Monday, November 23, 2015

Everything Normal to Back

One more photo.

Everything Normal to Back

Dear Fam: 

Well, for the first time in about a month we finally have a normal week ahead of us! Wahoo! I´m pretty excited. 

This last week was so crazy, it feels like five weeks passed by. 

First of all, the special meeting with Elder Ulisses Soares from the 70, and Elder JosĂ© A. Teixeira, Second counselor in the Area Presidency came to talk to us. It was really great, and they shared so many great things. It was fun becuase none of their first language was spanish, I think they all come from Portugal? Or something like that... but anyway, they spoke really well, with just a couple italian or portuguĂ©s words thrown in there. But something I really liked about Elder Teizeira´s talk is that he gave us the secret of how to follow the spirit. "Es muy simples" he says. :) He explained, everything that´s good comes from God. So when you wake up and you want to work and help people and teach, and you feel good, this is from God! And when you have feelings of dissappointment, and you feel like the worst person and you don´t want to work, this is not from God! It was funny the way he explained it, but it´s very true. If you get the feeling that you should do something, and it´s a good thing and a good feeling, it´s from God! 

It was a great meeting. And the musical number went great as well! I got to play the piano, Hermana Matamoros played the violin, and Hermana Sandau (and a couple other missionaries) sang, so it was a fun family reunion! 

Lets see, things here in Justo Daract. We taught Leonardo again, and this time a member was able to come with us. It went really well, we taught about the plan of salvation. We also invited him to be baptised again, but he says he still wants to think about it and learn more first. It was kind of sad to hear, but of all the reasons to say no, that´s one of the best. He doesn´t want to decide to be baptised when he still doesn´t know exactly what it actually means. So we invited him to keep thinking and keep praying. He wasn´t able to come to church, so hopefully he´ll be able to come next week. I guess prayers on his regard, that he can recieve his answer would be great. :) 

And Juan came to church again! We still haven´t been able to meet with him yet, becuase he works a lot, but we´re definitely going to be trying this week. We also saw him saturday standing by the side of the road by his car, and he motioned us over, so we went and talked to him a bit. He said he looked over a few things in the book of mormon, and had a bunch of questions. So we talked about the book of mormon and the story in contains, and tried to answer his questions. He´s still a little aprehensive about taking lessons and accepting the gospel, but he´s definitely curious, which is something we can work with. We´ll see how it goes! 

We also had a really great lesson with Marta, who´s a friend of a member. I don´t remember if I told about her, but she´s really great. She already has a book of mormon, which we talked about the other day, and she´s already prayed and said she feels that it´s true. She also accepted a baptisimal date, but she hasn´t been to church yet so we´re probably going to have to change it. The lesson was great because her daughters were there, and a couple of them are evangelicos, which is always interesting. The Evangelist chruch has so many things that are so close to what we believe, so they´re usually pretty accepting of everything we teach. But it means we have to be very bold with the differences, so that can understand that they´re not the same thing. so we were able to bear testimony of the priesthood, and how it was lost and restored to Joseph Smith. It was a powerful lesson, and her daughters said they would read the book of mormon as well. Oh! And the funny thing about Marta´s family is that they have 7 kids, the oldest is a girl, then a boy, and the rest are girls! I told them all that´s left are two kids from Ecuador and there you have my family! It was funny. 

Well, I guess that´s it for this week. Oh! Yesterday after lunch just before taking the long walk home we went over to the Elders old pench (we still have the keys because they haven´t come to take the fridge and stove out yet) to see if there was anything else they had left there that we could use. Just as we get in, it starts hailing. I´ll send some fotos. Long story short, we were very grateful we happened to be inside at the moment!  

Okay, that´s it. Have a great thanksgiving! I´m thankful for all of you! :) 

Hermana Cannon

Mas Fotos

Here´s some fotos of the crazy hail storm this week! 

Mas Fotos



Here´s some fotos of the crazy hail storm this week! 

One More


Monday, November 16, 2015

Quick Update

Hey family! 

So, crazy week! Long story short for the day, tomorrow we have a special meeting with a member of the 70 and one of the area presidents, and we´re doing a special musical number with a bunch of other elders and sisters, which we´re practicing tonight. So we all used today to travel from all ends of the Mendoza Mission here to Mendoza Centro and practice, so I´ve got just a minute here in the mission offices to send a quick email home and tell you all I´m alive! :) 

This week we had an activity in the branch, and it turned out great! We did a dessert contest, and some fun minute to win it games. here´s some pictures, see if you can guess what the games are. ;) 

The week actually started out pretty slow because we came here to Mendoza to do visa stuff for Hermana Sandau, and didn´t get back till wednesday night. But we still got to see some great miracles and find some new people! 

One of the exciting things that happened this week is that Juan showed up at church yesterday. Juan is a guy we met a few weeks ago while we were proselyting, and started up a conversation. He´s evangelist, and very active. Basically, he was quoting and referencing the bible more than he was using his own words. It was interesting conversation though. I like to talk to those who know the bible, because for the most part, they´re right! Anyway, so we talked for a long time, and then invited him to the activity. He sent us a text after the activity and asked if he could come. We said it was already over, but he was welcome to come to chruch tomorrow. And, surprise! He came! He really liked it, and afterwards we gave him a Book of Mormon and invited him to read it. So we´ll see! :) 

Well, that´s it for this week. Love you all! Have a great day! 

Hermana Cannon

Quick Update

More photos


Monday, November 9, 2015

The Missionary in Argentina

Hey Fam: 

I had to differentiate there in the title, because now there are two missionaries in the family! YAY! Super excited to hear the news, and so excited to be working together in the Lord`s work as his chosen servants. Congratulations Jessica! I mean, Sister Cannon. :) 

This week was pretty crazy, because we were traveling a lot. First we had interviews with the presidente, then we had a zone meeting on friday in San Luis, and ended it all with Intercambios with the sister training leaders. Then today we`re going to Mendoza to do some Visa work for Hermana Sandau and won`t be back till Wednesday. It`s all pretty crazy. But craziness doesn`t stop these sisters! We had some great lessons this week, and one of our investigators came to church! 

His name is Leonardo. We are also teaching his brother Victor, I don`t know if I`ve told you about him. But Victor has been working a lot so we haven`t been able to see him for a long time. Anyway Leonardo is about 26 years old or so, and he`s a language teacher. The Elders have been working with him for a while, so he`s already read various parts of the Book of Mormon, and says he thinks it`s true. He`s also already prayed to know if it`s true, and says he felt good and at peace. Wahoo! We invited him to be baptized, and he said he`d have to think and keep praying about it. Yesterday he came to chruch, which was really exciting! It just so happened to be the same sunday where the entire stake presidency came to visit the branch, so the chapel was full to the max. He couldn`t stay for priesthood, but he was able to come to sunday school, and he participated lots too. Anyway, we`re really excited about him. 

During the intercambios I was working with Hermana Lloyd, who`s actually from Karl and Vida`s ward. So that was fun. Hermana Goates, the president`s wife, has said that we should try and find more service opportunities to find people. So Saturday morning we walked past a family who was outside doing some saturday chores, and we offered to help. As always, they were a little resistant. But we kept offering, and talking with them, and finally they let us help out. We washed some of their porch chairs, and then shared a scripture and Book of Mormon with them. It actually went pretty well. They even gave us some juice and empanadas, and one of her daughters gave us a flower. So we`re definitely going to be doing that type of thing more often! haha

Well, I guess that`s about it for this week. Hope you all have a great week! 

Hermana Cannon

p.s. There`s a picture of me with Presidente and Hermana Goates, and a balloon. Hermana Goates used balloons as an example of how we should elevate ourselves to elevate the mission. So...just to explain. :) 

Monday, November 2, 2015

Mas Fotos


Here´s some more pictures of the activity we did with the primary kids and their kites. Bariletes, they´re called. :) 

Mas Fotos


Here´s some more pictures of the activity we did with the primary kids and their kites. Bariletes, they´re called. :) 

Feliz Hallo...como?

Hey Friends and Family! 

Happy Halloween! So I thought they didn´t celebrate Halloween here because I didn´t see anything or anyone dressed up last year, but this year we did! Just a few kids going around to some of the street shops or houses asking for candy. It was cute. And I happened to have some candy in my pocket from earlier that day, so I handed some out. 

Also that morning we had traveled to Villa Mercedes (40 minutes on bus to where the other missionaries in our district are) to do a Tormenta Blanca, which is basically just where a bunch of missionaries all get together to help out one specific area. Knock doors and find people to give the missionaries in that area a little boost. So we went around and knocked doors, taking a Halloween approach to make it more interesting. It kind of went like this. 
Knock Knock. 
"Hola?"
"Hola! Feliz Halloween!"
"...Como?"
"Sabe lo que es Halloween?"
"...no."

And then we explained what Halloween was and offered them candy, a passalong card, and tried to set a time that the other missionaries could pass by and visit them. It was kind of funny. A couple people had heard of Halloween, but it´s just not that common. 

What else is new... oh, this week was a little slower because Hermana Sandau came down with a sore throat and a bit of a fever, so we had to take a trip to the hospital and try and get her better. She´s still got a little frog in her throat (haha, see pic) 

But we were still able to meet some new people, and do some teaching, so that was good. We weren´t able to meet with Christian this week, because he nor Ignacio were there for the meeting we set, but we did see Lucia. And she read! We left Moroni 10:3-5 and she read it through a couple times she told us because she didn´t understand it the first time. We have another meeting with her tonight, so we´ll see how she´s doing. 

This week we had a cool experience, and another testimony builder on Member Missionary work. We were looking for some old investigators, and one man we found told us that there was a lady who lived down the street whose brother had been listening to the missionaries, and had passed away not too long ago. So we went over and knocked her door. We talked to her for quite a while, but she explained that she was really closed off to God for now, and didn´t want to meet with us. We tried to share a hymn or different things, but she just kept refusing, so we left. 

The next day we went to the primary activity to help the kids make kites, and guess who was there? Vanessa! The lady we had talked to. Turns out she´s friends with the primary president, and she had invited Vanessa with her daughter to the activity. It was great, and she really liked the activity. So we´ve talked with the primary president and her husband and they´re going to try and set up a service activity in her yard and a family home evening with her. 

It was really neat to see, and although it was sad to see that she doesn´t want to accept the missionaries, the more important thing is that she accept the gospel, which can be taught and shared through many different forms. Love Member Missioary Work! 

Well, have a great week! Love you all! 

Hermana Cannon

Sunday, November 1, 2015

Springtime Winter

Dear Family: 

Good news! Hermana Sandau is letting me take pictures for her using her memory card, so I can send pictures now! We´ll see how long this lasts... haha

So these weeks have been really interesting because we should be in the middle of springtime. We´ve had a couple days where we went out with short sleaves and everything. But the weather is being really crazy, and for the last three days it´s been really cold, cloudy, and rainy. I had to bring my thick winter scarf out and everything. And I keep hearing that it´s going to be off an on like this for the whole rest of the year! Super weird. I was really looking forward to getting my Christmas tan. Que lastima. But I guess we´ll see. 

So besides the wacky weather, things are going great here in Justo Daract! More than anything we´re just having trouble getting second meetings with people. We´ll meet with them on the street or in their house, teach and have a great lesson, and set a time for the next meeting, and then something always happens and it falls through. Oh, I guess I kind of explained that already. Well anyway, it´s still a problem. But we were able to meet with some great investigators for the second time this week! So I´ll tell about them. 

Cristian, Ignacio, and Lucia. Lucia has family who are recent converts, so she already knows a little bit about the chruch. She and Ignacio are living together, and they have three daughters under the age of four, and they are so adorable! And Ignacio is so cute with them. Cristian is their neighbor, and brother of the Elders Quorum President. The first lesson we had with them we talked a little bit about the restauration and invited them to pray. Lucia looks at the pamphlet with the steps of prayer on it and goes, "okay. Let´s see how this goes." And then she just starts praying. After she finishes, Ignacio goes, "Okay Cristian, your turn." And Cristian then offers a heartfelt prayer too. It was very neat. 

Then this next lesson that we had was really great too. Ignacio and Lucia hadn´t prayed or read any of the pamphlet, but Cristian said he had. And he told us that all that week after our first visit went really well for him! It was so great to hear that from him. After the lesson, we invited Ignacio to pray since everyone else had already offered one before. He didn´t want to, but he sat there looking at the steps and thinking how he might say it, and we kept helping him out and encouraging him to do it for like 20 minutes. Cristian and Lucia were also helping him out, and encouraging him to do it. You could see the look on his face, and knew he wanted to do it, but in the end he said he just couldn´t. It was kind of sad that he didn´t feel up to it, but something Cristian said was interesting. "It´s hard the first time, but then it gets easier." And it really made me think about what prayer really is. I guess I had never thought of prayer from their point of view. It´s their first conversation with their father in heaven. After going throughout their lives, maybe they know God is their father, maybe they don´t. Maybe they don´t even know He exists, much less that He loves them. Hearing investigators´ first prayers has always been one of my favorite parts of missionary work, and now I understand a little more why. 

I know that prayer is real. That God does listen, and He does care. And He gives good gifts to His children, especially those who are willing to ask. 

Have a great week everyone! Love you all! 

Hermana Cannon

Springtime Winter