Gratitude

Familia,

HEY LOOK! I ATTACHED TWO PICTURES!! Dont get too excited, its not cause I fixed my memory card or anything, its cause the person who works in the ciber cafe finally knew how to work the scanner and I had him scan two pictures from the last transfer that were already printed haha. But hey, you are all welcome.

The one with the niña is Maria de Jesus` daughter who we have stopped teaching, but everytime we pass their house she yells "HERMANAS!!" and runs to hug us and tells us she loves and miss us. Shes a cutie. We were matching so we took the picture. 

The other is my companion Hermana Tah when we were on a bus. Cool stuff.

In the way of this week... I basically was just overwhelmed with gratitude for my upbringing. My country, my house, my parents, my siblings, my ward, my stake, my schools, etc. This week I just noticed even more how poorly some of these people live and I am just SO BLESSED. One day I will be able to share with you all more specific experiences, but sometimes I wonder if I am over priveledged and they are all living the normal life, or if I am the norm and they are living under priveledged... WE DO NOT realize how blessed we are there in the states. I pour my heart out to the Lord to care for these sweet families that are trying so hard to just put food on the table and clothing on their backs. Or have someone to watch their kids while they are at work.. which often they cant find. They cant even focus on providing the means for a better future for their children because they have to focus on the needs of today. For example, Dad, you work so hard every day to yes, provide for us daily, but are constantly working on ways to improve our future and the future of our children, and so forth (yes.. so forth... insert winky face). 

One experience I had that also made me think more about my upbringing is that there is a teenage girl here, a friend of a member, who wants to be baptized, but her dad wont let her and her mother passed away many years ago. He wont let her even go to church, but she attends seminary and loves it and just wants to be baptized. This week she was allowed to go to church for some reason.. only the second time in her whole life.. and she got up and bore her testimony. It was beautiful. But what called my attention even more was that her member friend could not hold back the smile on her face. She was trying to stay casual, but the joy was just spilling over. And then she bore her testmiony about seminary and the gospel and everything and it made me think about how very blessed I was to grow up in the church and to have the family that I have. Yall continuously bless me.. including your weekly letters.. they are SO VERY OFTEN exactlyyyyyy what I need. I love you all so much.

Thank you for everything!! Please keep up the prayers for our investigators. and that we can really get the support we need from the members and leaders here. It is so very cructial for the retention of the children of God.