I'm gonna name my child Spongebob

Evening fellow humans living here on Earth. Tis I Elder Slavens. I have returned for yet another email. How exciting right!

I feel like Corona is that friend nobody really likes. Corona is just always here and doesn't go away. Rude right. It's crazy how long this stuff has lasted. Maybe it'll end one day. Who knows. 

Missionary work and my life have been pretty much the same. I am inside, I make videos on Facebook, I speak Thai by myself, the couch is my best friend. Good stuff out here in Gilbert, Arizona. For anyone wondering, no I have not heard anything about Thailand or when I will be going. They do not tell us much here. I have heard Thailand is getting better and they can go outside and such but I still have no clue when I can go there. We shall see. 

But here is a mega positive. I didn't write about this last week but we are teaching someone now. Her name is Angela. She is Elder Weston (my companions) cousins daughter. He barely knows her but we have been able to teach her and it is amazing. She is from Idaho and she is learning and growing so much. We have taught her about 5 times now and it has been so coooool. She did not know much about the gospel or the church really before but man she knows a lot know. She is the best. Angela has had amazing experiences with prayer and reading the scriptures already. Wow I love it. 

Also as I said we are making lots of Facebook videos. True. This week we made the best video on planet earth. We duct taped me to a door and took me around all these places. It sounds cool right. Opposite. Well it was cool, but not temperature cool. It was 110 degrees and I was taped for 3 hours. Worth it. 

I have a confession. I have held my pencil wrong my whole life. I have always been made fun of for holding it wrong. That is changing right now. I am teaching myself to hold my pencil the right way. It sucks, not going to lie it is really awful. I can barely write and it's mega chicken scratch. That is ok, I am improving. Also I still have a cast so that doesn't help. But wish me and my hand luck. 

Enjoy reading this. Now enjoy your week. Now I will say goodbye. Goodbye bye bye. 

Oh if anyone has ideas for videos we can make let me know. I'll literally do anything. Thanks. Bye.

Elder Slavens

Elder Duct Tape

Elder 118 Days Inside

สัปดาห์นี้ผมสอนผู้ชายจากประเทศไทยในภาษาไทยให้เย็นใช่ใช่ผมเป็นลำโพงไทยมืออาชีพ

This week I taught a man from Thailand in Thai. So cool right? Yes, I am a professional Thai speaker.

Genesis 28:15 The Bible is mega confusing but this verse is cool.

This is Elder Bahian once again. He took this selfie on my phone. Thought you would like it. Welcome.

So here I am taped to a door. The tape is  suppose to like resemble mistakes that hold you back. 

It makes sense. I promise. 

Enjoying myself being taped to a wall. Eh not really, but it was fun not going to lie. Try it! 

BEHIND THE SCENES. NEVER BEFORE SEEN FOOTAGE. I CAN'T STAND ON MY OWN AS A DOOR. SAD!

I would just like to thank my Mom for letting us look really cool. If anyone knows Spongebob Squarepants 

tell him I am his biggest fan. Thanks lots.

I mean a big fat man with a long white beard

Hello friends and family and pets, and rodents, and alligators. I am back. I have returned. I am here once again. I am still alive, I am still inside. 

Another week has gone by. It feels as if the weeks are getting faster. I guess that is a positive considering every day is exactly the same and I don't move much more than 7 feet in a day. Ok, I move more than that but still, you get it. 

This week t'was very similar to every other week of my whole mission. Inside, study, call people, sit down, eat food, go insane, go on walks. It's the best. My favorite part of the year. It's the most wonderful time of the year. Speaking of Christmas, Elder Weston and I got in an argument this week. He thought the song “Santa Claus is coming to town” by Michael Bublé ended with "I mean a big fat man with a bright red suit". Incorrect. Crazy boy. I mega proved him wrong. Take that. I know everything about Michael Bublé.

Drumroll please. And now I will discuss my wrist. I went to the doc and was not sure what was going to happen. I sat and got X-rays and then the Doc said, "Well cool your wrist is doing better". So now I have a fancy new purple cast. They allowed me to move my thumb so I am happy. Last time they casted my thumb. Not this time. Nope. It doesn't stink anymore horray. So I am most likely not getting surgery and I am going back to get a CT scan in 3 weeks to see how it’s doing then. Exciting stuff. Wish me luck then.

Tis all this fancy week. Enjoy life, enjoy the sun, enjoy the Gospel you alligators.

Elder Slavens

Elder Bublé

Elder Gator Hunter

คืนนี้สำหรับมื้อเย็นผมกินไก่เทอริยากิผมอร่อยใช่มั้ย

Tonight for dinner I am eating teriyaki chicken how yummy am I right?

Alma 34:39 PRAYER IS GOOD

Well this was for a video but I thought you may enjoy it. So enjoy this. 

I love Doritos, also the Church is true. 

This week it was Elder Weston's birthday. We didn't have a cake, we didn't have candles, 

we didn't have ice cream. We did have nachos and a napkin though. He liked it. 

We hiked again and found a cave/mine thing. How cool. It said it was dangerous. 

I guess I am a risky Elder. 

This is my buddy Elder Bahian. You may remember him. We are best friends. 

While hiking we talked about his Grandma and what she likes to do. Great conversation. 

The sky. Maybe there aren’t many cool buildings in Gilbert, but at least we have the sky. 

It's always there willing to take photos with me.  

yeah, i am still inside

I'm glad you guys keep coming back for more. If you are reading this, thanks. Tips highly recommended and appreciated. And by tips I mean Spongebob quotes or Jamba Juice. I love those things. They bring me happiness. 

This week I just want to congratulate myself. I made it to 100 days inside a house. I would like to thank myself for not going crazy. I won't lie, it's been pretty hard at times. I want to be outside but I am SO SO happy. I have the best companion in the world and the best apartment ever. That helps a lot. But the moment we can go outside I will never come inside again. I will sleep outside. No joke. Inside blows.

Elder Weston and I are covering 2 wards. When you are serving from the inside, calling people all day every day, it ain't that many people. We have called and had lessons with almost everyone. Some people didn't answer and never will. So from here we are taking a break from having lessons and are going to do something else. We aren't sure what that thing will be, but I may be even more bored now. So that's a bummer. We shall see. 

I still have a cast. Cool right! It stinks and is really sweaty. I am going to the doctor this Wednesday. I will get another X-ray and we shall see how she's doing. If the ol' Scaphoid isn't healed I may need surgery. If she is doing good I will continue with the cast life. I am kinda excited to see. If I get new cast I may get purple. That would be exciting!

Thai is hard to study. I get an hour a day but it is tough stuff. I try to read the Book of Mormon every day in Thai. I still don't understand anything. You might think, “This boy’s been out for almost 6 months.  He's gotta be good at Thai by now.” Nah, he isn't good. Sad boy. 

That's all I've done this week. We made a couple videos about the Book of Mormon. I love that book. Read it please. Have a good good good good week. 

Elder Slay

Elder 100 day guy

Elder Peanut Butter

ผมมักจะทำไก่เป็นอาหารกลางวันทุกสัปดาห์แต่สัปดาห์นี้ผมขี้เกียจดังนั้นผมจึงซื้อ Cheerios ผมรัก Cheerios.

Every week I usually make chicken for lunch, but this week I am lazy so I bought Cheerios. I love Cheerios.

Today we went on a hike. I enjoy hikes. This is me. My name is Elder Slavens for those who don't know me. I love rocks and I love Jesus. 

We had another Photoshoot. I guess you can say we are pretty photogenic. We love the camera, the camera loves us. 

This is the sky. It's above you. Look up.  I dare you. I promise it will be there. If it's not email me. I'll help you find it. 

This is us hike boys getting outside and being all active and stuff. Pretty nice right? yeah. 

My all time favorite food is Peanut Butter. I just really enjoy the taste, smell, and feeling of PB. While this was fun, I do not recommend to those who don't want to shower for years to be clean once again. 

On the 100th day anniversary on being trapped inside we threw a party. We made a cake with 100 candles. It was covered in so much wax nobody ate it. At least the party was fun.

Call me Slayvein Thang

Hello ladies and gentleman. Gather round. Welcome to the Elder Slavens email. Crazy stuff happens in these email. Prepare yourself. Don't be scared. There is no need to fear. Elder Slavens is not scary, he is actually a pretty friendly boy. Drum roll please... Here he is... ELDER SLAVENS!!

Hello everyone it's nice to be back here in this email. It's been awhile yes. Well, before we get started I just wanted to thank my family, friends, and especially my math teachers for helping me get to this point. It's been a couple years. Yeah. Well I'm glad to be back. 

Ok, let's be honest this isn't a game show, this isn't a Ted talk. This is just another email from me, Elder Slavens. 

This week on Keeping up with Elder Slavens... nothing. It has been a very blah week you know. But it's blah in a good way tho. We’re still working hard every second of every single day. Every day we have personal study, companionship study, language study, 1-2 hours outside time to walk around get air and such, calling people to get lessons, and lessons. That's about every single day. It seems rough but its actually really fun. I’m mega learning and growing. It's the best. 

Besides that, this week we got a car cause this boy can't bike so we drive to the park and such now. Cripple life. I still have to live with 1 hand and I hate it. I'm still shaving my legs and I am still happy every time I look down at my beautiful legs. 

If anyone knows any less active or nonmembers who could benefit from a little lesson or thought by Elder Slavens let me know. I'll be happy to call them and help them.

That's all folks. Not much else. It's kinda wack tho. Elder Weston my companion and I are like the same person. Every song I've heard he knows, every movie I've seen he has seen. We are the same person in different bodies. Cool.

Now have a good week. Bye friends and family. Hope you enjoyed my email, not Ted Talk. 

Elder Slavens

Elder Slay

Elder Ted Talk

Elder Slayvein Thang

St. John 14: 26-27 Peace and the Holy Ghost are good

พูดตามจริงผม google แปลส่วนนี้ของอีเมลทุกสัปดาห์ขออภัย

to be honest I google translate this part of the email every week sorry

I found these ducks this week on a walk. I feel they need to make an appearance in my email.

This is my Father. I love my Father. He is cool. He looks just like this! 

Hello. We have a message about Spongebob Squarepants 

and how he can truly change your life!

Does sin make you feel dry inside? This book can change that. Even if you can't read it cause it's Spanish, it can help you. 

One night we decided to stack paper plates to the ceiling. It was very exciting. They fell and it wasn't loud at all. I've never had more fun in my life.

as the human torch once said, "flame on"

Hello my fans. I'm back and let me just tell you, life with a cast is kinda the worst. I do not recommend this to anyone. Showering sucks. So many people laugh when I say I fell off a bike.  It's itchy, it's very sweaty, but at least it looks cool. But showering is truly so awful. I bought this bag thing I wear over my cast and it smells like rubber and hurts to put on and take off. I can't wash either of my arms really because one is in a bag and you can't really wash your left arm with your left arm. Tricky stuff.

This week I hit 92 days in Quarantine. Surprisingly, I haven't been that bored or sick of it yet. Well, until this week. We do the same exact thing every single day. It's madness. It's really fun and I am learning so much but 92 days inside ain't fun for most people I would assume. There have been a few ways I have really kept myself amused. I watch random videos in Thai. I can't understand them but It's still fun. I also journal, but I now have a cast so I type instead. We also eat a lot. This week a member family brought us dinner and brought some gravy with it. It was yummy gravy. We then left this normal cup of gravy out for maybe 5 days. It smelled pretty good for maybe 2 days. Then something changed in the gravy. Our whole house soon smelled like gravy and slowly began to smell like poop. It felt like we were surrounded by poop in the air. It was awful. Still not sure why we didn't throw it away. It just sat on our table rotting. We finally threw it away but I still randomly am sitting on the couch and get a little scent of gravy. It's haunting me. 

One night we went on a mighty walk. On the way back we were walking by our apartment complex and saw something move on the floor. At first I assumed it was a scary rat. Nope. We looked and it was 6 baby kittens living in a gutter pipe. We walked closer to them then they walked to us. We put our hand out and then they just kept hissing. I don't think they liked humans. They only like darkness and smelly gutter pipes. We visited them for a few days. We left some tuna and water for our babies. We were so exited for our children to become huge lions. But our teenagers got sick of home and ran away. Teenagers always have to be so sassy don't they? I just don't get it. Parenting is so hard.

Besides that, it's been the exact same all week. Tons of lessons with members and tons of studying. I can't bike so we can't even really leave the house anymore. We go on little walks but walks get boring. So instead we just sit inside. It's the best. It's hard but so rewarding. I have seen so many blessings come from working hard and staying positive. 

On a spiritual note I lost my speaker this week. It was so sad. I said a prayer and woke up and it was at my feet on my bed. Confused how it got there. I guess God does answer prayers after all. 

Enjoy life. And it was Dallin's (brother of mine) birthday this week. He turned some age above 21. I'm so proud of him. Oh, also caption was something I randomly thought of during my studies. Yeah. Bye everyone. Corona sucks but God doesn't. 

Elder Slavens

Elder Gravy

Elder Kitty Carer

Mosiah 2:22 Very good, I posted this on my Facebook story. It's that good. 

กาลครั้งหนึ่งนานมาแล้วมีเด็กชายคนหนึ่งชื่อฆ่าและเขาข้อมือของเขาจนจบ

Once upon a time there was a boy named slay and he broke his wrist the end.

When we went on a walk and just sat and stared at the pool. If only. Sad.

Us and our kitty children. So little, so kind. But that can change any moment and your children will steal your heart and run away. Be careful fellow parents.

These photos were a recreated photo of my "Dad" when he was little. They said to find a picture of your Dad so I stalked my Momma and found this. It's my Uncle Jeff but oh well. Nobody knows that. 

When your zone has to wake up at 4:20 to go on a sunrise hike and you miss the sunrise. At least 4:20 was fun. 

Say Hello to my fancy arm. It's still pink. It says, "Myth Busted". If you are really interested follow Trenton Slavens on Facebook and find out for yourself. It's a good video. 

Snap Crackle Pop

Now this was a crazy week. Let us begin. 

About a month and a half ago I was riding my bike down the street. I let go or something happened and I fell down and crashed. I assumed I just sprained my wrist. I iced it and stuff but kept using it. I just realized this week that is still mega hurts. I thought, "that's not right". I called the Mission nurse and she said, "Yeah, that ain't good. Let's get you a doctors appointment". I went in and got it all checked out. I got X-rays and such. The doctor told me it could be fractured. I didn't want that. I got the results of the X-ray and it is, in fact, broken. The nurse told me how to help it and to get an appointment with a surgeon. Scary. I went to the hospital for the 3rd time this week and got crazy news. Ok, so it turns out I broke my Scaphoid bone in half. That is not a good bone to break. It does not get a lot of blood to it, and you need blood to heal. Crazy how the body works right? He told me, “This is not good. You have two options:

1. You can wear a cast for 6 weeks to possibly 8 months, but there is a 20% chance it doesn't help, or 2. You can get surgery this week and have a shorter recovery, but you can possibly get sent home because even with surgery there is a 5-10% chance it doesn't help". What a day! I didn't know what to do. He left the room and I just sat there. I thought, "Huh, maybe I’m going home next week". That was a wild thought. Then the doc comes back in and tells me that there is a good chance it will heal because I am young and healthy. He told me I will get a cast and see if anything changes. So, now I have a bright pink cast on. I will have this cast for 3 weeks then go back to the doctor. I will get another X-ray and if it is not better I'm getting surgery and possibly going home. Depends on the nurse and the doctor, but we shall see. So that was pretty exiting. 

I'll say it. My mission has been pretty wack. From thinking I'm going to Thailand to going to Gilbert to living inside for 83 days straight to having a cast and maybe getting surgery. Now this is a true adventure. I love it. 

Besides that. we have been able to have “Come, Follow Me” lessons every week with the 2 wards we cover. This week a lady in our wards said there are some people that are really ugly on the outside, but beautiful on the inside. She then began to name all these ugly people in her life including her cousins. She's the best. 

So, this week was pretty exciting.  I’ll let you know if any more news comes out about my janky wrist. I know God has a plan for us and evidently part of that plan is that I have a broken Scaphoid bone. He loves you and of course I love you!

Have a mega good week. Don't ride bikes. They'll snap your scaphoid. You don't want that. BYE BYE

Slay Out

Elder Slavens

Elder Pinky

Elder Scaphoid

2 Nephi 18:9 This scriptures is about Wizards. Wizards are true and so is the Church.

2 Nephi 24:11 And this verse talks about worms. The scriptures can be weird sometimes. 

อย่าหักแขนของคุณมันไม่สนุกผมไม่แนะนำให้ใครเลย แต่นักแสดงสีชมพูของผมเท่ห์

Don't break your arms. It's not fun. I do not recommend to anyone ever, but my pink cast is cool

Pre cast me and Elder Weston ft. brace. This is a sign by this huge park. 

I think these pictures are pretty cool. I don't know about you tho. 

Mid casting. At this stage I was confused and was deciding what color I wanted.

Cast boy. Don't mess with Elder Scaphoid. 
His wrists are weak but his heart is strong. 

The door is locked and the only way out is through the...perfume department.

I'm gonna be honest. It was a very normal missionary week. Well, not really cause I'm still inside. Normal missionary week in 2020 for sure tho. 

I'm trying to think of what happened. It was a very, very busy week. We had tons of lessons with members. We have started to teach the lessons we would normally teach to investigators so that's been cool. Some lessons end up being like 45 minutes long and we always feel dead afterwards. There was one night we had 4 lessons so we would get off one lesson then plan for the next and have said lesson. I wanted to cry. It has been really amazing to teach and learn tho. I'm still with Elder Weston and we work really well together. Good stuff. 

We go on lots and lots of bike rides. It's almost 111 degrees here everyday so that's rough. Bike+Hot=No Fun. Do not recommend hot weather. Positives of hot weather are nice watch tan and mega farmers tan. Idk about you, but I think I like that.

No joke, that's all that happened this week. My bad this week was just not exciting. I'll make it more exciting in the future. I think it might be kinda hard to make life exciting during quarantine but cheers to 76 days stuck inside. Congrats me. 

Have a jolly week. I miss Michael Bublé this week. That's all. Have a good one. Oh also the subject is from Spongebob of course. If you’re bored, watch the episode Shangheid. It's good. Now bye bye 

Elder Slavens 

Elder Shavens

Elder Eminem 

Elder Lavender 

หากคุณกำลังคิดที่จะนำอาหารมิชชันนารีอย่าไปกับพิซซ่าผมจะได้รับพิซซ่ามากมายและผมก็พอแล้วขอบคุณมาก

If you are thinking to bring missionaries food, don't go with pizza. I get so much pizza and I'm like that's enough. That's all, thanks

2 Nephi 13: 16-20 These verses are weird. They talk about wanton soup and mincing veggies and cars and ornaments you hang on trees but they are hung on legs. I don't get it. I do want wanton soup now tho. 

This week we went on a bike ride to the park. It was normal until I looked and saw a family walking their dogs. I'm not gonna lie their dogs looked kinda weird. Idk what breed they are but it's not normal. Arizona’s got wacky dogs.

We realized almost every picture we have taken together we have our helmets on. I don't care. I think helmets are safe, and fashionable.  

We found a monster's lair. Pretty spooky, so I had to make it a little better. Thanks to comeuntochrist.org the once evil lair is now a spiritual haven. 

Me when it's hot outside. Nice. 

This is Elder Bahian. I love him more than words can describe. He is from the Philippines so I always look up words in Tagalog and we speak together. I always ask him on dates and he says no. Sad. Yes he is wearing egg cartons as goggles.