Current Address

Elder Jordan Carlson


Send emails to: urumontemission@gmail.com with ELDER JORDAN CARLSON as the subject line. The mission home will print the email and send it to Jordan.

Monday, December 19, 2011

Getting Ready for Christmas

Elder Guex(He is Uruguayan), Elder Baxter (Without his tag, he isfrom Idaho), Elder Francis, and Elder Carlson


Dear Family,

We will be doing the video call from a members house. I hope the
internet is up to speed....
The Member (Matias) should add you as a friend or whatever so we can
skpye.

We are trying to call the member right now to get the schedule figured out. but im thinking that I will do mine at like 3:00pm which hopefully is 10:00am your time. If there are problems we can always call you the day of and trying to figure it out real fast. It will be about 40 minutes like last time I believe.

The Christmas conference was great. It was really fun to see all my friends and former comps. The food was fantastic, It was sadder than last year... I think that president is getting sad because his time is just about up. He has less than 6 months left. He leaves in July I think. But it was really good.

Thanks so much for the letter. I was really good. I noticed that some had more time to write than others. hahah.

So it rained every day this week. Not fun. The umbrella is standing up to the challenge.

I can't think of anything to write.

Well That's good about Spencer. I hope he gets it. Would he have to move to Chicago if he did? That would be weird.

Also I'm jealous of the Christmas party.  But I will just have to make my own christmas party I guess.

So I made cinnamon rolls yesterday. Turned out delicious.

Also on Tuesday I made a chocolate pin wheel cake for Elder Francis' birthday. It wasn't as fancy as mom's because I didn't have the thing to squeeze the frosting but it was delicious. Also the frosting turned out wrong..... I think the problem was that I didnt beat the cream
long enough. because it never got stiff. So it was really liquidy so I decided to try to fix that by putting it into the blender. It worked but th
en I over blended it an it separated from the pudding and I think turned pretty much into butter. But I ended up boiling it and making pudding pretty much and then adding some more cream properly whipped. It tasted good at least......

Thats all for now.

Here is a pic of the mini apple pies and vanilla ice cream i made on Thanksgiving.....




Love,

Elder Carlson

Monday, December 12, 2011

Dear Family,


Wow, thats really exciting about Spencer. I hope everything goes well.

Thanks for the recipes, I'm sure they will turn out delicious. I need a whisk. I think it would be helpful for all the whipping I will be doing. 


Anyway, sounds like things are going well, I was aware of your trip to England, you conveniently planned it for right before I get home.... oh well, sounds like its going to be lots of fun.

So things are going well down here. We had a fairly good week. Nothing out of the ordinary, we had a really good day on Saturday, we found a lot of new people so we are excited for that. Beatriz is kinda in wonderland. we don't really know whats going on with her. She works a lot and hasn't been able to come to church since we started meeting with her. We haven't been able to set a date for her baptism either because he just haven't met with her.

We received a reference from the other elders in a different part of the city, It is a guy named Carlos, He is an older guy, a little crazy but really good guy, we contacted the reference on Tuesday I think, we have had several charlas with him already and he came to church yesterday! He has a baptismal date planned for the 24 of December. We are really excited, he is keeping all of his commitments. He is reading and praying and is always ready and waiting for us when we have appointments with him. He has to give up smoking but im confident he will be able to do it.

I made a delicious Peach Cobbler this week, and also that box of holiday swirl Toll House Cookies. They both turned out quite yummy. I haven´t told Elder Francis that I'm going to make him a cake. I might try to make it a suprise if I can..... The thing is we aren't going to be here for his birthday this Wednesday, because we have our yearly christmas conference with President Da Silva and the whole mission. I´m looking forward to it. It was really good last year. Good food too.....

Well it's getting quite warm here. I´m sure looking at the Florida weather report to you guys it looks quite comfortable, but it's not to us. Sun and all and not having air conditioning. Oh well.

Oh yes I realized the other day that last year I was in Florida for Christmas and New Years Day, same story this year. That doesn't happen too often.

Well thats about it.

2 Questions....

Did you download and make a Skype account.... If so did you do it with your normal email address....? If you haven't made your account yet, use your provo email address that way I will be able to add you so we can chat. I will make sure that we figure everything out this week so we can tell you all the details next week. What is the time change right now....??? is it 3hrs or 5? I always get confused.....

Also could find out and tell me the exact name of the mission that Kylie is in.... and the name of the mission that Zach White is in....

Thank You.

Love,

 Elder Carlson

Monday, December 5, 2011

Inviting Everyone We Meet to Get Baptized

Dear Family,
First off mom, Thanks for notifying me that you typed your letter on your iPad, I feel like it really added to the letter. haha, You guys are all so spoiled. Cameron told me that everyone except whitney and I have iPads now. Oh yes, speaking of iphones,  an iPhone 4 down here costs $999, thats right, one thousand dollars. Ridiculous.

Anyway, I did receive the Christmas Boxes, thank you very much. The umbrella is very nice. I hope it stands the test of time. It hadn't rained for at least 6 weeks but rained the very same day that my box arrived, that was very convenient. It looks like you did a nice job stuffing those boxes full. p.s. I guessed about half of the things without even opening them. Syrup, Bisquick, I'm also pretty sure there are koolaid packets and slippers. Oh yes,  and the ping pong balls ripped open in transit.
Anyway, Thank you very much. I'm not sure when I'm going to make the cookies but They look yummy.

So Elder Luke is in America. He told me that he was planning on going to California for a little bit first and then coming back to Utah, He has a box for you guys that has some Uruguayan treats! Alfajores.... and some Dulce de Leche. Yum.

This week was good. It cooled down a lot. Thank goodness. The rain made it a lot nicer weather. We are having some difficulty getting our investigators to come to church like they know they should. But we have found a few promising investigators that could get baptized soon!   They are people that were investigating earlier but then never got baptized. We will see how it goes. One is a lady named Beatriz. She was investigating for about  3 years but wasn't married and couldn't or  wouldn't get married, but now she is separated from her partner. She has always wanted to get baptized so we think there won't be too many problems. They only thing is she works every other Sunday.

There have been a lot of little changes taking place in the mission. We have always been really focused on  baptism but now we are trying to focus even more. Our new desire, at least as a district, is to invite everyone we talk to in contacts to be baptized. It's interesting. Its literally like the second sentence that comes out of our mouth. We invited 61 people to be baptized, but our zone leaders invited 140, so I guess we have some room to improve. Obviously not everyone says yes, but a lot more than you would think say yes.  Even the people that say no usually have a better doctrinal discussion with us rather than just saying "no thanks come by some other day".

Just like last year, I feel very little of the traditional, I guess you could say commercial, Christmas spirit. I think it's because it's so hot out, and it's still bright out when we go home and there are no Christmas lights. However I think I'm going to try to focus my studies and thoughts on the Savior so I can get into the spiritual Christmas spirit.

Thanks for all the love support and prayers

Love Elder Carlson


P.S.   My companion's birthday is coming up and I was thinking about making a chocolate pinwheel cake, not as fancy as mom's but the same ingredients.... Could you send me the recipe for the pudding frosting.
And since Christmas is coming I was thinking Cinnamon Rolls.  If you could send a recipe for that as well.... :)

Monday, November 28, 2011

Thanskgiving

Dear Family,
So Change calls came and we are staying.  In fact our entire district stays the exact same, really strange. Unfortunately I do not get to go to Montevideo this week for changes because there is no reason for me to go, so tomorrow we will just stay here and work like normal. I say unfortunately because I won't be able to say goodbye to Elder Luke.  He has two days left in his mission. That's crazy. It seems like yesterday we were here in Florida.  It's really normal that the trainer stays with his oro for 2 changes. That's how it was with Luke and I, and president told us that he was going to do that from now on so I wasn't suprised at all that we both stayed. It will probably be my last change in Florida. It would be  out of the ordinary if it wasn't. Possible but strange.

So.... no one even asked me how my Thanksgiving was!
We ate lunch with a family that consists of a Mother and 5 boys the oldest being 14 the youngest 6 months and a girl thats about 5. I think they have a dad but he is working out of the country, Needless to say, money isn't something that abounds. The food wasn't bad by any means, but not the normal feast I am used too.  I don't know if you recall last year, we were given two little hamberguer with rotten buns..... hgahah.... But this year was still really good, they are an awesome family. Really well behaved children. The oldest is a stud, really mature. Anyway Thursday night I made mini apple pies. I bought the premade empanada dough and filled it with apple pie filling and baked them and I made some vanilla ice cream, it was really good. I should have made a lot more though. They kinda reminded me of McDonalds apple pies.  All in all a good Thanksgiving and of course with the sweating heat it didn't feel anything like a normal Thanksgiving.

It's getting hot here.  The nights of a sweaty backs have already begun.

So we have some investigators, we are looking for  more as always but we are having some trouble getting our investigators to church.  It's the biggest snag on the road to baptism for us.
Everything will turn out good though.   We found some good looks  yesterday that we are excited about.

So I'm going to be sending a little box with Elder Luke (Soon to be know as Jason Luke) to bring to you guys in exchange for a Sunday dinner. I will give him our address and the cell phone number of mom and dad probably.  I think he plans on going to California where he used to live first for  like a week or so and then coming back to Utah. I'm sure he will let you know.

Im glad to hear everything is going well.  Good luck on your big test Spencer. I will make sure to remember you in my prayers.

Thanks everyone for all the love and support.

Love,
Elder Carlson

Monday, November 21, 2011

Temple Trip

Dear Family,

So Juan miguel still hasn't been baptized.... it looks like his dad kinda changed his mind as well, so the situation isn't getting better. But we aren't giving up, he is a stud. He came to mutual last week,  like normal, but this time he brought 5 friends. Also we had district confernce. He went to one of the Saturday sessions, he is awesome.

This week was very nice. On Thursday we had the wonderful opportunity to go to the temple!!!!!! It had been 14 months since I had been through a session in the temple. And we did it in Spanish. That was interesting. My poor companion, he understood lots but I'm sure there was lots of stuff he didn't. Anyway we left Florida at 5 in the morning and had a nice early session around 6:30, after the temple we had a conference with President Da Silva, it was also really good. I am excited to be able to go when I get back. Do you guys know when the second temple is scheduled to be finished?  Like 2 years or something? That will be fun to be able to go to the open house and dedication.

Thank you so much for the Christmas boxes. I will almost definitely receive them in 8 days because we have changes a week from tommorrow. It seems almost imposible that Elder Francis is almost done being an "Oro" or greenie.  He will soon be a full fledged junior companion. Time flies. Also I might have already said this but normally the mission goes to the temple once a year. But it just so happened that I was in the CCM when they went a year ago, therfore I will only get to go once in my mission and once at the end of my mission, instead of twice in the mission and once at the end. Oh well its a good thing we live in Provo, the only city with two temples....

Im glad to hear that everything is going well. I hope you guys enjoy the vacation. Hopefully Spencer will got a lot of studying in.  Although I  probably won't be celebrating Thanksgiving like you guys I will be thanking the lord for all I have been given... I really feel like my mission is a huge blessing in my life both right now and in the future.  And Dad, about your little comment about "knowing I miss home some times"... I don't want to offend you guys or anything, but I dont miss home. I´m too busy to miss home. But thanks for the loving words of consolation. Maybe I will quote them to my oro if he starts missing home during christmas :)

Everything is going great down here. Really humid but great, it's starting to get hot, we broke out the fans.....

Love,

 Elder Carlson
P.S.  Elder Luke comes home in 9 days, I will give him your phone number.


P.S.S.  I tried making apple pie on Wednesday, it turned out delicious, also I made potato soup yesterday, also delicious, they don't have dill here or I couldn't find it but it was almost as good without it. also I made rolls last week, también, delicious!

Monday, November 14, 2011

Prayers Would Be Appreciated

Dear family,
I hope there aren't any problems with the video chat on Christmas day. There are a lot of little things that I could see going wrong. I'm sure president will let us know how he wants us to do it though.

Sounds like the new iphone is fun and fancy, so did everyone switch to AT&T or just you.... or did they come out with the iphone for Verizon?

Well we had a good but very difficult week. We started the week not having a planned baptism, we had a district meeting on Tuesday inspiring us to find someone that was prepared and willing and baptize them that week.  The Lord prepared the way and we looked through the people we had and former investigators with the qualifications necessary to be baptized this week, specificly investigators that had gone to church a lot in the past. Juan Miguel was one of them his only obstacle is his grandma.  I think I have told you about him before.  We were able to call the grandma on tuesday and talk with her. At the end she said that if Juan Miguel felt good about it and he wanted to do it she wouldn't stop him, Miracle right?! 

We notified the ward-Juan Miguel was super excited and told tons of ward members at Mutual. He told his friends and family too. Everything was going good. We did a companion exchange and got the interview done and everything just perfect.  At 3:00 on Saturday we recieved a call telling us that Juan Miguel needed to talk to us because he couldn't get baptized... Turns out his grandma changed her mind and also convinced his mother that it w as a bad idea. Basically turned his whole family against him. Just to try, I called his grandma to try to reason with her, the grandfather answered and after a few words from me started yelling at me. It was very unfortunate. Juan Miguel was devastated. He was at the point of tears when he told us. Very sad. After talking to him more we found out that the only obstacle is really his mother. His father is willing to let him get baptized but wants the mother to be fine with it too. Hopefully we will be able to talk with the mother to help her understand how important it is for Juan Miguel.... Prayers would be greatly appreciated.

Despite this very dificult situation we had a fairly positive week. we found a lot of new really promising investigators.... I don't have any more time but thanks for all the letters.

Love,



Elder Carlson

Monday, November 7, 2011

Video Chat for Christmas!

Dear Family,
Thats awesome about Josh Asplund, I assumed he was on a mission I just never heard anything about it. Suele pasar. That's fun that he is speaking Spanish too.

That's a cool story about sister Turley's talk at stake conference, but I don't know, or at least I cannot picture who she is, oh well!

So dad is a Sumo Sacerdote now... High Priest. That's cool, I wasn't expecting that. I dont really know who or why they call people to be high priests. I have been in Districts my whole mission so they don't have a high priest's quorm so I don't really know very much about them.

Gracias for the Christmas presents... now we will have to see how much self control I have. I hope it takes like 4 weeks to arrive, that would make it easier to resist. Last year I was pretty good, I only opened like 3 presents early... haha
Speaking of Christmas. I have a little suprise. We just found out this week that this year instead of doing a normal phone call we will be allowed to do a VIDEO Chat! I know that other missions have been doing that for some time now but we have some fairly strict rules here. I was really suprised to find out. Also they are going to get everyone a washing machine... that was super unexpected. I guess we are baptizing enought to merit such rewards. hahah. And I'm going to be sending a box home with my Trainer Elder Luke, he ends his mission at the end of November and he lives in Logan so he voluntered to take a box home (maybe in exchange for a Sunday dinner with the family). He is a great guy, he is the Assistant to the President right now.

So we had a baptism this week! Melani Lasalvia. She is the cousin of a recent convert. After seeing the baptism of her cousin and coming to the confirmation the next day she was fairly excited and willing to take the lessons and get baptized.

We are focusing right now on refilling our investigator pool.... it's getting a little lonely. Juan Miguel is still in limbo. His grandma still says no, but we have a secret weapon that we are going to try to use this week... President Davidson. He is a Seventy that is on special assignment. I'm sure I have mentioned him when I was in 33. Now he is working with Florida as well to make them a stake. so he voluntered to come with us to help win over the grandma. We are going to keep praying for that.

Everything is going really well here. It's getting hot. I'm looking forward to the days of continous sweating where you cannot escape the heat. Those are always fun..... oh yes and I'm not waking up wet from sweat yet so that's good.

I'm going to use the rest of my time to send some pictures!

Chau.
Love Elder Carlson



P.S.  Once again I find myself in a under developed country. The stupid computer won't let me send photos... maybe next week!

Monday, October 31, 2011

Mennonites in Uruguay

Dear Family,

Wow, sounds like everyone had a pretty good week. Thanks for all the letters and photos!

I noticed that Spencer is enjoying my clothing.... that is my shirt.
Also the fire pit looks cool! That will be fun with the new patio.

So I feel a lot better, illness-wise, I still have a cough kinda but I’m a ton better.
We have a baptism planned for this week; it’s a cousin of a recent convert. Hopefully everything goes according to plan, She came to church just fine.  We were expecting a lot more people but only two came. We have been finding a lot of new people to teach so our prayers are being answered. Now we have to just get them to start progressing towards baptism.

So last p-day we were on the bus from Montevideo to Florida and we noticed that there were two men talking in English, and one of them had a macbook pro, Americans.  Anyway we started talking to one of them and found out that they are part of 4 Mennonite families that were asked by their church to come down to Uruguay and start their church.... It was a very interesting conversation. He is a really good respectable guy - he lived in some small town outside of Ogden for a few years and has a lot of good friends who are Mormon. Anyway, It was just a really interesting encounter. They are farmers. He knows Spanish, and so does his wife, but his younger children that are with him are learning.  It’s always interesting to see the truths that are in other religions and also to see what it is that they are missing. It seems like a very respectable religion, I asked him about it a little.

So i have been helping my oro to learn Spanish and I have been studying Portuguese. It’s really interesting. I’m enjoying learning it because its way easier to go from spanish to portuguese than it was from english to spanish. Its funny because the pronunciation is the biggest problem.   It’s like someone took the english alphabet and then mixed all the sounds up.... di makes a J sound, ti or te makes a ch sound.... l makes a w sound... all these weird things to remember.

Everything is going really good with Elder Francis. We get a long just fine.  He went to BYU as well before his mission. He is really smart! Anyway, he is getting spanish pretty well, but there is still a lot to work on obviously.  A funny experience.... the other day we were teaching about the restoration of the church and he was going to recount the story of Joseph Smith’s first vision, so we usually say something along the lines of "and in Joseph’s own words he describes...." and my companion accidentally said "and in his own sins he describes..." Also he said "Pecados" instead of "Palabras" it was really funny. hahah He wasnt embarrassed or anything. I had a similar experience when I was an oro but mine was during a prayer! haha

That’s about all for this week!

Love,
Elder Carlson

Monday, October 24, 2011

Elder Francis

Dear Family,


I will try to answer some questions first.

I recived the box! Safe and sound and I don´t think anything was stolen. It had shoes, ties, candy, kool aid, portuguese books and envelopes and stuff. I'm pretty sure it's all there.
Thank you very much. I am enjoying everything, however one of  the ties you sent me was fairly ugly. No offense, it's alright though because I will be able to give it to someone I baptize or something-hahah Also I said it would be just fine to send me some of Cameron's ties, he even concented too, maybe for Christmas.

Wow. Max got married! I guess it has been more than a year, but still.

Wow Your birthday, I know it's today and everything it just really snuck up on me. I can't believe we are already at the end of October. It still feels like August or something.

Anyway. I am now with ELDER FRANCIS. He is from Brookings, South Dakota, he just told me that his town is mentioned in the show "Little House on the Praire" so you know its legit.

He's cool, He went to BYU for a year before the mission just like I did. He is really intelligent. He is the first companion I have had that uses bigger english words than I do. He doesn't have very much Spanish experience but his Spanish is better than mine was when I started.  I´m sure he will learn really fast, just have to practice a lot so he can speak more fluidly.

So I have had an incredibly stressful week.  Having an oro (greenie) wouldn't be too bad  alone, but apart from that I have been sick all week. I have woken up every single day with a headache and stuffed nose. Also yesterday and the day before I woke up with gunk glueing my eye lids shut.... pretty sure I have Pink Eye. Conjuntivtis is what its called in Spanish.... It's been rough.... We have been working anyway. I have been taking a decongestent and ibprofen as well as doing what Sister Da Silva told me to do -  this home remedy thing using Chamomile for the pink eye. I think it must have worked because I woke up today and my eyes weren't glued together. Don't get me wrong I still had a fantastic head ache but poco a poco my symptoms are disappearing.  I only had a fever one morning and it wasn't very high. 



The main reason we just keep on working is because we are super busy.  We had a baptism on Sunday after church of the daughter of a formerly less active family and we had to finish teaching and preping her and have the interview and arrange everything for the baptism. Everything turned out good but the road was paved with problems. Sickness, and plumbing were the biggest pains.  The other elders in Estacion had a baptism on Saturday and after they finished filling the font , one of the pipes broke, so we didn't have hot water.  Oh yes and the spicket (i dont remember what its called, the thing you use to turn on the water) for the cold water was broken,  so we finally got the cold water fixed and fillled it with cold water and then Sunday afternoon we dumped pot after pot of boiling water to try to heat it up a little.  It didn't really do anything.  Oh well!  She got baptized, oh yes and for some mysterious reason the cold water came out mixed with a little dirt.  Fantastic so the font was a little more green than normal.  Then the baptismal clothing that we had set aside for the dad and his daughter went missing!!!!! Someone took it out of the closet we put it in.  We fixed that too but oh man what a nightmare.  It was litterally the hardest baptism I have had in my mission, baptism wise.

You are probably thinking , well this isn't a very uplifting experience he is sharing and that's true... but here is the happy part. So because of all the situational problems it didnt really feel, to me, like that special of a baptism.  It's hard to feel the spirit when you are runing all over the place trying to fix everything, and you feel like garbage from pink eye. Anyway after all the problems and the actual ordanice took place, they gave a moment for testimonies for anyone that wanted to.The father, Gustavo, (He baptized his daughter Daiana) got up and bore a fantastic testimony. It really really brought  the spirit and I knew that what we were doing really helped this family. Gustavo has been a member for a long time and he has been inactive for about his entire marriage.  His wife is a member but they have never really been active.  Anyway, he talked about how this is really the first thing that has happened since he got married that made him want to come back to church. It was a very rewarding experience. I´m also really glad that Elder Francis could get a taste of Baptism early on in his mission.

Even though there are some really stressful and dificult moments, I am learning a ton and loving every minute of it.

Love,

Elder Carlson

p.s. I dont have my camera with me but I will send a picture of us next week....  Elder Francis is about the same height as me and has glasses.

Monday, October 17, 2011

I'm Getting a New Companion!

Monday October 17, 2011


Dear family,
Sounds like things are going good....


Bullet Bike is not a brand, it just means the fast kind.... hahah ok ya Spencer's car wasn't fast enough.


Mom what you were talking about kinda sounds like getting a new companion in the mission.... it takes some ajusting.... and lots of humility and patience.... the thing that I have noticed is that humility is the key to getting along with anyone. It's something that I have been working on my entire mission.... Know it all syndrome is not appealing to anyone and it always causes contention, which is of the devil (3 Nephi 11).


SO speaking of new companions, I'm getting one. The change ends tomorrow and we received change calls last night and when I say new companion I mean new, new, new! I'm going to be training a new missionary- oro (gold.... but more commonly refered to in English as a greeny). I have to travel to Montevideo solo tomorrow and pick him up.  I will have to tell you next week about him.  Elder Villar is going to Rocha which is kind of near  33, one of my old areas.


We had a lot of cool experiences this week but I only have time to tell you one.


4 Americans came to our ward yesterday.  One of the four served his mission here in Uruguay about  37 years ago and he came to visit with his wife and brother and sister in law.  Only the ex-missionary spoke Spanish but it turns out that he came down here not knowing if he was going to  see any of his converts.  He had lost contact with them all years and years ago.Turns out that one of his converts is the wife of our current branch president.  She served a mission a few years after she was baptized  and then later got married in the temple.  They have childeren serving missions too. Anyway he was able to talk for a little bit and express his feelings as well as the member.  It was a very awesome experience. After the meeting I got to do some translating for the wife and her sister and brother.  It really was a great experience.  They are all from Austin, TX but before they lived in Ogden  too.  Anyway I don't have any more time.....


Thank you for all the support and prayers.... Tell Andy to write me!


Love,


Elder Carlson

Monday, October 10, 2011

Another Baptism!


Monday October 10, 2011
Oh yes I made steak..... delicious!


Hey family!

Well, I don’t know if you will be receiving many more pictures any time soon because the guy who runs the computer place doesn’t know anything about computers.  Imagine that, it’s terrible!  I just hope he didn’t mess up my cameras memory card.

Anyway, well it sounds like things are going well over there.

Cameron told me about his work out schedule.  I too have been doing my morning exercises... haha, I do really like my perfect pushups too.  I weigh 67 kilos o sea 147 pounds... I don’t know if Cameron will ever weigh more than me.

Well the computer guy messed up my memory card.... not permanently but now I can’t access anything on it.... all my photos are in hidden folders so I can’t get to them.  I is so frustrating!

We had a baptism!!!!! Rebeca.  I would send you a photo but I can’t, thanks computer guy. Anyway, she is a friend of three recent converts.  Everything went surprisingly smooth. Sunday after the confirmation we had to walk with her and some other recent converts home but it started raining so we grabbed my two umbrellas, one is broken, my comps umbrella and we both wore jackets.  There were 7 of us walking.  My comp and I got soaked.... que bueno.... Anyway, we found a new investigator named Juan Miguel.... he was a referral.   Pretty much all of his family are members, he is 14 or maybe 12, ages are deceptive here. He is really smart and likes ping pong, and  he likes the church,  He came yesterday and got up in front of everyone and bore testimony.  Basically re-teaching part of the restoration and how he likes it here and feels good and he knows its the true church so that’s why he wants to get baptized.  Awesome right?  Now here is the bad part.... his grandma is either the legal guardian or just has a lot of control in his life because he has to ask her if he can get baptized and he asked about 6 months ago and she said no-.... but this time we are going to ask with him.  All we can do is pray that her heart will be softened.

I got a letter from Coulsen! haha his former girlfriend Erica dear-johned him a few months ago and now she is officially engaged.  He has a really good attitude about it all.

So we only have one week left in the change, time flies.  Also I almost have 13 months in the mission.  Weird!

Last night we started playing all these games and riddles and stuff at night before we went to bed.  It was really fun but it made me remember another game but I don’t remember all the rules.   I don’t know if mom knows this game but I have played it with dad.  It’s called MAU, I don’t know if you spell it like that but hey.  Anyway in order to play I need the rules.   It’s a card game and the twist is that only one person knows the rules and the rest have to play and figure out the rules as they go. It’s fun.  If you could send me the rules I’d be grateful.

I think that’s all.  It has been rainy and gray the last few days, oh well.  I haven’t received the box yet but Pte da Silva is going  to come here on Tuesday for interviews and he will bring it if it has arrived.

Thanks for everything!

Love,
Elder Carlson

Monday, October 3, 2011

Conference Was Fantastic!


Monday October 3, 2011
Dear Family,

I like the picture and by the sound of what’s in the box you mailed I’m going to like that too! You put in lots of stuff I want.  I wear a size 40 Ecco, hopefully that’s what they sent.  Anyway.... I knew the Portuguese book existed!

Wow conference was fantastic! I loved it.... I don’t have time to share all the things I loved but I would like to share some of the main topics that stood out to me:

               "Although the standards of the world are changing, God's standards never change -  Commandments not suggestions!” President Monson talked about that two times.... once in Priesthood and again on Sunday
               Standing as a witness
               Lots about Missions (especially in priesthood)
               Also they talked about not using facebook too much hahahah
               I was super excited and shocked when I heard about the tabernacle that will be a temple! It’s super awesome... especially because Provo is so crowded!
               I also liked the talk by one of the 70 about the Book of Mormon... he explained everything very clearly. It's a lesson we teach almost daily....
               Elder Holland’s was of course very good too, and  Elder Packers talk especially for the youth....

So right now we are working with a lot of incomplete families... There are three families that have children that were never baptized....

One is the family Perez. They have two daughters Daiana and Agustina. The parents are both inactive but recently started coming back to church and Daiana (9) wants to get baptized... the main problem with her is she is really shy.....

The family Suarez is an active family with like 5 kids. All active.... one is 8 years old and will be turning nine next week but for some reason he has never been baptized.,.... we are pretty sure that the main problem is his dad. He is active but he has some problems with a couple of the commandments....

Familia Chavez. Andres is a recently reactivated 19 year old that is preparing to serve a mission. His older sisters are members too but inactive, he has a younger sister that isn’t a member that we have recently started teaching.... Andres is a really cool guy he comes and works with us like three times a week.... it’s going to be excellent preparacion for his mission....

WE have some other investigators too.... but I don’t have any more time....

Time is just flying by.... only two weeks left in the change.....

Love Elder Carlson!

Monday, September 26, 2011

Bautismo!

Dear Family,
We had two baptisms Saturday! Efraín and Rocio. Lots of little problems but nothing unsolvable.
Another friend of Rocio and two other recent converts told us that she wants to get baptized so we will see how that goes. Also yesterday an inactive family came to church, we had passed by them a few times and my comp and his former comp were trying really hard passing by really often and they never came. But yesterday they did! It's good news for us because their 9 year old daughter isn't baptized, and now wants to be!

I can't belive you cant find that book! Oh well.... any portuguese language learning book would be alright I guess. And maybe a Book of Mormon in Portuguese.  Other than that I'm good I think, maybe get Cameron to donate some ties too..... :) oh and maybe some Trident tropical twist..... ohhh and maple syrup.... if it fits..... sorry I don't need a big box.....

So I was sick most of this week. I still worked but I have a nasty cough. It's kinda going away. It was worse yesterday.... I asked Sister Da Silva what I could do to treat it and she told me that she has a book of natural remedys and it says that if you cut an onion in half and put it under your bed at night supposedly the smell helps to cure, or rather when you breath in onion air..... who knows I don't really want my clothing smelling like onions so I don't think I will try it.

I am super excited for conference! We will be watching it here in Florida. This is my second to last conference in the mission.... I wonder what the main topics are going to be this time. I hope it's super Second coming themed! that would be awesome. Maybe it will be super Marriage themed and it will motivate Spencer a little more..... So Hannah eh? You will have to snap a photo for me..... I'm suprised you got a name out of him.....

I don't have photos of the baptism on my camera but I will send some later.

Random request. Could you see if you could find a PDF or something of the translation of the names of the Spanish hymns, or rather I want a list of all the Spanish hymns organized by number (in the Spanish hymn book) and the English name and number.... it would be helpful. I know a lot of them but every once and a while we sing something crazy and I don't know what it is.....

Also if you could find a picture of Uruguay and Utah comparing the size. Like maybe the outlines of the two overlaping just to demonstrate the comparative size. I think uruguay is bigger but not by that much.... Make sure they are proportional.... :)

Thats about it.... Its beautiful weather here right now.... It looks like its going to be a very nice day....

Thats all...

Love Elder Carlson!

Tuesday, September 20, 2011

One-Year Mark

Dear family,
So do you know what today is? Today is the 19 of September. Exactly One year in the future I will be heading home on an airplane to Utah. Sept. 19, 2012. Go ahead and put it on the calender mom. hahah. so I completed a year on  the 16th. Didn't do anything special.  I bought some really expensive ice cream. It's normal priced for down here but in comparison to America it's really expensive. it was 9 dollars for 2 liters. Hey you don't hit 1 year every day.

Oh yes the xbox.... no its okay Spencer can use it for now. I know if anything happens to it he will replace it.

Also that is terrible about BYU losing..... oh well..... they will be better next year, hopefully.

That's too bad you are feeling sick mom. I am actually having the same symptoms too. Sore throat messed up ears, head ache, and my jaw hurt, that's a new one. I feel better today.
It's so weird that you guys are getting colder, going into fall. I´m getting more and more confused, it's starting to get really nice here. We did have some gray rainy type days Saturday and Sunday. but it's a lot nicer now. It always rains at the end of the week. I don't know why but I hate it. It makes people not want to go to church.

That is insane that Andy is coming home so soon. I at least thought it was the end of October not the beginning. crazy.


So investigators....

We are going to have two baptisms this weekend if all goes as planned. Rocio and Efrain. They aren't related, Rocio is a amiga of a few recent converts and has come to church 4 times already but we hadn't had the chance to teach her up until now.
Efrain is a child of an inactive lady in our branch. she now is active and Efrain is going to get baptized. Yeah!

Other than that we don't have that many investigators. we will be focusing a lot this week in finding new ones.

That's about all! I'm going to send some photos! I love you guys and am really grateful for all the support and prayers I receive!

Love,

 Elder Carlson

Tuesday, September 13, 2011

Back to Florida!

Monday September 12, 2011


Dear Family,


For Real.... 10 years since 9-11 that's crazy.

Thats really cool about Bill and Karen. I´m not sure which ones they are but I'm sure I'd recognize them if I saw them. Are they the ones that we had Thanksgiving with? Are they going to learn Russian, or Ukrainian? I have a friend that just got home within a few weeks that went to Ukraine Russian speaking. It's crazy that people are already starting to go home. Andy Chapman is just around the corner and they Riley, Paul, Zac, and Jared are right there too.

Well i´m in Florida again..... Same house, same chapel, almost the same area. I really like it. It was really cool because we have church together, the two branches. I mean in the same building, not together. But I got to see a ton of people I know including converts, Not as many converts that I would have like to have seen but yeah, at least some of them are still going strong. I'm probably going to be going on a companion exchange this week with the zone leaders in my old area. We will have to see. We might be baptising this week and they might be too so we will a have to do some interviews.... we will see how it all turns out.

I like all the elders that live in my house. I'm not sure if I told you but I´m with Elder Villar, not Villard. He is from Santiago, Chile. This is his third change in the mission, 3 months and like a week. Pretty new but he is a really good missionary. In the same house we have the zone leaders ELder Guex and elder Baxter. Baxter is from Idaho and Guex is from Uruguay, he lives in the other mission thats why he is serving over here. He hasn't lived in the other mission his whole life, in fact he lived in Florida, Branch Estación for the first 17 years of his life. That's right he is serving in his home ward. His Grandma and two of his aunts live like two blocks away. The good thing is that they bring us food. And Elder Guex already knows everyone. so they are doing really well now.


Jordan with Elder Villar

So something pretty interesting happend here in my branch not yesterday but the Sunday before. I wasn't here yet, but one of the members got.... possessed....i spelled that wrong but you know what i mean.... like by a demon..... ya.... everyone has been talking about it. It's some one I know too. They used to live in Estacion but moved to Asamblea a while back. It's a pretty interesting story. I wish I would ahve been there. It would have been even more intersting. But they also think that it might just be that she is a skitzophrenic. Also don't know how to spell that but ok....

Thats about all for now.... Keep looking for the portuguese book.... I will complete a year of my mision this week.... that's weird....

Love Elder Carlson

Monday, September 5, 2011

I'm Getting Transferred!

Dear Family,

Well I will start with the noticias.

I'm leaving Minas! I can't believe I'm leaving so quickly. 2 changes is nothing. I'mm kinda upset because I wanted to stay because things have really picked up here and we have a ton to do. Elder Erwin is staying and getting a Latino elder that is fairly new in the mission like his third change. And Elder Erwin is going to be the District leader here in Minas

I am going to Asamblea. I'm going to be with Elder Villard. This is also his third change. so he is bien nuevito. He might be from Chile or Argentina we aren't sure. I'm going to be the district leader there. Oh yes and did I mention Asamblea is in FLORIDA! My first zone! oh yes and Asamblea shares a house with Estación! MY FIRST AREA. I'm going back to my first house. I did companion exchanges in Asamblea. its super weird. It's going to be cool though because Estación meets in the same church building so I am going to get to see a bunch of people I know. Converts and members and I'm going to be doing companion exchanges in Estación. It's super weird.

Also my stud of a trainer Elder Luke is now one of the new APs. He will finish off his mission as AP. 

It's hard to belive I'm going back to Florida. I'm not that excited to pack. Oh well.

This last week was good. We had some funny experiences. We had 4 investigators in the church so that was good. We have a lot of good progressing investigators it's a shame I won't be here to see them get baptized. 

The other day I was working and it was a little hot out so I took off my jacket. We continued working and walked a long ways, we ran by the house to go to the bathroom and get a drink before our next scheduled lesson. As I was walking up the stairs A thought from out of nowhere entered my brain. "Your passport and debit card were in your jacket pocket" I ran over to my jacket to check to see if they were still there because when I took off my jacket I was holding it in such a way that the pocket was upside down. Stupid Gravity. My debit card was gone. I still had my passport (in actuality it's just a copy of my passport) My mission debit card I should say, not my personal card. It's the way we get our monthly allowance and reimburses. So we went all over our area retracing our steps to try to find it. No luck. So I called the financers of the mission to tell them that we probably needed to cancel it and send me a new one. They didn't answer because they were out working so I left a message. It was very upsetting because that very day we were going to get our monthly money that's why I had the card with me. It was going to be a huge hassle. Anyway we continued working and about at 7 o clock we were walking to a lesson and some lady was getting in her car and she stopped us and pulled out my Debit card!!!!! She told us that she had found it on the ground on a street corner and saw that had a weird name so she assumed it was ours. It pays to be an American down here! It was a very welcome answer to prayer.

Also we have some problems down here in Uruguay. We teach people the correct way to pray but they forget a lot. We have an investigator that always starts out "Dear Heavanly Father............ Jesus......." and then starts her prayer. She ends by saying "Thank you jesus, thank you..........amen" hahah its funny. She really loves Jesus. She said in her prayer once that "I really love jesus and I like people who love jesus. and I don't like talking to people who don't like jesus. Keep them away from me....." haah it's pretty funny. 
Also someone in the church yesterday ended their testmony in the name of the holy ghost amen.

Thats about it. 

Here are two photos....
Me and Elder Erwin

These. are Alfajores. They taste delicious. I eat them often. Pronounced (Alphahore)



Love Elder Carlson!

Monday, August 29, 2011

An Early Birthday Present for Mom

Dear Family,


Sounds like everything is going well....


I had no idea that Spencer was moving out finally. Where is he living now? Is he just renting?
Oh AP Stats, does Whitney have Mr. Marker, he is the best and probably the easiest.


Well, we still don't have a phone line and what's worse we now don't have access to the old house so we are officially without a phone. We have a card to use the payphones throughout the city. It's a pain, oh well. Hopefully we get a phone this week otherwise change calls (This Sunday) are going to be a huge pain. It's crazy that the change has already flown by. This Sunday we get calls and the Tuesday following that is the actual changes.
Time is moving faster and faster the further along I get. This coming change (My 8th in the field) I will pass my one year mark. that's weird.


So here is a weather report from this last week.


Monday- I was gone all day doing immigration ( but i didn't do the immigration stuff, only my companion did, which means i have to go some other day and do it.)
Tuesday: Overcast, cold
Wednesday: Overcast, cold
Thursday: Overcast, still cold
Friday: Still Overcast, and Cold
Saturday: It started really overcast and extremely windy, then it got colder and it rained, and rained and rained some more.
Domingo: Overcast.


Today actually is pretty nice looking.  I saw the sun so that's good.


So things are going pretty well work wise here. Emma (Angela's Mom) is doing really well. She is reading the gospel principles book and loves it. Also we finally had a charla with Irene, Angela's sister. She had listened in on some of the charlas but we finally had one just for her. Also she is like 19 and is studying to be an English teacher, so we gave her a Liahona in English with the same one in Spanish to compare and read.


Ha ha... the other day we had a lesson with Emma and she was asking about our family and stuff and she said something, talking about my comp, along the lines of "He(Elder Erwin) has more American blood than the other(me) (because he's tall), but he (Me) must have some Latino blood because Spanish is easier for him" Haha it was funny!
First off everyone thinks all Americans are tall, beautiful and look younger than they actually are. Mom, I was going to save this for your birthday but on a few occasions when I show the family pictures people have thought you were my sister. don't let it go to your head or anything!


So.... the last time you sent me a box, you said it's hard to think of things to send me... well don't worry I am making a list for Christmas so it will be easier. But in the mean time I would be very appreciative if you could send me a very small packet of things (last time I asked for a packet you sent me a whole box, just a packet will suffice).


  1. I would really like the Portuguese Missionary language learning book, its lime green i think. you can get it at Deseret Book or maybe the Distribution center.
  2. Envelopes. The kind that are a little nicer that have the strip that you just pull off the seal it, the licking kinds don't work good because the humidity seals them shut.
  3. Address stickers. My name "Elder Jordan Carlson" and my mission address, just a sheet or two
  4. Kool-aid packets, but just send me the normal super cheap ones that you have to add sugar too. because we do have sugar down here
And maybe get Cameron to give me a few mission ties. That is something you can always send me, Ties. I always like me some ties.


Just a small packet. maybe for the good old one year mark or something.


Well that's about it.


Thanks and i love you all!


Elder Carlson!


ps. Kate Ze... I don't know how to spell her last name, besides its different now that she got married. Anyway, she sent me a letter. It was great and very much appreciated! Sounds like she is doing great out there in Virginia! Thanks for the update Kate!

Monday, August 22, 2011

Dear Family,


Well yup, I'm not a teenager anymore....

So today I was expecting a nice relaxing pday, we were going to get elder Erwin a haircut and do a little letter writing and fix some stuff in the house, like rig up our indoor laundry lines, but hey, you don't always get what you want. Last night when we were talking to the district leader he told us that we would be going to Montevideo (Again) today to sign immigration paperwork. The weird thing is that he said Elder Erwin would be doing it and not me. Its weird because I still haven't done it and I have been here longer than elder Erwin. Oh well I'm an illegal. Also its going to be horrible like last pday because we don't need to be there until 2 o clock. So we have to leave here in like a half of an hour at like 11:15. Its about a two hour bus ride from Minas to Montevideo. Then we will be there for about an hour or two and come home and probably arrive around 6, Just in time to start working again. (Ya Preparation day is really only preparation 8 hours.... I was a little disappointed to find that out in the CCM). So it's another pday down the drain.... at least the normal ciber is working today. Some of the cibers down here have the worst excuses for computers. But luckily the ciber we normaly go to has really nice ones, the best in my mission so far!.....




So yes I am sending a pic of Angela's baptism, just this week we starting teaching her mother too. Emma. We have already put a date with her for her baptism. If Angela was made of Gold then Emma is a dingy silver. But it's silver none the less. I think she might smoke but we can work on that.

We had a lot of people in the capilla this week. Over 70. It's the most my comp has ever seen in one sacrament meeting on his mission. I have seen a little over 80. We had half of the recent converts, which is good, its normally like 25 percent. and we had 4 non members. Fredy, who is going to be baptized in October as soon as they get married. Emma, Angelas mom, Diego, the son of some memebers that we were teaching but then he said he didn't want to continue but then he came this week so who knows what he wants. and Daniel, another guy that is living with a member, they aren't married so he can't be baptized but he wants to be, because they are waiting on a divorce for the member lady because she got married in Brazil and it takes lots of time and is expensive. So we don't know about him. Marriage and divorce is like the worst posible thing as missionaries, The government has made everything a super long and painful expensive process. It's terrible. In Uruguay you can't be married in the temple. you have to get married on friday and then sealed the very next day. Its a giant pain.

But anyway things are going good. Its been really cold this week. and windy. and rainy. and it hailed once. Apparently some polar winds are blowing through or something and thats why its so cold and windy. its supposed to get better today i think but  who knows. they were actually prediction snow here the other day. but it didnt happen. we talked to a guy and he said it hasnt snowed here in like 20 years and that he has only seen it three times in his life.

So for my birthday we worked like normal....

But dont worry thats not all. haha We went to one of our investigators houses. Pablo and Silvia. justo Pablo's birthday is the same as mine. so Silvia made cup cakes with a meringue frosting and hot chocolate. It was nice. but it  ended up making me sick. Uruguayans are so stubborn they won't take no for an answer so I was forced to eat a ton.  I really did feel sick so we ended up going home about an hour early and I was just going to go to bed, but about an hour and a half after we got home a member came by our house to tell us that our district leader needed us to call President Da Silva because he was trying to get a hold of us. We still dont have a telephone in our new house. It's the mission financers fault. Anyway my comp woke me up and I got re dressed and we went over there and I called President. They started singing happy birthday in English to me. hahah it was funny, I'm not sure if it was worth getting woke up and re dressed and walking over there in the cold but hey. They were the only ones that sang to me so its ok. haha

So my comp sure didn't cheap out. He took a piece of paper from a members house and wrote "Happy Birthday, you're old, 20" yep.

Thats all for now!

Got to go to Montevideo!

Love Elder Carlson

Monday, August 15, 2011

A Baptism and a Birthday

Dear Family,
Thanks for all the birthday wishes! As usual there is some problem at our normal Internet place and we had to go to a different one, and of course we are super short on time because we are going to Montevideo at 12 so I can get my wart re-zapped because the first time did almost nothing. So this letter will be quick!

So Angela got Baptized!!!!!

We weren't going to do it this week because we didn't have a chance to teach her Tithing and go over the interview questions with her, but we did an intercambio anyway with the district leader, and when he talked with the Zone leaders at night they made it very clear that we needed to do everything possible to get her baptized this week. haha anyway we went to her house the next day and everything went smooth, she already has an amazing testimony of tithing. So that's good. Interview went fine, the only problem is no one knew about the baptism so we went around announcing to everyone. Not very many people showed up but it was still a really good baptism. Her two sisters and mother came, that's good. We are going to start teaching them next!

Thats about all for this week! I made banana bread and apple bread, both turned out really well.... but yup.

Love,
Elder Carlson