Pushups

Dad doing pushups at the zone conference. The missionaries were impressed! He did 30-42 each time.

Mercedes and President doing pushups at Zone Conference

Tacuarembo Zone

Paysandu Zone

Zone Conferences and Uruguay

We traveled six hours to the town of Tacuarambo for our first conferencia de Zona with the Rivera and Tarcuarambo It is the cowboy/gaucho capital of Uruguay. We stayed at a little hotel that had a South American country feel from the 1930's. The next day we met the missionaries and fell in love with them. They are wonderful elders and hermanas. The assistants helped us alot because we still don't know everything. They are very good and obedient elders who are pretty much training us. We then traveled to Salto a town by the Argentine border and had zone conference with the Salto and Artigas zones. They are wonderful missionaries as are the missionaries in the Pysandu and Mercedes zones which we visited on Thursday.. We did a little better each time we did a conference, but we still have a lot to learn. the gospel is true and the Book of Mormon helps solve the questions of life and gives us peace and help which we need very much at this time. I am at a loss because I can't speak very well. It is a little stressful because we really don't know what we are doing yet, but we are learning. We both feel quite inadequate, but will take some of our own advice and "buck up" and do the best that we can. I haven't hardly been outside other than driving in the car, setting in meetings and here cooking and talking to missionaries on the phone for illnesses. Uruguay is something like California. There are palm trees in parts of Montevideo. There are flowering bushes and green grass, and the temple has some really pretty flowers also. There are pansies also. It has not been as cold as I thought it would be, but today is rainy and colder. In the northern part of the country there is a lot of farm land and lots of cows, horses and sheep. The land is quite flat but up in the northern part there are quite a few hills. They grow lots of oranges, mandarin oranges and grapefruit, but you cannot buy mandarin oranges in a can. you can't find anything Mexican, no chilli powder or green chilis. Well I had better get some planning done for teaching some health tips for interview week that is coming up the week after next. We had to speak in church today and dad had to speak at a youth conference for all the youth in Uruguay yesterday. We love you. keep us posted on what you are doing. We miss you but we are glad all is well. Love Presidente y Hermana Heaton/ mom and dad/ grandma y grandpa.

We're Here!

We are finally here in the beautiful country of Uruguay. The people here are very nice and the missionaries have been especially helpful in teaching us what we are supposed to be doing. We were not able to have a very long orientation with the old mission presidente. Our flight was delayed and we were not able to fly directly to Montevideo. We arrived by way of San Paulo and Porto Alegre Bazil and arrived at 3 pm and the Petersons had to leave by 5 pm. We have had several days of "walking in the dark" you might say. The Lord will help us. He parted the clouds so we could arrive in Dallas to catch our flight to Brazil, which luckily had also been delayed as we arrived after the flight was supposed to have left. We were set apart on the 22nd of June by Elder Holland and Elder Gonzales, who is from Uruguay. It was a special experience. All our children except Andrew, who had to go back to Louisiana and the grandchildren 7 and up were able to come. The boys got to stand in the circle when Elder Gonzales set me apart. We spent a wonderful five days at the MTC. Elders Holland, Oaks, Nelson, Anderson and Packer spoke to us. Elder Hinkley also spoke to us as well as President Eyring, Uchdorf and President Monson. We also had Elder Perry and Elder Bednar and Ballard and many of the seventy there. We learned more than our old minds could grasp about missionary work. The spirit was very strong. We welcomed Troy to the MTC and met his mission President and wife. We saw him after one of his lunches. They fed us at a different time than he had his lunch so we went into the dinning room to see if by chance he would be there and he was just leaving. We also saw him at the sacrament meeting. He got to pass the sacrament. He is going to be a great missionary. We have shed many tears as we left our wonderful family. Our hearts have literally been ripped out, but we are in the Lord's work and we have been promised that our family will be blessed eternally. We have also just adopted 196 missionaries to the family. They seem to be great young elders and sisters. I only wish I were a doctor or nurse right now. We have had 8 health related problems in the past 2 days and there is no area doctor in Buenos Aires right now so we are just guessing what to tell each of them. Today we went to get our health check ups and saw some parts of the city in the daylight. Everything is very interesting. We love all of you and want to encourage you to read and study your scriptures in your homes and families. We want you to pray for us. We are praying for you all. Our home is nice and in a very nice part of Montevideo. We had our first experience in la tienda. love MOM