The 1000000 Degree House

Brad wrote in his email this week that his apartment is 1000000 degrees at night (but the family they live with is awesome). This past week Brad's companion's mom contacted me. It is so fun to be able to share this experience with mom's all over the country. The Naylors live in San Diego - LUCKY and it has been great to share pictures and information on our Elders. I swiped, I mean borrowed these pictures of Brad's house that reaches 10000000 in their top apartment off her blog. Thanks Diane (her blog is totally cute, just like her and she has the cutest hair and shoes).

Oh C_ap!!!!

Hey everyone!

So this week has been hilariously busy. Some of the pictures may be a little graphic. And by some, I mean one. You'll heart he story soon enough. But let's start at the beginning of this crazyweek.

Wednesday, we had a zone service project. We stacked like 20,000,000 pieces of wood. It was pretty insane, but fun because so many people were there.

Thursday, I went on an exchange with my zone leader Elder Shafercotter (WAY cool. and I think I spelt his name WAY wrong). I went to his area (Middleton. Hooray!) and had a blast. He is the district leader of the other district which meant that we went to 2 district meetings (man I feel bad for zone leaders! haha). I did get to see some people I knew last year and it was really fun.

Friday was mission tour. This is like zone conference only it's in Boise and someone big comes. We had Elder Kenneth B Johnson of the 70 from England (Hey Jake!). It was pretty intense. It was fun though because I got to see so many of my missionary friends all at once. After driving back to Caldwell, we had dinner and went BACK to Boise for a fireside Elder Johnson held. It was pretty good.

Saturday (WARNING:This day was SOO insane, those not capable of reading beyond crazy things should stop now). I don't even remember the order things happened on Saturday. But we'll focus on Elder Naylor for now. We went to Los Betos for breakluch meal thing, and he got this huge bacon burrito. After that, we went to Sonic to get happy hour and he always jokes around saying, "you can get anything you want in a drink right? I'm gonna get bacon!" Well...he actually did it. He ordered a Caramel milkshake with bacon. I guess it is against Sonic policy to put Bacon in a milkshake, so the guy brought out his milk shake and gave him some free strips of bacon. Which he put in the shake and ate. Later that day, we had an All-you-can-eat corn feed. Elder Naylor decided that he could out-eat anyone there and be like his hero Johnny Chestnut. He than proceded in eating 10(!!!!) ears of corn. Along with a burger and brownie to finish it off like a champ. That night we went home (elder Naylor being a pretty sick boy at this point) and since it was early, decided to hang in the back yard where the temperature was nice. Well after a few hours and planning and stuff, we decided to head in and go to sleep. This did not end up happening, because as we headed in, Elder Tobin fell off the swing and it somehow came back around and hit him in the head. We didn't think it was a big deal at1st until massive amounts of blood started running down his face. I grabbed the car keys as fast as I could and we BOOKED it to the hospital. (I think angels were distracting all the cops, keeping them off that road. haha) He ended up getting 7(!!!) staples in his head.So crazy.

Because of the head injury, he couldn't attend church so I stayed home with him the next day. Kinda boring since he couldn't do anything. But really that sums up this crazy week. My only questions is why are we still using staples in peoples heads? haha. You'd think we'd have some super technological way to seal the cut, but nope. Common staples probably purchased at a $1 store. haha.

Well, Hope yourday is awesome.

Love ya all!

-Elder Woods

In Addition:

I forgot to tell you something very important that happened on saturday. A good friend of mine named Spencer A.K.A Elder Wenzel came to visit. It was a short visit, but he brought me a movie he put together that we made last transfer. Hilarious and amazing. I'll try to send you a copy. Just know its the greatest. haha. Love ya!

Shared photo book from Woods

Click here to view this photo book larger

The Late Bird, Er, Elders Speak in Church

Elder James Grant Visits Brad's Hideous Suit

Brad's new SHORT Hair and Elder Naylor

District Game

Hey!

SO this has been a great week.

Wednesday we had interviews with the Mission Pres. They were way good. He kinda hinted that I would be leaving, but other than that I have no clue. haha. After that we continued the amazing tradition of going to Golden Dragon (a Chinese buffet guaranteed to make you sick for 3 days) haha. It was way fun.

Thursday, we had District Meeting. This was pretty fun. So I made this game like a board game where people were the pieces. We rolled a spinner thing and it determined were you landed. Each space would get you a different challenge. Dark Blue- Scripture Concerns. Brown- Quotes. Light Blue- Preach My Gospel. Pink- A Recitation Activity (this led to some REALLY funny videos), and Black-Totally random hard questions. haha. It was Way fun.

Sunday was a pretty big day too. We both spoke (we walked in late and they said "and now we'll hear a little from the Elders" so we just kept walking to the front. haha) and we had another zone devotional. This was about setting goals. The Stake Pres there set a goal for 300 baptisms this year. Sounds crazy, but he broke it down to 4 baptisms to every group in every ward and it was way more than 300. 4 is such an easy number. Pretty cool.

Yesterday we did some crazy service staking wood. The whole Zone was there for several hours and we still didn't finish. haha.

Well, I love ya all.

Have a good one!

-Elder Woods

Area, District, Banana Split

(This picture is of Bro Belnap. The coolest Ward mission leader ever. He was a drummer, in a band, in Warped Tour. Officially the coolest. haha. But I had to say bye because I lost that ward to the new Elders. haha.)

Hey everyone!

So Crazy week.

Everything will make sense in the title...except the banana. Sorry. No explanation there. haha.

So on Wednesday I went on an exchange with Elder Mickelson in Marsing/Homedale. While ON the exchange, I got a call from the AP's telling me that my area is going to be split. Two more elders (McMurdie and Tobin) will be coming in and covering three of our 7 wards. Unfortunately, they wanted me to pick which wards they cover. This was difficult since I wasn't in my area and didn't have a map or anything. So I had to call my comp and get him to describe what the area looks like. I drew a map of what I thought it looked like (it looks NOTHING like the real map. haha) and picked 3 wards that are really close together and pretty small. This is because the other elders are on Bikes full time. Those three wards were actually the wards we dedicated the most time to. Oh well.

So on Thursday after district meeting (which was way fun. We had "Caldwell's Got Talent" haha), the other Elders moved in. They have yet to get a home for Elders to live in in the wards they cover so they moved in with us.(very cramped). Also unfortunate, it the fact that we live at the very North point of our area and the Elders area is the opposite side. So we have to drive them to their area everyday. ITs not as bad as I make it sound. They are both cool elders and we have a lot of fun. But that's what we've been doing.

Along with the area being split, they made a new district. My district is now the Sisters in Middleton, us, and the bikers. So a good deal smaller, but it should still be fun.

Well, that pretty much sums up this crazy week. Work has been really good though. No dates set yet, but alot of good things.

Hope your all doing awesome!

-Elder Woods

PARTY! PARTY! PARTY!

Elder Wenzel

Elder Mickelson

Random Gifts

Very Random Gifts

(Death by seriously ugly pants)

Hello everyone!

So the birth/death day was a success. It was really fun. I ended up getting them both a ton of random gifts and Sister Draper (hooray!) baked two cakes. One for each. I also ended up buying an Optimus Prime pinata and filling it with candy. But instead of bats or anything, we made them punch it. haha. This meant that I have some hilarious videos of both. haha. (Elder Wenzel for instance ended up giving Optimus the peoples elbow and dunking it in the basketball hoop) haha.

Wednesday we had a few comp. seminars with a few of the Elders and met with a lot of our investigators.

Thursday was district meeting in Middleton. It was the Zone Leaders turn to be in charge. It was good and we all went to pizza afterwards. yeah! haha.

Friday it rained like crazy but we worked through it. In fact, it rained ALL day. Pretty crazy.

Saturday we did progress records and visited a bunch of families. Pretty good day.

Sunday was a pretty long day. I had gotten used to 8 hours of church, but for some reason last Sunday seemed to drag on. Except for Sunday School. The gospel principal classes were some of the best I've ever been to that day. Dinner was way fun. Had some authentic Carne Asada. Yeah! That night we had a Zone devotional in Middleton with Stake President Evens. He taught us about Sincere Prayer. It was really cool and insightful.

Yesterday was a pretty packed day too. Besides weekly planning and planning for District Meeting (which should be way fun. I'll take pics. haha), we saw the majority of our investigators. This week should actually be really crazy. We have something everyday this week so it should be fun.

Stay tuned!

Love ya all!

-Elder Woods

Investigators Here, There and Everywhere

Henry's Baptism

Hey!

So this week has been a good kinda crazy. We've been REALLY busy. On Wednesday, we had transfers early morning. My new comp is Elder Naylor from San Diego California. He's pretty cool. Kinda quiet, but it's alright. We tried to contact all our ward mission leaders that day, but only caught like 3 home. But those three had people they wanted us to see. So it was pretty awesome.

Thursday was district meeting, which is really just zone meeting since there is only one companionship that isn't in our district in the zone. So we all combine and had a good meeting. We had a lesson with Henry (you'll hear about him later) and met with a ton of other people.

Friday, Elder Wenzel came with us. yeah! haha. We had a really good lesson with a New Member, who dominated Elder Wenzel at Ping Pong before the lesson. We met with two new investigators and talked about baptism so they are currently praying about it. Way cool.

Saturday was the big day. At 9 am, we had the baptism of Henry Helkowski. It went awesome. He was confirmed at the baptism and was so happy he was crying. (he's a pretty tough guy too. haha). At 11am, we had the baptism of Angela Anderson (no picture). A lot of people came to show support. She felt really good too. After that and progress records, we met with another new investigator and talked about church with her. She committed to go, but ended up being sick on Sunday. But she is pretty excited about baptism already.

Sunday was really busy too. After church we had a ton of people to go see that kept us moving that day.

Yesterday we had Area Leader Council (really just a replacement of district leader council since there is only 2 district). It was a really good meeting and after we went to Red Robins...which I'd never been to...which is AMAZING! haha. After that we were pretty busy contacting and teaching.

It's been WAY good so far. That's it for this week.

Love ya all!

-Elder Woods