Feliz cumpleaños a... ¡mi!

Dearest Familia,

So remember the baptism that we had? Well we had a hard time tracking him down after that. There were two weeks in between his baptism and when he could be confirmed because of General Conference. But he works all day and then he moved out of the ward boundaries so it was a hit and miss trying to find him. But we finally did, and reminded him that he needed to receive the Holy Ghost for his baptism to be complete. We got his address and passed it to the other elders, but it doesn´t look like they´ve found him yet. He hasn´t made it to the chapel since then, but we have a cita with him in the chapel on Tuesday, and made sure he knew what day and time. So hopefully that will go well and he´ll understand the importance of being confirmed...

We did get a few references... no, in English they´re called... referrals! One was a 16 year old girl that our Zone leaders contacted and she asked if she could have a Book of Mormon. Another one is from a part member family actually there´s two from that family. (extended family) And last, we were walking from contacting a referral that didn´t turn out to be that cool... but as we walked past the pizza place this guy ran out and said, "Hey I´ve heard a little bit about Joseph Smith, and it sounds interesting. Do you have a Book of Mormon I could have?" My companion and I both passed out right then and there. So we don´t really know what happened after that... Just kidding!  We told him that we didn´t have one on us, but we´d love to come by on Wednesday and give him one and talk about it a little. I like it a lot better when people contact us... They always seem to be more interested that way... ;)

Our mission is the pilot mission for a mobile open house for the church. We have a missionary couple that are in charge of it and go from Zone to Zone with it. We were going to have our first one this Saturday, but a bunch of the stuff got stolen. (oh by the way: it includes big pictures, big flat screens, touch screens and a life size Cristus picture. It´s like a mini-traveling visitor´s center) I´m not sure about what exactly was stolen, but it´s going to effect Saturday a little. So that wasn´t all that great of news for us... We´re still going to have an open house, but it just won´t be as high-tech.

Well apart from that, I´m no longer a teenager... weird. I´ve been that way for seven years now. And now it´s gone, never to return. That´s ok with me. To celebrate, I cut my hair. Awesome, huh? Ha ha! and later, we bought pizza from Pizza Hut (pepperoni and pineapple for me!) and Élder Shelley bought some... ¡ROOTBEER! (and it even had an American flag on it... It also said "Cerveza de Raíz", but it was rootbeer!) I realized that rootbeer is a wonderful thing. ;)  Then my District Leader Élder Rossiter placed a lumpy gift on the table with wrapping paper of the virgin on it... and a ribbon that said, "mis 15 años" but then I opened it, and it was a blender! Now we´ve been talking about getting a blender for a little while now, and I was the most excited about it because I cook (prepare food) the most. He found this one used and cheap this morning in a tianguis somewhere. It´s got an on and off switch and that´s it, but that´s all I really need it to do. I turned it on, and about had a heart attack. It sounded like a table saw... I guess I´m just used to different levels of speed... Then he told me that I owed him $65 MXN...

It´s probably getting kind of chilly in St. George now, isn´t it? Here it´s about 85°F with about 20% humidity. How´s it compare? ;)   Josh has a card coming, a list of everyone´s birthdays would be wonderful, I think I´ve got everyone´s right, but just to be sure... and I´ve killed 18,594 mosquitos so far (how does that compare to Andrew´s bug count?). Just kidding, but that guess is probably fairly accurate... ;) That´s all for this week!! I love you all!!

Con amor,
Élder Gibson

...Subjeto? ...Subject...Subjeto. Sí, es mejor.

 Dearly Fami,

 Well, It´s good to know that our Abuelita is with our Abuelito now. I don´t see how people can live without knowing the Plan of Salvation. That would make it so incredibly harder.

 Zone Conferences are amazing things, you know. Just chuck-full of awesomeness. We`re having Zone Conferences this month, and we had ours last Thursday. We had got a ton of awesome advice on how to improve our numbers and the quality of our lessons. Élder Cruz and I got picked to do a role play on "How to Begin Teaching". So every thing was going great, my Spanish was good, we were asking great questions, and when time was up and we were being evaluated everyone was saying positive things. Then President said from the back, "¡No oraron!" (You didn´t pray!) So that was a good thing to learn: Don´t forget the basic things... although I was hoping to learn something other than something so basic... oh well. It was awesome.

 Well, I was going to send some pictures... but, I've still got a virus on my SD card. Sorry. I´m not really sure what I can do to fix it... ¿Ideas? The people in the mission office couldn´t fix it.

 I found this giant citrus fruit in the street one day as we walked out our door. I wish I could send a picture! It´s green and about twice the size of a grapefruit, maybe a little bigger... I think it´s called Lima. (which turns out, isn´t lime...) My companion said it`s sour and people just make agua out of it.

 Our 1st counselor scared me yesterday. My companion was going to give a talk, and after the sacrament, he announced that we´d be hearing from Élder Gibson, and I just pointed at my companion, but the 1st counselor shook his head and said "he´s going to share his testimony." And then I wasn´t scared anymore. But for a second there... ;) Then all the members complemented my Spanish. I did this the first week I was here too. They said I´ve improved a lot. Which was good to hear.

 Well, that´s all I have time for this week. Talk to you next week!!

 Con amor,

 Élder Gibson

¡El Día de Independencia!

Querido Familia,
 
Well, el Día de Independencia wasn´t quite as crazy as I  thought it was going to be, but we weren´t outside for the crazy part of the day... so I guess it could have been. ;)  One of the sisters in our ward let me choose what we wanted to eat for that day, so I chose chicken enchiladas. They were soooo good! We had our District meeting and weekly planning on Wednesday instead of Monday, so that we wouldn´t be outside from 5 - 9 o´clock. President came too! He went around to every compañerismo, and gave them advice and candy bars. He told us about the stripling warriors and all the great missionaries in El Libro De Mormón, and why they were successful. (they were strictly obedient) It´s always awesome when President comes.
 
They have this thing here called the "Grita" (shout) and it was last Sat. It´s part of the celebrations that they have for Independance Day. They all gather somewhere, and someone shouts: "¡Viva México!" "¡Viva nuestro libertad!" "¡Viva la Virgin!"(they say the last one in Guadalajara, but I don´t know about other places), and stuff like that, and everyone shouts it after every one. There´s some story about someone who woke everyone up in the middle of the night and shouted those things and got everyone excited about for the revolucion. So that´s why they do that, and it was really loud! ... well, they had fireworks too, but there was a lot of yelling. And then our neighbors were up all night being loud, but I slept through most of that.
 
There´s been a ton of rain lately, but it´s always in the night. Our street was a river though. There was about 1 1/2 ft. of water in our street a couple of nights ago, and that´s why all the house entrances are up higher.
 
We had two investigators at church on Sunday. I think that´s the most we´ve ever had. One of them has a baptismal date for next Sunday and it looks like this one´s going to happen for sure. His name is Josué Moisés... something... and he´s someone that we´ve seen since I´ve been here. He would always say hi to us, but we never really thought anything of it. So we finally decided to teach him and he´s getting baptised next Sunday!
 
Well, apart from that, I ate a meat sandwich with a spoon for lunch today. (Tortas Ahogadas, look ´em up, they´re amazing!)

con amor,
Élder Gibson

¡¡¡Conference!!!

Querido Familia Mio, 

 I´ve never had a General Conference go by so fast! We all went to the Stake center to watch Conference. There were soooo many awesome talks! I think one of my favorites would have to be Élder Uchtdorf´s talk in the first session about the basics and focusing on what´s important. The Priesthood session was good too! ¡Awesomeness! 

We (the English Elders) got to watch all but the Sunday morning in English. So I guess I´ll just have to wait to read that session to see if it was good. The biggest turn out was during the Sunday morning session. The chapel and all of the cultural hall and the stage were full. Saturday was a little more sparse though. I think that Conference made me "autumn-sick." I realized that here, the leaves don´t turn yellow and fall off of the trees... oh well.

Awesome Dallin! Don´t let your salamanders die! :D Brian´s moving to Oregon? That´s a ways away. Not as far as New York, I guess. 

My companion´s family is fine. Apparently his town is blocked by mountains from the coast so his family and house are fine. Everyone asks him about that when he says that he´s from Veracruz.

I guess that´s really all that happened this week. Conference! Keep those prayers for more investigators comin´!!

Con amor, 

Élder Gibson

PS I´m still working on the picture thing... :/