Hello One and All,
So first off, to answer mom and Joy's question, no I am not living in the house with the fleas. That was in Vancouver, and we moved out of that into an apartment. My current address is:
Elder Stephen Richards
P.O. Box 786
Irrigon, OR 97844
Any and all mail or treats are welcomed and appreciated. We live with Sister Hoffman, a nice widow I lived with a year ago. The bishop actually talked to us about housing on sunday, so we may be moving in the future. We will see.
The first week back was pretty cool I suppose. There are a few people we are teaching that have a lot of potential. The Ramero family is awesome, and they should be getting baptized in the next few weeks. There's a recent convert family the Tabonys. Brother Tabony and I had a fun run in the last time I was in town. He wrote me a ticket! So yeah, the cop that pulled me over a year ago is now a member. Crazy! I've seen a few other people I worked with, the ward was all pretty happy to see me and they all remembered me which was nice.
We ride bikes a lot. It's ok, backside pain aside. The only thing that is unpleasant about it is that there is some crazy hurricane force wind every day. Just blowing blowing blowing like crazy. It makes bike riding pretty difficult. But I am in 6 months to sexy, so I suppose all the exorcise will do me some good.
We had a 70 come visit us on saturday and do some training. It was Elder Carden, he gave a very good training and I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was also a good opportunity to get to see some of the missionaries I have worked with before.
Elder Hardy and I continue to get along quite well, we teach a lot which is nice. With just a dash of tracting each day. I have a handful of people I taught that I want to go looking for to see if they're ready a year later.
On sunday I translated the first 2 hours of meetings which always leaves me pretty drained. In sacrament meeting several speakers called in sick, so the bishop called up a few members to bare there testimonies to fill the time. I was halfway through translating him calling me up before I realized that meant I had to go up and talk for a few minutes. Everyone was pretty happy to see me up there. Lots of smiling faces.
In short, Boardman is an area with a lot of good potential, and I am looking forward to the coming 5 weeks.
Love,
Elder Richards
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
Monday, March 12, 2012
Still Tetanus Free
Hello One and All,
This week was pretty good I suppose. Our district got changed up. Me and Hardy got kicked out of ours and switched out with another companionship to be in the other district in the Hermiston Stake. Not the end of the world I suppose, but still a shake up in my otherwise nice routine.
We gave service at a dog shelter. Not as fun as it sounds. We took out as many dogs on walks as we could, that part was alright. It was the dragging them out of bathroom stained cages and forcing them back in that was not so fun. But at the very least we got to run around playing with dogs for a little while.
Another day we were having dinner with the Bishop out in the sticks, so we decided to go early and find all the secluded houses we could and see if anyone had some potential. We found a woman who usually is at work, but fortunately enough had taken that day off, sort of a 1 in a 100 circumstance because otherwise we would have never found her or gone back to that house. We taught her and she invited us back to teach her whole family, so we will see how that goes tomorrow evening.
We've been looking up a lot of my former investigators from a year ago which has been interesting. Some of them are basically right where I left them in their lives, but others are more open and willing to listen, so hopefully we can get some success out of them.
We put Maria Romero on date. She's the oldest daughter (15) in the family. Her mom wants to get baptized, but needs more time to kick coffee. So we'll be having a baptism in about 2 weeks which will be awesome. After she accepted the invitation, we celebrated by getting facials. Her mom sells Mary Kay supplies, and has lots of samplers lying around. Also it was Hardy's 21st bday so we had some fun. So Inez (the mom) gave us instructions and guided us through a facial. It was cool I guess. My skin was very soft afterwards.
Saturday was a day of service for us. We spent the morning throwing out scrap metal for a family in the ward. I cut my leg on some old piping, but my jaw has yet to lock up, so I'm assuming I'm in the clear. After that we went and washed the Romero's car (on a side note we did a terrible job and will be rewashing it tomorrow) and they treated us to delicious papusas afterwards. (Mom and Dad, if yall end up coming out that's one thing that must be experienced, the papusa truck in Boardman. I missed it this last year...) While we were eating two sharp looking satellite salesman knocked on the door. And like most door to door salesmen, they were Mormons that recently completed their own missions. So we had fun chatting with them for a little while.
On Sunday we helped teach the 7 year old primary class. It was all about how to be missionaries. They all had some good comments and contributions, and afterwards we got cupcakes, that was my favorite part. Translating makes me very tired and very hungry, so usually we go scrounging after church trying to find as much food as possible. After a few more visits we went and had a big lunch at the Corpus' house which is always fun. I spent my first Thanksgiving and Christmas with them.
But yeah it was a good week. There are some big and exciting things coming up. Lots of potential and lots of service.
Love,
Elder Richards
This week was pretty good I suppose. Our district got changed up. Me and Hardy got kicked out of ours and switched out with another companionship to be in the other district in the Hermiston Stake. Not the end of the world I suppose, but still a shake up in my otherwise nice routine.
We gave service at a dog shelter. Not as fun as it sounds. We took out as many dogs on walks as we could, that part was alright. It was the dragging them out of bathroom stained cages and forcing them back in that was not so fun. But at the very least we got to run around playing with dogs for a little while.
Another day we were having dinner with the Bishop out in the sticks, so we decided to go early and find all the secluded houses we could and see if anyone had some potential. We found a woman who usually is at work, but fortunately enough had taken that day off, sort of a 1 in a 100 circumstance because otherwise we would have never found her or gone back to that house. We taught her and she invited us back to teach her whole family, so we will see how that goes tomorrow evening.
We've been looking up a lot of my former investigators from a year ago which has been interesting. Some of them are basically right where I left them in their lives, but others are more open and willing to listen, so hopefully we can get some success out of them.
We put Maria Romero on date. She's the oldest daughter (15) in the family. Her mom wants to get baptized, but needs more time to kick coffee. So we'll be having a baptism in about 2 weeks which will be awesome. After she accepted the invitation, we celebrated by getting facials. Her mom sells Mary Kay supplies, and has lots of samplers lying around. Also it was Hardy's 21st bday so we had some fun. So Inez (the mom) gave us instructions and guided us through a facial. It was cool I guess. My skin was very soft afterwards.
Saturday was a day of service for us. We spent the morning throwing out scrap metal for a family in the ward. I cut my leg on some old piping, but my jaw has yet to lock up, so I'm assuming I'm in the clear. After that we went and washed the Romero's car (on a side note we did a terrible job and will be rewashing it tomorrow) and they treated us to delicious papusas afterwards. (Mom and Dad, if yall end up coming out that's one thing that must be experienced, the papusa truck in Boardman. I missed it this last year...) While we were eating two sharp looking satellite salesman knocked on the door. And like most door to door salesmen, they were Mormons that recently completed their own missions. So we had fun chatting with them for a little while.
On Sunday we helped teach the 7 year old primary class. It was all about how to be missionaries. They all had some good comments and contributions, and afterwards we got cupcakes, that was my favorite part. Translating makes me very tired and very hungry, so usually we go scrounging after church trying to find as much food as possible. After a few more visits we went and had a big lunch at the Corpus' house which is always fun. I spent my first Thanksgiving and Christmas with them.
But yeah it was a good week. There are some big and exciting things coming up. Lots of potential and lots of service.
Love,
Elder Richards
Monday, March 5, 2012
A Lung Full Of Insulation
Hello One and All,
I hope everyone is doing good. I was sorry to hear about little Harrison's health troubles, hopefully he's doing better. This last week has been really awesome. Last night we found out that we led the zone in lessons taught. In all reality that's not all that impressive, because I'm pretty sure the rest of the zone just had a low amount of lessons. No worries though.
I can't remember if I mentioned this last week. But the cop that pulled me over got baptized with his whole family, but also another woman I tried to teach that turned us away is now baptized. She's a real nice, spunky older lady. It's a lot of fun visiting with her, and she did remember running off missionaries, just not me specifically.
We continue working with the Romero family, they weren't able to make it to church this week because of a wedding, but they really enjoyed it last week and want to keep moving forward, hopefully they will be able to get baptized together soon, I think they will. We found this really sharp kid Kristen last week, she's 16 and has a lot of experience with the church, she's currently attending seminary and she has a super solid testimony of everything. But she is currently in a very transitional time of her life and is trying to figure out who she wants to become. She's a good kid, and hopefully we can help her make some of these decisions. We also went and found an old investigator I taught a year ago, Susana, she remembered me, but not much of the doctrine, so we are starting from scratch with her. Another one of her kids has left home now and is going to school in Salt Lake City (go figure, she wouldn't talk to us before and now she's in Mormon capital). Susana seems a little bit more ready now, so things should be good. I also have a small stack of other people that we need to try that I taught a year ago, but I'm a little hesitant because not all of them ended on good notes, maybe a year is long enough for them to move on...vamos a ver.
This week we helped a member family out with building their house. First we were insulating the roof. So for a little while I was manning the machine and filling it with shredded up newspaper fuzz which was then sprayed up a tube and into the crawl space in the roof. After a few minutes of that the member shouted down we need a skinny guy up here. That's my cue. So I climb up there and army crawl all around the place spraying down insulation. I had to put all my weight on the three or four cross beams that I could reach so as to not fall through the sheet rock. Interestingly enough, despite my assumption I've had all my life, sheet rock is actually quite flimsy. Maybe we should change its name....anywho. So skinniness aside, I still managed to get wedged into some tight places a few times, but I finally got down out of the roof. Thank goodness for my face mask, it was dusty up there! After that we cut and hung up sheet rock. I'm gaining some valuable life experience out here. Speaking of, I've heard that we will be helping out with some cows soon...it's Pasco all over again!
Our member Sister Hoffman has been in Spokane for the last week, so naturally we party every night. Now when I say party, don't worry, we're missionaries, things don't get to crazy for us.
On Sunday I translated again, (I'm pretty sure this will be a weekly thing), and afterwards we spent some time with Eloisa which was good. She has a lot of tough times in her life, but a lot of it is her own doing. After that we got a ride with Arrow Corpus (the younger brother of Hopper who took us to Fossil every week a year ago and is now in Japan on his mission) down to Hermiston area to teach a family in the Stake President's house. It went much smoother this time, I didn't have any nervousness which is a plus. Last week I felt like the Stake Prez was evaluating me the whole time, and that the audience was a little hostile. But this time around was much smoother, we focused on my favorite thing to teach, the Doctrine of Christ. The two sons are pretty open, but their father still seems like he is waiting to unleash some crazy question or anti stuff. We will see what next week brings. At any rate the Stake President thanked us afterwards and seemed really pleased with how we had taught.
After that it was about 6ish and we were pretty famished from a long fast. Earlier in the day the High Priest Group Leader had invited us over for dinner. Which we were greatful for because our original dinner had cancelled. We got to his house and they had quite the party going, grandkids running all over the place. Apparently every Sunday they have all the family in the area over for dinner, and they prepared a bounteous feast of steak and barbq chicken. It was delectable. Point of the story being that after dinner Bro. Garrett was so gracious to us for coming over. It's next to impossible to leave that house without feeling good about yourself, they truly love the missionaries.
Well, that is enough for now; I hope everyone has a great week. I love yall and look forward to hearing from you.
Love,
Elder Richards
I hope everyone is doing good. I was sorry to hear about little Harrison's health troubles, hopefully he's doing better. This last week has been really awesome. Last night we found out that we led the zone in lessons taught. In all reality that's not all that impressive, because I'm pretty sure the rest of the zone just had a low amount of lessons. No worries though.
I can't remember if I mentioned this last week. But the cop that pulled me over got baptized with his whole family, but also another woman I tried to teach that turned us away is now baptized. She's a real nice, spunky older lady. It's a lot of fun visiting with her, and she did remember running off missionaries, just not me specifically.
We continue working with the Romero family, they weren't able to make it to church this week because of a wedding, but they really enjoyed it last week and want to keep moving forward, hopefully they will be able to get baptized together soon, I think they will. We found this really sharp kid Kristen last week, she's 16 and has a lot of experience with the church, she's currently attending seminary and she has a super solid testimony of everything. But she is currently in a very transitional time of her life and is trying to figure out who she wants to become. She's a good kid, and hopefully we can help her make some of these decisions. We also went and found an old investigator I taught a year ago, Susana, she remembered me, but not much of the doctrine, so we are starting from scratch with her. Another one of her kids has left home now and is going to school in Salt Lake City (go figure, she wouldn't talk to us before and now she's in Mormon capital). Susana seems a little bit more ready now, so things should be good. I also have a small stack of other people that we need to try that I taught a year ago, but I'm a little hesitant because not all of them ended on good notes, maybe a year is long enough for them to move on...vamos a ver.
This week we helped a member family out with building their house. First we were insulating the roof. So for a little while I was manning the machine and filling it with shredded up newspaper fuzz which was then sprayed up a tube and into the crawl space in the roof. After a few minutes of that the member shouted down we need a skinny guy up here. That's my cue. So I climb up there and army crawl all around the place spraying down insulation. I had to put all my weight on the three or four cross beams that I could reach so as to not fall through the sheet rock. Interestingly enough, despite my assumption I've had all my life, sheet rock is actually quite flimsy. Maybe we should change its name....anywho. So skinniness aside, I still managed to get wedged into some tight places a few times, but I finally got down out of the roof. Thank goodness for my face mask, it was dusty up there! After that we cut and hung up sheet rock. I'm gaining some valuable life experience out here. Speaking of, I've heard that we will be helping out with some cows soon...it's Pasco all over again!
Our member Sister Hoffman has been in Spokane for the last week, so naturally we party every night. Now when I say party, don't worry, we're missionaries, things don't get to crazy for us.
On Sunday I translated again, (I'm pretty sure this will be a weekly thing), and afterwards we spent some time with Eloisa which was good. She has a lot of tough times in her life, but a lot of it is her own doing. After that we got a ride with Arrow Corpus (the younger brother of Hopper who took us to Fossil every week a year ago and is now in Japan on his mission) down to Hermiston area to teach a family in the Stake President's house. It went much smoother this time, I didn't have any nervousness which is a plus. Last week I felt like the Stake Prez was evaluating me the whole time, and that the audience was a little hostile. But this time around was much smoother, we focused on my favorite thing to teach, the Doctrine of Christ. The two sons are pretty open, but their father still seems like he is waiting to unleash some crazy question or anti stuff. We will see what next week brings. At any rate the Stake President thanked us afterwards and seemed really pleased with how we had taught.
After that it was about 6ish and we were pretty famished from a long fast. Earlier in the day the High Priest Group Leader had invited us over for dinner. Which we were greatful for because our original dinner had cancelled. We got to his house and they had quite the party going, grandkids running all over the place. Apparently every Sunday they have all the family in the area over for dinner, and they prepared a bounteous feast of steak and barbq chicken. It was delectable. Point of the story being that after dinner Bro. Garrett was so gracious to us for coming over. It's next to impossible to leave that house without feeling good about yourself, they truly love the missionaries.
Well, that is enough for now; I hope everyone has a great week. I love yall and look forward to hearing from you.
Love,
Elder Richards
Monday, February 27, 2012
Back In Boardman
Hello One and All,
So first off, to answer mom and Joy's question, no I am not living in the house with the fleas. That was in Vancouver, and we moved out of that into an apartment. My current address is: Elder Stephen Richards
P.O. Box 786
Irrigon, OR. 97844
Any and all mail or treats are welcomed and appreciated. We live with Sister Hoffman, a nice widow I lived with a year ago. The bishop actually talked to us about housing on Sunday, so we may be moving in the future. We will see.
The first week back was pretty cool I suppose. There are a few people we are teaching that have a lot of potential. The Ramero family is awesome, and they should be getting baptized in the next few weeks. There's a recent convert family the Tabonys. Brother Tabony and I had a fun run in the last time I was in town. He wrote me a ticket! So yeah, the cop that pulled me over a year ago is now a member. Crazy! I've seen a few other people I worked with, the ward was all pretty happy to see me and they all remembered me which was nice.
We ride bikes a lot. It's ok, backside pain aside. The only thing that is unpleasant about it is that there is some crazy hurricane force wind every day. Just blowing blowing blowing like crazy. It makes bike riding pretty difficult. But I am in 6 months to sexy, so I suppose all the exercise will do me some good.
We had a 70 come visit us on saturday and do some training. It was Elder Carden, he gave a very good training and I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was also a good opportunity to get to see some of the missionaries I have worked with before.
Elder Hardy and I continue to get along quite well, we teach a lot which is nice. With just a dash of tracting each day. I have a handful of people I taught that I want to go looking for to see if they're ready a year later.
On Sunday I translated the first 2 hours of meetings which always leaves me pretty drained. In sacrament meeting several speakers called in sick, so the bishop called up a few members to bare there testimonies to fill the time. I was halfway through translating him calling me up before I realized that meant I had to go up and talk for a few minutes. Everyone was pretty happy to see me up there. Lots of smiling faces.
In short, Boardman is an area with a lot of good potential, and I am looking forward to the coming 5 weeks.
Love,
Elder Richards
So first off, to answer mom and Joy's question, no I am not living in the house with the fleas. That was in Vancouver, and we moved out of that into an apartment. My current address is: Elder Stephen Richards
P.O. Box 786
Irrigon, OR. 97844
Any and all mail or treats are welcomed and appreciated. We live with Sister Hoffman, a nice widow I lived with a year ago. The bishop actually talked to us about housing on Sunday, so we may be moving in the future. We will see.
The first week back was pretty cool I suppose. There are a few people we are teaching that have a lot of potential. The Ramero family is awesome, and they should be getting baptized in the next few weeks. There's a recent convert family the Tabonys. Brother Tabony and I had a fun run in the last time I was in town. He wrote me a ticket! So yeah, the cop that pulled me over a year ago is now a member. Crazy! I've seen a few other people I worked with, the ward was all pretty happy to see me and they all remembered me which was nice.
We ride bikes a lot. It's ok, backside pain aside. The only thing that is unpleasant about it is that there is some crazy hurricane force wind every day. Just blowing blowing blowing like crazy. It makes bike riding pretty difficult. But I am in 6 months to sexy, so I suppose all the exercise will do me some good.
We had a 70 come visit us on saturday and do some training. It was Elder Carden, he gave a very good training and I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was also a good opportunity to get to see some of the missionaries I have worked with before.
Elder Hardy and I continue to get along quite well, we teach a lot which is nice. With just a dash of tracting each day. I have a handful of people I taught that I want to go looking for to see if they're ready a year later.
On Sunday I translated the first 2 hours of meetings which always leaves me pretty drained. In sacrament meeting several speakers called in sick, so the bishop called up a few members to bare there testimonies to fill the time. I was halfway through translating him calling me up before I realized that meant I had to go up and talk for a few minutes. Everyone was pretty happy to see me up there. Lots of smiling faces.
In short, Boardman is an area with a lot of good potential, and I am looking forward to the coming 5 weeks.
Love,
Elder Richards
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
Here We Go Again
Hello One and All,
Well transfer calls came in on Saturday with news that no one expected. I am being transferred back to Boardman, and Diaz is being transferred back to Vancouver. So we're both going to our greeny areas. Crazy. I head out tomorrow morning. My new comp is E. Hardy. He's a pretty cool guy, I've hung out with him this last transfer, he's not a Spanish elder, so I'll be doing a lot of Spanish talking this next six weeks. I'm moving back into my old digs at Sis. Hoffman's house. Hopefully I can readjust to living in someone else's house quickly It's been quite some time since I lived in members' homes. Crazy Crazy Crazy. At the end of this next transfer I'll have spent 6 months in that little town, this time round I have a pretty good hold on the language so hopefully I'll be able to do some good there.
The last few days were spent running around saying goodbyes. But it's not too much like goodbyes because I'll be only a stone's throw away, I mean I'm in the same stake for Pete’s sake. Lisa, one of our most promising investigators took it pretty hard that we are both leaving; she's in a real tough time of life right now trying to get her husband back up here (immigration issues). Hopefully things work out for her. She wants me to baptize her, so if I'm still in Boardman when that time comes I'll come down to do that.
Other really cool news is that Griselda Ramos (the mother of the two kids we baptized in Kennewick) got baptized on Saturday. That just leaves the oldest daughter. Her husband baptized her and it sounded like it was a great experience for everyone. As for the rest of my time here in Hermiston, tonight we have a few more visits to make, and this afternoon we will be spending time with our good friend Freddy Alva. Have a great week everyone.
Love,
Elder Richards
p.s. Some pictures of our adventures in the plex.
Well transfer calls came in on Saturday with news that no one expected. I am being transferred back to Boardman, and Diaz is being transferred back to Vancouver. So we're both going to our greeny areas. Crazy. I head out tomorrow morning. My new comp is E. Hardy. He's a pretty cool guy, I've hung out with him this last transfer, he's not a Spanish elder, so I'll be doing a lot of Spanish talking this next six weeks. I'm moving back into my old digs at Sis. Hoffman's house. Hopefully I can readjust to living in someone else's house quickly It's been quite some time since I lived in members' homes. Crazy Crazy Crazy. At the end of this next transfer I'll have spent 6 months in that little town, this time round I have a pretty good hold on the language so hopefully I'll be able to do some good there.
The last few days were spent running around saying goodbyes. But it's not too much like goodbyes because I'll be only a stone's throw away, I mean I'm in the same stake for Pete’s sake. Lisa, one of our most promising investigators took it pretty hard that we are both leaving; she's in a real tough time of life right now trying to get her husband back up here (immigration issues). Hopefully things work out for her. She wants me to baptize her, so if I'm still in Boardman when that time comes I'll come down to do that.
Other really cool news is that Griselda Ramos (the mother of the two kids we baptized in Kennewick) got baptized on Saturday. That just leaves the oldest daughter. Her husband baptized her and it sounded like it was a great experience for everyone. As for the rest of my time here in Hermiston, tonight we have a few more visits to make, and this afternoon we will be spending time with our good friend Freddy Alva. Have a great week everyone.
Love,
Elder Richards
p.s. Some pictures of our adventures in the plex.
Monday, February 13, 2012
Kind Of A Bleh Week
Hello One and All,
So first off, Mom, I got the money and the package, thanks very much! Another item of business for Mike, I met one Scott McDaniels. He served in Toreon the same time as you and showed me a picture he had of you in his mission phone book thingy. He said he didn't really know you, just of you. Also that you were widely recognized as being from Hawaii. He said he was an AP for a month or so, so maybe you remember him. Crazy, 2 guys in the same area that served around both brothers. The best connection I can come up with for Whit is that I ate with a nice old Russian lady the other day. She was so excited when I said the two Russian words I know. She made us some sort of cake, I don't know how to spell it, I had her write it down for me, but it uses characters that aren't on the English keyboard.
So this last week was mildly uneventful, I got a little sick the last few days so we only went to our set appointments, and the rest of the time I napped trying to kick the cold. It seems to be pretty much gone now which is good. I finished a beanie, and began another scarf, (all during down time, not work time.) Today we are going to Walla Walla for a zone Pday, and truth be told I'm not too excited about it, but that's alright, I'm sure it will be great.
This last week I got to go down to Boardman. It was good to go back for a day. It turned out that Eloisa (a girl I taught and baptized) was having a really hard time and said she needed to talk with me, so Elder Hardy told her he would bring me the next day, she didn't believe him because she didn't know I was so close. So we got permission from the DL and off I went. She was surprised to see me. It was good to see her and her two kids again; Jessie and Jade even remembered me which made me feel good. We spent most of the day visiting with her and talking things out, she's having a tough time right now. We also made the rounds to a few other people I know. It turns out the Castaneda’s are moving back to Boardman, hopefully before I finish so mom and dad can meet them, they are an awesome family that really helped me out when I first started out. We also went by a less active family I used to work with. They were happy to see me and we had fun catching up. We also helped them pail putrid water out of a broken washing machine. A good time was had by all.
This last week and a half I have used the priesthood a lot! I've cleansed two houses of bad spirits. Given a blessing of comfort to a girl having similar problems, and a blessing of health to a very sick investigator, it’s been crazy. We are currently helping our investigator Lisa try and get her husband back in the states. It's a lot of paper work and is frustrating, but we are keeping at it.
Life here in Hermiston is good. Nothing too bad that needs complaining about, hope everyone has a great week!
Mucho amor,
Elder Richards
So first off, Mom, I got the money and the package, thanks very much! Another item of business for Mike, I met one Scott McDaniels. He served in Toreon the same time as you and showed me a picture he had of you in his mission phone book thingy. He said he didn't really know you, just of you. Also that you were widely recognized as being from Hawaii. He said he was an AP for a month or so, so maybe you remember him. Crazy, 2 guys in the same area that served around both brothers. The best connection I can come up with for Whit is that I ate with a nice old Russian lady the other day. She was so excited when I said the two Russian words I know. She made us some sort of cake, I don't know how to spell it, I had her write it down for me, but it uses characters that aren't on the English keyboard.
So this last week was mildly uneventful, I got a little sick the last few days so we only went to our set appointments, and the rest of the time I napped trying to kick the cold. It seems to be pretty much gone now which is good. I finished a beanie, and began another scarf, (all during down time, not work time.) Today we are going to Walla Walla for a zone Pday, and truth be told I'm not too excited about it, but that's alright, I'm sure it will be great.
This last week I got to go down to Boardman. It was good to go back for a day. It turned out that Eloisa (a girl I taught and baptized) was having a really hard time and said she needed to talk with me, so Elder Hardy told her he would bring me the next day, she didn't believe him because she didn't know I was so close. So we got permission from the DL and off I went. She was surprised to see me. It was good to see her and her two kids again; Jessie and Jade even remembered me which made me feel good. We spent most of the day visiting with her and talking things out, she's having a tough time right now. We also made the rounds to a few other people I know. It turns out the Castaneda’s are moving back to Boardman, hopefully before I finish so mom and dad can meet them, they are an awesome family that really helped me out when I first started out. We also went by a less active family I used to work with. They were happy to see me and we had fun catching up. We also helped them pail putrid water out of a broken washing machine. A good time was had by all.
This last week and a half I have used the priesthood a lot! I've cleansed two houses of bad spirits. Given a blessing of comfort to a girl having similar problems, and a blessing of health to a very sick investigator, it’s been crazy. We are currently helping our investigator Lisa try and get her husband back in the states. It's a lot of paper work and is frustrating, but we are keeping at it.
Life here in Hermiston is good. Nothing too bad that needs complaining about, hope everyone has a great week!
Mucho amor,
Elder Richards
Monday, February 6, 2012
18 Months Older and Wiser Too
Feb. 6, 2012
18 Months Older and Wiser Too
Hello One and All,
Well, it suffice me to say this was a pretty crazy week. Big congrats to Mike and Jessica on little Harrison, very awesome.
It's crazy how old I am. I still have plenty of time left and plan on using every minute of it, but still, it is getting close. To celebrate the occasion we in the plex burned a pair of old slacks as per tradition. We also had interviews with President this week, they went super awesome, and I gained a lot of insight out of them.
We had some good success, but the big news was in the sting operation I was a part of, the homeless family we helped out, and the exorcism we did yesterday. Yup, just another week in the life of a WKM missionary.
I'll spare the details of the first story for a more in person description; don't worry no one got hurt (during). I was on an exchange with one of the Elders I live with and we went to a less active's house and it turned out they were about to set this guy up, so we helped out (kind of got roped into it) and the bad guy went to jail. Chalk one up for America! Again, no one got hurt, the mission president knows, so there's no need to call or anything else drastic.
The next day we got word of a family living in a tent by the river. A married couple, their son, and his girlfriend who is liable to give birth at any moment. So we hurried and threw together all our warm clothes and extra food and ran them over to them along with fire wood and other necessary items. They are now working with the transient bishop, so hopefully they get a place to stay soon. Their big problem? 13 dogs. Yeah, 13. No wonder they can't find a place to live.
Then yesterday we all fasted as a district to have the spirit with us and went and blessed a family and dedicated the rooms in their house, they had been suffering from some paranormal kind of goings ons. But the house is clean now, and we all had a testimony building experience about the power of the priesthood. A recent convert also called Diaz and I shortly after and told us of similar problems she is having, so we'll be checking her place out tonight.
It's been a heck of a week. Should be interesting to see what this week brings...oh well, good journal entries right? Anywho, I love all of you and hope all goes well for you.
Mucho Amor,
Elder Richards
p.s. sorry this is so short.
P.P.S. Ana Guizar, a woman that Anderson tracted into got baptized on Saturday. I'm told it was an awesome service and the spirit was super strong. Missed it by 2 or so weeks. Well, asi es la vida. As long as she is now closer to Christ right? It's a cool story, I got to see her progress a lot.
Have a great week!
p.p.p.s.
Anderson says his stalker struck again. Still no clues as to who it might be.
18 Months Older and Wiser Too
Hello One and All,
Well, it suffice me to say this was a pretty crazy week. Big congrats to Mike and Jessica on little Harrison, very awesome.
It's crazy how old I am. I still have plenty of time left and plan on using every minute of it, but still, it is getting close. To celebrate the occasion we in the plex burned a pair of old slacks as per tradition. We also had interviews with President this week, they went super awesome, and I gained a lot of insight out of them.
We had some good success, but the big news was in the sting operation I was a part of, the homeless family we helped out, and the exorcism we did yesterday. Yup, just another week in the life of a WKM missionary.
I'll spare the details of the first story for a more in person description; don't worry no one got hurt (during). I was on an exchange with one of the Elders I live with and we went to a less active's house and it turned out they were about to set this guy up, so we helped out (kind of got roped into it) and the bad guy went to jail. Chalk one up for America! Again, no one got hurt, the mission president knows, so there's no need to call or anything else drastic.
The next day we got word of a family living in a tent by the river. A married couple, their son, and his girlfriend who is liable to give birth at any moment. So we hurried and threw together all our warm clothes and extra food and ran them over to them along with fire wood and other necessary items. They are now working with the transient bishop, so hopefully they get a place to stay soon. Their big problem? 13 dogs. Yeah, 13. No wonder they can't find a place to live.
Then yesterday we all fasted as a district to have the spirit with us and went and blessed a family and dedicated the rooms in their house, they had been suffering from some paranormal kind of goings ons. But the house is clean now, and we all had a testimony building experience about the power of the priesthood. A recent convert also called Diaz and I shortly after and told us of similar problems she is having, so we'll be checking her place out tonight.
It's been a heck of a week. Should be interesting to see what this week brings...oh well, good journal entries right? Anywho, I love all of you and hope all goes well for you.
Mucho Amor,
Elder Richards
p.s. sorry this is so short.
P.P.S. Ana Guizar, a woman that Anderson tracted into got baptized on Saturday. I'm told it was an awesome service and the spirit was super strong. Missed it by 2 or so weeks. Well, asi es la vida. As long as she is now closer to Christ right? It's a cool story, I got to see her progress a lot.
Have a great week!
p.p.p.s.
Anderson says his stalker struck again. Still no clues as to who it might be.
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