January 16, 2012

Wow, what a crazy week.

Family, I am so happy I have the chance to write you. I do not have a lot of time, but I am going to try and write as fast as I can. We had a couple miracles happen this week. Last Sunday a 26 year old mother walked up to me and church and said she needed to talk to us. We followed her outside and she said that she wanted to be baptized. We met with her later that night and taught her. Then the next day we taught her. We took her to Mexico City to have a special interview with President Ramas, and she passed. I was able to baptize her the day after my birthday. My first baptism! She is amazing and her name is Zulma........... It was a little difficult pronouncing her name, but I got it down. My district threw a suprise party for my birthday and bought me a massive cake with firecracker candles. You know, the kind that you cannot blow out. Haha, those tricksters. I felt so much love this week that it was almost overwhelming, but not quite. =) I went on splits with a few people and attached a couple photos of those too. We worked hard this week and everything has been seeming to just fall into place. Personally I think it is because Elder Cuevas and I had a long talk about obedience and the blessings we will recieve through it. The next awesome miracle that happened this week was that we married Sergio and Noelia. It took a lot of work, but we did it. Sergio asked me ¨I have been with Noelia for 20 years and we have never been married. I had so many friends and family members tell me to marry her. I even had her family members tell me to. I never did, and then Elder Cuevas and you show up and tell me to get married, and I did it. How did you do that?¨ Haha, they were married on Friday the 13th of 2012. Pretty neat, eh? We baptized them yesterday and they were sooooo happy. Today, we had a pretty bizarre day. I went to Teotihuacan. It was one of the most mind blowing, eye boggling, facsinating things I have ever seen. You would not believe the ¨coincidences¨ between that place and the Book of Mormon. We walked around and took pictures on some of the ancient ruins of the Jaredites. Hhahaha, wow. I bought some things for you guys and I will send them to you guys in a package. YOU ARE GOING TO LOVE THEM! =) Do not say I cannot, because you guys have already sent me so much for Christmas and my birthday, so I have to send them to you. Next, we ended up waiting 2 hours for our bus to come back to Pachuca and to our surprise the computers we used could not send our messages to president. So we are going to have to report our numbers to him at our interviews this week with him. I hope everything works out alright. I wish we would be able to send them to him. We went to Zulmas house next to eat, because her parents made a huge meal to thank us for baptizing her. Then after, they drove us to the hospital so we could give one of their family members a blessing. I can not tell you how powerful of a blessing it was. I am dead tired and hope that I will be able to do everything will full throttle tomorrow. We have a lot of work to do this week and I am devoted to getting it all done. Who told you that you needed to send me short emails so I had time to write you and President? I have a ton of time to write you both, so do not worry. How is everyone doing? I got a email from Grandma and Grandpa and that made me feel good. Tell them thanks and I love them! Oh, and that I am writing in my journal. TELL MY FAVORITE BROTHER AYD, HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!! AND THAT I LOVE HIM SOOOOO VERY MUCH AND I HAVE A REALLY COOL PRESENT FOR HIM FROM TEOTIHUACAN. Tell Jess, Kass, and Cam that they have to do track. If they do not, they will regret it the rest of their lives. How is Mand doing? She holding up good with another little Logie in her belly? How is Dad doing? How are you doing? HOW IS EVERYONE? I want to hear. Anyways, thank you so much family for all that you have done for me. I know that this is the true church of our Heavenly Father and that Jesus Christ is our Savior and that we are recieving so many amazing blessings through your testimonies. I love you ALL SOO MUCH. I hope you enjoy the photos!!! HAVE AN AMAZING WEEEEK!!!!!!

 

Sinceramente,

Elder Poulsen

 

January 9, 2012

Hola Familia y Amigos!

Today is a good day. It is my birthday and I am so thankful for all of the birthday wishes I have gotten from all of my family and friends at home! Such a blessing to have you guys in my life. Thanks for all of the pictures and the messages from my friends on facebook! It made me feel so special and honestly made this birthday in Mexico almost like it was from home. THANKS SOOO MUCH!! Well, today I woke up and we came with the zone leaders over in the central of Pachuca to play soccer. No, I didnt get to go to Teotihuacan, but that is okay because I want to go with more missionaries in the future. Tonight the zone leaders want to take me to Chiles to eat.. Haha. But I am not sure how that is going to work out since Elder Cuevas and I have to go to Mexico City tonight with one of our investigators for a special interview. But after that I am going to open the long awaited birthday package. =) This week was a little crazy, but fun too. I went to Mexico City with Elder Hernandez and I have a couple pictures from then. It was fun because I got to sign for my visa and see all of the other elders from my generation. Then we at ate Carls Junior! I had no idea they had that here. Then on the way home, Elder Hernandez and I had a whole bus to ourselves. It was a nice 2 hour nap. =) I spent most of the week with Elder Kleinhenz and I felt soo good. We contacted a lot of people and had some good lessons. We made your no bake cookies and some cookies called Buckeyes? I took some pictures with them too. Aso spent a couple days with Elder LeJeune and we had such a good time. I found out that some of the people I contacted with Elder LeJeune the last time I was in his area are now getting baptized! I feel sooo good! Sergio and Noelia didnt get married because they didnt have the money for it. So we are going to take them to Mexico this week to marry them I think. Then the investigator that we are going with today has a baptism tomorrow! So, things are looking up. Man, I cannot believe that today I am 21 years old. How strange. I had a bit of an interesting experience this morning. One of the guys in my zone in Elder Johnson. We have been friends and have been around eachother a couple times. But today when we were playing soccer I said something about Ely. He said, no way.. Your from Ely! IOther than that this week has been pretty laid back. They have a holiday called Las Reyes and you eat some sort of a fruit cake called a Rosca. Inside the cake there are little toys and if you get a toy in your bread, you have to buy tamales or some other thing for the other people that you were eating the bread with. Interesting eh? A lot of fun things this week, but today has to be the best. =) I wish I had time to reply to all of your emails, but my time is limited at this cafe and I need to be heading out soon to Mexico for that interview. Thanks sooo much for the recipes and the happy birthdays. It is almost like I was able to spend this day with my family and friends, actually. I fell like I did. Thanks to all the pictures and emails. Please tell everyone of them how grateful I am and how much I love them. I am going to keep all of you in my thoughts and prayers and spend this special day thinking about all of you and how lucky I am to have such amazing people in my life. I hope that I can do something for all of you when I get back, well.. I am defitnitely going to do something for all of you. THANKS SOOOO MUCH!!!! HAPPPY 21st birthday to me, and happy birthday to Nathan Hughes on January 3rd and Dillon Neubauer on January 14th, and Aydan Poulsen on January 19th! Let me know if there is anything I can do for you guys! I LOVE YOU ALL SOOOOO MUCHH!!! Talk to you in a week!! =) Oh yea, and my plaq for my mission looks amazing. =)

Amor,

Elder Daniel Poulsen

January 2, 2012

Dear Family,

It was so nice to get all of the pictures that you sent me this time. It was fun and was like was at New Years Eve with you guys. I was a little jealous to hear that you guys were eating enchiladas and crab legs, but I was happy too. Haha, it was nice to see the faces of everyone in the family and the random boy who was with Kassi. Who is this kid? Hahaha, I hope you guys enjoy the photos I´m sending this time. I tried to take a couple cool pictures for you guys this week. All in all this week was pretty much like all of the other weeks. We found a couple people who I will be excited to go back and teach. I have been on divisions for most of this week with Elder Kleinhenz. My companion, Elder Cuevas, had an accident at our house when I was on divisions. He was with Elder Carrion and woke up in the morning to start the hot water heater. He opened the gas valve and forgot something in the house. When he went back outside the gas had enough time to fill up inside the boiler and when he lit a match it blew up in his face. He got burned on his face and it singed off his eyebrows and eyelashes but he is alright, he just has to stay indoors for a week away from the sun and apply some sort of cream on his face. I felt bad that I was not there to help, but he is fine. Now I will most likely be on divisions for this entire week. It was awesome to see a picture of Jon, Ben, and Adan and it felt so good to hear that they were asking about me and sent me letters. Man, I miss those guys. You will have to tell them all that they are huge examples to me and I miss them a lot. Those guys are my heroes. Thanks for Melaynas address. I wrote her a letter today and tonight I have to ride on a bus to Mexico to stay the night at the secretaries house. I have to sign for my year long visa tomorrow. I am going to give them my letter and they will send it though pouch which will get to Salt Lake and then to her from there. I hear it is a lot safer because it is sent with all of the church forms from the mission president, so she should get it. I did tell her in my letter to send her letters to you guys so you can send them down in packages. I think that is probably the safest way I could get them. Pretty bizarre that it is now 2012 and that I can say I will be home next year. Time sure flies. Elder Kleinhenz and I spent New Years together and we had a good time. We bought a super pizza, some orange soda, some cookies and cream ice cream, and some stuff for breakfast and we spent the night talking about this year and making new years resolutions. We heard we had to be in the house early since there are a lot of parties on New Years. So we were in the house by 7:00, but it was a fun night. He keeps telling me that we are going to hang out at BYU and he is going to teach me how to lift weights. Haha. I also will be going on splits with the zone leaders this week because Elder Cuevas needs to go to Mexico to marry Sergio and Noelia. I do not know how this is going to work out, but we will see. Hopefully I can still go to Teotihuacan on monday for my birthday, I need to go to get you guys gifts and take sweet pictures. Haha, i think it is ironic that you guys ate enchiladas on New Years, because down here I was eating raviolis and chicken parmesian. The lady that we ate with knew that she was going to feed two americans and decided to make a meal from the united states. It was delicious, but not as good as moms. If you could send me other recipes to good you make it would be sweet. Something a lot of people like is for me to cook food from the US. It is something fun to do on Pdays. This morning I made some massive omletes with hash browns and it was so good. Elder Kleinhenz is so happy that he was able to eat something from the states. Altogether, this week has been very fast and we just do what we do. Contact people everyday, knock doors, search for references, teach lessons whenever we get the chance and hope and pray that we can baptize. So that is about it with me. In 2 hours I will be getting bussed to Mexico City to spend the next 24 hours there. I have not slept in my bed for at least 6 days. Sometimes, being the companion of the district leader, I feel like my Uncle Brent. Haha, constantly packing and moving to a new area every day. Shoot, well my loving family. I love you all SO VERY MUCH. I hope and pray that each of you are all so careful everyday and that you have good health. Keep being the amazing examples you are to me with your testimonies. Tell my friends I love them. Tell Melayna that she has a letter headed her way if you can. Have an AMAZING first week of the New Year! WHOOOO 2012!!! LOVE YOU ALL.

Amor,

Elder Poulsen

December 26, 2011

My Amazing Family!

I can´t tell you how amazing of a gift it was to be able to talk to you guys for 4 hours on the computer. I´m not sure if I was really allowed to, but I was just following my companion. Haha, just like Ryley and Dad said.. ¨Just go with it¨ Of course, I know the situations where I can´t. =) It was sooo nice to see all of your smiling faces and hear all of your loving familiar voices. I honestly couldn´t have asked for a better Christmas being so far away from home. I couldn´t believe that Ryley and Mandi are having another baby! I´m sorry if I didn´t stay on that subject long enough, it´s just so strange being away and having things change. Tell them that I¨M SOOO HAPPY FOR THEM. I will pray about them and the new baby that everything will go perfect. Last night after I hung up the phone I was a little down. We walked back to our house and I couldn´t stop thinking about you guys. I fell asleep and had dreams about being home. I woke up and remembered that you said that in my calendar I needed to read the 24th day. I sprinted into the living room early in the morning (Probably about 2 a.m. your time =) and opened up the letter. Mom, I honestly can´t tell you how many tears ran down my cheeks when I read it. It hit me hard, but after a couple minutes I sat back and really thought about the letter. I felt a warm peace come over me and I felt comfort. I went back into the room and fell asleep until 6;30 this morning. Thank you so much. I honestly couldn´t have a better family and I would do anything for you guys. Including serving this mission. I do have my down times, but I´m always lifted up. I hope I can change into the missionary I want to be. A missionary like Dad and Ryley. I hope I can touch the lives of everyone around me here and can be a useful instrument in the hands of our heavenly father. I will do my best. I honestly can´t tell you how excited I am to be able to talk to you on Mothers Day. I´m just going to focus on the work so time will go faster so I can get their sooner. Haha, anyways. I don´t have any more stories that I can share other than the ones I shared last night. So I´m just going to type until we are finished. Well, I hope that everything is going good at home. The house looked AMAZING when you took me for a walk last night. keep up the good work, Mom. =) Are you guys having any plans for other projects this summer? Do Ry and Mand plan on coming home this summer to stay with you guys for a few weeks until Mand has the baby? I don´t like the random changes thing, so if you could let me know about that kind of stuff it would be great. Hahaha. How about Jess, does she plan on doing track this year? It´s her last year to do it! What about Kass? What´s Cam plan on doing this upcoming year. Aydan goes to school doesn´t he? All and all, I love hearing about home. It reminds me that it´s there and it still will be when I get back.. Haha.  I wrote Skylar a letter today and am sending it over to the secretaries with my friend Elder Figueroa. His companion is getting changed this week, so hopefully my letter gets to him. I send a pretty neat picture with it that I will attach in the next e-mail. I have so many pictures I need to send 2 e-mails to you guys today! Haha, I hope you guys like them. I thought they were pretty neat. Try to pick out our Christmas traditions in some of the photos. Like the cinnamon rolls and chocolate milk. Or me opening my presents in my pajamas early in the morning. Haha, I´ll probably carry those traditions for the rest of my life. You guys have been such an amazing family and I´m so proud to say that I´m a Poulsen. You are the most wonderful people in my life and I pray for you constantly. Thanks so much for everything, including the no bake cookies recipe. I´ll make some this week and have pictures next week. You guys have an amazing week and I´ll try to come up with some fun stories and pictures for my next e-mail. Have and amazing week my wonderful family! I LOVE YOU SOOO MUCH! HAVE A HAPPY NEW YEAR! Just think, on the 1st you can say ¨Danny comes home next year.¨=) Again, I LOVE YOU GUYS! I MISS YOU!!!


  Love,


Elder Poulsen

December 19, 2011

Hello Family!

Well, this week has flown by so quick. On Tuesday we went to the Temple with 3 of the zones in our mission and we had a blast. First, we went through an endowment session in the morning and then after we ate in the temple and went to the church for our skits. They were all way good and I got those 3 packages! I have a couple pictures I took with the packages posted for you. Don´t worry, I hid them in my closet and I promised I wouldn´t open them until Christmas. All of my companions say I´m spoiled. Hahaha. This week every missionary in our district had a Christmas party for their ward and since my companion is the district leader we went to every single one to talk to the investigators that showed up. We ate sooo much food. I think my ward party was the most different. All of the other wards had normal food like spaghetti, rolls, mashed potatoes, fruit salad. My ward had carnitas. This is when they cut up an entire pig, throw all of the parts into a massive steam pot like thing, and then add all of the spices and what not. It cooks for 3 hours and then they pull out the parts, cut them up and you stuff in between a tortilla and eat it. My bishop chose what parts he wanted me to eat. Of course he was creative and I don´t really want to tell you what parts I ate. But you should be able to tell from the picture I attached.=) We also took a picture with Santa Claus at the ward party and I attached a photo of that too. Haha.. Well, this week I´ve been on divisions with just about every missionary in my district. Elder Figueroa, Elder Arellanes, Elder Kleinhenz, Elder Carrion, and for the past two days I have been with Elder LeJeune. They are all such awesome guys and I can´t believe we have our next changes meeting on the 27th! That means that I could get switched companions or moved to a new area. I won´t be the new missionary anymore! Haha, but this week has been fun. One day I walked like 12 miles with Elder Figueroa. It took like 5 hours. We have a couple pictures of the beautiful scenery of Mexico for you guys. =) Then Elder Kleinhenz and I did some work in my area and we made pancakes the size of our plates. We didn´t have a spatula, so now I now how to flip a pancake in a frying pan. I´m pretty happy about that. I have a new favorite drink. It´s called JUMEX Coco Piña, and it´s delicious. I have a pretty sick picture of a massive dust devil that Elder Kleinhenz and I came across. Along with other goofy photos. I get sketched out with some of the traditions here. For example, the ladies greet people with kisses on the cheeks. I can´t tell you how many times I´ve had to shun it. Haha, the worst part is only some do. So when you shake one of their hands you never know when they are going to pull you in. I played in my new soccer shoes today also, and I was very happy. Consider that a Christmas gift from you guys as well. THANK YOU! I love the pictures of you guys in Salt Lake. Was that at the zoo? I am pretty sure that we are going to skype you guys from 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. Mexico Time. Haha, I have your guys information so I´ll just add you. Just make sure you are on so you can recieve my friend request! If not I´ll just end up calling you guys. :) Well, it´s time I need to write my president, so I´ll talk to you guys on Sunday!! I´m so excited! I love you guys sooo much! Have a great week filled with Christmas and know that I´m thinking about you. Tell everyone that I say Feliz Navidad!! LOOVVVEEE YOOOUUU!!!!


Amor,
Elder Poulsen

December 5, 2011

Well, Family..

I can´t tell you how happy I was to read all of your e-mails and to hear how you are all doing good in this wonderful christmas season. I was so happy to get that picture that you sent me and I´m going to be printing it out and hanging it above my desk. =) I´m sad that I missed the games of apples to apples and the other fun things that you guys did, but I´ll be back in less than 2 years. Tell Dad to tell everyone at the mine that I say ¨hey¨. Mom, I have good news. =) Jess, don´t stress about your senior year. Just do your best and have fun. Tell Kass to keep up the good work and I miss her. Tell Cam that I´m praying for her to do good in her 1st chair position. Tell Ayd that everytime I see little kids here I think of him. Grandpa Poulsen, I think about you a lot and hope you´re taking it easy. =) Grandma and Grandpa Beckwith, I miss you guys and wish you could see this place. Ry, Mand, and Log I pray for you guys all the time as well. Tell Log that I´m praying that the ¨back-son¨won´t steal his wrinkles. =) Also, give everyone else my love. Haha, well. First the good news. Mom, here we are allowed an hour long phone call home on Christmas or an hour long call on SKYPE! This means you guys could see me again! I´m not exactly sure how it all works, but I´ll find out this week and get you my details so I can spend an hour with you guys on Christmas. =) Well, this week we didn´t end up going to Teotihuacan. (the pyramids) Because we are rehearsing for a skit we´ll be putting on at the temple on the 13th. So, today we played some soccer, practiced our skit, went to the store, and now I´m writing you. This week was interesting. I ate a grasshopper. The guys in my district made me do it. I have a picture of it. Tell Dad that he needs to try the chorizo´s down here. Oh, man. Delicious. My companion and 2 other guys made breakfast and it was amazing. Breakfast burritos with jalapenos, scrambled eggs, chorizo, and cheese. All from scratch. I can tell you guys that our gas loves to randomly turn off. So I´ve showered with a bucket 6 times this week. I don´t have a huge problem with it. I actually kind of like it. =) We have 5 new investigators! 2 of them are a husband and wife. Their names are Sergio and Noelia. They are such sweet people and want to be baptized on the 25 of this month! Christmas! We also found a cute little family when we were knocking doors. There´s the mother, Martha. Along with her two daughters, Paula and Deanna. I have a picture with them in front of their Christmas tree that I helped them decorate. Then they made me snow flakes out of paper. Haha, my interview went well this past week. The mission president from San Diego was the one who audited me. He was the mission president for the San Diego missionaries in the ¨District 2¨. He said he was extremely impressed with my Spanish. He told me that if the other missionaries did as well as me the program would be a success. I´m thinking about buying some soccer shoes. We play soccer a lot, and when I play in my PF´s I get massive blisters. I don´t want to spend money out of my account back home. I want to save as much of that as I can for after my mission. I still have 100 dollars in my wallet from money you guys sent me at the MTC. So I´ll be fine. The missionaries here love it when I talk like a white boy. They always say ¨say verde¨and I´ll say ¨vuuuurrrddddaaaayyy¨Haha, I´m getting along with all of them. They´re like my brothers. I have been wanting to put together a package with things from Mexico and send it to you guys, but I´m not sure how to do that. It wouldn´t have crazy stuff in it. Maybe some souvenirs from Teotihuacan and some Mexican candy. But I do want to send you guys something? Does anyone want anything specific from Mexico? It´s all so cheap down here. 250 pesos is about 20 bucks. With 250 pesos you can buy a lot. Well, I better attach the photos and write my mission president about how everything is going. I love you guys SO MUCH and can´t wait to be able to talk to you all on Christmas. You´re all in my prayers everyday. Tell everyone I love them and I´m doing fine. Hasta el proximo Lunes, mi querido amorosa familia. Le amo.


Elder Danny Poulsen

P.S. I´m sending the photos in another e-mail. =)

November 28, 2011

Dear Family,

Happy Thanksgiving! Haha, I´m glad to hear that it was a good one. Everything went good over here.  Well, this week hasn´t exactly been the most productive. We had a couple Elders get sick, so I was assigned to be the companion of Elder Figueroa. It was a pretty fun and eventful day, you will be able to tell who he is in the pìctures I have attached. I ate my first habanero pepper. I won´t do that again. I had tears running down my cheeks for like 10 minutes straight. My companion couldn´t stop laughing. I took my first shower with a bucket of water. I´m not going to tell you how it was heated up, which I´m sure you know. But I´ll just say that I had nothing to do with it. Haha. I´ve eaten cactus at least 4 times this week for meals at members houses, and it´s actually really good. I´m still not used to being a minority. I honestly think I´m the only American here. I constantly catch people staring at me, and for some reason I think the people here are obsessed with blue eyes. All of the billboards and stuff having people with blue eyes. I often hear the phrase, ¨Tiene ojos azules¨. It´s cool though. I have become an english teacher. I have so many people asking me to speak to them in English. I think it´s hilarious because they will say ¨Say something in English¨ Haha, it´s interesting. I have a new favorite drink, it´s Sangria. But mixed with lime and salt. A lot of people have to have lime and salt with their food. I think I´m adopting new taste buds. All in all the experiences are great. I´m still adapting, but they are great.  Yesterday was pretty interesting. We got to church and the bishop came up to me and said, ¨Hey, we need you to give a 15 minute talk today in sacrament.¨ I said okay and spent like the whole time scrambling to put together a talk. My companion couldn´t stop laughing. Then, when the bishop got up to announce me, he announced my companion! Haha, you should have seen the look on his face. He did a good job winging it though. Today we took a trip to the center of Pachuca. I posted some pictures of that as well. Along with pictures of Elder Cuevas´ 1 year mark. Well, tomorrow is going to be intense. Elder Cuevas was informed that 3 experts from Utah are flying in tonight. They will be with us tomorrow. I will have one of them as a companion, he´s an RM who served in Spain. This is all because of the pilot program, they will be monitoring me and my Spanish. I hope it all goes well. Thanks so much for the picture of you guys in the truck. It was good to see your faces again. =) I can´t wait to talk to you guys at Christmas. Please keep posting my pictures on facebook. I´m so happy to hear that people are seeing them. How´s everyone doing? How´s the fam? Everyone else? Any changes to the house? I´d like a picture if there are. Oh, my companion plans on taking me to the pyramids next week. So I should have some sweet photos for you then. Well I like hearing about you guys a lot more than I like talking about myself. Tell everyone that I love them. Dad, Mom, Ayd, Cam, Kass, Jess, Mand, Ry, Log, Grandpa and Grandma Beckwith, Grandpa Poulsen, Amber, Summer, Josh, the whole family. As well as my friends when you see them. I´ll talk to you guys later. Todo de mi amor.=)

Elder Danny Poulsen