Day 234

Family,
Well i got the new comp! Elder Cevallos from ecuador!  he is 20 yrs old and has 13 months in the mission.  he was in the mission officwe before he came to the floating uros.  he was the elder that was in charge of baptismal records and references from church headquarters.  he is very dark skinned and looks almost black haha i am sending a picture so you can see what i mean haha  i am glad hear about all the people getting their mission calls and where they are going.  i know that these two years will be awesome and i will love to be able to share experiences with them after the mission.  and i am also looking forward to going to all their homecomings because i was the first to leave.  sorry i dont have much time to write becaus ei was struggling to put up these fotos for you all to see.  also i wanted to share how awesome our zone is.  when i got here the zone only had 4 baptisms, ya the whole zone.  everybody started saying that it was the zone of punishment because it is so hard to get baptisms.  but the month after changes we had 8 and this month we have 14 right now and our goal just this week as a zone is 9 more.  the mission president in very pleased in all of our hard work and will give the whole zone permission to go to the uros if they fullfill our goal 18 this month.  and i am sure we can do it and with the lords help everything is possible.  me and my comp have a possible baptism this week but if not for sure the next week and another for april  so we are working hard and having fun in the work.  mom thanks for the update on tanners birthday dad told me as well about the trip to vegas and sounds like everythin went well.  well we have to get going and find more peaople to bless and thank you all for yor suport chao!

Day 227

Family,
alright well its that time agian for tranfers.  my comp elder tturco is heading to cuzco tonigh and i should be with my district leader until my new comp gets here from cuzco.  i also remembered that tanner had his birthday yesterday and i hope that he had good one and still preparing to serve a mission.  i know its sometimes difficult to think about leaving for two years but you can come to know a lot of things in such a short time and grow up as well.  i believe one of our modern day prophets said that the mission is a shorcut to manlihood and i know that to be true. i am excited to keep working in the islands and help strengthen the uros branch so that in the near future they can have their own chapel on the lake.  i also heard that president is coming to puno to do interviews and i am excited to talk to him.  the last two interviews i had with him were really short because my spanish wasnt to good.  it sounds like everything is going pretty smoothly back home.  thanks for the package i got today with the postcards and tell bro. burrows thanks for his little note.  ron also for his letter last week and im grateful to have so many active family members.  i just want to give you guys a little boost on your temple attendance.  i was reading an article in the ensign by richard g scott (find it if you can) from a recent issue and i really liked 2 questions that said we should ask ourselves when we are planning to make time for the temple.  first "what can be more important than going to the temple?" and second "what activity can bring more peace and hapiness in the short time we are there?"  i have seen the sacrifice the members make just to go to the temple here in peru and because they know how important it is and how it makes them feel.  sometimes when we have a temple so close we feel like well when i have a little extra time ill run over.  but we all know that time sometimes doesnt come becaus ewe are always planning other things in our free time that we have.  if you have goals to go to the temple but are struggling to fulfill them read the article by richard g scott and make plans that will help you fulfilll these goals.  that is what we do as missionaries,  we make goals and plan our days and weeks so that we can fulfill those goals.  if our plan doesnt allow us to fullfill our goals then our plan isnt planned right.  alright well i hope you like the fotos and im outta time but i love you all and i am alway praying for your wellbeing and that you are staying true to the faith

Day 221

Family
hey family i hope all is well at home and soccer is going well.  here in the islands we are looking really hard for peopla that are prepared to listen and apply what we are teaching in their lives.  this week we decied to go island to island and just contact people and we met lotes of different types of people.  some that are cool to listen but dont want us to come back and keep teaching, other that say im "this religion" and im going to die this way, others that want to teach us the truth, others that say you guys are only 20 years old and dont know anything about god still, others that say i want to listen but i dont have time, and finally others that have questions and ask us to come back.  the last type in the type of people we are trying to find and we found one of these and his name is carlos.  we arrived at an island and my comp told me that it was my turn to contact and so i saw a guy that we call in spanish chinito which means little chinese guy haha but itsonly because he kinda has chinese looking eyes.  anyways i started talking with him and told him we are missioaries that we go around teaching not "selling" how to find happiness in this life and a purpose and asked if we share a little with him.  he said ya it all good and so we sat down on his island he told us that other religions had visited him and he had questions but they didnt have answers.  so we asked him what questions he had and we answered them. then we gave him a pamphlet of the restoration and asked if we could come back.  he said yes again.  we came back and taught him the restoration and i think it was the best lesson i have had.  he would ask questions we would answer then we would ask questions and he would answer brillantly and we also found out that he has never drank alcohol in his life and he said it just doesnt feel right.  we told him that is the light of christ that we all have in us that guides to know the truth and right.  and right when we were deciding to challenge him for baptism a dumb tourist boat showed up and we had to leave,  thank you satan.  i am very excited for carlos i know that he is somebody that has been prepared for us by a loving father in heaven.  i love you all and i love my father in heaven and i am grateful for this oportunity to serve the short time i have here in peru. 
Elder Wilkinson

Day 214

Family,
hey so we have been busy here in the uros and just had 3 baptisms this last sat!  we found the family only a week earlier and i told about the story about her mom and that we couldnt go back to her island but they endured and fullfilled their convenant with the lord and got baptized.  also i uncluded fotos of the pizza night we had for pday its was really cool but the pizza hear doesnt taste the same and it is expensive. also ther is this really cool big giant cement slide they have here is puno i though was pretty cool.  we changed rooms up and i threw in fotos of that as well.  the shower here is warm but not hot tlike my other ones i have had.  last pday we made a trip to the waterfalls here in puno they are pretty big.  i went behind them walking on the super slippery rocks to check it out and on the way back i slipped and fell and bruised my leg pretty bad.  later that day they wanted me to play keeper fro the zone but i coulnt cause it was hurting pretty bad but it is totally fine now.  well i sent all the recent fotos so i dont have to much time to write but i dont know if you all know but i can print all the letters and read them during the week so it is ok if mom and dad both write letters
Elder Wilkinson

Day 207

Family,
i have been growing alot in this new area with my new companion.  my spanish is now where i feel almost complety comfortable talking with random people and i am starting to realize that i can never talk to much or with to many people because they are all children of god and maybe this will be their only chance to hear the gospel, which i know can bless their lives in ways they will never understand.  and i have also learned that there are tons of people that are really ready to not only listen to the gospel but to accept it.  we found a family this week through a member reference.  we went and visited them and the wife came to chuch but her husband couldnt because had work but said he would come the next sunday he can.  the next time we talked with them he asked  us when he could be baptized and jokingly we told him tomorrow but then told him when you are ready and feel it is right you can be baptized.  the next time we went to see them on their island we met the wonderful mom of adela (the wife). she told us very nicely (not) that we cant come back to island because she is the boss there and it is her island.  after this experience i have realized that satan is very real and is trying very hard to stop this work from going forth but we all know he will lose in the end.  just like around the same time joseph smith restored the church of jesus christ satan also "inspired" a man to come forth named karl marx the father of comunism.  right now there are to many comunist to count and is one of the only thing that is stopping the gospel from spreading to every nation kindred and tongue, for example china.  i would just like to end with my testimony that i know what i am doing is what the lord wants and i am trying very hard to become his tool to help bring the message of the restoration to his children he is preparing for me, and i hope my weaknesses wont stop me from finding everybody i need to.  this isnt the time to play games and enjoy the country of peru but to work so i can be happy with my work when i am finished. i love you all and miss you but i am also very glad i am here.
Love
Elder Wilkinson

Day 201

Family,
alright family and friends i have quite a few things to tell you about my new sector and my comp.  my sector really is the bomb i am loving the islands.  the members are also really cool adn want to help with the missionary work.  we get quite a few references from members and they are usually pretty good ones.  we have a new branch president so it isnt the one that is in the article in the ensign but he is still active and sometimes picks us up in his boat to take us to the islands.  i did get a little sunburned this week and i even had sunscreen on!  i think its because it is only spf 30 but to buy sunscreen here is super expensive. my companions elder tturco is the bomb and we arte working hard and should have a baptism pretty soon.  i dont think i told you but the people on the islands speak another language called aymara which is like qechua but is for this area of peru.  i have learned a bit because they are always talking in it with family and friends haha kamisaraki means hola como estas or hey whats up? waliki means im doing good. we arent actually living on the islands but we travel to them everyday from puno in the morning and then we come back early at night before dark and we study.  my pension or the lady that cooks for us here is awesome and already knows how to cook pancakes!! but i amd sad because we are going to move rooms closer to the lake so we dont have to travel so far to get to the islands.  also we dont have somebody to wash clothes in this sector so we are washing by hand.  it is quite a bit of work and it rubs the skin off your knuckles haha but it is an awesome experience.  next week i will send pictures of the house we are living in and the church on the islands.

Love Elder Wilkinson

Day 187

Family
well i am happy and sad to tell you that tomorrow i will be having my first transfer.  i nhave loved izcuchaca and all the people i have met.  it is difficult to leave people that i have developed a good relation with but also its exciting to find out i will be serving in a different place and meet more people and change their lives.   i hope everthing is going good at home and everyone is staying faithfull.  the only advice i have for the family is to show your love for each other and remember to say please, thank you, and ask permission.  we have a family that is strugglying baddly and my comp told to remember these things and they will solve their problems.
Elder Wilkinson