One year down - one to go

Deanna Jensen Facebook post from Mar 28, 2016:

One year down - one to go. A big thank you to Brittany's cousins Gonzolo and Felicia for taking these missionaries out to celebrate!!! Always happy to see this boy's smile. Congrats Elder Jace Jensen

Un Año y nada mas!!!

[Mar 26, 2016 letter]

Yep its true!! as of yesterday i officially have an entire year as a missionary!! which i honestly can´t belive and i really don´t feel like i have been here for a year but its true!! so to celebrate we bought some pizza and grapefruit soda (which sadly doesn´t exist in the US) then as tradition, I burned a shirt... it wasn´t my shirt but i still burned it! ;)

Well other than hitting my year point this week has been pretty stressful! really good!! but stressful, last night the new secretary was called and he is going to be getting here anytime now, his name is elder Bio and he is from Mexico, the crazy thing is that he is a super new missionary! he only has like 4 1/2 months in the mission, usually the office elders get called between 7 and 10 months, but i have really good things about him and am super excited to meet him today! that and the new assistant was called last night as well and sadly that means that elder oliveira is going home this next week, which is going to be hard, but he has already been here for 2 years, he can go home.  

So basically all this week has been preparing for changes next week and getting the offices ready for a new assistant and a new secretary, we have been verifying all the flights and travel of the missionaries, and tonight we are going to officially start changes! we have to organize all the buses that are going to bring the missionaries to the bus terminal here in Montevideo and then make sure we can get them to their new areas without any problems or missed buses! Sadly we haven´t been able to get out to work much this week, so there hasn´t been any real progress in our area, but the sister missionaries in our ward are flying! they already have another baptism set up for the 9th (it would be the 2nd but there is general conference!).  so due to the 2 baptisms of some really awesome converts the ward is getting really excited about the work, and i really think that that will bring a lot more success and growth in this ward! 

But ya that has been my week, and i am super excited for easter and conference!!! have a great week and hope to hear from you guys soon! 

Love Elder Jensen

Chilling on the bench (Oliveira, peterson, briceño, me, cannon, xavier)

random platform in the middle of the ocean... not sure what elder cannon is doing in this photo...

now chilling on the beach

Foto De La Zona

steps of the hotel/casino

BURGER KING!!!

back at our favorite museum 

Hola, Hola, Hola!

[Mar 19, 2016 letter]

How is it going everybody! 

Well this has been a fun week! We have done almost absolutely nothing exciting, but we are just getting ready for the changes in a week and a half.  but the changes are going to start for us in like 5 days when we find out the actual changes and we can start organizing everything and getting the buses ready and preparing everything for the missionaries that are "dying" and the missionaries that are coming to the mission.  And the investigator that i told you about last week, left to argentina for the next month so we have no idea what is going to happen with her, but luckily she has some good friends in the ward, so i am not super worried that she is going to lose the desires to get baptized, but we aren´t going to be able to anything until she gets back.  But speaking of baptisms, the hermanas in our ward had a baptism, and we have been trying to get ready all day! we went to go start filling up the baptismal font at 1 30, and first it was dirty so we filled it up a little and cleaned it, and then the water wouldn´t drain so we got the bishop to come over and fix it, and while we were waiting for him, we started taking out the water by hand just using buckets, then next thing we know the sister missionaries showed up and we realized we had 40 minutes until the baptism and the baptismal font was completely empty! so we start filling it up.... and there isn´t any hot water!! so we left it filling up with cold water while we started bringing hot water from the kitchen (on the other side of the church) to help fill it up faster and make it a little warmer.... long story short, the new member got baptized in almost cold water about 1 hour after she was supposed to get baptized, but the important thing is that she got baptized!

Then another thing that went wrong this week was on this Friday we were going to take a sister to the airport cause she was going home with medical problems, and we wake up early and go to get the van, actually to get the car of hermana cook, because our van died this week and we literally can not drive it until we get it fixed, so we get in hermanas cooks car and someone had left the lights on all night and the battery was dead.... and the taxis are on stike.... and the buses as well... so we had no mode of transportation what so ever.... oh and it was pouring rain haha! but president came with his car and we showed up to the airport like an hour and a half before the flight took off, and due to some serious miracles we were able to get the hermana on the flight before it took off! so ya that is pretty much how our week has gone.... a lot of things going wrong and the miraculously getting fixed! like i said last week... its a miracle that the offices hasn´t burned down yet! but we keep working! 

Other than that we are doing good here! i hope everything is going great back on the home front and all is well! love you guys and talk to you next week! 

Love Elder Jensen

a photo Hermana Cook took of the offices elders at the conference with elder Bednar

practicing our Uruguayan hand signs for the presentation we do for the new missionaries... we decided that we needed new photos... and we may or may not have gotten bored ;)

Hello!!!

Hey everybody! 

Well this week has been really busy but really fun, we have been able to get out to work in the streets a lot and we almost have a baptism!! we are not sure how it is all going to work out or if she is going to get baptized here in malvin or not, but we are going to see this week,  so this week one of the super stud members showed up to church with his girlfriend who wasn´t a member, and we were just like ya!! an new investigator, and it turns out that she has been going to church for the last 4 weeks in a different ward and the missionaries didn´t ever go by here house or anything, so she decided to come to this ward, so we had a family night with her and her boyfriend, and she already wants to get baptized and everything, we just have to see if she is going to get baptized here or in the other ward but she is still a super awesome investigator! and after the lesson we had a spicy pepper eating contest... and i beat my comp from Peru!!! that was all i wanted to do, was beat my comp, but the member still beat me.... but it was totally worth it! 

Then this week, we took and elder to the airport, and there have been some problems with the flights of the missionaries that are going home at the end of the month so that is what we have been dealing with all of this week, but we were able to get it all figured out and it looks like everything, is going to turn out fine! honestly it is a miracle that 4 twenty year old guys can run the entire mission and get people home, without any major problems.  Because we have almost zero experience doing these kind of things and yet everything always turns out good.  but ya that has been our week here.  i am glad that you are all doing good and can´t wait to talk to you guys next week! 

Love Elder Jensen

We bought a an amazing giant candy bar... and i found some hipster "ray ban" sunglasses.. they're fake but had to try them out.

Elder cannon fell asleep at the airport.... it was 3 in the morning but still! 

cool restaurant we went to was full of paintings this one was my favorite

We shook his Hand!!!!!

Hello friends and family!!

Well before i tell you about what happened this week i got to tell you what happened last week... so litteraly 5 minutes after i finished writing you guys last week, we started getting ready to leave to go out and work, and we are just about to leave and we hear some people coming in the offices and Elder Bendar and like 3 members of the local 70 enter in the room!!!  We all probably looked liked idiots with our mouths wide open but we shook his hand!! #MissionAccomplished  So ya that was the highlight of the week!!

So ya after that this week was kinda lame! we have been busy with office work, which isn´t the most exciting thing to write about.... but we have been keeping busy... honestly i have almost nothing else to say.  We have just been getting ready for changes in a couple weeks and we have been preparing the flights for the elders that are going home after them.  the problem is that this change is only a change of five weeks, and usually it is six, so we have a lot of stuff to do like normal, but an entire week less. so we are going to hope and pray that everything turns out fine! but ya that is about all that is going on right now.  But thanks so much for all the prays and support! Love you guys! 

Elder Jensen

these hands.... 

they were handing out free mate in the streets! even though we aren´t allowed to drink it...still cool!

This is a drawing that a member in my old ward was going to do for me and it finally got to me! 

Elder Bednar!!

[Feb 27, 2016 letter] 

Well, this week was fun! but seriously this week was crazy with all the changes and the conference that we had with elder bednar yesterday, which was unbelievably amazing!! but the problem is that Elder Bednar is coming to the offices and we are being kick out for the day, so we are not sure when we are going to be able to finish writing, but i am going to try and get as much of it as i can in these couple minutes that we have right now.  Well this week was awesome and crazy, the new missionaries came on Tuesday, and we had a conference with them and spent pretty much all day with them, and then on wednesday we were running around like nuts! we had to care of the new missionaries and make sure that them and they trainers got to the bus terminal on time, and then make sure that all the other missionaries got to the bus terminal and didn´t miss their bus, and make sure that the missionaries that were going home made it the mission home.  then that night we spent with the missionaries that were leaving which is awful! because they are super trunky and they just are ready to go home!  Then we started with the flights at 1 in the morning!! ya!! luckily this change there wasn´t as many flights in the middle of the night like last change, so that was nice.  We finished all the flights around 2 or 3 in the afternoon on thursday and we went home and started getting ready for the conference with elder Bednar! The Conference was amazing! but it was originally going to start at like 2 in the afternoon on friday, but due to flight problems and elder Bednars work, we didn´t get to start until 7:30. but it was still an amazing 2 hours!  he didn´t really have a specific topic, he kinda jumped from topic to topic, but on of the first advices that he gave us was to stop worrying about being perfect.  That worrying about being perfect often gets in the way, and we just need to do our best! and trust that God will do the rest.  it was absolutely the best! Then i learned a very valuable lesson.... only one missionary in all of the two missions got to shake Elder Bednar´s hand, and it wasn´t an assistant or some office worker.... it was the pianist...  Ugh! if only i had learned the piano better!!! tyson... keep going with the piano, you might be able to shake an apostle´s hand for it!  

But anyway we are probably going to get kicked out of the offices in any moment, and hopefully we will see Elder Bednar ;) so i will try and write you personally and send some photos later but this is all the time that i have right now.  Love you all and thanks so much for everything!!! 

Elder Jensen

Change Photos:

Me and Elder Silva he went home due to knee problems and is going to try and get back here in 3 months, so i might pick him up! 

Elder Leite one of my old Zone Leaders from my first zone.

This is what the changes do to the office workers, you fall asleep in the nursery room.

fotos

Hey everybody! 

Well life is all good here we are just getting ready for changes and honestly we haven´t had much of a p day, we have been getting stuff ready for the changes and elder bednar coming next week! but we are doing awesome down here.  We have really seen some miracles as we have been getting ready for the changes and we have found some super awesome new investigators who really look like they are going to progress, so we are all really excited here in the offices! but sorry that there isn´t a ton more for me to say, but thank you all for the letters and the support Love you all!

Elder Jensen

then me and elder xavier got a gift from a new investigator that just showed up to the church on tuesday! its a starwars comic book in Portuguese! 

Me and elder cuessy rollin in the van

painting a fence!!!