Kinghood

Hey friends and family! :)

I hope things are well and stuff. The usual ;)

Anyways, let's get riiiiiight into the week!

Me in the rafters with the roaches

On Tuesday we did service for a guy in our ward. He lives in a garage and he's a hoarder... he has everything he's ever got stashed in banana boxes. On his contact in our phone he's called "Don't answer, only wants service."... haha but Elder Wolfgramm answered it anyways. Classic :p so we did service for him rearranging his boxes for about 4 hours. He had me crawl up in the rafters of his garage and there were so many roaches... but, we were doing service so blessings right? ;)

Wednesday we went to mutual and we made lightsabers! Haha we made lightsaber out of pvc pipe and foam and duct tape. Haha it was super fun and we got to listen to Star Wars music the whole time so pretty much it was the best day of my mission ;) haha On the bike ride home Elder Wolfgramm and I were going full speed and dueling back and forth in the dark on our bikes, Anakin and Obi Wan episode 3 style ;p haha it was super fun.

Anyways, I had a pretty cool experience this week. It wasn't big, but it's what I needed. So we are working with this less active family. The wife has been excommunicated and they haven't been to church in 4 years. Ever since I got here we've been trying to get in with them but they haven't been up to it. Randomly a little while ago, they texted us saying they wanted to meet! So we went over once just to meet them and then set up a return appointment for Friday afternoon. When we first got there, it was just the husband because she was still driving back from work. We talked to him for a while and he really opened up. He expressed desires of returning to church but he felt like a hypocrite. Which is understandable in his situation. The wife showed up and we talked for a bit and then started a lesson on prayer. We were all super open with each other. I asked her when a time a prayer of hers had been answered. She thought for a second and then said, "Right now." She told us for four days she hadn't had any alcohol, and by us bringing the spirit into their home it was an answer to her prayer. She was in tears and the spirit was so so strong. I bore our testimony on prayer and the big picture. We all felt the spirit and she thanked us graciously for being missionaries and always being there for them even when they didn’t accept. She said she knew it must be hard but she was so thankful that we kept trying. I needed this experience. It’s moments like those that make all the extremely hard times worth it. I love being a missionary and the experiences this gospel brings.

Charles

We had an Easter ward breakfast with an egg hunt for the Primary Saturday morning. Haha they had us there at free breakfast ;)

Sunday was the mission president fireside. They had a convert from our ward speak :) Her parents were there and it was the first time they heard her conversion story so it went really well :) I also said the closing prayer, again ;p I might just do it every time...

Anyways, that's about my week. I'd like you all to know that most the time I was writing this, I had a small green anole lizard in my hand sleeping ;) His name is Charles.

The firstborn of Kinghood

I love my district right now. We named ourselves the firstborn of Kinghood. Haha we have a lot of fun and we all get along super well :)

I love you all! Thanks for everything you do for me! Have an amazing week! :)

Love,
Elder Wood

Original classic rock records a less active had.  I was in heaven!

Keep on keeping on

Hey friends and family! :)

First off, thanks for all your emails and support! It makes all the difference and I appreciate it a ton :)

Next, I guess I’ll talk about my week a little ;)

Doing service on exchanges

So this week, I don't have my journal with me so I'm gonna try to remember as much as possible off the top of my head :p On Tuesday, we had zone conference. That went pretty good! It's always super fun to see the missionaries you know and connect with all your new friends. I've gotten super close to some of them and it's a real good time :) We played the name game for a segment of it and it got super competitive! Haha I was one of the last leaders and then one of the senior couples guessed I was Freddy Mercury....

I went on exchanges this week with Elder Abbott, my district leader :) That was a lot of fun. We biked down to Porter because Elder Abbott doesn't have any poor sections in his area so he wanted to go. We talked to a less active named Red Dry. Haha he's super nice and he and Abbott got along super well. He promised he would come back to church but he didnt... RIP.

We had dinner with the Lane family. They are probably one of my favorite families here. The kids have lived in Kingwood their whole life and we started talking about what we wanted to do after the mission. While I was talking I showed them a picture of the ocean in Hawaii and the daughters started crying because they have never seen pretty blue ocean water cause the water in Galveston is super dirty... Haha so now all the kids are obsessed with Hawaii.

I think one of the highlights of my week was we were knocking some less actives and as were walking down the street this 40 year old man in a baby blue minivan comes cruising down the street going 30 miles per hour over the speed bumps in the street blasting Nickelback as high as his speakers went. Just so classic. That's an image I'll never forget XD

My fly suit I want

Today we went to Burlington and that’s like the best store. They have dope clothes and they are all super cheap. I so wanted to get this super slick blazer but I decided not to last second cause I couldn't wear it while doing work... but I looked fly. ;)

This week I've studied a ton about faith and prayer. That’s helped me realize everything is determined by your faith and reliability on the Lord. If you want anything to go right in your life, you need to humble yourself and realize you can't do anything without the Lord.

Well, I love you all so, so much! Keep on keeping on :)

Love,
Elder Wood

The best Mexican place.  Good food, good music, and good friends.

Unfortunate fate for the lizard

Pretty cat I found

Another Monday...another email.....

Hey friends and family!

Oh man, here we are again. Another Monday... Another email... And again, nothing to write about :p

Note from mom: Maybe you could write about why there is fish in this doorway.....

This week was good! Kinda slow but we worked super hard so hopefully soon things will start coming from our work! :)

Monday the Orange zone leaders came down to stay with us before MLC the next morning. Elder Latu is Polynesian and he is super hilarious. Haha something about that culture, they're always happy and just good people.

We did service for a family and put mulch in their flower beds. That went well! I caught a snake and didn't get bitten so that’s always a plus ;)

Porter Pass.....more like Porter River!

This week I've been studying the gospels more and read through Peter and James. It's really interesting to put together the pieces and see how they were preaching the exact same thing that's in the Book of Mormon and in latter-day revelation. Haha except back then in the New Testament, they didn’t really care about offending people so they say some things pretty harshly but it's the truth! Haha it's awesome.

Elder Wolfgramm and I are getting along super well, haha, the other day we were biking and we found a bamboo forest! I got some and took it home and made a flute! I'm not gonna lie, it's dope. And it works :) haha oh man...

I never know what to write... I’m doing well and I’m alive! I got bitten by a medium sized dog in Porter this week and I wanted so badly to stomp its head into the ground, but I didn't! So, I'm sure Jesus is proud of me for that ;)

One thing I learned, is sometimes, when it’s raining outside, you have to take time to sit on your porch and eat a grapefruit while you listen to the tropical rain. It's just for fun ;)

Love you all! Thanks for everything!

Love,
Elder Wood

Best pancake!!

Chogching

Hey friends and family!

Nowadays, it seems the days all mesh together and I don't even know what week it is. :p

We've been working super hard since Elder Wolfgramm has been here. He's been out for 20 months so he's got some experience and he's a really good missionary. I forgot how sore you can get from biking all day because we had a car for a while with Elder Sheppard’s injury ;p

We went and saw these less actives, or so we thought. Turns out they've just been in China for a while. They fed us chogching which is pretty much ramen noodles on steroids. It's probably the second hottest thing I've ever eaten in my life... But it was still super good! Haha Elder Wolfgramm was sweating gallons of water while he was eating it :p haha It was so funny.

Other than that, Craig has decided as of now to get baptized when he gets married. So probably in a few months. We will continue to work with him, but as of now, he's decided to wait.

I love it here in Kingwood! Something I've been studying lately is Christ’s atonement. It truly does have power and through it, there is hope for everything to be done.

I love you all and I hope this week goes well for you!

Love,
Elder Wood

A "large" pizza a member got for us

6 Months! And transfers

Elder Wood and Elder Sheppard at transfers

I'm staying in Kingwood! Elder Sheppard is off to be a DL in Huffman. I'm getting Elder Wolfgramm. He's super cool. He was born in Hawaii and raised in Canada. He's super nice, I spent some time with him during Harvey clean up and I'm really excited for this transfer.

Because of transfers, I don't have much time this week. So sorry in advance :p

This week we finally got a Tiwi in our car because we didn't have one before since it was going to be retired until Elder Sheppard hurt his ankle. So, we had to be real missionaries finally... Haha ;)

We had dinner with the B* family and their dad didn't show up so we couldn't go inside. Haha they set up a table right outside their door and they brought the food to us outside :p then I played 3 on 1 with their kids at basketball and even though they were kids, I don't take an L. (*a loss)

C* came to institute this week so that was good. I'm really hoping he will realize how good being baptized will be for him.

At district meeting President Hewlett surprised us by showing up! It went super good and then he took us to Chick-fil-a after! So we are pretty much his favorites ;)

We also did the classic burn ties thing for 6 month so that was pretty fun :)

Anyways, that was my week in a nutshell. I'm thankful for all your support and love!

Love,
Elder Wood