Hey everyone! Life is good here in lil Strathmore. I tried to send some pictures but this computer is just not working! I'll start out with the biggest adventure from the week. ROAD TRIP! We were looking at our area map and there was some tiny towns that we covered that we wanted to visit. Hussar was the first one. It took us an hour to drive there, and we almost missed it! There are 157 people there and we tracted out half the town, one street that is, in 15 minutes. It was typical tracting, small success, haha. We bought some lunch at the tiny general store and watch some little league game for a bit. Then we went to Standard, which is just a little bit bigger, and visited with a member there. That was a half hour away. Then we drove down to Cluny, one a highway where i didn't see another car for 20 minutes (we didn't have cell phone service for over half the day) and in CLuny we found this hole in the wall bakery/convenience store that had some delicious bread. Then we went deep into the Indian reserve there and saw the gravesite and last camping ground (before signing over their land) of Cheif Crowfoot. There were Rocks in a circle from where his teepee was! cooool. We even tracted out some teepees. No one was home sadly. Then we went back to the bakery and got some more of that bread. good stuff! blueberry bread with lemon icing, and chocolate chip banana bread, only 50 cents a slice! yuummmmmmmm. By then it was time for us to head back the 85 kilometers to Strathmore for dinner. Which was fun and crazy. We were beat and our allergies were going crazy cuz of all the crazy plants and stuff we saw. Elder Wheeler literally sneezed 27 times in a row. I thought he was going to die!
I had my last interview with President Archibald. That was really weird. I didn't want to leave the room, because i love talking with him. Next week at zone conference i'll be giving my farewell testimony. That it SO weird. It almost would be at the same building as my greenie testimony, but its down the road a bit. SO weird! i can't get over it. I've been telling the ward that i'm only out "a bit over a year," cuz then it won't be brought up as much and i won't trunk myself out of my mind. I'm ignoring the impending disaster. :)
We have a foosball table and every now and then. It reminds me of playing on the one that we have at home, except a bit more on the new side, haha. I spoke at church on sunday about Jesus Christ being our example and i think it went well. Hope fully it'll have the members of the ward more willing to have us over, because at the moment, no one is really keeping the appointments we've set with them, its really annoying. After Strathmore ward we went to the Siksika Nation Branch. We've been teaching these two native boys who were baptized a while ago. they each received the priesthood. They had a friend there that i almost kicked cuz he had some fascination with the word "duty." He would say it every 5 seconds as we were teaching. AGHHHHHH. haha whatev.
Life is good, i love you all and i'm working hard. til next week!
Elder Crippen
Monday, June 28, 2010
Monday, June 21, 2010
June 21 Letter
HAPPY FATHER'S DAY! I tried calling but no one answered.
Just kidding! :D
Sorry, no pictures this week, i forgot my camera. I guess you got those ones from the Joostens and Elder Owens though. The Joostens were AWESOME. Now i know why Martin was so cool. My companion is Elder Wheeler and he is a funny kid from Mountain Home, Idaho. And yes that is a small town. I'm no longer in a walking area which is a bummer but its fun cuz we drive A LOT out to small towns and stuff. Its an adventure all the time. Small town people are always a but more relaxed, which i like. They even had a tie contest after church on Sunday, and you are speaking to the official Strathmore Ward Annual Father's Day Tie Contest winner in the Craziest category. It was the fish tie that i have. It sealed the deal. Woot Woot! I won a small box of candy, and in some eyes, immortality for sure. :) After church, where i met someone who served in Lake Elsinore Ward and he remembered the Sniders and the Fardigs. That was cool. He supposedly served there back when the Dexter Building was new/dedicated. Crazy!
But yeah, after church we went to the Siksika Branch, which covers a native reserve and that was interesting. I'm so grateful to live in an area where the church is strong, but not too tremendously strong, oddly enough, haha. They have a potluck after church every week and that was fun. We had some funny conversations with the branch president about "ripened fish oil" aka rotten, then rottened again and left on the beach for 3 weeks, then rotted some more,cooked and made into oil. Oh, did i say rotten? I meant ripened. my bad, haha. We're gonna go try some next week probably. Yikes. Afterwards we were trying really hard to find something to do, because no one was home or answering their phone out there. SO we stopped by some random native lady who is the sister of the branch president's wife and talked to her for a bit. Then she said that someone came and mowed her lawn and was a member, so we didn't really know much at all about who it was so we just went there and visited with them. turns out they've been inactive for a few years, not because of lack of testimony but because of laziness. We had a great long conversation with them and they want to start coming back! That was our little miracle for the day.
We had a baptism on Saturday, which was very exciting because they are always fun to see. I didn't really have anything to do with it, which is kinda a bummer but whatev. I'll find someone else. :) Her name is Jessica and she's 15 and was really excited. Baptisms always blow my mind because they are SO simple and so fast. It's something that we as missionaries try SO hard for and work for months at a time with people to get them to come unto Christ by a 5 second ordinance. I love that the gospel is so simple like that. Til next week! I love you all!
Just kidding! :D
Sorry, no pictures this week, i forgot my camera. I guess you got those ones from the Joostens and Elder Owens though. The Joostens were AWESOME. Now i know why Martin was so cool. My companion is Elder Wheeler and he is a funny kid from Mountain Home, Idaho. And yes that is a small town. I'm no longer in a walking area which is a bummer but its fun cuz we drive A LOT out to small towns and stuff. Its an adventure all the time. Small town people are always a but more relaxed, which i like. They even had a tie contest after church on Sunday, and you are speaking to the official Strathmore Ward Annual Father's Day Tie Contest winner in the Craziest category. It was the fish tie that i have. It sealed the deal. Woot Woot! I won a small box of candy, and in some eyes, immortality for sure. :) After church, where i met someone who served in Lake Elsinore Ward and he remembered the Sniders and the Fardigs. That was cool. He supposedly served there back when the Dexter Building was new/dedicated. Crazy!
But yeah, after church we went to the Siksika Branch, which covers a native reserve and that was interesting. I'm so grateful to live in an area where the church is strong, but not too tremendously strong, oddly enough, haha. They have a potluck after church every week and that was fun. We had some funny conversations with the branch president about "ripened fish oil" aka rotten, then rottened again and left on the beach for 3 weeks, then rotted some more,cooked and made into oil. Oh, did i say rotten? I meant ripened. my bad, haha. We're gonna go try some next week probably. Yikes. Afterwards we were trying really hard to find something to do, because no one was home or answering their phone out there. SO we stopped by some random native lady who is the sister of the branch president's wife and talked to her for a bit. Then she said that someone came and mowed her lawn and was a member, so we didn't really know much at all about who it was so we just went there and visited with them. turns out they've been inactive for a few years, not because of lack of testimony but because of laziness. We had a great long conversation with them and they want to start coming back! That was our little miracle for the day.
We had a baptism on Saturday, which was very exciting because they are always fun to see. I didn't really have anything to do with it, which is kinda a bummer but whatev. I'll find someone else. :) Her name is Jessica and she's 15 and was really excited. Baptisms always blow my mind because they are SO simple and so fast. It's something that we as missionaries try SO hard for and work for months at a time with people to get them to come unto Christ by a 5 second ordinance. I love that the gospel is so simple like that. Til next week! I love you all!
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
June 14th letter
SO yup. I'm getting transferred. I can't believe it! I'm going to Strathmore, and I'm pretty bummed to leave Lethbridge with only 6 weeks left, but whatev. I'm sure plenty of adventures await. the week was pretty good, nothing too crazy happened. we had more rain and thunderstorms, that was cool. This is definitely the wettest spring i have ever been a part of in my life. Yesterday Elder Madsen and i helped someone build a playground for someone and it was a blast. Afterwards we were bored so we rode around in the country part of our area, and found a cool park to go to but to get to it we had to ride down this REALLY steep gravel road for about a half mile at least. It was intense and REALLY fun. Anyone remember Elder Bullock? he served in Canyon Lake and i met him a few nights ago! It was cool, he said he remembers everyone loving the Crippens. Last night we had a great appointment with Bro. Tsui and we really helped him a lot. He's the non-member in a part-member family.Sorry this email is really short, i'm just a little bummed so i'm distracted. I love you all and will talk to you on Monday! Elder Crippen
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
Flaming Pongs and Clowns at OneTrueMedia.com
I find it ironic that Cody looks like a clown with that play button on his nose!!!
June 8th Letter
Claresholm CHICKEN!!!!!!!!!!!
the best frosted brownies you'll ever see. Aren't we so good?
Elder Hass is pretty 
Elder Madsen and I outside the templeYup, we went to the temple and it was a blast, learned some good stuff, and felt really good. Someone asked me yesterday, so how many weeks? and i was like, uuhhh 7. I hadn't thought about it in terms of weeks! yikes. Its crazy. Its really starting to hit home that its happening, and its pretty scary. Guess who i saw at the temple! Bailey Hughes Kado and her husband! Such a surprise! It was weird to see Bailey prego. She came up to me and gave me some really good advice, "Cody (it was weird to hear that name), don't ever get pregnant." it was pretty funny. I'm thinking i won't have a problem sticking to that. But it was really good to see them and chit chat. I heard all about Elizabeth's visa problems in the MTC, thats rough! Hooray for Canada's wide open borders!! haha
What an AMAZING experience this last week. As a result of a 7 Day Challenge we gave to our ward mission leader we received a referral from them to teach their son's acquaintances from high school. He spoke with them at a grad party and they said they'd be interested in meeting with us and "telling us what they believe." He mentioned that they were very opinionated girls so we were expecting them to try and bash, but we found quite the opposite. They were very accepting and active in the discussion that we had (in Starbuck's, of all places, our clothes smelled of coffee for two days, haha) as we taught the message of the Restoration and began to answer each other's questions. One of the girls said, "I came here today thinking that I would disagree with everything that you said, and that you would tell me all of these things that you can't do and that you would tell me that I was going to hell because I'm a terrible person, but everything is totally opposite from what I expected." They then invited themselves to church, weren't able to make it due to work, but were excited to read the Book of Mormon and we are meeting with them tomorrow! Such a great experience!
Adding to that, one of our bishops called us this morning and told us that a less-active family in the ward wants their son to be baptized! This is someone that we've been trying to contact for the whole time we've been here and that was an awesome thing to hear.
It was borderline creepy to hear about all the people getting married and having kids. its weird that life goes on so quickly and people grow up. Next week is transfers so i'll be emailing on Tuesday, and just a head's up, pday will be moving to Monday after that. Our mission is finally hoping on board with the rest of the world, haha. I love you all and pray for you!
Elder Crippen
What an AMAZING experience this last week. As a result of a 7 Day Challenge we gave to our ward mission leader we received a referral from them to teach their son's acquaintances from high school. He spoke with them at a grad party and they said they'd be interested in meeting with us and "telling us what they believe." He mentioned that they were very opinionated girls so we were expecting them to try and bash, but we found quite the opposite. They were very accepting and active in the discussion that we had (in Starbuck's, of all places, our clothes smelled of coffee for two days, haha) as we taught the message of the Restoration and began to answer each other's questions. One of the girls said, "I came here today thinking that I would disagree with everything that you said, and that you would tell me all of these things that you can't do and that you would tell me that I was going to hell because I'm a terrible person, but everything is totally opposite from what I expected." They then invited themselves to church, weren't able to make it due to work, but were excited to read the Book of Mormon and we are meeting with them tomorrow! Such a great experience!
Adding to that, one of our bishops called us this morning and told us that a less-active family in the ward wants their son to be baptized! This is someone that we've been trying to contact for the whole time we've been here and that was an awesome thing to hear.
It was borderline creepy to hear about all the people getting married and having kids. its weird that life goes on so quickly and people grow up. Next week is transfers so i'll be emailing on Tuesday, and just a head's up, pday will be moving to Monday after that. Our mission is finally hoping on board with the rest of the world, haha. I love you all and pray for you!
Elder Crippen
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
rain and more rain, little kids shooting at us, and really good ice cream
this is from our tour of the water treatment plant. SO cool.
we made German pancakes! 
panoramic pictures are the best
this is from our dinner on Sunday in honor of Memorial day. The wife is American and this reminded me so much of home! The Subject pretty much sums up the week right there, haha. It was a good one.Yesterday was the first day it didn't rain all day for a long time. Thursday was the worst. We tried all day long in the pouring rain to try and contact people with no luck. Walking from dinner to our next appt we were walking into the wind and heavy rain. Needless to say, we were totally and completely soaked. At our next appt they gave us towels and a hairdryer to try and dry off our pants. We were WET. So that was a big adventure. A few days ago we were walking around, and there was a whole bunch of kids playing with toy guns, and when they saw us they started yelling some sort of battle cry and were shooting at us and making gun sounds. Their dad's just looked on annoyed, haha. They did it over and over and over as we walked by, then saw something shiny and ran to play with it. it was funny. Ok, check this out. I don't know if they have this in the states, but up here, dairy queen just started serving STRAWBERRY GOLDEN OREO BLIZZARDS. ummm, heaven? yes. I LOVE GOLDEN OREOS. speaking of those, anyone up for sending Vanilla Joe-Joes? :) Life continues to be good. There are so many awesome families in these wards, but we are struggling with finding someone for us to teach. But we're having fun. Good news: outside of church and mission meetings i never have to wear a suit coat on the mission again! woooooooooooohhooooooooooo. It was legit. We get to go to the temple next week so that'll be a blast. We finally got in contact with Amanda, she's moved out of our area now, but she said she wants to eventually move back into the ward boundaries in a month or so. We had "stake conference" on Sunday and Elder Pace of the Seventy, Elder Ballard and Pres. Uchtdorf were there. It was great and i learned a lot. I love you all and will talk to you next week! ME
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