Spring arrives this week

Time is moving by pretty quickly here it seems, I've been here for two months but it seems like just a few days. Me and Elder Hemsley just get along super well.

It is starting to get warmer here and the rain is coming down more often and a lot stronger. Apparently there was some sort of mix up and I was supposed to be senior companion but we didn't find out until this week and now we are equal companions, nobody makes the decisions and we switch off driving.

We're using Facebook more effectively but I haven't gotten around to posting anything recently. I'll work on that.

I am glad to be out here, the church knows how to take care of its people and The Lord does too.

Elder Willard

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Community Event

This week moved by pretty quickly. We’re working hard and seeing success. I don't know how it works but it seems we always find someone to teach no matter how many times missionaries have knocked on a door. There was a big community event here over the weekend that involved a lot of barbecue near a lake. There must have been 10,000 people there for the event and there were all sorts of games and booths and rides. We met some people from Elder Hemsley's last area which was a YSA ward and they paid for our admission and they bought us some ribs! The best part was we gave them like 30 pass-along cards and they handed them all out for us! Super cool people and one of them was a Disney princess who worked at one of the parks!

I snapped the wrist band for my old watch so I bought a new one today and took an awesome nap. Thanks so much for the Seahawks shirt by the way! I’ve been wearing it at every available opportunity. Sometimes I think about some of the missionaries that go home for medical or some other reason and don't come back and I just think that's crazy, that thought just never occurred to me and I am grateful that I had all of my family's support to get back out here. Thanks so much guys!

Elder Willard

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Getting cold

Salutations from the sunshine state! It was relatively cold this last week with a low of 45. The tracting goes on and iPads are just annoying. Not to sound ungrateful but it is slow as a herd of turtles here.

My new companion is an elder with whom I have had some experience. Elder Hemsley is from Idaho Falls and he is a professional ballroom dancer, very good actually, and he is only a little bit shorter than me. He's a middle child like me so we get along pretty well.

We are having fun and getting the work done here. We're teaching an 11-year-old kid and he has already come to church twice so it should be great.

I still don't get to drive but I know the area pretty well and we are moving right along.

Elder Willard

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Fort Lauderdale temple opening soon

Glad to hear everyone is doing well, those poor kids all alone with only their common sense to guide them...

Things are interesting here to say the least. We have had some awesome progress with one of our investigators who is the only member of his family not a member. He had never been to church but we have been visiting his family with the elder's quorum president, who is a stud by the way, and we were able to do some good old manual labor in tree trimming. We had him come on a temple tour with us that Afternoon and he came with us to church the following day.

Another investigator has been praying about a baptismal date and April 19th kept popping into his head. He didn't know at the time that that's the scheduled date for the ward to go to the Fort Lauderdale temple open house. So now we'll be baptizing him at 6 in the morning and then driving him down to the temple on that same day. Should be sweet.

I wasn't transferred so both of my companions are leaving and I am staying here in Clermont. Honestly, I'm a little scared of having to carry an area but this ward is so solid and all the members are missionary minded that I think It will all work out. Thanks for the news about the home ward, that bishopric is going to be awesome, I hope they stick around until I get back.

Best wishes,

Elder Willard

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Valentine's Day

Hey! I was caught in a torrential rainstorm on a bike! My Spanish is getting better and we learned that my Coloradoan companion is being sent to the São Paulo MTC for a refresher on the language before he heads to his mission. I'm getting really into tie trading here and I think I will probably have quite the collection when I return. It has been frigidly cold here and I always wake up cold. There is something wrong with the heating that is making it sap much more energy so we can't use it.

We were able to visit the temple on valentine's day and that was amazing but the Florida temple isn't quite as cool as the Seattle I think. I went home teaching for the first time yesterday to some really cool families in the ward. I went with their home teacher and left my companions for about a little while which was weird. Things are going well down here and I hope the snow in Hawaii melts before you get there.

Rather shocking, but it has been cold for the last couple of days here. Of course, cold means the lowest it gets is 55 and you make sure to turn the heat on but that's about it. We had a ward campout and everyone got really close to the fire. As it turns out missionaries in the states care a lot more about ties than normal people or other missionaries so my collection has expanded greatly.

Because I have an ipad now I was debating sending certain study materials home such as preach my gospel and my quad to save room.

Elder Willard

A picture from Christmas

New iPad Minis

Hey, so earlier in the week we got ipad minis. They are pretty sweet and I just bought a little keyboard for mine that is made of rubber and rolls up for storage. $20 is not bad, right? I think I need to buy a new watch, the band is breaking on this one I’ve had for 2 years. It's been a kind of weird week, lots of new tools that aren't really effective yet and it is a struggle to plan.

I am finding lots of ways that the ipads can be used for evil and that the gospel library is pretty sweet. We saw Elder L Tom Perry on Saturday as he was talking to all the ward councils in the area. He is super enthusiastic and he is 92! He ran up the stairs, pounded his fist on the pulpit, and was cracking jokes the whole meeting. We just got to watch the broadcast though and we didn't get to ask questions.

We met some great people and had some excellent food and all is well here in florida. I hope Howard is doing okay at home and he isn't worrying too much about everyone's salvation. You guys better do family home evening tonight! Every little bit counts!

Hope everyone is well,

Eder Willard

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