May 12th

Hey yall. It is a little easier for me to write in English than to speak it. A little out of practice. 

sorry Elder B. Your Dominican accento threw me off as well. I was so glad to hear you all and to see you!! Hard to believe that n just a few short months I will be coming home. Last time I will skype dad and k. I am sorry, that I was short on words in a few places but I was just happy to get to see you. 

It has been hard to get adjusted to my new area, so I didn´t have a lot to say there either. I hear ya AB, I´m sure it will be quite a change for you and having to transfer isn't always easy, but you have been doing a lot of good work so keep up the attitude and keep pushing! It´s not new for you to hear, but just have faith in the Lord that everything will be alright this transfer because it will :) I love you Alex. I know you´re going to make a difference in your new area. 

Dad and K, It was great to hear from you, two. tell Doug thank you and I say Hi as well. thanks as well for all of your packages.Karen I will answer your question in the letter I have ready to send. 

 

 

It is Extremely important to follow the Prophet. The blessing of being a missionary it has been great to share 2 things- The Atonement of Jesus Christ, and the Restoration. To truely appreciate and know of the truthfulness of the Prophets words we must start with a testimony of the Restoration. Which also starts with the words in the book of Mormon. 

 

But i will write you more in the letter, and Dad, it was awesome to speaks Spanish with you too. :) 

I don't have too much else to say as well. But thank you for making it possible to see all of you. I know that it is the work of the Lord, yes It is hard, but it doesn't take away the truthfulness of this message. 

 

I love you and hope you have a great week. and yes I will send more pics next week. 

Les quiero mucho

May 5th

Hey Famm

Sí! feliz cinco de mayo. Nadie se lo celebra aquí, pero asi lo es. Hope you were able to eat tacos, burritos, drink lemoñade, etc. This week has been a little crazy. There are days with absolutley nothing, and days with a lot going on. Hey- Guess who came to visit? One Direction... We were practically at the concert with everything that happend there where a lot of fireworks and the few YW that are in our ward all went. tons of fireworks we had a pretty good week.

 A lot of contacting more than anything and we are working harder to ask for references from everyone.  One cool experience- we noticed a hurse coming out of an apartment building parking lot a couple of weeks ago as we were going to have lunch with a member. We asked the members if they knew the person who passed away, and they told us yes, not that they knew them very well, but that they knew them. We ended up contacting a person who lived in the same apt building as the family with the person who passed away. we went with a member to visit this contact that we had after our first plan failed. the plan de respaldo also fell through, but we contacted a woman in this apt buildng- at first the woman was pretty stubborn and didn't want to hear us, but the member who came with us has so much excitement for the obra misional. She pretty much gave lesson 1,2, and 3 to this lady who didn't want to hear us. But her heart completely changed in the end. She told us that her mom had passed away. the daughter of the lady who passed away just a week earlier. Although she didn't accept our invite to teach her or for her to come to church, we had a great lesson with the member who came with us and the member bore her testimony. I was very impressed and grateful for this member who was so persistent in sharing the Gospel with this woman who is a great example to me. A lot more has happened this week. Not too many progressing, but incentive to find more people to teach. 

 

........

I received good news from my old sector. that A____ had her baby and that J_____ that i have mentioned in a few letters came to church with all of his family. He has pretty much been attending alone for the past 6 months. hermana salazaar told me the good news today, :)) I am so happy for this. 

I wish I had a bit more to tell you. time always escapes me, but hey I will talk to you all on sunday hopefully. 

I am grateful for so much... and although the results don't always follow, I know that everything works out in the end and that Heavenly Father knows what is best. I am here to do my best, and to share what i know and believe. I love you guys. 

 

Yes if you can i would be so grateful to receive something warm. I am planning on buying more warm clothes. Depends on our pdays but in the next few weeks. ....... I love them so much :) 

 

cool to hear congrats to ELDER CLARK! and to the new bishop lol!!!!! how cool

ELDER B. such good news i will be praying for ____ as well cool with your ward in prov. how awesome is that?? 

 

 

a few good views fromm my apt and our faithful Menos Act hno Cofree. Very stylish. 

........

have a good week i will talk to you sunday!!!!!

Ether 12:4

hola familia. 

lo ha sido una buena semana aqui en JP. Discoursé mi primer Domingo sobre la importancia del ayuno por la obra misional. Y, aparte de esto yo estaba tranquila con hna Veron trabajando y conociendo los miembros y las calles. Los miembros son diferente acá. Menos JAS y mucho más niñitos de la primaria- un buen cambio jaja. Algo diferente es que tenemos algunos conversos recientes, estamos trabajando más con ellos ahora. 

 

(It has been a good week here in JP. My first Sunday I discourse on the importance of fasting for missionary work. And apart from that I was calm and working with Sr. Veron knowing members and streets. Members are different here. Less JAS and more little children of primary-a nice change haha. Something different is that we have some recent converts, we are working more with them now.)

 

I have learned a lot within the last few days. It has been challenging to get to know the sector but Hermana Veron has been helping me a ton. The ward is different. I don't have too much to write on account of only being in my sector for a week. But we have been able to find a few new investigators and like i said above, a few new conversos which we didn't have in el parque. It has been a transition coming to JP, and I am also getting used to the cold weather starting up . que lata. I am also studying a lot more about hope which is my attribute that I am working on this month.- may. hope you like my scripture of hope to go along with it. 

 

 

Ether 12:4

.....

perdon que no tengo mucho para responder. les amo muchisimo y espero que tengan una buena semana. 

(sorry I do not have a lot to answer. I love them very much and I hope you have a good week.)

haciendo comida con hna veron hoy y ayer en la capilla.

 

 

Sr. veron making food with today and yesterday in the chapel. 

April 21st - finally getting transferred

Tuve cambios hoy! (I have updates)

J P Alessandri es mi sector nuevo. Something notable about my sector is that COLO COLO (fùtbol team) plays here and in Chile, you`re either a Colo Colo fan ò de la U (de chile). But I have about 6 hours in my new sector. It was super sad to say goodbye to everyone in the ward yesterday, I will send you a few fotos. There were some cool things that happened yesterday, though. One of them is that our Less-Active, Hna M_____ G_____ went to one of our  church activities yesterday. An Easter Activity, or as they say here, la Pascua de la Resurrecion, Hna M____ hadnt been to church since she was 14 years old. Although it technically wasn't Sacrament meeting, she came to church and loved the presentation by the choir. She is 54 years old. and our goal since the beginning of working in El Parque was to bring her to church- She also knew it was my last Sunday. Not only that, but after the presentation, Someone came and put their arms around me from behind. Her daughter, A____ was there, she too is a less-active. I didn't think that I would be able to see her before I left because she left for the weekend, but knowing that I would be leaving, she came and met us at church. She and her mom got to see the Easter Presentation. I said good-bye to a lot of the members here. I have been in El Parque for over 8 Mon.

Glad to see that K and Dad were able to visit the Hathaways this past week. And that you stopped by to visit hna coley! she looks well and happy!! and Sister Dodd got her Call!!!! Wow, I cant believe it! havent heard of Because of Him but sounds cool. 

Alex- how cool with the Boston Marathon. you are right Bstrong!!!!!

Dad- i love you and I live right next to a post office now. you will all be getting letters soon 

I too want to let you know how much I love the Easter Season to celebrate the resurrection of our Savior, Jesus Christ. I know He lives and He came to do the will of His Father. And that Our Heavenly Father not only had the love of His Son in mind, but the love for us. He left us with a special gift, the Holy Ghost, to remind us of His love. 

I love you all and am grateful for the examples that you are to me, I hope you have a great week!

April 14th

Hola Familia-

This week has been a lot of work- a lot of walking, I´ll just put it that way. We have had difficulty finding people. We are not sure if it is just this time of the year (it got a LOT colder this week) or what, but it sure has been a challenge. One thing that I am proud of this week is that I have been studying the Harmonies of the Gospel,. I´m not sure If i mentioned this in an email, a few weeks back or not, but it has been really really really cool, to start from the Beginning of the life of Christ and work all the way to the end. In fact, I suggest it. As of now, I am finishing His ministry in Galilea and starting to study the last week of His life. Perfect timing, eh? With Easter coming up this week, it is really special to know more of the Ministry of Christ and what He came Here to do. One day this week, I was studying in John 6. This is a chapter where Christ feeds the 5,000, where Peter walks on water to meet Christ, and where Christ teaches the people in Galilea that He is the Bread of Life. It pretty much moved me to tears. Reading from John 6:66-69. It is incredible that Christ did not cease to heal, teach, and serve those who only believed and did not follow. and how John 3:16 is one of the most merciful verses in the Bible. And yet, to follow Him completely to the end, there are very few willing to do so. I love Peter´s response in his loyalty and friendship to the Lord. And how we can respond the same way. I am very grateful for the teachings of the Savior, and these days that are coming up are days of recognizing Him, His life, and His resurrection.

I hope you all have a great week. I also ask that in your prayers you can remember the people here in Valparaiso, Chile. There have been huge fires that have killed a few people and left a few homeless. 

A few photos from this week. Andres, Paula, Valentina, Cristobol and Vanessa (amiga de la Vale) after church. and making sushi at the bishops house. We also hiked the hill in our sector. Reminded me a lot of Cback :))

love you i will let you know when i get packages. everyone looks great! congrates hailey! she is so big and hazel. looks like yall had fun, :)

April 7th

Hola Family

I don't have a lot of time to write this week. I LOVED conference. It is that much more special as a missionary and listening to the talks and thinking of how some pertain to the people we are teaching. It was a blessing to hear our Prophent speak to us. An ongoing topic from what I heard was the theme of the love of Jesus Christ. There is never an end of learning or knowing more about our Savior and our Relationship to Him. There is not an end to knowing what the Atonement is and how to apply it. And I am taking on the challenge of studying it and applying it more. I am so grateful to know that I am a daughter of Heavenly Father. And that as a missionary, I can testify of this truth. 

This might be the shortest of all of my emails, but I hope you continue on this week and ponder on the truths we´ve heard from the servants of the Lord. I love you all and am grateful for your examples of faith. Faith is an incredible divine attribute. 

pics- A___, P____, V_____ (holding her cousin____) F____, her friend and C______

baby shower for A____

pic with my comp after conference

Please keep in prayers also the people in Northern Chile. very terrible earthquake. Don't worry about us here. We are safe. We do get some cool temblores though :)

March 31st

Short email this week! I don´t have a lot of time to write. Neither was there a lot going on. It has been a pretty cold week weather-wise. And we have been working, battling the sicknesses that are going around Santiago. It seems like everyone we have gone to visit this week has been under the weather. Please continue to pray for A____ G____ and his family! They still don´t know when they can get married. They have the desire, 100%, they just need to ask and take care of the paperwork now.

I, like Elder Berthelson, am getting ready for the conference. We are telling all of our investigators about it. I am super excited to hear the prophet speak and direct us. I was also very grateful to receive a package with a conference talk from President Packer! and some twistables to mark my scriptures with. Thank you so much! 

I do have a favor from you, each of you, Dad and Karen esp. I am studying the attributes of Christ in PMG, starting with faith. If you could send me a conference talk, share your testimony, or anything relating to the topic of faith in Jesus Christ, I would greatly appreciate it. I got this idea from my wonderful companion. And knowing that I am halfway through my mission, I am using the last nine months to study and completely apply these nine attributes. Ideas in application could work, too. I am so grateful to be a representative of the Lord and know that this is His work. 

I hope you like the fotos . I now know how to make the perfect pancake thanks to our investigator, Jackalyn! Chilenos make them differently. nevertheless, i am excited to make them for yall when i get home. Also, eating at a pakastani (sp) restaurant on pday with the hermanas in our pension. 

Perdón por la carta tan corta y fome esta semana. Les amo mucho. Disfruten esta fin de semana y escuchen las palabras de los siervos del Señor.