Feliz Navidad!

Hello everyone!
Hey how are things going? SO this week has been a good one. Christmas was fun. The people down here do things on Christmas eve instead of Christmas day so that night we went caroling with the Branch President´s Family for an hour or so and then back to his house for a dinner. The dinner was way good. There was tons of steak and pork as well as sausages called chorizo. yummy. There was also a bunch of potatoes and rice as well as bread. Elder Tondevold and I made Brownies to take over for them. The other elders that we live with came over for dinner too.
Christmas day was pretty relaxed. We played games in our pension with the other elders and then went to lunch at a members house. SO there is a family in our branch that doesnt have a lot of money and it is a single mom working 2 fulltime jobs to support 4 kids. She is really awesome and has taken her sister in to live with her so she can still go to school. We have been teaching the sister for the past few weeks now. Anyways, we got a box and stuffed it full of candy and some toys and took it over to them. They loved it. Later on that day, I got to talk to my family....finally. The guy who said we could use his house phone to receive the call wasn't even at his house when we told him to be and then our families ended up not even being able to call. After like 3 hours of going into town and then buying minutes on a cell phone and having a guy call around, we got the code to get out of the US and got everything worked out. PHEW!!!
Phone number they called us at in Chile 0115653636681

Okay, so now on to the good stuff. This past saturday, we had a baptism! Her name is Nayareth Rojas and has moved in with her older sister who lives in our ward. My companion baptized her and yesterday in Church, I confirmed her. It was a cool experience for me but I was pretty nervous! I hope everyone had a great and safe christmas! Take care and i´ll talk to ya next week. -Elder Nelson Nayareth's sister, family & us.

Little Rays of Sunshine

My favorite flower down here "Little Ray of Sunshine"

Hey Everyone!
How are things going? So this week has been a busy one. We had our Christmas Conference up in La Serena this past Thursday. We had to be on the bus by 6am so we got an early start to the day. The conference was really good. Pres and Hma Wilhelm spoke to us. Our special musical number went really well also. It was I heard the bells on Christmas day. They also asked me to play the opening, closing, and prelude. It was fine this time because it was all just christmas songs. But, we had a nice lunch and then a gift exchange. We all got mission shirts. I will have to take a picture of mine and try and send it next week or something. After that we had like a soccer activity. Friday was full of events as well. We had interviews with both President and Hma Wilhelm. Hma Wilhelms interview is about like our health and then memorization stuff....she also has us do pushups for her and then set goals for next time. I got44 and my goal is 60. she doesnt count them either if you dont go all the way down. So after that, we had an activity where we sang the songs that we had been practicing. We went to like a children´s home to sing to all the kids there and then had a santa claus give out gifts. IT was fun and the kids liked it. After that, we had our singing in the plaza with some of the members. It was a lot better than i thought it was going to be. They had mics and speakers all hooked up so we were jammin the whole plaza . Between each song the missionaries had to give a little minute long thing to introduce the next song. we had to write it by ourselves. i introduced silent night.
Well everyone is getting ready for Navidad down here. There are people who set stands up for wrapping presents and stuff and a lot of people have lights hanging up. its funny because some people have those lights for drapping over bushes just hanging on the side of their house...and its only like one square too so it looks kinda funny to see a patch of lights on a house.
Alright, well I hope everyone has a great week and a feliz navidad! Love you all and take care!
-Elder Nelson

Vote on our ties

Me & my companion Elder Tondevold from Murray, UT

play a game with people. We ask them to vote on whose tie they like the most.

So...who's tie do you like the most??

The first family I met in Limari. They are moving up north to work.

Christmas lights in the down town plaza of Ovalle
A little country town of Punitaqui, 30 min. from Ovalle

Well hello everyone. Things are going well down here in Ovalle. Just when you think it cant get any hotter, we get a nice little overcast day. It is wonderful but I am sure the clouds will go away before too long. So this past Saturday night the 4 elders in our pension(apartment) invited a bunch of the member young men and their friends to play some basketball. It was way fun and i can now dunk it with a mini ball. it was funny to see how they play. it is like unorganized churchball from the states. I am pretty sore today though still.
Earlier this week I went on intercambios (exchanges) to a small town about 30 minutes east of Ovalle. It is called Punitaqui. It was way hot there and kind of a little country town. Not much out there but it was fun.
We are still practicing Christmas songs for our mission conference this Thursday as well as to sing in the town plaza this Friday with members of the church. It should be fun. Yesterday at the practice with all the members the person who plays the piano for that never showed up so i had to play. I didnt know a couple of the songs but I winged it through them alright...
Well hope all is going well with everyone! Love you all and thanks for everything! Take care!
Con Amor, Elder Nelson

It's Hot!

A dog that greets us at our pension...we named her Luda.

Jaren's Christmas package from home finally arrived!

He has a mini Christmas tree, presents and pink walls!

elder smith (left), me, elder villagra (right).

they are both so funny.

elder smith said that he was going to smile like a

south american in his pic haha

Our zone.

Hey everyone!
So this week i gave my first haircut today to elder halverson. it turned out good but it did blaze a spot right above his ear but he doesnt care. We found Nayareth to teach. She is going to be baptized on December 27th. She moved in to live with her sister who is a member and they came to us at church last week saying that they wanted to start the discussions. It is pretty cool. So tonight I am going out to Punitaqui for intercambios (exchanges). so i will have been in every sector of the ovalle zone. Things are going well with my companion and I. We like a lot of the same things and found out that a lot of the little annoying things we do to family and friends are the same. Its a good time and we enjoy working together. I am playing the piano for the Christmas conference this month...its only 4 songs and i am able to practice them every day so its not that bad. We are also singing in the district conference for Ovalle. We had a practice yesterday with members and the lady complemented my singing a couple of times--haha...i was doing bass too. I dont think it was me she was hearing because I don't sing...SO on the funnier side of the week, we were walking down this big hill earlier on tuesday, and this guy who was probably like 22 was at the bottom and walking the opposite way we were going...anyways, he turned up to wave at us and took his eyes off the ground and hit a curb and did the goofiest looking fall i have ever seen! The first thing he did was look back up at us to see if we saw it. I gave him the thumbs up and just kept walking. He was laughing...it was funny. Well, just enduring this heat...take care everyone and enjoy the snow for me ;) Love you all! -Elder Nelson
P.S. Happy Birthday Uncle Neil, Uncle Andy, Uncle Byron & Erica! Hope its a good one :)

Crooked mouths & a new companion

Hey Everyone!
Hey how are things going? Things are good here. It sounds like Thanksgiving was a good time. I didnt even notice a difference down here.
So drumroll....I am still in Limarí, Ovalle. I do have a new companion. His name is Elder Tondevold. He is from Murray, Utah and has been on his mission for about 13 months now. He is cool and we get along good together.
So, yeah this week was full of contacting. So i dont remember if I told you this earlier but there is a superstition here that makes me laugh just about everytime I see it. It is called the "boca chueca"...not really sure how to spell the second word, but it means crooked mouth. If anyone is drinking a hot drink or ironing, they will come to the door with their mouth covered because they think if they talk and the cold air hits their mouth, it will get stuck. My comps like to have a little fun with these people sometimes and kinda make fun of them without them realizing by like cautioning them not to come out anymore. Its pretty funny.
So its weird to think that on the 13th of Dec. I will have been on my mission for 1/3 of a year already. The time really flies down here but the MTC seems like forever ago.
I am still working hard and learning the language. It its getting easier for me to understand people but speaking still is a challange at times.
I better wrap this up but I hope all is well and you are enjoying the cooler weather...its only getting worse each day and I would kill for a cool breeze. I'm getting quite a tan line where my watch is. Well today is still overcast and nice but we will see how long that lasts :) I love you all!
Love,
Elder Nelson