February 20, 2012

woohoo! i´m headed to BYU! i´m pumped. in celebration of the good news, i´m going to finally send you some pictures of what´s been going on here in argentina the last couple weeks. This last saturday, we had a baptism! woohoo again! his name is angelo and his sisters are next.

tell kessa that she is free to date only if she hooks me up with her date´s older sisters haha.

transfers came in and i´m staying with elder zuleta. things are going well though, we´re going to baptize a lot this transfer. we already have three more lined up for this saturday and at least one more the next so things are good. i´m finishing strong.

love you!
elder newey

pic 1. a lake we hiked up to in San Martin de los Andes
pic 2. same lake. me and my comp elder zuleta
pic 3. ...same lake. me. yeah
pic 4. sick picture of my plaque

Feb 13, 2012

That exercise program sounds intense. I´ll definitely have to start doing it with you guys because i´ve lost a good bit of weight on the mission. I weighed myself the other day and over my whole mission, i´ve lost almost 20 pounds haha. I´m pretty skinny right now. But i´m healthy, it has nothing to do with worms or nothing of the sort haha, i just don´t eat as much as i did before the mission. Here, we only have one really big meal and there just isn´t time for much else. I´ll gain it all back when i go home though. Back to eating chick fil a and mall pretzels haha.

I talked to my good buddy elder Presley in the office and he said that i won´t get my travel plans until the last week of the mission haha. Apparently you weren´t supposed to send them to me haha. It´s not a big deal though, I´m not trunky or anything of the sort. The conference we had with Elder Foster yesterday was incredible. He taught us a lot and I got a bunch of promptings of things I need to do better as I come to the end of my mission. I feel like i finally know how to do missionary work now haha. We´ll see how much i can teach Kaleb before he leaves though. That´s good that he´s super excited, it will make him a really good missionary. People like being around excited people haha.

transfers are this next monday so i´ll let you know what happens. Really anything could go down at this point so i won´t even bother to make a prediction. love you

elder newey

February 6, 2012

Today i´m writing to you from San Martin de los Andes, a little tourist town about four hours away from my area in Zapala. We got permission from president to come so we left at two in the morning this morning and arrived at sixish. We met up with the other elders here and we went on a hike that has a sick view. Funny story, on the hike, this kid comes out of a house that was near the trail and tells us that we need to pay to go any further. I was full aware that the Argentines often take advantage of tourists and foreigners so i just ignored him and kept walking so our whole group just blew right past him and he didn´t say a word. well further along in the hike, i ask one of the san martin elders what all that was about and they tell me that we actually do have to pay them because we are technically on their land....oops. so we were all apparently trespassing and breaking the law this morning haha. I got some sick pictures though...if that makes up for it haha.

The work is going well here. I´m getting sick of my comp but i can handle it. I secretly hope he leaves with this transfer but if he doesn´t, i´m consigned to ending the mission with him. We have some really good families though that are so close to baptism, we´re just having a hard time getting them to church. we are working hard though and seeing results.

anyway, have a great week. Next monday we get to go to Neuquén to listen to elder Foster from the area presidency so i´ll be writing on Tuesday. Love you

elder newey

Jan 31, 2012

yeah, only two more months. i´m not really sure what to think at this point other than that time goes by really fast. things are going good here, it´s actually getting kind of cold which i don´t like haha. we´re just working hard. we had a zone conference yesterday. my last one on the mission. it was good but it made me feel weird thinking about my first zone conference i had on the mission and just how much has happened in two years.

yeah all the mission preparation makes the time go by super fast. Does kaleb have to buy a coat there in ukraine because of the cold? i know when sean left for russia, they told him specifically not to buy a coat in the US because they aren´t good enough.

yeah last week i was going to tell you happy birthday but i got caught up in kaleb´s call and stuff and i forgot. how old are you already, like 30?

you better believe i´ll end strong. it´s hard though, at the beginning of my mission i always thought how lame it was when other missionaries wouldn´t end well and i made a promise to myself that i would finish working. well now that i´m actually in this position, i undertand the other missionaries who can´t handle the pressure because it really is hard. Suddenly you start feeling really tired and you aren´t as excited to go out and work. it´s hard to descibe but that´s how it is. I´ll finish well though, you can believe that.

i still didn´t get my travel info but i´ll be in the mission home a day before i go to buenos aires so probably the day after general conference, i´ll leave early in the morning for neuquén like at four in the morning to get there by 7 ish. then i´ll have my interview, have time to go buy stuff and then we´ll get on the plane to buenos aires. wow i just got a vision of me boarding the plane haha. trunky thought. love you

elder newey

January 2, 2012

yeah it was cool to see everyone again. I didn´t get to see Sarah for very long because right when she got on, the connection failed and we had to reconnect haha. It was great though, I loved it. Another elder did his call in the morning and said it worked great. Apparently the ciber was pretty packed when we made our calls so that´s why it was so slow. but yeah, in two more transfers i´ll be home anyway so that should be exciting. Tranfer calls come in this Saturday so i´ll let you know on Monday where i´m off to. I´m not really sure what´s going to happen with these transfers but it´s just the adventure of the mission right?

I´m way excited to see where Kaleb is off to. He should get his call in like three weeks right? My guess is Miami Florida Spanish speaking. But i might change it in a couple weeks when the real pressure is on.

It´s pretty hot here. This morning we were out at like 11 in the morning and it was already 30.5 degrees which is like 90 or something Fahrenhite haha. I´m loving it though. This should be my last p day here so we´re going to play football american style in the church in another hour. I really love it here, the elders in the zone are awesome. We all sleeped in the zone leaders pench for new years eve and it was so hot me and another elder couldn´t sleep so we were up till almost 4 talking haha. He´s a really good guy. He´s from washington and I really hope he can make his way down to BYU after he finishes the mission in October.

Mission work wise, it was a really good week. Actually, we paid pretty dearly for the success we had. In the beginning of the week, we kept coming acros pastors that wanted to bash with us. Now that´s something I don´t enjoy doing but when they start insulting Joseph Smith and tell me I´m preaching a lie, we have to throw it down. So we had some intense Bible bashes in the street but I held my own. They can´t argue against the truth and they always whip out the same old scriptures, it´s like you know what they are going to say long before they even say it. They my comp got spit on by a guy we wanted to contact and then right afterwards, we ran into another pastor haha. So that´s how the beginning of the week went and then we got a sick reference of a less active family who has two kids that aren´t baptized. Score. Then we set four other baptismal fechas with some other investigators, so it was a good week. The area should be all primed up and ready for the next elder that comes down here.

Anyway, that was my week. I´ll let you know next week where I´m off to. I´m thinking i´ll be going up by Neuquén. It´s even hotter up there... love ya

elder newey

December 19, 2011

Wait so Holli isn´t going to be there when I call on skype? I would love for her to be there but if she can´t i´m pretty sure she has a skype as well so I could call her, I just need to know her username and stuff. Could you get that for me?

Bummer there isn´t any snow. I miss snow a bunch, but I don´t miss the cold, I´m lovin the hot weather. you´re going to see my sick tan on monday when we talk. Does anyone else from the brotherhood get to skype? I already read that kyle gets too, anyone else?

In the next bolsa they send to me, I get my "trunky papers" which i think have some travel info in them. I´ll let you know on monday when we talk and we´ll get it all worked out. Man, I just got hit with a wave of excitement for christmas and being able to skype on monday! ooooh man it´s going to be sick! That would be cool to have everyone there, all the cousins and sarah and fax and everyone. I could see how much everyone has changed but if they can´t be there I understand as well. Just one more time for the doubts, i´ll call at three my time which is 11 your time. i´m hoping the ciber will be empty and that we won´t have any problems with getting a computer to skype on but you never know. If i can´t get one right at 3 here, don´t worry i´ll be calling as soon as I can.

I´m pretty sure my package should be getting here tomorrow so i´m excited for that as well.

The work is going great here. We´ve put a couple fechas bautismales but we want more. I haven´t baptized in a while, like two months and i´m starting to feel it. I would love to have a baptism on the 24 so we´ll see what we can do. pray for us! love you

elder newey

December 12, 2011

Well this week flew by. Quite honestly I don´t really remember what happened. I do remember that we had some problems in the district with a companionship that i´ve had to deal with but I´ll tell you more about that when the whole mess is over. It´s kind of a long story anyway so maybe i´ll just tell you about it over skype. I am so excited to skype you have no idea. I´ve been telling everyone we talk to that we get to skype with our families for Christmas.

Well the work was kind of slow this past week, being that we didn´t get to meet with any of our progressing investigators. I´m not sure what happened there but they were never home and we could never set up a good time to pass by. I´m hoping this week can be different and that we can get a baptism set up for the 24th so we can have a White Christmas haha.

Me and my comp have been enjoying the peanuts christmas and the home alone soundtracks that I have so that has really gotten us in the christmas spirit even though it is incredibly hot outside. I hope you´ll be able to see my tan on skype haha.

anyway, can´t wait to see you all on the 26th! love you

elder newey