Updates:"We watched all 4 sessions (of conference) and preisthood too. They were great. I really liked Elder Holland´s talk on angels and all of the missionaries loved Sister Allred´s talk on missionary work and the importance of helping missionaries and giving referrals. We started clapping and cheering when we heard her say that members should give missionaries referrals, it was exciting to hear. I also really enjoyed hearing Bro. Aidukaitus´talk on the converting power of the Book of Mormon. It´s really cool to see the changes that that libro (book) causes in peoples lives. We got to watch it in English in the high counselor room in our chapel, which was nice. Pres. Jones and his wife and daughter and son came to the Saturday morning seession and watched it with us, since there was a baptism between the sessions and someone needed a special interview.
"Our zone leaders told us that our zone is leading the mission in baptisms, which is really exciting. Next Saturday, there will be 7 baptisms throughout the zone and then 2 more on Sunday the 12th. It´s really exciting to have baptisms but also really sobering because I honestly don´t feel like I´m doing any of the work. We just present the material and the lessons and then it´s all up to the Spirit and that´s what really causes the change in people.
"Michelle and Eduardo´s baptisms were moved to Sunday at 7. Eduardo has been practicing in the tub at home. haha sweet boy. I dont think I told you what happened with the font at the baptism. We started filing it with hot water at about 11 then we came back at 2 to see how it was going and it was pretty much empty. Somebody had turned off the hot water. So we started filling it with cold water and it got done just in time, but Josselline and Eduardo had to get baptized in cold water.
"Abraham Rossi and Gabriel Matus are ward missionaries in my ward. (
Quick background: these two young men got in touch with Janessa this week and we've been chatting in very broken English about Elder Cloward. They are great kids!) All of the ward missionaries are young men and young women. Poor Gabriel was supposed to baptize Eduardo. I really like him though, he was so patient with Eduardo for about 30 minutes he was with him in the font trying to help him go under. So he's going to try again Sunday. Abraham Rossi is 18 hes getting ready to go on his mission. He has 3 younger brothers and one litter sister who is the youngest. Their family is very active and he and his dad go with us to teach lessons a lot.
"We found a new family last week. They are the Garcia family. The mom is Martha, and the kids are Daniela, 13, Carlos, 10, and Camila, 1. We found them on Sunday and have already taugh them the first 3 lessons. Carlos is going to get baptized on the 25th of October. He came to the morning session of conference yesterday (Sunday) and sat with the Correa family. Apparently he and Eduardo are friends from school. When we taught the plan of salvation, lesson 2, they all said they wanted to go to the celestial kingdom. I thought that was a good idea, too. We explained to them that they had to get baptized to get there and Carlos said he wanted to do it, but Daniela and Martha are more hesitant. So then Daniela asked us, if Carlos gets baptized doesn't that mean he´ll be alone in the celestial kingdom? Wouldnt it just be easier if none of us got baptized, that way we could all be in the terrestrial kingdom together? That was pretty funny I´d never thought of it that way. We explained to them that the only way to be with their family was to all get baptized and go to the celestial kingdom together. Then Carlos turned to Daniela and started shaking her shoulders and told her "¡Bautizate, bautizate!" like, "get baptized, get baptized!" It was really funny.
"Javiera should have the baby this week. She and Christian asked Elder Butterfield and I to bless the baby when he's born, which was really cool. They said that they want us to do it since we are helping Christian come back to church and giving Javiera the lessons. We gave Javiera a blessing of health so that everything will go well with the birth. She started crying as soon as I started the annointing with the oil. She is very sensitive to the Spirit. I think Christian was a little teary eyed too and his mom was definitely crying too. The baby's name will be Vicente Andres, and his due date is today! Wow that's weird. I'll be sure to send pictures when he is born.
Random info about his mission:"The members cook a lot of different things, a lot of pasta, mashed potatoes, chicken, meat, soup, not too different at all from American food. There's this thing called churipan which is just a piece of bread with a sausage in it. Very creative, right? We had a lot of empenadas for the weekend of Sept. 18th since its their independence day. Salads here are interessting. A salad here is just chopped up lettuce with lemon juice and olive oil, or chopped up tomatoes with some salt. I never liked raw tomatoes before but I'm getting used to them and starting to like the taste. We havent played volleyball or soccer lately since we can only do it on pday and when we do it takes up the whole day. We can't see the ocean from our sector we are about 60 miles from the shore."
Elder Cloward getting his shoes shined in Estación Central by an anti-Mormon (Elder Cloward tried giving him a pass along card and he started tearing into the church. It was interesting to say the least. Nice guy though)
Elder Cloward building a shelf out of the card board boxes they get the Books of Mormon in (still a little bit of the engineer in him!)
Invitation to Michelle and Eduardo's baptisms
