Happy Happy Birthday!

hola familia,

hmm where to begin. So much has happened this week. Okay from the beginning. So we found out on monday that my comp was leaving on friday and then on wednesday we had zone conference which was really cool and really good. And after it we went over to a park thats in palermo (my old area in capitol) and we read a story about how in that very park was where they dedicated the prediction of the gospel in latin america. That was pretty cool. such a sick park! So then my comp had his end of mission interview and since he was going home early and wouldnt get to participate in the despedida and all the normal end of mission things president took me and my comp and the assistents and his son to get mccdonalds and ice cream :) It was awesome! We ate ice cream at a place where they put it on a cone and then stretch it out and then dip it in chocolate and freeze it and then its seriously a long sword. So sweet! Sounds like a great day right? Yeah then it got worse.. it was a very rough day and crazy week. Some stuff happened and then we went home on the colectivo and then had to go get my stuff in the pention in elder whitsitts area from divions the day before and we missed dinner and just lots of stuff. We got home at like 9:40. So nuts.. but yeah and then elder behotas last few days were alright. I'm glad I was blessed with lots and lots of patience when I was with him. But he left on friday and I was afraid I would get a new companion or train which I didnt want to do cause I wanted to be in a trio with elder arostica and elder solum. And now in the end... we are a trio! :) Its awesome!! We have kinda been back and forth in maschwitz and savio but we sleep and stuff in savio but its so sweet! I feel happier and a bit more relaxed. But yeah so we are still working with maria. She is still struggling stopping smoking but we are on that. She and her daughter have a baptism date next sunday so we hope they make it! They both came to church yesterday and liked it again. So we are gonna work a lot with her. Besides that it was sad that yesterday there was a ward baptism of a girl that was almost 9 years old (the daughter of our ward mission leader) and this was her second try to get baptised.. the last time she got to the water and everything but got too scared and wouldnt go under the water so yeah and.. the same thing happened this time.. it was really sad :( and then today just barely we were playing basketball and elder garcia may have broke his ankle. We will find out. My comps with him and his comp to the hospital and I'm with 2 other elders and we are going to go play soccer in a bit. should be fun :) But yeah a lot happened this week.. but anyway. Should be a good week this week with maria and florencia getting baptised and I have dinner like 4 days this week and an asado on my birthday and like at least 2 or 3 or maybe 4 cakes coming my way :) I guess thats about it for now sorry this is kinda brief details wise. And 2 last things. President is so cool! haha hes just like another one of us almost. It was cool to get to know him a little better. And last monday we found out that elder whitsitt is supposed to go home in october but someone in the church offices decided that since he was in his house for 2 months it would be better for  him to stay longer. So he is now coming home with me and elder walker in december! :) haha he has mixed feelings about it but hes excited to go with me and elder walker.

So here its still pretty cold but the last few days have actually been really warm in the afternoon. Today is pretty hot! It feels good though! The pention in savio is really warm cause they have a good heater so we are fine there. The one in my area not so much.. that would be super cool if austin could get playing soccer again. Do they not play much anymore? and it sounds like it would be a fun birthday! He didnt write me much at all... :( well thats it for this week. les amo a todos!

Elder Buxton

Happy Pioneer Day!

Hola familia, 

So basically its freakin freezing here!! Me and elder whitsitt last week when we did divisions we did some service painting and we were in shorts and a short sleeve shirt. It was so warm! And now ever since then its been super super cold and will be til about wednesday then its supposed to warm up a little bit more but it is really just an unbearable cold because of the humidity and stuff.. but we are still alive! :) So besides that this last week felt really fast.. we went to hermana alomos house to see if we could see how maria is doing and stuff since we hadnt talked to her since the first time over a week before and we got there when maria was finishing moving in haha so she lives with the flia alomo now which is great! So we had a couple lessons with her last week and she now has a baptismal date for the 4th of august and she came to church with her 8 year old daughter so we can baptise her that day too and she is super super excited!! Looks like ill have a white birthday :) her only problem is she needs to stop smoking and we are gonna help her with that so she is gonna overcome it!! It was cool how we found out how she got the interest to talk to us (not sure if that sentence made sense..) so I guess like hermana alomo had talked to maria a little bit about the church'various times in the past but she didnt want anything. And one day a couple months ago I guess we went and had a lesson with hermana alomo cause shes a recent convert and I gave her a ummm I cant think of the word in english.. oh pamphlet! haha yeah I gave her a pamphlet about the gospel and committed her to give it to someone and she gave it to maria and maria read the whole thing and then 2 sundays ago when hermana alomo invited her to come to the lesson she was willing cause she liked what she read in the pamphlet. I thought that was pretty cool! The small and simple things confuse the wise :) hmm besides that we had ward conference yesterday which was really good and we had a ward counsel meeting but with the stake leaders and that was really good too. I learned a lot and felt the spirit there. Our stake president is awesome! The other day I also passed on the street gabi nieve who is a returned missionary that lives in tortuguitas that is marrying a girl from here in maschwitz and I was good friends with. It was so great to see him! Hes gonna invite me to his legal wedding when they sign the papers and stuff here haha and its kinda funny cause the girl just recently got called as a ward missionary so we will be working with her hopefully quite a bit now. Besides that I'm pretty sure we set a record for most times calling the police in the past 10 days... haha but everythings all good. The police here in argentina are really lazy.. but anyway! We have our first zone conference with president ayre on wednesday in palermo so that should be good! Oh and also I'm pretty sure my companion is leaving soon.. either this week or next week he leaves cause he has to do some tramites at home and stuff. Hopefully I will get to be a trio with elder solum and elder arostica! :) and last thing HAPPY BIRTHDAY AUSTIN ON WEDNESDAY!!!! :) :) 19 years old!! how fast time goes... your a capo bro!! I love you!!! Keep up all the good work!!

Brents already home???? wow that was so fast!!! Yeah mom I think that a lot of times people do feel appreciative and grateful inside but they just have a hard way of showing it. I'm excited to show you how much I appreciate you not just in words but in action too. Because faith without works is dead! That works in loving and being grateful towards people too. hahaha yeah mom that quote was pretty cool huh? :) I came up with it on the spot! Actually thats not true. The spirit gave it to me on the spot :) haha bueno les amo a todos ustedes! que sigan adelante firmes en la fe de cristo! amo esta iglesia! :)

Elder Buxton

(The quote that he is referring to is from his email last week that I loved that said ""these trials have been the hardest blessings I've ever received". I thought it was very profound and inspired and I love it!)

(I also asked him if him and Elder Whitsitt, who is from here, speak English or Spanish and if English will be hard when he gets home and this was his reply:)

Yes english will be difficult haha.. We speak in spanglish. All of us greegos here we just like speak in spanglish cause we cant remember all of english. IF you guys heard us talk to each other it would probably sound super wrong and funny haha but it makes sense to us! I know right!? :) thanks mom!

Love You!

Hola Familia,

So this last week was a long/short week.. that feeling is kinda weird. haha but so yeah basically last week familia peñaloza was going last week to the church in san fernando (our mission offices) and I told them to just maybe look or something to see if they could find my lost package. And then on like tuesday they said that they had it and they gave it to me but when I opened it and stuff I realized that it wasnt the old one that got lost. It was the new one that you sent me mom. So the old one is still lost.. but at least I got my new package sooner :) The dvd with the new mormon messages is sick! but it doesnt have the stay between the lines one from elder holland... could matt easily reburn it with that one on it? If he can tell him to add that one and the video from the sattelite broadcast that shows the family that do missionary work with the song I'll go where you want me to go. That would be awesome! So basically me and elder whitsitt did diviones again last week which was great. You'll be happy to know mom that me and him are pretty much almost best friends now :) haha. So remember maria who I told you guys we found last sunday? yeah well we were suppossed to have an appointment with her on tuesday but we got a message from hermana alomo (her sister in law) saying that marias husband died on monday night so we couldnt hae the cita.. :( he hung himself. way way sad. She really needs the gospel now more than ever and I know it was not a coincidence that she met us the day before that happened. We are going to pass by on turesday this week and see what we can do. We also found a man thats a member named diego who has been inactive for like all his life. He's about 33 now and he has a lot of doubts and has gotten into a lot of antimormon stuff. He has showed us a lot of it and I talked with him the other day for a good bit but its just sad that people dont understand the apostacy and the priesthood and then they get hooked on a lot of other stuff than arent true. But we have an appointment with him on tuesday so we will try to help him and really try not to drop the cane on him. Or if we have to we will just do it with love :) besides that we had a good day yesterday. After church we had ward counsel which was long kinda but really good. Then us and elder solum and elder arostica cooked lunch in their pention. We made arroz chaufa :) one of the greatest peruvian dishes :) I love peruvian food!!! And then in the night sandy got back from peru on saturday so we went to her house and watched her open her mission call. We got there kinda late but thats okay. She is going to mendoza! Thats where I tell everyone im from :) she leaves on august 29th, way way soon. And I'll still be here so thats good! Then we stayed and talked with yamila and some of the members for a bit and had some peruvian desserts. it was great! :) sandy brought us some candy from peru too and she brought me the d&c videos too :) look for some new pics mom that surely yamila will put on. Thats about it for my week.

Yeah this last week its rained a ton the past like 4 or 5 days. pretty crazy. Wow I'm glad that they all got home from youth conference alright. seriously cassidee lost her job? thats so stupid... well my advice for you mom right now would be watch the mormon messages haha I just love them and they always help me. I'm so greatful I have them :) things with my comp are going alright. I wont lie its hard and has been hard with my past 2 companions too. But I'm greatful that my heavenly father has helped me to expand my heart and love more and to have lots and lots more patience. Thats something that is different this time about this long trial I'm going through that I've never experienced before in my life. Is to just really always find the good things even when things seem to be going very wrong. Prayer has been a HUGE part of that and I've been recognizing my blessings a lot more also. These trials have been the hardest blessings I've ever recieved :)  yes we do email our president and we should have zone conference like next week or something. And yes I keep in touch with all of them. Even occasionally carson too. So he told me about his visa waiter. And today I think we are gonna play some basketball with elder whitsitt and elder solum and stuff. Should be good. les amo! :) This church is so true!

Elder Buxton

How was this week?

Hola Familia,

Happy july 4th last week!! como estan todos? So this week was a really fast week I felt. So first of all things are going alright with my new companion. Things arent as bad as I thought they would be so far so thats good. Obviously its not way way fun but its alright for now. He kinda has an anger problem but I'll see what I can do with that. But the great news I got last monday night is that my district leader is elder whitsitt :) haha so sick! And elder solum and elder arostica are in my district too so thats good too! elder arostica is like one of my best friends in the mish. We are a lot alike and both love soccer and were just way tight and we will be here in savio for the next almost 3 months together too haha. I wish he was my comp so bad.. but anyway. So last week on friday we did divisions and I went to el cazador with elder whitsitt even though my comp only had 3 days in our area but he did good. Elder whitsitt is training but he doesnt get a long with his comp very well either so we are in the same boat together haha. But it was so so much fun on divisions. After this transfer me and him will be great great friends just so ya know mom ;) oh and we were talking about how you mom and his dad never introduced us before the mission but you should have.. but oh well. Elder whitsitt says hi mom and he says you need to find someone that needs to get baptise ;) so for july 4th all of us greengos in our zone did a conference call and sang the star spangled banner haha it was sweet. But anyway so basically me and elder behotas last week found more investigators than me and elder ullua did all last tranfers.. freakin nuts. We found a couple kids last week and gave them a book of mormon and then the next day we went and I wrecked them in soccer so we will see how they progress. We also found a lady yesterday who a recent convert invited to the lesson we set up yesterday and she accepted a date for the 28th and everything!We read a few paragraphs with her in the introduction of the book of mormon and then after it all we were talking to the recent convert and another member that was with us and the lady (maria) had already read the whole introduction! What a capa! :) we have a cita with her on tuesday so we will see how that goes. oh oh and shes married! :) Her husband supposedly doesnt want anything but she can at least get baptised! We will work on the husband and the 2 kids. So yeah its been really cold here the past few days and yeah.. so thats about it for now. 

Its interesting that you say that about spiritual gifts mom cause president ayre sent us the parable of the talents and wants us to answer on a piece of paper 4 questions that are what we want to have accomplished at the end of our mission and in 5, 10, and 20 years. He wants us to put those goals so that we can find and develop our talents. And something I thought was funny was in the sattelite broadcast a couple weeks ago when they almost got rid of tracting and they started to use facebook and more technology it was funny cause in this mission we hardly tract at all and with facebook and more technology that probably wont start down here for another year or so we heard so basically it didnt change much for us haha. President gulbrandsen told us he already had the vision of working with the members right when he got off the plane here in argentina to be president. such a capo! I'm glad you guys had fun in vegas! Thats awesome! Whatd you guys do and stuff? austin bought a car?? what kind? with what money? yeah austin doesnt write me anymore really.. thats dumb about the guy moving in to their apartment.. your gonna run a 5k? haha thats awesome! You can win money too? good luck! when is that? Today we are in pilar and gonna eat at a pizza libre (pizza buffet) and play some soccer :) Should be fun! And yes I've been lifting weights a quite a bit and stuff for exercises so I'm doing good with 6 months to sexy so far ;) les amo a todos!

Elder Buxton

Transfers?

Hola Familia,

So this last week felt really long and so so much happened so hopefully I can sum it up.  So first of all with transfers. elder ullua really wanted to leave and me and him didnt get along that well. We actually had a 2 hour companionship inventory last week cuase he doesnt like me much but in the end he left.  I am now with a elder behotas whos from here in buenos aires but he is also dying (going home) this transfer so I'm technically killing him. And hes still junior companion.. but he goes home with elder solum (him and elder arostica stayed together in savio which im happy about :) ) and so I guess that means that I will be here for at least 2 more transfers which will make it 7 and a half months in total in maschwitz so crazy.. So I guess we will see how this transfer goes.. So on tuesday we had a meeting for trainers and people who can possibly be a trainer which was really good. And then on wednesday we had our last meeting with pres and hermana gulbrandsen. It was such a good meeting and I learned a ton about love and charity and how important it is in this work. Then at the end for like an hour or more we got to just ask them any questions we wanted haha it was pretty funny. They told us the story of how they met and how he proposed and everything and then he showed us pics and told us a little bit about our new president. Then on friday me and elder thomas did divisions which is so fun haha hes so funny. He's actually gonna be in the offices now with elder jorquera and another elder. But yeah and president went home on friday. um then on sunday we ate pizzas with yamila for dinner which was really good and me and elder ullua, solum, and arostica wore our white ties that hermana gulbrandsen gave to us on wednesday. They are white ties for the temple and have the buenos aires temple on them and they are so sick. So we all rocked them to church on sunday. Oh and after we got those we got our last hug from president and then it was so weird cause we got a hug from hermana gulbrandsen too. Normally its just a handshake obviously but she just loves us so much haha my first hug from a girl in a year and a half hahaha so weird. Sorry mom I know you wanted that to be you. Then yesterday we had a meeting where we got to meet president ayre and his fam. They are way way cool and chill! They have two kids that are 14 and 10 that will be living with them here and they have a daughter in the mission in the US and another thats going to byu. They talked for a while and he showed us a video of him bungee jumping out of a hot air balloon. So sick! And then one about michael jordan haha but it had to do with his talk so dont worry. So yeah that was pretty much a short sum. We ate at familia cubillas house last night which is always way good and we worked a lot with maira this last week but in the end she didnt end up getting baptised.. We are gonna work on that! So this week we really need to find cause we dont have much.. and this month we are going to struggle with lunch too. Should be an interesting transfer... and this transfer is my birhtday. So anyone that wants to send me something for my bday I will happily accept it :)

And when are you guys going to vegas? and with who? and what are you guys gonna do? and why do you want to have the dentist on the 19th so bad? will it cost less? wait austin moved back because of a guy? hmm what do you mean? austin get a job you lazy butt!! ;) love you dude!! well I guess that is it for now. les amo mucho!

Elder Buxton

From Traci: I would greatly appreciate it if you could remember Cody in your fast this next Sunday. This transfer could be tough for him and he could use some extra prayers and strength. Also, if you would like to send him anything for his birthday or Christmas, it would be great if we could put some money on his debit card so that he has some spending money for souvenirs before he comes home in December.  I am also sending a birthday package on July 9th. If you would like to add a card or something small to it, please get it to my house by then. Thanks for your love and support!