Week 32: Well... Trump won...

Yeah I know that has little to do with my missionary work in Mexico, but it is something!

Anyways, I say that because many people here have asked me who I would have voted for.... I always tell them that that decision is like choosing which leg I want to cut off... XD Sorry to offend any hardcore Trump or Hilary Fans, but it looks like we cut off my left leg!

Pictures aren't working so waiting till next week.

Anyways, back to Mexico! This week was a bit rough... We weren't able to have a lot of lessons, but we did get 3 baptismal dates set!

Anyways, we also had interviews with Mission President and that was good!

But with the three dates that we have scheduled for baptism, they are family members of the first members in my area! Her cousins are and nephew are really open and receiving the gospel with open hearts! But the people here are really great! I can't wait until I can see them get baptized and start on the road to return to their Heavenly Father!

This week, even though I know there will be challenges, I know that I will be able to become the missionary that the Lord would have me be. And I would like to challenge you all to do the same! I think we should all focus on trying to be exactly who God would have us be right now, because we can always be better and He will always help us!

And for anyone who doesn't know where to find out how to get better, I suggest start by praying. And then listen. Listen to your thoughts and feelings and let the good ones lead the way, because all good things come from God. He will help you if you let him, I have seen that happen in my life so I know it will happen in yours too.

So, with that I will be off, until next week! Have a great time in the real world!

Week 31: Well 7 months and running

So yesterday was 7 months and wow, these past 7 months have been absolutely amazing. I can't wait to see what the other 17 months are going to have for me!

Anyways, there are only 4 photos. And they are almost the same...

2 of some candy that one sister in our district bought for our district(Hermana Perdue)

And 2 of the view from a cool cave in my area! But you can't enter into the cave... But there is apparently another entrance on the other side of the mountain, so next Pday maybe! 

But anyway.... This week was really good, we have been really trying to work on helping people start to progress and they are progressing! We were able to help multiple of our investigators make it to church! 

Also, this week we were able to find a lot of new investigators who are starting to change their lives for the better! We had a really good lesson with a member that was one of the first members in Tehuantepec like 50 years ago! She went with us to visit her friend and then her cousin! And with her cousin she testified of eternal families and there is nothing more amazing that to be able to know that you can have a family, FOREVER! And help others come to that knowledge as well!

Anyways... yeah a bit short... but, I hope that you all had a great week and can have another!

Week 30: HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!!!

HALLOWEEN!!!!  Well actually it is almost the same as ever other day here.... A bit sad, but that is ok!

Photos! Well most of them are from the baptism! Oh yeah we had another :) But some are from our last district meeting where we combined with another district to eat PIZZA! It was good. But yeah you can almost see the pizza in the selfie with the other missionaries. ALMOST.

Anyways, the baptism this week was really good again, but also stressful. My companion told me that baptisms for him hardly work out really well but at least the investigator gets baptized. But the next baptism, I don't know when it will be, but I know that I will do everything in my power so it runs smoothly. It has been a bit difficult this last transfer because the ward doesn't have a lot of leadership in the ward level so we are going to focus on fixing that in the next few weeks.

Also, today were transfers but my companion and I are staying here! Not a lot changed. Only one sister missionary left and one arrived. And everything else is the same.

Hmm... well I want to share a little thought that my companion taught me, but I think someone else showed me before. It comes from the Book of Mormon in 3rd Nephi 11.

 17 Hosanna! Blessed be the name of the Most High God! And they did fall down at the feet of Jesus, and did worship him.

This is when Jesus Christ visited the Americas after his ascension into heaven and when He proclaimed Himself to be the Christ, the shouted Hosanna! If you look up what that word means, it translated means "Save us" (look it up in the Topical Guide) And so if we think about it, the first thing that the Nephites recognized when they saw Jesus, is that through Him we are all saved. And they pleaded for thier salvacion from Him.

We also should always remember that it is only "through the atonement of Christ, all mankind may be saved, by obedience to the laws and ordinances of the Gospel" (Articles of Faith 1:3) If we remember Him and always try to do what He would have us do, we will never make a huge mistake in our lives. Sometimes we might have a rough time, but He didn't have an easy time either.

So, with that I hope you all have a wonderful week and always remember Him!

Week 29: No time!!!!

AHHH! Almost out of time! So short and sweet. Hope these photos attach. Anyway, Photos are of BAPTISMS!!! 3 of them! Ok 2, but one of them 2 got baptized. Also zone meeting, and my district! My zone is the selfie.

And well first I want to talk about the baptisms. We had 3 people get baptized on Saturday, 1 in the morning and 2 in the evening.

First, in the morning my companion baptized Arelette. She is 19 years old and awesome. She has been receiving

lessons for the past like 3 months and we just learned her dad is REALLY REALLY inactive, but still a member!
In the evening we baptized Reyna, an 8 year old girl and her mom Maria Guadalupe! They have recently had a lot of problems, with her spouse (now ex-spouse) a heavy drinker but their baptism also had problems with the font.... so we didn't baptize her until like 8 o'clock at night but they both we baptized and I got to baptize Maria Guadalupe! It was a really neat baptism!
Nothing more this week cuz there is no more time, but with that have a good week!

Week 28: Wow... I was right....

This week was SUPER FAST! I feel like yesterday was PDAY! But today was a good PDay. But...

That is OK! Seguimos con las FOTOS! (Let's continue with the PHOTOS!)

Well one is a cat and me, the cat belongs to a recent convert, well more like a kitten, I like animals, and the kitten well I don't think it likes pictures...

Also, a nice view of my area, Guiengola. I dare you to try to pronounce that.  Also, we found a friend! We didn't name him, but he is a scorpion. He also might be a she, who knows, but it is dead because my companion REALLY doesn't like scorpions. Actually my companion says it is not a scorpion, because it has a different name in Spanish but I think the name is still scorpion in English. There are 3 photos of the scorpion we found in our house.

And the last photo is of me sleeping with a ukulele on my face... Missionaries do weird things when other missionaries fall asleep.

Anyways, this week was awesome! We found a lot of people to teach, even though a lot of other people we found are not interested... But, we also almost had the cops called on us, because we were trying to talk to someone that we had set up an appointment, and then her neighbor came out, she is REALLY OLD, and asked us what we are doing.

When we said we were missionaries, she didn't hear us so we moved closer because we were like 20 feet away. She FREAKED OUT. And was like, AHH WHAT DO YOU WANT?!?! Like we were going to rob her... But we told her we are only here to share a message about Jesus Christ, and then she told us we can't go around to people's houses and do things like that, that is why people get killed... I don't know what was happening with her that day, but we left because she said she was going to look for her phone to call the cops. So even though we didn't do anything, we had an interesting experience at least. And then... Well we talked with some other people that are actually interested!

But... this week we are going to have 3 baptisms! And so that will be great! 2 are part of a family that has been to church a lot and has been investigating the church for a while, but because the husband has a drinking problem, his wife has a hard time making it to church every Sunday. And the other is a really awesome young woman, who will be the first baptized in her family but her brother and mom are going to follow in her footsteps hopefully in a few weeks! The other family has a lot of friends who are members but they will also be the first baptized in their family!

Ok, that is about it for this week, I hope to hear from y'all next week and don't forget to always ask the Lord for direction!

Week 27: And he rounds the first corner!

Well, I have completed 6 months in my mission and I am wondering what happened to the time... If anyone knows a guy that can slow down the time just a little bit I'd like his number.... Actually his email, cuz I can't call him XD

But really, these past 6 months have been incredible, tiring, awesome, incredibly spiritual and amazing. I'm so glad that I have another 18 to go to finish. And I will enjoy every second of that time that I can. Even if I'm fasting in the hot sun, or trudging through hard rain, because even though I am not perfect, my Heavenly Father will always help me through all of my trials if I keep trying with all of my strength.

Ok, now that we finished the mushy part of the letter, PHOTOS! Sorry only 2 this week, not a lot of new things happened... But it was fun! I got to eat a whole fish, so I took a picture of that.
And I got hungry so I bought ICE CREAM! This was the first time I bought ice cream so I had to take a picture. Well first time in my mission. And the first time in Mexico I bought ice cream. Mn'M's ice cream too! It was good and I'll finish it probably tonight.

But, back to the important stuff. This week we tried really hard to get in lots of lessons! And we did! Almost 30, which is good for this area. But, the rough news is that 3 people who had baptismal dates, we haven't been able to find them in their house :O So sadly their dates we had to drop. And it is also REALLY hard to get the investigators to come to church out here, even if they have come like 15 times before and have a baptismal date for next Saturday. So, we are going to work with them especially hard this week, because we all need to go to church.
That means you too. Everyone is going to church this sunday! WOOHOO! HOORAH!

Ok, continuing. I know I probably misspelled that. This week was really good because we were able to find a new family who is interested a little and has a nephew in the mission! How cool! And also we are trying to get the help of the members, and they are really starting to want to help! I realized that I was kind of lazy with helping the missionaries back home... So tell them I said sorry if you get the chance. Because if every member went out with the missionaries one time a month or gave a referral to the missionaries one time a month the missionaries would be SOOOOOOOO GRATEFUL. So there is some advice if you want to help the missionaries out but don't know how.

And so I think I'll end this letter with a mandate to everyone reading this to go and look back over general conference. I listened to the talk 4th floor, last door, by Dieter F. Uchtdorf, given in the Women's conference, the Hermanas in my district told me I had to listen to it because it was good. And it is really good. But you don't have to listen to it. You just have to listen to one of the talks again. And you get to  pick! How great is that homework!

So until next week, (which with the way time is flying for me, it will probably be tomorrow XD)

Week 26: I have a small problem......

TEAM GRINGO!

my district at the BEACH!

Well, anyone who is wondering what my problem is for the subject line, you'll have to wait a second. BECAUSE FIRST IS PHOTOS!

One picture is of my district at the BEACH! We are underneath an umbrella and it is 4 Sister missionaries and 2 Elders and one of them is me. The other is my companion, Elder Velazquez. The Hermanas are Hermana Perdue(above the other Sisters), and (from left to right) Hermana Paz, Hermana Salgado, and Hermana Ascencion. The companions are Hermana Paz/Hermana Salgado and Hermana Perdue with Hermana Ascencion.

picture of me with a bunch of elders,

One picture of the beach from the zone activity.

One picture of me with a bunch of elders, (from left to right) Elder Velazquez(my companion) Elder Robbins(above and American), Elder Seañez(my trainer, and zone Leader right now, with his backpack) and Elder Castro.

"Education is the way on the right"
and the scripture that says,
"I am the way, the light, and the truth.
No one cometh to the Father, but through me." 

One photo of 2 signs right next to each other in Spanish, well 2 things painted on the wall. Translated it says, "Education is the way on the right" and the scripture that says, "I am the way, the light, and the truth. No one cometh to the Father, but through me." I am sorry if that is not how the scripture in John 14:6 is in English because I literally just did a rough translation. But I thought it was funny because there are only 2 ways, Jesus and the way of the world.... Just kidding! Education is GREAT!

desert

Also, there is one photo of some insects that were a desert to one of my lunches! YUM! Thanks to Brother Brady, I fear no insects going into my stomach!

picture of me with a really weird tie

Ok, this picture of me with a really weird tie is what I found in a package that my family sent me. I used that tie for General Conference! I am very glad to have my family, exactly how they are in every weird way that they are. :) (But the question that is haunting me is what strange thing will come in my next package...) (And where in the world do you find that tie?)



















Ok, the other photo is of a party we had for Elder Castro for his BIRTHDAY! We got CAKE! And it was fun.

And the last photo is TEAM GRINGO! Or team American! Because we got to watch conference all by ourselves in ENGLISH! I didn't know  that is a rule of the mission you need to watch conference in your language.


And that last photo leads into my problem. No, it doesn't have to do with the girls there, it is the fact that we tried to speak English AND OUR ENGLISH WAS REALLY BAD.... Thanks to the fact that I haven't spoken much English I have a hard time speaking it. I understand it perfectly but I was trying to speak English with my companion to help his English and it is really hard for me to only speak English. So I'm apologizing in advance for the phone calls my family will have to suffer through....
But this week was really good, but I don't have much more time so I gtg! I was reading Mormon 1 and it is really interesting to see all the things that Mormon went through at such a young age....
But until next week and to all of you, look back on General Conference because it was REALLY AWESOME!