Monday, December 26, 2016

Elder Edholm -- week 80

Saturday, December 24, 2016

Last minute Christmas happenings

Lucy sings in the Glee Club at school and they sang their songs on Friday.  It was very cute.  In one of the songs they are singing about pumpkin pie and at the end they all put their faces into the pie!
Lucy is standing next to one of her good friends, Elliza:
Lucy is in the pink shirt


I drove up to Cody yesterday to pick Audrey up from the airport.  While I as waiting I saw this Bear Spray sign and had to laugh.  Only in Wyoming would there be a bear spray deposit sign at the airport!



It's good to have Audrey with us:


As per our tradition we opened Christmas jammies on Christmas Eve:


Monday, December 19, 2016

Christmas tree #1

Emma is home and she wanted us to wait to cut down the Christmas tree until she was able to go with us.  So today Brian, Emma, and I drove to Ten Sleep, bought the tree permit, and headed up the canyon.  We didn't go as far as we normally do and turned off at the Ten Sleep Fish Hatchery.  We parked and hiked amid the bushes and snow drifts to find out smallish tree.  It was beautiful out there and had warmed up a bit, in the 20's, much better than the below zero temps we've been having.


Brian and the chosen tree

Beautiful Ten Sleep Creek


Emma getting ready to throw a snowball at me


Pre-snowball throw

Lights added

Finished product


We are planning on getting tree #2 when Audrey comes this weekend.

After our cold adventure, we came home to eating Elk tonight!  YUM!

Elder Edholm -- week 79

Saturday, December 17, 2016

Winter Wonderland

It's winter in Worland!  -23 this morning. 
It looks nice and sunny, but it doesn't feel nice and sunny!

Peter sang in the Eastside Elementary Christmas program.  He did a great job!  It was just the Kindergarten through 3rd grade, so this was Pete's last year to participate.  The 4th through 5th grades don't do a Christmas program.

Pete is the farthest left against the wall.

Peter's class

I've been busy at the Museum.  We sponsored a Christmas party for the boys and girls club, the 4-H, and the Youth Learning Center on Friday.  It was a Dr. Seuss themed party and Santa came to visit as well.  I got to do a story time with the kids and I dressed up as Cindy Lou Who.



It was a lot of fun!

While Andy was driving home with the basketball team from Green River and Brian and Emma were driving home from Utah Eric, Lucy, Peter, and I were invited to the Tejada's to make and decorate cookies.  We had a great time and the kids made some cool creations.

Not sure what Peter is doing in this picture

Nice face Eric

Yum!

The whole gang: Lucy, Eliza, Eric, Millie, and Peter

Monday, December 12, 2016

Elder Edholm -- week 78

Saturday, December 10, 2016

For Van Fans

Van is 5 months old exactly in this photo.  He is sucking on a washcloth, which is what Lauren used to do as well.

Me and Momma

Look at those eyelashes!


Me and Daddy

zzzzzzzzz

Christmas parties are starting

Eric was awesome at the ward Christmas dinner.  Click on the link to watch him lip sync.  It's a little blurry, but he is the second one up, then he does the batman song and Michael Jackson.  I think he's found his calling!

Eric at the Ward Christmas Dinner


Peter singing Little Drummer Boy

All the primary kids singing
Eric eating a cornflake wreath

Peter eating food

Lucy's primary class singing Stille Nacht

Lucy and Santa

Monday, December 5, 2016

Elder Edholm -- week 77

So Christmas is finally coming around and I love the thing that the church is doing about lighting the world in 25 days in 25 ways. We're trying to do it as a mission, plus the cards really help to give to everybody so they can see the video. It's probably the best way to proselyte this time of the year. Since Christmas isn't really that big of a thing here, it's a good thing to do so that people can understand what Christmas is really about and what they should be doing instead of just sitting in the street drinking.

Anyway Elder Florentino is going home tomorrow which is a big shame because we had an awesome transfer together. I think I've probably learned more from him than from any other companion I've had about doctrine and how to teach more effectively. But that's ok because he lives super close and he'll be coming back in a couple weeks to visit again. It was cool to see how much love he had for all the people he's taught. He cried the last visit we had with Ibelize, so that's something I've learned from him as well.

Besides that I'm hoping to start preaching even more effectively with my new companion, helping people understand the true meaning of Christmas.

Monday, November 28, 2016

Elder Edholm -- week 76

So, yes, Ibelize got baptized on Saturday! It was a great experience for her, she was very excited. Now we just have to make sure that we do every thing we can so that she stays active, that's the stressful part sometimes. But besides that this week has gone super well. At the beginning of my mission finding was the worst thing for me. It didn't like knocking on doors at all. Now I think I understand it a little bit more. I understand that if I'm not trying to find people constantly than I'm missing out on the blessings that The Lord has prepared for me and the person that needs the gospel stays in confusion and it's possible that their sins fall upon my head. Since I've gotten to this area I've just had that desire to go out and find those people.

In the baptism while people were changing we watched the video of the restoration, the short one that lasts 15 minutes or so. But when I was watching it, it had a different affect on me this time. It's because when the part came when God and Jesus Christ appeared to Joseph Smith I imagined that it was me, that I was Joseph Smith and God and His Son came down and appeared to me, and talked to me ¨Calling me by name.¨ It meant a lot more to me when I watched it like that, I felt the spirit a lot stronger, and I really felt the love of God so strongly directly for me. I feel like we should always read the scriptures like that, like they are addressing us specifically, I feel like we can get more out of them like that.

But I hope you all had a great thanksgiving, it's weird seeing the table not all the way full. Oh and Happy Birthday Andy! Wow, 16 years old!
 

 

Thursday, November 24, 2016

Thanksgiving





Our lovely Thanksgiving Lunch!  We had the dinner cooked, devoured, and cleaned up by 1:00!  The boys ran in the Gobble Wobble at 10:30 and the girls got everything ready.  Eric came in 3rd overall in the 2 mile run and came home with a pumpkin pie.  Andy and Brian ran the 4 mile race and Peter and Eric ran the 2 mile race.

This year Andy's birthday happens to fall on Thanksgiving Day.  We put candles in his Coconut Cream Pie.



He got lots of nice presents including a bluetooth speaker for his phone, powerade, pringles, beef jerky, chocolate, cereal, and a BYU Football memorabilia book.

The family humored me and we took a quick little history jaunt in the afternoon.  I've been typing in a lot of oral histories of this area at work and I recently read one that was about a very small town called Neiber.  It was a stage coach station from the early 1900s until Mary Neiber's death in 1923, but quickly faded away by the time the railroad came through.  I had the GPS coordinates of a small cemetery, which was all that was left and it was only about 15 minutes outside of town.  So we put the coordinates into Google Maps and drove away.  We found it on top of a hill. It was a short hike to the top of the hill and we had to dodge millions of small cacti.  It was a beautiful view of the stark landscape from the top. 



This past week Lucy has started her basketball season.  Brian helped coach the first two games as the coach was out of town.  They look pretty good and have won 2 out of their 3 games so far.

Lucy in motion shooting the ball during warm ups before the game with Brian watching.

Monday, November 21, 2016

Elder Edholm -- week 75

So, Ibelize had her baptismal interview on Saturday and she is ready! She's amazing, on Sunday, in the class for investigators and recent converts we were talking about repentance. She talked about how she repented the other week by apologizing to her granddaughter, she was crying, she said that she felt like she couldn't get baptized with that burden on her chest and that now she feels relieved. I can't wait for her baptism, I know she is a real convert, and our branch is helping out a lot so there is a big chance that she will endure.

But since this week is thanksgiving I wanted to take advantage of this email to do exactly that, give thanks. I want to thank everybody. First mom and dad for being missionaries in the first place to set the best example for me and for being amazing parents. All my siblings for making my childhood fun, although I know I wasn't always the best brother, but you guys were great brothers and sisters to me, even though I didn't always show it. Thanks so much for being the best family ever. I love you all so much!

Here are some pictures of my district and my companion and I.
 
 

Monday, November 14, 2016

Elder Edholm -- week 74

Monday, November 7, 2016

Elder Edholm -- week 73

Monday, October 31, 2016

Elder Edholm -- week 72

Saturday, October 29, 2016

The Goblin Gallop

4th Annual Goblin Gallop @ Rodeo Grounds @ 6 pm Proceeds go to food banks!!

The Goblin Gallop happened today in Ten Sleep.  It was a 5K fundraiser run. Andrew and Lucy ran in it. Andy came in 4th overall and 3rd in his age group and Lucy was the only one in her age group to finish the race, pretty good for a 10 year old. They both came home with t-shirts and Lucy won a pie for coming in first in her age group.  Wish I had pics to post, but it was very last minute and Brian and I didn't go.  Now we wish we had!

Monday, October 24, 2016

Elder Edholm -- week 71

So we had the baptism of Jeffrey on Saturday! Sonia ended up not being able to get baptized on Saturday because she got sick, so she will get baptized this Saturday. But transfer calls came on Saturday and I'm finally leaving Barahona after having been here for 5 transfers (7 months). It's kind of a bitter-sweet moment because I love Barahona, it's definitely my favorite area so far. I've grown so close to the members, converts, and just my friends from the street. It's going to be really hard leaving to tomorrow. But the good thing is that I will be experiencing a brand new area! I hope it will give me more motivation to work harder. I finally get to see new streets, go to church in a new chapel, work with a new branch, and all of that fun stuff. But I will be going to Don Gregorio which is in the Baní zone.

Thank you all so much for all of the birthday wishes and for the video, that made me so happy! I didn't think that everybody would care so much about my birthday, but thank you guys all so much! But besides all that the work is going great, I've tried to keep working hard so that my son has people to prepare for baptism after I leave. I've been scrambling around all today and yesterday trying to say goodbye to everybody.

But thank you all again for everything you guys have done for me, it means so much! I love you all so much!
 
 
 
 Palmer's new area with the red marker.  It's quite a ways from Barahona which is on the very far left. 

Monday, October 17, 2016

Elder Edholm -- week 70

Sunday, October 16, 2016

This Grandma is a Van Fan!

Let me think about that comment for a minute!

Favorite place to nap

Just wait till I'm mobile!