This week was the best week of my misión

This week was the best week of my misión. On Friday the other two missionaries in Rosario had 4 people for the baptismal service. Then in the middle of the day our Mission President called and said that he is going to be attending the service along with a member of the Seventy named Elder Montoya. We ran to the church cleaning and trying to make everything perfect. It was a really spiritual day and a wonderful experience. One of our investigator´s returned from EFY and she absolutely loved it and told us that she wanted to be baptized.  EFY changed her a lot and we baptized her that very same day. I have never been as happy in my life as I was that day. She asked me to baptize her and words cannot express how I felt that day. I will forever be a different person from that day and I have never felt anything as special as I did on that day. I was so happy for L_______ and she was really happy and two of the instructors of EFY came down to see her be baptized. This week was the greatest week of my life and I will never forget it. I cannot in the slightest express how happy that I am. Elder Montoya who came for the baptism the day before told me some really motivational words and he looks just like Mr. Schenk, only more Mexican. This week is the last week before changes and I have a feeling that I am going to leave after this week, but I can´t. I love everything about Rosario and I need to return after my misión. Have a great week and always be happy.

Love, Elder Cannon

 

Ryan's companion sent some more pictures since Ryan is having trouble with his camera.  Only problem is no explanation on the photos.  When you see the last one, you will see why that leaves us curious.

 

 

 

 

Awesome week

This week has been so awesome. I got a letter that you sent through Dear Elder, but I did not get a package. Every month we recieve letters and packages, I will let you know when I get the package. I really like the quote by Thomas Monson, it is true.

 The temperaturas actually aren´t bad.  It has been raining quite a bit lately and the rain feels amazing. When it rains the streets start to fill up with wáter and all of the kids go running around and playing in it. I bet that the concert with Lindsey Sterling was really good, she is amazing at the violin. Elder Hon, who has now left the misión field to his house, left me some really awesome speakers. On this computer sometimes it puts in Spanish words that the computer thinks that I am trying to spell.  

At church we had the most members that I have ever seen show up.  We had 42 people come to church!   I was so happy and I am feeling really good. A lot of great things happened this week and I am really excited to get back to work. Elder Sumano was not able to go to Culiacan, but we are going to go soon.  I feel like Spanish is starting to come.  It feels so awesome and I am speaking and understanding so much more. With our new Mission President he said that I need to practice my Spanish and that he needs to practice his English.  I write him in Spanish and he responds in English .  It is really funny. The new misión president is really awesome and is really nice. Thanks for the letter and I love hearing from every one.  Talk to you next week.

Love

Elder Cannon   

Part of Ryan's letter to Isaac:

Yes, I went to Bartlett and it was really fun.   I remember that I got 5 merit badges.  That a boy, you did the swim check. I also remember that I bought this really awesome giant pocket knife at the Trading Post. How is your Spanish? If you want we can write in Spanish to prepare you for your misión to Mexico in 5 years. How is your Reading the Book of Mormon going? It is really important to have a testimony of the Book of Mormon because when you are on a misión you are going to be inviting everyone to read and to pray to know that the Book of Mormon is the Word of God. Mexico is really awesome and I love everything about my misión. ¡Hasta Luego!

Elder Cannon

A Day in the Life of A missionary

I absolutely love the picture you sent of Dad and Brother Nilson.  It is so funny. 

 

 A typical day for me is we wake up at 6 a.m.  (in this mission we wake up a little bit earlier). I shower, eat cereal and an apple, read a chapter in the Book of Mormon in Spanish, and do push ups and situps. Then at 7:30 I start my Language Study. At 8:00 am I start my Personal Study. At 9:00 Elder Sumano and I have Companionship Study. Usually missionaries leave at 10:00 to work but because I am still in training we have an extra hour of study. We leave the apartment at 11:00 am. Then we work all day.  At  2:00 pm we eat at a members house. After lunch we continue working until 9:30. At 9:30 we return home and review what we did during the day and make plans for the next day. At 10:00 pm I eat and read the chapter in the Book of Mormon that I read earlier, except in English so that I fully understand what I read. Then I write in my journal and exercise and at 10:30 pm I go to bed. This is an average day for me and I love it.

 

We eat at members homes every day except for P Days. Usually they serve us frijoles(or bean), tortillas, and chicken. I love Mexican food!  It fills me up so much. I feel like I just ate Thanksgiving after lunch every single day. It took me a little while for my stomach to adjust not eating lunch until 2:00.

 

This week one of our best investigators named I______  said that he was thinking about moving to Guadalajara but he said that he probably was not going to move because of the way he has felt while talking with us. One day we went to visit him and he was not there, he moved. We had not heard from I_____ for five or so days. Then one day he called us and said that he cannot sleep and he feels that he needs to come back to Rosario. His wife has also been reading the Book of Mormon and she is starting to feel that it is true. What a miracle! Elder Sumano is a really awesome missionary and he has really awesome music. I am so much happier in the mornings because of music. He knows English pretty well and I have been training him for a test that he is going to take on Friday. We are going to go to Culiacan for the test and we are really excited to go to Culiacan. Thanks for the letter and the pictures.  They made me so happy.  Talk to you next week.

Love Elder Cannon

Happy 4th of July

Wow, it sounds like Isaacs Eagle project was a lot of work. My week was really good this week. For my 4th of July I sang a lot of patriotic songs like "I am proud to be an American" and we couldnt eat at a members house, so we bought a pizza for lunch. It was a really fun day. It sounds like your 4th of July was really fun and really busy. 

This morning when we went to wash our clothes it was raining really hard and there was a good 3 inches of water on the streets, my shoes got drenched. 

Elder Sumano is really awesome and he is a really good teacher. I also realized how important that my journal and the pictures that I take are going to be. I need to take more pictures.  I feel like I have not taken hardly any pictures. Everything is great in Rosario and there is no other place that I would rather be.  I cannot even think about someday that I will leave Rosario, that is going to be hard. If there is anything that you want to know, or if there is something I should be writing just ask. Thanks for the letters, I look forward to reading and responding to letters every week. Happy Holidays(4th of July weekend) 

Love, Elder Cannon

What A Miracle

(Note from Denise:  When Ryan left on his mission, we hoped he would always have a companion that is good with directions because that isn't Ryan's strong suit and he can get lost quite easily, but maybe in some cases it is a blessing.)

Letter from Ryan:

My companion is so hilarious and I feel like my Spanish is improving much faster because he is my companion. Elder Sumano actually knows quite a bit of English and it is hilarious whenever he sings in English. Wow, I cannot believe how hot that it is down in Utah. I really want to know what the temperature is down here.  I feel like I am starting to adapt to the heat. My week was really good and really hard. This week only five people came to church. I could not believe that no one came to church. It shows that we have a lot of work to do. We got a new Mission President.  His name is President Valez. We went to Mazatlan to see him and I think that he is really awesome. While we were in Mazatlan we ate at a Chinese All You Can Eat Buffet. I loved it.  It tasted so good. I had another really cool experience this week.  We were trying to find an investigator's house, but I could not remember where she lived. We ended up getting a little bit lost and we found someone named Alicia. We talked to her and I could tell that something was wrong with her. She started crying and told us that her husband died that day.   We gave her a blessing and my companion said some really comforting words to her. I felt so bad for her, I cannot describe how bad I felt for her. I think that if we would have found the investigator that we were looking for, then we would not have been able to help Alicia. What a miracle. I cannot describe all of the feelings that I have felt so far on my mission.   Thanks for everything that you have done for me. Love, Elder Cannon.

  Ryan's companion also sent us an email along with some pictures:

Hello Elder Cannon´s Parents, i´m the companion to your son, he´s very great!!! and very funny, we´re workin´ very hard every day!!! thanks for your son, he´s very good and i´m glad ´cause he teach me something new every day!!!!

Bye!!! we´ll see some day....Elder Sumano         

 

 

 

 

  We can't tell if they are comparing muscles or tan lines?

 

New Companion

A lot has happened lately.   I am getting a new companion today.  His name is Elder Sumano and he is Mexican. I heard that he can actually speak English pretty well, but I am  really excited to work with him.

I had a really awesome experience this week, when we went on Divisions with other companions, and I went with Elder Hon.  We had a really spiritual experience, this experience did not happen in Rosario it happened in Escuinapa. We went to go teach a man named Sergio.  He was very excited to see us and he told us how good he felt when he read the Book of Mormon. Sergio went inside his house to go get his Book of Mormon, and Elder Hon told me that he would nudge me when I should challenge him to be baptized. We started teaching him about the Book of Mormon.   I have never felt the Spirit so strongly when I bore my testimony about the Book of Mormon, and then Elder Hon nudged me and I challenged him to be baptized. He accepted very excitingly and I could tell that this was something that he really wanted to do. I have never felt the Spirit so strongly while I was speaking before. Elder Hon is leaving this Wednesday back to his home with quite a few missionaries. I am so scared that I am going to wake up one day and my mission is going to be finished. Time is going by way too fast.   What can I do to make time go by slower? I feel like I need an extension of at least a year to be able to learn and do everything that a missionary needs to do. I was able to get a picture with Elder Blood  yesterday before he left.  He is not a picture taking person.

Tell Zach that I am doing really great and that he is going to love France. It sounds like you have been really busy lately. The missionary work is good and hard.  Rosario is green and it has a lot of hills that kind of look like mini mountains. The homes in the city are small but they are decent homes, but once you leave the city there are a lot of shack looking houses. Send some good American food snacks in the package (I asked Ryan if he wanted me to send anything specific in a package I'm putting together for him this week).  Talk to you next week, I will probably have a lot to talk about next week.

Love, Elder Cannon.

Mangos

Hello!
  Everyone sounds like they are doing good back home. My week has been good and busy.  We are trying to find more people to teach.  Also a lot of members in our ward are really struggling to come to church. I cannot believe how strong that the wards are in Utah and I hope someday that our ward in Rosario will be more like the ward that we had back home. Spanish is still Spanish.  I am improving and growing a lot from having to learn Spanish. It seems like being a missionary in the United States speaking English would be too easy. I have really grown so much from all of the struggles that I have had with Spanish.

 I think that I have lost a decent amount of weight here, because my shorts are so loose on me. In the MTC my pants were tight on me and now they are a lot more loose.

I wish that I could see that  new video of Dad, I bet that it is hilarious. (Jacob recorded Steve in the car trying to make the sound that Chewy makes from Star Wars--quite entertaining).

 That raspberry pie sounds amazing and also the meal for Fathers Day sounds so good. I tried a mango for the first time and I absolutely loved it.  I am starting to get hungry from talking about food. I think that once I go to a different area with different computers that I might be able to send pictures to you. I am not sure when we get the new mission president, but I know that it is really soon. My companion is in the picture of Elder Holland.  He is the second person to the left of me and has glasses. Is Isaac getting his eagle before I got mine? I cannot believe that he is already doing his eagle project. That carnival sounds really fun.  I cannot believe how time is flying by. I am worried that once I can speak Spanish, time will go by even faster.  Maybe I just won't learn Spanish, just kidding.  Don't worry about me.  All is well in Mexico. Talk to you next week.   Love, Elder Cannon