Hello.

Hola.

Hey all. Hope everyone is doing great! We had another great week here in the beautiful city of Quito! I love it, I missed this massive, unique city. Gonna be weird leaving in it a few months....anyways!

This week was excellent. On Tuesday we had a big Mission Leadership Counsil, which was a big conference with all the zone leaders from the mission. Got too see all my homies from other cities. It went really well. President gave a few great trainings and we trained on ´´Living What We Teach´´. It went pretty great. On Wednesday we went to Los Chillos (a zone like 45 minutes outside of Quito) for a zone conference. It was awesome being back in Los Chillos...hadn´t been there since I was born! The conference went great. Lots of good teachings from President and some bomb food! We trained on ´´Vivir lo que enseñamos´´ again, and it went well again! It was cool seeing a few old comps and friends down in Los Chillos. On Thursday we had zone conference with the Turubamba zone, the zone I spent 8 months in. It was a great conference. It is cool because even though we have the same agenda for each conference, the Spirit always changes things up and we always get to learn new stuff from President and change our trainings according to what we feel. I got to see Elders A and U! My two best buddies in the mission. After the conference, we did divisions with the zone leaders from Turubamba. I got to go out and work a few hours with Elder U! It was awesome!!! We hadn´t worked together since the Mexico MTC...so it was way cool being with him. It was also awesome being back in my old zone...I miss South Quito. Had some major nostalgia and though back on some great times earlier on in my mission.

Due to all the conferences, we have only been able to get about 2 hours a night of work done in our zone, but wow! We are seeing serious miracles. We are teaching a lot of great people and have a family progressing towards a baptismal date on March 26th. I love this work and am learning new things every day.

A few quick Qs from momma bear...

Do you drive a car when you pick up missionaries from the airport?

-No, President Christensen always drives. And on the way home when we are with the new missionaries, we take a van or a bus that we have scheduled to pick us up, depending on the number.

Where do you live? How far away from the mission offices? Are the offices the same place as the mission home?

-I live in ´´La Colón´´ in Quito. The offices are about 4 minutes north of the Marriott, and our house is about 5 minutes north of the offices, walking. The offices are our mission home. We do almost everything here besides special dinners which we do at President´s house up in the Quito North mission about 40 minutes north of here.

How many people live with you?

-Just me and my comp. And every once and a while a companionship sleeps with us if they are in town for a special reason, but often sleep a few floors below us with the secretaries.

What do the mission office elders do, besides finance? 

-There are 3. One is for finance. One is for housing and visas and materials, and one is for baptismal records, plane tickets, paperwork, references, and other random stuff. He does what the Senior Missionaries would typically do, but we won´t have new Senior missionaries until June.

Do you still tract and teach at all?

-Of course! About 3 hours a day, from 6-9. Sometimes a lot less, and sometimes a few hours more. Def learning some good time managment skills!

Love you all!!! 

Oh yeah, also want to wish a HAPPY HAPPY (late) BIRTHDAY to my biggest brother, Jeffrey Todd! Thanks for everything, dude! You have been such a huge example for all of us. Я люблю тебя, Старейшина Соренсен! Rocking your Ukrainian tie in the pic, just for you ;)

Love you all, again. Have a great week. Remember who you are. ;)

ES

Changes

After three AMAZING changes down south in Riobamba, I am finally moving on. I loved my time in Riobamba and grew so much. I met some wonderful people down there and really learned a lot about a positive attitude and hard work. We had a great last week with Elder B. On Saturday we had the baptismal service of A. He is a great old man who has changed SO MUCH! When we found him he was always sad, lonely, and confused--but now he is so happy and his health has also improved like crazy! I can´t believe how much the Lord has blessed him.

At noon on Saturday I got a call from President. We chatted for a few minutes about the mission and life and then he told me he wanted me to come back into Quito and be his new assistant. It was a very humbling phone call and I am so excited to learn from him and push myself to become an even better missionary/person. Saturday night after the baptism a family who I love threw me a good bye party...pizza, cake, sweet words, it was the best! 

Sunday morning I bused up to Quito. Since then, everything has kind of been a blur. On Sunday we had a transfers meeting with President and then gave all the new assignments/changes to the whole mission. Sunday night we visited a few people and then went over to President´s house for dinner. It was super nice of him/Sister C to invite, and we ate some BOMB food. Monday we were in the office all day getting ready for training and incoming/outgoing missionaries. Monday evening we went back to President´s house for a ´´good-bye´´ dinner with all the missionaries who went home on Tuesday. Monday night at around 11 we picked up 2 missionaries from the airport. Tuesday morning we picked up 9 more. Tuesday night we had a welcome dinner for the new missionaries, and then at around 11 went baaaack to the airport to pick up the last missionary who had just barely gotten his visa. Wednesday we had a big conference with all the new missionaries and their trainers. Thursday we went to the zone/district meetings of our zone here in La Colón. Yesterday we planned out the month and some trainings for MLC and Zone Conferences next week. And today, we played Bball and Volleyball with the mission secretary elders. 

It has been a crazy week with very little sleep, but I have felt the support from above (and you all!). I am way humbled to be able to work so closely with President and have already learned SOOO much from him in meetings, car rides, and elsewhere. This week will be another hectic week with two zone conference here in Quito and a Mission Leadership Conference on Tuesday. 

Oh yeah, my comp! My comp is Elder F from SLC Utah. He is amazing. We are from the same group and get along great. He loves EVERYONE and I love being with him. We are super excited for this change!

Love you all! 

ES

Baños Round #3

What a week! As far as la obra misional goes...it was a rather slow one. On Monday and Tuesday we were basically locked in the house all day due to ´´Carnaval´´. But, we were still able to get our and teach a few lessons each of those days. Wednesday and Thursday we went pretty hard in the sector and tried to get as much work done as we possibly could! Unfortunately I never got over that sickness from last week, but on Wednesday the uncle of someone we teach gave me a free check up and then prescribed me to some solid cough syrup and antibiotics. Turns out my left lung was closing...but now I am feeling WAYYYYYY BETTER! Modern medicine works...after 19 months trying to tough things out I gave in and well....it worked. Haha!

Friday afternoon, right after lunch, we bussed down to Quito as a zone. Again. The trip was good, we got in to Quito around 7 and then from the Mission Offices jumped in some taxis and headed up north about 30 minutes into the Quito North Mission. The Elders of our zone (12 of us) stayed in the house/hotel of some zone leaders from the North Mission. Turns out I knew both of them! Both the Elders were in the MTC with me!! They came out 2 weeks after us but were in our same zone! We played soccer almost every day together. With Elder A, them, and I, we had a sweet little CCM reunion. 

On Saturday we had the Mission Wide Conference with Elder Jeffrey R. Holland. Wow. What an amazing experience! The conference went from 1pm-3pm. At around 12:30 we went out onto the bball court to take a mission wide picture with Elder Holland and Elder Montoya. Then we each got shake their hands/greet them on the way back into the chapel. The conference was just excellent. Sister Christensen and President gave small 5 minute talks, followed by a 5 minute talk by Elder Espinoza (area 70), followed by a 15 minute talk by Elder Montoya (70 from Mexico) and then Elder Holland took the stage for about an hour and a half. Wow. It was POWERFUL. He spent the majority of the time walking up and down the center aisle, really getting close and personal with us. He was extremely passionate. He talked about his own mission, the importance of our calling, the importance of the Book of Mormon, and he talked a lot about what it means to be a true witness of Christ. As he said, ´´I get all crazy and passionate about this because it means EVERYTHING to me.´´ It was truly epic. He pumped us all up and gave me exactly what I needed to hear for these last few months. I´d share more but all my notes are at home, so fam, wait a few months and I´ll get back to you.

This Saturday we have a baptismal service for a dope 76 year old man. He is awesome. We found him a few weeks ago in a very tough situation. He has been lonely and very sick for a long, long time. We have seen huge miracles in his life as he is slowly being healed by Christ, both emotionally and physically. Like he says... ´´I don´t know why, but when you guys are here I feel healthy, I feel good, I feel loved´´. So grateful to be a missionary and spread God´s love to those who are in need of it.

Today we went to Baños...again. It was EPIC. We went to the Pailon del Diablo again....this time we went to the upper part with those sketchy wooden bridges. It was epic.

This Sunday we will get changes. Sadly, it is likely that I am outta here and will be going to my final sector. But, anything can happen! President knows best.

Love you all! Take heart.

ES

​Pics:​

​Pailon de Diablo

Oops - dunking too hard

feliz carnaval

Hey all! Today we had to walk around downtown Riobamba for like 45 minutes to find this cyber to email. So I am way short on time. Carnaval is going on. A big holiday in South America. Basically a continent wide water/foam/color/egg/flour fight. Fun stuff. Today and tomorrow we will only be leaving for set appointments. And on Friday we will be heading up to Quito as a zone for the Elder Holland mission wide conference on Saturday. We are all sooo stoked! It is going to be great. This week was solid. We had a good MLC on Tuesday. I got to see the homies...we are getting a little nervous because the months are going by faster and faster! But needless to say...some epic BYU plans are being made. Haha! After the conference on tuesday we stayed in Quito one more day because I got a few more ingrown toenails ripped out. But they feel great now. And health wise I am doing way better. Thanks for the prayers, mamà!! On Wednesday there was the new missionary/trainer verification conference, so my kid Elder B came in on Tuesday night and we got to hang out in the hotel that night and talk about the past few months and shoot the bull about our good times in Quito together. He is tearing it up. My second grandson is from Peru, he is a BEAST! See pic.

Love you all. 

ES

Hola....?

Hello. How is everybody? 

Another good and crazy fast week down here in Riobamba. We just got off the bus in Quito about an hour ago. It was another, beautiful, long drive. I feel like I say the same thing every week. Oh well. I`ll just keep typing and hope that my momma doesnt mind. ;) Tomorrow we have a missionary leadership counsel which means more delish momma C food! Can`t wait. I have been pretty sick since last monday. Gnarly headaches, cough, chest pain, sinus pressure, and couldnt really hear out of my right ear until yesterday....so I am probably gonna have a medical appointment tomorrow after the conference tomorrow. Or I might wait until next week...we`ll see.

Speaking of next week... Next Saturday we have a mission wide conference and el ELDER JEFFREY R HOLLAND will be presiding!!!!! We found out last week but I forgot to mention it. I am sooooo excited! It is going to be one heck of a conference. It is exactly what will help me get double focused/motivated for these last few months. We will be traveling up to Quito as a zone on friday and then returning saturday afternoon. I am so stoked! Also pumped to see some past comps and a few grand children I haven`t met. Dont worry Jeff, I`ll get a pic for ya ;)

On friday we had interviews with President Christensen. It was good as ever. We talked a lot about my goals for this new year/the rest of my mission. It was great. I love this man, he has given me countless advice! (2nd to Kent, that is. ;)

As a zone, we have been trying to really get pumped up about talking with EVERYONE. We have given incentives to the zone, challenging anyone to out-contact us and they`d receive a prize. While the number of contacts had been going up a little the past 2 weeks, this last week we had 1002 contacts as a zone. In other words, 1002 people met mormon missionaries in our two small cities of Riobamba and Guaranda. DOUBLE our number from the past two weeks. We could really see/feel a difference. When you talk with more, you smile more and enjoy more. The zone also saw lots of miracles due to the efforts of everyone of talking with more people. This week eight people were baptized and confirmed, and it has been awesome getting to know each one of them and watching them make life changing decisions. The church is true and offers us so many blessings.

Well, that`s about all. Love you all and glad to hear that everyone is doing well. Stay golden.

Elder

pics.... alguien quiere verde..? and pitahaya roja