Week #11

The Oatmeal mask for my sunburn

I love my Companion Hermana Cadenas

Hola Familia!

Hola Amigos!

P-DAY (our day off)

Its always such a relief when p-day comes, but it isn't necessarily a day of relaxation. We always have lots of things planned. Last week was really fun, after emailing families we went to the church to play volley ball. Missionaries are not suppose to get competitive but, I am not going to lie we had 3 intense games of volley ball, it was so great! The only problem was that the sun was so strong that I got an awful sun burn. My face was as red as an apple! (It hurt real bad.) After the games we went to one of the elder's mamasita's homes for hamburgers, and she said that it helps if you apply an oatmeal mask, and then rub tomatoes on the burn. hahah so that night  Hermana Cadenas and I  rubbed oatmeal and tomato all over my face. I  don't think it really helped, but it was worth a shot. After  lunch Cadenas and I went to one of the little markets in our area. They have markets everywhere!!! . We picked up loads of fruit, we are both obsssssesed with fruit. The fruit here is so amazingly  good. Then we bought sweet matching pants that kind of remind me of gouchos!  Its funny what we will wear as missionaries. Oh also I found some adorable cat earrings! There are soo many cats here I'm going crazy! Like cats are everywhere, and i just want to take them all home with me, I am in heaven! My favorite cat is the one at my mamasitas house because she  just had a litter of kittens. I'm almost cried they were so cute.MY obsession with cats has not changed.

ALMUERZOS

Every day for lunch we eat at a members house with four other elders.(We probably have too much fun but you know me, fun just follows me around.) On a Normal day we show up but it takes them a while to serve us so we come up with fun games to play, or play soccer. Lunch is a nice break. Basically everyday we can expect rice potatoes and chicken. Other things they feed us might be steak fruit, salad, jello, flan, arroz con leche. Arroz con leche is a desert that reminds me a lot of grandmas rice pudding its is soo good. Well they always give us WAYY too much food! I can never finish my plate. The members are so generous and good to the missionaries. They literally give us mountains of rice. (and they expect us to eat all of it!) Luckily we eat with the elders. Elder Rusola is a black hole! He eats everything! He is a big guy from Columbia, so its really nice because I  just sit next to him and whatever I cant finish I slyly put onto his plate and he eats it for me! Its the best.

PRACTICAS!

Every Friday we have practicas with our whole zone. This week practicas was like torture. We went over how to give commitments to people. There is a lot more to it then you would think! Teach with the scriptures, ask Direct questions, promise blessings, testify, and verify question. One by one we were each quizzed in front of the entire zone on the spot. Think of an intense oral exam in your Spanish class in front of the whole school. Commitments are things  like following the law of chastity, law of tithing, or getting married. I was sooo nervous to go up there in front of all of these other missionaries who have so much experience. They also know Spanish. I have only been in the field for a month and  still  hardly speak the language. When I was finally called up, I got lucky, the zone leader likes me so he gave me an easy one. Reading the scriptures, I nailed it. I had a scripture ready to go I knew exactly what to do. It was sweet, obviously not perfect, but I got though it.  

HERMANA EULALIA

One of our investigators is a boy named Angel, he is 10 years old. He goes to church with his neighbors every Sunday and LOVES it. He reads his scriptures and has taken all the lessons.  Baptism is the final step. We had a lesson this week with him and asked him to say the closing prayer. It was short, sweet and to the point. All he said was Dear Heavenly Father please help me be able to be baptized, In the name of Jesus Christ Amen. That was it. He wants it so bad. However, because he is a child we have to have permission form his mom, Eulalia. This women is impossible to get a hold of. We met with her once last week, and then all of the sudden she disappeared! We knock on her door 3 to 5 times everyday and she is never home. Other people answer and say that she has just left, or wont be coming back. We are so frustrated and don't know if she is actually gone or if she is just avoiding from us.  I think the reason she is tentative about Angel being baptized is that she hasn't had any of the lessons herself, and doesn't know a lot about our church. ALL I WANT TO DO IS TEACH HER and shes never home. If she would just listen and learn I don't  think she would have any issues with Angel being baptized. but we can never find her. Hopefully we can make some progress with her this next week.  

LORENA THE ATHIEST

Lorena is the little sister of one of the menos activos she is probably the toughest investigator we have. She is 19, and has tons of tons of questions for us. Some of her questions are just flat out strange though. When we were taught about the fall of Adam, she was convinced that before Eve their was another women on the Earth with Adam, and had questions about that.  I've never heard of another woman before! She had deep questions about the old testament prophets and existence before this life? She has so many questions and just rapid fires them at us!  My feeling is that she needs to have faith that there is a God and find a way to feel the spirit. We gave her some homework. We asked her to read Alma 32 about faith and how it is compared to a seed. It was perfect for her. The next time we visited we explained that faith is believing in things that we cant see. A little demonstration helped illustrate the concept. We turned off all the lights and asked her if she had faith that we were still there. Lorena is definitely beginning to understand. She is one of my favorite investigators because she is a challenge. Most of the time people just accept what we say. But she is always question and desiring to know more. 

BAPTISM!

We had another baptism this week! Lydia was baptized she was so ready for it. The gospel has really helped her in her life! Next we are going to start teaching her daughter Stephanie. Stephanie is 11 but probably could be 17! If you have any good talks for young women send them to me in Spanish for her. She has had most of the lessons.

There is so much more I wish I could say but my time is up! Just know that I'm doing really well!

LOVE YOU ALL

Hermana Huish