Gracias, Gracias!

Dear Family and friends

First, I just want to send the biggest thank you to....

MOM and AUNT SUZY. you are both saints. I got the packages and almost started BAWLING. I was so excited and aunt Suzy? I don’t even know how to thank you enough. SO many of those things were JUST what we needed and I am currently using all of the pencils, stickers, pictures and everything to help me in my thirty minutes of trying to help the primary kids behave. Aunt Suzy, thank you thank you thank you! For every thoughtful thing was SO perfect, since we have next to no access to Deseret book and church things like that. THANK YOU!

Last Sunday, Fernanda was fasting because, yes, she has a baptismal date, yes she is getting married, but she has been looking for a job for almost six months. Not just any job, she wants a job because her degree is to be a social assistant. As long as we have been teaching her, she has been looking for a job. And finally, she was called in for an interview last Thursday. She was so nervous, but was fasting on Sunday that she would get the call on Monday...and she didn’t get the call. We went to visit her on Tuesday morning and she cried for only the second time that I have seen in my four months of knowing her--she cried but was still sitting there, eating her breakfast, and firm in her faith. 

That afternoon, we got a call from Fernanda, and breathlessly she told us that the company had called...and she had got the job that was absolutely perfect for her.

It was so incredible. We are not alone in this work. The phrase came to mind: "you can put your money on the Lord!!" 

As I bore my testimony that it was a blessing of obedience, she said "oh, of course, I know it was a blessing of the Lord..." and bless her heart, just yesterday went searching for the tithing slips so that she can start paying her tithing immediately. 

In the words of our ward missionary leader in our meeting this week: "It´s not a joke, the moment she is baptized we are going to make her teacher of principios del evangelio since she already knows everything"...but we are still working with Fabian. oh Fabian. Oh! But fun fact...they are currently demolishing the chapel so Fernanda is going to be baptized in the river, Jesus style hahaha. Awesome.

My other favorite moment of this week was with a new investigador, named Alondra. We taught her for the first time on Saturday, and we taught her the first lesson, but as we taught, the spirit was just testifying of the truth of our message, and about half way through i asked her what had called her attention in what we had taught. She hesitated, and then said "the light in you two, your eyes, the way that you talk about your message. this, more than anything."

"Alondra, if you feel something, it is the holy ghost, bearing testimony that this is truth..."

and as we continued, in the end we bore our testimony of Joseph smith and the evidence of the restauracion that we are god´s children and that he loves us, and she began to cry. She accepted a baptismal date, and as she prayed in the end she said "thank you for sending me this message, I know you will give me an answer that it is true, and I have the intention to get baptized"

It was a moment that you treasure in the mission--a moment that you work, walk, knock, talk and cry for, that you pay for in sweat and tears and blistered feet, but those moments that I realize that there are people who are waiting, and that this work is so much greater than I ever realize. I just hope that she continues to progress, because I have seen so many people who accept dates, who have all that happiness at the tips of their fingers, and then give it up. Darn agency haha. 

But anyways, I love you all!! I hope you all know how much I appreciate your support. 

 Love, Hermana Monroe

Our Papitas standing in front of their house.

We live in a little house behind theirs, we go in at the gate and around to the left.

With my papitas...please don't judge me, I let my companion dress me!