14 May 2023
VOLUME 11 – NUMBER 503
Caleb saying goodbye to Elder Miranda
A week ago we had transfers and my time with Elder Miranda came to an end. He left to a town called Lebu, I really experienced a ton of things with him good, bad, kinda stupid, but mkst of all I learned a bunch, he's kind of like another brother I got, especially after being together for 6 months in total!
And now I'm here with my new companion! He's named elder Angilau he's from South Jordan, he's Tongan, and this is his last transfer. We get along great. This last week we just kept working. We got some good service in and some lessons too.
Last week Casandra decided to be baptized on the 20th! Thanks for all the prayers. Her story has been crazy and she's really a special person. She and her mom. It's crazy that I've been able to be apart of their story and life. They're really good friends of mine.
I really love this small town, Los Sauces. It's insane I've been here for 5 months, the time just keeps going faster and faster.
Caleb and his new companion, Elder Angilau
Happy Birthday Isaac, and Happy Mother"s Day Mom! For Isaac's birthday, we extended it to be multiple days before and after his actual birthday, because he wanted Mother's Day, which was the same day, to be especially for Mom.
We just kind of partied all of those days, and for Mothers day, London prepared a delicious Mother’s Day dinner, and a lot of us children pitched in to buy mom a new Apple Watch for her Mother's Day present. I love you Isaac and Mom, and I hope you all have a great week!
London and Ashton cooking dinner
About a month ago, my supervisor, Ana, asked me about calls I was making for my wife’s training business. She said it wasn’t that I haven’t been doing everything they want me to, but she wondered why I was making calls. I explained to her that we needed to start up our dog training business to makes ends meet. I told her I was committed to doing my job at AtlasRTX.
What I couldn’t tell her was that even though I am still committed to my job, I am looking at other options. Our little business, MyPack Dog Training, is rapidly growing, and it’s taking more and more of my time. I have had impressions that I need to find a new line of work that allows me more flexibility of schedule.
So over the past few weeks I have been working out a plan. I briefly looked at seminary teaching, but the salary just isn’t what we would need. Then I had the idea that if I could go back and teach at BYU like I did several years ago, I could earn half my income there, and then have more time to grow our dog training business. I found out that the pay is quite a bit better than eight years ago when I last taught.
It is kind of scary for Jenny and I as we consider going by into business for ourselves and live off of an entrepreneurial income, but I am working on setting up an appointment to interview with the BYU Marriott School. And I have also decided to not make any more MyPack sales calls in the office. Instead, I bought a nice portable desktop for the Tesla, and I sit in my nice, air-conditioned Tesla office, and make sales call there during lunch!
Dad making calls in his Tesla office
School has ended, and my grades were pretty good, I got A's and B's, but mostly A's. It was also my birthday this week, and I got some money from Mom and Dad to buy something that I wanted, but I haven't been able to think of anything yet.
We got donuts for my birthday cake, and also watched the move Croods: A New Age. I have seen it before, but it has been such a long time, that I wanted to watch it again, and it was so funny, and hilarious.
London and Joanna cooking
Ashton did a really crazy activity! It was where he built a small ramp and on the bottom of the ramp was five cups with different flavors of condiments—ketchup, lime juice, soy sauce, milk, and mayo! Yuck!
We each switched it up a little when he asked us to name them from the worst to least-worst tasting. My list goes like this: 1) soy sauce, 2) ketchup, 3) lime juice, and 4) Tapatio sauce. With the Tapatio, I had to wait a while to drink milk, so I could get the taste out of my mouth, so it was extra gross!
We were also training a huge Newfoundland dog named Mondo. He was pretty well trained already, so we spent a lot of time teaching him to walk without pulling. We had a lot of dogs this week: Misha, Mable, Max, Beauty, Mondo, Moose, and Ted, so it was a lot of hard work, but it was really fun.
Children playing the Oreo game
This week we made it to the Saratoga Springs Temple open house. It was beautiful and it felt like a pretty unique temple. The inside had a lot of blue through in the tiles and furniture and a lot of the paintings had beautiful water and springs.
I am amazed by the beauty that people are able to make, and felt like the temple really did a good job at highlighting the beauty of nature and all that God has created.
Saratoga Springs Temple open house
Last week I went to see the new Guardians of the Galaxy movie with Endia and Cougar, and it was awesome! Its been a while since there has been a quality Marvel movie like that, so naturally I was bound to see it more than once.
London wasn't able to come with us last week so we had planned to see it this week on Tuesday. However she got super-sick that morning and couldn't go. Since I already had tickets, I asked a girl named Aubrey from my ward if she wanted to go with me.
The movie was even better the second time around. London and I went to see it on Friday, and it again seemed to get even better a third time watching it!
On Saturday, London, Endia, Cougar, and I went to the Saratoga Springs open house, which was was super impressive. I loved the blue in the temple, and honestly it is probably my favorite temple visually.
I was also at home that day and we ended up doing some challenges with rolling Oreos down a board into mystery dipping liquids such as milk, but also soy sauce, hot sauce, lemon juice, and so forth. It was fun and we got a good video of dad sending two Oreos down the board!
Children playing the Oreo game
One other thing that I should share is that I applied for a full time position at the MTC this week. My old boss, Rob Stephenson mentioned about a month and a half ago that this position would be opening and recommended that I apply.
I tuned up my resume and filled out the application, so we will see what happens next. It would be really awesome to get it, just because I love working at the MTC and I've told myself that I'll take any opportunity that presents itself until I have other plans outside of the MTC, which have not come to fruition yet.
Ashton with Elder Viehweger at the MTC
Isaac's birthday is on May 14, and so is Mother’s Day, so we decided to have Isaac's birthday the day before. He got a Lego set with some clones and a turret.
On Sunday London came over and made some delicious dinner for Mom, and then we shared our Mother’s Day cards and opened presents. I gave Mom a card, and all of us children (the adults too) gave her an Apple Watch!.
Selvin with his brothers and his dad
Selvin’s younger brother Emerson came to stay with us in December. Selvin hadn’t seen him in seven years! We decided to take him to Wisconsin to see his dad since he hasn’t seen him in 10 years!
We planned a trip for this month and so we were on our way this week. It was so fun seeing them all be together. It was a short trip so we tried to fit in as much as possible.
We also went to see my Dad a few times while we were there. On the way back, we stopped at the largest candy store. I had passed it so many times but never actually stopped there, but we decided it was essential to have snacks!
It is a pretty neat building, and they definitely have a lot of candy. Although the drive is always long, I’m glad we were able to go.
Yarima with her dad and Selvin
This week Mom has been gone during the day each day at TBRI training. I was with Joanna. We had to be in Mom’s room most of the time. It was really fun spending some time with Joanna and getting to know her a little more.
We had a little times set on things we were going to do. Like we played board games and then she would do some Starfall. After that we played outside for about an hour.
Then I would have to go to work and I would have to send Joanna downstairs with the boys. And on Thursday we all had dentist appointment, so Dad stayed home and worked, so he could drop us off at the dentist. He worked in the car while we had our appointments.
Children playing the Oreo game
Isaac's birthday was on the 14th, but that was also Mother's day, so we decided to postpone celebrating Isaac's birthday to the 15th and 16th. For his celebration, we watched one of his favorite movies, Croods: A New Age.
It's hilarious! It's an awesome movie, but the first one is classic, so I think I like the first better, but just by a little bit.
Children playing games
We are in the process of packing up our apartment before our summer move to Utah. Our contract is up this month and we’ve decided to put most of the stuff in storage and spend the summer closer to family out west.
The timing is a little interesting, and we have to pack up most stuff about a week before we actually leave. Except for my work desk, our beds, and the TV, we have the rest of our stuff in the storage unit.
It has been interesting living in a bare-bones apartment but we’re getting excited to live closer to family for the summer.
Ellie at the park