mom and family,

its a good thing we are emailing late today because i cant stay on forever. i only get an hour and we have to reserve computers at the library and we usually go at 11.  well nothing much happend this week. it was a little slow. but it is what it is. so when did the cat have kittens? i dont remember. freakshow looks kinda funny! that is crazy about the phone going down. what happend? this transfer is half way over!!! time is just flying!! the next thing i know im going to be done. we dont have very many investigators but we do have a few. we havent really met with them much because they are busy and so are we. but hopefully we will meet with them soon. so how is the perry plan working for you? you should give it a try and see what happens. hope all is well

love elder Woodard

dad,

ya i have heard of the im a mormon ads. they are pretty cool. you should watch some of them and mormon messages too on lds.org. they are pretty sweet. we usually share mormon messages with members when we teach them. the time is deffinately going fast. its already been 4 months and this transfer is already half way over! pretty soon i will be home. the investigators from sparwood arent baptized yet but they have a date and are going to be baptized on september 10. im excited for them. i just wish i could be there for it. oh well. we dont have very many investigators here. its hard to get the members motivated to do missionary work here. and most of the ward is above 70 years old!!! there are soo many old people in the 2 wards i cover. just remember to invite your friends and to feed the missionaries when you can. their(our) budget doesnt give us enough money for food for 3 meals a day for a month. im sure that you can set up an appointment for dinner when you get home. well i hope all is well.

love, elder woodard

mom and family,

     well we have the same thing. we are always challenging the members to invite your friends. and president wants us to get 20 lessons every week. and the lessons aren’t just investigator lessons. they are member lessons and less active lessons. missionary work has changed soooooo much since you and dad have gone. we invite them to be baptized in every lesson even on the first. and they really stress the importance of the members in the work. they don’t really want us to find investigators. they want the members to do it for us. they want them to invite their friends. the members find and we teach. oh and i think we got 20 lessons last week

      yesterday we had mission tour. elder baxter from the 70(i think the first quorum) came and he was the general authority there. we all got to go up and meet him and his wife and shake his hand. it was really cool. he gave us  training on the importance of members in missionary work. he said that investigators are more likely to convert and have a lasting conversion if the members are involved. he told his conversion story of him and his family. the missionaries that taught him brought a fellow shipper that was good for his family. and the member invited them to church and to sit with them. he told us that it is more powerful for the members to invite their friends to do stuff rather than the missionaries. he also talked about consecrating ourselves and loosing ourselves in the work. it was a really good experience. he was asking us questions and what we thought rather than him just teaching us. it was really cool to talk with a general authority,  i hope everything is well and the weather cools down!

love elder woodard

dad,

that is sooooo cool that tanner is doing that!!! when i was in b.c. we saw eagles and hawks and big birds like that all the time. we had 5 pet osprey. well... they had a nest on a power line next to the elk river. but we claimed them as ours and always honked as we drove by and they would always look at us and sometimes be on top of the nest and spread their wings. it was really cool.

     oh the arizona heat. i don’t miss it that much. it was about 32 yesterday which was really warm!! but that’s the hottest i have seen it.  that is crazy that emily is going to start driving. what are you going to do about vehicles? i hope she doesn’t get a brand new car!!!!! but if she does i guess i will be alright with it... in ten years! hahaha .........

love elder woodard

August 15, 2011

dad,

well lethbridge is... different. there are no mountains here which is a bummer. but the city is a lot bigger than sparwood. there are about 80,000 people here. there is about 20 missionaries in the lethbridge zone. the temple is in cardston which is about 45 minutes away. my companion is elder biehn (bean) he is from bountiful utah and has been out for 21 months. so he is about to go home. we are getting along just find. we have pretty much the same personality. its fun serving with him. we cover 2 wards of about 150 each that were there on sunday. maybe a little bit more. its like 5 times bigger than sparwood. the city is pretty cool. its on the prairie. there are hardly any driveways. just back alleys. and there are lots of trees by the houses that give shade. its kinda like new york a little except not as humid. that was good of mom to invite them over to the house. you should invite them to take the discussions in the home as well. if they say no at least you gave them the opportunity to learn more. they still have their agency if they wanna learn more. remember that you are always a missionary. even if you aren't preaching. people are always watching.

hope everything works out

love

elder woodard

August 15, 2011

mom and kids and everybody else!!!!

well lethbridge is nice. it reminds me of new york except not as humid. its been pretty cool here its been about 25/27 which is great weather. that is cool that hayden made the baseball team. keep working hard!!!! and that emily  made the show. i have a letter for emily.... but i havent sent it yet cause i have not made it to the post office:)  that talk from president utchdorf about hope is a good one. we have the mormon messages on dvd and share them sometimes with members for member lessons. and than talk about the message. that one on hope is one of my favorites. you should watch president eyrings "choose this day" you can watch them on lds.org. no you didnt tell me that eben was going to ohio!!!! that is sweet for him to go!!!!!!! what else is going on that you havent told me eh??? well we email at the library now so i dont have as much time as i did in sparwood. but im glad everything is going well!

love elder woodard

August 9, 2011

Dear Family,

Well I'm going to Lethbridge tomorrow. I'm kinda bummed. hunting season is about to open out here. hmmmm now that I think about it maybe that's why I'm getting transferred. oh well. and great things are about to happen out here!!!!!!! There should be about 5 baptisms this next transfer in Sparwood. I'm really sad to leave this area. the people here are amazing. and I just love the mountains and area!!!!  I guess I will be able to get the pictures and stuff to you.  well I gotta go pack. Hope everyone is alright.

love elder woodard

August 1, 2011

 July went by really fast. these past 3 months have gone by fast. I'm finally starting to get in the groove of things. me and elder Harris got to speak yesterday as well. i spoke on missionary work and the importance of members in that. it was really good. i almost passed out towards the end of my talk. I'm not really sure why though. my companion was in the shower this morning and we got a knock on the door. i guess the drain in our tub broke or something. but water was coming through the roof and was starting to flood their apartment! it was nuts! so the land lord called a plumber and they are going to come tomorrow and fix it. that is really sad for that family. do you know who the family was? i have learned that home teaching and that missionary work is very important. well i hope everything is going great back home.

love

elder woodard

August 1, 2011

mom and family

       It hasn't been too hot here. The hottest its been is about 30 (which is 92 Fahrenheit). It's not too bad. I can deal with it. I wish I could have gone to the lake with Hayden. I love going to the lake! I got ran over by a trailer on Saturday. but I'm all right. We were helping members on their farm put the hay onto the trailer and my foot got a little too close to the tires and it got ran over. but don't worry I am fine and nothing is broken. It doesn't even hurt. That's crazy that school is starting. Kids here still have like another month before they go back, but they got out the end of June or so. that's good that you got Ema back. is she getting into the terrible 2 stage yet. just remember. just keep swimming just keep swimming swimming swimming. Things are going good here. I hit 3 months last Wednesday and August 10 is transfers! I am pretty sure that I am staying here another one (and hopefully 2!!) We had an investigator come to church yesterday!!! He called us about 8 o'clock (church starts at 10) and said he couldn't make it. but than he showed up!!!! We were really excited about that. Me and my companion got to speak yesterday. Towards the end of my talk I started getting really hot and sweaty, and i felt like i was about to pass out. But I am doing lots better today. Nothing much is going on. Lots of people are gone for the summer. Things have slowed way down. I'm not looking forward to the snow!!!  So how are things going at home and in the rest of the great state of Arizona? (which i miss AZ a lot)

love elder woodard