Christmas Day and talking with Elder Edholm

What a wonderful thing to see and talk to Palmer today!  He had told us he would call at 1:00, but didn't get through until 1:45.  We got to talk for 2 whole hours!  His companion even said hi to us, although he only speaks Spanish and couldn't understand us very well!  Palmer is doing really well.  His baptisms last Saturday went well and he and his companion are teaching a lot of people.  He said that Christmas day there  isn't a big deal for many of the Dominicans.  He said most of the people just drink all day.  They went caroling this morning and he said many people were already drunk!  He looks happy and that makes me happy!

Christmas Eve we opened our Christmas jammies from Grandma:

They are a little slap happy!

Christmas was wonderful and I'm sad to see it leave us!

Andy the basketballer and Emma the cheerleader

The Worland Warrior Cheerleading Squad.  This year there were twice as many girls who tried out so they have two squads-Varisty and JV.  Emma is on Varsity.  They have the black and orange uniforms, JV has the white and orange.

Emma is in the middle row to the left

Emma is 3rd from right

Emma's face is obscured by the girls arm in front of her!

Andy is on the front row, 6th from right.  His best friend Jaden is next to him on the left.

Andy is on the Freshmen team, but this picture is of the entire team, freshman, JV, and Varsity.

Christmas activities

Andy had his first basketball games last week.  He played against Lovell and beat them handily.  Then they played Rocky Mountain (which is the high school in Cowley) and it was a very exciting close game.  They won in overtime.  Here is a picture:

Andy shooting a free throw

Peter had his Christmas program with the 1st-3rd grades.  He got to play the drums which made him very happy.

He is in the 2nd row from the top with the whitish shirt on

Peter is on the 2nd row from the top in front of the girl with the red dress trimmed in white.  I love how he sways to the music!

Lucy as we were waiting for the concert to begin.

My mom gave me a wonderful Santa for Christmas and in a rare moment of creativity I created this for him to stand among from the sawed off branches from our Christmas trees.

Looks better in real life!

Christmas songs

Here are some videos of Lucy's choir.  Lucy is on the front row, second from the left.

When Christmas Comes To Town, from The Polar Express


Best Day of My Life
In this song the first soloist is in our ward, he does a really good job!

Worland High School Band.  Emma is on the front row in the middle next to the tallish boy.

Emma playing O Come O Come Emmanuel at our ward Christmas dinner.  I'm on the piano half hidden.  She sounded really nice!

Elder Edholm -- week 27

So the two daughters of Ana Iris were interviewed on Saturday, and this baptismal date is actually going to go through!!! I'm so excited!!! Their names are Lizbeth and Albelina, and Albelina asked me to baptize her!! It's so exciting to finally have a baptism!

Christmas time is a really cool time, especially on the mission, but in a different sense. I've never felt closer to my Savior than I have here on my mission, and for that I really am starting to understand Christmas better, and people. We've been handing out Christmas cards that say A Savior is Born, and I am really starting to understand the real meaning of Christmas. I have really started to treasure the scriptures a lot more, especially the testimonies of the prophets, they're just so strong, and I really feel the holy ghost when I read them.

But it's also really cool to see people open up to us more during this time of the year. When we give a random person a card on the street I really see a change in them. Even though they don't call us back or anything I leave knowing that I helped someone feel the spirit, and that makes it all worth it.

Anyway, I can't wait until I get to call you guys on Christmas because that is the next time I will be talking to you because their is no p-day next monday because it's changed to Christmas. Anyway, I love you all!!

-Elder Edholm

Festivity

And the decorations are up!

I just noticed how dusty this shelf is!  We are remembering Palmer!

Palmer on the tree

Our two trees are a little sparse, but we love them!

At our ward Christmas party Santa came!

It's that time of year...Christmas concerts!

It's the season to attend Christmas concerts!

Front row third from left is Lucy Lou

Lucy is on the first row third from left

Lucy's choir sang at the Festival of the Trees at the Community Center.  The director does a very fine job with these kids and they sounded great.  Lucy loves it a lot!

This is a blurry picture of Eric's first band concert.  These are all the 6th graders and there were a ton of trombones!  There were more trombones than any other instrument!  Now I've heard a lot of beginning band performances and they can be a little hard on the ears.  This band, however, sounded really good!  Brian and I were amazed at how good they sounded.  Kudos to Mr. Wright!

Emma's high school band concert is tomorrow night and then Peter's Christmas program is next week.  It's so fun to see the kids perform!

Elder Edholm -- week 26

Well we had another great, work filled week this week. I've really learned to love working hard out here on the mission. I've learned that I can't control if I have success or not, but what I can control is how hard I work, and I've learned that working hard feels a lot better than sitting inside and doing nothing.

The cool thing is that our ward has really started helping us out a lot. We've really received a lot of referrences the past couple of weeks which have turned out to be awesome people. When I was younger I didn't know that I could personally give a referrence to the missionaries, and I think that was a problem. We've really tried to get it in to the member's heads that we want to teach their friends and family that aren't members. And I really think it's working.

It's really cool to see after how hard you've worked to see that invesigator that you have come to love actually come to church, it's probably the best feeling ever! I think we will actually have some baptisms before Christmas. There is this lady named Ana Iris, and she was a less active, but she started coming to church with her two daughters who haven't been baptized, and she just had her interview to be reactivated and now her two daughters have a baptismal date for the 19th!

I know that I won't always have success, and that I need to have patience when I don't because I know people are prepared, but maybe they aren't ready right away to go to church and be baptized. Anyway, it's crazy that I've been out here for six months now! I hope Lauren has a boy, and names him after me! I also hope that the basketball thing works out ok!

-Love you all!

-Elder Edholm

Elder Edholm -- week 25 = 6 months! Wow!

Well I had a pretty awesome week this week. First of all we had a small thanksgiving as a district, we had a chicken, potatoes, and my district leader actually made a pie!!! Which is very rare here!

But I think this week we worked harder than I've worked my whole mission, we had amazing numbers, and to help out, our zone leaders did splits with us!

Another great thing is that I bought stuff for this guy to make me pants this week which are really cheap here and look really good, I should have them in about two weeks, I'll try to send a pic.

It wasn't as weird as I thought it would be not having thanksgiving with you guys, I think that's because I was just focused on getting to work, but don't worry I still missed you guys!!

Sorry I'm really short on time this week, but I'm glad everything is going well!!!

Christmas Tree hunting and Lucy sings

Lucy is part of the Worland Youth Choir that consists of 4th and 5th graders.  They practice twice a week after school and they had their first concert this week.  They sounded really good.

Lucy is on the front row second from left

Since Lauren and Matt were here we decided to get our Christmas tree today.  The snow wasn't nearly as deep as it was last year and it wasn't quite so cold, though our toes were freezing by the end!  We chopped two trees down, plus two tiny ones that Lucy and Peter chose to put in their room.  (And by tiny I mean TINY!)

In the van on the way up!

Matt, Peter, and Lauren in the pink coat

Lauren (pink coat),Lucy, Emma's back, and Brian

Lauren, Matt, Emma, and Lucy

Peter and his tree!

Lucy making her way back to the van

We had a great time and our trees are fresh and pretty!  (No, I didn't get a picture of the trees, I will post more later!)

Happy Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving morning was crisp and cold and snowy!  Everyone slept in, which was the first blessing of the day!

Our good friends, the Durrant's, had their daughter Ellie's baptism this morning.  I was lucky enough to play the piano for her oldest daughter to sing and it was beautiful and sweet.  Peter and Ellie are good friends and like to hang out with each other.  Naomi, Ellie's mom, snapped a few pictures:

Our dinner turned out really nice and yummy!  Lauren and Matt made the pumpkin pies and we had all the traditional stuff minus the green bean casserole.  I've never done the entire dinner by myself so that was a first.  Here are a few pictures:

Lauren, Matt, Peter, Eric

Peter, Eric, Lucy, Andy, Emma

We missed Audrey and Palmer today!  After dinner it was on to pie and a movie and then the wonderful post Thanksgiving dinner nap!  A very satisfying day!

Elder Edholm -- week 24

Well transfers went well, I safely arrived in the nice town of Villa Altagracia. It's pretty secluded from the capital, it's about a thirty minute drive away from the capital, and it's surrounded by mountains, it's really cool. The area is really nice, and there aren't too many motorcycles.

My companion Elder Solis is from Mexico and we mostly speak Spanish together. He is trying to learn English so sometimes I help him practice his English. The good thing is, is that we're both really young and want to work really hard. We have some good baptismal dates that I'm pretty confident will actually happen.

We are currently teaching someone without a hand, another person without a leg, and another person without legs at all! But something I've really noticed is that when I'm teaching, and the investigator is saying something, I've gotten in the bad habit of thinking of something to say, but I've found out if I just really listen and really pay attention to what the person is saying then I can be better guided by the spirit as of what to say.

In the last zone meeting we had, the zone leaders related our zone to the story of captain Moroni and the title of liberty. It was really cool because basically we should have the same motives as captain Moroni. He wrote the verses that have the words of the title of liberty on them on a white shirt, but put our zone in there. It really goes to show that the mission isn't about you, it's about the people you came out here to serve.

Harp Playing

Here in Worland the Museum has many social events.  I've been asked to play the harp at some of them.  Last Friday night the musician they had scheduled, a fiddler, canceled on them because of bad weather (she was driving up from Lander).  So the museum director, Sherryl, texted me at 4:30 and asked if I could be there ready to play at 5:30.  I said yes.  It was the annual "Quick Draw Auction".  Artists from Colorado, Montana, and Wyoming come and they have one hour to complete a work of art and then it's auctioned off.  It was a HUGE event with all the tables sold out.  They offered a complete Italian meal, which was quite good, and had an open bar. They said the more the patrons drink the higher they bid!  I played for 2+ hours and they paid me $500!  Wow, apparently I need to up my price!  There was a photographer there and he managed to snap a couple of pictures of me.  I don't think they are the greatest, but then I guess you always think/hope you look better than you actually do!

Snow, it came at last and is here to stay!

Winter is finally rearing it's head up here.  Last year we were already at negative degrees, so I'm not sad it's taking it's time arriving.  Here is a few pictures of what I woke up to:

Snow on the pumpkin!

It's plenty cold and should hit below zero just in time for Thanksgiving!  Gobble gobble brrrrrr.

Villa Altagracia -- Palmer's new area

Palmer has been transferred to the Los Alcarrizos zone to the city of Villa Alragracia.  It is about 40 minutes north of his first area.  It;s population is 169,655 and it's currently 88 degrees with 62% humidity.  Here is where it sits in the country:





Here are some pictures from Google Images, since I don't think I will be getting a lot from Palmer!

Edholm Elder -- week 23

Well a lot of things happened this week. First of all I forgot to talk about this investigator we have named Frank. He is an awesome investigator and he actually comes to church. I can tell he actually wants to change his life. He has his girlfriend that he lives with and he has asked the bishop for doctrine on marriage to talk to his girlfriend with. He said if his wife doesn´t want to get married than he´s going to leave her because that´s how much he wants to follow the commandments.

We had a zone conference on Thursday, and Elder Zivic from the seventy was there. Zone conferences always just give me a fire to work harder, especially this one because that was a huge topic at the conference. After the conference I got my birthday package finally!!! I just got to say, you guys really know me really well because everything was just perfect for what I needed, thank you everybody for everything in there! It was like Christmas getting it! Tell Peter that I tried mixing a poptart with that koolaid drink stuff and it actually tasted pretty good!

On Saturday we received the transfers, and this was the biggest shock. They told us that they were whiting out our area and they were going to put two sisters here. I was devastated at first because I couldn´t help but feeling that I could´ve worked a lot harder and prevented this from happening because from the first day I got here I was afraid that they would white out the area, but there is nothing I can do about it now. It´s really hard to say goodbye to this area. The people here in Canastica are such good and amazing people, and it seemed like way too short of a time that I was here, we´ve spent this whole day saying goodbye to people and taking pictures, it´s definitely not easy. There are so many people I wish I would´ve gotten to know better, and I really wish I would´ve taken better advantage of this amazing ward that we have. But I am getting transferred to the zone Los Alcarrizos on the capital, the area is called Villa Altagracia, and If I´m not wrong that is the last area that Alex Wassum was in before he went home, which is pretty cool, but his last companion just finished training somebody there and I´m going to be with him. His name is Elder Solis and he is from Mexico. It´s kinda scary to think about because he just finished being trained and I only have five months so neither of us really know anything, but that´s good because we will learn a lot together.

CLARIFICATION (mom asked him about "whiting out the area" and if he would be the senior companion)
Yes I will be the senior companion, but for example Canastica right now has to sets of elders and they are whiting it out so they are taking out both sets of elders, that´s what whiting out an area means, when you take out all of the missionaries in that area

Elder Edholm -- week 22

Well, I had another good week this week, filled with great opportunities and lots more learning experiences.

We had a ¨harvest¨ or a ¨Mormon Batallion¨ as we like to call them this last Saturday in Cambita which is pretty far away. It´s a pretty rural area, I really like it, it´s right next to the mountains, and it´s just a really calm place. It was my second time going there, the first time I went there we went hiking, and I sent a picture of that I think. But anyway, these Mormon Batallions that we do, we have like one a month or something, and every time they´re in a different area in San Cristóbal. Well what we do is we visit less actives, and share with them, and then invite them to the branch conference or open house or whatever is going that Sunday. I split up and went with Elder Tejada, who lives in my house, and we taught this less active, I really learned a lot.

We first started out by just listening to the guy, and he really opened up to us, he told us about his life, who God is to him, and why he knows the LDS church is true. After that he started crying because he knew that he hadn´t been following the path he should´ve been. We said a prayer after that. But first of all Cambita is this other elder´s area, and he told us to talk about the Sabbath day with him, but after really listening to him Elder Tejada leaned over to me and told me we were gonna change the subject. I really felt the same way. We shared Moroni chapter 10 verse 32. That really testified to me that we teach people, missionary work is all about people. And if you really listen and discern the people´s needs, with the spirit you can teach straight to their heart. That was a great experience for me. 

Teaching with the spirit isn´t hard. You just need to really listen to the person, and with the spirit´s help you can discern their needs.

Well I hope everything is going well with all of you guys. I really hope Eric is doing well too. Tell him that I believe in him, and that he is the smartest 12 year old I know.

I love you guys!

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My sweet Emma!