September 14, 2015 Year Mark

Dear family,

So I've been having a constant, "that moment when you realize you've
been on a mission for a year" feeling. It's quite odd haha. I still
feel like I got eternity left pretty much. I don't know if that ever
changes. Elder Thomas is so funny. He keeps telling me he has so much
left. The other day we heard a plane in the sky and I asked him, "how
far away you think that plane is?" He says "I don't know.." I said "23
months!" Hahahaha he really appreciated that one :)

Anyways, we had a bomb diggety week! We taught like 22 lessons this
week and they just came to us most of the time. We had some that were
good ones when we went on splits with members. Overall, I thought a
lot about how God pretty much just gives us a lot of the lessons we
get, so we have to be prepared to teach someone always, even if it is
across the street at 8:30 at night! The only problem is that it is
pretty creepy in Eureka at 8:30, so we try not to get mugged or get
caught in a drug deal or something. It's very nice :).

For service on Saturday we helped the sisters in 1st ward clean this
lady's car in their ward. Let me testify to you, this was the NASTIEST
car I have ever seen on the inside. We were scrubbing all the fabric
with this carpet cleaning foam stuff and I pulled things out of nooks
and crannies I didn't know existed as one of gods creations. Along
with that there was a completely dried, full orange. How does that
stay there that long!? It's ridiculous. Haha it was fun though. I
cleaned this nasty brown mushy stuff out of the latch where the seat
sits, and it was so gross I like threw it super fast out of my hand,
and we hear a "plop." It had stuck right onto the side of a neighbors
jeep! We all looked with horror at it! Luckily it came right off haha.

We also helped a members son move out and I think e son likes a little
more now. He doesn't seem keen on missionaries, but he seems better
now. It was some good workout pulling stuff up and down stairs. Me and
elder Thomas are both like 175 pounds and we're getting big!

So our ward mission leader is finally back! Bro Richards, the super
funny old guy. It's so nice to have him back, I never realized how
important they are.

I just want to let you guys know that being obedient will bring
blessings to you! I have seen it with us as we have tried to follow
the counsel of our leaders and also make goals to be better. We are
here on earth to become better and if we are not improving we are
going backwards. Me and elder Thomas related the gospel to working out
in the weight room. If you don't keep doing it, you lose it! You can't
ever say that you have "arrived at salvation" or something related to
it. We are always progressing and that is what makes us happy!

I love you guys!

Elder Janson

My previous companion and now zone leader Elder Hastings in a skirt

 Me and Elder Thomas being creeped out by the stuffed sleeping cats...

Sweet picture of the Fort Lauderdale temple! Off of mormontemples.org :))

  Went to the Samoa cookhouse this week with a member! Unfortunately

it's not Samoan food, just on the peninsula "Samoa" outside Eureka.

September 7, 2015 Greenie!

Hey everyone!

Well it's been one long crazy week! I was in Santa Rosa for two days
with all the other trainers. On Tuesday president meets all the new
missionaries and then that night they choose who we will be with. So
Wednesday morning I got Elder Thomas! He's from La Jara, Colorado, a
tiny little town in the southern part of the state. He has an amazing
backwoods country accent. On the way driving up to Eureka with him and
two other missionaries he was not feeling good and was on the verge of
throwing up, but he's doing better now! It makes me think of back in
the day when I was in his shoes! Everything seems real scary then. But
he's super fun and about as dumb as me so we get along :). It's great
because we are the "Thomas Janson" companionship!

I think it was Friday when we were going all over Eureka helping
people. Sis Scott in our ward needed help switching out her old stove
for a new one, so we had to help her roommate Don take the old one out
of her extremely tiny trailer and get the new one in, all in our
proselyting clothes. It was interesting but we did it! Don was so
happy and thanked us a bunch in his hick accent! Then that night we
helped the sisters in first ward move a bunch of furniture out of
their apartment. Those poor sisters have been so sick and we gave them
both blessings and they missed church yesterday. I hope they are doing
better today. They handed off this girl named Taylor that they had
been teaching but she is in our area. She is about 11 and wants to be
baptized. Her mom is a returning member and it's so funny to see how
simply she thinks. She just knows she needs to get baptized! So that
should be happening soon.

Really the biggest piece of news is that Byron got baptized on
Saturday! It was great to see a lot of missionaries and members there
to support and he even brought his brother and other friend who aren't
members. And they loved it as well! It is amazing to see Byron and his
crazy self be so willing to make this change and sacrifice in his
life. He certainly is determined. The spirit that was there was
amazing and his brother felt it too and thanked all of us
missionaries. I can testify that the spirit is present when someone is
using the atonement! Nothing is more powerful than that.

Speaking of that topic, the Mormon channel online has some INCREDIBLE
videos that are following the 12 step program. 12 videos for each one,
and they are so powerful. I know that the atonement can bless anyone
who struggles with addiction, because Jesus Christ knows what you are
going through! Jeffrey R. Holland says this in his talk "Teaching,
Preaching, Healing" in Jan 2003 Ensign,

"However dim our days may seem, they have been a lot darker for the
Savior of the world. As a reminder of those days, Jesus has chosen,
even in a resurrected, otherwise perfected body, to retain for the
benefit of His disciples the wounds in His hands and in His feet and
in His side--signs, if you will, that painful things happen even to
the pure and the perfect; signs, if you will, that pain in this world
is not evidence that God doesn’t love you; signs, if you will, that
problems pass and happiness can be ours. Remind others that it is the
wounded Christ who is the Captain of our souls, He who yet bears the
scars of our forgiveness, the lesions of His love and humility, the
torn flesh of obedience and sacrifice."

I testify that what he says is true, even Jesus Christ our savior, the
only perfect man to walk the earth, suffered, and he suffered more
than you can imagine. We must be eternally grateful. I love you guys!

Elder Janson

Me and Elder Huff at transfers!

  The sunset in Santa Rosa as we worked the night before we got our greenies!

 Byron about to be baptized! And my new companion fresh from the

MTC, Elder Thomas.

August 31, 2015 Training!!!

Hello family.

Holy moly I am so excited this week! Transfers this week it turns out
I'm staying up here in Eureka and Elder smith did an in-zone transfer
only to Fortuna which is like super close, about 20 miles. It's way
funny because he is still in my district, but isn't my companion now.
But I'm getting to train a GREENIE! Haha when I saw it I freaked out
and was super happy. It's cool because we go down tomorrow to
transfers in Santa Rosa and we meet all the greenies, then stay the
night in Rosa and on Wednesday we know who our trainee is. It's gonna
be awesome!! It's weird Elder Smith came and left so fast, but that's
what happens! With this coming transfer I will have served in every
one of my areas for 4.5 months. I'm still only in my third area, which
is not too usual. But I'm ready man!

This week was full of stuff and flew by. On Tuesday I went on
exchanges with the ZLs and one of them is my past companion (the black
one haha) Elder Hastings. I went with him to his area in the YSA ward
up here at Humboldt State university. What a sad place haha. It's
really not that bad, but apparently they get a lot of crap from
students, but what's new huh? It was fun and we got to go to
institute, and I witnessed the tiniest institute building ever! It was
a two story house and it has all the little rooms like a house would.
It's kinda weird and the classroom is tiny. There were like 8 of us in
the class. It's different up here for sure.

So Byron's baptismal date changed to be this upcoming Saturday on the
5th. It was only due to scheduling his baptismal interview which we
couldn't do until last Saturday so we just rescheduled it not to rush
things. It's nice I didn't get transferred so I still get to be here
for it. And that darn greenie gets a baptism his first week! But he
also gets the area with the most crazy people. :)). Byron is doing
awesome and hasn't smoked for over two weeks now. He's gained quite a
bit of weight in that time! Haha a member is baptizing him so I don't
have to drop him in the water or something. I don't think I could lift
that man out of the water! Anyways, the ward is really excited for it
and it's going well.

We went on splits, kind of, considering only the elders quorum
president came out with us, so we were a trio on Wednesday night for
our lessons. We went to go spree these members who are super nice and
actually have a clean house! They gave us cake and ice cream and gave
me the largest piece of cake I've ever seen. I did not finish that and
I don't finish things to be polite. Because I think it's more polite
not to barf on their carpet. It was this gross Costco cake! Haha
speaking of Costco I had no idea what that was before my mission.
Apparently everyone loves it here.

Well I'll send some pictures of the greenie next week. We can see how
scared he is of me. Haha thank you all for your support! Love you all!

Elder Janson

Found a cute Pomeranian at a members home named Elvis. Looks like

a sane Carmine but all black haha

The picture of the district!

 Zone pictures...

August 24th, 2015 Service for days!

Hello everybody!

It was a sweet week and we are continuing to help Byron get ready for
his baptism. He has been doing awesome with the word of wisdom and
it's cool to see how he's changed. He's still just crazy Byron but he
is very diligent!

We did an awesome service project up in Trinidad which is way up there
like 30 miles from us. The Mckinleyville sisters invited us all to
help their member blaze a trail from her house down to the beach. I
say down because unlike Florida beaches, there is a huge drop off
right next to the beach. Kinda weird. Haha but it was so fun! There
were like 12 missionaries there and we were all raking and pulling and
hoeing everything to make it. We didn't do it all but it was sweet!

I have pictures from our hike up at Strawberry Rock which is around
that same place. It was super fun!

At one of our lessons this week with a member and her recent convert
grandson who is like 10, we had fun playing on her old people scooter
haha. It was quite hilarious. He is pretty cool but we just got to
help him get out to church because his grandma isn't always in the
best health to go. He's definitely rambunctious.

Met a guy who was pretty interesting. He had his records removed a
while back but is super cool with us and loves having us over. We
talked about his views and he has some issues with the church that I
think are lame but I shouldn't judge haha. He's pretty funny and
introduced us to all of the people in his little neighborhood he
called the ghetto. Haha we met one of his neighbors named Desirae and
her son Oliver who is blind but they want a Braille Book of Mormon!
Pretty sweet. We are going to keep meeting them!

Well I love all of you and hope your week is sweet! Keep strong in the
faith my people!

Love, Elder Janson

 Out on strawberry rock with the other missionaries!

Me and Sister Asay matching tie/scarf at district meeting. Sister

Aguilar gave them to us

The place called Humboldt county that s lot of people think is

beautiful... It's alright haha

Us playing on old people scooter

More strawberry rock

Our service in Trinidad (last four pictures)

August 17th, 2015 Alright!

Hello family!

Well today marks my 11 month mark out on the mission! Pretty exciting
huh? You know what that means!? Nothing it just means I have a lot
left :). Haha anyways we had a sweet week! I got a sweet package from
the family and the Burkes I love you guys!

We had a blitz, which is where a lot of missionaries go to one
missionaries area for about 2 hours and go work there to help out that
companionship. It was pretty fun as always! It was for the Eureka 1st
ward, the sisters in my district. It was the bomb diggety fun! We met
this lady who had talked to missionaries and said it would be fine to
have the sisters by again. What was funny about this lady was she had
a pet.... Pig! Haha and when we asked her name she said, "Emmy" and
brilliant Elder Moua who I was with thought she said "Hammy." So he
says, "come here hammy!" Hahaha we were laughing so hard. It was
pretty fun as we went about walking making dumb songs and raps. I
haven't changed a whole lot in that aspect.

Saturday night was the most fun though! We decided to go out and see
one potential we had way out in the outskirts of Eureka. It was a
sweet drive out there. Then we went to go see a member we didn't know,
and it was WAY out there! Before we knew it we were out on some
country road between these hills covered in Redwoods! It was so
awesome!!! I love hills and creepy forests at night! Haha it was a
great adventure. Didn't even know we had that cool stuff in our area.
We were disappointed when we had to go back to the town of Eureka. But
that's all good. I show some pictures of that.

We're going out to Strawberry rock to go hiking today! It's way up
north past mckinleyville and we got a member to riders up there. It's
gonna be awesome! A bunch of missionaries are going to go hiking. You
know that will be crazy.

Anyways, continuing to help Byron get ready for baptism. He quit
smoking Friday! He's doing well and your prayers are appreciated. You
all are the best!

Love, Elder Janson

 Hammy, I mean Emmy the pig!

A cool table our members have

The view of the majestic redwoods as we went on our middle of

nowhere excursion. Dark, but you get the point.

A totally knarly covered bridge we crossed!!!

August 10th, 2015 Temple trip

Hello everybody,

Well it was a pretty sweet week. We got to go to the temple on
Wednesday, and had to pay for it with a 4 hour drive up to Medford,
Oregon, the nearest temple to this destitute place! It was very long,
but boy was it fun! We rode with the Fortuna elders, and their bishop
drove the four of us. His name is Bishop Wecker, and he knows so much
about the gospel and the scriptures and the symbols relating to the
temple and everything you can think of! He is also a Freemason, and
knows a lot about symbolism from that. We got to the point of just
asking him to talk about a gospel topic, like baptism, and he would
pick it apart and say every way it is symbolic. My mind was blown!
He's the kind of person that talks so much, but instead of being
annoyed, you want him to keep going after 4 hours! Anyways, the temple
was awesome, and very small! About the size of the Palmyra temple. The
zone temple trips are always fun.

I had the opportunity of giving 3 blessings to the sisters in my
district this week! They just all needed one, Sister Siufanua, the
greenie, was sick. And the other sisters just needed one, probably due
to the craziness of this county hhahaha. Anyways, it was cool to be
able to help them out with that. And one of the sisters wasn't
actually in my district, but they are the Hermanas, who go to church
with us so we see them all the time.

We got to teach Richard again this week, who pretty much describes the
people in Eureka better than I could put in words. He was some mental
problem, and he laughs at all the unexpected times. It is hilarious!
I've emailed about him before, you might remember. Well he's been to
church twice, but he is surprisingly quiet at church, which is
probably good. I swear half the people we talk to you wonder about
their accountability! Haha I'm not trying to be mean, just stating a
fact of Humboldt county. Anyways, everyday brings surprises which is
good for missionary work. It can become rote and boring if you aren't
exciting yourself haha.

Anyways, it was a sweet week, and I hope you all are doing amazing! We
are still up and running up here in the mission. Byron is planning to
be baptized on August 29th, so keep praying for him.

Thanks! Love, Elder Janson

Here's a comical photo from our long drive to Medford. Elder

Sutterfield and Grange.

Some sweet pictures of the west coast while we drove south from

Medford to Eureka again.

The eerie sky due to the fires south of us in Lake County. The sun

was red and dimmed from the smoke.

Some words of wisdom :).

The Zone at Zone meeting

August 3rd, 2015 What a week!

Hello Family!

There were many interesting experiences we had this week. One day this
week was so sweet! We were teaching for days!! We got 7 lessons in one
day, which was my mission record! We had such a sweet day. Sometimes
the lord blesses you with cool stuff like that :).

This morning at Winco foods we had a man who obviously wasn't all
mentally there and he starts yelling in the store at us, "maybe the
Mormons can solve all the drug problems here! Have you guys read your
bible? It offended me! Jesus couldn't have come to South America!" And
so on and so on. It was super awkward and funny cause we just tried
walking away but he was following us and cussing and stuff and I
honestly was trying to withhold laughter. We escaped and a store
security lady came and apologized to us. We're like... "Well we deal
with it a lot, but thanks!" Haha it was an interesting shopping
experience.

We had another experience one night when two guys and a woman stopped
us and started talking to us, eventually they just were bashing and if
any things changed on my mission since the beginning is I don't just
stand there and bash. I was like, "well honestly I don't know all
these answers, but all we want to do is invite you to read the Book of
Mormon and pray about its truthfulness." They weren't too excited
about that haha. I've kind of gotten to a point when I'm pretty good
at just leaving those situations because it feels like such a waste! I
even went so far to one lady when I invited her to read the Book of
Mormon, she said, "well why would I do that?? Why would I waste my
time??" I simply said, "well now you're wasting our time, and we have
to go." Hahaha it worked and we left. The spirit can pretty much tell
us pretty quick whether this person has real intent to change, or just
to tear us down. The most frequent question I've gotten in eureka is
concerning us believing we become gods. Once they ask that question, I
know it's time to leave haha. You can't make a baby swallow a 1 pound
burger, when they won't accept the baby food! Haha nice visual for
you. If we can't understand e simple truths, how do we expect to
understand the deepest of gods truths?

Anyways,mom the good note, Byron, our main investigator is trying to
get baptized on the 15th, and we truly wants to, he just needs to work
on word of wisdom issues. He's an interesting guy, but he reads the
BOM and is sincere. Can't say he's not!

So it's nice having a car and everything. I've recently found out that
I have gained about 30 pounds on my mission... I was 180 pounds when I
checked the other day. I didn't know my body was capable of that! I
don't look any different, so I'm puzzled haha.

Hope you all have a sweet week, and remember all the savior has done
for you. He loves you!

Love, Elder Janson

Thought this was humorous :)

Us at  Arts Alive in eureka, a community arts event. My past

companion Elder Hastings!

Pictures of the fires in Northern California, couple hundred

miles south of us

Thought this piece of art looked oddly like Joseph Smith....

Heaven is above Eureka!

Deseret News posted this, they are now my favorite.