Especially for Youth!

Well, some pretty cool stuff is starting to go on. It's nice for a change. We've spent the last two fridays teaching at EFY, which is the church's summer youth camp, available through out the states. It's been a really cool experience because when I heard that I was going to being here in Buena Vista for EFY, I'll admit it, I said a little bit of a prayer that there would be a missionary day that we would be involved in. Well, on Elder Confer's last day, we happened to run into one of the administrators. She told us that EFY was doing something new this year. They were cutting out one of the two days of class, and doing a missionary day. They invited us to come for an hour and to teach the kids how to share the gospel with their friends, but not to be overbearing or seem SUPER religious and scare their friends off. It's been awesome. We get to do it again and for the last time on Friday. I'm hopefully going to get a picture with some of the councilors that I've met too.

Also, we're finally starting to teach our investigators a second time. It's good to teach someone, then come back and see that they haven't gotten blasted with Anti from their Baptist preacher or something. I cant stand it when that happens, but I guess its gotta. This is a sweet area, but hopefully things can pick up a little bit more as far as teaching goes. We're getting bored. Haha. We're running out of streets to tract, and we've visited most of the Less Actives and former investigators. I'm really hoping that President doesnt pull us out, but it might need to happen if things dont pick up. :/

I hope all is going well. I cant believe that July is almost over! Gah!!! That means Fletcher goes home soon!!!

Love, Elder Wiederholt
888 Oakwood Rd Ste 310
Charleston, WV 25314

Things are slowing down

Well, like the title suggests, things are really starting to slow down. We're unfortunately not teaching a whole lot, but we're doing our best and staying busy. Elder Weitz and I both go home at the same time, so we're trying really hard not to get trunky and whatnot. Theres a lot of Holler tracting going on, and just trying to find people. The Zone Leaders in our ward are doing great, and are teaching a ton. Apparently everything to do is in the north half of the county. Nevertheless, we're trying to do our best, and working hard.

We all had dinner with a family yesterday. The husband went on his mission forever ago in Montana, and actaully knew where Townsend was. It was awesome talking to him. He started to tear up a bit when Elder Weitz and I told him how the church was doing there. He was proud to know that Townsend was a ward, that there's 2 stakes in Billings, that theres a branch in White Sulpher Springs, and three wards in Helena. It's really crazy. He started to tear up a little bit.

Well, my greenie-breaker went home last wednesday. I miss Elder Kelsch so much, and I dont have his address. Oh well, I will sometime soon.

Love yall!

~Elder Shain C Wiederhlt
888 Oakwood Rd Ste 310
Charleston, WV 25314

storms and pictures!

  

The pictures I'm sending are from a photoshoot that a member did of us this transfer. Transfers are on Wednesday, and I'm staying. My new companion will be Elder Weitz, from Billings, MT, and he came out the same time as me. Elder Confer will be moving to Roanoke North, and working with the family ward there. It's sooooo crazy how fast time is flying now, because it seems just like yesterday that I met Elder Confer, but now hes all growed up and stuff. It's incredible. He's come so far and it's nice to see that he's doing well. He's really excited, and I'm excited for him.

 This week has been really crazy, as was last week. the weather especially has made it hard to work effectfully. That, and all of our investigators have been out of town or just havent been home. hopefully that'll change here soon. I'm looking forward to tearing it up with another really experienced missionary. First time that I've had this opportunity on my mission and havent had any leadership that would take up time as well. We're pretty stoked. We did find this super awesome lady named Pattie. We're really excited for her. We just tracted into her and she really opened up. She's really excited to read the Book of Mormon and she has great hopes that her family will have a unity of Faith one day. We're praying for her!

 

 Also we've been cleaning up our fair share of trees. We've cleaned up well over 20. It's incredible.

Well, sorry its short, but we got a TON to do. I hope you enjoy the pictures!

~Elder Shain C Wiederholt
888 Oakwood Rd Ste 310
charleston, WV 25314

storms like crazy!

 The weather here has been sooooo crazy that I dont even know what to do with myself. A week ago, it was 70's, two days later, it was 90's. the next day, it was 107 at one point while we were tracting(A thermometer on a porch told us) and then that night we had 80mph winds, and crazy lightning and rain. More storms to come baby! We've been doing a lot of service clearing trees. Some of the pictures I'm sending are of trees down in the yard of a member. a couple trees actually fell on their house! It's pretty crazy some of the carnage. We were without power for just a night, but because we're in town, we didnt have to wait on it too long. We stayed the night at another missionary apartment that had power, and we've been good since. We're all good, but be sure to keep the other missionaries in your prayers because theres still several companionships without power or water.

Because of the weather, things have been really slow. We're done our best to go out and work diligently, but we gotta be smart when the temperature is in the 90's, because the humidity takes it into the hundreds, and it stinks! especially having to wear shirt and tie in it. We were still able to teach, but all of our return appointments from our finding efforts last week fell through. :/ We're still working hard though. No worries! We're also still trying to figure out what we're going to buy today that we can actually use in case the power goes out again. We're gonna buy a lot of bread, peanut butter, granola bars, water, and tuna. mashed potatos for a good day. :D


Other pictures! besides the stormy pictures, one of an awesome view that we found when we were tracting in Glasgow. Also, one of the sticker on the back of my tag that I got from the National Day of Prayer last year. It originally just said "I Prayed" but I put the "to know" part on there to say that I prayed to know that these things are true. I thought it was cool I took the picture because its got the red, white and blue on there and thought it would be cool for the 4th coming up. We'll see how that goes. NOTHING IS GOING TO HAPPEN! Gah!

Love yall!

~Elder Wiederholt
888 Oakwood Rd Ste 310
Charleston, WV 25314

tender mercies!

Things are going pretty good. We had a lot of success tlast week, and really witnessed some tender mercies in our finding. It's nice to find people who are actually genuinely interested. AND who know what theyre talking about. It's the best thing in the world to a couple missionaries to meet someone that can legitimately have a religious conversation, without it getting heated. It's awesome! One guy was really cool, because he had a ton of awesome questions, and as he let us answer them, he started to realized that we might be able to answer all his questions. So although we had to get headed, he asked us to come back, and he's apparently excited to have us back, according to his less active mother.

Elder Confer and I are doing awesome. He's such a cool, funny kid, and we love to make jokes as we flex our "muscles" and say "Someone call the vet, because these puppies are SICK!" and other things like that. Hahahaha Everyday is an adventure! We might be parting ways here in 2 weeks, with transfers coming upon us once again. It's crazy how much faster time is flying now that I'm getting to the end of my mission. I dont like it. Also, I found out that my trainer, Chris Moen, is engaged! WHAT?! Apparently he's engaged to a recent convert in Morgantown. Good for him, for sure, and I truly hope to be there for it. Maybe even to take pictures if he lets me. We'll see. Haha

We had a specialized trained a couple weeks ago. It was a really awesome meeting, and President Pitt watched Elder Confer and I teach, and he sent us a letter telling us how awesome he thought we were doing. It really helped me a lot because we're in a tougher area since people are scarce, and people are generally uninterested, so teaching and baptized is scarce too. It's good to know that we're doing good in the sights of President and Christ even if we're not getting the success that we're hoping for.

Well, other than that, everything is just the usual. We're just knocking on doors and doing what we do. Love ya'll!

~Elder Shain C Wiederholt
888 Oakwood Rd Ste 310
Charleston, WV 25314