January 18, 2016

Hey Hey family :)

I am doing way good! This week had some awesome miracles!!!! I am glad to hear you guys are doing good! Don't worry mom I am being careful with the bike :) haha

The presentation went way good! I had to cut it down a ton! Yeah I ended up only having to speak for like 15 minutes! I was kinda stressing out too when I tried to plan for an hour! But yeah it went good! Hermana Goates took up the rest of the time! I told my district to not be surprised if I talk about setting goals for 45 minutes in district meeting tomorrow...... hahaha just kidding. :) My interview went way good with President Goates! He told me some pretty crazy news in my interview. Every single Hermana that's not already in their training or that is a sister training leader, will be training!  I guess there is a ton of new Hermana's coming in this transfer! It's crazy because there is going to be some brand new Hermana's that have to train!

Glad to hear things are still good with the exchange student! That's crazy he only brought 2 pairs of clothes! Just give him my old clothes... oh wait, Bryson already stole them all! haha :) I like his American name... Shawn! hahaha that made me laugh.

Oh hey, I keep forgetting to tell you guys, I got my watch fixed!!! It was like 60 pesos so like 5 bucks! Yeah I am happy to have it back and running!!!

Tell Taylee I say Happy Birthday! I love Brenda's cheesecake too!!! 

So listen to the miracles of the week! We talked with this lady on the street named Rosa and she was super nice and wanted us to come back... Well we go back like a week later and she is super happy to see us! She told us about how her life was super tough but after she talked to us everything started to get better! She found a job and everything. She was waiting for us to come by again! So we went by and she was just super ready to hear everything we had to say! She prayed right there and then to know if it was true or not and she accepted a baptismal date for the 13 of February! She is super awesome and has two kids that live with her! Her son Thomas is 15 and her daughter Milagros is 9! Both super awesome as well! I hope she will come to church this next week with us!

Other Miracle: So we had two investigators come to church this week! Juana came again for the second time! She was also someone we just talked to in the street! She is super awesome! We are going to talk to her about baptism this week! Someone in our ward gave an awesome talk about baptism this week, I think she liked it a lot!

Also our investigator Javier came to church this week! He said it was his first time ever going to any church! His wife is super less active and just moved here from Godoy Cruz. But we found them a couple weeks ago and yeah they both came to church yesterday! It was funny because I sat with them and my comp sat with Juana and we were both sitting like on the opposite sides of the chapel. They are both awesome!

I will try to keep learning how to cook Argentine food! I really want to come home and cook for you guys sometime! That would be awesome! Wow, I cant believe this Friday I only have 5 months left in the mission.... That's way crazy to me! The time is really flying! I am going to keep working way hard!  I am super tired a lot but I think its from the serious miles we put on the bikes hahaha :) 

Well I am really grateful for all you guys do for me! Thanks for the prayers and letters! Grandpa is for sure in my prayers! Man the air up north is not good! Sara Goeser... that name sounds really familiar... but that is super sad she has cancer :( is she in the grade below me?  That makes me way sad! Yeah just know they will all be in my prayers! 

I hope you guys have a great week! I love you guys tons!!!

Love, Elder Lawrence

PS. I forgot to tell you what we are doing today!!!! We are going fishing with a member! My dreams are coming true!!! hahaha I can't wait!!!!! Love you tons!

 Chaucito Elder Vera!

 My drawing skills were put to the test, we made a poster for all the members to sign for Elder Vera! Big head little body always! haha

 My District! :) super weird/funny photo!

 I found a machete when we were doing service the other day! haha super awesome!

 Empanada place knows what's up! haha

Just posing in front of sunsets as usual! :)

January 11, 2016

Hey Hey Family! Everything is going great here! Tunuyan is still gorgeous! This morning we woke up and it was super foggy! It has been like forever since I had seen fog! Our house is way cute for sure! haha ummm yeah there is a ton of bugs here.  I was using my bug spray at first because the bugs were eating me up like the first week but I think they got sick of me or something because now I have no problems! Also around our house there is like a million snails (seriously a million) I feel bad sometimes when we come in at night time because I can't see the ground really but I will hear a loud crunch under my shoe haha R.I.P snails.

Yeah it rains almost everyday here... not always super hard but like a group of clouds will come in for a little and rain a little and then leave and it just gets super humid after that! But most nights I go to bed a little hot from riding the bike all day and everything but always in the mornings its freezing!  I might break out the sleeping bag soon.

No my comp doesn't speak English, but he is learning! I have had him saying his prayers in English whenever we are in the pench! I also had him give the spiritual thought in district meeting last week in English! It wasn't bad! But yeah we only speak Spanish.

Mom bike areas rock! You can do so much more! You shouldn't be scared, I don't feel like its dangerous... In the centro part of Tunuyan they have bike lanes and that's the way we go whenever its night time so that's good!

Yeah District Leader is awesome! It makes me a little nervous at times! haha like this Friday we have interviews with President Goates (like we do every 3 months) and I have to prepare a presentation to give to my District and Hermana Goates while the missionaries have their interviews. It has to be at least an hour long but maybe longer depending on how long my district takes to have interviews... so I will just tell them all to be quick! ;)  I am not too nervous! I have to speak about goals and setting goals and just everything about goals! We will see how it goes. :) But yeah to answer you question District meeting went good last week! I made brownies and Hermana Maseda made some upside down cake! It was super good!

Speaking of President Goates, he came to our church yesterday! Because we are a Branch he is basically the Stake President over us! So he came and set apart an Elder in our branch to go on his mission this Wednesday! Pretty crazy that he gets set apart 3 days before he actually leaves! His name is Gabriel Vera! He is a super awesome guy! He is going to serve in Chile. I don't remember what mission but yeah! I will send you a photo we took with him!

Yes we have some investigators! The people are amazing here! They are actually super receptive! We met this girl named Juana last Monday or Tuesday and we taught her the first lesson and invited her to church and she came with her two sons! She said she invited her husband to come and he was going too but he had to leave for something so he wasn't home when we passed by. But yeah, I have been loving the work here! There is some parts of our area that are super humble too. We have one investigator that has a baptismal fecha named Gladis and she is reading the Book of Mormon and everything but she is struggling to come to church! I think she is shy or something... we are going to keep working with her! We also have lunch with members a good amount! I think like every Wednesday Friday Saturday and Sunday! My comp is a stud chef though! He has been teaching me some Argentine dishes so I am stoked to show you guys when I get home! He taught me how to make chimichuri its like a sauce, it's the bomb!

Well basically this email was just me answering tons of questions! I don't really have time to write anything else! But I loved the photo of you guys at Jacey's homecoming! I can't believe she is home!!!! Tell her I say sup. :) I hope things go good with the exchange student! I think he has some hard core jet lag hahahaha. I love you guys tons! You guys are the best family. Be safe. Today we are making Pizzas in our church and playing soccer! whoo whoo! Everyone likes to come to our little city for P-days because its the coolest one... haha jk but yeah everyone always comes to Tunuyan for P-days in the zone! Love you guys! I hope Kamrie is all better now!

Love, Elder Lawrence

 All the trees droop down in the mornings because of little water droplets. I thought it looked pretty cool close up.

 Me and Elder Bustos bought some sweet cups for 3 pesos (like 30 cents haha)

 You can't really tell that I am soaking wet in this photo but yeah I am. We got caught in a down pour on the way home from a lesson.

  Elder Vera! Right after being set apart as a missionary! He looks like David Artchuleta and is going to serve in the same mission that he served in! haha

Chilling in the back seat of some members car on the way to lunch. You cant really see but there are two kids and they are crazyyyyyy! hahaha

18 Months!!!

Hey hey hey hey Family!!! Happy New Year!!! I can't believe its already 2016!!! 2015 went wayyy fast! I learned a ton this past year too! and yes there was a little bit of burning of something on the 18th month mark :) Haha Don't worry will send photos!

Sooo yeah you want to know about transfers?...... I'm staying another in San Juan with Elder Landt................ JUST KIDDING haha I got transferred!!! I am 100% sure that I am in the prettiest zone/area in the mission!!! I got transferred to an area called Tunuyan in the zone of Valle de Uco!!! It is super pretty here!!! It's also a lot more tranquilo than Chimbas!!!  I have wanted to go to Valle de Uco ever since my first area! Elder Holmstead used to always tell me about how much he loved it here!!! and man I have been loving it here!!! The zone of Valle de Uco is just a bunch of little towns that are tucked up in the Andes mountains!!! My first day here it rained alllll day! It is super green here and looks like a jungle! It is way cooler here than in San Juan!!! We are wearing our sweaters today! Also Tunuyan is a Branch not a ward! It says something about that in my Patriartical Blessing! Pretty awesome stuff! :) 

Also my run of only having gringo comps came to an end! My companion is Elder Bustos from Santa Fe, Argentina!!! He is super awesome!!! He is like brand new in the mission! I am his first companion after his trainer!!! He is super animated for the work too! We have been talking with everyone and meeting tons of new people! He is also only a convert of like a year and a half! He is way boss though! His story of how he came to know the church and everything is way awesome! I will have to tell you about it someday! We don't have too much time to write today!

Also I am going to come home from the mission with some super hot legs because this is a HUGE area and its a bike area!!!! This is my first area ever that has bikes!!!! My legs are super sore! hahaha It feels like everything is up hill! We save tons of time though with bikes! plus it's super safe here and so that's why we have bikes as well! I love it! 

Oh also I am District Leader! I thought that was pretty cool! There are a companionship of Hermanas and a companionship of Elders and the matrimony couple (Elder and Hermana Maseda) are in my District!) I am pretty excited! I have to give my first District meeting tomorrow! Wish me luck! also, the Hermana and Elder in my district are both training this transfer! The new Elder is from Colorado and the new Hermana is from Chile! They are both wayyy awesome! We share the Branch with the Hermanas! 

Sorry I have like no time to write anything else! I think I am only going to have time to write you guys back today! Glad you guys liked the package! :) Hermana Keil is awesome for taking that to you guys!!! I was kinda scared that the coke was going to explode but nope it made it! I love you guys tons and hope you have a great week! Have fun going back to work and school and everything ;) You guys are the best family eva!!!! :)

Love, Elder Lawrence

Ps. I really hope I get some family benefits with that season pass deal to Brianhead!!!!!! haha :)

 Me and my new comp Elder Bustos!

 This is what it looks like in front of the pench! Straight jungle!

This is our pench! It's the nicest pench out of all the ones I have had in my mission for sure!

 The church building is also huge here! But yeah this is when we got caught in the rain my first day here!

 Bike area problems! My chain fell off.

 Chau 18 months! Crazy how fast it went. Don't worry it's just a pair of super dirty pants that I never wore! haha

Skyping with Elder Lawrence December 25, 2015

It was so much fun to Skype with Elder Lawrence on Christmas day!!!  He looked amazing and sounded so great!  We love him so much and are so proud of the wonderful missionary that he has become!!!  Here is a little video clip of him sharing his beautiful testimony with us in Spanish.

6 Months and Merry Christmas!!!

Hey Hey fam :)

Wow... I really can't believe only 6 months left in my mission... it kinda scares me! haha Like I am excited and everything but yeah wow!!! Time flies! :)

I am doing way good this week!! Everything is going great with me and Elder Landt! I can't believe that we have already been together for two full transfers! The time went way fast!!! Yeah we will see what will be happening this week if I get transferred or if Elder Landt will or if we will stay together!!! I will be kinda sad if I leave because Mara and Mailen are super super close to being baptized! I think I will for sure be here to go to their wedding but I don't know about the baptism... we will see though!!

I am glad to hear that Kam and E ended up with some good grades! That's pretty awesome! and that's pretty drama filled all that stuff that's going on with the cheer coach! Haha we will see if they get a new cheer coach next year!

I'm pretty jealous that you might get some snow on Christmas!  If you do, you will have to take the web cam outside so I can see it! haha :) speaking of skype, yeah that time sounds perfect! So I will plan on skyping you guys at 2 o'clock here. So that should be about 10am your time! Elder Landt is going to skype before me so I will probably go just right after him which should be right around 2:00pm! well, our plan to skype with these one members wasn't sounding too good because they said their internet keeps going in and out, but they gave us their web cam to borrow and we talked with the bishop and he got everything worked out for us to skype at our church! It's a pretty nice computer and good wifi so I think everything should go smoothly!!! I will give you a call or something if plans change but yeah just plan on that! :)

Well I am going to keep this email a little short because we will be talking here in a few days on skype! I am wayyy excited! All the missionaries are getting excited to skype and so am I! Get some questions ready or something! haha :) I love you guys tons!!! I hope you guys have a great/safe Christmas week and Chistmas Eve!!! Enjoy the cold! Cold Christmas's are where it's at! haha Chau chau. :)

Love, Elder Lawrence

 We made this giant awesome pizza with a part member family!!!

 Weird random picture from Zone Conference this past week!

Elder Christensen and Elder Mortensen... both studs!

December 14, 2015

Hey Hey familia! This month really is cruising by!!!

Sounds like you guys had a jammed pack week!!! Oh, I gotta tell you before I forget, I loved that wedding video of Bryson and Taylee!!! That was way good! haha man I totally missed out on an awesome wedding! But it's all good, I am super happy here. :) Looks like Kamrie had fun at Sadies and stuff! That's cool you guys chaperoned the dance! Also I am glad to hear the ward party was a success! No I don't think we even have a ward Christmas party planned here so that's super lame.

Everything is going good here!!! Man it is getting sooo hot though! I am way glad I have that little chap stick sunblock thing or else my face (especially my nose) would be completely fried by now!  We have some sweet plans for Christmas though! We are going to go spend Christmas back in Albardon! Elder Mortensen invited us to go up there with them and spend the night! We are going to make some Asado and play some sports! It's going to be way fun! Oh by the way I'm a little jealous that it might snow there this week, because it's going to be like 100 degrees here! haha

Our investigators are doing good! We got 2 new sweet investigators this week! Named Eli and Brian! They live in this barrio that we never really worked in before! They are super cool and super sincere. We didn't have a ton of time to talk when we first met them but we shared a good scripture with them and set up an appointment to come back. They are way cool though!

We also had an awesome lesson with Mara and Nestor this week!!! We shared a scripture about Christmas and how Jesus Christ was born for us. They really liked it a lot. After the lesson Nestor told us he had some news for us... he said "Elders I have to let you know that me and Mara wont be going to church again until we are married" and that made me way sad when he said that..... but then he continued by saying "but I have my vacaciones (Christmas break) the 20th of December, and we will be finishing our tramites and be getting married over the break so Mara can be baptized!" and we were soooooooooooooo HAPPY!!!! That was like the best news I have ever heard! Also Mailen (Their daughter) just turned 8 and she wants to be baptized too! We are hoping to baptize them both on the same day! It's going to be sooo awesome. I am going to be pretty sad if I get transferred because I won't be able to be there for the baptism or anything... Transfers are on the 29th so we will see if I stay for 1 more transfer or if I am leaving!

Oh yeah I almost forgot to tell you, President Goates is counting Christmas as our P-day for that following week so I won't be writing you guys on the 28th! Yeah just a little heads up. :)

Well yeah just wanted to let you guys know I am doing great! I am loving the area and the people in it. :) Let me know what time you guys are wanting to skype at and everything! Like in the morning or afternoon or whatever. We are still working on finding a good place to skype... we have a couple options but I just want to pick the best one!  I hope you guys have a great week! You guys are the BEST. I love you!

Love, Elder Lawrence

PS... Kody is thinking about Dixie too and I am pretty positive that's where Lincoln is going... I told Elder Landt I feel like Joseph Smith when he was trying to find which church was true, but I am just trying to find which of all the schools I should go too! haha but yeah we can talk about this later. :)

 Just a little girl with a turtle!

 Elder Landt broke my scissors trying to cut some cardboard, but fear not, my sewing kit came in handy and some thread saved the day! haha

 Happy Birthday Mailen!!!

This was the bounce house at Mailen's Birthday party!

Just me chilling with Santino and Gordo, I don't really know Gordo's real name, but yeah Gordo means fat in spanish. 

 Mailen

Selfie at the party!

December 7, 2015

Hey Hey whats up fam! Sounds like you guys are all doing good! Yeah I can't believe it's already the 7th of December! This month is cruising! Everything is going great here!

That's pretty lame about Dad's new work schedule! I hope it's only for 6 months! That's pretty cool that he can take his lunch break and go to Sacrament meeting! Yeah you should try to get your Fridays off too so you guys can hang out and go to the temple that day. :)

That's cool E-dog is already starting back up in baseball! Hopefully he likes it. but hey, if he doesn't he can always do tennis like me! If he was to play all four years of high school he would be a total stud by his senior year! How awesome would that be?? but it's up to him. :) and dang Kamrie has a ton of tardies! haha is she on her phone a ton? I feel like in all the photos I see of her she is holding it in her hand. haha!

Glad to see all the decorations up in the house! I love all the decorations! I think Elder Landt and I should buy a tree or something because we have nothing this year for Christmas decorations! I am also way excited to skype! I will probably give you more details in the next few weeks so we will know better what time and everything! I have talked to a couple members so I think we should be good to have a good computer and everything to skype! :)

Like I said everything is going good here!!! This week was a little harder than usual, this past week we had kinda dedicated all the mornings to finding a new pension, because our contract is going to expire and our dueños (owners) want to raise the rent! So yeah we talked to the Pensionista and he told us that we should go find a new pench! So I have been on and off the phone calling a bunch of houses we have seen and we tried to meet with a couple of them but they only want to sell the houses and not rent them out and we can't own houses as a mission... so we are still looking! Other than that our investigators are doing good! Yeah sometimes agency makes me mad, don't get me wrong because I love that we have the freedom to choose but yeah just sometimes people here just choose to do nothing! This lady in our ward shared this little story thing in her testimony yesterday and I want to share it with you guys:

So, There is a man sitting outside on his porch doing nothing, just sitting there watching people go by... Is the man doing good or bad? Is he doing good because he is doing nothing bad?..... or is he doing bad, because he is doing nothing good.... yeah, it just gets you thinking a little bit!

We are just going to keep working hard! We invited a couple of people to be baptized this week but both had reasons to say no for now... I am just going to keep working way hard and inviting more people than ever! This is like almost my last 6 months so I am just going to keep working hard as ever! Thanks for your guys support and prayers always! I love you guys tons! I hope you all have a great week! I laughed way hard that I accidentally sent my email last week to only Kody and not you! Glad you caught that because I would have never noticed! and no I haven't received a letter yet from Grandma for Thanksgiving but I will be excited to get it now! :) That's cool about Amanda Perry getting her mission call as well!

I love you guys! Have a good week! :)

Love, Elder Lawrence

             (Sorry the photos came out weird... I am using a computer from the 80's I think)

Pictures 1&2...These kids are part of a part member family that we started going by a couple weeks ago! The kids are awesome and have been coming to church more now!

Pictures 3&4...These are our zone jerseys!!! They totally butchered my last name! haha! whatever I still like it. :) It is number 10 because this is the zone that is known for getting 10 with member!

Picture 5...Street art

,