Keep prayin'

Hey Family,

How is everyone doing?

I am doing really good this week. It had its ups and its downs but it was good.

Tuesday i taught Brandon and Vianney, 2 kids of a member. I told them that they could move the baptism for this past sunday. they said no. the daughter said that she didnt want to get baptized. She is siding with her mom who isnt a member and doesnt want to get baptized but is willing to change everything. She quit drinking coffee. She is trying to come to church when she doesnt work. i just dont understand 100%. oh well. we are going to keep working with them and try and shoot for the baptism this sunday.

Wednsday we had district meeting and i realized how lazy i have gotten and my animo as it is called here has fallen slightly. i am going to change that and work harder. I am asking all of you to ask me every once in a while. how obedient i am being. how hard i am working. i need help. my companions try but doesnt help as much as i thought they would. so i have motivated my self and hope and pray that you will and can help.

Here is a lot different then california. The professional level is a lot lower. In california when president entered we stood and we shook his hand and such. but here no. we had transfer meetings and president entered and i reacted and stood up with other missionaries that were in california with me. missionaries stared at us for a while. We realized that it wasnt needed. we sat back down. Missionaries are lazy here too. i am shocked. I talked with the APs about it all and the differences and what not and they said that i should do everything i did in fresno. They hope that the five of us can rub off on the other 200ish missionaries here. good luck right. we are going to try everyting we can.

Anyway transfers were this week. everyone thought that i was going to leave the area. everyone thought that i was as good as gone. sadly my companion elder abbot left and i got a new comp and am opening up a closed area. i am not really all that excited for it. hopefully i can remember where everyone lives. i hope i can remember where we live haha. the lord will bless i know it. everyone thinks that i will be district leader next transfer. the APs keep saying that. I really dont want to be leadership. i just want to do my missionary job.
Oh i worked with an elder named elder montes a bunch this week. he is from mexico city. it was really fun to work with him but he has a hard area. not a lot of success there. His companion is an office elder and had to go down south to do audit stuff for a branch. i guess the mission is in charge of all of that. i didn't know that.

I love you all ever so much and i hope that you are all doing well. i hope that you are all reading the book of mormon. it makes a difference in how you do everything in life without you even noticing. I finished the book of mormon right before i got here, literally i finished on the plane. Anyway i quit reading it and have been reading the Doctrine and convenants. i am about to finish that. however i realized i love my animo when i quit reading the book of mormon. so i am going to start in spanish and read it everyday and try and understand it. for the most part i can so we will see. i love you all take care. the church is true. the book of mormon is true. Joseph smith is the prophet of the restoration. We have a prophet on the earth today. and it isnt the one we taught the other day in her front yard. haha. i love you lots take care. pray for me.

Love

Elder Paskett

Cold Nights

Hey family,

How is everyone doing ? Good I hope.

This week has been really really rough. For those who thought that Mexico couldn’t get cold, for those that thought who uses sweaters in Mexico. It is cold. Freaking cold. We live in a Mexican house, which means we don’t have insulation. So our house is literally a freezer at night. I wake up in the middle of the night and I can see my breath. I have never worn so many clothes when I go to bed. Not even on Klondike haha. The next thing that goes wrong this week. We have very low to no water pressure in the house this week. Sometimes we cant even get water out of the out side faucet to fill a bucket up to do dishes. We have had to go to the offices everyday to shower and prep for the day. It is a pain and cost a lot to take a taxi. One day we went to the mission home and prepped there. When I got into the shower I noticed there was a huge puddle by the toilet next to the shower. When I analyzed the bathroom a little more I noticed everything was dripping wet, the ceiling, walls, toilet paper rolls the windows, everything. I showered; which was a cold shower and was heading down stairs to tell president. He was walking up the stairs already. My companion had already told him. We came to the conclusion that the elder that showered before us left the hot water on all day/night to make it a giant steam room. I helped pres clean up and what not and left for the normal day of work.

so it has been like that pretty much every morning. Tuesday was leadership training for my companions. I went with elder Lopez and elder Scothorne for the day. It was pretty much boring. They are a struggling companionship. We didn’t really get a lot done. That night I went out with a member to teach my first lesson solo. My companions were at counsel with the stake president talking about the area. I went with a member to visit the Acosta Family. The husband is a recently activated member. The kids and the mom aren’t members. I taught the restoration and we watched the short version of the Joseph Smith movie. It was going really good. I asked them if they wanted to get baptized they said yes. Woot woot right? i told them that we could have a baptismal service the 20^th of February and when I said that the mom changed her mind. Of course I freaked out usually my companion took care of concerns but I didn’t have a missionary companion. Luckily I had a member who is awesome he helped a lot. The kids are going to get baptized but the mom doesn’t have a date. We are still teaching her and everything but still is stubborn and is going with her catholic traditions.

Antonio, came to church this Sunday. He has a baptismal date for the 20^th. He is doing really well. He is open at expressing his doubts which is really good. However he feels that he won’t be ready for the 20^th. He thinks that there is so much to know and so much to understand. We told him to relax and just pray for the help. I get nervous when teaching when they feel like that. I am not a perfect teacher so I don’t know if I am really answering the questions that they have, especially since I don’t even know if I understood the question haha.

Sunday was slightly depressing. It is my least favorite day of the week. It is the day we see if our baptismal dates are going to make it or not. As usual out of the 10 or so people that we have with dates only 3 came. luckily the day picked up after church. Elder Pedraza and I went out and contacted like crazy and taught lots of lessons on the street. It was really cool. Him and I were able to complete all the goals we had for the week. We were able to set a few baptismal dates on the street in our lessons hopefully they are solid contacts and such.

Anyway that is pretty much the highlight of the week. I hope all is well at hope. I pray for you all. I love you lots. Take care.

Con Amor,

Elder Paskett