Week # 10/25/2009 (Adjuntas)

Email dated: October 25, 2009

Hola Familia
well thank you so very much for doing that mother I’m pretty excited but this transfer just started so don’t get to worried yet haha but yeah thank you so much for getting those he’s going to die when I give them to him it will be awesome but anyways I like the black better anyways so good choice :). (Matthew asked me to get him a set up scriptures for someone in the Ward he is in who is planning on going on a mission. Elder Wingman is the name I had inscribed. I think I need to find out a little more about this guy!!)

but anyway yeah he’s from Alpine (Elder Maxwell, Matt’s Companion) that’s what I meant to write but its Lone Peak high school so yeah sorry about that but yeah he’s from Alpine.ok so it sounds like Mtn. Home is growing like crazy its gonna be a whole nother place when I get back its kinda nuts and the whole mormon temple thing (the Stake Center … I hope he really doesn’t think it is a temple. I told him about someone in the Mtn. Home News thinking it was a Mormon Temple going up over by McDonalds.) Is pretty sweet but anyways you said Brother Waddoups was there that’s pretty cool I should send them a letter so if you get the chance do you want to send me their address? that would be great but anyways it sounds like the missionary work is going good down there haha but yeah we spend most of all day every day trying to find people and contact people its crazy because here in Puerto Rico you find all day long and you can set up like a bunch of citas and then the next day you go to them all and they all fall and no ones there so then you just have to go find and try and get new people to go and teach its kinda a bummer sometimes but o well we will find the ones that are waiting for us haha but yeah life is going great and we are having fun and working hard we are still trying to find a couple good investigators so that will be good but yeah also something kinda funny I’m starting to learn about some Papiamento (language) a little bit cuz my companion was in Aruba and Curacao for 6 months and everyone thinks I’m going there after this transfer its kinda funny because the islands made this thing now they don’t let us in there for very long at all so now like the longest people stay in the islands is 4 transfers so this transfer about 5 missionaries have to come back from there so yeah that’s why everyone thinks I’m a gonner but we’ll see :) I don’t know if I want to start from square one with another language again :( but yeah so when your with a comp that came from there your supposed to learn a bit so you can get a little head start before you get there but idk I guess we’ll see :)well I hope everything is going good with you guys and that life is great its sure great here haha

love you guys
elder ward

Picture!!! Elder Maxwell & Elder Ward

Elder Maxwell & Elder Ward

After doing Service!

Week # 10/19/2009 (Adjuntas) 3rd Transfer

Email dated: October 19, 2009
Adjuntas
3rd Transfer
Companion: Elder Maxwell from Alpine, Utah

Hola Familia

So me and my companion are doing good he’s from Lone Peak Utah and he’s awesome. I was just telling dad that I was pretty sure that there wasn’t another missionary in my mission that did outdoors stuff and liked hunting but then the next day I meet my companion and sure enough he likes it about as much as we do haha but yeah his name is Elder Maxwell and we’ve been doing good. He works hard so its great we are going to get a lot of stuff done this transfer I know it :)But anyways that’s cool it was homecoming week this week. I remember one time at mutual we were doing that fear factor thing and I had to eat a caramel covered onion and it was sick. I couldn’t do it -- man it killed me haha so I know how he feels that would have been rough. (At the Homecoming Assembly the Homecoming King Nominees were in a relay. They each had to put on nylons, high heel shoes, a dress, boa, jewelry and then eat a caramel apple. The one that had a caramel covered onion was the Homecoming King.)So that’s cool that the ward is getting to work with the missionary work. How it’s really supposed to get to is something called CAR (conversion, activation, and retention) and all the leaders and the missionaries meet every week and they go over all the people they are teaching and the members bring new names and everyone works together to do it. Its pretty crazy but after being on a mission for a while I can see how it would work wonders haha so keep it up and get the ward going good hahaA NEW STAKE CENTER?! That’s crazy so that will be cool I guess when I get home. its kinda weird I don’t like getting old and everything changing haha its definitely going to be weird to go to Mountain Home when I get back.(Matthew sent home a package with some funky hats for Jason & Eric.) I knew they would love them haha I actually bought them because Nate Call had one at school and so I thought it would be funny if I bought one and we could wear them to school haha ok so about MR elder Wingman haha ok I know its going to be a lot of money but it would be cool if you can get him the bible too with his name on it but make sure its the new bible cuz the new bible just came out in Spanish and Elder Kolar was supposed to order that for him but then he left and forgot so yeah if you could just get a set of scriptures it doesn’t matter what color and no tabs and make sure its inscribed cuz that’s the main reason I’m having you do it cuz I could order them but I can’t get it stamped haha but yeah and just take money out of my account to do it :) THANKS! (Who does he think puts the money in his account? HAHA! as Matt would say!)But yeah we knew Elder Kolar was going to Aruba because when you leave to the Islands you get to know a little bit before because you have to fly over and stuff so yeah we knew he was going there and also when president came to church we got him to tell us that my companion was coming from the islands hahabut anyways that reminds me of something -- so since my companion has been in the islands for the last 6 months where they speak papiamento he doesn’t know that much Spanish haha so its way cool I really like it because before Elder Kolar knew it way good so he just spoke but now that my comp doesn’t know it to well I have to talk a lot more :) I mean he can talk as good as I can I think but it just helps me learn more :) about the pictures I’ve got a couple new ones I think so I’ll try to send them today but we’ll see if it works haha and for p-days usually we don’t have to much time to play around so usually we get all our stuff done as soon as we can and then just hang out with some other elders and go to the beach or play dominoes and stuff. But today we are staying in Adjuntas instead of driving down to Ponce so we might go to the highest mountain in Puerto Rico or something it all depends if we have time but yeah everything is going great down here in island paradise and we are working hard and having fun we are still trying hard to find new investigatores and we have been doing good this week so that’s exciting! We had one family that we found. It’s a younger family with 4 1/2 kids she’s about to have a baby any second but yeah so we are really excited about them. We have taught them two lecciones and they are awesome the last lesson that we had with them he asked us what the requirements to get baptized are so that was really cool and I’m excited to teach him some more. We’ve found some other pretty good people one guy we went to teach his daughter and when we showed up he was sitting there and we asked him if he would want to come in and have a lesson with us (which was also a blessing because it was a lady that didn’t have a husband so we couldn’t have gone in the house if he didn’t come) but yeah he told us that he was evangelical and didn’t want to do it but then finally he did and when we taught him he just ate up the whole lesson and just loved the Book Of Mormon and took it for scripture right off the bat. It was awesome I’ve never seen someone that just got introduced to the B of M take it like so respectfully it really is cool and I’m excited for him as well.Well that’s about all for this week. Life is going great and I would love to see those pictures you guys are sending me so yeah and put some of the cabin in there too if you can cuz I haven’t seen those pictures still either :) but yeah I hope all is well at home and I’ll talk to you guys next week.

LOVE YA
elder ward

ps how’s Andrea doing? she hasn’t emailed me in about two weeks

Week # 10/13/2009 (Adjuntas)

Email dated: 10/13/2009 (3rd Transfer – Staying in Adjuntas)

ok so I’ve got to make this email short cuz I just typed a whole email to you and then the computer didn’t work and it got lost so I’m kinda bummed about that but o well haha :)but anyways first things first I’m staying in Adjuntas and Elder Kolar is leaving to the islands. It’s kinda crazy he’s been studying his Papiamento and it cracks me up I don’t know how much I want to go to the islands because I want to learn Spanish really really good but yeah Papiamento is a pretty funny language and most likely I’ll end up getting sent to the islands sometime and have to learn it. but yeah other than that not a whole lot has happened here. President came down and had church with us and that was really cool and then he taught a thing about missionary work to all the leaders it was really cool he just explained how the church is changing the missionary program and now we are trying to move it worldwide where the members do the finding and all missionaries do is teach. He told us how and what we need to do to get there obviously our mission is really far from that because we do A TON! of finding but we are working on getting it there. haha but yeah that was good and he also said my companion is coming from the islands but we don’t know who it is yet we will find out Wednesday :)anyways so that’s cool you saw all those guys blogs! Elder Knudsen is with me right now and he thought that was pretty cool. He’s an awesome guy but he is getting moved too :( there are 5 people moving from my district this transfer. It’s kinda crazy and in my zone they are closing some areas like Andrea’s email explained my mission is getting the numbers cut a lot. When I came here there were 100 missionaries and my mission is getting cut to 50 – slowly. haha it’s cuz they have so many missions opening around the world so they need to send people over there. Anyways I better get going. I sent you guys a package today so that should get there soon it doesn’t have to much just a bunch of stuff I didn’t want here and some stuff for Eric’s b-day but yeah I’ll talk to you guys next week.
love ya elder ward

Week # 10/05/2009 (Adjuntas)

Email dated: October 5, 2009

HOLA
ok so life is going great and the mission is awesome but to start off this lovely email I’m going to have to ask you guys why you’re doing this to me? we haven’t got a big elk since that one I shot with the funky horns a couple years ago and then the first hunting season after I leave you send me this picture of a big old elk man! Your killing me! haha but no that really was cool looks like things went well but I’m expecting a detailed description of the hunt as well as a couple nice pictures haha.But wow I didn’t know Jason got hired by them that’s awesome but first things first I would have to agree with mom about staying in work because first off I don’t have any money right now so when I get back I’m going to be flat broke so I’ll have to work my butt off to get money for school but I have all summer to do it but Jason, on the other hand will get back in January and school starts right then so he won’t have time to work. You’ll just move straight to Rexburg and if you don’t have any money to take the ladies on dates with I don’t know what you’ll do hahahaha but yeah keep working right up till you leave is my advice.But the package did come THANK YOU! it was a great package I was tempted to keep all those laffy taffys for myself but elder kolar clearly pointed out that one of those bags were for him so I decided he had a right to them hahaha but really it was great and I liked the cds they are awesome thank you very very much and elder kolar is very thankful as well :) but about the Christmas cds just get them whenever you can Christmas here in Puerto Rico is pretty crazy and people get way excited for it. I haven’t heard any Christmas music yet because all I ever hear is regaton but yeah I guess Christmas time is crazy around here but the even bigger holiday than Christmas is "dia de los reyes" or the day that the celebrate the three kings but yeah so I’m really excited for Christmas it’s going to be really good. also if you can when you send those cds see if you can get some efy ones from somebody and my Joseph Smith cd in my box in my room that would be really cool but if not that’s fine too :)ok i really got to hurry cuz the library is all backed up and there are all these ladies just trying to get on a computer. but conference was amazing I loved it my favorite talk was ELDER HOLLAND that was amazing the most powerful testimony of the book of Mormon that I have ever heard it was amazing but yeah we watched it all at the church with all the members too hear. they all just go to the church and bring food and eat between the sessions and just like stay there all day its actually pretty cool. I watched it in English in the non air conditioned room haha :( IT WAS HOT! but definitely worth it. I loved it o and we did watch the priesthood session and it was great it was all about relationships of dads and their boys it was really good but yeah I got to go sorry but I’ll talk to you guys next week. Tell Jason to send me a letter or somethin haha ttyl

love ya
elder ward

Part of Andrea’s letter from Elder Ward – had some interesting info that I thought would be fun to share …
HEY
yeah I don’t think I got your email last week haha was it a good one? but yeah the videos are usually kinda hard to see cuz the computers are usually way slow over here and i dont have enought time to wait for them to load so yeah sorry about that i never even got to see jason open his call videobut the mission is going great I’m loving it we are having a ton of fun and its just great but the time is flying by way too fast it’s scary!!! can you believe that I have already finished 1/6th of my mission I don’t like to hear that it’s nuts and people that were here in the mission when I first arrived are going home like 6 of them this transfer and man it’s just weird. time goes buy way to fast out here its like crazy nuts but yeah its kinda sad because when i came in the mission had just over 100 missionaries and then within like a year it will be cut down to 46 can you believe that? its crazy crazy! so everyone is leaving and there won’t be a single new missionary till January it kinda stinks I’ll be the youngest missionary and I’ll have like 8 or 9 months its kinda weird but o well.We have a couple investigators right now not a whole ton we never really have a ton here in Puerto Rico I’m not gonna lie Puerto Rico is one of those hard working missions haha we have to go knock doors 2 hours a day everyday and then we have to contact 140 other people per week or 20 a day and then those are like our finding goals and here in Adjuntas we still only get like 1 or 2 investigators out of that every week its but I STILL LOVE IT!!!!but anyways about conference it was so so so so good you should get on the internet and watch it there was a ton of great stuff watch the talk by ELder Holland and you might just get blown off your seat. haha But you have to watch it -- don’t read it! You can watch them all on the internet right now :)well I better get going and ill talk to you next week
love ya
elder ward