October 26, 2015

Hey Hey hamily family! Happy Halloween week! :) Halloween is totally better in the states, especially the street that we live on! But it's all good, I will be there to see it next year. :) I hope you guys give out tons of candy!

Haha mom don't worry about us, we are staying away from all the scary dog filled places now! We should be fine!

I am jealous of the weather there! The weather here right now reminds me a lot of the weather in Utah! One day it will be really really hot, and then the next day I have to break out the sweater! But I have been enjoying the weather still. :) I imagine it is going to start getting warmer and warmer from here on out!

That's cool Gma and Gpa Lawrence came down for the weekend! I bet that was fun. :) Also that is sweet that we won Snow Canyon at Snow Canyon! Also that's awesome that Bryson and Taylee are going to be in Grandma Ligtermoet's ward! I can't believe they are going to be living over there! That will be nice because you guys can all meet up every Sunday and eat dinner over there! That's pretty convenient! Does Bryson know what he wants to do for work?? That's cool that Taylee is going to do the nursing program down at Dixie! They will have to let me know how they like it!

Dang the wedding is really coming up quick! Less than a month!!! I wish I could be there to film it all and make a video of it! That would've been so cool! I like the idea you have to have Pasta Factory cater the luncheon! that will be way yummy!

Our week was good! This past Thursday we had our interviews with President Goates! Mine went way good! I love every chance I get to talk to him! He always gives the best advice as well! He always makes jokes about making me come back to the offices to work again, and it always makes me laugh. :) We also had to bring our emergency backpacks to interviews. Mine is legit! I will send you a picture of it next week!

We have this family of investigators that are progressing a ton! Its the family that we did service for last week (I sent a photo of them) but yeah the other day we were walking home in the morning time to go make lunch in our pench but we decided to just walk by their house and see how they were doing and see if we could set up a lesson for some other time... well we ended making tacos with them for lunch! It went way good! I am becoming a pro at making tacos! haha :) 

They didn't make it to church this past week... Yesterday was voting for the new President of Argentina so everyone had to go vote... I think that's why some people didn't go to church... We also couldn't leave last night to go proselyting because of the elections! It was kinda nice to catch up a little on some sleep! haha :)

Well, we are working super hard here, I really really want to baptize with Elder Landt! It would be such a cool experience! Keep praying for us! We always feel the prayers and blessings that come with it. :) Thanks for always keeping us in your prayers! I really know it helps! I have a strong testimony of prayer.

I love you guys tons!!!! I hope you have a great week! Give out tons of candy! I want to see all the pictures! Good luck with your Relief Society lesson! I know you will do awesome. :) Oh by the way, I received an awesome letter from the Relief Society President and I think Sister Wiley wrote something as well! Please tell them that I really appreciated the letter!!! :) I love you guys soo much! :)

Love, Elder Lawrence

 Just Elder Landt messing up my photo of the sunset..... haha just kidding He is a stud and I wanted him in the photo!

 This street by our house got way flooded!

One of the few photos I took from when we made tacos with our investigators, and it turned out blurry.

Just catching some quick rays by the river. Well its more like a gutter! haha

October 19, 2015

Hey Hey cute lil' family!!

I am doing way good! I still can't believe that me and Elder Landt are companions either! haha We are getting along super well!! He is adjusting pretty well to Argentina! I am pretty sure his Spanish is way better than mine was when I got here! Yeah we have 1 hour a day to study the language! But yeah we really are getting along well and he is a stud. I hope I can be the best trainer possible for him.

Sounds like you guys had a legit week! That Bridal Shower looked like it was fun and funny! I like that idea with the video and the gumballs in the mouth thing! That made me laugh way hard. :) I am glad the Bridal Shower was a success. :)

The new cabin looks like its really coming along! It is going to be so awesome to go there after the mission! I imagine its wayyy pretty up there this time of the year! I am way glad you guys drove home safely with all that rain! That sounds way freaky!!!

Sooo we had a pretty crazy situation this past week! haha Well here is the story... So we were contacting a reference we got from our Zone Leaders this past Tuesday and it was in a part of our area that I have never really worked in too much and this area is pretty poor and like none of the dudes in the streets were wearing shirts and they were yelling stuff at us but it was like whatever... Well we keep going deeper into this barrio and we see some packs of dogs here and there just packs of like 3 or 4 dogs... Well we were walking on the side walk and one of these packs of dogs sneeks up behind us and one of the dogs bites Elder Landt on the back of the leg!!!! I didn't see the dogs at all!! I heard my comp kind yell or something and turned around and all these dogs are like barking and getting close to us! So I just keep my ground and I fake to pick up a rock and the dogs stop barking and kinda split up and go away! It was way freaky and we didn't even end up finding our reference we just got out of there. The bite wasn't that bad, we called the nurse because that's what we are supposed to do and she told us that we needed to go to the hospital that night... Well it was already like 9:00pm but we still had to go... So yeah I learned a whole new branch to my spanish language this past week, medical terms haha... words like dog bite, rabies, shot, anti-biotics, and much more. We ended up not getting back to the pench till after 11:00pm. It was a pretty crazy night and I probably wont forget it ever! Everything is all good now! He has all the medicine and the bite doesn't bug him! Its more of just a scratch. :)

Also quick funny little story that happened at the hospital.... So there was this way nice old lady nurse/front desk worker that helped us butt a lot of people in line because she knew we were young and not from here so she was really just helping us all night for the two hours we were there. We were really thankful for her so we got her an alfojore (Argentine candy) and she was just so happy and she isn't a member so she didn't really know that we can't do the little Argentine kissing thing (just where they kiss your face on both sides) So I went for the handshake and she just passed that right up and kissed my face twice, and then she turned to my companion and went to kiss him on the face and he just kinda froze up and like got all red in the face! haha after we left the hospital I just busted up laughing!!! It was way awkward for us all but yeah everyone remembers their first "Argentine besitos" hahahah :)

Well I don't have a ton more time to write! I forgot to tell you last week but my scripture I ponderized this past week was 2nd Nephi 22:2... Look it up its way good. :) I will send a bunch of pictures that will explain my week a little bit more! Mom Happy Argentine Mothers Day!!! It was el día de la mama yesterday! So yeah just wanted to let you know that you are the best Mom in the world. :) I love you tons!

I love all of you tons and hope you have a great week! Thanks for all the great pictures too! Be safe and do work! :)

Love, Elder Lawrence

Just some photos with my son. :)

 Dog Bite! 

  I swear I find giant spiders every week in this area! haha I turned over a wood board and this beast crawled out.

 See that giant pile of garbage in the bottom left corner? Imagine that but all over the yard haha! It was fun to do service with them!

This is one of our investigator families! Well the dad is a member but only him, we are teaching the mom (mara) and the daughter (Mailen), the other kids listen but aren't old enough to be baptized. They are way awesome! We did service for them on Thursday and then we brought them brownies yesterday because it was Mara's birthday!

October 12, 2015

Hi there family. :)

That was a pretty fast week that we just had! I cannot believe that first quarter of school is already almost over! I remember thinking that summer went fast for you guys, but I feel like that went even faster! I am glad you didn't have to yell at the niños too much about their grades! The home is happier when the grades are good. :) haha

So guess what.... you will never believe who my new companion is....  I am training...... ELDER LANDT!!! Yep yep yep, you read it right! I am training Elder Russell Landt who happens to be from Hurricane Utah (He lives up by Karter Beardal and Makaylee Shea). :) I cant believe that one of my companions is literally from the same city that I am from!!! He was visa waiting the past 6 weeks in Ventura, California. He got half of his training there, but I will be with him for the next 2 transfers to do the rest of his training. :) He told me that Ventura was way awesome and they had a car and stuff! I am pretty jealous haha (remember how I wanted to visa wait?) but I think he is going to like it a lot here too. :) He didn't bring any American candy because he didn't have room for it in his bags, but it's ok I will forgive him someday... ;)

I forgot to tell you guys last week, Elder Mortensen is also training this transfer! He is training another one of the visa waiters that went to Lubboc, Texas for 6 weeks and he said he met Jessica Langston there! But also something crazy, He came up to me and he was like "Hey did you play tennis with JD Gates as your partner??" and I told him yeah and stuff. Well come to find out that he is from Cedar City and he totally versed me and JD in tennis! and I totally remember him and who he played with! It was a big coincidence but yeah now we are like best buds. He tells me that he remembers him winning against us, but I don't remember, so I am pretty sure me and JD won.... ;)

I also met a few new Elders that said they read and saw pictures from my blog before the mission so they kinda had an idea of it! That was kinda cool! I wish I got to meet them all better! This new group of missionaries is awesome, everyone was really impressed with them when they went out and talked to people on the streets with them!

Glad to hear everything is a go for the wedding! wow only 41 days! I hope Taylee won't be stressing too much! It's just a wedding haha. :) I better see tons of photos from it! :)

The weather has been pretty weird here! It has been freezing cold here! It has almost rained a couple times but it is overcast all day. When the weather starts to warm up here I think the people will start coming out of their houses and we can start teaching tons of people. :) The weather really does affect the people a lot here!

Well That's about it for this week. I'm pretty sure I am forgetting to tell you guys a ton of stuff... I am really excited to be training Elder Landt, he is a stud. :) We are going to have a lot of fun together and we are going to teach a ton and baptize! Thank you guys for everything you do for me! You are always in my prayers! I hope you have a great week! :) I love you so much!

Love, Elder Lawrence

 Me and Elder Landt right after we found out we were companions! Still can't believe my companion is from Hurricane!

 Some of the newbies with their trainers!

 Awesome awesome awesome blanket that Elder Landt brought from Hurricane. :)

 The old district just right before transfers, I don't know why everyone's hands are on my shoulders.

Some action photos from the week!

Transfers!!!

Hey Hey family shmamily. How are you guys doing?? I am doing great!! I am way excited with our transfers! So you were right mom, Elder Lillie is out of here! He is going to the providence of San Luis! He is pretty excited, His new companion is Elder Ramirez from Buenos Aires, I don't know him to well, but he is probably cool! and for my transfers...... I will be staying here in Benavidez and I will be training!!!!! I am wayyyyy excited to train! I am also just a tid bit nervous but I think I will be fine. :) I know this area pretty good and I have made tons of good relationships here so I am getting excited to train someone that knows nothing about the mission. :) I know that there are 8 new Elders coming from the United states and there are 4 coming from South America! So we will see if I am with a gringo or a latin! I will find out this Thursday when I go to Mendoza for training meetings. :)

Haha yeah you caught me! I pulled some money out too when Elder Lillie did haha. We did get to do a little shopping last P-day! I will get you a really cool souvenir don't you worry. :)

Wow! That's awesome to hear that we won our Homecoming game!! I am glad to hear that Kamrie did way good too! I loved all the videos and photos! Tell Kamrie to put in a good word for me to Hannah Dutton for when I get home. ;) (but seriously hahah) Kamrie also looked amazin for the homecoming dance!! Trevor is a little stud. She is growing up way fast!... Also Ben is back in Hurricane?! That's pretty cool! I hope he is doing good! I am going to do some work with that kid when I get home. Just show him how much God really does love us and bless us.

General Conference was the BEST!!! Man all of the talks were sooo good!!! We are sooooo blessed to have living Prophets and Apostles. We watched Conference in the Stake center in Chimbas. It also was all in English. Man, it was amazing to see the new Apostles sustained and take their seats with the other Apostles, I felt the spirit so strongly and I know that they are called of God. I wish I had my notes with me here but I don't, but I will try to tell you all the ones I remember:

I really liked Elder Uchtdorfs talk Saturday morning session about "Simplify" our callings as members. We dont have to be sooo stressed out over our callings, we just do our part and the lord will help us with the rest.

I also liked the talk that was 2nd after that one. He talked about how we need to center our lives on Christ and the Gospel, just like the clay on the wheel. It made so much sense to me and I felt the spirit so strongly in his talk.

I LOVED the talk from Elder Holland about Moms. All of us Elders in the gringo room were about to cry no joke haha. So Mom, thank you sooooo much for everything. For always being there for me. Always supporting me. I owe it all to you and Dad. I love you guys. :)

I also really enjoyed the talk yesterday about "ponderizing" 1 scripture a week. I am going to try to do it! 1 scripture a week for 10 years. I want you guys to try it too! Maybe just stick a different scripture on the fridge every week and then just read it whenever you get something out of it! I guarantee we will see a difference in our lives and it will be a difference for the better. :)

Well there were a lot more I liked but I don't want to bore you guys too much. ;) I hope you guys have another great week! I am pretty excited for this week and to find out who my hijo (son) will be! I am way glad to hear that you guys are reading lots and praying as a family! You guys are awesome. I love you guys tons. :)

Love, Elder Lawrence, your Hijo. :)

 You cant tell but we took like a couple hours cleaning this room! It was pretty messy and wayyy dusty. Me and Elder Lillie were dying of sneezing.

 Haircuts!

  Bye Elder Cofer! He ended his mission in my old area of Albardon! Way awesome guy.

 Giant spider I found in the street. It gives me nightmares man. haha

Quite the difference! haha my shirts get that dirty just after a few days