Hermana Wood In The Hood

Hint (for my mom): Vida=life😉
Jkjk shes the best guys.
One big thing I have realized in the last 4.5 months is that never in my life will I experience the Joy’s of having a name people can pronounce….. I thought I would have a year & a half break of having to help everyone sound out my name. This must just be my purpose in life because turns out Latinos cant pronounce the “W” sound 🙂
so my name is a 50/50 split between being called Hermana Good of when they dont like trying to say that they give up and just say Hermana Madera-which is the word for Wood.
So basically I am HIGHKEY thinking of getting my nametag translated so send me your vote of which one!!😂😂
This week was good! I am learning so so so much about myself and others and to anyone thinking of serving a mission even the slightest bit. I 110% ENCOURAGE YOU TO SEND IT!!! I can not possibly describe the amount of growth you will see in every aspect of your life. And this is coming from a gal who didnt think it was for her hahaha. It’s so good.
I dont have too many stories other than to follow up on my last email that our dear friend Kevin has in fact been booked in the big house for a hot minute😎 he had a friend reach out to us and let us know that hes not really ignoring us😂😂😂😂 hes a good guy.
I also witnessed my first man hunt first hand. Not gonna lie I lowkey thought someone forgot to let us know World War 3 started when I seen 7 helicopters low flying above us.
I dont have a lot of other stuff that happened this week but my spiritual thought is actually pretty unique this week! Tremonton finally hit the map and is talked about in a story from This Septembers Ensign!! The name of the article is called “Becoming a New Creature Through Christ”. It is SO good and I wont say too much about it cause you guys should all read it for yourselves but all I will say is that GOD LOVES YOU. and JESUS LOVE YOU. I know there’s a lot of mothers and fathers and siblings reading these emails so I want you all to imagine sending your son or daughter off on a mission knowing that the people there would argue with your child, gossip about him/her, spit on him/her, hurt him/her and even torture and kill your child. I am no mother yet but even as a 19 year old sitting in a laundromat it brings tears to my eyes thinking of the agony that must feel like as a parent. Well that’s not all. All of this happened so that those same people who fought, gossiped and were so cruel -could be saved. So that they could have a second chance, third chance and as many as they needed to be happy again.

I can not possibly tell you how much YOUR Heavenly Father loves you.
He sent his son for YOU.
His son sacrificed his own life for YOU.

I’m not saying I dont ever forget this, Haha geez I make some stupid mistakes, but i think we could all use a reminder of just how much we are loved. And just how important daily repentance is.

So try it for a week, and if you get a chance, let me know how it goes😊

I love you all and hope you have a good and SAFE week!
Love Ryenne

Wow wow wow.
God loves Downey.
And so do I.
💙
Life here has been so good! My new companion is Hna. Wall from Virginia! Me and her are both pretty new so we’re having a lot of fun laughing at all of our mistakes.
The population here is mostly Hispanic. And be mostly I mean all of it.
I have seen 2 white people this whole week. 1 when I wake up, and 1 when I go to the bathroom😅
It’s seriously only Hispanics and I love it so much!! I have literally already found a very strong passion for homemade mango Chile popsicles and mariachi music.
I’m not sure if I can send a video but I’m sure my mom has found a way to post it already so I dont have to worry about it too much Haha- but one of our cute members who is 85 years old was telling us while we were eating that she loves to sing. She said everyone else loves her singing to and went on and on about it until we asked her to sing for us ha. I am not gonna lie, at first I might’ve just assumed that SHE thought she was really good because Latinas are just spiritually gifted with pride Haha but no. She whipped out the karaoke machine, cranked the volume, opened the screen door and sang her sweet heart out to us and her neighbors. And it was SO good!!! I will add that she wants everyone to know that mariachi is “bien mexicana” (VERY mexican) jajajajajaja.
Another fun story from this week was actually from my 2nd day here. Hna Wall had told me about our friend who’s name is Kevin Rasta …. yes Rasta… and Yes has a weed garden because “thats his passion”. But anyway, We had been out talking to people for a while near Kevin’s house but it was getting pretty dark so we decided to head back to the car. We turned the corner and there was 4 police cars with their lights on surrounding a car in front of ours and one more pulling up to the scene blocking ours. At first we thought they were in the house that was right there cause Kevin had warned us not to go by the house or down the street cause of it’s a cholo case but as we walked up we could see that they were doing a search in that car and there was a guy cuffed sitting on the curb. We sat in the car not really knowing what to do cause we were stuck and then Hna wall goes…. “Hey that’s Kevin!!” Hahahhaha we were like uhhh…..
So we are giving him the benefit of the doubt and saying that because it was dark maybe our judgement was off , but also we definitely haven’t been able to get in contact with him hahaha.
Lifes good in the Hood.
But yeah, my spiritual though for the week is something Hna Wall told me last night. When Moses was about to lead the Hebrews out of Egypt he prayed to God and told him how he was worried and he didnt know what to do and he didnt think he could do it. After he got it all out God gave him a stick. Haha I laughed cause I can just imagine moses (literally) stuttering when God hands him a stick and tells him to take an entire nation across the desert and against an army the size of China.
But God understood Moses’s frustration and doubts, and he replied by showing him the all the creations, universes and worlds with out number to show him just how small we are. To show Moses that even though we are so small and so tiny in comparison we each play such an important role and if we could trust the Hands that created all that, to guide us, even our own small steps, we could conquer our own Egypts.
So I wanna encourage you all to find your Egypt, and pray for a Stick. God will always give you what you need if you sincerely ask with the desire to do.
I love you all and hope you have the best week. Be safe.
Love, ryenne

Hey hey heyyyyyyy!!!
Well first off in case anyone is wondering. Yes I am crying because I miss the fair. No I’m not trunky or homesick. Just fair sick.
Buttt like I said I am so happy! The Spanish is coming slowly and one thing I’ve found about learning a language is you have to treat it like a relationship. You can spend as much time trying to figure it out as you want but if you dont learn how to love it, YOURE NOT GONNA BE SMART OR HAPPY.
This next transfer I will be getting a new companion but I dont know anything about her yet so I’ll keep you updated, all I know is her name is Hermana Wall:)
This week Fredy set a new baptismal date!!!! (Also before anyone asks…yes he is still in love with me) hes gonna be baptized on the 31 of August and I’m so excited for him!!
Nothing super crazy happened this week but I’ll include a super embarrassing funny story just because I love you all.
Last transfer me and Hna Sears decided to knock on this random door and a man answered. We started talking to him and when we asked him if there was a time we could come visit him he said this wasn’t his house but that they were cooking and asked us to come eat. Me being a polite young lady said “oh no thank you were so full!”
They both looked at me like I was nuts and hna Sears started to giggle a little. After we left, I found out that the nice man had not in fact invited us to eat, but that he had explained earlier that this wasn’t his house, it was his sister in laws’ and he was visiting because she had a heart condition 🙂👍😂
I can tell you that my Spanish is not great…. but it has improved hahaha!
This week we had dinner with our bishop and we were talking about how important it is to see the bigger picture. That if we could see 15 years from now how the little things affect us we would do everything in our power to follow the guide lines of our leaders. One thing he said that I liked was “sometimes we have members that are active in the church and inactive in the gospel” .
GUYS. BE. ACTIVE. IN. THE. GOSPEL.!!!
anyway, love you all, and be safe!!
Love Ryenne

Well this has been quite the week to say the least!
This week I have found myself on the listening end of SO many interesting stories. In one lesson we taught our dear friend jaime that he could have the opportunity to be sealed to his family forever. He looked flabbergasted to say the least so we went on to elaborate and say how it most marriages it’s only “until death do you part” but in our church it could be forever! We stopped to let him say how cool our message was and he goes “FOREVER???” We were like yeah!!! He looked around the room, let’s out a sigh and goes “geez cant a guy get a break?!?!”
We were literally speechless.
The rest of the lesson we spent listening to him tell us that he farted while pretending to shoot one of his past wives with his finger and she called the cops trying to get him arrested….I love LA!
Hahaha really this has been such a fun week and I am so happy.
Spiritual thought for the week is to read all of Roman’s because it is all super good but more specifically Romans 8:31 “31 What shall we then say to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us?”
I couldn’t even expound on that. Have faith. Keep on keepin on.
Love you all and be safe!!
Love Ryenne

So this week has been awesome! We are currently teaching a blended family and the moms name is Amber. Amber is like my soul sister I swear she’s so awesome and I feel like she’s the person who “turned me into a missionary”.  One day this past week we were teaching her and she just started exclaiming to us how awesome our message was and how much sense it made and she had wondered all her life about these questions and now it finally fit together! It was the first time in my life I have actually seen the Gospel take root in someone’s life for the first time and just flourish. I cant explain the feelings that come with that!!
Amber also has a brother who will sometimes sit and ask us questions about the church, he and amber were asking us some random questions and then he randomly blurts out, “Hey! Don’t you guys wear magic white underwear?!”
You can bet your bottom dollar there was a little red angel on my shoulder BEGGING me to explain how when I wear my magic white underwear I can read minds and if I don’t wash them for a long enough time then I can teleport into other dimensions.
I guess that’s why God gives us someone to literally sit on the other side of your shoulder who obviously has her red devil under control and kindly sorted out the situation😂🤷‍♀️.
Everyone keeps asking how my Spanish is and my girl Hna Taylor explained it PERFECTLY in her group so imma just let her say it…
“I’m at the point where I understand a pretty solid amount of spanish, like I’m no longer confused in lessons or at member’s houses. however, some members have really wack accents & also speak really, really fast. the spanish missionaries here are basically just 20 white kids from across the states attempting to learn spanish, & I’ve realized that a key part of being a spanish missionary is smiling, nodding, agreeing & then walking away & asking your comp, “what did they say?” and they say “I have no idea” and then you both shrug & just keep going.”
I literally cannot explain how accurate this is….😂😅
But I do love the Spanish work that is for sure!! There’s always something fun in it!  I have only had one thing I didn’t like and that was matte.  Matte is an Argentinean herbal tea that is drank in a very specific way.  It definitely looks like weed and tastes like what I imagine smoking feels like… that makes no sense but it’s the best way to describe it.
But also we tried it from some a few guys drinking in an alley…am I as worried as I should be? Probably not… don’t worry mom:)
Also this week my scriptures on hand & heart have been in Mormon 8. In this chapter Christ tells the people that judgement is His. That in the end if we can just hold on and try to have charity it’ll all come out in the wash.  I’ve been really really trying to watch myself with this one because it’s hard for me.  But its true, if we really try to do our part to the absolute best of our ability then we don’t have to worry about what will or “should” happen to others.  So try that one out this week and let me know how that goes!!:)
Love you all and have the best week!  Be safe!
Love Ryenne

Because YA GIRL IS DRIVING in the big city!!
For tonight’s session we will be covering a story called “small town girl hits big city roads”
So incase you missed the memo I’m the driver now and it’s a BLAST. I haven’t hit anyone yet and so far no ones hit me, but because I just wouldn’t be me if something didnt go wrong at literally every turn, our gas card got comprised!!! Aka all the money got stolen and taken off of it!! So we had to do some sketchy gambling on the gas we had left to make it up to Santa Monica for a new card!
I also learned how to make El Salvadoranian papooses and dang I’m good Haha 😜
Last but not least I Definitely hard core climbed a large gate to get into our members apartment complex!
Sorry lifes been pretty slow but I hope you all have had a good week and my spiritual thought is to TELL ME IF YOUVE ACTUALLY BEEN DOING YOUR SPIRITUAL HOMEWORK! Haha, cause I know most of you don’t actually get to the bottom of these emails. But if you do I’m proud and i love you hahaha anyway be safe and have a good week!!
Love Ryenne

Okay but for real this week has been crazy! I experienced my first 2 earthquakes EVER with in 2 days!! so we were in our “meet the President” meeting and president Cordón for the first time and he was giving a training. All the sudden the bench starts swaying from side to side. I though it was just some chunky elder at the end of the bench or something but then we got rocked a little forward and everyone started looking around and presidente stops mid sentence and goes “is this your first earthquake?” , we all answered, And then just goes back to teaching?!?! Haha so we were just casually listening to a training during an earthquake Haha. Hes seriously the coolest.

The second one we were in the church with Fredy before his baptismal interview and all the sudden he goes “temblor!!” And then church started going in a rolling motion! This one was a little longer and bigger, and it was a little weird to hear the church walls creaking. 😅 The first one was a 6.7 and the second was a 7.1, but the crazy thing is the epicenter is 125 miles away and we still felt them pretty strong!! Ive always been TERRIFIED of earthquakes because of buildings and such getting destroyed but now that ive been through 2 i’m so fascinated by them. I’ve also made that conclusion solely based on the fact that I was in a church building both times Haha so I know I’ll be fine😂
If I had to describe them though, I think I’d say it’s a mix between “why do I feel light headed? I think I’m gonna pass out” and “wow this the cheapest rollercoaster I’ve ever been on!” But all in all I’d give it a good experience!!

Since this is the last week of the transfer and my sweet mother Sister Sears is “dying” (going home) we gave her a funeral haha with cake and everything. So that’s pretty sad but we had a good time:)

Highlight of my week was for sure the John Cena baptism hahahahhaha. So one of the primary boys was getting baptized by his brother who is a professional boxer. Since Fredy is nervous about getting baptized we invited him to come and “see what its like!” Well during the ordinance the little boy wouldn’t get his head all the way under the water, so on the 3rd or so try, his brother picked him up a couple inches, grabbed his face and slammed him under the water!! Hahahahaha while the old ladies on the front row were wiping the font water off their face me and Hermana Sears were wiping literal tears off ours haha. Because A.) It was freaking hilarious and B.) Now we have to try and find a way to cure Fredy’s PTSD.  Lol I love my life.

Anyway I hope you all had a good week!! I hope the 4th was fun, safe and full of fireworks! This week my spiritual homework for everyone is to find out where you came from and why you’re here! I’m thinking it’ll be different for everyone because that can be taken so many ways but what ever you thought of first, FOLLOW THAT and START THERE!! If you took the spiritual route read scriptures, listen to conference talks or maybe go to the temple and do a session or baptisms for the dead and just think! If you took the more literal route of genealogy and stuff like that! FOLLOW THAT and START THERE! do some genealogy and figure out your past and where your roots take you. You cant know yourself completely until you know where you came from. You all have a purpose and a plan and I encourage you to each find that! Maybe not all at once but keep trying! All paths should lead to the Temple so start where you can and then find the road that takes you there! I love you all and hope you have a good 2nd week of July! Be safe! Love, Ryenne

So we moved a freaking palm tree:)

We Loff America

Dark days at Hna Sears funeral

Presidente y Sister Cordón

So basically if you know me at all you know that A.) I can usually get up in front a microphone and wing it for 20 mins in a sacrament meeting or anything else like it (I think that must be my spiritual gift) but when it comes to singing the only place you’ll see me is as I’m running out the back door. Well Sister Haynie asked me, sister rydalch, sister Sears and sister lemmon to do a musical number for zone conference. We had to sing this cool version of I am a child of God. We practiced quite a few times and it seriously sounded perfect every single time, believe it or not haha… butttt zone conference rolls around and i got up there, saw all the people, and we all agreed we were all so scared our cheeks (yes, both sets) were quivering….. Haha sooooo if president and sister haynie who were sitting behind us werent impressed with our voices at least we know we have some insurance lol😅
I WISH I WAS JOKING but I’m not hahahah #mylifesamess 🙂
Other than that my week has been awesome! I had my first baptism, President Cordon is now here as the new mission president and I was warmer than my parents at lake powell!! Karma? ….yeah I’d say so.
Anyway I’m super behind this week so I have to go but I hope you all have an amazing week and stay safe! My spiritual thought of course has to be to tell you all to go listen or read President Cordons general conference talk called “Language of the Gospel” its SUPER good and basically he’s amazing! Love you all:)
Love Ryenne

(Saying goodbye to Pres. & Sister Haynie)

I just love this pic

Well I hope the Pope can swim cause he’s about to get DUNKED!!!
hahaha jkjk but basically. This week has been full of SO many miracles I cant even write it all down!
But remember Freddy? The one that may or may not have told me he Hope’s I’m in his dreams? Yeah that one. Well we had to change his baptismal date cause he doesn’t feel like his ready, we’ve felt super lost cause we don’t know what to do for him but we had an AMAZING experience yesterday and now he’s getting baptized on July 7th!!!
We were teaching him about tithing and randomly a member named Hno. Romero walked in and we were like, “sure! Come on in! You wanna talk about tithing?!” So he helped us out and it was good but after I felt super strongly I needed to ask how he felt about baptism and he started to say he was scared, he loved the church but he didn’t know enough and wanted some more time. Well then Hno Romero starts to basically tell him that’s not true. That the gospel is a process and he wont be able to understand or learn more until he has the Holy Ghost. That once he does that the lights will turn on and he will be able to see more.
Well my translation got a little confused somewhere in there but all the sudden Freddy saying that he cant be forgiven be cause he cant forgive others. Turns out HE WAS A MINISTER back in Guatemala, he was married with 2 children but then his wife cheated on him….. Then the guy that his wife cheated with took his kids, his wife and his ministry and basically everything. He was left with nothing and when he started talking about all this he just stopped and started sobbing with his face in his hands.
We didn’t quite know what to do at this point-mostly cause I didn””’t understand like anything lol I was super confused- but THEN Hno. Romero starts telling his story, almost the Exact same thing happened to him and they connected so much!! He explained that with out the gospel he wouldn’t have been able to move on and they just hugged and cried and the spirit was so dang strong. They gave him an AMAZING blessing afterwards and he’s reset his date to July 7th!! God is good all the time, and all the time, God is good. COINCIDENCES ARENT REAL.
Also Freddy is 35…we thought he was 25… so that’s weird ha…
Also so there’s this area we go to in the Inglewood area that might be Compton or watts, might not be, I honestly have no idea but its suppppeeerrrr sketch. I love going there though because when we go I like to play a game where I count white people. Let’s just say my tally is quite low… Haha Sister Wilde keeps her hand on her pepper spray inside her purse while I count white people…#Priorities

Holy cow theres been so many miracles this week I cant write them all down but my spiritual thought this week is a poem I read this week.
How far is Heaven?
It’s not very far.
When you live close to God
It’s right where you are.♥️♥️♥️
I love this so much! Especially cause I’ve seen the difference!! I have come to KNOW what it feels like to have family surrounding me even though I’m so far from home. I LOVE THE GOSPEL. I wish I could just jump up and down and shout to everyone to come and see how happy it’s made me and how happy it can make them. Lifes too good.
Anyway I love you all so much and hope you have the best week!! Be safe please!
Love, Ryenne

Service is life

(The BOM experiment and our mini missionary!)

Joaquin our recent convert brought fruit and tajín to our lesson (BEST THING EVER)

YESTERDAY WAS MY 2 MONTH MARK!!
well that’s a little hard to wrap my head around, cause I feel like I left a month ago but not 2!!
Also I feel like every email I send home I have to include a congratulations to a different couple either for their recent engagement or wedding…like seriously calm down! If you guys want a shoutout just ask you dont have to do anything drastic 😂😉
JUST KIDDING, and really congratulations to everyone it’s so exciting!!
Also Happy Fathers day to-girst and foremost- my dad♥️, and ALL of my grandpas, uncles and other Dads who have taken me in from time to time! I appreciate you all more than you could ever know and hope you all had the best day!!
This week wasn’t too exciting ha, the extent of our excitement was probably eating Korean BBQ with the district which was great cause I LOOOOVVVEEE Korean bbq Haha. Except afterwards I was severely bullied when they saw my drivers license picture but it’s fine. I’m over it. I was hideous and I wish my mom would’ve hid me from the world but it’s fine.

Anyway yeah that’s about it for this week! My spiritual thought comes from my personal study this week. I just finished reading in Matthew along it with Jesus The Christ side by side. It’s been so humbling and-well I dont even know the words to describe, it if were being honest- while reading about the atonement and crucifixion of Christ. In Matthew 27:34 it says “but He would not drink” it doesn’t say what or a anything but in Jesus the Christ, it explains that prior to crucifixion it was accustomed to give the condemned a narcotic+numbing mixed drink to ease a bit of the pain. But Christ refused to drink because he was determined to meet death with a mind alert and unclouded.
The whole book and last few chapters really touch my heart<3
Anyway have a good week and be safe! Love you all!!
Love Ryenne