Book of Mormon lessons on the doorstep

I did get my package last week! I got it right after emailing! We get mail from the zone leader’s right after email each week. I saw as we were passing this week there was some sort of padded envelope from Grandma! Also last week I did get a letter from Grandpa Pickle. I don't know what other mail I will get this week though!

My knee is doing better, and yes we run every morning but Sunday. On car fast days I figure we walk around 5 miles or so.

As far as contacts are going we are doing amazing! We have upped the number of contacts made here in a week a little over 300% since we have got here and the contacting number is the highest it has been in four years. We have gone from 0 lessons with a member present each week to 1-2 (we are working on more but it is really hard because when we have our members with us people seem to not answer the door or the appointment drops but I guess they do that anyway) As far as investigators are going F y C dropped us this week which was sad. S is kind of progressing, he doesn't like to make promises... but he did come to church this week which is good because he has to go at least one more time if he is going to meet his baptismal date of April 13th. We have only two other progressing investigators both jovenes A y J. A I don't know too much about we have visited him one and he came to church this Sunday which was good. He really likes basketball and that takes up a ton of his time. J wants to get baptized but his dad is an eternagator (investigator for a loooong time) who likes worshiping idols and his catholic church and doesn't want J to get baptized until he does. In our last visit we talked with each individually and told J to talk to his dad about his desire to get baptized and to Dad telling him to let his son get baptized because he knows it is right, has a testimony of it, and is what he wants. So we'll see how that goes.

There have been lots of spiritual experiences, one that comes to mind was one time when we were contacting and Elder Herrera said that we needed to knock a door and so we did and the guy who answered wasn't really interested in our message but Elder Feinauer decided to teach him about the BoM on his doorstep. This helped him to open up and then he started asking us questions. After this his wife came to the door and invited us in to come eat some pizza roll things. So we talked with them and ate. After that they invited us back to have a lesson with them. We only got to teach them that one lesson because they are English speakers so we have had to hand them over to the redhawk sisters. But it was a cool experience!

The best thing about my mission? There are a lot of great things, ha-ha but I love the warm weather, I would have been kind of sad to be in cold weather but I love it here in Cali. I think the best part is probably how much I have learned being here and how much more appreciation I have gotten for the gospel and the scriptures. I wish that I had spent more time reading and studying my scriptures before my mission. The worst thing? Probably the stupid jumpers knee it made it really hard to run/ walk places and wasn't fun.

Who says there isn't wildlife in California?

Tell Cody that I am so excited for him!!! That will be an awesome mission!!! I will have to write him a letter or something but my time is running out and so I need to post my pictures if I have more time I will write more!!

Oh, I was wondering if you would think of some lunches that are cheap that I could buy for everyday eating, we have about $32 each week to buy everything for the week so if you could think of some things that would be good to buy that would be awesome. I have stuff but since you know shopping a lot better I would like to hear your ideas!

We saw a huge car wreck this week where the car broke a cement light pole, crashed through two barriers and some electrical boxes, and rolled over and backwards with a tire ripped off. We passed a few minutes after it happened it was crazy but I got to go love you guys!!!

 

I feel like I am on an episode of Buried Alive!

Hi!

My knee is doing better, not all the way, but it's getting there!

We only go to one ward (branch/Rama) on Domingo the Santa Margarita Rama. We have a small one and know everyone there. Half the branch is the people that we eat dinner with each night, haha

Slam Dunk!

A nicer camera would be awesome!! I really would love that, right now I haven't had a TON of time to take pictures because we drive everywhere making it difficult to take pictures, haha and I have been learning how everything works in the field, but I've pretty much got it now and should have a lot more time for pictures. I know that in Argentina I will have a ton more time for it because we will walk and it is much easier to take pictures when doing that! The other problem that I have had here is we aren't allowed to take pictures while proselyting so between driving and proselyting there isn't a huge amount of time so I have been learning when I have more time for it.

As far as our investigator S, when we went back he said he didn't have time to read or pray about it because he has been looking for a job but I think it's just because he is being flojo especially because he didn't go to church again! But we are hoping that he reads for our next visit this week. Our other current progressing investigators are F y C, J, and A. F y C are hard because they aren't married so we invited them to be baptized and they said they would pray about it, but even if they accept we have to make sure they get married before baptism. J is the son of A who is an ancient investigator we are dropping because he isn't progressing, he just doesn't try to receive an answer for himself and he loves worshiping Idols too much. But Josh knows that the gospel is true and his mom said he could get baptized but his dad doesn't want him to, so we are working on that. Armando is interesting because he is a Jdub. We have only taught one lesson to him but he was very receptive and wants a copy of our bible. I think we have a meeting with him this Wednesday and we'll see how that goes.

I haven't been in touch with anyone from the MTC because I am out of stamps and haven't been able to get any yet but we will buy them today. They did also just change the email policy so that I can email any friends and family and investigators so that is cool, but It is also hard because that would take away time from emailing you guys so if people do it sparingly and send more letters please! I would love to hear from people whatever way they choose! So I might email one or two of them today if I have enough time. I don't think anyone has gotten their visa though because a Hermana who is going to Argentina, my same mission, Hermana Jones is in my district and we see each other pretty often and neither of us has heard anything about visas.

It's awesome that you guys are busy with polo, it is funny because it has been nice and warm here and when we pass pools I think how badly I want to jump in and play some polo. Another missionary when we were on exchanges yesterday was saying how badly he wanted to get into the pool and I just thought to myself that he doesn't even know how bad I do because I probably spent more time in the pool in high school than out (well casi, haha) Oh man, but on that transfer, I thought I was going to die! We went to some family’s house for dinner and the first thing I think of when I walk in is the TV show buried alive that you would watch sometimes! Those people were hoarders! Then the entire time we were there they did and said awkward things like, oh, my brother is sooo stupid, don't you agree? Or the sister to her brother you're just jealous that I have a relationship and you don't then the mom pipes in that no you don't have a relationship. The whole thing was just errado. Then at the end the mom told us to tell the son why he should serve a mission and he was complaining that he would have to give up music, videogames, swimming, and flirting with girls (which was his main concern and was hilarious) but then I told him that yeah you have to not do those things and that I used to do all those things everyday almost all day but I gave those up for the thing that gives you the most and the truest happiness which is to share the gospel of Jesus Christ and to see the power it has be able to change lives and bring happiness to them and when you are doing that the other things don't matter. He didn't have any counter argument for that, je je.

Mi Companeros!

Serving here in Temecula has been great! It started out really slow but because of our hard work we are starting to have investigators and see the work progressing. I am also grateful for the two trainers that I have, when going on exchanges yesterday the English missionary who wasn’t my companion was doing some things like giving up when people said they weren't interested in the gospel that I defiantly wouldn't have done because of what my trainers had taught me. It made me grateful to have them to teach me!

We have been having a lot of fun with Elder Herrera. Since he is not from this country there are a lot of American things he doesn't know, haha. Like when we were explaining the point’s game for running into people with cars and the points you got for hitting people. He then asked us a whole bunch of questions about how many points different people are worth, haha. Like he said are pregnant lady’s more because they have a baby, haha. After the questions he said that Americans are crazy, haha.

Have you guys been getting the drop box pictures? I'm not spending too much money on the card am I? Sometimes I need to get some supplies or we go out for lunch on exchanges because they don't have food or things like that. I hope to hear more from you guys soon! Also you should send some letters because as far as email we only have like 45 min every Tuesday to be able to read and respond to emails! Plus I haven't heard from Emily and Nathan for a while!! Did they get my letters? I think today I will be getting some mail, my companion said that for the first batch to come it takes like two weeks or something because it has to come here then the zone leaders pick it up on Monday or something then district leaders distribute it on Tuesday.

Alpacas in Temecula

 Ojala todo es bien! estoy aprendiendo muchisimo y progresando en la obra! Envie una carta de solo espanol en mi carta hoy dia entonces esperar para eso. Estoy muy gradisido que udes son mi familia y les amo muchisimo. Quiero a oir mas sobre que esta panando con uds! Solo cinco minutos mas y nececito describir mi picturas entonces adios y les amo mucho!!!!

Free Pizza, Soda, Sandwiches and Breadsticks! Oh, the life of a missionary!

We haven't heard anything about our visas yet... I am pretty sure that we won't hear anything about them until we get them and at that time will be pulled out and sent to Argentina, but I'm not 100% sure, haha they don't tell us anything. Tell Grandma not to worry I did get the money and tell her thank you very much for it! Also thank the Webb’s for me! I was able to replace the items that were taken away and I bought the things that I needed mostly with the first weeks allowance but I think I used the card for a little of it, but the point is that I have everything that I need!

My knee still hurts I bought a band made specifically for it and have been wearing that and it helps but you are only supposed to wear it for 2-3hrs at a time. Sister Cook (mission pres. wife) said that I need to stretch it, ice it, take Ibuprofen, and not run until this Thurs so that is what I have been doing. I hope it gets better soon! On Saturday (which is our car fast meaning we don't use the car) my knee started hurting a lot from walking all day so it really needs to get better before I get my visa because once I get to Argentina it will be walking all day every day, haha

Elder Feinauer slacklining at the park.

The weather has been great here! Only two days where it was rainy and cold but the rest have been perfect!! It's awesome that Emily and Nathan are doing great in polo; I wish I could watch them play! The car video was cool; it looks like a really cool course that you guys have made for it! I wish I could be there and do that too! I don't know if there was sound to the video though because we email at the library and don't have audio, I'll see if I can get headphones and watch it when we do our Mormon.org thing this week because we usually have headphones for that.

Walking a chicken! What?

I'm excited to get my package! I hope I get it today! I don't know exactly what day the zone leaders pick up packages and distribute them; I'll have to ask today at district activity. I hope I get some mail, it has been a lot more lonely here than at the MTC. I was used to being able to get mail everyday not once a week.

I got the pictures I have on dropbox. I should be able to take a lot more this week but all the ones that I have for now that I hadn't sent already are on dropbox!

 

This week has been interesting, ha-ha On Thursday a guy named Russ who is an inactive member here called us up and was like; do you guys want to go to Red Brick oven Pizza today? so of course we said yes and he kept calling us talking about how he was getting it for free and was trying to get all these things like lasagnas and drinks and all this crazy stuff for free too, haha. He sounded all sad when he called us for the last time and said he could ONLY get us free pizza, soda, sandwiches, and breadsticks, haha. It was really good pizza! It was all gourmet and fancy pizzas and we got this meat lovers one and he had us all get a sandwich too (which were huge and delicious) then he ordered breadsticks and somehow got all of this for free for us, haha. Then like half way through the time there he got a call from his wife on the pizza place's phone (not his cell phone which he had been calling us from) from his wife saying he needed to come to the hospital and take care of their newborn baby. The whole thing was a little strange but it was really good and really nice of him. I thought it was really weird that his wife called him on the pizza places phone though, haha and now Elder Feinauer won't stop saying that I'm paranoid. I don't see the correlation because all I said was that it was weird but whatever, haha

Oh, and there is a Chick-fil-a near us but not in our area! :/ We passed it the other day when going somewhere in the Hermana's area! I really want to go there and we might be able to get permission from the zone leaders to go there one day! I really want to before I go to Argentina! It is actually quite close to us but the boundaries are set up weird so that a street that is right by us is the boundary between us and the Hermanas.

This week we have been teaching a lot of different people. A lot of the are Jehovah’s Witnesses (or Jdubs as Elder Feinauer calls them) and so it makes it very difficult to get them to see any other way then their own religion. One guy that we are teaching S, we extended the invitation to be baptized and he said that as long as when he prays about our message and receives an answer that it is true he will get baptized! It was so cool! Also I was the one who got to ask him if he would be baptized so that was really cool!

It is kicking me off soon so I will send this message and try to write more too, haha

I love you guys sooo much!!

Fue muy picante!

Me and Elder Reynolds on the way to the airport.


Hi, all is going great! The weather is amazing here! I got here and we were able to take our suit coats off for the first time since being in the MTC (besides in class)! We left for the airport at 5am and then we waited through all the lines. I got to talk to you guys!!! and text Emily and Nathan!!! Then we had our two hour flight to Cali where I talked to some of the people who were also going there on temp assignments. They are going to Brazil so they were learning Portuguese but there is only one Portuguese speaking missing in the US that they know of and that is Florida. So they were talking in Portuguese and I was talking in Spanish and I could understand most of what they were saying but it all sounded weird. I found out they liked photography a lot so we talked about that for almost the whole flight there. One of them had a really nice point and shoot that you could adjust the aperture and shutter speed on. It was really nice.

Then we got there and met the mission president, his wife, the assistant to the president, and some of the senior missionaries. We then packed everyone in the cars (there were 36 new missionaries for this mission). We drove to the mission home where we had a delicious lunch! It was so great getting to eat real homemade food for the first time in six weeks. Then we all hung out for a little bit while the mission president interviewed each of us to decide who our companions would be and where we would go. Right after my interview he said he knew exactly who he was going to put me with, but I had to wait until transfer meeting to find out. Then we did some practice contacting with the APs and they told us some mission stories. After this we went to the stake center for the transfer meeting. They gave us an overview of the rules of the mission then we joined the rest of the missionaries for the main meeting. They called up each trainer and who they were going to train. I was one of the very last ones just sitting there waiting to hear who my companion would be. As it turns out I got put in a tri companionship again, ha ha I think they were doing that for all the temp missionaries because I was told that we will be pulled out right once we receive our visas. I got assigened to be companions with Elders Feinauer (FINE-HOUR) and Herrera. Elder Herrera is my official trainer and he is from Columbia. He doesn't speak very good english mostly just Spanish. He has been a missionary for nine months four in Colombia and five in the US. Elder Feinauer is from Lindon Utah and has been on his mission for six months. He is the designated driver for our car, yes we do have a car, ha ha. All the Spanish speaking missionaries get a car because we cover so much distance. Oh, I almost forgot We are serving in the Temecula area! It is really cool here! It is the rich part of our mission. This makes it very difficult to find and to teach people who speak Spanish! Elder Feinauer said that in his last area Mission Viejo that it wasn't near as rich, not poor, just not so rich and there were a lot of Mexicans and other Hispanics and they were all a lot more humble than here and they had six lessons a day. Here we are lucky if we have a lesson in each day.

Our apartment

We live in a rather huge apartment with a living room, a dining area, a kitchen, two bedrooms one with a walk in closet, and two bathrooms. I was really surprised how big it was. We live in an apartment complex that if I remember right is called summer breeze. It is on top of a hill that is about the middle of our area. Each morning we are required to run for thirty minutes by mission presidents orders. The hill that we live on isn't fun to run :P the area we live in is pretty much all hills, ha ha and to run in the morning we have to run up a hill to get out of the complex then back down the hill to go anywhere so we have to go back up it to come back :P but it hasn't been too bad. Today however I have got what Elder Feinauer said is called jumper's knee. Today while running my knee started hurting right under my kneecap so he said we just need to buy some tape to help fix it.

Oh, so if you haven't gathered this already, I am Spanish speaking! which is great because if I wasn't I would forget it all, ha ha We speak Spanish pretty much all the time especially since Elder Herrera pretty much only speaks Spanish so all our planning and companionship study is in Spanish. I understand the overall idea and most of it but I have to have Elder Feinauer translate at times especially when he uses his errado Colombian words! We eat breakfast and lunch at the apartment with food that we buy each week and we eat dinners at members homes. The first night we got there we went to the Reye's family home for dinner. We had carne, frijoles, and arroz that fue muy picante! It was meet with beans and rice that was really spicy, but was good! Also we had tortilla to eat with it of course, ha ha the i think the second night was when we went to the Valtran families house and we had pulled pork and ice cream, that was really good. Their house was really nice! For most of the other nights we have been eating at parties of a group of members from our branch that consists of the Reyes, the Herreras, Hermano Saunders, Hermano Arones, an Hermana that I can't remember her name, and the ward mission leader and his wife who's names I don't know. I think that more than half the nights we've been here we have ate with them at a party of some sort. It often consists of many different things such as taquitos, arroz, frijoles, pollo, tortillas, etc.

Right now I'm not sure exactly how many investigators we technically have because a ton of people never answer their door here. Of people that we have met that I feel like are actually progressing investigators are S and C and maybe A and his son J. With S we just started teaching him the Restoration and invited him to church on Sunday but he wasn't there although I thought he would be. He seems like he is learning a lot. C we just barely met and started teaching he was one of the two lessons we had yesterday (two!) we have talked to him about the first half of the restoration and he is eager to learn more about our prophets and why he can't go in our temples which we told him we would talk to him about in our next lesson. He lived in Utah for a year so he know a little bit about our church but he has only hear a few things and has never had discussions with the missionaries before. I think that he is learning a lot also. A was the only investigator that came to church last Sunday. The problem was that he didn't feel the spirit and he had been told that he would. When we went to talk to him that night we gave him a lesson on recognizing the spirit and being open to receiving promptings. His son J actually wants to get baptised but A doesn't want him to :/ and the rest of the time we spend trying to get a hold of people and we either see them behind their peeping hole because they won't open the door or they try to avoid us all the time. I hope we start being able to contact more people! We spend the rest of our time tracting and contacting. I'm going to send pictures now because I'm running out of time but I will write more if I have time! Love you guy soo much!!!

SURVIVING THE MTC

Pre MTC suggestions:

1.      Read Preach My Gospel, the whole thing - you won't have time to do it here.

2.      Study Scripture Mastery and mark them all - in your mission language too if you have a copy of them - the scripture mastery scriptures are EXTREMELY helpful for teaching and you will have to teach in your mission language on day three!

3.      Learn all of the lessons in chapter 3 of Preach My Gospel.

4.      Study the scriptures as much as possible (Study topics such as the atonement, faith, service, plan of salvation, etc to have good scriptures for teaching.)

 

What to expect your first days at the MTC:

The first day that you get there you are greeted by a host missionary, who has been there anywhere from one week to twelve weeks. You are taken to 1M where you are herded through various lines to get your keys, card, nametag, etc. You then meet back up with your host who takes you and your luggage to your residence hall and you leave your stuff there (Make sure to get a bottom bunk if you can, if not make sure that your companions switch top/bottom every Thursday for linen exchange. The bottom is easier to get on and easier to make - plus you can put a sheet up and make a man cave J). Then you are taken to your classroom where you spend all your days at the MTC. When you first get there you will be greeted by your teacher who will only speak the language of the mission you are going to. You will then watch an orientation video and meet your companion(s). You will get to go to dinner and it is always a single choice dinner night but you do get ice-cream every Wednesday and Sunday. You will then go to some rooms and teach “investigators” as a group of about thirty or so. After this your Zone leaders will introduce themselves and tell you about some of the rules. You then are taken back to the residence halls to unpack for the night. This concludes your first day!

On the second day, as long as it doesn't change, which it probably will because that is the one thing you can expect at the MTC is change, you will start to have a somewhat normal schedule. You will have study and class time with your district which is what you will do most days pretty much all day. You will have to turn in you immunization record the first week, I don't know for sure what day. On the night of the second day you will meet with the Branch Presidency and they will decide a district leader, after interviewing the whole district. They will also decide senior companion, which is the person who comes alphabetically first, haha. The district leader will also switch after three weeks. Then your zone leaders will take you on a tour of the MTC and hopefully tell you all the tricks, if not that is hopefully what this letter is for!

Some things to know at the MTC:

1.      When sending mail make sure to use the blue mailbox outside of 2M not the one in the laundry room - the one in the laundry room doesn't get checked!

2.      The computers in the laundry room are the only ones that can send pictures!

3.      If you don't feel like getting dressed up to eat in the cafeteria you can get a sack breakfast but you have to wake up early because the line gets long fast! It starts at 6:30 so be there at least by 6:20 if you don't want to wait a half hour+

4.      You can mix and match the food, but I don't know what kind of food they will have when new people come because they keep getting rid of more and more of the options each week.

5.      Wake up early for showers so you don't have to wait a half hour. I get up around 6:05 and pretty much all the showers are open at that time!

6.      In your mission call book in your address there is a line with initials of your mission, for me ARG-RES 0225 which has a predicted date of departure from the MTC namely 0225 or February 25! I wish I would have known that.

7.      Find out how much you weight before you come to the MTC, it is interesting to see how your weight changes - there is a luggage scale in the gym in the north west stairwell that you can check your weight on while there

8.      You will probably buy a clip attachment for your magnet name tag and if you do make sure to buy the black one not the pearl one - the pearl one is the girls one and some Elders don't realize this, haha.

9.      Make sure to let all your friends know about Dear Elder it makes it easier for them to write you and therefore more likely. You will find out, mail here is like gold.

10.  If you have a rough time the first week, just make it through Sunday. A lot of people told me this and I didn’t believing it, but after that Sunday night’s devotional I found out it was true, haha. 

“Yea, I know that I am nothing; as to my strength I am weak; therefore I will not boast of myself, but I will boast of my God. For in His strength I can do all things; yea; behold many mighty miracles we have wrought in this land, for which we will praise His name forever.” Alma 26:12 I know that I alone could do nothing to make a difference, but with the Lord’s help anything is possible. I would like the world to know that Jesus is the Christ; he bled and died for us on the cross so we can live again with our loving Heavenly Father and our families. This church is the only true church here on this earth with the full truth and restored gospel. I am so grateful to be a part of it; it has truly blessed my life. I am excited for your turn to serve and be a part of this great work. The gospel is true! Elder Pickle

 

It's hard to say goodbye... but not when you're going to California!

I was so excited when I found out I got to talk to you, even if it was only five minutes! but I cant wait to talk to you all more when I go to California!

I am currently in the process of writing Emily and Nathan letters the problem is that I have so much to say and I have been thinking a lot about what I am saying that it has been taking a long time to finish, but don't despair, they are coming! I love you both soo much!

I did get my package yesterday and it was awesome! Everyone loved the Krispy Creme doughnuts! They were very delicious! It did have the phone so all is great! Also my companions said thanks for the felsnaptha!

I am not sure as to the number of letters exactly that I got for my birthday because the Dear elders combine multiple peoples letters on the same page if the letter doesn't take up the front and back of the page. I got one from all of the family though! Well, besides Cody who was on a vacation. It was great to hear from everyone! It was a lot of letters! Thanks everyone!!

 

For my birthday the Hermanas found some stuff in the free box and wrapped it and gave it to me, haha it was funny. They found some barbie cell phone thing that they gave me, haha the best part was they were joking around that I got one free call with it and the teacher was like Really? and then we had to explain it was a joke, haha

My Carlsbad mission home address is:

415w Bobier Dr.

Vista, CALIFORNIA 92083-1906

I hope that I'll be hearing from you guys there soon!

I am happy and sad to see the end of the MTC. The thing that I will miss the most is the friends that I have made and my zone. We have grown to be very close of the short amount of time that we have spent together. You really grow close to people really fast here. Normally if I were going to school or something I would never have been as close to any of them as we are. I have made some really great friends and we have already planned that we will hang out after the mission! I am very excited though to go out into the field and teach real investigators! It will be an amazing experience! I am also very glad that I am going to California! It is an awesome temporary mission and it will be nice and warm! I have a lot of advice for anyone coming into the MTC and I will write a separate email about it because I want to make sure to include all the things they need to know!

 

 

CAMERON IS THAT YOU ?!?!

Today I ran to answer the phone and almost didn’t make it but I hurriedly said, “Hello”. The person on the other line said, “Hi!” “Cameron! Is that you?!?!”

Cameron was allowed to call home to let us know that his visa did not come this week so he will be getting a temporary reassignment for anywhere from 1-6 weeks. He has been temporarily assigned to labor in Carlsbad California. Cali!! He sounded very excited to be going somewhere warm and have the opportunity to teach REAL investigators. He leaves for California Tuesday the 26^th at 8:31a.m. (For any friends who work at the airport and want to pop in and say HI and take a picture for me hint hint).

It was so amazing to talk to my awesome son! He sounds happy and just so excited to be where he is and have this opportunity. I am so blessed to be his mother!

The Young Men repeated this every week for mutual last year. I feel it reflects perfectly Cameron's purpose now.

“The Standard of Truth has been erected; no unhallowed hand can stop the work from progressing; persecutions may rage, mobs may combine, armies may assemble, calumny may defame, but the truth of God will go forth boldly, nobly, and independent, till it has penetrated every continent, visited every clime, swept every country, and sounded in every ear, till the purposes of God shall be accomplished, and the Great Jehovah shall say the work is done.”      Joseph Smith Jr.

I am so proud to be a missionary mom and have my son be a part of this great work!

How many Ashcrofts do you weigh?

February 15, 2013

Dear Family,

The events of this week haven’t been exciting at all. During the time I was sick my day consisted of lying there, sleeping, or nibbling on a little food at meals. The best part of my day was when I got to hear stories from the outside world. Since I really didn’t do anything I’ll just talk about the funny things that have happened recently.

One great thing was on Valentine’s Day Elder Whitfield was pretending to ask a Hermana to the “Valentines Dance”. So Elder Smith, who is a little odd or more than a little odd ha ha, quickly asked Hermana Jensen to the Valentines Dance (thinking there really was one). The joke for the rest of the day was who was going with who to the dance that night. We all thought it was hilarious that Smith thought there was a dance when there is a no hugging girls and no dancing, while as a missionary rule.

There is an Elder here, Elder Ashcroft who is very skinny and only weighs 125lbs. We decided that we would weigh things in Ashcrofts. I weighed 1.5 Ashcrofts until I got sick now I weigh only 1.4 Ashcrofts. Some Elders are 2.5 Ashcrofts. We now convert all weights to Ashcrofts.

As for our visas we are now just waiting for them. The earliest we could get them would be this Wednesday so we’ll see. We didn’t get travel plans with the rest of our District either. We won’t get them until we either get our Visas or get a temporary reassignment.

Thanks again for the birthday packages and please thank both Grandparents for me! I love you all very much!  Elder Pickle

Happy Wallentines Day!

This picture is of the hermanas in our zone who made signs that read "Will you be our Wallentine?"

 for Elder Wallentine in our Zone they had one person go in and have him stand up

 then they each came in one by one with their sign then hermana Crosby gave him a ring-pop, haha

 

First of all Happy Birthday Nathan! Sorry I couldn't tell you yesterday, I didn't get a chance to write letters while I was sick in bed so by the time I could have written one you would have got it later than this email since it takes like four days! But I hope that you had a great Birthday! Also please tell Grandma Happy Birthday for me!

My favorite Devotional so far was by a Brother Clayton in the Seventy who talked on the importance of being a missionary who is very conserned about both the investigators and the members. He said that we should know all of the members in the area so that when we are teaching investigators we will know who they can be freinds with in the ward when they go to church. He related this to the story of the lost sheep and how when the master found it he picked it up and carried it (not dragged it) back to the fold then encircled it in its freinds so that they could help the sheep to want to stay.

I haven't met any general authorities, hijole! Elder Holland was here for a devotional the night before I got there! Elder Reynolds actually was there a day early and got to see it, it sounded like it was amazing!

 

As far as embarassing things that have happened it has pretty much just been saying stupid things in Spanish such as:

We all fish sometimes - pecado vs pescado

I once asked to help the bed in a prayer when I meant to say bless the house - ayuda la cama vs bendigo la casa - this was in the first few days
I once told our investigator that our message was strange because I couldn't think of the word for different
Elder Reynolds once said that the BoM is a ring in a lesson
I can't think of any particularly weird habits that my companions have besides that Elder Reynolds will snore on occasion.

A Very Blue District

 

It has been great being a zone leader. The only downsides are that you have a lot of meetings to go to on sunday, but thats not too bad. We get to introduce the new districts in our zone to the MTC and give them a tour of the MTC. The only thing about that is we haven't had new districts for the past two weeks because of the new intermediate spanish zone that was made. We are incharge of looking out for all of the people in our zone and we interview the district leader each week to see how everone is doing then report the the branch president on this. We are also the ones incharge of making sure that our zone is following the rules.

As far as letters I wish everyone would write me more letters :P I have had people write and say that they will keep their letter short because I probably don't have enought time to read them but that is not true. Make sure that myth is corrected! I have plenty of time to read letters the only thing we don't have as much time for is writing back. I try to write everone back either personally or answer their questions in my family letters! I wish that I had the time to write each individual back always but that doesn't always happen. But I love getting them and have plenty of time to read them! As for specific people I haven't got many from freinds and that would be nice. But I aways love hearing from my family especially because I used to be able to talk to all of you every day and now I feel like I hardly even know what you are doing! I love to hear what is going on in your days!

I have to get off for now but hopefully I'll have time to write you in the laundery room too, love you guys very much!

I am getting better! I am not totally better but I haven't been spending all day in bed since tuesday! Today I have pretty much only a cough left so I am almost over it! I did get the birthday packages! they are awesome! I love all of it! the canteen tie is way cool, I had never heard of one before! The umbrella will be awesome for Argentina! I got a ton of candy between the three packages! It is all very delicious! Please thank both grandparents for me and Thank you for your package! Thanks again, It was crazy because I got three packages all on the same day, haha it was awesome!

 

The first picture is of the sheets me and Elder Decker put up on our beds when I was sick all day

and so we made "man caves". We are lucky because with all the new elders coming in they have

been putting in a third bunkbed in each room except ours because it is slightly smaller than the rest,

so while we have only three missionaries in our room most everyone else had six :P

Spiders and Snakes Oh my!

Latrodectus (Very venomous) 

Argentina Boa

 

Dear Family,

So this week has been pretty crazy so far! We met with the Visa reps yesterday and we had to do fingerprints for our Visas. They are VERY strict! We had to make sure our full square fingerprint was on the paper, with no smudges and not touching the line. If that didn’t happen the visa would be rejected and you could get a permanent reassignment. Luckily the lady said mine were perfect. (Quick side note: The lady who took Cameron’s fingerprints used to live in our ward and we heard that he is doing well and seems like he is really enjoying himself.) Today we met with the consul and talked about Argentina. We were told not to talk about religion to him or our Visa would likely be denied. They made the consul sound like this old angry guy, but he wasn’t. He was very nice and we all asked him questions about the culture and areas.

We were told that our Visas would be two to three weeks minimum and have been commonly taking a month. We are hoping ours will get here in time because if we get sent to a temp assignment we have to stay until the next transfer which are every six weeks. We are hoping that even if we don’t go on our dates that they will keep us in the MTC for a week or two to see if our Visa comes.

I really hope that I get sent straight to Argentina but it will be just my luck that I will probably get a temp assignment and two weeks past transfer date our Visas will come and so we will have to wait another month to go to Argentina!

When we were talking to the consul he said that the tap water is good everywhere but Resistencia. He said that he would shower and brush his teeth but not drink the water. He also said that there are snakes and spiders in the North (Resistencia) area. He said that when we eat meals there it is polite to keep your hands on the table and rude not to.

I hope all is going well and to hear from you soon.

Love, Elder Pickle