MERRY CHRISTMAS!!! Week 19

I hope everyone is having the best Christmas ever! Here they celebrate it mostly the 24th, and at midnight they open their presents and shoot A TON of fireworks! Like a ton…. We went on top of our roof at midnight to watch them. It was awesome, probably the most fireworks i have ever seen. On the 24th we had a lunch and dinner with some families. The food was super good and kinda Christmasy so that was good. This morning we opened all our gifts and stockings and stuff and it was super fun. We are all in our Christmas PJs too. We made some keish and we are gonna have an asado later today.

We got 2 more elders in the house. Elder Brian (from Laguna Beach)  who is comps with elder Anderson and I got a new comp, Elder Stover, who is from Tennessee. Me and Anderson were stoked when elder Brian came because we love him. He's so funny We already knew him because he's been in our zone. My comp didnt come till late saturday night so i was in a trio with Anderson and Brian for 3 days. It was the best haha.

My comp came straight from America because he had to go home and figure some stuff out. He only has 1 more transfer than me in the mission so our spanish isn't the best haha. He's nice but we are very different. Lets just say it's gonna be an interesting transfer… I was praying for a Latino so i could get super good at spanish but i got a yankee who hasn't spoke in like 9 months haha. All good tho it just means i'm gonna have to work twice as hard.

I went in a trio with our new Zone leaders and they were like “what the heck how do you know so much spanish already”. IDK why but my spanish was amazing that day haha. I told them its not usually that good.

We've been eating so much this week. I've probably gained like 10 pounds this week alone. It's bad. There is so much christmas pastries and desserts and candies and stuff and the members keep giving them to us. I love it but i hate it haha.

I hope everyone is having a very merry Christmas, and i hope you are remembering that it's all about Christ as well. I have a testimony that Christ lives and he is our savior. And through him we can all be forgiven for anything we have done. I'm so thankful that i am able to serve Him and teach people about the good news of Christ. This work is so hard but i've never experienced greater joy than the feeling i get after teaching an amazing lesson and the spirit is present the whole time. Enjoy the time with your family and the gifts from Santa! Love you all!

• Elder Tanner

This week was a Party : Week 18

What´s up Fam and Friends! We had the Christmas Party with President Cifuentes and we had our ward Christmas Party. The Christmas Party With Pres was super fun! We first had a charla (devotional) about how we need to plan more effectively for our investigators which was really good, the he told us to change into normal clothes for activities. Of course I had to break out the santa PJs (they are a hit). For the activities we watched the Polar Express (in spanish which was a bummer but i still understood most). Then we played a bunch of efy type games outside which was actually super fun (my team won most of them cuz im way competitive haha). Then we came back inside where we could decorate huge cookies and make some other arts and crafts type stuff (i just went for the cookies). While we were doing that President put on the new Beauty and the Beast. Everyone was stoked about that because they haven't seen it but i already have. Then Pres spoiled a bunch of new movies (that i've already seen but everyone else haven't). Like he just played parts of Wonder Woman and Star Wars and Guardians of the Galaxy 2 haha everyone was so mad. After the christmas party with president, we had our ward christmas party. We Found a few new investigators there that are part member families. We are super stoked to teach them.

My comp got to baptize an old investigator this week that he taught a while ago when he was in this one before. So it was super cool to go and be able to see that!

Our most progressing investigators (the Valdebenito Fam) was on vacation all week this week so we didn't get to teach them. That was kinda a bummer. But we did have a few investigators come to church so that was good. It's been hard to get people to go to church.

Yesterday, some members and kids formed a big choir in the street. It was like a street fair type thing, and they sang a bunch of christmas songs. While they were

Guys i love Christmas! It sucked a little at first because there's no Christmas lights or decorations really and it's super hot so you don't want hot chocolate and things like that. But we had the chance to watch all the ilumina el mundo videos and they were so good. We were all tearing up haha. Ive been able to realize more fully that CHRISTmas is all about Christ and serving a mission is the best way to celebrate Him. I also highly recommend watching the Bible videos of Christs birth because they are AWESOME. Keep doing your best to Light the World!! Love you all!

- Elder Tanner