Elder Edholm -- week 16

Well, I´m still alive. We didn´t have many chances to work this week because my
companion was sick... AGAIN!!!  He gets sick a lot, his immune systom is not the
 greatest, but we have three, almost four baptismal dates, two of them are gonna
 be on my birthday, what a great birthday present right! And my companion´s
 birthday is four days before that, I don´t know if he´ll stay here for his last transfer.

It´s really cool to hear all of the cool stuff you guys are doing now that I´m not at
home anymore, haha.   But it´s just funny to read how you guys said that you 
were cold, and I´ve completely forgot what  cold feels like.

We had an open house at the church on Sunday, and it was really great,
 we had an awesome showing.  Members gave a tour of the church building
 and after we watched meet the mormons.

I hope we can pick the work back up this week, I´ll let you guys know how it turns out!

-Palmer

Jackson/Tetons/Yellowstone weekend

The funeral service for my father-in-law went well on Thursday.  We left early that morning to go to Utah.  We wish we could have stayed a bit longer, but Andy had a football game in Jackson Hole to be at on Friday at 1:00.  So we left early Friday morning to drive up to Jackson.  We had never been there and the drive up through Star Valley was beautiful!  We saw the Star Valley temple under construction, which was really cool.  Western Wyoming is definitely the most beautiful country I have ever been to.

Andy's freshman football game.  They lost 34-0, but the view as we watched the game was amazing!

We stayed and watched the varsity play, they lost as well.  BYU also lost this weekend, so it wasn't a great football weekend!

We didn't want to drive back to Worland Friday night in the dark and hit a deer or other animal, so we decided to stay the night.  We drove up in the mountains a ways and stopped at a RV site.  We had two cars, since Brian had been down in Utah for a week, so we slept in the car and the van.  Apparently it's against the law in Teton county to sleep in a tent, and it's not because of the bears, because they let us sleep out in the open!  Didn't make a lot of sense to me.  Brian and I slept outside, Andy and Peter slept in the little car and Emma, Eric, and Lucy each slept on a bench in the van.  I lay awake until nearly 1:00am!  I was freezing and I kept hearing the Elk bugling to each other which was freaking me out, they sounded so close!  So I finally told Brian I was going to sleep in the van.  I kicked Eric out of the bench and he slept on the floor of the van and I took his bench.  Brian tried to sleep on the drivers side seat for awhile and then moved to the floor in the back of the van.  Needless to say it wasn't the best night's sleep!

Our sleeping quarters

Breakfast

Lucy's many funny faces

We pulled out and decided to drive home the long way through the Tetons and Yellowstone.  I immediately fell in love with the Tetons!  Wow, it's beautiful!  An added bonus was it was one of the "free" days for the national parks and we got into both parks with no charge!

Great picture of Brian and Lucy in Yellowstone

Beautiful falls

One of the craters, the wind was blowing really hard and the steam would engulf you as you walked passed.

Emma at the Old Faithful site with Peter photo bombing!

Peter and Old Faithful

All of us minus Brian who's taking the picture

It was incredibly windy in the park and as we watched Old Faithful go off the wind blew the stinky water straight onto us!  Emma was complaining that we smelled like Thermopolis!

We saw lots and lots of buffalo.  Toward the east entrance of the park as we were leaving there was a mama grizzly and her baby cub!  It was a lovely day!  We made it home in time to catch the last half of the General Women's Meeting.

It was a lot of driving in three days time, but all worth it!

Emma and Senior pictures

Emma had her senior pictures taken tonight.  I snapped a few pictures of the Wonderful Wyoming Wilderness as she was smiling serenely!

This is the Duck Swamp

Making sure everything is just right

I was trying to take Peter's picture, but he was hiding from me!

Gotta love those sugar beet fields

The bunnies were out in full force tonight!

Peter's patience was wearing thin

Looking out past the Duck Swamp

Clouds over the church

Bees and flowers

Colors!

Lucy and volleyball

Lucy loves playing volleyball!  Here she is serving in the game she played last night.

She also loves being in front of the camera and being silly:

Elder Edholm -- week 15

Well we went to the beach today as a zone and there was literally nobody there. We are allowed to put our feet in the water, but that was it. It was pretty fun, and hot. The sand just feels like hot coals in the sun.

But anyway, my mission president called me about grandpa´s death, he asked me if I wanted to call you guys. I told him I´d be fine. I hope that doesn´t offend you guys. I just didn´t want it to distract me too much. Although I was really sad about grandpa´s death, I knew the best way to cheer me up was to get back to work. And it did cheer me up a lot.

That family that I told you about last week is doing really great. Those are probably the most well behaved kids I´ve ever seen. The boy is 10 his name is Cesor, the girl is 9 her name is valori, they also have like a 1 year old whose name is Rosie. Cesor offered to polish our shoes for us the last time we went over there just because he likes us and he likes to polish shoes. They both are really excited and want to get baptized. Cesor said he was %110 sure he wanted to get baptized and he said he wants to serve a mission too.

I´m glad you guys got the letter, and liked that story.

-Elder Edholm

My Father-in-law

Brian's father passed away on Wednesday.  Brian is already in Utah helping his sister with the funeral details.  He had been recently diagnosed with colon cancer and also had Parkinson's.  He was 85.  He left a great work ethic in his children and a wonderful sense of humor. He will be missed.  Here is the obituary:

Our beloved father, grandfather, and great-grandfather, Bill Ronald Edholm, 85, passed away September 16, 2015 from the effects of Parkinson’s disease and following surgery to treat colon cancer. Bill was born March 23, 1930 to Olaf Selving Eugene Edholm and Eva Theresa Erickson in Lewiston, Idaho. After graduating from Clarkston (Washington) High School in 1948, he served in the U.S. Navy 1948-1949. He graduated from Eastern Washington University in Industrial Arts Education in 1955. Bill married Constance Faun Palmer August 12, 1957 (later divorced) and had seven children. He was the general manager of Camsco Mushroom Farms, a subsidiary of Campbell Soup Company for 25 years in Fennville, MI, West Chicago, IL, Hillsboro, TX, and Dublin, GA. Bill was a faithful member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and fulfilled many callings following his baptism in 1964.

He is survived by his children: Bridgette (Lee) Fife, Moreland, ID; Blythe (Douglas) Gunson, Matthews, NC; Brenda (Scott) Horne, Orem, UT; Brian (Julie) Edholm, Worland, WY; Brady Edholm, Arlington, VA; Barry (Rebecca) Edholm, Mesa, AZ; and Ben Edholm, Corpus Christi, TX, and by his 37 grandchildren, 18 great-grandchildren, and many nieces and nephews. He was preceded in death by his parents, brother Robert Edholm, and sisters Grace Powell, Doris Burns, Shirley Nissen, and infant sister Marilyn.

Please join Bill’s family and friends in remembrance of him at a graveside service held on Thursday, September 24, 2015 at 3:00 p.m. at Orem City Cemetery, 1520 N 800 E, Orem, Utah. A viewing will be held from 1:30 – 2:30 p.m. at Sundberg Olpin Mortuary, 495 S State St., Orem.

Emma and Andy

Andy is #88.  He has yellow shoes, which makes it really easy to find him on the field.

Andy is on the second row on the far left next to the girl.

Emma and her flag girls!  She's becoming quite the cowgirl with that hat!

Emma and one of her besties, Emrie

I love this face Emma!

Snail Mail Letter from Elder Edholm

Dear Family,

So a funny story that happened a while ago.  We contacted this house late at night and this old lady answered the door and we got in the house.  This lady looked like she was 70 or 80.  We started talking to her and she said that she lived there with her MOM!  I couldn't believe it, an 80 year old lady, and her mom's still alive and living with her!  Obviously Elder Campbell couldn't believe it either so he invited her to invite her in to share with us.  Then she yelled, "Mama!"  a couple of times.  Then I heard this deep growling that literally sounded like a zombie and the oldest woman I've ever seen trudged out of that room.  I couldn't believe it.

Anyway I'm also sending you guys a 20 Peso bill so you can see what Pesos look like.  20 Pesos isn't very much money at all.  45 Pesos equals a dollar.  But you can buy a lot with 20 Pesos here.  They have Colmados which are basically just like run down convenient stores, all over the place and you can buy a half liter of pop for 15 Pesos.  

Well I hope you guys are enjoying your air conditioned house and school is going well for everyone else.  Everything's going great out here.  Spanish is going really well, I'm not fluent yet, but I'm getting there.  Anyway, I'll talk to you guys later, I miss all of you, but not too much because I'm usually pretty focused on the work.

Love Elder Edholm

Cross Country Race

Eric ran today at the Lander Valley Cross Country Invitational.  Lander is about 2 hours south of us.  I drove down and watched him run.  He did great!  It was a hard course with lots of hills and he hung in there and finished strong!

View of the course

It was a lovely day for a run

This is pre-race.  Tanner Stott is in our ward and is on the left.  In the background is Simon Dalebout, he is in the 3rd ward.  Great group of boys.

Here are some videos of the race:

The start of the race

Lucy and Volleyball

Lucy had her first rec volleyball game yesterday.  This is her second year playing and she has really improved!  She has a lot of fun with the other girls on her team.

Getting ready for the game

And it's over the net!  Lucy finishing her serve.

Time out for a water break!

Her team played four games and won 2 and lost 2.

Elder Edholm -- week 14

Well I gave a talk in Sunday yesterday, and I thought it went pretty well despite the fact that I had to cut it pretty short. I talked about all the scriptures I had been finding that talk about putting your trust in the Lord, and in man. The first scripture I found that talked about it was in 2 Nephi 4:34 but then I just found more and more throughout the scriptures so I thought I would talk about that because I know I found those scriptures for a reason.

Also we finally had an investigator go to church. Her name is Norma De La Rosa, we went to pick her up (past couple of times we did that she wasn´t ready but said she would come later, but never did) but she was already walking there. We had just taught her about tithing a few days earlier and after sacrament meeting she understood that tithing is a commandment so she wanted to pay her tithing, and she did. I thought that was amazing. Our bishop also did a really great job making her feel welcome and was very appreciative to her for her donation. Some other members always do a great job at helping out with investigators.

That´s awesome to hear that Eric ran his first cross country race, and everything else too.

Football & Cross Country

Worland Sports Season is upon us!

Freshman football team played Torrington yesterday.  Andy was the quarterback and did a great job.  Worland lost, but Andy threw a pass for the only touchdown they got.

The varsity team also lost, but improved a lot in the second half.  Emma was there with her flag friends.

They are SOOO cute!

Eric had his first cross country meet in Sheridan.  Brian, Lucy, and I drove to see him run.  He did great for his first ever race.  The middle schoolers run a 3K and he had a time of about 14:50.  I was so proud of him!  Here are a few videos I took:

This is the start of the race, you can't see Eric, but he's in the pack somewhere!  There were a lot of schools represented.

Here he comes!  He looked really good!

Emma also took the ACT test today in Greybull.  We dropped her off and then went up over the mountain to Sheridan.  It was a beautiful drive, even though it took us a bit longer than if we would have left from Worland.  We watched Eric then got back in the car for our 2 hour ride back to Greybull to pick up Emma.  We almost ran over a band of wild turkeys on the way up the mountain and saw a deer right next to the road as well.  Great way to spend a Saturday!

Elder Edholm -- week 13

Well we went to the temple today and I did my first session in Spanish, I could understand what was going on in the session the whole time, but the last part was pretty difficult. But I got to see one of my favorite teachers from the MTC.

We have started working in this one area that is like a mile away from our house that missionaries haven´t worked in in forever. This one less active girl found us and we went to go visit her the next day. She´s super awesome and she has two kids that haven´t been baptized and her husband too. She said she stopped coming to church because she moved out there and she didn´t feel safe walking to church through busy streets with her little kids, but we found a member to give them a ride. They´re an awesome family, and people have been telling me this whole time that I would find people that have been prepared by the Lord for me to teach them. I know this family has been prepared by the Lord.

People do the craziest things during prayers here. It´s pretty regular for you to start praying and the whole time they just start whispering gracias and amen under their breath. The other day we asked this old lady to pray and she stood up and held up her right hand and started to pray. It´s all just pretty strange, but makes me laugh at the same stime.

´Till next week

-Elder Edholm

Cross Country season

Eric has joined the Worland Middle School Cross Country team!  I'm so excited for him to have this experience and I love going to cross county meets!  Here is the school picture. He is on the front row on the far left:

Homestead -- Midway Utah -- Jorgensen Family Reunion

This Labor Day weekend was our annual Jorgensen family reunion at The Homestead in Midway Utah.  This is our 7th year there.  It's a pretty small as far as reunions go, 13 people this year.  It consists of my parent's immediate family -- My mom, my sister and her husband, Brian, me, Audrey, Lauren & Matt, Emma, Andy, Eric, Lucy, and Peter.  We had everyone there this year except Palmer.  It seems we have someone missing each year, Audrey hasn't been able to come for the last two years, so it was great to have her there this year.

Lucy was the most willing to get her picture taken!

This is on top of the crater

Playing pool, Brian, Andy, Lauren, and Matt

Andy in action with Peter, Eric, and Matt watching

Andy shooting, Lauren, Emma, Peter, Eric, and Matt

Lucy playing ping pong with me

Best part of vacation is just relaxing!

The weather was a beautiful and we had a really nice time.  We had a special evening honoring my mom and I even found out things I didn't know about her!

Our time there ended on Sunday afternoon.  We went to church in Midway and because it was Swiss Days there the church was incredibly crowded.  Standing room only -- Brian and Andy stood the whole time, Brian counted and estimated there were over 1000 people  in sacrament meeting.  The passing of the sacrament took almost the entire meeting.  It was very cool to see that many people attend church.

Our original plan was to leave from Midway on Sunday and drive up through Jackson, camp somewhere and then head back to Worland.  No one wanted to do that, so we had a picnic in Midway with Audrey and Lauren and Matt and then said goodbye to them and drove all the way back to Worland.  It was so good to see my family!