Chilean MTC April 29, 2014

Hey everyone! I am starting my 3rd week in the MTC! I miss you all. Things are really starting to speed up! I am learning tons of Spanish! Lessons with our investigators are going great and I already have DC:4 memorized and the First Vision. I can pray and bear my testimony in Spanish and understand tons!! We had a new group of missionaries come in. Sadly two missionaries haven't even made it to their second week. Satan is working really hard at us. The Elders who got sent home are not bad Elders. They have been wounded and i am sure they will get back up on their feet. Today we are going to the Temple again. I am going to try and do it in Spanish this time! Being district leader is really difficult. There are so many meetings and i am always being taken out of class. Every sunday i have to prepare a 45 min lesson. I have one more week left with my companion and then i get a new one. Its a bummer. I am going to be put into a trio. Today I got a haircut... I am sooooooooo embarrassed. It is so short!! I asked for a 3 on the sides and 4 on top... im almost bald!! We have been doing alot of studying in preach my gospel. We have only studied 2 chapters our whole time here! Chapters 3 and 10 are very important and they keep telling us to read those. I found Camila! Camila Pujado goes to institute here and i saw my efy leader! Its been pretty neat! I got to spend a few minutes with dad last week. I miss nate! I need his email address! I have been getting tons of emails from friends and family! Its so nice. I am so anxious to get out to my fist area! I have 3 more weeks! I have been told that I am going to have tons of reactivating to do. Oh and one of the Hermanas that works here was at the new years party  at Rubens house till like 6 the morning and she said she remembers me there and more specifically how she talked to Ashlyn! Its so cool how many people i know here! I Miss you all! Thanks for all the emails!

Camilla (good friend from our old ward in La Serena!) and Elder Brady

Elder Brady and his Chilean EFY leader

Elder Brady and Elder Souza

April 22, 2014

Hey everything is going good! I absolutely hate the MTC!! Haha it was soo kool to see Elder Dirkmaat. I just randomly walked into him it really lifted my spirit! I also found out he is coming to the temple this week on Thursday. There are only 16 missionaries at the MTC right now but we should be getting about 32 more this wednesday. Sounds like you guys are having a lot of fun up there. I got an email from Uncle Ryan with some pretty dang good advice and some awesome scriptures that I marked down. Sounds like Nonny and Poppy are doing good! I wish i tried to learn more spanish when I was working with poppy. That would have helped out a whole lot. Its been really hard to feel the spirit in the MTC because everything is just so rushed. Sundays are really special though. I enjoy sunday. It was also way cool to be able to go the the temple. Thats so stinkin sweet that Joe is going to Ecuador! That will be wayyy kool! Things are still really difficult with my companion. He´s having a hard time and last night Elder Gilbert (MTC Presidents Counselor) and I were able to give hime a blessing. When dad came to the MTC I was less that like 15 ft away from him and i didnt even get to see him that was a huge bummer. We have 4 more weeks in the MTC! Language is coming along great. I think my biggest advice for missionaries about to go out would be to read Preach my Gospel Ch.3!! That has got to be one of the biggest things.

First letter from the Chilean MTC

4/15/14

Mom this whole mtc thing is way hard. I met about 7 other missionaries at the atlanta airporte and we all just had a terrible flight haha. We got absolutely nooo sleep! And our first day right when we got here they put us in the swiss embassy and had us learn and memorize the first vision and objective of a missionary and D&C 4. We spent 13 hours that day sitting in a chair reading and writing those 3 things till they were memorized. My companion is from Rio Brazil and he hardly knew spanish and like 3 english words. I am the only north american that doesnt have a north american companion. My companion is Elder Souza. We have gotten along really well he is pretty cool. But it has been super hard trying to communicate sometimes and teach but we are improving and will continue to improve. My spanish has improved so much. I can do my testimony and pray in spanish and have a good conversation with someone in basic spanish. It has been really hard here. Oh by the way I was called to be District Leader! It sounds really cool and exciting but its ... not so much haha. Its TONS more responsibilities and more stress. But things are getting more organized and stuff. One responsibility is to Give a 40 minute lesson for my district every sunday in spanish. I really enjoy being around all the missionaries its so cool to see how far we have come in these last few days. I miss you guys. We go to the Temple tomorrow! I really want to see Nate! I saw an CCM graduation picture of him. I havent really had any spiritual experiences yet. Everything has been so rushed because our district stays at the swiss embassy. Anyways.. Love you guys! Tell tyson and hunter i miss them!

P.S- Have your emails sent by Sunday. My P-day changes like every week.

 This is Elder Whitmore he is an awesome guy from Gilbert Arizona! We have alot of the same friends in Arizona. Its been cool to talk to him. He is a great friend.

He made it!

He will probably laugh at me for putting this post in his blog but it is too perfect not to.  It's all I needed to know he is ok.  He left the SLC airport at 1:55 on Tuesday to Atlanta and arrived at about 7:30 our time in Chile. 

Hi mom i made it! Im staying at a home by the MTC. I am with 4 brazillian guys. its pretty cool im excited! Ill write you monday bye

On his way to Chile

Wow!  What a crazy week!
Wes was set apart by President Keller on Sunday night and officially became a missionary for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.  Thank you Tyson and Hunter for being there with us.  You have always been such awesome friends!  It was a great evening.

Monday he spent the day with his companion (dad) running errands and getting things fixed around the house that Geoff needed help with.  Thank you for being such a good sport Wes!  Then the whole family went into pack up Wesley's room and luggage.  Ash is already moving into Wesley's room:)
We had one last friends get together Monday night.  I don't think Hunter wanted to leave.  We didn't want him to either.  It's hard to say goodbye to friends.  But 2 years will fly by!

Tuesday we got the last of the laundry and packing done, said goodbye to the Clarke family and Bishop, called nonny and poppy over skype and had our goodbyes with them and family prayer.  Thank you dad, for a beautiful prayer.  It's hard not having my parents be here with us.  Hard for them and us.  They are on their own mission in Guatemala and we wouldn't want them anywhere else!

Then it was really time to go.  We headed to Salt Lake City to the temple where Wes has been working for the past few months on the grounds crew planting all those beautiful flowers.  We had to see what Wes had been up to and get some photos.

Here we are in front of some of the flowers he planted.

Wes helped plant this flower garden

He planted ALL the poppies on Temple Square

He planted these flowers

Wes planted these flowers

He planted these flowers too

Time to say goodbye!

Farewell Day

  Wes, Ashlyn, Cameron, Spencer

Wesley's farewell was March 23rd.  We shared the special day with a family who was blessing their baby on the same day so the chapel was packed, the cultural hall was packed and I had a friend who was out in the foyer tell me that there was standing room only out in the halls.  They had to bless the sacrament twice because of so many people attending.  With the baby blessing and farewell we packed the building.  Wes gave an awesome talk on service.  He spoke of his grandparents (all of them) who have spent so much of their lives serving other people.  The best part of his talk was his testimony at the end.  He has a powerful testimony and will be an awesome missionary!
We had a luncheon right after sacrament meeting in the backyard of some of our friends, the Keyes.  Such great friends to let us do this!
We had papa Boyd and his friend, Collette; uncle Larry and aunt Stephanie; Cameron and Spencer; and my cousin Jessica all came from Arizona.  We had grandma Sunny come from Oregon.  We had uncle Kevin come from Washington.  We had tons of Utah family; Chris and Sara, the Noel family, Ranuta and Gerry and their family, uncle Howard and aunt Sharon, cousins Pam, Malia and her husband and darling kid. We also had tons of friends from the ward and Wesley's friends from school and ALL OVER! 
Geoff made Mexican street tacos and we had a potluck dessert table which was all so yummy!  My friend, Katie, made the guacamole that we all ate until we were stuffed! 
Thank you all SO very much for your help with the food and for being with us on such a great day!

 
 I LOVE THESE KIDS!!!  SOME OF THE BEST YOU WILL FIND ANYWHERE!