The Process of Becoming...

Hello all. I love your guts. I hope you are all doing ok. Things here are pretty good. We don’t have changes. There is a lot waiting here for us to do. We are needed here. There are only three hermanas older than me in the mish. Oh my gooshbar. Two go home this change and then one the next and then it’s me and Hermana Kirkham and Lundskog. Hermana Lundskog is from Utah and therefore will be going home with me on the plane. You guys and her fam will be waiting together while we come off the plane with arms linked. Haha It’ll be good. Valentine's Loves...
New president. Yes, we are getting a new one. We just found out who it is today. His last name is Armstrong. They are Americans. Crazy! I will not have him as my president though because Pres. Da Silva leaves (or finishes) his mission the exact same day that I do. Weird, eh? Apparently I’m only supposed to have him as pres… says the Lord haha. I love him. I’m glad it’s that way. The gang!
This week has been good with the work. We have been trying to get papers to get people married this week, but it’s going to take way too long. They won’t make it for this month... ugh, there is just too much in the process to be done. We went to the judge here and I reminded myself of you mom, begging and begging for them to bend the rules! haha But she wouldn’t have it. I had to give up and accept it. We met with Jessica and Augustin and they told us they didn’t want to get married after we just paid out of OUR POCKETS the money to send for their papers. She said it was too fast, but they can’t be baptized unless they do. Everyone (bishop and pres) has told us that’s how it needs to be. So we told them to go home and pray and figure it out with the Lord. They did just that and with lots of prayers, they came to us the next day and said they were going to get married. I feel like a counselor as a missionary. But we are trying to see this as a blessing that they and Jackalin will have to wait because to prepare them we would have had to see them every day this week and that left literally no time for other investigators. We have been blessed to find many more we think will progress well. More on that in a bit.

Tuesday we had our Minute To Win It activity. Everyone loved it. They had a blast and so did we. Besides that, everyone was OBSESSED with the chocolate chip cookies I made. I finally got them to be good in the ovens we have here. Yeah! Augustin playing games
Silly, cute boys!
Minute To Win It activity... so much fun!
We have seen Maira a few times and she is behaving so much better. It’s a miracle! Her mom even said so too. We are very proud of her.

We taught two of our recent converts, Ariel and Lucia, brother and sister. Their mom has been a member forever, but her husband wouldn’t let the kids be baptized. Because of that they ended up getting divorced. So sad, but she decided to move on without him. She has an awesome conversion story. When we went to the lesson, she came in and said I have someone you need to teach right away. In the meantime, she also found someone else and he wants to learn more. He has already given up drinking and smoking and came to church on Sunday. We will see what happens with him. She reminds me of Aunt Tammy… she’s awesome. She deserves the best.

I have finally become the missionary I want to be. I have managed to be disciplined. I have gained a testimony of the rules. I know how to teach well and I can bear strong testimony. I have all the tools I need to have success. I have been blessed with high spiritual experiences this week. I finished the conference Ensign and the end was wonderful. I am constantly being reminded of why this church is true: The music, the magazines, the leaders, the scriptures, the youth programs, everything that Heavenly Father has given us so that we can have success in this life and return to live with Him. His great purpose is to bring to pass our eternal life, which means everything we experience or have is for our benefit. How quickly people seem to forget that. How do we thank our Heavenly Father for all that he has given us? Do we do what we are supposed to? Do we get on our knees and thank him? It’s hard sometimes, but one thing I have learned while being here is that our Savior gave his very life for us. He let people kill and crucify him so we can be happy, have the ultimate happiness. All he asks us to do is... read our scriptures. Pray daily. Talk to him. Go to church for three hours a week and then have all the rest for ourselves. Dedicate a little bit of our time and talents to him. 18 months is nothing from me. I wish I could do more, just to show how grateful I am. It is literally the LEAST I can do. I still struggle to find the words to express my thanks to him in prayer. Sometimes I can’t do it and that frustrates me too. But all I can do is try. That’s all he asks of us. Just to push a little harder, go a little farther and he will pour down the blessings. We will be happier. It’s all for our happiness after all.

We had ward conference yesterday. A group of ward members formed a choir and as I was listening to them sing, I looked at each person and I thought of the hardships that I know each one of them are going through: a women with a blind husband, a woman who gave up everything to join the church (and lost everything else), the homeless, the lonely, the weak, the hungry… There was a little bit of everything in that group. I literally stand all amazed at the love Jesus offers us. How is it possible that he is aware of each one of them, each one of us, that he is working in our lives, that he is blessing each one of us, trying each one of us, listening to each one of us. I have no idea, it’s not comprehensible. But my testimony today is of that… that He is in each of our lives, he is listening, taking care of and lifting us. HE LOVES US more than we can imagine. Please don’t take advantage of the blessings you have. Use everything, every resource, we have to further his work and lift others as well. This is my prayer today. I love you all so much. Be strong, hang on to the iron rod. Know my prayers are with you, but more importantly that your Heavenly Father loves you and is with you. I love you so much. You’re so important to me and I think of you constantly. Have a good week.

Love, me… Ash

P.S. Thanks for your constant love and support and words of comfort. I can’t wait to see you again!

FAITH PRECEDES THE MIRACLE!!!

Hello all! Thank you for thinking of me and sending your kind love and words of wisdom and comfort. This week is the last week of the transfer. Changes are next week. I doubt we will change but... I guess we shall see. Happy Valentine’s Day and happy getting braces off day to Kenz! I’m so excited for you! I expect pictures next week. I lovesss you. FHE activity: water baseball!!
Oh boy, no idea where to start. I guess at the beginning… Tuesday was awesome! We had 44 people show up to our FHE activity. That’s like double what have been there the last two weeks. Three more ward families showed up and they even brought 11 investigators or 11 people, I guess I should say. Two of them have turned into investigators, more of that in a sec. But yes! Our plan is working! The ward is uniting and we are having other successes too. We played water baseball, but it was hard because NO ONE here knows what baseball is. They all got so confused at the rules. We didn’t realize that would happen, so we simplified the game a bit. The bases were huge pools of water and I got to wear normal clothes for the first time out in public for… I don’t know how long. It was great. Afterwards, my comp took the liberty of getting everyone against me and soaked me with the pools of water. It was fun though… I miss playing in water. (We pass a pool every day here and I crave to go to Seven Peaks. It’s killer!)

We had our zone conference. We didn’t meet the new President, but had a great training. President and Hermana Da Silva talked about obedience. I forget after teaching all the basic principles of the gospel on a daily basis just how complex and deep you can go with something so simple as obedience. That’s why it’s so awesome to be counseled as missionaries. We go back up to our normal level of learning and studying. It’s weird, and different, but it reminds me of real life. I was so touched and motivated by their words. I think that’s the point. But my comp and I knew we had to come home and change some things. During planning the next day, we set more goals for ourselves. President gave us the promise that the harder we strived just to get out of the house one minute earlier or wake up exactly at 6:30 or whatever it may be, that the Lord would bless us even more. And we would see miracles in the work, so we set goals just like that… with the faith and hope that it would help us even more.

We had a lesson with Augustin and Jessica afterwards. We decided she would benefit from seeing the Joseph Smith movie. I still love it. I have the entire thing memorized in Spanish. As we ended, my comp bore testimony of what we watched and asked Jessica what she thought. She said she believed and kinda got choked up. So did I. Once again, I had an incredible spiritual experience of my heart wanting to pound out of my chest. It’s the second time in my life it’s happened. I couldn’t speak and everyone was waiting for me to talk. It was amazing, and the spirit testified to me once again that Joseph Smith really was a prophet and how grateful I am for him. Jessica cried with me that night and she now has her own testimony of the spirit. It was so strong you could have cut through it. We talked to them about their plans for marriage or whatever because if they don’t separate, we have to drop them. As much as they want to learn, they can’t be baptized and therefore we can’t teach them, if they don’t get married. They decided they want to get married.

Later that night we talked to a member. He informed us a cute girl who came to our activity, and the baptism, had grandparents who were less actives and that she had been to church many times. We felt impressed to stop by her house. We talked to the mom and her and we feel like she’s going to be baptized too. We taught them a first lesson and asked if she wanted to be baptized, she said yes. We’ll see about putting a specific date for her. She’s so cool. Renata is her name. One of the coolest girls I’ve met. She came to church on Sunday by herself too. So awesome! Another recent convert brought her sister to the activity and the baptism and she showed up at church too. She wants to get baptized as well! Ana is her name. Now after going from no investigators to so many, we will probably not have enough time to teach them all. I am starting to see the result of 1 Nephi 2:19-20. I also thought of mom’s letter from the package I got: "the Lord will open doors for you, when you think it’s impossible" and he has done exactly that. It’s amazing seeing his hand. When you think you can’t go on anymore, he shows you that you can. It’s been awesome.

Maira was baptized! Yeah! We had all our investigators with a baptismal date there and they all loved it.
Maira Baptism!!
The best part of the week hasn’t even happened yet... Sunday. Maira. She usually comes with her grandma to church but at 9:05, when they weren’t there, we started to get a little worried that we would have a baptism without a confirmation, which is really no baptism at all. So we call. Nothing. We go to the house and she has just rolled out of bed. My comp says that it’s 9:10 and we gotta get going. She says she’s coming. We wait... she comes out and we leave. A few minutes later on the way to the church we get a call from her mom who is pretty intense. She yells and says we didn’t ask permission and neither did Maira to leave. I quickly hand the phone over to Maira and she starts crying as she’s in trouble. She hangs up and tells us she’s gotta go back home. What! You gotta get confirmed! Soo... we have to go to the house and talk with the mom AND the dad who is never there. She gets yelled at and we asked what happened. We apologized not realizing she needed to have permission. Her mom knew she was going to be confirmed that morning. Anyway, she got yelled at so much by her dad that she got in bed and wouldn’t come out. She was so upset and embarrassed. Her dad said all she had to do was ask permission and she could go. She got really stubborn and said she didn’t want to go anymore. In a house full of yells, her dad said that if she didn’t go to church today she could never go again. And he was serious. Oh my gosh. We just wanted her to stop being stubborn so we could go. Just ask! She wouldn’t. We were there for… not kidding… one hour trying to convince her to come to church and all she would do was yell that she didn’t care anymore. She didn’t ever want to go to church again and all sorts of nonsense. It was now 10:30 and the second class was going to end. We had to get to church to help our other investigators and besides we weren’t changing her mind. We told her we couldn’t come back if we left. She didn’t care. So we left without her. Her dad yelled at her and said she was never going to church again. Oh man. What were we supposed to do... we had done everything in our power. We read her scriptures, prayed with her, begged, tried convincing, I said so many prayers in my heart I couldn’t believe what was happening was actually happening. We left devastated and all my comp said is… "What do we do?" We did everything in our power. We can’t force her to live the gospel or to choose the right. That’s the worst thing about agency. I hate that. I just told my comp, don’t worry, something will happen and she’ll show up to church. Heavenly Father will take care of everything. If it’s supposed to work out, it will. I can honestly say, I had no doubt in my heart that that was true. We went to the end of our class with our investigators and after sitting for 3 minutes I got the idea to go talk to the amazing Primary President and see if she could go and convince Maira otherwise. Hermana Gonzalez, her husband is first counselor and I love spending every second with their family. She took her first counselor and they flew out of the church on their moto scooter. Welp in the meantime, class ended, and everyone gathered for Sacrament meeting. They started the meeting, we sang, we prayed and every two seconds we looked at the door to see if they were coming. The bishop and his counselors were mouthing to us asking where she was and if we were going to have a confirmation. We didn’t know what to do, but I knew they would show up any minute. The counselor got up to make his announcements and as he was standing at the pulpit, we hear the door open. Everyone looks over there and we see Hermana Gonzalez and no Maira! Oh my gosh, the door starts to shut and it’s gets pulled open again as Maira runs in. The counselor looks up and says, "… we had a baptism yesterday. Maira, will you come up here to be confirmed?" OH MY HECK. It was the most nerve wracking thing of my life. I have never had my faith tried in such a way, but EVERYTHING worked. My comp and I couldn’t stop smiling and giggling. It was incredible. I have never experienced something like that. But she is now the newest member of the church and she’s happy. I am so grateful for loving leaders who take over and do their part. Maira really looks up to her teacher. Wow. What an experience.

It’s been a good week… Trying, but our faith has proven worthy. Look at the miracles that come from just believing and trusting in our Heavenly Father. I testify, like Shaquel said last week, Heavenly Father knows us and has a plan for us. We do not need worry. He will take care of us. His plan is always going to be better than what our plan for ourselves would have been. TRUST! He will take care of everything. I love you all.

P.S. Package times!!!!! Oh how I love you guys. How do you know everything I need when I don’t even tell you! I love the watch. It’s exactly like my old one. Thanks grams Berg! I have been needing the things you sent. Thank you from the bottom of my heart!

I love you all, ash

Powerful Teachings!

Hermana Laursen sent me news that Anika got baptized and I am so happy. Where to begin? This week was extreme. First off, thank you for everyone who supports and loves me. I feel so blessed. I would be nothing without the love from family and friends. I owe you greatly. I hope one day I can repay you for everything you’ve done for me. Thank you.

I am just going to start from the beginning of my week because that will be easiest. As you know, last Monday we went cruising the forests of South America. It was crazy: we found some creepy stuff. haha You’ll hear more about that later. I don’t have time to explain or write about it. We found the river and had a good time. It has been soooo ridiculously hot this week. I can’t even function. More on that later too.

Adventures at the River!

ME in play clothes! First time in forever.... that was fun!
Tuesday we went to district meeting in Durazno to meet with our leaders. They talked about attitude and developing Christ-like attributes to overcome the trials of the mission and to move forward with the work and get our goals for baptisms for the month. Ours is four. The mission goal is a baptism a week. Wouldn’t that be fantastic? President expects nothing but the greatest from us. So we decided if we say anything less than four every month we are questioning the Lord’s goal for us and pretty much saying we know what he commands of us isn’t possible… hence, our goal is four. I don’t know if you remember but we had nothing last Monday… nothing… I left district meeting feeling like I had so much to change and knew that my attitude had to improve. I thought about that the whole two hour ride home. I knew I had to trust in the Lord. There was nothing else to do but change my attitude and get to work. My comp and I talked and decided if we were going to reach the Lord’s goal for four baptisms, we had better be doing everything to stay worthy so he could bless us with that. We immediately put into action several goals and went out to work for the day.

Miracle Number One... That same day we had a meeting with a little girl we have been teaching. Her grandma and aunt got baptized, but they don’t really understand very well. That doesn’t matter, she does. We invited her to be baptized and she accepted. The thing preventing her was her dad’s permission. We talked to him, got it and she will be baptized this Saturday... whoa! My changed attitude, faith in the Lord and a new resolve to be even more obedient was the cause of an immediate blessing. The Lord is WAITING to bless us and we just have to take that one step and obey his commandments and immediately the blessings come. This… my friends is proof.

That night we had our ward FHE with a scripture scavenger hunt and had a blast. It was awesome. Everyone said how much fun they had and if we kept doing stuff like that, the whole city would be coming. It’s amazing how much the little stuff means to these people. They are easily pleased and don’t need much. It’s a Christ-like attribute the people of Uruguay are born with. It amazes me. Just wait until they see what we are doing this week: water balloon volleyball. It’ll be a blast. The whole ward is preparing for it. Noemi, a member's daughter... I love this little girl! She is adorable.
Miracle Number Two... We have a bunch of investigators just no one who was progressing. We decided we needed to use the resources (people) we already had to get our baptism goal. So Jakalin (an eternal investigator) has decided to be baptized too and she finally came to church on Sunday and LOVED it! She will be baptized on the 25th we hope, right after we have a wedding for her. We are trying to help her get all the papers together. They have to announce it in the paper three times and we are trusting in the Lord that everything can be done in time for the baptism. Keep her in your prayers. While doing all this we met the guy who writes the newspaper here and has his own radio talk show. We talked to him and he has agreed to announce whatever we want, whenever we want, on his radio station. We just gotta give him the announcements and get the gospel word spread. Little do we know the success that would come in our other lessons. We taught A LOT OF THEM this week.

Miracle Number Three... We decided to visit Augustin. He said it felt like such a long time since he had seen us…one day! He said we needed to have church more often because he could already (on Wednesday) feel Satan’s temptations all around him. Wow! Not even members want to have church more often. He’s great. We had a lesson with him, taught him the five steps we have to do here in this life: faith, repentance, baptism, the gift of the Holy Ghost and endure to the end and we invited him to get baptized. There were and are so many reasons for him to have said no, but… he just looked at us and said it sounded great and that the decisions he was making in life now were leading him right to baptism. Oh man, he’s so awesome. We told him to be baptized he had to be living the law of chastity. We taught that to him and he agreed to live it. Right now he and his girlfriend are living in two different tents until they can figure something else out.

Augustin and Jessica with me and my comp
Miracle Number Four... We went to visit Augustin again and Jessica was there. She said she had agreed to live the law of chastity. I felt the need to ask her why she was praying, reading, even living the law of chastity if she had no intention of getting baptized. I asked what was stopping her. She just said when she first came to church, it was hard because she had never done that in her entire life. We bore testimonies from the bottom of our souls about how hard the gospel is, but how worth it it is. Lots of tears were shed and at the end we felt the need to invite her to be baptized as well, and you know what? She accepted. It was a huge change in her, not only that but before she refused to go to church. She went the first week that we met her and after that she didn’t want anything to do with it. But we asked her if she would come on Sunday and she said yes without hesitation and she was there with Augustin before we even got there. She’s opening up so much more to us. Anyway, we had to talk to president last night about the whole situation and he wants us to wait to baptize them both. First time ever in history that president wants us to wait to baptize someone if they already meet the requirements and are willing. But he wants to see the fruits of his repentance which we are already seeing. Since we met him, just like Yuri, he has come to every activity and every meeting. He is changing. He’s living the gospel and he’s changing. It’s incredible. Our bishop said that they would have to be married and not just separated. They told him that and he just said… if that’s what I need to do to be baptized, that’s what I will do. Oh my gosh, so incredible! I couldn’t believe his response. What an example to all of us. So... the 25th of February is probably not going to happen. Getting married here takes forever just to do the civil stuff. President made me promise and make a covenant with my Heavenly Father that we would still reach our goal for four baptisms this month even though Augustin and Jessica won’t be two of the baptisms. Oh man. I have a lot of work to do. We have a lot of investigators, we just gotta work with them. It’s been a pretty intense week.

Just a little side note. Thursday night... we couldn’t sleep, it was so hot we literally could not sleep. We got ice in bags and went outside to see if it would be better out there, it was little bit but still... then our ice melted and we were dying. We hung out outside, then saw a lightning storm start up. To get a better view we were going to walk out the front gate. Welp, as I’m walking through our grapevines, I see a giant spider web. The web was massive and the most beautiful I’ve ever seen, with the grossest looking spider inside. P.S. he makes this web every night because one morning at 5 a.m. when we left for district meeting, I walked INTO the web. Ew! After we went back inside, we laid on our tile floor, the only sense of relief we could find, but even then we couldn’t sleep. It was ridiculous. Just to give you an idea of how miserable the heat is here... there you go.

We have a surprise double zone conference this week. Yay! That means four hours to district meeting on Tuesday and on Thursday. We get to go to another state. We never do this. We think maybe they are going to introduce the new mission president to everyone. We only meet as a zone every other transfer and have interviews every other transfer. We alternate, but we had interviews this change and now we are having zone conference. Hmmm, weird. We will see. Once again, we won’t get any sleep this week. Yay! Also, we have our entire week planned out with appointments again. We don’t have enough time to handle all the work we have. Whoa.

The mission really teaches you to trust in the Lord. It’s amazing though, as humans, how many times we have to learn the same lesson over and over again before it sticks. The scriptures have been my saving grace this week: 1 Samuel 15 and Alma 26. Powerful stuff. I’m learning to depend on the Book of Mormon more and more. It’s so great. I love this mission! For every ounce of hardship it is... it’s worth it. Like dad said, a little good will outweigh the bad. And it’s so true. I love being able to serve and be a tool in the Lord’s work. It is a magnificent calling and I don’t want it to end. I’ll just end with a quote.

"In reality, you can never love the Savior until you have given to serve and labor among his people." That’s from President Monson. I hope everyone is well. I love you more than words can express. The gospel is true and Heavenly Father is there. Love, Ash

The Power of Prayer

This is how they pick up the garbage cans... by horseback!
As I stated last week, we are going to start having activities every Tuesday: FHE for the ward. Last week we had a pretty good turnout… more than I expected... 25 people. Everyone really had fun, we just watched the Joseph Smith movie and ate and talked afterwards and it was fun. We planned out cool activities for the rest of the transfer and the next one, if we are still together. They include things like a scavenger hunt, bonfire and s ‘mores, because we can totally do that here in the middle of nowhere, (except we just gotta find a way to make s ‘mores without marshmallows and graham crackers) haha, water balloon volleyball and some other things. We are doing water balloon volleyball tomorrow night and I will make peach cobbler and some members will bring vanilla ice cream. I hope they like it. I’m trying to do what dad said about using our "states" skills to further the work here. We know how it should be done so we are going to do it. The members want to be involved. It’s awesome. Wish us luck with that. Maybe you could send a pie recipe to me mom so we can make pie one time. Oh! And I need Minute It To Win It games! We wanna do that too, but I can’t remember very many. Will you send me some? Thanks! One of the millions of cows in the pastures... gotta love the country!
Miracle of the week. Last week we had two people show up to church. Then he came to our activity on Tuesday and brought a cake to share with everyone. His name is Augustine. Although we haven’t had a REAL lesson with him, we keep teaching him little bits and pieces. We keep finding him everywhere. It’s hard to describe, but we in reality have taught him a lot. His girlfriend doesn’t really want much to do with anything. After the first time at church, she decided she didn’t like it and didn’t come back, but he did. He’s great and really REALLY wants to know. He came to church yesterday and in between classes we asked him if he read what we left him about the Plan of Salvation. He said he read all of it and he had a million questions. Questions are good. Latins don’t talk much in lessons or have questions so when they do, it’s a good sign. We were all over the place trying to explain all his questions and finally I just had to stop and say we really need to sit down and have an actual lesson. We need to explain the Plan from the start. It won’t do you any good if we are talking about every principle of the gospel to answer your questions. Things won’t connect or make sense. We asked if he had prayed and he said he didn’t really need to. He said he just wanted to keep coming and if it felt good, then he’d stay. We explained the purpose of us asking him to pray. We explained how people here are too stubborn to pray a two-minute long process and no one will put forth the effort to find the truth. We ask tons of people to pray and they just say... uuhhhh no! He said he wasn’t stubborn and he wanted to know, so he would pray. When we asked if we could end with a prayer, he asked if he could say it. Well, of course. His prayer... was probably one of the most sincere and real I have heard from anyone. It was amazing and the consequences of it were amazing. He thanked Heavenly Father for us, for insisting and insisting that he pray and then he thanked Heavenly Father for the opportunity to learn more and to be involved in a good thing, to have met so many caring people and... everything and he ended. He didn’t look up, so we sat there... next thing we know he is in tears. As a missionary, you have to learn of the importance of silence so that the spirit can speak to people and that was exactly what happened. I’m not sure how long we waited while he cried and experienced something amazing. It was so incredible that he couldn’t even explain it to us. My comp asked what he was thinking or feeling. He couldn’t find the words. She asked if it was good or bad. He just said different. In a good or bad way we asked. He said, so good. The spirit was sooooo strong. I couldn’t even believe it. It was awesome. I think he knows it’s true now. He said he wants to be baptized. It’s going to be a little complicated because he’s living with his girlfriend so they have to get married or separate AND since they live in a tent, it’s going to be a little hard to separate. Yes, that’s what I said: they live in a tent. Oh man... life is rough. He’s so cool though. Tomorrow we will see him again. Keep him in your prayers. I hope this is the start of something really great happening. Patience really is a virtue.

We are going exploring today. I’m excited! Also, a girl in the ward just got her mission call today so tonight we are going to go watch her open it. How fun, huh? Reminds me of one day I had similar, about a year and a half ago. Weird...

Love, Ash

More Miracles...

This week was... all over the place. We have seen miracles and we have seen failures. We have had control over all and then lost it. It’s been crazy... where to begin? The roads of Sarandi...
We had surprise interviews this week! We went to Durazno two days in a row. That was killer waking up at 4:30 a.m. to get there. On top of that I have not been sleeping this week. It makes for very hard, long days of work. I blame the mosquitoes. Seriously! I was going to take a picture of my poor legs. It’s like last year all over again. I look like I have chicken pox. It’s so bad. I wake up in the middle of the night itching so bad that I can’t fall back asleep. It’s so hot at night that I can’t sleep with sheets or anything on, so the mosquitoes just eat me alive. Ugh! It’s been so miserable. There were no mosquitoes in Maldonado :( Just last night I decided to use my bug spray even though it would make my bed and sheets smell icky. I actually slept the whole night through... until my comp woke up because she was getting eaten. It’s such a nightmare. There is no escaping the elements here. We need to buy a fan. Anywho, interviews went well. President said the mission is seeing lots of success, but with lots of success, Satan works harder. He told us we needed to arm ourselves with obedience.

First thing Hermana Da Silva said when she saw me was, "How weird it is to see you over here, hermana! Why are you not in Maldonado?" Hmmm... I wonder? haha. Then pres said when I walked in, "Hermana, your Maldonado bishop misses you! Do you miss Maldonado?" I said, “Yes!” He said it was a good thing. It means I left part of my heart there and that’s good. He said if I didn’t miss it, it means I didn’t give my all and serve with everything I had. I took that to be a compliment (I guess). He asked how our Book of Mormon reading was going. I said good and explained what I learned. Then he said, “Ok, you’re done.” Uh... that’s all? He said he’s not worried about me.The beautiful sunsets of Sarandi...
There is so much to be done in this area. We don’t have much support from the ward at the moment, but we are trying to change that. Every week we need to find new people to teach, meet with the investigators we already have, teach all 22 recent converts every week, work with the ward and so much more. It is not physically possible. Like I mentioned before, we can only have three lessons planned daily because everything is spaced so far apart here that there isn’t enough time in the day for more than that. Plus, in between those lessons we have to find new people to teach and do our daily contacts. The ENTIRE week, and when I say entire week, I mean entire week, is already completely planned out. If we want to meet with anyone new, we have to set an appointment for next Monday. It’s insane. So crazy. For that reason, we really need the help of the members. They should be having ward missionaries to teach the recent converts, so we can have more time to find new people to be baptized. Other plans are to have a weekly convert class to invite everyone to so we can teach them all at once to save and gain more time. We are thinking of teaching a class on how to read because no one here in this town knows how. Also, we are using our resources of young women and to do splits every Sunday to get more work done and get to know them better. Every area has its challenges, right? In the meantime, this week we have been trying to meet with all the members and get to know them. We need references and if they get to know us, trust us, see that we are here to work, they will give us references. So very slowly we are trying to make progress… and slowly we are doing it… I think.

We had a lesson with a family which really paid off. They have a garden, huge property and a homemade pizza oven out back. For the first time since I’ve been here in Sarandi, I felt at home with a family. It was so great.

Miracle of the week… while doing splits last Sunday, my comp and her companion for the day found a lady named Sandra. They are wealthy here. She has one daughter and her husband. I was surprised when my comp showed me the house when we went to the return appointment later in the week. She had listened to the elders once before about four years ago. We had a really good lesson with her using the Book of Mormon. She understands everything and how to receive an answer to her prayers to see if this is the true church. It was great. Then we tried to make a return appointment and she said sadly that she was going out of town. So we asked for a number to call her. She looked at us strangely and said we already had her number. We said noooo... She said yes.... you called me two Sundays ago, remember? Um... we just met you one Sunday ago and we never asked for a number to reach you at. She stared at us and pointed to my comp and said, "Yeah it was you. Your accent. You called and said you were the missionaries. You asked me how I was and where I was. Then you asked if you could pray for me. You said you would and that you would be coming to visit me soon. Then you hung up." Um... we never did that. She said well I guess it was the other missionaries here in Sarandi. No... we are the only ones we told her and we don’t have your number. We all just kind of sat there in awe. She said she talked to us on Sunday because we had called and told her we were coming to visit... we said we never called and the spirit... I don’t know how to put it into words. We did not call! We went home and searched in the old investigator records to see if maybe the hermana who was here before had called, but we couldn’t find any record of her as an investigator at all. When we call old investigators and set up a lesson with them, we never ask if we can just pray for them. After searching that whole night, we have to believe that it was simply a miracle... angels… preparing the way for us. It was a wonderful experience and after we clarified with Sandra that we really didn’t call, she sat there thinking and said… well, everything happens for a reason. Maybe it’s my time. We haven’t seen her since but I think she will be baptized. I will keep you up to date.

I got a package from Hermana Hite this week. If she is reading this, THANK YOU! I love you. I’ll be writing you soon. I hope you got my letter.

This area is hard and everyone told me the baptisms just spring up here. Not true. We are working our darndest but... all the investigators we have had so far we had to drop. I know it will take more work and I’m going to have to be patient, but I have the Lord’s promise from that scripture I found in Nephi and this really is a choice land. It will just take some time. I gotta prove my faith. Until then... hard work. It’ll be good. I’m excited to see what things will happen here. Sarandi will be the best yet. I love you all so much. Loves….until next week. Love, Ash

P.S. Cool things. We found fireflies here. It’s so awesome. When it rains here, instead of worms (like in Utah) or snails (like in Maldonado), frogs come out everywhere. It’s crazy. Also, while walking we heard a man yelling it’s still alive!!! We turned around and he was riding his bike with a HUGE lizard that looked kinda like an alligator hanging there. Whoa. I’m gonna find me one of those. haha We were going to go exploring today, but it’s rainy and so humid. So….next week!