Well for all of you fam all over the world this week, ¿Que Onda? This is a crazy busy and very fun week for all of you I am very sure! First off, I loved all the pics of the ballet recital and of half the fam in Midway! From what I can see the Midway house looks straight fitted. Also, Dad, Grandma and Hadley I got your letters this week and hope to be able to write some responses today.  When we have our normal Monday p-days, they are extremely busy and I legitimately have zero time to write, but today I think I should be able to. Also Dad, be sure to tell Hannah I said good luck and be sure to kill it up at BYU! Also I'm guessing Logan and Baylee are starting too, they are all gonna have a super sick time!
 
Well Mom, to answer your question, the temple was so awesome! Like seriously, it was incredible.  I'm so glad we had the chance to go today. It was all in Spanish which I wasn't sure how that would be, but it was super normal. It was actually a little weird to talk in English when I saw Elder Grill there haha. The regulations here in our mission for attending the temple are that when serving in the Tampico/Madero/Altamira area you are allowed to change your p-day to Wednesday one week of every 12 in order to go to the temple. When serving in areas outside the city I don't think you can attend. But Francia is in right downtown Madero and we live like 5 minutes from the temple and the Stake Center and the Mission Offices which are all right in Madero too. As for the changing of Mission Presidents, there's no formal meeting and anything, we have Zone Conference this next week so Pres and Sister Call will say goodbye to everyone at our Zone Conference and then they leave coming up real quick. This transfer will end after the week of July 24 so that the newest generation of missionaries and Pres and Sister Jordan can all arrive in that week and start up the next week.
 
As for EFY, here it is seriously a crazy good deal. 300 pesos for a week of EFY at a super nice hotel. That's like 23 US Dollars, for EFY. All of the teachers are Stake Presidents, Bishops, etc from the area and all the counselors are volunteers, but it still looks like its going to be super sweet. Talking to Hermano Robledo, the session director who's in our ward, they have almost 1000 kids signed up right now which is awesome for all the kids from this area to get to participate in EFY.
 
It sounds like a really awesome week for all of you guys and I'm so excited to hear that Mom and Laur are safe and sound living it up in Hawaii. My week was really good as well! I really can't believe how fast the time is going. Last Tuesday we had a meeting for all the new missionaries in the mission so I got to see Elders Parry and Grill and we were talking and we all just seriously can't believe that it has almost been six months! That is crazy because it seriously does feel like I just left.
 
Elder Castro and I had a really good week. This week it got CRAZY hot. And SOOOO humid! One day (Monday I think) it was 104 with humidity out the window. But it's been a really good week. This past week I feel like my Spanish really improved and about half way through the week I realized that I wasn't really translating when I was listening to people talk, I was more just listening. That was a pretty good feeling haha. Also, Elder Castro and I have been working really hard to find people to teach with a really desire to progress towards baptism. Many times as missionaries, it is very easy to lose time teaching people who aren't going to progress towards baptism at this time, and so we have really been trying to not waste time teaching lessons just to teach, but rather to teach to people who are wanting to learn and keep commitments such as do the assigned readings, praying, repenting, etc.
This week also we found a new family, la familia Presa (I don't remember the 2nd last name haha). They are a family of four and they are super sweet! The Dad, Fransisco, was never baptized but his grandparents were very strong members of the church in this area and when he was a young kid, he went to church with them and can remember doing so. Saturday we were talking with the bishop and mentioned his name and where he lived, so Elder Castro and I decided to stop by. We did so, talked with Fransisco and his 14 year old son Jose for a few minutes, invited them to church, set an appt. to teach the fam, and left them with a pamphlet to read. Both Fransisco and Jose came to church on Sunday and told us they had already read the folleto we left them. When we taught them last night the Spirit was super strong! Their whole family has a real desire to learn and to be apart of the Church. It was really awesome.
 
As for Merced and Yedid, we haven't had much contact with them, their progression has really slowed to a stop which has been really hard to watch because I see their little family and know that the Gospel could bless their life more than any other thing right now. That is one of the hardest parts of the mission is finding people who would be such awesome members, or who are super prepared, or who the gospel could truly change their life, and seeing them exercise their agency and choose not to take part of the blessings of the Gospel. That's the hardest, the second hardest is having an appointment to teach someone at 3:00 in the afternoon when its 105 degrees outside, having that appointment fall through and seeing that the backup plan is tracting hahahaha.  But the work moves forward. Our neighbor's progress has really slowed too and the baptisms for the 23rd are really up in the air. But we are having faith that everything will work out alright and we know that if we just stay obedient and stay working hard the Lord will take care of everything else. That is the awesome part about being a missionary is that the Lord truly always does order and provide when we do our part.
I love you all so so so much, have such an awesome week and know that I am praying for you and that you are all such a strength and example to me.
Love,
Elder Stockard