My Birthday in Guatemala

 this past week was great. i have a wonderful companion and zone. on my birthday they gave me ice cream from mangos and had balloons for me and letters. they were so cute, oh also fireworks, it is tradition here to have fireworks for peoples birthdays. i was thinking when i heard them "ah they just broke the rules for me!!!!" ah!!! to tell the truth i felt a little terrible. this week i was thinking how in the mission i have become so much more obedient i know that i need to work on it more because i am not perfectly obedient but i am so much more than i was before the mission. i think it's one trait that i have always had but it is developing more on the mission. i think of the stripling warriors and how they obeyed with exactness. how amazing is that! they followed everything that was commanded of them! in the mission we have the mission manual and rules in the mission and i am trying to follow them but i do fall short at times. this is when we can be thankful for the atonement and repent. 

i loved reading the ensign for this month and reading how the atonement is so deep that we at times do not understand it but at the same time it is so simple. atonement is when Jesucristo died for our sins and made it possible to live with our Heavenly Father. but in the talk by Elder Bednar he said that it is to help bad people become good and to help good people become better. at times we think that it is only for people that have just sinned but it is for all of us everyday. i think it is amazing to be learning more about the gospel in the mission and teaching others how to live it. to tell the truth, when i teach it is when i personally learn. we are helping others to learn, but i know that i am the one learning. i love my mission and am so thankful that i have every day.

Testimony of Scriptures

we found a family Friday that is really positive!!! we are really excited, the husband had so many questions and felt the spirit. the challenge is getting them to church. they work so hard every day to provide for their family. they sell mangos so they gave us some yesterday and oh man they were good... i was thinking how when i go home i ll sure miss them so i am going to eat as much as i can!!!! but there is so much fruit here, its like paradise i love it! but this week was fun because we have been contacting like crazy and its fun seeing how my Spanish has gotten better and thinking how to teach people when they have doubts or questions. but one thing i know is always bear your testimony... so here we travel on a bus to Guitarra and this bus gets packed! also this past Friday there was one pastor on the bus preaching. it was interesting listening to him and thinking oh i wanna look up those scriptures, my comp is funning because she knows the Bible really well and understands Spanish better and she tells me how this other scripture would contradict what he said. she is really funny, she cracks me up. but we had great lessons with people where they had scriptures and we would have lessons with just scriptures. this really helped me think how blessed i am to have my comp and to be learning so much more about the scriptures. to not just use the same ones but always search for more, my testimony has grown about the Bible and the Book of Mormon, they really are semejante... umm.... together haha they support each other and help us be able to understand the doctrine of Jesus and Heavenly Father better. there are so many churches on the earth and they all have the bible but they have so many different doctrines. i love bearing my testimony to people about the Book of Mormon and the church. i think how if it wasn´t for my mission i probably would have never learned the importance of being a witness of Heavenly Father. i am so thankful i am here and thankful i am learning these things.

The Rain is Coming Back

so the rain is coming back... happy but not. haha. i feel like i am in a greenhouse.... it rains and the heat is crazy! so yeah i am in a greenhouse right now.... but i took out my chinas and was ready to walk in the water again, but i know in a few months it will be getting a lot worse. my companion is enjoying it, she always says she gets tired when it rains and i tell her well you will be really tired for these next 6 months and especially in october. that's when it gets crazy!

so this past week we baptized jaun! i don´t know if you remember him but we have been working with him for about 2 months. he was going to be baptized last month but presidente told us to wait and we did. it is crazy to see a change in him. he is a different person and he is really funny. he is like a little kid and he says some pretty funny things that make us laugh. i felt bad though because none of his family wanted to come to his baptism. i know he was sad too. the bishop talked to him afterwards and said that the ward is his family now. but i just can´t help to think how the gospel is so true, it changes so many lives and helps people see their purpose. i love working with investigators, converts and less actives, they are all at different levels of growth but i love seeing how the Lord cares for all of them and wants to help them all have the gospel.... the mission is wonderful.... i am so thankful that i am here and thankful that i have this chance to meet so many people and learn from them.

i wanted to tell you about one family. hermana oniele. she is a convert and has 7 kids and is a single mother. she is the only one providing for all her children and they are really poor. but she is such a hard worker and is always helping others. every time we visit her i am uplifted and think to myself how strong her faith is. the talk during conference about single moms hit my heart because i thought of her. but one elder's brother in the states did a project for his boy scouts where he bought shoes and sent them here for the children because a lot of them do not have shoes and we took some to her kids... they were so happy and it touched my heart. she is such a wonderful person. one thing she told me is it is hard living at times and we have difficulties but we should not drop the church because that is where we get our strength to keep going. she is such a hard worker and she has health problems but she keeps going.

felicidades pascua

this past week was way different because of Easter and the way they celebrate it here. for three days we were in the capilla in our stake center reading the Book of Mormon.... our goal was to finish it in 3 days... yeah we only got to Mormon but my comp went ahead and read all of it. i can say that i understand more Spanish... its cool seeing my Spanish improve. such a huge blessing. we would enter the capilla at 9 in the morning and come back at 9 at night so i really did not see all that they did during this time for Easter. but wed night is the night when Judus betrayed Jesus so a group of people have a mannequin of Judus and they go to door to door asking for money. when you give them money they do a little dance for you. then on friday it was almost to get to the capilla because this is the day people close off the streets by parking their cars to block it and they decorate the streets with this material, i don´t know what it is called, but they call this alfombra. it reminds me a lot of sand paintings. i did not get a pic because when we left for the capilla the people in our street had not finished theirs yet. i saw only one that was finished and it was so pretty... a lot of colors! but it was fun trying to read throughthe whole Book of Mormon. And i got to make smores, brownies and cake! it was also good getting to know the zone better and making friends.

but one evening we headed to fam rodriguz to teach them, we teach them every Friday. but this lesson was so hard.... we have been meeting with them for 2 months, and they really have not been progressing... i know that it is our fault because we have not been following up on the commitments so we told them this week to read chapter 1 as a family and this month we will just keep having them read the Book of Mormon. but they did watch two sessions of general conference and the wife loved it.

the other hermanas in our ward baptized a family last month and this family wanted us to eat dinner at their house. they live in bendicion and it was a little late when we finally ate. but they are a family of 7 and they are so wonderful. i really enjoyed just talking to the hermano because he knows so much about the bible and it was just fun looking at scriptures with him. my comp is amazing with the bible i learn so much from her every time. but when we were with the family i was humbled because they do not have very much and yet they are so happy. they didn´t have light and we ate by candlelight. it was such a beautiful experience. i really enjoyed it... also it was so good to just see how he was so happy to be a member and to be learning so much more about the gospel. this is the reason why i cannot drop fam rodriguiz because i see freddie in some ways like hilgio dias and his 5 children. i know this can bless thier lives.... but that is all that is happening right now. the raining season will start to slowly come back and i am looking forward to it but at the same time no... hahha but i am loving every moment of my mission.

bueno pues!!!!!

the conference talks were wonderful. they really touched my heart. we had two investigators go, juan and silvia. juan was there for all 5 sessions! we were so excited about that and silvia was only for the morning session... we need to follow up with her and ask her what she felt but also fam rodriguiz said they would watch it at their house on friday and i pray they did. i wanted to call them but he told us friday that he would rather wait until the next meeting with us to talk about it..... but honestly during the whole confference i thought hey this talk is for silvia o juan or other of our investigators. it was so cool just seeing how the lord has messages for all of us.. not just members in the church but also those investigating the church. being a missionary has really made me love conference so much more... has made me just have a greater love for the gospel and the blessing it is in our lives. on saturday when the last speaker was speaking i was thinking noooo i can not wait until sunday to hear more.... than on sunday the last session i thought i wish this would never end.... but then i realize the lord has given all these messages to help us in these following 6 months, yeah i wanna just listen but what will i learn if i do not go out and put it to practice? i loved what President Thomas S Monson said, that we are better people today than we were 2 days ago. i know that this life is to help us prepare to live with our Heavenly Father. that we are giving council from our prophet and apostles to help us learn and know how we can have eternal life. i loved hearing the messages and feeling the love of the Lord for me and for our investigators. now i got to put into practice what they said and help the wonerful people of Guatemala feel this in thier lives as well.

My District went to a Lagoon today. It was beautiful!