Hello Sunshine

Dear family and friends,

Good to hear from you Kristine! Maybe next week I´ll hear from the rest of you. :P Hope you all had a good week and are enjoying the fall time colors... one thing they don´t have here in Argentina! Today I finally busted out the short sleeve shirts and have been enjoying some nice sun/warmer temperatures/blossoming flowers etc. The spring here is Beautiful!

Nothing super exciting or new from me this week. We did have some success finding some new people to teach this week. Monday evening we always have a Noche de Hogar (FHE) with a family in our ward and usually being right after Pday we are always rushed for time. This Monday on our way to the Noche de Hogar my comp and I felt like we needed to pass by a contact we had done several weeks before and never been able to find. We had passed by her house several times, and always talked with her Grandma Isabel. We were very suprised to hear from her grandma that she had told her that we would be coming to her house and told her who we are and everything. Doesn´t happen too often! Her name is Yesica and she works all night on top of studying during the day and sleeping when she can, but Monday night we finally found her at home and they invited us in. She was just sitting down to eat, getting ready to go to work, but we were able to sit down and have a great chat with her and her grandma about the Book of Mormon etc. They both seemed really interesting and Isabel even went so far as to say... "my whole life I have been raised Catholic and I have a lot of faith in the Virgin Mary... but people can change". Unfortunately they weren´t there when we went back the next time (always frustrating!) so now we are praying to be able to catch them at a good moment again.

We also were able to get into the house and teach a family who we helped carry a mattress several blocks to their house last week. German y Catalina y several grandchildren who they have taken in and raised like their children because their parents apparently didn´t want them. Catalinas sister was also there visiting from Chaco, so it was nice of them to let us in to talk for a little while. They are very active in their church and have great faith in Jesus Christ and believe very strongly in the Bible. At the same time they were very open when we talked about the Book of Mormon y accepted the invitation to read and pray.

Saturday we had a Zone Activity called "Tormenta Blanca" where all the elders in our Zone go to one companionships area and do a bunch of contacts to give references to the elders in that area. This week we worked in Fabian Onsari... but we did something a little bit different. Instead of doing contacts the Ward had organized for us to pass by all the inactive members that are on the registros to see if the families still lived at the adress, if someone had passed away, etc. It was fun to work in a different area y we found some great people that for some reason or another just haven´t been to church in a while. We were told to keep things very brief.... but hopefully down the road our efforts will make a difference in helping some of those lost sheep come back to the fold. Our Stake here in Avellaneda is pushing a lot the counsel of Pres. Monson to seek out those who should be at church but aren´t. Probably one of the defining counsels that Pres. Monson has taught us. Evidence of the love that Heavenly Father has for ALL of his children.

Well that´s about it for this week! Hope you all have a great week and a Happy Birthday to Brian! Looking forward to General conference in the next couple weeks! My second to last general conference in the mission... unbelievable!

les amo
Elder Ian Wheelhouse