work. I'm definitely sad to be leaving. This ward has become my favorite of my mission. But I am excited for the new adventurew waiting for me down south!

That's all for this week! Sorry that this email is so short this week :P I'll definitely make up for it next week haha! I'll have plenty to talk about then :) I love you all! Have an awesome week!

Much love,
Elder Brennan Jon Rosenlof

1.The District


2. Final selfie with Shannon, Eric, and Jaden!


3. Meet Kyle!

Old Books and Dry Mormons (Week of 11/9)

Hello everyone!!

Well this week has been pretty interesting. First off, California very suddenly decided that it's time for fall and it hasn't broken 73 degrees this whole week. It's been really nice considering that I've been living in temperatures that almost constantly border 100 degrees for the past 6 months :) Definitely can't complain!!

Well first and foremost, we had probably the coolest service project ever this last Wednesday. We got in contact with Lois Eckland again (for those of you that remember her from a couple weeks ago), and she invited us over to help her organized some "old stuff" that she had. We went over, and she led us into her garage that was half filled with boxes on boxes of old books. Her husband was a big collector back in the day, and books were his favorite. We then spent the next 3 hours taking pictures of these books so she could post them online and sell them. It was AWESOME. There were some really awesome books in there, including a copy of Treasure Island that was printed in 1912; a copy of Uncle Tom's Cabin from 1896; and an old arithmetic reader from 1856. Afterwards, her husband told us to go through and to pick out a couple favorites to take home. Elder Crook took the Treasure Island, and I took a couple Mark Twain classics. Again, one of the coolest service projects EVER.

Work wise things are slowing down just a bit here in Atascadero, but the work is still going well! We just finished doing 100% accountability on the ward list (going through and contacting everyone whose records are in our ward), but that was our main source of finding so we're currently brainstorming what our next move should be. Kyle is doing fantastic though!! We had an awesome meeting with him on Saturday where we talked about the Book of Mormon, the importance of receiving a testimony of it, as well as how to recognize the Spirit. He also came to Church, was actively participating in Sunday School and Priesthood, and at the end one of the members came up and asked if he was a member that had just moved into the area. He was very surprised to learn that he was investigating. Needless to say, Kyle's on fire :) He's a really great guy that is feeling the joy that comes from gospel living and its going to take him far.

And that's about all the excitement from this week! Just a heads up to all of you that transfers are going to be this next Tuesday! I've got a sneaking feeling that this is going to be my last week here in Atown.

Have a great week!! Thank you for all of your prayers. They help more than you know :)

Much love,
Elder Brennan Jon Rosenlof

Halloween‏

Hey everybody!

First off, where in the world has this year gone? There is no way that it can be November already. I could've sworn that January was just a couple months ago. Honestly, this mission thing goes by WAY to fast. I remember thinking at the beginning of my mission that this would take forever. Then I blinked. So, in the way of mission advice, don't blink. Blink and your dead. (Sorry but I really couldn't resist)

Aside from my raging mission-mid-life crisis, this week has been pretty great! Not nearly as eventful as last week, but we still say some great things happen. First of all, we've started teaching Kyle. For those of you who don't remember, Kyle is Shannon's nonmember boyfriend who came to Eric's baptism. He's had a bit of a rough past, but he's cleaned himself up over the past couple of years and he's been on a search for God. He believes that He's there, but he hasn't been able to find a church that he's liked yet. So he tagged along to Eric's first recent convert lesson, and we ended up having a stellar discussion on the Restoration. He really loved the concept of the apostasy, and kept talking about how much sense it makes. He also readily accepted a copy of the Book of Mormon, saying that he's been wanting to read it for some time now. We also asked him if he would be baptized if he received an answer, and he gave us this weird look and just said,"...well duh?" Probably my favorite answer to that question so far. Anyhow, we committed him to read, pray, and come to church. Needless to say, we're excited to see where the Lord takes him.

Halloween was also pretty fun. This was my first one in the field (last year I celebrated in the MTC), so I was curious to see what it was like to be a missionary on Halloween. Sadly, we didn't get any compliments on our costumes, but we did get a lot of candy so it was a win for us. We were also the honorary judges at the trunk-or-treat, so we had the privilege of destroying childhood dreams. Always a good experience :)

We also said our goodbyes to Christina this week. She headed up to Oregon this last Friday, and we were sad to see her go :( It's been a privilege to have helped her as long as we have. She's a great woman, and we're excited to see where she goes. At the very least, we found a good friend in her :) Also, she appointed us guardians over her sons beta fish until we can find him a good owner. His name is Teancum.

That's all for this week! Hope you guys have a great one :) Remember to pray for your missionaries and always tip your waiter. Love you all!

Much love,
Elder Brennan Jon Rosenlof

2. Teancum



1. Us, Christina, and Myles.