Parker - December 18

Hey Everyone! 

I´ve had a really busy week here. First of all, Tuesday and Wednesday, I felt like I walked from one end of Argentina to the other, we walked so much. And then, on Thursday, I had to be in Salta for Trámites (whatever that is, I still don´t know), where I stayed outside for like 8 hours, then signed three papers, then we had lunch at McDonalds (It´s not the same here), and then came back to San Pedro. It was crazy, and then the next day, we had our christmas conference, which was a few talks from missionaries, the mission president, his wife, and testimonies of the people that are going home this transfer. And then food, where it was me and my companion sitting at a table, along with two sister missionaries from another side of Jujuy (our zone), and then the Mission President walks up to us and invites the four of us over to his table....What?! And then, we had a discussion of our areas, and a chat, I ended up telling everyone my ´´right arm´s been broken 3 times´´ story. I also directed our zone in the choir, which went great by the way. And then we did the classic ´´gift giving/stealing´´ party that everybody seems to love. I got to be one of the last ones, so I could basically pick my gift, I sent pictures, it´s a cool bag and a Book of Mormon in the Quiche language (pronounced keechua). I don´t know what I am going to do with it, but hey, its a good souvenir. And then Saturday, we had our Baptisms. I Baptized the father of the two kids that we baptized back in November. I also confirmed him in Sacrament meeting yesterday, my first confirmation. It went pretty nice. And also, on Saturday, we had an activity after the Baptism, it was a movie telling the stories of the Book of Mormon, so people could understand what the Book of Mormon actually is. There were some technical difficulties, like always, but I think it went pretty well. And yeah, that was my week, I love you all, and I can´t wait to talk next week!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Love,

Elder Blaylock

Brock - December 19

So this week was really good. We worked a lot but it payed off on Friday. One of our investigators has been keeping our commitments and received her answer Friday morning when she went to pray on her own away from other people a la Joseph Smith. So Elder M. had his first baptism on Sunday! It was really good. Now we´re looking to help her family. 

This week has also wiped me out, with Christmas coming. Our enthusiasm for having a fun Christmas made us...overly...enthusiastic...and now I am a poor boy. But, decisions were made by me and so I cannot complain. 

It is getting steadily hotter up here. And rainy. It most certainly not beginning to look a lot like Christmas nearly anywhere you go. Downfall of spending Christmas in the Southern hemisphere. (They call me Heat Miser, whatever I touch: starts to melt in my clutch...I´m too much). It also doesn´t help that Christmas is treated basically exactly like New Year´s here; wait until midnight with a party, watch fireworks, eat. They don´t have any of that same feeling we have with a whole season. My companion is very...logic...based and therefore doesn´t get too much into seasonal activities as much as the rest of us. 

Other than all that, I´m doing good. The ward Christmas party was last Saturday, we went because it was our lunch. This week we´ll have the mission party. By the way, my zone leader Elder W. told me that in his friend´s mission (in Europe) their assistants texted them the LIST of approved MOVIES that they can watch until 12:30!!! And STAR WARS 7 IS ON THAT LIST!! What the heck is this?! Why doesn´t this happen to me? Our Christmas party will involve basically another multizone conference, some musical performances, and food. Nothing more. 

s o  s a d. 

Anyway, I love you guys. Can´t wait to talk on Christmas. 

Parker - December 12

Wow, what a week, and this next one is going to be even busier. First of all, at the leadership meeting on tuesday, when we were setting a goal for baptisms for december, and people were putting in what they thought, my companion said 10 (the number we know we can get). One person tried for 13, but he didn´t get much support, and mostly everyone was just saying 11. And the Zone Leader who was conducting the meeting turned to me last and asked what I thought, and I panicked and didn´t know what to do, so I shot for the middle and said 12. And guess what happened? Nearly everyone changed their answer to 12...What just happened? Did my habit of shooting for the middle compromise just influence hardened missionaries? Just wow, oh my gosh. Anyway, moving on, Friday was a strange day, we started off with the Mini Missionary in the other area deciding he wanted to go home, and when we talked with the Mission President, he asked if it could wait until Monday. And then, that night, we had a Talent Show at the Church, and we were doing a representation of Nephi and his brothers going to get the brass plates, I was Nephi because I was the youngest and tallest (just like Nephi). It was fun, but super strange. Also, we didn´t think about how we were going to get Laban off the stage when he was ´´dead´´ and couldn´t move, so I just grabbed his legs and dragged him off stage, everybody laughed, they thought it was so great. And then, at the end of the day, the Mini told us that he had changed his mind and he´s going to stay for the rest of the transfer. What a weird day. And also on Saturday, we had Training with the Zone, and it fell on me to give a testimony about what we were supposed to study in Preach My Gospel this week. (They´re supposed to be a surprise, but I knew it was coming, so I made sure to prepare), And everyone liked it, so that´s cool. Also, during the practices, it just so happened to work out that the three newest missionaries got put in a group together (But Elder S. and Hermana P. are cool, so it was fine), and we had to teach basically Tony Stark way before he became Iron Man, so he was pretty snotty, but we managed to get him to accept a baptismal date (It was a practice, but still). And today we did some service and I am totally burnt out. And this week, we have meetings, Choir practice, I have Trámites on Thursday (still don´t know what that is, but at least I´ll see some of my MTC friends, it´s going to be everyone from my group). And we have a Christmas Conference AND a multi-sone conference to do. AND we´re going to have a Baptism this saturday (The father of the two kids we baptized a couple weeks ago, and a little girl who wasn´t baptized when she was 8, despite being born in the Church.) and afterwards, one of the recent converts that we visit a lot, and is also now the President of the Young Men´s, is putting on an activity, showing a video of the stories in the Book of Mormon. Sigh, we've got lots to do, but I am excited to get it all done. I want you all to know that nothing is impossible and that the Lord makes up the difference so long as we put in our all. There´s a saying I heard at the MTC, I´m not sure who said it, but I really like it. All God asks us to do is try, but we really have to try. what this means is that when we feel tired and want to stop, we need to ask ourselves ´´have I really tried?´´ If so, then we can slow down, relax, and let the Lord take care of things, If not, then we must get back up and keep trying. I want you all to remember what Peter said to Christ when Christ asked him and the apostles if they would leave too, ´´To whom would we go? ye have the words of eternal life.´´ leaving and giving up would solve some problems, yes, but it would also create more problems, and now we don´t have the Almighty promise that our Father in Heaven will help us with our problems. I want you all to know that I love you, and I pray for you all to have a stronger testimony every day, and that testimony only comes from the sunday school answers, pray, read the scriptures, and go to church (Here they call it OLA, Orar, Leer, Asistir). 

Love,

Elder Blaylock

Ward talent show:

Brock - December 12

So this week we worked until we were exhausted every day, and we managed to bring four people to church. So that´s great. We´ll try to get the rest of the family to church next week. 

On Sunday we had a Brazil-wide transmission. There was the (I think) second counselor in the general primary presidency, who spoke very good portuguese, the area Brasil President, and an Argentian Seventy who also spoke portuguese, and Elder Holland, who tried (t...r...i...e...d...t r i e d ) to speak portuguese. It was...not good. So after about two minutes he stopped and the translator took over. I was kind of bummed because it was just a transmission. Two apostles have visited Brazil at other times this year, one of them in the neighboring city! and I still haven´t gotten a chance to meet them personally. This reminds me of the time at BYUi when Elder Holland went there, but so many people went to the devotional that I couldn´t even see him from the audience. I had to watch the screen, and it was like just watching General Conference. Oh, well. Someday my chance will come. Still sad though. 

This week has also been kind of weird because 1: I found out that one of my former American companions who is already at home tried to make bolinha de chuva, which is like funnel cake in ball form, and the oil caught fire and exploded. Luckily his stepdad is a firefighter, but it looks like maybe my comp punctured his lung somewhere. It´s not fatal at this stage though. And 2: One of my other companions who also already finished his mission moved to Salto, to the other ward. So after the transmission ended I stood up and turned around and found him waiting behind me. So that was also surprising. 

Don´t have a lot more than that for this week. Started getting hotter, and has been raining here. Got a hair cut (silent tears). My companion got a bad hair cut. Worse than his previous hair cut.

Love you guys. Have a good week.

Haircut day:

Parker - December 5

Hey Everyone!

Sounds like you´ve all had a busy week, I have too. First of all, on Thursday we did splits again and I was with the Mini, and I was basically a Trainer for a day. It was weird, but I think I did alright. We also found a new investigator, so points to the newbies! (Of course the other guys found 4 new investigators, so...). Also, Guess what? I found out what a plague of flies looks like: Argentina. Seriously, there´s so many flies here, it´s awful. Oh and guess what happened on Saturday? So we went to Jujuy to start to practice our Christmas Missionary Choir, and guess what? I am now the Conductor, because I´m the only one who knows how. And let me tell you, my arm hurt so much afterward! And what doesn´t help is that our big song, O Holy Night, is in 6/8 time, so it´s like I have to basically make sure I get the downbeats right. Sigh, hopefully I´ll be ok. Also, we had one of our members who always comes along with us leave this morning for his own mission, and we had a farewell for him last night. And let me tell you, it´s a lot more fun to send our a new missionary than to receive a return missionary while you´re out in the field. (Oh, and during the thing, I managed to switch cups with O. and got him to drink soda, he´s a fanatic about not drinking soda, hahahahaha!!). And yeah, this week is going to be busy too, we have a ton of meetings and also another choir practice on pretty much every single day of the week. Concerning transfers, Elder O. is kinda freaking out a little bit, because one of us is going to go, and one of us is going to stay, he doesn´t want me to go and be left here in San Pedro (He´s been here for like 5 months already), But he doesn´t want to leave because he´s afraid he´s gonna be a Zone Leader, because a lot of missionaries are going home this transfer, and not a lot are coming into the mission field, which is why we have so many mini missionaries, because we´re basically understaffed. What he thinks is going to happen is I´m going to go work in the Offices as Secretary or Financer (because apparently I have a ´´look´´) and he´s gonna stay here with a Mini. But we still don´t know yet, basically we´ll know for sure a few hours after the Christmas Skype call. And to end this letter, I´ll share what I´ve learned this week. It´s about the Spirit telling Nephi to kill Laban, which is something a lot of people have a little trouble with. What it is is the Lord testing Nephi´s faith, kind of like Abraham. Something I´ve learned on the mission is that as soon as you say ´´Ok, I´m alright with what I have to do, I just need to keep doing what I´m doing´´ The Lord gives you another challenge. And this is what happened to Nephi: He said ´´I will go and do the things the Lord commands´´ he thought it just meant obeying the 10 commandments, so the Lord tested him, telling him to kill Laban. And Nephi, who said that we would do whatever the Lord commands pauses and says ´´oo, I don´t know if I can do that´´ this is a stumbling block for people, because when people are faced with new revelation, they say ´´hey, I´ve been doing what you asked me, why are you asking me to do this now?´´ But as we are obedient, the Lord blesses us in ways we cannot even comprehend, because Nephi killed Laban, we have the Book of Mormon, Nephi didn´t see that coming, but he obeyed anyway. 

I want to tell you all that I love you and that we can all do what the Lord asks of us, even if it´s something we never thought we´d do

Love,

Elder Blaylock

Brock - December 5

Man, what an exhausting week. We walked everywhere. We´ve been trying to find a new focus area this week, and evaluate the potential of some non-members that are relatives of members. But, after a long week, we didn´t end up having anyone at church, which is never fun. This week we´ll be back to the pavement, knocking doors and making contact with everyone again. 

Elder M. seems to be doing well. At least, I hope so. He´s pretty upbeat and always ready to get going again. I´m getting tired but I´ll keep going, too. 

Everyone here at our house is excited for Christmas, so this year has potential to be better than last year. We´ve got three strands of Christmas lights, a small tree with a few ornaments, and one of the zone leaders wants to buy brown paper and make a fake "fireplace", which would be cool. We´ve also got a packed schedule for events this month. We have a stake choir event in Itú, where the stake choir will sing Christmas carols in the square while we have a missionary table set up. We also have a Brazil-specific devotional this Sunday, the ward Christmas party (which we have to go to, because that´s where lunch will be), and the mission Christmas party. Not to mention the transfers on the third of January. in 2017. 

2017.

2017.

2017.

2017.

It´s already almost 2017! What the heck?! Where did all of this time go? How long have I been here? I feel like I´ve been here my whole life. Parker, the mission goes so fast. You´ll probably only see that at Christmas 2017, though. Even with all of the hard times that I have gone through in the mission, I´d never give up this opportunity to serve that I have been given. This time of my life, up until now, has been an incredible experience, and I only hope it can get better from here on out. I love you guys. 

Elder Blaylock

Cool bird of prey that was dive bombing a dachshund.

Our Charlie Brown Christmas tree.