October 10, 2011

Dear MOm and Family,

So we didnt go to the temple this last week, bummer!!!! because there was a problem with the scheduling the guy who answered the qhone for us was somebody from secuity and he said to come saturday but saturday is the day that all the people from provinces come, they come from the jungle and from parts that are really far away. so we rescheduled and we are going on friday! it should be really great we are going with Jarlis and some other converts and we are bringing some members too. i dont know it we will go to a session but it would be really awesome if we got to do it well see.

yesterday we had a baptism, it was really cool! this little girl, Olenca, is awesome everytime we got to her house she had her pamphlets adn her book of mormon, and in the little books we give people there is a part in the back that has questions and a place to put your answer kinda like a workbook or something, and guess what... she even filled that part out! NO ONE ever does that. haha it was really awesome! the cool thing is that all of her uncles and grandma and great grandma came it was really cool! they are all members but only the grandma and great grandma are active that is the sad thing. all of the other aunts and uncles havent come to church for like 18 years. that is the sad part. but now i hope that her dad comes back to church, he was crying in the baptism service, he wants to come back but he works on sunday and its hard to change his work, this wednesday he is coming to play futbol at the church withthe memebers and so well see how that goes. now the next part is we have to get him and his wife married! haha

my companion is doing good he is kinda up and down one day he is relly happy and the next hes mopping around and a little sad. it kinda ticks me off a little but i need to be patient because he is going through a lot and i need to understand that, next week he will have his surgery i think. he hasnt told his mom anything about the surgery i think that is why he is worrying so much. I think that hell be ok!

I havent recieved the letter from grandma and grandpa yet i dont know why it is talking soooo long ive been waiting for it im sure it will come soon. I hope! and I' ll ask pedro about the package he is the one that picks up the packages so he might know when ill get it. Thank you soooo much for sending it! I love you soooo much.

we had changes this last week and I m still in faucett and my companion is still elder perez. ive been here about 6months and with elder perez i will have been with him for 4 months at the end of this exchange. and ill get to pass my birthday here which is awesome!

I Really enjoy teaching the gospel and I am soo glad that I am able to serve. I know that this chuch is true and I know that joseph smith was a prophet, I feel the power of the story of the first vision every time that we share it. I know that it is true!

I lOve you all and i hope that you look for opportunities to share the gospel
Good luck in your training for your race! its comming up right?

Love Elder SAWYER

September 26, 2011

How are you all doing? wow i cant believe that meagan and jared went to homecoming that is kkinda scary haha. i hope they had a great time. they have definately changed in the last 7 months jared is a lot skinnier and meagan looks older. i hope they had a great time! and i hardly recognized the front room it looks a lot diferent from the little part i saw in the picture.

How is the training for the big race going? and no i havent tried ceviche because as missionaries it is a rule that we cant eat it because it is raw fish that is cooked in lemon juice. they dont want us to get sick. and i have my journal still but it has been a little while since i have written in it i need to get back on track with that. but sometimes there just isnt enough time in the day to get all of that in. and thats cool that Elder hatt has a blog too he is pretty cool he spent 24 hours with me he was doing a exchange for 1 day it was fun! he is from canada, i think it is really funny because he doesnt like when people call him gringo he thinks that only gringos are from the USA idk he is still a gringo.

so my companion had his first baptism yesterday it was awesome i was so proud of him! im training him and so the other missionaries call him my son and i am his dad its kinda funny, my litttle boy is growing up! hahaha but it is for sure that he has to get surgery, and he might have to go back to costa rica the recovery time for his surgery is like 2 months its really hard, he doesnt want to go home, he was supposed to enter the ccm in febuaray the same time as me but he had to get surgery on his knee so he came in june, and now he has to get another. he is having a tough time right now but he always puts a smile on and is really trying to just go to work. i really hope that he doesnt have to go home.

Right now we are teaching hermana concession and she has a daughter that is member and she wanted to get baptized but now she is having some doubts and its sad but some of the memebers have been saying mean things about her and its not cool and so we are trying to work with her on getting over her fears and doubts. we are also teaching a family where the father is member but he got baptized when he was 14 and then he didnt go to church and his spouse( they arent married) and their daughter who is 11. they are really awesoeme adn yesterday they all came to church except the dad jesus, because he has to work, but roxana the spouse really like the church and olenca the girl has been coming for a few weeks now and now we are cordinating olencas baptizm and hopefully the matromonio of roxana and jesus. they are awesome!!!

today we are going to play volleyball and we made shirts, they look dumb, but it is not too bad, it should be really fun im excited to play volleyball. they play volleyball a lot down here but we arent really aloud to play except for pday. i miss volleyball a lot! it was so fun playing vball with my friends my senior year!! im gaining weight and its really funny! they call me gordito sometimes haha i hope im not too fat when i come back to play volleyball.

i am always praying for you guys! and i know that our heavenly father has a plan for us and that if we live the gospel then the trials that we WILL have will be easier to bear. I know that church is true! I hope that you guys are sharing the best thing that we have to share, the gospel, with your friends and that you are looking for opportunities to share this amazing message with others, i really wish i would have opened my mouth more when i was at home!

I love you soooo much!
Elde Sawyer

September 19, 2011

Dear Mom and Family,

Como Estan? this week has been a pretty awesome week.first we went to the zoo for Pday that was really fun and we saw a bunch of different types of animals from peru. and some of them are Very INTERESTING! haha. it feels like Pdays go by a heck of a lot faster than the other days, but all the days go by realy fast! there were soo many parrots in the zoo! and i have alot of pics but i dont think i have time to send them all to you right now. so next pday.

we changed times to go to internent because the site that we use to write president is being weird and we think it is because when we are using the page the other missionaries in the other parts of the world are using it too and so there are problems. so it is just an hour earlier.

Its is starting to get warmer, the sun actually came out the other day haha. and im not wearing my sweater as much anymore. so while you guys are going into fall we are going into spring, how weird. Well this week we were really busy preparing everyone for there baptism, we had 5 yesterday and the other elders had 4 it was really awesome. and i need to get the pics from yesterday from elder hatt so ill send them next week, but there were a lot of people atr the baptism it almost looked like a sacrament meeting it was really an awesome experience. All of these kids are active but some of them there parents arent active so we are activating them, we have a lot of work here in barrio faucett and thats the way we like it! Yesterday we had stake conference, all of peru had stake conference. and guess who spoke, elder ganzalez de the presidencia de los setenta elder christofferson a apostle sister beck president of the relief society, and .....the prophet. we listened to it via satalite it was really awesome and the whole thing was on missionaries and how the lord needs more missionoaries and a lot of it was also on how that missionaries need to return and get married and so i guess i know what im going to do when i get back haha theyve been talking about that a lot lately, in the last conference too haha. I cant believe that general conference is almost here it comes so fast! it will be another great experience.

Im really glad that you had a great time in t george and that you saw leann and kim wow i havent seen them in a LONG time! wow that brings back some good memories! thats awesome that they have their family now. wow time flies! Make sure to tell the m Hi for me on facebook or something!

I hope all goes well in the job thingy! ill pray that you dont have to work on sundays, that is really important to be able to go to church! I hope that all goes well with the homecoming dance! make sure to send me some picks! hey so have you aleaddy sent my Package????? when did you send it?????'

I love you ALL

Elder sawyer

September 12, 2011

Good Morning Mother,
I hope you had a safe trip to st george and that all of the family is doing good even tho im sure everyone is sad that aunt pearl passed away. that was a shock to me. but its something that comes to everyone. and it is so great to know that this is not the end and there is a plan and that we will see each other again! when did you find out that she passed aways?

well... im glad that you all had a good time in meagans orchestra retreat and im glad that they all played well, and that meagan stuck with the violin! im also really happy that you are still goofy! hahaha i wouldnt have it any other way! i hope that you never change that!

well this week has been good but we got some bad news that elder perez has to get surgery again on his knee but what we are going to do is he is going to go to more thereapy to strengthen his muscles so that the recovery isnt as long and hopefully he wont have to go home but we will see and so he has been a little down about that. things will get better.

elder ochoa and elder hatt had some baptisms this weekend and guess what happened.... we get to the church and we find that there are people cleaning the tank that holds the water for the baptism font and the water that is coming out is really dirty. why they did it on a saturday in the afternoon i have no idea!!!!!!!! but we had to fill the baptismal font with a hose and it toodk forever but we finally got it filled and all went well!

This week we have 5 baptisms they are the kids that dont show up in the system and this week we will be busy all week preparing these kids for their baptism its going to be a good week. and this week we have our zone conference and it should be really good! we are really excited for it! and today we are going to a zoo and it has all the different animals from the different parts of peru it is going to be really fun i will send some pics next week.!

and i havent finished the book of mormon yet i kinda got side tracked and started reading the other books in the missionary library our heritage and search for happiness they are both really good and i finished them both but i need to get focused on the book of mormon again.

hey a question for you did you send me this latest missionary news letter? and have you sent me the package yet? My birthday is coming up and i would like to ask for a volleyball and a rubix cube and another wash clothe, i lost one of the ones i came with i think it got lost in the wash but they dont sell them here.
Well i realy hope that all is going well with everyone and have a great week!

well i love you all so much

Elder Sawyer

September 5, 2011

Dear mom,

How have you been? how was your birthday? im glad that you are training! It's awesome just keep it up! and remember that it really doesnt matter how fast you go it just matters that you finish! keep it up mom!!! i love you!!!

The past couple of days my comp had been a little sick with the cold/flu and he was kinda getting bad. so he took some pills and we rested yesterday and today he is a lot better and we are ready for this week of work!!!

Yesterday we had about 20 investigators in the church it was awesome we had some new people and also some people that are menos activos that came it was a good day! and this month we are preparing people to get baptized there are like 10 kids that dont show up in the system and so they have to be baptized again and we are teaching them again. obispo pedro said its a good chance to strengthen there testimonies and to look for there needs because all of them are going into the young men and womens programs this year and so they could use a little boost haha.

and also we found a guy who hasnt been to church in like 15 years and we are reactivating him and teaching and preparing his family for baptism. we still have to work with them a little bt they are really awesome.

so how are all of you guys? for reals! how is jareds arm? but i know that everything will be alright! im glad that you all have good health and that the kids are getting settled into school!

love you Elder Sawyer!

Zone Conference

August 29, 2011 Report of Elder Andersen's visit

Dear Mother,

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I love you so much and i hope that you have a great birthday!!!!
Mom thanks for the pics! wow that is amazing, its crazy mom!!! just keep it up!! dont stop!

well sorry i didnt say anything about the doctor it was just a check up for my apendix thing that i had, and the doctor gave me a copy of my surgery i was really happy!!!! sorry that i made you worry! hahait wasnt my intention.

This week has been pretty awesome we got to listen to an apostle of the lord elder Neil L Anderson it was sooooooo cool. First of all he served his mision in france and he lived in brasil and germany that is something that i didnt know abut him, him and his wife spoke in spanish, i dont know if his wife knows spanish or if she was just reading the talk but she did a great job! and we also got to hear a little from the new presidency of the area here in the south america northwest area. that ws cool too, and then we got to listen to Elder Anderson, the coolest part was that he never told us that he knew spanish but he had to have learned some of it somewhere, he told us he didnt know spanish but he would try to speak to us in spanish. it was really a mixture of french portuguese spanish and a little bit of english. the cool thing is that all of these languages are so similar that we all undertood. It was so cool, there were parts that you could just feel that he wasnt the one doing the talking and that the spirit was helping him out and i have no doubt that the gift of toungues and the gift of the interpretation of toungues were in a ffect in this meeting. He told us he didnt come prepared with a written talk but that he had recieved revalation on what he was going to talk about. He talked about what the first presidency and the 12 are expecting from us and what they hope for us. The main point was that we have a firm testimony in Christ and in the restoration and in the gospel in general. he said that it is really sad to see people that have served missions and then after there mission they decide to leave the church or arent active in the church. and they dont want this and that if we have a testimony of these things that we are teaching then this wont happen to us its kinda like helaman 5 verse 12. It was a really awesome experience. and there were 3 missions that went to this meeting the central mission the south mission and our mission. and so i saw a few people that i knew from the mtc and the CCm. I saw elder Quiroga that was so cool to see him he is a really good misionary and it was awesome to see him and funny story he left his picture of the savior in our room in the ccm and so i took it and i tried to return it to him because i knew he was going to be there but he said to keep it to remember him haha it was really awesome to see him. and i also saw elder wright from AZ i didnt talk to him tho, and i saw a sister that was in my district in Utah.

Right now we are teacing a few young people that want to get baptized but we are waiting on permission from there parents and we had a baptism for this last sat but it fell through and he didnt come to church and we cant go to his house because he lives outside our area but he wants to come to church in our ward so we have to find someway to contact him, and we visited a less active member who plays the piano and we visited him and then he came to church on sunday and played the piano finally we had hymns with a piano. that was really cool. and we found a part member family that the dad is member but is inactive for years! and we are going to teach them this week and we will find out more when we visit them. but the work is going good we are a little down because our baptism fell through but we are doing good and elder ochao went to another area and now elder hatt is here and he is from canada and he is pretty cool he is here withthe other newer elder ochoa and im still here with elder perez.

Well i hope everything is going good in AZ!
Love Elder Sawyer

This was a great Birthday for me! Despite missing him, It was a blessing to have an email on my birthday.

A trip to the Temple August 22, 2011

Dear mom,

The temple was awesome! it had been 4 months since i had been and it was really awesme to go back and partake of the spirit there. it was all in spanish of course and this time i could understand mostly all of it!!! it was really cool! it was really cool it helped me remeber that everything has an eternal perspective and this time that i went i stayed a good while in the celestial room just thingking about stuff and i was thinking about our family and how it will be soo cool to enter the temple with all of you and with our future families. it was really cool! i love the feeling at the temple and im glad that we get to go to the temple, because in other places they dont get to go to the temple.

on wednesday we will get to hear elder neil l anderson and i cant wait to hear that! it is going to be awesome!!! and i think that i will see elder quiroga because we are going with the south and the central missions. so that will be oool. but we had cambios and elder ochoa is going somewhere else to be leader de zona so im a little sad about that but its ok we will still have a good time in the house with 4 missionaries. elder haught is coming and he is from canada.

the work is going good we are finding new people we just need some baptisms now. we have a date for this saturday and i hope everything goes well but well see, he didnt come to church this sunday and so i am realy sad but i hope everything is alright with him. and we are waiting on permisos de some niños and we have some familiesthat are interested and we just need to teach them and see how thingsgo.

oh but elder ochoa it turns out had cancer in his bladder, everything is fine and they took it out but he has to do some treatment and everything is fine and he can serve his mission. the babys name is steven mosiah he is awesome and he was a little sick he was throwing up blood but everything is fine and i think it was a problem withthe milk or something on that side of everything you probably know whats going on more than i do, with your experience.

tell grandma that i am waiting for their letter and i love you guys and

i love you and hope everything is alright!
Love
Elder Sawyer

August 15, 2011

Dear Family,

I hope you all are doing well! Im glad to hear that meagan gave a talk and that she did really well! sonds like you guys had a fun sunday! we did too sundays are always really crazy in our ward everyone wants to talk to us and we need to talk to different people. we have been teaching this guys named cesar loiza and we is really awesome he is dating a returned sister missionary and he has been coming to church almost everyweek but the problem is that he lives in another ward but he really likes it in our ward and so we have been teaching him on sundays in the chapel after meetings. and he accepted a baptismal date for the 27 of august its awesome! he was afraid to get baptised because he wanted to know more about the scriptures and he thought he had to be pretty much perfect to be baptized. and he was unsure. but we showed him some scriptures in alma and also helaman 5:12 because this says if we buid our life on the rock of the savior we cant fall and we promised him that he would have the strength to push forward and that he wouldnt fall. and we asked him how can we build our lifes on the lord, and the answer is being baptized. it was really awesome and he is an awesome guys and he and his girlfriend are going to get married soon and that is also really cool!

Im glad that Harry and Brooks did a good job and that you were able to go to there farewells they are awesome! and im glad that you saw brian and vee tooo! they are all awesome people and i hope you said hi for me. has jared got his lisence yet haha

youll never gues what happend to us while we were writing on the internet all of a sudden the power went out and I lost my letter to the president but luckily i had just started and i didnt loose this leter to you. hahaha

Me and my companion are doing good we are learning a lot and we have found some awessome families that want to listen to us. last night we followed up on a contact that we had the day before and the old lady that had answered the door on saturday said she wasnt interested and she was catholic. so we returened yesterday and a little girl answered the door and we told her who were were and if she could call her mama and she came back and said we could come in, we were kinda shocked but excited at the same time. it was a big family that was living in this 4 story house, and they all listened to us. we taught them about the restoration, and they really liked it! they started saying how they didnt like how the catholic chrch worshipped saints and that they really liked what we were talking about and that we teniamos razon. it was so awesome it seems like latesly every sunday that we have had we have found a new family to teach. its a testimony to me that there are peope here that are prepared for us we just have to find them.

I love that you guys already bout me a car so that i can drive it when i get home!!!!! haha im joking. but that s awesome! it looks nice! BUt i dont like that somebody put crud in the trailblazer. tell them to watch out when i come back! haha

Tell Grandma and Grandpa i love them and to get better. I hope they are doing alright.

Tomorrow we are going to the temple Its going to be awesome! and on the 24th we are going to lesten to an apotle Niel L anderson i cannot wait our mission and lima central y lima sur will all be there it is going to be awesome!!!! this month is awesome the temple and then an apostle and then in october we have conference i cant believethat it is so soon! time flies!!!
I love you guys sooo much!!! say hi to harry and brooks for me and tell them goodluck on the mish, have you heard about cody yet?

Elder sawyer

PS elder ochoa had another operation he was peeing blood and i guessthere was something wrong with his bladder and so they operated but he is doing great now!!!!


Sorry this is out of order.

Pictures of Conference time

General Conference in Peru

HELLO MOM AND FAMILY,

Thats soooo awesome that Terri got BAPTIZED!!!!! i was thinking about that reciently i was asking to my self, when is she going to get baptized?
Im so glad that she was able to do that i am soo excited tell her hi for me on facebook or something! that is soo cool!

I cant believe Duke died! that is soo sad! tell sonia and Austin and the whole family hi for me! I still rememeber that day like it was yesterday, they i was sleeping over and they put us both on the couch and they said that they had a surprise for us we were getting excited and we were waiting and then Duke just ran into the room. then i stood up and duke got scared and ran away it was soooo funny. I have some Great memories with that wonderful family Tell them I love them Mom!

Conference was soooooo awesome i cant believe that it is already over it went by sooo fast! we were talking about it all week and then it came and went. and now we are waiting for the liahona that has all of the talks! I loved that they talked soo much about Peru! We got to watch it in english it was so cool, what a treat to be able to watch it in English. we brought a tv into the stake presidents room and they hooked it up for us and so the 4 gringos in my zone got to watch it in english, we bought some chocalate milk and oreos and stuff to share while we watched it! It waas soo fun! And when they talked about Peru we got a little crazy! It was kinda like going to a high school sports event we would say/ yell " YA Peru, we are in peru right now" or " thats our president!" haha dont worry we were still able to feel the spirit we were just so excited. I'm so glad that you were able to watch conference and that jared and dad went to priesthood meeting and to baskin robins i was thinking about that while i was watching it, and i was remembering the good times we had gong to baskin robbins. it was cool that we were all watching it at the same time! ME IN PERU AND YOU GUYS IN AZ!

The work is coming along well, this Sunday we have a baptism. On Saturday, we are taking some converts to the temple to do baptisms for the dead. We won't do baptisms but we are bringing members to help them and we are going to a session. It is going to be awesome!!!!! Yesterday it was my comps birthday. So i bought him, on saturday, a 3 liter bottle of coke and a thing of ketchup becuse he loves those things so much! It was soo funny we woke up and he went to take a shower and while he was in the shower me and the other elders got eggs and when he got out we hit him withthe eggs it was sooooo funny!!! the eggs got everywhere and it was a big mess but we cleaned it up dont worry mom! haha it was a really great day and then after conference we went to a memebers house and they made a cake for him it was really fun! It cheered my companion up a lot!!!! Either this week or next week he will have his surgery and so we are hoping for the best!!! He is worried about calling his mom. He doesn't want her to worry but I think it will be alright.

You should ask Dr Johnson where in callao he served! I hope tha Ryan is doing well!

That's awexome that cody got his visa. Did he have to serve in the states for a week or something or did he just stay in the MTC?

Im so glad that you are still training and that everything is going well with you guys i can t wait for my package! keep up the good work and keep me posted on everything. this week we have exchanges but i am 98% positive that i will be staying in faucett with elder perez, because the bishop knows the changes like a week before and he told us but it sould change. but i dont think so. those are the blessings of living with the bishop!!!!! haha steven mosiah is doing great and getting fatter and he has a lot of hair on his head, he just turned 2 months I can't beleve that time is going by so fast.

Love you All
Elder Sawyer