Monday, July 16, 2012

This week was another great week!  I got to be a companion with Elder Griffin's companion (Elder Villar) for the day.  We exchanged for just 24 hours.  Elder Villar is a big stud and is from Chile.  He's super nice and outgoing.  He's really funny and we had an awesome day!  He doesn't know any English so I had to use my Spanish all day with him.  It was great practice for my Spanish and by the end of the day we were both exhausted and ready for bed!

Yesterday was Fathers Day here in Uruguay.  It was interesting because our branch president canceled all meetings besides sacrament meeting since it was Fathers Day - and then he didn't even show up to church!  Elder Erwin and I had to conduct sacrament meeting and basically do everything for the branch.  I've had a lot of interesting opportunities with this small branch here in Noblia and have learned a lot about how to run the church.  I also gave a blessing this last week to a lady in the ward.  It was a cool experience and everything went well.  It's funny to think that I'm doing all these things in Spanish because I don't know how to do any of it in English!  Anyway, it was a great week!

This last week we have been teaching three teenage boys, Bryan, Mateo, and Juan Gabriel.  They are awesome and have been great.  An interesting story about Bryan is that he has been kind of a trouble maker here in Noblia.  He would always mess with me and the other elders and was just kind of a bad kid.  When we had some activities in the church a couple of weeks ago we had to physically remove him from the church because he was being so disrespectful to us and the church.  Anyway, a couple of days ago Elder Erwin and I thought that we should try and teach him since we have never even thought of it before.  We started to and everything has been going great!  He has been behaving and wants to know more.  It's been a miracle!

Uruguay has been awesome and I'm having a blast.  I'm healthy and doing great!  I love you guys a ton and miss you!  I can't wait to hear back from you!

P.S.  This photo is of me, Elder Griffin, and Elder Villar right before I wrote this email.