ALL things testify there is a God.

So my comps family sends her stuff. which means.....I get stuff too. score. This week we were pleasantly suprised with delicious turkey jerky and jelly bellys, costco size. so good! we have very much so enjoyed planning sessions. especially our 3 our weekly planning. after eating jelly bellies for 3 hours we thought that we should probably stop. However, with our gift of jelly bellies, a note of warning calls to us. The dreadful COFFEE flavored brown one. which is really close to the root beer colored brown one. like, I can't tell the difference, and that's saying something if I can't tell a difference in color. well,   we have devised ways to avoid the coffee ones, did you know they actually have coffee in them? yeah, fun fact. ...#missionprobs. (yeah, I just used a "hash tag" sometimes I feel cool)

well, I am here to testify of Christ and His docterine. 

 Yesterday, we were talking with some recent converts who are teenagers, who we visited saturday night, but STILL didn't come to church. what?! well, talking to them sunday night, they were saying how they have all of their things to do and don't have time to go to church. But really, we all know that their time just wasn't organized correctly. If we put God first, the rest will work out. I am a witness of this. I'm not sure how, but it does. Just like the cute young womens example of putting the big rocks in the jar before the sand and little rocks, if we do the important things first, it works, if we don't, it doesn't all fit. I testify that this is true. That is it important to put important things first!

If I had more time I could make a cool gospel connection to avoiding the coffee flavored jelly beans. there is always a gospel connections. as alma, or amulek says "all things testify that there is a grand creator" all things testify of God. even avoiding coffee flavored jeally beans. 

I am glad with the goodness that I get to witness and learn from. I am grateful for tender mercies.  I am grateful for good friends and parents, family, and others. I am also grateful for my socks that I rolled up in a ball and threw against a wall for my exercize in the morning....yes, I'm getting desperate, but creativity will make things work.  

life with the Latins

I had a fantastic couple of hours of conversation with my comp, elder swayer, and hno. Muñoz who used to be a bishop and now has like 4 callings, including one in the stake.  Him, and his young family are really sweet. We talked a lot about difficult, deep, or profound questions dealing with the gospel. It was a spiritual feast. It was so nice to be able to talk with people that understand,  have bright ideas and comments, and who like to know. I jotted down some notes after we finished talking. 

If we don't follow everything that God tells us, it is as if we are saying that we know more than God. 

 use my talents to bless others, or else it is nothing. 

living the law of consecration. 

 the importance and ability to live free spiritually and economically; otherwise, we become slaves or subject to debt, to temptation, to emotiones. 

with the more knowledge and intelligence that we have the stronger our resistance is to evil. 

The glory of God is intelligence. 

dicipline is what makes america so ....awesome. 

avoidance of addictions in any form. 

efforts to become like God. 

That was just some of what we talked about. It was so good and really refreshing. it was like a thrill or rush of the spirit. It was really neat to talk with someone with more life experience. with a family, with a testimony. 

Another highlight of the week was the relief society valentines day activity. Latins know how to party, aren't shy, bashful or self-conscious. Let's just say it was the first pagent I have been to at a church activity. It was really hilarious to watch my comp get elected to be "hermana amistad" to the cat walk, give a speach, and then be crowned hna. amistad 2014. I guess she needs to return next year to pass  along the title. Good stuff. a lot of fun and laughter. 

I have tried a new tactic for my mission. To decide that whatever I am doing, in that moment, is like my favorite thing to do. It's okay to be happy now. we don't alsways have to be waiting for a moment, event, or situation to have happiness. even if it is walking in a hot desert in a skirt and sweaty shoes. it's like the BEST!

I know this gospel is true. and the more I learn, the more I love it. The more I feel confident that I am where I need to be. study and learn. Knowledge and our families are what we get to take with us in the next life. 

mission, round 2.

Zacapa. My new area is pretty great. It is smaller than my old one, but a lot more hilly and ...still hot. I''m in for a treat when april rolls around. 

Sometimes it is hard to believe that it is winter here. We were eating lunch one day when we realized that the olympics were on. It really took me a minute to think if it is winter or summer olympics right now. Winter. but there is a  reason why winter olympics aren't held in guatemala. 

My new companion, Hermana Potrie, is great. She is from California in the same mission as my sister susan. My companion speaks pretty good spanish, especially for only having 5.5 months as a missionary. She has lot of love for people, and teaches with the spirit. I have been blessed with some of the charity that I have been praying for, and all of the prejudice that I shouldn't have ever had, is gone. It's a humbling experience to be in a new area as senior comp, but not knowing how to lead without knowing the area and how things work here. I'm learning a bunch of new names everyday, I sure hope they stick. All of the memebers and recent converts here love hermana Winward (the old comp of hna. potrie) I have a LOT to live up to and to get these people to accept me. Hna. winward is very different from me, but I hope to do a good work with my time here, in Zacapa. 

I had a good experience teaching the first half of the plan of salvation the other day. The woman and her children didn't know very much of anything with the gospel (at least that is what we understood) so I was explaining the purpose of this life. I talked about Christ and his atonement being center and key to this plan. How we need to follow the gospel of Jesus Christ, have faith in him, repent, be baptised, and endure to the end with the guide of the holy ghost. To have a family, teach them these things, get a body, and proove faithful to Jesus Christ. Afterward, my companion asked the investigator what she thought about what I said, the woman said that everything that I had said was beautiful. success! I was able to share something, docterine, beautifully, I hope with the spirit, and with enough spanish skill not to kill the beauty of the message.

 

Adios Barrios

Well, I have changes....just as I thought I would. Finishing up 5.5 months in Puerto Barrios has been good. wow. five and a half months, in my first week, I probably wouldn't beleive that 5.5 months would ever actually come. Now that it has, I'm scared to leave.

I am going to Zacapa. Out side of the captial...still. Not very many people have two areas outside of the cap. But I'm not too many people. It's gonna be hot, but it's dry there from what I hear.

my comp. She is from america, has 5.5 months as a missionary (including the 6 weeks from the MTC) aaaaaaaaaand I'm gonna, I guess, pretend that I can understand spanish all of the way. I think we will live, but I'll probably do something wrong, "not listen" to someone, and probably offend somebody. but It'll be okay.

The primary was super sweet and gave me and hna. Zuniga (she is done with her mission) a necklace and a ring and wrote their names on a card and sang us a song and took a picture with us. They were pretty cute all giving us hugs and kisses. I love these kids, I hope someday I'll get to work in the primary (probably just cursed myself....that's okay).

apparently I'm a pretty good catch. There was this old man and his wife that we contacted and were talking to, and by the end of the conversation he was telling me that I needed to choose wisely a good husband ...." you have beautiful hair, your eyes are beautiful, you body is perfect; what more could someone ask!? " I said thank you..in that awkward, thanks old man, I'm glad you think I'm super pretty, try telling that to the boys back in Provo. There was also this other woman who couldn't stop staring at my eyes, it was kinda weird, but I understand, I'M not even sure what color my eyes are.

funny story. My comp, hna Ynjo, and I were laying in the hammock together (feet to head) one night, after planning, and then we heard the rope break a bit, we looked at eachother with scared faces, and about a second later, the whole rope broke and we fell to the floor. I was pretty scared to hit my head or something, but the both of us were fine. Good stories like falling from a hammock are always fun.

The Liahona is AMAZING I understand why hna. Ramirez would spend hours reading the liahona in her spare time. I read almost all of the issue for january in one sitting. The messages from God to his children are real and continuing. We have a profet today that helps leads the church of Jesus Christ. He receives revelation, as well as the other general authorities which are pertinate to our day. I am grateful to have so many wonderful resources learn from and build my faith in my Savior, Jesus Christ.

the pictures are of me and the primary (and their leaders) and ...me on a pretty sketchy bridge that needs new wood almost every time it rains. I get scared to cross that bridge, that day wasn't too bad at all.