More pictures here.

"...He'll Testify. He says he's been to Texas, and it's the only place to be."

Dearest darlingest queridita familia,

I'm glad I'm not hurt too. And it makes me smile to think of Jensen's excitement at my home-coming being compared to her excitement at the release of an awesome movie. I am kind of like an awesome movie in some ways that I've failed to see as I've written that sentence. Anyway, I am also excited to see you all again too. And to see the Harry Potter movie. Me and Jensen will be reunited in our high-pitched squeals about movies as they are released soon enough. Wow, we sure seem to be having a lot of baptisms in our ward recently. I can only remember going to 5 convert baptisms in my entire life before my mission, and it sounds like we've had several this last year. That's exciting. Or maybe I was just clueless and not paying attention to what was going on around me. I very easily could have gone to a couple hundred and just not really understood. Now I get it though. It's a big deal, and it's very exciting.

I LOVE ward soup party! That was always my favorite party. It's just like every other ward party we have, except with delicious, delicious soup! The soup you made, kind of sounds like I would eat the whole thing before we ever even got it into the gymnasium to share with the ward. My poor car. Pobrecito carrito. I'm glad he's all better now. Adorable little Hung Car. I'm happy you are all taking good care of it.

I can't believe Laney is reading legitimate novels now. That's so exciting. She must be so grown up... crazy. It's good you got rid of those extra channels if it was costing so much. The more I think about it, the more I think I might just elect to just have a way nice TV and an impressive library of movies and no cable at all. If there's a show on TV I want to check out, the lest I could do is be social and find a friend who has cable and wants to have a party and watch it with me, and then if I like a show, I can spend the movie I might have used to pay for cable on the box-set. There's probably a flaw in this plan somewhere, but I don't see it yet. Maybe when I actually watch TV again, I'll think of what it is.

Lauren's letter this week had we laughing pretty hard. Mission dreams ARE the weirdest things. I had a psychotic one last night. Mom, if you want to give me an interpretation of this one, it'll be appreciated: basically I dreamt that the prophet announced a sign for the world. In a nutshell this prophecy went like this: 'This afternoon, at approximately 3:42, it will begin to rain blood from the sky. This will come as a sign unto the world that the war has begun (I don't know what war this is referring to. All the significant ones are sort of going on all ready) there will be many who will try to deny this sign. But I prophesy as the Lord's representative that it will come in such a way that none shall be able to deny it.'

So, an emergency mission conference is called and President Hansen brings the whole mission down to the Hafer building, and gives us instructions to stay calm and pray for a confirmation and for the Spirit to bring us peace. Seems logical right? I mean, he only warned us about this so we wouldn't freak out. So, we wait for this sign to come, and sure enough at exactly 3:42 the sky opens up and great drops of blood begin to fall. But it's not just raining outside—blood is pouring from the ceilings inside the houses, in the closets, underneath the precautionary umbrellas that the Elders are holding out for us, and pretty soon, everyone in absolutely drenched in blood. It goes on for a few minutes before the blood is slowly mixed in with water and it turns to normal rain and then stops.

Like I said, psychotic-missionary-dream. As it was all ending, I remembered thinking to myself, 'Hijole, I wish I could watch the news right now.'

Anyway, this week was charming. I can only think of 3 of the twenty appointments that we had that was actually scheduled in advance. Everything we had planned this week fell through, but we had a lot of random 'teach where you find, find where you teach' experiences come up. We had some great experiences and some heartbreaking ones. Including a cita with an investigator in which we were planning to teach La Palabra de Sabaduria (word of wisdom) that he rescheduled three times, and stood us up for all three, then we tried to drop in twice by surprise to teach him... So, we tried to teach him the Word of Wisdom FIVE times this week, and the last time we went over, we couldn't teach him because he was drunk. I knew he needed that lesson. His mother is a less active member of the church. She says he doesn't drink much. Hence why he got so smashed after just a couple of drinks.

Elder Frost and Elder Manship found a man who claims to worship the devil and also drinks. Elder Verhs and Elder Conrad found a woman for us to teach (a very white bi-lingual matriarch of a very Hispanic family) who has a lot of questions about the spirit world and believes what we've taught her about it, but rejects the idea of modern revelation, so she wants us to only teach her out of the 'Real Holy Bible'. We're preparing a lesson using bible scriptures to teach about the spirit world, and that also simultaneously teach about the great apostasy, so that we can help her come to understand WHY modern revelation is important. She seems like a rational person. Aside from the gigantic sparkly Santa Muerte with cash offerings and the baby Jesus in the fireplace. But those might be her husbands. We'll baptize him too:)

We have been teaching a really wonderful family who kind of what to adopt us. They said they always wanted daughters (they've only got too sons). If only we could get them to come to church.

One of our former investigators, Elena, surprised us this week by calling one of the members and asking for a ride to the church. We explained to Elder Frost that she's been to church four times already and has had just about all the lessons, so if we could start teaching he again that would be incredibly awesome, since the only thing that was keeping her from getting baptized was that she and her esposo, still weren't legally married, but then she left him and moved out of our area which is how we lost track of her and she ended up as a former investigator. Anyway, he asked us if he should interview her for baptism, and then, I guess she just straight up told him “I want to be baptized on the seventh of February.”

Hopefully, we'll be able to help her keep that commitment. She's still struggling a lot right now. But she's keeping more of the commandments of God and trying hard to improve, so hopefully she'll keep that fecha! We'll be praying for her.

This week, there was a lot of talk thrown around about whether or not the Holy Spirit testifies of truth in the form of artwork. Some would argue that it doesn't make sense for the truth to be testified of in the middle of something that is essentially a lie (art). But I sort of go with the V for Vendetta phrase 'Artists use lies to tell the truth, politicians use lies to cover the truth up'. I remembered that line from that movie at some time last week. And the awesome bit with all the dominoes. And I tried to recite what I could remembered of his 'V-words' monologue right at the beginning of the movie. “In view a humble vaudevillian veteran cast vicariously as both victim and villain by the ?vestitudes? of fate...” I couldn't remember the rest very well at all.

Anyway—the point is, I'm going to have to go with yes. The Holy Spirit testifies of truth where truth is found. Why else would Jesus teach in parables? Did all of those parables actually happen, or is it possible that his use of parables confirm this little theory of mine that as long as you acknowledge the fiction in the piece, the truth can shine forth?

Just sayin'.

This conversation actually started because of an incident in Sunday school class that I remembered from the year before I left, when Sister Singleton mentioned an article written by an ex-member woman who had said that she first began to doubt her testimony of the church when she felt the exact same feelings that she had come to recognize as the Holy Ghost while watching Beauty and the Beast with her daughter, and she realized that it wasn't the spirit at all, it was just good feelings. I remember raising my hand and saying, “I'd like to submit that Beauty and the Beast is true.”

Anyway, so, we were talking about this and the following decisions have been reached.

Beauty and the Beast: truth, beauty, love, kindness etc. (The Elders also voted Belle as the most attractive Disney character, inside and out. Pocahontas gets second place. Gaston wins for most weak-sauce villain. Dude, she's not your type. She's far too intelligent, if you ever did get married, she'd figure out how to manipulate you in about three minutes and you'd both be miserable forever. See those three blonde triplets over there? That's more you, just go pick one. All three maybe. Also, the wicked step mother in Cinderella was pretty weak as well. Geez Cinderella, just leave. She's not going to do anything about it.)

Hercules: elements of the preexistence seem to be eluded to, along with a heavenly parentage and “En serio, I can become a god one day?!” (Hercules won for the sisters in the same category of most attractive. Tarzan got an honorary mention. As did Jane for the attractive category. Charming accent.)

The Hunchback of Notre Dame: Clearly testifies of the Apostasy. Anyone watching it, who is paying attention during the hellfire number is bound to suddenly be like, “Hey... you know... I'm pretty sure the catholic church does not get their authority from God.” (Frolo wins in the villain category. He's a creepy priest who secretly worships the devil, and I seem to remember some Esmeralda coveting.)

Lion King: Prophets are essential and their guidance will lead us the reign in righteousness. Also, it's Hamlet and Kimba the White Lion combined in a blender.

“Far longer than forever...” -Eternal families

“Deliver us!” -duh.

Save Ferris! (Doesn't testify of anything we could think of. It's just a funny movie.)

“So here's us, on the raggedy edge.” -Clearly all about Agency and Freedom.

Also, “This sticker is dangerous and inconvenient, but I do love fig-newtons.”

Alright, alright. Talladega nights was pretty much just silly, although there was that split second moment when everybody is talking about their own personal favorite version of Jesus when inside myself I sighed and was like, 'Wow. That's kind of exactly like the apostasy. And also. The Book of Mormon is awesome.' I still think that whenever somebody mentions that scene. The rest of the movie is kind of ridiculous, but I'd say that moment at least emphasizes a need for modern revelation to help man discover the true nature of god. Ignorant people make up their own gods conforming with their own personal wills and vices, etc.

This was an interesting discussion. Thought I'd share. Several people got in on it and tried to justify their favorite movies. We're still working on Waitress for Elder Conrad. I'm sure it testifies of something good. That's a great movie.

We had Temple this last week. That was incredible. I love going to the temple. I bought myself some presents as well. Including the soundtracks for Prince of Egypt and the Swan Princess that were being sold at the church bookstore there, for like 4 dollars each. I can't actually listen to them as a missionary, but they're normally like 18 dollars each (the owner found them in bulk somewhere and was trying to get rid of them) so I figured I'm ship them home. I'm putting together a book of stuff to send home, letters and unneeded winter accessories and those two CDs etc.

I also found not one but TWO cheesy Alma 17-? romance stories about Ammon and Abish or the Princess he refuses to marry. Did not purchase. Do not plan to. I can't read them anyway, and I'm not real sorry about that. I still do kind of want to make a very epic, big-budget, artsy film about the story of Ammon, using very little dialogue and long beautiful shots to tell his epic story. Who's the guy who was responsible for all the prettiness in that movie 'The New World'? Do you think he'd take pity on my project? Somebody ought to do some decent movies using the Book of Mormon. 'It could be a way powerful conversion tool!' -Hna. Christensen.

There will not be much romance in my movie. He's a messenger of God for sobbing out loud.

...He's busy.

But don't worry. Abish and the Princess. And the Queen. And all the other women in the movie, will be gorgeous, so as not to lose our male audience. Ammon will be pretty too. Como no?

Alright. I've talked of nonsense long enough. Just to reassure you that this isn't what's on my mind all the time, I do want to let you know that I'm happy and excited about life again. Although this week had all that craziness that I explained about the citas falling through, it really was a pretty incredible week. It's strange having P-day on Mondays, being the day after Sunday, since Sunday, is always such a dramatic day. I typically go from miserable to elated about fifty times on Sundays. It's the end of the week when we see how all of our work that week has effected, or hasn't effected the people we are teaching. Every less-active, recent convert, or investigator we see in church, is call for a massive hosanna shout and every empty seat leaves one feeling empty themselves. It's pretty exhausting, and if there's a baptism that night (which there was last night, the Elder's investigator Juana) then the stress
and the joy is all combined into a cocktail of terror that leaves one wanting a nap and a hot bath.

So. On Mondays, I'm frequently not-quite recovered from all this. Which I think makes me write like a crazy person. But, that's why we have Preparation-day. (And because we've got to do our laundry sometime) ...we need to recover from the damage of last week and prepare for the upcoming struggle. It doesn't always quite do it's job though... Typically when six o'clock rolls around, I feel a little like that boxer who's sitting in the corner, sweating and bloody and looking not-quite up to the next round, and then the bell rings and it's time to go!

Speaking of time to go, I'd better get. I love you. I miss you like Buster misses his left hand (another show we're trying to find a gospel relation with, tell me if you think of any).

MWAH!

Hermana Lillywhite

Attempted MansLaughter

Yeah, I usually wouldn't be able to write to you today, but since we've started doing our e-mail and laundry at Ashley's (with permission from president, of course) I get to e-mail you today! GREAT week. Okay, actually it was pretty stressful and we had a lot appointments/members cancel on us last minute, or just not even show up. It was pretty frustrating.

I know how important it is to have members with us at our appointments, but being an HOUR late, because we're waiting around for our member is just ridiculous. If them being late was unusual, I wouldn't complain, but it's not. It's pretty typical actually. But an hour is too much. As Hermana Christensen put it, “Well it's acerca de tiempo!”

Debbie, Tony and Shannon got baptized which was the highlight of the week. The service was gorgeous. English wards are so formal. They were so happy, and looked like a family of angels. I got a picture to send you all when I print out pictures next.

Here actually it's much left to comment on for this week... Zone meeting was very good. President Hansen shared some remarks that were very appropriate, I think exactly what I needed to hear. Hermana Thomas had her surgery on Friday. I don't know how it went, so I'm going to write her today.

Also, my companion hit me with the car yesterday. That was fun.

Well, actually it was terrifying for the couple of seconds before I figured out I wasn't injured—after that though, it was just hilarious. Poor thing, she was utterly convinced she'd killed me for a minute, but I'm fine. I'm sore. Very nearly bruised and that's about it. It's this silly backing thing that we have to do. Whoever isn't driving (obviously me, yesterday) has to stand outside and signal with your hands if it's okay to go/which way to turn. But it was dark and hard to see.

Yeah, so, aside from that, there isn't much to share... we've been doing a great deal of finding lately. So everyone who were teaching is brand new and just learning to walk on baby-feet. I love them all already, and I'm pretty sure they're all getting baptized though. Maybe not this transfer, but soon enough. Hermana Christensen seems to have a knack for finding people, in addition to her attempted manslaughter of my person, she has many talents. Whenever we go knocking we seem to find a new investigator. Good people too, very solid. I hope we'll be able to help them.

Home sounds charming. Yes, do tell me how the silly 2012 movie goes. During our lessons, I typically ask if they've got questions, and I've been frequently hearing “Is the world going to end in 2012?” to which I usually respond, “Well, I'm not sure, but I'm going to take a confident stab at no.”

One of our little recent converts in this ward Jaquelin, was very seriously concerned...

“But, the Mayan calender ends! Why didn't they make anything more after 2012?” -Jaqu.

“Well, they had to finish sometime!” -Me

“What do you mean?” -Jaqu.

(To put things in context, she had just brought out her new “Cute & Cuddly Kitten Pictures” calender to show us what kitten pictures had been chosen for our birthday months. She's 10.)

“Well—it's like... say the Mayans really liked kittens, okay, so they decide they're going to make a cute kitten calender and they take their ancient camera and take like billions and billions of pictures of kittens and then they start to make a calender, but they're still eventually going to run out of pictures of cute kittens with which to assign months for this calender, right?” -Me.

“Oh.... okay!” -Jaqu.

“Yeah, and you know, they couldn't just keep making calenders forever, eventually somebody's going to be like, 'Wow, okay, we're covered on calenders for the next couple dozen centuries, we can probably give it a rest and do something else for while, I'm sure there will be time sometime in the next two thousand years to make some calenders for after 2012,' I mean, they're an extinct civilization for sobbing out loud, they wasted they're time counting up to 2012 in the first place, they could have stopped ages ago and it wouldn't have mattered for them anyway, why should it matter for us?” -Me.

“That makes sense... so when is the world going to end?” -Jaqu.

And then, we moved into a rather brilliant lessons about the millennium, and left little Jaquelin much less frightened about 2012, and looking forward to the second coming, rather than fearing it.

I think my understanding of the 2012 theory is inherently flawed. But that's okay, I helped a 10 year old girl get a good night's sleep and had her imagining Mayan kittens, so all's good.

Anyway, tell me how you like the movie.

3.6? Good work Jensen! Ra ra ra. Si se puede!

I got Sifu's word about the Kung Fu test. Sounds intense! You know what else sounds intense? The political climate. Urgh. Kind of glad I'm missing it.

Carmen! Ooo, cool! I was totally thinking about Opera this week. I don't remember why. It had some relevance... Anyway, that lame that the musicians sacrificed a good show for their own selfish reasons. Three minutes? Honestly? How totally unprofessional and without keeping in the spirit of art and beauty and love. They should be thoroughly chastised.

I'm so sorry about your tooth, that sounds painful. Sad too, that you couldn't even get a hold of your dentist... Something like that needs to be handled quickly.

Well, I love you all and miss you terribly. I'm looking forward to mommy's letter this week in the mail.

Os quiero mucho,

Hermana Lillywhite

2010

Hey family! I am very well, I went to see the doctor this week and he gave me some stuff to start taking and scolded me for not properly medicating myself before now. I already feel a lot better, so I guess he had a point. Aside from ill health this week has been really great. We lost all our top investigators in just the space of a few days, (moving to Mexico/Oaklahoma/dropped up) but we had some success knocking and contacting referrals and now we have a great deal of new people to work with who I'm really excited to teach! Hermanita Christensen is incredible. She's a fearless sister, ready to take on any challenage and we've got a lot of the same taste in everything. She was going off about how much she loves Meryl Streap and 30 Rock and I thought of Jensen.

Oh! That reminds me. Last week, after I was done writing you, Ashley woke up and came out of her bedroom and was humming to herself, "01189998819901197253." Turns out she's a huge fan of the IT Crowd and the Mighty Boosh and all my shows that I left behind so I could serve God. Once again, thought of Jensen. You'd dig these people, they are adorable!

Hermana Christensen had a dream that she taught and converted First lady Laura and President George W. Bush. She said that she some how ran into them here in Houston and gave Laura a Book of Mormon, then a few days later they got back into contact with us and asked to be baptized! Then I had the same dream, except it was Hulk Hogan and his wife (ex-wife?) and I was giving them couple's counseling, but also preparing them for baptism.

I also had a dream that Michelle Obama started insulting the Prophet (it wasn't Monson or Hinckly, I think it might have been Benson) durring a press conference, because of some false accusations that were being put against the relief society being a secret organization to overthrow the government. So, I went to lay the smack-down on the first lady, but then I woke up before things got violent--but man, she made me mad. I don't have anything specific against Michelle Obama really, I seem to remember being annoyed with a couple of stupid comments she made in the past, but I don't really remember what they are now. And I might be mixing her up with Al Gore's wife. It has been a year, after all, since I read a newspaper or watched the news or listened to talk shows etc. I don't know anything about the current situation, so this whole dream came completely out of left-field. Whatever, it made my companion laugh, so that was fun.

Your trip to California sounds wonderful mommy and daddy! So does that mean daddy's all recovered from his pneumonia? Once again, I love the food. It sounds like Meredith has married into a very nice family, and so has Tanner for that matter:) San Clamente sounds dreamy. I've got to admit, I'm slightly devistated that that Sea Cliffs place was sold, remember how determined I was to becoming wealthy and eccentric and buy it myself? My dreams are dashed... Oh well!

Dracula's Castle is still for sale, right?

I'm really looking forward to those two weeks of paradise with you folks. Although, I'm not so much looking forward to the gigantic presipice of nothing that follows those three or so week after I get home from my mission. It's alright though... I think I might take your advice and just figure it out when I get back. I can't really devote a sifficient amount of attention to it now anyway. I just wish I'd put a LITTLE bit of thought into my post-mission plans before I left. Do you know if august-september is too late for me to apply to Graduate school at BYU for the Spring sememster in 2011? I don't really have money or anything, so I might want to get a job and work on that for a bit anyway, but I would like to get on with my studies before too long.

I'm glad that you got the opportunity to visit with family. And various missionaries:) Our mission President was just stressing the importance of asking for refferals from everyone, so we've gotten a few new people to teach as a result of that council.

I'm reading Jesus El Cristo for my language study. I've read it in English which makes reading it in Spanish a lot easier. I doubt I'll finish it before the end of my mission, but I've made a goal to finish before the end of the year. It's the only real new years resolution I bothered to have, since I think I'll actually fulfill it, which will be kind of amazing. Maybe I'll read it while lying on the beach in my swimsuit in august. Probably. I also want to read Crepusculo (Twilight in Spanish) and the Harry Potter series.

Ashley is preparing to get her patriarocal blessing this next Sunday. We're suberbly excited for her. Hopefully God will let her know she's supposed to go on a mission, since us telling her this seems to have little influence. She typically just shakes her head or makes up some excuse like "I'm so NOT sweet and innocent. I can't be a sister missionary!" But she can and she should be. She's got her albedrio though, but hopefully upon reminding her of that she'll go to the Lord in prayer and then make the right choice. She's our source of knowlegde on the outside world. She's told me about two movies: Legion and Daybreakers, neither of which she's seen but that she thinks look interesting/like I would like them. Don't really know what either of these are aside from one of them being about vampires and the other about angels, which is a fun contrast.

Shannon and Christopher got married. The wedding was small and thrown together at the last second, but really quite lovely. It was a nessecary step for Shannon to get baptised this saturday with her mother Debbie and father Tony. (This is the family I met on Thanksgiving who the English Elders are teaching). I thought about Meredith and her wedding which was going on the same weekend and hoped you all were having a really wonderful time.

I'm loving it here, but I do miss you all a lot. I hope everyone is well and happy! MWAH! I love you!

Hermana Lillywhite

Hermana Christensen

My new verde verde is Hermanita Christensen. Wednesday night last week all the Spanish sisters in the mission gathered to take the new sisters greeny-tracting (knocking doors their first night) but on account there being a demand for missionaries to attend a combined 3rd&5th ward party we just ended up driving all the way down to tickle downtown to take them to this party and meet some of the ward members. Hermana Christensen came with me and Hermana Russon in our car to go down there, (this is before we knew I was going to be her trainer) so she got to see me in traffic/when people don't give me proper directions and invent exits for me to take off the freeway), which may not have been the most uplifting experience—but the party was awesome! (depending on who you ask) I thought it was awesome, because the Castillos of 5th ward were there, and I love that family! I met the mom on memorial day last spring and talked with her for a while and she asked to met with the missionaries in her area and now she and her mother and her seven children are all members. And Alicia and Janet and Yolanda came (three of my recent converts from 3rd ward) and Alicia's tia who just got baptized and who I haven't gotten to see since the first time I met her when Alicia brought her to general conference (my last week in Crosstimbers) and Luis! Another one of my recent converts. So I was like “YAY! Everybody came!” but pretty much nobody else besides them came, so everyone else was pretty sure the party was a failure. We still took pictures and had a blast, and I got to talk with everyone who I haven't seen in ages for a while, before we had to run back down to the mission home to get the girls in before nine.

The next day we had breakfast at the mission home and then President announced who would be training who, then we got to go to the temple and then (on account of it being new years in Texas which means drunk people and fireworks, we were under orders to be in by five o'clock. Hermana Diaz made us papusas. Awesome. And Tamales. With banana leaves. Yum.

Hermanita Christensen is ADROABLE! 4'11” and blonde with big blue eyes. She was a cheerleader in high school and is just a lovely little energetic thing. She's so excited to work, and the girl's got NO fear. I'll just be like “...You should probably talk to that guy,” and she's like, “Okay.” and there she goes. It's amazing. She's so determined to speak Spanish and since there's that whole lack of fear thing, she just does it, and talks, even if it's not totally correct, she just speaks and tries her best and people are understanding her. She's going to be fluent in no time, I'm positive. She's from Royal City Washington and she constantly has to tell people, “No, no, it's really not anywhere near Seattle.”

She's a great missionary ya.

Well Steven got confirmed this last week, he almost didn't because he was too terrified to get up in front of everybody in sacrament meeting, so the bishop made arrangements to confirm him in his office with just his mom and a couple of people there. It worked out great and he's got the gift of the Holy Ghost now.

I'm doing great, entounces... Oh! Remember my pink pillow-case that's covered in mini Salt Lake temples and cute little babies and girly stick-figures? The one that I got in my Mission-Prep class? Turns out that Hermana Christensen's aunt is the woman who draws all those little stick figures. Hermana recognized the pattern and was like “That's my aunt's drawings!”. Very funny.

Pregunta: What is a 'Charismatic Christian?'

We knocked on some woman's door (frequent activity for LDS missionaries) and she answered and said “Sorry, I'm a Charismatic Christian.” and slammed the door. Let's lay aside that completely contradictory nature of the whole situation and just examine this practically... Que quiere dicer ESO?
I'm pretty sure I'm a Charismatic Christian. I'm a very Charismatic Christian. I've got charisma for miles, what does that have to do with anything?

I know, I know. It's some sect I know nothing about. We were both just a little confused however.

It must be so weird not having kids running around por todos lados en casa. Jensen's at BYU and Laney's at school. Poor daddy in bed! And mommy at school too. But I'm glad you are all still trying to have some fun. I'm excited about the existence of the Sherlock Holmes movie. And New Moon sounds like exactly my kind of girl-fest. Didn't I already explain to you mom? That brilliant thing about the Twilight series is that there's NO plot until the fourth book and then they throw everything at you all at once. And somehow it works for me. A very well written, creative first-person narrative completely devoid of all traces of plot, except for a couple of nods to Jane Austin and the Bronte Sisters. Up until book four that is. Then it develops it's own plot so fast it kind of smacks one about the head and shoulders. It's a bit uncomfortable for people who are not inexplicably madly in love with the story like me.

Good for ginna on her grades! That's so cool that you guy get to go to Meredith's wedding. Please send pictures! I'd like some shots from the Kung Fu test too. I like to see the carnage.

Well, not much else to report on this week. I got some awesome letters from people recently and some SWEET Christmas presents. Thank you to aunt Nuggie and uncle John and Kat and Daniel! We are disfrutaring a lot in all the goodies and little, incredibly useful presents. And thank you to Aunt Les and Aunt Missy and Filly for your presents! And I just got uncle Dan's letter, I'm way excited to hear from him... I still need to send out my belated Christmas greetings to everybody. Hopefully I'll get the chance to do it today. As this is getting ridiculous.

Last little bit of good news! Remember in that weekly breakdown that I gave last transfer, who I mentioned teaching the Medina's inlaws at Thanksgiving? And then I threw up as soon as we left cause I was all sick? Debbie and Tony and their daughter Shannon, have all just gotten their interviews for baptism yesterday. It was awesome. I just remembered the first time we taught them...

“So, we teach in Spanish, and go to the Spanish congregation, but there's some very nice young men who teach people interested in coming to the English congregation, if y'all would like them to stop by sometime and talk to you a little bit more about this.”(motioning to the pamphlet I just handed them)

“Yeah, yeah, I think I'd like to hear more about this.” -Debbie

“Sure. They can come by.” -Tony, “But... you know... We're catholic. So...”

I just smiled big and said quietly inside myself, 'Not for long.' (sinister chuckle)

Okay, so it can' be that sinister since I'm wishing for their eternal happiness and salvation and that they might receive the opportunities to enjoy in the blessings of god in this life and well as in la vida venidera. But I just like the comic-book imagery. We are trying to take over the world, you know.

It was a really touching experience to speak to them again on Christmas Eve. There had been a huge change in them, and you could see how they were just so full of hope and joy now. The Elders officially love us. Elder Frost when he interviewed them said he was totally blown away by how prepared they were and how spiritually sensitive they were. They've been able to pick up on how everything that's happened to them in connected. How God has been leading them to this place at this time to make this decision. It's so beautiful. I'm so happy that I could be involved in helping them find the truth. Their baptism is scheduled for the 16th. I'm really looking forward to it!

I love you all. Mommy, I miss you all like crazy too. I can't wait to see you all again, but I know I'm in the right place and I'm doing what I should be doing. 6-7 months isn't really all that long when you think about it. I hit my year mark this week. That's nuts. I still remember exactly how it felt when I was walking away from all of you and I was saying to myself, 'Don't look back, you're just going to sob louder. It's okay, just keep going.' and then there was this other voice that you like, 'You won't see them again for a year and a half, turn around!'

Man, it was rough. But time does fly. 2009 is over with, and with 2010, I'll be back home with all of you!

I LOVE you my family!