Feliz Año Nuevo!

Here is pics from our New Years party today!

Here is our sleepover with Elder Rodriguez, and the present I gave him

My newly decorated desk with all the pics from the package. Haha

 Here is my Christmas morning presents, and breakfast

Hello everybody!

Well I hope you all had a great Christmas! Loved all the pics Mom! Looks like you guys all had a good time. It was awesome to call on Christmas! Lots of fun, it sucked to be over though. haha Loved all the Christmas eve outfits haha I hope Nichole won the sweater contest haha. My Christmas was really good though, but I am glad its over and done with. haha. My whole goal so far in the mission was just to get to the new year and I'm almost there! ahh. . I cant believe 2013 is over, definitely the best year of my life. Ha I remember last new years eve when I had the flu and I was down in my room while everyone else was up partying, and I remember thinking well this year is gonna suck if this is how it starts! haha but it was awesome, I will always remember it. Lived in 2 countries, visited 4 others, graduated, started the mission, ya it was pretty good. It is weird thinking every bit of 2014 will be in Mexico.

So as far as Christmas day goes, we woke up and I opened all my presents while I ate my breakfast of papaya and watermelon. LOVED all the presents from you guys! Thanks so much! I'm set! haha Brandi, loved the game, dang good idea, gives me a good little stress reliever and settles my withdrawals from playing games with you guys. haha. But that was all I really did until 2 then we went to the Eldas and ate lunch then called you guys!  Elder Bocanegra had a lot more difficulties but I think it was because he was trying to Skype like 10 different people at the same time in a bunch of different countries so we had to go back the next day to finish his call. That night Elder Rodriguez came and we had a Christmas sleepover because his companion went and spent the night in the hospital with our zone leader who is really sick. So that was fun! haha. But Christmas and new year is not a good thing for the mission. It was such a rough week for many reasons but mainly because we had zero success. Everybody leaves and those who stay don't want to talk with the missionaries! And I locked the keys in the house 2 times. haha. I imagine this week will be similar with new years, we get to be in house nice and early both days I believe. yay. Today we spent the day with Elder Rodriguez and the Elders of Centenario in his area. We had a new years party and ate pizza and cake, then went for tacos, Walmart, and had a good time. haha. (see pics)

Everything is going really good with Elder Bocanegra, I really like him a lot. He actually has a sense of humor.  haha. I am getting better at understanding him, and teaching him a lot of English, he is learning fast. I still teach most of the lessons, but the parts he teaches, he teaches really good. (not too hard when you actually speak the language, I don't feel bad ha).

Church was a bit rough as well, lots of people were gone, and we only had 25 people there. Me and Elder Bocanegra taught the 3rd hour combined class about the 2nd coming. The piano lady was gone too so I had to play all the hymns, lucky I knew them all.

The day after Christmas we went to Ivan's and they made us Pazole. Probably one of my favorite dishes here. It is a corn soup/broth thing with shredded chicken then you put in salsa, onion, lettuce, cheese (the good creamy crumbly white stuff), and eat with with tostadas and cream. Super good.

SO um Nichole, this is for you. I have already set up a marriage for you with Elder Rodriguez. Its official and there is nothing you can do about it. :) Hes on board. haha He is so funny, he speaks English, and is coming to BYU for school. He has houses in Ixtapa, Mexico City, Cancun, and Central Park NYC. He has already traveled all over the world, and is gonna be a super successful businessman. So um ya he will be sending the ring in the mail. hahaha.

Oh so today we were in a mall and I saw a scale in the GNC store and I weighed myself and I have gained 10 pounds. Its not good. haha

So, Mother for the valentines package. . umm. . You can put Joshua in charge of this but I want music, on just a usb stick. I have a speaker. I want good church music, not just hymns, like piano guys, and the kind of music they have on lds.org. Also church movies that I can watch! Like the Otherside of Heaven, Legacy, those things. Also Pens. (Pilot G-2 05 in black and blue). And pics! Like from Christmas and things. Maybe you could send a mini photo album or a binder with sleeves or something with them :) Umm. . But that is all my requests.  I like surprises :)

Well I believe that is all I have to say, I hope you all have a happy new year I will be thinking of you and I will probably just be eating my feelings away with my Christmas chocolate sitting in my hard metal chair watching some church movie :)

Con Mucho Amor,

Elder Elgan

Feliz Navidad

Pamelas baptism (Ivan and Syra)

Some pics from today, we had 6 of us in a tiny taxi, hahaha

 Me and Elder Rodriguez, my fav Mexican missionary 

(from Ixtapa, speaks English, going to BYU)

Back left is Bocanegra

Well it has been another crazy week, what with changes and everything. So we had changes on Tuesday, and I  said goodbye to Hernandez, . . SO during changes President calls my name and I stand up and he says so. . here is your story. Your comp isn't here yet and is coming from Columbia at 2 o'clock in the morning. So for the rest of the day I got to be companions with the assistants to the President (one is Elder Gillis my old DL). And I had to get up at a lovely 1:30 in the morning to go to the airport to get my companion. It was a long day. . haha.  But I didn't even see him for the whole next day either because he had to go to downtown MC to do his visa stuff. . but anyways his name is Elder Bocanegra. He is Colombian, and his Spanish is different. I seriously feel like I am back to square one with Spanish, because it is so hard to understand him. But other than that I really like him a lot! He is pretty funny and we get along well. During changes I also saw Elder Farnsworth! He said I look like I have filled out a lot. Freakin Farnsworth don't tell me that, haha I also found one of the new white sisters that I went to school with. But so far the training is going really good but it is hard work! This week has been really really busy and a bit stressful as well. It would make it so much easier if I could just communicate fluently with him, but oh well one day.

So we had 2 more baptisms this week! We baptized Pamela. It was a miracle because we have been waiting so long for her to make the decision. Her dad is Ivan, who is an awesome recent convert, and her mom is Syra who hasn't come to church in years, but Syra was really excited about the baptism and is starting to be active again and has the goal to enter the temple with Ivan and their family. So I'm really excited for them. We had her baptism on Saturday and Elder Hernandez got the permission to come and baptize her which is what she wanted because he baptized her dad, and she was really adamant about following the example of her dad.  We also baptized a kid named Brawlio. He just turned 8 so it wasn't a convert baptism, but oh well. Right before his baptism he really hurt his neck somehow and was crying crying for the whole thing. But he was really excited and was a trooper and made it through. Before he didn't know if he could do the baptism so I pulled him aside and talked to him and asked if we could say a prayer for him to feel better. We did, and he made it through. It was funny when they got in the water (Bocanegra baptized him), Eld Boc said ok now we are going to say the prayer he said, yo lo ofresco, which means I will offer it. haha he always wants to say the prayers. After he came out of the water he said the water took away my pain! I was thinking it was all in his head because he is kind of a whiny child but by the time he changed and came back out he was crying again, so hopefully it wasn't too serious. But ya this weekend was busy trying to organize both the bap. services, filling the font (which takes forever here), preparing a Christmas talk for Sacrament meeting, and trying to train a noob. 

On Friday we had our Christmas party so in the morning we got to go to the temple! So that was definitely the highlight of the week, Such an awesome experience (but when isn't the temple an awesome experience??). The Mexico City temple is huge, and really pretty but it will be cool to go through it in 2015 after it has been remodeled. Everything was in Spanish which I was a bit worried about, but I understood everything. I definitely needed some extra help with things but it was all good. After we had a big lunch in the stake center by the Temple and a talent show from the missionaries. We ate tacos, and Elder Bocanegra couldn't eat them because they were too spicy. haha He cannot handle even the littlest amount of spice. And everything is spicy here so that is gonna be fun for him. But after the activity we went to the offices and I got my Christmas package! Yes it made it to me! Safe and sound.

Yesterday was really, really busy like I said with 2 confirmations (Rodolfo and Pamela), my Christmas talk, gospel principles class, organizing Brawlios baptism, and to top it all off we ate with Hermana Lucy. She gave us so much food, Elder Bocanegra couldn't even make it to the main course! haha. It was a huge bowl of sopa, tortas, rice, more tortas, and milonesia. Definitely the best she has given us so far. We also had a really good lesson with 2 of our investigators, Marlen and Ofelia, in between it all. I felt really good because they are hard core bible chicas, and I was able to answer all their questions, and I taught all of the restoration lesson (without the help of blackmouth). So yes it has been . . busy.

Today was a good day as well. we woke up, cleaned the house, went to a zone meeting, then went with some other Elders to Walmart and ate Dominos for lunch and bought some food. We came back to the area, locked the keys in the house, got a haircut, and now I'm here writing.

I cant believe it is Christmas eve tomorrow. It doesn't feel like it at all. I can't even remember what snow feels like, I miss it. haha. I just want Christmas to be over so I don't have to miss home anymore. haha. But it will be good, the 24 is really the holiday here in Mexico, not so much the 25. Everyone just drinks and parties all night, so I have some good street crazies to look forward to. haha. I think we have to be in house at 6 both nights.

So for Christmas. . I will be calling/skyping at around 3ish my time. We are going to eat with the Eldas at 2, then call after so that is 2 o'clock in the afternoon for you guys? so ya. I'm super excited to skype though, I have been looking forward to it for a long time. I figure that will be a better time of day than when Josh called. haha. I will try to figure out a skype account now. So. . see you guys Wednesday!

Love you all so much and hope you have a veerry Merry Christmas!

Elder Elgan