Hitting the 5 Month Mark

The last half of August flew by.  We had a few baptisms that added to our new convert teaching list.

Farias family - L-R: Griselda, the mom, Hna. Condie, Carolina with her daughter Juliana, Damian, Yanina, his sister and Hna. Martinez

First was Damian the older brother of Carolina.  He is 24 years old and has now followed his sister Carolina into the waters of baptism.  We just have his sister Yanina (who is married) to convert and to reactivate the dad, Jorge (has word of wisdom challenges).  If the spirit and the missionaries can work a few more miracles, we can perhaps get an eternal family created here in Venado Tuerto.

The other baptism is Giselle. 

Giselle with Hna. Ellsworth on the left and Hna. Martinez on the right

She actually lives pretty close to us.  She is 17 soon to be 18 years old and was a referral from one of the members.  She is definitely an example of someone prepared by the Lord.  Her mom, Rosa, is taking the discussions as well, but just isn't quite ready to take the plunge yet.

This last transfer of missionaries has been the most difficult so far for us.  We had gotten close to a number of the missionaries that were transferred out, especially Hna. Condie.  She is from Cedar City, so there is a good chance we will be able to stay in touch.  She has certainly worked miracles here in Venado Tuerto.  She is a great missionary!  Now we are back to having to groom new missionaries on how to work with us.  They really don't know what to do with us as we are the only senior couple serving in the mission so it is a new experience for them.

 The two sisters on the left were transferred - Hna. Condie and Hna. Elos, from Chile.  Hna. Elos had been serving out in Murphy.

Also both elders from Rama 1 were transferred - E. Galindo on the left and E. Fuentes on the right.

These two greenies got transferred.  Venado Tuerto was their first area and so we've known them the whole time we or they have been here.  E. Margaria in the foreground is from the Pampa here in Argentina and E. Raven in the background is quite the character.  We knew both of them well and learned to love them.

We had a zone conference at the end of August.  This time we had to travel into Rosario for it as we were meeting with the Rosario West zones.  They are two smaller zones as the area they cover is quite large (a lot of smaller towns just outside of Rosario).  We've been here long enough that we saw a number of former missionaries that had served with us in Venado Tuerto.  We also met some of the missionaries we've worked with for medical reasons at this zone conference.

All kinds of interesting things go on at a zone conference.  Above E. Thorpe is doing push-ups in an object lesson about giving it your all.  Below, E. Castilla is going through an exercise to illustrate trusting in the Lord.

 The Elders who are slated to go home before the next zone conference are always asked to bear their testimonies.  This time 9 elders gave their farewell addresses - L-R:  E. Wolz, E. David, E. Thorpe, E. Fields, E. ?, E. Palacin (from Spain), E. Scott, E. Taylor, E. Robertson

 At Pres. Allred's request the missionaries all stood and sang "I Know That My Redeemer Lives" as the closing song.  I'm behind them all playing the piano.  It was a powerful spiritual experience.

Here is our zone group as of the last transfer on Aug 18th.  Front row L-R:  Hna. Alvilez, Hna. Tippetts, Rhoades, Allred, Hna. Ellsworth, Hna. Martinez  Middle row L-R:  E. Wolz (DL) E. Thorpe (DL) E. Williams, E. Pertuso, E. Grahme, E.  E. Castilla, E. Bryan, E. Packer, E. Betancort (from Venezuela), Back row L-R:  E. Barrientos, E.  E. Veraga, E. Fields, E. Scott, E. Morel, E. Topham, E. Sessions

Our mission prep class is progressing.  We've been able to keep our attendance up for the first three weeks.  There are 15 weeks for the entire course so we'll see how we do in the long run.  It is a good group of young adults.  If we can get the majority of them out on missions it will be a great blessing to the district.  One girl, Stefania Moreno, has submitted her papers and is just waiting for her call.

Elder Rhoades continues to make progress with the young men.  He has had two kite making classes here at our home.  He teaches them how to make a small paper kite first, then they graduate to making a kite out of an empty Doritos bag and finally one out of cloth.  He has been hunting for bamboo to use for the kite sticks.  They grow here it just has taken him awhile to figure out where to find them.

 Here is one of the kites we've bought down here (above).  Valentin Sanchez is holding it.  Below you can see it flying in the field next to their house with one of Dave's kites (the circular one) flying below it.

Valentin's older brother, Joaquin took to kite flying immediately and did a great job with Dave's two stringed kite on the first try.  He had a birthday August 20th so we went out and bought another bat kite and gave it to him as a birthday present.

E. Rhoades has also managed to talk me into letting him buy a foosball table.  With how much these boys love soccer here he figures it will be a hit with them when they come over for activities.  It was a bit expensive, but the decline of the Argentine peso has helped to make it more reasonable.

Speaking of the peso....the economy here is teetering.  When primary elections were held this month, the candidate that came out on top was the one that has leftest ideologies.  The markets did not like that and immediately the following day the peso went down (for them), up for us.  The rate of exchange is now 55-59 pesos to the dollar depending on the day.  This is up from 38 pesos to the dollar the first day we were here at the end of March.  That's like a 50% increase/decrease depending on how you look at it.

The Rolon families that we work with who were struggling economically have been blessed with steady employment.  They both got hired on with the church working on some of the church owned properties nearby.  This will allow them to learn new skills, be around good people and have a steady income, something they didn't enjoy when they worked on their own.  This opportunity became available to them after they had fasted and prayed for help.  It sure is good to see the Lord answer prayers and watch as new converts learn to turn to the Lord and trust him to help them with their needs.

L-R:  Gustavo & Soledad Rolon, E. Raven, E. Packer, Gabriel & Pamela Rolon

The Ochoa family's garden area is progressing.  The mom was in a motorcycle accident and had some significant injuries.  No broken bones, but a head concussion with memory loss.  She wasn't wearing a helmet.  So things were put on hold a bit, plus we needed to wait for the overnight frost to be over.  But she now has a number of plants in her garden and we'll see how things fair for her.

 Down here you use what you've got.  They have a lot of dogs so we had to try to fence in the garden area.  She had some fencing material and Dave is trying to shore it up using empty pop bottles filled with sand so the dogs can't dig under it.

 Above - lettuce plant.  Below - parsley plants.  The dirt was full of these broken tile pieces.  They are putting them to good use by lining them around the plants.

Below you can see a few of our seed starts that we are still nursing along.  

 It was the funniest thing.  The boys were fascinated with E. Rhoades' drill.  Finally he let them actually use it.  They were having a ball!

Just have to show this photo below.  It is one of the Ochoa families pet dogs.  Any guesses on the name?  It is a female dog, just to give you a hint.

If you guessed Cynthia, you are a winner!

We got in one service project during the last half of August.  It was helping to paint part of a school.

 Members of Rama 3 work on painting the steel doors.

 Here's a group photo as we painted the outside iron fence.  The paint was a pretty poor quality, real runny.  We got to wear those yellow helping hand vests the church uses for service projects.

Just after participating in this service project as we were driving home, we finally found a bike for Dave.  And because it warmed up the last half of August we've been able to go out a number of times on bike to do errands.  We haven't gone to appointments on bike yet.

Dave's bike for the next year.  Pretty basic but when it's all flat you don't really need a lot of gears.

Spiritual Thought for the Week: 

"But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.  Therefore, my beloved brethren (and sisters), be ye steadfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord." I Corinthians 15:57-58