I am just loving the heck out of this...

Thank you all so much for your letters this week. They were just awesome. And as a sidenote to friends, I am getting really bad a writing and then not going to the post office....so just so you know you´ll all be getting letters soon. I just always forget to send them. Lo siento! :)

I am so glad to hear about your experiences this week. I loved hearing about your spiritual experiences, and also about the fact that you all get to house the missionaries for a few days! YAY! What a blessing. Also, Dad, when I heard about the fact that you were not sure you had enough people for them to teach, I thought to myself that you need to invite the neighbors over to the house and invite the missionaries over and have a Noche de Hogar (FHE). Seriously though, do it. :) If you can´t do it this week do it sometimes. I am learning that we cannot be the ones to hinder the work. The members are so so so very crucial in this work. The missionaries really are the worst friends ever to the investigators, because in the end we all leave them. They have to have trust in the members. You have to invite people to your house and have the missionaries come teach them in the house. That is where the success is. The Spirit is different in the houses of members, we all know that, we just have to take advantage of that. We learned something this week that amazed me: if every member brought one friend into the Gospel every year, the entire world would be members in 9 years. Why should we wait? There is no time to wait. There is work to be done. I promise that if the entire ward´s focus was on missionary work, the entire ward would have more success (more active, happier, less family problems, whatever the case may be). The only thing that makes missionaries different that regular members is the fact that they are baring their testimony all the time. Because we are doing that we have the Spirit with us all the time...and we are so so so happy all the time! Gosh, I just am learning so much. I told President in my letter to him this week, that I really just feel like I am getting the behind the scenes of success in life and in the Gospel. It´s living what we are teaching...but really we gain an undeniable testimony of these things by teaching them. I am begging anyone who reads this letter to please please please pray about your friends and family and pick someone, invite them to your house, and invite the missionaries to come over and have a Family Home Evening with them. This is important, and you will see miracles in your life and theirs. BE A MEMBER MISSIONARY. Those are the best missionaries that exist. Missionaries like us are not able to do this work without members...it is so very impossible without you.

Well, enough of my preaching. Can you tell I am working on trying to be more bold when I teach? This was my goal for this week, and I finally feel like my Spanish is to the point that I can carry on pretty well in conversation, and so I am using that in my teaching. I am trying to testify and teach with more boldness. It has been really cool this week. I am realizing that there has to be boldness in this message...it is a message that will change lives. It is different because Jesus Christ was different...and so is His message. We can´t treat it like it is just some book on a shelf. The Book of Mormon is the journal of Prophets who saw and touched the hands of Jesus Christ Himself. We can know how that is to see His face; we have all this at such easy access...why would we keep that to ourselves?

Well, some really great things happened this week. I don´t know if I told you all about Karen, but she is getting baptized at the end of this month! I really feel so so good about her. She was prepared, and she had so many perfect questions. We are so excited about her.

Also, I got to eat McDonalds this week! We were in Puerto Montt for our Zone Conference on Wednesday so we went to the mall food court...I got a Cajita Feliz (Happy Meal). It´s pretty legit.

Conference was spectacular, as always....so good that I don´t have time to write all my notes or feelings, but it was about working harder and having faith that we can meet our goals.

Also the coolest part of this week is that our investigators are really starting to progress. This is really the first time that I can see people really changing...a lot. Gosh. The best part is that it is happening with a lot of our families that we are working with. We are so so blessed right now. I am in love with this. I don´t remember if I have talked to you all about Jose and Cecilia but Cecilia joined the church maybe 6 or 7 years ago, and was inactive for much of the time...her husband never joined, and now they have 3 little girls. Cecilia is starting to come back to church, and Jose is showing great progress. So we are pumped about them. Also we are going to try and start working with the husband of the RS president who has been working with the missionaries on and off for a really long time, but is afraid that a year after he is baptized he will be branch president (yeah he is that great...I would believe it too.). Also the COOLEST thing that happened this week is that we have been working with a family that is the family of the District President´s daughter´s boyfriend (if that makes any sense). We found them knocking doors, and they let us in and then we found out who they were, but we have been working with them for about 2-3 months now...Erna and Roly. Roly has been really sick with a tumor in his brain, and we went over last night with President Pinto (the district president), and he gave him a blessing. Roly and his family have changed completely. Roly offered to say the closing prayer...in all these months I have never heard him pray. His pray was of gratitude for the Spirit he felt when the hands were on his head. It was the most beautiful and sincere prayer I have every heard. It was so powerful. We are going to see lots of progress with them, and they are going to be a great strength in the Church.

Well this is all I have time for. I wish I could write more...I always do. But you´ll just have to read my journal when I get back! Love you all so so so so so very much. Take care..