October 26th, 2015

Wow it sounds like yall have had quite the week! I'm not even quite sure where to start this week. This has been a long awesome humbling week. :) I love the gospel so much! This week at Church our branch only had like 7 people that weren't missionaries or from the stake. Since it was raining everyone stayed home. It was sad to see and we were all kind of stressing cause the Stake President was there and we didn't want him thinking that's how it was every week. He got up and talked about how there were a lot of empty chairs and I really thought that we were going to get a little bit chastised but instead he just told us all how proud he was of our choice to come to church. He testified to us that our Heavenly Father knows of our efforts and he was proud that we came to partake of the sacrament. I felt the spirit so strong. I know that our Heavenly Father truly cares about each one of us. He takes care of us 1 by 1. I wish that yall could come to our awesome little branch (not just so our attendance would be up haha) but because they truly are not missing the mark of why they are there. There isn't alot of fanciness or frill we just do our best and invite the spirit there. and that's what it's all about :) We also had a pretty awesome trunk or treat party. We were in charge of the games so we did donut on a string and it was alot of fun! We also went to a meeting in New Orleans and it was a pretty good time. We rode up with our Senior couple the Nelsons and it was super awesome!! I love yall so much and hope that you have an amazing week!! Work hard, pray hard, party hard, that's what my mama taught me :) Love Elder Mud

October 19th, 2015

Hey my awesome family! I'm glad that yall have had a pretty good week! Things this week have been crazy, but good. It was super hard to leave Pineville and all of the awesome people there that I love you so much! It also was hard to see my trainer Elder Richardson to go home. He is a super good dude and I am going to miss him a lot! We might room together if he isn't married already haha I am here in Morgan City now and it has been quite and adventure so far. The first night we got there we didn't have beds so we slept on these tiny little couch things, my trainee Elder Nichols has had a unique first week haha I have been trying to take care of him the best I can. We've got beds now so we really can't complain. We live with 2 other elders and they are both super awesome so it has been good so far. Elder Whitmarsh has been out just a few more months than me and he is from Australia so we get along real good. He is training a new missionary too Elder Shaddick who reminds me a lot of Westley so it has been fun. Elder Nichols is from Kaysville and was a professional drummer before he came out so am definitely going to have to get his autograph. Our branch is really small we are in a phase 1 building, uncle travus will know what that is, and we had 27 people there yesterday including 6 missionaries so it was a different church experience than I have had before. We blessed the sacrament and they had us 3 missionaries speak, so I was the concluding speaker and Elder Shaddick spoke and then Elder Nichols spoke and then we sang a hymn and they left me with 30 minutes to speak haha dirty dogs. So with Heavens help I spoke for 30 minutes and only put one guy to sleep. :) I am excited for our new adventure! Hopefully we can get a few more things figured out this week. We went tracting our first night and we didn't know where the church was, what our phone number was or anything but we made it work and got it figured out. I love yall so much! Thanks for always praying for me I sure can feel them. Keep up the good work!! Love Mud :) P.S. I hope you like the pictures and I hope they really are worth a thousand words cause I need to improve my emailing skills. :) Also tell dad that I will keep workin' on opening my eyes in pictures...cause I know he was thinking it on a few of them haha

October 13th, 2015

Hey hey hey my family! I'm sure glad to hear that everyone is healing up and that you survived another crazy week! That is a good looking deer that jake got I am very proud of him! Thanks so much for the package it is awesome! I found out that they are canning me tomorrow and sending me somewhere else. And I have a lot of mixed feelings about it. I love the people and the ward here so much! I am going to miss them something awful and I am going to miss all of the awesome missionaries here to, but I am excited for my next assignment/ adventure. I am training a new missionary and opening up a new area! I am really excited! When my mission president was telling me about it he told me that it was an "interesting" missionary that I was getting and that I just needed to love him. So I am excited to find out what interesting means. :) I have really been learning a lot about gratitude and enjoying the journey lately. Having a "gratitude attitude" really does make a HUGE difference. We can wish life or trials away or we can party, throw rocks, drink dew, slap mamas hiney, and king crab grandma through them, it's all up to us! I love being a missionary so much!! I am so grateful to have the best family ever! Cause my family not only taught me how to talk some smack and work hard, but they taught me how to love the peanuts out of people and I am so happy cause I get to do those 3 things every day!! Thanks for being the greatest! I love you with all of my heart!! Mud :) "Good timber does not grow with ease, the stronger the wind the stronger the trees."

October 5th, 2015

It has been a wild one this week! We have some crazy missionaries here but they are also awesome! I went on exchanges to Natchez Mississippi with a Canadian missionary named elder sabey. He is a trash talking little guy and so as you could guess we get along pretty well. So him and the other Elders pranked me and we spent the night at the church. They had set it all up with there ward mission leader so he called and told us that we had to evacuate our apartment from a carbon monoxide leak and sleep somewhere else. So we ended up at there church, which is a creepy old church that they bought from the pentacostals and slept in the basement on some church pews. They are not comfortable to sleep on by the way. We also played some Ghetto basketball and taught all 11 of them after we earned there respect. We started out talking about Prophets and asked them if they knew what moses did and none of them knew so one of them was trying to google it. It was a pretty cool experience! We also watched conference with Brother LaCour and some members in the ward (the yosts) it was really awesome! I'm glad that you all are doing well! Keep up the good work healing! I love yall so much!! Thanks for all of the prayers that you send! Peoples hearts are being changed here because of your prayers, I can see it. :) Love mud!

September 28th, 2015

My awesome family! I'm glad to hear that yall are making it and I hope that you get doing better soon! I hope that you can have some fun during spud harvest as well. This week has been a pretty good one! We went on 2 exchanges this week the first one I went to Eunice, La and it was really good. I was with Elder Martell (one of the guys I came out with) so it was fun to get to be with him again. We heard a lot about the pope being in America from all of Catholic people they are teaching. The other exchange was with the assistants and I stayed in Pineville. We were able to get a lot accomplished! On Saturday we helped one of the members non member friends move and also helped with the stake primary activity. It was a good time. We also had a stake priesthood meeting yesterday and it was really good. They definitely aren't afraid to say what they are thinking around here haha One of the guys in the Stake presidency his name is president McClure he is just a good ol Cajun boy and he got up and started going crazy about how he was sick about hearing about the pope and that the deacons in the room had more priesthood authority than him. He just gets right into the meat and potatoes of things haha Hope that yall have an awesome week! things are going really good here. My companion is a great guy. Thanks for all of your love and prayers! Love Mud! :)

September 14th, 2015

Hey my awesome family! This week has been a pretty good one! I got the chance to give Brother LaCour the priesthood yesterday and it was awesome! It's always an amazing feeling to get to pass that awesome power on to someone else. I am really grateful that I have such awesome men that passed it to me. This week has definitely been a week of adjusting. I'm not sure why this transfer has been so weird and hard to adjust for me but it has. I went from a really serious mature companion to one that is not so much... but he has a really good heart and is an awesome missionary so we will be just fine :) We have really been working on finding people and we met a guy named John Melder that reminds me so much of Thurman it is crazy. He is a great guy and hopefully he will follow Thurmans awesome example and get baptized too. We had a Zone meeting that we had to do some training at and for me be the one that "knew what he was doing" it went pretty well haha I love our missionaries so much they are awesome! You can see pictures of all of them on www.thelbrm.com under our missionaries it is pretty cool :) Thanks for the awesome package and just for being an awesome family. I love being a part of such an awesome eternal family! Hope you have an awesome week! Love, Mud :)

September 7th, 2015

Hey my awesome family!! I sure love yall!! Man it sounds like life is crazy busy! I'm glad to hear that things are going good and that everyone is happy and partying hard :) Things here have been pretty wild this week! We went to transfers on Wednesday and I got my new companion, his name is Elder Nield and he is from Twin Falls Idaho. I'm excited to be with another Idaho boy!! He has a very similar personality to David Judy they are so much the same it has blown my mind a little bit haha But I am excited he is a really good guy! Elder Decker's new companion is Elder Jones so that has been really interesting having one of my old companions living with me but it also has been a lot of fun! Change is a really interesting thing. It has been super weird to not be with Elder Brimhall since I was with him for so long it kind of feels like just a really long exchange so far but things will settle down again. Brother LaCour is getting the Priesthood next week!! I am super excited! He asked if I would be willing to give it to him. I love him so much! I am excited for another transfer to be able to serve in Pineville and help of the missionaries out in our zone. I love helping people so much! I got a little bit tired and down this week but I am ready to go and hit it hard this week! I will keep working hard, praying hard, and being happy because that's what Dye's do. I love yall so much!! Thanks for being the best family ever!!!! Love Mud :)

September 1st, 2015

My family!! That's so awesome that Thurman got baptized! I'm glad that it went so well. And I also am proud of yall for surviving the first week, that's one of the hardest ones to survive. And tell Jessa (the hairy one) volleyball chick to keep up the good work :) This week has been a good one! We made it through!! and sometimes that is a great accomplishment haha Brother LaCour got baptized on Sunday and it was so awesome! I sure love that man. He definitely keeps my fluent in "trash talk" and he also reminds me how much I love being a missionary, and how much I love our Savior. I went on 2 exchanges this week so we kept really busy. For one of them I went to Leesville and we got to go on post and Fort Polk it was pretty cool. I am taking over Pineville and I am excited but also a little bit nervous. But I will just keep trying and praying and it will work out. I have really been trying to not stress so much and find some "joy in the journey" and it is still a work in progress but I am getting a little bit better. I am going to miss Elder Brimhall. He did drive me a little crazy sometimes and we did think almost completely opposite of each other. But I learned so much from him that I really needed to learn. and I will forever be grateful for him and his love for me, loving me enough to help me be better. Thanks for always listening to my random rants and I am working on being more positive so if I'm not, tell me and I will give myself a chest nuggie haha I love yall and hope you have an awesome week!!! Thanks for all of your love, prayers, and letters :) Love your Mud "Some of God's greatest gifts are unanswered prayers" :)