93 Days to go...

¡hola familia! i remembered my camera this week but my batteries just died... i`m sorry! i took some awesome pictures too... :( oh well. this week has been very special, and we have had our bummers. in the familia nuñez, the parents got married on friday and our ward had a reception for them in the church on saturday. yesterday, the father received the sacerdocio and will be able to baptize his family next saturday. the ward is thrilled and very happy to have their family in the church. florencia did not get baptized because her dad says that she is too immature to get baptized and needs to wait a few years more. that was our bummer. we are thinking about a member that we can bring to their house to be able to change his mind and help him see that florencia is ready and that she really wants to. the think about florencia is that in all aspects of her life, she isn`t too thrilled about things and she sits at home all day on facebook. kind of a wierd personality so her father is right in some ways. since i met flor, she has been progressing a lot. we haven`t been able to talk a lot with them this weekend because we travelled to 25 de mayo for 2 baptismal interviews on friday and when we got back on saturday, her family went to chocòn. pucha. it was a good trip though and the missionaries there had their baptisms. i gave a talk in church yesterday too. i talked about the importance of unity in our ward and with missionary work. everyone working together. i felt really good about it. it is a topic that i have been thinking a lot about because we can`t work effectively if we don`t work together. that includes me and my comp, and all of the missionaries in my zone. i have been thinking about my zone`s needs and with my companion we read 1 corintios 12 that talks about the body of Christ. we make up the body and we can`t function if we are incomplete. i also liked DyC 38:27. sed uno, si no sois uno, no sois mios. es poderoso. unity is critical. today is my companions` last pday, so we went to buy a few souvenirs for his family and now we are going to play bowling with our district. i`m excited for that too. i will buy some more batteries today for my camera. this week is going to go very well. we are going to have a few conferences too because we are going to have a training session with our zone and we will have another conference with the other zone leaders of the mission on thursday. i am excited and we are preparing some cool stuff to do. it is getting pretty cold, but my things are holding up. my sleeping bag is very warm, asi que no se preocupen. hoy rompi un pantalon pero voy a arreglarlo. oh y el lunes comimos tacos con esa familia estadounidense. los mejores que he probado en argentina. no recibi mi paquete todavia pero creo que llegara la proxima semana. estoy animado por los traslados esta semana porque creo que veremos muchos cambios en la zona. cambios buenos. y estuve pensando que voy a llevar una caja de alfajores a los estados para compartir y mostrarles como son. a mi me encantan los alfajores con esa masa hojaldre, con coco, dulce de leche en medio y chocolate arriba. son de diez. it was announced that on the 15 of august, they are going to start restoring the parts of our church that was burned, so we will be assisting in another chapel for 3 months that is a lot further away. :( but it should be interesting. to see how it works out. this week we found another family to teach pero viven en el barrio nueva españa that is kind of far away. we went looking for the familia fonseca but they weren`t home asi que aprovechamos de estar lejos and we started looking for new investigators. it was the first time that i have been in that part and i really liked it. i really feel like my area here is a combination of all of the areas that i have been in so far and i love that. today we have lots of plans and i think that we are going out to lunch today. i might buy my comp lunch because it is his last week. should be fun today. gracias por las cartas esta semana! i feel bad because i don`t have much time to respond to some of them but i`m working on that. i love you guys and i hope that this week goes very well for you. con mucho amor y ànimo, elder summers

99 Days To Go....

¡hola familia! bueno, i forgot my camera... sorry! this week has been nuts and a little draining with all of the drama in the zone but we are getting through it. one missionary hurt his knee and he might have to operate (but he would have to go home early). another has problems with her apartment because of the humidity and she had problems breathing. we are trying to get them another place to live because her contract is void. this week we helped some missionaries do some visa stuff here in neuquen and they had to go to trelew for a few days to finish up their documents in rawson. they had some arguments in their district before they headed out and they brought both of their cell phones leaving the elders there in 25 de mayo without a way of communicating, and that made some tense problems. it was very stupid and immature, and when they returned to their areas, it was ugly. now everything is settled and i think it is going to be ok. our zone had interviews with president lovell and it was pretty cool. i couldn`t renew my temple recommend because he forgot to bring his things for it, but he is going to interview soon. i will mention the endorsement with him. elder jorge f. zeballos wants to visit our mission and i`m excited for that. we don`t know when but it will probably be the next transfer. florencia came back from disney world and she is very happy. she has changed a lot and she is a lot more grateful for her parents. before she wan`t very respectful to her mom, but now she is spending a lot more time with her. she also said that she hated the food in miami because everything was fried. she must have eaten terrible stuff. pobrecita. i told her that if she ever goes to colorado with her family i will get them real, delicious food. we are planning her baptism for this saturday, and the ward is helping us. right now, people are finishing their winter vacations and starting school today. i guess i forgot to explain alfajores and they are amazing! there are various types of alfajores but the most common are like cookie/cake sandwiches with dulce de leche in the middle and everything is bathed in chocolate. i guess i should take a picture of that too but i am planning on bringing a box of them home with me. it`s delicious. with santiago, we watched the restoration in the church with him and it went excellent. he said that watching that movie, he felt the spirit strongly that it is true and we invited him to read the book of mormon starting with the introduction. he was more than excited to start reading. you could tell that he had that spiritual ``hambre`` and it was a very cool moment. he couldn`t make it to church though... he doesn`t have a phone so it is difficult to contact him. gabriel was there at church with his mom. his mom is inactive for pretty much her whole life so it was awesome seeing her there and she was very welcome with the members. gabriel felt very comfortable as well. a family invited us to go eat tacos with them at 11:30 today. i`m excited because they are from the states and i like speaking english with them. it`s the same family that made me cornbread :). we have been teaching a lot with the family zúñiga and those lessons go very well. they started calling me ``elder calhoun`` because in the movie best 2 years, that elder has glasses, works the comb over (yes, i`m working the comb over too), and challenges everyone to be baptized like me. i believe that putting a baptismal date in the first lesson is very important because it shows the people the direction where we want to go and that we care enough about them to make that invitation. so if that`s why they call me that, i`m ok with it. they have a friend named melisa that we started teaching and we put the fecha for the 18th of august. it was an awesome lesson. we stressed the part about being children of God and His plan for each of us. we watched a video from elder uchtdorf about the ugly duckling, and how we all have the eternal potential. this week, i loved reading in 1 corintios 9 20 And unto the ARGENTINES I became as AN ARGENTINE, that I might gain the ARGENTINES; to them that are under the law, as under the law, that I might gain them that are under the law; 22 To the weak became I as aweak, that I might gain the weak: I am made ball things to all men, that I might by all means save some. 23 And this I do for the gospel’s sake, that I might be partaker thereof with you. 24 Know ye not that they which run in a race run all, but one receiveth the prize? So run, that ye may obtain. 25 And every man that striveth for the amastery is btemperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a corruptible ccrown; but we an dincorruptible. i like these scriptures because pablo had to adapt to situations and try to relate to everyone that he was serving. these are cool scriptures. on my contract that i signed with president peterson, verse 24 was on it, so i looked it up and found this part. that`s the promise if i do my part and give everything i have to the work. i love that phrase- so run, that ye may obtain. i am grateful to be here in argentina, the best mission in the world. i love you guys, thanks for the letters! con mucho amor, y ànimo, elder summers

105 Days To Go...

¡hola familia! hey! how´s it going? i loved getting pictures today! i need to be better about sending my pictures too... i´m sorry. next week. but everything is going well here too. been a pretty busy week here. last pday, we went bowling with the district from cipolletti and it was really fun. even though i lost, i still had a good time. after that, we got to work!! we had a district meeting in villa ceferino at our church. there was a fire in the church because somebody left a chair next to a heater and it was melted. the upstairs was covered in smoot and they were cleaning all week. it´s pretty clean now but there´s still a smell. we are going next saturday with the ward to help clean some more. on domingo, we only had sacrament meeting, and we all left early. on wednesday, elder carquin and elder zuleta came in from 25 de mayo and catriel to do their tramites, and renew their visas. we had to help them all day to get it done and there were really long lines. i ended up waiting in one consulate with elder castillo (he was in my district in rawson and now we are zone leaders together :) ) and it was fun talking with him again. this week was pretty crazy and i ended up meeting a lot of really interesting people. we found a guy named carlos, a big mapuche man, and it was an awesome lesson. mapuches are the native people of the patagonia. he has a fecha to be baptized in august. it made me think about what shane´s mission would be like in samoa because when he talked a lot in his language, it sounded a lot like samoan. azul is progressing a lot more and we are happy for her. today she turns 10 so we are going to call her and sing happy birthday. omar becerra still hasn´t had his surgery and he is thinking about suing. it has been almost 3 months since his accident and he´s getting depressed about it. on his birthday on saturday, he was drinking again. i wasn´t there because i was on divisions but my companion told me that it was pretty bad. we passed by again on sunday but he had a bunch of his friends over to celebrate. we found another woman named silvia. her husband passed away a few months ago and she is already getting over it because she believes she will see him again. we put another fecha for august. i ate cornbread for the first time in 2 years! we are teaching the sellman family from the united states and jose, the dad made me some cornbread. it was so good, and now i feel like cooking something good today for my pday. i´m thinking of making them some chocolate cookies today, so we will see how they turn out. i don´t have a lot of time today because this computer is slow and i just finished turning in the numbers for the zone. no baptisms this week but we are looking really good for next week. florencia comes back from florida on saturday night so it will be great to see her again and get her ready for her baptism. oh! and an elder gave me his tape recorder because he doesn´t use it so i might be able to send a tape! we will see if i have time later. my comp is rushing me... i love you guys and i´m looking forward to next week. i´ll send some pictures! con mucho amor y ánimo, elder summers

112 Days to go (UPDATED)

¡hola familia! this week has been crazy and full of awesome events. winter vacations started this week, if you can believe it. today is a holiday in argentina, so almost everything is closed for the day. we are writing in a different ciber! on sunday, president lovell arrived in neuquen with his wife. i was able to meet him on wednesday at a conference for zone leaders. we spent almost the whole day with him, getting to know him and his wife and it was really cool. i am very excited to work with him. he has a presence like president eyring and has a ´´quiet, but piercing voice´´. i know that he is going to be awesome. his wife doesn`t speak any spanish but she is very excited to be here. president lovell talked about his vision for the argentina neuquen mission. the church has only been in this part of the world for 40 years. we were trying to imagine what the church will be like in another 40 years and i loved thinking about all of the positive consequences that come from this work. we all ate lunch together in the mission house, and we ate lasagna. president lovell sat by me so we were able to talk for awhile. he said that bishop larsen mentioned me to him and was excited to meet me. president lovell is an awesome guy. tuesday, my companion and i went to cipolletti for the district meeting, and we were very impressed with how well things are going in that district. they have very high goals and they are almost meeting them every week. they are some of the ´´machines´´ in the mission and we are very happy with how they are doing. we got them all alfajores to celebrate with them. on thursday, we had a zone conference so president lovell could meet everyone. he is on tour for the next few weeks to get to know everyone. i don`t know if you guys know where all of the missionaries are in my zone, but we have the east half of neuquen, the city of cipolletti right outside of neuquen, the town of catriel, and another called 25 de mayo. our zone has the most missionaries of all of the zones and everyone came in for the zone conference. on friday, we ended up taking a bus to 25 de mayo to do two baptismal interviews. i did them both. quimey is a 9 year old girl that is more than ready to be baptized, but her father wants to baptize her and he isn`t worthy right now. he has the goal of stopping some things so he can baptize her in august. the other interview i had was with a boy that wants to be baptized but he isn`t ready yet. he is going to fix a few things. we got saturday afternoon to eat some lunch, then had our english class at 4. Gabriel and Santiago were both there, and we ended up teaching them after the class in the home of some members of the church. it went great and they both accepted to be baptized this month. gabriel`s family was already baptized and he feels the need of getting closer to God. Santiago is a 34 year old man from colombia that we met from our english class. he is a kung fu master and he teaches here in neuquen and practices tai chi. he is studying geology in the university of comahue and he had interest about the church. we also had more lessons with azul, she wasn`t able to go to church because she sprained her wrist and was in a lot of pain, but now her arm is feeling better. azul is a 9 year old girl, and her mom has been listening to the missionaries for a really long time but hasn`t been progressing because she drinks and uses drugs. it has now been 2 weeks without using, and isn`t drinking anymore. she has made lots of changes, and her boyfriend doesn`t live with her anymore. azul wants to be baptized the 28th of july. we found another family in parque industrial. they have fechas to be baptized on the 5th of august. the parents, rodrigo and claudia, both smoke so we are going to address that but they are progressing and reading the book of mormon. the kids are excited to learn more and their family is becoming more united. their daughter sharon is finishing high school, and she is very interested in the book of mormon. we passed by their house and had an awesome lesson with hermano gomez about the restoration. elder cortés and i are doing a lot better here in neuquen, and we are feeling very excited about how things are going. we are getting closer to meeting our goals and we are setting the bar higher. i feel very good about our accomplishments, and i know that we will see all of the fruit of our work very soon. on thursday at the zone conference, i received my ´´trunky papers´´. the office wanted my information and your email address so they can send me home the 30th of october. they are already buying my plane ticket... this morning, i was finishing the book of jacob in the book of mormon. jacob 7:26 says ´´ that the time passed away with us, and also our ´´missions´´ passed away like as it were unto us a cdream,´´ . that really called my attention and freaked me out a little. but i still have plenty of time left to enjoy being a missionary :). i also received a contract from president peterson that i signed, promising to God that i will ´´sprint until the end´´, giving the mission my very best over the next few months. i also really enjoyed reading jacob 5. i learned things that i have never thought of before and i am very grateful for the new insights i was given. in verse 64, it is talking about my area with my investigators, and the members in my ward. 64 Wherefore, dig about them, and prune them, and dung them once more, for the last time, for the end draweth nigh. And if it be so that these last grafts shall grow, and bring forth the natural fruit, then shall ye prepare the way for them, that they may grow. i am very grateful for this opportunity to help build the church in neuquen. i read another talk from bishop edgley (i think) from the priesthood conference, and he said that when he thinks about saving one individual, he is making a difference for generations to come. i am not baptizing hundreds of people in this mission but at least i am making a difference for those individuals, or families, for the future. that´s an awesome thought. i love being in neuquen and i am looking forward to another great week ahead. i loved getting all of the pictures this week! all of the kids are getting so big and it made me very happy. i have been thinking about our family and how blessed i am to be a part of it. i loved seeing the pictures of the ´´next generation´´ and i know that they will all be strong in the gospel. i love you all and i am so grateful for the love and letters :) con mucho amor y ánimo, elder summers

113 Days to go...

¡hola familia! hey! how´s it going? everything here is going great. it was a pretty busy week but we got through it and i don`t feel as stressed because everyone got to where they need to be. it all went smoothly. this week was successful, and we got a lot done. we did not have a baptism, but things are looking very solid for the 14th and the 21st. the becerra family still need to go to church, but they want to be baptized on the 14th because it is omar´s birthday and he believes it is the perfect day to be ´´reborn´´ :). with florencia, she is heading off to disney world this week but we set the fecha for the 21st. she is very complicated to teach because she gets distracted easily and is addicted to facebook. we have been thinking about having the young women in the ward send her links to sites on mormon.org or things from the church so she can have more contact with the church while she`s surfing the web. we had an object lesson that turned out awesome! i was thinking that we could put a glass of water and pour in a red dye to the water to represent stains on our souls when we sin. i saw that once at home and i was thinking it would be perfect for florencia to understand and it worked perfectly. she payed attention, understood, and is very sure to be baptized when she comes home from florida. we also had a lesson with her niece gianina that was baptized about 3 weeks ago, and that really helped us a lot. gianina and florencia are really good friends and gianina made a huge impact in that lesson. my companion and i are pretty excited for them. azul did not make it to church. we are thinking that she just slept in but the hermana that was going to bring her knocked on the door, called their phone and tried to wake them up, but nothing happened... next week for sure she will be there. we ended up only having florencia in church. we went to cipolletti this week for another baptismal interview. julian was baptized on saturday and we finished the month with 9 baptisms. our goal was to have 13. i think that we are looking great for the month of july. this month, our goal is still 13 baptisms, and hopefully we will be able to contribute at least 3. we are looking great with fechas and i am sure we will meet our goal. president peterson went home on saturday, and president lovell arrived yesterday. i am very excited to meet him and our zone is going to have the chance to meet him on thursday in a zone conference. i heard about the fires in colorado! i have talked with a few people that were concerned and i`m glad you weren`t affected by it. how is mitt romney doing? one man told me that things are going down hill for him, but then again, he was saying a lot of negative things. made me wonder if he was even credible or not. this week, i have been thinking a lot about charity and what it really means to be charitable. i want to be able to see the people as the Savior sees them, and i want to be able to treat them as if they were the Savior himself. i have been thinking a lot of this scripture in moroni 7:48. i am sure i have shared it before but it is one of my favorites. 48 Wherefore, my beloved brethren, pray unto the Father with all the energy of heart, that ye may be filled with this love, which he hath bestowed upon all who are true followers of his Son, Jesus Christ; that ye may become the sons of God; that when he shall appear we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is; that we may have this hope; that we may be purified even as he is pure. Amen. this is how we can be real followers of Christ and that is what i want to be. this week i am going to try harder to serve with all of my heart. i love you guys and i am very grateful for all of your support and prayers. i hope that this week goes great and you enjoy the holiday! con mucho amor y ánimo, elder summers