Saludos de Argentina

Dear family and friends,

Another great week here in Argentina. The weather has been very pleasant y it seems like the summer heat is finally gone for good! Had a great morning cleaning the pension y doing some laundry (I have really come to enjoy washing my clothes by hand!) y excited to finally sit down and relax, y best of all to hear from and write to all of you!

This week we have started working with a less active member that my companion found one day on intercambios with Elder Sanchez. La Familia Palavecino - Jorge is the father, the mom Argemina, Nadia (18), Belén (15), Ariel (13), Priscila (10) y Nahuel (9). The parents y 2 daughters were baptized several years ago in Guernica y shortly after moved to the Province of Santiago where they pretty much lost contact with the church. They lived about 4 hours from the nearest chapel there, so they decided to attend an Evangelist church near by to be sure that their children were raised with the teachings of Jesus Christ in their lives. When they moved back here to Berazategui, they continued attending a branch of the Evangelist church here that they had been with for the past several years. They recieved us VERY well in their home y are great people! The mother is already set on coming back to the church, but the father is having a little harder time. We have passed by several this weeks and are reteaching the lessons from PMG y helping them remember the things that the missionaries had taught them before. The father admitted that he has all the doctrine confused in his head, but that he has great desires to follow God y knows that He is there to answer and guide him. They also have their son and several grandchildren who haven´t been baptized yet. We are excited to get them involved with the members y they will be a great addition to the ward!

Yesterday in Church Darío was suposed to be ordained a Priest, but he ended up not even showing up! Apparently he had gone to a Young Single Adults activity y dance on Saturday y some friends there had invited him to their ward for some reason. Also, apparently he had gotten in a fight with his family y didn´t stay with them this weekend like he usually does, but he at least said that he won´t let that get in the way of his going to church,etc. Obviously we hope they can get things resolved! We were a little shocked at the news, but content that at least he went to church! We had to explain to him that it is very important that he goes to the ward where he belongs, ESPECIALLY to be able to recieve the priesthood. We had a great lesson with him about the priesthood this week, although he felt a little bummed about not being able to recieve the Melchizedek priesthood right away. He is pretty excited y destermined on preparing to serve a mission!

On Friday we had Zone Conference in Adrogue... which meant waking up extra early to be able to make the 2 hour train trip. Always great to learn from y be with Pres. y Hna. Stapley as well as the other missionaries. We talked a lot about chapter 6 in preach my gospel about developing "Christlike Attributes" y several missionaries were called on randomly to give the 5 minute talk that we all had to prepare before hand speaking about one of those attributes. Even though I didn´t get called on, I enjoyed y learned a lot preparing that talk. After lunch, we have the tradition of singing happy birthday to all the Elders y Hermanas who have birthdays during the 2-3 months between conferences, so this time it was my turn! It was extra special this time because they sang the birthday song in 3 different languages... Spanish, English, y Portuguese for the new Elder that arrived from Brasil y is serving in Wilde (y Hna Stapley who speaks portuguese)! So that was pretty cool... then on top of that we got a tasty chocolate rice crispy treat, homemade with love from Hna. Stapley!

Anyways, that’s all for this week! Can´t wait to hear from you all again soon! ¡Cuidense!

les amo
Elder Ian Wheelhouse