January 8th!

Hey family,

Well this week was really cool but kind of unexpected. So I went to Praia alone with the intention of coming back here with my new companion but that didnt actually work out... The Conference was amazing and was one of the most spiritual ones yet and then at the end President Oliveira told me that I wasn't actually going to receive a new comp until the end of the transfer (dec 8) and until then I would be serving with a mini missionary. I now have my mini missionary (djony my recent convert from

Santa Maria) and things are going very = good! I love djony and we just have a good time all day long and at the same time teach txeu lessons. 

Also the other good news I got is that my flight was bought and I am now set up to go home January 7th and my flight to slc arrives at 10:35 january 8th. Wahoo!!!

 I was thinking that you guys might like to come back and visit CV during the summer or spring time. Praia isnt all that interesting but I think you guys would really like to see Mindelo (mini Brazil) and Sal. There is a lot of cool history stuff there and after visiting the old salt plant today that was founded by the Portuguese I decided that one day I need to take you guys there. 

 Love you all a ton!

Just 5 weeks! Keep waiting but dont get too trunky.

Elder Edwards

Coming Home.

Dear family,

Wow things here are weird and crazy... So I got everything figured out in Santa Maria and then last night I got a call from the president saying that he has to take the zone leaders out of santa maria and put us on the other side of the island because there they are killing the Lords work and once we fix them we can become a district.. So I am now in Espargos.. I have been thinking a lot about this and I think that I am going to start school in January... I wanted to extend because I didn't think I would have enough time to get everything set up in Santa Maria but now I have learned that the Lord is doing His work in His time. He didn't need a lot of time but it was him that pieced everything together and built up his church. Now my work here is coming to an end and I feel like it's time to start school and prepare to one day have a family..

 I hope all is well with you guys. Love you all.

Elder Edwards

***Update: We were planning on having Elder Edwards home before Christmas but they were unable to schedule a flight that would get him off the island in time. So he will be arriving back in the ol' US of A the first week of January. We can hardly wait!

30 Minutes A Day Challenge.

September 2nd, 2013

Wow this week was full of adventures and full of new experiences. First off on Tuesday and Wednesday we had to do everything for the week because we were going to Praia so we ended up marking 12 lessons just on Tuesday and 9 for Wednesday with 3 baptismal interviews. It was crazy and we were running around like mad men trying to get to all of our lessons. We ended up getting everything set up and then Thursday afternoon we got to Praia and I did a division all day with my best friend ever Elder Christensen. 

Friday morning we had zone leaders council which went really good. The first part we just talked about health and basic info that we needed to pass over to our missionaries and then we played the dreaded ´´scripture game´´. A couple months ago our mission president decided that we all need to know the scriptures better so he asked us all to memorize one scripture for each segment in the missionary lessons. That means in total we should all have at least 42 scriptures memorized. I had them all but a couple weeks ago I decided I wanted to have better scriptures for each one instead of just the basic really short ones. At the council we decided to play the game and when it was my turn I completely killed it. I quoted the best scripture that was full of life and super long.. The mission president stood up and gave me a standing ovation which was not like him because he is really serious. Then we made our goals for this month and reviewed with everyone what they thought and how we were going to make it happen. We also we all challenged to take a book of mormon, write in the front cover what we want to change in our lives or who we want to be and then read the book 30 minutes every day and watch for this change come to pass. It was a really cool idea and I am stoked to get started ( The same challenge works for all of you guys as well).

Then Saturday we woke up at 5 to get to the airport for our flight that was suppose to leave at 7... That sure didn't happen though. The plane got delayed and we ended up flying out of Praia at 1 instead which really messed stuff up. We didn't get back to our house until 3 and we were suppose to have 3 baptisms at 3:30 on the other side of the island.. We ended up just cancelling the baptism we planned with everyone else and we just our baptisms here in Santa Maria in the ocean at 6:30. It was actually a really sweet baptism and I got to go into the ocean to do one of them so I can't complain. 

Then it was my first Sunday here in Santa Maria which turned out legit! Even though we were out of area we still had 10 investigators show up and 2 of them went up and bore there testimonies about how they read the book of mormon and prayed about it all and they know that it's true and are anxious to get baptized... SOOOO sweet to see and to know that God is working to help all of our investigators. We are seriously being soo blessed here and we are seeing miracles all day everyday. Also I realized that the mission President sent me here with a giant task to accomplish. He told us that where we are and what we are doing is not just for any missionary and in itself is a blessing and a privilege. We are suppose to lead and help our zone to be able to have enough worthy priesthood holders to seperate from the mindelo stake and become its own district. Then in our area we are suppose to find and baptize enough people for Santa Maria to become a branch instead of just a group. Man there is a lot of pressure on our heads right now... We don't really sleep anymore because we have soo much to do.. But I am 100% confident that through obedience, diligence and scripture study we are going to be able to accomplish all of these things and the Lord will use us in his hands. 

Elder Edwards

Drum Roll Please....

Elder Edwards has his release date. He will be arriving January 2nd and we couldn't be more excited. I was really hoping we would have him back to spend Christmas with the family but the people of Cape Verde are lucky to have him a bit longer. Here is this weeks update from our Elder:

Dear Family,

   Drum role... Edwards' official coming home day as of today..... JANUARY 2ND! WAHOO! I talked to the mission pres and he said that my release date is the 2nd so I think that I should be flying in January 1st of December 31. That should be a good enough amount of time to get settled in, play a little bit of xbox, maybe buy a laptop for school, have a car? hopefully kiss a girl and get into school. That's about as far as I have though into things. 

 Today we finally moved into a new house which is looking sweet! It's a brand new apartment that has never been lived in before which is complimented perfectly with a brand new oven, fridge and washing machine.. Now we're living large and in charge. I think that I am going to be staying in this area for the next transfer (starting on the 5th) which should give me time to baptized all of our new amigos and realize our wedding.

Things this week having really started to turn around. We were praying to know how to better help our area and we both felt like we needed to leave a bunch of investigators that haven't been progressing. On Monday we set our minds and all of our faith to finding the elects that were ready to progress and ready to make there first steps to come closer to Christ. We ended up receiving a bunch of references and marked a new investigator with a baptismal date almost everyday. It never ceases to amaze me how full of miracles the Lords work is and how he will always answers our prayers and help his work to keep moving forward.

Love, Elder Edwards

A Kiss For A Missionary.

These are excerpts from two different emails home. One to the Edwards' and one to the Wagstaff's. Both sent on March 3, 2013.

Bom dia,

   Well I have officially finished my first week here in Mindelo. It has definitely been a weird transition. I came Relva, the most third world part of all of Cape Verde to São Vicente, which may be the most developed and modernized part of all Cape Verde. The work here is definitely different than Relva but things are already starting to pick up. This area was supposed to turn into a stake this next week but the church decided that it's not quite ready yet. Our goal now is to work our butts off and hopefully in the next couple months we will be able to make the change. 

  A weird thing that happened this week was that a full grown man walked past me very slow and creepy like and then kissed me on the shoulder... I think he had been drinking.. I was for sure a little bit weirded out.

I love the mission and the work here is on fire! I don't have time to think about everything else. These last couple weeks on top off normal mission work I have been teaching relief society, a mission prep class, training the 4 new ward missionaries and yesterday I gave a 10 minute talk in sacrament meeting! I don't have time to even think about what's going on! ha. Well I hope all is well with you. Love you all. Elder Edwards

Secret Trip.

Hello my family,
  This last week lots of things have happened. Last week after using email I heard a secret that came from headquarters that I had 2 plane tickets that were going to take me out of Fogo over to Praia and then up to Mindelo. The strange thing was when I got on the plane and did the math my first flight was set to leave at 4:50 to Praia. The second set to go at 5:35. It's a 35 minute flight.. that doesn't leave a lot of time for a lay-over. I was kind of nervous about how it was all going to work out. The first flight took off late and we landed in Praia at about 5:40. There aren't any other planes out in the hanger. I figured I missed it. I ask the service lady, she tells me to run out and check back in real quick and we are running, (me and the sister I was with It definitely looked like a date). We go through security to discover that we are back on the exact same plane haha. And by security I mean they looked at my ID and then I walked through the metal detecter that is clearly unplugged for everyone to see. I got to Midelo, São Vicente to discover that I am now serving in the second best area. Second to and only Relva.
  I am now officially settled in and am serving with Elder Vicente. A guy from Fogo who I met while I was there and he is serving here until he gets his visa to go to Brazil. He's a boss and we are going to baptize like crazy!
Love you all.
Elder Edwards

Long Overdue Updates.

See additional post below. Sorry for the infrequent updates. Elder Edwards has been so busy that emails are shorter and less frequent. He is doing great and we couldn't be more proud of him. Can't believe it's already been 9 months!!!

 "Hello meus pais. This week was another good one. I took that one day plane flight to Praia because the President wanted me to attend a specialized leadership training. It was way good and made me feel like some sort of business man flying around like that. My companion bleeds blacks! My new companion is a fellow highland high rammer and we have been representing for the SLC and getting work done! This week Elder Ensign showed up and he is in my district. He is in the city right next to mine (Cova figuera) and he seemed to be in culture shock at district meeting. He is strugglying with the language but he has a huge testimony so he´ll be fine. And the area that we´re in nobody speaks portuguese. It is crazy to hear about all the new missionaries and changes in the mission work. I´m glad that I am going to be here to help them lead all out. Its not too good to hear the utes are sucking it up. Hope all is well with you. With love, Elder Edwards Oct. 28th"

October 21.

Hello my family. Its good to hear that halloween is here again. Im not gonna lie I forgot about that holiday, it doesnt actually exist here.. The bad news for the week is that I am in Sao filipe again so I cant send pictures this week. This week was the end of the transfer and once again, I am getting a new companion but luckily I am going to stay here in Relva another transfer. There is an active volcano and I do live at thew bottom of it. I really hope it explodes that would be awesome see. This mission is super weird though. Tomorrow I am going to take a plane flight to Praia, Santiago to pick up my new companion and then the next day Im gonna take another plane to make it back to fogo. This will be the first time in my life having a back to back plane trip in just 2 days.It was good to hear from you and about how life is going. I hope all stays well. Love Elder. PS GO UTES!

Cape Verde!!!

E.E has arrived! Aaron, the girls and I, along with Spencer and Nicole were lucky enough to get to go see him at the airport yesterday since we didn't get to say bye at the MTC. Unfortunately Nicole had to leave before he got there but it was very beneficial to us all. Matt is doing FABULOUS! He is a natural missionary and when I spoke to him while on his layover in Boston he had already been doing missionary work in the airport. He left SLC yesterday at 9:45 a.m and didn't arrive in Cape Verde until almost that same time this morning. Here is the email he sent:

"Hey Im just writing you to let you know that I have arrived safetly. Im going to be on Assomada on Santiago. Everything went smoothly getting here. I have my all of my stuff which is more than others can say and so far this place is awesome the people and the culture is nuts but Im excited to get started. Ill write you on monday. Love you all"

Right now we don't have a snail mail address, but keep those emails coming. It will be interesting to see in the next few weeks how fast Matty has access to email and how slowly it takes snail mail to arrive.  Love you Elder Edwards!