The Little Miracles

First off... can I just say HOW EXCITED I AM FOR CONFERENCE?!? I cannot wait. Seriously. This is going to be the best conference ever!! Because conference is always amazing, and I cannot wait to hear our prophet speak. President Monson is amazing, and we are so lucky to have a prophet who teaches us the will of God. 

Second off... I was thinking the other day about how lucky I am to be in this mission. Here in Honduras. There aren´t very many girls in the mission, and there are even less gringas. I know there is a reason for this, and I feel so lucky I get to be here serving in this amazing mission. Whoooooooo yay for Honduras, because Honduras is amazing. Super crazy sometimes, but amazing. As I was flying in from Mexico I had this crazy strong feeling that this is exactly where I am supposed to serve, and I still know that. Also, no cambios for me!! Yayyyy. I am still in awesome amazing Campana. I was convinced I had a cambio because I love my area and companion, and when you love both, you always get a cambio. But here I am, still here, loving life. 

Yesterday I also had to give my first talk in Sacrament meeting. I was terrified. In our ward there are six missionaries, and they asked the two gringas to speak. I have never prayed harder for the gift of tongues. But luckily this week I have been reading a lot about how God is a God of miracles, and how he is the same yesterday, today, and always, so I put all my faith in him. After Sacrament meeting Marco Huezo came and told me that he had understood everything perfectly. I almost cried for joy, and almost didn´t believe it. I am so grateful that God is miraculous and that he blesses us with gifts of the Spirit! I am still working on rolling my r´s. If anyone has any secrets for me, let me know.... Because everyone makes fun of me. In a loving, you are such a white girl way... but still :)

For exciting news one of our borrachos (drunk men) in the street finally came to church. After countless Palabra de Sabiduria (Word of Wisdom) folletos he finally came! We were never serious when we were inviting him, but hey, everyone needs the gospel. Sadly he got escorted out, but hopefully we can find him one day sober to teach him. Who knows. Si Dios quiere. If God wants it, it will happen.  

Also cool story. Yesterday we were in correlacion (I think it is ward council in English, but our correlacion is nothing like I imagine a ward council... so I am not sure). One of the members said he was talking to someone the other day and they said "oh yeah! The church of the gringas right?" My companion and I felt pretty cool. We try to talk to everyone we possibly can and invite them to come to church. Most of the time no one comes but hey we know the Lord will bless us for our efforts. 

Yesterday in our class for our investigators the teacher taught about matrimonio eterno (eternal marriage). Anyways I raised my hand and told about when my two friends got married in the temple before my mission, and how I got to go, and how it was basically the most beautiful thing in the entire world. There aren´t words to describe the Spirit and the feelings in a sealing. Then after the teacher told her story too. The cool thing about here is everyone are converts. There are only a few little kids who were born in the church. The teacher started crying as she started to describe how beautiful it was when she got to go with her family to be sealed forever. Then after one of the Elders, Elder Caballero from Tegucigalpa, shared his story too. His his family got to go to the temple and be sealed for all time and eternity a short time before his mission. The spirit was so strong and so beautiful. Every once in a while we get a taste of heaven and the temple, and it is absolutely beautiful. And I just want to bawl my eyes out because it is so beautiful and people here have so much faith. I was so happy because Maria Huezo was there, and we have been teaching them about eternal marriage basically before they got baptized, because there family is so perfect and ready for the blessings of the temple. 

We also taught Amilkar yesterday. Amilkar is awesome. He is 15, and he is super cool. He has these red skinny jeans and he is always impossible to find, so we have nicknamed him "Waldo." We have to ask a million people everytime, and a lot of times the different people will say contradictory things. But it is all good, since we have the Spirit to help us out. He also has these super cool green eyes, which is really rare here, and a fohawk. (I just want you all to have a good picture of this kid :) He has gone to church a bunch of times, and for a long time I thought he was a member. But we found out, nope, he isn´t, so we have been teaching him oh so slowly but little by little. We usually teach him on the side of the road. I don´t know if his family doesn´t like us or what but it´s chill, I am used to sitting in the dirt teaching. Sometimes we can convince his neighbours to let us sit on their porches, so that is nice. Yesterday though my companion and I were asking him why he liked the church, why he reads the Book of Mormon (sometimes he is super slacker, but sometimes he reads a ton!). And he said the sweetest thing. He said ¨I like the way you sing at church, and I like the prayers. I like the feeling." It was so beautiful. So we decided we needed to talk about the temple, and the feelings in the temple. We are going to try to prepare him to get baptized before the next ward temple trip so he can go with the ward. Also tonight we are going to go with him to the Stake President´s for a Family Home Evening (I hope everyone prays that we can find him so this will actually work out... Another round of Where´s Waldo coming up!) Also another random thing about Honduras. Almost all of the leadership is super young. I have always thought of the Stake President as a balding gray haired old man. But here the bishop, stake president, everyone has little kids and are just starting their families. 

Well I love ya´ll so much. I know that this is the Church of Jesus Christ. I know Jesus Christ is my Savior. I know God lives and loves us, and that he speaks today. I know we can receive personal revelation, and that he will help us. I know Joseph Smith restored this church. I am grateful for the strength and courage of my ancestors who followed the prophet so that I could have all of the blessings I enjoy today of the gospel. I am so grateful for this opportunity to share the gospel! This is the work of the Lord, and he is hastening this work! Hurrah for Israel!

Honduras is famous! Our temple is on the cover of the Ensign!

Well this week has been filled with a lot of screams and stoning. So the bugs have officially started to come out. And somehow, I am always the one to find them and the one that needs to capture them. But thankfully another Hermana (Hermana Lopez) in our house is always willing to kill it after I have captured it. We have had three frogs (baby frogs, so not too bad) a cocroach, and a scorpion (it was sooooo gross! It was like five or six inches). But I am still alive. Anytime I feel like anything might be touching me I literally have a panic attack. I always think it is another scorpion. Our method of killing the cocroach and scorpion was taking them outside then finding large stones to kill them. So far it has worked. Hopefully it keeps working.. well hopefully these bugs stop finding a way into our house! Luckily this morning all we had was a butterfly. I can handle butterflies :)

We had the baptism of little Jose. Another beautifully stressful baptism. He is 13 years old and we have been teaching him for three weeks. We had his date set for this Saturday, but on Wednesday we went to go tell him we are probably going to need to move his date so that we can finish teach him everything. He literally was having a panic attack. So we told him if he wanted to get baptized this Saturday we needed to visit him twice every day. Yep. So we did it, and we had his baptism, and it was beautiful. My poor companion was dying of sickness during the whole thing, and she has been in bed for two days! Luckily I have found lots and lots of cleaning and laundry to do to keep myself busy. I have washed every pair of shoe and close to every article of clothing. It was probably a blessing in disguise because the Lord knew it was time for some spring cleaning :) I found something in my suitcase that still smelled like home and some gum from the States. Probably some of the tender mercies of the Lord. This morning I woke up and I didn't feel like dying of exhaustion, and I was so confused, and for a minute I thought "am I back in the States?" Then I realized it was because yesterday I hadn't walked miles through the dusty streets of Honduras. I think this it was the first time in six months I have felt refreshed after waking up. But I am praying for a miracle so that tonight and tomorrow we can go out and keep working, because lets be honest, a missionary in a house starts going a little crazy after a while.

Also this week I was reading in Ether about the brother of Jared. I realized that he saw close to the same thing that Moses saw. He saw the Lord, and the Lord taught him how we are made after his image (Ether 3:15) and after that he was shown all the inhabitants of the Earth (Ether 3:25). Sometimes it takes reading it in Spanish to really get the good stuff. But that made me start thinking about the experience of Moses, and how one of the first things the Lord taught Moses and the Brother of Jared is that we truly have divine nature. We are divine beings created by God after the image of his Only Begotten. When Satan came to tempt Moses the first thing he told him "Quien eres tu? Porque, he aqui, yo soy un hijo de Dios, a semejanaza de su Unigenito (Moses 1:13)." In English, who are you? Because I am a child of God, and I am in the similitude of the Only Begotten. I think sometimes in this life we forget our divine nature. We forget that we are truly children of God, and that we have divine potential. I especially love it in Spanish because there are two different forms of "I am." A permanent "soy" and an impermanent "estoy." We are permanently, and forever, children of God with divine nature. In a talk that I absolutely love by Tad R. Callister he says (to missionaries, but to anyone really) "I do not believe there is one missionary (or person for all you non-missionaries) whose weaknesses are greater than the potential strengths within him. Why? – because each of us is a son and daughter of God, with his divine nature and divine potential woven into the very fabric of our souls." I love that. Our divine potential woven into the very fabric of our souls. And sometimes we let Satan and others tell us that it isn't true, that we aren't special, and we forget our divinity and give into temptation and to sin. These last few days as I have been wearing my hands off washing clothes I was thinking about the best ways to resist temptation, and how we are divine beings, and a thought came into my head: that the best thing to do is to be like Joseph with Potipher's wife and RUN. RUN RUN RUN. Don't stay to watch, don't stay to see what happens, just RUN. Don't toy with anything, just run away as fast as you realize what it is, and do what Moses did, and call upon the name of the Savior to help you. 

But I love the Lord, because after he teaches the Brother of Jared and Moses about their divine nature, almost immediately after, he teaches them about our nothingness. He shows the brother of Jared all the inhabitants of the Earth, and Moses as well. That is probably the most humbling experience EVER. Afterwards you would feel so small and minute. So God is teaching them, and us, two things here. The first is that we are divine beings, and the second is that we are nothing. I think what he is trying to teach us is that we have divine potential and power, but without him, we are nothing. We can't do anything, but with him, we are everything. So give in. Give in to God. Give him your desires, your weaknesses, your emotions, everything. Only when we do that can we reach our divine potential, our divine power, and then we can change and be like God.

So yep. Those are my thoughts for the week. I love you all and it is possible next Monday I will have a big announcement that I am in San Pedro or something like that :) We shall see. I love Campana and my companion too much to not have cambios.

Hugs and kisses.

So that ya'll can appreciate this scorpion I had to trap!

Shall We Not Go on in So Great a Cause?

So I am probably one of the biggest believers in karma, and this week I definitely got the karma coming back to me! In our District meeting we had a practice, and I got to be the investigator. The other hermanas were teaching about the Libro de Mormon, and I kept asking questions and making them explain more. Well, three days later we went and visited one of our investigators, Christian. We had given him to read the Introduction in the Book of Mormon. The last time we had come we had machetead him a little bit for not reading or praying (background information:Here every person has a machete and uses it regularly, so when you scold someone or are very honest with them, you machete them :) We came and he told us very seriously that he had a lot of questions. We went through line for line of the Introduction and for almost every sentence he had a question. SO LEGIT! I was so happy afterwards I was ready to cry with joy. Here I am not sure why but people don´t ask the why questions (but it is okay, because I ask it for them and then answer it for them :) I always ask them ¨Have you ever wondered why we use the Bible and another book?¨ And they always look at me and say ¨No¨ And I say ¨But good question right? Let me explain it to you¨ And that is how it goes with a lot of the questions. So the fact that he had so many questions I was so excited! And he came to church this week, and I am convinced this 15 year old is going to be a Bishop or a Stake President one day. His Dad died when he was younger, and I know that he is working over time for us and his son for his son to accept the gospel.

This week we were walking (as always), and I looked down at my shirt and I realized I had stains all over it. So naturally I was like ¨Poochika! I have to wash my shirt again this week! I just washed it last week.¨ My companion looked at me and said ¨At least we aren´t in the States where you would actually have to change since you have stains all over your shirt...¨ And we both started laughing because who changes just because you have stains on your clothes? Also, washing our clothes is such a pain since we have to wash them all by hand, so really our level of cleanliness is quite different than it once was. But nobody worry, we are as clean as we possibly can be. We shower every day in water with tons of dirt flecks :) It is wonderful!

The mission is so great, every day is an adventure. Every night I pass out on my bed and every morning I force my eyes open, but as soon as we are out teaching it is so wonderful and beautiful. People are changing and learning the truth little by little. One thing I have learned is the importance of patience, and most importantly patience with people. In Preach My Gospel it teaches us that we need to invite people to be baptized the first or second time we meet with them (Which is very important!) But what I didn´t realize is the importance of the seed, and the seed growing a little more slowly yet steadily. When the seed grows slowly yet steadily, it is conversion, and this is what the Lord wants for his children. He wants conversion, people who are reading their scriptures every day and praying, and changing their lives and repenting. These are the people who can be the leaders and who can help others.

The other day was also so legit as we went to go and teach someone who lives out in the jungle. Literally. We were on divisions and I told the hermana leader we were going out to the jungle, and that it had just rained so it would be muddy. She didn´t really believe me, and then we got out there and we were slipping and slidding in the mud, and I was having the time of my life and she was miserable! I felt so bad. She told me that she had thought it was a joke. Luckily I had my super legit Keens to keep me safe :) (Yes Emmie, the shoes you think are super ugly!!)

Well this is truly the work of Salvation. I know my Savior lives and loves me. I know this is his work and his vineyard. I know we have a prophet today, and that the Lord speaks through him! He is truly his mouthpiece for the world, and the Lord speaks to me through President Thomas S. Monson. I know this life is just a small part of our existence, and if we endure it well, one day we will receive the greatest gift of God: eternal life with our families. I know the Lord is aware of each of us and cares about each of us so much! I know that the Lord is perfect, and so is his plan. I am so grateful for a fourteen year old boy who had a simple question for God, and who chose to ask.

This is my favorite scripture for the mission, and I have it right above where I study so I can see it every day:

¨For there are many yet on the earth ... who are only kept from the truth because they ^dknow not where to find it...Therefore, that we should waste and ^awear out our lives in bringing to light all the ^bhidden things of darkness¨ D and C 123¨:12 through 13.

And it is like the Prophet Joseph Smith said ¨Brethren, shall we not go on in so great a cause?¨

This is such a great cause! And this is truly the Lord´s work and his glory. I love you all! 

Mexi and Kendi

Allen with his mom Gladis

Allen with his mom Gladis

The Lord Always Has a Plan

This week has been beautiful and so stressful!

On Tuesday we finally made it to go and visit the family of Fernando. His sister, Karla was there and she was showing us pictures of Fernando. Hermana Neibaur, Karla, and I were all sitting there crying our eyes out. We all kneeled and each said a prayer, including Karla at the end. I tried to keep myself somewhat together, until we left. We went into the street and then I couldn't hold anything in anymore. So there I was, standing in a dirt street of Honduras, bawling my eyes out. Just so everyone knows, everybody knows everything and sees everything. I told my companion we needed to go more off to the side for my meltdown, but we didn't quite make it there. Of course one of the neighbours saw and told us that we needed to come in. She gave us some pila water, and I have to say that was the best water I have ever had in my life. In every lesson that day I started tearing up. I was just like I am so sorry I am such a mess! But I promise this is the greatest and most amazing gospel in the entire world. Karla asked us if we could go to the grave and pray that Fernando could rest in peace. So we pulled the Elders in so that we could go and dedicate the grave. On Thursday we all trecked up to the cemetary with Fernando's family and dedicated the grave. The cemetaries here are quite a bit different then in the States, but we still had our own nice little funeral. On Sunday Karla came to church, and in our class for the investigators the Elders taught about the Priesthood. Later we got to tell Karla that the Priesthood, the power of God, is what we used to dedicate the grave. 

We also had two beautiful baptisms this week! The first one was on Friday for Marco. It was beautiful, and the Spirit was so strong, and it was the smoothest baptism I have had yet! The second one was for Allen. This was kind of a miracle baptism. We have been working with Allen since I have been here in Campana, and his entire family is members except for him. He has never wanted to get baptized, and we had kind of given up on him. He was always coming to church though. However, this Monday we had a Family Home Evening with their family (we made banana bread too :) and we were teaching about the temple. We brought a picture of the Tegucigalpa  temple and his little brother, who is 8, gasped and said "Ahhhhhhh it is soooo beautiful!" And they were all in shock by the beauty of the temple. For all of you in America, you have to understand here there aren't beautiful stunning buildings like the temple. The temple really is the most beautiful building in Honduras (I am pretty convinced of this... :) We also showed them a picture of the Salt Lake Temple, which is gorgeous and everyone here says "castilla!" which is castle when they see it. We started talking to them about how they should go with our ward in April as a temple, and Allen was like "I want to go too!" So we told him that we should have his baptism this Saturday so he could go to the temple with his family in April. And he agreed!!! What a miracle! But he told us that we could not have lots of people there. We agreed and yah. However, the baptism rolled around at 5 and there was no Allen! Johanna (one of our other investigators who is super amazing) was there (she is friends with the mom of Allen). So at 5:45 Johanna and my companion and I prayed that Allen would come. We finished our prayer, then about ten seconds later there he was! He was super nervous so we went into another room and had a kneeling prayer. I prayed first then we told him to pray. After he said he was ready. He went and changed then started getting all nervous again, but he did it! Just so you all know, Allen is the cousin of Berenice. I think there is a family thing going on here. 

Right now we are also teaching like 10 young men. I feel like the Lord has a very distinct plan for this ward to have more missionaries, because all of these young men are super interested and want to get baptized. The Lord is definitely putting the desires and seeds into their hearts. We keep trying to teach the parents, and they are super not interested, but all these boys are, and they are all coming to church and being super awesome. They are little monkies and teaching them is kind of obnoxious but they are adorable. Yesterday we were teaching one named Amilkar and he was sitting there trying so hard to focus but he was so distracted. He was over there like shaking his legs but trying so hard to focus his attention. It was so sweet. 

I have also been learning more this week about trying to put my faith and trust in God. We had an hour and we had to walk far away for one lesson that I thought would not even be there. I was feeling pretty negative about the whole thing, and I remembered in a talk for missionaries it talked about how we need to sacrifice our negativism and sarcasm. So I said a prayer in my heart and asked for forgiveness, and then as we were walking we found two people we are teaching that we haven't seen in a long time! Also another family that we have only taught once, and they weren't there for our other sita, pulled over and asked us when we were going to come visit them. Last night as we were walking I started feeling all down and negative again, so I asked my companion if we could pray. We said a prayer, and later we found by chance a man who had gone to church a few times in America, but had never talked to missionaries or gone to church in Honduras. We were also able to find one of our young men that is such a pain to find and have an awesome lesson with him. I know the Lord is guiding this work, and sometimes I just have to put a little more faith in him and sacrifice a little bit more :)

Well I love you all! The Lord knows each one of us and is working little miracles in our lives. By small and simple means the Lord brings great things to pass. I know the Lord works in the little things in our lives and is so aware of each one of us. The Lord truly has a plan and knows what is going on, even when I am confused and have no clue what is happening around me :)

Part of my district! My companion is the first gringa on the right... 

Drawing Closer to God

I have to say that Campana is the coolest place in the world. You can all be so jealous because it is beautiful here and the people are so amazing. 

For awesome news we had the baptism of Mexi and Kendi yesterday!!! They were SO CUTE!! Mexi is 12 and Kendi is 10. We have been teaching them for a little over two months and they were finally ready for their baptism. Their mom was a less active member but she has been re activated! It was so cute Kendi went in the water to get baptized, and after the baptism she came up from the water and she said "frioooo frioooo" and we all started laughing as she ran into the bathroom to change. (Here in Campana there is no hot water). Afterwards we all ate a pastel (cake) that we had made for the baptism and it was beautiful. The nice thing about Honduras is that people are always impressed with sweets. Our cake that we made from a box everyone was proclaiming "ahhh su pastel que rico!!!" And I was like, thanks, I added water, oil and eggs then stuck it in the oven, but you are making me feel so good about my cooking skills! And I am pretty sure everyone will be talking about our pastel for a few weeks. Thank you Betty Crocker!

   

We are also planning on having the baptism for Marco this Friday. Yesterday at church he was telling us that he was worried about the baptismal pants not looking good, so he didn't want pictures. And I wanted to just be like... wow that is so not important! But I tried to honestly listen to his concerns, and then told him that the pants would look fine, and that we were going to take a bunch of pictures. He didn't have too much of a choice. I think he is the first person to be concerned about the baptismal clothing not looking good... like in the history of baptisms in Honduras. People here just aren't worried about stuff like that. I was pretty shocked. We were also prepping him for the baptismal interview last week and we were going over all the questions. Ley de Castidad (Law of Chastity) came up, and he was like "wait you never taught me that." And I looked at my companion, then she looked at me, then I was like "Puchika! He is right." So we started into Ley de Castidad. It was a nice awkward ten minutes, then I went into "pornografia" and the first thing we always ask is if they have heard the word, or know what it is (most people have no clue). He looked at us and was like "si si yo comprendo yo se." Ahhh there is nothing better than 19 and 21 year old girls teaching you as a 19 year old boy about pornography and the law of chastity. Poor kid. 

We also had some really terrible news this week. One of our investigators got killed. We had a lesson with him on Wednesday, and he was telling us how excited he was to come to church. The last time we went he was showing us the turtle he had bought, and his new rabbit. On Wednesday he was showing us his turtle that he had cooked and how excited he was to eat it Sunday night for dinner. After I had a feeling we should go visit his friends, who we have pretty much dropped until they come to church. So we went and visited them, and it was super great, and we made a plan about how Fernando, Marjorie, Kimberely and Janary were all going to come to church together. As we were walking back we passed by Fernando again and he told us how he was going to go get his hair cut. We told him how excited we were to see him on Sunday with his new haircut. On Saturday night my companion called Kimberely to remind her about church, and she said they weren't coming because they just found out Fernando had died. My companion hung up, and she told me, then I started freaking out a little because I was like "wait, like our investigator Fernando?? The one we visited on Wednesday??" My companion is still new to the area so she hadn't realized it was the same person. I called back Kimberely, and she could barely understand me freaking out in Spanish since it is already hard for people to understand me on the phone since, well a) I am a gringa b) our phone is really ghetto and c) I am a gringa. The sister of Fernando also called us and told us. The funeral was on Sunday at 9, and we couldn't go since we have church at 9 and we had a baptism as well right after church, which meant before church we were running around like maniacs. My heart is torn for Fernando and his family. Keep them in your prayers. We are going to try to visit them tomorrow, and hopefully I can keep myself together. All I can imagine right now is my neice who died last year picking up where I left off teaching him, and him continuing his progress towards God. That night I was really upset and my District Leader called and reminded me of the section in the Doctrine and Covenants when Joseph Smith sees his brother Alvin in the Celestial Kingdom. I know God lives and has a plan for us, and that this life really is so short, and it is so important that we align our lives to God.  

This past month I have read the conference talking "Drawing Closer to God" by Elder Terence M. Vinson over and over again, and now more than ever I think it applies in my life. I love it when he says "But here is the point—rather than solve the problem Himself, the Lord wants us to develop the faith that will help us rely upon Him in solving our problems and trust Him. Then we can feel His love more constantly, more powerfully, more clearly, and more personally. We become united with Him, and we can become like Him. For us to be like Him is His goal. In fact, it is His glory as well as His work." So that is my feat, my task, to learn to rely on Him in solving every problem and helping me in every challenge. The great thing is, I realized this week as I was reading the first chapter of Moses, that I can do this and overcome. As Moses said when Satan was tempting him "For behold, I am a ^ason of God, in the similitude of his Only Begotten" and I, too am a Daughter of God, in the similitude of his Only Begotten. We are all Children of God, and he has given us the tools and resources to overcome and conquer, and we can realize this as we draw closer to him every day. I love my Savior so much, and I love this plan that our Father set up for us. It is a perfect plan, and I know I can have hope in the future, and hope in every second. I know God loves each and every one of us and is so aware of us, and he truly works in the details of our lives. 

The Joys of Missionary Work!

Hello Everyone!!

It has been another lovely week in Campana. Sometimes though I think the Lord likes to try the patience of not  just the people, but also of the missionaries. In fact, I am pretty convinced of that. This week has been beautiful, every day, and then Sunday we had buckets and buckets of rain! Just so everyone knows, when there is rain, NO ONE LEAVES. I am pretty sure here people think they will melt or something. Whenever we show up at people´s houses they always look at us in shock that we are actually WALKING in the rain. So Sunday we were passing by for people to come to church, and they were all like, ¨"Sorry Hermanas, you are crazy to be walking in this wheather, no, we cannot come to church." And we were like ¨Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo.¨¨ But, of course, as soon as church ended there was the sun once again. Our assistencia for our ward was half of what it normally is! Oh the joys of Honduras :) But Familia Huezo and Julia were there, being the amazing converts that they are. I have to say out of all the Sundays to rain buckets, this was definitely the Sunday to do so because for the two hours after Sacrament we had a special meeting about Family History. Our four investigators that were there I was trying to sit by them and explain what baptisms for the dead are, why we do them, parts of the Plan of Salvation, and everything else. They all were looking at me a little freaked about everything. Oh the joys of missionary work :)

We are hoping Mexi and Kendi get baptized this coming Sunday! They are soo scared though, so I hope everyone prays for them that they will be able to get baptized this Sunday. We are also hoping Marco is able to get baptized. Marco is awesome, he is 19 and the only person in his family. He has been looking into the church for about eight months now, but he left for San Pedro for about four months and he is back now. We are re teaching him all the lessons, and our last lesson he was talking about how much he has changed. This gospel is so amazing. It truly changes people!! And it changes people for the better. There is truly a new light with people. It is so beautiful. 

Also a cool fact is that TOMS does actually give out another pair of shoes to kids in need. The other day a bunch of families were telling us about how they were going to the school to get free shoes. Afterwards they were all showing us and they were all black TOMS. I was kinda in shock, because I have never really considered the people here in need. Yes, they have a lot less than people in America, but they are all so happy and they all seem to be getting a long just fine. It is funny how much my idea of ¨poor¨ has changed. Money really isn´t even important, and like Julia told me the other day ¨¨I am glad I am poor, that way I know I won´t ever be focused on my things, and I will always rely on God.¨¨ There it is. The lesson of this life.  

This week Maria, Yeimy and Odalis of Familia Huezo went to the temple. They were telling me about their experience and my heart was melting. Also Julia payed her tithing for the first time this week. These sweet moments make every morning of waking up at 6:30, every sore muscle and confused moment worth it. This work is amazing! 

I love you all! I hope you all had a lovely Valentine´s day. For Valentine´s Day I fell on one of the dirt roads with lots of rocks and I now have some pretty nice battle wounds. We had a lesson and our last lesson with the family had not gone very well. We went and my entire calf was covered in blood. We kept yelling ¨buenas¨¨ and no one was answering, so finally we just walked in and I pretty much begged to use their pila to wash all the blood off. (A Pila is basically a big basin of water where we do everything, wash our clothes, a lot of times wash our dishes, things like that). Now I can´t really kneel which makes praying kinda awkward... so I hope I recooperate really really quickly since we spend about as much time on our knees as we do walking (which is a lot....)

Love you all!