August 14, 2010

Congrats on Alden!!! Im so stoked to have a nephew now too!! Thanks haha!!!
Friday the 13th though...heh thats pretty cool! Not my birthday, but the next best thing I guess ;-) Glad to hear everything went smoothly and all thats great!
I figured out how to attach fotos better, so heres a few. I guess you'll be getting all the full files pretty soon anyways on my card, but thats okay. Most of them are the ones I thought I sent before, but didn't turn out good. enjoy!
Send me lots of pics too!
My birthday was good, a couple of elders going home were staying with us and they got me a cake and all. It was a great birthday.
This last week we found 2 new GREAT families that are planning on going to church tomorrow. Theres a lady in this ward named Marlene that asks for pamphlets and Books of Mormon and then goes out and preaches just like a missionary! Shes so incredible, she spends all her spare time doing the Lords work and then on Sunday she takes us to visit the people she found and WOW. She finds a lot better than we do heh, She know EVERYONE since she's lived in the area for like 30 years taking care of everyones children. So....a ton of doors are opening, slowly but surely.
In the photos, #8 is when a bunch of the youth came to the terminal at midnight to see me off to Deo from Salto. #1 is our last baptismal service in Salto where Daniela (34), Claudia (22), Javier (17), and Henry (17) got baptised. Daniela's husband is a member, 3 kids of hers are being baptised up there this next week, Claudia's husband and mom are receiving the lessons, we had already baptised Javier's mom and sister, his dad is paying tithing but still has doubts about batism so we'll see what comes of that, and Henry (Javier's best friend), sister is getting baptized next week, and his parents are preparing as weel for 2 weeks after. Some SOLID families up there. I can't wait to tell you all the amazing stories of their conversions. So many miracles have happened... #2 is a sunrise from outside our apartment window last week. It was so pretty I had to take a pic. # 3 and #9 are Adriana and Florencia's baptism. Their dad/husband, is getting back into church activity and they are doing GREAT as a whole. She cooks REALLY good too haha She'll be a blessing for all future missionarys heh #4 is a rainbow outside our back apartment view that overlooks Montevideo International Port, Ciudad Vieja and all that. BEAUTIFUL view!!! #5 and #6 areconvert families that'll all be sealed in a years time :)
I wish I had more fotos of baptisms and well...everything but unfortunately I can't bring my camera everywhere with me or it'll get stolen, but my camera still has like 1300 fotos on it or so, lots of fun stuff :)
This week was so stressful I learned a ton about the personal responsibility each of us has for...ourselves heh. We had to deal with a lot of disobedient missionaries this week and it was sad to see people having worked hard at times (others never) throwing it all away for a little bit of fun. The President and Sister Heaton have passed through so much fire these 6 weeks or so since they came its unbelievable. Satan wants this mission to go down pretty bad. Salt Lake informed us that the Lord is sending even more missionarys here though. I believe that by the end of the year we may have over 200 missionaries in the mission!!!! That's quite a few, but the need is present. There's a number of cities in the mission where missionaries have NEVER been to EVER, so I think some new branches may be opened up over the next year. Lots of miracles will be happening soon in Uruguay.
I love you all and I'm excited to hear that so much good is happening in the family and all. Keep working hard in all you do and being obedient with exactness. Don't anyone dare ever think that the Lord asks too much, because we are in debt to him everything and very rarely does he ask for so much. Just be obedient and be happy with that. Serve your family and friends always and get some references for your missionaries!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Love you a TON,
Elder Magnusson