All Is Well

Well, up in Washington all is going great. WE actually just went to the Temple for the first time in four and a half months it was awesome! I got to go to the Columbia River Temple and It is way pretty inside. Since it is a small Temple their is only one level so the Baptistry is right at the entrance it is beautiful!! SO yesterday we had interviews up in Yakima and when we got to the spanish Elders to get our car we found that it had been broken into and a GPS was taken! Welcome to Toppenish! the person kicked the passenger side window with his foot then opened the door form the inside and ran. We know who it was though becasue of a witness along with the cop took some good fingerprints off of the window! Other than that life is great! We have been blessed this pass week to have found people to teach and will look forward to seeing them progress! When we went to contact a former investigator we found a new investigator becasue the girl started talking to us telling us that she grew up in Vancouver and went to youth activities. She told us that her parents were members but she never was baptized. Our thought was we can change that!!

So that was our week! A letter is in the mail I kept forgetting to mail it til Monday and that was a holiday!

Love you all

Elder Rushforth

Getting to Know You 2009

Tyler sent me this email. It was pretty funny to read. It's one of those "Getting to Know You" forwards. You know, you get it from a friend with all their answers in it and then you're supposed to fill it out as it pertains to you and send it off to all your friends. Well, this is Tyler's. I don't know if it's more entertaining or less entertaining because he's a missionary and isn't allowed to do half the things the questions are about. You decide.

1. What is your occupation right now? Stormin Mormon Missionary!
2. What color are your socks right now? White
3. What are you listening to right now? Silence

4. What was the last thing that you ate? Cookies
5. Can you drive a stick shift? no
6. Last person you spoke to on the phone? A missionary
7. Do you like the person who sent this to you? yes
8. How old are you today? 19
9. What is your favorite sport to watch on TV? I don't watch tv
10. What is your favorite drink? water
11. Have you ever dyed your hair? none
12. Favorite food? mashed potatoes and gravy
13. What is the last movie you watched? I don't remember that long ago
14. Favorite day of the year? Christmas and Mother's day
15. How do you vent anger? Knock on a door
16. What was your favorite toy as a child? Lego
17. What is your favorite season? Spring
18.Cherries or Blueberries? Blueberries
19. Do you want your friends to e-mail you back? Yes
20. Who is the most likely to respond? Not too sure.
21. Who is least likely to respond? Again, not too sure.
22. Living arrangements? With members
23. When was the last time you cried? I don't know
24. What is on the floor of your closet? Dirty clothes bags
25. Who is the friend you have had the longest that you are sending to? Don't know, Don't have any friends
26. What did you do last night? Planned the next day and went to sleep
27. What are you most afraid of? Dogs
28. Plain, cheese, or spicy hamburgers Spicy
29. Favorite dog breed? None at this time they seem to like chasing missionaries
30. Favorite day of the week? Tuesday! P-day
31. How many states have you lived in? 3
32. Diamonds or pearls? I don't know
33. What is your favorite flower? any

Show and Tell...but mostly Show

Tyler sent pictures today via email. There's only three of them and I can only guess at what they're pictures of because he didn't include ANY details.

I think this is his companion that made Chain-Mail. (I know, my skills at deduction are ASTOUNDING!)

This is Tyler and the Companion that makes Chain Mail and some guy I don't know.

And I haven't the foggiest idea what this last picture is.

I did email him back and tell him that he needs to include descriptions along with pictures.

Transferred

Elder Rushforth was recently transferred from Vancouver, WA. He is now serving is Kelso, WA. And it is a car area.

Here's what he had to say about his new area and companion in his most recent email to me:

"Well, my new area is amazing and very large. The Castle Rock ward boundries goes all the way up to Mt. St. Helens and all around it although, there is no one who lives up there. My companion is a stud and is the same size as me so our combined weight is 260 and are in a Ghetto area:) Don't worry if I get Mugged I at least get another lesson:) Okay so it isn't that bad people actually avoid us even though they could squash us like a bug."

Elder Rushforth appreciates your continued prayers on his behalf, as well as on the behalf of missionaries and their work world-wide.

One Busy Monday

This last week was an exciting one for Elder Rushforth. Here's the story as I got it in my letter:

"Hey Wendi and Gale,

Well, last week was great, but yesterday(Monday) was the best journal entry! It all started with a district meeting then lunch at Boppin Bo's a old style cafe! Mmmm Bottomless fries...know wonder I'm so fat. 130 lbs. After that we washed and waxed the district car that isn't even ours. What a wonderful entry! NOT! But wait, it gets much better! So we decided we better get something accomplished so we went out and started walking to do a drop by. While we were steadily strolling down 99th street a cop flips on his lights and pulls over toward us. My first instinct was crap they found me! run! but I did otherwise! The cop rolled down his window and said, "My wife said to flag you down becaues you love getting in normal clothes to do service. " Just as he is about to give us his info a old truck came puffing by with exhaust out the wasoo! He gives us his business card and goes about his duty! We put his card in our wallet and head on. On our way back to our house to have dinner we were stopped by a young man who wanted to talk to us! Sweet right? Wrong! his eyes were as glazed over as a freshly glazed donut! but he said he was suicidal so we sat down to talk. Just then, in a blink of an eye two police cares and an ambulance pull up! The cops come out with their hands on their guns and call the young man over and we leave. Further down the street we were stopped by two yuong men who asked if we knew the young man back there and we said no and found out they knew him from jail. We talked to them a little bit then went to dinner! Overall it was a exciting afternoon!

The evening was wonderful! We went to an appointment with a new investigator and they were actually there! Krista was someone we met at a yardsale(hers) and we came back and watched Finding Faith in Christ! We have another appointment Thursday!"

See, a very exciting day for Elder Rushforth! But it sounds like everything is going well and he's still working really hard!

May 12, 2009

I wanted to share some of this letter because I thought it was kind of entertaining...

"Hey Family:

It was really great to talk to everyone Sunday. I found out that everyone else spoke for three hours! But I wouldn't have been able to talk that long. It's great to know that everyone is doing great.

On Monday we had a lessong with a less-active member where my companion taught us how to do a little chain mail. We tied the lesson into the armor of God. Tnoight we had a lesson with Sister Jennings who has been attending church for hears with her family but isn't baptized because of concerns about teaching of the prophet Joseph Smith. We felt that she needed to come to gain a testimony of the Book of Mormon. Brother Selee, our new Ward Mission leader had the same prompting. Tonight we read 3 Nephi 11 and then watched the last chapter of the Testaments. The Spirit was so Strong! We committed her to read and pray about the book of mormon and she said she would. I'm really excited for tomorrow because we have Brittany and Brianna, the grandchildren of Sister Hansen. They have both grown so much while we have been teaching them. Last week they didn't know if they were ready to be baptized we reassured them that they were by going over the baptismal interview questions. We also have three lessons with new investigators, hopefully they will be home. :)

How great is my Calling!"

Sounds like Elder Rushforth is hard at work. (And maybe playing a little...seriously? We're using chain mail now as a teaching tool? So funny!) He's always such a good example to us and in our individual notes from him, he encourages us to better ourselves through prayer and scripture study!

As families of Missionaries, we truly are blessed in so many ways!

Mother's Day

It was nice to talk to Elder Rushforth on Mother's Day! It sounds like he's doing great and loving the work!

Because we're all so good at writing, we didn't have a lot to update each other on, so it was a brief conversation all around!

Transfers are coming up, but he thinks his companion will get transferred, but he'll stay put. As you will tell from the letters, he's doing quite well!