Feliz Navidad

The baptism of Librada! (Last week)

Cocodrilo, jekar'a, whatever it is, there's a million of them and there is a lake in the middle of town where everybody goes to feed them (Similar to a duck pond) 

Play timmeeeee




Hello everyone, hope you are enjoying the nice weather up there! Hit 48 degrees celsius on christmas hahaha (about 110ish) 

The Navidad was good this year! We had to spend it in our house because it's a bit dangerous to leave during the day. Sooooo lasying on my bed, nothing to do but think about blessed christmas in the United States was not the ideal way to spend it! haha But Skyping the fam sure helped. We had the activity of christmas in Ita this year! (My town) So 250 missionaries all came here to our church and partied it up for a day. It was a blast! We played capture the flag, soccer, volleyball, and ate a bunch of food. Sooooooo yeah well spent. We played so hard in fact, that we were both sick (My comp and I) this week haha Sooooo we have had heardly any time to visit people. We did however, have a baptism this week!! WHOOOOOOO (The pic is of the chicka who got baptised 2 weeks ago) AND.... I have a new comp! We had our changes today, so my old comp left, and I had to go to Asuncion at 3 in the morning to get my new one. He is way cool! His name is Elder Alvarado, and is from Peru. He only has 6 months in the mission haha But I am so stoked to get out and work with him! My old comp was ALWAYS talking about home, and was really getting lazy there at the end. So I'm excited to get out with my new comp and work as hard as we can so I can forget about how great snow is! ha He is 19 years old, and from Peru. Doesn't speak a lick of English! But yeah, that's about all that happened this week. I hope your christmas's were a little more eventfull! 

Love you all, 

Elder Horton

Mangoes and Mandioca and..... Chicken Hearts

The mission changes people...

The field is white and ready to harvest plus your average Paraguayan house in the background  

TENEMOS FUEGO  hahaha still haven't cleaned up the scorch marks!  

Bienvenidos my friends and family! This week has been SO much better. Much hotter than before, but much more succesful and rewarding!
First of... Mangos and Mandioca! This time of year is mango season here in Paraguay. The streets are lined with Mango trees, and it's too convenient to not come home every night with a big old bag of Mangos! We've been eating em like crazy, they are TOO good haha PLUS everyone here seems to be just a bit too short to pick the good ones... haha! Finally my height has come in handy down here. Aaaaand Mandioca! We have eaten a lot this week in the houses of members, and we always eat mandioca with whatever they have prepared. It's a very traditional food down here! Evreyone eats it with everything. It's not good at all, it's a bit liek a potato, but much more dense and even less flavor haha But it fills you up so fast! Aaaand it's basically dirt cheep. The chicken hearts are a favorite of my comp! He eates them (So I end up eating them) every Monday! Yummmmm

This week has been really nice haha I feel myself starting to get lost in the work more and more every day! I taugh my fist lesson completely by myself yesterday, (With a little help from my comp haha ) But my spanish is coming along faster than I expected it to! My training ends in a week and a half... AH! Then I have the responsability of needing to know everything... AHHHH! haha NAhhhh I'm not too worried. My comp has a 90 percent chance of getting transferred this month, So I'm expecting a new comp! 

We had one day this week were all we did was walk. (And of course it was the hottest day of the week) We were searching for a family inactive that we found in our area book, and spent a solid 3 hours walking up and down dirt roads, past acres of farms looking for this person, but never fund her! After that, we had to walk another hour to reach an appointment we had set for that night, and that fell through, so we just ened up walking back to our house (Another hour) because we had interviews at the church! haha My legs hurt too bad the next day. 

This week was still pretty good! We found 3 really great families, and two of them attended church this sunday. They are too awesome! I have loved getting to know them, and they really have made me feel more at home. Aaaaaand we had a baptsim this week WOOOOOOO hahaha That was too cool. Pictures attached!.. maybe next time haha  She is way cool, 24 years old, and has 2 kids. (Not anything to rare here in Paraguay) 

Love you guys! Hope the weather cools down for you guys back home. 

Piatacopio

This week... Was tough! haha Not gonna lie. It started off great! Buttttt then went downhill. Let me back up a bit. Soooo my comp got called as Lider of our District, so we have been traveling almost everyday to do interviews the past few weeks. This, combined with my extra hours of being trained had left us with hardly any time to get out and teach our investigators. Our two baptisms that we were going to have last week BOTH didn`t end up going down. One of them disapeared haha We can`t find here for anything! The other, we aer still having to work with her on a few things, but is going it hopefully be baptised this Saturday! Soooooo it`s been a bit tough. haha Lot`s of walking too! It`s supposed to get super extremely hot this summer, and on wednesday or thursday, we were sitting at 40 degrees celsius in the shade!! It was tough for sure ha And Fast Sunday in the heat is one of the hardest things to go through haha So yeah! That was my weak.

It`s still been fun! (At times) We did some service this week and helped a member fix his motorcycle. It is really intereting how the Lord has prepared me to be exactly what some of these people need. Like the skills I learned from fixing my neighbours Motorcycle, has really been put to use! Because, welllll everyone hs a motorcycle here haha And how I used to always build forts! That has already come in handy too much while helping construct sketchy jungle homes hahaha But that`s something that I`ve noticed a lot lately. Just little things like that! ha

At first, the mission felt like a dream somehow! Like it a numb reality. But with every day, it starts feeling more and more normal, and that my life back home was all just a dream hahaha It`s weird to explain, but that`s just how it is. Honestly, it really has been super tough ha But with all of these challeges, I have learned so much! The language barrier is starting to loosen up, and I am feeling like I can now communicate pretty much everything I want to say. With that abiity has come with a LOT of work! ha There is a girl who arrived here in Paraguay in the same group as me. She is in our district, and has been struggling with her spanish. Our Zone leaders have asked if me and my comp could meet with her and her comp three times a week so I could help her out! That has been a lot of fun actually, I enjoy helping her learn.

So today! Today is December 8th, and is a day of celebration (ish) here in Paraguay. Some holy santo virgin thing for the catholic church is going down in a city next to us, and EVERYONE goes. Businesses close, and the busses are packed to get to this event. It`s loco! Haha It`s like nothing I have every seen before. And all to worship some statue! 

Well family and friends, thanks for the emails! I love you guys a ton. 

Elder Horton

Mbae Chapa Chida'a

Us pre-chowing down in some members house

It's been a bit rainy here this week (dirt roads turn into streams)

Hola! Que tal mis amigos? This week has been rather normal ha Nothing too crazy happened, sorry to dissapoint. Oh! Something funny did happen last night. We were planning for today, when we heard a ton of noise coming from our bedroom. My comp runs over to see what was going on, and I was right behind him. I thought for sure someone was in our room robbing us, so I was super panicking! haha Turns out it was just a bird that flew in and was knocking stuff over hahaha Phew! We caught him and put it in the apartment of the other missionaries. haha

Our baptism/wedding that we were planning for this week didn't end up going through! Turns out two teenage boys don't make the best marriage councelors hahaha I guess people need for convincing than just simply telling them "The Bible tells us we need to get married" haha The chicka still wanted to get baptised, so we convinced her to move out (Separate) herself from her partner and so she is going to get baptised this week for sure! She is way cool. She is 19 years old, and already has 2 kids, which honestly is pretty normal down here. She has two brothers that are members, but inactive! We have another baptism this week too. It's another girl, that is 24 years old. She is the sister of David, that kid that we baptised about a month ago! She has been a bit tough ha But, we helped her all this week on how to recognize that the libro de mormon is true. She also had problems with the word of wisdom and law of chastity! We Challenged her last night to get baptized this Saturday, adn she accepted. It was so relieving! haha We have worked super hard on helping her. 

This week, we ran into someone who doesn't believe in God! It was my comps first in his mission! haha So that tells you something about the people here. I haven't talked much about my comp huh! He is way cool. We get along super well, and talk a ton ha He has a bit of an interesting story. He is from Peru, and grew up a member. He moved out of his house at the ageof12 to live on his own in another city (Never told me why). He lived on his own, and worked at a grocery store while going to school as well. He was inactive at this time, until he turned 20. He was involved in some pretty crazy stuff ha (Gangs) But he wasn't happy, and left that life in puruit for something different. He moved back to Lima, where two missionaries met with him, re activated him, and then he left to serve a mission. He is SUCH a good teacher, and I have learned a ton from him!

We have been instructed by the quorum of the twelve to use a video this month in helping invite others to be baptised. It is called El es la Dadiva, or he is the gift! It's super cool, and works like a charm. We have already used to set dates for baptism for 10 people! We have 15 people with baptismal dates in the month of December. Go check out the video! It's way awesome. My scripture of the week is definitely Alma 37:35-47. Super awesome! Talks about the LIahona, and how we simply can't get lazy in obeying and acting on the words of the prophets.

Love you guys a ton! Hope you had a fantastic Thanksgiving. 

Elder Horton

Pre-taking out the pique! haha (Me trying to look tough)