Busy week coming ahead.

hey fam hows it goin up there in the 801??? things down here are going well, the weather is warming up so i cant complain, we went down to mdeo this last week with all the zone leaders me and elder gonzalez presented what we are doing in our zone and it turned out really well i had alot of missionarys tell me they liked it and learned a lot from it so thats always good to give a helping hand when i can haha, we also had another baptism this last weekend, his name is martin, he is the young mens president nephew, it was super awesome and the young mens president was super excited, martin is a goalie for his soccer team and we play soccer together every night and i told him i was a goalie as well and he thinks im just the most legit goalie there is out there haha he wants me to take him out the field one day and teach him more stuff haha i see a lot of myself in that kid its pretty awesome he is a super good guy. a lot of his buddies went to the baptism as well in cluding his mom, so we are hoping that the mom will now get baptized, and than all of his friends love going to church haha there is about a group of 5, 15 year old kids that just like going to church and playing soccer so its super cool the young mens class is just filled every week with investigators haha ummm this next coming week we have a lot going on as well, wednesday the senior couple is coming here to tacuarembo and we are talking them around to every missionarys house to do house cleanings haha makin sure that all the houses are clean and all that jazz. than thursday president heaton is coming with elder nygard my x comp, to do interviews, it will be my last interview with president heaton out here in the field so it will be interesting to see what he has to say to me haha i hope i have been a good missionary. i am sure he will just want to talk about the zone haha. so yeah thats whats going on here, i am glad everyone is hoppin into school good and that things are nice and normal back at home. the days are few now and i hope sue you can hold out till the end, i am trying my hardest haha. so yeah thanks for everyything love you all. keep it real. elder barton

23 months done 1 more to go

September 3, 2012 family whats going on???? all is going good down here in the guay entering into september my final complete month here as a missionary for the church, how crazy is that time has flooowwwwnnn by. the zone is looking fairly well for this month and according to my old comp elder nygard (asistant) he tells me that we have the best zone in the whole mission haha. but you all know me, elder barton i hate losing with a dirty dirty dirty passion so its better that i am in control of the best zone in the whole mission haha.this week all the zone leaders are getting together in montevideo and elder nygard asked me to talk about 20 minutes about how to be a zone leader and what we have to do in our zones so that everyone has success, not gonna lie its just one more thing i have to do and i dont want to but i guess i got no other options haha so we will see how that goes. we had a baptism this last week, she is the aunt of the bishop, she is a super cool lady mom of 9 kids we have baptized 3 of them but the rest are big and have their own families and live in the middle of no where here in tacuarembo like 2 hours from the city haha. so yeah the bishop was super happy and its nice to feel like i am completing my role as missionary bringing families together forever. we have also been teaching the bishops cousin, for about 2 months now she cant get baptized because she is living with a guy and they are not married, she got up and bore her testimony yesterday and talked about how bad she wanted an eternal family and how she has hope one day that her husband with want to come to church one day or for the least get married, it was super sad but at the same time super awesome to see someone really understand the gospel she has 2 little girls as well one we baptized and the other is just a little thing she has 2 years.other than that things are going good we had 13 investigators in church yesterday so we are expecting about anothe 10 baptisms this month and its not a bad way to finish the mission haha so i am pretty stoked sincerely just trying to work my tail off so that i dont get to trunky even though i think i am on the verge of death cause of how tired i am, when i am home i think i am gonna take about a 3 day nap haha i am BEAT. but i gotta do it for one more month than i am done haha i wouldnt want it any other way. so yeah tahts the news here from the guay, i love you all so much thank you for everything you do for me, keep it krispy. hast luego. elder michael barton

change 16

August 28, 2012 ok. family and friends i am now entering into my final change out here in uruguay and it turned out to be not a change. haha i am staying in my area with my same comp haha which is alright i am totally cool and down for it i have no problem, we have a lot going on in our area we are expecting about 9 baptisms so its awesome. this next change i am just really gonna focus on the missionarys and their areas and let my comp take care of our area. i have found that when i am helping others the time goes by a lot faster, so i am gonna be doing changes every week outside of my area just to try and get some of these companionships that got nothing to do...something to do haha. i am super pumped though cause my kid, elder brown, is coming to tacuarembo! so i am gonna be able to hang out with probably the coolest comp i ever had and i will get to see how much he has progressed in his mission so thats super awesome i am super pumped for that, the weather here is going crazy sometimes its freezing cold the next second its roasting hot haha so its kinda confusing and from what they should it should be that way until october, or until the end of my mission so all my clothes are getting a good nice last run haha even though just about all my white shirts are now yellow and all my pants are extremely faded from the sun that it looks a little ridiculous but hey what can ya do haha. so yeah this week went well just a normal week the assistants came into town or elder harris came into tacuarembo and gave the missionaries a training it was super good elder harris has become a freakishly good missionary haha and mom no from what he has told me his parents arent coming to get him we are gonna be walking home together in the airport haha "the walk" as we call it haha. umm than the rest of the week was just work work work tonight i am gonna be at the terminal until 3 o´clock than i have to go back at 5 o´clock haha it sucks but hey its the life of a missionary/zone leader. very little sleep i guess you could say i am use to it haha. so yeah all in all i am doing well, with plans to finish the mission strong. thank you so much for everything. i love you all and we will be in contact next week. thank you. peace. mad crazy love from a crazy wanna be uruguayan. elder barton

Birthday.

August 20, 2012 for those that are reading this letter, to be honest i have no idea who reads these emails anymore haha. my week went fairly well changes are next week so before i forget i will be writing you next tuesday haha president has been calling like a mad man to us about changes and what he is going to do in the zone and all that jazz, it looks like i am the only one from my group that is going to die as a leader elder harris is getting droped down from assistant after 6 months and elder peterson as well from being zone leader after 6 months, so for there last changes they are going to be getting bumped down and things would appear that i am staying as a zone leader to die...huh it will keep me focused haha. this week went fairly well it rained alll weekkk and the rain isnt to fun with a bike, but it just makes me appreciate the days when its pretty outside haha, the worst thing about the rain on the mission is just everything is wet and you cant put it outside to dry cause its raining so everything just stays wet until the rain stops haha so i have basically just been running around wet all week haha. we had 2 baptisms though one of the baptisms is the husband of a recent convert, he had to quit drinking and we helped him out with that and he finally decided to get baptized and the other one was a daughter of a less active member who we reactivated, its a single mom of 9 kids haha yeah the oldest has 14 years and the youngest 2 years so yeah its a pretty rough life she has got goin and it was nice to help her get back on jesus team to get some good ol classic jesus help. so yeah its my birhtday this next wednesday....crazy i am 21 years old i can now gamble, buy some booze and other things which of course we all know i wont do, but i could if i wanted to haha. like i said before in this email changes are this coming week, i am pretty sure i am staying with my comp to enter into my last change and i am hoping to finish my mission strong i have been around trunky elders on their last change and it really isnt the funnest thing to be around so i have plans to just work hard and finish strong until the end. i hope i can complete that goal. its crazy how fast these 2 years have gone by i cannot believe i am going home soon, i have seen so many missionarys come and go and i feel like it will never be my turn but reality is starting to kick in a little bit. i am gonna make it home one day, the battle has been long and rough but i am about to win haha. i am glad everyone is starting school up again, my last summer missed thank goodness and next time we get on that boat i will be present i cannot wait its gonna be awesome haha, the picture is absolutely awesome, even though its the same paper as last year haha. carly i cannot believe how much she has change that is absolutely insane!!!!! she is a little lady now and as for everyone else really you look all the same haha so thats good i havent missed to much. other than mark looking like he has got some gray hairs creepin in. watch out old man. so yeah thank you so much for the picture it has been a while since i have seen an updated picture of you guys, i think my last birthday was the last time haha so yeah enjoy school, work hard, be the best, and i will be talking to you gys next week. mad love, elder michael barton

the last testimony, and my 1974 green bullet

August 13, 2012 hey family and friendssss,,, so this week was my last and final...zone conference. yes. haha i dont know why i have never been the biggest fan of zone conference i just cant sit down for that long haha but it was super good i was in charge of lunch and all that jazz so i was pretty stressed out haha we as zone leaders had about 1 hour to teach our zone something so me and elder gonzalez decided to invite some recent converts and share their testimonys with the missionaries and tell them thank you, it was super awesome and everyone was crying haha we than talked about sharing our testimony with everyone and the story of brigham young and how he was converted to the gospel through a simple mans testimony. than later on in the conference as tradicion the missionarys that our finishing their missions give their last testimonys. and it was my turn haha kinda weird seeming how i am missing 2 months still haha so yea that felt really weird and trunky haha i still feel like i am missing a ton, but we will see. other than that the week went well worked pretty hard a pretty funny story happened, my companions bike broke so we went to go get it fixed but we had an appointment about 8 kilometros from where we were so we needed a bike instantly the bike guy loans us a bike that is from the year 1974 and glow in the dark green, seeing the rather worried look on my companions face i gave him my bike that ran a lot better and i had the huge privelage to go on the green bullet as i called it, here i am going in the mud in the mountains of uruguay on a bike that has one change and is on the verge of braking just pedaling with all my might haha. it sucked haha i got home that night just about on the verge of dying haha but my companion was very grateful for the sacrafice that i made so i guess that was worth it...only on the mission haha than after that their was a huuggge rain storm here on sunday and it killed all of us basically no one had people in church haha and yeah i really dont know what else there is to say just still working hard haha. i hope you all are doing well school should be starting up here pretty soon in the follwing week, that sucks haha. so yeah not to much more to say, i love you all thank you for everything..keep it real peace. elder barton

a looonnnggg time since that has happened.

Monday August 6, 2012 hey family and friends i hope all is well with everyone. things here are going well things are getting a little warmer in terms of weather so i am getting happier haha. this week waas good not really to much to tell i got 2 main key storys. the first would be, we had 3 baptisms on saturday!!! all of them are the cousins of the bishop so the bishop baptized them it was pretty awesome and now the mom of them or the aunt of the bishop wants to get baptized!! they were a reference from him and so it was pretty awesome, he later on told me that it says in his patriartical blessing that he would have the opportunity to share the gospel with his family members, so it was prety awesome he gave me a big hug and thanked me, it was pretty cool not gonna lie haha the bishop in our ward is an awesome guy him and his mom are the only members in his family he was baptized when he was 15 all by himself and when he left on the mission his mom got baptized so he has gota super strong testimony and we are hoping that there will be a chain effect on the rest of the family!!! nothin better than baptizing the family members of hte bishop haha. the next story would be my comp...elder gonzalez, got sick..super sick. and i spent 2 days in the house while he was sleeping....holy cow i almost died of boredom haha that when me missing music and tv really kicks me in the butt haha i have never had a desire so bad to jam out to some taylor swift haha i was on the verge of going insane, but he is getting better little by little and so hopefully we can work everyday this week. tonight the president is coming here to tbo for zone conference tomorrow, he is taking us out to dinner tonight with his wife to talk abot the zone and what is goin on. and also tomrrow in the conference me and elder gonzalez have about 1 hour to share something with the zone, i have invited some recent converts some not so recent converts to come share their testimonies with the missionaries and tell them thank you for the sacrifice they are making by leaving their houses and all that jazz, it is something that always pumps me up and i hope it does the same for the missionaries here in the zone. i guess we will see. i will tell ya about it next week haha. that is super crazy about taylor and his mission call leaving super super quick, lucky guy doesnt have to wait, and oklahoma that is like football city he is gonna love it there, i am pumped for the guy i wish i could see him before he leaves, maybe the next time i see him will be with my wife hahahahahahahaha JUST KIDDING. so yeah thats whats up with me, i love yall thank you for everything, if you need anything just let me know ok. and i will do what i can, take care, mad love. elder michael barton

Bein' the big Boss Dawg

July 30, 2012 hey family and friends hows it goin for ya´ll out in the 801!!!!!!!! here things are going pretty well i am enjoying my time with my paraguayan companion and i am kind of realizing that my time of speaking spanish is running out...pretty sad i really really like speakin another language haha. but yeah things this week went well, Workin like crazy i am starting to feel the diference of bein Zone Leader 1 than 2, its weird to be known as the big boss dawg in tacuarembo. i went off divisions and i had a bishop call me that haha super weird but its awesome this little town of tacuarembo just knows me as the bigg stud of the missionarys which is a load of crap, thats why its hilarious haha. so yeah all is normal here really nothin to new just workin my tail off. i got to take that missionary out that i wrote about last week and i just wooped him on the bike it was a blast. than the next day we went to another town about 14 miles away that a missionary hasnt been there or about 1 year haha it was super fun, we found a really awesome family and i hope they progress in the gospel. the bike is really sticking to me i think i am really gonna get into it when i get home, plannin on doin a trip from SLC to st Geore on the bike. that would be pretty awesome haha. but yeah its gettin a little warmer here but not really, the day is fine but the night is freakin freezin haha. so yeah thats really about it from here. I hope all is well over there i didnt really here much so i am just assumin people are busy with activitys with the summer and doin all sorts of fun things. its gonna be awesome to live with ryan i cant wait i am stoked haha. so yeah i love ya all thank you for everythin. keep it krispy. hasta luego. elder barton

changes

July 23, 2012 hey family and friends so here is another quick update on what happened this week my new companion elder gonzalez from paraguay is awesome he is super awesome and really relaxed guy and i have already learned a lot from him we get along super well and i am pretty sure i am going to be finishing my mission with him prettty weird to think i have gone through all my mission companions that the lord has chosen for me haha i hope i learned what i was suppose to from them. mom you had a couple questions, the pig was from the elder corums he has like 12 and we killed the biggest one, we just fried the meat and i cant remember the other question you asked haha.this week went fairly normal with changes i was in the terminal until 5 o clock in the morning than i had to work all the next day i was pretty beat haha took a lovely nap today cause of it. so yeah tomorrow i am pumped a new elder came into the zone that is pretty dang prideful he is from costa rica and is 23 and doesnt listen to anyone i guess i am gonna bring him with me tomorrow and work him into the ground haha i cannot wait its goin to be fantastic and we will see if he gets humbled up and gets things going in his area. other than that all is good july is flying by the 24 is tomorrow that is super awesome i hope you all go to cottonwoodheights and wach some fireworks, time is flying by. so yeah that is insane everyone is moving out there at home and that is fantastic that ryan is gonna wait for me haha we are gonna kill it with our own apartment i cannot wait. so yeah other than that all is good and dandy here in the guay, and time is flying. hope you all are doing well and are enjoying your summer. elder barton

I am officially a man

July 17, 2012 well this wednesday i took one of the biggest steps in being a man. we went to our elder corums house and we helped him pay for his trip to the temple....how did we do this....we killed a monster of a pig. yes with a knife and an ax. yes we hit the pig with the ax in the head to stun the daylights out of it than we stabbed it right in the throat while it was stunned...i am a man, i personally than had to carry the dead big pig over my back to the place where we would skin it. we boiled up some water and would throw water on it essentially burning the hair and taking the rest off with a spoon haha yea than we shaved it and all that jazz. we than continued on to skin it with a knife, that was new i learned how to skin an animal and it was actually relatively fun, later i had the grand privelage to help fernando, elder chorums president, to gut it out we opened up the body and just cleaned the sucker out completely haha. and than he gave us some of the meat to take home and cook...it was delicous haha it was really cool though he told us that the money he earned from selling the pig was the just perfect amount to get him and his family to the temple and he was super super grateful for us and what we did for him. ok that was the cool story of the week. now changes......i am going into change 15 (second to last) elder nygard is getting out of here and i am staying and going up as zone leader 1, yes the big boss dawg. my new companion is elder gonzalez from paraguay, i met him once he is a really really good guy and it would appear that he will be my last companion here in this great adventure in uruguay. i have the goal to work my tail off until the end of my mission as well as learn guarani with my new paraguayan companion haha. but yea this week all in all went really well, we made the zone breakfast this morning we made pancakes and little sandwiches with eggs and bacon than we played dodgeball and soccer all in allthe zone really enjoyed it and they had a lot of fun. so it was good. i am sorry to hear the trip to bear lake didnt really go as planned but its still always nice to get out of the house for the weekend, i thnk it rained cause you all went without me haha. other than that it sounds like everyone is super busy with their summer time and everything is going well. thats awesome i am super glad. i hope it goes by fast. thats about all i have to say to yall, thank you so much for everything and we will be in contact next monday. mad love. elder barton

Barbeque Chicken

July 9,2012 hey family so yeah another has come and gone and i hate to break it to you but i got nothing new to tell ya haha. this week we went down to montevideo again to have our grand zone leader conference and it was really good i learned alot it was also the fourth of july so all the americans sang the nation anthem as well as sister heaton cooked barbeque chicken and we had root beer probably the best meal i have had my whole mission haha it was awweeesssooommmeee. so yeah than it just got freezing cold here its fine during the day but when it is night time and you are on a bike it is freeezzzsing cold haha and waking up in the morning isnt the easiest thing either haha....i feel like im camping, in my famous words haha. so yeah we had a super good week interms of investigators and stuff we took the bishop and his wife to a lesson with us and it was super awesome and when the investigator was leaving church yesterday she said she was gonna get baptized she was off and on about getting baptized due to the law of chastity she had a long time boyfriend of 11 years haha and than she was praying to know if she had to get baptized she caught her boyfriend walking out of a house with another woman so she dropped him super fast and now she can get baptized but she still feels like she is not ready but when we had the chat with bishop and his wife she realized that you dont need to know the whole world to get baptized just need the desire, thats cool olivia gloeckner got baptized tell her congrats and yeah sounds like its time to buy a new boat(cough cough) rebecca coligan wrote me that was super awesome to hear from her i love the colligans haha so yeah thats really about it for my part i hope you all are doing well and yeah love ya and miss ya all, keep it gangsta. elder barton

giving a helping hand to the children

family friends and loved ones of elder barton hows it goin.....things are going good down here in the guay, and thisweek was just full of giving a helping hand to the children aka the missionarys haha me and elder nygard went on a total of 5 divisions this week just trying to teach the missionarys...how to be a missionary haha. as bad and terrible as it sounds one of my favorite parts of being a missionary is bringing a missionary into my area and just working him till he cant even stand haha i do it with love of course but its just so fun to show missionarys what working your tail off is, and i love hear them saying, man i could definately put a lot more work into my area haha just making them realize that there is another level of working hard that they have no idea about haha, and thats exactly what i did this week about 5 times just worked the lights out of the missionarys haha. thats what being a missionary is all about, the lord just cares about out mentality and if we are ready and able to work for him, he doesnt care about the knowledge we have or the experience, just that we are willing to give everything we got for him. we are really starting to focus with the missionarys on HOW to do the things in stead of just WHAT they need to do, just treating them like children and molding them into what we want them to be haha. i never thought i would find myself like this on the mission just people looking up to me and my teachings and what i do as a missionary, super weird but a super good feeling when i say something or do something and a missionary just goes wow or thats a really good idea haha super intersting. but yeah thats whats goin on with me just working my tail off haha. i hope you all are doing well, soakin in that summer sun, the 4th of july is coming up here, i hope you guys get the neighborhood gang together and get lightin some fireworks haha. so yeah thats all from me and the guay i am still the same, and still have hair. i love you all so much, thank you for the support and love. mad daps. elder barton

back to normal

well family and friends i am writing a little early today because president is coming to tbo and i dont know if i will have time later to write so here it goes. this week was really really really nice and good it was a normal week, and from what i have seen as a zone leader you hardly ever get a normal week. haha so it was nice to feel like a normal missionary again. we had 2 baptisms this week fabricio who is 30 is the brother of a member and bruno who is the brother of a recent convert. they were super good baptisms and the ward was super pumped to see them. we also made the bishop a really happy man haha we brought his aunt and 7 of his cousins to church and he was super pumped to see his family members in church they will all be getting baptized here in the next monrth....awesome. there wasnt really any cool stories to be honest this week just a lot of working hard and i am starting to love the bike more and more i am thinking about buying one when i get home and going from salt lake to st george on it, it would be a blast i am cranking out about 25 kilometros a day on the thing so its helping me get back into shape haha and i am super pumped to get back home and start training me for my tour to st george haha. so yeah president heaton is coming tonight he has to do interviews tomorrow so he is probably gonna take us out to dinner tonight with his wife and we will talk abot the zone there and how things are going and what not. i always learn a lot from president heaton when i talk to him so i am pretty excited. so yeah all in all the work here is going good and i am definately excited to be here. i cant believe june is already over before we know it its gonna be my birthday again haha. the big 21 crazy. so yeah i hope all is well with you guys hopefully you are planning a trip to bear lake or something for the 4th that would be super fun but i dont know do what you guys want with your summer haha. so yeah i really dont have to much more to tell. i love you all and miss you guys and hope you guys are enjoying the summer sun. thank you for everything, i have the best brother, sisters, mom and dad i could ask for you. keep it gangsta. elder barton

loooonnnngggg weeeeekkkkk

hey family, so this week not gonna lie was probably the longest week of the mission haha. i will tell you what happened now. so on monday we met with the stocker of the sister missionary here that is a member and we had a little intercourse with him and in the mean time while i was playing soccer outside someone seem to have stolen some of my things from my backpack that was inside of the church, bad day number onehaha, tuesday we had to get up at 1 in the morning cause the sisters called us scared and crying cause they thought the stocker was outside of there house and so the following day we had to see the sister missionary off to her new area cause she was just to freaked out by this guy and didnt feel comfortable here anymore, it sucked losing her in our zone, bad day number 2. wednesday we had to get up at 2 am to go to montevideo and have our meeting with our the zoneleaders that was a good day other than we got home at 12 pm dead and had to get up at 630 the next morning haha thursday, we did divisions i had to go to an area where they had absolutely no investigators and not very good plans to find investigators, that was a long day haha. friday was normal and saturday was just stressfull cause no one could listen to us. yesterday was sunday i gave a talk in sacrament meeting about how all are called and few are chosen, it went rather well, than we had a meeting with all the bishops in the whole stake and we gave a 20 minute presentacion to them, talk about feeling pretty insignificant haha i never thought i would find myself standing in front of 7 bishops and the stake president, telling them what to do so that was pretty stressfull haha and than last night it POURED ran and we couldnt get into a single house haha so we rode around on our bikes from 6 to 9 in the pouring and freezing rain. great way to end a terrible week. haha so yeah me and elder nygard are both feeling it today and just got done taking a loonnngg deserved nap and we are hoping that this week will go alot better as of right now it should be a pretty normal week. but it never is as a zone leader haha. so yeah thats whats up with me i cant believe we are already halfway through june it has flown by and i hope you guys areo ut and about enjoying the summer sun, i gotta run but i love you all so much and thank you for all the support. all the love in the world. elder barton

changes.

hey family barton, so this email is gonna be quite short i am running really really short on time haha but yeah this week was good we had changes and on tuesday night i had to live at the terminal i was there from 11 at night till 5 in the morning making sure missionaries left here and arrived safe here so yeah haha it was quite the long night than we had to go out and work a full day so yeah it was pretty rough on the eyes. haha really i cant remember a whole lot of what happened this week it was a tougher week full of trials and working hard and not having a whole lot of success, there was a cold wave that came through here in uruguay and it was freezing all week i pulled out the sleeping bag haha, but they say that its gonna get a little warmer and today was quite warm so thats always good. you guys know me i dont like the freezing cold at all hahaha. so yeah just worked really really really hard trying to be the example for the zone and all that jazz, we had kind of a sad experience we are teaching the mom of a recent convert and she loves us she takes the book of mormon to her work and everything, but she told us that some of her work buddys and her boyfriend of 11 years they have been making fun of her quite a bit for talking with "the mormons" but we had a great talk about how there is an opposition in all things and that after trials comes blessings so she was really grateful for the chat and just loved us more for it haha she is for sure gonna get baptized. so yeah more than that i cant really remember about the week. mark and sue congrats on the big 25 that is awesome, hope you did something special. rest of the fam i hope you enjoy the warm weather, go to the beach or beating or something fun for me. love you all thank you for everything. elder barton

Change Night.Stake Conference. Wedding Bells

Tuesday, June 5, 2012 hello barton family and friends it sounds like the weather is getting warm out there and ya´ll pulled out the boat for the first time to do the infamous osbourne barton day of boating, and my last one that i will miss haha so yeah change number 13 has come and gone and now i enter into number 14....3 more to go. mychange is...im staying haha me and elder nygard are staying as zone leaders here in tacuarembo. so yeah not to exciting there haha. so the big 2 headlines of this week were one we had stake conference this last weekend, president heaton went and spoke along with the temple president and his wife, the tempe president is a stud 100% i have heard about 4 of his talks now and they are unbelievable haha so stake conference was awesome after the conference me and elder nygard organized a stake baptism, 7 people were baptized and there was a baptism from every ward except for one in the whole stake so wholefully that pumped up the members to help us a little more with missionar work here in tacuarembo. we had a baptism her name is marta she is the neighborhood ofthe elders quorum president, she has been an investigator for about 4 months now and hasnt missed a single sunday, she had to wait 4 months cause she wasnt married....so we helped them get married they both got married on friday and she was baptized on sunday, the husband, lazaro, has to stop drinking grandpas old cough medicine (alchol) and he is gonna get baptized on the 23rd and they already have the goal to get to the temple so its pretty freakin awesome.than the other story happened last night.......so it was about 845 at night and we were heading to the house about to call people with there changes when we get a phone call from a sister missionary crying....some guy ( a member) followed them all night and claimed his love for the sister and wanted her nametag or something like that, the sister got prettyfreaked out, so she called us and we were about 25 minutes away from where she was and we just got hallin, we started bookin it to downtown and we got there in about 10 minutes but the hermana gave us the wrong direction she we went about 1 mile to far from where they were we finally found them on the street with the hermana with tears in her eyes, so we walked them back to their apartment and made sure they got home safe, than took them some hot chocolate cause it was freakin freezing outside it was a pretty good experience, i love serving others and helping people feel better and letting them know that its all gonna be alright. so yeah it was a pretty special, fun, full of hard work week for elder nygard and I but i am super grateful for every experience i learn a ton from them. so yeah i hope you enjoy this email i feel like it was one of my funner ones haha but yeah thank you for everything you do. i love you guys so much, thanks for the support, see ya later fools. elder barton

families and boating

Monday, May 28, 2012 well this week went by ridiculously fast haha me and elder nygard were super busy with all sorts of things, first we had to give a presentation to the zone and teach them some things to make their missionary work more affective so we held a zone meeting on wednesday morning and did that than the next morning we went to seminary at 6 in the morning and taught the youth here how to share the gospel with their friends and invited them to come to church on sunday, i am really glad i never had seminary at that time haha. than on we also had a baptism this week. so super cool story we found this kid through some recent converts he is about 14 and his name is cristian, he is friends with a group of recent converts and they are all pretty strong in the church, so we find cristian and we get teaching him and than we thought to ourselves we need to try and find his parents, so we went over to cristians house and talked to his mom and 4 brothers and grandma and we left them with the book of mormon challenge to read and find out if it was true. so that went well than the next time we went back to their house the mom had read the part in the book of mormon and absolutely loved it haha later on we asked her to give the closing prayer to end the lesson, she did so and while doing so she began to just burst into tears...wow. she said she couldnt make it to church cause of work but she was going to get out of work to come see the baptism of her son...she came to church just intime to catch the last bit of relief society and saw her son get baptized. she cried during the baptism and said it was so special to see her son getting baptized and later cristian said in his testimony that he wanted to see his mom and brothers get baptized and he wanted to be a missionary one day. fahh it was pretty awesome haha now the mom and the family is pretty dedicated to being baptized and going to church. so yeah that was a super cool experience that i highly highly enjoyed and am really excited to see what happens here on this next coming week with that family. this week should be filled with stuff like that as well as its the last week of the change and we have stake conference this weekend, we are going to do a baptism as a zone cause we have 10 people getting baptized all from different wards here in tacuarembo so it should be pretty awesome and an awesome way to get the zone pumped and a great way to end the change. this change went by crazy fast. well memorial day is coming up i hope you guys have warm weather to go boating with the osbournes and you guys enjoy yourselves. you guys just gotta suffer through one more summer of boating with out me and before you know it i am back in action haha so yeah thats all here from the guay have a good one, love you all so much. elder barton

workin hard with a change of heart

Monday, May 21, 2012 family and friends so another week has come and gone out here in the guay. this week went really well, president came for zone conference man being a zone leader and having zone conference in your zone is stressfull we spent all monday organizing the food getting tables set up cleaning and all that jazz but i highly highly enjoyed zone conference both the sister and president heaton spoke of conversion and the importance that it is to be converted and how if we are converted we will reach our full potencial and a change of heart. it was really awesome something that i have been actually for the past 4 months just about having a pure heart and reaching my full potencial as a disciple of christ. me and elder nygard also had time to talk to our zone about what we wanted we chose to talk about walking with christ, we used the example of enoc in moses 6:31 to 34. it went quite well along with some other scriptures that we shared just about knowing what the lord wants us to do in our missions with our companions as long as us as people. after zone conference it was just a normal week of working crazy hard just to catch up on 2 lost days of work in our area we activated 2 families this week and one family brought some friends to church and now they are getting baptized, missionary work is just so easy when the members are involved haha so yeah i hope you all had a good mothers day and a good week with school finishing up and everything i cant believe we are already going into june and boating season is right around the corner, the last one im gonna miss haha ummm sue you asked me if i had any sisters in the zone we do we have 4 sisters in the zone 2 work crazy hard and are really good missionarys the other 2 just bug and annoy me haha i dont have the biggest testimony of sister missionaries yes i am racist haha but yeah so thats really all i can think of this next coming week is completely normal and a week just full of hard work hard work and a little more hard work, i have never beeen so tired in my wholelife haha i am exhausted i get home every night and just die haha i dont know how i am getting up and working everyday well i do its the spirit and the power of my calling and man i am gonna really miss that when i get home i am really excited to get home and just work crazy hard if thats anything i have learned on my mission its just that just when you think your done, beat, to the ground you can always get that little bit out of you and go that much farther and be that much better. its so awesome to see people grow and see the lord just build his kiindgom down here i love you all so much thank you for everything you have done. i love you all so much have a great week. elder michael barton

the phone call

Monday, May 14, 2012 hey family it was super super super awesome to talk to you guys yesterday even though we didnt have the best internet connection it was super awesome seeing you guys and it kinda sorda made me super trunky haha but thats all good it just reminded me of us always sitting in that stinkin living laughin our faces off. heather i am digging the hair cut and the new job way to go what a blessing. megan looks like a mom and just has life undercontrol just the way she wants it, even though trent didnt really talk to me i can tell that he makes her really happy, rybart, same haircut, same schooling, not much change there haha but that is actually super awesome i am excited to go hangout with thesame brother i left behind haha sarah, you look like a superstar pretty much thesame but a tad bit older and more mature which is awesome that probably naturally happens when you pack up and move to hawaii haha carly...WOW holy bonkers she is a little woman taking high school by the horns i am sorry you didnt enjoy prom thatm uch but you still got next year so dont even worry about it!!! and mary......the most changed with her huuuuggggeee looonnnngggg blonde hair haha she looks like a mini megan and is just shredding things up on the lacrosse field. mark, lost some weight??? get on that bike a little more. and the quueeeennn of them all sue...i was so excited to see you, your still my best friend and you are still the same gangsta as when i left. all in all it was a great phone call and i really enjoyed it. even though sue killed me with the question about going to school. i dont feel like i am old enough to go to college yet i am still growing up i have so much more to learn haha. so this week is basically a normal week tomorrow we have zone conference with the zone of rivera they are coming down here so me and elder nygard have to get the chapel set up tonight for that tomorrow as well as president heaton is coming up here and he is gonna take us out to dinner and talk about the zone a little bit with one of the assistants elder glenn. so tonight should be prettty fun president heaton is just the coolest man on planet earth and i love spending whatever time i can with him i learn so much about him everytime i talk to him or hear him speak he is just the man. and than after that tomorrow its just back to work. so just nothing new going on here just work work work work being a zone leader you always got a bunch of little things to do and it keeps you super super busy and you can never rest so the next 5 months here are gonna be really tiring ones and probably really really fast ones haha so yeah thats basically the update down here in the guay. i love you all sooo much thanks for everything you do. i love you keep it gangsta elder barton

MOTHERS DAY IS HERE!!

hey family hows it all going. so we are running super behind right now so this email is going to be super super short haha. not much updates with me this past week we went to montevideo and had a big meeting with all the zone leaders and president heaton it was super fun i learned a ton from president heaton. i also got to see elder peterson and elder harris my compps from the mtc so that was super awesome first time i have seen elder peterson in about a year haha so that was a blast. so yeah this sunday is.......mothers day!!!!!!!!! and yes we are going to skype it i am going to find a computer and i will make it a good last phone call to home haha. so i am planning to get on skype at a8 o´clok at night here so i think thats like 4 or 5 there i dont know i will call you a little before and confirm hopefully you guys have a good skype set up. so yeah im doing super good no need to worry about me here in the guay just working like a crazy mad animal me and elder nygard today had to take a 5 hour nap cause we were so whiped out haha so yeah i will see you guys on sunday!! love you all. keep it krisp. elder barton

first week in tacuarembo....and ryan martin??

hey family and friends so i am here in tacaurembo!!!!!!!!! so far things have been pretty good i got here on wednesday morning and things have been going crazy non stop ever since than, with meetings in the stake, meetings with the missionaries, teaching the investigators, meeting the members, and all that good stuff so its pretty been good but pretty dang exhausting all at the same time. so like i said last week my new comp is elder nygard he is from washington, and he is a work horse haha we are gonna work crazy hard together, we set a goal for the zone just to be the hardest workers in the whole mission and we set a companionship goal just to be the hardest working missionaries in the whole mission so its gonna be pretty exciting haha. elder nygard is awesome we get along great. so yeah tbo is definately different than deo a lot more relaxed and even though i miss allthe people i met in deo i dont really miss the city life all that much haha. umm so the biggest story of the week would be i met my bishop on wednesday night we had a meeting with him, he asked me a little bit about my self and where i was from when i told him i was from sandy he tells me that he had a companion in his mission from sandy he told me his name....yup you guessed it RYAN MARTIN haha haha haha haha i told the bishop that he lived about 2 blocks from my house and that his family and my family were really good friends i guess ryan and my bishop had a blast together and had a lot of success, later we had lunch with the bishop last saturday...yea i saw an album full of pictures of ryan martin on his mission haha it was a little funny to see. other than that all is normal down here just chilin working hard trying to get use to the life as a zone leader even though its not that much more different its still the same work but there are a little few changes i had to make in myself to be a better zone leader. so yeah i hope all is good over there that the weather is treatin ya good and that everyone is getting excited for school to end. sorry this email isnt very long i dont really know what to write haha but i love you all. talk to you soon in about 2 weeks!! keep it gangsta. elder barton