Week 66: We just need to K.I.S.S!

Keep

It

Simple

Sweetie!

Hey Hey! I'm back again! Figured I'd write you guys real fast! It's been another great week here in Argentina! This past week we were in Catán 1A! It was a great week, I got to see some of the members from my first ward real quick so that was super nice, It's so great to see the people that you have grown to love again. 

So, as for the title, that's my new slogan that I've been applying recently. You just need to Keep It Simple Sweetie. The Gospel of Jesus Christ is so simple, and sometimes we just make things too complicated. So it's good to remember sometimes that you just gotta keep things simple!

We were with Elder Ramos and Elder Jesson, they are both great missionaries and I loved working with them, Elder Jesson is from Pennsylvania, and Elder Ramos was living in Utah before the mission.

I've got 2 quick stories for you, first I was walking with Elder Ramos the other day and this drunk guy just walked right up to us and started talking to us. Pretty normal I just thought it was super funny how he shook my hand. He shook it normal but then he didn't let go, he held on and then grabbed my thumb and put my hand on his head? I was pretty confused, I'm not sure if he wanted me to read his mind or something like that. Haha! But that was fun.

The other one, the sacrament meeting yesterday was super awesome! This week the ward went to PFY, or the For the strength of Youth camp. And yesterday all of the young men and women got up and bore their testimonies about the camp. It was amazing, there were probably 8 or 9 of them that said that they didn't want to go before, and then at the end of the week they didn't want to leave, they said that before they wanted to inactivate themselves and never go to church again, but then they went and it changed completely their state of mind. It reminded me of when I went to EFY, I didn't want to inactivate me before, but when I went there it completely changed my life, it helped me to feel the spirit and feel the desire to act for myself. If anyone is thinking about going or sending their kids, do it!! It's so worth it!

Love you all! Until next week 

-Elder Slack

(captions added by Mama Slack)

Elder Slack is the 3rd missionary from the left.

Elder Slack is the second missionary from the left.

Elder Slack can't resist the smile that is "goofy". He has always been a very happy person. 

Week 61: BAUTISMO!!

Hey Hey Hey!! 

It's been a great week here! This past week we were in the ward Ciudad Evita 2A! We were with Elder Reyes and Elder Ramos! The ward shares a chapel with my old ward Villegas! It's was an incredible week! Full of learning and lots of great experiences. 

First things first, on Saturday we had a few baptisms! It was super fun! Three little brothers that the missionaries had found about 3 weeks ago that they had been teaching, and another woman that they had been teaching for about a month now. It was so great being able to work with them this week and help them prepare for baptism. The woman´s name is Karen, it was really interesting because just this week she was going to be baptized and everything seemed to go super crazy in her family, one of her daughters decided to fight with her and she was super stressed out, but when we passed by and talked with her we were able to help her feel better and she realized that it was like the Elders had told her before, that the devil is going to do everything possible to stop her from being baptized, so it's important that she can be firm and strong! And she made it!!

The other 3 kids, there names are Ismael, Alexis, and Arión. They're brothers, well Alexis and Ismael are brothers and Arión is there cousin I think. They're super awesome these little dudes, 2 of them are 12 years old and the other is 10. We taught them a few times, they had heard about Joseph Smith before from the Elders so when we showed up the second time, they showed us how they had buried a Book of Mormon in their front yard so that they could be modern day Joseph Smith's when they dug it up. I have to admit it was pretty awesome. 

On Saturday in the morning we did an activity in the ward where we brought all of the missionaries from the zone and we did something a little different that's called una Tormenta Amarilla (Yellow Storm). It originated from an activity that they normally do that's called una Tormenta Blanca (White Storm). Where you send lots of missionaries to contact all of the people that they see, more or less. But in the Tormenta Amarilla, we all put on those Mormon Helping Hands shirts/vest things and we went and talked with everyone possible and we knocked on a bunch of doors and we brought brooms and we offered to sweep their sidewalks! It was pretty awesomely fun! And we tried to teach the person while one of the others was sweeping! It was different than how we imagined it, but it worked great!!

It was such a great week, being able to work with the Elders was great, they are both incredible missionaries, I loved getting to know them and I loved learning from them. I could see that both of them love so much the people that they teach, and I loved seeing how they weren't trying to act to be a missionary or anything, I could see it was actually something that they want to be doing, they would talk with us in the pension in the same way that they would talk to the people that they are teaching or that they would contact. It was a great week! I hope all is well with all of you! I'm super excited to be able to skype my family this coming weekend!! I love you all and I hope you enjoy your Christmas's!! Until next week!! Chau!

-Elder Slack

Below are some pics from the Tormenta Amarilla and the kids that were baptized!

And here are some other photos, We also had the christmas ward dinner this week, I loved the costumes that the kids used to dress up, it was pretty funny their play type thing.

And we did 2 services this week, we helped adjust the water tank of a family that was about to fall down, and we helped to dig out some trees and I got a little "boo boo" on my finger. 

 

Week 46: So little time, so much to do!

Hello! Hola! I'm back again! Elder Slack, one more week has flown by!

I hope all your worlds are doing well! Mine is great! Missionary life as usual doing all of the things and none of the things. But we keep on chugging here in Villegas!

Well this week has been full of fun! We started off last monday we had our District Activity! I cooked Stroganoff (BRAZIL!!) and we had some great conversations, and at the end we kicked a soccer ball around for like 20 minutes. We were going to do a scavenger hunt for photos, but it started raining! So, we are going to do the scavenger hunt part this week! WHOO!!

Then Tuesday we had our district meeting and fun stuff! It was great! We had some great fun classes and I've got some great ideas for the district meeting this week, it's going to be super awesome!! I'm not a big fan of having meetings where we all sit around for a lot of time people start getting sleepy so I always try to include some sort of game in the teaching, this week I've got planned to teach about baptism! But in a super way! We're going to do a practice baptismal service!! Without water and stuff, and we don't have anyone to baptise, but we are going to practice all of the other things, taking of the photos and the invitations and all that good stuff, to help keep in mind the goal with our investigators is that they can make it to baptism!!

Well, Wednesday and Thursday we had to do 2 intercambios, or I think they call them exchanges in english. They went great! I went with Elder Villegas one day and then the other day I went with Elder Ramos! They both are still being trained, but they are super awesome! I was able to learn a lot from the both of them! They are going to be super great missionaries! Elder Villegas is in our ward here, the ward of Villegas, (Yes his last name is the same as the ward!) And Elder Ramos is here in Ciudad Evita, which is where we live, It's super great!

On Saturday night, we got together 2 familias from our ward, the familia Cortez and the Familia Quiñones and we had a family home evening in the house of Juana and Gustavo! It went super well! We got there at around 7 and we were super stressed out for like half an hour because the other families were already supposed to be there, but they weren't, so we tried calling them and calling them until we called son of the Familia Cortez who could give the phone to his mother and everything was "mas tranquilo" as we say in castellano! (It's like... More chill?) And then when everyone got there we talked about the importance of the small things with a fun activity that my companion did, and then we talked about how we have to trust in God, and we played that one game where you have to fall and have someone catch you and you have to trust in them to not let you fall! Whoo!! It was great!!!!!!

And Rufino! This week, we've got a baptism planned, we need to line up the interview for our investigator Rufino and if he passes Saturday we've got a baptism!!! WHOO! It's going to be great!!! Rufino is a bit older he's got around 50 years. And he's really nice and just likes to know more about God! So, I'll be updating you guys next week how that goes!

Juana and Gustavo are going great, they didn't come to the church yesterday, so that was a bummer, but we went by their house later with a member and we taught them about the sabbath day, and they are super great and excited to go to church this next week. Now we've just got to work with them so that they can start the process of getting married!

As well, Elder Marty and I we are trying to figure out better ways to plan and we are putting all of the less active members and the old investigators on our map to with their house number and we can plan super fast with them on their, so that's great too!

But yeah, that's pretty much a full week, it flew by! This upcoming week we've got transfers AGAIN! What! It went by so fast! So we'll be seeing what happens! But until then we are going to keep working super hard! There are so many things to do, but not a ton of time to do them. So we'll do all that we can and leave the rest to the Lord!

Lot's of love and hugs for everyone! It's been warming up a lot this week, it looks like summer is coming really early, winter is mostly gone. Thanks for all you guys do! 

Chao! 

-Elder Slack

P.S. My companion told me that I've been spelling chao wrong my whole mission, so that's whats up. 

Here are a few photos from the intercambios, where they've got an empty pool outside their pension, and the district activity and fun times with elder marty sneaking the camera around in the area!