Some Interesting Pictures

Alright we had a really good week this week!  We were able to get out and visit some really cool people!  Laura is still progressing really well!   She is the best member in our ward!  She actually is like looking for references and just doing awesome!  We will probably end up moving her fecha up just because of how great she is!  I don't know this whole writing thing is really hard because I feel like the same things just happen and I am really like out of things to write about!  

We have found a few great news this week and we are hoping for the best with them!  We are going to work hard with the little bit of time that we have this week!  It is going to be another crazy one! Tomorrow we are cleaning out houses, Thursday Polanco and Friday taking Laura to the visitors center!  I am really excited to see how she likes it!  

My new comp is pretty great!  Elder Olson from Farmington Utah!  We have some fun and it is nice that we get along because we will probably be comps for a little while....  Everything is going great over here in Leandro Valle!  

Last week was super crazy!  Sorry I just didn't have time to be able to write!  We had them (the new missionaries) all here and they all wanted to write and I just had my cycle close for getting all of the money in and so it was a stressful week!  This week should be less stressful!  As far as that I don't think there is much more to catch you guys up on!  I guess the only thing could be that our ward now has home teaching and so we are taking steps in the right direction!  

I love you guys have a good week!

Love,

Elder Orchard

(I got pictures but no explanation.  I sure am curious about these!)

I Get Another New Comp Tomorrow

Sorry things have been kind of crazy today!  The news (new missionaries...this week is transfers) are good and I only have a little time to write today!  This week has gone good!  We have tried to work really hard and have had a little bit of success!  We have met some new people and they seem really cool!  More coming on that later!  I also don't have time to respond to everyone!  Sorry but things are crazy!  We have been training people all day about things and we have eaten a lot!  Not the best food but that is okay!   

Laura is still progressing really good!  She is saying that she spends an hour a day reading the book of mormon and just making sure that she understands!  She is soooo awesome and she is progressing sooo good!  

I get another new comp tomorrow and I have tons of work so that should be interesting!  I will have to work like crazy today for it!  But things are going good here!  Hopefully next week I will have more to tell you guys but at least I sent some good pictures!  I am still loving my time!  Crazy to think that Norr is leaving soon and that things are going to get a little more dependent on me!  That is okay I think that I can do it! If not I will call him!  haha We are having a good week planned and then things will get a little more back to normal!  

I love you have a good one!

Elder Orchard

(I did not get those "good" pictures Elder Orchard mentioned.  I will share a few I found after the fact from previous weeks.)

Sister Stutznegger put this cute pic on Facebook.

**Pics finally came:)  The captions are mine, not Elder Orchard's.

Playing Settlers of Catan, one of our favorites!

Elder Norr's countdown chain.

Torta

Always eating!

Wear At Your Own Risk

Just pulled a fast one on all you guys!  They just changed my P day back to Monday!  At least that is what the assistants have told us!  So I am on here early this week!  This week was short since we are writting early but we saw a ton of miracles and were truly blessed!  Sorry these thoughts are going to be random but here we go!

Alright so first of all they saced out the other missionaries from our ward so we are the only missionaries there as of right now and we only work the afternoons so talk about a lot of work!  The good news though is that we have a bigger area to try and find some people!  And because of that it really helps us with less actives that we can go find!  We got a list of everyone in both areas and we are going to go try and reactivate some families.  Things are all good in leandro valle!

This week we had even less time to work than usual!  We watched the missionary last week on Monday and then P-day on Wednesday and we went to Polanco (to get Visas) on Thursday so that was a whole day trip!  So we really struggled to try and find time to work!  We end the week on Saturday and we had only gotten 13 lessons(that was more than I thought we were going to get.  Luckily we had a good Friday).  So we just kind of said okay whatever happens tomorrow happens!  We get to church and twelve less actives come like four different families and things were good! Laura our super chosen investigator made it to church before we did and as a ward we had more than 50 people and that was the first time I have seen that here!  We were truly blessed from what we did through the week!  And everyone we are teaching is progressing at this point!  So things are going awesome!  We put a fecha with Laura last weekend but that is going to get moved up here in a little bit I think!  But as of right now it is on the 22 of August.  However she reads the Book of Mormon every day for at least an hour!  The next step is to get her kid animated and get him coming to church with her!  I am super excited for the week we have to work and go find some news!

Short side funny story.  We were at Polanco and we saw missionaries from the north mission.(Other missions kind of look down on our mission and think we aren't as good as them who knows why) and this kid sees my watch and he starts freaking out he was like what they heck you guys can wear watches?  And I was like yeah why wouldn't we be able to?  And this kid was freaking out about how we could wear watches and I was like it is wear at your own risk just because I wear it doesn't mean it won't get stolen!  It was just funny he was acting like it was some great thing and some really bad thing!  Alright that should be all. I can't think of anything else that could have happened so have a good one! 

Love you guys

Elder Orchard

Celebrated the 4th and Pulled an All-Nighter

Currently eating a torta de tamal which is amazing! 

Anyways this week was kind of exhausting! I got to catch up on a lot of sleep today which was nice and much needed!  We had an amazing week with the little time that we had to work!  We have found another really cool little family of two.  The mom contacted us once we got off of the bus!  It was actually a really cool story once she told it to us! She said that she was wanting to talk to us but she was scared and embarrassed to say anything because she didn't know what to say to us!  So she finally decided if we got off at the same stop it would be a sign from God and she would talk to us!  Okay that is her side of the story and a little background!  Now from our side, we were going to lunch and weren't really paying attention and forgot where we were at!  When we realized we passed the street we got off at the next stop we could and then this girl contacts us and was like ¨so I haven't been baptized when are you guys going to come by my house?¨  We put a cita and then went back a few days later and it turns out she is sooooooo chosen!  Since Saturday she is already on chapter 17 of 1st Nephi.  That was yesterday when she told us!  She said she loves what we are teaching and she does all her homework!  It is nice!  She has a son who also likes to listen and who thinks things through a lot! It is an amazing family!  Things are going great here in the Agricola Oriental! 

So we had a nice celebration of our great country!  We sang the national anthem, had a BBQ and just really enjoyed ourselves!  I sent home tons of pictures of it so I will leave it up to you guys to sort through the good ones and put up the ones that you want!  So we had a major party for that!  Pasta Salad, Jello thing, chips, burgers, brats, everything!  We know how to party that is for sure!  We went all out America ties and everything! (Elder Orchard did not write the captions to any of the pictures. They are strictly the observations of his mother:))

What is wrong with this picture?  It looks nothing like a nice, safe outdoor location.  Is that a washer and dryer I see??

I'm pretty sure I see that same washer and dryer in the background and now the grill is fully lit.  Um......?????

I proudly claim that handsome Elder in the front:)

Not sure who planned this party but it makes a mother's heart proud.  Great job Elders!  It looks like you remembered everything.

Do I spy pineapple on that bun?  Douglas has NEVER eaten pineapple in his life.  I think he has embraced his new culture!

Elder Blotter

Elder Norr and Elder Orchard

If you look at the top of the picture on the far end of the table you will spot the "Jello thing" Elder Orchard referred to.

So then on Monday we get a call from Pres and he is like we had an Elder try to commit suicide last night so I need you guys to come over to my house and watch him today and tomorrow before he flies home!  You guys are on suicide watch!  Well we had to stay up all night to make sure that things were good!  He let us watch the Disney movies he had there so we watched the Lego Movie, Frozen and Monsters Inc before the night was over!  And then we played a lot of Monopoly!

The mission home

The mission home

The mission home

The mission kitchen

The mission home

The mission home

The mission home

The mission home

The mission home

The mission home

Pulling an all-nighter!  Monsters, Inc.

Frozen

Elder Blotter, my comp

Trying to stay awake!

It was fun but yesterday was so hard to work!  We got back to the offices after dropping the Elder off and Pres was like go sleep until you guys have to leave to the food!  So we got like a four hour nap before we had to head out and work!  And then today we got to sleep in and we will probably take a nap again!  Then tomorrow we have to go to Polanco and do Visa things all day!  So we have super busy weeks! Sleep is not always easy to come by!  But I am loving what I do and am having the time of my life!  

Have a good week and I love you!

Elder Orchard

Elder Orchard has missed Mountain Dew.  It is hard to come by.  I am not sure where he found this but he looks happy about it!

Thanks For All of Your Love and Support

This week has absolutely flown by!!  We have been working hard trying to find some people!  We may not have tons of investigators but we are working hard!  We had some really cool less actives show up at church on Sunday that we have been visiting!  He just totally came and was like yeah here I am again!  He was like the first person there to set up chairs and he was the first person to offer and help us do divisions!  It was really cool! 

We had zone conferences and those were awesome!

About the suit Douglas is wearing:  I did a little bit of trading with my suit that didn't fit anymore to get one that did fit!  I like this one better and so it was a good trade right!

Pres is so funny!  He gets so animated to talk with us and I just always end cracking up!  He is like running around while he is teaching us and jumping and talking about his cars and counting down time left and it just makes me laugh!  He is awesome!  I am lucky to get to work so close to him!  He always is saying how the YSA are just like overgrown laurals and priests!  He is always making us laugh without knowing it or doing it on purpose!  I am sorry I have like nothing good this week!  I don't have much time right now!  And we had a slow week!

Last week we found 8 news and we taught the most lessons that have been taught here in awhile.  At least for the office missionaries!  We had set the goal on Sunday that we were going to find ten news this week and that we were going to set seven fechas and so we were just working hard!  We also decided to contact a full street in our area!  So we started praying to find it!  At the end of a few days we were all on the same page of what street it was going to be!  So we set out to contact it and we literally contacted everyone on this street!  I mean everyone...doors, people walking, rateros, Catholics, Christians, everyone!  And we get done and not a single person accepted us!  It was kind of disappointing and we were feeling kind of down but then out of nowhere we get to Friday and we had found five people and we were kind of sad with that!  Then we get a miracle family that was a reference and we got a couple more news out of that!  It was awesome to see that we worked hard and although we may not have found news the way we thought we were going to we were able to see the Lord's hand in our work!  

Thanks for all your love and support!  I love you guys and I will talk to you again next week!  Hopefully we will have a good week and then I will have better stories and things next week!

Love,

Elder Orchard

Pics of the mission office which is also Elder Orchard's home.

I asked Douglas to tell me about his responsibilities as the Financial Secretary and this was his response:

My responsibilities are everything that has to do with the finances of the mission!  I have to make sure missionaries get their ajuste in the middle of the month.  The monthly gets sent automatically by the church I have to send the rent!  I don't really balance the cards of the missionaries because they are just debit cards but I do have to balance the card of Sister Stutz and Pres. Stutz.  I have to make sure that they have everything accounted for.  Anytime they buy something on their card I have to classify it and upload a receipt and all sorts of stuff like that!  If they sac out money then I have to make sure I have receipts showing where they spent it all!  I also have a card that I use for mission things that I have to do the same!  In an average month I can send out around a million pesos in everything!  I have to pay all the bills for water and gas and light!  I have to pay for the visas and make sure all the money is in order!  It is kind of crazy!