Week 22

It was great to talk to you yesterday, it sounds like you are all doing well. Thank you for all the gifts and cards that you sent. Well, the letter this week is going to be short because I pretty much told you what happened this week but it was a great Christmas despite not being able to spend it with family. I feel really good right now, I am not homesick at all and have a good "innerpeace" right now. I'm doing well and I always am happy despite being tired and exhausted a lot. I still have a lot of challenges and difficulties, but I have to much to be grateful for to get down. I can't believe that I turn 20 this week! Thanks for the bday emails. I kinda forgot about my birthday and haven't told anyone so I need to get on that so we have somewhere to eat that night. This week we have another exchange and then my birthday is Thursday and then new years eve, I'm not sure what's happening that night but should be fun. The work has slowed down since we've been so busy with all the meetings and with Christmas so we really need to work hard this week to find people. We are working hard to get Diego to be baptized on Jan. 8 with Breise but it's not looking to good right now. Diego is so awesome, I want him to be baptized before I leave because we've been working with him so long but not looking to promising right now.

Sounds like Christmas was fun and you played ALOT of games. That's good that you have a little time off work to relax and spend time with everyone before they all go their separate ways again in a week. I Hope that everyone got everything that they wanted and you got the best gift this year, your becoming grandparents!! Thats so exciting!

Spanish Christmas Card

Hope you enjoy the card! And have a great Christmas. I'm excited to talk to you all on Sunday! Wish I could be there, but being here at the moment is better. Thanks for all the love and support that you give. Just want you to know that I'm doing great and that I love you all and miss you tons.

Week 21

Sounds like your doing great getting ready for all the Christmas activities and having everyone coming back into town. It was a fun week this week. We taught a lot of lessons and are seeing a lot of progression with our investigators although our baptism for the 30th got cancelled. The easy part is getting people to agree to get baptized but the hard part is getting them to church! We haven't been finding a lot of new investigators but we are working hard on getting people prepared to be baptized on Jan. 8. Right now we have one solid person but we want to have three people baptized that day. That would be awesome because I am pretty sure that I'm getting transferred on Jan. 11 so that would be a good way of leaving Reedley. This week Elder Malo was gone for two days at some leadership training so I had two elders come to Reedley for those two days. It was fun and we got a lot done but being in a threesome is just very awkward. So this upcoming week there is a lot of fun things happening. Tomorrow we have our Christmas party so the whole south of the mission is getting together (80 or so missionaries) and we are going to watch 17 miracles again and do some fun stuff. And then on Christmas Eve we are getting together as a zone and watching kung fu panda 2 as a zone and then were going to Diego's for Christmas Eve. Then on Sunday, we have just an hour of church and then were going to a few members homes so were well taken care of. Thanks for all the packages! I haven't opened any of them yet (waiting for Christmas) but I'm excited! Well thats about it with me this week, have a good week off and look forward to talking to you this Sunday!!

So the jacket that the member gave to me I think is for keeps so don't worry about sending money as I will not need it soon as the weather will warm up. Right now is long sleeved weather but when the fog comes in, its a lot colder. So with the phone call, it will probably be around the afternoon but I'm not sure exactly what time. Well, excited to talk to you this weekend, love you and miss you

Week 20

So don't have much time to email today because we got stranded at the mall for a couple hours. It was a good week and trying to keep busy all the time which has been hard because its too cold and no one is outside when we bike around. We probably only talk to 5-10 people every hour so the work has slowed down a bit. I can't really remember what happened this week but it was good. Today went shopping in Fresno but couldn't really find anything I liked, I only ended up getting one tie which was a disappointment but everything was too expensive. Nothing special really happening this week, our baptism got cancelled because the mom wouldn't give permission but we will see if we can reschedule her date. Still getting fed and have dinners lined up for Christmas eve and for Christmas so shouldn't be too bad. With the calling thing, I have 40 minutes to talk, so next Monday will finalize a time to talk but will probably be around late afternoon your time. So I don't know what the whole spam thing is all about, but just ignore them I guess. Sounds like you had a good week and a great ward Christmas dinner with a lot of people. We only had about 80-90 people but it was still good. Hope that your having a good week and hope that everything goes well with everyone being in town, it will be fun to play all those games especially the couple game night that is happening. I know there is other stuff that I wanted to talk about but don't have any time so will have to wait til next week. Love you and talk to you soon.

Week 19

So another great week. The work is really taking off thanks to the members. We are working with a lot of part member families right now and are hoping for another two baptisms this month. We also have Breise in January before the next transfer so were finding a lot of people that are ready to accept the gospel. We had Josefinas baptism yesterday and it went pretty well but it was kinda stressful because most people showed up late and then a person that said they were doing a talk didn't show up so no baptisms so far have been easy. Also, the elders we asked to fill up the font only filled it half way so Elder Malo had a challenge but he did it but after she came up so she was choking so Elder Malo and I don't want to baptize the next person because we nearly drown them! Sunday night we came back to Reedley and watched the Christmas Devotional. After that we had two dinners so it was a good day. This morning we played basketball with some elders and members so it was good to get a good work out but I can't touch the rim anymore so I think I'm going on a diet, I weigh like 175 now so I've put on about 10 pounds so far. So the weather around here has cooled down which is nice, it gets in the 30's at night but nothing below that. Oranges are being picked next week so were excited to get a bunch of oranges straight off the tree. I really hope that I don't end up like Laura and be in my first area for a whole year. I'm glad that I'm here another transfer for all the baptisms and we are treated so well by the members.

Only a couple weeks until Christmas, I'm excited to talk to you all. So I think that I have 45 minutes to talk so not much time and no skype I don't think. Have a good week and will talk to you next week. Love you and miss you all.