Weekly E-Mail: November 5, 2012

Short and sweet this week:

Things are doing good. kind of got sick yesterday, I think I had a bad reaction to Saturday's dinner. But i am doing better. I got the package and the card that followed, i also got Grandma and Grandpa Lott's card. The baptism went really well. We have another one coming on the tenth. Thanks for sending those things in the package. Talk to you all later.

I hate it when my kids are sick, even though they are older. There is a stomach bug going around just now; Elder Page's little sister had it. It doesn't last long, thank goodness. Hopefully, that's what he had going on. 

Weekly Email: 10/29/2012

Thanks for the birthday wishes. No mail here yet, apparently the people we stay with in Livingston were traveling when i was transferred so they stop their mail and ours too. So it will be awhile before it can get forwarded. The work is going great here, one of our investigators just got interviewed for baptism, ... he will be baptized on Wednesday. We have another investigator who will be interviewed for baptism later today. She will be baptized on November 10th. Things are going good. For my birthday, my companion and I were thinking that as soon as we get enough money, we'll go and have dinner to celebrate. I'm glad to hear that things are going well. Talk to you all later.  


Note: So, it looks like that if there is a doubt as to where to send mail/packages to Elder Page, send them to him at the mission office address (on the sidebar of this blog) because they are really good about getting the mail forwarded quickly. Just remember to send any packages by either first class or priority! If anyone has any questions, just get in touch with us. 

Transfer! 22 & 24 October 2012

10/22: Glad to hear that everything is going well. I just got tranfered to Dillon, Montana, It's going to be a bit before i actually get there. I haven't got the birthday card/gift from Grandma and Grandpa Lott yet, since i just got transfered it is kind of hectic with the mail right now. We recently had stake conference here in Montana, that went really good. I have to say i'm kind of surprized that it's already been almost 5 months since i left, seems amazing, dosen't it. Talk to you all later.

10/24: I arrived in Dillon yesterday and my new companion is Elder Sites. Everybody is telling me that Dillon is a really nice place so i am looking forward to working here in Dillon. I'm sad to hear about Brother Fobbs. He was on the high council, wasn't he? I kind of remember him. I was shocked when i just read your email. But we all know that he has gone home "to that God who gave [him] life". I hope everything else is going good. Talk to you later.

Weekly E-mail: 16 Oct 2012

Hi, I'm glad to hear that everything is going good. Things are going well in Livingston. We are working mostly with less-actives. I thought that it was neat that Michelle got to go see and hear Elder Bednar speak. Elder Smith and I are doing our best to keep the work moving. I have to say congrats to Marianne, that must be exciting for her. Talk to you all later.

October 9: Catching Up

So, we haven't updated this blog in a long while.  The last few months have been especially busy for our family.  The good news is that Elder Page is doing well.  He is now serving in his second area, Livingston, Montana.  His address there is:

148 Old Clyde Park Rd. 
Livingston, MT, 59047

...But if you ever want to send him a letter or package, you can always send it to the mission office and they can forward it (so long as it is mailed either first class or priority).

Snow has already fallen in Montana - during the first week of October! When we heard the weather forecast early in the week, they mentioned snow in Montana...and we hadn't sent out all of his winter gear yet!! So that morning, we scrambled around and ordered appropriate boots for him, and got together the other things to mail.  Once kids were at school, Mom made a trip to the post office to mail his coat and gloves Priority so they would get there by Thursday.  On Wednesday morning, October 3, Elder Page wrote: "It kind of snowed today so i need my winter gear soon..."  We quickly wrote back that it was on the way and to hang on!  His regular weekly email yesterday said that those things arrived. Whew!

In the last month or so, quite a few of the church's General Authorities have visited or toured the mission.  So Elder Page has had the opportunity to hear from and meet Elder Quentin L. Cook, Elder Steven Snow, Bishop Stevenson from the Presiding Bishopric, and Elder Terrence Smith (an Area Authority), as well as Elders Robbins and Echo Hawk of the Seventy.  He seemed to really be buoyed up by those experiences. 

In late August, he had an interesting experience where he and his companion were along with their Zone Leaders to a dinner appointment.  On September 3, he wrote: 

Everything is going well here in Montana. About the D.A with Bro. Owen's brother, Elder Banks and I were with the Zone leaders in Bozeman that day and they brought us with them to their dinner appointment there and the other Brother Owen asked where i was from and i said "Okemos, Michigan", he asked if i knew Brother Owen, i said yes, He then said "He's my brother", i also added that Dad is one of Brother Owen's home teachers. So that's how i found out the connection. 

Also in late August, Elder Page received a summons for jury duty! I made a phone call to the court clerk's office and explained the situation, and asked for guidance in completing the form so that he would be excused.  The court clerk I spoke with was very kind and understanding, and instead of requiring me to fill out the form and mail it in, she was happy to take care of it all over the phone. 

Our family has been greatly blessed due to Elder Page's missionary service.  He told us that Elder Cook promised the missionaries that their loved ones would be blessed because of their service, and he (and we) are seeing that come to pass.  

Catching up: 16 July and 23 July

So...there has been a lot going on these last few weeks and we fell behind a bit. Family reunion, and a fractured ankle for the Dad of the missionary requiring surgery, a hospital stay, and now a stay in a physical rehab facility. Whew!


July 16: Hello everyone, how is everyone doing? I hope everything is going all right. I just sent a letter for Sarah, it probably will show up in your mailbox within several days. Everything is going good here. I did some service on Friday. Phil has been smoke-free for almost 13 days now, several more days and after several more lessons, he will be ready for baptism. Yesterday we went tracting and we found a few potential investigators, we'll see what happens from there. I miss you all and talk to you all later


Letter sent to little sister: Dear Sarah: I'm having a great time here on my mission. Sure, I have had a few tough days on my mission, but we get through them.  What I do here as a missionary is to "invite others to come unto Christ, by helping them receive the restored gospel."  We teach those who are not members of our Church by teaching them the gospel and encouraging them to read the Book of Mormon.  From there, we see if they have the desire to be baptized. 


Montana is great! Almost everybody has a dog.  On Friday night, we helped a member collect hay and stash it up, and she had a few horses on her property.  


We are currently teaching someone named Phil, and he has a strong desire to be baptized and to come unto Christ. 


Anyways, I hope you are getting better and I miss you and the rest of the family.  Thank you for the pictures, and I love you all.  Love, your brother...




July 23: Hi, how is it going? I'm glad that Sarah got that letter. I hope Dad gets better soon. Well things are going well here. Phil finished reading the Book of Mormon yesterday. We also gave Taft a general conference talk to read and he said that he will read it. Transfer is almost over, and work is going well here. Sorry that it's not much here to say. Things are going great and talk to you all later. 

Weekly email - 9 July 2012

Here's the weekly e-mail!  


Hi, how is everyone doing? I'm mostly surprized that it is hot over there. I miss all of you guys. I think it's cool that you guys got to go to the movies the other day. I hope Sarah gets better from her cold. Elder Banks is doing a whole lot better. Phil came to church yesterday. He seemed to have enjoyed it. We also got him to do the stop smoking program and he's been smoke free for almost a week and after that week, that will be another step towards baptism. We gave talks in one of our wards that we are covering and that went well. They gave us only a few days to prepare. I sure miss being able to have a few months to prepare. Talk to you all later.

Weekly email - 2 July 2012

Okay, so I'm a few days late in posting this.  I blame it on this extreme heat that we're having.  Anyway, it's always good to hear from our missionary!


Hi, how is everyone doing? Happy belated Canada day, and Happy Birthday Mom, best wishes to you, hope today goes great for you. I saw that picture of Sarah feeding the horses and i'm glad that she's feeling better from that little shock. I got to meet the new mission president on saturday, President Mecham, he seems really cool. He's going to be mission president for the rest of my mission. 


Also i met one of my fellow missionaries: his name is Elder Rust i think, who happens to be an old friend of Collin Ritchie back from when they were living in Georgia. He didn't know that President Ritchie was once stake president until i said to him that President Ritchie was once stake president. He seems like a nice guy. 


Yesterday's fast did go well for me. My companion was sick yesterday, so we couldn't do much yesterday, but he is doing better. I hope everything goes well and again, happy birthday mom, Carpe Diem. Talk to you all later.

Letter from the mission president, Pres. Gardner

Elder Page is in the back row, far left.

We got the traditional letter from Elder Page's mission president, Pres. Gardner. He put Elder Page's mailing address in there, plus some helpful info about sending packages, so here it an excerpt:


Elder Page's new address is:


Elder Daniel Page
30 Reinig St
Belgrade, MT 59714


"Missionaries love mail, especially early on.  Just as much as they should be writing to you on a weekly basis, we would hope that you would also write positive, encouraging letter to them every week. (italics added)  It does wonders for the work.  Missionaries are only allowed 30-40 minutes to e-mail each week, so we suggest that a mass mailing or an email forwarding system be established for communicating with the extended family.  


When you send a package for your missionary by way of the Mission Office, please send it by First Class or Priority mail only. That way the package can be forwarded to him without additional cost.  Otherwise, it will cost the same amount again to be forwarded to him.  On the envelope or package, please include their first names, as we have several missionaries with the same last name."


So, some good advice about sending packages!  We're looking forward to Elder Page's next email!

Email - 25 June 2012

Here's the usual p-day e-mail from our missionary.  Now that he's out in the field, we figure that the Monday e-mails will become the pattern.  Anyway, this is a great e-mail - it sounds like his first week out in the mission field has been quite eventful!


hi, how is everything going back home with the family? I hope everything is going all right. Belgrade is about 148 miles from Billings, i think, and we live in a member's home, i'll find out the address and see if you could send things directly there. 


We had a special fast on Saturday for the missionary work and remember how i would get really huge headaches when i try to fast, well this time i didn't get any headaches. So this is the first time that i suceeded in fasting, except for the part that i got dehydrated and had to drink something, other then that it went really well. On the day of the fast we tracked into a guy named Patrick who was fixing his truck and he allowed us to come back after he gets his truck fixed, and we think he is someone who is ready to hear the gospel. 


Also yesterday, we tracked into [a] grandson of Ezra Taft Benson. He went to his door and he had a couple of dogs who normally bark at strangers, but they did not bark at us at all but came up to us as they knew who we were. He let us in and we talked to him for a bit and apparently he was excommunicated over issues that i don't want to go into detail about, and he felt like he was wronged. He said that we could come back, even though he said it might be a waste of our time. He told us that he let us in because he felt something different about us and that his dogs did not bark at us. I told my companion that i felt that the Spirit led us there to his house, that we were led there for a purpose which might be for us to bring him back into the fold, we'll see how things go from there. Anyway, i hope things are going well and talk to you all later.

21 June 2012 E-mail

Here's the latest from Elder Page:


Hi, I arrived in Montana safely a couple days ago. I am currently in Belgrade and my companion's name is Elder Banks. He is really nice. So far Montana is beautiful. i love it here. They have a Hardees in Billings, which i haven't seen since Kentucky. My companion tells me that we have an investigator that he was teaching that committed to baptism on August 3rd i think, he just needs to quit smoking before that could happen, and his name is Phil. In the mission office they had me write a letter to you all, but you might get this before you get the letter. Things are going good here and i hope things are going well over there.


We looked up Belgrade on Google Maps, and it is right in the mountains, population 7,389 according to the 2010 census. It is also not too far from Bozeman, which is where my Grandma Lu Knapp was born in 1929. How cool is that?!

Week 3 email - 16 June 2012

Kind of a short email this week. It's hard to believe that he'll be leaving the MTC this coming Tuesday and be heading to the mission field. Here's where the rubber hits the road.  Anyway, in an e-mail to him, I had asked him how he found the MTC, and about what he had learned there. Here's his e-mail:


hey there, how is everyone doing? ... Thanks for the package, i got it yesterday. The MTC was difficult in some ways but it taught me a few things that i need to know to be a good missionary. Come Tuesday, I will be in Montana. I got Sarah's letter from Dear Elder and tell her i miss her too. I hope everything is going well and talk to you guys later.


As of Tuesday, 19 June, he'll be in his assigned area. You can always send a letter to him at the mission office address (on the side bar) or send an e-mail to his e-mail address.  

Week 2 E-mail, 6/8/2012

This week's email is a little longer! Yay! Here it is:


Hey there, thanks for the emails, also tell Sarah i said thanks for the pictures, it's great getting to hear about things going on back home. Week 2 here at the MTC was great. I now have 2 companions: Elder Costello and Elder Dayley. I got back from the temple an hour and a half ago. Oh and remember Matt Ficker from Owensboro? On Wednesday, when we were doing service i ran into him here. Apparently he works here at the MTC. I told him he looked familiar and he said the same to me. As soon as he realized who i was, we talked to each other briefly, he asked how Dad was doing, and i told him how we don't live in Kentucky anymore and that i have 2 sisters instead of 1, and he said that he and his wife have 2 little kids now. So it was nice to see him again after so long. Anyway I hope everything is great and i'll talk to you guys later.




Heidi here...How fun that Elder Page ran into Matt Ficker! Matt was in my Sunday School class way back when...I think it was about 10 years ago. When we were talking about Lehi's dream, I put a big piece of plain white butcher paper up on the wall and had Matt illustrate it for the class as we read the account in the Book of Mormon. He illustrated it a la Monty Python. It was - and still is - pretty awesome! I still have it packed away in a box. I need to dig it out again soon.

2 June 2012 - A Quick E-Mail

"hi, it's me Elder Page here, so far it's been great at the MTC. There are some really nice missionaries here in my district. six of us (me included) are all going to the same mission: which is Montana of course. I already miss you guys."


Short, sweet, and to the point! But it was good to hear from him. Hopefully as time goes by, we'll get some more detailed e-mails. Maybe. :-)

Arrival in Salt Lake City

Elder Page arrived yesterday in Salt Lake City, safe and sound, and was met by our dear friends, the Long family.  This being his first time in Utah (changing planes in SLC without leaving the airport does not count), they took him to see Temple Square.  They took pictures, and so I'm posting them here.  All of these photos are courtesy of Karen Long.  Also, I spoke with Elder Page about a half-hour before he entered the MTC, and he sounded excited and ready to go!  This is a day that he has looked forward to his whole life.  As he grew up, he never spoke in terms of "if" he went on a mission, but "when."  As his parents, we are grateful for him and his desire to serve the Lord.

MTC Address and E-mail Address

Elder Page's e-mail address is: daniel.page (at) myldsmail (dot) net


While he is at the MTC, his mailing address is:


Elder Daniel Alexander Page
MTC Mailbox #198
MT-BIL 0619
2005 N 900 E
Provo, UT 84604-1793


He is scheduled to leave the MTC for Montana on June 19.  


Thanks for all your support and encouragement! 

Getting Started

This is the first post on this new blog.  Elder Page leaves in two days (Tues, May 29) for the Missionary Training Center in Provo, UT. He will spend three weeks there before leaving for Montana.  We will be using this blog to post his emails home so that friends and family can read about his mission experiences.  Let the adventure begin!