Unwanted baptism visitor

Yea Clean teeth!

Well I talked to you all last week so I'm not sure what to say hahaha. 

Everything is going great. Thank you everyone for the cards and gifts!!! 

We have stayed busy!! The last 3 weeks are all a blur in my head and I can't decide what happened when. We have been running mad to get everything done for the baptisms and get everyone ready.

Funny story. Last week as we were filling the font for M I cleaned it out starting filling it and came back to check on it, i noticed a small creature swimming along the wall. Yep it was a salamander. It had to have come from the pipe because I swept the whole thing out. So we did some mcGivering and I fished it out with a net we had to clean. Let the little buddy go out the back door hahaha. Silly little newt!

Christmas was really special this year. It was really great to go around and bless people on that special day. Helping them feeling the spirit and peace of out Lord and Savior Jesus Christ in their homes. We were able to visit many families, all of which stuck true to their Hispanic culture and forced us to eat in about every single house. We had a big lunch with a family from Uruguay we ate chancho (small pig) roasted whole. And Chorizo a type of sausage that is really good! And this wonderful desert that I can't remember how to say it, but it was really good! 

 One of my favorite things about winter here serving with Hispanics is the hot teas and drinks they make (they call anything hot and made with plants tea, don;t worry no breaking commandments here) They make this one called Ponche that is so good, its kind of liek wassel but way more fruit, i love it! The tamales, the barbacoa oh its all so good!!!!

We are still working with a lot of people getting them ready for their baptisms this month. Need to work out some marriage stuff (as usual) Its going really great and I'm glad I'm here in Chamblee. I really hope they don't move me next month that would be lame!!!

Love you all, hope you had the best Christmas ever!!!

Love Tanner

I ate cow gut tacos,cow tongue and cow tongue tacos. The tongue was delicious! Chicken feet not as much.

Merry Skyping

There was no email this week because Elder Charlesworth was able to Skype with his family for an hour.

It was great talking/seeing him. We loved seeing his face light up when he starting talking about the people he has been interacting with. Sis Harding told me that there are several  "Atlanta White Christmas'"  planned for the next couple of weeks. 

Even in Utah

I don't feel like writing very much today. This week was insane (as usual) and I am very, very tired!!! 

President was so busy with two zone conferences that he asked us to drive a missionary to the airport and send him on his way home (medical reasons) That Atlanta airport is so big!

We have been helping a couple people get ready for their baptisms this week. M is such an incredible lady. We stopped by to check up on her and she was like oh good so glad you came by, I've needed to talk to you. Like I said before she was hoping her son who is a member could come up from Mexico for this. He has no idea that she has been meeting with us and wanted to surprise him. I can fell that she is truly converted. She was telling us how she prayed and has just felt so much peace about being baptized whether he son is here or not i know on that day i need to be baptized. She is so solid and reads daily, loves everything about the church and already feels like she is a member.

 You can always tell when someone prays about something. Prayer is so powerful. The V's family only hold up is that they are not married, and he does not believe in marriage. She was married before in Mexico and is not divorced. We invited them to read proclamation to the world and then counsel together and then pray about what they should do. We went over on Saturday and their concern now is what is will take to get her divorced. They have it worked out so they can go to church every other week now because of his work and they continue to pray and read daily. They are such a neat family and the 3 little boys even come sit in with us each time. Taking members with us has also made a HUGE difference. Missionary will not retain unless members are involved in the conversion of a person. Remember that, even in Utah. Look around you, how many people have fallen away or are just waiting for someone to tell them about the church. One person we are teaching right now who will be baptized next week lived in Utah, went to temple square and no one ever told her about the church. Well she found us one day a few months ago when I was last here and now she is being baptized cause a friend of hers kept inviting her to church after all this time.

A missionary friend I have in New York right now sent me a really cool story. They are serving in downtown which covers the temple. They started talking with the guard outside and turns out he is from Africa and has been reading the Book of Mormon on his own but no one has ever told him about it, or how he can join or anything, well they did, and  now he is being baptized! Not even temple workers stopped to talk to him and invite him to church. They are all around us!!!!

Brenen I love you and I pray the surgery goes well.(Brenen had brain surgery trying to get his seizures to stop) .Good job on those wins!!! (wrestling) you'll get them all next year!!1 Love you buddy. I love the tiger you sent me, it looks great!

Love you all, happy holidays

or in the words of Ronald Wesley "Happy Christmas Harry"

Love Tanner

Crazy tired

P-Day! Elder C,Pres G, Elder S, Elder B and Elder M

This week was a whirlwind!!! So crazy!!! Some days I really wish that I was not a Zone Leader. These past few months just take a toll on you hahaha. I do enjoy it for the most part but when Elders keep fighting and then you have you have to do an emergency exchange,and have a companion for 2 days that does not speak Spanish and then wait for all the stuff to get done for an emergency transfer oh boy, I am worn out! Good news is though I'm not nearly as sick as I have been the past 4 weeks. We have so many people to teach and it was a still a really good week!

M is an investigator that I taught last time I was here and refused to commit to baptism finally accepted a date!!! She is such a neat lady. She finally feels like she can commit her self to it. She reads like everyday and has since we first invited her to. She does not enjoy going to church only because it is not as reverent as she feels the true church should be (the branch here has some problems with that I'm not going to lie) She decided that she knows its true and needs to go no matter what. 

 We found C again..She was someone that got lost since I was last here. After I left the area they split it up and divided the 3 spanish areas in the branch into 2 spanish areas. She some how was never visited after I left and fell through the cracks. Well I told Elder Baugh that she was ready when I was here at that was like 7 months ago. We knocked on her door and she was so excited we came. She said she had been waiting for us to come back. We taught her the Restoration again and committed her to a date early in January. She is so happy to be learning again. Its been so cool to come back here and see all these people again. She is so ready. She has prayed and knows its true. She's been waiting for missionaries to come back since I left. 

The V family is a neat family. I think I've mentioned them before. They are doing so great! They read everyday and he wants us to get the kids all involved and teach them. They all accepted a date for early in January and then came to church tomorrow and all three boys loved it!  
We have been having tons of success and have 3 baptism to prepare for in the next 2 weeks and a few for the first week in January. The crazy thing is I have no idea how we get all this stuff done and teach all these people and still take care of all the Zone Leader stuff like meetings and running stuff and taking care of problems. The Lords blesses us and we spend every second of our time doing something. I'm so tired by the end of the day its been taking a toll. But its a good kind of tired! The kind that makes you feel like I did something good today! Its been so great to see all of these people learn, progress and grow and enjoy the Gospel. Its been worth every tired moment (which now days is like every moment of the day) Time is flying by! Everything is all around great! :)

Bless your heart

Where's Elder C? Picture courtesy of Elder Gautavai's mom

This was a CRAZY week. We had lots of zone leader stuff going on. We were on exchanges and had those interrupted because we had to do an emergency exchange because two elders in our zone got in a fight and separated so we had to find them and split them up for the day. It was just all around kinda funny though. My companion called me ( I was in another area) and said hey two elders just split up...what do we do??.. Bless his heart, he has not even been out a year yet, first transfer as zone leader and he is doing a great job at it. I said well elder....we are going to go find them and then take care of it. All worked out well and the two are back together and happy.

We had Elder Corbridge of the 70s come and talk with us on Friday which was really great. He taught us many great things and I had a great time in the 7 hour meeting..... dang was I tired though hahahaha.

Sunday was probably the best day though. A got baptized(i'll send pics later) and then right before that G (a recent convert of mine) grabbed me with a hug full of excitement and asked me to give him the priesthood and ordain him a priest. That was one of the most spiritual experiences on my mission. First off just that fact that I was able to come back to this area and still be apart of his progression, second the Spirit that I felt during to blessing was so powerful. He is such a great example to me. He studies his scriptures. He loves to serve and he was SOOO excited to get the priesthood. He also grabbed me after the baptism and asked if it would be okay if he brought some friends of his to church the next week so we could teach them. I said yes G that would be just fine hahahaha. Such a great guy. 

A's baptism went great! There were a ton of people there and everyone enjoyed it. 

We are teaching a lot of great people who are reading and doing what they need to do. We can hardly keep up with all the people we have to teach and are working really hard on getting everything more organized so we can do more with our time... and we plan a lot as it is. We just need to figure something else out so we can get in everyone that we want to. 

I hope that everything is going good for you all. Brenen keep it up in wrestling!! I want to see some pics of that soon. Guppy thanks for your letter, I will write you back soon!!!

Hope all is well.