Letter from June 6th

G-day,
Hi! Everyone I just want to write and tell you a little bit about Toukley & Central Coast.
Toukley Ward covers over 30 suburbs. Pretty Crazy huh? Our zone is pretty small it only has 5 areas, and 10 missionaries. My zone leaders are Elder D'fahulu (New Zealand) and Elder Frame (Boise, Idaho). We have the youngest zone in the mission. 3 trainees are being trained in the zone. There are 4 that are under a year and only 3 that are over a year. Although the zone is young it is an awesome zone. This past week everyone in the zone had a progressing investigator. That is the first and only time that has happened to a whole zone. That's pretty cool.
Well now a little bit about the area. It is heaps different than being in the city. Everyone is a lot more relaxed and slow paced. Typical Aussie style. The other main difference between here and Dural is the money$. Most people here are pretty humble. The ward is good too. There are heaps of less-active that we are trying to work with. Most of the members are either old or young families. We are trying hard to work with a few (LA) Polynesian families that their children haven't been baptized because they don't go to church.
Everything is going good here in Toukley with Elder Vogel. Thanks for all your prayers. Wow it's been over 5 months. Well thanks
Elder Blake Andreasen

Elder Andreasen in Toukley

How Tall is Elder Vogel

Apparently Elder Vogel is quite tall and the two of them walking down the street together is pretty funny.

Letter from June 4th (Pictures and Videos coming soon)

Mom,

Hey! Well its been about a week here in Toukley. In the Toukley Ward the members are pretty cool. The area is really nice as well. My comp., Elder Vogel is from Orem. He is pretty cool. He is reall tall. He is 6ft 5in. So it looks pretty funny, us walking down the street together. haha

Driving is fun. The area is pretty big, so that means more driving. Driving was easy to get used to it only took a couple of "close calls" before I got the hang of it. :)

I just found out the mission is getting e-mail back, starting in June. But it will probably take awhile after that to get everyone's account set up. That will be cool so now you wont have to try to read my beautiful handwriting.

I have been blessed with another big flat. 2 showers, 2 floors, 3 bedrooms. Living the high life in Toukley, or maybe President Scruggs think I am high maintenance or something. :)

Toukley is going good the investigators we have are all under 15. Most of them are from less active families that hopefully start coming back to church before their kids get baptized.

Well you probably looked for the memory card before you read this (he must know his mom pretty good), but I will explain the pictures:

* Elder Harrison & our Flash as new car

* HAHA Home Brand

* Some Scenary

* The tennis rackets on the far left is the best in the world, Bro. Ken Degan designs them (he is from the Dural Ward

* Zone Activity by the pool :(

* Elder Stott, Moffitt, Harrison & I having some fun

* Cool family from Dural ward with Elder Harrison and I

* Elder Vogel and I in Toukley

* My tattoos I recently got

I sent Tim-Tams they are really good. I am thinking about bringing back a suitcase full of them :)

Well thanks, Love ya Heaps

Elder Blake Andreasen

MOTHERS DAY!!

Wow, talk about a bitter sweet day. A week from Monday Elder Andreasen will have 5 months under his belt with 19 more to go. It was so so good to talk to Blake today. He seems to have picked up a little bit of an accent. We found out that he is getting transferred to a place called Toukley, Australia. If you map it, its right on the beach. Its 107km north of Sydney. He is really excited about the move and will become senior companion. They also have a car and so that will be a fun experience to drive on the wrong side of the road. He seems to be very happy and still loving Australia. He told us that he received a letter from Elder Warnock this last week and was happy to hear from him. He got to talk to me and to Natalie and Brian and Jeff. Collette (his 2nd mom) and her two boys stopped by and talked with him for about 10 minutes also. I dont think an hour has ever moved so quickly as it did while he was on the phone for that hour. He promised he would send home more memory cards from his camera. He said that he was mailing a package today (which is Monday for him) so we should get that in the next week or so. He wanted me to tell everyone hi.
I am so proud of him and his desire to serve.
He is definitely a blessing in our lives.

Letter From May 5th 2008

Mom,
I think I have already said a few times, but your last letter said you dont know where I am and who I'm with. I'm still in Dural Ward with Elder Harrison from South Jordan. Thank you for the Resses & Jelly Bellys. Hey you said you put pics on my memory card? I put it in my camera & it said it was empty. Either it is the wrong file type. (I will check it on a picture machine here to see) or it didnt save. Maybe you didnt click safely remove hardware? Thats good to hear about work. They retro paid you back till March. That was nice of them.
Conference was awesome. Elder Holland is the man. That was a good talk. I liked Elder Uchtdorf also.
You would be impressed with the last thing I cooked. It was rice and bacon. I cooked an egg in it with a little soy sauce. YUMMI
Well things are going good. An 18 yr old member brought her friend to church so we are starting to teach her. She is chinese so she doesnt understand alot. SO we have to teach simply.
We had mission tour this past week. Elder & Sister Sybrowski spoke to us. Elder Sybrowski called Elder Harrison and I up in front of the whole mission and told us to teach out of this 1 verse. Man was I nervous but after I read it he pretty much took over,so it wasnt too bad.
Thanks for the goodies and stuff I will try to send my card home more often.
Love Ya Heaps
Elder Blake Andreasen

Letter from April 25, 2008

Dear Family,
I am still loving Australia. Although it has been raining alot it is still really fun. I love seeing all the birds around. The most common bird, but the most annoying bird is the cockatoo! They are white birds with a yellow mohawk things. The bird that sounds the coolest is the Cookabana ( i am not sure how to spell it) it makes a monkey sorta sound. Well enough about the birds.
General Conference was awesome!! I got to wwatch it the next week so the 12 & 13 of April. I went to all the sessions so we were at the stake center for ages. Thats how they watch GC they boradcast it to the Stake Centers. I really enjoyed Elder Holland's talk. I guess because we get that all the time. People say "The B of M adds to the bible & it says not to" I also liked Elder Bednar's talk.
Well Elder Harrison & I are doing good. We still have a car, so we havent gotten too wet yet. Elder Harrison drives the car, because he is senior companion. It kind of sucks though cause he doesnt know the area & I have been here for 3 months. Oh well, I think driving here is easy, they have heaps of round abouts & less traffic lights. It still is kinda weird driving on the other side of the road.
The work is starting to pick up here in Pennant Hills. This past Sunday at sacrament mtg there were heaps of non-members there & Elder Sybrowski pretty much invited all of them to get baptized in his talk. It was a good talk though. He is going to talk to our mission this Thursday too. So that will be good.
For preparation day today we are going to pick some pizzas up & go to the chapel with some other elders and watch some church movies or something. So i just ordered the pizza & we are going to pick it up in 20 min so I have to be quick
I started trying to make food this week. Since, Mom you said you were not impressed with my cooking skills. I made fried rice with veggies, soy sauce & eggs in it. That was pretty good. Then last night we ran out of food in the flast so I made rice with beans. That was good too. I will take pictures of my master pieces and send them to you. I bet you would be impressed. Well gotta run and get pizza from Pizza Hut its only $5 today, I got BBQ meatlovers, Yummy!
Love ya Heaps
Elder Blake Andreasen