Oct 13

Well. It is a change week! Ugh how I hate change weeks. They make me so nervous! But so my companion is leaving....which means I am here in this gigantic area that I still dont know by myself. But thats okay. I will live and figure it out. It also means that I am the senior companion and have to teach the new hermana how to be hermana leader...so I need to figure out how to be hermana leader by tomorrow haha. just kidding. i know how, but like I wouldve liked a little more time to adjust, but I think my companion is going to be training so I am happy for her. BUT you know what this means?? I could have two more changes as hermana leader and then they could take me down to be a trainer for my last change! I hope so so much! I would love to end training because well then I wouldnt be baggy. I would be able to focus even more. I am going to tell my president about this.

 

So this week we had a miracle on Monday. This lady has a sister and mom and stepdad that all got baptized recently and she was getting taught by the missionaries but then said were too dramatic haha for the coffee and so she ddint want to get baptized. she came to conference and we had a lesson and asked her toget baptized and boom she was like yeah. and we asked her to a fecha and she said yes. it was out of nowhere but it was awesome! its pretty hard to teach her because she has two kids and theyre always screaming and running around haha but you know thats okay. we will figure it out.

my comp is sick. she has dengue. she has a fever and a huge pain in her body. i feel so bad for her! well in the moment, i know lots is happening here, but well i cant remember all that much. OH!!!! I got to go back to my first area in zacapa!! i had divisions there and it was so awesome because i actually speak and understand spanish now so i could talk to them all. and all the pregnant ladies now have their cute little babies. awww it was so great. but yeah i will try to send photos.

love you all! have great weeks! ill try not to be stressed out :) haha love you all!

Oct 6

Dear Family,

Okay so last week I was in such a rush that I COMPLETELY forgot to tell you guys that general conference was this weekend! I hope that you mom watched it and Steph and dad I have a couple talks that I want you guys to look up online. On my part, I loved it!! I am very sad that it is over. I just love the prophet and all those men so much! And I loved that they get to say it in their own language now! I heard one of the spanish ones in spanish and it was super cool! Everything is just far more powerful in the language in which it was originally given. I learned a lot and received answers to my questions. So watch some of them! Especially that David A Bednar one from the Sunday evening session and from the same session Elder Ballard and from saturday morning session the one by President Uchtdorf!!

So everyone and their cat is sick here right now. I dont know why. Not a single member could leave with us this week. It was pretty sad, BUT so one night we were like out of ideas so we thought we could go visit a recent convert and when we get there, his mom tells us that he has been sick for 4 days with a super high fever, hes not eating because he just pukes everything up. They are a humble family and had already done tests in the hospital that resulted in nothing. His mom was worried and just started to cry. So we called around trying to get someone to come give him a blessing and no one could. So we got permission to go buy some stuff from the pharmacy for him, so we left and as we are walking there, we run into a member! We were like HERMANO JAMES!!! we need your help! It was just a huge testament to me that God is watching out for every single one of His children. He loves us :)

And quick question...are the coke bottles personalized in the states too right now?


Sep 29

So I dont have a ton, a ton of time. Because were going to the capital today and its a 3 hour drive and the bus leaves in like 40 minutes and yeah...sothey cut this time a little. 

But let me guys just tell you, I absolutely love my zone! Like they are all so amazing! Our zone leaders have a lot of faith and are very humble and are trying to help the zone as much as possilbe. OUr pdays are always super fun! We have the guy who was the assistent to the president in my district which was intimidating at first haha but not anymore. Every single missionary that we have is just super amazing. They all try to be super obedient and work hard and I am so happy here! We are seeing miracles. Every Friday we share a miracle that we saw during the week and it makes me so happy seeing the miracles that are happening to them! And with us. Theyre also super fun! theres an hermana in our zone that says she has a gift to know what spirit animal we are. apparently i am a baby cheetah hahaha. what?! but yup, thats what i am. my companion is a chinchilla!

To explain districts are a group of missionaries that are close together in proximity and zones are usually 2 or 3 districts. and they depend on where you are. And we meet together every monday, wednesday, and friday!

So we have seen a lot of miracles. Weve been finding lots of families. And on Sunday we went to two citas that were supposed to be super secure but they both fell and we were like okay...so we went to contact a reference that we had received and we met this guy who recently got married and so we went to get to know his wife too. turns out that they have been trying to decide what chrch to go to because he is evangelical and she is catholic. i lthink evangelical is non denominational christion in the states but im not sure. and anyway so we teach them about the restoration of the church and how God only has one church and all of that. In the first vision of Joseph Smith we felt the spirit so strong and the wife too. at the end we asked if they wanted to get baptized and he was like yeah. and then  his wife like kind of made a face and he was like yeah? haha it was kind of funny but she just needs to learn more. she felt the spirit and she will figure it out soon enough. 

We had the womens conference and i LOVED it! Mom, you need to watch it if you havent because it was incredible! and for the first time like ever we received cincho from a leader haha. but yeah, i love you guys and i hope that you have great weeks! happy fall! enjoy the weather for me haha :) 


Sep 22

Okay. Where to begin? Where to begin? Well first of all. I have 13 months. WHAT?! okay. now that leads to my next statement. because i have 13 months, all of my nice comfy shoes are broken. so much so that literally everyone and their brother was like oh hermana....you need new shoes. thats awful. thank you, thank you. a family invited me over to their house and gave me their daughters shoes haha. awkward, but also nice because i didnt have to buy any. but because people were giving me shoes...they hurt me because i wasnt used to them. so ive gone my whole mission without problems in my feet and now im having problems...after a year.

so my companion and i have high goals for ourselves. were in the how are we going to acheive it phase. and i think we found our answer. theres a city that is 45 minutes from where we usually work that has never been visited by missionaries. ever. and we went there and we just felt so happy! like the spirit telling us...these people are ready. we have a plan (because its so far away) to look first for people with cars and then when theyre members, we will have people who can drive our investigators without cars to church! its genius...i know :p but its from the Spirit, not us. so im not being prideful, i just get excited haha. 

I am loving being able to do divisions! getting to know the hermanas is so exciting and being able to gain their trust and help them out...i love it! maybe ill be a counselor when i get back! we shall see. i had my first division in my area on thursday and i didnt get lost...a single time. i was so proud of myself. our area is huge!! we cover until the border with honduras and were always taking buses, so it was a miracle.

also i received a lovely letter from ainee (i will write back :)) and i realized i used words that maybe people who dont have family on missions dont understand. so to explain division is this. there are always companionships, but we as hermana leaders do divisions with them once a month, which means that i go with one of the hermanas and her companion goes with my companion. we work either in her area or my area. and we do it so that we can see if theyre having problems, if their being obedient, or just to help them be animated if theyre feeling down, or show them different ways to do some of the things. so yes.

i hope you all have great weeks :) love you!


Sept 15

Dear Family,

Wow, okay, I am EXHAUSTED!!!! Like i thought i was before, but no. This week we did two divisions (I went to other areas and worked there all day long). Im exhausted haha, but thats okay. I love it. Its also super weird not being in the area that much, tomorrow I am leaving again. Then on Thursday my companion is leaving and Im the one staying here. Ahh I am super nervous because our area is huge, it goes until the border of Honduras...Like in a bus we can travel for an hour and still be in our area. So i am a little nervous, but itll be okay haha. 

Okay so I learned this week how much simple little things can be such a blessing to otehrs. That we can serve them by doing very little. On Tuesday we had interviews with President and the elders were hungry but they couldnt leave and it was lunch time and we were already done so we offered to buy them subway. Well, then all of the elders decided they wanted subway so we bought 10 sandwiches and we head back to the capilla and were like OH NO! We hadnt thought about President and Hermana Crapo and we felt so bad. So we get there and tell them that and they thought it too and so they were like here, just take our sandwiches and tell them its a gift, so we did and HErmana Crapo started crying. Like right there. She was like thank you so much! This is what the mission is about, service and obedience. She took pictures with us all and the subway and put it on instagram haha. It was just so cute and it made me see how small acts make the days of other people and that we should always be looking for them. So maybe its not that cool of a story for you guys, but shes just so cute haha and I love Hermana Crapo.

So the other day in a consejo de lideres, one of the assistants was like okay, what does it mean to you to be a representative of Christ and we all answered and he was like okay. Everything we do, we do in the name of Christ. When you break a rule, you do it in the name of Christ. When you are disobedient, when you sin, you do it in the name of Christ. And I was like ...oh my gosh...its true. We always think of the good things, but also all of the bad things too. It really made me think and I have even more drive now to complete everything with exactness. 

Lots of stuff is happening in the area, we are seeing miracles everyday and I am loving it :) Love you gusy! Have great weeks!

Pics at bottom
Sept 8

holy heck this week has been crazy. so i told you guys that i had changes. well you wont believe what the changes were. i am going back outside of the capital (that doesnt usually happen) to be a sister leader out there. basically i do everything normal except we have to do divisions with the hermanas that were in charge of. in a month we are supposed to do divisions with every group, there are 7 companionships. so we will be starting that this week. im so nervous haha. im grateful for this opportunity to be put in a position of leadership, although i dont know i was chosen exactly haha. but thats what God wanted I suppose.

But so I am in Chiquimula. I will be able to do divisions in my old area!!! woohoo!!! Never thought I would see Zacapa again. We are 3 hours from the capital. So on Tuesday i came out here, then the next day we had to go back to have a reunion of liders and it was super awesome! all of the zone leaders and President and the assistents and the other hermana leaders. I really liiked it. The mission has a goal of reaching 20 baptisms fper month for every companionship. IT is a lofty goal but it is a promise form a Setenta that we would be able to acheive it. So me and my companion are being super bold right now. We dont have time to waste. We invite people to baptism from the first time we ever talk and ask them to accept a fecha too. It is crazy but I have grown as a missionary already in this last week and I am loving it. I love my new companion. Shes from Argentina. Hermana Bustamante. I will send pics next week. But yeah, I am loving this change. I am nervous because I feel a lot of responsibility to be perfect haha but I am excited for the opportunity to grow and I want with all of my ehart to acheive this promise of 20 baptisms in a month. ELder Alonzo promised it to us before this year ends. Its crazy to think about that, but its possible, and we are going to accomplish. 

I am already exhausted haha. We have traveled so much in this last week. We had about 3 days to work last week and they were all like half days for other activities, and yeahh. But we are just going to give it everything and then rest when we get back to our houses haha. 

I love you all and I hope that you have great weeks! :)

Sept 1

Well, I am officially leaving this area. After 6 months. My second area. Leaving my 4th companion, my hija. I am sad. But also, I am looking forward to my next area...at least I am trying to be happy about it. Im sure I will be fine once I get settled again, but I will miss these people so much. They have truly impacted my life and changed me as a missionary and a person. I love them!!! Its crazy how people I never knew existed, nor could speak to a year ago, have such a profound impact on my life. Ahh but "asi es la mision". I will let you know next week where I go. I think the worst part is finding out who replaces you. Its weird. Anyways.

We finished this week, well Friday, with a baptism :) Joseline is her name if I havent talked about her before. She is 16 and super awesome! She was so excited to get baptized! But as Satan doesnt like it when people get baptized, he tried throwing in some problems, but he will not win. So that day it started raining torrentially. So much so that a tree fell down in the interstate, creating a huge backup that stopped everyone that was going to come. It was supposed to start at 700. She got there at 730 and her mom had left work at 5 and still had an hour left in the traffic. So we waited. And took pictures. And waited. And chit chatted. But her family was all able to make it eventually. There were like 40 or 50 people there in the baptism. And she was so happy. At the end she bore her testimony and was like when the hermanas first came to the house, I wont lie, I didnt want it. But as I kept listening, I felt an emptiness in my life be filled, and then I got super excited and I loved it and I am grateful for this gospel. AHHH! there is no better feeling than to know that someone was able to come to the gospel becauase we did something.

Well have great weeks! Love you all! Lets start my (hopefully) third and final 6 month area!! Woo!



Aug 25

Dear Family,
Well this week has been very different, but amazing! So on Thursday I completed a year. A YEAR! Can you guys believe that? A year ago I was at home. I feel like I just left! Crazy how fast the time flies. It is insane. We celebrated by having a conference with Elder Alonzo who is the new 2nd consejero in the presidency of the area. Well after hearing a super inspiring talk by President Crapo, Elder Alonzo gets up there and was like if any of you guys want to go home, I am willing to sign your papers. He told us that he has the ability to see into our eyes and see our life. To see when we made a mistake, with you, and what we did. He was like if you have been thinking that you want to go home and dont want to be here, I will be more than willing to help you. But if not, you need to talk to your President and work out your problems. He was like you know who you are. And we are all just like......oh gosh. But the rest of it was super great! You can tell he truly takes his role as someone who cries repentance to all nations very seriously because he sure did cry it haha. But at the very end of all of the talks, he gave us a promise that if stop thinking about home and start putting into practice the things that we learned that day, that we would by the end of the year see that we will be having 5 baptisms every week! Well, I believe in that promise, we just have to change the way we are working to a better way and we will acheive it :)

I also got to do divisions with the hermana liders and it was so great because I got to go to her area for the day. After being in the same area for almost 6 months, it does get difficult to not get thrown into a routine and to just walk and be like I know everyone here haha, but when you go to a new area for a little while then everything is new, you dont know anyone and it helped me to remeber what is my purpose, and it was a really good experience for me.

On Saturday and Sunday we had stake conference and another 70 was there and it was so awesome! I learned a lot from those sessions.

This week we should be having 3 baptisms and we are very excited!! the frist baptisms of the hermana Flewallen :) One is this 16 year old girl who is so excited, she is basically jumping every time she talks about it. Its so cute!

I love this gospel so much and the ways that I have been able to change personally and see change in other people. I love that Heavenly Father has placed people in my life here in Guatemala who always help me when I am struggling. People here seriously have impacted my life and changed it for the better and I will never forget them. Its crazy how a year ago, I couldnt even talk to the majority of these people, but now I have amazing friends out here! I love it :) Have great weeks!



Aug 18

Dear Family,

So I have two stories that I want to share with you guys this week. Okay, the first one is that we have a fecha for the 30th and she is a daughter of a less active and she is so super awesome. When we first met her, she said she wanted to find which church was true because seh felt an emptiness in her life. So we started teaching her and she said she felt it was true and that she did want to get baptized and that she wants to enter the temple! So we are all happy about that. We have also been working with her mom, who is slightly harder BUT she is reading the Book of Mormon and she is coming around. Before she didnt even want us to come to except on Saturdays. Well yesterday, they didnt come to church, so we went over to their house to see why and they had had some problems and the daughter si wanted to come but they couldnt. The mom came out and was like I just wanted to tell you thank you for everything that you are doing for my daughter. I hadnt had the chance to tell you before, but thank you for everything and it was so sweet to hear her say that! And then she was like and so maybe we can plan a day during the week that you can come over!! AHH!! I love the Spirit and I love seeing people change with the gospel.

And okay so yesterday we had an activity that was musical and so we went with our ward mission leader and another hermana from the church. So afterwards he was like I want to visit people with you, so we tried a couple people who werent home and were like ughhhh what do we do? so finally we decide to go to an investigators house (the one i wrote about last week that wrote the paper about us) but the thing is he had gone to the activity that day so we had already seen him, but Heavenly Father wanted us to go there, because we had a super spiritual lesson with him. I have seen him change so much in these past 6 months and with the extra help from Rafa, he is so close to baptism. SO CLOSE! He just has to get over his fear. Ahh, I love how Heavenly Father guides us to things like that. And I love when the members help, because its nice for the investigators to hear a different testimony than from us..

I hope you all had great weeks :) Love you!

8/11/2014

Well, I feel like I just wrote to you guys because I basically did.

 So we are having a lot of miracles here. We are confronting a lot of desafios too, but we really are seeing the hand of God here, and I love it! So I think I told you about Jely last email. Well on Sunday she came to church WITH HER ENTIRE FAMILY!!!!! It was so exciting :) Her two sons and her husband, who we havent actually ever been able to talk to! It was so awesome to see her there, and I know that she is ready, we just have to make sure we stay there with her, which we will be doing.

So idk if you guys remember Cesar, but hes the investigator that was getting over a lot of addictions and what not, but didnt want to get baptized and stopped coming to church and kind of asked us to stop coming. Well. We saw him on Saturday and we were like hey and went to talk to him and he was so excited to see us and told us that a member had seen him that day and invited him to church, and he was like i think im going to come. And then he said he read the last text that we sent to him that was like even though you dont want to, just know that you are always invited to church and was thinking about that. And then he saw us and was like okay, well im going to go tomorrow. and he came!! all by himself! now granted, he left after the first hour to go to another church, but he told us why he decided not to get baptized, which he hadnt before, he just got defensive and told us basically to stop wasting our time. then he said he wanted to talk to us, but felt bad for how he acted so he didnt want to. so who knows...maybe this time it will work! 

Also, we have this investigator who is a journalist and hes been our investigator for 6 months now. He loves the church and likes going, but he is rather....doubtful of everything. he just has lots and lots of questions and lots of things have happened to him in his life, but he always listens to us and i can see him changing and its amazing. but yesterday in our cita he was like the next time you guys come, ill show you something i wrote as kind of thanking you guys and he said its titled "how to talk to someone with a hard heart" haha.

So that guy carlos from last week...he came to church and liked it and brought his girl friend with him and she really liked everything too! it was so cool to see.

If you guys would like to pray for someone with me, please pray for someone named Xiomara. She is so awesome and pilas, but we just need a little additional heavenly help from God :)

love you guys! have a great week!!! :)

8/6/2014
Dear Family,

Oh heck. Well as you can tell it is now Wednesday and i am just writing because we went to the temple today so we didnt have a pday on monday. its been such a weird week. i feel like the week is just starting but tomorrow is already thursday...my schedule is super messed up!

anyway. Okay. We have found straight up the most golden person ever. Well, up until this point. And we didnt even find him. He came to us really. So a member called us and said his neighbor is interested in learning about the church so we call him and he starts telling us this story. oh goodness gracious. so hes been like super catholic his whole life, like super catholic, even he says that. he speaks english btw (he also asked me if i was from germany or something because i was struggling with my english...how embarassing haha) but anyway so his life started falling apart he said and he had a ton of questions that he realized his church wasnt answering. so he owns a recycling business and they brought in a box of bibles and in this box he found a book of mormon. he said that he doesnt know why but he couldnt throw the book of mormon away. he kept it, but never read it. then he moved a month ago right by our members and found out that they were mormon. these members are super pilas and shared a liahona with him and he was like i read it and i just felt a burning desire to get to know the church better. we met with him and we were like when is best for you? and he was like no, this is important i will arrange my schedule for you guys and were like...haha well okay. and then yeah, he accepted the baptism fecha right there. he was still kind of like well yes, i will, i need to know more but i think so. so were like woohoo! we call him to ask him something else and he is like...yeah, anoteme por esa fecha. like write me down for that day! he is a miracle, and i am so excited to see him progress!

also, we have another investigator jely who weve been working with for the past couple of weeks and we have seen such a growth in her. at first, she was kind of cold towards us when we talked aobut jose smith and what not, but now, she is like SO excited to learn aobut all of this. idk if i already wrote about this but we read to her from 3 nephi 11 and explained to her the way God wants us to get baptized and she was like kind of skeptical and i showed her a picture of a little girl getting baptized and we asked her to be baptized and she didnt answer. she tried handing the picture back to me and started crying and was like i think im believing it. i feel soemthing and idk how to describe it. it was so incredible. we explained that little kids have no need to be baptized, which had been a worry of hers for her son who isnt baptized. it was just such an amazing thing to see such a great change in her. shes a "tough" woman who doesnt cry and the last two citas has started bawling. haha, i love it.

we are truly witnessing miracles and i know its the gospel and the spirit testifying of the truth. I know that the book of mormon changes lives. that if people honestly take the time to study it, they will recognize it as a book of God and will recognize that His church has been restored upon the earth. that we can be saved through the power of the priesthood. it is such an amazing thing to be able to testify of. i love it :) and i love you all! miss you!

Welp, a lot has changed here in the zone! new zone leader, new district leader, new elder in our ward! Its crazy, but its been good!

Its also starated to rain again. It was pretty dry for about a month and then last night we were knocking on a door and i heard this sound and i was like...hna i think thats rain and we look over and you can hear the rain pounding on all the roofs and its getting louder and louder and we were like ahhhhh get your rain jacket and so as im trying to do that, the phone falls out and were scrambling around and acting dumb haha and these people are watching us from across the street and are like hey!  come here so we went inside so we coudl get everything together and we contacted them and talked to them a little and it was super cool because God gave us this perfect finding opportunity with two girls our age and they were like yeah, sure! come back! so we shall see :)

We have this investigator named Jely and we were going to drop her but we went back one more time to tell her and she was SO INTERESTED. like she had a ton of questions about te book of mormon and she was like yeah, i want to read it more and figure out if its true and can i bring my husbadn adn kids to chruch too and were like...um yes, yes you can haha. they didnt end up being able to come but it was still nice because i think next sunday they should be able to.

I have learned a lot that happiness doesnt come from your cirumstances. Sometimes i have the tendency to think that because of my circumstnces, i dont desrve to be happy and its just so not true. I love that God has made this plan so that we are happy. I have learned that a lot this past week, and i htink i am improving a lot to not get so down so quicly. my comp is never upset. in like 3 months, i have seen her upset like 3 times and shes in the beginning of the mission, which is iwhen people are usualy the most upset haha. shes been great for me!

my birthday was good! ate lots of cake and spaghetti from pizza hut! but it was weird not talking to you guys. it felt like a normal day, only now i feel super old. no longer a teenager. oh well, life goes on. 

Well, i love you all and i hope you have great weeks :)