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!

Summer is here!

Hola Familia,

So this last week was pretty good. All these weeks can be very difficult with my companion and stuff but I'm hanging in there. So last week on tuesday I did divisions with elder thomas which is always fun so that was good. And besides that we didnt have much luck in finding new investigators which was sad.. we are gonna work really hard with maira this week to get her baptised this sunday so we will see what we can do with that. They didnt come to church yesterday since manuel apparently got really sick but yeah. So besides that I really loved the meeting last night! I dont know how many of you got to see it or if you even did mom but it was awesome! I wish all the members in the world were able to attend cause they talked a lot about our duty as members to preach the gospel and how the missionaries in the wards and stakes are there to only help the members and the bishop and ward mission leader in their own missionary work and not the other way around. Here in argentina its mostly the other way around. A lot of the members dont do much so that was very good for some members of our ward to hear that last night. I loved all the videos and stuff they showed too. Very cool! I looked really hard to find trent but I didnt see him on there haha. hmm also I'm going to finish the book of mormon this week!! :) finally! Its such a great book and I have such a strong testimony of it! I have no doubt in my mind that its true and has a power to change peoples lives! It's the greatest!! Besides that this is the last week of the transfer so I will be emailing you guys next tuesday instead of monday and I'll tell you where I'm at and who I'm with if things change. Also this wednesday we have a special meeting as a mission (I knew they would do something like this haha) because this is president and hermana gulbrandsens last week in the mission! so crazy and weird! Everything is going to be so different! A verse I liked in the book of mormon today is the very last verse in the whole book of ether. I believe it is ether 15:37? or something like that. the last one in the whole book. today we got permission to go to pilar with elder arostica and elder solum to play soccer and eat at a pizza buffet so that should be fun :) les amo mucho!

 

Elder Buxton

 

I forgot to read your email and respond to that hahaha I'll do that now. Thats nice that its warm there. It is now very cold here.. and its worse that its humid too.. congrats on reaching your goal mom!! :) and thats awesome that cass starts her job!! so weird! haha yep mom us as members can do so much more.. and theres so many things that I didnt even know existed until I came on the mish like ward council meeting and all those meetings and things. It's pretty sweet! okay well thats all haha. les amo!

How are you?

Hola familia,
So I'm writing earlier today and you all are probably asleep still haha but I'm writing early because we got permission from president to go to a campsite in pilar thats owned by the church that has like a grass soccer field and basketball courts and grills to cook stuff. So we are going there as a zone and we got permission to leave in the morning so we have time to do stuff. So yeah pretty much its gonna be super sick! :) I havent played on a grass field in over a year and a half.. demasiado tiempo! Okay so second thing. Happy fathers day!!! :) I hope it was a great day for all of you especially you dad! your the best!! :) Well besides that it was a rough start last week but then the end was better. My comp was mad at me about some stuff in the beginning but never said anything, just decided not to help me with anything. So on thursday after weekly planning (which I did by myself) we had a companionship inventory and it took a while but I finally got him to open up a little bit and we had a good like 45 minute talk. It was really good and now things are a lot better and we are working way better together and we are happier and everything so I'm very grateful for that. It was definitely the lords blessings. So because of all that stuff we havent been able to find any new investigatores.. we found one last week who is athiest (dont know how to spell that anymore...) but we had an interesting conversation with him. I love that whenever we have talks like that we cant ever lose cause we have the truth :) and I dont mean lose in a bible bash kind of way. But every 5 seconds he would say "there is no God and there is no jesus christ. They dont exist!" It was actually pretty funny haha. I love the gospel! :) manuel got confirmed yesterday which was good and his uncle whos a member is like shy and doesnt know much so when the bishop told him to do it (he confirmed juan and didnt know how to do it at all) he said to have me do it so the bishop told me to just do it so I was like "okay :)" so that was basically the first time I confirmed someone haha it was sweet. I baptised him and confirmed him :) besides that we had dinner at cubillas again on saturday which was the 5th birthday I've celebrated in that house haha and we played charades and mafia. It was a lot of fun! so this week I officially hit my 1 yeah and 6 months mark which means that I start 6 months to sexy :) haha thatll be fun. Many missionaries do things like diets and stuff but Im just gonna have the goal to do really good excersices everyday and eat less junk food and galletitas. Its gonna be great! and um next sunday we have the meeting Im sure youve heard about. President monson is doing a conference with all the new mission presidents in the mtc and it will be broadcasted to all the missionaries in the world and all the presidents of the organizations and their spouses in all the wards or something like that. And does that mean trent gets to see president monson? so yeah besides that we have been passing by a lot of members house and looking for old investigators and less actives in the area book to ask for referrals cause the weeks before we were basically just doing the same things over and over again. We havent had much luck at all and we had less lessons last week because of it but we are gonna get down on that cause I know that there are people prepared in our area. i love the promise we have in alma 13:24.


Yeah dont worry mom I will answer all those questions about my comp and stuff when I get home. I'd rather not write those stuff and not focus on them. But I have definitley been blessed by the lord with more love and charity and patience towards not only my comp but also the people and members in my area. Oh good mom I'm so glad that everything went well with the surgery. I was very worried.. so so very grateful that it wasnt cancer or anything like that! :) you have no idea. But thank you for your words mom. I love reading you thoughts and what you think about things especially since you probably understand me the most out of everyone on earth haha. hahaha erin is getting married? weird.. yeah tell me who it is if he went to timp. Your just mailing my package tomorrow? I thought you mailed it last week? I probably wont get it for over month then.. if you sent it last week I would probably have got it at transfers but oh well. Thanks mom! les amo! chau chau! :)


Elder Buxton

How was this week?

Hola familia,
So this week was a pretty good week. So we found out that elder cook 2 weeks ago had a meeting with the other 3 missions I think and then had a meeting with just our mission. Thought that was pretty cool! On wednesday we had our last interviews with president. So weird that he leaves in 3 weeks.. :( it was really good though. Mine was short and sweet but I really liked what he told me in the end. He stood up and said "I love you elder. We will forever be friends." I'm greatful that I will always have president gulbrandsen as a friend. I hope that you guys can one day meet him. They told us there too that that was the last time we will see him so we are doing something else with them in the next few weeks. Guess we will see. On saturday we did some service in savio with a family helping them build a different part of their house to make it bigger. And we ate with them and had cake too cause it was the kids birthday too. His names yanpierr. You gotta pronounce that really latin like or it doesnt make sense haha. But hes 17 and is way sick at soccer! Oh and on friday we did divisions and elder thomas came to my area so we could do maira and manuels interviews. So thats always fun! I dont know what happened to maira but in the end she didnt want to get baptised.. She will though so dont worry. Manuel is just a capo though and he asked me to baptise him so yesterday we had a baptism and savio had 3 so it was a sweet day! We had to look all over for baptismal clothes for everyone on saturday night and we ended up going to yanpierrs house again to eat birthday cake and stuff with all the young men and women waiting for the elder from savio to get back. It was really sweet cause we are way good friends with the youth in the ward. I'll send some pics now but we have been working with leila (the girl with the hat on in the pics I sent like a month ago) quite a bit cause she is a recent convert and shes just awesome! We are trying to find through her. We have a little bit but no one that was prepared. We are gonna contact some referrals from her tomorrow so we will see. I'll send some pics right now if it works. Hopefully it does. After church we ate a familia peñalozas house us 4 and that was a lot of fun too. So yeah and after sacrament me and elder solum went all the way to pilar to get baptismal clothes for everyone but in the end everything worked out good and it was a spiritual ordinance :) Well those were pretty much the highlights of the weeks I guess. My mind is jumbled right now sorry haha. Tonight we are gonna eat at familia cubillas house and then again on thursday I think for another birthday. So that will officially be my 5th birthday celebration in that house hahaha I have 4 videos of each one. And if I stay here for the next transfer I will be there for my birthday and I think like 2 more of them are in august too haha so nuts! Oh and something that we learned in the interviews meeting that I liked it that president taught us the importance of and how to really confess our sins to god. Many times we just say please forgive me for the bad things I've done during the day or week. But thats not technically confessing our sins since we didnt mention a single one. Its kind of interesting but president told us that if we pray to remember what we need to confess it will be given to us. So we each went away from others and did that and then confessed them to god. It was really cool. It almost doesnt make sense: asking god to tell us what we did wrong so that we can remember that thing to tell it right back to him haha. But thats how repentance works. We have to do each part.


The waters of mormon month goal is for the mission mom. Matt and tanner are moving in there now too? uh oh.... they should all be on missions!! haha. Oh man you guys have no idea how much I miss carpet!! Are we ever gonna get carpet in the family room? Wow mom I hope that everything goes okay today! I know you will be alright! Your always in my prayers! cassidee going to cali? So lucky!! And no no news about the package.. have you heard anything about the ward package that that sanders person sent me? It might be stuck here.. he might have to send an email or something to get it sent back.. and yeah I've been thinking about taking a couple classes at UVU right when I get back. That would probably be a good idea. When would you need to sign me up and stuff? Thanks for the letter that cass wrote! I'll read it in the week. les amo at todos!


Elder Buxton

How are you?

Hola Familia,
Well this week was a week of ups and downs but I really have a testimony that if we find the good in things and in our situations that we can still be happy. So this last week was full of crazy stuff. First of all like I said last week the temple was way awesome obvisously! haha. And we stopped in liniers station (my old area) to eat and I got to see jared and antonela! So great to see them! And then on tuesday we had district meeting and then we did divisions and so I went to matheu with my DL who is elder tomas who has like a couple transfers less than me and is new as DL and struggles with spanish but he is so funny and we get along really well. So it started to rain and hale harder than I have ever seen in my life... every street was flooded up to our knees if it didnt have some type of hole or sewage system so it was interesting trying to get to district meeting by colectivos in that haha. Then the power was out at the church so we did it in the dark which was interesting haha but then divisions was really good cause to be honest I was excited to get away from my comp for a bit (ill explain about him in a sec). So then on wednesday we had a meeting with elder cook!! :) It was so awesome! It was just our mission but I think he had a meeting with the other missions in buenos aires before us. Not sure though. But it was so sick! The area president was there and a few other 70s and before it started elder cook wanted to shake our hand so we all got to go up and shake all there hands. yep still havent washed my hand after that ;) we heard many of them talk and then elder cook obviously talked in the end and it was such a great talk! He said many things that were personal to me and that I needed to hear so I'm greatful for that. And by the way he testified of some things I wouldnt doubt that he has literally at least heard the voice of the lord. Pretty crazy but who knows. Well I guess he does but still haha. Then on thursday we had zone meeting. (pretty much a week of spiritual meetings :) I love meetings now haha weird right mom? ;) ) And that went really good. We set goals and everything and based on the scripture in mosiah about the people that were baptised in the waters of mormon we decided (for president gulbrandsens last month on the mission) to follow the scripture and set that as our baptism goal for this last month. 204!!! our record is like 199 in one month I think so its gonna be sweet WHEN we break it. So yesterday we went and got maira and manuel this time to make sure they came to church which they did and juan too and they all went to their right classes finally!! And so maira and manuel will be baptised this next sunday! :) and the elders in savio have like 7 baptisms planned which I'm thinking will get narrowed down to about 4 or 5 at the most so we are gonna have a big baptism day next sunday to help us for this months record! The month is now called "the waters of mormon." Okay so besides that the other week a parrilla (grill, retaurant) opened up next to our pench so we went to go buy something when we didnt have lunch last week and the couple that owns it are members in a different stake! So they basically told us that whenever we dont have food or want something that we just go by them and they will give us what we want :) What a blessing and tender mercy of the lord!! So we took advantage of that a couple times last week haha. Besides that some hermanas were mad at us and me yesterday so we had to fix some of that so its all good now. And we are gonna try something new this week to find new investigators since we arent finding by what we are doing cause there arent many less actives in our area. So this week we are gonna pass by lots of active members and ask for referrals and what not and we are gonna find some news! I know it will work! Okay this is long. Last thing. Things in the beginning of the week still werent very good with my comp cause he was still doing things he shouldn't be so our district leader got involved with me a tiny bit and stuff and I wont lie that last week a couple times I prayed that my comp would get transferred.. but after the meeting with elder cook and the zone meeting I knew that was wrong. So I changed my prayers. I started to ask for ways to serve and love my companion and help him and to have something to talk about during the week and stuff and things are way way better now. Obviously he isn't perfect now (neither am I AT ALL) but we are talking and stuff so that's great! I love prayer! I know it works just like I know that this church is true! Oh and I'm in alma 54 I think. I'm behind. Here's my favorite scripture for the week. A great example for all of us! alma 48:11-13,17.


Oh and apparently sandy has to wait like a month more for her call cause of some stuff so that stinks.. haha wow cass finally got her license? I'm kinda scared not gonna lie... haha and yeah austin should get a job. How often is he at home? Thats good if he really is gonna finish the back porch. Yesterday at lunch we talked with hermana peñaloza (sandys mom) for a while about family and stories and stuff and this might sound weird but it got me really excited to be able to have long talks with you mom. And it really made me appreciate the mom you have always been even more than I already appreciate it. Thank you for everything!! :) She (Cass) wrote a letter about me? smart little girl.. where does she come up with this stuff?? haha. I wanna read it! Well I guess thats it for now. Tonight we have dinner with a family in savio the 4 of us and tomorrow another birthday at familia cubilla in savio. It will be my 4th birthday eating in that house! haha were gonna eat an asado! :) Well ¡les amo mucho! ¡gracias por todo!


Con Amor, 

Elder Buxton