Elder Smith 25 Ene 2010

Hello family,
Another week gone by, another change gone by better said. we finished the week with a really nice baptism service. in the one 7 people where baptized. We have been running around like crazy this week doing a little bit of everything. i hope that everyone at home is doing well. i have a new Companion. his name is Elder Rojas from Mexico, i dont think that he is a family member but its close haha. looking forwad to anither good week. this week with the changes there are 8 new elders in the zone so we are gonig to have to get to know everyone of them and gain their confidence and work together in the mission work.
thank you to all those that wrote me this week. the letter mean alot and the words of encouragement are priceless. looking forward to hearing back from everyone next week.
Love and miss you all.
Elder Smith

Elder Smith 18 Jan 2010

Hello family,
How is everyone doing at home? I hope all that is well and that everyone had a good week. We are about to finish another change. Hard to believe how fast the time goes by. The good part is that we have been keeping really busy. We are getting ready for a baptismal service in the zone this coming up Saturday. It should be a really good turnout. The missionaries have all been working very diligently. My companion is still working well too, enduring to the end haha. This week we have a lot to get done so the time will go by even faster than normal. We have a few baptism interviews to do, two interchanges, inspections of all the houses of the Elders and to make sure everything is ready for the baptisms Saturday.
As far as the work goes in our own sector, it’s been pretty slow. Defiantly less than what I have gotten use to here in the mission. We have been trying to find new people to teach and we have had very little success. We put together a small plan with the members so that they could talk with their neighbors so we are looking forward to receiving references from them. We have knocked a lot of doors and that was not a very successful way to find people even though we did find one sister that was very interested and we taught her two times and she accepted a baptism date, we were excited for her and for the lesson that we had taught and we were leaving her house when her son calls and says that they are going to be moving to Portoviejo, hopefully she will be able to find the church and the missionaries there.
Not too much more going on here in Ecuador. Staying busy, trying to help the people here in Quevedo find the happiness that every one of us as sons and daughter of our Heavenly Father deserves. Hope that all is well at home. Looking forward to hearing back from everyone this week.
Elder Smith

Elder Smith 11 Jan 2010

Hola Familia
How is everyone doing? Hope that all is well at home. We finished a another week here in Quevedo. We had a pretty good week. The rain season has started here in Ecuador. So far we have been pretty lucky because it has only been raining at night. Not too much new has happen this week. We knocked a lot of doors trying to find new people to teach but we didn’t have too much luck. We are hoping that a few of the people that we were able to come into contact can become new investigators this week.
We have one person that is getting ready for his baptism the 23rd so we are excited for him. There are a couple of families that we have been teaching that are trying to progress but they haven’t been able to attend church. They are really good people that have a desire to learn more and change their lives so we are working hard to help each one of them complete the commitments that we give them so that they can get ready to receive a baptism.
Other than that not too much going on. My companion is about to finish his mission. He only has two more weeks left but he´s not too trunky. He is still working hard haha. Looking forward to hearing back from all of you this week.
Elder Smith

Ecua haircut- $1.oo

Elder Smith 4 Jan 2010

Hello family.
How is everyone doing? Here in Ecuador we are doing well. I hope that everyone had a good new year. Good to welcome in 2010! We had a week of looking for people to teach which wasn’t too easy to do with all of the parties and people traveling but we were able to teach a few less active families that came to church yesterday so that was good. We are working to have a few people ready for their baptism the 23 of January. The biggest challenge right now is to get the new investigators to attend church but we will do everything possible so that they make it Sunday. Thank you to all those that wrote me this week. Your letters mean a lot. Hope that everyone has a good week. Love and miss you all.

The picture is of a "año viejo" old year. the Ecuatorian tradition is to make a person and to burn it in the street at 12 o´clock to start the new year.