July 18, 2011
Hey Hey Hey everyone!

How are you all? I miss you guys. So here in Edinburg everything is going great. We played soccer today and some basketball. For the rest of the day, we are just going to relax. We have interviews tomorrow with President Trayner and we are giving a training on the power and authority of your calling as a missionary. I hope it goes well and has some effect on the zone. We are struggling with being bold. We are working hard this month, but we need to find people for August. President Trayner has invited us to invite everyone to be baptized first lesson. And as we've done this, we've seen lots of success. So that’s good. We are finding a lot of people who are ready and those who aren't, and this way we can focus on the people who are ready.

Yesterday, Elder Simmons and I had a great day at church. We had 9 investigators there, which was great. Three people that we are teaching and a family of five that we are teaching, and also this boy that got baptized yesterday. It was great to see so many people there. The Spanish ward was really full and they even had to open up the overflow, so that was pretty cool. We are working hard down here. This one family we are teaching of five, we are super excited for, I think I’ve talked about them before, but the Dad is a less active member and he has five daughters who want to get baptized. I love it when they come to church because they bring in a great spirit. He usually comes with his 8 kids and his cousin. They all live in one small trailer and they are a very humble family. They come to church in one car and all pile in and out. We have to save almost a whole middle row for them. It’s awesome. They are getting baptized the 31st, so we are super excited. We are also working with this man. He is so humble and just ready to change. I’ve talked about him before also. But almost every time he prays, he cries and he says it’s because he feels it. I gave him one of my white shirts and a couple of my ties. He was so so so happy. It was so humbling to see. As I gave it to him he walked in and stopped, and held it out just to look at it, and had a huge smile. It was great. He came to church and we were so happy. He used to be a famous luchador, which is a Mexican wrestler.

The zone is doing good, I’m running out of time. By the end of next weekend, we should be up at 11 baptisms. And so that leaves the last weekend to reach our goal of 16. And we will. The Lord wants us to. We are super excited. A missionary that I really look up to is leaving on Saturday and I won’t see him till after. He's going to play football for BYU. I’m bummed he's leaving. It’s weird to think. But he taught me a lot. Everything is going great. I love being out here and I would trade it for anything in the world, I can honestly say that at this point. I stress so much though because we are dealing with salvation on a daily basis. But I’m out of time. We found five new people this past week and set bds with all of them so that was cool.

I love you all
-Elder Stone