hey guys,
we had a killer week here in guaymallen this weekend. first things first.
we had the baptism of the flia. perez. thanks for the prayers. at the beginning of the week, me and my comp had a meeting with are seventy, pres. avila and stake pres. it was way good! nothing intense, but i learned a lot from it. it was only thirty minutes (: not a big deal. then, pres. came with us to perez home, they still hadnt taken the decision to get baptized. but we didnt want to take president with us to make hime look like a problem solver, so we just went in and shared our testimonies (: it was amazing. we were out kinda late with pres, but it was worth it. he took us home in his car. we talked about politics...he started it. haha. amazing guy. then next day, i went with my comp, and we were racking our brains for way to figure out how to get these people baptized without being obligators or anything. anyways, we went over there and they looked pretty normal. and we sat down and they started to hold hands and sit closer to each other, and walter started talking, "well, chicos, we´ve been thinking about it and we actually prayed last night about it too and..." by this time i was getting super nervous...getting ready to come up with a magic solution to this situation. "we want to get baptized". boom, fireworks, angels regoicing, happy missionaries, and water already filling up the font. easy. the spirit totally did that one. what a great conversion. they all come to church with modest clothing and shirts and ties and they want to do everything in the church. especially vanessa, she goes to activites at the church just to clean up and she has an interview with bishop this weekend to set up with her plan to get to the temple. she wants the gospel principles books and just wants to go all out. she is for sure a strong convert (: i am so happy! yay. thanks for your prayers. walter asked us how to get a temple reccomends and what he has to do to get the priesthood. haha. so good. love these people
we had 25 de Mayo this months. Its like indepence day. we have locro and chori pan and everyone gets the day off. we dance folkloric. the whole ward, young and old started doing fold dance (i kinda wish the USA would get into this kinda stuff) it looked so fun!, i cant because im a missionary. ug....it sucked. it was a great activity and we had seven new investigators there! super cool. love argentina culture.
then yesterday and this morning we had consejo. of course, it was super fun. my zone did good! our goal was 8 and we got 7. other zones got 1, 2 and....0 yeah. its tough out here right now. but, they were super disappointed with the baptisms. i spent this morning with aps doing stuff for the mission and they said my zone, mendoza zone, and chimbas (one of my old zones) were the best ones. so that made me feel good. pres. avila wants to visit the flia. perez again and we spent alot of time at his house.we had tacos...oh man!!! super good! and then, we sat around presidents house giving testimonies, and elder jacobs played songs on the guitar while we sang a bunch of songs.

 it was super fun. then this morning we had a little meeting and alot of people left, but i played basketball with ap´s, elder roche his comp and the office elders. i couldnt believe how good i was! people actually passed me the ball and i almost made a three pointer (: yay (:haha. so you could say my physical ablities have improved. hanging out with all the other elders is super fun. than we got permission to go the new burger king that just opened up in mendoza....have it your way! it was yummy whopper time for me. yum yum yum. anyways, that was my week (: hope you guys enjoyed the photos (: haha.
love you guys, elder valle

 

5-21-12

this week has been great! quite stressfull, but always worth. lets start off with great news! my comp from la punta, elder stearns called me last night to update me on my converts. angelita is super strong and is well on her way to the temple. she loves it and almost might get a calling....exciting! my convert fernando, is just on fire! he has the best record for home teaching and takes the elders out to teach twice a week and after he gets the melkesidek priesthood, he will also get a calling. he said the closing prayer at ward conference and at that ward coference they announced that la punta was going to be it´s own ward!!! WOOO!!!! i never thought i would go back to visit those guys, but now i have too. we will see what we can do (:i was just crazy happy...oh, and agustin is good, is mom who was inactive just got a calling. i can´t believe how much my work had paid off. in la punta, i felt helpless only having baptized 4 people and thinking that my work wsa mediocre. hearing that news was one of the highlights of the mission. i felt great (: yay.

this week we had a meeting for zone leaders and president talked about working with members. it was cool. we were only there for a little bit, but it was still fun. and then tomorrow me and my comp have a meeting with pres.avila, our stake president (which is a big deal, because stakes are more wide spread down here), and the are seventy. we have to present a bunch of stats about the zone and lots of averages for the last couple weeks. you can tell they are serious about getting a temple down here soon, so they are doing some super analyzing and stuff. im a little nervous, but it should be good. im getting super prepared for it. we are excited and it should help us to get better at working with the members. then me and pres. avila are doing intercambios for an hour an we are going to go visit the flia.perez. i invited him and even though i might be self concious of my teaching, it should be fun. (: i am way stoked. i didn´t think he would accept the invitation but he did! so we are going right after the meeting. i need you guys to pray so much for this family! they are so close to baptism! and they need it this weekend. hopefully pres.avila takes all his guns out and helps us out. hahaha. pray for them and yeah...haha, we will be going crazy this week seeing if they can make it. they are soo ready. we need it so bad! haha (: thanks guys. i am stressing again for the zone goal and hoping that the missionaries can step up their game. i don´t know how to get missionaries to understand the importance of somethings, sometimes. i am working on it. haha (: should be a good week, just pray for us (: anyways, glad to see you had a good week (:

love elder valle

5-14-12

loved talking with you guys. not gonna write a lot, because i already talked to you guys. it was super fun. i will get the alpargatas when you guys send me the info. happy mothers day! love you all. enjoy the photos (:
elder jay valle

Jay said him and the cat have twin eyes

5-7-12

Familia Valle,

beanies from the package we sent for upcoming winter

Crazy day today. We have so much to do todfay. I will try to keep this email un random and in order (:
I am so excited to talk to you guys this sunday at six o clock in the tarde my time and listen to your voices. It shall be fun (: I sent mom all the information and Grandma Etelvina. I hope she remembers who I am. This week we had meetings and more meetings. The first meeting was for zone leaders. We didn´t reach our baptismal goal. Bummer. We have lots of people for this month and we should easily get the goal, and that makes me happy. But I feel like its better to be constant and tru to the goal instead of one months baptize a lot and another month baptize little. It´s just not the best way. I am trying to install that in the missionaries this transfer. I am also trying to install more animo and get them excited to do the work (: Sometimes, I feel too hard on them, like I might be pressuring too much...but I try to not let that get to me. Afterall...it is part of my calling. Haha...but I do it with love. No fear. We had consejo and President Avila is sure warming up to being funny with us. At the beginning of his presidency, He was a little strict, and thats cool, but now he knows how to make the mission work fun. He showed us clips of the Argentine football team and of Messi and all the sick goals that they made in history. He related the soccer team to a zone and district leaders. It was super awesome. He also showed some Michael Jordan clips for us gringos. It was sick! We learned a lot and my zone is doing very good. We have good new Elderes. We will be working hard for that. At the end of consejo, we went to Presidents house for lunch (super fun) I played paino for one mini zone leader talent show. I have gotten a lot better on the mission. They liked it. And then, we went to the stake center and played dodgeball! oh man...talk about sweet reward for being a zone leader. I didn´t realize how out of shape i was. i need to start up again. haha. anyways, the next day we had another meeting with all the zone leaders and district leaders. it was a lot bigger, not as personal, but it was still fun to see all my buddies and see how stuff was going in their areas and talk about my old areas with them (. super fun. We also had a meeting this sunday with the ap´s and my disrtict leaders and us. it was fun, idk what the point of it was, but it was fun (: we also have to fill out a bunch of informes and registros and stuff. it is quite the load, but it is hard to get all the elders to do things for the work and not just because i told them too (: haha. i am working on it. I realized that one of my weaknesses, is trusting other elders to get stuff done. my work would be so much easier if i could delegate people to do it. I have a hard time trusting people and letting them do important stuff, because i can usually trust myself (: anyways, i am working on it. I am excited to talk on sunday with you guys! come with questions...i have a hard time starting a conversation in english. spanish is easy so it sounds like etelvina and grandpa get an advantage. haha. crazy. i will try to send you guys pictures and stuff. hope that i can do it! thanks for everything guys.

Love Elder Valle

p.s. got four people to church on sunday! whoo!!