The Old Man is Snoring

When we bring our umbrellas with us, it doesn´t rain.... When we decide not to bring them with us, we get soaked.

I´m soaking wet and I´m emailing you still. because I love you. It´s funny though. Hermana Mendez and I went to the office today to get her money back from the millions of dollars we have to pay for rent and water and all of that fun stuff and it started raining while we were waiting... and the elders were shocked that we would leave in the tormenta... but it´s p-day!! We´ve got stuff to do. Hermana LaPierre took a picture as we left because it literally took 3 seconds for us to be soaked to the bone. and we just laughed as we walked to the store to buy our food because people can´t handle weather here.. A little rain falls from the sky and everyone runs for cover... but here there is this equatoriana and this blonde american walking in the pouring rain without umbrellas and we´re laughing and smiling... People stare at me reguardless... but this was extra special. It was hilarious. Maybe you just had to be here but I´m still laughing at all of the people huddled together under canopies of the stores and us just trudging through the rain and the puddles having a good old time...

Now I´m freezing though. urgh.

I wonder what Posadas would do if it snowed.... aaahhh. I don´t even wanna know.

This week was a rollercoaster again... I don´t even understand my own thoughts anymore. This week was horrible. seriously horrible but in the same week, it was one of the best weeks of my mission. Someone please explain to me how that works.

For some weird reason, I´m always nautious. How do you spell that? I always feel sick. Like I want to throw up but I can´t. It´s weird... But I think I figured it out.

Imagine if you were to go to lagoon... No 6 flags cause 6 flags has cooler rollercoasters. Imagine you´re in 6 flags. and you really like that new rollercoaster Triple X or something like that... So you ask the dude working the rollercoaster if you can just ride the same one all day without getting off... He lets you. Cool... After 3 turns, you´re going to throw up. You want to throw up just thinking about it, right?? That´s how the mission is. And I decided that´s why I feel nautious all of the time. That is totally spelled wrong... Oops.

POR FIN!!! I had real investigators at church yesterday. Everyone can cry happy tears for me. It was the best thing ever and I was so proud!! Florencia. Her spouse... boyfriend. Everyone here calls their boyfriends and girlfriends husband and wife.. even if they aren´t really married. It´s confusing. and there is a SERIOUS problem with unmarried people living together and having families together here. So we have to ask everyone if they are really married. whatever. But Florencia´s esposo is a member of the church. He has been for his entire life really and his whole family belongs to the church. But they have a daughter. She is the most beautiful baby in the world and her name is Maitena. Gorgeous. But Florencia has been meeting with the missionaries for at least a year. And she is basically a member of the church really, she just needs to get married before she can be baptized. She has been visiting her family in Buenos Aires for the past 2 months that I have been here and that´s why I just barely met her. But she is incredible. Im in love. really. We had the greatest lesson with her on Friday. We went to her house with Claudia and we talked about the blessings of eternal marriage. and PRAYER. It was so incredible I don´t even know if I can explain it. Sorry. The spirit was so strong. I feel the spirit all of the time... but this was different. And she got emotional and I think I saw something change in her. Like her priorities are changing. They just bought a new car... A car is more important that eternal salvation. NO. and they have other things that they are saving up to buy... but I think that with a little more time these priorities will change. They are begining to realize that this whole marriage thing is seriously important... if they want to be a forever family. They´ve got to do it now. We taught from D&C 132.. Read it. We are seriously so blessed.

Hermana Elva. Our other investigator that came to church. Basically she is a Evangelical Pastora. She even had to get permission from the Pastor that is like her boss to come with us. and her church was having a worldwide fast yesterday and she came to church with us!! Granted, we had to pay for her taxi to and from the church because she is missing one leg. which is really cool because her hermano is a member. Hermano Ramon. He tool the discussions for FOREVER and was finally baptized. but he lost his leg too.. and they are siblings. He struggles coming to church cause he´s the only member in his family and no one wants to drive him to church and we don´t have many members with cars and taxis are a bit expensive... but we were able to get him to church with his sister who is a pastor and it was great! I think that Elva likes her lively worship services but she definitely felt the spirit which is really so cool. Such a blessing.

This week we had emergency divisions with the Hermana Lideres. Becuase I got really frusterated with Hermana Mendez... I always get really frusterated when she doesn´t know what she´s doing. but we never talk about it so Hermana Mendez just holds everything inside until she explodes at a random moment when I have no idea what I´m doing wrong. She is really rude sometimes telling me that she doesn´t like my attitude and all of this crap.. and it´s hard cause She freaks out at the most random times and she doesn´t have the patience to explain what I need to change so I don´t know how to change to make things better. But we had divisiones which was really great. They called us in the middle of a lesson and told us they were coming to find us.. I was with Hermana Rejas this time and it was so great. I learned so much from her. And we were able to talk about our problems and we fixed them. And we are better at talking about things that drive us crazy when they drive us crazy so that we can fix them and be happy.

Lessons are going better. We´re finding more and more people to teach everyday. The Lord is truly preparing people for us to find and to teach and to bring closer to Him. It´s incredible. I am so grateful to be a part of this marvelous work. It is such a blessing. I feel really selfish sometimes because I feel like the Lord is helping ME more than I am helping Him and more than I am helping His children here in Posadas. But I am trying more and more everyday to be the missionary that He wants me to be. Because He knows what he´s doing. I don´t. But with His help, I know that I can see miracles.

Oh my gosh cool miracle. So we had this really creepy person that we met the first week I got here and he said he didn´t remember his name and we thought he was just a bum and we see him all the time. But we have a new investigator... Tamara. haha mom... but it´s her BROTHER!!! and their mom is seriously distraught because the bum-- cristian. left his family.. which is seriously so sad so we were able to help them solve some problems and we shared a scripture about the responsibilities of a parent and hopefully it helped. Tamara is so cool. She smokes a ton and she is 22 she has a 6 year old and a 3 year old and her husband-- not really married is 40... So she´s a little crazy but so cool. Keep your eyes open for fun stories about her. She was really hard to break at first, luckily Hermana Zambrano was with Hna Mendez for that one cause Hna Zambrano is super frank and great... but yep. Cool miracle...

The Rojas Family is struggling. The dad left. Just up and left. so yesterday, we had a cool lesson with them and I was able to relate to the kids. Not that my dad left. He didn´t. I have the greatest parents in the world. but it was really cool to be able to literally on almost the exact same level.. I could relate to this family. And I think they really were touched that I´m not this perfect blonde from Utah. I have struggles and problems too. I´m real. It´s important to be a REAL missionary I think. The spirit is able to testify of things that we really can´t ourselves when we forget ourselves.. our insecurities, our problems and humble ourselves enought to say. look, I understand... my life isn´t perfect either but I am a living testimony that you can do this!!

We can do all things through Christ who strengthens us. :)

I love you all. I am so grateful for your love and support everyday.

Praying for you always.

xoxo

Hermana Karlie Bee!

Still can´t believe corb is a MISSIONARY!! Oh my goodness. How cool.

Challenge for the week!!: It says in True to the Faith that if we merely lounge about doing nothing on the sabbath, we fail to keep the day holy. Abstaining from work and recreation is NOT ENOUGH. Your challenge is to set goals and think of things you can do on Sundays to keep the day holy. A nap is fine... but do things that are productive... Like write your missionaries... Visit the sick and distressed... study. :)

Pictures:

We had Family home evening with the familia rojas on monday and made tacos!!

Hermana Rejas...

My Christmas tree!! I used all of my neckaces... our broken key and some ribbon to decorate it. And of course a bow on the top... a scarf for the tree skirt.. and I bought those cool owls. Wendy should be jealous. They were a little expensive... sorry mom. but so worth it!! Everytime we passed the store that I got them from, I would stare and stare and finally I had to just buy them. Merry Christmas to me!!