Photos!

A big dog!!!!!!!!!  IT is  3 months old... and its dad is taller than me, and weighs 160...  this thing scares me...  so i tried kissing it...

today we went to a hill that looks over poptun... and  well these are the pics... 

Poptun

This week was a pretty good week... not as good as the last one... but it was still pretty good.  Wendy didnt come to church this week which was a bummer.. but we are planning on this next week... but she is progressing pretty good in her life... 

Also this week we did a lot of service and had some activities that were pretty good and we are just chuggin along here in Poptun...  

One thing that was cool is that our Elders quorum president, his wife is a little inactive, and she was sick with a lot of pain... and we just felt like we should pass by his house to see him... (although we didnt know she was sick) and well it turns out that we gave her a blessing and she got better and she came to church.  So that was pretty great!

But to be honest there wasnt anything else that was spectacular this week... so we will see how it goesthis week!

Love Elder Stuart

Photos!

The missionaries of poptun!

me

2 little kids in the street

Changes

Well it is official now.. I am into mylast change.  Me and Elder Morillo stayed together for the last change and we are still in Poptun!  So we will see how that goes becuase he is also going home the same day that I do... so that will be interesting!

But as for this week here in poptun we are doing good.  We were able to have 105 people in church!  We are super excited to see this branch progress!  It is super cool to see the fruits of your labors... so yeah things are going pretty good here.  And also the person that we are teaching... wendy... also came to church again... so that is super good she is on her way to getting baptized...  So we are planning on baptizing here withing these next few weeks...  The only problem that we have here is that we cant seem to get mario and carlos to church but we are working hard for that!  

We also had the opportunity to have a meeting with the leaders (kind of like ward council) but we cooked them lunch and talked to them a little about what we want from them... that is kind of the trick to tell someone what you want and not having them feel bad you just gotta give them a little bit of food... so that was pretty great.... that was on saturday... then on sunday as a branch they had 15 visits... when the normal was 0... so they got that going a little bit better!  So we are just kind of enjoying our time here....  because now we both have finally gotten used to knowing what to do that we have a lot of ideas of how to get things going... it is pretty nice... so yeah we are just pretty content here in Poptun and hoping that this week can be twice as good.

Love Elder Stuart

Another week

Well this week was a pretty decent week.  We were able to get things going a little bit better here again... so all is well here.  We are getting better and better each day. We have three investigators that are progressing pretty well here... Named Mario Wendy and Carlos.  They are all pretty cool people that we were able to find these past few weeks.. and they all said this week that they want to get baptized... so we are working with them to get them baptized within this month of June!  So we are pretty excited for that!  Also we are hoping to get this area going strong!  

Other than that all is well here in poptun... 

Love Elder Stuart

Bueno bueno

Alright well here we go again!  So this week was pretty great!!!!!  We were finally getting going again..  These 3 weeks have been some of the most stressful weeks of my whole life... I usually dont get stressed out so this is kind of new for me..  but I think we are now getting things rolling here.  So basically what has been happening is that we have had so many problems in the district with obedience that I have basically been babysitting 14 missionaries for the past 3 weeks... It has really just been stressing me out.. but this week we had the conference with Elder Alonso from the 70!  So he basically just called out the 4 Elders that have been causing the most problems in front of everyone and told them that they need to change and be more obedient... So that was pretty great... so for right now things are going pretty decent again bu I guess that we will see how long that lasts..  But yeah so I hope that now It wont be so stressful

Now for the work in Poptun we were also having a ton of problems here... one of which is the attendance of sacrament meeting, another are the leaders, another is that the missionaries that always come here always get their area cleaned out... and I could go on for days about all the problems here.. but Basically yesterday we got everything figured out... because we finally got to talk to the to the Branch President who was super depressed about everything... and we finally got to talk to him to figure out his problems to help him get back into everything and by the end he was feeling super good about everything.. and he was back in the game... so that is going to solve just about all the problems that are going on with the branch..  So that was just fantastic.  

So yeah this was kind of the ending of a really stressful three weeks, but now everything is better and we are going to be doing much better these weeks....  Hallelujah!!!!!!!!

Love Elder Stuart

Photos

Well I dont have much to say this week because we talked last night.. but it has been a pretty good week this week and we were excited to be able to work this week.. our big focus here in Poptun are the youth... so these pictures are pictures of an activity that we did for the youth here in poptun.. it was fun... we had trivial questions divided into teams and then we did relay races and many other types of games to get the youth more spiritually and physically excited to go to church...  So that was the highlight of the week.  Also we are working on getting some of our investigators to church but it hasnt really been working so we are trying to figure out what we can do to get that rolling..  Me and my companion are doing good getting along and what not... so that is good.. but yeah that is about all...

Love elder Stuart

Poptun!

Well my new area is poptun... and it is a pretty great area!  It doesnt come even close to Cubulco... but it is still a great area..  so it is pretty exciting... the only problem is that here was one of the 6 branches that we have here in peten to become wards... and so that Peten will become a stake and not just a district... but the only problem is that the attendance here was about 120... and then it just dropped like 8 months ago.. so it was ready to become a ward.. .but now it isnt.. so that is our goal here... to get the attendance back up to 120 because now it is at like 48 last week.. so we have got a lot of work to do.. Because this is now the last branch that we need to get ready for Peten to become a stake.. or in other words if we get the attendance back up and everything else stays good... we are going to have our second stake in the mission... so we are super excited for that!  

So we have got a lot to do.. and the biggest problem that we have is that all six of the missionaries here (me and my companion and 4 sisters)  are all new to the area... or in other words nobody knows anything about Poptun here other than the fact that it is in a hole... so we have a lot to do... and my companion is Elder Morillo.. he is from the Dominican Republic.. so he is now my second companion from there and he is super funny so we are going to see how this all goes with him..

So this week was just a lot of walking around and trying to get to know the people here and looking for people who want to hear the gospel... but next week is going to be much better!

Love Elder Stuart

Changes!

Well they finally kicked me out of Cubulco...  It is super sad for me to leave this place... I really grew to love it! I had been here in this branch for a total of like 11 months.... That is a super long time... and it was so hard for me to say goodbye to the people here yesterday... That is one of the hardest things that I have ever had to do...  But I am going back to the Petén which is kind of exciting but also a kind of sad because it is super hot there right now.. but I guess that I will get used to it.  I am going to a place called Poptun.  Luckily it is the coldest part in the peten, but it isnt cold... It is probably like summer temperatures in utah.. so yeah it will be fun though!  Also I think that it will be my last area in the mission.. (that is so weird to say).  

But anyway about this week in Cubulco... we were able to help it progress here a little bit this week.  The biggest problem that we had while I was here is that I was the only leader here in Cubulco... there were no callings for the members here...  because we couldnt give callings to the Group especifically... but we finally got permission to give some callings out to the members here in Cubulco and they were super excited to get their callings.. so hopefully for the new group leader here it will be a little bit easier for him because there are now callings here.  So that was probably the biggest this that we did this week, is that we had to teach these people what is their calling and how to complete it and all that to prepare the way for the new Elder that is going to come to Cubulco.

Also I am a little bit sad to leave here.. because we finally got the people to start to progress here, and the baptism of Tereso (who got baptized last week) was a big step here in Cubulco.. and there are about 10 more people that will be baptized here in Cubulco in May and June... so I am a little bit sad to not be here for that, but I will be excited to hear about their baptisms in the future!

So that is about all for this week...Love you all!

Love Elder Stuart