Sounds Great, to be honest i never really liked the old bishop I know its bad but i cant help it. oh well at least i dont have to worry about it. Sounds like it will be a good bishopric. So we do get to watch confrence here but not when it is brodcast we get to watch it a month after we get to watch it on a DVD and they they play it on a projector at the church. We went to Chobi again today thats the 2nd time i got to go to a World First Class area. I have so many pictures to show you i just need a way i can send them. Hope would love some of them!!!! i know she would.  Oh Ugandas Independence day is coming up on Oct 9 and from what i have been hearing from ward members and investigators is that its going to be full of parties and lots and lots of drunk people and they also tell us that is a not a really good day for us missionaries to be out teaching people. People are going to be doing some crazy things! oh and i am starting to devlope some ugandan habits i guess is what you could call them. i am starting to roll my R's (i had help with that in spanish class) and i have fugierd out a finger thing i will just have to show you when i get back  AHH at the end of next transfer i will be 6 Weeks on my mission or in other words 1/4 of the way done with my mission! i am learning the language here really fast its close to spanish so its  easy to learn.

sorry for the bad english time was running out so i didnt have time fix a lot of stuff and i started to just start typing thats why words are spelled wrong. hope you have a good day

Oh and watch my Facebook for a little see if there is any unusal activity going on with it, thanks. Have you sent the Rings and the Christmas presents yet? next week i will resend the list :)

On Mon, Sep 30, 2013 at 5:27 PM, Traci Ericksonwrote:

Oh, and we got a new bishopric.  Bro. Gooch is now bishop. His councilors are Bro. Bullock and Bro. Clark.  No one even knew it was going to happen.  We went to church and the Stake Presidency was all there and we wondered what up.

> Date: Mon, 23 Sep 2013 19:18:21 +0300

 so me and the elders decided to play vollyball with some of the locals
 and we were slottering them. they wernt so happy about that. it was a
lot of fun seeing them get upset, we had to tell them many times we
are just playing for fun. after the first few games some more people
 came and played with them and they got a lot better. close to the end
of the last game one of them spiked the ball really hard hit me in the stomach it hurt for maybe 4 seconds and then i was fun.....good thing i have been working out me stomach a lot! almost every day. i guess
 you could say that i have a 6 pack. we will see if i can keep it on
 the mission.

 On 9/23/13, Braden Erickson  wrote:
wow still sounds like life is busy huh. is good that dad is home now
but hopefully he will get better soon. hope things slow down for you.
good the you are getting some help. of course as soon as i leave you
 make salsa...just my luck haha just kidding. life is going well here
 the house is infested with mice and cockroaches but we are killing
 those things off like there is no tomorrow. Uganda's independence day
is on the 9 and i have good feeling that we will be stuck inside all
day that day sorry to make this short but the internet is being slow.
> > On 9/23/13, Traci Erickson  wrote:
Glad to hear you are doing so well. Just retract what has been done
before, you always find someone that wasn't home the first time or has decided to
 let you in. So Dad decided he missed the hospital so much that I had to take him to the ER last Sunday-they kept him in the hospital until Thursday.
 He is home now and doing better. He has to be on oxygen 24/7. So we have a machine in our house that changes the air to oxygen and he has a long cord
 that makes it around the house, even to bed. He has a doctor's appointment tomorrow and hopefully can get off of it.Grandma and Grandpa Erickson came to help out.
Grandma and Grandpa R came and helped do yard work. They picked buckets
and buckets of tomatoes, a few green peppers and hot peppers. So I went to the store to buy onions and a few spices and made 18 pints of salsa. It went pretty fast with the help of Grandma E. Maybe I'll hide a bottle so you can have some when you get home.
The kids are still doing well in school and helping out extra around the house because of all of the craziness that has been going on. Hope has
the hospital pretty much memorized now. But hopefully we won't have to go back for a very long time.Love, Mom

Date: Mon, 16 Sep 2013 14:45:46 +0300

Not much new has happend Transferes happend and i am still in the same area. if i stay much longer i will not know where to go tracting anymore i know if i go to far out in my area the people wont come. I did get a new companion and he Really funny and is a great guy he comes from Utah as well! so far both of my comps have been from utah i wonder how many times i will be put with a Utahn haha. His name is Elder Halladay. We have had 3 Baptisms and next week we might have 3 or more depending on how people are. Driving here is Very Crazy there are no stop signs and the need less to say the bigger the vichle you have the right of way. traffic is also a flowing traffic everywhere there is no stoping or you will get stuck. But boy do i miss driving stick cars. i havent been able to drive yet because i dont have Mission Pres. permission to drive yet. but i almost had to drive to the Zone meeting. Wait Dad is back in the ICU that cant be good! he needs to get better not worse. Thats cool that Parkers car did well. Hope is SO funny
 she makes me laugh a lot. What mask The death eater mask? Paiges name will change to Pibz soon just you wait haha.

 On Mon, Sep 16, 2013 at 6:42 AM, Traci Erickson wrote:
So has anything new happened? How are your investigators? Any baptisms ?
Most of all, is driving crazy over there? I haven't sent your ctr rings yet.
I special ordered them and they came in the mail. With all of there craziness going on here-I haven't made it to the post office. Dad was doing well until last night. I took him to the ER after I got home from church.
 He is back in the ICU. The blood clots in his lungs have gotten bigger instead of dissolving. So he is on new blood thinners and they are
running
tests to see why this happened. Maybe he just loves the hospital so much that he had to go back. Me- I'm pretty tired of it.
 Parker and I made his pinewood derby car and it actually did well. He
 took
1st place between the cars he was on the track with. He came in 8th place.
Not to bad. There where 18 cars entered. I send a pic.
We all laugh at Hope. Her new favorite thing is watching "don't mine at night" songs on U tube. She knows all the words to 3 of them. And for Halloween she wants to wears dads scary monster mask . She is such a hoot.
Paige said that was funny About something. Hope said,"No, that's hilarious.
Paige told her, your a hilarious being-Hope replied, I know. Also, Hope
 was trying to get Paige's attention and kept saying Paige. Paige didn't
respond, so Hope called her Pibz and she answered. Too funny.
 When I figure out the pictures stuff I will send them.Love you, MomP.S.
Here's a big HUG! 

Moo-zoo-gnoo

Things are going well here, my companion and i have ran out of ideas of where to prosolite its kinda nerve racking haha, we have no idea where to go and we dont want to go to the DEEP ends of our area it would take 2 hours of walking....not worth the walk to only work for a few hours and have to walk back. if we could drive that would be nice but we cant. i dont have permission form the mission pres to drive and my companion that does have permission to drive lost his license, haha.  Yes, something interesting happend this week we were walking to the church on saturday for a baptism interview.  we had a guy run to us in and said there are some people that want to talk to you in the bus over there. so we went over there and we found a bunch of (Moo-zoo-gnoo) or White people, it was very weird they were from the states and wanted to come to church on sunday.  they also gave us some candy it was good.  we talked to them for a little and then had to go.  they did show up at church on sunday and we talked to them a  little then as well. So Dad ask for things i would like for Christmas here some things that would be nice.

New set of Scriptures

Scripture case that can go over my shoulder and has a few pockets (zippers)

Shirts

Mesh garments (it gets really hot here and mesh ones breath)

ties

USB Drive that has a lot of music on it (EFY Melody is one i really want)  The church has a list of song

Starburst (candy)

Air head

jerky...i think you get the idea.

Food:

Mac and cheese

alfrdo

stuff that wont go bad over a few months.

On Mon, Aug 19, 2013 at 9:31 AM, Traci Erickson

How are you ? How are things going? Did anything exciting or interesting happen this week?

We went camping in Vernal. It was fun.  We went to the Dinosaur museum there. Ethan was impressed but of course , he loves those kind of things.

The rest of the kids , however, weren't.  The museum is Dinosaur bones still in the rock. Excavated so you can see most of the bones.  There are hundreds of them.  Some almost the whole dino, lots of just pieces.   The hand two dino's set up like the ones at Thanksgiving point but that was it.

We camped in a small log cabin-beds and a table. No bathroom or running water-kind of a pain.  We had to walk down to another camp site for the water and more than half way across the camp ground to get to the bathroom.

We were buy a small lake and decided to go to the beach and for a swim.  Me, oh my.... the lake had receded a lot since spring and we walked through mud to get to it.  We all looked like we had mud shoes on. It was quite a sight.  The ground in the lake was pretty much the same.  We had a good laugh and a good story to tell. We now call the lake MUD lake. Not one we will go back too. 

Ethan starts school tomorrow and is very excited. I hope he comes home feeling the same way.

Keep up the good work.

Love ya, Mom

emails to Dad

To: Loren J Erickson 


Its great hearing from you. So you know that VISA card you sent me its
kinda funny because well...when i get the cable i will show you. I
guess something that would be nice to get for christmas would be USB
drive (With lots of music on it, and talks), food is always nice
(ramen, alfedo, mac and cheese, and candy) stuff like that. i have
been eating a lot of bread, eggs, noodles, and PBJ.  you probably dont
know this but i get 100,000 shillings or $40 a week.  not much.  if i
wanted to i could live off of noodles very easy! i can buy a pack of
them for 50 cents or about 1250 shillings.  but who wants to eat
noodles all the time haha.  i have been offered food from
investigators and members all the time but most of the time we tell
them to keep it. its culture for them to feed visitors. i have tried 2
different kinds of fish and they are alright the sauce is the only
thing that makes it good haha. Tea here is anything hot so we have to
be careful of what we are drinking we have to ask them if it has tea
leafs in it haha. we have 12 new investigators and if all goes well
the last sunday of this transfer they will be baptised! they are
progressing well. i can give you more about them next time.

hope all goes well. sounds like its not going to be a lot of fun.

On 8/7/13, Loren J Erickson wrote:
Hey Elder, I really enjoyed reading your last letter.  It sounds like you are making
quite a name for yourself both in the kitchen and in music.  I really like
the song Be Still My Soul.  I think I may have mentioned that the ward
choir here sang an arrangement of that song and Where Can I Turn for Peace, with the two songs being sung on top of each other by different parts.  It
 sounded pretty cool.  I recorded it on my phone, and I'd send it but I
 don't know if you're allowed to receive attachments like that.  Our ward
 Christmas program is starting to take shape.  If we can pull it off it
 should be a spiritual feast.  I am trying to focus on four main doctrines
 related to the Saviors birth: the prophecies, the birth itself, the
announcement, and the gift.  So far I hope that we will be singing the
following songs: O Come, O Come Emmanuel (mens chorus), When Mary Sang Her
 Lullaby (womens chorus), He Sent His Son (primary children and ward choir),
 and O Come, All Ye Faithful (choir and congregation).  I need one more song
 to cover "the announcement".  I have a couple of ideas, but haven't
 selected one yet.

 I think it's great that you are using your musical talent as part of your
 mission.  I hope that you continue to embrace and enhance that talent over time.

 By "something special" for Christmas, I simply meant that if you'd like something in particular beyond a VISA card, something that we could send so that it would get there in time for you to have a nice Christmas, we'd need to start planning for that now.  I didn't having anything particular in mind.  We are working on sending you the things you have requested so far.
  I know from experience that that first mission Christmas can be both spiritually moving and lonely at the same time.  I hope that when that time comes for you, you remember who it is you are serving right now.  What a great way to give something back to the Savior.

 Now to the subject of my email.  I met with the surgeon today, and they finally agreed that my arm problem is serious enough that it needs surgical attention.  Right now, I am scheduled to go into surgery sometime on August 20th.  Two weeks from today.  The doctor thinks there are several things  going on.  One of the screws in my neck may be broken and may (or may not) be affecting the stability of the fusion. I also have some kind of growth in that area that projects into the spinal column channel, and the gap where the nerve that goes down my right arm comes out of the spinal column is very narrow, which is ultimately what is causing my numbness and tingling.  At a minimum, they are going to widen that nerve passage and widen the spinal column where it is constricted in the area of the fusion.  If the loose screw has affected the stability of the fusion, they will do a second fusion on the back side of my spine.  I may be out of commission for about six weeks or more.

This kind of thing is never without risk, but I want you to know that regardless of what happens I know that you are exactly where you need to be right now.  You and our family will be most blessed by you fulfilling your commitment to serve the Lord.
 I love you and am overjoyed when I hear about your adventures in the mission field.  I know that you are touching the lives of many individuals, probably more than you realize.  Stay true to what the Lord expects of you, follow the inspiration He will send and know that He will send angels to be on your right hand and on your left hand, if necessary, if you are obedient in all things.  Know that we pray for you and your companion daily.  Write about your feelings in your journal every day, even (especially) on the bad days.  You will be surprised at how much of a treasure and comfort your own words will be to you when you are older.

Love always,
Dad

More than normal mission work

Thats good to hear sounds like a lot has happend this week!!! the
emails with pictures shouldnt take to long i have been getting them
from my friends all the time. i will try sending them with out the
drop box if they take to long to get to you i will use the drop box.
when you said dani got engaged for some reason i was thinking of Shay!
it kinda had me thinking but not anymore haha. i have been taking my
pills daily the only days i miss are fast sunday. because i have to
take food with the pills. its good that you found your ipod! so turns
out i could i have brought my ipod touch oh well!! to late for that!
wait what the garage is clean!!!! there is no way! I hope dads
surgery goes well. tell zach he can use the "bad" set of speakers (the
round ones) i want the others to be kept safe for when i get back
they cost a good amount. but tell him he needs to start emailing
me!!!! It is hot here and they say its the cooler season it gets
about 90f here sometimes hotter. cant wait for it to get
hotter......not!!! the investigators are doing really well they have
been learning a lot. I get to teach Mission prep, institute, and
primary. i havent been playing piano yet, i told the missionary
couples that if i could have a hour or 2 each day to practice i could
and they said they would think about it and would have to talk to the
new mission pres.

can you also get my COD sunglass's out of the pontiac? I still have a
little time left so i can tell you about one of the investigators he
was a J-dub when we first contacted him he knew a lot about the bible
and as soon as we taught him about the restoration he left his old church.
his name is christopher and he is learning lots, his family was also
baptised this last week. its really neat they say thats is really rare
to baptize families here. oh this is random but we run into a lot of
peachers of other faiths and they always try to tell us what we are
teaching is false and they start quoting scriptures from the bible and
we start to teach them they are wrong and they try to prove us wrong
but never can haha.
On 8/12/13, Traci Erickson 
 Dear Elder Erickson,Here are attachments for recipes and food ideas. I hope that you find better food to eat. Remember to take your vitamins so you stay healthy. I set you up a drop box account for your pictures, Dad says they will take for ever to send via email. So go to www.dropbox.com enter your name and lds email-your pass word is-really you thought I'd post it here?-no capitals. This way we can have access to them and transfer them on to our hard drive. It is very simple to use. I use it with my new phone.
 Speaking of electronics---Dad found my i pod that has been missing for about a year. He was searching for the t.v. remote and found it in the back of the newer brown rocking chair. I had searched it and so had some of the kids, maybe moving the chair into the family room and kids jumping in it moved it out of hiding, I don't know but Hope doesn't get to play with it.
 I got Dad to borrow Uncle pats trailer and we finally got the old couch and other stuff to the dump. Yeah, we can park in the garage now. I knew if we didn't do it this week it wouldn't get done cause dad's neck surgery is in 1 week and he can't lift stuff for a few weeks after that.
 Your cousin Dani got engaged and instead of having a reception, they had an engagement dinner for the adults. It was nice. Grandparent's Erickson's were able to make it and we also ran into dad's Aunt and Uncle Mike James.
 It was fun to get caught up on family things.
 Hope and I cleaned your room. All of your computer stuff is in the top of your closet. I moved a lot of your things up to the higher shelves in your closet to people won't bother them. Zach started moving his things into your room. He put his lizard cage on top of your dresser, so I treated your dresser with a wood moisturizer so it will stay looking nice. Don't worryit is still the same color, just a little shinier.
 Is it still really hot? How are things going with investigators and your area? Do you get to teach FHE? Dad said you might have to play the piano in church, do you? Aren't you glad you had lesson's?
 Know that I am proud of you and what you are doing. I love you with all of my heart.
 Love ya, Mom
 P.S. Hope says missions are way too long. She always asks me how many
 minutes I will be when I have to go some where. I think she is worried that I may be gone as long as you.

Thanks for the food

Thanks so much for the food. i got the packages and 7 letters. it
just takes a long time for them to reach here about a month or so. You
do know that you can send more that a quart sized bag of candy/food
right??? haha im just kidding. I have been eating a lot of eggs,
ramen, and bread lately because they dont give us very much money to
spend for the month. Speaking of money you know that gift card you
sent me. well funny thing is i dont think you looked close enough to
it i will send you a picture why when i get the usb cable to send the
picture. Im sorry all the fish are dying are you sure you are taking
care of them well enough? Thats awesome that the boys had fun at scout
comp thats really good :) thats true school does start soon i was
thinking about that a few weeks ago and it kinda scared me thinking i
have been gone for that long haha its almost been 3 months!!! time
sure goes by fast! it feels likes its been one big day to be honest
if things keep up at this rate i will be home before i know it! oh
and you know suprisingly enough im not going through computer
withdrawals haha! did you put my laptop's, keyboard, mouse (reciever,
mouse pad, cable) in safe spot? Oh has anyone taken my room yet? The
reason why i didnt get to really email you is because it took almost
the hole 2 hours we have to email to load the email page sorry about
that.

On 8/5/13, Traci Erickson 
 Wow, I must have been at the end of all of your emails cause it was so
 short. Or did you just get to the church late?Transfer? New companion? How
 are things going?
 It was quiet at our house having Ethan and Zach gone to scout camp all week.
 The girls finally out numbers the boys for once.The boys had a great time
 at camp and have been telling us many stories. Ethan's first one was that
 he got lost going to his first class. Luckily, he never made it out of
 camp. He just couldn't remember which building he was supposed to be at. He
 got there late but they were waiting for him. So he didn't miss anything.
 We are down to 1 fish! And 2 pollywogs. The store gave us the pollywogs for
 free because they say they just die at the store. We don't know what kind
 of frogs they are or how big they will get. At least something is still
 alive.
 Ethan gets to go to the temple Saturday to do baptisms for the dead. He is
 real excited. Grandpa and Grandma R had all the girls sleep over and go to
 their ward party. I took Hope for the Saturday fun because she wouldn't
have slept. She had fun playing with all of her cousins.
 We have started back to school shopping, I can't believe it is that time
 already. The kids got their school fees in the mail. Paige's was a lot and
 then she noticed that they were billing her for a boys and a girls choir
 uniform. HAHAHa. She doesn't need either because she already has the one
 she needs from last year. That saves us $200 off of her fees.

Here are a few recipes. Let me know what else you want. Your package has
been mailed. We included everything in it. And pictures of Christ on the
 outside-hope it makes it to you.
 I put them in an attachment but don't know if you can open them so here they are again.

Really?

I think that this could be the short email ever. I see where I stand with getting mail-last.  At least I know he is a live!!...

you can even email the recipes i dont care what kinds they are. sorry
to make this short times up sorry. but i have to go
________________________________________________________________________
On 7/29/13, Traci Erickson <tracirerickson@hotmail.com> wrote:
 I have bought the things you requested but am still putting some recipes together. Is there any special recipes you want? I will try to get them in the mail by Tuesday. This week was pretty uneventful. Just doing the normal day to day stuff. However, Saturday and today we are doing last minute packing for Zach and Ethan to go to Scout camp for the week. Zach isn't happy about having to be up at 5 a.m. in the morning. Ethan doesn't leave until 8:30 a.m. so he will be fine. He still gets up like it is the school year-6:30=7ish.
 We found a new home for Katie. I have found her peeing on the carpet. She just doesn't get enough attention, I guess. Since she doesn't go to the door and whine when she needs out, no one pays enough attention to her to let her out every few hours. A high school boy and his college age sister came and looked at her and asked questions and took her home. Katie went wagging her tail and was fine with it.
 We have moved all of the cat stuff to the top floor. Since he is usually up there anyways. He now sleeps in my closet or on my hamper. We see him a lot more now that you are gone. Also, one of the kids that signed up for preschool is allergic to cats. So I figured the cat shouldn't be downstairs.
 Our poor fish are still dying. I think we may have to start all over but we will do it right this time. I have been looking on line and have learned quit a bit about setting up a new tank, to adding the fish etc. We probably should have done that the first time. Oh well, live and learn.
So the most exciting thing that happened, happened to Grandma Erickson. She was riding her bike and ran into another biker that had stopped for a stop sign. She got bucked off her bike and hit her head on the road-no helmet.
 So an ambulance came and took her to the ER. She ended up with 6 staples in her head and a concussion. Wow, I bet she is a lot more careful when she rides her bike for now on.
Did you get transferred or a new companion? How are things going?
 Love ya, Mom

New mission President

Braden Erickson

7:27 AM

To: Traci Erickson

The week has been going very well. Transfers happen this tuesday/wednesday. The new Mission pres. is Pres. Chatfield, he is a great guy and is very excited to work with us all.Yes he is from UT. we also found out that elder bednar and the person over the mission area is also going to be coming down to uganda!! i Cant wait!  I hope you get felling well soon. That sound like Ethan alright, it sounds like you are having a hard time keeping the fish alive though you must be doing somthing wrong! haha jk.  The stake pres talked thats awesome! he always gives good talks and is a great guy. wait so paige and ethan are getting temple recommends? thats great! I wish i had temple close to Uganda so we could go there but we dont have one yet. Wait a sec did you say ethan is counting down the days to go to school?! thats not like him at all but i guess i could see why he is excited it is Jr. High after all.

 

So i had a wonderful idea about sending pictures not sure its something you want to do though.  my idea was that you could send me a USB cable that i can plug my Memory card into the computers here so i could send you pictures through email. that way you dont spend as much money mailing the memory card back and forth. I was also resently told that the mission pres. doesnt like us (missionaries) sending packages home but he doesnt mind us reciving them. i was also told that if you want to make sure the package will make it here you should tape pictures of Christ on the box's and us the Post Office boxes. It would also be nice if you could send some Scripture Highlighters (many colors) and some measuring cups i could use to make food. OH FOOD! email me some recipies that i can use to make food. you dont have to send the measuring cups but i would be nice so i dont have to guess the amount im putting in.
you dont need to send those things but if you do end up sending the Cable it would nice to get the other things as well.

 Traci Erickson <tracirerickson@hotmail.com> wrote:

How was your week? Did you get transferred or a new companion?  Who is your new mission Pres, and is he from Utah

Remember when you got your shots the nurse said she thought that she had meet the new mission Pres and his wife?

This last week was hard on me. I have another dumb sinus infection so I took it easy.  I did manage to take the 3 younger kids to seven peaks for a few hours.

Ethan has been saving his money and decided that he wanted a shark. Yes, a shark.  So we bought a 20 gallon fish tank that he has finish earning. He bought some fish that look like sharks but they eat algie. He also bought a bala shark that can get up to 24 inches long.  I let the other kids buy fish that were $1 or less. The shark died and then so did others.  We treated them with fish med's but more died.  So we then went back and bout more.  2  of them have died two but are covered so we get to take the dead fish on and get new ones.  I don't know how I get myself into these kind of things. More pets to take care of.

The Stake Patriarch spoke today in sacrament  meeting and was very inspiring.  Paige scheduled a meeting with the bishop so she can get hers.  Ethan also has an appointment so he can get his temple recommend to do baptisms for the dead.

Ethan is counting down the days for school to start. He is excited about going to Jr. High.  I on the other hand would love to add a few weeks of summer. Ya know, sleeping in, relaxing, having fun and NO homework to help the kids with.  But I guess, I can't stop it from coming.

LOve, Hugs and Prayers for you,  MOM