MERRY CHRISTMASSSS!!

It looks like y'all got my Christmas gift! I've been hearing that it's snowed/ been snowing in Houston. Unfortunately, that's probably the only gift I'll be able to send. The only place we go shopping is Wal-mart so it's kind of hard to find good cultural gifts I could send y'all. But I was reading a talk by Elder Holland and he said that Christmas is about celebrating the birth of Christ, and the Wise men didn't show up until after the birth. So giving gifts on Christmas day isn't that important, but y'all will get them during the year.
So did y'all watch the Christmas Devotional? It was pretty good. It made me miss home too. It took me back to the days when y'all would make me go, but I wouldn't want too. What a bad kid. I bought the Mormon Tabernacle Choir Christmas cd today at DI for $3. I'm excited to have some Christmas music to listen to.

I've been reading the "Discourses of Gordon B. Hinckley." Elder Pearl is getting ready to go home so he gave me both volumes. Because they take up a lot of space. But I read the talk where he got his letter from his dad saying "forget yourself and get to work." So that's what I'm trying to do. Yesterday we shoveled snow for 3 different people. It took like 2-3 hours. We ended up missing the dinner appointment. But it was worth it. Helped me warm up, AND got my mind off of home. When we got into the house last night after working I checked what the temperature was, and it was 8 degrees. But it didn't feel that cold. So thank you for praying for me and that I would be able to stay warm. It snowed so much here lately though. yesterday we got like a foot of snow. There was enough of it to go up to the bottom of my knee. Way too much.

Well the other day we were talking to some of our investigators and we invited them to be baptized. The didn't say "yes," but they did say that they had been talking about it that day. And they came to church the next day and everything. We're hoping to get them baptized on the 26th of December. So hopefully that will be able to be done.

Decemberrrrr

Thanksgiving here was pretty good. We had dinner with a bishop in a different stake but we had fun so it was good. We went out with his son and were able to teach 4 or 5 lessons. and luckily for us we only had to eat 1 dinner. We didn't have a bunch of families forcing us to eat.

I'm sorry the weather is cold there. It's good for a little bit, but when it starts dropping into the 20's and teen's it's not so fun... But it could be worse. I could be in Wyoming. My MTC companion got sent there, and I wanted to see what the weather was like so I called Tell Me and it said it was 5 degrees. Toooo cold for me.

Well updates with what is going on with me. I'm no longer with Elder Gudino any more. Which is kind of bad. He was a good companion. My new companion is Elder Guillen. He's from Paraguay. He's been out for like 8 months or something like that. But he can't really speak english so I'm making sure he speaks it in the house. Because he doesn't want to work at it all his last companions just gave in and spoke Spanish. But I can do it. He's a little annoying.. I don't know it'll be an interesting 6 weeks. I'm still covering the same area, but they took away the Spanish branch so now I just cover 1 ward. The branch they took away is the one that didn't really have any work in it, so I won't really miss it too much. One of my friends from the MTC got transferred to the zone I've been in for the last two transfers. So when I heard I was staying in the area I was excited, but then I found out even though I'm staying I'm being moved to a new zone. This zone isn't as good as the one I was in.. But oh well. That's how the mission goes sometimes. Oh, and they're changing the e-mail system so My e-mail is going to be Kyle.Andrews@myldsmail.net. I think. OH and we were able to have our 4 baptisms this weekend so that was a good way to end the transfer. And for the first time I got in the water and baptized somebody. All 4 of them seem like pretty solid converts so that is good. Hopefully they'll stay active.

Here are some pictures from this last week. The first two are from the baptism of Ivet, her son Issack, and daughter Daniela. Her uncle (Hermano Sarmiento) used to be a bishop and she is living in the house with them, so she should stay strong. The third one is of the person I baptized. Alicia. She's been coming to church for 2 months or so on her own so hopefully she'll stay strong too. Then the last two pictures are of me and Elder Gudino messing around With the Sarmientos and Ivet. We had a pretty good time.

Six Months

We went to the temple with some of our investigators this week. They felt the Spirit so it was good. Yesterday we had 3 of the 4 people interviewed and they passed to be baptized. So we're planning on having our 4th one tomorrow. What else... For Thanksgiving we're going to do nothing. I'm going to play in some Turkeybowls and we might go to some houses for dinner if we get invited. Tonight we're going to a members home for Pie Night. They make a lot of pies the night before and eat them because they're to full to eat after Thanksgiving. So it should be fun. I can't really think of much that's gone on this week. We're tr;ying to go to Temple Square for Friday night. So that we can go to the first night of the lights. It seems like we do the same thing everyday. Teach, eat and you know. Well I bought "Joseph: A Nashville Tribute to Joseph Smith." So I'm excited to listen to that. I'm getting ready for transfers on the 2nd. I've already been out for 6 months. CRAZY.

Snow

Things here are pretty much the same. We're planning to have a baptism in a few weeks. On the 28th. We for sure have 3 people being baptized that day, and we're planning on adding another 1 or 2. So it should be a good day when it comes. I can't really think of much to update y'all on. Nothing too much has changed.

Man it's cold. Probably a lot warmer in Houston than here. We had a big snow storm on Saturday and that was not fun to walk in. But anyways... the Spanish is coming along pretty well. I can't wait till I don't have to try at it though. Some day. We have dinner with the Americans on Mondays and Tuesdays so it's pretty fun. I can actually communicate well with them so it's a nice change. I can't really think of anything that I can say or any stories. But next week I'll have more to write about. Or When things happen I'll write them down so I don't forget them since I can't think of them right now. Well this Friday we have interviews with the mission president. Yup.

Enjoy the pictures...Well the first picture is from Saturday. We walked from 6000 West to 7400 west. It was a very long and cold walk. Which leads to picture number 2. I think I'm going to buy one of these hats so I don't die in the winter. They're from a stake multi-cultural activity we had. The guy served his mission in Russia so we tried on some of his hats. And the third picture is just us messing around.

21 Day Promise

Well things here are going pretty well. Like I said the spanish is getting easier. I still have to focus while listening to it, but I can understand a lot. We have some pretty solid investigators right now. The one that has been coming for like a month, who I think I mentioned last time, we put her on date for the 21st along with her daughter and son. And then we have another family that is living with her cousin or uncle who attends the English ward. We put her daughter and son and her on date for the 28th. So we're hoping to have some baptisms coming up pretty soon. There's potential for 6 or 7 baptisms. Then another one of our investigators, Alejandro, recognizes the blessings of the priesthood and that come from us teaching him. But he hasn't accepted a baptismal date. So last night I committed him to read the Book of Mormon and pray about it. Once he does this we'll be able to get him on date. I'm pretty excited about that. We had 9 people at church last week, and taught 24 lessons. I'm trying to push and get 30 lessons in a week.

I'm trying the 21 day promise out too. Elder M. Russel Ballard and Robert E. Wells gave to all the people living inside of the boundaries of the Salt Lake City mission. You make a list of your friends or family that are less active or non-members. And after you make that list you pray for them every morning and everynight for 21 days straight. And they promised that at least one person on the list would accept missionaries into their house and take the lessons. So I'm excited to see how that works.

Well the next transfers are on December 2nd. I'm kind of worried about Thanksgiving. Because I don't want to get fat. So we'll have to see how I do with that. Oh and we went to the High Councilmans house for lunch on Sunday and watched "An Unlikely Mormon." It's Glen Beck's conversion story. Y'all should probably watch it. It's pretty good.

Time Is Flying By

The time is going by really fast. I already almost have 6 months in the mission. It doesn't seem like it's been that long. My Spanish is improving a lot. I can understand most of what is being said. And I'm still working on speaking. But it's getting easier. So I'm excited for that. I'm doing pretty good. I don't know I'm still me. But man, this weekend we had a baptism of this lady. She was so prepared from the first visit. We left her at church because we thought she left, but she just went to change her baby. She still came again the next week. I probably told y'all that before. But I could have performed my first baptism, but I figured it would be better for someone in the ward to do it. We change every 6 weeks but the ward members stay and they'll be the ones that keep them active.

There's another investigator that we added last night. She's been coming to church for the past 3 weeks, but we've never been able to get her address. We finally got it on Sunday and visited her yesterday. We're planning on committing her to be baptized on the 14th. She seems like a golden investigator too. We're still working on the family of 6. We had a Zone Conference on Thursday and it was so good. The Spirit was so strong during the whole time. The ward that did the lunch for us did an amazing job. They had some pumpkins carved and lit up (see below). But anyways after lunch we always sing to the people who prepared the lunch. And the Spirit continued during this. We sang "Armies of Helaman" and I had to hold back the tears. All the ladies we're crying and even the Stake/Branch President was tearing up. He was a big polynesian guy. He shared us a story about his nephew who is one of the top ranked high school football players. But after we sang that we sang "Called to Serve."

For Halloween we couldn't really go out at night so we had a Zone activity and had a chance to watch the movie. I told everyone we should watch the Hannah Montanna Movie. Pretty much all of them were making fun of me and saying that it would be a stupid movie. But 2 or 3 said they would and they rented and brought it to the activity. During the movie everyone was into it and liked it by the end. So it was funny. I think that's about all that's going on with me.

Halloween

There's not too much to update on right now. We're still working with the same people. There hasn't really been any real big changes. We're still going to have a baptism this Saturday. Umm me and Elder Gudino are still getting along alright. We were talking with an Apostolic pastor assistant and he asked us if we celebrate halloween. So I said yes and he started playing a CD about the "origin of Halloween." And it talked about how it is to celebrate the first lie told on earth by satan. It was pretty weird and full of a bunch of non scriptural stuff. I think I'm going to get a copy of it.

Today we went to Kohls and they had a Texas sweatshirt for $25 and I bought some sweats. Because I didn't really have any cold stuff. Only basketball shorts and a pair of jeans, and one long sleeve shirt. We had the first snow storm of the season yesterday which wasn't really too fun. I think that's about all that's really going on.

I think that we should be able to baptize every week this month. Hopefully we can. We have a lot of good investigators in one stake. But the other one is kind of dead. The members don't really help us out at all, and so we don't have any investigators. The work in this area is mostly with the help of members, because tracting doesn't work out too well here. That's why we have so much success is because we have a lot of member support. I can't really think of any experiences that I've had this week that really stand out. I'll try to think of one. Last Sunday we were at the library trying to get some books because we had to teach the Gospel Principles class. And the librarian is a white lady that isn't very nice. So Elder Gudino asked if we could take all the Spanish Book of Mormons and Bibles because she only gave us 3 gospel principle manuels. And when he asked she said "HELL NO!" So we were surprised at that and now we joke around about saying that when people ask us questions. It's pretty funny when it has the mexican accent. Well that's about it for now and I hope y'all have a happy halloween!