Ok so I'm super sorry about not writing you yesterday! as you could probably tell by no letter, i got transferred!! but it was not what everyone expected, i got sent to the complete other side of the island to satins furnace in DAJABON! right on the Haitian border. But right now its December so its not that hot, but there are tons of mosquitoes. More than Esperanza. haha its the area no missionary wants to go, but i think its actually kind of cool. There is like nothing here but things are so cheap. I can buy shoes for 3 dollars, and ties are really nice for 15 pesos. My companion is Elder Leonardo, he is really cool and goes home 6 weeks before i do! We live with the zone leaders so i love how its a 4 man house. The zone leaders are also Dominican so its me alone with 3 Dominicans, but i know all 3 and they are super cool and i know Spanish, so its all good!

So ya i started traveling at 7 in the morning and got to Dajabon at 7 at night, it was a long day! We had an activity at the church and we played basketball. so it was a good day!

Well i woke up this morning and totally forgot it was thanksgiving until i was writing in my journal and wrote the date, and was like, no!!!!!!!!! Why did i remember haha. it sounds like you guys will have a great time eating turkey and pies and all that good stuff. I told the Elders in my house today was a very special day so they are going to buy me pizza and turkey haha! so ill try to make it a good thanksgiving until next year with you guys!

We had our baptism on Saturday and it was really good! i think that is like number 15 or so. We have alot of cool people here with dates so ill try to work super hard, this zone is the most baptizing zone in the mission, so pray for me! ill give you more details on my area next week.

Well i don’t got much to write this week, but i want to tell you guys what I'm thankful for, i don’t know if you are all together right now eating or not, but here it goes...... I'm so grateful for the chance i have been given to be here in the Dominican Republic serving my Lord Jesus Christ and bringing souls to him. I love this Gospel and would give my life for it! I'm so grateful for the Book of Mormon, it has changed my life! and thankful for two loving parents who have raised me in the gospel my whole life and have constantly taught me lessons of life. I love you Mom and Dad, and i love my brothers Jared and Josh. You guys are such great examples for me, especially the example you guys made going on missions. Thanks for everything, your my best friends and especially my little sister Jakelle. ill never forget the times we have always shared and the time i would take you and pick you up from dance and show you all my favorite songs! Thanks for being a great sister. I'm thankful for all my other family and there support. i love you all and hope you have a great day! We will talk in 4 weeks so I'm excited! I love you, bye!

Elder Jesse Westergard

Well mom i will correct you on what you said about my wrist and the boys beeting me, you and i both know that that is impossible right? me losing to the boys in golf? thats like saying michael jordan will lose to a 15 year old one on one! by the way, dad, Phil Mickelson will never receive 3 million dollars just to show up to a golf tournament, i think you just need to face the facts now, Tiger is the best! wow Josh that stinks so bad that your knee is all messed up! que vas a hacer por 6 meses? jaja tu vas a ver mucho juegos de balancesto y tiger woods verdad? oh y tienes que beber mucho dr. pepper y recordar que tu hermano en la republica dominicana tiene que beber coca cola....hmmmmm. no hay aqui, pero en puerto plata si hay Dr. Pepper y mt. dew! bueno buenas suerte y estas en mis oraciones. te quiero! sorry mom and dad and jakelle and lexi, you guys dont know spanish, ask Jared or Josh what that meant, but i cant believe the Suns are in 1st place! thats insane, im jealous you guys get to see them good this year.

Here everything is going good! this is my last pday in this area and i will know where im going on Monday, about everyone in the zone is like 98 percent convinced ill be the next zone leader, plus president told me in my interview i was going up next transfer and the zone leader right now is going home next week. soooooo ill let you know on Wednesday ok?? so dad your teaching an inactive and there having trouble with tithing....well something i like to do is teach by examples. like ill say, ok you have 100 pesos(think of dollars for your situation) and tithing is 10%, so you should pay 10 dollars. sure 10 dollars is alot but look at how much you got left, 90!! so if they look at it that way it could be alot easier. like someone who has 1million pays 100,000 but still has 900,000. so really it helps with me and the people here. and then you just tell them experiences you have had or heard of. so i dont know you can try and talk about that.

We have a baptism on Saturday and im super stoked for that, baptism on my last week here. so that will be fun. Well the big news of the week is that Elder Russel M. Ballard was here in the Dominican Republic to have a fireside with all the Caribbean, so we got together as a steak and all the missionaries here and watched this fireside. there was talks from the area presidency in spanish and last Elder Ballard talked! but i was so glad he did it in english! he said it first and then someone said it in spanish after! i will tell you right now that i have never heard a more powerful talk in my whole life! he talked about how we have the rights to know what we should know through revelation. it was amazing! he shared about 7 stories of pure revelation that would make the hairs on your back stand up! i want to share one of them with you....

Elder Ballard was going down to Chile to sperate a steak into 2 steaks. so he got there and met with the Stake President and said, ok President where are all the other people i am to interview?? the President only brought 3 people with him he thought could be the new President. and Elder Ballard said you didnt get my letter?? i wanted all of the Bishops here, counselors, high councel, of all the steaks. you call them now and tell them to get here so i can interview them! by the time they all got there it was late so they didnt do all the interviews, all but 2! so they had to do them the next morning before church where they were going to anounce the president, but Elder Ballard had not recieved a answer yet. so in the morning one hour and a half before church started, the first of the two came in and they shook hands. Elder Ballard instantly said, do i know you?? the man said we shook hands last year at general conference. Elder Ballard thought, i shook thousands of hands last year, but he sticks out to me?? Elder Ballard went on to call him as President and then told him im really sorry but now you have to think of your bishops and counselors and high priests in an hour and a half, the man looked at him and pulled out a peice of paper, he said Elder Ballard last night i received witness that i would be called as president and i knew the people that would be called as leaders to, these are all the names! WOW!!!! so can you believe that story or what?? talk about revelation, i cant tell you how much my testimony grew because of that story. After Elder Ballard said jokingly, father why didnt you just let me know you had something in mind so i didnt have to worry about all that haha.

Well thats about it from here, i cant believe that thanks giving is next Thursday, the day after transfers. it seems like last month i was in Puerto Plata with 3 months in the mission playing football on the beach with my trainer... that was a year ago! well time seems to go by faster as the more time i get here, its weird that in january ill complete a sister mission. haha. well i love you all so very much! your in my prayers and i hope im in yours, especially if im ZL and will be doing lots of work. bye! love elder westergard

Wow this week was going so great until mom made me feel dumb about miss spelling baPtism!! haha it was kind of funny though, but really it was good till this morning playing softball. There was a fly ball to me out in center field and i was sprinting to get it, and i stuck my hand out and the softball struck my wrist, the one i broke, and i dropped to the ground! it hurt really bad and now its just badly bruised. but we did win the game 15-14!! it was an intense game, missionaries verses a actual baseball team. Ill put up a photo we took at the end to.

But as i said this week was super amazing, especially in one lesson we were talking about the 3rd lesson, gospel of Jesus Christ, and i was testifying of babtism and the authority and that were the only church that has it, the spirit was so strong and me and my comp both instantly felt we should put dates with them, so i said, will you guys follow the example of Jesus Christ and be babtized in the true church with someone who has the authority of god?? and they said yes and how they want to preach like us also! that night was a super strong testimony builder for me, its times like those i remember why I'm here and get the biggest animo boost!

Our district meeting on Monday was also very good and i learned so much! i gave the spiritual thought and i shared some verses from Alma 5, its very strong but i love it. How we wont be able to lie to god at judgement day and how Alma asks if we are doing what we should be doing now and not later! then the capacitation by the district leader was about finding people through the members. Its something this country's members need to work on, they don't really like to give us references, but a stat my old president gave us was for every 80 or so contacts, there is 1 baPPPtism, better mom??. and for every 7 references there is 1 baptism. so references are really important. so ya it was super good.

It sounds like everything in Arizona is good except the heat. I'm sorry but not really because its hot here every day, all year, it does get cold at 3-7 in the morning. Wow the Suns are 7-1?? man that's super exciting, i cant wait to go to games again, being here in the DR i have grown to love baseball again since that horrible day i will never forget when i got hit then quit baseball haha. but dad don't get rid of the Diamondback tickets because if no one will use them i will use them all the time. that's good that no one has the flu in the family, stay safe. Josh good luck your in my prayers, i hope you feel better soon.

I cant believe Cameron Tryon is home already! that's super weird and Brandon is getting married?? Wow can you believe that you will be talking to me in 1.5 months?? and that means you only have one more phone call from me in May, which is my 21 birthday......um....ok never mind don't think about that its so close and i don't want to go home. I love the mission and it will be so weird being at home. Transfers are coming up in 2 weeks so we will see what happens with the whole Zone Leader thing, i actually hope i go up, so i can focus on the work these last 9 months. Well family i don't know what else to say, sounds like you are all good. be safe and i love you so much and have a wonderful Veterans Day!

I love you all. adios! Elder Westergard

Snake Snapped at Me.

Sweet Snake

Rainbow after the Storm.

Sandlot Gang!

Hey everyone, how are you all doing? It sounds like everything is good! wow i cant believe that was my last Halloween in the mission, it was sad to think about but ill be home for the next one! I was really craving moms chili with some IBC root beer and black cherry, but i had something else that was really good. To start it off, we had those 2 kids get baptized, Wendy and Nichole on Saturday, then after we went to a steakhouse and got fillet mignon, and here it was only like 9 dollars! it was really good to, so we had a really good week. Saturday we have another baptism, another kid like the others. so were really excited about that.

Yesterday we went to Santiago for our zone conference with President Lee. It seems like 2 weeks ago i was just in a zone conference, that was 6 weeks ago. time is flying so fast i don't know what to do with it! next thing you know ill be home. The conference was good though, we talked about unity between companionship's, it was a super good conference.

We also had our interviews with the President and i learned something very interesting and scary. president told me i was only going to be with my comp for 1 transfer and to prepare myself for a big responsibility! I also know the zone leader here goes home in 3 weeks. I'm about 95 percent sure I'm the next zone leader, so we will see. I'm really nervous.
All in all this has been a really great week, I'm glad you were ready to defend the church. really the book i told you about, the day of defense is so good for that. Well i don't know what else to say besides happy NOVEMBER! oh and don't worry, Christmas stuff has been up here since October1st, ya i hate it!
well OK i will put pics up today. i love you so much!

Love Elder Westergard

Elder Nuñez, Frazier , Westergard. he went to highland

After Church picture

Steakhouse after baptisms

My 2 baptisms and Fraziers 1 baptism.

Wendy and Nicholas family

So comfortable at the steak activity

Matching pants!! Elder Beahrman

Mesa boys!!!!!

Wow congrats Lexi and Jared! all three of us celebrate something this week! birthdays and a 15 months mark! have a fun time and ill try too, skipping Halloween! I'm not excited but its my last one in the mission. I have like forgot all about Halloween cause Christmas is already being put up here, people have lights up and everything! so ya its weird and it does not feel even close to Christmas. It sounds like you guys have had a great week this week! especially Mom and Dad in New York, so mom I'm glad you liked it, i told you you would. I remember when i went, that was almost 5 years ago!! wow time flies by. I'm jealous dad that dessert you ate sounded so good sitting here, i was dying! sorry you couldn't dance dad, what a bummer, actually mom he was really happy he couldn't dance, i know i would, i hate dancing and me and dad are like the same, ha.

Well this week was an amazing week! to start off i learned that a girl in Esperanza i was teaching forever got baptized 2 weeks after i left! so i count that as my baptism haha cause i spent tons of time and put her date. So I'm pumped about that, we didn't have a baptism this week because the ward went to the temple, so it should be this week. by the way, did i tell you we cant go to the temple in December?? ya i have not been in a year and i have to wait 9 more months. not happy.

Me and my comp are working super hard! in 2 days, Monday and Tuesday, we taught 12 lessons! we have 4 baptismal dates and tons of investigators! time flies when your working and being obedient!

So whats big between all the missionaries is a book called the day of the defense! wow this book is insane, i have it in Spanish printed off the Internet, but its in English and mom i want you to send me the book for Christmas, there might be to volumes or one not sure, but its amazing! if a missionary studies this book and knows the scriptures in there, he can defend the church at all times. Its like a court trial, the judge is a Orthodox Rabi, the accusers are like 20 different churches main scholar people, and the defense....TWO MISSIONARIES! wow i cant believe the knowledge of these missionaries, they have answers for every single accusation there is, and at the end the judge asks the missionaries to go to teach his family! It proves that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saint is the only true church with authority, the Book of Mormon is true, and Joseph Smith was a prophet! you guys should read it, its amazing. its helped me in my studies and gain a testimony so much!

Today we played basketball at 6 in the morning against the best club team in San Francisco! well they won the first 2 games and we were really disappointed, then we proved who the true church was and won 3 in a row! but serious i was like guarding Isaiah Thomas, and there was like a Tim Duncan, Ben Wallace, and Rajah Bell. I honestly don't think i have ever played that good in my whole life, it was awesome! my ball handling skills have become great dad, they triple teamed me like always and still couldn't get the ball haha. ( I'm glad he has so much confidence) so it was fun. Then we went to eat lunch and do some shopping, now were here!

Well i don't know what else to tell you guys, sorry. so i guess I will end! I love you guys so much, and hope you have a safe and fun Halloween. felicidades Lexi & Jared.

Love Elder Westergard!

Wow i cant believe its been a week already since i have been here! it has gone so fast! the good news is that i have a great comp and my animo is now back way up! we have 2 baptisms on Saturday, one next week, and one the week after! were trying to baptize every week this transfer and i think we can do it! Elder Doncel is a very funny guy! always talking about Mexico and how he is going to take me to Cancun when we are both home! haha its cool. He does not know very much English but he knows the simple phrases, like whats up man, whats your problem, and he always says, were going to party like its 1999. haha he is super funny. Being with him makes me feel like i am really good at Spanish, because he talks so clear, no mumbling like Dominicans and I'm learning so much! he tells me my Spanish is good, so ya! its all good!

On Thursday we had a lesson with a lady and we watched the Restoration video! it was super powerful and right after i bore my testimony we put a date with her! it was so awesome and the spirit was super strong! on Sunday we had 7 investigators at church! it was a good turnout. We taught about 33 lessons this week to! So me and Elder Doncel are working and on fire! I'm so bummed that I'm going home soon because it feels so close and i want to keep working, so i don't know.

Monday night and all day Tuesday and this morning we were not aloud to leave our houses because there was a huelga!! it was crazy, so Elder Frazier and Elder Nuñez come over that whole time because our house is safer, we live in a 3rd story apartment, so we like slept, ate and watched church movies all day! it was pretty relaxing and a good break. But this morning we finally left and went to play basketball with the zone. Elder Berhman and Elder Frazier were there(Arizona boys) and it was so fun! so like Elder Frazier and i have become very good friends, turns out he lived next to the Ashby's his first 10 years then moved to Higley and baseline but all the friends he has i know! its so weird so we have become close friends and plan to do lots of stuff after the mission.

Oh i forgot, during the huelga the people were like burning tires in the roads, throwing garbage everywhere, gunshots going off! it was crazy! smoke like filled the house!
Well i cant think of much more to say! i love you guys and mom and dad have fun in New York! oh and Jared, your birthday is my 15 month mark! love you!

Elder Westergard

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JAKELLE AND GRANDMA!! wow i hope yo guys had a great birthday, what did you get jakelle?? tell me how the Mexican food and cupcakes taste because i forgot! i would send you a present but it costs so much to send something there. so i will buy stuff at the end of my mission for everyone in the family and take them home OK??

Josh how was the reunion?? haha and the Applebee's. man I'm craving some boneless BBQ wings right about now, and potato skins, ha i know your thinking the same thing but hot wings, ya don't worry i still know what you like! going on any dates?? an Elder that finished with my last comp came back to visit for conference and he said he has not been on a date yet, haha its been 12 weeks! he was like ya man, i don't know why, i just don't ha!

That's super exciting mom your going to NEW YORK finally, remember how i went before all of you? OK sorry just wanted to throw that in, but its not a trip if you don't go to the Hill Cummorah! its amazing and the Sacred Grove, if you remember in my farewell talk that's where i for myself got my testimony, so let me know if you are going....

I can not even explain to tell you how amazing this week was! well the sad part first, i only have 1 more conference to watch in the mission, what???? ya only one more. I'm going to have to say this was the best conference i have ever watched in my life! i made a goal to take notes the whole time, i ended up with like 20 pages of notes, it was so amazing how in tune i was, i learned so much and heard so much that i needed to hear at that time. But mom you guessed it, the only thing us missionaries are talking about is Elder Hollands talk!!!!!!!! have you ever felt something more powerful, filled with love, conviction, testimony, confidence, and revelation in your life?? because i can tell you i have not. That talk brought me to tears, i could not believe the words he used, like when he said all the pathetic attempts to bring the Book of Mormon down, and its still standing! wow there is no doubt in my mind that it is the most correct book on this earth and then when he said i want you to put my testimony down right now as a witness that its true, wow!!! i also loved Elder Neil l Anderson's talk, i really needed to hear what he said, i felt like he was talking to me! especially at this time in my mission. I'm grateful for his words. I also love Richard G Scott about the evils and destructiveness of pornography, it was very strong and spiritual. ok sorry haha but i also loved Elder Bednar talking about the hypocrisy stuff...wow!! i could not believe that. and yes like you mom i loved the prophets talk about service, i think all missionaries need to hear more of that!

So all in all i loved conference, and mom if its possible, when the DVDs come out i would like you to send me them, if you could?? so then on Monday we had an intercombio and i went up to teach with Elder Robertson and do the DL stuff evaluating haha. but i want to share with you an experience i had...... we went in to a house with a man and a women seated, investigators, and the subject we were talking about with them was prophets. Robertson talked great about it, then it was me who testified. It popped into my mind that i should ask them if they knew of any church on this earth who had a prophet and 12 apostles...they said they didn't, so i got the impression to tell them that this last weekend we listened to prophets and apostles. and then i said with tears streaming down my cheeks, hermano y hermana, i testify to you that we have today a prophet called of god, his name is Thomas S. Monson and he has 12 apostles who assist him in leading this church, i testify that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is the only true church on the face of this earth and through prayer and study of the Book of Mormon you also can know! so ya i was strengthened so much spiritually by that event, and hope you guys were too!

I'm so grateful to be a missionary and serve the Lord. I know this is the true church, there is no doubt in my mind! I'm grateful that i can testify with the same power that the apostles have about the gospel. I know if we do the things god wants us to do and preach his gospel and endure to the end, we can inherit all that our father has prepared for us! in the name of Jesus Christ, amen. i love you guys so much.

Elder Jesse Westergard