Week #15 - Mucho Turkey!

Hello everyone!

We definitely did do something fun for Thanksgiving....if you are a sadist. We went and ate with three different families. Three different LATIN families. Needless to say, we ate until we were SO FULL and then went to another house and ate till we were SO FULL. I officially hate food - what a great predicament to have! I never want to see turkey again. BUT ugh. I said thank you many many times, no worries :)  

Spanish is going well actually. Many people have noticed improvements and commented upon it. I am getting to the point that when people learn that I have only been speaking for 3 months they go "WOW! Hermana, your Spanish is so good!" I am pretty hard on myself, so I only notice the fact that I still don't know a lot of vocab and that my verb tenses are often wrong but I am getting better, therefore....something I'm doing, I'm doing right. But to be honest, I rely so heavily on the Spirit. My trainer says that it is a mission rule that we do all Spanish days every other day....but that hasn't happened much since the 2nd day of the mission....because she forgets and I don't remind her....because I don't want to.....BUT I won't do that with my greenie breaker (2 more weeks of training!!) Hopefully I can start anew with a goal of speaking Spanish whenever I leave the house. I'm learning the names for the human body now and when we have a meal appointment with a certain family, the little girl there will give me a quick Spanish lesson. The little spit fire is awesome :)  Her name is Emil and she is awesome and I love her so much. She is very quick on her toes and every time I go to her house she picks on me :) It's hilarious. This last time we were talking about how tall I am. The conversation changed and I got the word wrong for "Liar". The mother started teasing me and telling me that my nose was going to start growing. I told her that instead of my nose growing, I get taller......then the Emily goes,  "Oh, then you must lie a lot, huh?" We all laughed :) Later I was playing with little kiddos (tender mercy-I was missing the cousins :D) and was getting quite the workout. I said as much and Emily goes, "Stop! You are too skinny as it is!" She has such a dry sense of humor and so sassy....reminds me of Ashley :) TENDER MERCIES EVERYWHERE! 

Miracles this week: Many of you might remember a girl named Carolina? So Carolina is the sister of Marco who was baptized about 1.5 months ago. She knew everything was true, went to church with us every week, shared the gospel with others, kept all the standards, CALLED the LDS church "her" church like she was a member, etc  but refused to get baptized saying that the baptism she had when she was 14 into another church with "proper authority", too. So frustrating. Anyway, we dropped her and started praying for her to be given trials to help humble her because she was being SUPER prideful. She told us that when she was supposed to be baptized God would give her a sign...she was expecting a vision or something! BUT the Lord always provides. We were weekly planning and Sis. McAfee felt super strongly that someone was to be baptized this week even though we had no one that was ready. We were talking to Marco, Carolina's brother, about what we could do to help her come to the church. The next day she texted us and just started to talking to us. We knew who was getting baptized that Sunday right then. We went over and she broke down. Apparently, she had been looking for a good guy that she could marry and settle down with but the world kept giving her men that only wanted to use her. She kept saying the world had nothing to give her! Then we talked about temple marriage, standards of the church etc. and she said she wanted that. She loves the church because she says that we are respectful and good people. We told her the only way she could have a temple marriage was if she was baptized. SHE ACCEPTED AND WAS BAPTIZED YESTERDAY!! YEHA!! 

Carolina's Baptism

BoM: Mormon 1:2. I can be me. I tend to be a little more quiet. A little more reserved. Not crazy and happy and loud. I can just have silent joy. Like Mary. She was silent but so joyful. I CAN BE ME! Sister McAfee is much more loud and crazy. I felt a little sad that everyone loved her so much but did not love me quite as I wished. I couldn't bring myself to act like that - I was like that in high school and it EXHAUSTED me. I couldn't do that. But I've been studying Mary and realized that I am similar in some ways. There is a poem that says, "I made you just a little different, a little more lonely, a little more quiet, a little more thoughtful so you could turn to me." That's definitely me. I have grown so much closer to my Savior and have relied on him. Now, the ward loves me, treats me the same and I am able to be myself. Amazing how the Lord works right?

I have many more miracles to share but just don't have time! I have been witnessed more times than I can count that the Lord loves me. He is aware of me. He wants me to be happy but won't let me live half a life. He gives me my "full potential" of trials! 

Love you all!

Hna Lake