Week 30~

Como andan ustedes?? Well this week was great as always! Elder Hokanson and I are finding tons of new people to teach and have programmed several new people to be baptized in the upcoming weeks! We are super focused on trying to find the people that are prepared to accept the gospel so we invite the people to be baptized on the first lesson,which can be kind of tough, but we are finding lots of success with it! And the people are willing to accept the invitation. I am continuing to try to develop more patience for everything.. Companion, investigators, difficulties of the mission.. I have found that I am not a very patient person, so I am working on it! Its tough though.. But I am so grateful for the mission and how it has helped me to see how weak I really am without the help of the Lord. Yesterday I got way sick! So that was sweet! For lunch we ate a big asado (cookout of meat) and I tried blood sausage for the first time, which was a huge mistake. I actually didn't mind it that much, but yesterday afternoon right before we were going to leave to work, I started feeling super sick and from basically 6 in the evening until 1 in the morning, I was throwing up.. I think the blood sausage is the culprit (is that a word?) but yeah I kept trying to go to sleep but just kept throwing up and I had a nice fever, but I took some medicine and finally got to sleep and I am feeling a lot better today!. I am telling you this because I am okay now so theres no need to worry mom.. But just wanted to warn you guys to not go out and eat any blood sausage today. I am loving my area and the members are super awesome. Our branch is super united which is something you don't find here very often, but all of the members are like one big family which is so cool. A great example to me. It really is so important that we fellowship other members of the church and create that feeling of a family in the church. Hope you all know that I love you and am grateful for you guys! Families are ordained of God! And I am so grateful that I get to be a part of this family that our Father in Heaven has given us! Love you guys

Week 29~

Hey mom! Another good week in Venado Tuerto! This week was transfers so thats why I am writing today.. Elder Hokanson and I are staying together for another transfer so thats good! It will be a lot of patience and hard work on my part but its going to be a great transfer! The good news is that Elder Howe is coming to my zone!! My comp from the MTC whos like my best friend in the mission. I love that guy. And I havent seen him in 6 months since we got here so I am super excited for that! This week we have been working hard to find more people to teach and working a lot with the members of our branch to find people that are prepared to hear our message. Working with the members really is the key to success in the mission. I have realized more and more the resposibility that every member of the church has to share the gospel with others. It is a commandment from our Heavenly Father and as Joseph Smith said, the most important thing we can do. I am trying to keep being patient with my companion and know that I have a great opportunity to help him so I am going to keep doing everything I can to help him out! We are teaching a family right now that is so awesome that we are preparing to be baptized at the end of the month. Nelson and Maria and their son Gaston and they are so awesome. Everytime we teach them, the Spirit is so strong. I feel so much love for them and they lready feel so much love for us too. They always ask us a million questions about our lives and its actually kinda nice. It is impossible to teach a lesson in less than thirty minutes because the people take a topic or an answer to question and just run with it for 10 or 15 minutes without taking a breath. Haha its really funny, but the people are super open and willing to share their thoughts and experiences which I love. The people here are so great. So tonight this family invited us over for dinner so that will be good! But today is the start of my 5th transfer in the field and it is just flying by so fast. I cant believe it. But I m excited for another transfer to be better and improve my ability to teach and speak spanish and most importantly, strengthen my testimony of Jesus Christ. I dont have too much to tell this week, but know that I am doing great and working hard! I love you guys!

Week 28~

Well this week was super great! I am always remembering the motto that Elder Saez taught me, ``Patience and Love, Elder, Patience and Love`.. So it has been a good week! We have been working our butts off and seen lots of results. The mission is not about numbers, but I am pretty sure we had the best numbers in the zone and from week to week we are progressing a ton, so that has been great! We found a bunch of new investigators this week and are teaching this one couple that is so awesome! We went and visited them on saturday and had one of the most spiritual lessons I have had on the mission. It was a little birthday miracle. They are reading the Book of Mormon and praying to know if it is true and they are already feeling the spirit every time we come and I have no doubt that they will be baptized in the next month! Interesting note about the area I am in.. there hasn't been a baptism here in like a year or two.. Which honestly doesn't scare me or affect me at all. I know there are people being prepared for us in every area, all we have to do as missionaries is do our part and be obedient and good things will come. I truly believe that If I do all that I can the baptisms will come! And we are already seeing the truth of that here! For my birthday in the night we went to the Yufra Family`s house and they had made a cake for me and it had this sparkler candle in it so that was sweet! They are a super awesome family that is always helping the missionaries and I am already super tight with them! Alejandro just got back from his mission in Sau Paulo and he gave me a tie as a present so that was super nice. A little more about Elder Hokanson: He is from Ogden Utah, he has about 18 months in the mission,he is an awesome companion.. He cooks super well and is super chill and patient with me so I am grateful for him. He is also my district leader!We live in an apartment house thing with two floors and our zone leaders live above us! Elder Holloway from Meridian Idaho and Elder Esteban from Bahia Blanca Argentina! SO the four of us get to hang out and see each other a lot and cook good food sunday nights so its been fun!

Venado tuerto is really growing on me and I am starting to love it as well as the branch here! There is a huge grocery store here which is sweet! As opposed to basically a gas station convenience store was the only thing we had in Feliciano so I can actually buy food now! But I am really happy and doing great! I know that I am serving my Heavenly Father in the best way I can! I have truly come to love my Heavenly Father and have the desire to do His will, sometimes it is hard, but I know that through diligent prayer and a sincere desire to change I can do all that He asks of me! Love you guys a ton and am grateful for you! Les quiero muchismo! Hasta la proxima semana!

Week 27~Leaving Feliciano

Well you have already heard that I got transferred in the middle of a transfer this week! It was an emergency transfer and I was the lucky candidate. To be honest.. it was TERRIBLE. I got a call last tuesday morning saying I was being transferred to Venado Tuerto in the Provincia of Sante Fe. So i had Tuesday to pack up my stuff and say goodbye to everyone and I left Tuesday night! I was so sad to leave. I felt like I was leaving my family again. When I said goodbye to Edgardo and Eva (my converts) we all cried like babies.. haha kind of embarrassing, but they were like my parents in Feliciano. Edgardo said it was the third time in his life that he has cried so I guess that is an accomplishment.. But for real it was super tough to leave. Elder Cac was such a good companion too so that was tough to leave him.. But hey it happens.. Tuesday night I had a 10 hour bus ride by myself to the complete opposite corner of our mission. Haha I left the very northeast corner and went to the very southwest corner. And I arrived here Wednesday morning. Honestly it has been the hardest week of the mission for me, maybe other than the first week.. But it has been super tough, but I am learning a ton and continuing to try and develop the attributes of Christ that I lack. My area is great, super chill like Feliciano and the members are awesome. We have our go to families and the branch here is like four times the size of Feliciano. It was weird because yesterday all i did was sit in church.. We ride bikes here so my legs are getting jacked. My apartment is a little smaller and worse but its still good! Everything is going good! I have learned a lot this week and everything is on the up and up. Well I am out of time, but i love you all and am grateful for you guys. Thanks for the birthday wishes. Be good and choose the right. The church is true and Heavenly Father loves us!

Letters to Connor~

Connor's Apartment

Hi friends & family~

Connor's birthday is coming up on May 24th, if you would like to send Connor a letter I know it would be the best birthday present he could get...... hand written letters are better than gold to him! 

Connor's Address~
Elder Connor Jamon Cushman
Argentina Rosario Mission
Blvd Argentino 7935
2000 Rosario
Santa Fe
Argentina

If you would like to send him a letter but don't want to have to deal with mailing internationally, you could send the letter to me, I would be happy to mail it to him.
  
Lisa Cushman
4435 Beckwith Place
Cumming, GA 30041

FYI~ at this time Connor has told me NOT to mail any packages, he will NOT receive them.  

Thanks for ALL the love and support you have shown Connor as he has been in Argentina!

6 Months~

Elder Cushman Cooking with Albina Cardoza

I don't think I am gonna write too much today because we will be talking on the phone next week!! I didn't even realize that until today haha.. But I think I am going to try and use google hangout so that everyone in the fam can join in! And I hear you have been talking with my friend Alvina on facebook haha. Hopefully you guys aren't sharing too many embarrassing stories.. But thats cool that you get to see pictures!And no worries about the glasses. I use them pretty regularly to conserve contacts and also rest my eyes. I have a feeling there is probably going to come a time when I run out of contacts so I am starting now to conserve them haha. But no worries all is good! I honestly don't know what to do about that whole situation to be honest haha.. I am going to look into to seeing if I can get more here. I am sure I can.. So no worries. 

This week went super well. We had a lot of success in finding new people and also preparing a few people for upcoming baptisms. We have one baptism coming up this weekend which is super exciting too. We have branch family home evenings on friday nights with the members and I lead that this past weekend and it was super good. I have gained a testimony of family home evening and how important it is for our families and for the love and unity we have in the home. Whether it be the whole family or just two people. It is a time to grow closer together and strengthen the family bonds we have here on earth. 

It has been raining a bunch here and all the streets are dirt roads in Feliciano so we are pretty muddy these days.

Hope all is well at home! Love you guys a ton and I am super excited to talk to you next week! Tomorrow I complete 6 months in the mission.. Pretty dang crazy how fast time is flying!

Albina Cardoza

Week 25~

This week was super good, we worked hard as usual and have a bunch of people that we are preparing for baptism in the upcoming weeks. One of which has been investigating the church since naum.. Literally.. I think they have been listening to the missionaries for like 20 years but things are looking good with her! We are also teaching a girl named Natalia that doesn't speak at all because she is deathly shy because they live out in the country far away from everyone.. I think I have mentioned them before, but she is progressing!

This week we started up english classes again which is going to be better than the last time because I actually know spanish now... Turns out you need to know spanish to be able to teach english.. 

But we are getting lots of activities going with the branch and putting more time in to helping the branch and organizing everything and things seem to be moving in the right direction. I am really excited about these next five weeks that I have here to help the members more and leave this branch better than it was when I got here. But its definitely not all flowers and butterflies.. I am learning lots of patience and love for the members. And also realizing what a lazy bum I was before the mission. I didn't do anything! But the good news is that I am changing that! Things are good with my comp Elder Cac. He is always just super chill and he is glad that I am still here to help him out and push him so things are good!

This week in one of our contacts this guy told us that we came from monkeys and that he wasnt convinced that the world is round. He thinks it might be flat.. So you can assume how that conversation ended up.. Haha it was interesting. You meet interesting people on the mission! But you also grow to love people that you have only known for a short period of time. And thats what I love. I feel the love that God has for His children every day. I am trying to act in the way that he wants me to because I don't want to let him down and I know that we are the happiest when we do what He asks. I love the mission and I love the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I am so grateful for all of the many blessings I have. Especially my awesome family that I have at home. I feel so lucky for the life I have been given!

As far as fluency goes, I have come to find out that being fluent is very hard to define.  There are lots of levels of fluency, but yes Ihave definitely hit a very comfortable level of fluency which is great! I am super comfortable with the language and can converse naturally so that's good!