December 30, 2013

wow i felt a little depressed about sunny... but its for the best. so i had an interesting week. with christmas and chrstmas eve and the 15 años with the mafia its been pretty exciting.

but we will start with tuesday.
tuesday. we had a christmas eve with the familia uribe. it was fun about half of the people there were lds like i said and we had a good time. i learned that christmas in mexico has the significance of party and then some. but we had to be in our house before 9 30 so it wasnt super crazy. but we broke piñatas and i ate this gross food that to me was like cat food and seaweed. it was bien feyo for lack of better words.

wednesday. chrstmas christmas time is here time for joy and time for cheer... i woke up christmas morning did all of our family rituals and had a good morning. i cant complain. we made lasagna for chrstmas it was so good. then we went and visited an hermana that is inactive and hasnt been to church for a long time. it was a great lesson all we talked about was the meaning of christmas but the spirit was there. we went back to the solanos house and they were watching the hobit. but not just watching it but watching it in 3D iresisted the temptation to put on the glasses but i listend to it while we talked with the family adn the little kids.

thursday. we had a really bad day for teaching lessons and it was really cold. at least cold for here. so we talked with some members after all of our apointments fell.

friday. we had lessons with members and a few less actives but it was another slow day.

saturday was crazy. we started the day off in tanque 2 and the family that i told you guys about invited us to a 15 años but in the night we told them we would stop by and eat a little food and then leave if we came and they said that was just fine.  so we went to san isidro the other hill in  my area. we talked with an hermano who was menos activo. and it went well after we went to search for our other less active lessons and they  were going to the visitors center.. i figured that was a good enough excuse. so we went to the 15 años at 7 30 and ate what seemed like shredded pork tacos they were pretty good. then we talked with the family members that we knew and one of them the "gordito" said hey jenson you have to talk to my nices they speak english. they were from california, fresno. and thats about all i know because the music was loud and we left right after that. but it was a good experience to have i dont think i will go to another one on my mission but there are better places for missionaries to be.

sunday. we went to church and ate with the president after the block. it was fun to talk with him and his family. about half of them are less active. but he is a good guy and always invites us to talk to his family. we left and went and taught two other lessons it went great.

and today in the morning we went to the gym as a district and my arms are paying it i did a bunch of different bench excercises and tomorow i dont think i will be able to move my arms but thats fine.

well thats about all that happened thiss week it was great to talk to you guys and i hope that you all have a wonderful new year. love you all tons and i will write you in a week. !

December 23, 2013

hey well it sounds like its been pretty hectic around there. jordan hijole be careful! and its great to hear about all of your great accomplishments. this was a week that i learned a lot from. and i had some wonderful experiences.

tuesday we went in divisions. i went with elder Ioane again and we worked our tails of in his area. we taught three lessons and we brought two other young men from the branch give them the opportunity to experience missionary work. we had an awesome night. i felt like i was with three brand new missionaries and really all four of us could be considered new missionaries. but we had the spirit with us while we taught. one of the lessons one young man shared his testimony of the atonement. and the other talked about the strength that preparing for a mission gave him. i know the less active miembros enjoyed our message. but what we gained more than anything in this night was that these two young men were excieted to go on a mission. derek if you have the opportunity to go with the missionaries before your mission GO! it was great i wish i had the opportunity to go before my mission. but that was tuesday,

miercoles. we finished divisions and i was back to walking up and down hills all day. we taught two lessons this day and the hermana solano had to go to the hospital because she had som hernias. it was a pretty good day.

thursday. we went to the top of both hills in our area this day to look for refrences. and you know what happend we didnt teach one lesson but asi es la vida if you know what i mean dad. we did find a new family to teach and i want you to look for there house. the live in a wood house at the end of the street tanque II. it was so cool to finaly find a full family to teach this will be my first one.! we also taught a lesson in the night with an investigator about the word of wisdom. and this woman from the time we started teaching her said im catholic and i was born that way, and i  plan to die that way. This lesson her heart was softened. she explained feelings of joy of how the church had changed her childrens lives and that little by little she wanted to change. it was an awesome night and her daughter who was in the lesson with us was super excited when we talked with her after.

friday. WE WENT TO THE TEMPLE!!!!! and it was great im so glad i have been here for 4 months because i could understand everything. we had an activity after and had a talent show it was a riot! all of the fun ended at about 3 and we went to work after that. mainly inviting people to our christmas activity saturday which was great.

saturday. in the morning we went to tanque 2 and visited the family we had a good lesson on the restauration. and they were very excited with what we taught other than the whole no worshiping the virgin guadalupe. but after we talked for a little while they were ok with that too. after that we talked with a family that im pretty sure is like a mofia family. but i will explain mor about them when i know them better. and in the night we had our ward Christmas party. it was great fun and we had some investigators in the church.

sunday. we went to church. and after church we went caroling with the youth. everyone we visited cried becuse the spirit was there strong. i was so greatful for our chance to do service with the youth it was a blast and we visited like 8 families. 4 or 5 in tola and 3 or 4 in san juanico. my area.

hope that you guys have a great week again im going to try and call you with skype wednesday if you guys could have your emails open at around one that would be great so that if we have a problem we can work it out. love you all so much and thanks for the advice dad i know i need to do better at writing. have a wonderful christmas.!

elder jenson

I think he forgot what country he was called to.

December 16, 2013

ha ha thats so great. dont worry about savy she didnt walk home from the gym so she is not quite me yet ha ha but  its good to hear that things are fun at home. i will admit i have had many thoughts of home sickness this week because i have been away for so long but still have a lot to go and i was frustrated because we had a bad week. but alot of fun things happened this week i think that added to my frustration. it was hard that i was having fun but we werent doing very well because it felt more like a vacation then i was on a mission and this week was really slow.

but i will give a quick update.
tuesday. we had a district class and if i remember right divisions were this day too. i was with elder ioane in the night of the virgin guadalupe. it was a good break to talk english and about football we talked for a long time that night and then in the morning we jammed out to songs sung by samoans it was a good division that ended short so we are going to do them again tomorrow. im really excited for them.

wednesday. i only remember walking a ton this day. we had like one lesson it was good but im not sure why but i felt a little off this week. we followed that up by looking for people to teach. and not having success oh the joyfulness in my heart from fallen appointments.

thursday we had a decent day. but it was the same story little succes and a lot of work.

friday. friday was a break we had the stake christmas party. and it was a blast i got to talk like a gringo in the skit we did. then we ate some good snacks at the end of the party.

saturday was ok it was just a little hard because it was the same story of one lesson. but we had a great talk with a less active sister to help her feel comfortable with coming back to the church. it was a good night. but a long day. oh and in the morning we smashed piñatas ha ha it was great!

sunday. we walked a ton after church and found a bunch of people to teach but i think the learning experience for me was that i was laying on my  bed after we ate in the afternoon and felt like i just wanted to take a nap. i was just thinking why not im tired and we arent going to teach anyone and as soon as i thought that i was like i need to get out of bed and just work. we headed out to find someone to teach...we didnt teach one lesson....but we found 3 new people to teach. it was great to get a little insentive for getting out of bed and going to work.

today. well i made pancakes in the morning with a family  it was a blast. then we went to the walmart to buy some stuff. it has been a good day.

well that was my week  it was a good one just slow but dont worry i have pictures.

one quote i liked that our branch president had in his office was "el que no vive para sirvir no sirve para vivir" it made me laugh

hope you have  a great week love you tons hasta luego!

December 9, 2013

ok in my defense before you all try and kill me i wrote a letter last monday but being a considerate son that loves his family i thought oh i will wait till after the food we eat to send you guys the letter with pictures of the family we ate with. ha ha we ate at 4 and didnt finish until after six so after the following paragraph i hope you will understand why i didnt send anything. so this week you get two letters


Las palabras finales de esa nota se centran en la obediencia a la ley de Dios: “Si desea regresar a sus seres queridos con la cabeza erguida… si usted desea vivir una vida abundante— entonces observe la ley de Dios. Al hacerlo, puede sumar a las valiosas libertades que usted se esfuerza por preservar, otra sobre la cual las demás podrían depender, la libertad del pecado; ya que en verdad, ‘la obediencia a la ley es libertad’”

del discourso de L. tom Perry "la obediencia a la ley es libertad"

dad i found this while i was reading in lds.org one day. it strikes me especially hard right now as im away from my family. i have had many challenges out here that were unexpected. right now training has pushed me to just about all of my limits as i try and guide my companion and be an example. opening the area has been dificult but i have learned a ton in my personal studies. i think the christlike attribute i have obtained most in the last two weeks is pacience. my companion laughs in our lessons when i struggle with my spanish. which when i began training made me mad, and i lost confidence when i talked. but over the last week i have learned to take another route to deal with this. when he laughs i wait for him to correct my grammar and say thank you. it helps me stay focused. and keep the spirit in the lessons. we have come in contact with some new investigators this week and after starting with nothing i have been especially greatful for every lesson we have.

I am especially greatful for my family. i have read alot from liahonas in the last week every night i prepare for bed by reading 4 or 5 stories from the liahona a lot have been about families and that they are ordained of god. one of them was in august of 2011 it talked about strenght of families.

ok well here is a quick up date. this week was a little bit better in my area. we have been visiting the less actives for the most part but we are starting to get more investigators which is a blessing because i dont get any references. i got to eat chicken foot soup this week. it was a little wierd because to eat the chicken foot you had to suck the skin off the toes. ha ha but it was really good.

this week we had a pretty normal routine everyday so nothing really great happened until the weekend.
Saturday. we had to teach mutual with the young mens and young womens group we taught about different traits of missionaries and in the end we did an example of the atonement of jesus christ. it was the one where one person does pushups and the rest get to eat chocolates. i did the pushups and in the end the total was around 195. i was dying. i cranked through the first 120 but the last sixty took all i had i was exahusted. i finished and sat back on the table as i tried to explain john 3:16-17 it was really a spiritual moment some of the leaders cried and i felt like we got the message across

sunday. well i woke up and im not sure if  i have ever been so sore in  my whole life. my whole upper body hurt from the pushups the day before. but when we got to the church we had two of the less active families that we visited in the church. it was so good. elder frica and i taught the lesson in principios del evangelio. it was so good and in the end one of the hermanos that we visited gave the final prayer and started crying later talking with him i found our that today was 7 years that his mom had died. he was over come with the spirit and felt the need to change to be a better dad. it was an incredible experience.

monday. well today we went to the centro the main square in mexico city. it was so nice to see some nice things. i love my area but its a little ghetto. we had a great dinner but i had to eat mushrooms you guys would be so proud of your little missionary eating all of his least favorite foods....

ok this is the past week. tuesday let me see i walked a ton because we couldnt find anyone else to teach. and we had a class of district and ate a ton of pizza it was so good. ( for mexican pizza they dont put tomato paste on their food how wierd ) but that was sweet.

wednesday i totally had a shadrac mishack and abendigo story. ok in the mornings we have to turn on the boiler to have hot water. so it was my turn. we have kind of a crappy boiler so sometimes it doesnt start right when i want it to. so i tried the first time and got it started but for some unknown reason it turned off. so i changed it back to pilot and started it up again. only this tim i was greeted by a fireball that engulfed my whole hand part of my arm and got close to my face. i jumped back more scared than in pain but i know that when you get burned your skin only hurts a little before the blisters form. I really didnt want to look at my hand but after about 40 seconds i forced myself to. miraculosly there was thothing there. no blisters no serious burns and not a single hair in sight hahaha. i said a quick prayer of thanks that i didnt have any injuries or serious burns. after that we worked a normal day. it was good.

thursday. we walked like normal i dont really remember very much about thursday. but it was a good normal missionary day.

friday. we had a zone confrence from elder benjamin de hoyos de la setenta it was great. he taught a little about how we can work better with members and how we can be better missionaries  more or less. after we had divisions and i was with an elder whose name is elder frica. he is a negrito de dominican republic he is a riot to be with he is my district leader. it was good to have a break from training. we worked hard and testified well with each other.

saturday. this was one of those days where i realized two things. im not the smartest cookie sometimes when it comes to exercise. and second that my body is definately in missionary condition. in the morning i went running with elder frica i think it was like a mile and a half. and when i got back i was feeling really really good. so we had a good morning of studies and we got to work. we started by looking for the house in bolanos cacho #8.

THE STORY OF BOLAÑOS CACHO #8

in my area the low numbers are in the bottom of the hills. with this we can start our story.and they number their houses terribly here in mexico.
so i started looking for this house in the bottom of the hill we walked up the street and knocked on a door. a young woman opened the door and we asked if brian and kevin lived here. she said no so we asked if it was house number 8 she said yes it was but that in this street there are 2 number 8s ok. so we said thanks asked her if we could share a message with her and her family and she told us to come back next week thursday.

so elder frica and i started our journey to find the second number 8 in the street. we had to walk around a  school and almost two thirds of the way  up the mountain. panting we arrived at the second house. we knocked the door and a man answered i was overjoyed that he was in the house. so we started talking and we asked if brian and kevin were home they are like 16 and 14. he said that they didnt live here and asked what the address we had was. so i said number 8 of this street. he laughed and said here is the thing in this street there are 3 different number 8s and kindly  told us that we could find the third one almost at the top of the hill. i said thankyou offered that we could come and share a message with him and he agreed and gave us his number.  and we were on our way.

we found the third number 8 at the top of the hill just like he said we would. i was so tired. we got their and knocked on the door and what do you know it was the house of brian and kevin. but they werent there. oh how discouraging that was. we talked with a man in the house and he said we could comback another day and talk with him his family and brian and kevin. we walked back down the hill a little discouraged, and extremely tired. i ended up climbing to the top of the mountain 2 more times and when i got home my feet hurt bad. i will send you a picture that will explain why.

 when i got home i realized that in our search of brian and kevin we had found like 6 new people to teach and in my prayers i gave thanks for the chance i had to do a little extra work. it was a great experience to show me that with trials come blessings it was a great learning experience.

sunday was good i got to listen to the broadcast with a family we had a great night and watched the testiments with and investigator after.

and finally today. i played soccer and the gringos whooped the mexicans it was a great feeling (this because the gringos are underdogs... there should probably be an effort to integrate cultures rather than separate and compete against, but we'll see how the rest of the mission goes.). im deffinitely the best gringo but compared to the mexicans i look like a big lurpy white kid trying to play with all of th
e fast little black kids in vegas. it was really fun and we got to play a little basket ball to so i cant complain.

i had a good week. i love you guys and if you could send me the card with my patriarchal blessing it would be wonderful. i love you guys and hope you have a great week tty in a week!

with love and christmas spirit in great abundance
elder jenson

December 2, 2013

No letter from Brandon today : (

Nov 25, 2013

well family it sounds like you are all doing great which is great to hear. well just so you know dad im not getting fat any more these hills are ridiculous in my area. and its worse because all of the people we visit are at the tippy top of the mountain. i dont think i have ever been as tired as i was this week. between training and trying to find people to teach it was a tiring week. but im having a blast my companion is from monterrey and he is a little chubby. he was a cop before his mission and also worked as a chef but hasnt cooked anything yet... there is deffinately something wrong with our companionship... haha but really i have loved my new area. and this week i streghthened my testimony just about as much as my legs... really you dont even understand these hills are crazy...

during this week i strengthened my testimony in alot of diferent ways. one was by reading. our mission president gave me the goal to finish the book of mormon before diciembre in spanish. this week every night before i went to bed i read for about 40 minutes right now im in alma chapter 24 or close to that. its been a real strength to me to read the stories of alma and the sons of mosiah. they had so many aflicciones. and they dealt with all of them with patience. which helped me a ton as i went through this week. i also learned the lord can bless me when i give just a little more than i think i can. on tuesday night we came back home at about 7 15 because all of our appointments and people we were looking for were not home and we had an appointment with the lady that owns our house.. so we were sitting at home and all of the sudden i had the impression to search our area book one more time and our list of members close to our house.i searched diligently and marked all of the members that are in our area of the rama. i found three houses in our street of old investigators that we had searched before and they werent home and had the feeling we should go and look for these people. so we left to look for these people and found two new people to teach. it felt so good to finally catch a break in this week.

ok quick up date of the week

tuesday.. climb hills
wednesday.. climb hills
thursday.. climb hills
friday.. climb hills
saturday... climb the other hills in san isidro its a little bit mor sketchy there and also the golf course is over there... but i cant golf there because its a private club... oh sad sad day.. but we also had a fast this day and we climbed hills all day fasting. it was crazy but i felt great the whole time i fasted i was only a little thirsty after walking all after noon.
sunday. was just a nother normal day. we met with our first counselor after church it was good.
and today we went bowling it was awesome. i went with elder bowler ( yes thats his name but very ironic) and with his companion and with elder frica and elder ioane. he is a huge samoan. its great.

its been a good week i hope you guys have a good one! cuidense mucho les amo
elder jenson

finishers wanted! 10th frame...ouch

Nov 18, 2013

ha ha im starting to think like you  i woke up this morning stressing about my new (assignment?) and all the challenges of training. i love my mission i love spanish and i love my old ward and new area. i had some awesome experiences in the last week.

This week we had a lesson with felipe on monday. and talked about his baptism. i gave some words of encouragement and explained how it would bless his family  in the future. he seemed to feel the spirit and under stand a little better he got baptized last friday.

tuesday was a difficult day for me because i found out  i really had changes and not just to the other side of my area. i didnt really get to say good bye to jonathan and the family of amelia before we had changes. so we got our new companions  and elder chacon told me that jonathan was out side and wanted to say good bye. it was a little emotional for me. after a short goodbye i went to my new house. we didnt get there till 8 in the night and didnt have a cell phone so president told us to stay home. we shortly found out that we didnt have a map either. so that has been a little bit of a trial. and we have a huge area. we are in the indios verdes rama. }

Wednesday was a little slow. we had a zone meeting and after that we looked for members. thursday was the same. slow and we walked a ton. i was so tired.

Friday was awesome. we had a training for all of the trainers and their children. and i was by the temple. and i saw logan lefevre he is doing great other than he just got his back pack stolen. but other than that. great. we talked for a while and had a good time. that night felipe had his baptism and for some reason he told the people who interviewed him that he wouldnt get baptized unless i did it so that night i baptized him it was good but he was a little confused because it was so fast. so after i explained the symbolism and the covenant he made and he seemed alot more content. it finished late so i stayed the night in vergel. i talked with elder chacon a lot about training everything is good between us we left on good terms and i had a great night.

saturday was slow and sunday i gave my testimony en our branch about missionary work and how we can work together. they seemed excited to have new missionaries.

today i played soccer and got blisters but i scored a ton of goals and we beat the locals. my new zone is really cool and next week we are going bowling. i cant wait to get to work this week and i have learned that when i speak with confidence i can speak with the spirit. hope you guys have a great week love you a ton
 elder jenson

ps. i excercise every day. i think i will lose some weight in this area because we have a ton of hills.  sorry no photos i just dont use my camera because i live in areas where it might get taken but i will bring it to bowling next week.

November 11, 2013

Well this was one of those learning weeks. it started off with our investigator postponing the baptism until this week. Then i had an aweful week of searching houses for the new missionaries that are going to come to our area.  My companion and I struggled a bit that day. and so i got mad after a long day of searching the houses without success. It was a really hard day with only one lesson and a ton of walking. the next day was the same.  then our lider de zona left for home. so our other one elder Villalobos came and stayed with us for the last few days. he has been a good friend for me the last few days because I learned a lot from him we laughed a lot and i feel a lot more confident about everything. and i learned that i could speak spanish with an italian accent and it was so much fun.

Which is really good because i have been called to train and open an area. Im going to receive a new companion tomorrow how crazy is that! im super excited for  this opportunity and also a little scared but not like scared como tengo miedo mas como no siento preperado en mi español y tambien en mi enseñanzas(Not frightened, but inadequate because of my language progress and ability to teach). but im not that worried because i know that whatever i lack, if im diligent and try my hardest have the spirit in our companionship then he will learn what he is supposed to.

ok thats all the cool news i have for right now. but i want to share one more experience that i had this week. this thursday that passed i learned about prayer. first my companion lost all of his money for the month... yeah it was bad and we couldnt find it so i said a prayer and what do you know 15 minutes later i found the money in the book of mormon he was going to give away to an investigator. second. was the house... i hated looking for the house... and tuesday and wednesday we had no luck and we searched hard. and the same thursday we went to search again and i said wait we need to say a prayer ( this was after the money experience) my companion said ok what ever you want. and so i prayed that we could find a house. we found a new house to rent in thiry minutes. i know that these two experiences i had were to remind me that even when we have little problems if we ask with faith we with recieve help no problem is too small to ask for help with.

I love you guys so much and look forward to writing you guys every week. Its so great to hear about all of the blessings our family has and it was funny to hear about a dryer because no one down here has one. alot of the families dont have washing machines too. its wierd that washing clothes by hand isn't a strange concept for me anymore. this week our water heater for our water bucket broke so i had cold showers all week. cold showers in november my favorite ha ha but i cant complain too much because i never was tired this week. oh and Jonathans birthday was yesterday! thats all the fun stories i have for this week
cuidense mucho, les amo
Elder Jenson

Nov 4, 2013

wow things sound like they are going pretty great at home! so glad to hear that! derek its so great to hear about your piano keep being a great example. savy keep playing hard and listen to dad! jacob dont get discouraged if you dont score offense wins games but defense wins championships. jaxon good job on the hat trick! and jordan just keep pushing on i feel the same way you do when i play soccer here! ja ja

well family everything was pretty good this week i learned a ton about the mexican culture this week which in some ways is good and in others not so much. this week was the week of the dead  in mexico which means that the 31, the 1st and the 2nd are all holidays. and there was a fiesta every night! it was insane! and here is my recount of the week.

Tuesday. we taught 8 lessons how crazy is that and i got to teach one in english wich was awesome! The lady i taught it to was a single mother of about 23 and we watched the movie about the scorpion that stung the guy from the seventy it started as a lesson of forgive ness but turned into a lesson of encouragement for here to raise her kid the spirit was so strong in the room.

wednesday. we did so many service projects this day and it was a great day too. we had a fhe with Jonathan and his mom it went great and  it was the first one they had done as a family its so great to watch Jonathan grow in the church!.

halloween... well this was one of those days that i learned somthing. we went to this new investigators house and he invited us to eat cake. so being polite we ate the cake. it was really good. and we talked to him about the traditions in mexico for the days of the dead because neither of us are from mexico. he explained all about it and we had a good time talking with him. after we got done talking we went to mutual with jonathan and some of our investigators and my companion felt really wierd.. so we asked jonathan what this type of cake had in it. it turns out that this cake... "derompope" the cake has alcohol. my companion was so wierd the whole night he was laughing about the dumbest things and then in the night he had a huge headache. it didnt really affect me but it was one of those ooops! moments. we didnt eat any more cake for the rest of the week.

friday. we had an awesome capacitation about how we can work with members better our mision president taught it. he falls  me well ha ha things in spanish are so wierd to say in english. but anyways yeah it was a good day. we were late to everything and my companion had some small after affects from the day before.

saturday. well we had a pretty good day nothing really cool happened saturday. other than it was the last day of parties. we went back to our house early and all was good.

sunday. we had a good fast sunday. and it was my first time ever bearing my testimony completely in spanish. i couldn´t talk very well for some reason but i felt the spirit so strong. so i got up and bore my testimony. and after we had two lessons before comida it was terrible. but for some reason when i teach i'm never hungry in the night we had a fhe with the familia fuentes and the familia de jonathan. it was awesome. we watched john tanner and talked about the law of consecration. it was good!

today.. well we had an activity of our zone and we got together and played some games it was a blast. ilove being with all of our zone they are bien padre... mexican for really cool... sothat was my week

hope you guys have a good week your always inmy prayers. i love you guys so much.
cuidense mucho :P te amo
elder jenson

Oct 28, 2013

Sorry to hear about your dad mom. but im proud that you dealt with it all so well. Its so wierd that these things happen because i can picture them. but i dont really feel all the emotions because im not there.

ok well alittle about my week. We have another investigator who will be baptized in two weeks. im stoked! his name is felipe and he is a great investigator. he can probably answer the baptism questions better than i can.we also got another new investigator that is a single mom with two kids. and she is so excited about the church because it will teach her kids about Jesus and their Heavenly Father. she told us that these kids have cousins that are atheists. and that she didnt want her kids to go through life not knowing God.  its incredible how Heavenly Father prepares people to accept his gospel.
ha ha it was another crazy week of work but everyday goes by so fast i feel like sleeping takes for ever!!! and all of my dreams are in spanish right now its really weird. but hey i learn spanish twice as fast so its fine with me:) This week was kind of boring but here is a quick run down tuesday. we had a lesson with a lady that was less active and her kids there was absolute chaos as we tried to explain the importance of reading scriptures, praying everyday and going to church. we used an object lesson and the kids loved it they were a little rowdie and it reminded me of the little boys ha ah .

wednesday.we had a family home evening planned with one of our investigators in the house of the bishop. she stood us up so we had to teach the lesson of the restauracion to the bishop the patriarch and another high priest and their wives. it went really well actually and all in the end we gave our testimonies and talked about how we knew that this was how the church was restored to this earth. we asked for references and got three!! and they were all excited about the lesson so they told us they wanted to do this with all the less active families if we can. our ward is starting to get excited about the missionary work its really cool!

thursday.we took an investigator and her kids to mutual an they absoulutely loved it. the kids learned some new primary songs and she had a good lesson with the relief society. all was good. and we had a little time after  before we needed to go home so we went and got tacos with a less active family. i get so much free food from people here... its really bad i have put on 20 pounds.... oh well fat and friendly its a really inviting image.:)

friday. i taught one of our investigators sons english this day. it was fun until they started asking me what all the swear words were... but the mother was thankful for our time and we taught the restauracion when we finished so it was really good. then we had the lesson with filipe and when we asked him if he would be baptized he said yes it was a great day!.

saturday.we helped a recent convert plan his lesson for church it was great his name is arturo. you might have seen the picture with me and all the food he told me he was going to post on facebook. ha ha and i wonder why im getting fat... but it was really good then we taught johnathan and his family about the plan of salvation and where it explains all of the little details. his mom knows the bible like the back of her hand she is awesome to bring to lessons.

sunday. yesterday was good nobody was home so we talked to caren and amelia and a few other recent converts. they are like my family here. and they talked to us about our homes and gave us some food and we explained to them why we fast. it was a good day.

and today. every monday we have tiangies like two blocks from our house and its awesome its like a huge grocery store/ black market with everything you could ever want. and we met a family that was lds that sold fruit and salads. they asked us if we wanted a little food. so we ate a cup of fruit with chilies and sugar. its really weird to eat candy or fruit with chili. but i ate it all. and i was thinking hmm this is a good snack its healthy good job elder jenson. then they gave us fried bananas with sweetened condensed milk and some type of cream and jam. not so healthy. but it tasted amazing!

that was a little update about my week hope you guys are doing ok i love you all so much. and i pray for you guys every night!. spanish is good except that all of the people try and teach me all of the slang in mexico now and if you thought kanab had a problem with slang you have no idea. but its all fun to learn. the weather is great down here. it was a little cold like 60 degrees this week. im having a goood time and lovin it cuidense mucho!
te amo

elder jenson

Oct 21, 2013

Ok family here is the down low on my week. we have two families that we are teaching  with a single mother and their children. they are progressing well and both went to church this was the first week in like 4 weeks that we had investigadores in the capilla and we had 4 it was awesome! and also my english is starting to get a little bad when i talk to the north americans its either in spanish or every other word is in english ha ha its terrible i have only been gone for 3 1/2 months. im not going to speak english when i get back! but thats fine because i am lovin it down here. its hard but its really fun i feel like i have had a blessing in the last week because we worked hard and finally got to see the benifit of our works sunday.

ok new things this week well i had divisiones with the district leader and it was a little rough but i learned some new things and that was really good. second i went to polanco again i wish it was in our mission it is so pretty. ha ha and we played soccer today and ate biscuts and gravy, and no bake cookies! so good to have some food that was familiar. we found a park close to our house that we can work out in and that has been great this week.

I had a lot of good experiences and i learned alot thanks for being a good example always padres mios and it sounds like you guys are having a good time back at home tell the family high for me. jaxon jacob and jordan good job in soccer thats awesome. savy keep working and listen to dad he will teach you good things. derek thats awesome you will be a great blessing to the people when you go on your mission.! thanks for the update its good to hear about you guys how is kanab football going?  well have a good week love you family
Te amo Elder Jenson

OK otro experiencia yo tuve esta semana. a noche tuvimos un noche de hogar. lofue muy bien. la leccion fue sobre perdon. traemos una investigadora y su hija ella tiene 31 años y su hija tienes 5. cuando yo y elder chacon fuimos en camino ella nos dijo que ella ha bebido un poco antes. entonces ella fue boracha todo de la lección. durante la lección yo puedo ver los affectos de la alchol. sus palabras fue un poco  lento y sus pensimientos no fue muy claro. por el fin de noche su cara mire como toda de la inteligencia se va. dispues de la fhe caminamos a la casa de ella y ella no puede caminar en un lino derecho fue bien feyo y su hija fue caminando con nosotros. cuando estuvimos en su calle ella nos dijo porque caminar bien rappido? y ella cae en la calle. su hija gritado mama mama! con suerte nosotros tomar ella a su casa pero fue una momento yo nunca voy a ovidado.  thanks for never letting alcohol be in our house i didnt want the kids to read this story so i wrote it in spanish  tell me if you dont understand it. love you guys so much !

Oct 14, 2013

eso es todo!!! ha  ha thats the funniest thing i have heard in a long time. jacob your awesome!

this was a good week but at the same time it was a little hard. we worked like crazy to find new people to teach. and we had a little success but not a ton. which was a little discouraging but im not to worried about it because i know that if we keep working hard we will help all  the people we are supposed to. and its funny because one of our neighbor hoods is a little ugly at night because there are a lot of drunk people. one night we were with an investigator and his wife said to him "go with the missionaries because its a little dangerous. i looked at her and smiled and said dont worry hermana we have a curfew at 9 as long as its before 9 i know im safe becuse i am being obedient.  dont worry at home i know that im blessed when i follow the rules of the mission becuase of d&c 130:20  21

well this was a week of a lot of firsts ha ha. the first first was this week on tuesday we had a lesson with a woman who is baptist and she really didnt want to hear what we had to say but thats ok becuase on of her sons was a little interested. so the lesson went ok. we finished the lesson and the funniest thing happened. in mexico the women give the people a kiss on the cheek when they leave from a house. well this woman didnt think twice about it with me ha ha i went for a hand shake and she tried to pull me in for a hug and a kiss on the cheek. i had a mini spaz attack and thank goodness that mexicans are short because i was able to avoid it barely. she looked a little confused and i said still in a little panick "im sorry i cant " she was like no im sorry in my church we like contact its a good thing. i laughed and said hermana me too before my mission and i will after my mission but right now i cant. she said ok and looked at my like i was the wierdest person on earth.( i dont want anyresponse to that from home.) we left and me and my companion laughed so hard!. then i left the keys in the house ha opps we had to take the window out of the door it was really funny cause we were scared our land lady was going to planchar nos and i got to make salsa this week it was really fun!
love you guys take care!
Elder Jenson

October 7, 2013

ok mom your officially awesome! like super woman but a little more modest! ha ha

ok a little update from mexico. well spanish is coming along great i love being able to talk to the people and understand their problems doubts and questions!!! i never thought the day would come when i started feeling comfortable. my spanish is good enought that the people understand what im saying but i still have much work to do. good thing i still have 21 months right. haha i love mexico so much except the lack of greenery but other than that i love the people here. they are so good to me. my investigators are in wierd situations but they are all coming along and i hadnt had a new investigator in the last two weeks which was very frustrating. but this week my and my new companion worked like.... well we worked hard. ;) and this last thursday we were walking all over the area searching for new investigators. and we were tired it was like 7 in the afternoon and it was a hot day like 82 degrees. ( the weather here is great) but  we were a little discouraged and i looked at my companion and said " we are going to have a new investigator tonight im not sure how  but we will." and we had two more old references to look up. they were both not at home. well there went my idea. it was about 7 30 at this point and elder chacon and i had nothing more planned for the day so we went to the house of a reference that haddn´t ever been home... yeah she was there and we taught the first lesson to her. it was awesome!. she was my first new investigator in the last to weeks its been a little rough but like it says in ether 12:6 no miracles until after the trial of your faith.
my new companion is named elder Chacon he is built exactly like cristian like 5´2 and tiny but he is a good elder. we get a long great and he doesnt speak english very well so we talk in spanish all day. this is a huge blessing to my spanish. he is from guatamala! and he has been in the mission for 8 months.
ok how about confrence!! it was freaking amazing. i had so many questions for investigators answered. and it felt like to me the message was all about God and learning obedience. this is a problem i have noticed here is that a lot of people have wierd ideas about the nature of god. but  i also know that the only reason that we dont have really weird ideas is because we have men called of god that recieve revelation for us in this day. man what a blessing. im sure you all enjoyed it a ton and there were many things that you guys were able to take away if nothing else we learnded " not to look back" and that we should always "look up" ha ha
Savy write me a letter about basketball por favor! i wanna  hear what you think about it. jacob dont shoot your eye out. derek keep up the good work on the piano your talent will bless the lives of many on your mission. jaxon keep being great for mom and dad. and jordan STAY AWAY FROM THE LADIES!!! ha ha i love you guys so much and your always in my prayers
te amo
 Elder Jenson

Sept 30, 2013

I could see the temple from the house!

awesome mom!!!! i hope the rest of the time was that good too!. Jacob happy birthday yesterday!!!!!! that's awesome buddy!.

ok my last week was a little hectic!. first off elder figgy went home this week it was a little sad but im happy for him he was a good missionary. i learned a lot from him and it was really cool. our last day as compañeros was this thursday. after that i got elder jensen as my companion. ha ah we had a good time but it was a little weird because i was in his area the whole time so we didn't get to have lessons in my area. this was a week i learned a lot from because i had to actually help in the lessons and i could feel the spirit really strong a lot! then we had a baptism yesterday it was so cool the guy we baptized probably could of taught me the lessons he was solid.we also sang at the baptism. and i know the holy ghost was strong cause i sang loud and we could still feel the spirit after. we sang O Mi Padre to the tune of Joseph Smith's First Prayer lo fue bien chido! today we played volleyball and it was a lot of fun. i got a little sunburned but not to bad ha ah. 

I was in the ward casas alaman and it was a little different. every night was there they had a party.... and not some lame little party. i mean the people would close off whole streets. there were fireworks all night. loud music the bass from the amps shook our house it was crazy. also the house i stayed in had a shower. that was awesome hot shower in the morning i didnt think that those still existed! ha ah anyways i had a good time watching fire works from my house! it was so cool  but it was kinda annoying when the fireworks went off at 5 in the morning Hijole these people know how to party!

ha ha no real new stuff this week. but its was good. we ate hot dogs yesterday that was great the bishop was really cool. im excited for the night. im with two latinos de bolivia y mexico should be interestting ah ha hope you guys have a good week cant wait to hear about mom. i get my new companion tomorrow. estoy animado. hasta luego 

se llama laba laba one of the guys that left was hawiian te amo 

elder jenson.

Sept 23, 2013

To anyone who has written Brandon recently,I would guess he has written back to most, if not all of you.  He has had problems with his e-mail sending out e-mails.  Anyway, I just want you to know that he probably believes he sent you a reply and you haven't received it.  I don't know why, but be patient.  He really does love the notes from you.

Hey family sounds like moms doing great and every one else is doing great..... im forgetting something...... HAPPY BIRTHDAY JACOB!!!!!!!!!!!!! you have now reached the best number, 10 thats awesome brother! ha ha well i will give you guys a little bit better update this week.

ok well i will start with the language. it is going a lot better... but my grammar is terrible ha ha. i think that the worst is everyday i do spanish homework... i think i have done more homework for spanish in the last two weeks than i did in all of my high school. but one thing that is great is i can understand so much better the language im starting to know where i am in my area. and most of all im learning how to have conversations. and i think my english is getting worse i tried to read in english today and i pronounced like 3 words like they were spanish... oh well i dont need that for 2 years;)

this week we went to the house of two women in our ward who are menos activos and my companion said ok you have the lesson im not talking for the next hour.... well it wasnt pretty but i got er done. we had a good lesson about FHE and i talked to her son who is not a member about how god can bless our lives. its was a good learning experience for me. also we have had an unusal amout of people that believe in reincarnation this week in our lessons.. its so hard to explain to people that god has a body of flesh and bones and that we are like him... I have learned a lot of patients this week. because i explain something and then its like they get it all and at the end say yeah i can see how that kinda works but god is still an energy.... in my mind i think lean not unto thy own understanding( proverbs 3:5) but i really do love all my investigators. they are all such good people. It was kind of funny i was walking down the road with my comp. and we were talking about how people just dont get it some times. And i said " I completely understand how my dad feels when he tells me that i need to do something and i dont do it because i think that im right. when in reality he knows what will make me happy. ha ah aha" we laughed about it for a little while but it was a learning experience for me.

I am having a blast down here. i really do love being a missionary. not watching tv is great, i feel like i actually acomplish stuff in day. Im a little sad about this week my trainer goes home this thurday and im not sure how i feel about it. its really weird.. i hope that you guys have a good week love elder Jenson

And keep going mom!!!!!!!

Sept. 16, 2013

yesterday was independence day for mexico it was a little sketchy because there were a bunch of drunk guys. and the other is a picture of pig skin soup...

ok quick up date. life is good. mexico is crazy fun and my spanish is getting better each day. i had a good week. we met a family and im stoked because the kids both came to church this week.  I eat a lot of tacos and they are awesome , pig skin soup for breakfast on saturday.... it was nasty. and i had to eat a ton of fish in one of my lunches because my companion is allergic to fish.... yeah it was rough but with enough lime i got it down. i love you guys congrats savy... your growing up to fast. much love elder jenson.

Just some newspaper topics

We thought it might be good to include some of the big news items of Mexico.  Right now there is a strike of 90,000 school employees which has over a million students out of school in about 7 states.  Many of the teachers went to Mexico City to protest and have been in Brandon's mission since the week he got there. If I read right, they had 3000 policemen break up their camp in a major plaza in preparation for some national celebrations.   He's about 6 miles from all the excitement.  Mexico is in the line of fire of hurricanes from the gulf and from the Pacific Ocean.  They found 12 youth who were abducted from a bar and killed because a couple of their dads were connected to a rival cartel.  They found the bodies in a mass grave on the east side of Mexico City.  They have also had a lot of people die from rain and flooding.  Other headlines include a concern of what connections they can make to understand the 600 disappeared people over the last 6 years.  The U.S. beat Mexico in Ohio this week to assure a spot in the World Cup.  I include this news because Mexico has the same struggles as a lot of places, but it is neat to hear how loving and patient the people have been to Brandon because of what the missionaries represent.  As we well know, there are many great people everywhere.  Some of these challenges bring out the best in many people and prepare many with a desire to better understand the Lord and the purpose of this life.  I include it because I hope Brandon is not too up to date on the details, and he better not offer any opinion on the subjects because of the great work he is involved in.  He seems to be loving these people and the gospel is needed in every home in the world.  I know last week Brandon went downtown so he was close to all of this last Monday.

http://fotos.eluniversal.com.mx/coleccion/muestra_fotogaleria.html?idgal=16121

http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/ciudad-metropoli/2013/algunos-maestros-desalojan-campamento-en-zocalo-950474.html

Sept 9, 2013

well family its been another great week in mexico i have had some of the best experiences of my life in the past week. we can start wednesday. it was a discouraging day my spanish had been terrible, and it was raining like it does every day here. we were teaching jonathan he is 16 years old and had just barely told us he didn't want to be baptized. so we decided that we would follow up at the house of one of our recent convert families. we taught him the importance of reading the scriptures and praying to god. he said he had good feelings when he read and when he said this, for some reason i had an impression to ask him if he knew the book of mormon was true. so our conversation went like this...(in my broken spanish of course) jonathan do you know the book of mormon is true? he said yes. then i asked if he could feel the spirit when he was at church. he said yes. then i asked do you know that god is your heavenly father and that jesus is you brother who atoned for your sins? he said yeah i do. so i said jonathan you have a testimony and you know this church is true. so will you be baptized?

he responded by holding up two fingers and saying i have two questions... (in my mind i thought, "oh great i thought i just had the spirit tell me what to say and he still has doubts....") he continued on saying  when can i reset my interview and when can i be baptized!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! it was the greatest moment i have ever had. until Sunday that is when i had the opportunity to baptize him. Talk about a great 3rd week. I have had many times this week when i was discouraged and thought why am i doing this? this is hard, its raining, i can't speak spanish to save my life. but the experience i had last night baptizing jonathan made all of that worth it. and i have a whole new respect for the joy we will have if we bring but one soul to know the truth. because i was grinning ear to ear last night and i knew without a doubt as his mom shook my hand with tears in her eyes that this gospel really does bless families. and it's given to us that we can have joy.

What a wonderful day, with wonderful people!

 pictured with more than my family it is amelia, elder figueroa, jonathan's mom Irma, jonathan me and amelia's daughter 

ok now for the less exciting part of the week i went to the "centro" today the huge center of mexico city and it was awesome i bought a new backpack. its more of a satchel but its new cause my other one broke. it was great be cause me and two other elders de north america were together and i heard the word "guero" so many times. its what mexicans call white people it was so funny. i got to eat tacos pastor which are the best thing on the planet i'm craving them just thinking about it. thats all the fun stuff i have today i will talk to you guys next week!

Sept. 2, 2013

well family here is my letter home. Jaxon Congratulations you are so awesome ! savy you're going through an exciting time i'm so happy you are such a good girl. and Jacob your almost the best number there is hang in there bud.

well what to tell about this week i think the first thing is i have been studying the Christlike attributes in p.m.g. and humility and diligence have really stood out to me. i try and be the best missionary i can but it is really hard when you don't understand the total gist of the story. in the past week i have been humbled more than any coach could ever humble his player. i have times where i don't understand anything that is going on or i have to pause in the middle of an extremely basic sentence because i don't know a word. but at the same time there have been a few, no more than 3 or 4, times where i actually felt like i spoke good sentences or could understand a whole conversation this week. and its those little moments that make it so i can keep going forward. i had  the awesome experience this week of teaching an investigator named jose luis. he is about 60 and has a wife and a daughter that both are members. he has been familiar with the church for 30 years and when we talked to his wife and daughter they said he would never be baptized. we taught him parts of the restoration and the plan of salvation over next hour and a half. i have never felt the spirit so strong in my life. i didn't say much in this lesson. i bore my testimony 2 or three times about different things. but it was an  incredible experience. he has a baptism date of the 22 of September.

ok now for the other parts of being a missionary ... i have come to terms that being a missionary means that people forget your appointments all the time. and also that the song i sang as a child "I hope they call me on a mission" in the chorus should have said to "WALK AND WALK AND WALK AS MISSIONARIES DO". not walk and talk and teach.... that's my chiste con mi companero (joke with my companion). but its really great to be out here. i have meet some amazing people that have shown me and my inadequacies more than enough love.

i live on Volcan paricutin in a white house with blue lines and a black door the house number is 102. (please only send stuff by e-mail or to the mission home address above.)

I have learned alot this week and am looking forward to the next one also tore a blister playing soccer today... so excited to walk on it. ha ha i really am having a great time out here its so cool the wards have like  100 people in them wich seems tiny compared to utah.. and when ever people ask me where im from the response is "utah the fabrica"(of missionaries) it usually gets a few chuckles. well i love you guys so much im glad i was raised in such a great family! sorry no pictures i dont have my camera.

Walk and walk and walk... NO.. played soccer... We taught him to play basketball and football because we knew he was too soft for soccer!!

Elder Jenson

August 26 first letter from Mexico!

ok where to even begin this is the craziest place on the planet. i flew in on monday night as you all know and found out what 20+ million people look like it was like driving in to vegas but way way way bigger. we arrived that night at 8 30 and stayed at the presidents home. all of us north americans were pretty tall over here. any ways we played basketball for a little on the cement court out back of the presidents house. i can stil throw it down. and also we talked with the president and he asked how our spanish was and how we were doing. it was good. after that we went and got our new companions. my companion is named elder figueroa. he also just got released as the assistant to the president on tuesday. he is an awesome trainer! and he has 24 years so he has a little age on me. after that we just  got put in an area that neither of us knew. we spent most of last week getting to know people and getting refferals for investigators. it was really good and crazilly at the begining of the week i had no idea what was going on in any of the lessons. when ever spanish was spoken i had no idea of what was going on. but little by little i have been picking things up last night i was able to have 2 or 3 decent conversations in spanish and i know what is going on for the most part in all of my lessons. so thats my update on language.

getting around with 20 million people... well first off i need to explain that they do have roads and stop lights and lanes and all the other good stuff.... the difference is they look at those things as a suggestion.. taxi rides are crazy, people cut each other off and drive on the wrong side of the road. but i haven't seen an accident the whole time i have been here. oh and the speed on most of the roads that would be like main street in kanab have a speed limit of 60 miles an hour. ha ha its a little fun to cross the street.but my favorite is the micros. they are kind of like a bus but smaller(hence the name) but you will have to have mom derek or savanah explain this but it is comparable to standing up in the indiana jones ride in disneyland... they are pretty fun. for the most part we walk everywhere. my companion somehow knows where we are going and he gets us where we need to be.

food... well its hot and makes you sweat when you eat it but its pretty good. ok first day in mexico and you will never guess what my meal was... in mexico its reffered to as panza. but as us north americans would refer to it, it would be called cow stomache. the taste it was GROSS... and the biggest problem i had with it was the texture. it was kind of like fat but you could chew it up a little. then you could see the linning of the stomache. when we got it i told elder figueroa not to tell me what it was until after i ate it. yea crazy food already this place is great!! but its also getting to the point where without spice food is a little bland. so im getting used to that too. also we only have one real meal called comida which takes place at about two in the afternoon. at nights we usually just have pan dulce and leche wich is amazing.

my house well i live in a house with a kitchen and a bathroom and a main room and a bedroom. we dont have any hot water. so while we are exercising in the morning we have to put water in a bucket and heat it up with an electric water heater and then dump the water on us in the shower. its sweet i feel like a more civilized version of ¨the other side of heaven¨ and on saturday i had a member call me collie pocki it was funny but seriously it is way different down here. i miss home when im not talking to people but when i talk to the people they are so nice to me and i can get my point across wich is nice. but i have been able to explain a lot of things to people about the church and we have a baptism lined up for this saturday.so excited!!!! well love you guys lots ttyl

August 18, 2013

Hey parents I thought I should let you know i will be leaving the mtc at 430 monday morning after which i will go over to the airport and fly out at 8 am. so excited any ways. we get laid over from like 12-4  in atlanta so i will call you around two if thats ok. if i can get a phone card. but i should be able to find one in the airport. so excited to talk to you guys!

Ok quick over view of the week. had a devotional tuesday  night and it was amazing. Elder Scott came and gave an amazing talk about prayer. it was extremely spiritual. he also gave us an apostelic blessing that all the missionaries who were learning a language would be able to recieve the gift of tounges thats a great thing to hear when you are a week away from being in a foreign country. when he left all three thousand missionaries stood in silence it was sweet. then while he was walking out he said "BE GOOD" it brought a lot of laughter to all of us that heard it. it was great to see that a man who was so quiet and humble was still able to have a good sense of humor. 

Wednesday was a pretty slow day until i got the opportunity to host a fellow kanabite... Elder Matthew Aldredge. it was so much fun seeing Matt and the rest of the family i felt bad i didnt give Sister aldredge a hug. but I have been here for too long. ha ha . that day went on pretty slowly after i finished hosting but i did see yanni later that day it was good to run into him. i have seen them a couple times since they got here and both seem like they are doing great!.

Thursday... in field orientation. this is a meeting from 8AM till 5 30 PM. it was awful. but we learned a ton about how to work with the ward in missionary work, how to plan weekly goals, and listen to a ton of speakers. one of the speakers talked  about a race that only the best athletes could participate in called an ultra marathon... the whole time i was thinking yeah my mom is awesome... he likened it to persevering to the end and told us a story about a guy that was 60 that ran it and not only did he finish but he set the world record for it. he ran through the nights when all the other runners would stop. and he won because he gave all that he had in that time. as missionaries we need to give all of my time to god and not take rests because 2 years isn't that long.

Friday we had a hand ball tournament which i took second in. i got a haircut. the barbers use a vacuum after they cut your hair and suction your whole head to pick up the extra hair it is the best thing ever... just sayin... wink wink nod nod cough* mom! cough* anyways we got done with that and went to classes just the same old stuff.

Hoy just finished my last class in the mtc and i cant wait to go when I get to mexico i will send you picks of my class and teachers. 

THis week we learned about reflexive and subjunctive both past and present my head only hurts a little so i can count that as a win! 

well hope you guys are having a good week hopefully i will talk to you on monday! love you muchly

Elder Jenson 

August 12, 2013

Hey family, well where to start with the week. I finished the book of Mormon on tuesday, which was really cool. When I finished I went to pray to know if it was true like Moroni instructs,then i remembered a talk given in a devotionional. the speaker said he went to pray to know it was true and realized he already knew.I  realized I knew that it was true. there was no need to pray about something i have already known. so i prayed that i would be able to focus more on little topics that could help me in my work and in my life in general. I then read over the course of the rest of the week king benjamins words to his people. i tried to focus alot on the versus around the scripturemasteries and i have learned so much from his words. if i had to have a king it would be king benjamin hands down.

 This week has been quite a learning experience for me we have talked alot about planning and organizing... you all know how much i love to plan stuff. but over the last few days i have  realized how great planning is i have filled out my planner completely, i have check lists and everything its a miracle in my mind because i am starting to like it better. it helps me stay focused on what i need to be studying and i have become alot more efficient with my time.

 People i have seen this week include brett weston which was great i got to talk to him last night for a few minutes and he said he was enjoying the mtc he has been here for 4 days. I have also seen a few kids from gha and I have been able to talk to them for a few minutes also. i really want to try and host for matt on wed but i dont know if I will be able to.

Spanish is going great. we had a two day english fast. nada palabras en ingles por dos dias.! if we did speak in english we had to do 5 pushups per word. which isnt too bad except a few guys ended up doing like 120 which was hilarious. i did like 60 facil as pastel! I am getting better at praying forsure. i can say almost everything i want to say. and this sunday i had to say the sacrament prayer and give a talk in spanish super divertido.

 Recreational activities of the week include dodgeball, beach volleyball, basketball, and the best of all hand tennis in the dorms. we seet up these courts in the hallways (which i found out is corredor en espanol... mi maestro dijo, " no correr en el corredor" muy chistoso) and we have sweet games of hand tennis everynight for about 20 minutes. the dementions of the game are 11 steps by 3 steps by 11 steps in any hall way long enough.

Well its my last week and  i am so ready to leave. im going to miss my zone really bad. which reminds me an elder named Cavazotti is going to the st g mission so if you guys see him stop and talk to him he is a pretty cool  kid. But i really am so excited to leave this week its going to be "sick" in the words of Craig. the mtc is a great place of learning. i have probably learned the equivalent of 3 years of spanish in here which is crazy in only 5 weeks. I think i leave on monday i will try and email you when i get my travel plans. love you guys so much you are the best!!

ok  final cool story of the week. so i went to the conselate on monday. and being in salt lake made me a little homesick for  some reason. I thought by some miracle i might see someone i knew. well i didnt see any one i knew but i got to go to mcdonalds so i wasnt completely let down. the next day i was still thinking about you guys at home and i was like im not going to see them for two years this is really depressing. we went out to the field for p.e. and had a sweet game of kickball. well our 50 minutes ended and we started heading back to get ready for tuesday night choir/ devotional. i was at the stop light before entering the mtc and this car came up to the curb and started yelling at us. I thought it was someone protesting, but it turns out the people in the car were one of the elders friends so they pulled up to the curb next to us and started talking. once again i was like im not going to see anyone from my family in forever. then I looked over as a car pulled up to the light and I was like i know that car... GRANDMA!!! grandma jenson was at the light at the exact time i was on a corner going in from gym the only day of the week i have it in the mid afternoon. what were the odds. it brightened up my whole day and it gave me a little bit of a boost after being a little homesick it was exactly what i needed. just another little way the lord was looking out for me.

well tty in a week when im leaving to MEXICO!!!!! love you guys a ton.

August 5, 2013

well those classes sound like what i'm going through so i totally feel for you mom! and jordan dang it get feeling better!! well i'm off to salt lake at 10 to go get my visa i'm so excited!! usually the missionaries don't get their visas till like the last week. mom you are doing great things in running and being a missionary! I'm so grateful for the great example you have set for me.

 well the new sport we play at the mtc is sand volleyball because its the only one you can dive in and have fun. we cant touch net or backboard or rim in basketball. but its fun to play with all the kids from up north. i am a tank at 160 on a heavy day... i have put on like no weight.  i'm trying to beef up so when i lose 20 pounds my first month in mexico i don't look like skeletor;)

 teaching keeps getting better!. we taught hermana link again and it went so much smoother. yesterday was the hardest fast i have ever done. we didn't eat til 5:30! but we had a testimony meeting, and i have never felt the need to bear my testimony like i did yesterday. i felt like my heart was going to explode and i got up and bore it in Spanish it was the best and most sincere testimony i have ever said. i love that part of Spanish you really have to mean what you say because i cant just go off with difficult language and an expansive testimony. its just simple and sincere. kinda like a little kid!

 i see Tanner like every day. but i haven't really talked to him much. last week i got to see Austin and James it was pretty cool i see Tyler a bunch still and i got to say good bye to stew the night before he left cause we were on the same floor. well i miss you guys like crazy and hope you guys survive all the craziness you are going through. Jordan I'm serious get feeling better! or i will beat your face;)

Te amo

Elder jenson.

July 29, 2013

The contents were very agreeable with my pallet, and all the cute little notes from the kids were great. jordan thank you for the fan! jax i have seen no games of any sports its killing me! and jacob we are going to fight when i get home;) you are all such a good suppor to me and i am so glad i grew up there.

 i love using scriptures in my lessons and the things i learned in seminary have helped me to know enough to have a few in each lesson. My schedule is different everyday, but it usually consists of 6 hours of class in two 3 hour segments. 1 hour of some sort of physical excercise. they have a weightroom with dumbells so I use that about twice a week. i dominate 4 square and horse shoes. basketball is fun and soccer isnt too bad i have only played once. we have all you can eat meals 3 times a day and most of the food is pretty good. like chicken cordon blue and ribs. breakfast is terrible though. i have an hour of personal study every morning at 7. we usually have language study for an hour and 15 minutes and an hour or two of companionship study. and we have this thing called TALL, which is kinda like roseta stone, for an hour. Tuesdays and sundays are usually devotional days and i love the devotionals they are so good.

 i have seen stew, fev,tyler glover, and matt dove from kanab plus a bunch of kids i played sports against in region nine.

ok epic fail of the week... hermano Alworth is out of town on wednesday and hermana Link is his substitute. Elder welch and I had to teach and when i got in the room i completely forgot how to speak spanish it was so bad. any ways it was the worst lesson ever. we got paused half way through which im not sure if that has ever happened in one of these before. ... it was demoralizing... anyways no one in our whole district taught "Clara" (Hermana Link's investigator name) well. it was such a hard night i felt like i had gone backwords and  knew nothing.

Even more daunting was that i had TRC, they bring in voulunteers and you have to talk to them in spnanish. i prayed for a lot of help that night. and i the morning elder welch and i said a prayer before we went in. we hadnt ever done that before. and we taught the best lesson we have taught while being in here. then we taught two more lessons that day we said prayers before both of them and they had equally as impressive results. I know that Heavenly Father helps us when we pray with real intent and it is somthing that i have learned how to do since being out here. something about learning a language and not understanding people really humbles you, but the lord always helps me out when i really need it. love you guys so much and thanks for all the treats again. loved them! have a good week

Te amo

Elder Jenson

 The Kanab boys at the Provo temple

 Missionaries headed to Mexico City East Mission

 That is a pretty good image of how he'll feel for the rest of his life after these two years

 Mini golf is not exactly how we did the MTC back in the day

He named this "Long Day"... probably from the mini golf?

Elder Jenson is working hard and loving the MTC.