My birthday!

Hello familia! This week went a lot better than last week. We're still getting to know the secor because it is huge and we still get lost sometimes. We had a hard time finding this week so we just decided to spend more time visiting members and trying to get references. It went really good. We're really gaining trust in the members and we got a bunch of References to visit this week. We found an interesting investigator this week. He's a young Professor the doesn't believe in God. I invited him to pray and ask if God exists and then he said he wants to make me a  deal. He'll pray and he wants us to teach him but only if we teach in English. He (or my companion)  doesn't speak any English so I don't know how good this is going to work. We'll see this week I guess?

My Birthday was awesome! We have soccer night every Wednesday so we got to play soccer for about two hours. Afterwards, I ordered pizza and my companion bought me cake so we had a thirty minute party. It was a pretty solid birthday. I didn't get any of my packages but we have interviews with the president on Wednesday so I'm hoping they're there!

Its starting to get cold! Every morning i wake up freezing. I think I'm going to need to buy a new jacket if that's alright because mine isn't really waterproof. That's about it for this week. Love you guys!!!

sorry the computer I have won't let me send pictures so you'll have to wait to see my birthday pictures next week. Also I don't know if i should buy a jacket. I was going to buy a decent wind breaker that would be really warm with a sweater under it for about 70 dollars? I was also thinking about my grey ski coat and wondering why I didn't bring that. Maybe that would be easier to send. Let me know what you think.

Elder Roberts

3-3
We had some crazy changes this week! We had an emergency cambio. I got a call on Thursday to pack my bags and to leave Quirihue the next morning. I was a little bummed because I didn't have very much time to say goodbye to everyone and I had to miss my birthday party that they had planned for me and Elder Dabell that would have been today. We just went and said bye to a few members and then had a family home evening with some of my favorite members. I am now working in a city called Chillan. Its like Concepcion but a little bit smaller. It's so crazy going from Quirihue to the City. We have a really strong ward with about 120 members that love to work with the missionaries. I haven't really been able to work with the members very much my whole mission so I'm super excited to work here. There is also Mcdonalds here, the only one in the whole mission so I'm super excited for that. My companion is Elder Raquena from Santiago Chile. He's a super funny kid and doesn't know any English at all. I love speaking Spanish all the time. I feel like I'm learning so much now. It was so hard to speak Spanish with Elder Judkins and with three gringos in our house. I'm also learning a lot of new Chilean words and phrases.  Hermano Gaillard -last thing I heard is he is doing better. Thank you for your prayers. That's about it this week. Love everyone!

3-10
Today I found out I'm staying in Chillan for another cambio with Elder Raquena! I'm super exited, I think this cambio is going to be awesome. Elder Madina whose family lives in Parker's ward is leaving and Elder Hoops from Draper who I ran track with is coming to take his place.

This week wasn't the greatest. Our sector is huge and both of us don't know it very well so we spent a lot of time just walking trying to find houses. I'm pretty sure we walked fifty miles so I think Bishop is going to get us bikes soon! ojala!

We have a conference this week with Elder Zaballos from the seventy. It was amazing. He talked a lot about the importance of learning English and how English is the language of the Restoration. All the Latinos are trying to learn English now. I saw my companion from the MTC Elder Watson at the Conference. Its insane how much he changed! In the MTC he weighed 142 and I weighed 165. Now I weigh 150 and he weighs 172! He's a giant and I'm the skinniest man alive.

I went to Mcdonalds today for the first time! I was really excited but the food was horrible and way more expensive. I definitely won't be going there again. 

Thanks everyone for the Birthday wishes!!! I feel old. I literally feel like my 18th birthday was three months ago. I'm hoping I'll get my package but I doubt it. All the packages go to Concepcion and nobody from Chillan ever goes to Concepcion so I might have to wait a bit. I'll get it eventually though. Thanks for everything! Love you guys!!!

RINCON!

2-17

hola family,

This week was alright. We've found a lot of investigators the last few weeks but this week we just couldn't get a hold of them. We're trying to work with the members but we ended up tracting a lot. We found a new investigator named Carlos. He understands everything and is doing really good. The only problem is he has a special needs child that he can't take anywhere or he just destroys everything in his path. He wasn't able to travel to Coelemu but he said he'll be able to come to Quirihue this week. We had a super awesome activity at our house on Friday. We did a game that we played a long time ago with our stake. You have to follow a rope blind folded with an egg in your hand and there's Satan's temptations trying to break your egg before you reach the end of the rope or eternal life. It was hilarious and everyone loved it. Not much else happened this week. My ping pong skills are improving a lot! The new Argentino in our house is really good and we've been playing a lot. Being district leader is really hard but I love it. I'm starting to recognize the guide of the Holy Ghost so much more and all the blessings that we receive every day. I love this work and I know its true! Love everyone!

Elder Roberts2-24

Hola Everyone, 

This week was not the greatest. Everyone is on vacation and we've been having trouble finding people to teach. Half of our contacts don't even live here. Vacations are now over so this week should be a lot better. We found out one of our good members Miguel Gaillard just has a few days left to live. Before church on Sunday we got to go to the Hospital and give him a blessing. It was a really good spiritual experience. It is really sad because everyone in the branch has been friends with him for years. It would be great if you could keep him in your prayers.

On Saturday we went to faria that they have every Saturday here. A long road with people selling tons of random things. We have some members that sell there so we set up a table with pamphlets and book of Mormons. We sat there and made contacts for about three hours and it was actually really successful. We had the greatest time and set up about sixteen appointments between the four of us. I think that will now be a weekly activity.

This week my fear for spiders just increased. I was on a mini cambio a few weeks ago and found a lady that lost two fingers and now has a whole in her stomach from a spider called a Rincon. This week we were contacting and talking to some lady and all the sudden she yelled and said there was a spider on my back! The spider ran up to the collar of my shirt and then she told me its a Rincon! I freaked out and my companion hit it off and killed it. She then told me she saved my life and because I'm a servant of the Lord and he's watching over me. Its so true! Well I love you guys!

Elder Roberts

2-3

This week with the cambios we got a new missionary in our house from Buenos Aires, Argentina right where Parker lives. He has a weird Argentina accent. My first week being a district leader went awesome. There's only six missionaries in my district so that's really nice. The Elders I live with and then two sister missionaries. We are all super young in the mission! Three of us have six months, one has 4 months and two only have a month and a half! We all have a lot to learn but we're actually doing super good. We have a good group of investigators right now. Last night we found a couple that just had a baby. We had an awesome lesson with them. The husband has a few doubts but his wife accepted baptism! They have definitely been prepared and I'm super excited to teach them. Church was in Coelemu this week. We were out picking up some of our members before church and we decided to invite some guy that we taught a few days ago. He smells horrible and has a huge beard full of food. Its disgusting but we invited him anyways and surprisingly he came. During church he kept running out of the room pretending to talk to people on the phone in English. It was funny because he knew like ten words in English. He then started pushing buttons and making his phone beep. Everyone was just staring at him the whole time, It was horrible. He then left again for another phone call and then left the building and disappeared. I think something is wrong with his brain and I don't think we'll be visiting him anymore. Thanks for the package mom! Love all you guys!

Elder Roberts

2-10

Dear Family,

This week week went super good. Being a district leader is a lot more work but I'm loving it. I got to go to a new leader Conference in Concepcion on Tuesday so I got to go stay in a place called Dichato for a night. When the earthquake happened, Dichato got hit worse than every other part and got destroyed. It was super fun to work there. I stayed with Elder Mitten from my MTC group so that was awesome. The conference went great, I've learned so much these last few weeks. I also did my first baptismal interview This week. The other Elders in our house baptized an 18 year old kid named Eric. At his baptismal service I accomplished one of my mission goals to play the piano at a meeting. I played "God speed the right" the only song I know and my companion sang a solo. It was hilarious because my companion had to follow my rhythm which was way off, and I messed up like 7 times but I finished the whole song so I was pretty proud of myself.

We worked super hard this week and found a lot of people to teach. We had 8 investigators committed to go to church Saturday night! I was so excited for Sunday until not one of them showed up and we had about 12 there total. Super, Super disappointing. I guess it just means we need to work on our commitments to go to church. We are finding a lot of people though and we have a lot of people to work with this week. Love you guys! Take advantage of the snow while you can!

District Leader in Quirihue

Cambios again! I had the biggest surprise ever last night! We usually find out the cambios in the morning but last night I was getting ready for bed and got a call from President! I am now district leader in Quirihue! I was definitely not expecting that at all but I'm super exited to take on the challenge. I'm going to be finishing the training of Elder Judkins and I'll probably leave Quirihue next cambio. We had an awesome week this week. We had church in quirihue and had 30 people there! That's the most people we have had since I have been here. The branch is definitely growing and the members are willing to work with us. Were starting to give them assignments in church. We even have some less actives giving talks and teaching classes now! I am excited to see how it grows this cambio. We have 3 investigators right now that have accepted baptism. They weren't able to come to church this week but hopefully we can commit them for next week. I think I'm still losing weight. I'm trying to eat a lot but I just don't care anymore. I could come home looking like a skeleton. Thanks for the package mom! And my guess for Taylor is Curitiba, Brazil. Love you guys!

January 13

Hello family, 

P-day was awesome today. This morning  we went to a less active's house that works at a chocolate store and we helped her make chocolate all morning! It was definitely the best service project I've ever done. I ate so much chocolate I'm going to be sick. We then went to the plaza again and rode those little bikes again.They're so much fun and every time we go we get a crowd of people watching us. This week went really good. We are still really trying to work with the members. At church we had 3 less actives that hadn't been to church in years. We're starting to get a lot more referrals and the members are starting to get involved in the work. We still have a lot of work to do but the branch is definitely getting stronger. We weren't able to get any investigators at church on Sunday but we did find a lot of people this week. This area has been tough but I've been learning like crazy. I know God is just preparing me to be a better missionary. The harder it is here, the more I try to perfect every little thing I'm doing wrong. Thanks for the "Just keep Swimming" article, that's exactly what I feel like. I know with exact obedience we'll find these people that are prepared.

My companion is doing good. He's a pretty funny guy and likes to talk to everyone which is awesome. The other day he chased a guy down on a bike and made a contact while running with him. We've had some good experiences and were doing awesome! 

Love,

Elder Roberts

January 20

Today we had a nice relaxing day at the beach! We went to a little town about 40 minutes past quirihue in the middle of nowhere where the weather and everything is perfect. We played Frisbee and watched like 100 sea lions, it was amazing. This week we had interviews with the President again. That was the fastest three months ever. It went good. He said he's not planning on closing down quirihue any time soon so that was some good news. I'm a little nervous for next week though because we have cambios again and I don't really want to leave yet. We are starting to make some awesome progress with the members. I also had a mini cambio with Elder Dabel. The last time me and Elder Dabel had a mini cambio I had a month and a half on the mission and he had about 2 weeks and it was horrible because we both knew no Spanish! So this time went a lot better! We could actually talk to people and we had a lot of awesome lessons. We are still working a lot with the members and we are seeing a lot of progress. This week we had church in Coelemu. Not very many members came because it is so hard to get people to travel! This next Sunday is in Quirihue and I think we will have a lot of people there. We also have a few good investigators. One with a baptismal date. We've only taught her once but I really hope she can start progressing this week.

Love you guys!

Happy new year!!! It's crazy how fast that year flew by! This will be my first full year on the mission and I hear that this year will go by even faster. New years was awesome. We made some rootbeer floats with coke and ate a bunch of chips but then we had to be in bed before the new year.

We had a good week this week. We're starting to work with the members a lot more and were starting to get referrals. We're really going to focus this week on strengthening the members. Church this week wasn't the greatest. Not one member from Quirehue came to church in Coelemu so we definitely have some work to do. My companion is improving a lot. He's a pretty funny kid. It's hilarious watching him learn Spanish because he says a lot of funny things. Sometimes he forgets we're speaking Spanish and just speaks English to people. I'm really trying to speak as much Spanish to him as I can so that doesn't happen again.

This week we had a mini cambio. My companion had to go to a new missionary conference and I went in a trio with the zone leaders in Tome. Tome is amazing! I seriously feel like I'm on vacation every time I'm there. The weather is always perfect and running on the beach is the greatest. I really hope I get to work there sometime on my mission. Other than that, nothing really happened this week. We are working hard, teaching a lot of lessons, being obedient, and really making progress with the members. Sounds like you guys are doing awesome! Enjoy the cold weather. I'm getting fried here and cant wait for the winter! Love you guys!

The third picture is us riding these little bikes in the plaza. It costs like a dollar and we go every P day.