Hey everyone!

So this week we met a super cool lady named sister Ridgeley! She is awesome and is a drag racer!  Next time we go we are going to get to see her cars, and the last time she gave us zucchini bread, which was cool because the day before when we set up the appointment, we smelled and said it was good.  So she had a couple bags full waiting for us after we taught her!  It was super cool and I am way excited to go back! 

So at the beginning of the transfer we did a lot of tracting in this area! (Going door to door) but we have realized there’s a better way! So we go out behind our house where there is a little bike path right on the Columbia River, and we just walk that and talk to people.  It’s not as intrusive as knocking on someone’s door, and we have a pretty view!  It is pretty cool to switch things up every now and then!

We watched Elder Oaks' talk on Christ’s life in priesthood yesterday, it was really good and there was some great discussion afterwards.  It was a super good lesson, and it didn't feel like 20 hours long (Elder's quorum can get kinda long sometimes)

So I hope you all have a wonderful week!
Love,
Elder Pickett

4-24-12

Brandon had mission temple day, so he p-day was on Tuesday.

Hey everyone!

So this week was super awesome!  There is a man here named brother Wilstead who hasn't been to church in a very long time, he's about 70 and doesn't go because he is super sad about his wife, who has Alzheimer’s or something.  Anyway, he just doesn’t have the motivation to get out of bed on Sundays and go to church.  This last week we visited with him twice and we have been going through the lessons with him, because Elder Fernquist hasn't had too much experience teaching, so we're getting him into the groove, and getting his skills up.  We taught him the restoration one night, and just talked about a scripture the second night.  The scripture thought, which is generally a minute or two long, turned into a half hour discussion and he was giving alot of feedback, which is uncanny for him.  Anyway, he came to church on Sunday!  It was a truly amazing miracle to see him walk into church!

So the weather here has been beautiful!  It has been sunshine and happy days the last little bit!  Except for the awesome thunderstorm last night (which still counts as beautiful weather because I didn't have to walk around in it!)  So it has been short sleeve shirts the past couple days, and I am loving it! 

Pasco is a really cool place, and I am excited to be able to work here!
Love,
Elder Pickett

4-16-12

Hey everybody!

This week, my companion and I definitely felt like Ammon!  We did service just about every day!!  IT was awesome to be able to get out of the white shirt and tie, and do some work for a while!  Although, it’s not nice remembering what a sunburn feels like though!  I got to drive a tractor!  We were doing farm work for a less active family, and they needed someone working the tractor so my companion and I took turns driving it. It was pretty cool.  We also painted trees, I’m not sure why but it supposedly helps them. 

That's super col that they're going on a cruise!  That’s really funny because me and my companion have alot of time to talk as we walk for miles and miles and miles (maybe exaggerated), and we were talking about cruises yesterday and he said they were pretty cool.


Our area is actually one of the smallest in the mission, so there is not so much work to be done, because almost all the houses have been knocked on within the past 6 months.  So we do a lot of work with less-actives, and trying to get them to come back to church!

Sorry for such a short letter today!
Elder Pickett

The First 6 Months

Hey everyone!!

So I'm in Pasco WA now, and I guess I am getting to know what real missionaries feel like! I'm walking now :( It's a pretty cool town, and we have an awesome view of the Columbia River from our house! I could literally throw a rock into the river from our balcony! The work here is pretty slow, and mostly we just do work with less-actives. The area is so small that one missionary who was here for 6 months tracked the entire area, twice. It is pretty crazy!

So my new companion basically is just a reincarnation of Kyle Gemmell, but 2 years older haha. He's a way rad guy and we have tons of fun walkin around together! He just finished training, so I am "Greeny busting" him, it's pretty cool to finally be with someone who is younger than me haha. So we had an awesome miracle happen the other day!

We were tracting, and kept getting rejected, as usual, and finally knocked on a house and a guy answered. I did the normal approach, introduce myself and let him know that were sharing a message of restored truth to prophets, and he asks us to share that message with him on the doorstep! We did so, and asked if we could come back sometime, and he said we could! This was awesome because Elder Fernquist hasn't had too much teaching time to investigators, and he did an awesome job! I'm really excited for this transfer, and can't wait to see what the Lord has in store!

Love,
Elder Pickett

Hey everybody!

So I just got here in Hermiston 6 weeks ago, and it turns out that I'm going back to Washington!! Or as they say it here, Warshington!!! I'm headed to Pasco, baptizing capital of our mission! I'm very excited to get there because I have heard the work is never slow so that will be an awesome experience! I sure am going to miss Oregon though, no sales tax and stuff like that was pretty nice! But I am excited to be going to the Tri-Cities (Richland, Kennewick, and Pasco).

We've seen some raccoons around here as well! We live on a pretty long dirt road, and every now and then coming home we see the coons having a party in the street! They live in some raspberry bushes off the side of the road and sometimes will be out in the street when we are coming in so it's way cool to be able to see them. Although they are just down the road, they really don't do much to mess with us, or our host families’ dogs. They have a half border-collie half black lab, and a full border collie. They are both exceptionally fat, and probably the coolest dogs in Oregon!

This week our car went into the shop on Monday, from damages previous to me coming here, and they had it until Thursday! This was basically the longest week of my life hahaha, we were lucky enough to be able to bunk with other missionaries who live in town for the week so we were only 2 miles out of our area. Luckily they're great guys and gave us rides every now and then! So yeah this week was great for exercise! So my area that I'm going into is a walking area, so I guess this last week was just training for the next 6 weeks, or longer.

Well I sure love yall lots!
Elder Pickett