2/27/17: Temple Trip

This week included a trip to the temple! We left bright and early Thursday morning at 3 am! We left the bus terminal at 4am and got to guayaquil at about 8am. Then we arrived at the temple and went to a session in the morning. Later, we waited in the temple housing and studied a bit then got to go do iniciatories which was really cool, then we went to another session right after in the night! 2 sessions in one day. Such a cool experience. Then on friday we had a multizone conference and at the end all the people who are leaving next month had to go up front and give their testimonies. terrifying.

    So we´re teaching the daughters of a less active woman that´s also named maria castro..and it´s funny because she lives like 6 houses away. #whichmaria But she has 3 children and 2 aren´t bapitzed and the 2 girls aredying to get baptized,haha. One is named Paulina,10, and the other domenica,8, and they showed us their book of mormon, complete with princess stickers. They´ll be getting baptized on march 18th! Pray that everything goes well and that their father also gives them permission..we taught him once and he´s nice. Him and maria are separated so it´s kind of complicated. 

   Strange thing, this week I´ve have 2 dreams that one of our investigators, maria castro (the other one) got baptized! The first time was friday night and I just remember seeing her get baptized. Then this morning I woke up and remembered my dream and it was the weirdest dream ever. I was walking on some dirt road and i was talking to mom on the phone (rule breaker) while I was filling out the baptism record (okay, it´s called ficha bautismal in spanish so I´m not sure how to say it in english) of maria castro. I was also walking past an evangelical church and they were all singing and clapping and I was telling mom that I couldn´t hear her because they were singing too well. Not sure what it means but we´ll see! Maria Castro hasn´t really been progressing so I´m so confused about these dreams, because I usually never remember my dreams. We´ll see. 

   Carnaval also started on saturday and ends tomorrow,it´s basically just a holiday where everyone gets each other wet with buckets and water balloons..but we´re working as normal and so far no one has gotten us wet! 

    Well, time´s going by super quick. I´m trying to enjoy every moment I have here and soak up all the sun I can! Love you all so much!!! CHAO CHAO!

2/20/17: Miraculous Recovery of Her Memory Card

Oh man, this is going to be one speedy email because we had to send photos of our house to the misison haha. But to answer your questions (im just going to write everything right here) I did find my drivers license, expires 9/19. and that's fine about the money, haha.

   This week....went by so fast! as always. We brought like 3 menos activo families to church this week which was awesome but none of our investigators came...everyone went to go vote in el centro because yesterday were the elections, what. I think the new president`s name is lenin or something like that. 

   We passed by for maria mendoza and things are looking so great for her...she was kind of acting like  a child and was like no I dont want to be bapitzed anymore because we taught her the law oc chasitity and she told us she has UN OTRO compromiso that lives in portoviejo, and we told her if she wants to be baptized she has to end it or get married. SHE wants to get married but he doesn`t. Never thought I`d have to tell people things like this,haha. But yeah, she was a little molesta with us. She just needs to soften her heart and repent! Well enought about that. 

  It`s been raining less, it`s still pretty hot, I made no bake cookies this week and gave them to a family of members. Hope they liked them! Today I`m makin another batch, gotta win over the hearts of the members withcookiies so that they give us references and go with us to the lessons...I mean....

   But yeah, everything`s going good, this week we`ll have more people in church! LOVE YOU ALL! CHAO CHAO!

These are the photos from last week, now I have my memory card again! Miraculous recovery. We took some photos on the street that we walk each day...right in front of the beach!

2/13/17: Happy Valentine's Day!

Happy almost valentines day! Totally forgot about that until reading the subject line of everyone´s emails haha. I´ll be sure to eat something chocolate tomorrow. This week we traveled to Guayaquil on wednesday to go to the verification of the 6 weeks of my companion and then we stayed in the house in the sector called florida, then returned thursday nght. 8 hours in total traveling in bus!woo! So update, maria castro came to church yesterday which was great because it was raining SO hard yesterday morning and there were like 40 people at church. But Maria Mendoza didn´t come and I was heart broken! We called her and passed by her house but she wasn´t there. We taught her on Friday about the word of wisdom because she drinks coffee and she told us that she stopped drinking coffee after we told her like a week ago that we don´t drink coffee. whattt. But something weird that happend is that when we got to her house her grandaughter came out and said that someone was smoking in her house and then maria came out and smelled like smoke and we asked her during the lesson if she smokes and she was like no, it makes me sick I could never smoke! And I asked her if she was alone with her grandkid and she said yes. confused...

 Also..we took some awesome photos this morning but I was a fool and put my memory card in the wrong slot of the computer and now I can´t get it out...so pray that we can rescue it! Just all the pictures from my mission,no big. It´s been raining every few days here and it´s been SUPER hot. WELL; i´m going to try to rescue my memrory card somehow. WIsh me luck! CHAO CHAO: 

2/6/17: Missionary Manicure and Lots of Rain

Another week! Yesterday Maria Mendoza and her daughter Luz Clara Cedeño came to church and they loved! They were so cute all dressed up. Practically members. But we found out yesterday that her husband, who she´s NOT married to, lives in the same house as her..theyve been sepearted for 10 years and sleep in different rooms and he like had another wife and got married to another woman and had a family with her and the hose beongs to maria but he doesn´t want to leave...so we´re praying that she´ll have permission to get bapitzed...my soul is so pained for her! She NEEDS to get baptized, not to name favorites but she´s probably my favorite investigator,haha. Her and her daugter are SO great and already have testimonies of the church and the book of mormon. Pray that they can get baptized the 25th of february!

   This week we had intercambios and I went to montecristi with hermana franco and it rained SO hard. Then yesterday we went to the house of the 2nd counselor to eat lunch and after one of his family members who paints nails had brought this giant tub of nail polish and was like sit down Im going to paint your nails! So I had my first manicure yesterday...I felt really weird, a missionary getting her nails down? haha. But she really wanted to paint them so watcha gonna do. 

   I also saw a quote this week that I LOVE, so here it is.¨Men and women who turn their lives over to God will discover that He can make a lot more out of their lives than they can. He will deepen their joys, expand their vision, quicken their minds, strengthen their muscles, lift their spirits, multiply their blessings,increase their opportunities, comfort their souls,raise up friends and pour out peace.´-Ezra Taft Benson. 

   Well, it´s still raining here and we´re still wearing our ponchos (sometimes...other times I just don´t bother) but everything´s going well here in Jaramijo. LOVE YOU! CHAO!

Didn´t have many photos from this week,. just this one from the grocery store! I decided I´m going to try all the weird fruits I can while here.