Parker - January 1

Hey everyone! 

Sorry for not sending a big email out last week, but I was more preocupied with CALLING HOME!

Oh my gosh, it was so great, I love you guys so much. 

But yeah, for all you guys that I missed, MERRY CHRISTMAS and HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

But yeah, we've had some interesting days here in Argentina. The past few days, we've had lke four or five people just come up to us and started talking to us, it was really weird, but great as well. 

And yeah, for Christmas, we were able to spend it with this really nice couple who made us barbecue and we played pool. It was fun. The wife isn't member, so we were able to work a little with her. She's reading the Book of Mormon and praying, we just need her to get to church. 

And, since for today we were allowed to have zone activities, the zone leaders planned a zone activity, but it was gonna start at nine in the morning and we weren't gonna be able to make it cuz public transportation was basically nonexistent this morning, we spent yesterday afternoon in the zone leader's area and spent the night with a family in their area. They made some killer food, then we had to head back to their apartment on foot, cuz there was no public transportation last night either. The entire experience of walking back late at night in the mud was like a strange mixture between a horror movie and a comedy. It was surreal, but we made it back alright. 

Then we went out in the middle of a muddy field and watched all the fireworks, it was pretty cool. But this dog was goin crazy, and it was runnin around everywhere, and then it starts runnin right at me. It slips in the mud and bowls right into my legs, soaking the lower half of my body in mud.

Sigh. I don't like dogs.

But yeah, then today in the morning, we played a bunch of water balloon games, hot potato, volleyball with towels, and even just a water balloon fight. It was really fun. 

But yeah, that's about it for us. 

I'm really excited for 2018, it's gonna be a really great year, I can feel it,

I Love all you guys!

Elder Blaylock

Jack - December 26

Feliz Navidad! Feliz Navidad! Feliz Navidad, Prospero Año y Felicidad!

I want to wish you a merry Christmas!

Hi Everyone! I hope everyone´s Christmas was awesome! I can´t wait to hear about them. Our week was pretty good, we had exchanges twice, and both were awesome, the missionary couple in charge of health and maintenance of the houses of the mission payed us a visit this week to talk about getting me a better bed, because I´m literaly the tallest missionary in the mission, and there are some pretty tall ones. They also brought my Christmas package from the mission office so that was awesome. Just so everyone knows, the package came in like 1 or 2 weeks, super fast, send me more! Hahaha just kidding. Though I´ve heard if someone sends a letter it takes way longer, no idea why.

Anyways this week was really good, we stopped by one of our investigators who told us he was leaving for four months to start his career as a sailor, we met him about a week or two ago and he is really interested in learning more so even with the information that he was going to be leaving for 4 months starting the 21st of December, we´ve been trying to teach him and have faith. So we stopped by his house the 22nd, and we found out the earliest he can go is the 20th of January! Because he´s only 17 years old. It was like a miracle, we were able to teach him again and he still has tons of enthusiasm to learn more.

For Christmas here, everybody eats a Christmas dinner at like 11:00 and stays up until midnight to see the viajito pascuelo (Santa Claus) and open gifts. Its a bit different but it´s interesting. We had permission to stay out until 11:30 in a member´s house, so that was fun, we ate tacos and they gave us a few presents from the ward here. Also Christmas morning we had a barbeque with the ward mission leader in Casa Blanca with those elders, it was a lot of fun.

Yesterday it was awesome to talk with my family via skype, though I wish it was for more time it was great to see you guys. I love you and hope you had a merry Christmas.

That also goes for everyone, I hope your Christmas was awesome, and that your new year is even better.

-Elder Blaylock

Jack - December 18

Hola amigos! ¿Comó estamos?

I hope everyone´s week was great! We had a pretty good week here too, though it seems to have flown past. Last monday as a zone we made like 8 huge pizzas with practically whatever you could think of to put on it. I was in charge of the crust (Thanks mom for the instructions). And even though I´m a picky eater it was actually pretty good. There was tons of different vegetables, eggs, onion, spices, whatever thing, I was super nervous but by the time we were finished I was just hungry haha.

We had a christmas party in Viña with the whole southern part of the mission, it was a ton of missionaries, but also tons of fun. I got to see Elder Zamora and Elder Espinoza who both arrived at the same time as me, so that was awesome, because also I only knew them and the missionaries in my zone. There were like 5 or 6 zones there. We played volleyball with towels and waterballoons, basically you had to toss a water balloon back and forth between the two teams without it breaking. We also played a crazy rock paper scissors game where two zones would line up and have to run around trying to get to the other zone, but when you met up with the person from the other team you had to play them in rock paper scissors and if you won you continued until the next person. Tough to explain but really fun. Each zone also had to show a christmas sketch, they were really funny. I was an abominable snowman in mine because I´m so tall... oh well haha.

There was also an awesome concert that the members of the church and the mission do down here every year where they sing a bunch of christmas songs and there´s a choir and a bunch of instruments, it was awesome.

Other than that not much happened this week, it all seemed to fly by really fast. But I hope your weeks were awesome as well!

Elder Blaylock

There was also a beautiful sunset, some crazy thing with the sun that looked awesome, and a gift from the mission president and his wife. Unfortunately no photos of the concert and only one from the party with an elder who used to be in our sector (and photo bombers). I forgot to take very many pictures.***

***Fortunately, his mom found some pics online :)

Parker - December 18

Hey everyone! We´ve had a fairly good week. 

Tuesday we had a fairly good district meeting, and we went back to the city and managed to set an appointment for today for the doctor stuff. But we also were able to pick up the studies that they did on my head and back. I can´t exactly translate them or make it out, but basically, I can make out that there´s nothing wrong with my head, but there is something wrong with my back, I just don´t know what it is or how bad it is. We´re going back again today and the doctor will give me the breakdown. 

Wednesday was good, we had to do Weekly Planning in the afternoon though, cuz Cafayate told us that they might need baptismal interviews Thursday, which means that travelling is gonna take way too long and we´re not gonna be able to do it Thursday. And we did a really good weekly planning session. We took a leap of faith and started planning for two people to get baptized this week. And we had some pretty direct lessons this week. Both really spiritual, but when we came out of them, they were really committed to read the book of Mormon and pray to see if it´s true so they can get baptized. It was pretty cool. 

Then Thursday was a curveball, cuz turns out they´re not gonna have baptismal interviews. But then, at night, they say they do, so Friday we´re gonna do the interview by phone :/ 

Friday we had interviews with the mission president in the morning. Went pretty well, then we stayed in the city and had lunch and then did some baptismal interviews with the elders in the Santa Ana area, then we did a Tormenta Blanca in Santa Ana, ending it off in an Ice Cream shop, it was pretty fun. Doing baptismal interviews by phone is not fun though. 

Sunday was AN ADVENTURE. So, we had lunch with a member in a little town like 30 minutes away from our main town, but still in our area. So we are coming out of church and we see a storm coming, with lightning and everything. We don´t pay it much attention. But as we´re headed on the highway, the storm wall hits us. Fierce wind, torrential rain, and hail the size of quarters. Not to mention the pieces of broken tree. We are pushed into the bank and are stuck in the mud for a while. 

For a small moment, I thought "oh, so this is how I die." But then I snapped out of it and I say a prayer, just started reading Ether in the book of Mormon again, so I put in as much faith as I could muster, and after a few moments, the hail stopped and the wind died down. It still storming, but now we can get out without fear of getting pelted or torn away and push the car out of the bank. We also find out that three trees fell in the middle of the road, and if we had been just a little faster or a little slower, we´d have been flattened. 

And, when we get to lunch and get out and get a proper look at the car, we see that it is undamaged. All that hail didn´t damage it. It was a miracle, really, It was so cool how we were protected. 

I just want to share with you all the power of faith and how it really does work miracles. 

I love you all, 

Elder Blaylock 

Jack - December 11

Hey guys how´s it going? My week was pretty good this week, a number of interesting things happened.

First of all, we got the coolest ties anyone has ever seen, and I mean it. Both me and my companion got one and I wore my last Monday after our pday and on the way to our first appointment to two members who live near us and during the appointment I received like 4 compliments, after the appointment we went back to the pension real quick because my companion was jealous and wanted to use his too. Haha, whenever we use them everybody is like "Your ties are so cool! Where did you get them?" We actually bought two red ties and found a place to put a logo on them, so they´re custom haha ;D

Also last Monday we had a fun family home evening and this family had so much food! There were like 16-17 completos between the 6 of us, and a huge pie! It was crazy.

My companion had a meeting for district leaders last Tuesday so I was with the companion of the other district leader of our zone. His companion had hurt his head during our soccer game on Monday and spent like 16 hours in the hospital waiting and stuff like that, so neither he nor the zone leaders got any sleep, so we didn´t do much. I feel bad for his companion who then had to go to a training with the mission president with only 1 hour of sleep. I found out that the first missionary in Chile was Parley P. Pratt, who is one of my ancestors, so that´s awesome.

When we went to the zone leader´s pension to make the companion switch for the day one of the zone leaders went into the other room and came back with a poster saying, "Now if you don´t want this, there are many other people who want it, but Elder L left it for you." It was an awesome poster of Captain America Civil War so of course, I accepted it. I only had one intercambio with Elder L and it was right before he finished his mission, so we talked a lot about movies, especially superhero movies, and he showed me that poster. Turns out he left it behind for me. What a cool guy. 

Also, we learned something interesting during the meeting for district leaders, my companion wore his tie I was talking about and he received tons of compliments, and at one point the mission president´s wife came up to him and said, "Elder your tie is so nice, did president not say anything? He´s a HUGE fan of the flash, and he´s been watching the 4th season of the tv show all the time." ...guys, I knew there was a reason I was sent to this mission... hahaha just kidding, but how crazy right? If you weren´t sure the Flash is also my favorite superhero haha.

Also if you want some proof the scriptures are true someone actually stopped us and tried to convince us to (and he literally almost said) Eat, Drink, and Be Merry. Or in other words, 2 Nephi 28: 7 "Yea, and there shall be many which shall say: Eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die, and it shall be well with us." He argued with us saying that we should enjoy our lives, to which we responded that we were because sharing the gospel is awesome, and how missions are bad because serving people is something you should do your whole life, to which we pointed out that just because we specifically set apart two years of our lives to do this full time doesn´t mean we can´t serve people when we get back too. haha, it was crazy.

Anyways that´s basically all for this week, other fun facts of my area include that there´s an Optimus Prime here, and that Kevin, the bird from the movie UP, lives here and can be heard as you walk by this one building.

Elder Blaylock

Parker - December 11

Hey everyone!

So yeah, this week´s been fairly long. 

We went back down to Salta to talk to the doctor, and basically, he told us "yeah, we´re gonna do exactly what you asked us to do, come back another day to get a cat scan on your head and an x-ray of your back. 

So the next day we had leadership meeting and district meeting, and they took out my stitches. I´m doing fine, nothing wrong anymore, my head's fine. 

Wednesday, we went back to get them done, it was crazy, hooked up to this huge machine, unable to move at all. And afterward, we couldn´t head back to the first doctor, cuz we had to go to tribuno, the sister´s area so I could do a baptismal interview. But when we get there, turns out their baptismal candidate has had some issues from his past, and I am not authorized to do those interviews, so we went and picked up ice cream before heading back to our area. 

Thursday, was normal, just weekly planning, lunch, and work. 

Friday, we went back to the doctor to have a look at the stuff they did. But, turns out they just weren´t working that day, so it was just a waste of time. 

Saturday, we had our own Church Open House, the only problem was that just as it started, it began pouring down rain, with thunder and everything. So we literally had four people show up. It was a little rough. We also had no investigators show up Sunday. 

But on Sunday, we had a very fun lunch, barbecue, right after cooling off, sticking our feet in the pool. It was pretty crazy. 

And yeah, at some point in the week, we´ll go back to the doctor, but I feel fine. 

And yeah. I´m doing great. I´ve been focusing more on reading the scriptures and praying better. It´s going really great. even though we´re going through a little bit of a rough spot, I´m not getting discouraged, everything's pretty chill. 

I love you all so much, 

Elder Blaylock

PS We have a place to call home, it's with a member

PPS 8 Months left :)

Jack - December 4

Hey guys! What a week this week! Wow so much to talk about.

At the beginning of this week, I was having a lot of trouble with stress, especially about talking with other people, both because it´s a different language and because if you know me at all you know I´m a man of few words. Also, I kinda feel like I´m not progressing and my companion kept skipping my time for language study so the beginning of the week was really stressful. Then we had Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving was incredible! The members who offered it are so awesome, Sister R homecooked everything and it was just like at home, and I mean it! Especially desert! We had banana bread that tasted just like my Mom always makes(without chocolate chips, unfortunately), and a lemon pie. The best part was the homemade pie crust! It tasted practically the same as my Mom makes it! I gotta tell you, miracles happen. haha. They also shared how they met and started dating and it was hilarious! We had the dinner with 3 other sister missionaries also, and because these members speak English, Spanish, and Portuguese, and a little Italian the sister missionaries wanted to know which language they first spoke into each other. They shared how they met in Utah, at BYU and it was so funny. Basically, Brother R ran into her one day and tried to flirt with her (a little unsuccessfully) and decided he had to meet her again. Eventually one of her roommates invited him over because the roommate had a crush on him, and in the other room he could hear her speaking Portuguese so he tried to escape the conversation and go talk to her, and she then saw him and tried to impress him with her Spanish that she was learning (also a little unsuccessfully) she basically said her name in a Spanish accent haha. This was all in the morning, and later in the evening he returned and she had just finished work and he literally told her, "I´m dating a girl in this same apartment building downstairs but I´m going to go break up with her and come back here" Hahaha! She was pretty confused but he went and did it and then returned and was like "alright now I´m single!" and she was just like "that´s great... I´m not" Eventually they started dating but it was so funny to listen to their story though. After that, we shared what we are grateful for and had dessert. If you´re ever feeling down, remember to give thanks for what you have, it won´t solve your problems but it´ll remind you to keep moving forward.

We had exchanges again this week with Casa Blanca and I was able to meet their Ward Mission Leader... He is insane! I´m serious. We went to an appointment with some investigators, and he showed up a couple minutes later and followed up on some of the commitments he left to read the Book of Mormon, they said they hadn´t had time to read because of their kids and school and work and a lot of excuses, and he was just like "alright then I´ll leave, if I´m going to promise you to take time out of my schedule to help and teach you guys and you won´t keep your promises then I´ll leave, I too have a busy life and a family." Elder M and I just sat there really worried he was too harsh on the investigators, but he continued and straight up read in front of them a chapter of the Book of Mormon and Prayed, all with a timer on the table. It took him about 4 minutes. Sometimes we never think we have time for everything we have to do, especially in terms of things we should do to progress spiritually. Honestly though, we can take less than 10 minutes to read a little and pray every day, we can do a lot more than that, but at the very least that´s practically no time out of your day. And the rewards are endless. In my studies this week I found one of my new favorite scriptures: "Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and thieves break through and steal; But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal." And most especially this next verse: "For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also." Wow. One of my new favorites, and very true, for me my family and friends... well I suppose that means you guys, are everything to me, and though I´m gone I think and pray for you often. I share my experiences I´ve had learning from you guys with others. My favorite part of this gospel is that it centers in love and family and in the teachings of Jesus Christ. That´s where my heart is when I bear testimony to those I meet, I can feel it. So imagine if we put more emphasis in our lives for the things of God, the things of Heaven. One of the lessons we teach as missionaries is God´s plan of happiness for us, and all revolves around returning to him. So if there´s a way to be closer to Him a little early... I think that´s incredible. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.

One last thing I wanted to share this week, sorry this letter is a little long, is about the initiative that the church started for December, for this time near Christmas. It´s called Light the World, at least I think so, here it´s Ilumina el Mundo. Anyways there are 25 videos at Mormon.org or also on youtube centered on how we can be happier this Christmas season and also how we can spread that. The videos are incredibly short and I invite everyone to watch one every day and think in how you can serve others, there are some ideas at Mormon.org also. First, though I want everyone to watch the kind of explanatory video, the first one, so look up Light the World 2017 and watch the official video. I´ve only seen a couple but honestly, they make me so happy to see and to think of how I can serve others, especially the main video and the video for day 1. I think it´s like day 12 or something that has one of the piano guys in it if you´re interested in that as well. And guess what? It´s even easier to keep track of each day if you already have the church´s Gospel Library app, it´s all there too. I promise that through this we can all be a little happier this Christmas.

And that´s basically it for this week, I know it was a bit longer. Also funny story, I saw two cats reenacting the end of Star wars episode three, a black cat was hanging precariously onto a fence looking up at a grey cat on a roof, and I could just almost hear "It´s over Anakin, I have the high ground!"

Elder Blaylock