Thursday, November 24, 2011

I am trying to catch up with his blog, I am a little slow starting this, so I will try to catch up with where he is now and what he has been doing.
He is in his 2nd area, but he has had 4 companions. His first was from Star Valley. He got along with him very well and it was nice to start out with a companion from the United States.
His next companion was from Mexico, but he lived by the border of Texas and he had gone to school in Houston. He wanted to speak English, so Matt's did not have as much help with the language as he thought he would have had.
His 3rd comp was from Ecuador and he was able to learn Spanish speaking it all the time. Now his latest comp is from the United States again. He says it is nice to speck English again.

Grass in Cuernavaca


Matts in the field!

Matts in his first area. It has been fun to use Google Earth to find where he is living and where the Ward Buildings are in the towns he is serving.
For Matts birthday a sweet sister in his ward made him a birthday cake - She could not remember his first name, at least she remembered his middle name.

Elder Bird and his companion at the Church

The weather is still warm in the middle of Mexico, around 80 most of the time. He says that he has a hard time thinking of it being November while it is so warm.

This past General Conference was one of his highlights. He said they were able to listen at the Ward House. This is the first time he listened in Spanish. He was afraid he might not understand the talks, but he said he was able to understand and feel the spirit - even in Spanish!

I'll post more later and some of his letters. 
Happy Thanksgiving! 

Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Matthew's Mission to Cuernavaca, Mexico

Matthew and Addie 
dinner the night he was set apart

Matthew left for this mission the morning after this picture was taken with our family.
The next day we drove down to Provo to take Matthew to the MTC. We went a little early so that Matthew and David could attend one more "Mission Prep" class. His companion was David since he was set a part the night before.

After lunch we parked across the street from the MTC and took pictures in front of the Temple.
The system of dropping off Missionaries was completely different with Matthew. I was not ready to leave him there, but it was comforting to see him walk in to the building with the other Missionaries who were there to greet them and help them to check in. He did not have to walk away from us alone.

Day one of Elder Matthew T Bird's Mission to Cuernavaca, Mexico