I'm Elder "End-ree"

This week we had a stake conference for one of the two stakes that we cover. Elder Baxter of the seventy came and spoke. He was hilarious. He is Scottish and has a very thick accent. He would say things that were hilarious and then not even crack a smile which made it even better. He did an adult session on Saturday night which was really great, then the Sunday session turned into mostly calling random people up to bear testimonies. It was good, though. I got my picture with him.

Elder Hendrix with Elder Baxter of the Seventy

We did some service in which we helped a woman clean her house. After which, I split off and went with Brother Allred, a ward mission leader, that each week puts his lawn tools in his truck and drives around and mows lawns for anyone in the STAKE that may be in need. For example, one was a family with a parent in the hospital, another had a father with a broken leg, etc. This ward mission leader ALSO has a full time job that he does this service around. What an awesome example of service and of missionary work!

All the spanish speaking people here pronounce my name funny. The letters "h" and "x" are not really pronounced in Spanish, so it sounds like "end-ree" and I've apparently gotten used to it because someone pointed out that I started introducing myself to people as Elder "endree" instead of Hendrix. 

Feel free to send me a letter!

Elder Hendrix

1108 W Sanetta

Nampa, ID 83651

Have a great week!

Elder Hendrix

Week 14: Now we are a trio

On Tuesday we got a call that we were going to be taking another missionary and becoming a trio. His name is Elder Morrow and he is from Utah. He spent 6 weeks in the MTC learning Dutch so that he can serve in Belgium/the Netherlands, but his visa didn't come through, so he'll be with us until it does. It's kind of difficult for him because he knows no Spanish at all, but he's doing okay.

Transfers were this week, I didn't get transferred and neither did my companion. 

I've been praying for help with my Spanish... This week, a missionary named Elder Homer got transferred into our zone. He is Spanish speaking as well, and he has spent a lot of time over the last week helping me with my Spanish which was awesome! He helped me study Spanish for most of the day on Saturday while my companion went to a district leader training. That night, I went to visit an inactive family and I understood EVERY word they said and I talked to them for about an hour, almost entirely by myself, because of what I had learned from Elder Homer! We connected really well and we talked about Mexican culture and how colorful everything in Mexico is, just like my socks. Then, the next day, THEY CAME TO CHURCH!

Unfortunately, our president made an announcement this week that we can no longer wear suspenders or crazy socks... so no more of that.

That's all that happened this week!

Please send me some mail!

Elder Hendrix

1008 W Sanetta

Nampa, ID 83651

Have a great week!

Elder Hendrix

Week 13: The big fire

This was a pretty slow week. Not a lot happened...

There is a large fire that is burning over here. It's about 20 miles from me. The buildings and trees that are difficult to see in the picture are only a quarter mile away from us. The smoke is even more dense than it looks in that picture. We had a few companionships get evacuated, but I believe that they have all been able to return to their homes as the fire passed by or changed direction. 

That is basically the highlight from my week. We have a LOT of parties with the members of the spanish ward. It's crazy! I think we had 3 just last week. A two year old had a birthday party and they had a few hundred people there! It's basically everyone on the ward list plus their families! It's funny because we only get about 30 people for sacrament.

That's all that happened this week!

I need some good ideas for suggestions or programs to get the members into missionary work! I am putting some flyers in the programs next week for all 6 of my English wards with pictures of the missionaries (English and Spanish) that cover their ward. I would like to put a list of simple ideas of how they can be "member missionaries."

Also, I am working with the Stake Young Men's and Women's presidencies to try and get the youth more involved with missionary work, so if anyone has seen or has any ideas for activities or programs that would help in that regard, please let me know!

I really enjoy receiving those handwritten letters:

Elder Hendrix

1008 W Sanetta

Nampa, ID 83651

Have a great week!

Elder Hendrix

Week 12: A painted fence and flat tires

This week not much happened. We taught Oscar and Migueli the last of the lessons.

Yesterday my companion and I did a split with another companionship. That way he could go to the spanish ward and I could go to one of our 6 other wards. It turns out that the ward I went to was having ward conference that day. As the third hour approached, I felt that we needed to attend the combined young womens and young mens class. So, we did. The stake young women's presidency taught the first 20 minutes or so, leaving about 30 minutes for the stake president's councilor to speak. He walked up and said, "Elders, please come up here." So we walked up to the front and he asked what one piece of advice we would give that group. Then someone had a question, then he had a few more questions and we ended up being the entire lesson. We sat down and he closed with his testimony saying that he had an entire lesson planned but that he felt that he needed to have us speak instead and that he now knew that that is what he was supposed to do. It was really good, but I had a feeling that was going to happen.

The only other thing that happened last week...

We picked up another pair of elders and went to help the sisters to paint a fence for one of their investigators, Chuy, while he was at work. We spent a few hours painting, until we ran out of paint, then everyone left. We had to park about two houses down. As we walked to the car, the owner of the house we parked in front of angrily asked why I parked in front of his house. Apparently we had a metal box in his front yard that had a small for sale sign on it and when we parked, we were blocking that... So, I apologized, we were getting in the car and one of the other missionaries pointed out that we had two flat tires... My companion decided we would drive on them anyway. We drove about 6 feet and he changed his mind. 

We called a local company to come and air up our tires. We waited for about an hour when this gentlemen's neighbor came out to make sure we were okay. None of these people are members. She explained that she saw him let the air out of our tires and called the cops. She also had some other descriptive words to say that I will keep to myself.

Anyway, we continued waiting another hour or so for our car to get fixed, and then the investigator who's fence we were painting came home and he aired up our tires.

Please send me some letters!

Elder Hendrix

1008 W Sanetta

Nampa, ID 83651

Thank you for your continued support!

Elder Hendrix

Week 11: The Ramirez kids got baptized!

This week was slow until Saturday.

The Ramirez kids got baptized! Oscar and Migueli got baptized and confirmed on Saturday! It was really neat! They wanted me to give the opening prayer and a talk. It went great! Luckily the service was in English so it wasn't too difficult to speak in. Oscar got baptized by His Grandpa. Migueli got baptized by her cousin, Joey, who was only 17. I made a note to explain to him how to baptize before the meeting started, but I spent the entire afternoon trying to find a print shop that was open so that I could print out the programs. We have like 5 of them here and every one of them is apparently closed on Saturdays. Anyway, I forgot to teach him how to baptize, but he did pretty good anyway!

Friday afternoon I did an exchange with the zone leaders. I went with Elder Riddle. He's from Utah. He is great! We had a blast! We went and taught a couple that was awesome. She had hot Pink hair and he had Sky Blue hair! It was great! They accepted a Book of Mormon and commit to read and pray about it. We went to visit a less active member that is working on overcoming smoking. He used to be a pack a day smoker but is now down to 3 per day and he doesn't finish them when he does smoke, so he is doing great! Apparently the church has a program like Alcoholics Anonymous with support groups and things like that, so we are trying to get him involved in that. I would imagine that quitting the last few is probably the most difficult, so if any of you have been through that and have any advice or tips that I can pass along, please let me know.

On Thursday, I thought it would be fun to make snicker doodles to give to people when we go tracting. Nobody has had snicker doodles here and most people had never even heard of them. We went down to the church to use the kitchen. I wasn't sure how many a batch would make, so I did a batch with triple the recipe. That made just over 200 cookies. I put them on plates so they would look nice.

Feel free to send me letters!

Elder Hendrix

1008 W Sanetta

Nampa, ID 83651

I'm sending photos with all of the cookies... One with Oscar and Migueli! I am standing next to Elder Ledacis. I think he taught their father a few months prior when he was in the area. The next one has two of the awesome Spanish speaking Sisters, Hermana Stadler and Hermana Vujich. They are awesome! Then, also awesome, is Elder Summers. He is an English speaking missionary that played the piano at our baptism.

Until next week...

Elder Hendrix