Pictures!!

Here are some pictures we recently got of Alex at the MTC! He did great and is now loving his time in Spain! 

Alex by the Provo Temple

 Alex and his MTC companion

This week's letter!

Hello Family!

Well hello all! How is everyone?  Let me just start out by saying that this past week was really amazing.  Many great things are coming to Barrio 9 :)  First off, Antonio has his baptism this Saturday!! How great is that.  He was a little scared but he is all good now and is ready for it.  Luis is also getting ready for his baptism next week:)  He has been waiting for about a month and he can´t wait for it.  As I said before, his wife is a less active member but she has been coming back and wanting to come.  Benito also is so ready! He would so get baptized right now if he could.  He is still waiting to get married,  Diana is from Peru and she has been waiting for her papers and has them, but Madrid is taking a little time with this.  It takes some time here so they should be getting married in about a couple of months, no one really knows.  It is just good to know that they are ready for this.  They have been coming to church every single week and attending all the activities we have, which is so good.  They really want to get married and the amazing thing is they want to go to the temple and do work for his father and get sealed in the temple.  Benito is on fire right now.  As you can see, our investigators are doing well.  They all are progressing at their own speed, which is fine.  Some aren't doing as well, which is not so good. Amanda has her date set for the end of this month, but we can never meet with her.  She has time to go out and play, but not for us.  She does work a lot, but she always says, oh, I just have no time, I´m sorry.  We set up lessons with  her, then she drops us, but we get to meet with her almost every Friday and Saturday.  Soo it could be worse.  Well other than that, our investigators are doing great! 

Well, I have had some amazing food this past week.  First off, as I have said, I am in South America. Well this past week I have had a lot of great dishes from Peru, Ecuador, Dominican Republic and other places.  Well the best are these two.  First, I had this drink from the Dominican, It´s called Morir soñando... ohhh wow this was so good.  It has milk ,lots of surgar, and a lot of lemon juice.  It might sound gross, but it is so good!! Second was this dish from Ecuador.  Our investigator, Luis, loves to cook and he and his wife made rice, mashed potatoes, and a lot of meat.  Well it was sooo good and yes they gave us a lot of it.  He gave Elder Woodbury and me a big plate of rice, like a mound of it, basically, it covered the plate with a big dish of mashed potatoes.  Then there was a slab of meat on the side.  Ohhhh it was sooo  goood!!! And yes, I ate it all.. And yes, I didn´t eat till the next morning because I was so full!!! 

Well something sweet is I Met JC Carrol, He plays for Madrid Basketball and I guess he is pretty good.  He just came to Sacrament because he had a game that night, but he was super nice and talked to us about the mission.  He went to Chile I believe. Well onto some funny things that have happend to me.  Well we were talking to Diana about a dream she had.  Scary dream.  She says that she feels something dark is around their piso, but she said it was gone until this dream she had.  She said that she saw this Black Shadow jump onto their Piso mate and come back into their piso.  I was kinda freaked out but she says that Fernando (the mission ward leader) came over and talked to them and calmed them down.  Well the funny part is we were talking about satan.  Well the word for satan in spanish is Santanas... welll I said Santana... kinda similar but not.  She looked at me and started laughing and said... like the rocker?? hahah well ooops I corrected myself and said sorry for the oops I just had :P 

Well when we are on the street, I stand out.  I am a tan so I kind of blend in, but my size screams American.  We were contacting and I just stopped and turned around to run down some lady I saw.   Well as I turned around this little old Spanish Lady runs into me.  I stay still, she goes flying.  Her glasses about fall off and she is madder than a wet hen.  Ohhh she was about to scream at me.  I of course am shocked and help her get her balance.. I say sorry and just go on my way to get the lady I needed to stop.  Well that´s happend a couple of times, but not as bad.  I tell you what, Spanish old women are mean.  They stare at you and say some weired things..

I mentioned before, but the transportation is really good.  The buses are fast and get you to where you need pretty quickly.  Yesterday we needed to get to the church.  We walked to the bus stop and the bus was about to leave.  Well, I start sprinting.  I tighten up my back pack and just sprint.  I caught the bus, and my companion, Elder Woodbury just takes his time seeing that I got the bus.  That's happend a couple of times.  Well family I love you all so so much!! I miss you all and I can´t wait to call in a little bit!!  I LOVE LOVE LOVE YOUUUUU!!!!!

Love Your Favorite Spanish Missionary,

Elder AlexLaubaugh!

Last week's letter

Hello all!!!
How is everyone?? Well this week has been reallly good and yes still very hard.  Well just to let you all know, I had an interview with President Watkins yesterday :)  It went really well and he was really impressed how much we are teaching and how the members are coming along.  Yes Mitch, I told President what you told me to tell him.  I told him that I am here to work, and to Light up Spain.  I also told him that if he needs a missionary that is willing to work, that I am that Missionary :) He told me thank you and we went on our way with the interview.  Well this week we also had 19 lessons.  Our investigators are doing so well!! I am so glad that they are really wanting to change their lives around for this.  I am so glad for the people who listen.  We have another investigator.  It was a member referral and she seems really nice.  I hope she wants to hear more after the 2nd lesson.  Well, as I said, our investigators are doing well.  Luis and Andrea are doing super good! Every lesson that we have had with them, he has cried.  He wants to be baptized so bad! I love it!!  :)  She is already a member and so is her family, but this is a really big step for him.  Diana and Benito are doing super well too!! On Sunday he spoke up during class and said a comment that he wasn´t a member, but he will be soon and that baptism is just the first step he needs to take.  He wants to go to the temple and do the work for his dad.  I am so proud of him.  I am so glad that the Lord has poured these blessings on us.  He has helped me out so much this past week with Spanish.  Our other investigators are also doing well.  Some are doing really well, but need a little help with some of their doubts, but it´s life and they want to make sure on this decision they are making. 
Well, today I got my residency card!  YAY!! I don´t need to bring my passport to get food anymore! :)  While we were going there, we had a great time.  When we got to Aluche metro stop we got off and saw a guy being held down by 3 gaurds and a girl yelling at him.  He tried to break free... bad idea.  I wanted to see a good fight but all I saw was a random guy take his head and slam it to the ground to help out the gaurds.  It was getting really intense so we stayed and watched him get slammed up against the wall.  Well after that I got my haircut.  It was much needed!  Well we went to this cheap place that did a nice job.  Well before I got it, the lady got a phone call.  Well she started yelling in Chinese.  She went outside and started yelling and yelling and saying all this Chinese words.  She then stopped, hung up and came over to me and said, what would you like.  I was freaked out because I didn´t want to get this messed up haircut because she is mad at some person.  But she did a good job :) 
Well this week I have been is Alma.  Wow I love the Book of Alma.  There is so much about missionary work and I knew that, but not to this level.  I now have a favorite chapter, Alma 26. Wow what a great chapter! I love 10-13 about boasting in God, it really hit me for some reason.  I was just thinking about it a lot this past week and this week also.  I also love Ammon.  Man was he a great missionary!  I love how he was saying everyone laughed at them for going up to the Lamanites, but he showed them and converted thousands upon thousands of people.  Love it!  Well that is about it for this week.  It has been really busy and we had a great day of contacting yesterday.  We had 9 people that wanted to hear more, so hopefully a couple of them really do want to hear this message that we have!  I hope that the trip went well!! I am not sure if you are still in Utah, but I hope that it was great!!  And Great Job Mitch!!! Way to go!! Muy guai!!
I love you all so much and I hope that you are doing great!!  By the way Dad, the other Elders in the Piso are really hard workers, they are really good.  Well all get along really well and we both have great investigators.  They just had a baptism last week and it went so good!  Well I love you all!

Love your favorite Elder,

Elder Alex Laubaugh

Another great week in Spain!

Hello family! This week has been crazy goood!!!!  First off, most of our investigators are doing so good.  Unfortunately,  Pamela (the one with the doubts) dropped us last Wednesday.  It was sad, but she just didn't want it.  She doesn´t want to obey the commandments so it was hard for us to get to her.  We had set the date with plenty of time for us to get her ready and for her to feel ready.  Amanda is doing well. She wanted more time because she knew she was doing this for her kids, not for her, so she wanted to have a testimony.  That was so good that she told us because she has been really good.  But, I could tell that she needed more time.  Antonio is going to get baptized a little later, not the 21st.  He just wasn´t ready and he asked fo rmore time, but he is still good and ready for the future.
We have another fecha as well. Luis.  He is married to a less active and is around 26ish.  Well, he went to this concert at the stake center and felt something prompt him, so he wanted to get the missionaries over.  He found the B3 Elders.  They taught him and he started to cry and say this is what I want and need in my life.  They set a date for the 12th of May.  Well, they soon found out he was actually in our area, so now we have him. How cool is that!! By the way, Benito and Diana want to get married and they already have plans to do that!! He also wants to get baptized.  He has been telling us and everyone that he wants to and he will.  He is so much happier now that he has the gospel in his life.  The members have taken him and his family in.  The members here are so nice and take in all of our investigators and make them feel like family.  I love it!
Well in other news, we have 3 new investigators.  We have Miguel and Adriana.  They are not married and have a little girl.  They are so nice and really interested in it.  We stopped her on the street and she didn't seem interested but, we went with it and I am glad we did.  She is super nice and they both came to church after just teaching Adriana.  We didn´t know that Miguel would come. We also have Eliana.  She is single and we also contacted into her.  She has a lot of questions about church and life in general.  So we set up a lesson with her right away and now she wants to learn more. 
Now it´s story time.  Luis, our new fecha, made us lunch.  Ohhhh wow!!!! He is really good at cooking.  He made us this Lasagna and it was bomb! I gotta learn how to make that.  Second, We got asked if we had drugs to sell.  We contact/walk through some areas that aren´t bad but just different.  Well we are walking trying to find this apartment building and these guys ask us for some random name thing.  We say no cause I didn´t know what they were saying but Elder Woodbury was saying that it was for some drug that he didn´t know what it was. hahaha that was funny.  Third story, well not really a story, but a miracle.  We have been working our butts off over here.  We had 19 lessons this past week.  It was so good.  Since everything is kinda far apart, around 20-30min metro ride, we usually don´t get a lot of time to contact and find new people, but we find time and make time.  Well since we had a packed schedual we only contacted into 57 people (people who stopped and talked with us).  We do more but those are the few that were nice and some what interested.  Well, the awesome part is 21 of those, people gave us their info, and some where they lived.  Wow the Lord has really blessed us this week.  We have much to be thankful for.  Seriously Elder Woodbury and I pray so much for what the Lord has given us.  I am so thankful for the blessings we have.  With that, there was a price for those.  We had to work really hard and to take a step into the dark.  It is really scary sometimes, but we do it.  I have been getting better in my Spanish.  It is still ehhh but it is better.  Elder W says it is, but I think it was just to be nice :P  haha but I have been stopping everyone I see, and I mean everyone I see.  We might stop around 150 people and only a couple of those people stop to talk.  It is hard when people just say I don´t care, but it pushes me to talk even more because what if someone does care.  That is why I feel the Lord has blessed us with these people who stopped.  I want the Lord to know that he can put someone in our path because he knows that we will stop them.  He has put many people in our path and it has really been a great blessing. 
This week I have been in Alma.  Wow what a stud he was.  I believe in am in the 19th chapter, but I love the book of Alma.  Elder Woodbury and I are like Alma and Amulek, walking city to city preaching and teaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ. 
Well I love you all so much and I pray for you all so much. I hope David is doing great with his new job!!

I love you all!!

Love,

Elder Alex Laubaugh (Lobo:)

another great letter!

Hello family!! 

How are all of you? Well this week has been hard, but very rewarding.  As I said a little bit ago, we have a fecha.  Antonio, he is around mid 50´s and lives with his cousins who are very good members.  We set up the date for the 21st of April.  The best part about this is that a couple nights before our lesson he said he had a dream about 2 rivers and an angel.  One river was clean the other dirty.  The angel told him to change his ways and get into the clean one and get out of the dirty river.  So he wants to be baptized.  How cool is that!

 Well, as I said this week has been hard, actually really hard.  Spanish is my main challenge.  I am understanding a lot more and speaking more, but I still need to work very hard.  Elder Woodbury helps me out a lot and we read together and study together so I can learn the ins ands outs of Spanish.  He really pushes me and wants me to study harder everyday, so I do! :)  He is a great companion.

Well let me tell you about my other investigators.  First off we, have 3 fechas or dates. (most spanish missionaries use the word fecha as another word for a baptism date) First Antonio, then we have Amanda.  Amanda is a mother of 2 young kids who are members.  After visiting with her we learn her parents and most of her family are good members.  After the first lesson we felt we should ask her to be baptized, so we did and she said she has no problem with that and she wants to be.  Second we have Pamella.  She is harder and has a lot of doubts but we have helped her with those and cleared those up.  The other Elders met her before I got here.  So she has been taking the lessons for about 2 months now.  After that we have Benito.  He will have a fecha soon.  He is a father of 2 young boys (less than 3)  and is living with a less active member.  They aren´t married, but he has stressed that he wants to be soon.  So awesome! We didn´t even need to tell him.  He has talked a lot about all the points we were going to bring up.  So he is on his way!  The sad thing is they are going through some hard times and they need a lot of help.  The sweet thing is that they always have a smile on their faces and want us to come over and help them out.  Their little baby was in the hospital for the past couple of days.  We felt we should go and visit her.  When we did, she was sitting down reading the Book of Mormon.  How awesome is that.  We talked to her for a bit about the chapters she has been reading and she loved it.  I do have more, but I will tell you more about them later on.

Thank you Mom and Dad for the package and Elder Woodbury loved the candy! He says thank you so much!  Thank you also for the letters and the pictures of Bella.  They always make me smile :) 

This week, everything was pretty good.  But, I do have a story.  Well yesterday, we are in a lesson with a less active lady and her daughter.  She is very nice, but has a lot of doubts.  As we are talking, her niece starts acting crazy - like a demon crazy.  She was all over the place, slamming her feet against the door and screaming!! Ohhh the spirit left so fast! I was just praying so hard that she would be silent and that we can get out of this.  Luckily, she calmed down about 15min later.  I tell you what, I thought I heard the Devil in her voice. In the end, the lesson went okay. It was good, but not the best. We taught her and brought the spirit into her home.  We gave her daughter a blessing of comfort because she has been going through some hard times.

Easter was good, but it was not like an American one.  Sunday was normal and everyone talked about Easter and what not.  During this time, Spain does a holy week where everyone takes off work and school to go and play kinda of like a spring break, but for everyone.  We had dinner at a member's house.  It wasn´t like ours, we had a lot of pasta and thin sliced meat.  I wasn´t sure what it was, but it was good.  After, we had some cake.  I finished my cake a little early.... so the daughter takes my plate.  I think she is going to clean it and put it away.  Nope!!! She put on another slice and said here ya go!!! so I ate it :) It was so good, but I was about to gag.  We don´t serve our own food.  Usually, we get a plate, big or small, but usually big.  I say I don´t eat that much and they just laugh at me and give me a big plate.  :(  ahhh good ol Spain, but my weight has been good.  On member meal days I don´t eat breakfast,  just a piece of bread to tide me over till lunch. (most meals are at lunch)

Other than Easter and some awesome lessons, nothing really big happend.  The mission is hard, really hard. When I hit my bed I am out for the night!  But some fun facts about Spain, fanny packs are big here.  Mom you would fit right in! ahahah  Everyone wears one.  Gypsys (think thats how you spell it) wear couch fanny packs.  haha Second, I am very very big here.  Most people stare at me and say.. wow.. you are big! of course in Spanish.  I usually look down. I have only looked up twice :)  Just to let you all know, I am in a part of Spain that has a lot of south americans.  Our part has a lot of people from there.. not Spain :P  That is all that has happend this week.  A lot of really good lessons and people staring at me :)I love you all so much and I hope you all have a great week with everything!

Love your favorite person in Spain,

Elder Lobo

aka.

Elder Laubaugh

latest letter from alex!

Hey family! How are all of you doing??  Thank you all so much for the letters. They are the best and they always keep me in the loop :)  Well Spain is doing good.  We are lighting it up like always!  The past couple days though have been very hard.  People just don't want to listen, but that just means we have to work extra hard to get to them. 

This week has just been a funny one also.  One fashion that I have noticed is mullets.  Yes business in the front, party in the back.  I was in the metro, waiting for the metro.  A family walks by... the 5 year old kid has this nice long mullet! hahahahah yes i did laugh a little bit to myself.  Another time, we are at this place, I forget what the name was, but this guy walks in.. no lie, he has on these red pants, some rock band shirt and yes, a nice mullet. :) 

This week we did get a lot done, but as I said, we had some really hard days.  Yesterday actually was a great day  We contacted all day, buy it wasn´t supposed to be like that.  We had about 3 lessons planned for the afternoon.  In the morning we had District meeting so we were going to go from there, eat some lunch, study, then go to our lessons for the day.  Well everyone didn´t want to hear from us so they just weren´t at home or just said they didn´t want to hear from us.  It was really sad and it hurt, but I hope we get to them.  Yesterday was just a bad day, it was long, rainy, and no one wanted to talk to us.  There are a couple of good things that came from it.  We taught this part member family that haven´t had the lessons for about a month now. We stopped by at around 8:30ish to see if they were home.  They were and we talked to them and they are doing just great and still want us to come over more often and teach the husband.  The wife is the member and I believe the kid is around 6 or 7.  First good thing. Second is my Spanish is getting better.  I can understand my trainer a lot better compared to the first day, and I can understand the members better too :)  I found that out yesterday when I was talking to the wife of our investigator.  She just started talking and I just was responding without a pause.  The other thing is funny i guess.  So here in Spain, people are always in a rush and just don´t want to talk.  Well when you do stop someone you have to wait for an odd reply because that´s what you are going to get.  So i usually start out by saying hi, we are elders blah blah blah.  Then I say, we believe in God and Jesus Christ, Do you believe in them?  The most given reply is... I´m Catholic.  Yes, it is odd but, it is really stupid. So I say... soooo yes?  And then we go on from there.  I have also noticed that a lot of people do not believe in God or anything.  They just say they are this and that.  It is so sad, but I get the chance to talk to them and see why and how this became, so it is really neat to see other people's views. 

So the other day, Spain had a holiday.  It´s called Huelga day (or riot day), where everyone strikes and makes a mess. Yes, I did get a poster and I will be sending it out soon after I get a couple things from here.  It was really strange, but the Metros were very slow and the buses were too. We waited for about 15min. for a bus when it should be about 3min.  It was fine we had a couple of lessons spaced out because of that day and we contacted a lot but it was just strange.  It was a really forward and a lot of people were waving flags and saying "huelga!!!!!!!" over and over again... so I took some videos from our piso :)  hahaha

As you can see, I am doing well, everything is so good here and I love the work, the people, and the Lord.  It is so amazing how He works.  I was having a rough week, it was long and painful, but today was great.  We went to the temple, the best place ever.  I got to rest and think about these past couple of weeks and see how much I have grown.  The Lord is preparing me for a lot.  I am so blessed to be in Madrid in this time.  The people are hard, but with a lot of prayers, and talking, we are getting people who really have been wanting to learn more.  It is awesome to see who the Lord puts in our way to talk to.  We have been setting a goal to talk to everyone this week and for now on.  We play a game called pistol and we have to stop a person for a couple of seconds till it is the next ones turn.  Yes it was my turn for about 10min, but I talked with everyone, literally,  I stopped everyone I saw.  It was amazing on how many people didn´t stop, but also how many people, wanted to listen.  We didn´t get a lot of numbers and lessons, but we did teach a lot about us and the Church.  It was a really good day and week in that.  Yes some days are hard and you just want to stop and rest, but I am telling you what, my planner does a lot of wonders.  I have written on it "light it up!" and whenver I am down, I look at it and I feel so much better :)  I love it!  Everyone does.  A lot of the missionaries use it now because I said it and they saw my planner :)  They love it and also the natives :)  In Spanish it is called  enciéndelo!!  hahah so many people use it :) I love you all so much and I miss you all, I hope this letter was good. :)  I hope and pray that everyone has a good week, always know that i am looking at the stars at night :)

Love,

Elder Alex Laubaugh

               In another email, Alex shared:  Conference was so goooodddd!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  it was amazing that all of the talks answered my questions :) the Lord loves me and he loves his missionaries :)  I love Pres. Eyring's talk about challenges and yes, I did pray for one... and yes it was an answer that I already have :) aka... Spanish :P

Wahooo!!! First area!

Hey family!! How are all of you? Well, this week was my first week in the field. How sweet is that!! My new address is: 

Calle de la oca 2, 3ºB

28025

Madrid, Spain

 

Well, a little about my new companion, my new best friend, Elder Woodbury.  He is the 5th of 6 kids.  He is from Phoenix Arizona, and has been out for a year and four months.  He is a great missionary and he helps me a lot on my Spanish and other things as well.  He is sooo awesome! We do what you told me to do Mandy, we read out of PMG for around 20-30 min a day so I can work on my Spanish.  Thank you for the input on what to do to help me.  I will definitely do that :)

We are in a piso (apartment) with another companionship (Elder Wilson, and my old comp, Elder Johnson).  By the way, Elder Bagley is in the Canary Islands!! How sweet is that!  Elder Woodbury and I serve in barrio (ward) 9 in Madrid. We have a huge area! We could take the metro for a good 30 min and still be in our area.  Our ward has around 150+ members in it.  They are so nice, so nice that I had to bear my testimony and intoduce myself on Sunday.  

We also have a lot of dinner and lunch appointments. :) ahhh yeahh! We also have a set of sister missionaries in our ward. The food is amazing here, but don´t worry it is not like 24/7 eating.  I eat a small breakfast like a yogurt and a piece of fresh bread.  Then lunch is usually bigger, like a dinner. We usually eat just at the piso, but sometimes a member has us over.  Then dinner might be with a member but, most of the time we have it at the piso, and that is like a little snack or something light.  But, I am telling you what, the food here, is SO GOOD! On Sunday for lunch we ate at Miriams piso (member family).  She made these half a chicken things (not like a real half of chicken, but they were huge legs and thigh pieces) with these huge potatoes (sorry for my spelling, Spanish has ruined what was left of my spelling skills)  She gave everyone 2 potatoes spit apart each with a chicken half with strips of meat and some other type of meat.  Yes, she gave everyone that, and also yes, it was amazing! Ohhh and rice and salad of course.  It was just huge.  Lets just say i didn´t eat till the next morning.  I was so full!! 

Well, I am doing good! Our teaching pool is not huge, but a good size.  We have about 5 good investigators.  Well, to let you know we walk a lot!  I´ll say at least 5-6 miles a day.  We are always on the go and talking to everyone.  Spain is so awesome! But it is also hard.  It is hard to teach and speak because people don´t want to listen.  We get some fake numbers and all that. Some people actually give us their number, but when we call, they turn us down.  But every so often someone wants to hear from us :)  

Well the language is hard because people speak a mile a minute here and it really stinks, I´m not gonna lie.  But I push on and study and speak more.  The Lord has really blessed me with a lot.  He has put a lot of peple in my and Elder Woodburys way.  Because I have made a goal to talk to everyone i see. It is very hard, but I want to be bold, like a lion.   

I´ve met a lot of people who don´t believe in God or just don´t care about religion.  I just wish they would listen, for just 2 min. of what we have to say, but they don´t.  When we say hi, we usually get, I´m in a hurry, don´t talk to me, or my favorite, good bye. hahah  Occasionally, we do get those nice people who actually care and want to know what we are all about :) 

Well everything else is good! I love life and the mission, just livin the dream!  I always look up at the stars mom and dad. I always think of you all :)  Don´t worry, I work my hardest everyday, but at night when we are getting ready for bed, I look out my window and see the stars and think of you all.  

Well, I will be in this area for at least 2 months because I have more training that the church just started to do.  It´s a 12 week program for new missionaries to help us more with the lessons and the language.  And yes my p-day is on wednesday! :) Ohh fun fact about our piso, we have no dryer so it´s the good ol´ drying racks or hanging things out-side :) 

 

I love you all so much and I can´t wait to hear from all of you :) I love you all!!!!

 

Love your son, brother, and brother in-law,

 

Elder Alex Laubaugh

 

ps. when you send a package to me,it doesn´t have to be like right now, don´t worry I am fine, but please put a jar a peanut butter  in there... :) creamy please :) Spain gets this other stuff that doesn´t taste that good :( i think it´s from china... hahah but yes that would be great...

 

pss also I would like if all of you could please send your testimonies to me by mail.  I can´t really print here, but I would really like that.  :) thanks

 

I love you!!