...and a Happy New Year!

I can't believe this year is already over. Crazy, eh? 

So...this week went pretty well. We're not as lost as we were before. We are also working with some super prepared investigators.

Wilson is amazing. He accepted a baptismal date right off, which almost never happens. If everything goes well, he'll be getting baptized next Satirday! On the 12th. He even brought his 5 yr old son to church on Sunday. :) Yesterday, that is. We're also working with Alvaro, who has had some problems with the word of wisdom, but is doing a LOT better. He's amazing. He even came to church in a suit and tie. :) Awesome. Other than that...we're still just getting to know the ward and trying our best to find and find some more. :) But we've been doing well. :) My son is awesome. He doesn't talk as much as my other two sons...which may or may not be a good thing. I think I've seen both extremes now with my sons. Haha. Anyway, he's a great missionary. :) 

Anyway...sorry this is so short. Time's up. 

Love you all. :) 

Elder Cannon

P.S. We played futbol today. Here's a pic. :)

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Oh!!!

I totally forgot! 

YURANNY GOT BAPTIZED!!!

Neither of us were there, but the sisters that are now in Quinta Bosch called yesterday to tell me that everything had gone well, and that Jorge had baptized her, and that she had been confirmed as well. :) 

I'll send you pics when they send them to me. Haha.

Yay!!!

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FELIZ NAVIDAD!!!

So, Happy Christmas, everyone. :) Haha. I can't believe it's Christmas again. But I'm super excited for it. Mostly because I get to talk to my amazing family. :) I love y'all so much. What would I do without you? 

Christmas in Bogota feels a lot more like Christmas. It's cold. That's basically why. Also it feels more like Christmas because now we can listen to music, and so I've been listening to amazing Christmas music. The only CD that I miss is the Come to the Manger CD. I think it's Orrin Hatch and Janice Kapp Perry? I don't actually remember. It's been a while. I only remember listening to it every year as a child. And the song that says "Beautiful is the mother of God, beautiful lizard sun." Still makes me smile when I think of that. Like the livering room, or the lansoom welcome doll. Haha. :) 

Anyway, Christmas is wonderful. And this ward is too! I'm pretty sure I received the warmest welcome (despite the cold weather) I ever have to a ward here on my mission. Our ward mission leader is awesome, and very supportive (and also Argentine. Or Utahn. I'm not sure which. Haha. His spanish is Argentine, and his English is Utahn). But the ward has been very supportive. We're replacing the sister missionaries, which did an amazing job working here (as they always do), and the ward basically loves us. They're very active. I mean, apart from just attending on Sundays. We went Christmas caroling twice this week. :) It was so much fun. I didn't have my camera, or I would have taken pictures. They gave us all a Santa hat and we went around to less actives and elderly members and sang them Christmas Hymns and gave them bags of goodies. It was a blast. :) 

Anyway, I'm basically just REALLY excited to talk to y'all tomorrow. :) 

So, Merry Christmas to all. Don't party too hard without me. ;)

Love, 

Elder Cannon

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Cucuta Christmas Choir activity: Take 2 + Novenas + Cambios = TIRED...

This week was pretty much amazing. We had an amazing Cucuta Christmas choir activity, where we sang (I actually didn't sing. I got to play the piano.) an amazing medley of Christmas Hymns. This was my second time being in this activity, since I was here last year, but this year I got to be the one that arranged all the songs and put them together with key changes and stuff, which I loved, of course, and all the Elders in the zone sang while Elder Valverde (my awesome Ecuadorian music/choir director friend from Bogota) directed us. He actually directed the stake choir as well, because two weeks before, the real director went to Bogota. I think it turned out really great. The stake center was FULL, with a lot of investigators, so we were busy before and after contacting everyone and their dog. And! I only messed up once. Haha. I went to the deceptive cadence instead of the second verse of The First Noel. :P Oops. But I don't think anyone noticed. Except maybe my companion. 

So...there's this thing here in latinoamerica that's called "Las Novenas." It's a Catholic tradition that I'm not really very fond of. I don't even know what they do in the novenas. I just know that they do them the 9 days (nights) leading up to Christmas at 3 in the morning, and there's always fireworks included. Plus the fact that we live half a block from a huge catholic church...they didn't let us sleep at all. Sigh. We closed all the windows and sliding doors and such, but it didn't block out any of the noise. Sigh.

Then...yesterday was the last day of the transfer. Dun dun DUN... I'm leaving. Nooooooo... I didn't want to go. The Stake President and 2 or 3 other members had already invited us to dinner on Christmas and Christmas Eve, and I was hoping to stay here in Cucuta for my 2nd Christmas on the mission. Sigh. Pero así es la vida. O...la misión, mas bien. My companion is leaving as well. Actually I think we're going to be in the same stake in Bogota. I'm going to the Dorado ward, in the Dorado stake. I guess it was a nice break here in the heat. I've been vacationing for the past 3 months. Haha...okay, not really...but with 90+ degrees every day and 700% humidity (okay, It's only about 75%. But...still). I guess it'll be nice to be back in the cool Bogota weather. 

Here in Quinta Bosch they're going to put sister missionaries. There are actually going to be a lot of sisters coming out with the new age limit. This transfer we have 30 new missionaries!!! I'm not sure how many are sisters. Which reminds me...one of those 30 is going to be my third son. I'm going to train again. :) Fun stuff. 

So...last night we were up until...really late...packing and cleaning and filling out some last minute things in the area book. Then there were novenas...again...so that's why we're writing early, because we're going back to the house to sleep after this. We'll leave for Bogota at around 2pm. 

Oh!!! One more thing! Basically the most exciting piece of news in like 10 years. And sad day that we're not oging to be here. :-/ Yuranny came to us Thursday night after a choir practice and says "I have something to tell you. But don't get too excited. I want to be baptized." I'm pretty sure that if she hadn't said not to get too excited, I would have freaked out. Haha. I coulnd't believe it! So that same night we had a lesson where we went over the interview questions and set a date for this Saturday, the 22nd of December. I asked her what had made her decide to be baptized, and she said "you guys were always telling me I should pray to know if it was the right thing to do, so that's what I did. And it felt right." In that moment, the Spirit washed over me, and I remembered all of the prayers that I had said, and all of you that have been praying and praying for her to reveice an answer. Well I have some news for y'all: Prayer works. It's always such a testimony builder when I experience first hand the power and the truth of the promise God has made us to give liberally and upbraid not if we only ask in faith. This church is so true. I love it. :) 

So. that's basically my week. In a few hours I'll be on a 16 hour bus ride to Bogota. We'll get there around 6am, with time to shower and be to the temple at 10. 

Pray for me. :) 

I love you all. Take care. And merry almost Christmas. :) 

-Elder Cannon

P.S. The fotos are of Elder Madsen, Elder Valverde, Me and my comp, Elder Salazar. And the other one is the decorations for the activity (that we put up and took down.) :)

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Dear the fam,

Another week passed, and we're another week closer to Christmas. And another week closer to the end of the world. Only 11 days left!

Okay...not really. :P We get asked that a lot, actually. "Is the world really going to end this month?" We usually quote the scripture about Christ coming like a theif in the night, or that not even Christ himself, nor the angels in heaven know when He will come. Heavenly Father is the only one that knows. We usually tell them that the end is near. That's why our church is called the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. So we need to be prepared, and not get caught off guard like one of the 5 virgens that didn't have oil in their lamps. And that preparation comes by following the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Faith, repentance, baptism, receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost, and enduring to the end. So. Go buy some oil. 

This week we started a new plan. Operation: Fortalecer a Sión. The ward here is wonderful, and they're all great people. But we've decided that we need to strengthen them and help them build their testimony before they can strengthen others, or help us with our work. 

So. Any prayers you can send this way for the ward, the members, the Bishop, us...will be greatly appreciated. :) 

We're still working with Ricardo and Yuranny, but this week their dad, Oriol came to church. We're also working with Jennifer and Ronald, their half sister (is that how you say that?) and her "husband", that just had a baby last week. They've been pretty interested, but with the new born and all the craziness, plus needing rest from the C-section, they haven't been able to come to church. 

And hey!!! I just realized that in a couple weeks, I'll be able to talk to y'all again! I'm not sure how it will be exactly with the new president, but I'll keep you informed. 

Hope you all have a wonderful week. 

Love y'all.

Elder Cannon

P.S. Happy birthday, Dad and Sophie and Alicia! Love y'all to death. :)

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Holidays mode:on.

So. Happy Holidays, everyone! Crazy how time flies, but it's already December. I remember the last time it was December. That was a while ago...

This week was fun. And also sad. I'll talk about the fun part first. 

Tuesday morning, a sister in our ward called and asked us if we could come help her organize the house of her step daughter, who was going to have a baby this week, and needed some help. Well we agreed, but since we had appointments after, we thought it'd be okay to just go in our missionary attire. ...wrong! We got there, and she was like, "Uhh...why are you dressed like that? I thought you were going to come in normal clothes." And then she goes on to explain everything we have to organize and clean and mop and dust...inside, outside, in the back patio, etc, etc, etc. So...we both took off our ties and got to work. By the time we finished, our shirts were more black than white. Haha. It was a blast. So, we came home, showered and changed, and then went to our appointments. 

Nother fun thing that happened this week was the amazing Christmas Devotional last night. I LOVED the version of "What Child is This" that they did. I guess the music was my favorite part. And also President Monson's story about him being the problem child in his primary class. Haha. :) I love President Monson. And all of the prophets and apostles. They're wonderful men. 

The other cool thing we did was an amazing "Mormon Helping Hands" service activity on Saturday. It was a blast. We were restoring...or cleaning in and around a historic temple in Villa del Rosario. I'll attach pictures. 

So...the not so cool part of this week was that we had a chat with Ricardo and Yuranny about baptism...and they told us that they don't want to get baptized on the 8th. That they might get baptized later on...and that it was still something they wanted to do, but not for now. :( :( :( Saddest day of my life. My companion, walking home from that appointment, we were both just really sad. I told my companion that I felt a hole in my heart, and he said he felt the same. It's just the saddest thing in the world when you know that a person knows that the church and the gospel are true, but don't want to accept it or really follow Jesus Christ. It's really sad. So...we're still teaching them, and hoping and praying that everything will work out. Any prayers for them will be more than appreciated. 

Anyway, that was basically my week for ya. Cambios are coming up in 2 weeks. I can't believe that I've been here more than 2 months. 

So. Hope y'all are doing well. Take care.

-Elder Cannon

P.S. I'm also attaching fotos of Johanna's baptism. :) Enjoy.

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More fotos.

This is us after the service we did, and also my companion eating Subway. It was the first time he had eaten there, so I got to show him around. Needless to say, he loved it. ;)

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