December 5, 2011 with Elder M in Melo

Hey all,

Sounds like everyone had a good week. Keep it up. We have had an amazing week. Casiano, his wife Fernanda, and their son Ramiro got baptized yesterday. It was a miracle. Casiano finally took the decision to make a sacrifice and not wait until the end of shearing season to come in and get baptized. Pictures next week...hopefully with pictures from the next baptism. We're trying to have a White Christmas year with plenty of baptism all month `round. We had a really exciting month in November as a mission. 150 people got baptized and confirmed. That's about 30 more than have ever been baptized in a month in our mission.



Before I forget: Recipe ideas...not much. Empanadas de Carne are really good. I don't have a recipe, but they're pretty easy, i'm sure there's a recipe online. They're also good with shredded ham and cheese instead of meat. With the sopapillas (Tortas Fritas down here) put dulce de leche on them instead of the usual honey and stuff. It's amazing with Dulce de Leche. Also, if you ever think of making hamburgers, put a fried egg on the patty- it's delicious. Um...Alfajor....I don't really know of a way to make them other than how we made them before I left. I'd do that with dulce de leche(sensing a trend?) in the middle and put a chocolate covering on them. That's how they are here. The kind with out the covering are kinda weird and they put coconut all around the edge. I don't know what an Ojo de Dios is. I'm curious. Activities....the big activity for Christmas here is eating asado (kinda barbecue), playing soccer, and drinking mate and I don't think any of you would like mate very much. The difference is that it's hot out here.

I don't really know why Elder Alldredge isn't psyched to be in Fraile Muerto. They're exploding the area. They already have baptisms planned for next week. and are finding tons of people to teach. The only thing scary about Fraile Muerto is that there's a little beach on a river that's pretty popular (imagine that place we always have to stop on the way up to logan...the first dam?) and there are lots of....jovencitas, but I think it's no problem unless the missionaries want it to be a problem.




Re: Christmas. No one even seems to know Christmas is close. You've all started with some serious Christmas celebration. The church is barely starting to announce the activities. We didn't see the First presidency devotional. Didn't even know about it. It's kinda depressing. In montevideo, at least there were big sales and stuff at the stores. Here...nothing. It's really tranquilo.


The heat isn't too bad because there's plenty of wind these days, but I can tell it's gonna extra bad here in Melo. that's what everyone says at least.
Enjoy your Christmas and remember the reason for the season!
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