How are you? I'm doing great! Things have really improved in the area! I'm lovin it. We had someone get handed off to us who has a baptism date. A difficult situation was resolved with one of our investigators and everything is looking up. We have some good stuff set up for this week. It should be good. I'm happy to be here. We've been having fun and working hard and getting it done. This is a great area. We are excited to have a lesson in the stake president's house later this week. It's gonna be powerful. 

Do you know what I did on November 1st? I played some Christmas music. I didn't play it all day like you do but I listened to a couple songs. I love Christmas time. You gotta send me a picture when the tree gets put up. I wish I could be there for thanksgiving. I want some spinach dip....

This week was great. I am having a lot of fun and getting to know my area. We had a baptism this week. His name was Cory. He is a super solid kid. I'm excited to have been a small part of his journey. I conducted the music at his baptism. I'm getting kind of good at that. It was fun. He was one of our few solid people. We are running out! We gotta find more. I feel like I've become a pretty good teacher and I'm alright at helping people get baptized. I just gotta do better at finding, that's the hard part. I know it will work out. this is how things go. You get to a tough spot and press forward and blessings always come. 

So my new area is pretty good. It's the singles wards in boutiful. I am a district leader out here which is pretty fun. I like my new area pretty well. I'm still getting used to it. I don't have much to say about the area. I really miss my old area and Elder Miller. This is ok though. I will get you my sizes once i figure out what they are. There's this cool member that owns a suit shop and he will measure me. He got me a new shirt the other day too. That was way cool. I don;'t have that much to talk about. I hope you liked your present. I'll have a lot more to say next week once I figure out what's going on here. I'll tell you about my new companion i guess. He's elder bickley from Washington. He's pretty cool but we aren't as close as some of my other companions. Well I'll write you next week. We have a baptism this weekend! :)

We had a great week! We found this girl that's super prepared and all we had to do was invite her to be baptized and go over the interview questions! Also we had a lesson with 2 Korean girls and they're so ready to be baptized! I love this area. The thing is the baptisms are October 20. I really wanna be in this area for them. I also love serving with Elder Miller. 

I had some very discouraging news about a choice one of my converts made. It's very private and shouldn't be talked about just know it made me upset. I feel hope knowing it's not too late for repentance though. I sure hope she does and I hope she doesn't stop coming to church. It just made me sad and discouraged for a little while.

Hey guys!

We had a great week! We found this girl that's super prepared and all we had to do was invite her to be baptized and go over the interview questions! Also we had a lesson with 2 Korean girls and they're so ready to be baptized! I love this area. The thing is the baptisms are October 20. I really wanna be in this area for them. I also love serving with Elder Miller. 

I had some very discouraging news about a choice one of my converts made. It's very private and shouldn't be talked about just know it made me upset. I feel hope knowing it's not too late for repentance though. I sure hope she does and I hope she doesn't stop coming to church. It just made me sad and discouraged for a little while.

This is gonna be a great 2nd year! I'm gonna baptize a ton! Have a super great week you guys!

Love Elder Damewood

We had a sweet week! We had a lot go on and we had a super awesome baptism. We didn't do much finding but we have a few good lessons set up. There was also a very amazing experience. First I'll tell you some new then I'll talk about what was so amazing.

I went to the dermatologist this morning. They took off my mole and are checking it out. The doctor said it should be just fine. I have to wait for my hand to heal. It's weird to have a hole in my hand. I haven't looked at it closely yet cuz it's so gross and weird. Anyway it's off and i'm glad about that.

So now for the super cool experience. We had that great baptism of Ainur and Altinnur Jeikey. They are great super cool twins from Mongolia. They were baptized and confirmed on Saturday. We had the Brigham City Temple dedication here instead of church Sunday. As you know you have to be a member of the church and have a recommend to go to one. Well Ainur and Altinnur met with the bishop right after their baptism and got to go! They showed up and were so excited and happy. The Spirit was very strong and made me so happy. It was so cool to sit at a temple dedication with people that had been members of the Church less than 24 hours. The ward was supportive of everything and they are excited. The Bishop said he wants to have a baptism in his ward every month. I'mm all for it. We have one set up on Oct. 6! Dane is gonna get baptized! It's so exciting! I love being on a mission and I love this area. It's so cool to hang out with people my age and then get people baptized. It's so much fun.

I love you guys!

-Elder Damewood

We've been having some super great lessons! We got like 6 referrals this week!. We added 3 new investigators! We had a great lesson with Ainur and Altinnur. They recieved an answer right there that they are supposed to be baptized. Their baptism is Saturday. 

We met a guy named Dane who is super prepared. He accepted to be baptized the first visit! Oct6! We met with Hillary and she got an answer to be baptized but to wait until her life calms down. I usually get disappointed when that happens but the Spirit told me it was best for her. I care about her so much. I want her to be baptized at the right time rather than rush into it cuz I want a number. I'm excited for this coming week. Pray that we will find people and that my throat will feel better. 

I love you have a great week!

-Elder Damewood

Hey everyone!

 I can't believe it's been pretty much a year. The time has gone so fast and the privilege of being in this mission is half over. 

 We had a pretty good week. We didn't really meet all of our goals. It was transfer week and as a zone leader it's even busier. All the districts got entirely moved around. Things were insane but they've calmed down. We have a few potential investigators and yesterday we had great lessons. Hillary is almost on date. Plus we actually got a referral in our almost always empty referral box!! I was so excited. We had great lessons with Ainur and Altinnur (the twins from Mongolia) and Jiyoun (from Korea) is doing very well. This is such a boss area and it'll give me a great start to my second year.  

 I've been thinking about what I want to be different about this year. My first and most important goal is to baptize more! President Winn said the key to success is faith. I will increase my faith by having more effective studies, following the schedule better and striving to do whatever it takes to have the spirit with me. I'm excited for this next year and I want to have 2x as many baptisms as last year. I have 30 so far, I want 60 next year... It could happen but it'll be really hard. I can't give up!

Hey guys,

  My week was good. It was the last week of the transfer. We had a baptism. She was so solid we didn't have to teach her anything. It was the easiest baptism ever! I loved it! 

Yeah the zone is doing well. I'm very tired. Being a zone leader is tough work. 

I'm not sure what else to talk about. My companion is getting transferred. It's ok though. It happens. Well I ought-ta get going. We are going to the Salt Lake Bee's Baseball game. 

Oh! Dad! We sang that hymn in church that says Victory! Victory! and it was about 10 times so slow. I turned to my companion and had this sad tired look on my face while singing and we both cracked up! I thought you'd like that story.

I love you,

-Elder Damewood

 Yeah it is getting close to the hump day! It's gone so fast! It really doesn't feel like it was that long!

We almost reached the standard......... We were 3 baptisms short. We had everything else!!!!! We needed 12 baptisms, we had 17 on date and ended up with 9!!!! I'm so upset about that.

We had a surprise baptism though. Gi-Man Lee from Korea got baptized. 

it was a ton of fun this week. we all worked really hard and our faith was built. it was a record week for the New Salt Lake Mission. We had 55 baptisms. The record for the old mission is 88 though! 

We did service at the humanitarian center today. it was fun. I don't know why President chose our p-day to do service though. the rules say to avoid doing service on p-day. It was pretty cool though. We were putting together backpacks full of supplies for kids. I asked the zone, "Doesn't this just give you back to school fever?" It was pretty funny. The answer was a big "no" almost in unison from everyone else.

Another cool thing was that we have 3 people on date right now. There are these twin girls from Mongolia that started to meet with us. They are so solid. Then there's this one girl Juliana who texted us and referred herself. It was so cool! I'm so happy that school started again. The work has really picked up!

I sure love being a missionary here. It's tons of fun. Not only do we do a lot of fun things, we also help people who can't do this for themselves. It's cool to be having an all around awesome experience. I love my mission and I can't believe it's already pretty much half over. I just now feel like I know what I'm doing. We had an amazing lesson last night. There's this girl Hillary. She's always had a rough life and she's so caring. We helped her see that it's not selfish to look into this just for her. She deserves and needs to be happy. It's so cool to see her get that answer from God in the lesson. It's crazy how God can give you love for someone. I just met Hillary (and all these other amazing investigators) and I love them before I even really know them. It's so fun!

Have a great week. I'm glad the Hurricane didn't come.

love,

-Elder Damewood

Hey! 

 We had a super awesome week! I really loved it. We had 2 baptisms! 

  Doctrine and Covenants 4:1 "Now behold a marvelous work is about to come forth [in the Salt Lake Zone of the Utah Salt Lake City Mission]." You know the Standard of Excellence right? Well we are going to hit it as a zone. I'm so pumped for it! We have the people on date ready for this weekend. We are gonna have at least 12 baptisms 36 on date 60 to church 96 lessons with members present and 36 new investigators in this zone this week. Please pray for this to happen. We know it's what the Lord wants and we're so excited for it. 

Man it's not easy being a zone leader but it sure is worth it when you get to be a part of something so cool. I am so excited to hit the Standard. It really rekindled the fire in me. I love it so much.

Man we ate at Taco Time (cuz it's free) and now I feel yucky. Plus I'm still a little carsick from texting in the car. I'm having so much fun out here on my mission. I can't believe how fast time is going! It's crazy. Things are going good in our area as well. We had a busy day and found a few people at church yesterday. School started today and there's a lot more people to baptize here now. I love it. 

I love missionary work! The Church is true. The Book is blue. May the force be with you!

I love you

-Elder Damewood

Hey guys,

Thanks for the birthday package. The cake didn't turn out but I'll put the frosting and candles on a cobbler we got... maybe. I really liked the presents though. Thank you so much.  We just got done at the Salt Lake temple this morning. It was really great. I hadn't gone in like 9 months I really missed it. 

That is what being a zone leader is like... minus the glory... It's still fun and I get to work with some amazing missionaries. I can't wait for Skylar to go either. I'm like a year ahead of him. Brooke is starting senior year! That's crazy! 

This week was awesome for us. We put this guy Jake on date and then this girl Devin came back from her trip to Orlando and the first thing she said to us when we saw her at church was, "I wanna get baptized" It was so exciting! We didn't find anyone new this week but we worked well with the people we have. I had a good birthday. The member we live with gave me cookies and a gift card. He's way nice. I got a great card from this cool girl I know ;) and Elder Singleton got a package on my birthday it was funny. 

Well I gotta go now,

I love you,

Elder Damewood

Dear family,

 You guys rock! I got my box but I haven't opened the presents. I read the note. Thanks. I was frustrated when I saw them all wrapped. I knew I'd have to wait. I'm excited for that though! AHHHHHHH I'm gonna be 20. how are the Olympics? I got to watch like 10 seconds of them total so far. It seemed kinda good. 

 We're gonna try and have a baptism on my birthday. We'll see if we can find one.  Thanks for all you do for me. It means a lot I'm having the best time out here! I love it!

Things are going good in this area. We met some cool people and they're starting to progress. The one thing about college kids is they like to think. It's good to think and understand but you can't have a testimony without paying attention to your feelings. They'll get it eventually.

Well I hope you guys have an awesome week!

I love you,

Elder Damewood

Hey guys!

 This week was crazy busy. I was so sad to leave Green River but I'm glad to be here. It's so crazy busy being a zone leader. I know hardly anyone in my zone and it's kinda stressful. I wanna get to know them all better. George is awesome! I like staying in his house. We're in the basement so it's nice and cool. 

Yellowstone is awesome I'm so glad you were able to go. Speaking of the Hinkley building the institute building at the U of U looks just like it! It makes me miss BYUI and that's the building where Cassandra had church in college when we were both there. It sure is weird. I was hardly in the benson. That's the science bldg. The ricks is math. I'll be there a lot. The Taylor is the girl bldg. That's where the cooking and sewing and stuff like that is. The MC is where food is so it's my favorite!

This week should be good. Pray that we find a lot of people and that our mission will reach 3500 baptisms this year please. I like this area a lot even though I really miss the people in Green River. 

I love you. Have an amazing week and a safe flight.

-Elder Damewood

Hey, 

  How are ya? It's so cool that you're in Idaho. I like it there a lot. Did you have fun in rexburg?

We didn't have a baptism but we had a good week. There's a lot going on in this area. I'm sad to have to leave it soon. I want to stay here for the rest of my mission! We have a lot of solid people that are getting ready to be baptized! We had a few great lessons today. We also went atv-ing this morning. The scenery is awesome. There was a part where we drove through the river. It was so cool. You gotta meet the family that took us. They're great! I'll send the pics and videos when I have time. It was so much fun!

I'll tell you what my new address is on Friday. 

I really don't wanna leave Green River. It's so much fun and the work is going great! My companion is great and things are just amazing here! Well I don't have much time. We had a busy day and just had to squeeze in time to email. 

I love you,

-Elder Damewood

hey guys! I'm in Bonneville YSA stake! I love it. I'm a zone leader here and I'm with Elder Singleton. He's really strict but really great!

My new address is 

Elder Brandon Damewood

550 Northmont Way

Salt Lake City, Ut 84103-3323

Hey guys!!!!

 I have a great story but first lemme reply to what you said:

Being a leader is great. It's stressful but rewarding. I get to work with some amazing missionaries and I'm learning a lot. 

Have fun in the tropical storm. It's probably about as windy as Wyoming is right now lol.  You can't shoot fireworks in city limits here so I don't get to get warmed up for the show. Hopefully I can see the fireworks show here though... Sounds like that was a fun birthday! It's really cool to hear about people back home. I'm glad the BYD went well. 

Alright now Imma tell a story. So we were planning and felt to set a baptism goal of 1. We had Ken on date but we didn't feel it was that solid. He gave some excuses and stuff and we thought it would fall thorough. We set a goal of 1 anyway. Then we stop by Thursday to either set up the baptism or drop him. We talk to his niece and she said he was still planning on the 23rd! We set up the program and got everything ready in like 2 days! It was awesome! I'm so glad we listened to the Spirit and set a goal of 1 because it gave us that mindset and we worked for it. Without that I think it may not have happened. That's our cool story this week. Another cool thing is we hit the Standard of Excellence! It was a lot of work but it's always worth it!

I love you so much,
Elder Damewood

Hey president let's us email the friday after transfers to let everyone know our address. It's still

220 Shoshone
Green River, Wy 82935

post that on the blog and tell everyone thanks I love you.
Also, I'm a district leader now. It's stressful and a lot of work.
Love you,
Elder Damewood

Hey guys!
 Sorry this email is a day late. We went to Martin's Cove yesterday. It took all day. We get a little extra time today to get all our usual p-day stuff done. 
 I have a miracle that happened I'd like to share with you. I was on exchanges with a zone leader. We were teaching a lesson to this guy Ken. Things went pretty well. We taught him and had him pray about baptism. After he prayed we were all silent for about 2 minutes. It felt like a really long time! Then he said he felt this calm chill and that he was going to get baptized. His date is June 26. Pray that everything will work out so that he can get baptized on that day. 
Lemme tell you about Martin's Cove. It was so cool to walk where those pioneers walked. It was a really hot day though so it wasn't all that authentic. It was still the same place though. I took some pictures and we saw a snake. It was really small and I didn't hear a rattle. It was really cool. Other than walking that day we had a 5 hour round trip in the car. That took forever!
Oh one more thing. Starting after this next transfer on June 13 all mail will be sent directly to our apartments. I'm allowed to send a short email out friday after transfers to let you know my address. So, we won't use the mission address anymore. So ask Cassandra when she sends her letter that week to make sure it's after she checks what my address is for that transfer. Thanks.

I love you and hope you all have a super awesome week!
-Elder Damewood

Our week was good. Yes our baptism happened. I gotta tell you a story about that later. Be sure to post this email ASAP so everyone can see the story.

We had a lot of fun yesterday. We stayed in Green River. We set up a tennis game with some of the kids from the stake. It was a lot of fun. We played basketball and tennis and the 6th ward invited us to their activity that was at the same park. After that we went shopping and a real nice guy paid for us. We had a lot of fun and now we're gonna go have a good day of work after emailing. 

Well now for that crazy story. Here in this stake we have assigned font fillers. They called me to say they'd be out of town. They asked if I knew how to fill the font and if I could do it. I said, "yes." I didn't know that there was more to it than just turning on the water. Anyway they told me to start filling it at 8 in order for the font to be full by 10. Elder Little(our district leader) came down cuz the family wanted him to give the opening prayer. So we go at 8 and turn on the water then we leave to get a couple other things ready and come back in an hour to set up chairs and  see how the font is coming along. I open the doors to the Stake Center and you can't even imagine the feelings running through me when I see water in the hallway! I run to the Primary room and turn off the water. There's at least 30 gallons in the Primary room, hallway, and Bishop's and clerk's offices! It's 3 inches deep in places! There was so much water it was crazy! We just start pushing water back into the font. We make calls and get shop vacs and all sorts of stuff. We work up a sweat sweeping water into the font. Then people start showing up and they panic more than we did. It didn't look as bad as it was when we first got there. So we were baptizing this 10 year old kid. He saw the font. It looked a little like watered down mop water at this time. We drained some of it and filled it with more water to dilute it. He still wanted to get baptized. It was cool to see how he understood the importance of baptism and didn't wanna wait any longer. He was so willing to do what he was supposed to it was amazing! When we got in the clerks office there was a cardboard box of documents and a power cord with a ring of dry around them. That was pretty amazing. Anyway we stay and clean until people take our jobs from us and start cleaning themselves. It's fine cuz we had to take Elder Little back to Rock Springs anyway. So that whole day we were trying to relax and calm down. It was so crazy every time I thought or said the words, "We flooded a Stake Center." So we decided to give ourselves a nickname. We're the Wet Bandits! Then Sunday a funny guy came up with a better one, "Hydromaniacs." Anyway it was all a crazy event and we had some laughs and stress. Things are better now. You can't afford to not serve a mission cuz you miss out on all these crazy stories.

I love you,
Elder Damewood

We had a really good week. The area is slowly picking up. I wish it would go faster though. 
We watched the solar eclipse yesterday. We could see it a little. It was really bright though. It was so weird to see the sun look like the moon. It was crescent shaped. 
We have a baptism coming up this weekend. It's been a little while so I'm glad about that. 
Our free pizza got cut down to 50% off pizza. We're gonna have to start going there less. The guy said it wasn't our fault. The price of food has gone up. I don't like it.
We met with Dakota last night. He's doing great. He's moving so fast. It's awesome! I love this area so much. I've got about a month left here at least, hopefully more but if not I'm gonna end with a bang! 
We had leadership training this past week. I left Elder Smith in the area with another missionary and he did great. I also learned a lot at training. It was cool to feel the Spirit so strong. It really built my testimony that Jesus lives and loves each of us. I'm so glad to be a part of this. I'm so grateful for all you've done to get me here. It's awesome! I love serving a mission!
I hope you all have a great week!

I love you,
Elder Damewood

I had tons of fun talking with you guys too. Well I'm not really having a rough time it' just the work is slow and it's picking up just not fast enough. There's so much potential I can see it. It's just a little ways away. I'm excited for when it does come. My companion rocks! He's really really good at teaching already. I'm trying my best to teach him. He's great. 

I can't think of anything super crazy this week. Well we had these 2 girls at church. Their mom isn't ready to come back yet so we sat by them. They're 8 and 10 so they had a hard time staying still in Sacrament. I never thought I'd have to babysit on my mission! Well I have leadership training in Salt Lake tomorrow. I'm leaving Elder Smith in my area with my District Leader's companion. I remember the first time I was left in my area without Elder Davis. It was a difficult scary thing but I learned a lot and really grew because of it. I'm excited to see how well he does.

After we got off Skype I went out and ate a snack with the Harris'. it was good. they all thought I was weird for putting peanut butter on my hot dog,  but it's so good! It's nice to have a place like theirs. They're so friendly, they love having us over and they're so fun.  I wish we could go more but we have a ton of work to do so we can't go too often. That's a good thing though :) Sister Harris really is a huge help out here. She feeds us and mends our stuff and tells us stories from her son. He's in Russia. I'm gonna miss them when I have to get transferred. I hope it's 2 more transfers away. The fact that I'm training a missionary helps increase that chance. 

I love you all,
Elder Damewood

Hey,
I'm excited for Sunday as well. I think have some time in the afternoon. it may be at like 5 your time. We can get son skype so I'm going to the Harris' house to call you. I'll call you on the phone when I get there to set it up. Yeah my arm is a lot better. It's almost healed.
I gotta tell you the transfer news. I stayed. I got a new companion. And when I say new I mean it! I'm training a greenie! He's super great! His name is Elder Smith and he's from California. We get along really well. I really like training, and since you're usually with your trainer 12 weeks that increases my chances of staying here another transfer! I love this place so much I never wanna leave! Well I guess in about a year and a half I can go :). It's so crazy that I'm training. I thought it'd be a while before I trained. Elder Davis still hasn't gone home so Elder Smith has a living Grandpa. That's pretty rare. I guess President trusts me. I just hope I don't get any other leadership. I just want to train at most. Elder Smith invited his first investigator to be baptized. She said yes! It was so cool.
Well, now I'm gonna go have a P-Day. I love you so much! Thanks for all you do for me. The mission is the best thing ever!

I love you,
Elder Damewood

We had a pretty good week.  I had a bike crash this week. I got 6 square inches of road rash and ruined a pair of pants. The arm is almost better but the pants are gone. I don't really have much news though. The week was pretty slow. The area came to a stop after we baptized everyone but I guess it's speeding back up now. It's transfer week. I'm hoping that I stay. I love it here. 
I don't really have much to say. There doesn't seem to be much new stuff going on. We've been walking a lot and finally the month is over so we get more miles. 
Dakota's friend should be meeting with us Tuesday. Dakota passed the Sacrament yesterday. That was super cool. 
I guess I can talk about Manilla. We went down there and did service. We were expecting to teach but that didn't work. We just laid sod at someone's house. The cabin we got to stay in was really awesome though. We're going there Thursday. Hopefully I'm still in the area then.

I love you,
Elder Damewood

Hey,
Man what a super great week! We spent a lot of time at the stake center Saturday baptizing! It was a ton of fun. The person that was originally going to do Dannika and Deleani's baptism couldn't make it so me and Elder K. jumped in. Brian's baptism was super amazing too. I love the work in this area. There's just one problem now. We've baptized all our teaching pool pretty much. We need to go find more people!. I sure hope we do it this week! This is how me and Elder K. expect transfers to go: He leaves and I stay. I'm gonna miss him. He's been great. The thing is I don't want my next companion to come into a dead area. We gotta pick it up this week. Pray that we find and that the members here find as well. I loved making those videos. I wish I could just email them to you. It'd be so much easier. Oh well, we'll just have to do it this way it's not so bad. 
So I'm officially moved out of my room.... I leave and everything changes. lol Thanks for keeping my guitar safe :) We taught at a BYD recently. It was fun. We had them all ask any questions they want. I love that.
I love the work here. The members are super helpful and it's so great. Tuesday we should be going out to the one ward out here in the middle of nowhere. It's called Manilla Utah. I'm excited. Hopefully there's a ton to baptize out there. 
Well I gotta get P-Day a rollin' here. It was great to hear from you. I wake up each Monday excited to read emails from you.

I love you
Elder Damewood

Mom, 
  I'm safe! We had zone conference on monday so pday got moved to today. You never have to worry about anything happening to me if I don't write. As long as President or an Apostle or someone doesn't call I'm 100% fine. 
  Yeah it's been 7 months. It's starting to move even faster. I can't believe i've been with Elder Kemendics 2.5 months! He's so funny he's the funniest. Well here's the reply to your email:
 That's so exciting! Brazil. Tell him congrats. We didn't end up going fishing Monday. I wanted to see what river fishing was like. Elder Kemendics had no photo ID so he couldn't get a license. it was ok though. We did other stuff with Dakota. We went up on a mountain and looked at Green River. It's was such a cool view. Then we went to the local airport. I took a picture of it. It's the picture of the empty field and a wind sock. It's a great place, no security, no waiting, any aircraft that can fly can land there. I just can't guarantee you can get it back up again. Do you wanna know the name of the airport. No lie it's the "Greater Green River Intergalactic Spaceport." it sounds like something Dad would make up. NASA feared a comet would strike Jupiter a long time ago so the mayor here passed a law that any citizens of Jupiter had to be welcomed into the city and that they were welcome to land at the Spaceport. After Dakota had to go home we went to Rock Springs where there were these small basketball hoops that you could dunk on. that was a ton of fun. Man, I guess I'd better save $ instead of buying IBC root beer. The baptism went great! I loved it sooooo much. He's the coolest kid ever! The girl in that one picture is Sadie Mortenson. She was Dakota's fellowshipper. I think once Dakota gets back from baptizing thousands on his mission he'll marry her. It kinda reminds me of you and Dad. He's a lot like Dakota. 
This coming week Brian is getting baptized. It's so exciting. He's super great. He finally agreed after Elder Kemendics taught him in Evanston, Brian moved to Green River, then Elder Kemendics got transferred here and taught him. Now he's getting baptized! This mission is the best.

We biked all day yesterday. I'm sore but it feels good. I like working hard.  

So this morning we went up to the spaceport to take pictures. Me and Elder Kemendics took some. I'll send them in a separate email. I'll also Dropbox you a video of us lightsaber fighting. Well time to go finish this epic week

I love you,
Elder Damewood

Yes I had a super great week. It could have been better as far as work goes but it'll pick up. These things happen. See, Green River isn't the most exciting town in the world. EVERYONE goes out of town when they get the chance. We had no one to talk to this weekend cuz it was Spring Break. 
Man my Easter was pretty good. It was an average day at church except we sang He is Risen 4 times. Then we went to dinner at this super cool missionary minded family. They gave us Easter baskets and we ate ham! There was homemade root beer! I bit the ears opf my rabbit. I'm not sure if I'm gonna eat the rest. We get way too much candy out here.  Today we're gonna go fishing with Dakota. Hopefully Elder Kemendics can get a license. I know it won't be any problem for me but he doesn't have a driver's license and his passport is in Salt Lake.  He's such a cool kid. He's also taking us up on one of the mountains here. Look forward to pictures next week :). 
I've been having a lot of dreams about being home and still living mission rules. It's frustrating. I'm at home and I don't get on the computer or play video games or anything. I wake up at 6:25 and get dressed in a suit AT HOME! Well it looks like the mission has got to me. I'm 100% missionary now. 
We had a baptism this weekend. It was for a girl that finally got her mom to have 100% custody so now the dad can't say anything. We didn't have to do anything for it. I've seen the girl 3 times. I didn't take pictures either. It was nice to break my no baptizing streak though. We have 2 lined up for this weekend. One is shaky(the mom is trying to delay it. The dad is on our side) and one is Dakota so we're having at least one for sure. 

Well time to go fishin!

I love you,
Elder Damewood

OH MAN! Conference was epic! But first let me tell you about my week heading up to conference. We set really high goals and reached most of them. We wanted 10 people to watch conference and we had 9. We wanted 9 with a baptismal date and we have 8. Setting goals isn't always about reaching them though. It's about stretching yourself. This week was a lot of work. We met Lance. He is Dakota's friend. He was super solid and prepared too. He didn't know as much as Dakota did at first but that doesn't matter. The knowledge isn't as important as a testimony and it'll come when he needs it. He already has a testimony. I think it grew the most when Dakota shared his. They both got really excited when he accepted the 28th as his date. Then they were more excited when we said by then Dakota should be a priest so he can baptize Lance!
That's the main miracle this week. Other than that it was a ton of running around teaching people.

Ok now I'll tell my conference story.
Alright so Friday morning I slept in. I don't know why but I just couldn't stop dozing off. We worked hard all day and planned to drive from Green River to Evanston(halfway point 1.5 hrs away) at 9pm. We had to wait for our district so we could figure things out and we didn't leave until 10:15ish. I was so tired but not as tired as I would have been had I not slept in. It looks like the Lord had everything all planned out. 

Then we got there at like midnight and went to bed. We got up got ready and headed to Salt Lake City! I wore the 600$ suit I found in my last area. We went to temple square and hung out with the other missionaries. That was tons of fun. Then we went to the visitor's center for the morning session. That was cool. Then we went to Crown Burger for lunch. It was packed but so worth it! Then we went to Deseret Book. That was also packed. Gerald Lund and John Bytheway were there. I didn't get to talk to them though cuz I was busy it it was crowded. After that we went back to the visitor's center for the 2nd session. I was so mad! There was an MTC choir there! I wanted to do that! Oh well.. Then while we were walking to the car some security guy handed us ticked to Priesthood session! We parked closer to T. Sq. cuz we had a parking pass now. Then we went to City Creek. It's this huge mall that opened in Salt Lake. It was jam packed of course and we had this huge line at Chick-Fil-A. I missed it a lot so it was good to eat there again. We went to priesthood session and had balcony seats. It was still great to be there and see the prophet in person even if he looked tiny. The session was great but it was so warm in there I had trouble staying awake and focused. Then we went to President Winn's house for the night. He had pizza for us and we all went to bed. We woke up and got ready and packed sandwiches for later. We went over to the Conference Center. We went in to morning session. It was just as amazing as before. Well actually a little better because the Tabernacle Choir was there that time. They were on fire! Then we went back outside in the yucky weather you saw from the shots they took outside. It was fun though. We had a good time and watched the last session in the visitor's center. I would say that going to the conference center is a must for everyone at least once. It was really neat and has a lot of advantages. It's definitely worth it but I think I prefer watching it at home most of the time. You don't have to sit so close together and you can wear PJ's. There's no protestors and it's not quite as crowded at home. It's great to go of course but I don't wanna go every time forever. You guys do have to go sometime though!
The protestors make me mad. I wanted to dress up as Iron Man and go kick them in the false doctrine!!! A lot of the stuff they were saying though was true. "JESUS IS THE CHRIST!" "YOU MUST REPENT OF YOUR SINS!" "ONLY JESUS CAN SAVE!" I wanted to walk up and say that they were saying the same thing inside the Conference Center. One guy made me really mad cuz he had garments and and apron. The coolest thing was right past the protestors on either side of the sidewalk is a line of people singing hymns. It made me want to cry every time. There's just one way I know that the protestors are wrong and the Prophets are right. "By their fruits ye shall know them."

It was cool to see Taylor there! I wish I saw Malorie! That would have been awesome! Elder May saw Caroline! That was crazy! Man this was a fun weekend.

I'm looking forward to my box!
 
I love you!
Elder Damewood

Hey!
 So transfers were this past week. Me and Elder Kemendics stayed together! We're really building up this area! The members are starting to trust us a lot more and we're fixing a lot of things. The last missionaries that were here last weren't very good. We were frustrated at church. we only had 3 people there. I do have exciting news though. Did I tell you about Brian? He's that fully active non member with a calling and everything. He decided to get baptized! At first his date was April 14 but it may move a little cuz family might not be available. Either way it's going to be a great transfer! We have 4 baptisms lined up on the 14th! I'm so excited! This area is really picking up. I love it out here and I never want to leave! Well I guess when my time is up I'll feel ready but I don't want to leave Wyoming for the rest of my mission! So we have that investigator Dakota. He's like one of my best friends now. When school ends we're gonna do so much fun stuff on p-days! We're gonna go mudding and bow fishing! The people out here are so great! We checked our referral box at Seminary again..... It was empty. We checked it just as a class was finishing up so I made a point to say "empty" really loud. This one girl said she'd fill it. I hope she meant it! If not I'll have to chastise her! I don't remember who she is though so that might be hard. We didn't have anything to powerful or amazing happen this week. I've been trying to share more miracles in my emails but sometimes you just have an average week. It was good... just nothing special.
Pray for Mike Olsen. He's been in the hospital with kidney problems for a while and I really care about him. I'm kinda worried. 
We had this challenge in our mission to watch these DVDs we have for training 3 times this transfer. We had them playing during all our free time since Wednesday and we're done. It was a total of 24 hours worth of videos. They are the most annoying videos ever too! I was about to go crazy! We did it though and now we get a special breakfast. It was all worth it.. I think..... 
I'm so excited to go down for conference this weekend. We have tickets to the Sunday AM session. Keep an eye out for a Cowboy and a European missionary. I'm kidding.. I won't go as a cowboy. I'm really excited to go there though. It'll be a first for me. I love this mission!
Keep an eye out for my news about baptisms coming up in 2 weeks! That's when it all starts! I'm so excited!

I love you,
Elder Damewood

Hey guys!

This week was great. We didn't have any baptisms scheduled this week. They're all for after conference. I'm very excited for them. The work is going pretty well here. I love Green River WY! Transfer calls are tomorrow. I hope me and Elder Kemendics stay here. It's more than likely. We checked our referral box that we made for the seminary class and it was empty! Bro. Glathar(the sem teacher) is gonna talk to them. I thought our lesson went great. Everyone had fun I guess they just didn't apply it yet. Or maybe they're working on it. Who knows? I can't think of any miracle moments this week. We had a great lesson with Dakota and we added a family yesterday. They aren't available for a return appointment until April 10 though.
OH! We had to jump start our car this morning! That was fun. No one knew how to do it but me. Thanks for teaching me Dad. Our Subaru has a specific hook thingy made for the black cable. It was so convenient. 
Yes good choices are great! I see it in the people here. They turn around and they see the difference. A smart man learns from his mistakes but a wise man learns from other's mistakes as well. There's a lot of things I'm not going anywhere near ever! I see what it does and it's stupid. I love being a part of this great work and seeing the light in people's eyes. Dakota is a perfect example of this. I mean not that he'd made bad choices before but he's just getting more and more light. I can tell these things he's being taught sound familiar because he was taught them in the Pre-Earth Life. Oh and keep this on the down low but I think him and his fellowshipper Sadie are gonna end up getting married. It's just like you guys! Except Sadie is a little younger not older :) Her parents both had a good feeling about Dakota when they first met him.
I love you,
Elder Damewood

Yeah 6 months already. I'm burning a tie today! Pics of that next week. 
Alright now to talk about my week. This week was really dumb the first few days. We couldn't find anyone and we had hardly any lessons. We kept going anyway. Saturday I was sick but since we had a bad week I wanted to get more done so I worked anyway. It was a pretty good day but nothing too special. We worked hard anyway. Then yesterday the miracles came. I set a personal record of having 9 investigators at church! It was amazing! It looks like Brian is planning on finally getting baptized too! The highlight of my day started back on Thursday. We went to the Seminary Building to talk with Pres. Glathar about our ideas for when we teach seminary (this Tuesday). As his class was letting out Sadie Mortensen came up to us and said her friend Dakota wanted to meet us. We set it up for Sunday. We got to the lesson and introduced ourselves. We asked why he was interested and then he said he wanted to be happier. He wanted to be closer to Heavenly Father and he wanted that something he couldn't quite put his finger on that he felt whenever he went to the Mortensen's house. We talked a little bit about the Holy Ghost and then baptism. We set a date right then and there and he was so excited. He's getting baptized April 7th and he's pretty excited. He came to church that day and we didn't even know it! It was a great day! We had some cake at Brian's house cuz his step-daughter turned 13. We stayed a while and chilled out while kind of talking about his baptism. It was the most laid back lesson but he seemed more sure than we've seen before. It sure was weird. 
So far we have like 4 people getting baptized on the 7th. Then we have 1 on the 14th. This next transfer is gonna rock! We're also gonna be able to meet with Dee this week again. She and the Smiths have been busy. This is gonna be a great week! I can't wait to tell you about it. Let me know how it goes with Brookie.
I love you,
Elder Damewood

  Dee is doing ok. Their families have a lot going on so we won't be able to see them until the 17th. We recently taught her the Law of Chastity. That wasn't fun. She said she's having problems arguing with herself about what's more important. She's not gonna stop meeting with us which is good. She'll find that feeling the Spirit is better :) She's still going to investigate. This area is picking up. When I got here we had almost nothing. Now we've almost hit the Standard of Excellence. We were 1 person to church off.
  We taught Caesar a lesson and he won't be able to meet with us for like a month.  It's been hard to catch Jesus home so we're gonna try by maybe this weekend.  
  Things are going great! Things I need...... I can't think of anything I need. I'm looking to get some cowboy boots. Mike took us to lunch and got me a hat and belt buckle(pics next week). I love it! So today imma see if I can afford to go full cowboy :).
  This week was pretty good. It was the best one so far in Green River but I can't think of any major spiritual story to tell or anything. We found a girl who was interested and I felt prompted to ask her if she felt different when we're over there. She said yes and I said it was the Spirit. She really recognized it. That's about all I really got. I'm tired though. This was a long hard week. I know the area pretty well now so it puts a lot more weight on my shoulders as senior comp. It's better than being lazy and bored though.
   Remember last year in March when I called you and talked about how they had corned beef and cabbage at BYU-I? That was a whole year ago! 
   This is going to be a great week I can feel it!
  Did you hear the news about the missions they're adding in Utah? There's going to be a Salt Lake City Central mission(doesn't affect me) and a Salt Lake City West mission(could affect me if I get transferred there June 13). It's exciting! We get tons of new missionaries here and the baptisms are going to go way up! I secretly hope to stay in the UT SLC mission. I love it here and I love President and I want to stay in Wyoming my whole mission!
Love,
Elder Damewood

My week was pretty good. Monday we had a FHE with the Harris family they have 12 kids and one is on a mission right now. He's in Russia. They read his letter. I realized my letters need some improvement. So get ready for a great letter :)
So about my week: We found 2 people tracting this week. We haven't had a chance to talk to them too much but it was cool to find them. Hopefully something will come of them. We saw Mike smoke once but he didn't see us. Then we went to his house a little later he said he smoked and it was so gross he'll never do it again! He's also getting me a Wyoming belt buckle! He's the nicest guy ever! We're going to his house later to help him move some furniture. I got kind of sick this past week and it wasn't fun. We worked in the evening even though I felt bad. The evening is too important to rest through. It's all this cold air and wind that got me sick. I can't wait until summer. Did I tell you about Dee? We teach her at the Smith's house(such a fancy house!). She's 65 and she's awesome. She was pretty skeptical at first. She reads all her assignments and she says she's getting more and more interesting. I said the opening prayer for our last lesson. I prayed that we would feel and recognize the Spirit. Then we went forward with faith. My companion asked her 3 questions. "Since you've been meeting with us has your soul been enlarged? Had your mind been enlightened? Do you like these things we talk about?" Then we read Alma 32:28 Now, we will compare the word unto a ^aseed. Now, if ye give place, that a ^bseed may be planted in your ^cheart, behold, if it be a true seed, or a good seed, if ye do not cast it out by your ^dunbelief, that ye will resist the Spirit of the Lord, behold, it will begin to swell within your breasts; and when you feel these swelling motions, ye will begin to say within yourselves—It must needs be that this is a good seed, or that the word is good, for it beginneth to enlarge my soul; yea, it beginneth to ^eenlighten my ^funderstanding, yea, it beginneth to be delicious to me.
She said, "I felt it" Then we set a date for her baptism. March 24th! I'm so excited and grateful!
I've been trying to read the whole Old Testament.... I'm in 2 Samuel. It's weird stuff.

I love you,
Elder Damewood

Mike did great with the stop smoking program!  He was so grateful for our help. He wrote us a nice letter and told us we were too thin and gave us a Smith's (local grocery store) gift card! He's the best! Get those missionaries in Tifton to give it to Aunt Cindy! We've found a few investigators. It's different out here. In Rose Park we could find every day or every other day by just tracting. Out here tracting is useless. We have to work through the members. It's the best way. As I told Dad we need the ward missionaries to go by the members and gather referrals for us. It's what the handbook says to do. 

I see other families that have missionaries out. They take such good care of me. Looks like they have the same idea as you. If you take care of them (the missionaries back home) I get taken care of :) We got some homemade caramel corn yesterday. I really need to work out more. We're going to Sonic for lunch today probably. It's free in Rock Springs. I just wish it was a little closer. 

So I gotta tell you about last nights dinner. Man it was very relaxed. I got to be myself and everyone was laughing at all my jokes. It was just like being at home and making you guys laugh. I'm gonna try and fit more comedy in these emails. We'll see how it goes... Oh did I tell you guys I'm senior companion? It's not really a big deal it just means when things go wrong it's my fault. and when things go well it's because we both did good. :)

I love you,

Elder Damewood