Louetta

Fambly,
Hey! Sounds like everything is groovy back home. Dad’s continuing with his Bishoply duties, huh? Senior Bishop? Is that a thing? Does that mean he’s been Bishop the longest in the stake? Yeah, that’s crazy, but I was thinking about it the other day, and I don’t really remember a time when dad wasn’t in the Bishopric, and I have to stretch my little mind back to before he was Bishop to when he was a counselor. I do have vague memories of when he was first called into the Bishopric though, but before that… nada. Me mente esta quebrantado ya.
That’s the weirdest funeral I’ve ever heard of… I don’t think I’ve ever been to a secular funeral. I must not have, because that’s just foreign to me. Why would you want to be remembered like that? Crazy. Don’t worry mommy, I won’t let that happen to you, or to you, daddy. There will be classiness for all to disfrutar.
Lane’s so adorable… I haven’t gotten her newsletter yet! It’s transfer week, and they like to hold the mail and packages until we’re all in our new areas and settled, also, it’s Columbus day. But, lucky for us the church’s employment office is open, so we came to do our mail since it’s fairly close and we had to drop some stuff off at the mission office (right next door) anyway.
Jen’s enjoying her classes? I just got that AWESOME picture she did of Poison Ivy, with MY costume. Everybody dug it. It’s gorgeous and it looks so great, I’m glad you’re continuing to improve, and that you FINALLY drew something I asked you to draw ginna! Bien hecho. Laughing stock sounds hilarious! Please, please continue to tell me everything you can remember about their shows. I can just see it all in my head. Man, that’s funny.
The garden sounds gorgeous, I love veggies… today, while I was shopping, I ended up getting mostly veggies without even realizing it. I hadn’t grabbed any sweets at all (accept for some pop-tarts). Not because I was making an effort to be healthy, but just because I wanted to eat veggies. Thanks for describing the food again mommy. We had a bit of a funny experience last Friday (my third day in our trio). There was something wrong with the tire on our car, so we went to NTB and had to sit there for THREE hours while they fixed it, argued on the phone with the mission car-guy for a little while, and dealt with a crisis (money missing from the register. Lots of cussing and angry mechanics). So, there’s a big old TV that they have to leave on during business hours, but because we were the only people there, they did let us change the channel (but not turn it off). We finally switched it to the news in Spanish and decided to call it slightly Apostate Language Study, just because we didn’t know what else to do. I learned some new words. Cabellos de fuerza (sp?) = Horsepower.
But before we got them to switch the TV for us, Rachel ray was making something that looked pretty amazing. And Dr. Oz suggests that the color of my alarm clock might be keeping me awake at night, and that it’s too warm in Houston to get proper sleep. Anyway, watching the cooking show made me so hungry. I love hearing about the food. Dinner sounds like it was delicious.
After a bit, the mechanics got tired of fighting with their boss about the missing money and one by one tried to escape. We ended up teaching two of them about the Apostacy and Restoration for the last hour and a half or so while we were waiting there. One of them was Iranian and didn’t know anything about religion in general, he said, but he was very nice and open minded about it. Said he was curious to know what the big deal was. The other guy was Hispanic, but clearly preferred speaking in English, though he tried to bash with us using that good old “Well, if you read the bible in Spanish, which is really more correct it says this…” one of my favorite arguments that people bust out when their talking to gringos, so then I just pulled out my brand new Reina-Valera and was like, “You mean this bible in Spanish?” and he kind of went, “Uuh, yeah. That one.” And didn’t knew where to go from there, because he was lying about the difference in the Spanish/English translation. He stopped trying to argue with him once he figured out that we speak and read Spanish fluently. I think he was kind of impressed actually, because he just took the pamphlet and read a little while I continued to explain about modern day revelation and prophets.
Very fun day.
Saturday we had the pulga again. We ran out of supplies, which turned out to be a really good thing, because then people who talked with us, couldn’t just take and card and run off, they had to stay and chat. I taught a woman named Yazmin who used to meet with missionaries in Spain and seemed genuinely interested. She lives in… I think Elder Dorion’s area (my old area) which is typical. He’s just going to go ahead and baptized everyone I find, which is cool with me:) I’ve really got a firm belief in the right missionaries being put in place to teach the right people. It’s something that’s been proven to me again and again, which makes it easily to turn over the wheel to someone else once you’re finished with whatever you’re part in their story happened to be.
Have I told you guys about Pulga music yet?
Okay. Remember the Weird Al Spoof where he redoes a bunch of rock music as Polka music?
Pulga music is that, but they also translate the lyrics into Spanish. Then, get yourself a cowboy hat and some very classy stingray leather accessories (that’s who’s buying all of your merchandise dad, Pulga people.) and you’re stylin’ for intercity Houston Texas and you’re very, very cool here.
It’s incredible.
My Trio is so fun! I love these Hermanas. Hermana Willis is super smart, she’s only two transfers older than me and Hermana Bastian, but she really knows what she’s doing. And Hermana Bastian is a real sweety. Very in tune with the spirit, especially when it comes to spur-of-the-moment changes in plans. I don’t think we’re ever going to be just sitting there after everything falls through and going, “Uh, what do we do now?” she always seems to have lots of ideas popping up in her head. She and I went into the MTC on the same day. In fact, I think in one of my earlier letters I told a story about the companion that Hermana Thomas was supposed to have? That’s Hermana Bastian.
Guess what? I’m finally funny in Spanish. And not because I’m making mistakes, but just because I’m clever and saying clever things. This is cool, just because I was told once that I’d never be funny in Spanish, but I have told at least five jokes and I’ve made investigators/members/my companions laugh. In Spanish, “Ja ja ja ja”. So. I win.
Also, learning to play the piano has turned out to be one of my best assets on the mission. It’s sort of a rare thing here. I played the piano in sacrament meeting and relief society in my last ward and now it looks like they’ll need me to do that here too. I also do it for most of the baptisms as well. Or, at least for the ones when Elder Meade wasn’t there. Very useful thing that. I’m so glad I got the opportunity to be relief society pianist in our ward abck home, otherwise I’d have no luck trying to play all these hymns on the fly. But I know most of them pretty well now. Finally. So, in case you were wondering, I think that was the purpose for that.
The last thing I wanted to tell you about was Victor.
Victor. Is. AWESOME.
He’s twenty years old and he’s getting baptized this Sunday. I’m so happy I arrived here in Louetta just in time to teach him. He’s such a great young man, de Honduras, he likes to speak in vos sometimes, which is my favorite. He’s very funny and he’s got such a strong testimony that’s developed in him so fast, and he’s just smart, he just totally gets it. I hope everything goes well, he’s determined that this Sunday is his fecha. Very secure in that. So… Yay! Also I’ve got another baptism this Saturday back in Crosstimbers. Silvia is eight years old, barely. Her parents are waiting on a divorce to mom’s real husband hiding somewhere in Mexico, and some vicios, so they’re not members, but still very much a part of the ward in the mean time. She’s such a great little girl! Adorable, I can’t wait till you see her and go, ooooo cute!
So, that’s all the news I’ve got for now… I love you all tonz and tonz, and I miss you like crazy, but I’m sooo happy here and I can tell that you’re all safe and happy back home. I’m sorry if there’s some questions I forgot to answer ect.
Les amo a ustedes.
Hna Lirioblanco
P.S. Do I need to worry about registering for school next spring at some point? Somebody pointed out to me that it’s something I’ve probably got to take care of, before I return home. HEARTS! Mwah.