September 29, 2014


Dear Family:

We had a really interesting week this week.

Montag (Monday): It was P-day but we had a lesson with a less active member in Tegernsee which is 2 hours away by train. So we emailed and basically went straight there. We had about an hour before our lesson was going to start so we hiked some of the hills. IT WAS AWESOME! Tegernsee is the most expensive/ prettiest places in my area so I didnt mind our extra hour to hike around haha. We then went to Bruder Cruz to teach a lesson. He is from Chile but married a German woman. He served a mission in Chile and loves the missionaries but doesn't come to church because he feels he is judged by a lot of the members. But he loves us. So we chilled with him shared a little spiritual thought and than he asked if we wanted to make Impanatas. They were so good! I felt like I was in Stevie's Mission except for the fact that we were speaking German and in a super expensive apartment that I probably will never be able to afford.

Dienstag (Tuesday): We walked past Oktoberfest München ( Munich puts on the biggest thing for Oktoberfest in all of the world) on our way to distrikt meeting and some crazy Mormon lady from Salt Lake came over to us an wanted to take a picture. It was super weird. I also can spot an American from Europeans so easily now. Americans are SO LOUD. It a painfully truthful stereotype we have haha.

Mittwoch (Wednesday): We passed out a ton of flyers for our Gemeinde Fest (ward party)it wasn't anything that special.

Donnerstag (Thursday): Elder Evans and I had to go to München to pick up pamphlets and things for our booth at the ward party and I saw Elder Hunter! He was my best bud from the MTC. He is working in the office now because he and his trainer both have hernias haha. (He is the on that drew the virdonken deer in the MTC)

Freitag (Friday): We had two eating appointments and it was awful. In Germany you eat the food until its gone. They don't believe in left overs and they always make a bunch of food. I felt awful.

Samstag (Saturday): We had the Gemeinde Fest. No one that the missionaries invited from the street or mailboxing came so that was lame. But, we had a lot of members bring friends which was way cool. Schwester Unterhare is from Brasil and she brought a friend who is from Mexico and Elder Smith spoke to her in Spanish. It was way cool. He took 6 years in school so he is pretty good. We also had Gaby and Bernhardt there with their boys and that was awesome. Their kids played with kids from the ward and Gaby hit it off great with a lot of the members in the ward. Even though we didn't really get any new investigators from it, it was awesome to help progress some of the ones we already had.

Sonntag (Sunday): We made this huge disgusting sandwich for dinner because we had a ton of food we needed to use before we buy more today. It was an egg, chicken, BBQ sauce sandwich. The funny thing was it didn't taste that bad haha. But it looked awful.

I love you a bunch. Have a great week.

-Elder Carr

Ps I GOT MY PACKAGE! I ate all the jerky sticks in two days haha. I Also love my yo yo and ninja turtle pens. I literally ran out of pens this week and now I have even cooler ones haha. Thank so much!

Elder Carr

The nasty but kinda good sandwich

September 22, 2-14

Dear family:

So I don't even know where to start with this week. It was funny, weird, and spiritual. So we had some really cool lessons this week. We went to go visit a less active member name Bruder de Sousa and he actually has a really strong testimony. He reads and prays every day. We started teaching him, and his kids who aren't members came and listened in, and he wants us to continue teaching his children COOL! Their mom doesnt believe in God, and that makes it hard for the kids because they are caught between a mom that doesn't have any faith and a Mormon father that does everything except come to church soooo our work is cut out for us. Bruder de Sousa said I look like Bill Clinton sooooo I got smashed at his house too. It was a weird lesson.

 Next, we taught Danny. He is the son of some less actives we meet with and are making a ton of progress. Danny is punk 17 year old kid but he came to church the other day.  He wants a Book of Mormon and he loves us. It was way cool. We also taught Monika and she is going to read in the Book of Mormon and pray to find out if it is true. The work is getting pretty exciting here!

Here comes the weird part. We met with some investigators named Gaby and Bernhardt( they have the son with Epilepsy) and we invited them to the ward party on saturday. They are going to come and thats great. Wealso mvisited with them for a while and things are going really good. WEIRD PART! She told Elder Evans that I was hot and would totally date me up if she was younger... EW! She is like 50, married, and also 50! Yup I felt way weirded out after that. Now I feel really awkward everytime I go over there haha.

We had the biggest lightning storm I have ever seen the other day. It came out of nowhere. We literally were running through a wall of water.

We had a finding day on Saturday and my German improved so much because of it. I talked to at least 500 people easy. I even had a conversation with one of Rosenheim's residential crazy men. He is going to come to the ward party now... NICE ONE ELDER CARR BRING THE CRAZY DUDE TO A PLACE WITH LOTS OF KIDS! I felt dumb but I didn't know he was crazy until after haha. Also, on our way to email our families for the week, there was a man and his wife from China who asked us for directions to a bank. We told him where to go and he gave us these good luck charms. He said  ''they are from China!'' really excitedly and I was just like '' Yeah so is everything else on my body...'' haha. I didnt say that but I thought it.

I hope you all have a great week. Mom you are going to do great on your test. I BELIEVE IN YOU!!!!! Jake good luck with cross country. TJ I love you too! Kacey have a good week at school. Dad have a great time at work. 

I LOVE YOU!

-Elder Carr

M with Elder Bakewell- After our "wall of water" experience

The Chinese good luck charm

September 15, 2014

Dear Family:

Kacey tell Coach Schultz i say Hi back! 

That service project you guys did sounds awesome.

1 Spiritual experience: Elder Stilger went home this last week and before he left I challenged him to give a BOM away on his way to the train station and he found a super cool investigator. He was really grateful I told him to do that. 

2 I read all of Mormon today so I felt really sad. I am almost finished with the BOM in English but I am also studying in German and I am only on chapter 13 of first Nephi.

3 The funniest thing that happened was a veganfest. so all the weirdos in Bayern were in Rosenheim.

4 I got a hair cut

So last  Thursday we started the new transfer. I will be finishing my training with Elder Evans so I am excited about that. Elder Stilger went home his 2 years came and went. Elder smith is TRAINING! so we have two Greenies in our apartment. The new Elder is Elder Bakewell he is from England and it will be cool because I get to go on a tausch with him and we both are bad at German haha but that is where miracles happen. It was also Elder Evans' birthday on Thursday and we had fireworks going off at Herbstfest. Thursday was great!

We didn't have very many lessons this last week and most of them fell out so that kind of hurt. We did teach one less active and her granddaughter is going to be taking the lessons from Elders Smith and Bakewell. We really just want to be teaching so we loaded this next week with lessons all over our area. We are going to kill it this week.

We went contacting on Saturday and in Alte Stadt.   We saw these huge horses pulling this wagon that was full of beer barrels. there was this band playing and guys cracking their whips to the beat of the drum.  It was really cool.

I gave my first talk on Sunday. It was about moral purity... in German so I hope I didn't ruin the principle of the law of chastity over the pulpit haha. I was throwing around words I didn't fully know the meaning of but I think it went ok. I am really starting to love the German language. I can communicate decently now and my accent sounds German so I really like reading out loud to show off haha. I still have a long way to go until I am even proficient but I really enjoy speaking now.

Love Elder Carr  

My district

Elder Steigler and Me

The band- and the cool whip guy below

September 7, 2014

Dear Family

 My companion is Elder Evans he is from south Jordan Utah I think I told you that when I first got to Germany. The Rosenheim ward is smaller than any ward I have ever seen in the states, but it is a typical small city ward for Europe. We have about 40 people on any given Sunday so the missionaries make up about 10 percent of the ward haha. There are bigger wards in like München (Munich), Salzburg, and Wein (Vienna) but we have some really small branches in the mission too. 

I have had two interviews with Präsident Kohler. He is awesome! Before he was a mission president he trained mission presidents, so he knows what he is doing. I have eaten so much good food I dont even know where to start. I have eaten a lot of Bayrisch (Bavarian) food like Wurst and potato salads. They eat a whole lot of sausage here. I also LOVE Döners. They are Turkisch but they are on every street corner. I honestly haven't eaten anything bad so I am living the food mission dream. 

The best thing I have eaten was at a member appointment this week. I was on Tausch with Elder Vitel (he is not my companion he is my zone leader and he is from Romania) and we went to Familie Madei. They are converts to the church but have have been members for forever. They are both in their 90s. She made us 60 Zwetschgen Knudl and they were sooooo good but sooooo bad for you. They are plum dumplings wrapped in bread and then fried. You then drown them in butter and dump suger all over it. They were soooo good. 

Saturday we had a really interesting experience. So Rosenheim has a little Oktoberfest called Herbstfest. Some guy went to Herbstfest and had a little too much to drink and ended up at our doorstep and past out. Its ok though the ambulance came and picked up. He was Smashed.

Today we went to Herbstfest and it is basically a giant fair like we have in the states but it gave me an excuse to eat sausage and wear Lederhosen so I was ok with it haha.

So we had a really numbers this week but we did teach a less active from Angola named Bruder Dos Santos and we shared with him why it was so important to read in the scriptures, go to church and pray. He told us that he wanted to start becoming active again. He is leaving for Angola at the end of the month but he asked us to make sure that the missionaries would have his contact information because he wants his wife and daughters to hear the gospel. So we are going to make some Angola Missionary's day when we give them Bruder Dos Santos' info because they will get a great progressing less active and some golden investigators.

Ich hab Sie lieb

-Elder Carr

Me and Elder Evans in traditional Lederhosen at Herbsfest

Sept. 1, 2014

Dear Family-

I forgot to tell you about the miracle that happened this week. We have these investigators named G and B. and they have a son with some medical problems. The school wouldn't accept him. He is a perfectly normal boy but he has epilepsy. (check the spelling on that haha). They were really worried because they want to give their son all of the opportunities he deserves. If he didn't get in to school G. would have to quit her job and it would ruin them financially. We told them that if they would kneel down and offer a sincere prayer that they would be ok. They did it. The school changed their mind, because someone in the school's administration has had the same issue in her family.  She heard their case and their son is allowed to go to school now. 

God Answers prayers! 

-Elder Carr

in der Berg

It was supposed to be beautiful mountain vista- all we got was wet!

Catholic everywhere- even on the top of the mountain

Aug. 24, 2014

Dear Family:

It sounds like a lot went on this week to say the least. So I got a ton of "good looking wife" points this week. We went contacting and only found one guy last week. Everyone else were hating on us so hard. They didn´t just say Nein Danke, they cussed at us. But it wasn't anything I wasn't expecting.

 I have a pretty good story with contacting this week though. So an appointment fell out and we doored 6 houses and this old guy came out of the apartment complex. We tried talking to him, then he turned to us and said "Young people should be more concerned with football, women, partying, and getting drunk". Those were the people we dealt with this week haha.

 We did have a really productive week though. We have a new investigator that is showing a real desire to learn and I went to sleep TIRED everyday and I felt good about my efforts at the end of the day. I am starting to understand everything in German the trick now is to be able to speak it which is a whole other animal haha.

I had Tausch with Elder Smith (in my apartment) this week and Elder Stilger and Elder Evans went hiking with some of our investigators and they came back home with 300 euro worth of Steinpilze (really fancy mushrooms) that we ate for dinner... I hated them. It made it hard for me to mushrooms at a members house later in the week but I will survive. I know that other missionaries out there are eating way worse haha.

I love and miss you guys so much!

-Elder Carr 

Steinpilze!!

August 18, 2014

Dear Family:

 That Horse trip you guys took looked awesome. Mom, there is two things that we have in Bavaria- The Christmas spirit and Lung cancer from all the cigarette consumption haha. Dad who is your Home teaching companion? Kacey- HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!! If you love chocolate you need to come to Deutschland it is really good. PS I'm not getting fat from the food. We eat really healthy in the apartment and I have actually lost ten pounds. 

I AM LEGAL! I got my visa stuff done so I shouldn't be deported anytime soon haha. So I spent 3 days in München this week because I had zone training on Tuesday and then I had an Aus Tausch there again on Wednesday and Thursday. My exchange was really cool. I went with Elder Roberts. He has been out on his mission for 18 months and he is from Everett WA!!! We talked about Washington a ton (ps Bayern-Bavaria- is like western WA. It rains all the time). We had a lesson with one of his investigators and it was in English so I could contribute more than usual haha. So we had to have the lesson on her balcony because we didn't have another male with us and it started raining way hard. She ended up going inside and we sat in lounge chairs on the balcony with umbrellas trying to teach about tithing... it was really funny. That investigator got baptized last Saturday! 

Funny Story: Elder Evans and I were walking back from the church and some guy yelled "go home you blanky-blank Zeugnis Jehovah (Jehovah's witness) It was funny.

I had another Tausch with Elder Stilger on Saturday. (He is part of the companionship we share the apartment with). We went on an Adventure in a place called Tegerseer, looking for an inactive 2 hours away from the city and didn't find her but I saw some of the most beautiful farmland of my life. Dad that is were you want to retire. Everything is green and Mountainous. I'll send pictures.

Well that was my week i love you guys a ton!

-Elder Carr

The view from a member's house

Tergeseer

Cows! :)