Hola!

      I´m loving it here in Molinito! The hills are killing me, yes, but I´m getting used to it. I met the ward yesterday and they are great! Our bishop is an amazing guy as well. So one thing that I forgot to mention last week that I´ve been feeling bad all week for forgetting to write, is that it was dad´s birthday! During all of that week, all I wanted to do was to have a baptismal service on my dad´s birthday. And it came to pass with Alejandro and Karen! So happy birthday dad. I love you lots! This last week was crazy because it was the last week of the month. We had a goal for 200 baptisms in a 4 week month as a mission. We got a text on Sunday afternoon saying we were at 199 and we needed one more. My comp. and I went into crazy mode and we found someone! We ended up baptizing him at 10 pm. haha. It wasn´t from our area, but we still found him. He was so happy to be baptized and he knows that he made the right choice. He wanted to do it no matter how late it was. During the week, I got to go back to my old area, Las Armas! I was here about a year ago, and I got to see some old friends. I also went to some old people that we were teaching and we found them some good people to start teaching again. It was great to head back there and see how it´s changed. As for us in our area, we have found a few people that can be baptized this week. One of them is named Hermano Milán. He has been listening to missionaries for 11 years.....11 years! My comp. and I went over, and we found out what his doubt was through inspired questions, and he excepted to do it this Friday! We were so happy! Also, we got a call from one of the zone leaders from the zone that´s right next to ours called Lomas Verdes. He said that he needed us to come over to do an interview. It was weird because normally the district leaders do it from that same zone. But he said that the guy who was getting baptized was a Jew, and their Bishop wanted us to come over. So we went over there, and my comp. and I did rock paper scissors to see who had the chance to interview a Jew. I won!! haha. He´s a great guy, and he´s ready to be a Latter Day Saint. It was a cool experience. As for my comp., his name is Elder Arellano from Los Angeles. His parents are Mexican so he speaks the both languages. But he claims to be an American.  Lastly, I got permission from President Whitehead to listen to the CD´s that Molly made about Grandpa and Grandma Barton! I can only listen to them on P-day, so I listen to them while we clean the house and what not. I absolutely love them! I have laughed so hard at a few stories and I have been touched by the spirit by others. Thanks so much for that! That´s all for me this week. I love you all!

Con amor,

Elder Barton

La familla Sanchez from Armas!!! It's been ten months since Jared has seen them. Jared has grown to love them

Jared had a meeting with Pres. Whitehead and he ha some great council:
He said to take advantage of spiritual moments. like after a baptismal service, or just whenever the spirit is there. And he also asked me an interesting question. ´´Why do you think I trust you so much?´´ I didn´t know what to answer...
I told Jared to pray about it

Goodbye to "the Flagship zone"

Hola familia!

     I just want to say thanks to all of you for praying for Karen and Alejandro. We went by a few times this last week trying to figure out their doubts and why they just didn´t want to get baptized. After a few visits, Karen accepted!! It was awesome to see her conviction when she finally said yes. We had just needed to get Alejandro to say yes. We were doing everything we could with every scripture we could. I was praying so hard to know what he needed to hear or know. It was my turn to talk, and I asked him if he had prayed about all this. He said yes, but he hadn´t received an answer. I figured that the only way to get an answer is through the spirit, so I decided to share something that always brings the spirit into the room. I asked him if he remembered about Joseph Smith. He said a little bit. So I just did a brief version of it. I recited his exact words and the spirit filled the room. I testified that those feelings are all we need to feel to know that it´s true. After my testimony, I asked him again to be baptized with his sister. After a 10 second pause, he said yes. The spirit hit us so hard in that moment and we all just started to cry. Especially Amelia and Karen. Even Elder Bradford and I started to tear up. Him and his sister were baptized yesterday by their uncle. Who is a bishop in another mission. The services were amazing and I was so happy for those 2. I had really learned to love them so much and I just wanted the best for them. Also, we had our changes come this week. I had the feeling that I was heading out. The call came on Saturday night and we got the changes for the whole zone. I heard my changes last, and I found out that I was heading out to an area called Molinito 2A. I´m now zone leader 1 of my ex-zone Culturas! It´s a zone with 26 missionaries instead of what I´m used to of 14.  I´m excited to be in Molinito with my good friend Elder Arellano. He was in Camarones when I had just arrived in Tacuba. He is from California but is Mexican.  I know that we are going to have a lot of success together. I looked at our lineup of missionaries and I have the most time in the mission out of all the elders, and only 2 hermanas beat me on time in the mission. I´m excited for this new challenge! You probably want to know this, but Molinito is in the top 5 of most dangerous areas in the mission. haha and another 2 of those top 5 are in my zone. I´m excited to be here and I know that the spirit will guide us. I love you all!

Con amor,

Elder Barton

The Liahona cover, they called themselves "the Flagship zone"

baptism

Jared likes the cute girls

La Familia Sanchez Preciado

Brian and Lina

the bishop and his 2 boys

Back to back

Querida Familia,

     Well here comes another Wednesday email! We had our meeting with Presidente Whitehead on Monday and our zone meeting yesterday. When they were showing us the results of last month, they did the same and were eliminating one by one the zones from bottom to top. Elder Bradford and I got really excited when it came down to, yet again, Camarones and Metepec. Long story short, the slide that was shown showed Metepec in 2nd place. Camarones is back to back champs!!!!! I remember having the same feeling when we won región as a baseball team. haha I was filled with energy and I was just so happy. Our hardwork paid off again and we squeezed out another win over Metepec. In our zone meeting yesterday, the whole zone was anxious to know as well. When we announced it, everyone got a huge burst of energy. haha. As the changes come next week, I´ll be anxious to know if I get to stay for a 4th change or if I´ll be heading out. I´ll be fine either way. But I do love it here in this zone. One thing that I would ask everybody to do in this week is pray for a few people specifically. They are 2 people that we have been teaching named Alejandro and Karen. Their mom, Amelia, got baptized on the 21st of December but they didn´t want to. Last night, my comp and I were over there and we almost had them decided to do it this Sunday. They are SO close, but I know with a lot of prayers, they will do it. Thanks for the help! So as we went to our meeting with President, we received the mail and I got the package from Glenn and Molly! I saw the post it note saying not to open until Christmas....I debated whether or not they meant this Christmas that just passed, or this next one where I´ll be home. So I took a guess and just opened it. haha. I love it! I always love getting letters from them. I haven´t had a chance to look at the DVD´s yet, but I think I´ll have time today! So as the change comes to a close, the statement ´´every change goes by faster and faster´´ remains true. This week I complete 15 months of full time service to the Lord. I hope it slows down here soon. I love you all!

Con amor,

Elder Barton

numero uno!!!

Elder Floisand seems to be carrying the weight (hahaha)

Tim Tebow and I don't know who else....

Americans are weird, mom

unity activity

the board of power

Elder pose like sister....sisters like elders

totes adorbes

elder pyramid

Surprise!

     Sorry for the unexpected email on Monday. President changed the day of our meeting to next Monday because we had zone meetings on the 24th and the 31st. So he gave us a break. But he didn't tell us until Wednesday night....haha. So next week will be the Wednesday email. So this week, we unfortunately didn´t baptize...it was rough because we have some possibles but we never found them through the week. But this week we will baptize for sure! So we had another zone meeting and activity on the 31st to close out the new year season. We played some more basketball and soccer, and we got to watch the movie 17 miracles. It was really fun, and we did something fun for the zone meeting. Instead of just giving talks, we made different activities so we were up and around. We made a maze in the overflow of the stake center with chairs, benches, and tables. We blindfolded the missionaries and timed them through the maze. haha it was funny. My companion and I were the lab rats and we did the first run before anybody got there. I did pretty good, just hit my head on a white board...haha. Other missionaries walked straight into walls, almost doubled over on benches, and hit their shins on chairs. The whole point was based on a scripture in Isaiah 59. Where if we don´t obey God or keep the commandments, we feel the wall like blind men do. It was a fun way to get the obedience point across.  We had some problems with obedience, so my companion and I had to get on a few people. The maze I thinked helped them. I´ll send some pictures of the maze in a minute. So that´s all I have for this week, but I´ll have more next week when we get the results from last month. I love you all!

Con amor,

Elder Barton

Jared always finds the cute girl table

The maze

the maze from the other side

I zoomed in to this pic and saw all the scars from bug bites that Jared has on his arms :/ he never complains