Email received April 27, 2015

My oh my what a week that was and what a week we have ahead of us! Monday was a fairly normal p-day. Tuesday was interesting because we were able to meet a recent convert who moved down here from Marion Indiana and I had actually met her a couple of times in the 6 weeks I was serving up in Marion! That was cool.. Then dinner with the Yates family which was awesome and then we came in for the evening around nine and the Unklesbay's met up with us because I had to give them something and while we were outside our apartment building talking to them Sister Unklesbay was taking some pictures of us (she's awesome) and while she was doing so a couple of guys came out of the building and made a comment on her taking pictures of us so we started to explain to him that our mom's out west like pictures of us and then talked about who we were and why we were dressed up and what we do and then two more guys showed up and then it turned into lots of testimony bearing and turned out to be a fantastic lesson in the last 20 minutes of the day! So awesome :) Then Wednesday went by then a long day of weekly planning and working with the zone on Thursday then service on Friday helping Brother Yates with some yard work for a sweet mother's day present then we took David out with us which was great then the ward chili cook off that night which was lots of fun! Saturday it rained and we ran around seeing people getting ready for church then Sunday was a Stake Broadcast which was amazing! :) Now begins the fun week.. P-day today, exchanges tonight till tomorrow night, Stake Reports Wednesday night, Thursday 9am-5pm is zone conference which we actually have to be there around 730ish for preparations, then Friday from 9am-6pm is leadership council which will be amazing as usual then of course the weekend! :) Hooray for being busy! :) Here goes nothin! I love you all! Have a wonderful week!

Elder Gunnoe

Email received April 13, 2015

Oh my Gosh... what a week... this has been yet another crazy week... it'll probably stay that way so don't be surprised if i say that again next week... So Monday was p-day of course, played some awesome basketball and cleaned, then I went on exchanges in Liberty with Elder Bayly which was  a good exchange! had a great dinner with a member of the stake presidency. Then Wednesday was fairly normal despite lots of phone calls and working with some missionaries, then Thursday we had Zone meeting which actually we planned on Wednesday so that was part of Wednesday. but zone meeting went very well, it went kind of long but it was great! So we were planning on initiating some sort of Zone Car Fast now that the weather is nice and so Elder Sunderland and I decided to test it out before zone meeting so we gave up the car and went walking for a solid 3 hours and found 3 new investigators and met lots of people so it was very successful! So we shared our experience during Zone Meeting and the Sister areas in West Chester and Liberty (Sisters always have a full time car) they took our experience to heart and tried it out themselves even before our actual car fast and saw a ton of success from it! It was amazing seeing the Sisters make that sacrifice and receive the grace they deserved! Then I went on another exchange this time to West Chester on Friday with Elder Goss and we did some service at a food bank and I got a free pair of brand new Nike training running shoes which was awesome and then we walked around quite a bit during the day and then an awesome dinner with Bishop! Saturday was pretty hectic with lots of service in the morning and at night and work in between.. Then Sunday which was another great day.. the weather is so beautiful now we've been having meals outside and meetings outside and no more suits... it's so wonderful :) I am staying here for at least another 6 weeks but I am absolutely devastated to see Elder Sunderland go... he has been an amazing companion and he means the world to me.. I know without a doubt that he'll do great wherever he goes.. Most of the Zone is getting mixed up so I'm very excited to see what the Lord has in store for us. I cannot believe I only have 12 weeks left... time is flying so fast.. I'm working on sending my winter clothes home which is weird.. and we just heard about a young man in the Fairfield ward that got his mission call and he reports to the MTC July 8th... the day my ministerial certificate expires... whoa.. anyway I love you all so much. Stay amazing :) Love you!!

Email received March 23, 2015

Whoa what a week! Monday was an absolutely gorgeous P-Day and we were able to get together as a zone and play some ultimate Frisbee at a park here in Hamilton :) A guy from the local paper came by and got some shots of us enjoying the nice weather.. haven't been able to find the article though :/ Then Tuesday we got to go to the temple!!! :D It was inspired.. so our zone trip was originally on Thursday then it got switched to Tuesday at 11 and then it got switched to Tuesday at 1.. and when we showed up I found Brother Jordan and Bishop Maddox were there and Sister Jordan was going through for her own endowment during the 1pm session! So I got to see Bishop Maddox and his wife, Brother Jordan and his mom Sister Jordan, and Sister Knotts!!! Such a fantastic surprise!! :)) So the temple trip was amazing. Then Wednesday we had District Meeting and then we had exchanges with the Liberty Elders that day so I went to Liberty with Elder Spagnolo.. pretty good day! Then weekly planning Thursday and then we had exchanges with West Chester on Friday and this time I stayed in Hamilton with Elder Goss and we had a fairly good day.. then Saturday roles around and we're a bit behind for the week.. so we worked quite a bit Saturday and it was super fun because we had Bishop's son out with us all day :) We also had an amazing dinner out at Sue's! Then Sunday we still needed to teach 8 lessons so we buckled down and worked and we did it! Sunday was a great day :) We sang in ward choir in sacrament meeting which I loved :) Then we went out and worked for the rest of the day and had some awesome lessons and ended the day with teaching the Invite By the Spirit lesson to the Maddy family which was a blast :) Brother Maddy and his son's love baseball and he actually let me bat and pitch when he was helping his son practice at the church.. it felt sooooooooooooooooooooooooo good.... I love baseball <3 The Zone is continually improving which is great to see! Something we've been focusing on in the mission of course, as I mentioned before, is being a Zion mission or being united. We are taught that just because we aren't seeing huge amounts of success in our area as long as we're doing all we can and being diligent and obedient the grace will be poured out where it needs to be in the mission :) Also my studies have been super in depth lately because I got a Strong's Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible and it has a Hebrew and Greek dictionary in it. So as I read the scriptures if a word stands out to me I can look up the original meaning of that word and it brings a ton of depth and meaning to the scriptures.. So wonderful :) Well all in all life is fantastic :) Time is flyin! #Halfthetimehasgonequick..thesecondhalfwillgoevenquicker.... Hope everyone is doing well back home!! I love you all so much! Stay amazing! <3

Elder Gunnoe

Email received March 9, 2015

Whoa!! What a week that was! Transfer week went very well.. we got 5 new missionaries in the zone and we had a very solid week here in the land of milk and honey (Cincinnati north zone). So Friday we had an amazing day at the mission home with President and Sister Porter for Leadership council! it was an amazing and very revelatory experience. President Porter towards the end of leadership council gave an amazing lesson on how we should be teaching the doctrine behind coming to church. lots of very real analogies and very obvious reasons from multiple scriptures and i don't share it on here because it is best shared in person :) We have had a lot of amazing dinners lately and I've been eating a lot :P and then doing a lot of sit ups to make up for it. :D Going to be a very busy week ahead of us as we have interviews tomorrow to run (as zone leaders we work with the sister training leaders on doing role plays and planner/area book checks for all the missionaries in the zone...:P) and then Wednesday we have zone meeting which we need to prepare for then in between we have preparations for Sue's baptism! Sue is a very amazing woman who we have been teaching for a while now. She is like a grandma to me she's so sweet and she has some amazing faith and she has studied and prayed so much it is inspiring :) I love her :) We're excited for her baptism this weekend and look forward to being with her on that special day :) Well other than that we are getting some warmer weather now which is amazing :) I'm wonderful, life is wonderful.... peace out!! #snowflake #Romans8:18 Love you so much!<3

Email received February 23, 2015

What a week this has been!! Monday we had our zone fun day which consisted of painting a "We Believe" sign, playing some chair soccer, and then going to take a tour at Jungle Jims!! Ate a larvae, some dragon fruit, super good pineapple, and some other foreign fruits.. good stuff!! Tuesday we were out working and we found a 93 year old woman that we're teaching now!! She's so awesome :) Super funny and quite hard of hearing.. hooray for a well projected voice! We also found a micronesian family that we'll be working with now as well which will be a little harder because there's a bit of a language barrier.. But it'll work out :) Wednesday was district meeting which went well and a scattered day of work.. Thursday lots of running around and an awesome evening with some investigators in the Bishop's home for a game night :D so many laughs and good times :) Friday was exchanges with Elder Bayly. Saturday was a very crazy day because we woke up to about 5 or 6 inches of snow that wasn't completely expected and we had service all the way across town so driving was fun with people driving super slow.. But painting at the Ruiz's was a blast :) Then we went to give a blessing to a recent convert who is having problems with his shoulder then an awesome pancake dinner with some awesome members and then we went and watched Joseph Smith Prophet of the Restoration with an investigator which was a powerful experience! Then Sunday.. -_- the plow crews plowed the church parking lot halfway through Saturday while it was still snowing and they didn't go back so there was still snow in the parking lot so bishop had to cancel church which was kind of sad but we got to watch a session of general conference with an investigator to make it still church on Sunday :) So that was awesome :) Then we had another awesome member dinner Sunday night and some awesome short lessons with our investigators including one who gave us a bag she prepared for us before we came over that had snacks in it! :D this was the first time we officially met her and she already did that :) Her aunt is a member and she's met with missionaries before but not for a while :) So great :) Lots of family history work getting done lately! If you haven't worked on it... work on it! it's so wonderful! :D i love you so much :)
#snowflakesarethebest #myloveforsnowflakesisnutty #God'sgraceiswonderful #lifeisgood :)

Email received February 9, 2015

Oh my gosh what a week that was!! So we started the Final Four weeks leading up to March Madness and we started it off with a Finding Challenge.. We as a zone broke our record and we as a mission shattered our record for finding new investigators in a week with just over 1000!! So amazing. Zone Meeting earlier this week was great as we had a Zone Council on how we can improve and become united as we all work towards having a "Zion Mission." Tuesday we also had exchanges which was a lot of fun with the West Chester Elders. We were able to help a new couple move into the ward from Missouri which was a good workout ;) Wednesday we gave an awesome Chapel tour to one of our newer investigators and also gave a blessing to an elderly woman in hospice. Her granddaughter who lives in Las Vegas got a hold of us asking to go give her a blessing and also an uncle that lives here in Hamilton. In the blessing I told her she had fulfilled her purpose in this life and she could peacefully pass which she did the next morning. Very spiritual experience! Thursday we had an amazing Zone Conference in which we talked a lot about the Legacy we want to leave behind as 60% of the mission goes home in the next 6 months... That Legacy is as follows.

Be a Zion Mission-One Heart, One Mind
Be a Mission Family-No one left behind, no empty chairs
Be as the Army of Helaman-Each missionary obeys every word of command with exactness
Have Missionaries that love God and serve Him with all heart, might, mind, and strength
Every missionary is a leader who changes patterns
Have a spirit of positivity and enthusiasm for the work
We receive grace to reach ALL goals by living the power triangle.

and this is how we will fulfill that legacy...

Every missionary believes, doubting nothing
We pray for every missionary's success
We pray for the pure love of Christ
We see our areas as a land of promise
We do all the little things every time
We will see ourselves, our companions, our investigators, the members and the ward as God does
Each missionary reaches individual goals
Each companionship reaches companionship goals
Language is always focused on the cause
We live "Remember This" (in the back cover of PMG)

So that's what this mission is up to :) Elder Judd had a great insight as we talked about what we teach others and what they need to know and he said that every time we feel the Spirit, it is a manifestation of God's love for us. How true is that!! The Spirit comes from our Heavenly Father and it conveys truth and comforts us and does all of these wonderful things so anytime we feel the Spirit we can know of a surety that God loves us :)  What a great thought and truth!
It was a crazy weekend running around the area seeing everyone and also of course finding. It's going to be another awesome week and more miracles will rain down!! :) I love you so much! :)

Elder Gunnoe :)

Email received February 2, 2015

This is just bits and pieces of our email with him today:

mornin!! not a lot of time today.. got stuff to do around the zone.. :/
I'm great and tired and good :) i don't know what's up with the mail... i got a card from nana thankfully on saturday which was a relief because hers have money in them. but i was worried about not getting yours that's why i had sis unklesbay ask when you sent em.. we might check with the post office today (he hasn't got any letters from us since he moved to his new area) i asked her to call and check cuz i was worried :) I might be slightly relying on her for pictures for now because of how much running around we've been doing and all that fun stuff... tired just because of how much we run... stake president reports were wednesday night, leadership council all day friday, stake conference saturday and sunday, zone meeting tomorrow, zone conference thursday, exchanges tomorrow and friday... life is fun :) no pics today because i didn't think we'd be emailing this early :/ we are going to another district's fun day because it's just a set of elders and a set of sisters so we're going to offset it so it's not like a double date... then Jungle Jim's later on here in hamilton and more preparing for zone meeting :) gators are doing well! it'll be a busy week with them as we have a finding challenge in the mission preparing for march madness... we're going to do something no mission around here at least has done and baptize 100 in the month of march and to prepare for it we're having challenges each with one with finding one with baptism extensions one with member presents and the last with gators at church. i probably won't be able to knock out a blog email today... It will be a crazy February and a crazy march!! we've had super mild weather... i'm loving it!! ya the weather out farther east has been crazy!! we've had a couple of semi spring like days as well just more clouds.  area is great!! It's fun being in a huge ward with lots of awesome families :)
we'll run by the post office because the same thing is happening to elder sunderland :/
today we're bowling with the liberty district.. we haven't planned our big fun day yet but it'll be awesome :)  i do love bowling :)