3-26-2012

Your primary class seems like a lot of fun! Everyone sounds
like they´re doing really good! Tara´s baby is really cute! If you get this
before they all leave, tell them all I say hi and that I love them! That´s cool
Tean´s in Disneyland, that sounds like a lot of fun. And Tance scoring in Rugby
and stuff sounds awesome! Make sure to record the games so I can watch them
when I get home! And Sawyer, whenever I show the families our family pictures
everyone thinks you´re the second oldest, right under me! Haha it´s pretty
funny. I´m glad everyone is staying close!
I love you all so
much! And everytime we´re with a family I always tell them stories of us when
we were younger and all the things we´ve done, and they love hearing about
them. I know i´ve said it before, but I know this is the True Gospel. The
things i´ve seen, and the people i´ve seen change have been such a testimony to
me, and some of the experiences i´ve had with the spirit are remarkable. I hope
the whole family gets to read these emails, on Gigi and Papas side and on
Grandma and Grandpa´s side. Tell everyone thanks for the emails, and i´ll do my
best to email them back and to send them letters!


We had another 2 baptisms this week, Gerardo, finally, he´s
the boy that we had to postpone 5 different weeks because he´s had so many
family problems. My comp and I think he´s going to be the next prophet or
something because there were so many problems with his baptisms. If you all
only knew the things we had to do to get him baptized! haha but finally we did
it, and it was a great experience for him and his family. His mom is a member
but went inactive a while ago, and we were able to get her coming back to
church, and the rest of his family too.

The other boy his name is Mauricio. His mom has been
inactive for 20 something years, and we found her name in the records. Mauricio
is the son of Goyo, I don´t know if you remmeber me talking about him a few emails
back, but he´s not willing to get married, so this monday it was pretty funny.
Me and my companion are planning, and we were thinking, and we were like, Why
are we not baptizing his son that has been coming for 3 weeks in a row to
church? haha so we went monday night, and we planned to put the baptismal date
with him, and we were planning for the next weekend, which would have been the
31 of march. That was the plan when we went into it. But we taught him the
lesson, and at the end my comp looked at me to put the date with him, and I was
just thinking in my mind, lets put it for this weekend, but my comp didn´t know
that I was going to do that. So he looks at me, and I look at Mauricio, and I
said, " Mauricio, we have prayed, and we ahve thought much about it, and
we think that you can be baptized this weekend (the 24 of march)" and my
comp looks at me with these huge white eyes, and was like, "what´re you
doing?!" in like a funny, you´re crazy, kind of way, and he accepted, and
we did it! Haha. And after the lesson, my comp was like "wow, I can´t
beleive that just happened, I wouldn´t have had the guts to put it in one
week!" haha but we worked really hard with him, and taught him every
single day, and we baptized him on saturday! It was really awesome.


This cyber that we´re typing at doesn´t have computer ports
to upload pictures, but when we get back to our pension, we´re going to run to
the cyber there and i´ll upload the pictures there, so you´ll get pictures in
about an hour or two. We have 3 baptisms planned for this weekend too. We would
have 4 but we found out the 15 year old that we´re teaching is smoking a pack
of cigarretts per day. he´s freaking 15 years old! But we´re working with him
so he can get baptized too. IT´s amazing what the scriptures can do for people
in their lives. I had no idea how important it is to read the scriptures. I
don´t know if i´ve talked about Luis Velazquez, but he is such a stud. He´s
like 30 years old, and he´s got 2 mentally handicapped kids, andwe have been
teaching him for about a month and a half now, and he has changed 100%. It´s
amazing the things he tells us. I´ll tell you a little more about him later
though.


Here the weather is FINALLY starting to change. It´s really
cold in the morning and at night, but during the day it gets pretty hot. IT´s
starting to rain quite a bit too, which is pretty refreshing.

I don´t know if i´ve
told you all about Alfajors, but they´re so goooooooood. It´s like a cookie
brownie mix, with Dulce de Leche is what it´s called. It´s like liquid
chocolate that they put in everything and it´s the most amazing thing ever.
Anyways, with Alfajors, it´s pretty funny, with the families that we´re
teachign with a lot of kids, I tell them "Okay, we´re going to do a challenge. If you don´t read
the scritpure that we mark you, by the time we come for our next visit, you owe
me an Alfajor", and then I tell them my favorite kind, and they start to
laugh and it´s pretty fun. nobody has yet to actually give me an alfajor
unfortunately though. haha.

One of the families we´re teaching has a few yuounger kids,
and one of them is an exact replica of Lilo, from the movie Lilo and Stitch.
And ever since the first lesson, i´ve called her Lilo, and now it has grown
into an epodemic, haha her mom calls her lilo, her family calls her lilo, and
the other day we actually heard people in the streets calling her Lilo! Haha
she loves it and it´s so funny that everyone is calling her Lilo now because of
me!



Dad- Every weekend here the people are always BLASTING their
music really loud in the streets, and about every other song is a song from
Franco Devita or one that I knew before coming, and the people always laugh,
because they see this gringo singing all these spanish love songs, and it´s
actually a good way to contact people.... "Woah, where are you guys
from?" "The united states" "then how do you know this
song?" " IF you give us a few minutes i´ll tell you, we are
representatives of Jesus Crist....." hahaha.

But i´ve also been
writing down a lot of really cool songs for us too, dad, for when I get home,
and i´m going to start buying some CDs for us too. They have some really really
good music here. One song that´s really popular here is called "The
Watchiturro" look it up on youtube and you´ll probably find it. It´s
pretty cool. I don´t know what it says, and i Hope it´s not bad, but it´s a
really popular one.

Thanks for all the encouraging emails dad, they really help.
Did you ever feel bad when people wouldn´t accept your message as a missionary?
Or when parents wouldn´t let their kids get baptized, even when their kids
really want to? It makes me really sad, and it´s really hard for me to see. I
love you dad, and I miss you. Thanks for going golfing with me before we left.
In our area there is a golf coarse that´s beautiful and looks really fun. We´re
definitely going when I bring you all
here, and since my companion leaves and goes home this week we´re going to ask
permission to be able to go for a going home present haha.

I love you all, and I really miss you all. Thanks for all
the support you give me!

3/19/2012

These are just some fun pictures we´ve taken in centro and things like that, the one of me in front of the statue the statue of The Matte Man. I don´t remember if you remember when Matias told us but EVERYOEN drinks matte here, and they made a statue of what everyone does all day long, and it´s hilarous because it´s perfect. Everyone sits with their little mugs and their matte cup and pass it around while we teach and things. It´s really funny. The boys we baptized: Alejandro is the older boy we baptized, and Julian, the little stud is the one I baptized, the one that calls me Elder Azucar. This family makes me feel really close to all of you, and it makes me really happy. Make sure you attach all these photos so everyone can see them!

Hey Everyone

To answer the questions, my weekly budget is like 250 dollars ish each month, and we only have to pay for snacks and things so it´s not bad, and it´s just barely enough that I don´t have to go hungry or anything at all so it´s enough. Things here are REALLY cheap, like the common things you have to buy every week are probably almost half compared to utah, a loaf of bread here is like a bunch of rolls, probably double the amount of bread in one bag for about 2 dollars, and I love all the snacks and things. I found out that Monte Carlo where Ben is going is actually pretty close, but he´s not in my zone or anything like that unfoturnately.

This week was excellent. I am starting to really love the people here, and care a lot for them, rather than just try to baptize them to add a baptizm to my name. We had two baptisms!! It was awesome! SO i´ll just explain the entire stories first off.

About 3 weeks ago we received a reference from a member to go to this house where only about half the family are members, so we went over there and found out that they are really really poor. Their house is literally just a big shack and they´ve got 12 people in the family. Their land is just bare with weeds all over and they are all super super dirty. To shower they have a big well and they send down a bucket, and get water, but the water is really dirty already and it´s really nasty, and the little kids always are just filthy.

The first time we went there the little kids had more dirt under their finger nails and on their face than in the whole state of utah, and when we shook all their little hands, afterwards i looked at my hands and mine were about the same color and it was really nasty. But nonetheless we started teaching and trying to figure out the situation and things like that. Anyways we come to find out that about half that there are about 5 baptisms that still needed to be done in the family, the dad, the oldest kids, and two younger kids of 9 and 13.

THe dad is really really really addicted to tobacco and we´re still working with him, and the oldest kids have kids of their own and are trying to get married, but the kids we baptized are the two younger ones. Alejandro 13 and Julian 9. Me and Julian from day one started having so much fun. He´s just got the cutest little voice and he´s hilarious and we are always playing together. About 3 lessons in, he finally gave up on trying to pronounce my name, and from then on started calling me "Elder Azucar" which means sugar, and it´s so funny.

Every time we go, their house is WAY far outside of the edge of our area so we only went about 3 times a week but every time that we went they made "Chipa" which is like a scone type thing, with all hteir dirty little nasty hands and they use the same oil to cook every single time, and the whole situation is just nasty, but the Chipa is really good, and we eat it without saying anything haha.

But about a week ago we started talking about the baptismal service, and how it was going to go, and we asked the boys who they wanted to do the service, and Alejandro chose the bishop, but when We asked Julian, his cute little face looked at me and said, "I want Elder Azucar to do it" and it was a really cool moment for me.

When he said that I just felt so much love for him and this family, becasue we have gotten really close to them over the last few weeks, and we´ve had a lot of funny stories that i´ve been writing in my juornal. When he said that I could just feel how much THe Savior loves him, and how excited I was that he wanted me to do it. So we prepare them, everything works good with them, and Saturday we start preparing the font, and the drain doesn´t work, so all the nasty crap in the bottom wasnt´t draining, adn I had to climb down in it to clean it out and it was a giant mess haha but it was fun and the baptismal serivice went great.

But I just remember climbing into the font, and then I told him to come down, and there were a lot of members that came and are looking at us, and I was pretty nervous because the baptizmal prayer in castellano is a little hard to pronounce some of the parts, so I was a little nervous, but I did it perfectly, put him in the water, and then brought him out of the water, and before he was even standign on his feet as i was bringing him out of hte water, he just said, really really loud, "Que Lindo!!" Which is like saying, how nice, or how lovely, or how great, (somethign like that)!! And everyone started laughing, and it was actually really special for me.

I could feel that he felt clean! Which really really surprised me the feeling I felt when I brought him out of the water and when he said that. I almost started crying because it was so cool! But i love this family so much, and last night we went to visit them and the dad is going to get baptized in two weeks, he´s going to stop chewing and everything he told us that he wants to change because he´s seeing the changes happening in his family, and how they are all loving eachother more and he wants to be apart of it, and wants to be able to go to heaven with them.

This week I got to taste a little bit of why missionaries say this is the best 2 years of their life. I felt the spirit and the love our savior has for people multiple times this week, and I am so happy. It´s a happy feeling that you just can´t explain. I think it´s a feeling of the pure love of Christ, and We´ve got some other baptisms planned for these next few weeks, and it´s just a relief. Becasue we worked SO hard for so long without a baptism, and now that i realize the joy you feel when you bring someone that much closer to Christ, It´s going to give me even more of a drive. THanks for supporting me everyone. This week made me miss you all a lot, but it was a life changing experience. I love you all so much!

3/12/2012

Picture is of our district at a district meeting! Us eating at a members house eating Churipan, it´s SOOO good, i can´t wait to make it for you. Us outside of our stake conference two weeks ago. Picture of us having some fun in the pension of the other elders and two silly pictures.

How is everyone? That last email seems pretty exciting that everyone is starting up new things! Dad´s business sounds like it´s coming along really well, you´ll have to send me a few photos when things are all the way up and going.

Tean, that´s so awesome that he got his eagle and is working out a lot. That´s more than what I can say, i´m trying to work out really hard in the mornings but it´s really hard because i´m so tired, but I still do them, we go play basketball a lot.

Tance, that´s awesome he´s playing rugby, that sounds like a lot of fun, you´ll have to film all the games so I can watch them when I get back. Sawyer, congrats with the Beehive and the youth coucel stuff! That´s going to teach you so much and ít´ll be so much fun I bet!

I hope Tean and Tance made that Misison List I told you to a while ago, because i´ve got some more stuff to add to it right now: Buy a 16GB Flash Drive, because you´re going to want all the documents and music and pictures from the other elders, I just bought one last week, and it´s awesome to have to be able to back up all your pictures and music and all that stuff. Also start looking for a hand bag that you can carry, at least for me, I don´t need that shoulder bag right now, it´s just too hot, and we only need our scriptures, not our preach my gospel, so start looking for a little bag you can carry that will fit a BofM a Bible and an extra BofM for the investigators, plus some room for some pamphlets, and that works well for me at least. THe shoulder bag is great for Pday when we have to carry some things and groceries and stuff, and for when we travel, but for every day proseliting and things i just have that little hand bag.

Last week I bought a sweet Argentina Jersey, i´ll include a picture next week when I can, and hopefully you get the pictures i´ll attach this week. The baptism we have planned FELL THROUGH AGAIN, becasue the kids dad has cancer, and they had to travel to go see him, but we talked to the mom, and she said we will have it this week no matter what.

Plus we have another family of 3 kids we´re going to baptize, which is really good because it´s a family of 11 and we are reactivating the whole family, and baptizing as well. We are finally starting to find the people that are ready. This week we found 3 different families with the parents less active, and the kids need to be baptized, which I found out that basically what this mission is all about, Baptize teh kids, and reactivate the family.

I found out about 80% of our baptisms are like that, and it´s really cool to see the parents come back to church, and feel that gospel in their lives again. This week I´m transfering all my pictures and music and thigns so sorry the email isn´t really long, but next week I´ll include the stories of all the baptisms and the stories of hte families and how we found them. HOpe everyone is doing well, thanks for everything, Love you all. Nos Vemos, suerte

3/05/12

Thanks for all the advice about the emergency stuff, i´ll do that today. Next time i´ll upload a few photos that we took today in the main city, they´re pretty cool, but my camera battery just died sorry, or else i´d do them today.

I still can´t beleive Tean is trying to pick a college, that just sounds so weird and i don´t feel old enough to have a younger brother ready for college! And Tance, that´s awesome you´re playing rugby, it sounds like a lot of fun. Sawyer, I hope you like the new highlights in your hair! You need to send me a picture so that I can see them!

Not a whole lot happened this week. It rained like crazy, but now theSun is out and since it rained so much the humidity is pretty atrocious. The baptism got cancelled again this week, because his mom got called in to work, so this next week we´re hoping for a double baptism with another kid we found, and then next week we´ve got a family baptism planned, so hopefully all that works out.

Today we went to the big city, and to the placita and I bought some awesome stuff, and a Jersey that i´m pretty excited about. The language is coming along much better every day, and it´s not SO frustrating anymore. I can have a pretty regular conversation now with people, so that makes me excited and i don´t have to worry as much. I still have a while to go until i´ll be able to be completely independent, but for now the progress is coming at a good rate, and i´m pretty happy about it.

I found out that you can actually still DearElder me if you want, and I get them the same week, or a week after depending on when you write them, so if anyone wants to do that, tell them that is an awesome way to write me, or they can just do a letter. But the dear elder is really nice because it´s just one piece of paper, and it´s free. So tell people to do that when they ask.

This week was pretty regular, not a whole lot happened that I can think of. It was a little frustrating with that baptism falling through, but we´re still working really hard.

Oh and I found out my companion lied to me, this is hislast transfer! But he didn´t want to tell me because he didn´t want me to think that he wasn´t going to work hard or that he´d be lazy because he´s almost home. So this is his last month, and I think i´m going to send a few things with him to give you all, or at least some letters, rather than me having to send them from here and them take forever.

Sorry this isn´t a whole lot I know, but next week will be better with the photos and things like that. Thanks for all the emails, keep them coming. Tell everyone I love them, and that i´m proud of them. NosVemos, Chau

02/28/2012

Hey Everyone, thanks for all the emails and the stories, I love hearing about what everyone is doing and how things are going! It sounds really exciting all the ball games that are happening, and that Tean is looking for a college, that is crazy! Hopefully i´ll be able to respond to those individually but we´ll see.

The baptism didn´t end up happening this week, the mom had to work and so hopefully this week we can do it this friday. This friday we have 2 baptisms planned and so far so good with both, and hopefully we won´t have any more problems with those. This coming Saturday is stake conference here, but the Stake conference is really hard to do because the wards are pretty far apart, so our ward has to travel about a half hour to the other chapel, so hopefully all goes well there.

Sorry I didn´t email yesterday, it was a holiday and here everyone is home for the holidays, so our mission president wants us to go work, so if you ever don´t get emails on Monday, it´s because of that.

Last Tuesday I saw a huge spider start to make its web, and instead of killing it, i decided just to watch because i´ve never seen a spider make a web before, and it was actually fascinating! I´m sitting there in a lesson and this spider is just flying around making this enormous web, and I won´t lie, I wasn´t paying attention to the lesson at all because I was just so fascinated with what was happening, but don´t worry, the lesson was with a member, we were helping him write his talk for sunday, so nobody´s eternal salvation is at stake. But it was so cool! I don´t know how they know how to make them, but if you ever get the chance to watch one, watch it. It´s awesome.

This week I had the >Bishop´s wife cut the sleeves shorter on my shirts, and that helped a lot with the heat. My sleeves were really long and started to annoy me really bad with the sweat, but now that´s fixed so the heat is a little more bearable.

On Wednesday we were waking back from our last visit for the day, it´s hot, about 9:26 pm, and we were really really tired and it was dark and we were just trying to get home, when all of a sudden these really really drunk guys call us over there. So we walk over and just start greeting them and all of a sudden as i´m greeting one of them with a handshake, he pulls my hand up to his face and he kissed my hand. It was the nastiest thing on earth with his beer lips and a little spit was left on my hand after, and it was discusting. But we took down all their addresses and we´re going to go teach them all haha, maybe one of them is ready for the gospel right now in their life. Hopefully not the hand kisser though, that was just weird.

Here it´s also custom to kiss cheeks when you greet people, but of course the missionaries can´t do that, so we have to try really hard to make it known that we can´t do it, but almost everyone does´, and you don´t want to look rude or make them feel awkward, so ´that´s a litlte bit of a challenge but This week i got kissed.... it was really awkward, not just because i haven´t even touched any type of woman for 4 months, but i don´t know. haha hopefully it never happens again. My companion taught me some tricks that we can use to get out of it, which before he conveniently didn´t tell me about of course. ha.

But earlier this week a few people died from the heat because they didn´t get enough water. It´s actually really common that people die here because it´s just too hot, its not healthy at all to be in the sun, but we do our best to drink water. Our mission president last week told us each missionary has to have like 8 gallons of water handy, and there have been a lot of power outages lately so we finally bought that and we feel better.

I think something bad is going to happen here. Last night I had a dream that an earthquake hit, and I think that the people here are so wicked that something like that is going to happen. But we´re going to be prepared if it does.

I did hear about that huge train wreck, but that was near Buenos Aires I´m pretty sure, which is really far from us, but it´s still really sad. This week on Friday night we were teaching a big family, and in the middle of the lesson we got a call from the zone leaders and they said that all the police officers went on strike, and so we had to return to the pension early because riots were going on and people were going crazy and lighting cars on fire and stuff. That actually scared us a little, because we were on the farthest outer edge of our area, about a half hour walk to get back to the pension, and we had to cross the main road through the town, but we made it back safe and nothing happened, but it was pretty nerve racking.

Saturday it started raining really really really hard. So much water was being dumped and everything got soaking wet. Luckily one of the members gave me an umbrella, and luckily we went back to put our boots on, so personally I was fine, but as we were walking back that night, we saw a car off the side of the road, and they were trying to get it out of the mud, and it was 9:45, so we were supposed to be back at the pension at 9:30, but we decided to go help them. So we walk over there, and their little tiny mazda is just buried in this sink hole of mud and the guys getting it out didn´t know what they were doing, and they were covered in mud. But we started to help them and manuever the car, and each time the wheels turned the mud came up and just splattered all over us. We got so wet, and muddy, and dirty that it was crazy! But we finally got him out and he offered to give us money, but instead he´s just going to give us lunch this week, and we´re going to go teach him. Hopefully there was a reason he got stuck and just so happened that two big tall white guys came to help him. Maybe he´s a chosen one to get baptized! We´ll have to see. But that was pretty fun.

Cleaning the pension today isn´t going to be fun because of all the mud we got everyone, and all our clothes that are stained, but a little bleach should do the trick. I think that´s all for today, thanks for all the support and for everything. Good luck with all that´s going on. I pray for everyone every night! Next week i´ll be able to send some more personal emails so seeya in a week. Chau, nos vemos

2/20/12

Today is a holiday here, so I don´t have as much time as usual to write, so sorry this is´n´t going to be super long! BUt, Not a whole lot to report this week, other than it was really long, and really really hot, and it was pretty difficult.

We went on our first transfers this week, so I went with another companion and my companion went with the district leader, and that was a Little interesting. The companion that i went with, his name is Elder Pusey, and he´s from colorado, and he´s gota round 5 months here on the misión, so he doesn´t speak very well at all, and we were trying to communicate with all the investigators that he had planned. It was also rough because I had to go to their area, so I didn´t know anyone, and it was a really really poor area. Most of the people we visited didn´t have really anything, and it was pretty humbling.

But we met quite a few drunk guys that we got their addresses and we´re going to go teach them this week, so that´s good. Oh and yesterday we had 10 people at church! It was so awesome. The people we brought made up about one fourth of the congregation, and the bishop was really excited. We have our first baptism planned for this Saturday, it´s a boy named Gerardo, and he´s 11 years old, and he´s so awesome. He reads every night, and through him we are going to reactivate his family which has been inactive for a little while now. Every time we go over to his house his mom makes us this juice that is so good! Each time is a different kind, and last night it was pinapple with tons of pulp, and it tasted so good! So this saturday we are going to baptize him, and we are finally finding people that are ready for the Gospel. Finding people that are keeping the committments and finally showing us they´re willing to learn more, and I hope things start going a little better from here on out.

For the 17 of March we have around 8 people´s baptisms planned, so that should be a really good weekend, and we´re praying and fasting really hard for the people. We are finding famalies now too, which makes me a lot happier, because as a family getting baptized together would be a really great blessing.

The food here is getting a little bit bette every week, and i´m not sure if it´s because i´m getting used to it, or if it´s because i´m gaining weight! Haha I think i´ve put on a few pounds, which this week is going to change, there is a little basketball court and my companion has a basketball so we´ve been playing that a little bit every morning, and that´s pretty fun. But I think i´m starting to get into ¨the groove¨ now, and things aren´t SO new anymore, and my castellano is improving a lot, and I can communicate pretty well.

We are really trying to strenghten the ward a lot, and right now we´re trying to think of activities that we can do for the ward to strenghten them, so I need your ideas, what are some things we could do for ward activities? Thanks for all the support, I love you all, and Hope all is well

2-13-2012

Hey Everyone

This is a family we´re teaching. In total they have 14! Most families are really big here, but this one beats them all! It´s really fun going here, and they´re very nice and very respectful, and I love talking to all the little kids, and they think it´s hilarious when I say a word wrong or something. They just laugh and laugh and laugh, but it´s a lot of fun. This is the familia Claro

Not a whole lot to write this week! We have been working really really hard, and the beginning of the week we placed a lot of baptismal dates, but the problem here is the people are really really lazy, and this area is a pretty wicked area, but we´re doing our best, and we´re finally getting a few people to come to church.

We are working with a guy right now his name is Goyo Rivas, and his son Mauricio, and his wife is an inactive member of about 20 years, and the first time we met him he told us he wasn´t a religious person, and he wanted nothing to do with religion, but he agreed to have us over, and now he´s come to church 2 weeks in a row! Which is great, but now we have to get him and his wife married, becuase here, nobody gets married, they all just live together, and have a lot of kids, and they say they´re married which is one of the hardest parts of Argentina.

Also because it´s not free to get married here, it´s pretty expensive, and a lot of people don´t want to spend their money on getting married, when in reality, it doesn´t change anything for them, but he´s been feeling the spirit, and he´s been reading all the assignments we´ve given him, so that is doing really well, and we are praying to know how to help him. He says he knows this is the right path for his family, and everytime we go to his house, he improves a lot, and so right now he´s our main focus.

We´ve got 14 people with baptismal dates in the upcoming month,and we´re doing our best to get everyone on track and keeping their committments. The people here are really lazy so that´s the hardest part.My castellano (language) is improving a lot. Every day it gets a little better,and a little better, and it´s fun to be able to say things in adifferent language. They tell me i´m improving really fast, faster than most, which makes me have a lot of confidence, because I still get a little frustrated sometimes, but it´s getting better.

It´s funny, my drive right now is that I can´t wait to talk to Rossy and Giovvani when I get back, and for some reason I think about that day often. Haha i´m not sure why.

The food is getting better and better though. My companion got a bugearlier this week, and he was up a few nights sick, which didn´t help. Hopefully i´ll be fine and not get it. We have been meeting alot of families lately, which is good. Right now we´ve got about 30ish investigators in total, which means we haven´t really had to clap doors yet, so that´s good.

The problem is people tell us they´re going to do all the things we ask.... and then they don´t do it. But we´ve got a few that are actually following through.I´m starting to really enjoy the people here, and starting to finally be able to love them enough to want to help them in their lives. I also feel this with the members as well, which is really cool to see the change not only in myself, but in the spirit and how it works in their lives.

I have been reading the Book of Mormon like crazy lately, and one thing I really regret is not reading it very often at all before the mission. I never realized how fun, and how meaningful studying the scriptures are. I´ve learned so much from reading, that I enjoy and value every single hour of study we get. I know every missionary encourages their family and friends to read it, but I completely understand why now. Each page has a message, and each page is inspired from our Heavenly Father to help our lives, and to ensurewe are the most happy that we can possibly be in this life.

Don´t really have any stories this week! Hopefully next week i´ll havea lot more. Thanks for all the support that I get from everyone, I hope that my emails are helping people and that people are having their prayers answered because I pray for everyone each night.

I remember one though, yesterday we were clapping a door, and this guy was out front of his yard and was putting this bag into this can, and like getting whatever was in the can all over the bag, and then putting the bag up to his face and breathing really really heavily,and we asked him what he was doing... all he responded was....oooooooaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. And then we realized it was paint thinner, and he was getting high off of paint thinner, right in front of us... THe best part was the house we were clapping was HIS house! and he just sat there and acted like it wasn´t his. Hahahaha oh man, This place is absoutely crazy. something new happens pretty much every day. But I love it here, and i´m excited to bring everyone back someday to visit. .

I love you all thanks for all the support, next week i´ll let you know more about the investigators, this week i forgot to bring my notes of the things i wanted to tell you, sorry! But hope all is well, sounds like you´re all doing great. Love you

PS. Oh also, one last thing, I found out i CAN email any family member, no matter the relation, as long as their family, so tell everyoen they can email me if they want!

And i just changed the setting on my camera so the pictures aren´t so big, i found out that is the reason it was so hard to send pictures via email, so we´re making progress!

Dad, your email made me laugh. Hey son not much is happeng, but hereis a story of some guy scaring little kids with a snow man suit!hahahahahahaha that was so funny to me. thanks for the laugh! love youall