Week 10 Corpus Christi, Texas

Hey mom,

Yeah, Thanksgiving was good. We had 2 meal appointments but it was good becuase we didn't want to get super stuffed. 

It sounds like all is for the most part well at the home front. That is sad to hear about Brother Burge (a long time member of our ward passed away on Thanksgiving).And Aunt Deb as well. Hope all gets well with her. (Honorary aunt got super sick and landed in the hospital.)

Ours was fairly small, both Huff and I blessed the sacrament. So it was fairly small. We also didn't have anyone in gospel principles so we just hung out 2nd hour. 

Reading the Old Testament was a struggle, it was so long and at some times it was super boring. The institute manual really helped though to understand it and get the meaning behind all of the prophecies and hidden meanings behind everything. It was crazy to see how similar the church is today compared to the ancient church. It is very interesting to see the similarities. Next on my list is the New Testament with the institute manual, so it should be good. 

Texas can't decide if it wants to be cold or hot. Today is in the 60's but yesterday was in the 70's. It can't make up its mind. 

Teaching this week was good. We found a few different people and taught them various lessons. We found this one lady who actually used to be a member of the church and she asked us all of these questions about dealings and how that will all work in heaven. However she has to first decide whether or not the church is true because if it isn't, dealings will be the least of her concerns. So we told her that and basically said she has to decide if she will commit or not, that was interesting. 

Not much else is new. Christmas is coming and that is super cool. Also, we start December the end if this week, that is insane. 

Hope all has been going well at home. 

Hope you have a great week.

Love, 

Elder Goodbaudy 

President Torres has been super happy since President Nelson came to the devotional at the Alamo Dome and he shook the hands of all the mission presidents. So President Torres sent us this photo.

 A very thoughtful Elder Goodbaudy.

Elder Goodbaudy at a waterside gazebo thing.

Week 9 Corpus Christi, Texas

Hey Mom,

That is so cool to hear about Matt and Sean, that sounds like it was super nice. (Matt ordained Sean to be a Deacon.)

Good to hear that everything has been doing well. It is that time of year again when the holidays roll around. 

I don't know where we will have Thanksgiving at but a few members have invited us, so we will see.

Don't have a whole lot of time this week, everything has been the same old same old. 

My big accomplishment was finishing reading the Old Testament along with the institute student manual, that took almost 6 months. I learned a lot but some parts were a struggle to understand what they were talking about. 

We are teaching quite a few more people, which has been good. Things are starting to pick up for us, that has been nice. 

We didn't do much at church yesterday. All we had was Sacrament meeting because President Nelson spoke at the Alamodome so everyone went there. The missionaries in our mission weren't allowed to go but we got to listen to it so that was cool.

The weather warmed up slightly this weekend but it is going to be cooling down again pretty soon.

Other than that everything has been going good. We have been doing the usual. 

I know you are probably going to ask me what I want for my Christmas box. I am going to need a new journal, this should be the last one I need. The one I have now will last me to about January, so I just need one to last until October.

Another thing like I said is last time is books, Gospel books are super nice to read. 

I think that is pretty much it. 

Good to hear all is good at home. Hope you have a great week and and a Happy Thanksgiving!

Love,

Elder Goodbaudy

Week 8 Corpus Christi, Texas

Hey Mom,

Yep, this week was normal. Weather has dropped into the 60's with some heavy wind and rain, feels like I am in Oregon again. 

Yeah Capitan has to do with language study. If you meet certain requirements (like workbook exercises, days of only speaking Spanish and things like that) it helps you 'measure' more or less how you are doing at learning Spanish.

How did you hear we will all be in McAllen? They haven't even told us that yet. Oh well, that would be cool.

(Missionary Moms are always in the know. 😊)

Teaching has been good. We have found quite a few people but a lot of them still don't quite understand the gravity of what we are telling them. Oh well, we will have to do better at helping them realize the magnitude of what we are saying. 

Its crazy how fast everyone is growing up, it's unreal. 

Training is going good. Sometimes it feels like you are dragging around a bag of rocks but it's alright. Transfers are December 11th. So about 3 weeks left. 

Really anything, the food has been super good. 

No, we didn't help in church but we did ask everyone for people that we could go teach. So that was good. 

Not a lot is new. I also don't have much more time today. Hope all is going well at home. 

Talk to you next week.

Love,

Elder Goodbaudy

Elder Goodbaudy receiving his "Capitan" certificate with Sister Torres.

Elder Goodbaudy receiving his "Capitan" certificate with Ron Hunsaker.

Week 7 Corpus Christi, Texas

Hey Mom,

This week was good. It was pretty long, but there was a lot that happened. 

Sending Christensen off was good, we had a good time together and I enjoyed it but his time had come to an end.

This next transfer goes to December 11th and the next transfer will be until January 28th or something like that. 

Weather has been pretty mild. It has been varying between the high 70's and low 60's so it has been nice. 

We met quite a few new people this week and taught them some good lessons where we just got to know them and got a better idea of where they were coming from. 

We also helped a member in our ward on Sunday to put all the stuff for his smoker away (he used it to smoke meat for our ward lunch BBQ we had on saturday)

Tuesday was transfers so we drove down to McAllen and I saw a whole bunch of people there that I hadn't seen for a while. It was really cool. I also met my greenie, his name is Elder Huff and he is from St. George Utah. He will probably only be here for 6 weeks though because he is here waiting on his visa so he can go to Ecuador. 

Thursday we found out that we had a 2 day Mission leadership conference (MLC) so Thursday morning we drove down to McAllen again to go to that. The MLC was super good, President Torres talked a lot about being a leader and how as leaders we need to be examples to those around us. Thursday we spent the night with some other missionaries who live near McAllen so we could be ready to go for tomorrow. 

Friday morning we all played dodgeball which was super cool. We then listened to more of President Torres talking about leadership and some goals that we have as a mission. 

We came back up to Corpus Friday afternoon and then we got back to work. 

For the rest of the week we just did the usual missionary stuff. 

On Saturday our ward had a lunch BBQ get together thing so that was cool. We are some delicious food and we had the opportunity to talk to a lot of members. 

Sunday was pretty much as normal. Church was good, fast and testimony meeting wasn't too weird. It was pretty normal. We had a pretty full gospel principles class which was good because we had quite a few people come. 

Today we went to the aquarium as a zone activity. It was pretty cool. We are getting ready to go play some sports at the church so that should be good. 

Anyway that is pretty much it.

I know you will probably ask, so I can't think of anything I want for my Christmas box. I guess if you find some more books that look good you could send them. That Habits of Holy Men book was super good and I learned quite a bit from it.

But that's pretty much all for this week. 

Have a great week, love you!

Love,

Elder Goodbaudy 

Week 6 Corpus Christi, Texas

Hey Mom,

Don't have a whole lot of time today so this one will be pretty short. 

Last night we got transfer calls. I will be staying in Corpus Christi for another 6 weeks and I will be training a new missionary again! Christensen will be heading back home to Montana. 

Good to hear that all is well on the home front. 

Not much happened this week. We had dinner with the Fayol family yesterday. (They are the French Hawaiian family in our ward) We had rice with pork and some macaroni salad. It was super good. 

Anyway not much is new for us. It is the same old same old.

I will have more news and more time next week.

Favorite scripture is not necessarily a single scripture but I looked up obedience and the commandments in the topical guide and that was pretty cool. I was asked to give a talk on it so I used that to get some information. The topical guide is super helpful. 

Anyway hope you have a great week.

Love,

Elder Goodbaudy