September 9, 2013
Dear Family:
Well I am still in Riverside! Elder Hawkins and I are still
together in the same ward as Elder Cook. He is getting a new comp, Elder
Braithwaite. He was in Hemet with us also. He's alright, I was hoping for other
people though. He was the cause of a lot of drama in Hemet, so we will all be
treading lightly. It is kinda weird, I am on President Smarts computer right
now. All the other ones in the office are taken so I'm in here. We didn't go to
the library cuz we had to bring Elder Spencer to the mission office to he could get
on the plane to SLC tomorrow. So a quick run down of the week!
Elders Hawkins, Wood, Spencer and Cook
Monday I bought my guitar! :) it pretty nice. I was looking
at Fenders and Yamahas. They were the same price and both sounded really good.
I ended up getting the Fender for a few reasons. It came with a hard case which
is going to be really nice because missionary apartments are dangerous and so
are transfers. It also was a little better looking and has 3 years longer
warrantee. So if anybody out there that knows more about guitars than me and I
need to switch for the Yamaha let me know! For dinner that night the ward had a
missionary activity where ward members were supposed to invite non-members to
eat at the park and have a pick-nick. There were tons of non-members there, but
none of them were invited or eating with us. That is OK though. This ward does
really good at always giving us stuff to have people invite non-members to.
Some Pictures from Last Week's Birthday Party
Elder Spencer and Elder Wood
Tuesday was really slow. Elder Hawkins was sick.
That didn't happen until after our district meetings though. I played a lot of
guitar. We pretty much didn't do anything all day, it was pretty boring. When Elder
Cook and Elder Spencer got back to the apartment they were both super trunky
ha. Elder Spencer only has a week left. Elder Cook was at the mission office
when his uncle rolled in in his son's challenger. He was dropping stuff off for
the office to give to Elder Cook.
Wednesday we had a really good lesson with Bishop Merrill.
We trying to help people in the ward do more missionary work, and he is letting
us try it out on him. For dinner we ate at the Hodge's house. They fed us
spaghetti burritos. They wanted to try them because of the show iCarly, but the
burritos worked way better.
Thursday we did weekly planning and then tried to visit some
of the people who didn't answer the phone when we called them during
planning.
Friday was productive. We had the car because the office
assistants were doing stuff in the truck all day. We also had Zone meeting that
day. In zone meeting we found out we have to have designated drivers. So
only one companion can drive. I don't like that at all, because that cuts my
chances of driving in half again. Luckily I talked Elder Price into letting me
be the DD! So I got to drive all day Friday and Saturday. Elder Hawkins didn't
like that very much ha. That night the office assistants were putting an
apartment together so we covered a lesson for them. It was a first lesson with
a part-member family. It was weird teaching him. We really couldn't get him to
say anything. We are going to try and get them to eat with us to see if we can
get him more into his comfort zone.
Plastic Cow
Not Elder Hawkins Favorite Hill
More Hills that we Ride Every Day
Saturday we still had the car. We got to meet with Mary Ann
and teach her a good lesson. Bad news is she just got a new job in Anaheim. So
instead on only being home 4 or 5 days a month it will be 2. I am going to try
and hand her off to the Anaheim Elders, but we will see if Elder Hawkins lets me. That night the Gonzales
family put on a death dinner for Elder Spencer. They had some good ideas. They
made him a grave outside. When we went inside we got shot with a bunch of
marshmallow guns. They had some cool deserts with a bunch of Elder Spencer
quotes written on tombstones stuck in them. All in all it was pretty fun.
Sunday was good. We had a few good lessons that night with
ward members. That night Elders Haslem and Green came over to spend the night.
They had to get up at 4:30 this morning so Elder Spencer and Elder Cook could
take Elder Green to the airport. He is a visa waiter and is flying to Brazil.
He left this morning, Elder Spencer flys out tomorrow morning and will still
almost beat him off the plane. Elder Haslem is from Vernal. It was really fun
to talk about Basin stuff. We have everybody pretty sketched out about
skinwalker ranch ha.
It has been hard seeing a missionary die (mission slang). It
makes you realize the shortness of a mission. Elder Spencer has been a really
hard working elder. You can see how much his mission has meant to him. He is
really excited to make it to the BYU/Utah game though. He is a huge BYU fan.
They get season tickets every year.
I was wondering if you could send me a picture of the new
car? Also I talked to a guy this week whose brother served in the same mission
as dad about the same time. Did you know a Russell Cullins?
Well Got to head out!
Love Ya!
Elder Wood
