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 temple

Yup, 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

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

May 26th Letter

Hello family. It was a good week and stuff. we had interviews and zone conference and i love those two times. Interviews is always great because President Archibald is the man. He's so easy to talk to and helps your perspective grow a lot. Some missionaries from my transfer are going home a little early so they gave their farewell testimonies and that was really weird. Time is tickin. Zone conference is always cool because you can see that you never stop learning. Just because I've been out 22 months doesn't mean at all that i know everything. I learn things that are new everyday. We were able to teach Dawn, the friend of a family in the ward a few times and its been great. In one of the lessons she asked what were the greatest experiences of our missions. I instantly started tearing up a little bit, which NEVER happens because i know what they were and they are so sweet to me. We had a great couple of lessons with her and hopefully will be able to see some progress with her. On Sunday we spoke in church and I spoke on the benefits of having missionaries in your home. There are a lot of them. I shared some experiences and ended with saying that we can't be like the servant who hid his talent. We need to share our talents/the gospel because we were blessed with in and ENTRUSTED with it. As we share it, our welcome from the Lord will truly be, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant." Won't that be AWESOME? I love you all more than you know!

Elder Crippen

Colossians 2:4-5

May 19th Letter

you guessed it, LIFE IS GOOD! Elder Madsen and i fixed up the bikes that the Vaka's gave us and we are biking FIENDS. its a blast, i don't mind not having a car one bit cuz i love biking. total blast. hopefully this'll mean my "winter coat" will melt away. woot woot. No nasty spills yet, just tons and tons of fun. And weird looks from people. One thing i like about being a missionary, you always can make people laugh. whether or not you're talking to them. I wonder if they notice that they are staring and laughing. With summer comes mosquitoes and they're already finding me. Its a good thing i didn't go to Africa or South America or I'd be dead.I have 3 on my arms and two on my legs. BAH. Monday was a cool day because i found a shirt crumpled at the bottom of our laundry closet, and i liked it and it fit perfectly! Woot woot! As i was cutting an extra button hole for it (ok, it didn't fit PERFECTLY, but whatev) I cut my finger so that was a bummer. But its getting better. But we pretty much did service all day. We started out mowing our lawn, Madsen did the front and i was about to di the back when we realized that the tree in our backyard was totally infested with bees attacking the flowers on it. The back lawn still remains uncut. Then we helped a few families with random things, helped someone move, then went to the Vakas where i did that AMAZING chicken for them. I MISS BBQING! i love it. Then we had to rush to an appt with Amanda, our investigator, which didn't happen :( but we had an awesome lesson with another family an hour later. We were EXHAUSTED that night and quickly fell asleep. Last week after pday we had a lesson with a Part member family the Tsui's (choys) and it was great. Supposedly Bro Tsui, the non member said wow to his wife after we left. It was an awesome lesson, we were able to get out his concerns and stuff, and most of it was on spirit recognition.
We had an amazing spiritual experience with a less-active we were teaching last Thursday. He expressed that he was really feeling down with things he was going through at the time and we talked a bit about that. Then we moved onto the lesson, which was on Moroni 7, the reading assignment. I was leading the discussion so i started talking and stuff. It was a big struggle because i could feel that i was receiving NO help from the Spirit. I sounded like a bumbling idiot. I felt no power helping me. So i just stopped talking, hoping that someone else there was inspired to say something. After a few quiet moments, Bro Wilkinson says, "Is it just me or is this not what we're supposed to be reading right now?" Boy, was he right. I didn't know what to do, and neither did he, but Elder Madsen says, "I know where." And he had us turn to the Sermon on the Mount and it was PERFECT. Its now one of Bro. Wilkinson's favorite stories and it really helped him a lot with the things that he was going through at the time. Such a great lesson! For sure on of the first times I've ever felt the spirit tell me to shut up, haha. Thanks to everyone for all the mail that keeps arriving at my house! We hardly ever get mail sent down here so its always fund to check our mailbox and see something from family or friend! Mail will be delivered from the office tomorrow and I'm SO excited! we haven't gotten any since may 5, so I'm hoping there's some good stuff waiting.
Suit coats got to come off for the last several days! It felt so good. Sadly, that shindig is over cuz its gonna be on the more chilly side for the next week. :( oh, and we have a lesson with a new investigator tomorrow! She has a lot of questions about the church and stuff so we'll be teaching her tomorrow! woot woot!
OH! we got to go on a tour of the Lethbridge Water Treatment plant. Probably one of the coolest things I've seen. Its crazy all the things they have to purify water. I"ll send pictures next week. It blows your mind! unfortunately my mind was so blown i didn't really take many photos. bum bum buuuhhhhhh. But yeah, life is good, I'm alive and loving life. I love you all!!!
Elder Crippen

May 12 Letter

The Lethbridge Zone
Grape Drink! few will get it.

This is Ashley, the girl who was baptized just after Clawson and i got transferred out of Confederation Park. The other girl is a recent convert who was a great fellowshipper for Ashley, Carly Raslask.

We got Carly "I Got Baptized" stickers and she gave one to Ashley, haha!


Great week! agghhhh first off is was SO good to talk to the family. I almost fainted when i talked with the little ones who are not little ones at all anymore! Kaela, Michael, Reagan, it blew my mind how old they sound! And it was so good to talk to David and plan stuff out with him. I"M EXCITED to see everyone and be able to be more involved in your lives! And Happy mother's day mom, i already told you it but now this way it'll be broadcast to the world,. you're the greatest!!!! I have to admit, its been the only phone call that made me a bit trunky, but after that i felt really motivated cuz i was like, i can't go like this for 3 months! So don't worry, I'm better, but i loved the call, it was AWESOME.
So, awesome story. We FINALLY were able to get a hold of Amanda, through Bro Mathes, our awesome ward mission leader. He set up a dinner for Friday where we would all be and stuff. 2 hours before the dinner, she called and canceled with him. When Bro Mathes let us know we were pretty devastated. I had a stack of flyer's in my hand that i had brought in from the mailbox and i threw them in our kitchen floor, childish, but that's how upset i was. This was like the 10th time she'd canceled and stuff. So we were bummed. then we stopped by a member who said she had a friend who wanted to meet with us. That member then said that the lady changed her mind and only wanted a Book of Mormon. another bummer. Then a half hour before the dinner we got a call from Bro Mathes who said Amanda had uncanceled!! we were ecstatic! It was a great dinner, we taught the first half of lesson 4: The Commandments and she accepted a baptismal date for May 22! WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO she's still going strong and is set for that date.
Later that week we went and visited with a cool family named the Bissets, who we have met with a lot. Sister Bisset normally wears glasses. A lady answered the door who looked completely unfamiliar and I, thinking that it was one of their tenants or something, said,"is Ben or Victoria here?" And she goes, I am Victoria. AGGHHHHHH i was so embarrassed. Elder Madsen looked at me really funny and stuff. Oh man that was weird. SO i explained the whole glasses thing and stuff. haha oops.
I got a letter from a friend who said shes been looking at the blog and said that i have gained weight, but she has too, and started a challenge to get back to our July 08 weight. Winner gets treated to dinner. Katelyn, YOU'RE ON. I'm already down 3 pounds.12 more to go. boo yah! my pants are fitting better already!
My district is the Lost BoyZ. We are named after the kids from Hook, i'm Rufio, Elder Madsen is TooSmall, the kid who goes, there you are peter! Elder Whiting, because he can eat like no other, is the fat black kid named ThudButt, and Elder Grace is Tootles. Good times.
Life is good, we're finally having some warm weather, its BEAUTIFUL actually. I love it. We're SO close to no suit coats! ahhhhhhh can't wait. I love Elder Madsen, he and i are having a blast! I love you all!
Elder Crippen

breaking into the safe at Scotiabank. The bank manager is a ward missionary and he had to stop by there to do something and he said, yeah, go poke around where ever you want. how often do you get told that in a BANK! JEAH!

Hello family! Its been a good week. Craziest things first. The weather is ridiculous. More crazy storms and snow and WIND. Oh man the wind is unbelievable. Its enough to drive you crazy. But we've seen a lot of good things happen. Beaudette is a less active lady we've found and she's been great to meet with and she has SUCH a desire to come back and especially she has a massive desire for missionary work. Its great. We were able to give her a blessing and stuff and that was awesome. Elder Madsen and i have really gotten better and better at our teaching and we've had some good experiences with that. Its so fun to totally feel the Spirit totally take control and help you out. Oh! and Transfer news. Nothings really changing. Madsen and i are staying together and I'm DL again. Which is a bummer because i really enjoyed just being able to focus hardcore on just being a missionary. But whatev.
I think one thing that has been awesome is see members really get excited about missionary work. We have people coming up to us and telling us about these awesome experiences they've had with their friends. They are so excited! Thats just a smidgen of the joy that we'll feel later in heaven. Well, that's all that's really going down this week. I love you all and can't wait to talk to you on SUNDAY! yeeeahhhhhhh!!!! hah it's gonna be awesome. oh! the phone number, I'll send that in a separate email. hugs and kisses. bye!
Elder Crippen

April 28th Letter

Me and Elder Lee running to the temple in the rain/snow/slush.

iOle!

we had to take the classic photo

Me and Bro. Vaka bringing in DA PIG!

the pet cat we had for 10 minutes

our baby

painting without war paint is for chumps.






SO yeah, transfers are next week. SO I'll be emailing on Tuesday. How crazy is that? Time is going by way too fast, its blowing my mind. Reality is setting in and I'm FREAKING out, haha. Life is so good as a missionary, so I'm gonna take advantage of it. Big thanks to mom, Leneah, Kaela, and Maddie for the letters i got from them! we only get mail every like, 3 weeks down here, so that's a bummer. More than likely I'll finish here and if you want to send anything direct, my address is 47 Laval Blvd W, Lethbridge, AB T1K 4E4 Canada. That's more optional that anything, whatev you want! Oh and Maddie, thank you for the iPod comparison, but mine is better cuz its old school! haha not. but it works still. Right? right? please say yes. That blew my mind when you said that I'm the next missionary to report. How does that happen, like, what goes on there? We just went to the temple today, that's why I'm writing a bit late. It was awesome. We had ANOTHER surprise spring snowstorm and that was good times. there was a WHOLE bunch of missionaries there, our whole zone, and a few others from other zones came, so it was really good to see old buddies. A few nights ago was writing in my journal and i was just kinda feeling down a bit. Satan works on me hardcore and tries to make me feel like i haven't done anything good on my mission. I had earlier listened to a CD Jayni sent me forever ago with a song on it by the tabernacle choir and it says in it, "If you're worried and you can't sleep, Just count your blessings instead of sheep, And you'll fall asleep counting your blessings." That song came to my mind and i thought I'd try it out. I started counting my blessings, and WOW nothing chases feelings of insecurity away more than that. Mostly i tried to focus on the people that i have met that have changed my life and that i know that I've helped them a little bit. It was such a great feeling. I want to find more of those people!

We had a good training by the assistants a few days ago. Prior to the meeting we were asked to read two talks. Man Down by Pres. Eyring, and the Swallowed Up in the Will of the Father by Elder Maxwell. They both are great talks about forgetting yourself and serving others. I thought that i had been doing a good job with that but the Spirit helped me see otherwise. I learned that we can never stop moving forward, but we always need to keep moving forward. We can't just be all happy and complacent with where we are. We can always get better and better and be more effective instruments in the Lord's hands. It was a humbling but really cool wake up call for me. I wish i could have had my act together 21 months ago. But whatev, we're here to learn!

I really like Elder Madsen a lot. We are a lot alike in personality so we have lots of fun. His teaching is getting better and better, he's one of the best teachers I've ever seen so young in the mission. I really wish i could get all of me feelings down, but i have the same problem Nephi does in 2 Ne 33:1. Bummer. i guess i can just tell you guys stuff. Oh, by the way, Sister Lambert from the office called the other week and asked for travel plans and stuff. I told her i wanted to go to Ontario Airport. I'm guessing that's where you were planning on anyways. Its SO weird we're making these plans. wow. Well, life is good, i love you all, and I'll talk to you on Tuesdays!

Elder Crippen