Elder Daniel

                                                         Elder Ehlert with baby Cami

January 7, 2015

Well, I was transferred, so the last couple days have been mainly packing and visiting members and others saying goodbyes. We taught Skyleur on Sunday, so that was good. Her baptism is January 17th, so I'll miss it, which will be hard, especially since she wanted me to be the one to baptize her. I am now in Luverne, Minnesota, a town of 4000 people. I went from the furthest west in the mission to the furthest east. We cover the part of Iowa that is in our mission too. We have a lot of small towns we cover. Monday we drove to Gillette, then to Rapid, then spent the night in Rapid. Then the next morning we loaded up the trailers and vans with missionaries, but we needed more room, so my stuff and another Elder's stuff was put into a Chevy Silverado, which they told me to drive from Rapid City to Sioux Falls, which is a little more than 4 hours. That was kind a fun, I just followed the transfer train. After arriving in Sioux Falls, I put my stuff into our truck, and we drove back to Luverne, which is an hour from Sioux Falls. It was a crazy couple days, but I'm here now. My address is

109 East Luverne Street #330

Luverne, MN 56156

Hopefully all is well there, have a great week!

Elder Ehlert

January 12, 2015

Luverne is a cool place. It's pretty small, and we have only 3 families here that are members. We live in an old school building that was turned into apartments. It has a gym and stuff in it still. It's pretty cool. We cover the Brandon ward, which just recently became a ward from a branch. It is a small building, with only an assembly hall instead of a chapel and gym. The assembly hall is used for pretty much everything. There is also a small library, primary room, relief society room, and that's pretty much it. The church is in South Dakota, 20 minutes away. There are actually 3 sets of missionaries that are assigned to the area. Us, the Brandon set, and a set from Sioux Falls. I'm not sure why there are so many, but the work seems to be progressing.

We don't do a lot of teaching here, we have scripture study every night at a member's house, she has palsy and is in a wheelchair. One of her helpers/workers is a less active member and she stays for scripture study, so that is really good. We spend most of our time tracting. We have 2 investigators, but my companion has never met them. He has tried to contact them multiple times, but they aren't ever home. My companion is Elder Rucker, and he's only been in Luverne for one transfer.

The biggest news right now is that with the new president coming in July, they are splitting the mission. We knew this would happen soon, but before now, it was just rumors. Three stakes will be taken out of our mission, Gillette Wyoming, Casper Wyoming, and Sioux Falls South Dakota. We will be getting a new stake from Montana. The mission headquarters will be changed to Bismarck North Dakota. As of now, I'm not sure which mission I will go to. I could stay in the North Dakota Bismarck mission, or go to Colorado Ft. Collins, Montana Billings, or Nebraska Omaha. If I stay in Luverne until they split, I will most likely be in the Omaha mission. We will see what happens with that, and I will keep you posted on the changes.

That's about it for me, hope you have a great week!

Elder Ehlert