9-17-12

Hey family!!!

 

Things are going well for us here in Glew. We had a pretty normal week. The first half of the week went really slow... but the last half went quickly and we got a lot of work accomplished. We found a new family of 8!!! So that is exciting. They are from Peru. I hope they cook for us sometime... I love Peruvian food. So that is awesome. Also we have reactivated several inactive members and started them on the path towards the temple. So, that is really awesome as well. I hope you got my email with the photos.

 

Well I`ve been getting a little sick this week, and yesterday I lost my voice completely; today it`s even worse. So that makes a little hard to teach. lol. Luckily today is pday. WE watched ratatouille. I love that movie.

 

Ali sent me an email with her news about her mission. That is soooo cool, Frankfurt Germany!!! That is so exciting, I`m happy for her. She studied three years of German, so she has got a great head start. She leaves in January I think.  

 

My comp is great. He works hard, and we are working well together. He has a really thick Paraguyan accent, so it`s really hard to understand him a lot because they speak horrible. They just yell as quickly as they can with their mouth open and don`t pronunciate anything. But that is thanks to the Guarani, the Indian language that they speak. It`s hard sometimes, but it`s going to train my ear a little better so in the future I will be thankful.

 

I pulled out the short sleeve shirts this week! WOOT! Lol. And then today it was cold... lol. But it`s spring here, officially next week on the 23.

 

Right now I am helping 4 families prepare for the temple :) I am super stoked for that. They were all inactive when I showed up, so it`s a really great feeling. They are all planning for about a year from now. I told them it would be amazing if we could plan our trip and they could all try to go to the temple the same weekend so I could be there with them :)

 

Well fam, I love your guts!!!

 

Chaocito.

 

Elder Gardner

9-10-12

Hey family!!!!

 

So I´m super happy you all had such a great time :) The pictures look amazing, and I can´t stop laughing at the pics with a cut out of my head :) My favorite is the one with taylor swift... :) Did I ever tell you we got her christmas album last christmas to listen to it during the holidays. It was a good couple of weeks!! lol. It sounds like you guys had a lot of fun adventures!!! If you all enjoyed it, I´m glad. It´s been a long time since we´ve had a family vacation! Only a year left, and then we can all be together again. 

So things are going well here! The weekend was AMAZING!!!! Friday, we had the fireside with pres eyring. He is so amazing. He talked for an hour, and then Ballard and Christofferson talked for a half hour each. They were all super amazing. We learned a lot of amazing things. Elder Ballards grandpa was the apostle that iniciated missionary work in South America, and they did it from here in Buenos Aires. And also his son, and his grandson both served here in the south mission. Elder Christofferson served in the Cordoba mission, with Elder Scott as his mission president. lol. So they all had neat connections, and good feelings about Argentina. Elder Christoferson speaks spanish SO well. lol. I´m jealous. I was suprised! I didn´t think that any of them were going to be able to speak, but he did. 

Saturday, we had the cultural event. It was amazing. There were soooo many people there. I got to see people from past areas that I´ve served in, and they were all soooo happy to see me, so that makes me feel good. And I´m happy they haven´t forgoten me. Wow I can´t spell anymore! In the cultural event All the missionaries along with the future, and ex missionaries sang called to serve. It was awesome. And we gave eyring, ballard, and christofferson honorary panchos :) 

The dedication was amazing as well. The talks were great, and the dedicatory prayer was inspiring. I love our prophets and apostles. They are such great examples, and I just love them!

That´s about all the important stuff that happened this last week. Things are going well!! I learned how to make a new dessert. It´s called bizcochuelo. But really it´s just like a really yummy cake without icing. lol. But I make it homemade. mmmm. 

I meant to send pictures today, but I forgot the camera in th epench. sorry!

Love ya fam! Don´t have too much fun without me, kay??

Get me again. 

 

Elder GArdner

9-03-12

I just never know which email to send itto, so I just email both :)
Well This last week went really well!!! I got my hijo, his name is Elder Agüero, and he is from Paraguay, fresh out of the MTC. He is awesoem, he is 19, and served two mini missions, so it`s like I`m not even training. He speaks Guarani, which is the indian language of Paraguay and northern Argentina. So he is teaching me some things as I teach him English. He has a REALLY thick paraguayan accent lol. But that`s okay, it`ll help my spanish come along.
OH!!!! This last week, we had the wedding :) Two of our contacts got married on friday morning. And on friday also, we had his baptism, and the reception as well. It was a realllly busy day. She got confirmed on sunday as well. It was a great week!

My new comp really likes to work, which helps a bunch, so we are getting a lot of great work done and finding new people and stuff. It`ll be a great 3 months! Hopefully we can get a lot more work done before I go.

Well fam, I hope you are enjoying your time in NYC.

Chao!!!

 

Elder Gardner

8-27-12

Hey fam!!!!

Well the big news for this week is I`m not getting transferred... I am staying in Glew until the end of November because I get to train a new elder. I`m excited, and by the end, I will have 11 months in Glew. That almost never happens lol. Everyone in the ward was super suprised I wasn`t leaving. They all made me lunches, and we had tons of dinners too in the week. Yummm. I am super full (especially of pasta). So today I am staying in another area with some other people waiting to train. The new elders don`t come until tomorrow so yeah. We`re just waiting for them to come. I heard that they are almost all latinos because of all of the visa problems with the states. But we`ll see :)
I hit 13 months today! Time is just flying by. by the time I hit 16 months, 11 of them will have been in Glew :) Lol. We for sure will be spending a lot of time here when we come back.
The wedding is this friday! WOOTT!!!! I am so excited for them. And I am so excited that Ï will still be here for it. I was super scared I`d be sent far away and wouldn`t be able to come to it. But even better that Ï just get to stay in Glew. :) Sheesh someone here must be waiting for me to find them.
I`m glad everything went well with the super activity, and am super excited you have the NYC trip. That will be super fun for you. All of us here are just waiting for pres eyring to get here and for the cultural event. That will be super exciting.
Not too much news here. Things are going well.
I love you family! Hasta luego.

Elder Gardner

8-20-12

Hey fam! How was your crazy week in st. george? I hope everything went well, and there weren`t any major accidents. With the singles, there are always accidents, but hopefully nothing huge. Tiff told me that today grandma has surgery, I`m sure you`re busy with that today. Tell her I love her, and I hope everything goes well. I got the package too! I love the tie. It`s real nice. And the chocolate was soooo good. Mmmmmm. Elder Parker and I found nutella in a supermarket today. YEah.... we will be eating well tonight!!! :) It was like 30 pesos though... we still have yet to find peanut butter. BUT! There is a giant supermarket going in next to the pench, it`s called a coto. I think it`s owned by cosco, so we are praying that they have peanut butter :)
So this last week was not amazing... lol.  I talked to president a couple months ago and he said you can be a very obedient,spiritual missionary doing everything right, but in the end people still have their agency. I think I mentioned that last letter, but yeah. It`s so true. I just hope that we are doing everything we can. We are struggling finding new people lately, we`re going to focus on that. Clapping houses! YAY. lol.
We had a ward trip to the temple on saturday. SOOOOOOOO amazing. It`s so pretty. And we had a couple investigators and inactive families come. It was so amazing. I just want to go back. It was such a great experience. I think I would love to do a temple mission with my wife when I`m allllll big and stuff. When are you two headed out on your mission?
NYC trip coming up in what, two weeks!!! Wow. I bet you guys are super excited. I`m excited for ya.
Well that`s about it for the week!I love yea guys, and hope to hear from ya soon.

Chao!

Elder Gardner

8-13-12

Dear Family.

Things are all going well! This last week had a lot of ups and downs. It was kind of crazy.  Stupid agency. Just kidding, agency is amazing, but sometimes on the mission you just want to take it away from people :) But we have found a new family, hopefully it goes somewhere with them. They were a reference from the tmple because the youngest son went and filled out a reference card, so I guess he is a little interested, we`ll see.
Finally having the language down, I am understanding people on the streets.  Good thing you guys won`t understand them when you come visit, and I won`t translate that for you :)

I hope you guys have fun with the singles ward this week! Have some fun for me.
We found some guy who makes some really cool argentine shoes, and I ordered some today. I ordered six pairs! Lol. But it`s only 275 pesos, so like 55 dollars. No biggy. They are awesome too.
The family that I love so much here in Glew had a really rough week. I feel so bad for them, but they don`t even have time for a cita with us so we can`t even help. It`s so weird how much you can love someone and want to help them. I hope the best for them.
The weather is getting better! Today, no jackets, and no sweaters. Weird right? It felt sooooo good.
Transfers are coming around the corner. I wonder where I`m headed. or for some weird reason I stay another transfer. I reallly doubt it though. But who knows, missionaries never get transferred back to their old areas either, but it happened :)

Well family, I love you guys.! Before you know it, it`ll be christmas and we can skype again.

Chao!

Elder GArdner

8-6-12

Hey fam!!!!

So I think the temple openhouse is going well. I don´t get to go until the 18th of Aug. Our ward rented a bus to take the ward, and our investigators. WOOT!

Elder PArker does feel better :) I think... the humidity is terrible, so it´s making him sick longer, but we´re working and stuff, so that´s good.

We do have microwaves :) The apartments are usually reallllly nice compared to the homes here. They take care of missionaries, especially sister missionaries. So no worries. She enters the MTC the same day as maddie hansen. Lol when I first saw that picture, I hadn´t read the email yet, so I was trying to figure out who it was. But I´ll look for her next december when she gets here.

Yeah dad, they all think I´m a monster with my height. Everyone usually stares. They all just know immediately that I´m not from here. I get a lot of ¨are you German¨or even russian. A lot of the members know about the election, just because of Romney. They all want him to win. How is the election going? The trail camera sounds awesome.

This last week was amazing! Well, a couple really amazing moments. But overall, the week was REALLY hard. But it all was worth it in the end. On Friday night, we received 18 references from one family, that is an extremely high number, and then on sunday we found a new family of 6+ personas and they ALL agreed to get baptized :) and it should happen my last sunday here in Glew :) That will be amazing. I should be leaving glew on the 27 of Aug. But who knows!!! Lol. That´s when pres told me I was leaving the last time ]I talked to him.

We had a terrible day on thursday, just tons of rain, and lots of stuff happening, so we passed by a bakery on the way home to get some comfort food, and we found the best pastries... mmmmm. They were soooo good. They were like moms home made rolls, but dessert style. They were soooo good. And we bought a dozen empanadas :) I love how I can make anything better with some good food.

I´ve been eating well :) And my weight is just the same. I think I´ve hit my happy medium :)

We have like no time today because of our zone activity, so I´ll talk to you next week :)

Chao!

Love ya!

Elder Gardner