Sunday, June 25, 2017

June 19, 2017

Dear family and friends,
The past 2 weeks have been interesting, President Mella will be going home soon and we'll be getting a new president next month. So we had our last interviews with President Mella last week and Zone Conference also. Zone Conference was really good and was probably one of my favorite ones since I've been on my mission. They are always really uplifting and a good spiritual recharge. We get a lot of training and talk about what we can improve too so they are pretty productive. The only downside is that they go from like 10 in the morning to 5 in the afternoon. 

Last P day we went and got some Stance socks at the outlet for pretty cheap. They are super nice and comfy socks with some pretty unique designs on them and they are really cool. I got some Warriors ones, a pair with Biggie Smalls on them, and a some that are based on the '92 dream team. So that was a fun little thing to buy. It's a long story, but we also found a foosball table that we put in our apartment to play at night before we go to sleep. So that has been an interesting addition. We have to set an alarm though to make sure we go still to bed on time. This P day we didn't really do much, just the usual grocery shopping. It's been nice to relax though because our past few P days have been pretty busy. This past week went really fast because of meetings and everything, we are just continuing to work with people. We have been able to find a lot of new people interested in listening to us, the biggest problem that we've had is that everyone is too busy to catch at a good time. People have to work a lot to get by in the Bay Area and especially in lower income areas. The Spanish community is really awesome though and they are all such friendly people. Our members always make sure that we are fed and make some pretty dang good food too. 

I feel like my testimony has grown a lot lately and I've also felt like my Spanish has really been coming along too. So things are going well personally and my companion is absolutely great. As missionaries, every Friday we do weekly planning where we plan out our entire upcoming week and it takes about 2 hours and sometimes 3. So, instead of just sitting in the apartment, we go to 7/11 to get drinks and then go drive up to the top of the mountain and do weekly planning up there to turn it into a fun part of the week instead of something long and boring sitting in the apartment. It's a great view from up there and its pretty relaxing. 

But anyways, things are going normally you could say. It hit 100 degrees this week though which I guess is record heat for the bay. We have a mission wide training meeting tomorrow morning for all the missionaries Spanish program tomorrow so that should be really good. The work is moving along and we have been working a lot on the ward members and in ward council. I've been able to learn a lot about how a ward functions as I've served which I'm sure will be of benefit in the future. There are so many things that you learn as a missionary that simply can't be learned from any college, school, institution, or company. My mission so far has taught me a lot about myself, others, the world, and the gospel. I'm really glad to be serving and there is nothing that I would rather be doing. There are things I miss of course, but I wouldn't trade any of it for serving a full time mission. I love the Lord and His hand becomes more evident every day. I hope everyone back home is doing well. Keep sending me emails, I love hearing from everyone. 

From, 
Elder Godwin










Wednesday, June 7, 2017

June 7, 2017

Dear family and friends,

The past few weeks has been good. I didn't have any time to email last week because we went down to Monterey to the aquarium. Unfortunately, the weather wasn't the best so we didn't go down onto the beach but we spent a lot of time at the Aquarium, which was really nice. A lot of members around the mission have season passes to it with free guest passes that they let the missionaries use, which is a nice hook up. When we went down there, we had to go pick up the passes from this members house that lives on pebble beach so that was super sweet. It's probably the most beautiful place that I've ever been. I was wondering how expensive some of those houses were that we were driving by because I'm sure it's insanely expensive. But it was a really cool experience to go down there and it would be a really great vacation spot for the future. 

Today for P day we hiked up Mission Peak which is a mountain in the southeast Bay Area close to where I am serving. I'm not a huge fan of hiking, but my companion and some other people wanted to go so we went. The view at the top was really awesome which I guess makes it worth it. We got up super early to go so it wouldn't be too hot and we wouldn't take up the whole day, so it wasn't too bad. 

So since we went to the aquarium, Elder Mosher and I were inspired to obtain a pet goldfish for our apartment. So we had interviews last week and asked president about it and he said that we could get one lol. So we went and got a little Goldfish and put it on the table between our desks which was a fun addition to the apartment. 

Overall, the work in this area has been moving along.  Unfortunately,




we had to push back the baptismal dates that we had because the family that we've been teaching isn't quite ready yet. They are an amazing family though and still really want to join the church and it's honestly been a miracle to work with them thus far. The people here in the Spanish community are awesome. Elder Mosher and I get along super well and have really enjoyed serving together in this area too. We are starting our 2nd transfer here and hopefully it goes well. Since we had to whitewash the area and start from scratch, it seems like the first transfer here we were setting up a bunch of dominos but now as this next transfer is starting a lot of things are falling into place and the ball is really getting rolling. So I'm excited and am looking forward to how things go, missionary work is a really cool experience and I love it.

Other than that I'm not sure what else to say, the Warriors are killing it though and it's really cool to be right here where all the madness is happening during the finals. Hopefully they win it all, I miss watching NBA playoffs a lot lol. But anyways, I love you guys and hope everyone is doing well. Thanks for the emails and letters, miss you guys.

From, 
Elder Godwin