"¡Me mordió un perro!"

This week I learned a new phrase - "¡Me mordió un perro!" (A dog bit me!) That was interesting I´ll tell you about it in the long email :) just wanted you to see the pictures.  It was a big dog...ha my g´s protected me in the front it wasn´t really bleeding but the one in back was.

Me mordio un perro!

So this week was pretty good. I´ll start off with what happened last Tuesday! I got bit by a dog! What the heck. Well first it bit Hna. Alvarado and then it bit me...TWICE once in the front of my leg and once in back. It´s owners are some gringos so it had its rabies shot but I have an interesting missionary story now! haha We were in San Pedro El Alto contacting outside this house and the owner of the dog was leaving so he opened the gate and the dog ran out and bit us! It was a bunch of crap. But everything is fine I´m not going to die. It was a big angry dog though and now Hna. Alvarado is afraid of like every dog. It´s sad. Also I had a cold last week which was not fun but that´s not really important haha.

Anyway we taught J and G who are the daughters of an investigator named I. They are really awesome and really smart. Last night we passed by just to see how they were and we asked J if she had read and prayed to see if Joseph Smith was a prophet and she said yes and that she felt really good and that it was indescribable! That was awesome. She wants to come to church this Sunday too! 

We also went to Santa Maria this week and we took two of our members to teach Hna S and a new investigator named MS is still awesome. She said she believes that everything we´ve taught her is true and everything the only problem with her is getting her to come to church since she lives so far away! But we´re going to try again this week. She already has permission from her parents to go so that´s really good. We also met M  and her kids. They are awesome. Her sister is a member in El Tejar and they´ve attended a ton there and they love it. She said she wants to learn more about the church and everything because they really like it. She has a daughter named N  who is 16 and she has done a lot of activities with the young women in El Tejar. They attended in Tejar last week because it was N ´s birthday so they went down there for that.

We also taught J  and her inactive daughter C . We gave her a giant triplet last week and she´s already in like 2 Nephi 15. She was so happy to have it! She reads like 5 pages a day. Her daughter  is inactive and J was just like you need to go to church and be better.  It´s crazy that she hasn´t even been baptized yet and she has a stronger testimony than her daughter. 

We taught JD (last weeks baptism) about the priesthood and he´s excited to get that. He´s really coming along great. We are so proud of him and the changes he´s made. He´s excited to prepare for a mission too! We taught L  again but she doesn´t seem too interested anymore. She keeps saying she knows she needs to be baptized but she won´t say yes to a set date.

Yesterday for PDay we went as a zone to this place called Las Colinas and it´s owned by the church. It´s awesome just a bunch of fields and basketball courts! We played soccer which was really fun and volleyball which was less fun because everybody sucked haha including me. We had barbeque for lunch which was delicious. Oh and we also were throwing around a football and I accidentally pegged a kid in his privates. Everyone was like "¡él nunca va a tener noches de hogar!" haha how sad. He´s ok though I think.

I am expecting to have changes but we won’t officially know until the Monday before changes in a couple weeks. No I´m not breaking any rules mom haha there are just things we need to be better at that´s it :) I guess my kids took a day off of being my guardian angels because I got bit haha

Thank you for the pictures of Star Valley! How are you guys doing right now? Anything fun going on in Cedar....ITS PRACTICALLY AUGUST! 

I love you momma have a great week and tell Michael that I love him!

Happy pioneer day and year til I get home day if I leave in time for school!

July 24th (we were driving around Yellowstone National Park and luckily found a spot with cell phone coverage right at the time she writes so we could email back and forth from our phones!)

So this week we baptized JD! It was so great.  He has a messed up past like I've said in other emails but after his baptism he said he felt free and like a new man and started crying and just said thank you. It was such a sweet experience. He´s only 18 but he's great and he wants to go on a mission. It's crazy to think that there was actually a time while we were teaching him that we were going to drop him because he wasn´t progressing and then he all of the sudden changed and now here we are with a happy member of the church who is going to serve a mission someday!   

JD's Baptism

Now for Hna L....she was doing great and everything and then we invited her to the baptism to show her there was nothing to be afraid of...well seeing as René wasn't strong enough to hold up JD really well and he didn´t know the words, he had to be baptized 3 times so as for not scaring her off hopefully the spirit helped with that. Then she didn´t come to church on Sunday. We passed by their house to pick her up but she said she was going to go with her son in a different town, and last night she seemed like she didn´t have the desire to be baptized but she always says that she needs to but God hasn´t put it in her heart to want to be baptized right now.

Our next most positive person lives in Santa Maria de Jesus so it´s kind of hard for us to get up to see her since it´s kind of far and it´s hard for her to come to church because she wouldn´t get home until really late at night. We called her the other day and she said she didn´t have permission to go to church because she was going by herself but we told her that we would go and pick her up and she said she would invite a friend for this week! She is really smart and really receptive and when we committed her to be baptized she said yes right off the bat so that was great. We just need to figure out how we can keep her active if she gets baptized since she lives so far away.
We also found a guy named J. He is older but lives with his mom because he has epilepsy. He seemed really interested the first lesson because we talked about the plan of salvation and then we committed him to be baptized and he said yes and then asked permission from his mom and she just said he´d have to think about it a lot because God isn´t a game. But he seemed really excited but then we went and visited him on Sunday and was kind of more distracted and said he didn´t remember anything we talked about before! But we´re going to keep working with him.
We also went and visited some less active members. One was Hermana S. Her situation is seriously dire. About a month and a half ago she left her home and her and her little family are living illegally on some land that is being occupied by people that don´t have houses. It´s so sad there are tons of people there that are living in little plastic tents and don´t have anything. She said she´s not coming to church because if she leaves her plot of land some other squatter will come in and take it. It´s really sad but we tried to explain to her that it´s not right and that she still needs to put God first and come to church. Then she didn´t come to church.
We met a lady and her mom yesterday contacting because a lesson fell through and they started asking lots of questions about death because one of their neighbors just got killed. It was really good and they seemed really interested so that was great. 

We had zone conference last Friday which was really good. President Brough told us that we have guardian angels in the mission and that they are our ancestors and our kids because no one else in the spirit world cares more about the way we turn out more than our future children. I thought that was pretty cool he also really stressed the importance of obedience and how our obedience and our blessings are directly tied together so I am going to be more obedient so you guys can be more blessed (and me too)! :)

I forgot to say that Ian is in Utah right now for 10 days (well he left today for Utah) so yeah if you want to send my contacts and debit card with him that would be great! Yesterday for Pday I got my hair trimmed and that´s about it.  haha

The picture where we´re frowning is because we´re waiting for JD to finish working so we could take him to his interview to be baptized.  Haha

So how is everyone doing? When are you guys going home..How´s Star Valley and work ?

Waiting for JD 

I only have 3 minutes so I love you and I hope you have a good week and that you are having a good time in Star Valley! I love you so so so much! Also can you update me on your side of the family sometime? Thanks love you momma you´re the best! 

It's been a great week!

July 17th, 2012


So this week has been really good. It felt a little bit longer than normal but that´s ok because it went well :) 


The first and best thing that happened was we had a lesson (well lots of lessons) with JD. He has had a pretty messed up life but he´s is so willing to change and figure things out. We taught him in the home of a member on Tuesday and we committed him to be baptized and he said yeah but he wanted to make sure to have his life in order first and THEN he said he wants to serve a mission! woah total 180! He is so awesome. I think of him as my own brother. 
Earlier in the day we were in San Juan and we found out that someone we contacted that happened to be a inactive member was looking for people to work for him and JD was looking for a job so we asked if we could bring him by and they said yes. So Wednesday we took him and now he has a job! This kid is on the right track for real! We have his baptism scheduled for this Saturday. One of his friends that he lives with named R  is going to baptize him so that is awesome as well.

This week we also taught L . She is still really receptive so that is good. She´s a lot happier than the last time that we were teaching her. She knows that the church is true but she keeps saying she´s not ready to be baptized. We don´t want to pressure her because that´s what happened last time. At least now she is receptive and coming to church..well this Sunday she didn´t come but she´ll come next week. We taught B  (Hno. P´s not wife) and she is receptive but I think we´re not going to teach her as often seeing as she can´t really progress if her and Hno. P  aren´t married. I really hope they get everything worked out with his other wife.

We also taught S  about the Book of Mormon but her husband wasn´t there when we taught. She said they would try to come to church but they didn´t make it. On Saturday we met the daughter of one of our recent converts and we are going to start teaching her too. We also found two families that are really awesome and seem really interested in the gospel. They could possibly be "escogidos." One of the families can only have lessons on Saturdays though but we´re going to keep going to teach them to really find out if they are interested. The other is a husband and his wife and they have 2 young children. They´re a young couple and seem interested in learning more about the church.   

Yesterday we taught JG. She is the mom of one of our members and she has been kind of upset because her brother died a little while ago. We taught her the Book of Mormon and said that because the church was restored and we have the Book of Mormon, we have the knowledge of the plan of salvation (which we had already taught but we touched on it a little bit more to help her cope). 

Other things...we were contacting and I knocked on the door of some baptist missionaries...they weren´t very nice. It was a bunch of teenagers that answered. Too bad for them they don´t have the true gospel..haha 

Pday was great. Hna Gainor made corn chowder and it made me miss you mommy! haha after that we went back to the house and slept! My favorite pday so far :) Also thank you for sending the pictures :) 

4 months down & 6 more weeks in San Pedro las Huertas!

 I´m staying in San Pedro with Hna. Alvarado! No vamos a ver cambios! woohoo! 

4 Months down!!! 

I´m doing good - just preaching repentance haha. My favorite scriptures to use are in Alma cinco (or cincho as we like to call it) haha I really like to give chicoté with amor of course haha but being a missionary is awesome..

I finally realized that this is the greatest experience ever !

So this week was really good. We started visiting the wife (not actually married) of a member and her name is B. She is actually really receptive and likes learning about the church. Her husband is actually an x-stake president so he answers like all of her questions. The only problem is that he is still married with his other wife but they´ve been separated for 10 years...so we don´t really know how to approach the situation. He´s really cool though but his old wife won´t sign the divorce papers. Their friend S was there the first time that we taught them too and she is really receptive. She has a tough work schedule though but we´re going to keep trying to get in touch with her because she was really ready to learn more about the gospel. We also taught I´s parents. They aren´t really interested at all but hopefully “I” can be the example they need in their home. He´s such a good kid. He was confirmed on Sunday but his parents didn´t come.

We found a family of like 7 last week. They are really cool but the dad has a crazy work schedule. They seem really ready to learn more but we just have to find time to teach them and all will be well! We taught them about prayer the first night and they seem like a really united family.  

We also taught A and M again. A is a lot more receptive than M and we gave them a copy of the conference ensign to read. They are so great and A is SO ready to be baptized (after he prays and gets a testimony). We invited him to come to church and he said yes! BUT..we passed by for him on Sunday and the Catholic church called him to teach something..I didn´t really understand. What I do understand is that Satanás es astuto. Really A is going to love the true church when he joins it. He was really scared about attending so maybe that had something to do with it too.

Finally! We got photos of her cute apartment

We also found another family. They are really cool and want to hear more. At the end of the lesson we invited the husband R to say the prayer and he said no that he´s not worthy to pray. So we´re going to explain to him in more detail that God just wants to hear from him and that he can always pray!  We had the noche de Hermanamiento in the house of a less active member family which went really well. They still didn´t come to church on Sunday though.

We ran in to J D and he had been smoking marijuana and so we told him he needed to shape up and if he wanted to change we were there to help him but if not that he needed to move out of M´s house because the stuff he´s into is dangerous. Well he came to church on Sunday and we had a lesson with him and basically he said he wanted to change and so we're going to do all we can to help him! That was a miracle.

We taught Hermana L again. She is a lot more receptive than the last time. She keeps saying she wants to get baptized but last night she said she´s not ready yet but she is going to get baptized sometime. It´s progress but we´re going to try and push for the 22 of this month.

Yesterday for Pday we just came to Antigua and went shopping. It was relaxing to actually get back to the house early enough to do nothing haha. Today in district meeting we read Ephesians 6:10-19. you guys should read it it´s great.

 I love you so much and I am so happy that we are going to be a family forever!  You are the best parents in the whole wide world!

 

July 2, email (sorry it's sooo late!)

Thanks for the package momma I loved it. Yesterday we went to the jade factory and learned about mayan symbols and which ones correspond with our birthdays. You and I are the same! haha It´s called Kan and it´s a serpent. Dad is ajmaq and mike is i´x


So this week was really good...first of all...
.

First baptism!

WE HAD A BAPTISM!!   


 "I" got baptized and it went great! He was really happy and so was I because it was my first one (hopefully first of many). He´s an awesome kid and he´s going to grow so much in the gospel.


 We also taught M and A. They are brothers and they are SUPER catholic. It took 3 lessons to really explain the apostacy so they would recognize that there is no such thing as a pope with the preisthood. They are both teachers in the Catholic church and sing in the choir and everything. But they are really receptive. When we taught them about the book of mormon we read the introduction and how it says that we invite all men everywhere to read and find out for themselves it's true, A said no where in the Bible does it say that the Catholic church is the church of Christ and like we don´t even really say it but here it says that we can find out that your church is true so I´m going to do that. AND THEN when we went back....they had read! and not only the introduction..they read the intro, testimonies of the 8 and 3 witnesses and Joseph Smith, AND 2 chapters of first Nephi! holy moly these guys are going to be great Latter-Day Saints! They said they would keep reading and they were like we won´t have as much time this week so we´re only going to read to chapter 8 probably. wow I can´t wait to baptize these guys haha. When we extended the invitation to be baptized they both said ¨claro que si!¨ (if they find out for themselves it´s true of course). 


We taught J, she is the mom of a convert and she is so ready to be baptized but she just had surgery on her foot and she can´t get it wet for a really long time I guess but she has a testimony of the church and truly believes its true!

So this week we had divisions and I went to Antigua. Divisions were really great. It was nice to have a change and it helped me apreciate my area a lot too. It was fun working with Hermana Vera and to see the differences in what she does compared to what we have been doing. They have an investigator who started to pray and then had a TERRIBLE feeling so we taught about Joseph Smith and what happened during the first vision and after she was like...So I should've kept praying! and we said yes! so she is going to pray again. 

We also taught a guy named R. He is really intelligent which kind of interfered with the spirit of things.. He was talking about psychology and astronomy when we were trying to explain prophets so that was kind of hard. Luckily we had a member with us who just got off his mission. he is bien Pilas! wow I don´t even know how to discribe this guy. He can explain any lesson easy and he has a powerful voice that would make you want to listen. I just hope that I can be a missionary like him someday. He knows so much and was just able to turn the conversation back to where it needed to be and had really good examples. They have an awesome, very helpful barrio in Antigua so that is great for them. Their mission leader helps them contact and everything it´s so cool.

Mayan ruins?

Thanks for the package...I got it while I was FASTING! hahaha but I wore the shirt on Sunday so thanks for that :) On PDay we went to a Jade Factory and the tour guide explained all about the book of mormon even though he´s not LDS haha

Well I´m getting off right now but I love you have a good week! LOVE YOU!!!!!