Hermana Nelson's Mission Paraguay Asuncion North

Last Post!!!

2011-04-13T06:31:00.000-07:00

OOhhhhhhhh man!!! Well I have about 2 seconds to write, but last week was the BEST week EVER!!! I can't wait to tell yall all about it. Man I love these people and I am going to miss them like crazy, I've been crying all week long and we are about to leave to Luque for my despedida and I'm going to cry more. Oh man. I can't believe it's really time. But I'm so EXCITED to see yall!!! It'll be so fun!! Thanks sooo much for all your emails, I wish I could email you indvidually but I can't, but no big deal, we'll see eachother soon! I love yall so much!! Thanks so much for everything. THe gospel is SO TRUE and really, I have felt so much HAPPINESS on my mission. The best year and a half of my life. Love it! Love yall. See ya soon! Be good!!!
Love,

Hermanita Nelson

April 4, 2011 10 Days Everyone!!! 2cd to last post

2011-04-05T07:47:00.000-07:00

WOW, Ok I don´t even know where to start!! Conference was AMAZING, I loved all of it (bueno, all of it that I saw...) but I think Sunday afternoon was my favorite session, and like everyone else said, I too want to just be a better, kinder person! So this week was crazy! Probably one of the hardest weeks of the mish... we got rejected so many times this week! it was incredible, I´m talking worse than Asuncion rejected. Looks like someone is trying to get me discouraged and desanimada (I´m sorry, I can´t translate that..I just spent like 5 min trying to think of the word in english). But that is NOT going to happen. And everyone keeps saying this week will be even harder, igual no mas. I´m so excited for this week! MY LAST FULL WEEK in the mission field, entonces OBVIOUSLY (like Nick obviously lol) it is going to be AMAZING. Time to step it up, go BIG or go home!! Ha and home is going to have to wait a week and a half. So I´m just going to work my hardest, with the goal of going home TIRED...they might just have to send me home on a stretcher, perfect. Man, didn´t conference just get everyone excited to live and to be happy and to serve? Oh so the story... bueno, on the saturday session, our adorable lil investigator Gisel, surprised us and came! Which we were really excited about. The full story will just have to wait, but basically during the second session we were pulled out after about 15 min (right after they announced my old mission president, Terry L. Wade, to be a general authority!!!! Called that one, he is so amazing!) and one of the member told us that Gisel had left somewhere because she wasn´t feeling good. So we start searching EVERYWHERE for her, and then finally found her- and bueno she has some kind of sickness but I´m not sure what it is, but she has like those attacks like she can´t breathe (like an asthma attack maybe, but they said it´s not that) and it´s been happening like twice a week lately. So justamente she had one right after we found her. And we were like freaking out because we didn´t have any idea what to do and we´re just praying like crazy...bueno yall will get the full story later, but basically we missed that whole session of conference because we ran to the emergency room and were there the whole time. Por suerte, she is fine but we were so scared. I know that God answers prayers. Ahhh so that along with other things, like them not having the session in english and the power going out, made it so we didn´t see all of conference. But it´s all good, and what I heard just changed my life lol. The church is so true and so legit. I love being a missionary and a member of this true church. Life doesn´t get any better. Thanks for all yalls support and love, it has made this experience all the more sweeter!! FELIZ CUMPLEANOS Nate this week! Chulina! Love yall! Have a great week!!!

Love,
Hermanita Nelson

**Amanda's homecoming will be on April 17th at 1:00 pm
She will be arriving home on April 15th!!!

Mar. 28, 2011

2011-03-30T09:34:00.001-07:00

Hola los estados unidos!!!! Alrighty, I have no time bc today was crazy, but I´ll give yall a lil somethin something. Ok so justamente on the 23rd (my official last day of my mission), I woke up feeling TERRIBLE. But woke up at the usual hour 6:30 to do our usual caminata- our lil walk around the neighborhood, and just about died and we had to turn around and come home early. But we continued with the usual and after studies I went and laid down a lil bit before we went out to work. Well the whole time we´re out working I just feel so terrible and weak and can´t breathe and yeah... to make a long story short, I almost blacked out on the colectivo and everyone on the colectivo was freaking out and the chofer wanted to drive us to the hospital- out of his route- to make sure I was ok. We´ll save that story for after the mission, but basically we got back home as soon as we could and I hit the bed and was out. I don´t know what happened to me, I´m pretty sure it was some bicho- a bug- because I had chivivi (I´ll explain after the mish) the whole time and couldn´t eat anything and felt like death for 2 days straight. Bleh. Hna Tuaone also got way worse with her cold and we were both so sick and so pathetic. It was so sad. And right now, I´m pretty sure I still have some kinda bug, but I´ll be fine. But I really feel so blessed because the Lord blessed us so much even though we were out of work for 2 days! We saw so many lil miracles, lil tender mercies. Juana-an old investigator who we haven´t seen or talked to in over a month, we decided to randomly go to her house and we were really nervous bc we didn´t know how it would go, but it turned out sooo good! Unfortunately she can´t fully progress right now because her husband won´t give her permission to go to church or anything, BUT she knows the Book of Mormon is true and she is so excited to go to conference and it was just great, I´ll explain the full story later. Another thing, for the first time EVER Graciela´s husband shared with us. It was incredible! A complete change of heart. I don´t know what happened! It was a miracle and he accepted a baptismal date. So cool! Also we have such an incredible investigator right now, Gisel, who is just SO prepared for the gospel and loves it and recieved an answer and is just so legit. She is the cutest and I am so excited for her and it is just such a joy to teach her! And then yesterday we had one of the COOLEST lessons I´ve ever had in my mission. The spirit was SO strong and everything just went SO smoothly, the Lord was just guiding everything! With this man that we contacted the week before, we found his house and taught him for the first time. It was just like the perfect lesson, everything you want an investigator to do. Ahh and as I was testifying about the Book of Mormon, he interrupted me, and he´s like I´m sorry but I just have to ask you a question. If you die right now, do you think you will be able to live with God? ANd I was like ah ojala (hopefully), and I was like I´ll tell you what. I don´t know what would happen, but I do know that I am in the right path. That the gospel of Jesus Christ is the answer. And that it is through a baptism with the authority, which is the first step to enter into the kingdom of God. And I know that this is the true church of God on the earth today, etc. And then he was like you just seem soo sure, I can tell that you know what you are saying is true. I want to feel like that and have that surety. I want to know too. Ahhhh... I was like perfect. And then we just went on to testify and invited him to be baptized. ANd he was like absolutely. And he is really excited about the conference as well. Ahhh I amm SOOOO excited about conference! And we are just make everyone sooo excited!!! I can´t wait!!! I know this week is going to be sooo awesome!! I love yall! Thank yall all so much for the emails! I don´t have time to write individual emails, but next week! And thanks Angela and Alisa for your blogs, chulina! ANd thanks grandma and pops and mom and alena and mamma wariner and emily and hna case and g and todos! Love yall! Have a great week!

Love,
Hermanita Nelson

Pictures

2011-03-22T12:10:00.000-07:00

Here are some pictures Amanda sent home yesterday:

March 21, 2011

2011-03-22T07:10:00.000-07:00

Ahhhhhhhhhhh man this week was SOOOOOOOOOOOOOO goooood!!!!!!!!!!!!! Even though both my comp and I got sick this week and almost died, pero por suerte it wasn´t dengue! I got some kinda bicho, bug in my stomach, and then a couple days later Tuaone got a cold or something and still getting over it, but we´re better now! Aver, so we had a BAPTISM! Ahh it felt soooo good, it´s been awhile. It was for Wildo, I´ll save the story for later, but it´s a good one! But it all went really well, a couple problems right at the beginning ha but we are in Paraguay so not a big deal. The church is true. We also had the conference with President and that went really well, always really inspiring, man we did so many practices, it was intense. But it was cool bc we did a practice with la hna Madariaga and the Spirit was just so strong and by the end we were all 3 crying, and she was like wow hermanas if you can bring the spirit in that strong during a practica, yall must be doing just fine out in the field. It was cute. And man, yesterday at church it was so random because so many of the inactive people we have been visiting forever just randomly decided to come to church! And I can´t even describe it but when I saw them walk through the doors, my heart just like melted because I was just so happy, and it like moved me to tears. Man, I just love these people and feel so special to be out here serving them. And it´s just soo cool because I know the work we are doing here is blessing this rama so much, which just makes me feel good. We get to be instruments in the Lords hands to help these people out. They are good people, they just need a lil help, and that´s what hermanas are for! Oh haha and we also had a birthday party for the relief society and it turned out to be really cute. There was just a couple of us there but it´s cool that they are celebrating all over the world! ANd let´s talk about how I officially finish my mission this Wednesday, my 18 months will be up! ha but don´t worry, I just take that extra 3 weeks as like a bonus. THere is still so much work to be done here and it is time to go out with a bang! And I know the Lord will bless us for our obedience and animo! No time to waste people, time to get serious. I love Paraguay. I love the mission. I love being a missionary. Life is good :) Oh and by the way, Angela and Alisa have got to be the cutest lil moms, that makes me excited to be a mom.. mas adelante. But all that stuff was so cute and I love seeing pictures of the kids. And mom what are rueben sliders? And I´m going to send a couple pics just incase yall forgot what I look like... ha probably a lil different then the last time yall saw me. Bueno I love yall! Have a great week! Be good!

Mar. 14, 2011

2011-03-14T18:17:00.001-07:00

Ok a couple things, first, I can´t believe Ty is completing a YEAR in the mission!!! WOOT WOOT! That´s awesome bud! And so sweet you still have another year to tear it up! Second, yeah I definitely saw that picture of Payden, and said, ahh chulina! aka ahh payden, cute! That´s so awesome!!! I´m so excited for him! ANd chachi! Awesome. Good job boys! And Gpa Al, Happy Belated Birthday!! Other thing, remember how whenever I started to feel sick or whatever, I would always say I had cancer? Now, it´s dengue. Everyone in Paraguay has dengue. And all these missionaries keep getting it and they just sent us this huge warning and all these things we need to do to prevent getting it haha. Man so my comp and I are so scared of getting dengue. And like every area we go to, they will say something about someone having it. Ha pray for us. Also, I have some really AWESOME NEWS! Manu got his mission call this week!!! ANd he is going to Peru!! So awesome, and so I´m just praying that Emilio gets his before I leave!! But that is just so awesome that they are going to go and be missionaries! And this week was just so good. We worked a full. We like doubled our numbers from the week before and just finding and teaching and finding and teaching. It´s a blast. Oh and there was like a lil cold front that came in yesterday, so the weather is awesome, which makes it even greater to work in. Tomorrow and Wednesday we have a conference with President which should be really good. Man once again I have just been so humbled and so grateful for all the blessings I have. Mostly about family. Man, family is the best. Yall better be ready to just be with me all the time, because that is what is so important. It is so sad to see all the broken families here. It´s something completely normal, and every time it just breaks my heart. I never realized how blessed I really was. Ha thanks parents for being so awesome, and siblings for being so awesome. We have such a great family. What a blessing. Man that´s so awesome we´ll be able to live together forever if we just do our part here in this life. Family is part of the plan of God. The main part. It´ll be so fun starting my own lil family... mas adelante. But it´s so cute to see Angela and Alisa and their lil families. And to just see how they are living the gospel and teaching their children now. That is following a prophet. Man, I am so excited for conference! Ha everyone in Paraguay thinks it is the end of the world. All of the newspapers say it. After what happened in Japan, ahh soo sad. And we just keep pointing at our plaques and say estamos en los ultimos dias. We´re in the last days, the signs are everywhere. Repent! Ha ok maybe not exactly like that, but man the gospel is true and I am so thankful for a living prophet and for the scriptures. We have all the things we need to prepare! Ha oh and yesterday at church a member came up and asked me if I could give the sunday school class about 2 minutes before it started, I was like oh perfect no problem. Ha so I did. And it acutally went really well, it was really cool to see how the spirit guided the lesson, and someone gave a comment about what a privilege it is to be a member of this true church. And I just kept thinking about that. What a privilege, what a responsibility. Ahh and how privileged I feel to be a representative of Jesus Christ and to serve my Lord for this year and a half. Awesome. I love yall and am so thankful for your love and support. Have a great week! Be good!

Mar. 7, 2011

2011-03-08T12:03:00.000-08:00

Alright...so first off CAMBIOS!!!! Ha no cambios, por suerte!!! I´m dying in Ypacarai with la hna Tuaóne!! I´m so excited!! There is SO MUCH work to do here and I love this special lil rama. And I am so grateful to be able to help them out a lil bit. Ohhhh and I got the package from the Wariners!!!!!!!! Thank you so much!!! Those oreo covered mint something were SOOOO GOOD! ANd I love chocolate! It was great! And I got letters from the Otts, chulina! And Hna Henderson that she sent in November... and the Batchelor´s! Thanks! Aver, so we found the cutest lil couple this week, Rafael, 62 and Tomasa, 50 and they just love us and love everything we say and are just so eager to learn more. It´s so fun! And we passed for them Sunday morning and unfortunately they couldn´t come to church, but she invited us over for lunch, which was AWESOME, because it was fast Sunday and all we had in the house were eggs (which we´ve been eating for the last 6 weeks), so it was nice for a lil change. And she made us this cute lil meal and it was so good and then we shared with her after. Anyways they are super cute and we´re excited to work with them. Our family didn´t come to church this week :( but they are still so cute and we have hopes for them. ANd basically we are just finding finding finding to find those people that are ready! Ahh and we had our mission prep class yesterday and it went really well. It was so fun! I think I want to be a seminary teacher. And church went really yesterday, a lot of people got up to share their testimonies and it was really cool. The mission is changing like crazy, we got a bunch of new rules again today. Exciting stuff. Too bad I´m leaving, which is why I just need to go work at the MTC! That would be awesome! THanks so much for your letters! I love hearing from yall! Oh p.s. Angela is so cute, all that stuff for Tyler´s bday was awesome. Bien hecho. I love yall! Have a great week! Oh p.s. Hna Case is OFFICIALLY ENGAGED!!! Woot woot! Alright Be good!!! Love yall!

Hermanita Nelson

Feb. 28, 2011

2011-02-28T12:57:00.000-08:00

M´bae cha pa?!!! Bueno, to start off, FELIZ CUMPLEAÑOS TY!!!!! 20 Years old!!! Oh man.... what a stud!!! I hope you have fun!! Second, EMILY IS A MARRIED WOMAN!!! Haha that´s crazy. Pero, FELICIDADES!!!! And this week we have changes!!! Mi ultimo cambio!!! I´m hoping I stay here with Hna Tuaóne, but anything could happen!! All I know, is that whoever I am with we are going to TEAR IT UP!!! There is a lot of crazy things happening around here, President just put a ton of new rules (one of them that we can´t have any more hermana activities :( which I´m really sad about because if we don´t have changes I won´t be able to say goodbye to Remache and that would be soooo sad. Ha I already tried to convince him to give us permission to see eachother but apparently he´s really serious about all this and he told me no, so what can you do?) He just wants everyone to be more obedient so we can have more exito. It´s kinda rough but he knows what he´s doing, so you got to just trust in him. We had a really awesome week this week! Oh and by the way, Ty´s experiences were so cool, that´s awesome how the Lord just prepares the way. We have these really cute investigators we have been working with... there is this cute lil family, bueno the dad doesn´t like it and doesn´t want to share with us, but the mom and her 4 lil boys are just the cutest things. We went to pass by for them yesterday for church and when we got there they were all ready to go and excited. And the boys just love us, it is so cute. The oldest is 10 and then 8, 6 and 2. They are adorable. We always do these really cute activities with them and it´s so fun. We drew maps of the plan of salvation with them last time and it was so adorable. And yesterday in church we had the most asistencia that we´ve had so far, which is awesome and we were really excited! All these menos activo families that we´ve been working with for awhile are starting to become activo otra vez. Ahh it is so cool and so rewarding when we see them walk in the church doors! Ha we always get so excited. Poco a poco. And the members love us, it´s so cute. Last night we had our lil meeting with our branch president and then his wife and one of the youth came out to talk to us, and they just randomly started talking about how greatful they are for us. It was really cute. They just love having elderas (hermanas haha) and it´s just cool that they say they have noticed a huge difference ever since we´ve came. I just feel really blessed to have been able to come here to good old Ypacarai. Ha it is so special. But it´s just exciting because I just know it´s going to keep on progressing and pretty soon they´ll have their own church. Man the mission is so rewarding. Ha we also climbed up a water tower this week, I thought I was going to die!!! I almost peed my pants when I was like half way up and I was so scared to keep going up, and I looked at the view and I almost just fell off. Man, Paraguay is beautiful!!! And por suerte I made it to the top and we got some cool pictures. You could see the lake and then just all the green of Paraguay and the sun was starting to set, it was sweet! Ohh that reminds me!!!! We went over to that part of our area because we recieved a couple references from a kid that´s from the states who apparently lived here for like a month like 3 years ago, but we ended up finding all the people up there and they just loved him and remember that he was such a good kid and that he didn´t drink beer or coffee and was just so nice and sweet. But his name is Shawn Reed I think, you could try to find him on facebook or Neil Reed and let them know we´ve contacted the people and that this week they will all have Books of Mormon!!! What a good story. Alrighty I gotta go!!! I love yall! Have a great week!

Love,
Hermanita Nelson

Feb. 21, 2011

2011-02-23T06:56:00.001-08:00

FELIZ CUMPLE MI QUERIDA ABUELA!!!! Happy Birthday Grandma Olson!!!! Woot woot! I hope yall had so much fun celebrating! This week was SO MUCH better than last week, ahhhh. We had so many awesome lessons, it was a blast. We are just finding and teaching a ton and we have some cool people we are working with. The sad news of the week is that Hna G is going home this Wednesday :( She just keeps getting worse, she has some kind of bug, so they are sending her home a change early with Hna Tsosie who is also sick. Sad day. I´m really sad about it, but she is such a guapa and such an awesome missionary. Yeah so she called last night to let us know, so I quickly called President to organize a lil hna activity so we could all say bye to them. It was a lot of fun. I don´t have like any time to write though. But I love yall and thanks so much for the emails! And the pictures from Alisa and Angela´s blogs are ADORABLE. Man I have got the cutest sobrinos, I love it. It´ll be so fun to play with them! But I love yall so much, sorry I don´t have any time. Have a great week!!! I promise I´ll write more next week!! But just know I am happy and loving life and the mission and Paraguay. Life is sooo good and the gospel is sooo true!! Life doesn´t get better than that. Be good!

Love,

Hermanita Nelson

Happy Valentine's Day!!

2011-02-20T20:34:00.000-08:00

**HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA Mom I about peed my pants reading that!!! That is HILARIOUS!!!! I´m serious, I just got so many weird looks, oh man I can just picture the whole thing. Hhahahaha pobrecito. hahaha good story mom. Oh man Emily had her shower, that´s cute, ah and Sarah Ott is engaged! Chulina, how´s the guy? Yeah do you know what day I´m doing my homecoming talk? Will it just be that next day? Oh by the way, I got my FLIGHT PLANS!!! Ahh man that is going to be the LONGEST day. I have to take 4 flights and then I have like a 3 hour layover in blasted Salt Lake lol. I fly most of the way with my peeps and I think one is coming with me to Salt Lake and then his parents will pick him up from there, but I´ll be chilling there all by myself, so sad. But yeah that would be so SWEET if they could come down for my homecoming, or if we could go up for Easter, I´m so down. Oh and let Monica and Michael know I got their card! I was so so excited! And I´m not writing a big email bc I don´t have time, but tell Tyler I love him and Happy Birthday! And I liked your quote of the day. It´s so true!!! With all these letters we are handing out to the future missionaries, we decide to start a lil mission prep class for them to study the scriptures and preach my gospel because they don´t have anything like that here. We´re really excited about it. We found a couple other boys that are excited and want to be active again and prepare to go. So cool. Love serving! This past week was actually way way hard and really sad, I´m glad it´s over, and we are starting a new week. We just heard so so many sad stories about peoples lives, last week more than ever and our investigator Juana that we´ve been workign with forever, her husband didn´t give her permission to get baptized, we even had the AP´s come out with us to try and convince him, but no. It was really sad. We are just hoping she´ll still be able to come to church and that one day she will be able to blessed with this baptism. Man you just learn so much in the mission. I almost just super guilty about all the blessings in my life that I have. I have so much and have been SOOOOO blessed and then hearing all those stories this week was just really hard, Peoples lives here are sooo hard, it´s incredible. We have so much. Ahhh. It was just so weird because this week more than any other week in my mission in almost every cita the people just let out their load and we just felt like pshychatrists (haha can´t spell that) but it´s just so crazy bc the answer is always the same. The love of the Savior. The Atonement of the Savior has such a healing power. It´s the gospel! The gospel can change your life and make you happy and help you feel peace and comfort ahhh and everything. We just must live it and trust in the Lord and pray to him and read his words and obey them, etc. Incredible. He loves us so much. Man, I am just so greatful for that knowledge. I love the gospel. And am always always always just so greatful for you and dad, seriously I don´t even know how to say it. Yall have done so much for us. Ha and I was never greatful, I never understood, and wow now I do, and I´ll spend the rest of my life thanking yall and trying to follow yalls examples. Love yall! Have a great week!

**This is her response from me telling her about getting locked out of the house and my adventures trying to get back in the house.

Feb. 7, 2011

2011-02-07T11:24:00.000-08:00

Man, I just love Paraguay. Let´s talk about how all I do is eat...bueno right now it is MANGO season and GUAYAVA (look it up...bc I don´t think we have that in the states) and I love it! I love just picking fruit off the tree and just eating it. Ypacarai has a ton of fruit everywhere, so everyday I just pick some fruit off the treat and it´s such a good lil snack! Also, there are icecream stands everywhere! ANd it is so cheap and sooo good because it is soooo hot! So we have icecream just about everyday, also we have that sweet americanish restaurant with the amazing deserts of pecan pie with icecream, that we´ve been getting everyweek, and we just discovered a Burger King and McDonalds in our area (ha our area is HUGE, and we have this one really chu chi spot that all the rich people from Asuncion go during the summer time, because it is right on the lake and they open a summer BK and McD, it is sweet!) So yeah we went there again today, yummy yummy yummy. ANd man the work this week was so good. I´m not even talking good, I am talking sooo good. We pretty much just tore it up. Like I was telling mom, this week in companionship study we studied a full on el espíritu santo, the holy ghost, and every lesson was just so awesome. We really focused on having the spirit being the teacher and man, it just flowed. Ahh and I can´t remember if I told you about Claudelino, he is a joven that we found that got a card (the invitation to go on the mission) and it´s cool, because he really wants to prepare to go and yesterday he came to church again and brought his sister (who is not a member) who just moved in with them. And she is going to get baptized, bueno I can feel it! This week we have zone conference, the last one before I go home (weird) which means I have to give my final testimony, which is so lame because I still have more than 2 months! But it´s cool. Being a missionary is the best, and I just feel like this will be the end to another beginning. I can´t just stop being a missionary. Yeah, maybe I won´t have the plaque but there are so many ways we can be member missionaries to help "bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of men" because that is why we are here. Gotta love it. The mission has just opened my eyes in so many ways y como siempre digo, estoy muy muy muy agradecida por la oportunidad y privilegio que yo tengo para ser misionera y servir a mi Dios. No hay nada mejor en la vida. No hay nada que trae mas felicidad o gozo. Da gusto luego! Ha I love yall! Thanks for all your love and support, it means the world to me! Be good! Ok bueno, we´ll finish with a ´good story´ from this week, ha from today. So we were riding the colectivo home from BK and we got on and it was pretty darn crowded and my comp got a seat in the very front and I got a seat in the very back but we couldn´t really see eachother. And it was raining a full outside so you couldn´t really see anything. So we had talked earlier about how we were going to go and do internet after we ate, so that´s the plan, right? haha so the stop is coming up, so I push my way to the buzzer, and I buz it and the bus stops and I get out with about 4 people behind me and people were coming out the front as well. So I jump off and run under the shelter so I don´t get soaked and wait for my comp...but wait, she doesn´t bajar (get off) and the colectivo drives away. So I like start panicking and I´m like oh shoot maybe she got off a block before, bc I had pushed it a lil late, so I´m looking around and I don´t see her. And so I´m like alright well maybe she got stuck and couldn´t push her way through on time to get off, so the colectivo will probably pull over again in a sec and she´ll get off...uh nope. So here I am, panicking and getting SOAKING WET looking for my other half. Ha you have no idea how weird I felt, ALONE. I was so scared lol, it felt so wrong. So now I am honestly just drenched standing in this huge puddle trying to look down the street, thinking oh man she must have thought we were going to go home first (which is another 8 block walk) and I´m like about ready to pee my pants, because I´m going to have to walk 8 blocks all by myself, when finally I see her walking towards me in the distance (like 4 blocks down) with her lil umbrella, dry as can be haha. Yeah there was definately some miscommunication, she wasn´t really sure if we had decided to go do internet or what, and she had a testigo (jehovah´s witness) sitting right next to her asking all these questions, ha it was a really old lady, and she was going to try and get off earlier but the lady wouldn´t stop talking and then she started panciking bc she couldn´t see me anymore on the colective and the testigo was like what´s the matter? And she´s like I don´t see my comp, and the testigo is like, aren´t yall always supposed to be together? haha oh man, so she hurried up and jumped off the colectivo. Oh man that is a good story. Man, I am going to be so weird after the mish, I´m going to have to have someone at my side siempre! lol Bueno, time´s up! Love yall! Have a great week!

Eldera Hermanita Nelson

Jan. 31, 2011

2011-02-01T09:18:00.001-08:00

Ahhh man, Ok I don´t have too much time! But this week was a lot of fun, we actually got lost like 3 different times this week and ended up in the middle of nowhere! We were trying to find some houses and it didn´t quite work out. We about died from heat, but we did end up finding one of the houses that we were looking for (one of the youth that had a letter/invitation to leave on the mission) and it´s been a really long time since he´s been, but we met him and have him some animo, and on Sunday he came!!! We are excited because he wants to find out more and reactivate himself and prepare for the mission. It was really cool. We also had a lot of inactive people come that we found this past week and who we´ve been visiting who haven´t been in months or years, so that was really cool. It´s crazy because the branch really does depend so much on the missionaries. But that´s cool, they are all new and learning, and we are just helping them to progress. It´s a lot of fun, they are all really good people. Investigators, no one came to church. We were really sad, that is our goal this week, to get people to church! It is so important. But we found a couple really new cool people that we are excited to work with. Also, we had another really cool lesson with Maicol. We were reading the Book of Mormon in guarani, portugues, y español. And it was really neat, the Spirit was so strong. I´m starting to get all emotional again haha. I remember at the beginning of my mission I was and then the middle I just kinda numbed out and now it is all coming back. Man, it´s just been manifested to me so many times how important this gospel is and how it can bless these people in their lives and how much they need it! Today we had our district meeting and an Elder shared a really cool analogy. He said alright, let´s say we have $1,000,000... what would you do for that? Just about anything right...claro. Ok let´s say we have $1,000,000,000, what would you do for that? Now let´s say, our Savior Jesus Christ. What would you do for him? Sad how sometimes we just put more value on worldly things. What would we do for our Savior? WHat would we sacrifice for Him? There´s always that one thing... that one thing, that we just hold on to and justify and tell ourselves it´s ok. What if we gave up that one thing, however big or small it is, what if we gave it up, so that we could allow ourselves to become closer to our Savior, and to be a better representative of Him? Man, I love this gospel. I feel that it is such a privilege and blessing that I have to be here serving my Heavenly Father in Paraguay. Life just doesn´t get better. Let us be better, sacrifice something more, so that we can be worthy of the blessings of God. Love yall!!!

Jan. 24, 2011

2011-01-24T14:50:00.000-08:00

¿Sabe qué? I may or may not have just completed 16 months in the mission and 14 months in Paraguay!!! Man that just flew right by! Oh and cambios!!! Alright, so la Hna Messina went up as sr. comp and went LEJOS!!!! She went out far to Villa Hayes and is with a latina! Ha she´ll do great and I´m gonna miss her, she is a guapa! So that leaves me y la hna Tuaóne! It´s great! We´re having a lot of fun! And we have made our theme for the year 2011 ¨Good Story¨ because life is just such a good story! And as we were talking about it, I was like yeah...that is so true. It is just how you look at things. And it´s just so much funner haha to have a good time and be happy and not worry or complain about the heat or the rain or the broken oven and stove and fridge and water haha, now it´s just a ´good story´. lol it´s great! Life is just full of good stories. And man the mission is just the best. I´m just loving it. And my blasted comp always reminds me how short my time is (not cool, but I totally remember doing that to Hna Case all the time) so we are just so pumped to find way cool people and have really good amazing spirtual lessons and be obedient and have fun and spread the gospel to everyone who will listen! It´s a blast. Oh and I got the card from the Tenneys! Super cute! Thank you! And don´t worry, it is still Christmas here in Ypacarai, we have all our decorations still up and they will stay up til I leave lol, so it´s great! Oh and it is official, I am coming home :( lol the Elder called me to verify my flight and told me I will be arriving home to the St. George Airport on April 15th at 4:30 p.m. algo así. I think that is just about perfect to go and eat some really good food... I´m just saying. Yeah so story time... we have this really cool investigator named Maicol (Michael) and he is from Brazil! Ha he doesn´t speak any spanish. He has been here for like 3 months or something and is living with a family who is also from Brazil and are here working, but they´ve been here for a long time so they speak both languages and Felipe, who is a recent convert. He was baptized in September and is just a stud and is preparing to go on his mission. Bueno, so we´ve had some really amazing lessons with him. It is just soo soo amazing to teach with the Spirit. Ah I love the mission' bueno, so Felipe pretty much translates, Maicol can understand mostly everything we say but just can´t respond very well in Spanish. It´s cool those because portugues is pretty similar and we can understand some of the stuff he says and we can have like normal conversations with him. Bueno, so it was really cool teaching about the Book of Mormon and the plan of Salvation and Felipe would just be teaching and sharing his testimony, yeah anyways it was super cool! And he came to an activity at the church and made some friends so that was way cool. And Juana, we are still working with her...oh that´s another good story. We´ll save that for after the mish but her baptism will be such a miracle and I´m really excited for her! Alright I gotta go, but I love yall. Pray to help us find more cool people! The church is true. God loves us. We have a living prophet. Man life is good. Love yall!
Hermanita Nelson

Jan. 17, 2011

2011-01-24T14:49:00.000-08:00

Mbaé cha pa?? How´s everyone doing? Paraguay is great!! We should be getting our changes tonight, and I really don´t want to leave this area, pero vamos a ver que pasa. We actually had a special change this past Thursday and they took my daughter away from me! They called on Thursday night and we were like an hour away from our house and they told her she had about an hour to get home and pack her bags for like 5 or 6 days and that the elders would be picking her up. Because Hna G has been super super sick that past week, something really weird happen and they don´t know what she has but they hadn´t been working for like 5 days in their area and Hna G was staying at Pte house, so yeah Hna Messina should be coming back like tomorrow, but I have no idea. We had a pretty good week, found some new inactive families(about 30 new people... I´m not kidding) and handed out some letters for the future missionaries! We also found this really cute family, who are catholic but they are at least open to listening to us and with time they will realize how the gospel can answer all their questions and unite their family! So I´m excited to work with them!! Also, Juana went to church and she basically knows everything is true and I can tell she wants to get baptized and right now her husband is out of town, so she is going to church secretly but doesn´t want to get baptized unless her husband says she can. ANd we had a really good lesson with him when he was here and he said he would come to church, so I´m just praying that he keeps his word. ANd she wants to get baptized in the lake!! And that would be soo cool! ANd our recent convert, Gregorio would do it. Man that just spells out PERFECT!! I´m excited! Ha and I told her yesterday that I was going to be here for her baptism and she just smiled and was like I know you just have so much faith and she always tells me how she can tell I have the gift of discernment. Ha she is a character, ha so is Gregorio. I can´t wait to just sit there and tell yall all about these people. I love them! Man, the mission is soo good!!! Oh my goodness, AND!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Emilio called me yesterday and told me he is about ready to turn in his papers!!! How cool is that??? And Manu just barely turned his in! I am so so excited for them. Emilio will complete a year as a member on Jan 30th and his mission papers will be in before that! And I´m just praying that their calls get here in time, and that I´m here still so I can go through the temple with them. Manu said the lady told him it could be like 8 weeks that he could get it, but normally it is about 3 months, and I know 2 guys that just barely got their papers and it took 4 and 5 months!! Man, can you imagine?!! So I am just hoping and praying that it all works out!! But that is just what makes it all worth it! Man, the gospel is so true. I just love it. I love yall so much and am so thankful for your love and support. Have a great week!

Jan. 10, 2011

2011-01-13T07:23:00.001-08:00

Hola amiguis!!!! How is everyone?!! Today we had a zone activity and we went and hiked this cool hill ha and man it was sooo HOT!!! Ha and I got SOO sunburnt!!! My legs even got way sunburnt, but we got some cool pictures. And I am soo tired, I feel like my body is just breaking down here people. Ohhh and I got that like package you sent with the OREOS!!! Man those things are SO GOOD!! We opened it and ate them all right there!! Yummy!!! Ha it will be so weird walking into a grocery store on the snack and candy isle, I will be in like Heaven! Oh you know what else I realized this week...I think I will be home for Easter! Unless it´s a different day in the states. I`m kinda sad, because Easter is so much fun in Paraguay because they make a ton of CHIPA!!! LIke you already know the Elders called me today and asked what airport I wanted to fly into...que macanada! I dropped him the cane, and I was like I`m sorry I think you have the wrong hermana or something because I still have 3 months left! Ridiculous! And we have changes next week, o sea like the 18th. I figured I would just die here, which would be sweet, but my lil daughter just might move up with Tuaóne which would kick me right out, but I hope I stay here!! This past week was actually kinda sad because 2 of our investigators that were going to be baptized this week both fell :( One didn`t get permission from her father and the other one didn´t get permission from her husband. Ahhhh. So we talked with their family members and we had really really good lessons and the spirit was so strong but in the end they both said no. :( No da gusto. So that was really hard because they were like the cool people we have, but I know that they will get baptized someday and we were just helping them out on their journey. So this week we have a lot of finding to do! Ha finding is so much fun, you meet the funniest people. Ha the mission is the best. And also this week we focused on handing out the cards to all the potential missionaries.. I don`t know if I ever told yall about that. President gave us this list of 68 young men from the ages of 17-24 of muchachos that could be going on missions. The problem is that only 2 of those 68 are active, so we have this HUGE project to find all of these people and hand them out their letters personally, we can`t just drop it off with family members, so if they aren´t there we have to keep going back until they are there. And bueno, so we´ve been asking the ward members to help us because we don´t know who any of them are, and so now we know about 30...but they don´t know the rest of them. And this week we handed out 10 cards! We were so proud,and we found over 50 new menos activos. Incredible. But it was cool because you can tell that some really do have testimonies and want to go back to church they just need that support. And actually a couple went to church this past Sunday after years of not going. So I figure we´re still saving souls right? So poco a poco we are going to get these cards handed out, and hopefully in the meantime God will bless us with some really cool investigators as well. It´s crazy because most of these people live WAY FAR AWAY!!! Our area is SO HUGE, they could probably put like 4 pairs of missionaries and there would be so much work to do. So traveling to their houses has taken up a lot of time, because if there aren`t colectivos, we walk, ha and it is so hot. My body just sweats it´s amazing. Ha these are the best days of our lives! Ha and we still have no water pressure so we are still showering with buckets, gotta love it. This next week is going to be soo good,I already know! I love spreading the good news of the gospel. I keep just thinking about it and I´m like wow, this is such a blessing! Life really doesn´t get better than this... all I have to worry about is helping people come unto Christ. There is definetely heartbreak, but your love for the people and the gospel just grows and grows. You just feel like your heart is going to explode! Da gusto! I love yall! And I am so thankful for yalls examples and testimonies and support and love and emails and pictures and everything! Yall are the best! Have a great week!

Love,

Hermanita (Eldera) NelsON (ha just picture them trying to say nelson with a spanish accent)

Jan. 3, 2011 FELICIDADES!!

2011-01-09T17:48:00.000-08:00

2011!!!!!!!! ¿Mbaè? ¿En serio? Man, this is going to be such a good year, I can just feel it!! 2011 just has a ring to it, right? Ha maybe just in Spanish, but I think it sounds pretty good in English too. Yeah, like mom said I am always excited for a new start too! And you know what justamente today I have exactly 100 days left. Crazy! Don`t worry, I`m not counting, it`s just my DyC countdown. But man it was so fun making metas (goals) and weird, it`s like I`m planning 2 different lives here. But man I just love Paraguay, life is so good. Ha and it is SO HOT here, I can`t believe it SNOWED in St. George- that is straight up snow! Those are some sweet pictures! Ha grandma wrote me how on new years eve they had some couples over to play cards and then at the end they all were done by 10:30 and went to bed, and she was like "I guess that`s just what happens when you get old" and then I wrote her back and said, "or if you`re a missionary"- because we had to be home at 7 because it gets a lil bit crazy here in Paraguay on New Years Eve and I was out by 8:30. Ha and I had so many good plans of what I was going to do, and boom I decided to write a lil bit in the journal on my bed, and the next thing I know, I hear the fireworks going off like crazy!!! So we woke up and went out on our balcony and screamed "Feliz Año Nuevo!" and all kinds of good stuff. Ha right around the corner from our house there`s this street and almost everyone is family or they`ve all lived there forever and are just really good friends and they were having a huge block party and were up all night long shooting off those fireworks... there were some pretty ones, but most of them sounded like gun shots- ha they are so loud, I`m serious! And you know how in the states like the adults shoot off the fireworks, here no... the adults are all sitting in their lawn chairs while the kids from 3-14 shoot off the firecrackers. I`m not joking about the 3 year olds. We have an investigator, Jessica, who has a lil boy who is soooo cute! And he is 3, bueno I think he just turned 4 and everytime we go over there he loves to throw the firecrackers at us. You can buy a lil box for a mil, like 25 cents and so that is what the kids do todos los dìas!!! Insane! Ha I love it, because it is sooo Paraguay! Aver...ok yesterday at church, SOO GOOD! We only had 2 investigators, but that is pretty dang good too, and we also had 61 in church! Which is amazing because we usually have like 30-35 ish so it`s pretty much like double! We were so happy! And it was funny because we found 10 random members during the week, like in just random spots and we were contacting and then found out they were members, ha we find so many every week, it`s like a game now. But it`s all good. There`s a lot of work and we are excited to help out this lil branch! It was just a really good week! I just love the mission, I can`t imagine not being a missionary. I`m not going to let them take the plaque off haha. I just keep learning and learning and my love for the gospel keeps growing. It`s great. The mission is the best. Cada dìa I realize a lil bit more, how amazing yall are -mi familia y mis amigos- mi gente luego. Just love yall! I love your letters and love and prayers. It really helps and I need them! Thanks for everything! Have a great week!!!

Dec. 27, 2010

2010-12-31T08:07:00.000-08:00

WE WISH YOU A MERRY CHRISTMAS, WE WISH YOU A MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR! Wow so Christmas is already over and new years is this week! Que loco! It was my last Christmas in Paraguay! Ha they did so many fireworks!!! And new years eve is just going to be even crazier, I love it. It is so Paraguay. I think one of my favorite parts about Christmas this year is that we made these cute lil gifts baskets with pan de banana (banana bread) and boiled cookies and some Paraguay candy and we put one of those pictures of Christ (that you sent to put on the lil Christmas tree) on every plate. They were so cute, yall´d be proud. And then we went out and Christmas caroled! Ha Christmas caroling in Paraguay is the BEST! Ha they loved it but they had no idea what was going on. We would clap at the door and they would come out and before they got to the front gate we would start singing and they would like try to come up and kiss us (to greet us) or they´d be like, here just come in the shade, you don´t have to stand out there in el sol (in the sun), haha. They didn´t really understand that they were just supposed to just sit there and listen. But it was way fun, and we had to wait for a lot of colectivos, so we would just bust out our hymn books and start singing Christmas songs with our lil santa hats and reindeer ears on. It was actually really cool, I felt the Spirit really strong everytime we would start singing. Ha I almost decided to just take my santa hat off, put it on the ground, stick our colectivo money in it, and just start collecting change, lol but then I decided maybe that´s not so missionary appropiate. Good times. Ok and let´s just talk about Christmas morning...so good! I LOVED all my lil regalos! They were all soo good and exactly what I needed and the 12 days of Christmas thing was soo soo cool (ha even though I did it backwards), I loved it! Thanks soo much! I loved the testimonies and the pictures of yall. So creative! And all those cards, PERFECT! I could go on and on! Yeah and oh...Gregorio, our recent convert- his son just got in a really really bad moto accident and so we got permission to go visit him in the hospital yesterday, yall could pray for him! Man, hospitals in Paraguay are pretty scary, I don´t think I would trust them. That was quite the experience. Aver... yeah but it was SO GOOD to talk to yall and hear yalls voices. Ha that is so fun! And DAD you are a stud!!! I am so glad you figured it out to work so I could talk with Ty too!!! I loved it! Ha just like old times. Yeah I was telling everyone how cool it was that I got to talk to my brother even though he´s on a mission, yeah pretty sure that never happens. That was a huge blessing! Mom, you about killed me when you told me what you did after you hung up. Talk about trunky! Ha jk, I´m fine, It´ll just be a lot of fun to eat cute lil american appetizers and sit down and play dominos! But man can yall believe it is going to be 2011?!! I remember writing last year and saying, holy cow, it´s going to be 2010 and I´m going to be in Paraguay all of 2010, and now OPA 2010! That was fast. Que pucha sheraá. But I love putting metas (goals), new years resolutions, empezar de nuevo and commit yourself to being better, that´s great. Ahhh and it´s Kylee´s birthday this week!!! Cute, 2 years old...really?! Wow that is crazy! Ahhh and it was so cute to hear Nate´s lil voice on the phone, I can´t believe how much he talks, that is adorable!!! I wish I would´ve been able to talk to Kylee and Tyler, yall just have to give them lots of love and tell them it´s from me. But it sounds like yall are going to have a super fun week all together. So fun. Everything is going good here, there is SO MUCH work to do! We are trying to find more people like Gregorio because he was the perfect investigator, really ready and prepared to receive the gospel and to commit to living it. He will be such a great leader. Once again I am just so greatful to have witnessed that miracle! It was the best Christmas present. That is what Christmas is all about. That is the reason for the season. To come unto our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. And it was so amazing to see that happen in Gregorio´s life and see the change take place in my life as well. Amazing! I love it. Alright I love yall and otra vez I loved talking to yall and hearing yall, and it was really cool to read all your testimonies because I could just read it and hear yall talking, thanks so much for your love and your support. Talk to ya next year haha. Stay safe.

Love,
Hermanita Nelson

Dec. 13, 2010

2010-12-17T07:25:00.001-08:00

M´bae chapa?!!

How is everyone?!! I love yall!! Ok and mom, I got the packages!!!!!!!!!!!! I was SO EXCITED! ANd we set up our cute lil Christmas tree and put all the wrapped presents right underneath, and tomorrow I get to open the first one!! It´s a good thing I got the best mom in the world! So yeah I just got the 2 big ones with all the wrapped stuff! Aver, oh so we did have CAMBIOS!!! Ha Hna Messina and I, are now on our 4th change together! And we are now in a trio! Ha another trio, yikes, but we´re with Hna Tuaóne, and it´ll be good! So we had to rearrange the whole house to fit 3, and everyone loves that there are now 3 elderas! Ohh and at changes this Elder came up to me and handed me a picture, and I was thinking, who are you? I´ve never seen you before lol, but it was a picture of him from the MTC holding up a Paraguay flag with another elder, and then I realized that it was TY!!!! Ha I was so excited!!! I can´t remember his name, but apparently they were together in the MTC in the same zone, and after like 8 months, this is the first time I´ve met him. Ha it totally made my day! Oh and guess what, yesterday it DIDN´T rain!!!! Bueno, it did rain later in the day, but in the morning it didn´t. We didn´t have as many people come with us this week because they were all ¨sick¨or they were taking care of someone who was ¨sick¨. Haha they can´t leave the house if they have a headache or their stomach hurts or anything. But our golden guy, Gregorio came and he just loves it, we haven´t been able to see him because something always happens so that our schedules conflict, but we´re going to try tonight. We also had this cute girl named Jessica come with us, who´s 22 and has a cute lil 4 year old boy. We also finally met with our branch president last night and now we understand a lil better all of the problems that there really are in this branch! But we did have 58 people in church, which is HUGE!!! We were so excited, most of them just piled on in for the last hour (sacrament) but we´re trying to work with them. THey have a lot of excuses for why they don´t come the first 2 hours to the classes...oh excuses! Aver.. yeah so Pres told us that there is over 1,000 people that are members but that the majority were baptized for almison (like welfare), so what do you do with a 1,000 people that don´t even want to have anything to do with the church, but are baptized? Ha I don´t know. So we are trying to do everything we can to help and serve in anyway that we can. So much work to do! No time to waste people. But I love all the people and this area is great, so I´ll probably die here or go back to Luque which I would love! Oh and we might be able to go to Luque this Friday for a baptism, so I´d be able to see some people and that would be so so cool!!! Vamos a ver! I love Paraguay and I love the mission! Ha I can´t remember what life was like not being a missionary and I can´t imagine it not being a missionary, so basically I´m just going to stick with the being a missionary for the rest of my life thing. It´ll be great! I really am so thankful for yalls support and love! It helps so much! Ohh and you know what?!! THe mangos are starting to come out!!! I´m so so excited for that! It´ll be so great to hear yalls voices in 2 weeks! Have a great week! Love yall!

Dec. 6, 2010

2010-12-17T07:22:00.001-08:00

DECEMBER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Wait a second, aren´t we still in like August? Ha that is when Hna Messina got here and that seems like yesterday! 3 changes ago, and I have 3 left...que pucha cherrá! and December means it is ALISA´S BDAY!!!! FELIZ CUMPLE!!!! That´s so fun!!! And Happy Bday Rick tambien. Hahaha I loved the story about Nate and his firetruck haha and Kylee and her lil cheer, what cute lil sobrinos I have!!! I´m so proud! Ahh and Ty, holy cow, I love how you so calmly told that story about you almost dying and running into a ditch! But I´m glad you are good! Ok a couple stories... Ok so this morning we put up our cute lil christmas tree and window decorations and my comp made these sweet snowflakes! And yeah mom I want the pics of yalls decorations! Ok haha there is this one lady, menos activo, who we´ve only seen a couple times but the first time we saw her and were saying goodbye, I went up to give her kisses haha and she kissed me and then pulled me into this super tight hug and just clung onto me and said, "ah chulina!" haha and she does that everytime she sees us, it is hilarious. And want to hear an embarrassing story? Ok so yes, I´ve been in Paraguay a year, but ha my spanish is apparently not perfect, we were teaching this family about the plan of salvation (el plan de salvacion) and so I´m starting, and I´m like ok ok, what do yall think el plan de salvacion is? and they were like uhh... and so I repeat it a couple times and phrase it differently... yeah Heavenly Father has un plan for each of us, what do you think that plan is? haha and the guy just keeps giving me the weirdest look and I could tell he was thinking like so hard, and then I said it one more time, el plan de salvacion- and you can just see the light bulb click and he starts laughing and he was like ohh I thought you said, el pan de salvacion- the bread of salvation- haha so the whole time he was trying to figure out what I was talking about and he like thought I was talking about the sacrament or something, good times. que verguenza! ok and yall should all look up la virgen de caacupe, every year on dec 8 they have this HUGE misa and they go and worship the virgen that´s in caacupe, and caacupe just happens to be right past our area, and the thing is the people go WALKING from all over Paraguay to go and worship the virgin, they could just take a colectivo but they walk to show their love and sacrifice for this virgin, and so yesterday we started seeing the people that were starting to walk there a couple days early, but tomorrow it´s going to be crazy and there´s going to be a TON of people!!! ha everyone keeps inviting us to go and walk with them to caacupe to worship the virgin- we´re like here, let me tell you a lil something somethin about the restoration of the church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints lol, gotta love Paraguay! Ok want to hear another good story, so yesterday was Sunday- which means OF COURSE it RAINED again, justamente at 7:30 when we left to go and get our peeps and continued raining all morning- of course it stops raining right at 11:30 when church gets out and doesn´t rain for the rest of the day, ha whatever it´s cool. but we have a MIRACLE story!!! Seriously, straight up miracle from our loving Padre Celestial. We met him on Thursday night at like 8:45 by complete coincidence, we had just randomly decided that we would change our plans a lil bit to come back and work around our house and to stop by for a menos activo family, so we walked up and went and shook their hands and we met a man named Gregorio. We were just going to share with the mom because the dad had his friends over, but one of his friends (Gregorio) came up to us and told us he had met with the missionaries in Argentina when he was living there and that he knew all about Joseph Smith and the first vision and loved it, and so we invited him to share a lil bit with us, and he just talked and told us about how God had been preparing him to receive this message, and how it was such a miracle because he had just been back from Argentina for like 2 weeks and had lost contact with the missionaries because he suddenly had to come back to Paraguay and that he didn´t know there was a mormon church here, but bueno everything he was saying was just an answer to our prayers, we have been praying so so hard to find someone who will just accept the gospel and be excited about it and understand it and have their own desires to learn more and to go to church, etc. well wow, he told us, I know that I am an answer to yalls prayers and that I am the fruit of your labors and that God loves yall and your are angels in His work and that this is true, and he accepted the baptismal fecha without problem and then told us that he wanted to come to church so that he could prepare himself for his baptism and that he was going to try and bring his son and that he was going to help reactivate that family and that God has a work for him to do and he just kept praising us and telling us that all of our hard work would be paid off and we would recieve blessings and that he was just one of those blessings that we were receiving. I think my mouth was just wide open the whole time he was talking. It was incredible. And he came to church and tried to bring his son, but his son didn´t want to because of the rain, but he even got up at the end of church to bear his testimony and told everyone that he knew this was the true church and he knew it without a doubt and that is why God had sent his angels otra vez to bring him the restored gospel. It was amazing! We were so excited! Man, and I just feel so blessed to witness this miracle and to be able to be an instrument in the Lord´s hand in leading Gregorio into the waters of baptism.ahhh it is soo so sso cool!!! Man and it was just such a sweet tender mercy of the Lord to us, that he loves us and is watching over us and that his hand is in all things! And he was all excited about going to church and being there on time and everything, we actually got there a lil late, and it was a lil sad because when we got there, there were only 7 people there, and we had 3 investigators. It was kinda frustrating bc all of the amazing classes we told them they were going to have, there weren´t any because there weren´t any other youth there (we had 2 teenagers with us too) ahhh but by the end of church there were 36 (they all came for the sacrament for the last hour), ahhh there is soo much work here to do! pray for us!!! I love yall so much and am SOOO thankful for your prayers and emails and love! I hope yall have a great week!
Love,
Hermanita Nelson
haha and yeah the people still call us elderas!

Nov. 29, 2010

2010-12-17T07:21:00.001-08:00

Ok ok ok!!! Well I hope everyone had a WONDERFUL Thanksgiving!!!!! I heard that some of you just had a fantastic weekend...aka EMILY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! FELICIDADES!!!! Ok so Emily is engaged!!!! With a fecha and everything!!! Well now that ALL of my best friends are going to be married when I get back...awesome haha. Just kidding! I´m super super excited for you! Ok let´s talk about our Thanksgiving here in Paraguay, well first our lunch apt. called us and canceled haha, nice, so then we decided to go and get some empanadas and do it Paraguayo style. They were pretty dang good, and then we came home that night and ate PECAN PIE with VANILLA ICECREAM!!!!!!!!!! Oh man I´ve either been gone a really long time or that was one really good pecan pie! It totally made me happy! This past week also hit a lot of big dates for me!!! Let´s see Tuesday the 23rd was my 14th month in the mission, and the 24th was my ONE YEAR in PARAGUAY mark!!!!!!!!! Ha that is insane. And then Thursday, Thanksgiving, and Friday I started the DyC countdown. Ha I don´t know if all the missions in the world do this, but you start it when you have 138 days left (bc that´s how many sections there are) and you count down. Ha I still clearly remember when Hna Case started that. Crazy!!! Ok and ready for the really sad news, we only had 21 people at church yesterday. We left way early to go and stop by for everyone and it started raining pretty hard at like 7:15 and we hadn´t brought our umbrellas or anything, so we got soaked! and no one would come with us! it was so sad, ha and then we had to wait for 45min in the rain waiting for the colectivo and ended up being late for church, and we came in soaking wet. We did have 1 person come with us, and then we decided to go and invite people on the street because there was only 2 people in Relief Society-the teacher, and one of the hnas that we convinced to come to church even though it was raining- ha the thing is Paraguayos are scared of the rain, and when we passed by her house she was like no the weather is to feo, to ugly, I can´t come...we were like no no no you are coming with us and we are going to get soaked together lol, but she got her husband to take her in the moto- so bueno, we decided to go look on the street, and after inviting a million people to come and see the church, we convinced this man named Ricardo to come in with us. haha he was funny- apparently everyone in the ward knows him too and says he is crazy, but they were all really impressed with him and his behavior and he absolutely loved all of it. We also gave talks. It was a lot of fun actually. We were just so tiny and there was no microphone or anything, and it was one of those testimony builders. It´s like wow, why do we do all this stuff as missionaries? Go out and get soaked in the rain to pass for people to come to church and all of the other sacrifices, but it´s because it is all SO IMPORTANT! And that´s what I learned as I was giving my talk. God loves us so much! And how can we show our love for Him? It´s simple, we keep His commandments. And man I just know that brings the felicidad! That makes us happy! That makes us spiritually strong! Sacrifice brings us closer to our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I just love this gospel and I just love the mission! Paraguay is great! It is crazy, but that is what makes it so great! I love yall! And I am so thankful for yalls examples and love and sacrifices! That is what makes it all worth it! Haha and other funny story, there is this kid that looks just like Payden!!! And he acts just like him. He´s 11. haha it´s great. Everytime I see him and talk to him, it reminds me of Payden. That actually happens all the time, I mean, we´ll be sharing with someone and it just reminds me of all of yall. There´s a lady that is igualito a Alisa and another one a Angela, and there´s this way cute lil jovencita that reminds me so much of Alena, and all the mother´s I´ve had here in Paraguay have reminded me of mom. And ha I just love showing my fam pics to everyone because they always say the same things-they always love dad and that he is bald and they just think you and dad look so young. And there was this Elder in my last zone that looked just like Ty! And there are always people that remind me of yall. Yall are always in my thoughts and prayers and that´s what keeps me going! love yall!!!

Hermanita Nelson

Nov. 22, 2010

2010-11-27T06:25:00.000-08:00

First off, HAPPY BIRTHDAY Bobby and Kimmy!!! FELICIDADES! Also I want to thank Becky Goodwin for writing me again, it was really good to hear from you and your letter made my day! Ok ¿sabe qué? This week I am going to complete ONE YEAR IN PARAGUAY!!!!!! That my friend, is crazy!!!! Oh I just love it here and ha I just keep walking around this area thinking, holy cow I´m in Paraguay! I remember that used to happen to me all the time when I first got here, I was like what in the world, how did I get here? haha but I love it! It´s so great. Ha I have a funny story for grandma and grandpa- the other day we were in a lesson with this less active family and I was showing them pictures of the fam and they saw grandpa an grandma and they were like we know them!! And they were so excited, and they were like who are they? And I was like haha those are mis abuelos, and they just went off about how they knew them because they had been in Paraguay before and had come to their house, and I was like ha I don´t think so, and they were like well if it wasn´t them it was someone who looks exactly like them! This cute lil lady who was so nice and her husband with white hair haha, I was like yeah well that sure does sound like them (by the way...I hope yall feel better, I´ll be praying for yall!) Also it is SO funny because all the people here call us elders because they are so used to having the elders here, so we told them, no we are not elders because those are the muchachos (boys), so then they started calling us las elderas (making that word feminine) ha it´s so funny, and we´re like no no we are hermanas! But there are still so many people who just call us elders, it makes me laugh and then they try to give us hand shakes-that´s weird! We´re like no, we KISS!!! Ha we give besos-oh man it´s going to be weird coming back home and having hand shakes be normal and not kissing people all the time haha. Oh and you know what else?! My shoes BROKE!!! I was not a happy camper, it´s those ones you sent me mom that are supposed to be really nice- and they are because everyone else here has the same exact ones and they still use them, but my strap things came off, like somehow the fish line came undone or something, I don´t even know, but I can´t even wear them anymore. So today we were in Asuncion and so I bought some new shoes that hopefully last me until the end, ha they better because they were expensive!!! Ok and so sad story, we only had 35 people in church yesterday (it rained so everyone used that as their excuse) ha and we only had 3 people in Relief Society-5 including us. Yeah we got a lot of work to do here! Oh and today we had an hna activity! It was fun! And we left last night and stayed in President´s house because we live far away and would´ve had to leave pretty early to get there in time, so that was fun! We got there and we made sandwiches and ate with Pres and Hna Madariaga and Hna Kimball also came, so it was fun. And then this morning we got up way early to make a huge breakfast (it was our activity for thanksgiving haha) and then all the hnas came and we ate and then watched a movie about the nativity. It was great! And mom, ¿sabe qué? we have this lil restaraunt in our area that just happens to sell pies (the only pies I have ever seen in Paraguay) and they just happen to sell pecan pie!!!!! I´m stoked, so we are going to buy a huge pie and some vanilla icecream for ourselves to eat for Thanksgiving! Alright I think that is all the news here! It´s going. We´re working, working, working. It´s so fun to just spread this restored gospel with everyone, even when they don´t understand the significance of everything. My testimony just grows and grows and my love for my Heavenly Father and Savior Jesus Christ just keeps expanding. It´s true! That´s so great. I love all the simple truths of the gospel. We have a true and living prophet here on the earth today, Thomas S Monson. The Book of Mormon-wow what a guia! It´s a guide! It has all that we ever need to know to have la felicidad (happiness) in our lives. It was written for us! Wow this work is good. Spread it people! I love yall! And Alisa, I love you and you are in my prayers constantly. I hope everyone has a good week! Love yall!

Nov. 16, 2010

2010-11-16T13:37:00.000-08:00

Alrighty so this past week has been ABSOLUTELY CRAZY!!!! And I´m writing today (Tuesday) because yesterday we had this huge conference with Elder Foster from the seventy. Por eso no mas. Ah man, ok where to start?! Let´s just start with Wednesday night at 10:31 p.m. (bed time, right?) The phone rings...what? Presidente Madariaga...WHAT?! uh oh haha. So I answer the phone, and he says hermana I´m sorry for calling so late, but I just needed to tell you something. Ok... You and your companion are having a special change and you will be going to Ypacarai and you need to have all your stuff packed and ready to go on Friday morning........ I´m sorry what? I was like what in the world?! So we spent all the day Thursday going around and saying bye to everyone and showing the Elders our area. Oh and also the familia Zafra took us to lunch to Paulistas!!! I was SO excited! It´s like a Brazilian restaurant that has a ton of meat (like Tucanos) and I´ve wanted to go my whole mission and have never been, and that´s where you go your last night in Paraguay. So that was really nice of them. And we spent the rest of the day packing like crazy! Holy cow I have so much stuff!! Good thing I´m going to leave like everything here! And ok so the crazy part is, is that otra vez we are white washing an area! There were elders there before and they took them both out to put us in. So once again we don´t know anything. Lovely. And it´s crazy because there have NEVER been hermanas here! So we are the first hermanas! And our area is HUGE!!! I guess they had it divided at one time but then put it all together again because they weren´t having success. Every keeps telling us suerte when they hear where we´re at because apparently it is really hard. But whatever. It´s BEAUTIFUL! And I´m so excited. We have a lake in our area and it is so so so pretty! I´m so excited! And it´s just a rama (a branch) we meet for church in an old movie theater, it´s pretty sweet. Apparently the average of church attendance is 40ish but we had 51 on Sunday. And the Pres. told us there is over 1,000 members here. So basically there is 1,000 inactives. Lovely. I guess they all got baptized for almison. So we´ve got a project ahead of us. But it´s all good. Everyone is so nice and it reminds me of Luque! But it´s prettier! And we were given the impression that nobody was really happy that we were coming because they love the elders so much, but let´s be honest they love us. And with time they´ll love us even more :) A lot of people have actually told us they were really excited and that we are like angels, and I guess one of the elders investigators (Juana) had a dream that they were going to come to her house and their first visit together she just cried, but then she just felt like it wasn´t right and that it should be girls. And then we came, and she told us we were the answer to her prayers and a couple other people have said that, so it´s pretty cute. It´s all pretty overwhelming but I actually feel pretty calm. I don´t know how we are going to work this whole area, but it´s ok, we´ll just follow the Lord. And yeah I´ll probably be here til I die. And Pres told us me and my comp would probably be together for a really long time too, so she´ll probably end up killing me. Yikes! Crazy stuff! And the conference we had yesterday was really good too! And we live in a sweet house and we have AC!!!!!!!!!!!!! I am SO excited about that, because last summer I about died. So who knows what will happen this week. But it´ll be fun! Bueno I love yall and I hope things are better this week! Yall are in my prayers!

Hermana Nelson's feelings on the passing of Bro. Rick Ence

2010-11-16T13:35:00.000-08:00

Wow, I agree with Ty. I can´t even explain how strongly I feel the love of God right now, for me and for all of yall. I have honestly been so strengthened in testimony as I have read and cried over your sweet words concerning Rick and the Ence family. My heart is with yall during this hard time. I just cried and cried more as I read, but at the same time, I felt the presence of our Father in Heaven so strongly. I admire yall and your strength and tesimonies. It´s incredible. I can´t even imagine how everyone must feel and I am so sorry, but know that yall will be in my prayers. Thank you for your faith and your examples, the Spirit of the Lord has touched me greatly. I really like what mom said about the conversation between Rick and God. I´m sure that Rick was strong enough and had enough will power to live and that´s why he kept coming back to life, but in the end he humbly accepted the will of our Father. We can´t possibly understand why, there are just things that happen in life that leave us questioning. But I know through the gospel of Jesus Christ we receive all the answers that we need, to move on with faith and endure to the end. We know that it was the will of the Lord that Rick passed away, we might not understand why-why him? why now? But we must trust in the Lord and go forward with faith. And how special it must be to know that he (Rick) will also be sharing the gospel message with the rest of our brothers and sisters who have not had the chance to hear it or who are having another opportunity to hear it again. What a marvelous work and a wonder. And to know that he will be working right along with his son Justin and soon to be Blake, and with everyone of us who understand our Heavenly Fathers plan and the importance of sharing it with others. Because that is the point. That is the purpose. And if we can understand and really know and comprehend that we are children of God and that He loves us, that is enough. Because it is His work to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of men. Eternal families-that is part of the plan. In fact that it is the center of the plan. What a blessing it is to have the gospel in our lives. Thank you for turning to the Lord and depending on Him. He is the one who can comfort you and bless you in this hard time, and He can help you see and understand the big picture. I love yall with all my heart and I am truly greatful for your strength. Yall will be in my prayers.
Love,
Hermanita Nelson

Nov. 8, 2010

2010-11-08T15:03:00.001-08:00

Alrighty!! Ha I loved reading Ty's like past 2 emails, because that is exactly how it is here! So I know how you feel bud. Satan is working hard, but the gospel is true, our sides going to win, but times are getting crazy. And they are doing all these changes in the mission all over the world, and I LOVE IT! It's just showing you how serious this is, we are in the last days people! This message has got to be spread and we are the missionaries that are spreading it! Woot woot! And mom that girl, is the girl that is here, she ended up coming early because her spanish is so good, unless there is another girl that comes with that same exact name. Ok aver- this week my comp and I started our like music class! It is so cute! Ok la verdad is that I don't do anything- I take the pictures, but my comp is teaching people how to play the piano, and I'm learning too, it's great! We only had a couple people come, the idea is to get more investigators, so we'll see what happens! Ok and yesterday our fast and testimony meeting was amazing, I don't really know why, but the Spirit was so so strong! And I just about cried the whole way through it! And then our RS class was really good too! The teacher started the class with 2 questions. 1. What is the Book of Mormon? 2. What does the Book of Mormon mean to you? And the class was just full of testimonies and it was fabulous. It was so neat, because that is what we are teaching every day! So I'll just invite you to answer those questions for yourselves. But I also loved Ty's testimony about the Book of Mormon. It is the clave people! The keystone of our religion! And it was really cool because yesterday there was a kid in sacrament that I had never seen before so I went up and talked to him and turns out he is from a different area and he had been invited to church by a friend and so he came! His name is Diego and he's 20. And he just stuck with us through church and had so many questions and then we met with him at the temple after lunch and shared with him about the restoration and gave him a Book of Mormon. It was FABULOUS! He would not live in our area ha, but man it just felt good to teach! And to teach someone that was actually interested and excited! Here in our area we end up just teaching in the door because people don't let us in and if they do let us in they want us out as soon as possible and we haven't had any progressive investigators in a really long time (bueno we were looking at the history of this area over the last year and there have been 7 baptisms and only 1 is active and she goes because she works for a really active family). It's challenging to find people who actually want to listen. And yeah I'm sure that is how the state and europe missions are-tough! But bueno, so we just taught him and it was like the perfect lesson! He asked questions, we asked questions, we bore testimony and the Spirit was there! Gave him the invitation to be baptized-accepted with enthusiasm. Yeah, he is one of those golden people, unfortunately he doesn't live in our area, but it was just cool! He will definitely be a missionary! And it just made me excited and reminded me that YES, there are people out there, that are looking for the truth and that want to know the truth! Ha that is one of the first things he told us. I asked him why he had decided to come to church, and he was like well I'm looking for the true church. Beautiful. Ahhh. good stuff! I LOVE the gospel of Jesus Christ! It is true! In fact, the church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is the only true church in the world! Y porque? Because it has la autoridad de Dios. Buenisimo! Sacerdocio, priesthood! We have a living prophet of God on the earth. Does life get better?! I love it love it love it! The mission is just the best. I love being here. I love all the experiences because you just learn and grow so much! Ha and that is what I need :) Alright I love all of yall! Thanks for all the letters!! Have a great week!

Love,

Hermanita Nelson

Nov. 1, 2010

2010-11-01T14:11:00.000-07:00

Ok so this week, was better! Ha remember the story about me falling and my foot hurting? Well turns out I like twisted my ankle-smooth move I know. And so we were home all day Tuesday and Wednesday because I couldn't walk. Ha I looked ridiculous and it HURT so bad!!! I went to district meeting and my zone leaders sent us right back home. And then the family Zafra lent me some crutches to walk around the house- how embarrassing! Ha I looked like a joke. But now I'm fine, it still kinda hurts but it's fine. Oh and I got the package the Wariner's sent and I was so excited! Because they gave it to me at district meeting so it made me so happy despite all the pain I was in! And we've eaten almost all the candy and the pillow case is SO CUTE!! I'm so impressed!! And the St. George shirt is super cool too! And the lotion and stuff I loved! Thanks so much! I also got a lot of letters from my peeps in Luque that day, so it made me happy! Oh and if yall could please tell all the people who are getting married (ridiculous, who gets married? haha jk) to send me announcements! I want to see pics! Ok and that is all the time I have!! Oops! And can someone please tell me where October went? That was SO FAST! We are in November now! I hope everyone had a Happy Halloween! People here don't celebrate it- ha they don't know what they are missing out on, but I wore orange and black and ate candy all day, so I was good. And this week we should be having a baptism that we are super excited about (by the way, I always get super nervous to tell yall stuff because it always jinxes things), but hopefully it'll happen, if not this week, next week! Ok I love yall! thanks so much for your emails and support! Make it a great week!

love,

Hermanita Nelson

oh p.s. that one girl came that has family from texas, and hna g is training her in luque! I met her today and she is super cool and I told her that when I go back to Luque she can kill me there (be my last comp) so vamos a ver! love yall!

Oct. 25, 2010

2010-11-01T14:10:00.001-07:00

HELLO!!! Ok so cambios- bueno, everyone got changed except for me and my comp! haha my poor comps, I think they have this curse, that si o si they have to be with me for more than 2 changes. Normally people are together, maximum 2 changes. I was with Remache for 4 (6 months) and now this is my 3rd with Messina (4 1/2 months) and we'll see what happens next change. Yikes!! La verdad is that I miss Luque, but I'm trying to stop comparing because that makes things worse. Let's just say that I think we broke the contact record of the mission. We contacted SO MANY PEOPLE this week and got rejected SO MANY TIMES! Ha that's a real good spirit booster. Man yesterday I almost had a break down, because we had been finding all day, because they were like yeah you should find on Sundays because that is when all the family is home and it'll be great, and we have almost 0 progressing investigators right now-- so sad I know (let's not even talk about how many people we passed for yesterday morning to go to church with us and how we got the most ridiculous excuses, ha I just had to keep telling myself- you can't force people, because all I really wanted to do was dragg them by their ears and be like, listen you'll thank me later. It's just sad because this is so IMPORTANT and there are so many BLESSINGS and then to just see how they are just rejecting the blessings...blah yeah) ok so we were out finding yesterday and we were excited because this is like the only part of are area we haven't contacted yet, so were like perfect, this'll be great! So after being rejected for about 2 or 3 hours straight, we got to this home and a young couple came out and they were so cute and looked so nice, and they actually came all the way out to the front gate to listen to us, perfect! So I did our lil shpill and asked if we could come in and share more, and he just looked me straight in the eye and said NO and ha I don't know why that affected me so bad (probably because I was so excited bc I thought that finally someone was going to let us in) and I almost just started crying, and I was like is it ok if we just pass by right here in front and share for a couple minutes, another NO with an explanation of how they were catholic and la di da. Yeah that is pretty much how our week went. Ha and at the end of the day we always do a list of 'gracias' and after one long day, we were just sitting thinking, and Hna Messina pops up and says, "Today was a great day! You know why? Because we talked to a million people and now they all know where the church is." Yep, that's my comp. Ha I started busting out laughing, yep that is exactly right. So we are planting seeds, but that's important too! And maybe, just maybe we'll find a seed that was already planted from other missionaries that is ready to harvest! like dad said, it's all just kinda a mental game. But we are in the greatest work that there is- we are proclaiming the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. It doesn't get any better than this! Nobody ever said it would be easy, and I am learning that. But man I am learning so many great things that are going to help me for the rest of my life and hopefully yall are receiving blessings for my service too! And mom I loved the whole part about the baptism stories, but I don't have time right now, so I'll do that next week! Oh and this week I also got a retarted foot. I think I rolled my ankle, I was jumping on a wet surface and totally biffed it and now I just walk like a retard and it kinda hurts but yo tengo la culpa. Alright I hope yall have a great week, oh and a great Halloween!!! fUN FUN! Love yall!! Thanks so much for the emails and prayers and love, I need it! Love yall!

Oct. 18, 2010

2010-11-01T14:08:00.000-07:00

Ok so basically this is what I have gathered when Ty was having a hard time, everything was fine here and we were having exito (success) and now that everything is going great with him (which by the way I am SO EXCITED about, that is so AWESOME and I'm always praying for ya bud) everything over here is like falling apart. I hate to say that, but it sure does feel like it! But don't worry we haven't lost any animo, we are just even more determined to go out and find the people that are just waiting for the gospel. We know that they are out there and we know that God will bless us. This week was a lil crazy and we missed almost 2 days of work all because of a stupid accident. Ha it's actually a really funny story. Last Monday for a zone activity we played soccer with the elders and my comp got kicked in the leg, ha apparently the elder was trying to kick the ball and missed and kicked her right in the shin. And that lil tiny bruise that was there the first day just turned HUGE and got worse and worse because she just kept walking on it, so pretty much when hna madariaga found out she dropped me the cane and made us stay home so she could rest it. I tried to tell her she had to rest it lol but she is just a guapa and wanted to keep working, so I tried to call a few people to find out what to do, but then a member made me call hna madariage and yeah. So my poor comp has been so frustrated bc she did not want to stay in the house when she wasn't even sick, but now it should all be better and we'll be fine. So that was kinda sad. And basically this week was just really challenging as well. We had so many rejections and none of the news we found want to progress, so we'll be starting to find more again this week. And all of our investigators that are suppossed to get baptized have been lying to us or just weird things have been happening and they are all falling apart. I'm not trying to make this sound like a really depressing email lol but that is just what has been going on here in Moroni. We had an Hna activity this morning and had an amazing american breakfast! Crepes and like this egg caserole deliciousness! Yeah food makes me happy. And then we had our last zone activity before changes and ate asado. Yummy! This week I've really been greatful for the opportunity to testify, to bear testimony like Ty. One night we found this one family and I was really excited that they let us in because it was like 8:30 and dark! And they had told us that they were catholic, but everyone says that..anyways so apparently his wife and their mother had died not to long ago. And man as we were testifying about the plan of salvation, the Spirit was SO STRONG! I don't know what got into me, but I just started crying and just sharing how beautiful God's plan is for us, His children. We can live with our families forever! Death cannot separate us! We can return to the presence of our Heavenly Father! It is all possible through the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. It was just so awesome to be able to share that truth with that family, that they would be able to see their wife and mother again and that they have the opportunity to live with her again as well. I loved bearing testimony and it just skyrocketed my testimony as well as I was sharing with them about these eternal truths. Unfortunately they didn't want to accept it (that just blows my mind) and rejected us, or rejected the message mejor dicho which made us share with them even more powerfully, but at the end they said they didn't want to hear more and didn't want us to come over again. Ahhh so sad. But asi es la mision. We are just waiting to find the people that do receive the message and recognize the Spirit and the truth, and that day will be wonderful! Ok I love yall so much! I am so thankful for your love, support and testimonies. This work is so important! We have something that EVERYONE needs, the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. Don't be afraid to share it! have a great week! Love yall!

Oct. 11, 2010

2010-11-01T14:07:00.001-07:00

Ok WOW!!! I feel so thankful to have family and friends like yall! Sabe que?! Your emails were just exactly what I needed to receive this week! All of them. I loved TODO!! So thank you so much for your testimonies and faith and dedication to the gospel of Jesus Christ. Incredible. Ha so this week just kinda happened. We worked A FULL but didn't see much success, just one of those weeks. And just some of our progressing investigators are falling, oh and ha something else...about that apartment we were suppossed to move into and was absolutely perfect, just didn't work out. Pretty much everything was just a miracle and we were so excited and everyone was so excited that we found somewhere to live and everything, and then President decided he needed to look over the contract and make sure it was good. So apparently he made some changes on it, and when the Elder called to see what the lady was thinking, she told him that she had just decided to rent it to somebody else. Can you believe it?! So then we were in trouble because we didn't have anywhere to live, so we had to call and beg the familia Zafra again and they said it would be fine. So basically all day Wednesday we spent moving into our new place. Ha we barely fit all of our stuff in and a lot of stuff is just still in suitcases because we are still trying to find somewhere to live, ha and we don't really have a kitchen, well we do just minus a stove, which is fine no big deal. But we now have to viajar (travel) an hour into our area and leave at 8 every night so we can be home by 9, and yes we walk those hours haha it's great. Unfortantely colectivos don't pass by very often. So yeah.. oh my gosh and we found out we have cambios a week earlier. So now we'll be finding out on the 21st and switching the 22nd. Crazy! I don't know what's going to happen, I'm guessing we'll probably stay together. Oh and mom! You know that girl you told me that is coming? Well I don't know her, but I saw her picture about 2 months ago and I was like ahh she is so cute, I want to train her! So yeah that would be so awesome, so if anyone has anyway to contact her, just tell her to be so excited to come to Paraguay because it's the best mission in the world and that we are all praying for her and that any of the trainers would be awesome! But yeah that is so cool, and my zone leader right now, a girl from his ward is coming in like March or something. How fun! This really is just the best mission! I LOVE PARAGUAY! It is so great, ha it is crazy, but that is why you love it. I LOVE sharing the restored gospel of Jesus Christ with the people. Yeah it's sad that a veces they don't want to hear or live it, but when they use their agency to follow the teachings of Jesus Christ it is AMAZING! Miracles happen! I love it! Mom I LOVED your letter! All of it! INSPIRATION! And Angela too!!! Wow what an amazing family I have! And I'll just leave yall with a funny story, ok so we went out to the bajos this past week (this is like the poorest area of Paraguay) anyways we have an investigator out there, but he wasn't there so we shared with the daughter- ha and everytime we go over there the kids like hide from us, so we were excited that the daughter would share with us. Ha anyways so we had just got done introducing ourselves and singing and we explained all about prayer and then I started to say the prayer. So there we are sitting all tranquilo as I am praying and all of a sudden I get drenched with water! One of the little kids had come and ran outside and then sprayed water all over me as I was praying. Ha I just started busting out laughing during the prayer, my comp only got a lil wet because she was behind me lol haha who does that? Welcome to the bajos. Haha and now a story that you should probably not put on the blog...so we were at one of our other investigators house and we were sitting there talking and I was going to cross my legs and all of a sudden Matilde just started busting out laughing and said, TIENES SHORTS! (you have shorts on) haha but it was SO FUNNY, the way she said it and the look on her face (apparently she had seen my garments!) but she just couldn't stop laughing, and then her mom who is probably like 60ish was like well that's better because it won't show your underwear line haha. And then Matilde is like but it is SO HOT outside why would you wear shorts, ha I was like oh geez but it was just so funny and then they started calling my comp 'la gorda' (the fatty) ha she was so offended. I was like yeah that's just what they do here. Man it was so funny!. Ahh ok eso no mas. and mom for the christmas list, I don't know!!! That is so far away! I'll give you a couple things that you can get now, but don't send it yet! Ok trail mix, como siempre, those oreos you got me last year! So good! Oh and apparently there are these new pretzel m & m things that are so good! Hna Kimballs daughters brought them and I liked them a lot! And if you could just make me some Cmas cards that I can send out to people that would be AWESOME!!! They don't have to be super fancy or anything like that, just simple and easy to make. Oh and I'm going to need more tampons and contact solution and maybe a pack or two of make up remover wipes. Some lil candy canes, they don't have those here, and just a couple pair of socks, because I'll probably need some to finish the mish. And yeah eso no mas for right now, but i'm trying to think of a couple gifts I could send to my converts (so if you think of anything cute let me know). Ok I love yall! Thanks so much for everything! Have a great week! ANd P.s. Ty is always in my prayers, I promise I'll write you after I get home from the mish, but you know how it is with time here. Love ya!

Oh and also! I got the card from Gpa Dale and Laurie! Thanks so much for remembering me!

Oct. 4, 2010

2010-10-05T09:20:00.000-07:00

HAPPY BIRTHDAY GRANDPA BILL!!!!!!! 91!!! Viejito!!! Chulina!!! Gpa I love you! You are the best! And look at you, 91 years old and still going strong! I am so proud and am so excited to see you next summer! I hope you had a great birthday party with all the fam and friends! Love ya! Ok WOW this was one of the best weekends of my life! Thursday we went to the temple and ended up being there for 5 hours! It was SOOO PERFECT! Such a nice opportunity to just be in the House of the Lord and contemplate and commit and just have that spiritual strength to keep going. I loved it! And guess what?! I got to see my first temple wedding! Ha it was soo cute! ANd probably the only time in Spanish that I´ll see one so that was something really special for me and of course I almost cried, the promises and the things that were said were so beautiful. And it´ll be so cute when I finally find that special one and know that I´ll get to be with him and my family FOREVER! And ahhh it was just so cute! and they were so cute and it was just perfect, I´m so greatful that we got to see it. And then of course, CONFERENCE!!! Ha bueno actually the whole conference process was a huge mess! Like all the communication was horrible, so we really never knew what hours they were going to show it here because everyone was telling us different things and the bishop didn´t know and neither did the members and everyone had different hours and we weren´t sure which church we´d be able to watch it in so we could see it in English and all of that. So it was kinda difficult to coordinate with all of our investigators. But my comp made these cute invitations to hand out to everyone and we were just contacting a full and testifying and it was a blast! Turns out, we had to go to the church in Trinidad to watch it which is pretty lejos (far) from our area, but that is where they had it in English but our investigators didn´t want to go clear out to trinidad, so we just organized for them to go to our chapel in Moroni. We passed by for them all Sunday morning to make sure they were going and were excited and it was all great! But we don´t know if they went because they don´t have phone numbers, so we just left them all sheets of paper to take notes! But conference was great and each session I just kept thinking of all of them and thinking how perfect it would be for them to hear it, so I hope and pray they went! Oh man and that´s right... Hna Kimball´s daughters were down here this week. They are so cute! It was a ton of fun (lost some sleep because we were talking to them) but they are way cute and one of them had served in Honduras and she was just telling us all about that and just giving us all this life advice. Ha and then they would stay up playing cards all night long...yeah that´s not trunky at all! Haha I was like ah man this is just like us! But no, I´m good, don´t you fret. Oh and I also sent some stuff home with them (2 hammocks, some old letters and my winter coat) and I am so greatful for that because that would`ve taken up so much weight in my suitcases! So you'll have to send them thank you letters and I´ll send you their addresses. Oh and also today I bought a nativity set and it´s made out of this like famous paraguay wood that has this certain scent (it´s called palo santo) and just a couple other recuerdos. Aver, oh man and also, MILAGRO (MIRACLE!) ¿Sabe qué? Like on wednesday we were going out to work and we were just walking along and we had just randomly gone a different way than we normally go to this one house and like when we were like half way there, I even said that's weird, we never go this way, but we just kept going. And as were walking I look towards the left and I see this like store and above it this huge sign, and then my eye catches a sign right about it...AQUILO, do you know what that means? haha, for rent! which ok whatever, not a big deal, it's probably super expensive because it's right there on the main road (España) and right in front of Pizza Hut and right next to a McDonalds that they are building, but we take the number down and just keep walking. And I call it and she tells me un millon, and the elder only told me we could pay 700, but that was actually the cheapest we've ever found because the other ones are usually like 1,500. So I call the elder and just ask him and he just says oh yeah that's fine. What?! so then we go and check it out and it is so PERFECT! And so to make a long story short, we should be moving in this Wednesday which is so perfect because they are kicking us out of the other apartment at the end of the week! It was such a blessing and so unexpected! So thank yall for your continued prayers! And it is just in the perfect location, a couple blocks from the church and the grocery store! The other hermanas are going to love us! Alrighty I think that is all! I love yall! Have a great week!

Sept. 27, 2010

2010-09-28T06:49:00.001-07:00

Oh my land!!! What happened to all the people in St. George?!! Holy Cow!!! Spring started this week in Paraguay, but yall are all in Utah!!! What in the world?! Like everyone is just getting married. Emily, you better just watch yourself lol. Nah, really I’m super excited for everyone on that HUGE long list of people that are going to get married this year! But that is CRAZY! This week was great as usual. We had a mission training and went over all the new things that are going on with the mission and like the 8 ynew lessons and it’s really exciting! My comp is a guapa and she totally has that MTC fire going on, so it’s great! She is just whipping me right into shape, and we are going to tear it up. Ha I feel like I’m in the states because we get rejected all the time here! Nobody lets us in. In Luque it was completely opposite, everyone let us in, you just clap at their door, say permiso and walk in and they love you. Here they have doorbells you have to ring or lil speaker phones in front of their house that they answer. Ha it is so weird. We have fun though. We just play the rejection game. We have gotten some pretty funny rejections. The other day we were passing by this HUGE house, and I was like ahh man, we are so going to contact this house and see what happens. And it had like 4 flights of stairs that went up to the front door, and I was like guaranteed they won’t even come down one flight to talk to us. Ha ok so this lady comes out, probably like 50ish and there we are, 2 cute lil American rubias (blondes) standing at the front of her gate smiling so big, so excited to share about the restored gospel of Jesus Christ (just picture this) so she comes out and says in her most pleasant voice, que dicen? (what do you say) ha and when I say pleasant, I really mean she seemed really annoyed. And so my sweet comp tells her we are representatives of Jesus Christ and that we have a message so special to share with her, ha and she throws her hands up in the air and says , No NO NO!! I am catholic, my family is catholic, my grandparents are catholic, blah blah blah. And so then I jump in and I’m like oh that is so perfect, because we share with everyone and we know that our message can bless your life (now remember she is like 4 flights up so we are like shouting) and she freaks out and just keeps throwing up her hands in the air and waving them no, and we just keep talking and invite her to conference and talk to her about the prophet y el evangelio restaraudo and she just plugs her ears and is telling us she doesn’t want to hear anything we have to say. Ha it was actually pretty funny. So then we leave and are just like laughing and there is this guy parked in a truck on the side of the road, and when we were contacting I had seen him come out and get into his car but I thought he had left, but apparently he had stayed. But he started asking us what the church is all about and that he wanted to learn more too (that he is catholic) but that he wanted to hear more about what we believed. So we gave him a nice lil run down and invited him to conference and he was pretty interested in that and said he wanted to go to a session and we are going to go back and visit him on Wednesday. But at the end, he was like man that lady really didn’t want to hear anything you had to say huh? It was pretty funny. But it was a nice lil milagro (miracle). The Lord really does just put people in your way. Keep praying that we will be able to find people. We found for like 4 hours straight the other day and only got into 1 house. Everyone else rejected us. Yikes! But we are working a full. And this week, I am SO EXCITED!!! On Thursday we go to the temple!!!! POR FIN!!! And then I’ll go once again in April right before conference and then the night before I leave. Oh my goodness that day is coming way to fast. I don’t like it. Do you know what?!!! I hit my year mark last Thursday! Can you believe I have been gone a full year?!! Crazy! Ha I don’t want to hear about any more marriages until I get home, everyone just needs to slow down lol. Ahh and then we have conference!!! I absolutely love conference! And we have just been showing everyone in Paraguay the picture of our prophet, Thomas S Monson and testifying like crazy. It is a blast! I’m hoping that we’ll have some good asistencia for conference. And I’m really hoping we’ll be able to see the Relief Society broadcast, here they have that on Saturday morning. For conference we all just meet at the stake center and usually all the members and latinos are in the sacrament room and all the Americans are in their own lil room watching in English on a lil tv. Haha last year it was a lot of fun! Ahh I’m so excited! And next Monday we move into our new place!! Crazy! Today Sis Kimball’s 3 daughters are coming to stay for about a week and it’ll be a lot of fun to get to know all of them! Alright I better go! Love yall so much! Have a great week!

Love,

Hermanita Nelson

Sept. 20, 2010

2010-09-28T06:48:00.001-07:00

Ha CHISTE!!! Ok soo we didn't exactly find a house but we found a place we can stay until we can actually find a house! La familia Zafra (I think I've already told yall about them, we ate lunch at their house a couple weeks ago and the food was so good and they are American and he is here working) right...so they just happen to have this lil maids courters atras su casa, in the back of their house they have this lil place where their maid can stay but turns out she doesn't stay there so they have just been using it as a storage place. Well last Monday we went to their house to do our laundry and our internet and then that night Hna Zafra called me and was like, hey I was talking with my wife and we just wanted to offer yall the lil place behind our house if you can't find anything. So I was like sweet! And we were actually thinking about that like the week before but we didn't really want to ask them cause that's kinda awkward, so it was a real blessing that they offered. And then we told Hna Kimball what they said and she said she had been thinking that exact same thing too the week before and she was planning on asking them this week. So it was really just an answer to all of our prayers and all of yalls prayers (thanks so much!) and so this past week Hna Madariaga went over to check it all out to make sure we can live there and we got the check! So later today we are going over to clean it all out and we'll move in in like 2 weeks. We won't have like a kitchen really, but it will be just enough space for our beds and our desks and that is just perfect until we find another place. We're excited because the familia Zafra is AMAZING but we are really sad to leave Hna Kimball. Ok more good news, last Saturday we had Graciela's baptism!!! Ahh she is just the cutest and was so happy to FINALLY be baptized. She has always wanted to but we just wanted to make sure she was ready. Ah it was so cute and 2 of her kids came which was a really big deal because she wasn't expecting it and neither were we and it was great. Those crazy children were there, so that made things a lil stressful but Hna Messina played the piano again and it was FABULOUS. I love music! I'll have to send some pics (oh by the way, did yall send me another memory card in the package or no?) oh that package is just so great! We made the cake the other night and oh my land! It tasted so AMAZING! It tasted so AMERICAN, ha it was weird. Yummy!!! And all those SNACKS! Ahh who knew I would ever be so happy about getting FOOD for my birthday!! Hehe and we decided we are going to try to make the 7 layer dip...which means mom I need you to send me the exact detailed recipe when you get this and then to email me back right away and I'll check later. Ok? Perfect. Aver... Oh and also this past week Hna G and her 2 hijas (she stayed with them both for this change) they came and lived with us last tuesday until this morning because they got their electricity turned off haha because they hadn't paid their bills in like 3 months. Yikes. Ha so that was fun and crazy and I am still so tired, I have so much sleep to catch up on. Oh AND dun nu nu guess what?!! I found another Emilio, Manu, Alcides type guy!!! We are so excited! And just guess what his name is?! Yep, that is right, another Gustavo. Ridiculous! But he is the right one!!! And we just call him Gustavito. He's 19 and we found him as a contact...bueno we were clapping doors. The problem is he is only available on Saturday and Sundays. Lame. He is in the military so he's all into that and his studies and his work and he is just watching the house that we visit him at over the weekends. But he is a stud. We gave him a Book of Mormon and he's been reading and we invited him to be baptized for the 09 of October and he said yes (oh that was last Sunday and we were with Emilio and Manu) and so their all just good friends. And he came with us to church for the first time yesterday and he loved it of course and he asked where Emilio and Manu were and I told him they are from Luque so they go to a different church (and then I talked to Emilio after church and he asked how Gustavo was doing, ha it was funny) but that they are preparing to go on missions and that he can prepare with them. hehe. And then at church he asked me something about baptism but I didn't hear his question so I told him we'd pass by later and talk to him about it. Oh and apparently him and Graciela know eachother because they used to work together and it was funny because we were with her that morning to pick him up and they were like oh hey! So that's good lol. Anyways ok so we went there and he was like uh yeah so do I have to find white clothes to wear to my baptism or what? Ha I was like what a great question! Well for YOUR baptism... Ha I like how he put himself in that situation. So I'm excited to keep working with him. How cool! Another missionary boy. Love it! Ok oh and Alisa and Angela loved yalls blogs, the pictures are so cute! All the kids are so big!!! I can't believe it. Nate and Tyler are lil boys!! And Kylee oh my land! How did that happen!!! She was like a lil baby when I left and now she is just the most adorable lil girl!! Ahh I can't wait to come home and spoil them! Oh and Nick's email was hilarious! I loved it! thanks for sending that! Oh and question...who wants one of those cool leather scripture cases? I'm sure Skyler and Bobby know what they are if you don't know what I'm talking about. You can get like pictures of temples or Christ engraved on them. But if yall want them just tell me what size your scriptures are and what kind of picture you would want. Ok I think that is everything! I love yall so much! Thanks for the emails! Tell grandma I miss her emails, they need to get back already!! Have a great week!

Sept. 13, 2010

2010-09-14T10:45:00.000-07:00

Happy Birthday to me! Happy Birthday to me!!! Man, can you believe it?! I am 22!!! HOly cow! And let me just go ahead and throw out a thanks to mamma wariner because she is the only one who told me I was still young, everyone else said they couldn't believe how OLD I was! Haha! wow so my first (and last) birthday in Paraguay!! Ha it was fun! The night before one of our investigators, Jose (who is like 45ish) bought me some alfajors (those are really a big deal here) and some juice and sang me happy birthday and then the next day for my bday we went to church, which was actually a disaster lol because we just had these crazy kids there and sacrament was oh so spiritual haha pero esta bein. Despues we went up stairs in the kitchen of the church and ate lots of cake! And then we went back to the house and Hna Kimball made roast and mashed potatoes for my birthday!!! It was SOO delicious!!! I was so excited, it's a good thing too because I missed out on that yummy chicken enchilada meal ayer! And then Emilio and Manu came out and worked with us all day! It was a blast. And then we came home and Hna Kimball made guacamole and ha I was telling them all about the 7 layer dip that you make! And then you wrote about that haha...next year for sure!! OH MY GOSH!!!! And that PACKAGE!!!! That was AMAZING! Ha I was SO EXCITED! Ha and so was my comp! All the candy is just about gone and ahh Alena I loved the photo colauge (ha yeah I can't figure out how to spell that) and all that FOOD! Yeah that was just the perfect thing...who knew I'd be so excited about getting food...oh and blasted, the cereal got broken, so that was all over the place and stale, but don't worry the rest is just PERFECT!!! I'm serious I could just go on and on about how much I LOVED IT!!!! And THANK YOU Sis Andersen for including that card and the food! Loved it! Oh and also this past week I got letters from Keri, Quickie Dickie, Flora (ha I LOVED the puzzle thing, that was so tyte!!! And yeah that took like 3 months to get here bc it got sent to the south mission- and ok Flora has got to be home now!!! Crazy!! ANd yeah I'll be waiting for another letter because I need your new address!) and the Bachelors (thank you- ha they are so awesome and their lil boy is so cute!) and from President Lyman! Oh and we got CAMBIOS!!!! I think we are going to start getting them on Monday's from now on, but I'm staying with my hija! We're happy! Pretty much everyone stayed together. Oh man and we still DON'T have a house! I don't know what we're going to do! This past week-let's see... well last monday we had an hermana activity and we went to mercado 4, which is kinda a big deal because nobody ever gets permission to go there...ha but I know how to work it hehe. And I bought a couple hammocks that are way sweet! And then Tuesday we went out to lunch with Hna Sherwood (who is another missionary that works in the temple and I guess she always takes the missionaries out to eat on the first Tuesday of every month) and we went to this really nice...like way nice seafood place, who woulda thought there'd be good seafood in Paraguay but I ate clams for the first time, ahh and shrimp is so good too! Oh and then today we went to Pizza Hut and there ended up being a ton of missionaries there, so we had a lil party and it was so fun to see everyone! This past week was actually pretty rough, I had a couple emotional break downs because Satan is just working a full on this area! We had some really AWESOME investigators (a family, who I had just come to love SO MUCH and who are just so perfect for the gospel and we've had family home evenings with them for the last 2 Mondays and they just went fabulous! THe first one we talked all about the family and they just loved it and then last week, we had a family from the ward come with us and we went to the church and just gave them like a tour- because they've never gone before-bueno, the mom has never gone before, so the point was so that she could go and see that it was amazing and feel the spirit and everything, but she ended up not even coming because she was sick...so sad! We wanted her to come so bad! But the kids just loved it! My comp played the piano and we sang and they just loved all of it and then we walked around the temple and everything was just perfect! And they all told us how excited they were to come to church with us) And then we passed by their house like on Wednesday to see how they all were, and their mom came out to talk to us and was super blunt and just said, look- we appreciate all you've done for us, but we are catholic and we aren't going to listen to yall anymore and we are not going to go to church with yall, and my kids are going to a catholic school and that is how we are going to raise our family and we are not going to go to the mormon church that has polygamy and blah blah blah. Basically, I just started crying. Ahh and I did NOT want to, but it just absolutely broke my heart. How is that possible? Ahh I don't understand but maybe one day later on they'll accept it and they will remember us and our love for them. I cleared things up with her misconceptions of the church and just bore my testimony and told them that we loved them. She apologized and she said she really loved us too but that she had told us from day 1 that she was catholic but she accepted us because she needed us in that moment but that now she was fine. Ugh. And then later we had another crazy lesson and I just bawled again. wooo, but now I'm 22 and everything is better! A new cambio! Whoo! Bueno, I love yall and am so greatful for all your letters and the package and the birthday wishes! Oh my gosh and I saw Nate's video!!! I almost cried! That was the CUTEST! Give him such big hugs and kisses for me! I love yall all so much! Have a great week!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY HERMANITA NELSON!!!!!!!!!

2010-09-12T07:47:00.000-07:00

*I just had to post something about Amanda's birthday today. If you happen to be glancing at her blog maybe you can send her feliz cumpleanos greetings!

Sept. 6, 2010

2010-09-12T07:46:00.000-07:00

Ok first off...wow TY is such a STUD MUFFIN! wow!!! those pics were great! I was so excited to see him! He looks so good! And yeah he has definetly got that light in his eyes! Chulina! Ha you got that picture of me and my mission parents..I don't really remember what I looked like..yikes! Ahhh I'm turning 22!! Oh man I'm going to be an old maid when I get back...ha jk I don't care. Ahh and I'm so excited you gave me permission to open my package but I think I might just wait til Sunday...ha we'll see how long that lasts. Ok so we had Luis' baptism and it was so beautiful! Ha I actually felt like I was in the states for a second.. members actually came and my wonderful companion played this beautiful piece on the piano and the lil talks were great and after the baptism Luis bore his testimony and it was just so cute and then he wanted me to get up and share mine which made me almost cry. Ahhh I was so excited for him! I just kept looking at him and realizing how much I loved him. He is just this big ole teddy bear, it is so great! And then the next day we went to his house to see how he was doing and he was just so happy. And after his baptism he just kept smiling and it was the cutest thing! And then while we were at his house and he offered the prayer and it was so sweet. He thanked God for being a Mormon. haha he is so excited to be a member of the church! And then he just told us how much he loved us and how greatful he was for the gospel and bringing it to him and helping him out. I'm telling you...times like that make everything else worth it! He told us something but I can't remember exactly how he phrased it...but he said I wish I would've met yall earlier so I could've had this gospel in my life. He has changed so much. He still has a long way to go, as do the rest of us, but that's where that perseverar hasta el fin (endure to the end) comes in. Ahh and I have to tell you about this family we found. Ha so Saturday we put time to find in before lunch. So we were just going around and we were in a really rich part of our area, like everyone has these huge gates in front of their houses so you can't see in and then they have a speaker in front. So you have to ring the speaker and then talk to the people...and let me just tell you what usually happens. You ring it, they say, que dice? you tell them your missionaries and you have a message about Jesus Christ you want to share and they tell you, no sorry we just work here and we aren't allowed to leave the property. LIke all these rich people have these lil servant people and they aren't allowed to open the doors or anything for security purposes. And if the person who actually owns the house answers they tell you they are catholic or are busy or w/e. ok so after being rejected for a good hour or so, I was like alright we have to make it a meta (a goal) to get in one of these big houses contacting through a speaker! So like 30 min of rejections later we got to this house and my comp contacted through the speaker and a man answered. Now that is just weird because they are always women. But she told him who we were and he said well I'm really religios, Catholic Ramonic...i don't even know, some really catholic religion that like every person in Asuncion is a part of...but he said, I have your church's bible and I'll come outside real fast and saludarle (like say hello). Sweet! ha so he comes outside and he's like 35ish and he just starts speaking to us in English. Ha it was great!! He speaks like fluent, I guess he studied in the states, but he was so cool. And he let us come in and we met 2 of his kids and his wife, who just all happen to speak english too! the kids look american and they are so cool and so cute! and their house is so HUGE!!! and so NICE! ha it was so fun! so he wanted us to talk to them in english so they could practice. ha it was so weird! talking no...but teaching was really hard! I kept going in and out of spanish and english...ha I think the lessons sound better in spanish..it just sounded weird in English. But they were a lot of fun and I guess their oldest son (who we didn't meet) went to the same school as the Wade's boys. Anyways we are going to start teaching them and I'm excited. They are pretty in to their religion (he pretty much believes the Bible is EVERYTHING and there isn't anything else) but he told us he is really open to listen and he said if God touches him, then he'll follow that answer. So he is open and he is going to read the Book of Mormon, and this will be their first time meeting with the missionaries. woot woot! and they just so happen to live on the same street as the temple and the church. It's perfect. The gospel is perfect. I'm stoked. Then yesterday we ate lunch with the familia Zafra. They are in our ward and are from the states. Bueno the dad is from Peru and the mom from Mexico but they have lived in the states like all their lives and he works for the embassy. But this weekend was just weird because it felt like I was in the states or something. They cooked us an amazing meal and we had american brownies!!! SOOO GOOD! It was a great week! The time is just flying. Every week we are just finding and finding...searching through the weeds. But it is fun. And this Sunday is my birthday! woot woot! And then next week we have CAMBIOS!!!! That is crazy! Man time flies. I'm pretty sure I'll stay with my hija. She's a guapa and her spanish is AMAZING...lol it is better than mine, so she has made it really easy to train. Another great week! I love the mission! Ha the familia Zafra..well the parents told us to tell their daughter why she should go on a mission. ANd I was like, the mission is the best thing in the world! Ah it really is! Bueno, I needed the mission. It has changed my life. I just keep learning and growing. It is incredible. THings that you wouldn't ever learn in any other way. I am so so so thankful to be a missionary and to have this opportunity to serve my Heavenly Father. Yeah for sure there are hard times, but it is so worth it! Love it! Love yall! Have a great week!

August 30, 2010

2010-08-31T08:05:00.001-07:00

WOW!!!! What a week yall had! How exciting! I loved all the emails and all the news. That is so CRAZY that Skyler is going to Ty’s same mission! What a small world! Wouldn’t that be hilarious if Ty trained him? Haha. And Ty thanks for sharing what the member of the 70 had shared with yall, it helped me a lot! So wow quite a week! Alright here in Paraguay we had quite a week too!!! So we had the special changes from Monday night until Saturday morning and it was probably the best week of the mission. Hna G and Hna Henderson (who lived with me my first change and were super tyte) came to stay with me for the week and we just had a BLAST! We had the capacitacion (the conference thing) from 9-3 every day and it was just AMAZING! I just love being a missionary! It was so eye opening and man there are just so many things that I need to be doing better ha but I’m working on it, so it’s all good. We probably only got in like 6 hours of work the whole time they were here because we didn’t end up getting home until like 5 every day… we had a couple interviews with President and then I got super sick on like Thursday and waiting for colectivos and yeah, and then at night we had consejo de barrio (ward council) and a meeting with our mission leader. So the work was kinda limited which really stinks because this week we have to like start over again! Because all of the investigators from the hermanas that left are not progressing!!! I kinda wish we would’ve dropped them earlier because we just found out that they have been working with the other hnas for a really long time and they aren’t keeping their commitments. Ahhh dificil! So this week we are starting over with a new clean slate. We should be having a baptism this Wednesday with a man named Luis (again…stories for after the mish) and I’m really excited for him. He really wants to be baptized but we’ve just been trying to help him prepare better and he just loves us and teases with us all the time. When I first got here I couldn’t understand barely anything he said because he mumbles! But now were good. Ha he kinda reminds me of grandpa Bill, like the way he jokes around and everything, it’s hilarious. Aver… so something happened yesterday that changed my mission for me or maybe better said, changed my life. Bueno… actually this week there have been a couple different things that have happened that just COMPLETELY and TOTALLY changed my perspective about life! 1. There is opposition in ALL things. Something I have truly come to understand and treasure. We can’t ever truly appreciate something until we have truly understood the opposite.. like living here in Paraguay and seeing so much poverty.. Things that have literally broken my heart and I have felt completely hopeless on what I could do to help. And there were times when I asked, Heavenly Father, why them? Why do these precious little children and loving people have to live like this? Why did they get this life? I look at these kids, and yall know how much I love children… and their lives are just so so so sad. Most of them don’t know who their dads are, they live in trash (the other day we were walking over this lil bridge and underneath there was this nasty steam filled with trash and pigs and was just gross, and there was this lil boy, probably like 4 years old, searching for food. I’m sure yall can’t even picture that. But that is just how it is in a lot of parts of Paraguay. And just things like that happen every day. And then these poor moms that have all these children and NO SUPPORT and can’t find jobs and can’t provide for their children. Ah it just kills me. I feel so bad for these poor children that have to live in the mistakes of their parents. I honestly don’t understand how it works. But I know that God loves them just as much as anyone and that His plan is for EVERYONE. It is the ONLY plan that brings happiness. I am so eternally thankful for this knowledge that I have. I’m serious. God loves us. His love is so great for all of us individually.. I hope you pray to understand the greatness of the message of the restoration and then that you go out and share it! I love yall so much! And am so thankful for all your emails and love and support. It means the world to me, to have family and friends that actually care and that are such great testimony builders. That is AMAZING. There are times when I try to explain to our investigators about family prayer and family scripture study and family home evening…things that honestly were not my favorite things to do growing up, but now what a treasure that is to me-and they can’t even comprehend something like that. Now, I understand the difference it makes. That opposition. Ha now I understand how important it is to follow the council of the prophet. He really does know what he’s talking about. I don’t know why sometimes we don’t follow. But I know that if we do follow, we will be happy and we will live with God and our families again. Wow this email is all over the place! Just pray for me. Pray that we will find the people that are ready to accept this message so they can have the FULLNESS of the gospel. And that we can find a house! Ahhh! I love yall! Have a great week

Aug. 23, 2010

2010-08-23T18:31:00.000-07:00

Oh my goodness! So turns out today is my 9 month mark in Paraguay and my 11 month mark in the mission and the weeks just keep flying by! I can’t believe it is Monday otra vez! And this week is probably going to go by super fast too… Friday night my zone leaders called me and they were like Hna we’re just calling bc you have a special change. Excuse me?! I was like WHAT?!! And they were like yeah we’re going to do it on Monday night and your daughter is leaving to MarianoRA and you’ll be staying here. And I was like uh elders I don’t understand. And I was like well who will be coming with me? And then they told me Hna G and I was like what?! That doesn’t even make sense… she has hijas too. So here I am like freaking out that I’m going to be separated from my darling hija and then he’s like well it’s just going to be until Friday. Ha and I’m still really confused. And then he tells me that all the trainers and district and zone leaders have like this special conference to learn how to be better missionaries and to use preach my gospel better and all that good stuff. So it’s going to be Tues- Fri in the mornings. I’m actually really excited about it! It’ll be really awesome to learn and be better and then just go out on fire! And that’s exactly what this area needs! Man, yesterday was a tough day! Ha Sundays in the mission are CRAZY! Like I’ve already explained, you always leave about an hour early so you can go and collect all your investigators for church. Well yesterday we left at 6:50 (church starts at 9) to go and stop by for all our peeps. Saturday we committed everyone to go! It was awesome, like we resolved all their doubts, promised them blessings, verified, testified, everything and at the end of the day we were pretty confident that we would have 11 people in church on Sunday and we were pretty stoked about it. So we leave Sunday morning and the weather is just BEAUTIFUL! And to make a long story short we only had 1 person come to church with us. We stopped by for everyone and more people and everyone gave us all these excuses. Ha it’s times like that when I wish I didn’t understand Spanish! It was pretty tough. We were both like near tears because it’s just like we develop so much love for these people and we can truly see how the gospel can bless their lives, how they can change their lives and be happier and have better relationships with their families and everything and we just get so excited when they read in the Book of Mormon or are doing their prayers and keeping their commitments, but then when they don’t, it really just breaks your heart! It’s hard to explain. Ha I don’t think I could ever handle a rebellious child, because you just love them so much and you see what is best for them, but all you can do is love them and teach them but you can’t force them. Ha and sometimes I just want to force these people! I have learned so much about el gran regalo del albedrio. The great gift of our agency. What a gift! Man! It’s hard to watch people use their albedrio to go down a course that isn’t right. Man, it’s all about that iron rod. Hold on to that! It’s so important to just CLING to it and never let go! I loved mom’s email and that talk. We talked about that in sociedad de Socorro tambien. But I never thought about how you explained it. But I love that. As missionaries that’s what we are doing too! Helping these children find their way home. 1. Teaching them to read in the Book of Mormon 2. Bearing testimony and 3. Teaching them to act rather than be acted upon. So thanks so much for that correlation. It makes me excited to work. It’s so true. Ah man I just love the Book of Mormon. It is so true. And all week I’ve been reading all the talks from the last general conference; AMAZING! I just love conference! And in every contact and lesson we have been saying we are missionaries of the church of jesus Christ of latter day saints, representatives of Jesus Christ and we have been called by a prophet of God to share with the people of Paragauy the restored message of the gospel. Ha it’s been great! I love doing that because it helps me remember my purpose as a missionary and it will help those who are prepared recognize us as servants of God. Love it! Love the mission! Bueno, I love yall! I hope your praying that we’ll find a new house in a good location ha because we haven’t yet! And we also want to start working in a different part of our area and we really need to be led by the Spirit to help us decide! I love yall so much and am so so so thankful to have yall in my lives. And I really appreciate your emails! Have a great week! And Happy Bday Hna Case this Saturday! Love yall!

Love,

Hermanita Nelson

Aug. 16, 2010

2010-08-17T08:33:00.001-07:00

CRAZY WEEK!!!! Ha but this one went by a lot faster! First, holy shnikies I got my HUGE HUGE HUGE package!!!! And now it is just sitting there in my room staring at me wanting me to open it and I have to wait another month until my birthday lol! But I'm glad it made it! Also ha mom remember when you told me Bro. Nichols knew a girl that was coming out here that plays piano...ha turns out that is my hija! Ha and I found out that her and Hilary Heidiman are really good friends because they did piano together at BYU...small world, I love it! And now here we are walking the good ole streets of Paraguay! Ha to start this week off so well on Tuesday night we were getting ready to leave our area to go to a consejo de barrio in the church (ward council) and we didn't know exactly which collectivo to take so we made sure we finished in time so that we'd be able to figure it out. So we asked like 3 different people which collectivo we would need to go to brazilia y espana and they all told us 23 or 24, so we go out to the routa and a 24 is coming right down, so we sign it and it stops and we get on and we are like so stoked because wow que bendicion that the collectivo came right then when we needed it! and just to make sure I ask the collectivo driver that it passes by brazilia y espana and he says yes. well FAIL!!! ha our first day without hna rodriguez and we get LOST! ha we are going and going and we turn on espana and I'm like perfect we're almost there and then we pass this street called brazil...and i'm like hmmm that's weird I hope that's not what they thought I meant...but I had told them it was by the big church so we should be good. FAIL...all of a sudden we turn again and we end up en los estados unidos..ha that is what the road is called. and I'm like oh shoot this can't be right, ha so we bust out the map...and those roads weren't even on our map lol. so then i'm like freaking out and we stop the collectivo and get off. and so we had been off for less than a minute and we're like ha what should we do and then all of a sudden this guy comes up to us and he's like, can I help you? ha but he is totally talking in english! lol it was fabulous, I guess he had lived in Arizona por algunos anos and so he spoke english! and he helped us figure out which collectivo we needed to take and it was just such a blessing! and we only ended up being like 10 min late to the meeting. Ha so yeah then later we had found out we had gone into the South Mission...which you could get sent home if you go into that mission...lol but it wasn't our fault! Aver... we also had zone conference and it was really good...different than how we used to do them, but I'm excited for all the changes that are going to happen with preach my gospel and everything, and we are just going to become better missionaries but unfortunately it all starts the month before I go home..que triste, which is why I want to work in the MTC so I can still be a part of everything! Have I told yall how great my hija is? She is just so cute. She is a way better daughter than I was. Her spanish is amazing and she isn't afraid to do contacts or talk or anything, it's amazing. I love it! Training is really hard, all of this responsibility with being comp mayor...senior comp and trying to do your best to help the newbie do things right and to be a good example. But we are learning juntas and having a good time. I still get frustrated with my spanish, but I'm working on it! We've been working with all the old investigators from the other hnas but we're trying to transfer to start working in different areas that haven't been worked in a really long time, probably bc the houses are mas chu chi...like way nicer.. but the other hnas have been in the bajos (like the poorest part of Paraguay I have ever seen...it is SO SAD...they pretty much live in the trash down there and their houses are just built from whatever they could find, the people are really great but a lot of them dont want to keep commitments and the church is so far away that they don't want to walk and there isn't a collectivo that passes and it is the farthest point of our area and we're not allowed to go there at night or on sundays because it is to dangerous) entonces we are going to start working in other parts. And we have found some really cool people. First this girl named Liliana whose dad just died about 3 months ago and our first cita with her when we found her was just incredible. The Spirit was SO STRONG and ha I started crying when we sang at the beginning before the prayer or anything because we sang...familias pueden ser eternas..families can be forever...I don't know if that is the translation but you know what I'm talking about...and man the Spirit was just there and by the end of the lesson we were all crying! And at the end she was like it was a coincident that we stopped by because she was alone and she had just been thinking about her dad and that she was just so greatful for our visit. she is so cute, she's 21 or 22 and then the next night we met her family and they are great. We all click just great and we're laughing and everything. But there is something that is holding the mom back, I don't know what it is...but I just know that they are so prepared to receive the gospel, so please pray for them. The mom Porfiria, and then the son Gustavo who is 18 and then there are 2 more kids we haven't met...one that doesn't live there and then another daughter. We want to go back over there tonight though. We also met this lady Alejandra that didn't want to let us in her house at first, but finally we convinved her ha. And she had told us she just had a couple minutes to share..yapoo! we ended up staying there for like a half hour. at the end of the lesson she also told us that it wasn't coincident that we stopped by because just the week before she was going through a big box of books and she found a really old copy of the book of mormon that someone had given her and that she had wanted to start to read it. ha it is such a old book! I had never seen one like it before, but it is just so awesome because the words are just the same. So we came and commited her to read it and to pray about it and next time we are going to share the first vision and story of Joseph Smith. The problem is going to be getting her to come to church because she says she is just not the type of person who goes to church and she only goes for weddings and funerals. But that is just all going to change! She is so prepared too! LOVE IT! The gospel is so true. Man I love the mission. Ha it is such an emotional roller coaster but ha the ride is just soo good! And also if you could pray for us to find a house. We have to move and apparently we are in charge of finding a house to move into lol so if you could please pray for that, that it can be in a good area and for a good price! Bueno, I love yall all so much and am so so so greatful for your prayers and your letters! Have a great week!

Aug. 9, 2010

2010-08-11T12:06:00.001-07:00

HOLA!!! Oh my goodness! I think this has been the LONGEST week of the mission! I’m serious! So many CRAZY things happened and I don’t even know where to begin. And I think it has seemed so long because so many things happened every single day and it seems like in a normal person’s life it would be like within a month. Ok so first we will start with CAMBIOS! And yes…there were cambios and they are CRAZY!!! Ok so Monday night one of the hnas called us and was like hey did they tell yall cambios and we hadn’t heard anything todavia and she was like yeah well our elders called and told us our cambios but I’m pretty sure it’s a joke. And we were like well what did they tell you? (And p.s. we had talked to the office elders earlier that day about cambios and they were joking around with us and telling us what they thought would happen and we were like ha NO) And she said that Hna Remache (my old comp) would be going with Hna Garcia- now if you knew the story between them you would know that that cambio would be absolutely insane bc hna Garcia does not like hna remache (yeah just be excited for post mission stories) and so we were like they are so full of it! But hna rem heard too and she was starting to get a lil bit nervous bc that would just be insane and so we were like, no hna it’s just a joke that they are playing. Later- our elders called us and said they had our cambios… and we were like ha we already know it’s a joke but let’s see what you have to say. So he starts with hna remache and tells her she is going with hna Garcia and she just starts bawling! Pobrecita and we were like hna no it’s not true they wouldn’t do that, don’t let it get to you etc. then they told hna g her cambio.. that she would be staying in Luque and that she would be having a baby (she’d be training) and then she started freaking out bc she didn’t feel ready etc.- but that actually seemed legit. So then we were like ok what is my cambio?!!! And they said that I’d be going to Moroni (Asuncion)- seems legit- but then he says that I’ll be having a baby too- which just proves that it’s all a joke because there was an hna already in Asuncion and she would have to stay there bc Hna Leavitt was going home. So we were like elders yall are so full of it!! And they were like no it’s true you better go start packing your bags. Oh and another reason it was all just a joke is because they NEVER call on Monday nights, because we always get our changes on Tuesday during district meeting. So that night we were all freaking out a lil bit and all just so convinced that it was a joke. The next morning Hna Leavitt calls me and she says that she is busy making all these maps and writing down things about the investigators so that I wouldn’t be so lost when I came. And I was like WHAT?! You really think it’s true? And then later we got it all confirmed that it was true. WHAT?!!! So turns out now I’m in Asuncion con mi hijita se llama Hna Messina de Las Vegas and we are white washing the area! Ha yall know how bad I am with directions. Hna Rodriguez has stayed with us until today to kind of show us around the area and where the investigators live and everything. But it has been CRAZY! So last Tuesday we just went to all the people we are really close with to say goodbye bc Hna Remache left too (Hna H came to our area to white wash it and train too, but she has been in Luque before). So basically I just spent all day Tuesday crying and saying goodbye and I didn’t get to say goodbye to Emilio because he was in school and I didn’t know, so that just made me cry harder. And we didn’t get home until almost 10 and then I stayed up until 3 packing and have gone to bed like an hour late every night and I am so exhausted. YIKES!!! And then my daughter and a couple other missionaries flights didn’t come in time, so they ended up coming on Thursday instead of Wednesday. Oh so 3 newbies came, 2 from the states and 1 Latina and everyone thought for sure the latina would be my comp and she was here on Wed. and she came with us to work and we thought for sure we would be together bc it would be good if I had someone with me who spoke and understood Spanish to help me get to know the area and the people and everything…but NO! We guessed who was going to be our daughters and were completely wrong. But my daughter is AMAZING. She speaks really really good! More than I knew in like my 3rd change but she just doesn’t understand very well but she’ll get it. She’s really excited to work and teach and do everything, it’s great! And I’m sure we’ll get lost a ton but it’s all good. Right now we live with Hna Kimball who is a widow that is serving a mission with the temple and with our mission and she’s amazing. She reminds me a TON of grandma! We’re going to move though so we might not live with her again. The house we live in right now is AMAZING! I feel like I’m living in a hotel and she’ll cook lil goodies for us so it’s a lot of fun! And our ward is good it actually functions like a real ward and our bishop is really cool. So everything should be fine. It’s still sad because I’m not in Luque with my Luque family and it’s all really different here but it’ll all be good. I’m here because this is where the Lord wants me and we’re going to work a full and have a blast. Pray for me so that I’ll be able to follow the Spirit! Also it just blows my mind that I’m already half way done with the mish…I don’t like it. It’s crazy that now I’m the senior comp who speaks the language and “knows” Paraguay and now I have my lil hijita who is just new and adorable and I’m training her. CRAZY! Yeah I’m gonna need yalls prayers please! And it was funny because we did a Noche de Hogar the night received cambios and I was sharing a scripture and talking all about faith and trusting in the Lord and then my cambio came and I was like WHAT??? What is He thinking? Ha but He knows what He’s doing. I don’t know what I’m doing lol but I know as long as we’re obedient and diligent everything will be fine and I just decided I’m going to let God be the senior comp and we’re just going to follow the Spirit. Bueno I love yall!!! Have a great week!!!

August 2, 2010

2010-08-05T15:36:00.001-07:00

Oh man!!! Where to start?!!!! First, what in the World happened to July?!! How are we already in August? Blows my mind! So first the really sad news… another 350 of my pictures got DELETED!!!! Yeah, not cool…and not my fault. An elder was trying to figure something out on my camera and accidentally deleted all my pictures. Ahhh and I´m so sad, I can’t even think about it because it makes me want to cry! Because this week I was going to send yall some awesome pictures (de la gallina que yo maté!- of the chicken that I killed) but now I don’t have them and they were so AWESOME!. TRISTE. Also, of the us with the chicken befote we killed it, the process, and the cena… Hna Remache cooked it afterwards. Ha it was so awesome. It’s really a great store, but we’ll save that for after the mish too. Let’s just say that was the first and the last chicken I am going to kill. Ha but it was demasiado chistoso. Ok let’s see… oh yeah so this week I went to Ybera with Hna Welch for like 3 days, I was really sad to leave my area but it actually ended up being a lot of fun. She is hilarious and we just laughed a lot and it was really cool to see her teach and meet all the people there. Ha it was so funny because in every cita (appointment) we had she would introduce me and then tell them where I was from, but she would change it everytime. Ha so turns out, I’m from Argentina, Brazil, France, Australia, Uruguay, Chile, Bolivia, etc. And she would make up these crazy stories and everyone believed us. Ha I was like dude, I can never come back to this area because then they will be like oh I thought you were from…. Cualquier país. And so the people would like ask me to say Words in french or portugues, ha and she volunteered me to say the prayer in french lol…oh man good times. But yeah it was fun, but I was ready to come back home to Luque and I came back to an awesome surprise! We had a baptism on Friday! This girl named Fatima, she’s 22 and we’ve been working with her for like the last couple months and it was so cute. She was so happy and it was so amazing to watch her change her life, and quit smoking and drinking to be baptized. So cool! And then today for p day we had an hermana activity and we got to wear JEANS!!! Ha it was fabulous! And it was a lot of fun to hang out with all the hermanas and divertirnos un poco. Oh and I have to tell Angela to tell Tyler that I totally shared his prayer experience in the Noche de Hogar that we did last week and everyone loved it. We were talking about faith and about how little children often understand things better than nosotros. ANd just tell Tyler everyone loved it and give him a big hug. ANd mom…you told me to read Alma 32 this week and I did and I totally loved it. Such a great chapter. And it’s funny because a week ago I gave it to Belen to read for her tarea and when we went on Saturday she still hadn’t finished reading it so we decided to finish the chapter with her. Oh my gosh, it was SO PERFECT! We taught her and her sister Cynthia and the Spirit was just SO STRONG. Unfortunately, she is to into her other church right now, but I straight up testified along with my companions that la iglesia de Jesucristo de los Santos de los Ultimos Días es la unica iglesia verdadera. I mean the whole lesson was just so awesome because everyone was just bearing testimony and compartiendo y todo! I dunno how it impacted them but the rest of us were all edified and my faith has definitely been strengthened. It seems like, when you’re teaching people who are just being stubborn and are just refusing the truth and who know everything but don’t want to be baptized, your testimony just GROWS! Because wow, it is absolutely incredible how much I love Belen and her sister and their family and it just breaks my heart that they aren’t accepting the message of the restored gospel (another Gustavo…ahhh!!!) and as I testified I just started to cry of course and just said… ya know what… we are representantes de Jesucristo and we are here at your house because God wants you to have this message. We are the second set of missionaries that have taught you and it’s because God wants you to have the FULLNESS. Ha it just blows my mind that people just reject the gospel. The gospel is EVERYTHING to me, now more than ever, and it’s just going to grow. Otra vez it all comes down to if the Book of Mormon is true or its not. Ha we are either all crazy and the book is false, or we are right and the book is true. Ha wow it is so true. I love it! And the evidences are everywhere. I just keep noticing the blessings everyday and just feel so incredibly blessed to have been into a family where I learned the gospel… ha I never understood what that really meant or how good I had it. Ha but now I know. I remember those times when you forced us out of bed to do early morning scripture study or prayer, ha and I hated that and man I was such a complainer about family home evening and everything haha sorry! Now I apréciate it demasiado. Seriously, thanks for all your struggles in raising us. We all turned out pretty good I think lol. And it’s all thanks to you mom and pops! I love yall and I hope yall have a great week. Oh man and we have CAMBIOS this week!!!! We are going to know tomorrow. Yeah, I am freaking out. I feel like I’m leaving and that makes me really sad. I love this area but I’m getting the vibe that I’m outta here…so now I’m just nervous of where I’m going and with who!!! Ahh pray for me so that I can know that it is right and that I’ll be ok. Love yall!! Oh yeah and tell Ty…apparently one of the missionaries here (Hna Stagg) knew him from the MTC and he told her to say hi to me…well she told me she knew you today and I was so excited! I love ya bud and you are always in my prayers! oh and it sounded like yalls california trip was a BLAST!!! thanks for the pics I LOVED them! Yall all look SO GOOD! And the kids are soooo cute!!! Give them hugs and kisses for me. ANd I hope you told gpa bill and Harry and Mary Lou and everyone that I say hi and love them! And that is SO COOL that yall saw Elder Gould in the mall...tender mercy!!! Oh and also Grandma, thanks for the picture! It is about time! Yall look great!!! And I can't believe the boat got stolen for awhile, crazy! But I'm glad everything was fixed and I hope yall have fun fishing! We'll have to do that when I get back too! Oh man also, SIs Andersen, you're awesome! Thanks for your letter! It's so you, I love it! And you are so right, Kids are so smart! It's so fun to watch them learn, and half the time I feel like I learn more from them, then they learn from me. And thanks also to mamma wariner and Emily! Love yall. Ha I love letters! Keep them coming!!!

July 26, 2010

2010-07-27T08:18:00.000-07:00

The gospel is just EVERYTHING. its so true. and it brings such HAPPINESS when we live it. i was listening to a talk the other day and it was talking about the plan of salvation and talking about his favorite phrase to describe the plan of salvation is the plan of HAPPINESS and how it is the only way we can have TRUE happiness. When we dont know of the plan of salvation we cant have the complete happiness.its so true. and tambien he compared it to a 3 act play. How bueno, the first act we are in the preternal life with God and our families and everyone but then the CURTAIN HAS BEEN DRAWN and we forget everything. It was a brilliant act but then all of a sudden we have been thrust into act 2! And act 2 is a lil more difficult, it can be described with the 4 Ts. Tests, Trials, Temptations, and Tragedy and not once in act 2 will we hear the HAPPILY EVER AFTER...thats always saved for the last act. Entonces how are we going to make it throught act 2 when it is full of HARD things? How are we ever going to find happiness, comfort, and joy that is LASTING? Thats when the plan of salvation comes into play. It takes the blinders off...it allows us to see the eternal perspective. It allows us to see the whole plan. We cant have true happiness without the plan of happiness. But when we know of Gods plan during this life we understand that God is in control.That the Happily Ever After is just right around the corner and if we just cumplir con los mandamientios de Dios and do the little things...things that we have been told to do our WHOLE lives (that now on the mission I have FINALLY understood why its so important to repeat things things and to drill them in our heads...because they WORK) read your scriptures...STUDY your scriptures, say your prayers DAILY...rely on the Lord, depend on Him, trust in Him, go to CHURCH ...for all 3 meetings...PARTICIPATE, listen to the prophet...FOLLOW the prophet...OBEY the prophet. The happily ever after is possible! I know it is. I feel it so strongly in my heart right now. We just have to keep pushing along. poco a poco. The light will come. One of the most special and sacred things I have learned on my mission..not just like learned but really learned and now I understand is the importance of the gospel...of living the gospel. Its not just another religion or a nice way to live, but it is the REASON WE LIVE. It is the point of this life. It is the only way that we can make it back to our Heavenly Father. Its hard ha I know that too, but man it is going to be so worth it! And thats why we have eachother too. We are just one huge big family and if we know the truth we have to spread it! We gotta share it! We have to help everyone get back! Bueno, I love yall so much and I am so thankful for your prayers and love...seriously its the best thing yall can do. And the best thing I can do for yall. Yall are always in my prayers and my thoughts. Thanks for being such a great support. Make it a great week. Find someone and share the gospel and then tell me how it went!

Love,

Hermanita Nelson

P.S. So I have had a special change...I think it is just for a couple days or ha I hope and pray it is just for a couple days because I want to go back and finish my change in my area! but turns out one of the hermanas is sick and she has stayed in our house for the last 3 days and we have each rotated and stayed home in the house with her. Rem friday, yo sat, and G sunday. but she is still sick and her comp..hna welch goes home from the mission this next week and obviously she wants to work so she had been with a member working for the past 3 days and now i am going to go work with her until the sick hna gets better. ha she better get better fast lol...pray for her. ha i have so many good stories that i have to tell you about awesome hna drama...but we will save all that for after the mish!

ahhh i almost forgot to tell yall!!!! Ruth, Jessica, Leticia, and Emilio all went to the temple on Saturday!!!! Ahhh I was so excited for them and they all had such great experiences! The temple is the best! haha oh and dad I just have to tell you... yesterday we were at a members house and they were watching church movies from like the old testament and it reminded me how you would ALWAYS bring home videos from the library and want to watch them with us and ha how I never had the deseos to before, but man I am so greatful for you! For your love, your testimony, your worthiness to hold the priesthood and your support. Incredible. I will definitely watch good ole church movies with you after the mish.

mas fotos!

2010-07-27T08:08:00.001-07:00

July 19, 2010

2010-07-20T10:35:00.000-07:00

Have fun with this letter all! *google translate will help

Ustedes querían una carta en español ¿verdad? SUERTE!!!! JAJAJA JEJEJEJE

ENTRAÑABLES MISERICORDIAS

He visto la mano de Dios en mi vida muchísimo, esta semana, especialmente ayer (domingo). Recuerdos pequeños que Èl me ama y que Èl es en todo aspecto de la vida. El sabado, empezamos un ayuno con el propósito especifico tener asistencia de 8 en la iglesia y también por algunos investigadores y sus necesidades. Y el viernes tuvimos una gran lista de personas que pudieron ir a la capilla el domingo y el sábado pasamos por todos de nuestros investigadores. Trabajamos a full el sábado en el frio y en la lluvia con mucho animo con los deseos a comprometer las personas a asistir la iglesia. En el fin del día, terminamos nuestro ayuno muy contentos con la esperanza que Dios nos bendeciría por nuestra fe y obras. Levantamos muy temprano el domingo para pasar por la gente. El tiempo fue re mal! Hacía mucho frio y estaba lloviendo íte! Pero igual fuimos y nos mojamos para cumplir con nuestro parte. Pero, las personas no estaban o no estaban listos a ir o no pudieron por la lluvia y frio y yo entré en el colectivo un poco desanimada. Luego, entramos la capilla y había poco gente adentro. Vista que los paraguayos tienen miedo de la lluvia y no quieren salir sus casas. En total había 31 personas por las reuniones- muy poquito! Y ningún de nuestros investigadores estaban. Empecé a preguntar mi mismo- ¿Qué pasó? ¿Nuestra fe no es suficiente? ¿Por qué Dios no contesta nuestra oración?- Pero, realmente yo sé no es así. Y no podemos hacer preguntas así porque no es justo. Y bueno, empezamos tomar la Santa Cena y pensé de Jesucristo, de su amor, su sacrificio, TODO! Y yo miré a las personas a mi lado- los niños- Ruth, Jessica, Evelyn, Erico, y Rosie- conversos recientes que esperaron en el frio, en la lluvia (sin paraguas!) por el colectivo y cuando se dieron cuenta que el colectivo de la iglesia que es gratis había pasado, no se fueron a sus casas, sino que pagaron pasaje y se fueron en otro colectivo. ¡Qué ejemplo! ¡Qué fe! ENTRAÑABLES MISERICORDIAS. Y después, Leticia, otro converso reciente recibió su recomendación para entrar en el templo este sábado (y también Ruth y Jessica). Y justamente las dos veces pasadas cuando le visitamos a Leticia hablamos del templo y leímos en el libro- principios del evangelio- acerca del templo y ella tenía muchos deseos por entrar y este sábado va a entrar. ENTRAÑABLES MISERICORDIAS. Y Ruth está trabajando a full para cumplir con su progreso personal; chulina!!! Y ayer, después la iglesia, Emilio (otro converso) nos acompañó todo el día en el frio y en la lluvia y wow! Su testimonio es muy fuerte! Fue muy chulina escucharle testificar a las personas sobre el Libro de Mormón y el evangelio restaurado. ENTRAÑABLES MISERICORDIAS. Ahhh y…Alcides (mi otro converso) nos llamó ayer!! Él está en Brasil trabajando y hace 3 semanas que no escuchamos de él y yo estaba un poco preocupada. ¡Pero, él nos dijo que el domingo de testimonios él compartió su testimonio en portugués!! Y que él está en el grupo- manos que ayudan y que siempre esta compartiendo el evangelio con todos! Y también que está preparando por su misión! ENTRAÑABLES MISERICORDIAS.¡En cada uno de estas situaciones casi lloré! En serio. ¡Dios está en todas las cosas! ¡Su mano y su amor está en TODO! ¡Increíble! Y a veces no entendemos el por qué. Pero, no necesitamos entender. Solamente, necesitamos confiar en Dios. Él sabe lo que está haciendo. Y Él ve todo (the big picture). Realmente esta experiencia me ayudó muchísimo. Dios nos ama. ! Jesucristo vive! El evangelio restaurado es una gran evidencia del amor de Dios. Love it! LES AMO!!!! Que tengan una buena semana! Jejeje

Con mucho amor,

Hermanita Nelson

July 12, 2010

2010-07-12T18:39:00.001-07:00

Hello!!!!!!!! Ok i don’t have any time!!! But first, HAPPY BIRTHDAY EMILY!!!! And that’s about all the time i have! Sorry! This week was a great week! We had our zone conference and it went really well! Our new president is really good! But we found out we’ll Only be having conferences and interviews every 3 months which is kinda sad because before it was every month and a half. We also had a really good conversation with a CRAZY LADY! Haha it was so funny. She was telling us all about these diablitos (lil devils) that are everywhere. She explained exactly what they Looked like and everything. And then she told us she’s been to heaven like 3 times and also to hell just to see what it Looked like. I wish i had more time to give you more details, but times up! The kids are still as cute as ever! Pray for their mom so that we can teach her and she can also accept the wonderful message of the gospel! Love yall all so much! Thanks so much for the letters! Have a great week!!!

Love,
Hermanita Nelson

July 5, 2010

2010-07-06T08:25:00.001-07:00

HAPPY 4th of JULY!!!! Ha so I’m glad to hear that nobody blew off any fireworks that ended up causing a huge fire and burning down a bunch of bushes and almost a house. Ha love you Bobby. So we celebrated 4th of july a day early (on Saturday) and we all wore red, white, and blue and sang a couple patriotic songs of our beloved country… ok really we just wore red, white, and blue to have Paraguay Spirit because those are their colors too and they played against spain and unfortunately lost L but it was fun to get all decked out with lil paraguayo flags on our faces. Ok so this was just a FABULOUS WEEK! We did have the baptism on Saturday night and it was so perfect.. but I’ll tell you about that in a sec. First, haha I didn’t really I sent home so many pictures of dead animals, but turns out there’s a lot of dead animals lying in the streets of Paraguay. Ha and yall should be looking forward to a fabulous video that I took or someone killing a chicken! Bahaha it was so funny! It’s this menos activo (less active member) named Rufina who we’re really close too and who I’ve been begging to kill a chicken for like the last 2 cambios and finally she decided she wanted to show us. Ha it was hilarious… and next time, I’m going to do it J hehe it’s really crazy because killing chickens or pigs or w/e is just so normal for them. When they want to eat and don’t have anything, what do they do? They go out into their yard, sharpen the knife, grab a chicken by its neck and kill it! Ha that’s the truth. And then we helped pluck off all the feathers and cut the chicken apart and take out the insides. WAKALA (GROSS!). I never realized how much of the chicken they eat…eww! But unfortunately we didn’t get to eat it because there wasn’t enough time! But that was fun. Oh man!!! And also I got the package from the Wariners!!! AMAZING! Ha I was so excited! Fabulous! Oh and I don’t think I told you, but now that we’re in a trio (Yo, Remache y G) we are working in BOTH areas. You just have to understand that the area I had before was HUGE and turns out that their area is HUGE tambien, and now it’s combined. Crazy!!! So we are doing a lot of walking! Ahh and also last week in church we had 14 people in church! And if yall could please be excited about that, because the elders in our zone our lame and did not show very much enthusiasm, but that’s kinda a big deal especially when normally we’re excited if we have like 5 people in church. It was a straight up miracle, but it was AWESOME! Ok now- the BAPTISM. Ahhh I don’t know if I’ve told yall how much I LOVE these kids! They are just the best ever. And the little one (Ariel- I know in English that’s a name of a girl but in Spanish it’s of a boy) he’s like 3 and he LOVES ME. Ah and I love him too, he’s the cutest thing. Whenever we go there or he sees me, he just runs up to me and hugs me! And gives me besos (kisses)- because here everyone gives besos on the cheeks to greet eachother…haha so if I ever try to give yall besos in the states, please try to understand lol. Ha that was really weird for me when I got here, but I’m gonna miss it when I come back. Anyways… so he always is with me (everyone calls him my lil hijo-son) and everytime he sits on my lap he always takes his arms and wraps them around my necks and just hugs me really tight. It is the cutest thing! I’m such a sucker for lil kids. Ahh and I could just go on and on talking about these kids and how amazing they are but we’ll have to save that for after the mission! Ok so President Madariaga and his wife ended up coming to our baptism (he got here on Thursday I think and we found out the night before that he wanted to come to our baptism. YIKES. A lil nerve racking) but everything turned out so fabulous. Our new pres is really nice, ha it’s weird because he’s not pres wade and she’s not sis wade but it’s all good. I know I’ll love them just as much too! And there ended up being a good number of people there for the baptism and all the tortas (cakes) and cookies turned out good too! It was such a great night and then yesterday they received the holy ghost! Oh how I love this gospel!
Seriously, my mission and life changed the day I met them. I have truly come to understand the beauty of the message of the restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The gospel is the most important thing in the world and has the power to change lives for the better. It has been such a privilege to see how the gospel has transformed this family and how wonderful it is that their lives will just continue to change and become better; that this is just the beginning for them! As we visited them in their humble home and situation I was always so close to tears. Every time I was just overwhelmed with the love Heavenly Father has for them, His precious children. And cada vez my testimony would grow stronger about how the gospel is one of the greatest gifts of God. Happiness is not found in the riches of the world, but in the tender mercies of the Lord that He offers us everyday. And witnessing their baptism, seeing them all in white, little angels, was such a sweet and special experience for me. I know that the Lord loves us. That He knows who we each are individually. He is so aware of our needs and concerns and I feel so blessed to have been able to be a tool in his hand, to be an angel for this family, to bring them the truth and the happiness of the gospel. I love it!!! Hope yall have a great week!
Love,
Hermanita Nelson
**be sure to check out the photos in the post below!

Pictures!!!!

2010-07-05T09:12:00.000-07:00

Here are some of the pictures Hermana Nelson sent back with Tyler Curtis. I will post a few more every week.

June 28, 2010

2010-06-29T05:56:00.000-07:00

Hello hello hello!!! Ok first off CAMBIOS (CHANGES). You will NOT even believe what happened!!! So turns out I’m going to complete exactly half of my misión in Luque! This will be my 6th change!! And I am staying with Hna Remache (for our 4th change together- 6 months) and we have another addition to our companionship. We are in a trio with Hna G (Galbraith-my comp from the MTC) INSANE!!! Ha not what I was expecting! I was actually really really sad because I thought for sure I was leaving, and for the Noche de Hogar (family home evening) I just started crying because I didn’t feel like it was time yet. I just kept thinking, no I just need one more change, uno cambio mas! And everyone was like no you’re going to stay, we’ll see you later this week…we just know you are going to stay. But of course I couldn’t believe that because that’s just crazy talk. So the next morning at district meeting they stuck all our name tags in a bag to draw them out and give us our changes. And turns out mine was the very first one picked. That has never happened either! So of course I was like freaking out and didn’t want to know but really did… and so the elder starts asking me questions…so hna Nelson, how many cambios do you have here in Luque? 5. Oh and how many cambios do you have in the misión? 5. Oh wow, so you’ve been in this area your whole misión? Ha yes. And so by now you probably want to leave, right? No, no, I want to stay! I don’t want to leave. Well, that’s lucky because you are going to stay for one more cambio! WHAT?!!! SHUT UP! NO ME DIGA! Yeah I was like in complete shock and so so excited. And then later I found out I was staying with Remache again (holy cow) and Hna G (ha I’m super stoked to learn from her too!) So yeah crazy. I kinda feel like I’m going to leave like half way through this cambio- it’s this weird feeling, I dunno, but I feel so blessed to stay here again! These people are just AMAZING! Ha and all week everyone was like we just knew that you weren’t going to leave yet…we kept saying that it seemed imposible because you’ve already been here for 7 months, but we knew that you were going to stay again. QUE SUERTE! Ok…also, the family. So their mom left to go to Argentina for 5 days (bueno, she left them solo…it’s just the 8 kids that are there and they don’t have anyone watching them) so we’ve stopped by everyday to check on them. They just love us and oh my gosh I am so in love with ALL of them. I just want to take them all home to the states with me. And they just love going to church. They have their baptism fecha (date) this Saturday. I’m so so excited for them. And I just pray that they will continue faithful all their lives. Their mom hasn’t ever gone to church with them but she wants them to be baptized, and we’re going to start working with her specifically when she gets back. Ha so Elder Curtis is back (or I guess he is Tyler now) that’s so awesome. Yeah be excited for the pictures and drill him about Paraguay lol. Oh man, yeah and can you believe I completed HALF of my misión?!!! That just makes me sick. Time has gone by SO FAST! Everything just needs to slow down! But the misión is just great. There are hard times, but I have grown so much and I just keep learning and learning. It’s incredible. I love it. I love yall so much. Thanks for your prayers and support. Really, it means everything to me. Have a great week!

Love,
Hermanita Nelson
**Sweet Tyler Curtis brought us the pictures yesterday. There are a lot...a lot, a lot. I will be going through them and posting them soon. And thank you to Tyler because when he came with the pictures we did indeed drill him about Paraguay and he was so nice to let us and answer all our questions!

June 21, 2010

2010-06-22T06:32:00.001-07:00

HOla my wonderful, beautiful family and friends!!! How are yall?!! How is grandpa and Harry and Mary Lou?! I hope you gave them all the love in the world from me! And I hope everyone had a wonderful fathers day ayer! And I hope dad and mom had great birthdays too!!! Man, this week was a good one! So we've still been working with this family and wow my heart just keeps expanding expaNDING and EXPANDING! We went to their house to do a service this week with the help of Divina and Emilio and we spent about 2 1/2 hours washing clothes...ha yeah lets just say I am SO GREATFUL for washers and dryers in the states. Ha funny that I used to hate doing laundry... it's so easy and convenient. Here they hand wash EVERYTHING and it takes days and you use all these buckets of waters and soap and WOW.. it's intense. I got these sweet lil soars on my knuckles from scrubbing the clothes. ANd you know what the sad thing is? We couldn't really get the dirt out of the clothes because it is just STAINED on the clothing and ya know how in the states if our clothes have a lil tiny whole we just automatically throw them out? Yeah it doesn't even fade them here, in fact I don't think they have clothing without wholes. I know this is like a really sad picture I'm painting but it's the truth. And then a couple days later a lady in the ward gave us some clothes to bring to the kids, and it was a sure lot better than what they had but it was really sad because there wasn't anything that would fit the oldest girl, Ruth (15) and I felt so bad. Because bueno, she is like practically the mom of all these kids and does everything and there wasn't anything. So the next day I just brought her like half my clothes and gave each of the older girls skirts they could wear to church. But I just told them, the biggest gift I could ever give you is the message of the gospel. ANd man it just coming back to me over and over, the gospel is the ONLY thing that can change their lives. It is the greatest treasure anyone could ever have. Money doesn't mean anything to me anymore, I know it's not important. WHat's important is LOVE...pure, kind, love. CHARITY! I love that I have this opportunity to be a missionary. It's like I am learning things, really learning and understanding things, that I could ONLY learn being a missionary..ha a missionary in Paraguay. LOVE IT! And then on Saturday, we had this HUGE ward activity and they came too! Alcides works in this balneario (it's like a swim place) and so he hooked the ward up. We didn't swim, we just used all the fields to play soccer and volleyball. It was so fun!!! Ah I just love these people! And holy cow these kids KNOW how to play soccer. THey were just running circles around us, making us look ridiculous. Ha no it was so fun and they did kick our trash..we played boys against girls and we lost everytime. But I did score a goal :) Brother Scott..be proud. And we ate chorizo. Yummy! Oh and also, Belen came to church yesterday! FOr the first time! IT was great! Bueno, her mom is so so stubborn, but I have so much hope for Belen. She's gonna be another missionary. But the problem is she says she doesn't feel anything when she reads the Book of Mormon.. which just blows my mind. So we just testified to her that she just needs to keep reading, keep praying and she WILL receive an answer. That's the beauty of it. I know that if ANYONE reads and prays sincerely about the Book of Mormon, they WILL receive an answer that it's true. THat's just how it works. It's wonderful! ANd also we found this kid named Gustavo a couple weeks ago (yeah, another Gustavo...the name is such bad luck, so we just call him by his full name...Gustavo Gabriel Gonzalez. But he's a stud too. He's 21 and the missionaries visited their family like 10 years ago, so he already had a Book of Mormon and had read it and was really familiar with it. ANd his parents loved their old missionaries so they like us too, and I'm excited for them and their family! But you know what is horrible?!!! We find out changes tonight!!!! And ahhh I DON'T WANT TO LEAVE! lol I know I've had my whole mission here, but this is like my Paraguay home...everything is just going to be SO DIFFERENT if I leave. New comp, new area, new ward, new house (with only me and my comp, whereas I've been living with 4 people since I've gotten here), and new mission president!!! Oh man! ANd I'm just gonna cry! We're going to do a noche de hogar (family home evening) tonight with some of my favorite people, but right now the weather is horrible (rainy and cold) so I don't know if they'll come... but hopefully! So yeah next week yall will all know what happens. Pray for me!!! Ahhh and what in the world happened to Ty and his teeth?!!! Poor guy...stick with football. lol love ya bud. ANd ANgela and Alisa where are your blog posts?!!! I know yall have a lot of stuff to blog about and I'm waiting to see all the pictures!!! Ahh and Emily every MOnday we jam out to WICKED and I always think of you! Trunky. Chiste. Ok bueno, I hope yall have a great week! Yall are always in my prayers!!! Oh and mom that is so crazy about your keys! I can't believe they were in your purse! That is a straight up miracle! THanks for sharing the experience! ANd thanks dad..or should I say ALena for the email lol! ANd wow you don't even know how chu chi panda express sounds to me! ALthough, we did go to Pizza Hut today. It was my first time going here in Paraguay... let's just say everything is better in the states lol but I did eat like 6 pieces of pizza, so I'm a happy camper. Or should I say happy tadpole :) Love yall!

Love,

Hermanita Nelson

June 14, 2010

2010-06-17T07:01:00.001-07:00

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD!!!!! (On Wednesday) and HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM (Sunday) and HAPPY FATHERS DAY!!!! (To all the dads)! And give Gpa Bill a HUGE HUG when you see him for me and tell him I love him and I hope he is still reading my emails. And whoever else you see from over there, tell them I love them! Oh man and I can’t believe dad is turning 50!!!! FIFTY!!! Holy cow!!! But don’t worry because everyone here in Paraguay things you look like your 35; lol seriously they all see your Picture and they’re like JOVENCITO!!! So you’re doing good!! And it sounded like everything was so fun in Logan with all the girls and the kids! I hope yall took lots of cute pictures so I can see them! And speaking of kids… I am still waiting for some kind of announcement from one of my sisters that they are pregnant! Get on that por favor. Ok so this week we had our last interviews with Pres. Wade! Que triste. Ha and mine was interrupted from a call coming from SALT Lake City UTA lol… one of the elders dad in my zone was calling to talk to pres. wade because apparently his son got robbed at gun point so the dad was freaking out, ha and it was really funny because pres wade was totally tranquilo (chill) and was like yeah that happens all the time. I’m sure in the status it might sem. Like a big deal, but here we just come to expect it. And then alter he hung up…he was like so Hna Nelson have you been robbed yet? YET?! Lol real nice. No not yet. Ha welcome to Paraguay. Don’t worry, I am completely fine and have only felt endangered maybe one time and that wasn’t even a big deal. Ha just continue to keep me in your prayers J Oh and today we got to watch the olymics because Paraguay played against Italia! We were so excited, because we never get permission for things like that, but Paraguay ended up tying…lame. 1 to 1. But it was still fun and kinda made me miss american football. Ok and I have to tell you about this family real quick. We found this one lady named Maria a long time ago (like it’s been 2 months) and we contacted her one day and we’ve gone back probably like 4 times, but she is never there, but her kids are always there (there are 8 of them). Anyways, so we went there on Friday and she was there, so we shared with her and a couple of her kids and it was fine, and we invited them to church but she said she couldn’t go because she had to work, but that her kids could go. So we went by the next day to verificar, but she wasn’t there and the oldest daughter (15 years old) had left too and so it was us with all the rest of the kids (the oldest of them I think has 12 years) and their house is just a disaster…bueno I don’t know about the inside but the outside is just a disaster. There are just these huge piles of dirty, moldy clothes everywhere and random dirty dishes in every corner and the kids are just dirty. LIke honestly, painted with dirt…and I’m sure they go dayS without bathing, because their mom doesn’t do it, so it’s just left up to the kids if they want to bathe themselves or not. ANyways we decided to do a lil servicio and help them out a lil bit and spent a good while washing, SCRUBBING all their dishes because they were just covered in left over food and then we decided we should help bathe the kids to get them ready to go to church the next day. And let me just explain this to you…you know like buckets we use to wash the car or something? That’s what they use to bathe. They fill the bucket with water (cold of course, because there is no hot water) undress the kid, wet them down, put some shampoo and conditioner in their hair, wash it out, wash their bodies with a scrub (ok no, they don’t use scrubs, it’s usually like another piece of clothing and wash them). Can you believe this is real life? So Hna Remache spent a good time washing these kids down, scrubbing all the dirt of their bodies. And then they didn’t have any clothes to put them in, so they just put them back into their dirty clothes that they’ve been using for like the past 3 days. It is so so sad. I almost just started to cry just thinking about their lives and how sad it is that they actually live like that and they just don’t know any different. But the next day we went by to take them to church and all the kids went with us menos one of the lil boys because he went to a friends house to watch the game. And they are actually all really well behaved and are just the cutest things in the World and most of them really liked church. And turns out Hna Rojas (we eat at the familia Rojas house every Sunday for lunch and they are just the coolest, humblest, most loving family in all of Paraguay) is the school teacher of a lot of the kids and so she was so excited they were there and was just welcoming them and loving them. And then she invited all 7 of the lil kids over to eat with us. And we ate chicken and potato salad and I almost just cried otra vez because I’m sure that is the biggest meal they’ve had in a really long time and just thinking of the generosity of Hna Rojas. Wow. I want to be someone like that. Her love just radiates along with everyone else in their family. Ah and just to think that the gospel is the ONLY way to have a better life for them. That is the key to a better life. Ahh I love the gospel and how really it has the power to change people’s lives for the better and to bring happiness and to really understand the love of the Savior. Incredible. I love yall so much! THanks for the emails!!! Have a great week!!!

Love,

Hermanita Nelson

June 7, 2010

2010-06-08T08:14:00.000-07:00

Ok so first off!!!! Grandma, I finally got your package!!!!!! And I was SO SO EXCITED! It was perfect. Seriously. Thanks so so much!!! It's already almost gone lol. And ok ready for a funny story. Bueno, so as a missionary in Paraguay you have to have the 5 things to be successful. Well i've got 2 down. One of them is...you have to biff it really hard and another is have lice. Yeah I'm pretty sure I have lice, but that is completely normal here. People will just sit out in their front yards and pick lice out of each others hair..you think I'm joking. I'm not. And then the other day.. bueno they have a lot of like barb wired fences that you have to like crawl through to get to the other side. So we were leaving our lunch cita the other day and we were going throught the backyard through the fence thing. So I'm like bending over to adjust everything (my bag, my skirt, my jacket) and I'm like half way through the other side and I'm starting to stand up but somehow my skirt got stuck on the wire and I completely fell over and flashed everyone around me. AWESOME. And then a couple days later we were in a part of our area that we've never really been before and we were trying to find our way back to the routa and my comp handed me the phone to talk to someone, so I was just following her and talking on the phone. And up comes another barbed wire fence but there was like a door in this one, and so my comp had just passed through the puerta and I'm following her, but then all of a sudden my forehead runs right into the top of the barbed wire fence and I like shoot backward. Ah it hurt so bad!!! Oh and it was the night of the baptism..and so I had this huge red mark right in the middle of my forehead which later turned into a nice blue/green bruise. Real cute. Haha gotta love it. Lol not a big fan of these barbed wire fences. Oh and today I made boiled cookies (no bake cookies) and they turned out soo good! Maybe it's just cause I've been in Paraguay to long, but I thought they were really good! Thanks for the recipe Alena. And then this week has been pretty interesting; we've had a couple different experiences with pastors from different religions. So remember last Sunday night when we were at Belens house and as we started to teach her, her pastor shows up. And how at the end of the lesson he just asked us how much it cost for a Book of Mormon! So we gave him the book and invited him to read and pray about it. That's pastor number 1. Later this week we were contacting and we met this man who told us he was a saint and that he was already saved. And we're like perfect, can we come in and talk about the palabra de Dios and he's like yeah yeah, do you have your Bibles? Oops..no. So instead of course we brought out the Book of Mormon and this guy just went absurd on us and telling us how we couldn't have that kind of book in his house and just went off about the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith and all this “false doctrine” that we are teaching and told us we should go home and burn our books and then to go around and tell all the people what we had been teaching them was false. This makes me cringe just writing this. But it was unbelievable how strong the Spirit was in me, just burning inside me, testifying how true the gospel really is. And after listening to this guy ramble off for like 30 min on us about how wrong and childish and innocent we are, my testimony was being strengthened! And I just felt so much sorrow and pain for this man who is just so confused! And just hoping that he could open his heart just a little to receive this beautiful and pure message of the gospel. And as we tried to testify (between him and his other pastor friend interrupting us) I just knew once again how true this gospel is! So that's pastor 2 and 3. And then last night we went over to Belen's house otra vez and otra vez her pastor came. I don't know if we need to go at a different time or if we were there at that time for a reason lol. But this time he was different. We started to read from the BOM again and he tried to prove us wrong with quoting scriptures from the Bible, etc. And ahhh I am just PRAYING that something that we said will ring to them. Especially for Belen and her mom, they are looking for the truth! They want to find it and now they have the confusion from their pastor. But once again we bore simple and powerful testimony of the restoration of the gospel of Jesus Christ and how they could know for themselves too. Isn't that just amazing? Wow the power of prayer. God is the same. He loves us. He will answer the prayer of those who are sincere and are truly seeking for an answer and are commited to follow the answer they receive. And he's the only person with the whole truth. He is the fountain of all righteousness. James 1:5. Ask God if you have a fault of sabiduría (ok I can't think of it in english). But wow please pray for them. And wow I just feel SO BLESSED to be raised in a family with the gospel. Amazing! Love it. And we have our last interviews with Pres. Wade tomorrow! How sad!!! Oh and the zone conference was amazing as always and sad because it was their last one. And we only have 2 more weeks of this cambio! Crazy! Ha I still don't want to leave this area. Ok bueno, I love yall! Thanks for all the letters, keep them coming! Oh and Alisa's dog is so cute!!! And mom and Alena give Tyler and Kylee lots of kisses when yall go see them...and Bobby and Angela tambien. Mom I'll be thinking about the birthday package and let you know. Love yall so much! Ah and send Ty my love! He's such a stud. Have fun!!!

Love,

Hermanita Nelson

Another great week in Paraguay!

2010-06-01T07:09:00.000-07:00

Hey Hey!!! Ok another great week in Paraguay! Gotta love it. So sorry I’m writing so late! We went to Arregua again today for a zone activity! It was a lot of fun! We played some serious soccer and now I am so sore! But I scored 2 goals…that’s right…so it’s all good. Ah and tomorrow we have zone conference which I’m really excited about, but I’m really sad because it’s the last one we’ll be having with President and Hermana Wade… but I’m secretly hoping we get the whole mission together and have a huge conference antes they leave!!! Ah and yesterday Emilio got his patriarchal blessing along with Manu and Rafa. Ahh I was so so excited for him. How cool is that?!! And on Saturday we had a baptism!!! We’ve been working with this girl named Leticia who’s 22 (lol but tells everyone she’s 19…ha she is hilarious) for like the last 3+ months…antes Alcides. But she was always really nervous to commit to baptism because she felt like she didn’t know enough and couldn’t go to church every Sunday because she has to work. Her parents are menos activos (inactive) and we went to her house with Hna Case but never met Leticia and her mom, Rufina wasn’t always all that excited to let us come in and usually said “otro dia” but then after awhile she started letting us in..and we just kinda clicked. Ha she is so funny! She has the best facial expressions (which I love of course) and it’s just really fun to joke with her and she actually ended up going to church with Hna Case and I once or twice and before that she hadn’t been for over 7 months and probably more than that. Anyways one day Hna Remache and I went over to visit her on a Sunday night and her daughter, Leticia, was outside cleaning and she talked to us first and was like hey can I come to church with yall….UH YES YOU CAN…and ever since that we have been teaching her. Lol Leticia is hilarious too, I’ve never met anyone like her in my life; she kills me. We had to teach everything really simply with her for her to understand and feel confident in her knowledge of the principles of the gospel, and then all of a sudden she decided she was ready to be baptized and was just so excited about it and of course so were we! And it’s always funny because in church she’s always participating and she just loves it. And I’m really excited because Rufina has been coming back to church with her and I told RUfina the other day that I wanted to see her with her whole family at church before I leave…I gave her 3 weeks. So that’s our goal. It’s exciting! Ah and that other girl we were teaching, Belen… we went over there and she wasn’t home!! But we went again on Sunday and she was sleeping but her mom was there so we decided to teach her. Her mom is legit. I’m actually really excited for this family! They are so looking for the gospel, even if they might not know it yet. But it’s just awesome because their family is united and happy and complete lol…and there aren’t many of those in Paraguay. Falta the gospel no mas. Ok so we started teaching about the Plan of Salvation and our proposito (purpose) in life and it was all going really great until this man pulls up on a moto…and she tells us it’s her pastor from her other religion that always comes over to read the Bible with her. Lovely. Ha so he comes up and we just continue teaching lol. It was actually really awesome for me. I felt the Spirit so strong and like everyone was listening and attentive (which is not normal either…there’s usually distractions or if it’s a pastor, he is usually bashing us with questions and trying to argue about why our religion is wrong or cualquier cosa) and I just started to testify…testify about the restored gospel of our Savior Jesus Christ upon the earth today, and how we have a Prophet, Thomas S. Monson who guides us through revelation, and we have 12 apostles and the same organization of the church as when Jesus Christ came and organized it, and how we have the priesthood authority of God on the earth today…God is the same yesterday, today, tomorrow, and forever. He loves us and has blessed us with his gospel so that we can return to live with Him and with our families para siempre (forever). And how we have the Book of Mormon to help us find the correct path back to God, our Heavenly Father. Wow the Spirit was just there. And after we both got done testifying we asked if they had questions and the pastor said he just had one… Yikes!! And then he asked how much we were selling the Book of Mormon for. Wow. It’s free, handed it over and invited them both to pray to God about the things we had taught them and about the Book of Mormon and they both said they would. Ha crazy. Gotta love it. Ah I just love this gospel!!! Are yall doing the little things? All the primary answers… reading your scriptures daily, praying, going to all your church meetings, etc. I love the mission because it has opened my eyes! Ha I finally really understand why we’ve been taught that over and over our whole lives. That’s the key! If we’re not doing the lil things we’re not progressing…we’re allowing ourselves to fall. And how would we like to fall short of the kingdom of God because we failed to do the lil things. Yikes. Keep yourselves close to God and on high ground. Stand in holy places. Yall are always in my prayers. Love yall! Have a great week!!!

Love,

Hermanita Nelson

May 24, 2010

2010-05-25T06:04:00.000-07:00

**Note- There is a new address for the mission office where we send her mail***

Hello!!! ok first of all CONGRATULATIONS TO TAYLOR AND SAM!!! That's sooo exciting! I always feel the spirit so strong when I read someone's mission call! And I want Sam's and Hilary's addresses! Ok so I have like no time to write! This week was good. We found this girl the other week that i'm really excited about teaching. She's like 19 and she's with a different religion right now but she's really just looking for the truth in her life. The problem is that she is only home on Saturdays because she works and has school all the rest of the week. So we went there for the 2nd time on Saturday and shared lesson one with her. It was awesome. The spirit was really strong. And after I asked her if she wanted to know if the Book of Mormon was true and she said yes and I asked her why. And she basically said that if there really is a true church out there she wants to be a part of it. she's really awesome, and I'm praying that she's another Emilio or Alcides. That's what we're looking for, los escogidos. The chosen ones. Hahaha oh my gosh! And I LOVED Ty's email!!! haha let him know I am praying for him all the time. Speaking of crazy people, I got proposed again this week...I think if this keeps happening I'm going to start taking pictures of these men and after the mish we'll take a poll of which one I should marry. Haha chiste. Ok something I do want to share before I leave is that yesterday we had a class in church about the importance de la obra misional...missionary work. And it was funny because before the class in sacrament meeting, while i took the sacrament that is all I was thinking about. I was just feeling so overwhelmed with gratitude that I have this opportunity to be a missionary because my eyes have really been opened. All my life I have known that the church is true but now I understand why it is so important to know that and how important it is to share that knowledge with everyone! It makes me excited! Thanks mom for sending me the copy of the first vision, it really opened my eyes otra vez. How powerful that simple statement is. "...I saw a pillar of light exactly over my head above the brightness of the sun, which descended gradually until it fell upon me. It no sooner appeared than I found myself delivered from the enemy which held me bound. When the light rested upon me I saw two Personages, whose brightness and glory defy all description, standing above me in the air. One of them spake unto me, calling me by name and said, pointing to the other---This is My Beloved Son. Hear Him!" JS History 1:16-17 From this statement we know that God and Christ are two separate beings. That they live. That they love us. That God answers prayers. That the heavens once again are opened. That we can receive personal revelation. That the church has been restored on the earth again. That Joseph Smith was a prophet of God, called of God to bring to pass the restoration of the gospel of Jesus Christ. That we have the priesthood authority on the earth today and a living prophet; Thomas S. Monson. Wow the gospel is so true! Love it! Love yall! Spread this message! Have a great week!

Love, Hermanita Nelson

May17, 2010

2010-05-25T06:03:00.000-07:00

*Sorry this got behind all...sometimes I think I've posted when I haven't...yikes the old brain is going!

What's up?!!! Ok so are yall so excited to hear about what happened at changes?!! Ha well guess what?! There is not much to tell because we did not have changes, I'm still with my comp in the same area...which means this is my 3rd change with her (4 ½ months) and my 5th change in this area (7 ½ months). CRAZY ¿verdad? Wow oh AND Hna G (my comp from the MTC that I LOVE moved into our house and is now senior comp with Hna Garcia) What a guapa! She's so awesome and her Spanish is incredible. And I am so so thankful that we get to live together...maybe one day we'll be comps again! So I was also able to go to Hna Case's despedida (farewell) because it was in our area, so I met her parents and everything. So fun! Ah they just reminded me of our family! Ha a lil trunky...yall will have to meet them too! Oh man and last week I forgot to tell you, I almost died. Like literally. We were in Asuncion for a zone activity and most of the streets are just like one way..and we were going to cross the street and we were like joggin across and then all of a sudden I hear my comp gasp and I'm like what in the world, so I turn to face her and she is to my left and I see this car coming straight towards me and I like jerked to a stop and the car passed right in front of me (like half of a foot). It like scared me sooo bad! And then there were these elders that saw it happen and they were like I don't know how you're alive. Real nice, right? That's called being a missionary..ha we have angels guarding us. Ha I thought yall might appreciate that story. Oh and I almost forgot!! I got mom's package! Woot woot I was so excited because it has been cold and rainy all day yesterday and today! Which means I should be getting grandmas in the next couple weeks! Perfect! Oh another story... the other day we were walking in the routa (the road where the collectivo passes) and there was this huge puddle in part of the road so I was like ok we need to hurry and pass before we get splashed! And so I start going and I'm like almost to the other side when this collectivo comes out of nowhere and goes right through the puddle and I get completely drenched!! Gotta love it. Ok and what in the world is happening with Ty?! I thought that he should be leaving pretty soon...so he could possibly leave today but nobody knows. Ha that's awesome. Good email though. Man he is going to tear it up in the field! I can't wait to hear about all his cool experiences! And I'm so jealous that Elder Holland came to the MTC. How awesome. But man Ty is just on fire! What a testimony. Love it. Ok and that's so so tyte that there was an OWL in our backyard. That's so crazy. Who would've thought? Ha and mom I'm completely confident that the Egypt project will be the best one out of everyones! I'm excited to hear how it goes. I hope everyone had a great week! Love yall! Write me :) And as always thank you grandma for your love and emails. Their perfect!
Love,
Hermanita Nelson

May 10, 2010

2010-05-12T07:31:00.000-07:00

***It was so amazing being able to talk to Amanda on Mother's Day!! She sounds just like Amanda with a few Spanish words thrown in. I think she's at the point where she doesn't speak English, Spanish or Guarani...just a mix of all of them...haha!
It was so wonderful to still get a letter the next day. Here it is:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ALENA!!!!! 15 years old!!! Watch out! Woot woot I hope you have such a fun day! Live it up chica! Ahhhh and it was so so good to hear yall's voices yesterday! Chulina! Seriously, it was fun because it just felt normal. Yall are all just fabulous! And I hope everyone had an amazing mothers day!! So like I already told yall my comp has been sick for this whole past week, que triste, and we find out changes tomorrow! Oh la misión! Ahh and I have to tell yall something so cute, that's happened twice! Ok so one day about two weeks ago I was with my comp and we decided to contact this one house and so we entered in and were walking to the front of the house and there were these 2 lil boys playing soccer (one was like 10 and the other one like 4) and we walked up to them and started talking to them and then all of a sudden the younger one looked at me and stopped playing with his brother and just came running at me and just gave me the BIGGEST HUG and just held onto me for like 10 sec and then walked away like nothing had even happened. And my comp was like, and me? But he just walked off. Ha it was the cutest thing! It totally made my day because it was just so random and out of nowhere and you know how I love little kids!!! Especially lil latinos. And then this past week I was with Hna Case on our division and we were walking down the street in her area and these 2 lil girls were walking towards us probably like 10 and 4 tambien and they were like hola hermanas and we had no idea who they were (which is pretty normal because most of the kids know who we are) and then the lil girl came right up to me and did the same thing. Hugged me and just held onto me and then just walked away. I know it doesn't sound like a big deal, but to me they were lil gifts from God. Tender mercies, ¿verdad? Ahh and then Emilio recieving his llamamiento (calling) to be the 2nd counselor in the YM presidency. And we were able to be there to sustain him. Just so cool. Love the mish. And mom in your email you talked a lil bit about the light of Christ. And yesterday in church somebody gave a talk on that. And I told Emilio and Alcides that they had the light of Christ now and you could just see it because they're always just so happy and excited about the gospel. And Emilio told me that that was one of the first things he recognized about us. He said I could just tell there was something different about yall and I liked being around yall because I always felt so good and felt closer to God and could just see something different in your countenance. And the other day we were at his house and I was talking and said something like, "ya know life is always going to be hard, but it's just so much easier with the gospel!" And then he just bore testimony of that, and said how at first he wasn't really sure about all of it and he had a lot of doubts, etc. but now with the gospel he can see the difference and he recognizes how simple everything really is. That's also one thing I have noticed. The gospel is so simple. The doctrine is laid out, so simple that a child can understand. But for some reason a veces (sometimes) we like to make things difficult and complicate things. And bueno, how many times does it say in the Book of Mormon that if you keep the commandments, you will prosper in the land, you will receive eternal life. That's it! Why do we make things so complicated? Ha I do it too. But man, I have come to love the simplicity of the gospel. It's in the little things (reading our scriptures, attending our church meetings, praying) if we do those things we'll stay strong, we'll have our rock built upon the foundation of Jesus Christ and when the hard times comes, we'll stand strong. Ha the gospel is perfect! Love it! Love yall! I hope you have a great week! Pray for me! Be excited to hear what happens in changes! Yikes! So nervous!

Love,

Hermanita Nelson

May 4, 2010

2010-05-04T07:51:00.001-07:00

Ahh I'm so excited to be able to talk to yall in a week! How fun! Prepare yourselves because I'll probably be speaking a mixture of guarani, spanish, and english! Ok so this past week, I was able to witness something so special and sacred for me! One of my converts, Emilio who was baptized 3 months ago (crazy how fast time flies!) is just a stud. As yall know, he has been blessing the sacrament ever since he was baptized, and about a month ago he entered in the temple for the first time, and this past Friday, he performed a baptism! It has been so rewarding to see the gospel change his life and to see how happy he is with the gospel. He is the only person in his family who is a member and his mom does not like the church or us lol but he is so fiel. He also just got his papers to start filling out from the bishop for his mission. He says right now, that it is the most important thing for him and he hopes and prays that he will be able to serve our Heavenly Father. And then to see him baptize Alcides! Ahh just so rewarding because it was a miracle that Alcides decided to get baptized. I was at the point of thinking it was hopeless for him to decide to get baptized and then I was able to witness a miracle! He changed his mind and on Friday he was baptized and received the Holy Ghost. That is what it is all about!!! Moments so sacred and special like that are what make all the hard times worth it. I feel so blessed to be a part of this work and to see the gospel change lives and to see and witness the power that the Book of Mormon really does have. The church is so true! I love being a missionary! I honestly tried to send a picture but it’s just not working out and it takes up too much time, BUT I’m going to send my chip (memory card) home with Hna Case and she’s gonna send it to yall…so in about a month you should be getting a good chunk of pictures! In fast and testimony meeting on Sunday, Manu got up to bear his testimony and he started talking about the Book of Mormon and how they are still planchas de oro (plates of gold) that each Book of Mormon is of that same worth and more! And how these records had been hidden up for years to be brought to pass at this time for us! I really liked it. Honestly the Book of Mormon is not just another book from another religion. It is the word of God, written for us. It is our guidance and map in this crazy world. It is such pure evidence that our Heavenly Father loves us. I know that God loves us. I know that he sent his son, Jesus Christ to die for us, so that we might live eternally with them. Ohhh the church is just so true! Yesterday (Monday) we had an hermana activity that we do about every 3 months, where all the hermanas get together and we do something. Yesterday we went to a baby hospital and handed out lil baby blankets and then went to the Wade’s to eat lunch. And after the 4 hermana’s that are leaving got up to bear their testimonies to the rest of us. Tear fest…yes. But as they were talking I just kept thinking, WOW this gospel is so perfect! And we know all about it! Sometimes it just blows my mind when the people don’t want it. Ha for me it’s just so simple and so obviously true. I dunno cada dia I just feel more and more blessed to have the knowledge of his gospel and to have the opportunity to share it with others. So awesome! Love the mish. Not gonna lie, it’s really hard, but like I said moments like watching Emilio baptizing Alcides make it all worth it. And honestly the Lord’s hand is everywhere in the work, you just have to recognize it. Love yall so much! Oh and thanks for forwarding Nick’s email…what a stud. Lol he’s gonna be such a good missionary! And I’m so excited for Steve! I can’t wait to hear where he’s gonna go! And oh man I can’t believe Elder Curtis is going home so soon! I don’t know if I’ll see him again before he leaves…so yall might see him before me! So you better tell him, he better write me! Que rapido!!! And mom that’s so tyte about the DT. Que guapa. I’m excited to hear what happens with that! And which picture did you use? Bueno, g2g. Chao!!! Love yall!

This Should Make Y'all Smile

2010-04-26T13:33:00.001-07:00

¿Mbae cha pa? Wow it sounds like yall had quite the week!!! So much for our quiet lil cul-de-sac! That is insane! Haha I was laughing so hard when I was reading that whole story, because I was just picturing how scared yall must have been and remembering how scared we were that one time when Lucky was barking like crazy. Pobrecitas! Haha but I'm glad everything's ok and that no one was actually in our house! Ok and Ty is a stupbrain (man I haven't used that word in forever but it just came to me lol) like he didn't write! And I didn't get anybody's blogs post this week (Angela, Alisa or Ty..so I don't know if that's because they didn't have any or what). And ah man Nick is on his way to Russia!!! Sis. Andersen are you freaking out?! Haha. Ok and mom I want to see a picture of the scrapbooking room with the wood table! Oh man and gracias gracias gracias a mis abuelos por el paquete. Estoy muy muy muy animada! Es perfecto y estoy animada a recibirlo...y mi compañera tambien! Ha ok I have a funny story! So there's this lady that has a son who's 18 years old and bueno she just loves me for some reason. And we went to her house the other day and she was there with her sister and her mom, and we walked in and she was just so excited. And she was like “look at my beautiful nuera (daughter in law), she's rubia (blonde) and she's Americana...and she just loves Romu (her son).” I was like wow, what in the world and my companion was laughing hysterically. And then she explains to her mom who I am in guarani (and her mom is like 80ish years old) and she just looks at me and gets so excited. And then she asked me if I know how to cook and wash clothes. Ha I was like...yes... and she was like perfect because you'll be cooking for me and washing my clothes. Haha cri cri (awkward) no it was so funny, and I was like ha no thank you. Lol and then later that week we're in a cita (lesson) and then we here her (se llama Baldomera) and she starts talking to the people we were with and telling them that I was going to marry her handsome son and how perfect I am and blah blah blah. And then we went to talk to her and she was like, look there he is! So churro, go talk to him! Lol the lady is crazy, but SO FUNNY! We just laugh everytime we're with her. Y otra historia...we were doing contacts the other night and we were talking to these girls and then this man pulled up on his bike, and started telling me how beautiful I am and asked me if I would marry him. Lol oh Paraguay! It is so fun. I'm going to miss all that when I go back to the states lol. It's not everyday that people tell you how beautiful you are and ask you to marry them. Love it. Ok and Emilio just a lil stud. The last two Sundays he's broughten (ha I don't know if that's a word) friends with him to church. He's such a lil missionary! Ok and one more story; I don't know if I've ever even told you about Alcides, but we have been teaching Alcides por casi dos meses and he is just a stud. He loves reading the Book of Mormon and going to church and he's such a missionary. He's always telling his friends about the church and reading to them parts of the Book of Mormon. It's awesome because there have been a couple of different times when we're contacting or finding around where he lives and people will be like oh yeah, "Alcides goes to your church and he's invited me a couple times" or "yeah I've heard of the Book of Mormon, Alcides was telling me about it". Que misionero, ¿verdad? Everything about him is just golden but for some reason he does not want to get baptized. He would just say over and over how he didn't want to, he didn't have the deseos (desires). He knows that the Book of Mormon is true and that the church is true and that Thomas S. Monson is a prophet of God and everything, but for some reason he just does not want to get baptized. We decided to go ahead and do the baptismal interview anyway and had the elders come for a surprise one day. Turns out he had a problem with question 4 and so he had to have an interview withPresident Wade, and after his interview Pres. Wade said he's worthy to be baptized. But even after that he still said he didn't want to! My companion and I didn't know what more we could do and then we decided we should fast. We went to his house the next day and he was the same as always; happy, wanting to share what he had read from the Book of Mormon, but still lacking the deseos to be baptized and even said, "How will yall understand, that I just don't want to be baptized?". Ah we were just at a loss for what to say, near tears, and just decided to testify one more time. After we testified he grabbed his Book of Mormon, read a scripture, and excused himself. About 5 minutes later he came back and invited us to his baptism for this Friday! What?!! Ahh it was such a miracle and tender mercy from the Lord. I'm so excited for him. He told us the next day, I'm going to get baptized because it's a commandment of the Lord. Wow. What faith. Sometimes there are times in our lives when we just don't understand why we have to do certain things, but we do it anyways because it's a commandment of the Lord. Ah I love this gospel. The church is so true. And there is so much power in the Book of Mormon! Alcides is 20 years old and he wants to go on a mission too! If he goes through the temple in a year, I might just have to extend my mission so I can go through with him! Puede ser! Love yall so much! Please drop the cane on Ty for not writing...there are no excuses for that! I hope your week isn't too crazy this week! Be safe. I'm praying for yall!!

Love,

Hermanita Nelson

April 19, 2010

2010-04-20T08:25:00.001-07:00

HOla!!! First off, I got Keri’s wedding invitation in the mail…SO CUTE! And I also got a letter from Sister Tenney which I was not expecting and was such a nice surprise! And haha she told me something very interesting…she said they saw a couple the other night…one on a bike and the other one jogging and turns out that it was mom and dad. WHAT?!!!! Haha I was shocked. Bien hecho!!! Lol that’s so awesome. Also I got a letter from the Batchelor’s which was also an awesome surprise and their new lil baby is so so cute and I really appreciate their love and testimonies! And also another one from Flora! And I think that Annika should be getting her mission call soon, so I want to hear where she goes! And also, mom I am getting Ty’s blog posts, so thank you! Speaking of Ty… ha I love his shpills of inspiration because it reminds me of being in the MTC; which is really one of the most spiritual places next to the temple! But I love lil inspirational thoughts because it gives me the animo to seguir adelante cada semana! But tambien, Ty we need MORE DETAILS PLEASE! And ahh I’m really excited about the oatmeal and hot chocolate! (even though it has been really really hot again this past week…but by the time I get the package it will be perfect!!!) And ok gracias a Sis. Brann…chulina!!! Lol that’s soo cute! Ah and so did yall end up having your game night? Haha games are the best! And Alisa I’m impressed with your skills…the pillows turned out super cute!! And that’s way tyte that you’re going to start the bow website..I want to see pictures of your cute bows! And thanks for sharing the homecoming talk with me; that was really good! Ok woooh! Now this week, lol I don’t know what the deal is but the people do now want to be baptized! Pedrito’s mom said no because they don’t want him to make a decision now that he will regret later. But he’s such a lil stud and always wants to go to church and his lil sister has gone with us 3 times now too and ha I love going and sharing with them… just picture this: every time we pass by their house they always scream out to us “hermanas hermanas” and we go in and they bring out all their lil chairs (that are all half broken or like the size of those lil tiny chairs we have in our back yard that are like for 2 year olds) and they have this lil swing set that’s like falling apart but that has two lil chairs and we all sit down and they all want to talk to us and get our attention (there’s usually about 6 or more) and they love the song, “I Am A Child of God” and Pedrito memorized it like the 2nd time we were there and all the kids are trying to memorize it. Ah that song has taken on a whole new meaning for me as a missionary! Because we sing it I don’t know how many times in one day because it’s usually our investigators favorite, it doesn’t matter how old they are. Soy un hijo de Dios. And we usually sing that when we contact people…because bueno about 85% of the time people are just sitting outside in front of their houses drinking terrere and just chillin, so we enter in y cantar (and sing) that song and then just testify that we are really children of God and that we have a purpose here in the earth and that God has given us the gospel to help us learn and prepare to live in his presence otra vez and then invite them to church. It’s really fun and the people just love the songs and about everyone let’s us in…ha and then there are those few who are like “otro dia” or no thanks we already have our religion, we’re catholics…and we’re like ha all we want to do is sing a song. Lol the mission is great! Last night we had dinner at Justino’s with the other hermanas (Hna Case y Garcia) and a couple of our friends from the ward (Jose y Gladys and Manu). It’s so funny because you know when you’re out camping and you camp over a bonfire…yeah that’s how a lot of Paraguayos cook everyday. It’s so crazy, how different things are. But these people are just so awesome and I just love them so much! It makes me really appreciate living in the states and I just wish I could bring them all back with me and help them and show them a better way of life pero asi es. And like then you have Manu and Emilio who are just studs! Their testimonies of the gospel are so strong and they would give anything to go on a mission and share with others the restored gospel but they don’t have the means sufficient enough to do it. Really they are just like the 2000 strippling warriors. It was so cute because Emilio started a new job a couple weeks ago and so last Sunday he didn’t go to church because he had to work and then we went by this week and he told us he quit his job because he knew that he shouldn’t be working on Sundays but he didn’t know how they would get by and his mom wanted him to be working and she doesn’t understand why he doesn’t want to work on Sundays because bueno she doesn’t like the church or us… but that he prayed for help and that he knows the Lord will help him and that they’ll be able to get by. So cute. And it’s always so awesome to go to his house and talk to him because he always shares scriptures with us that he’s found and then just bears such a powerful testimony! And he’s about half way done with the Book of Mormon. How cool is that!! Ahh and it was so cute yesterday because somebody was like ahh who are the missionaries that baptized Emilio because he is such a guapo and already knows so much and has such a strong testimony. Wow, I just feel so blessed to be a part of his conversion. Ha I know it wasn’t anything I did, but I was able to be there and watch the changes in his life! The gospel changes lives! It’s the most amazing thing. I just want to find more Emilio’s! Bueno, I’m out of time! But I just want to close with my testimony. I know the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is TRUE. I know the Book of Mormon is true and that it is the word of God written for us. I know that we have a prophet on the earth today; Thomas S. Monson and that he was called of God to lead the people of this dispensation. I know that God is our Heavenly Father who knows us and loves us individually. I know that Christ lives and that he gave his life for us, so that we can be made clean through baptism and the laying on of hands through the gift of the Holy Ghost. I know that families can be together forever. I want our whole family to receive the blessings of this restored gospel. I love yall all so much and I am so so thankful every week for your emails and words of love and advice!

Love,

Hermanita Nelson

hello!!!

2010-04-13T04:56:00.001-07:00

Hello hello!!! Ok so I don't have very much time because I just spent all my time looking at pictures and blogs and I LOVED IT!!! Chulina! Ah I just love the pictures! And Alisa your hair looks amazing and Angela your hair looked so cute curled!!! And Alena you're just a lil hottie and I loved all the pictures with Ty at the MTC. So fun!!! Bueno, so it sounds like everyone had a really fun week! I loved getting all your emails; it always makes me so so happy! And it sounds like yall had fun with gma and gpa and Eric and his fam! Oh Mexican Train..love it! And gma asked me a fabulous question :) She said and what are you craving now?! And bueno it actually started getting pretty cold in the mornings and in the nights at the beginning of last week and we don't have a heater or anything ha or hot water...yeah taking showers in cold water when you're already freezing is awesome..lol camping?! Honestly I love this mission. And so I started craving hot chocolate!!! Like straight up hot chocolate with the mini marshmallows! And those oatmeal packets...brown sugar and cinnamon roll!!! That is what I am craving...and yes kit kats and trail mix is good at any time during the year! So I'm just throwing that out there if anyone is feeling a lil extra love for me this week. Ok and in Emily's letter she told me that Hilary got called to the Portland, Oregon mission and Mandy to the Rochester, NY at the Hill Cumorah VC and I don't know what it is but everytime I read about somebody going on their mission or getting thier calls the Spirit seriously just whooshes over me! Like really, I read that part like 3 times and every time the Spirit was just SO STRONG! Ah I just know that the Lord knows what He's doing. The church is so true and missions are the best! Seriously, I've never felt so complete and happy in all of my life! Bueno and this week I found a new favorite scripture that I absolutely fell in love with. It was perfect for me! I think it's in Doctrine and Covenants 64:33 but I'm not really sure, but it says something like... “don't be weary in well doing, because you are laying the foundation of a great work and small things bring to pass great works” o algo asi. But it was perfect because there have been nights that I just came home feeling weary and un poco stressed out because I felt like we have been working so hard and doing all the little things and we aren't seeing any immediate success. And I read that scriptures and just felt a relief wash over me, and I knew that Heavenly Father was proud of me, proud of our companionship and our efforts and that all the effort we have put into every day really is making a difference, because we really are laying the foundation of a great work. Ah and I just felt so at peace and I realized bueno, I just might be a planter (planting the seeds for others to come along and harvest) but I feel ok with that. Yes, I would love to see immediate success, but truly I know that the Lord's hand in is in the work and that the great things that are promised to those who give their hearts and a willing mind (vs. 34) will be brought to pass according to the Lord's will and time. I know that doing the small things makes a difference. I'm excited to continue working hard and giving my heart and mind to laying the foundation for this great work! I feel so blessed to have this opportunity to share the gospel with these people in Paraguay; ah I just love being a missionary :) And that's so cool that Alena is going to be getting her patriarchal blessing! So so awesome...and Alena you are a lil jerk!!! I totally believed you that Alisa was pregnant and I was so excited and telling everyone around me that my sister was pregnant! Ha and the whole time I was thinking, man that's so weird because mom didn't say anything about that and neither did dad or Alisa. Haha rude! But that's a good idea. So Angela or Alisa better start working on that because I want another neice or nephew about the time I get home! Oh and Nate's bday party looked like it was a lot of fun! HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO NATOR GATOR! What a lil cutie. Oh and Hna Case says she's gonna come visit yall so be looking forward for that. And mom I want to see pictures of the finished scrapbook-craft room...that's gonna be cute, I'm excited. And congrats to Aubrey, Stefanie, steve, and Bro and Sis Graff...that's all really exciting! And yeah I still want a detailed letter from Skylar! And Alena that's tyte that you found the camera charger! Ahh and thanks for the pictures Chels...CHULINA!!! You looked so hot and I love your dress!!! And I got the dearelder from Keri and she's getting married this month! Ahh and so is Nikki! So crazy. And I got a letter from Flora :) She's doing really good and will be coming home pretty soon. And mom I want the forwards from Ty's blog tambien :) And pobrecita Kylee...she will be in my prayers! Ahh I love yall all so much and I love hearing from yall. Paraguay is awesome as always. The time just keeps flying by! Ha I just need to learn Spanish already! We have zone conference tomorrow so I'm really excited about that and today we went to the lake at Arregua again, so pretty and I'll have to send some pictures one of these days! The mission is the best thing that ever happened to me, I can't believe all the different emotions I have! I know without a doubt that this gospel is so true. And I'm really coming to understand the importance of doing the lil things and enduring to the end. It is so essential. Life is just so much better when you're living the gospel. Love it. Love yall! Have a great week!!

Love,

Hermanita Nelson

hey, hey, hey!

2010-04-05T20:36:00.001-07:00

Hey hey hey!!! Ok wow what a week! First...grandma-I love you!!! I got your package and it was absolutely perfect! Just keep that up every 3 months and you'll be my favorite grandma :) haha and I have been getting your emails and I love them!! Keep them coming, I love hearing the little details of your life! Bueno, segundo, CAMBIOS! Changes...I am staying in the same area (QUE BENDICION!) with my same comp! Ahh we were so excited!!! So this will be my 4th change in this area! I love it and we're having a lot of fun together! AND Hna Case is back!!! She is now comps with Hna Garcia who lives with us, so now we all live together! So fun! And this is her last change of the mission, que triste, but we're going to live it up and it's awesome because we're in the same ward and zone and everything...it's almost like we're roommates. Love it. Ok haha and I didn't even remember that it was Easter until they announced it in conference! Ha Easter in Paraguay is la semana santa (holy week) and what do they do? Uhhh from what I could tell, they eat a lot of chipa!!! haha it's hilarious, and I ate so much chipa paraguaya...it's kinda like bread..but not. Ha yeah I don't know how to explain it, but it's not too bad and we helped make it, fun fun. Ah and on Friday nobody was outside...it was almost like a ghost town and there were NO COLLECTIVOS during the day, so after waiting for an hour and realizing that they weren't coming we decided to walk to our area..which took a lil over an hour...yikes! Oh the mission, but it was fun because we were all walking together and being goofs. And yeah so I didn't get any kind of easter dinner, BUT I did eat all my christmas candy from the Wariner's and trail mix and kit kats from grandma, so I have absolutely nothing to complain about! Ok and conference...WOW. I just love conference! Man, the church is so true, I can't get over it. And we were so blessed, because 7 of our investigators came with us to conference and I'm really excited to work with all of them and see them progress! Bueno, so all week long it was a lot of fun because we were contacting everyone and their dog...in this case...their cows and chickens...and it was such a great opportunity to teach and testify of prophets and the restored gospel on the earth today! And on Friday, we were walking passed this house and there was this guy outside on his chair and we just walked right passed him, and I was thinking, oh shoot we should've contacted him...but we just kept walking around the corner and there was a family all sitting there and we almost just walked right passed them too because we've already contacted them a lot, but we both kind turned and stopped right at the same time, and just started talking to them and they invited us in..and turns out the guy was one of their sons who we have never met before, and he came over about half way during our invitation and started asking questions (but like out of curiosity, not like he wanted to argue with us and see if we had the right answers to his questions like a lot of people do) and we invited him to the conference and he was like yeah I'll go, and he came to the session yesterday. Ha and he liked it and he seems like he's one of those escogidos (chosen) so I'm excited! Ha also Pedrito came (his mom didn't come) but his lil sister came with us...and it was so cute because he took notes! All on his own, and they were so cute. He's such a lil stud and we told him to make sure to share what he learned with his mom. So now we're just praying that his dad will give him permission to be baptized, because the mom said earlier this week that the dad didn't like the idea of it because he's too young to make sure a big decision. Ah pray for him. Ok and conference went by way to fast! At the end of each session, I couldn't believe it..I was like that's it?! I need more! And yeah so thankfully we were able to watch it in English...so all the Americans are in this room with a tiny lil tv, and my guapa comp was with all our investigators in the other room. Ha it's really sad because nobody comes to conference here...bueno, everyone comes for the sunday morning session, but there were maybe like 20 people there for all the other sessions. Que triste. They just must not understand exactly, because conference is AMAZING!

And what's this about Ty being a zone leader?! What in the world! Que rapido! What a stud. And yeah I want pictures already! I haven't even seen the ones from when he left or anything. Please, send me some! Gracias! And yeah Alena I want to see your yearbook stuff, that class seems like a lot of fun, and you'd be so good at that! And mom....wow! That RS road trip sounds like it was SO FUN! I'm serious...I'm glad you had so much fun! Ahh and I want to go to the SL temple too! And I'm excited to read the priesthood session in the ensign. Ha I just love conference, I love the gospel, the church is so true. I love my Savior, Jesus Christ and for his sacrifice for me. I loved the emphasis on Jesus Christ and on families this conference, it was so perfect. And I loved that our beloved Prophet, Thomas S. Monson closed with my scripture!!! Did you think of me? “Trust in the Lord with all thine heart, and lean not unto thine own understanding, in all thy ways acknowledge him and he shall direct they paths.” Proverbs 3:5-6 And it was so perfect for me...because I had just read that in my personal study that morning because the night before I was kinda having a hard time, because I felt like these last two changes we have worked SO HARD and done everything we were suppossed to be doing, but we weren't seeing any success and I couldn't understand why. And then when I heard the scripture read from the mouth of the prophet, i just knew that the Lord loves me and wants me to put my trust in Him because he sees the big picture, and it's ok if I don't understand everything because He knows. I was having a problem with leaning unto my own understanding, but that's not the way it works. It might not show in our numbers of baptisms that we are working hard, but we know that we are doing everything we can and the Lord knows and that's all that matters. He'll take care of the rest according to his voluntad (will). He knows what He's doing, He knows the people we're working with and their personal needs and He will help us as we turn to Him in faith and as we trust in Him, He will direct us for good and lead us by His Spirit. It was a good lesson to learn. Ah I love the Lord. I am learning SO MUCH! I feel so blessed for this opportunity! I love yall so much and am so thankful for your love and support! Have a great week!

Oh and it was so fun to read all about Nate! What a little stud. And so fun everything that happened this weekend, with easter, and conference and everything. I'm so proud of him for him getting over his fear of the water...now you better watch out bc he's always going to want to be in the water and he's going to try to jump in without his floats!

Hey, Hey!

2010-03-29T13:35:00.000-07:00

Ok I just love the mission. Really, how cool is it that I'm in Paraguay serving a mission! Love it! And guess what?! Emilio went to the temple for his first time on Saturday!!! How amazing is that! Ah he is just the coolest. And ok Gustavo did not get baptized..toda via...I have faith that he will, but he's just got to make that decision on his own. But the day we saw him we had a nice long chat with him and he told us everything that happened, and how he was all prepared and ready to go and that one collectivo passed by but that he didn't get on and that he hadn't told any of his family about it and he just got really nervous and all these different fears and doubts. Bueno, y despues I told him that I wanted to share a story with him about these 3 friends. ( And if somebody could look up this story...it won't be exactly like this but something along these lines and then let me know how it really is that would be awesome) So there are these 3 friends and they were the best of friends in heaven and they always talked about how great earth life would be and how it would be so awesome to meet back up and talk about what happened with their lives while on the earth. And then God came to them and told one of them (se llama Hna Remache) that she would be sent to Columbia and that her family wouldn't be very rich but that they would always have the things that they needed, and that gracias a su papa who would be converted when he was 18, she would have the gospel in her life. And that her grandparents would also later convert to the gospel and be sealed in the temple. And then God turned to the other friend (se llama Hnita Nelson) and said and you will be sent to the United States and your family will be very blessed y gracias a su mama who will be baptized when she is 17 and will later meet your dad and they will be sealed in the temple so that yall can live together forever as a familly, you will have the gospel in your life. And then he turned to the other friend and said and you Gustavo will be sent to Paraguay and your life will be hard, every day your family will struggle to have food to eat and you won't have the gospel in your life. But gracias to your best friends right here who will be sent to Paraguay on their missions and will be companions and will serve in the very spot where you live, you will have the opportunity to accept the gospel in your life, so that your family also will have the opporutity to live together forever. And then he counseled Gustavo to remember to be faithful and have trust in Him, his father in heaven because there would be many other things in his path that would seem good, but that were not the full truth. And then Gustavo turned to his friends and pleaded with them to be patient with him and to just love him because he was going to be difficult and stubborn and it would take him time to recognize the truth. And then I just talked to him and said, Gustavo we're still here because we promised you that we would find you and do all we could to help you recognize and remember the things you already know to be true. Realmente, I know that you need to be baptized so that you can return to live in the presence of your Heavenly Father and so that you can live with your family forever too. Ahhh the church is so true! And yes tears were shed lol. But he'll get it! I have faith. I can't imagine what my life would be like without the gospel. I feel so blessed to have a testimony, have a firm testimony of this gospel and it just makes me excited to share it! Ha oh and a couple weeks ago we met this lady and we went in and sang with all her kids and all the neighboring kids and everything and the kids just loved it! And bueno, so everytime we went to go back she was "never there" so the kids would always want us to come in and sing with them y cosas asi.. but it had been awhile since we had been there and on Thursday one of the kids told us he had been to church before and he wanted us to talk to his mom. So we went to talk to him and his mom and ha apparently it wasn't our church (it was the testigos...Jehovah's witness) but she wanted to know if he could come with us to church because everyday he would come home and ask her if he could go with us. His name is Pedro..Pedrito and he's 12 years old and he's just a lil stud. So he came to church with us yesterday and we went to his house last night and his mom was like, oh he just loved it and he says he wants to be a missionary like yall...and then she started asking questions about how he could be a missionary and what they needed to do to get him ready. haha it was so cute!! But yeah during church he like turned to me and pointed to my plaque and was like I want to be like you, I want to have one of those and be a missionary like you. I was like ahhh precious! lol so we're hoping that his mom will come to conference with us this week and have the desires to keep coming! ha because the first time we talked with him we left him a pamphlet and told him to read the first page and highlight all the parts he liked, ha and he actually did it with his mom's help! And underlined God, Jesus Christ, felicidad (happiness), it was just cute. So we left him a Book of Mormon and told his mom it will be really awesome if she could read it with him. Ha and there is power in the Book of Mormon! I'm excited! Ah and we have cambios this week! And I don't want to leave this area! Ha I'm praying that I don't..which probably means I will...but I hope not! I love everything here...the people are amazing! Ah I just love the mish! Oh and I got a letter from Elder Moore who is coming to this mission and leaves for the MTC April 21! Ahhh I'm so excited for you! This is the best mission! And yeah Pres Wade leaves in July, but I didn't get my letter from him until like a week before I entered the MTC...but I'm sure you'll get it sometime! A really good way to prepare would be studying preach my gospel and the scriptures and just becoming familiar with both! And yeah most of the people here know both Spanish and Guarani...ha and actually I found out this week that a lot of the words I say are not spanish, it's guarani! Crazy...the languange is really tight and I know I'm going to come home and speak a mixture of guarani and spanish and people won't be able to understand me, but it's all good. Also, mom I didn't get Ty's first forwarded email...I got the one he hand wrote but not the other one..if there was another one. Also I need you to tell me how to make guacomole because avocados are starting to fall from the trees! Ha I love Paraguay! So we've been eating them and they are sooo good! And I still haven't gotten a letter from Dave, but I got Emily's letter this week!!! (And I don't think I'll have time to write her back today, but I've gotten it all written down to send next week!) And question...when is Easter?!!! I have no idea, and neither does anybody else...yall made it sound like it was really soon! And Alena's patriarchal blessing, that is SOOO EXCITING! Alena that's awesome, I'm super excited for you! Look at you all grown up! Yikes! But yeah I get to call home on mothers day..I'm not sure what time or anything yet, but if you could do her blessing like a week before or something that'd be good. And the RS party sounded like it went really well, and that RS open house sounds really fun and you're going with really fun sisters! Guapas. And congrats on the design team and getting all that scrapbooking stuff! That sounds like it will be really awesome! ok yeah my times up, so I'll email Emily next week! And wow Ty is such a stud...I'll send him an email next week too! He's just got to remember to be patient with himself...ha and I'm so glad he has hermanas in his district! So fun! Does the kid have a camera because I want pictures!!! And he's just going to start loving the MTC...it was hard for me at first too! And how are his teachers! ANd tell him good job on the details. Very good email, I want them all like that! Love yall so much! Have a great week! ANd I think it's SIs. Wariner's bday this weekend...if so happy birthday!!! Love yall!Love,Hermanita Nelson

Email from March 22

2010-03-29T13:33:00.000-07:00

Hello hello hello!!!Ok really this week I have NO TIME to write!!! We went to the lake today for a zone activity and it was SO MUCH FUN!!! I'll have to send a couple pictures next week. Ok and yeah we went to the temple this past week!!!! Ahhh it was actually a really amazing, spiritual experience! I love the temple. And the feeling that I had the whole time inside the walls of the temple was that I felt at home. I felt right at home. It doesn't matter that I am in a completely different country and everything was in a completely different language, the temple is the same everywhere. Beautiful, amazing, clean, the house of the Lord. And what a TENDER MERCY it was to be in the celestial room and to first, meet a sweet old lady, who just so happened to be the FIRST sister missionary in Paraguay (about 50 years ago) who just so happened to be visiting with a group of people who were only going to be in Paraguay for that day and then leave...and just so happened to be in the same exact session as us. Tender mercy? And despues I just so happened to meet another lady, whose husband had also served in Paraguay, and she just so happened to live in St. George!!! Wow!! Tender mercies! And like Sister Curtis said, "Coincidences are God's way of staying anonymous" (P.S. thank you so much for that!!! I'll write to you when I have more time!). Wow the blessings are incredible!!! Bueno and my packages!!! Ahhhh yall are so AMAZING! I'm not even kidding! Those were the best in the world!! I'll write more about that later too, but let's just say about half the chocolate is gone and the trail mix! And I loved the IN-N-OUT tshirt and Emily thanks for the letter! Loved it loved it loved it! Yall are FABULOUS! Ahh and Ty's in the MTC!!! How awesome that yall saw Steve Anderson and that Johnny Esplin is his zone leader! Haa that's so cool. Yeah, I know him, he was in my temple prep class in the singles ward! He's a stud. Wow the tender mercies of the Lord. I can't wait to get Ty's first letter! Ok I got to go...but I need a favor!!! Please please please keep Gustavo Sanabria Cañete in your prayers! He was supposed to get baptized on Friday and we had seen him earlier that day and it was all good and we were just about to leave for the baptism later that night and he called and said he couldn't do it. Honestly, for the first time I experienced the heart ache of a missionary!!! We've been teaching him for 3 months and he knows it's true!!! But his friends and pastor from his other iglesia are confusing him really bad. We're praying for a miracle. He needs strength! I don't know what to do except to pray for him. I know he is so special to the Lord. My comp and I were really just heart broken and cried and cried. And Hna Case had come to the baptism to surprise him and a bunch of people from the ward had come AND Emilio (my converso) was going to baptize him!!! Needless to say, it didn't happen. He is just so so close.I feel like he is one of the people that I was supposed to find..no I know that he is one of the people I was supposed to find and bring the gospel too. And I just feel like if he doesn't get baptized I will have failed. He knows it's true and he know's that baptism is so important but yet he is yeilding to the enticings of men! Ahhh mi corazon! But we haven't talked to him about everything yet...hopefully we will be able to tomorrow. But honestly he needs your prayers. And pray for us so that we might be guided by the Spirit to say the right things that he needs to hear. I love yall so much and thanks so much for all the emails! Hopefully there will be more time next week! Ahh and can you believe we have cambios again next week?!!! And oh my goodness, TOMORROW IS MY 6 MONTH MARK!!! Can somebody please slow down the time?!! Yikes que rapido!!! Have a great week! Love,Hermanita Nelson

hola, hola, hola!

2010-03-15T11:46:00.001-07:00

Hola hola hola!!! Ok first of all, I have really BAD NEWS!!!So I had about a good 400 pictures from my mission so far, and ALL of them got DELETED!!! so so so so so sad!!! I don't know what I did, but they were there and the next thing I knew, they were all gone!! Yeah super triste. The good news is that I got the package from the Wariners-por fin!!! But I actually haven't gotten it yet, but they called me and told me it's here! And I haven't gotten the one from yall either..ha I'm waiting very paciently! I should get them on Thursday! And no, I haven't gotten the one from grandma yet- yeah the mail is really slow. And tomorrow we're going to the temple! I'm so excited! It'll be AMAZING! Oh man and Ty had his farewell yesterday! Sounds like he did an amazing job! I knew he would..what a stud!And thanks for the pictures! I'm excited to get the ones on Sis Andersen's camera! And that's fun that all the peeps were there for the weekend! And Alisa..your hair is so cute! And tell Emily and her mom, I'll write them back next week! Ha funny story...this is totally Paraguay for you...so first of all busy roads are shared by cars, collectivos, moto's, horse and buggys, 4 wheelers...and apparently by cows too! lol it was so funny the other day we were waiting for a collectivo and all of a sudden we see this poor lost cow roaming down the street holding up all kinds of traffic. Ha I'm sure it was just terrified for it's life because everyone was honking and starting at it, but man it was so funny! Unfortunately I didn't have my camera with me. Also we had entrevistas (interviews) this week with Pres Wade and Elder Curtis was with him and he came into my distict meeting and it was so funny, just remembering the good old days in sunday school in the church building and then being here in Paraguay in the chapel talking about the gospel. haha it's cool. Oh man and who knew that Jehovah's witnesses were all over the world? ha well they are all over our area! They are crazy lol, we were teaching a family the other day and they are testigos and their beliefs are so different! It's kinda sad, it makes me so greatful to have the gospel in my life and to have a testimony and know with a surety that the gospel of Jesus Christ of LDS is true! Ahd we've also had some Marzo Milagros..baptisms no, but we've found some really cool people! We found a cute lil family that came to church with us yesterday and also this other guy named Alcides, who also came to church and he accepted a baptismal date yesterday when we saw him. I'm really excited for all of them and am excited to see them progress! And ahhh Gustavo, I hope yall are praying for him! He came to church yesterday too, and we are praying for a miracle and for him to be baptized this month! He has all the lessons and everything, and the kid loves the Book of Mormon but he's scared of making the commitment to be baptized. Ah but I have faith! He'll get it! And ah we have cambios in 2 weeks..man the time just flies by!!! But my times up! I love yall! And I can't wait to get Ty's email from the MTC!!! Don't cry too much on the way home! ANd take pictures before yall cry so you can send them to me! I hope our service will bless the family! I love yall so much! Have an amazing week! Love, Hermanita Nelson

Hola!

2010-03-10T07:19:00.001-08:00

Hola!!! WOW WOW WOW!!! Primero, Gpa Al, HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!! You’re what, 50 por alli? I hope you have a great day! Proximo, Michelle Morley and Amber Peacock are both pregnant?!!! What in the world…I leave for 5 months and look what happens!!!! Ha I’m so so excited for both of them! That’s so awesome and so cute! Tell them congrats! Ok…and SKYLAR YATES…NOT OK!!! Somebody needs to remind her that she isn’t supposed to get married until after I get home! And who is this guy?!! I swear she was not dating ANYBODY like 3 months ago! Whoever sees her first needs to tell her that she has A LOT of explaining to do and that I want all the DETAILS on who this guy is and how they met and how he proposed and EVERYTHING! Understand?! And ok yeah I’m really excited for her too! Emily...don’t even think about it. Ok and oh my goodness Ty’s farewell is THIS Sunday!! Yikes!!! Ahh that is so crazy and so fun! This weekend is going to be so crazy for yall with all the peeps down from Snow and all the crying that’s going to go down! Oh wow. Oh and mom my ZL called me a couple days ago to let me know that I got a package and turns out it’s from you! Woot woot! So really I don’t know what ever happened to the one from the Wariners! Hopefully I get it soon! But I’m not going to get it until tomorrow, but THANK YOU in advance because I know I’m just going to LOVE IT! Bueno, ¿que mas? Ha the picture of Elder Curtis and I…we’re just the cutest, ¿verdad? Haha I totally forgot we even took that picture…yeah how cool is it that we are both on our missions in Paraguay?! He’s a stud and it’s always so fun to see him every month! Oh and grandma…let’s get one thing straight…I will always be your favorite missionary  And Alena way to go with school, you’re such a guapa! And what the random with the exchange student haha. And ok Alisa, Nate’s room is so DANG CUTE!!! I love it! And wow that’s amazing what a lil spray paint can do! Now you just need to put pictures of Nate on there so I can see his cuteness! And that’s fun that Rebekah y Nathan are coming to visit Angela and Bobby…be sure to take lots of pictures! Ahh and I got Chels’ email!!! Gracias! I LOVED IT! I’m excited to write you back…ha yeah email is so much better! Ah and I saw your cute picture from the dance, what HOTTIES! And yall would go to Vegas, the beach and Disneyland without me! Ha jk take lots of pics so you can send them to me, and we’ll just have to go next year when I get back! Ok bueno, we had a really cool experience the other day with following the Spirit. It was like 8:00 and it was dark and we were kinda tired but we still had a couple citas that we needed and we had a couple contacts left. Bueno, so we were walking passed this house that we walk by I don’t know how many times in one day and we both turned and looked at each other and walked up to the gate. Usually people will say “otro dia” or ¿que dice? Or algo asi especially when it’s late, but she told us to come right in. And then she was telling us how the night before she had been asking God which church was true because there are so many churches and different books and teachings, etc. And so we brought out the Book of Mormon and shared a scripture and bore testimony that it is the word of God and that she can find her answer as she reads and prays about this book. Then we went back there a couple days letter and shared the first lesson and when we started talking about Joseph Smith she got really excited and was like, “yeah I have that same question that he had!” and once again we testified of the truthfulness of the gospel and how Joseph Smith was a prophet called to restore the gospel of Jesus Christ, the same gospel that he formed when he was on the earth. It was a really cool experience to see how God had prepared her to receive this message! And also how he had prepared us and guided us with his Spirit to her house. Tender mercy? I think so! Ah I love this gospel! It is so true! I feel so blessed to be a part of this great work! Also we have this mission goal right now to have 384 baptisms this month as a mission because are numbers were so low from the last couple months, so we’re pretty much going to triple the number we had in Febrero…128ish. But we’re doing it because those are the people that we were supposed to find and bring the gospel to, but didn’t. Those are the people that are out there waiting to receive the message of the gospel that the Lord has prepared for us! Our goal as a zone is 46 and 5 as a companionship. Please help us with your prayers! It will be really appreciated! I love yall all so much! Thanks for your testimonies and your letters, your love, everything! Have a great week! Love, Hermanita Nelson

Are You Ready For This?!!

2010-02-22T14:26:00.000-08:00

Hola!!! Wow wow wow, so we had CAMBIOS!!!! Ok bueno, so I’m in the same area!!! And my new comp is Hermana REMACHE!!! Haha yeah she is definitely latina and doesn’t speak english! WATCH OUT! Yikes! She is super guapa though… blows me out of the water! She’s just this cute lil colombiana y tiene 24 años and is just on FIRE. Lol I’ve met her once befote and I told her that we would be comps one day and here it is! I had no idea it would be this soon because she moved up super fast! This is only her 5th cambio in the misión! Which means she only has 2 more than me, but she’s guapa that’s why she moved up so fast. Ha and God know that I needed a latina to help me learn spanish! Lol Hna G also got a latina comp this change..apparently we need some help! This change is going to be CRAZY! Lol I think this change I will learn A LOT!!! Bueno I thought my comp was this lil shy, quiet girl but oh how I was wrong! She is so bold and intense. We worked afool this week! It was cool because like our second or third day together we were having comp study and she was sharing a scripture (bueno before that I was telling her how I was so excited to be her comp because she’s a guapa and I knew I would learn a lot from her this change) and so after she shared the scripture she started crying and was saying that she had always prayed that she would be a good example for her comps and how she just wanted to be the best missionary she knew how to be y eso. And then it was so cute, she was like and I would always tell everyone how I wanted to be your comp because that first time I met you I just thought how fun it would be to be your comp and there was just something about you..chulina ¿verdad? But it’s so crazy because before the cambio I was like Heavenly Father just let me feel peace with my next cambio and know that it’s right y eso and I totally did. I know that I’m supposed to be with her right now. And I’m not gonna lie she’s kinda the type who’s like ‘my way or the highway’ and has dropped the cane on me a couple times so it’s kinda hard sometimes, but I’m humbling myself and trying not to be offended or anything and just learn and grow from this cambio. If I’m lucky I’ll be with her another cambio because I have a lot to learn from her. Pray for me  But ok I have no more time because we had an hermana activity today with all the hermanas! So fun!!! So I gotta see my momma (Hna Case) y Hna G and everyone! And we have zone conference this week! But that’s all the news for now! Thanks for all the emails!!! And really next week I’ll write Emily! But give Tyler big big kisses for me for his birthday! I can’t relieve he is 3!!! I looked at the blog emails…so cute!!! And give Grandma a big hug and kiss too for her bday! And GRACIAS to Hna Andersen for the email! I LOVED IT! What a guapa..and also Nick’s email was HILARIOUS. Love that kid. And also Hna Wariner!!! And tell her since she’s my visiting teacher she’s responsable for sending me letters and packages and everything  And Alena good jobo n your talk! And thanks for sending me Tyler’s prayer it was ADORABLE! Y bueno..mom if you could fix my spelling because the computer keeps changing i tinto weird words! Love yall so much! Have a great week! Love, Hermanita Nelson

Feliz dia de los in amorados‏

2010-02-16T16:20:00.000-08:00

Familia y amigos!!! How are ya’ll? Lovin life? Ojala que si! What a great time to be alive! First off, I got letters from John and Pauline Sadovich in our ward (tell them thank you because they sent that like 2 months ago! It was such a good letter and had some awesome advice) and I also got one from Codi!!! I was so excited! And I’ll get a letter sent off to her next week! And also one from quicky dicky! And thank you Sister Curtis for FINALLY sending me an email! Oh and I finally got that email from Nick and Ty. I found it in my account when I was deleting the other ones. Ha I loved it. And can you give me their MTC addresses because I have a lil regalo for them. I have like no time to write today because for pday we had a zone activity and went to Tobati. It was like 3 hour travel but we did some hiking and got a couple sweet pics and then ate some yummy food! They had these things that were a lot like glaciers! They were SO GOOD! Bueno, we have cambios (changes) this week on Wed. Que triste. It’s weird because I remember thinking in the MTC…wow I love these hermanas so much (G, Deem, Burnette) and how can I love anyone just as much as I love them. And then I got with Hna Case. And she’s just such guapa. My heart just keeps growing and growing…there’s so much room to love! Ha it’s amazing. Ah and these people. I feel like this is the best area in the World, with the best members and investigators and how could I ever find other people and love them just as much? But I know I will. Ha but I also have a feeling this next change will be one of the hardest, because I have got to know Spanish already!!! So I’m just gonna push myself. Ha pray for me. Ha but guess what?! This week we actually had water…now our kitchen Light is just out! Ha gotta love it. Bueno I just want to leave yall with my testimony. This gospel is so AMAZING. I can’t believe I’ve already been on my misión for 5 months! Ahh I can’t believe how Fast time flies!! It makes me nervous. So ahora I’m just trying to enjoy everyday and every momento. There are a couple of elders going home in the next couple days that we’ve become pretty good friends with and it almost makes me cry just thinking that they are ending their missions and leaving Paraguay. On the collective ride today out to Tobati I was just staring out the Window and just looked out at Paraguay and it’s so BEAUTIFUL! I’ll be so so sad when I leave. Ah these people are just so close to my heart and I still can’t even understand them! Wow the misión is the best thing in the World. My comp. shared a quote with me and it’s from President Hinckley talking about sister missionaries. And it’s so good so I want to share it with yall. Dice, “ Many young women are serving missions. Many are preparing to serve. Not because they aren’t married or have nothing else to do, but because they have a desire to serve. The reason so many are going is because in the next generation, Heavenly Father will be sending his priesthood army to the Earth. He wants to send them to Mothers who have been properly trained and taught the gospel and what better training can a young woman have than that of serving a misión?” Chulina, ¿Verdad? The misión is awesome. I love it. Ah there is so much more I need to do to be a better missionary but I’m trying. I want to give it my all. Ha yeah I’m definitely going to be one of those weird missionaries who is ALWAYS telling misión stories and talking about Paraguay and about the people and how much I love them. I can’t wait. Prepare yourselves. The gospel of Jesus Christ is so true. So happy. And it changes lives. I love yall! Thanks for all the emails this week! I was so so excited to read all of them. They were excellent. Have an awesome week! Oh and I hope yall all had a good dia de los in amorados! Love, Hermanita Nelson

hey hey hey

2010-02-10T14:07:00.000-08:00

Familia y amigos!!! How are yall?!!! I’m doing just fabulous! I love the mission! Oh the life of a missionary and the miracles we are able to witness. We’ve been working with this guy named Gustavo for the past monthish and he’s a stud. The problem has been that he already has his own religion and he’s comfortable there and he’s not really looking for a change in religion. Ha but wow it just amazes me how much truth there is in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and how many blessings and how much happiness comes from the gospel. Anyways, we’ve seen him everyday this week and it’s really cool because every time we see him we just dig into the scriptures and he always has scriptures that he’s marked that he wants to share with us and then tells us why he likes them and it’s just awesome! Oh there is so much power in the Book of Mormon! And also everyday this week we’ve asked him if he was going to come to church and everytime he said vamos a ver and never gave us a commitment. Well we were at his house on Friday and he was telling us that the night before he was just sitting outside by himself and had time to just think. And he was thinking about the church and thinking that he would just need a sign in order to know. Well we know that that is not exactly how it works when we receive an answer! So my guapa comp turns to Alma 32 where it talks about “blessed are those who are humbled without being compelled to be humbled” and about signs, etc. and while she was looking it up, I took the opportunity to bear testimony. I told him that what it comes down to is if the Book of Mormon is true; because it’s either true or it’s not. And if it’s true, WOW! If it’s true Joseph Smith translated the Book of Mormon through the power of God, and that he was a prophet called of God, and that we have prophets today on the earth to guide us and teach us the things we need to do to return to God and to live with our families forever! Ha I just get so excited about it! Oh the church is so true! Anyways, I just bore testimony and told him that God had a plan for him and that he had so much potential and testified how important it is to attend church and then went on to promise him blessings if he would. And then after Hna Case shared the scripture he still hadn’t given us a commitment that he would come, but explained that the reason he couldn’t come was because he was having a reunion with his friends that they only do every like 6 weeks or something (and I guess he had already told us about that a couple weeks ago too) but said if they didn’t show up by 8 then he would come. So we prayed and prayed and prayed and fasted that he would come, and then what happened?! He came!!! Apparently his friend’s car had broke down. Ha is that a sign enough?! It was awesome and testimony meeting was so perfect. I love this gospel! And yesterday when we first got to church we were about to enter the chapel and Manu was like Hermanas, hermanas look! And we were like what in the world? And then out walks Emilio in his white shirt and tie! Ha it was so cute and it gets better...he blessed the sacrament! It was so awesome to hear his voice over the speaker blessing the sacrament, and knowing that he holds the priesthood authority of God and that he is truly a man of God. And it gets better…we asked him earlier in the week if he would share his testimony because one of us is for sure leaving this next change and he was so nervous about it because he didn’t know what to do or say. And he was sitting there with Gustavo and Manu and Manu kept nudging him to go up and then Manu went up and he still hadn’t gone and we only had like 5 min. left, and then he got up and walked to the podium! And he was like, well I just got baptized and this is my first time up here and I’m kinda nervous, and then he just lost it. He put his arm over his face to control his tears…which of course made me lose it…and waited like 30 sec and tried to talk again but still couldn’t. Then he got control of himself and just thanked God for being able to be a part of this great work and thanked us for bringing him the truth and testified how it’s changed his life. It was so awesome! Afterwards so many people came up and told us how impressed they were by him and how fast he was progressing and what a strong testimony he has and how he just brought in such a special spirit when he bore his testimony. Wow, what a special and sacred experience! You know how in the call letter it says, “you’ll experience greater happiness and joy than you have ever felt” or something like that…well that’s how I felt! My heart was just about to burst! I am just overcome with happiness and feel soo soo blessed to be a part of this great work, to be an instrument in the Lord’s hand and to be a part of his conversion and to have this opportunity to get to know these people! I love them so much already, it’s amazing because I still can’t understand them half the time. But my heart is so full of love for them and I just want them to experience the happiness of the gospel. Oh what a great work this is! I love it…and it makes it all worth it..for example…the fact that we have to shower out of the sink because there’s no water…or the fact that we didn’t even shower for the past couple days because there was NO WATER in our apt and the fact that we went to bed dirty and sweaty and stuck to our beds because it’s so humid and that we’ve gotten like a total of 10 hours of sleep for the last 3 days because it’s been so hot and humid! Ha pero igual no mas. I actually think it’s hilarious and I love experiencing all of this! Oh Paraguay! What an adventure. It doesn’t get any better than this. Camping, what?! The church is true and that’s all that matters. Love yall and love this work! Have a great week!! And also thank Sis Wariner for her letter! I love getting them! And I loved Emily’s too…I’ll write her back next week! And Chel better write me this next week all about her hot date! And I want pictures too! I also got Keri’s dearelder..gracias! It’s so awesome that you’re working for the Daily Universe, you’d be soo soo good at that! And that’s so cool that Chels is taking your engagement pictures, I can’t wait to see them! How exciting! I love getting yall’s letters! Keep them coming!!! Oh and before you send the package make sure to include: garments ( I want those bottoms you got me that came out new..they are amazing and I need some more tops!) also perfume, dove deodorant, toothpaste/brush, facewash, bobbypins, chapstick (a liquid kind), a calendar, one of those lil battery spray fans, koolaid, mixed nuts or trail mix, cheese itz, ped socks!!! (black ones), pictures, mascara and eyeliner. I can’t remember what I told you last week so yeah…but any food would just be fabulous! Love yall! Love, Hermanita Nelson

Guess What?!

2010-02-03T09:23:00.000-08:00

Hola!!!! Guess what, guess what, guess what?!!!! EMILIO GOT BAPTIZED!!! Ha I didn't want to tell you anything about it last week because I was afraid it would jinx it again lol! But the 30th de Enero he got baptized and received the Holy Ghost and priesthood yesterday at church! Can you believe it?! Por fin! It's been crazy! He's such a stud. It was funny because for the last couple of weeks he's just seemed like a member to me, because everytime we went to his house he would teach us something from what he had read. He's about half way done with the Book Of Mormon and it's so awesome to look through his book because he marks all the ones he likes and writes comments and questions. The kid is a stud. He wrote us a letter and just thanked us for bringing him the truth and he said he couldn't wait to be a part of ¨this great work of the Lord"and he told us he wants to go on a mission! He'll go. Man, I just can't get over it. It was so cute at his baptism because he was just so smiley the whole time! How awesome that I get to start off my mission with him. Hermana Case said he has been her best investigator by far and that he's been the most converted, but I'm gonna find more! Ah and I just love Paraguayo's. It's so cool because when they're converted they aren't afraid to share their testimony with anyone! In fact they love to share it with everyone and they're always testifying about how the gospel has changed their lives and made them so much happier and how they love the scriptures and the Lord. It's awesome! There's this kid named Manuel in our ward ( I can't remember if I've told you about him) but he's such a stud too. And he'll usually go with us once a week and help us out and everytime it just makes me want to be better and to be bold and to share with everyone the excitement of the gospel. But after the FHE last week Manu and Emilio were talking and I went up and told them to teach me. And the day before Emilio had his interview to be baptized and before that he shared a scripture with us. THe scripture is 2 Nephi 29:6-7 and he just shared how the scripture was kinda the trigger for his conversion. ANd how he had found it after having his doubts about Joseph Smith and everything, and that when he read that scripture it changed things for him and HE KNEW. Anyways, Manu said he would share a scripture (and I thought he was going to do one from 3 Nephi because he was telling me earlier that he was reading that) but no, instead he picked that SAME scripture Emilio had shared with us the day before and Emilio and I looked at each other and we were like no way! Ha it was awesome. But anyways, he read it and then told us why he liked it and then Emilio was like, can I share why I like it. So then he shared again why he liked it and then they asked me why I liked it. I don't know, it was just so cool sitting there talking about the scriptures and feeling the Spirit. I love the scriptures! I love that people can read the same scripture and like it for so many different reasons. It's so awesome! And then I had a vision! haha well...I just pictured myself teaching at the Provo MTC and then being there when Manu and Emilio came in to go on their missions! Ha can you imagine? THat would be so awesome! And Manu was only baptized like 8 months ago and they're both such studs. Oh how I love the gospel! Emilio's baptism was really good though. Nobody from his family came, which is something that I think is really hard for him because he knows how important the family is to the gospel. But his ward family was there. That's something that is so cool too. That the members here are so welcoming and they just love him. Love it. And after his baptism we had cake and things got a lil out of hand and somebody started a cake fight...I don't know who it was... but it was hilarious. Oh the mission! I love it. ha and have I told you that Paraguayoś are the biggest liars. It's actually really funny and they hide from you which is even funnier. That cute lady I told you about last week who was sitting out reading the pamphlet we gave her, HID from us this week. As in we see her sitting outside on her chair and we're walking towards her and we straight up see her get out of her chair and run to her door and go inside and lock it! Hilarious. Life can't get any better than this. And yesterday after we ate lunch (I don't know if I've ever told you that we live with 2 other hna's but we do and they're latin and they think they are so funny and call me witch all the time..shouldn't have taught them that word lol and I love them to death..anyways) so we were about ready to leave but I still had to go to the bathroom really bad but Hna Garcia had gotten up to go, so I'm thinking in my head, I have to beat her to the bathroom. SO I stand up and start running to the bathroom door and right when I got right in front of it, I BIFFED it SO HARD and fell right on my butt and knocked my knee and hip into the edge of the door on the way down. How embarrassing. ha I could barely walk after that but we all had the giggles so bad! Love it. Ah I'm pretty sure my time is up BUT I'm going to try and send some pictures!!! BE EXCITED! And thank you for everyone's emails this week...much better! And I don't have time to email back today, but I already have it all written down so I'll just do it quickly next week. Oh but tell Sis. Wariner and Chel that I did get their letters they sent in the mail the week before last (sorry I thought I already said that) and I wrote them back last Monday (letters) but I don't have any money to send them out yet. I'm broke! And also thanks Becky Goodwin because I just got her letter last week too and I love them! Keep them coming everyone! And Gpa Olson is in my prayers, poor guy! And oh my goodness!!! Nick had his farewell!!! I can't believe it. TIme flies by! What a stud. He's gonna be awesome! And I have a present for him so I'll need his MTC address so I can send it. Tell him to be excited. Love all yall and if anyone was planning on sending me a package or anything here are just a few things you could include if you wanted :) PICTURES...I am seriously lacking pictures from yall, ped socks (black), deodorant (dove), mascara and eyeliner, FOOD (cheeze itz, trail mix, kit kats, fruit snacks, koo laid...really anything AMERICAN)! ha love yall! love the gospel, love the mish. Pray for me! Make it an AWESOME week! Love, Hermanita Nelson

Finally posting...Sorry for the delay

2010-01-25T14:36:00.000-08:00

Sorry I haven't posted in so long. Monday seems to be a jinx day for me and I've been sick for the past couple of Mondays and just didn't get the emails posted. I'm just going to get the one from today posted and will try to get the others posted later:

Hola familia y amigos! First off, wow it sounds like yall had a crazy week! I’m sorry to hear that Gary passed away and I can’t believe nobody called and told you! Luckily you were able to attend his funeral. Oh grandpa…he cracks me up! And I saw Angela’s pictures and I was so shocked when I saw the pictures of the snow. I had literally forgotten that it was so cold there. Time is so weird here! I don’t even know what the dates are..I know it’s January but it sure doesn’t seem like it. Weird! So this week some funny things happened. First, I totally got on the wrong collective. We were standing at the corner waiting to go and then Hna Case was like ok there’s one, so I’m like sweet and then I turn around to get on it and then I see Hna Case walking outside towards the back of the collective (because there’s a door at the back) so I just figured she was going to get on in the back..and then once I got on, I realized she had not gotten on and then started freaking out haha. So I’m like ah wait! And I got off and see her hopping on the collective right behind us. Que verguenza. So then I run to get on the other one and the driver was like, ha did you lose your lil friend? So embarrassing lol. And then later we almost got attacked by a big dog. I don’t know if I’ve ever told you that there are dogs EVERYWHERE! It’s hilarious and sad because they’re all about ready to die because they just eat whatever they can find. Anyways there were these dogs barking at us so we told them to stop and then all of a sudden we hear this dog running up behind us barking its head off and I just grabbed on Hna Case’s arm because I was so scared! But then we got away. Oh Paraguay! And then one day we had planned out our day and we’re going to our citas and everything and we had an appointment for this guy named Antolin for 5:00 but we ended up doing it a lot earlier in the day…anyways we went to pick up Victor because he was going to come and help us and we were waiting at his house for him to get home from work and this kid came in the gate. And we were like who is that? And we figured he was just passing through the backyard because people do that all the time, but then he came back to the front. So we asked him who he was and apparently he’s Justino’s nephew. So we’re like sweet and we were just sitting there, so I was like well we should probably just teach him while we’re waiting. Ha so we started singing and then start the lesson and Hna Case was like look at your schedule. And it was right around 5:00 and turns out that kid’s name was Antolin. Ha crazy! We were like apparently the Lord knew we were supposed to see you today! And then he came to church yesterday too! Oh how the Lord blesses us when we’re following our plans. Awesome. And also we saw this cute lil old lady a couple of weeks ago and I kept feeling like I should talk to her, but I didn’t. Fail, I know. But I just kept thinking about her and then somebody told us she was looking for us and wanted to talk to us. So we ended up finding her house a couple days ago and just stopped by and invited her to church and gave her a pamphlet because we had other citas, and then later we walked by again and it was so cute because she was just sitting out on her lil chair reading it. So we’re gonna see her tomorrow! She’s just the cutest little thing and I’m excited to start teaching her! Ok and I don’t have time to write Angela and Alisa back today, but they can wait  But I LOVED the pictures and I’m almost done reading Angela’s blogs! And I like that it’s going to email them straight to me. Perfect. And Alisa asked me about building up the kingdom of God..and I didn’t have very much time to think about it, but I had a couple ideas. I liked the ideas about the envelopes, but maybe you could even have them start thinking about their testimonies and helping them realized that first we need to build up our own ‘kingdoms’ because we are each daughters of a King, entonces we are all princesses of a loving Heavenly Father. As we begin to realize our own individual worth and understand our relationship with God we will have a greater desire to serve others. And then you could have them write a letter to the Lord. Tell them to write Him what they are willing to do for Him and what kinds of things they will give up to serve Him better. Help them realize that our testimonies of Jesus Christ and the gospel should be the foundation of our lives (Hel. 5:12) and that is the foundation that will help build the Kingdom of God. We can build up his kingdom by serving him, by being an example. We will show the Lord that we love Him through our actions. As people begin to see the love they have for the Lord through their example they will want to know Him(the Lord) because they know them. That probably didn’t make any sense, but it made sense in my head. Lol Ahh I gotta go! I love yall so much! Thanks for all the letters this week. Loved them! Have a great week! Pray for me so I can do the things I need to do to serve these people. Love, Hermanita Nelson

Felicidades!‏

2010-01-04T10:23:00.001-08:00

Hola familia y amigos! Happy New Year!!! Ok can you believe that I will not step foot in the United States at all in 2010?! LOCO! Ha that's so crazy and I was thinking about that and then I thought man, I`m going to be talking about the year 2010 for the rest of my life! So I`ve been thinking a lot about what I am going to do to become that missionary I want to be and that God wants me to be. And let`s be honest the mission is hard. I don`t know exactly what I was expecting ha but it`s awesome. And I`ve just been thinking, you just gotta love it. You have to love the work, and love the people and love everything y despues you`ll be successful. ¿Verdad? We had some really cool experiences with finding people this week and teaching them and it was just fun. I love feeling the Spirit so strong and feeling God`s love for these people. A veces it`s hard because the people just straight up lie. But here`s what I decided. I know I`m in Paraguay for a reason. I know God called me here because there are people that I can help. I don`t want to have to pull people by the teeth in order to get them to come to church or baptize people when they don`t really understand what it means. To be baptized is a big deal! They are entering a covenant with God. I want to see these people after this life, I want to meet them at the tree. And I think a lot of it has to do with us as missionaries. Are we teaching them everything they need to know? Are they feeling the Spirit during each lesson and building a relationship with their Heavenly Father? I just know that there are people out there waiting and ready to hear and that just really motivates me to work harder and give it all I can. I love my companion. She is a guapa. And we decided that this week we are going to work harder than we ever have and I´m so excited. Ha sometimes it's hard when it's really hot outside and you`ve just eaten a thanksgiving feast for lunch but I know the Lord can bless me with the energy I need when I show him that I really want to serve Him. This work is awesome. Ha we`re gonna figure this out, and then we`re just going to take off. Watch out! The gospel is so true! And man have I told you how much I LOVE companion study? I think it's so awesome that Ty's studying with his friends because it will help so much. Ha and I should probably apologize because I was never really that big of a fan of family scripture study and always whined about it, but now oh man! I love reading the scriptures and just talking about them and hearing different opinions and how so many people can interpret one scripture so differently. It's so cool! So I can encourage yall to make family scripture study more effective, just become excited about the scriptures and just talk about each verse! Ah love it! Ha man it must be hard to be a parent. Because all you're trying to do is raise your kids in the right ways and hope they catch on. Ha and now I finally figured it out! Ha it only took 21 years. But thanks! Thanks for being the parents that raised us in the gospel and did family scripture study and prayer even when we didn't want to. Wow what a difference the LITTLE THINGS make! President Wade talked to us about that...be obedient to the little things and that makes the difference. It's so true. A couple things that we talked about in comp study that I want to share. We talked about the 'word of God' and that the word of God is found in the scriptures. And Hermana Case compared it to instruction manuals...in most everything you buy it comes with instructions or directions on how to use the product to be successful..even pop tart boxes come with directions. Anyways, we talked about how the scriptures are our instructions on how to receive eternal life. The word of God, the word of the prophets. And then I went through the scriptures and found different descriptions on how they described the word of God. I don`t have the list with me, but it was huge and it was so interesting on all the different descriptions. Do that too! And then I found a scripture that I really liked! 3 Nephi 28:20 ha read the whole chapter it's good and funny actually..it says 'they did smite the earth with the WORD OF GOD' and I was like YEAH.. that sounds good. I like that. That's what I want to do. Smite the earth. Ha love it. So don't even worry about me, I'll just be smiting the earth with the word of God. Aver so man who knew that I loved mangos so much. There are mango trees EVERYWHERE. Ha and can I just tell you that I love that I'm in a mission that when you ask people for directions they say 'you just past the fence and go for a while and it's just right by the big mango tree' ha hilarious. Because they only have street signs in the chu chi areas..which I am not in. So I'm all about picking fruit off of trees and eating it..and off the street for that manner. I've had so many mangos and manzanitas (these lil lil apples) and also coconut...different than I thought it would be...there are coconut trees and they're just in these balls and you crack them open with a rock and then you just eat them..it doesn't taste like coconut, it tastes like walnuts. Ok and so apparently tengo un bigote, look that up because it's embarrassing. haha so they put steroids in the food or something I don't even know and yeah wakala. And remind me to tell you all my experiences with bathrooms after the mission because wow...I think it beats camping. I love this mission. How awesome that I'm here. And a couple cool experiences from this week. So Hermana Case met this lady her first day with Hna Tsosie, so like two or 3 months ago and she met her in a jammed pack collectivo and gave her a pamphlet and told her a lil bit about the church and gave her our number. Well they never saw her or anything and then a couple weeks ago she called like out of the blue and said she saw us with her son and that they wanted us to come by. So we set up a time to see them like 3 or 4 different times and it never worked out. And then it just so happened that we had to go to the store and buy something..a store that we never go to..and then we had to wait for a collective in a spot that we never wait at..and then after about 20 min of waiting we decided to go even further to a spot where we have never waited and were randomly standing in the middle of the intersection trying to decide which collectivo to take and then there's this lady that starts talking to us and asks if we're the missionaries..anyways turns out she was Fatima (the lady) ha what the random, right? Such a miracle...and we saw her the other day ha and she's a guapa. She works all the time and hasn't been able to come to church, but the Lord will bless her and she'll be able to come. Wow the Lord really does help us and apparently we were supposed to teach her because the Lord just kept puting her in our path. Ha ok I have no more time! But thanks for all the emails!!! Alena and Ty it is about time! Keep them coming! I love hearing what's going on! And Ty that's so awesome that you went through the temple, I want to hear all about it! And Alena...omg I legitimately almost peed my pants when I read your 'funny story' I was reading it on a collectivo and everyone was looking at me like I was crazy because I was laughing so hard...ha but let's be honest it sounded legit. And Alena thanks for the pictures...yall are all such hotties! And thank you grandma for always writing...your temple experience must have been really special! Let's work on getting everyone in the family there! The gospel is so true! Have a great week! Enjoy the new year!! Love, Hermanita Nelson

Hola and Happy New Year!

2009-12-28T13:02:00.000-08:00

Hola familia y amigos!!! I hope everyone had an amazing Christmas!!! It was so fun to talk to yall and hear your cute voices! And thank you to Alisa for finally writing me!!!! And to grandma and mom and dad! Unfortunately, Ty, Alena, and Angela did not get the memo…so yall better work on that real fast  K bueno! So I have no time again! Yikes! But ready for what it´s like in Paraguay at Christmas time?! Ha oh Paraguay..first we had to be in our house at 7 because after that it gets a lil crazy and they just celebrate with a MILLION LOUD FIREWORKS..it´s insane and then they turn their music up really loud. Ha it´s awesome. Oh and the other night there was a really bad thunderstorm at like 3 in the morning and I felt like we were going to die. It was like banging out bathroom door shut because there´s a lil window that´s open in there and the thunder and lightning was so so cool! I love thunderstorms. But Paraguayans hate the rain.Literally . They use it as an excuse for everything…like not coming to church. No bueno. Our numbers were really low this week but I´m so excited to get to work this next week and get all our numbers up again because last week was crazy with everything! Oh which reminds me Dec. 24th was my one month anniversary in Paraguay and Hna. Case´s one year! And we celebrated it with a wedding and a baptism! So awesome! What an awesome present! And whoever said baptizing in South America was easy was wrong… that is if you want legit converts. I love teaching these people about the gospel but I want to see the conversion process take place like it did with Emilio, Victor, and Gustavo and his family. I want them to love the gospel and understand what it means! Hna Case and I had a really good conversation about the gospel last night and how powerful and amazing it is. The last days are coming. And we are here in Paraguay in the last days with the calling to teach these people the word of God. Ah it´s such a great calling and what an amazing message we have been called to share. I really feel so so so blessed to be able to serve a mission. How awesome that all I have to do for a year and a half is share the message of eternal families, of the plan of salvation, of the restoration of Christ´s gospel on the earth again. How awesome that my relationship with God is growing stronger and stronger everyday and that I have the Spirit with me all the time! Yeah sometimes it is REALLY hot outside and the food is not my favorite..but I am in Paraguay! What in the world?! Ha it still blows my mind sometimes. What an amazing calling..to be a missionary. I love it. I love the gospel and I know that it´s true and knowing that just motivates me to learn Spanish because I want to be able to communicate with these people and tell them how the gospel has changed my life and has changed me and how infinite the Atonement is and how amazing prayer is…how amazing it is that we can have a PERSONAL relationship with God! Our creator, our Father. Wow..blows my mind! The Book of Mormon is true and it changes lives. I love it! I´m so stoked for 2010 and just a chance to make new goals and start afresh! Just a few funny things… Ok in Paraguay they eat MAYONAISE with EVERYTHING! Ha it is sick! I remember Karina..the girl I worked with from Boys and Girls Club in AF who is from Brazil used to do that..and I was like you are so gross! Ha but they really do use it on everything..yikes. And everyone here thinks it is hilarious that my last name is Nelson. Ha I never thought I would have a problem with my last name…but they think it is so funny and everyone tells me that I have the name of a man. And I´m like oh for the love it´s my apellido (last name) ha and they still look at me funny! Oh and we sing before we teach everyone..so that is a lot of times in one day and the best part is that the people NEVER sing with us, so it´s me and Hna. Case singing a duet…I just thought yall would appreciate that because you know how beautiful my voice is! Ha yeah no. And the bathrooms here..oh dear the bathrooms…first of all about 98% of the people we teach don´t really have bathrooms..they’re just lil outhouses that they have in their backyards…camping?! But all the other bathrooms you don’t flush your toilet paper! Haha yeah…the smells…yikes. Ok and yall are going to all appreciate this…remember how I said I´m gaining wait…I totally BROKE A CHAIR! Haha how embarrassing. We were sitting there waiting for a collectivo and I was on this lil crate thing and I was like oh man this feels like it´s about to break so I go to stand up and I totally fall right through it! Haha and then I go to stand up and it was stuck to my butt! Oh dear!!! Anyways I have no more time! But thank you Alisa and Skyler for your email and ADORABLE pictures! Loved them! And Happy Birthday Kylee!!!! That´s so fun that everyone will be there! Tell them all hi and give them all kisses and take pics and send them in the package  And tell the Bachelor´s, Berry´s, Dave, Keri, Chels (FINALLY), thanks for writing me! I´ll try to write them next week!! And also Becky Goodwin…I loved your email! You are amazing and you better keep them coming..and I want to know the whole story about you are your husband and all the craziness and how yall finally ended up together! I hope everyone has an AMAZING NEW YEARS! Wow 2010. Live it up! Love yall! Love, Hermanita Nelson

Feliz Navidad!!

2009-12-24T06:13:00.000-08:00

Hola!!! Ok I have no time to write because we had a Christmas party this morning with our zone and watched Ice Age which would have been so cool if I knew Spanish lol but it was still fun and we had pizza..which was not really pizza. Lol oh man I have so many stories!!! First off, I am really sad because Emilio did not get baptized last week and he is not going to be for awhile because he is leaving for Christmas with his family! His mom said she wanted him to wait because this was such a big decisión. But I know he will get baptized so it is all good. Second off, I almost died this week! Literally died. I have never been so sick in my life! Ha it was hilarious…I don’t even know what I had but apparently I had a really high fever and I was talking to myself and throwing up everything I’ve ever eaten in my life! It was great. But I figure now I should be immune to anything else I eat so I’m all good! Oh and mom I want you to email me a copy of the Christmas letter! So here I am in Paraguay and it’s Christmas time but I feel like it’s the middle of the summer. Ha it’s super hot here right now and I sweat like nobody’s business…hopefully sweating off all the pounds that I eat during the day! There are a couple houses that have Christmas lights up and about half the people have trees..and when I say they have trees I mean they have those lil tiny trees. It’s awesome. And we have a tree too! It’s so cute, we bought it and decorated it and then Hna. Case’s mom sent us one too! And so all the cute lil wrapped presents you gave me are sitting under our cute lil tree! Oh and that’s so awesome that I know Hna. Case’s cousin, Chantelle! And tell her thanks for her dearelder! I remember her telling me that her cousin was in this misión and that her name was Amanda too! But I totally forgot about it until she said something! My comp is so awesome. Seriously I have been so blessed with companions! She is such a hard worker and it’s so awesome because she makes me work hard…like we never take breaks; we just walk and walk and walk which is so good for me because a lot of other companionships take breaks but I so want to be in the habit of just working hard all day! But we still have fun and she’s so cute! I love it! I don’t have any time to describe our cool investigators BUT right now we have 6 BAPTISMS planned for this week!!! What an amazing Christmas present to our Savior! I’m so excited for all of them! And their planned for before Christmas so I’ll be able to tell you about them on Friday. Pray for them!! I don’t think I’ve ever describe what Sunday mornings are like so I’m going to tell you real fast! Ha so first you leave the house way earlier than normal..like 6:30- 6:45ish and you go and find all the people you’ve talked to during the week that you’ve invited to church and if you’re lucky they’ll come with you..the thing is our area is HUGE so I don’t even know how many miles we walk in that hour and half we have before the collectivo comes to pick them up around 8ish! It is absolutely insane and by the time we get to church I am soaking wet in my own sweat. Ha oh the misión! But we only had 6 people yesterday which was sad because we were supposed to have a lot more than that. Next week! Oh and I was thinking since you said our ward has been talking a lot about missionaries lately they probably need to Start sending us PACKAGES! Tyler agrees! And they should probably put really good food in there because Paraguay does not have really good food lol. Just throwing that out there..:) And did Ty find a job at a mexican restaraunt yet? Haha and last thing before I leave…I don’t understand how I have been in Paraguay for a MONTH and have not received a single letter from any of my siblings!!! Just throwing that out there too. And I got Emily’s email and dearelder. Gracias!! And just tell her to just always send me emails because it takes about 2 or 3 weeks to get a dearelder. But I’m writing her a letter back today because I don’t have time toe mail her! Love,Hermanita Nelson

Hola!!

2009-12-16T21:04:00.000-08:00

Ok so Emilio get´s baptized this weekend! Ah my heart is so happy! We were at his house a couple days ago and I was asking if he had talked to his mom about being baptized (which he hasn´t, I think he´s kinda scared because all of his family is Catholic) but he was telling us that he´s always tried to put God first in his life and he can´t deny the feelings that he felt and that he was going to get baptized no matter what. And a couple days before that he said his doubt with Joseph Smith just kept coming back and back and I was like, remember when we watched the movie and do you remember what you said after the movie? And he was like yeah, but... ha and I was like yeah, but NOTHING. I was like that was the Holy Ghost bearing witness to you of the truth (he´s shaking his head in agreement) and when God speaks to you, YOU LISTEN! ha hopefully I got the point across. I can´t wait to see him in white and hopefully I´ll be able to go through the temple with him in a year! He is so going places; he has so much potential! Ah the gospel is so true! And that´s the thing...this baptism is just setting the bar for the rest of the baptisms I´m going to have. Because there´s this problem in Paraguay where people just get baptized so they can feel good and to feel like they have religion in their life, but they don´t really understand the importance of baptism. It´s a COVENANT you´re making with God!! And a lot of missionaries were telling me that about a 1/3 or more of their baptisms are inactive now. NOT OK. I don´t want that. There are so many people in our ward who are inactive because they went to church 3 times and got baptized and then never came again. I want people like Emilio. People who really go through the conversion process and develop their own testimony of the church and understand how important baptism and the gospel is! I´m excited! I´m gonna be bold and declare testimony and change lives! How exciting, right?!

And right now we have two studs that we´re teaching and their following the Emilio path, which is so exciting! We have Victor, who is such a goof! I love the kid! I think he´s 17...I don´t know what planet this kid came from. He is always smiling and laughing, I love it! Ha and he always makes fun of my Spanish and how he can´t ever understand me, but he speaks Guarani half the time so I really can´t understand him! But he´s just a good kid who wants to change his life. And that´s the thing, he´s like Emilio..like we can trust him. If he says he´s going to church, then he comes to church. If he doesn´t do his reading, he will tell us honestly that he fell asleep while reading or whatever. Oh and he´s living with his uncle in their car. We came by to get him for the first time last Sunday and he came out of the car (from where he sleeps) and had this corny lil smile on his face and was ready to go. And yesterday he told us that he told his family about the church (and they live pretty far away) and they said they wanted to come. Ha he´s just a stud and he´s ready for the gospel and ready for the changes!

And then we have Christian who is also a stud. We met him a couple weeks ago when we were visiting a ward member and he was just sitting there in the background so I invited him to church and he said yeah he would come. And it was weird because he said yes and I actually believed him too. And then the next day he was there! He´s 16(seems a lot older) he´s been through A LOT in his life. Both his parents are in jail and his younger sister is taking care of all their younger siblings right now-and they live very far away. And right now he´s living with his real dad and their family. His step mom Christina was the one we were visiting with and she is so great! She faithfully comes to church every week and loves the Lord. Her husband (and his dad) is a drunk...even though he was baptized too (that´s what I meant when I said I wanted legit converts). So Christian is one that just is so ready for the truth too. He said he had been invited to church a lot before but he could never come because he always had to work but now he could come. Every time we teach him he just accepts everything and agrees with it and adds his two cents. He´s such a stud. And he wants to be baptized! BUT..remember his drunk dad...yeah his drunk dad freaked out at us the other night and told us that there was no way he was giving his son permission to get baptized and started trash talking the people in the church. So Hna Case was like well sometimes we just have to remember that the church is perfect but the people aren´t. And he was like yeah I know the book of mormon is true but there´s no way I´m letting my son into that church. Yeah apparently he never had a true conversion! Oh and then his dad said he was sending Christian back to where he was from (which is way far away) and so all weekend we were so sad because he wasn´t here anymore. And then yesterday morning we were going to the collectivo (bus) spot and there he was! Ahh and then we felt so bad because we hadn´t even invited him to come to church or anything but HE WAS THERE! All on his own..stud, right?! And last night he was like why do I have to have my dad´s permission to get baptized, I just want to get baptized. So we´re going to try and talk to his dad when he´s not drunk! Oh the mission! Oh and yesterday before church...we have a collectivo that comes by and picks everyone up to go to church for free..but it never showed up! Ha so Hna Case and I had to pay for everyone to go to church..yikes! Oh the experiences! Another reason why you need to come pick me up, so you can ride on collectivos with me!! :)

Oh and we had Zone Conference this week which was amazing! And then we had interviews with President Wade..love the Wade´s! And I asked him what I could to become a better missionary, so that I could be the best missionary I could be and always remember my mission and remember that I did everything I could do to serve the people and to serve God...and he said Be obedient (with exactness...and be obedient to all the little things..even though they seem small, they will make a difference!) , Work hard (give it your all!), and lastly have fun!!! He was like if you´re not having fun, you´re not doing something right! ha I was like ohh I like that. Ahh and Hermana Wade makes the best banana bread! One of my favorite foods in Paraguay along with cokitos (dried bread or something), popcorn!! Ahhh I love popcorn all of a sudden! And lomitos!!! Oh my goodness so good! They´re kinda like burritos but not at all, but like the closest thing they have to mexican food here and you can really only get good ones in Asuncion and we´re here today because Hna Case needed new shoes. And then EMPANADAS! With meat! Yummy! Another reason you need to come :) Oh and Elder Curtis says hi...I saw him at the zone conference and we had a nice lil chat! He´s changed so much! I love it! I just love studs. And Ty´s about to be such a stud missionary! Ah so excited for him!

Oh and I got Keri´s dearelder..gracias gracias! And you can tell people they can email me, it just has to be through you and I can email them back through you too.. I can´t wait to talk to yall again in a couple weeks!! Love yall so much and thanks for everything! And yall better start sending me more emails! ( I haven´t gotten anything from any of my siblings..what is this?!) Have a great week! Remember the gospel is so true and it changes lives!!

Love,
Hermanita Nelson

Hola from Paraguay!

2009-12-07T12:55:00.000-08:00

This week has been so amazing! The gospel is so true! So I found out what it´s like to be in a thunderstorm in Paraguay..ha I love it! They have awesome thunder and lightning storms and it rains like crazy!!! But this past week we saw a double rainbow!!! So awesome right! I was like man something good is going to happen…and it did!!! So remember Emilio…ok he´s such a stud; one day yall are going to meet him! But we wanted to watch the Joseph Smith movie with him to help resolve his doubts and so we went on Wed. and his dvd player wouldn´t read it! So we came back the next day and he borrowed his friends and it worked! And we were watching it and it came to the first vision part and of course it´s scratched! We were like you´ve got to be kidding me! So we´re both praying like crazy and then it starts working again (few!) and then a lil while later someone starts clapping outside (ha another one of my favourite things in Paraguay..you don´t knock on doors you clap outside!!! It´s so funny!) so he paused it and then came back in and we watched the rest of the movie with a few more random scratches in the dvd (which is funny because we watched it again yesterday with a family and it worked perfectly! Satan is really working on him!) So after we just sat there and of course I was crying and holy cow, the Spirit was so strong! I literally felt like my chest was going to burst out!!! I couldn´t even breathe (and we know I already have a breathing problem lol) But then Hna Case shared her testimony with him and then it was my turn and I was like how in the world am I going to communicate with him what I want to say in Spanish?!!! And my head was just full of questions and thanks. Wow Joseph Smith suffered so much to bring to pass the restoration of the gospel and it´s thanks to him that we have the Book of Mormon, the most correct book in the world. And I was just overcome with gratitude and a feeling like, wow this is why I´m here. This is why I´m in Paraguay to share this true message with these people. And that´s what I told him with tears in my eyes; I said, ¨¨ Emilio, this is why I´m here, this is why I left my friends and family for a year a half to find people like you. The Lord loves you so much and I know that he wanted us to find you. I know that the gospel is true and that Joseph Smith is a prophet of God. I am so excited for you because I know how much this will bless your life! And I know it won´t be easy and I know a lot of the times it will be hard, because sometimes people think we´re a little weird lol, but it´s so true so it doesn´t even matter. I´m so excited for you because I know this will bless your future family and your family right now.¨ And I was just praying that he would feel just a portion of the Spirit I was to know that it was true. And then we asked if we could pray. So we all got on our knees and he prayed and about half way through the prayer somebody knocked outside again!!! But he didn’t get up, he kept praying. And yes I was so crying during his prayer! And then after he came back into the room, I asked him how he felt and he said good. And then I asked him how he felt about Joseph Smith and he said, ¨¨I know that Joseph Smith was a prophet and that he restored Christ´s gospel to the earth and that we need a prophet on the earth today.¨ Ha I looked at Hna Case and I was like did he just say what I think he just said?! And she said yes. Oh my, I have never felt like that in my life… I was just sooo happy. So a long story short he is getting baptized Dec 18th!!! Thanks so much for your prayers! This work is so great! And then to make the week even better we finished it off with 9 people at church!!! I was so thankful!!! Last week we had 5 but only 2 were really from us and this week 8 of the 9 were from us! I know the Lord blesses us when we´re obedient. That was our goal last week to bring 8 people to church (because 8 is the minimum goal of people we´re supposed to have set by Pres.) and it happened! I know the Lord helps us and brings us success when we are obedient!!! Ha who would´ve thought I would have ever been excited about being obedient..ha I´m already turning weird! Love it!!! Ok I have no time but a couple other things…the two other things I forgot last week that makes a successful Paraguayan missionary is getting lice and biffing it (biffing it HARD) ha yikes! And a couple other things I love about Paraguay…everyone says a Dios when they see eachother ( meaning ´to God´) ha it´s so cool! And everyone BLARES their music..it´s hilarious. It is SO LOUD! And it´s so funny because most of it is American music!!! They can´t even understand it! And there are butterflies everywhere!! Love it! And now for a couple things I need (ha or want) some kind of energy pills because the sun kills all my energy and so does all the food they make you eat! And then some chocolate candy  And cookie mix ( the Betty Crocker 20 min kind)! Beautiful!! Perfect! K I love yall so much and can´t wait to talk to you this weekend and find out where Ty´s going!!! Woot woot! The gospel is true, live it! Love, Hermanita Nelson

First Week In Paraguay

2009-11-30T13:42:00.000-08:00

Ha estoy en Paraguay!!! Can you believe it?! Wow ok..where do I start?? My area is Maramure which is in Luque. Ah and I finally found out who my compañera is! Hermana Case…she is so cute! She´s actually from Provo and she hits her year mark on Dec. 24th. I already love her and we are going to tear it up and have a white Christmas! Oh and my second day here I saw Tyler!! And he says hi to everyone. He is now the AP and probably will be for the rest of his mission. What a stud. It was fun to see him! Oh my goodness..so we packed our stuff in the taxi and left for our area (it´s probably like 30 min. outside of Asuncion) and when we were getting ready to leave to go work, I realized I forgot one of my suitcases! Ha I would do that lol. So I still haven´t gotten it back yet…hopefully tomorrow! Lol it has a lot of my study stuff in it. But it´s all good. Ok are you ready for a description of mi vida in Paraguay?! Haha it´s awesome! There are chickens and roosters and cows EVERYWHERE! It´s hilarious..they just roam everywhere..and then there are occasional pigs and goats. Oh and they have their horses and wagons if they don´t have cars and a lot of people just don´t have any transportation..so they´ve got buses! Oh man..that is an experience!! We ride a bus at least twice a day (to and from our area) and everyone just gets packed in the buses and the drivers are insane! Mom you would die. Haha you like step in the bus or out of the bus and before you get your other foot off or on they´re already driving away. It´s so fun!  Let´s see..yeah my feet are probably going to fall off because the roads are crazy..I´m so excited to take pictures and send them to yall! They don´t really believe in trash cans so the road is covered and there will be like shoes and soda cans buried in the rubble. It´s great. The sunsets are gorgeous!! And the people, oh my gosh the people are so AWESOME! They laugh at me every time I speak in Spanish..I think it´s hilarious. And I just laugh with them. The kids are so awesome, too! They make me so happy. They get so excited everytime they see you and they totally look like little Lamanitic children. The big problem in Paraguay I think is probably that they are just so chill, so when you invite them to be baptized, they´re just like sure, ¿por que no? But I don´t think they really understand what that means because after they get baptized a lot of them don´t even go to church anymore. Ha and they are such big fat liars…it´s hilarious! All these people told us they were coming to church and only 5 did! I need advice people!!! What kinds of things can I do to help them actually desire for themselves to do these things? I´d love to hear what yall think! Aver… oh my first day we were teaching this family (oh by the way you teach maybe 2 or 3 lessons a week inside somebody´s house)! Let me paint the scene for what it usually looks like; you go to their house and clap in the front and then the little kids come running up and invite you in (when I say in, I mean into the yard); and then they go and gather chairs! Ha I love the chairs because they´re all so old and cute! And man they are so polite and nice and offer you the best chairs and everything. Ok so back to the family; we sit down and this was my first lesson with kids and we sing ´I am a Child of God´ and it was so peaceful and there was a nice breeze and I almost just started bawling!!! It was just so tender and I was just looking at this family and their humble situation and I just fell in love! It was so cool! We´re teaching this kid named Emilio and he´s definitely the closest to being baptized. Man, he is such a stud!!! He´s 19 and he would just make such a good missionary! He´s having a lot of doubts about Joseph Smith, but he is like a golden investigator (meaning he really wants to know and learn and he´s reading the Book of Mormon by himself and has kept all the commitments). He said his friends told them if he got baptized they wouldn´t be his friends anymore and wouldn´t go to his baptism or anything. For him, he would have to sacrifice a lot. But man, this gospel is so true! And I just know he´s going to get it! I can see it in his eyes. And I just know that Satan is working on him because when Emilio is baptized he is going to make one amazing member of the church. Paraguay needs more people like him! I´m so excited for him! Ha oh I forgot to tell you about the food…oh man! Speaking of food, how was Thanksgiving?!!! Tell me everything! Ok so we usually get fed by members once a day and when I say fed I mean they top your plate with a ridiculous amount of food…think of how much you ate for Thanksgiving..yeah they put that much on your plate for lunch! Ha and that´s just for round one! Everyone keeps telling me my stomach is just going to grow because of how much you eat…and yeah you definitely don´t say no. You eat it all with a smile on your face even if you feel like you´re going to barf! And then when your done they look at you and smile and say do you want more and politely say no and then they smile again and add another huge amount of food on your plate!!! I wish I was exaggerating..but I´m dead serious. It´s hilarious. Yes, I´m going to gain weight! Yikes! And yes we walk A TON and yes it is a MILLION DEGREES outside. I sweat like you wouldn´t believe…ha it´s awesome. It´s definitely hard but I know that I´m supposed to be here and I love serving these people. Oh and everytime I show our family picture to them (the one we took when yall dropped me off at the MTC) they always think dad looks so young and that Alena is like 19. And then once they realize who I am in the picture they´re shocked lol because I look so different now! But they think I´m beautiful and I´ve never been whistled at so much in my life lol and they call me a Barbie..I´m gonna miss that when I go back to the states haha. Ok and one last thing that I learned yesterday. There are 5 things that make a successful missionary in Paraguay. 1. Being bit by a dog 2. Getting picque 3. Getting robbed …ok I can´t remember the rest lol..I´ll send those next week  Oh and yesterday we had church. It was great! We meet in the stake center and it´s really nice. I bore my testimony in Sacrament meeting (at least tried to in my best Spanish) and then Hna Case and I had to teach the gospel doctrine class (I guess that happens a lot because the teachers just don´t show up) ha that was fun…she taught most of it and I just shard a couple scriptures and stuff. They are really patient with me and my Spanish; it´s great. I don´t know how I´ll ever learn Spanish but I know I will so it´s all good! Ok my time is up! Love yall all so much!!! Have a great week and pray for me and the people of Paraguay!!! Oh and if you haven´t sent me a box yet please include a spray fan!!!! And also ped socks (but not the ones with the padding…just the regular black ones that come to the middle of your foot more in the front!) Gracias!Love, Hermanita Nelson

estoy en Paraguay!!!

2009-11-25T06:04:00.000-08:00

ha i cant do any of the right symbols or capitalizations but im in paraguay!!! oh my goodness it is so beautiful! im already in love with it. ha its super humid pero esta bein. i love it. its so green and there are beautiful sunsets. sorry i couldnt call again but i had no money on my card. triste. but pdays are on mondays so thats when i can email yall! be excited. we find out who are companions are tomorrow and where we are going! we got in tonight and came to the wades house and ate dinner. love the food. love the wades. and now i have to go. a lot more details next week. love yall mucho! love,hermanita nelson

A Few MTC Pictures

2009-11-25T05:59:00.000-08:00

Here are the last pictures Amanda sent us from the MTC. Sorry I didn't get these posted sooner.

Last Week In the MTC- 4 Days Until Paraguay!!!

2009-11-19T16:36:00.000-08:00

Hola!!! Can you beleive the time has finally come for me to head off to Paraguay!!! Woot woot! It's about time! I am SO READY! Oh and just real fast call Emily and tell her she has to send the package tomorrow and make sure that I'll get it by Saturday or else I won't get it!!! Oh and tell Bobby, Kimmy, Lauren, and Keri HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!! Oh and also I think you can send me DearElders in Paraguay for free..or that's what I've heard..so you should all probably definitely take advantage of that :) And I got Angela's packet!!! Omg LOVED IT! I loved the pictures!! Gracias!! And I got yalls too!! Thanks for the cookies!! Love them!! And cards and Christmas presents! Ah I just love packages :) And tell Sister Andersen thanks for her cuteness! Oh and send me everyone's phone numbers so I can call all yall...or tell me what the plan is. Are yall all going to be home or what?! If not send me Angela's, Alisa's, and Dad's. Ok and guess what?!! Our progressive investigator, Gabriel got baptized last Saturday!! haha it was sooo cool! It made me super excited. And it was cool because it was one of the teachers in our zone and he actually served in Paraguay so he was acting like a Paraguayan! Love it! Anyways oh my goodness! Can you believe I will be in Paraguay in 5 days!!! Ha I still can't! I'm so excited!!! Life is so good. I have been so blessed! It's going to be sad leaving the resort but shoot now I'm going to the celestial resort. RIght?! Well it's about to come that way anyways. I don't know a lick of Spanish but it will come! Ha it's going to be sooo cool! My life is going to be so different next week, I can't wait. I can't wait to be humbled..again lol. A mission is the best thing in the world! So we watched a fireside by Elder Bednar and he said, "Become a missonary, do not merely go on a mission." I love that. Become a missionary. And then he said, "when it's time to leave the mission-return to your home but do not leave the mission field" ha that is so going to be me!!! I had a revelation this week...I now want to come home weird! haha but I'm serious! How can you come home after serving the Lord with all your heart, soul and energy and teaching with the Spirit everyday and then come back and not feel weird listening to certain music or watching certain movies, etc. I know for me it's going to be like..wait a second..I finally just got the hang of Spanish and teaching good and now I have to go home? What in the world?! Yeah I'm definitely going to be weird. But I'm excited!! I want to continue being a missionary my whole life!! Elder Oaks' wife was here for Relief Society on Sunday and she said, "When we come to understand the basics of our religion, we begin to understand ourselves" and then she said this, "this church is not just a nice way to live, it is the reason we live." Wow I love that. This gospel is the reason we live. We live for this gospel. Dad said, "for a year and a half you have nothing to worry about other than proclaiming Christ and his restored gospel." Am I blessed or what?! It doesn't get any better than that!!!Ok and guess what?! Sheri Dew came on Sunday night!!! Talk about AN AMAZING WOMAN! I don't even know what to say. I wish I could just send you my notes. Inspirational. She helped put things into such a clearer perspective for me. She talked a little bit about the Atonement. The Atonement is something that has always been so INCREDIBLE to me. Christ died for me. For me. For me and for you and for everyone! And why? In order for us to be able to become clean and return to our Heavenly Father. What hope. The Savior's Atonement is so personal. So personal. He knows us. He knows us individually. He knows our weaknesses and our stregnths. He knows the pain and hurt we feel. He knows when we're discouraged and frustrated or when we suffer from heartbreak or sorrow. He knows what it's like to feel devestated. But he also knows our joy. He knows the joy of a family. Of a baby. Of a rainbow. He knows what makes us happy. He knows how to bless. He knows how to HELP US. He is who we can turn to when the going gets rough. Because HE KNOWS. Oh what joy the sentence gives, I know that my Redeemer lives. I know that my Redeemer lives. And that is the message I will share for the remainder of my days. I truly stand all amazed at the love Jesus has for me. Presiding Bishop, Brother Edgley came Tuesday night and said something that really helped me. He said, "once we receive a calling from the Lord, the Lord qualifies us for the work." Ha I love it because I am so not qualified for this great work, but I know that the Lord will qualify me so I can share the message of the restored gospel with EVERYONE! Ha I can't wait to speak the limited Spanish I know and just bear testimony to EVERYONE! I'm SO EXCITED!! I love yall so so much! Keep the love coming! Next weeks email is going to be awesome! Ha what is it going to be like?! I don't even know. The anticipation is killing me! I'll be in Paraguay!! Ah I know I will just love it! I love yall and thanks so much for your testimonies. Please pray for the people of Paraguay and for my new companion! Ha she definitely needs your prayers..I would be tough ;) Have a great Thanksgiving and eat lots of pie for me because I won't have it for 16 months! Woot woot! Love yall :) Hermanita Nelson

10 more days!

2009-11-12T12:36:00.001-08:00

Hola!!! Can you beleive how fast time has flown by?!! I leave for Paraguay in 10 days!!!!! PARAGUAY..what in the world?! I am so blessed! This week wasn't super eventful but still an amazing week at the MTC! Have I ever told you that I love the MTC?! lol I'm so excited to go to Paraguay but I'm sad to leave behind all the amazing people I've met here! How am I ever going to be able to leave behind all of the amazing people I meet in Paraguay?!! I'm going to go back and visit for sure! I'm not exactly sure when I leave (WE GET OUR FLIGHT PLANS TODAY!!! SO STOKED) So I'll try to get back on later and email you what the deal is! But yeah Nov. 24 will be my first day in Paraguay and when Ty meets with the Bishop and Stake President; so cool!!! OMG STORY..so yesterday I hosted AGAIN :) And I got to host Heather (the girl I worked with..awesome!) but before she came I was sitting next to an hermana and out of nowhere she says omg that's my family (looking at a van that had just pulled up) apparently her brother was entering the MTC!!! ha so her family jumps out of the car and is like sprinting up to her to give her a hug and she's like no you can't come up here but they attack her with love anyways! ha it was so great! I almost cried lol. And then her cute lil brother that was entering the MTC came up to her and gave her this huge hug! Made me miss yall mucho! It was great! it would've been so fun to have Ty in the MTC at the same time, pero esta bien! Ahhh NICK!!!! Russia!!! What in the world?!! ha that is so awesome!! I'm so stoked for you!!! And Ty omg I can't wait to see where you go!! Maybe Paraguay, too! Definitely South America!!! Oh AND Sister Curtis said that changes are on the 24th(when I should get there) so Tyler might be in the mission home and I can see him my first day in Paraguay!! That would be so great! And maybe he'll be a trainer to one of the elders in my district! Love life! Oh man I'M GOING TO PARAGUAY! The mission hasn't really felt like it's started yet and I can't even imagine how exciting it will be to teach real people and help them come unto Christ! Wow, it'll be great! We taught lesson 2 in spanish for the first time and it actually went really well, words were just coming out of my mouth; it was awesome! Ha I feel like I don't even know any spanish but it's all good because I will work really hard so I can teach the people effectively! Ahh but in the meantime when I'm struggling I know the Spirit will help me and relay the message that I'm trying to say in spanish to their hearts and they will know the truth of what I'm trying to say! Fabulous! A couple good quotes: "This isn't about people joining a church, we don't care about numbers, this work is about reuniting people with their Heavenly Father." Ahh how blessed I am to be a part of this work, the salvation of souls! Wow! And I like this next quote because it puts things into perspective for me; "the real 'mists of darkness' (referring to 1 Nephi) come after the people are baptized. Don't be satisfied or led to believe that you have accomplished your purpose when you have not." I bet that is so true. Once their baptized doesn't mean they're going to stay active for the rest of their lives. It is ALL of our responsibility to help eachother stay close to God so that we can ALL return to live with Him again! One more, "when Christ is all you have, you realize He's all you need." Ahh me gusta. When you feel like there's no one else in the world who feels the way you do, it's ok because Christ knows exactly how you feel! The Atonement is so incredible to me and is very personal to me. It's so hard to comprehend what our Savior did for us. He died and suffered for us so that we can repent and become clean and return to our Lord.Love it! Oh and I'm sending home a memory card with lots and lots of great pictures! BE EXCITED! And I don't think yall got the memo because this week I received the least amount of letters during my whole stay at the MTC..so let me say it one more time :) I only have TEN DAYS LEFT!!! In other words, I better get A TON of letters and packages this week! Deal?! Perfect! Love yall so much!!! Thanks for your testimonies and examples! Love,Hermanita Nelson P.s. Mom Hna Galbraith's mom is going to add you on facebook so she can see all my pictures :) Love ya!

18 MORE DAYS!!!

2009-11-05T14:05:00.000-08:00

HOLA!!! How is everyone?! Y'all can you believe it...I only have 18 days left here in the MTC!!!! Loco!!! Ahh estoy muy animado ir a Paraguay!!! So that means I'm only in the states for another two weeks...which means I'm expecting A LOT of letters and packages before I leave the country :) Perfect! Ok and I hosted yesterday! It was fabulous! And just guess who I hosted..yes two hermanas from St. George! McKayla Belen who is going to Korea(she's a year older than me) and Whitney Tanner who is going to Kentucky! Ha it was sooo fun and crazy! I didn't even know they were coming while I was here! It was really exciting! So hopefully I helped make them feel comfortable! Ha love St. George. Oh and I found out I can call home from the airport if we have long delays..which I'm guessing we will! So that'll be like the 23rd I think but I'll give you more details later! And it's crazy because next Monday two districts leave (my favorite district is leaving :() and we'll be the oldest district! Ha I can't believe it! I remember thinking that the older districts were so smart and knew so much, lol and I don't feel that way at all! The Spanish is coming..I'm hoping to get a Native companion! I know that would be SO HARD but it would help me learn the language so much better! But amazing how the Lord blesses us with the gift of tongues..and I got my testimony and the baptismal commitment down in Spanish so I figure that will be good enough for now :) Oh and tell Sister Curtis I'm excited for her letter and that right now I'm kinda freaking out because the reality is starting to hit in that in two and half weeks I'll be in a country where they only speak spanish so I'm studying so hard! And ahh so first tell Nick I'm still waiting for a letter..and that I saw all his information on the computer because my teacher looked him up! And tell Heather Hennrich that her class is in the same building as mine and she'll be living in the same hall as me!! lol my teacher hooked us up! That's so crazy that Nick is getting his call right now! I'm so excited to hear where he is going! Ahhh and I can't beleive Ty will find out in a month!!! Love it!!! That's so so exciting!!! Oh and mom you can probably just have them ship the shoes here! Ha and I'm so excited Sister Dickerson came to see you! She's so amazing!!! Her and her husband just blow my mind! They are so fun! And if you want to send like the makeup and stuff up with her or if you buy the shoes by then you can send that up with her! Oh and send me a pair of jean shorts!!! I found out I could have them in Paraguay and it's going to be SO HOT AND HUMID when I get there in 18 days! WOOT WOOT! They don't even know what's coming..me! Of course this week was amazing! The MTC is the best! I'm kinda sad to leave but esta bien! Some good stuff I learned this week; first tell Ty and Nick that one of the most important sections in PMG is the BOM section and they told us that all Pre missionaries should read it and become familiar with it before they come to the MTC! And oh how I love focusing on the Book of Mormon! "Be a BOM missionary" Stay in the BOM always and share scriptures with the people as soon as possible! It can change lives! President Dickerson told me something that really really has helped me! He said, "two individuals can do anything, if one of them is the Lord." Ahh so true! There is no way I can do this work by myself and learn this language by myself! Man it can be challenging and there are definitely struggles but it's ok because the Lord will help you because this is His work and he wants you to succeed. Ahh it's so cool! I have been called of God...I never realized how powerful that was before. Think about that for a second. I am a representative of Jesus Christ. Wow. Blows my mind. What an amazing responsibility and opportunity! Sister Smith (Mission president's wife) said, What level of missionary will you become? Tellestial, terrestial, or celestial. Sacrifice your comforts to do the will of the Lord. If we could truly understand the Atonement we would recognize how important ONE soul is to our Father in Heaven and we would seek out EVERY wayward boy and girl and DO ALL WE COULD to help them prepare for eternal ordinances. Today in the temple I couldn't help but think..this is what I want the people of Paraguay to experience, this is what I want my whole family to be worthy of. How great are the blessings and ordinances of the temple! How amazing it is to know that we can live with our families FOREVER! What a great work we are doing to bring souls unto Christ! Sister Smith closed with, "choose to become the angel you have been foreordained to be." Is that beautiful or what?! I just wanted to cry lol. What a great statement. There is so much potential in all of us. The Lord expects great things from us. We are his children and it is us who can help bring his precious children back to his presence to live with him again. Love it! At the fireside on Sunday night we talked a lot about gratitude! "Start a new day with gratitude" "gratitude begats divine guidance" Say a prayer of only thanks today! We have been so blessed! Take some time and tell your Heavenly Father how thankful you are for what you have. We praise the Lord when we give him our thanks! And last thing! Tuesday devo. we talked about being BOLD! ha I love being bold :) Brother Rasband said, "be a bold finding missionary!" In PMG it says "nothing happens in missionary work, until you find someone to teach!" Ha then he said "go into your mission with fire in your bones!" he said "take the fire of the MTC with you and breathe new enthusiasm!" "One missionary can make a difference" ahhh 18 days people!!! And yes I feel like I am on fire! I can't wait to be in Paraguay! How blessed I am! I love yall all so much and I'm so thankful for all your amazing examples! Can't wait for all the letters and packages! Love, Hermania

From the Missionary Resort

2009-10-30T06:21:00.000-07:00

Hola!!! So here I am in the Missionary Resort, LOVING IT!!! So it snowed this past Tuesday, yikes! It's starting to get cold! And pops I can't believe you have pneumonia!!! I'm praying for you! And I love getting your letters so keep them coming :) Ok there's so much to talk about and no time! First, on Monday's we go to the RC (referral center) and call people that have called for church dvd's, or bibles, or BOM's...well I had such an AMAZING EXPERIENCE!! First off, I just love black people :) ha and you can totally tell your talking to one by the sound of their voice :) Well I was calling a Mr. Roberts to make sure he received his free Bible and he actually hadn't, but then I started telling him about the BOM and the truths that it holds, and he was like super interested and he was telling me he had been interested in all kinds of religions since he was little and he had all these different religion books. Anyways, I was like yeah have you ever wondered why there are so many religions in the world?! There's like a different church on every corner, but there's only one God, so shouldn't there only be one true church of God...and ha he actually disagreed with me but then I was like can I tell you a story? He said yes of course, and so I began to tell him about Joseph Smith and how he was really interested in religion too and he wanted to be where God wanted him to be and as he was searching for answers he came across James 1:5..so I read him that and then said, and if you were JS and you were looking for the true church and you had just read that vs. what would you do? And he said pray and ask my God..and I said exactly and that's what he did. And he recorded his experience (ha and then I was freaking out because I could only remember it in Spanish!!!) but then I found it and about my 5th word in to reciting the first vision I just felt the Spirit SO STRONG bearing testimony to me once again that Joseph Smith is a true prophet of God and of course I started crying and I was like oh no! He's not even going to be able to understand me! But he did and after I asked how he felt and he said he felt moved and good, and I said Mr. Roberts, that is the Spirit testifying truth to you. And he said yeah that sounds right. And he said he was really touched and he could tell how much it meant to me. And he's meeting with the missionaries in a couple weeks to learn more and I'm gonna try to call him back after and see how he's doing. Ahh it was sooo AMAZING! The Book of Mormon is just AMAZING. We had a huge discussion about it last night (and when ELDER PERRY CAME ON TUESDAY NIGHT..AMAZING, I KNOW)! but Hno. Dickerson went around the room and asked each of us, "If the Book of Mormon is true..." and we answered! If the BOM is true, then Joseph Smith had a vision and had the priestood conferred upon him, and the gospel of Christ was truly restored on the earth, and there really is a God who loves and cares about us individually, and I truly was called of God, and there is a prophet on the earth today, even Thomas S. Monson, and ON AND ON AND ON! The BOM is either true or it isn't, there is no middle ground. And I testify that it is the most correct of any book on earth, the keystone of our religion, and a man can get closer to God by abiding by its precepts, than by any other book; like Joseph Smith said. Ah pray for a confirmation yourself and ask yourself, "if the BOM is true then..." The list can go on and on! A couple other things that were inspiring. Hno Stone reminded us of something that I think we forget sometimes as missionaries. He said, "who signed that paper and who wrote their acceptance letter to be a missionary? Was it your mom, your dad, your Bishop? No, it was you. You are the one who said that you wanted to be here. Nobody else made that decision for you." It's so true! So I just want to suggest that Ty and Nick (and whoever else) make a copy of the letter of acceptance to be a missionary and bring it with them on their mission, so when the going gets rough they can turn to that and remember why they decided to come on a mission. And even write down right now why they want to come on a mission. You get that question all the time. Go because you want to go, because you want to serve your Savior and bring others unto Christ. If you're just going because it's expected of you, change that right now. Find that desire to serve! Because it's the best! But oh my goodness, it is SO HARD! A couple quotes... "The future is as bright as your faith" I love that! Tenga fe!!! "The Lord doesn't care what your abilities are, he just wants your heart, and when you give him your heart, he will make weak things become strong unto you. Sister Masumori (in the Primary Pres.) came to RS and spoke to us on Sunday and told us a story about how her and her husband were actually able to see their son on his mission because her husband went to NY a lot on business. Her son served in the Bronx and she said right before they were about to meet their son for lunch they almost got like shot because these gang members were about to do a drug exchange and they thought that her and husband were like from the gvt. or something..anyways she was like yeah that made me real comfortable as a mom having my son in an area like that, but when I saw him and his comp. turn the corner I literally saw a bubble surrounding them. "The Lord protects those who do his work." Future missionaries: You will be a great missionary if you 1. Have an eye single to the glory of God 2. Love your companion 3. Love the people and 4. Are obedient. Remember, "missionary work is a privilege, not a right". "Success breeds success" Elder L Tom Perry said "the first step to becoming a great teacher, is to first become a great student". Hno Stone said "the reason we find ourselves when we lose ourselves in because there's more of us to find..the more you give yourself, the more you find out about yourself..you become recharged and enlarged! LOVE IT!!! LOVE YALL!! LOVE THE WORK!!! I'll be sending out a letter tomorrow too with more info!!! Thanks for being amazing and such good examples! Stay close to the Lord! Alena and Ty..I'm expecting letters :) Love yall! Have a great week!! Oh and we taught in Spanish this week for the first time, more details later :)

Pictures from the MTC

2009-10-24T17:40:00.001-07:00

Here are some pictures we got today from Amanda at the MTC. There are more posted on her facebook page.

Loving Life

2009-10-23T10:38:00.001-07:00

Can life get better?! I submit that it CAN NOT :) Man life is just tan bien!!! I hope you've gotten all 3 of my emails so far! Let me know! So this week I am just overwhelmed by all the blessings in my life! I feel like life is just so good! I have absolutely nothing to complain about! Of course it's muy dificil but I figure I have the Lord on my side, so all is good! So last night Hna G, Elder Keele, and Elder Sims and I were sitting on some couches just studying and this teacher came up to us and asked where we were going on our missions..Paraguay! Well turns out she went to the same mission and has only been back for 3 months!! I can't remember her name but she knew Elder Curtis!I was so excited! But she just told us so much! I guess our mission is the highest baptizing mission right now in South America!!!! How amazing is that?!! She just couldn't stop talking about how amazing EVERYTHING about Paraguay is! Ha I am sooo going to be like that!! It's going to be amazing!!! She said it gets to like 110-115 but you just get used to it and you learn to love it! Hermosa!! Oh but madre, necisito mas zapatos por favor!!! She said she went through a ton of shoes! LIke the nice expensive ones. She said the roads are just awful! And since I'm sending two pairs home I figure I need two more pairs!And I will probably need them before I leave the MTC! I'll write a letter more about that! Oh and I got the package, gracias :) So have I ever told you how much I love our district and zone?! I can't believe I'm just going to keep meeting such amazing people throughout my whole mission! THE MISSION IS THE BEST! And I can't believe it's already been a month!!! Loco!!Yeah every Wednesday the new missionaries come in and I see them being dropped off and I just get all teared up haha. But I have finally reached the point where I am just fine. I remember my first night here I just bawled my eyes out and there were these two hermanas on my floor that were comforting me and one of them said, "yeah I was the same as you when I first got here, but you'll get to a point when you feel like your district has become your family." ha and I was thinking there is no way!! The Elders don't even look at us, they're super awkward and I just don't know how I feel about the hermanas yet, and there is just no way I will ever feel like that! Well two days ago I was telling my district about mi familia and how amazing yall are, etc. and at the end I just started crying and I told them what that hermana had told me and how now I feel like that. They are just the best! We are all so tyte, I love it! And Hna. G was super sick all week long and the elders gave her a blessing a couple nights ago (Elder Sims) and it was his first one ever, and he did so great! The Spirit was so strong! I think that unified us more. THe priesthood is INCREDIBLE! oh but I was going to tell you that I get to be a host in two weeks! ha I'm so excited! I don't pick them up at their cars, but when the elders escort them to the building we take them inside and show them their room and then kinda give them a tour of the MTC! That will be so fun! And I think Hna Henrich will be coming in that week so that will be so cool if I host her!!! Ok just some cool thoughts from this week... let's talk about Satan for a second..he is just so awful and so real! One of his most powerful tools is to cause us to doubt ourselves, to doubt who we are and what we can accomplish. Doubt is not a feeling from God. God loves us so much! And he has so much confidence in us! It's absolutely unbelievable! He is totally cheering us on with the angels in Heaven! They rejoice when we make good choices and when we have righteous desires (like bringing people unto Christ) God will prepare a way for us! Yes it won't always be easy, but the reward will be great! And if we bring save it be one soul unto Christ, how great will be our joy if we bring many souls unto Christ (ha fix that so it's right). But ahh I can't wait to actually help bring children back to our Heavenly Father. We lived with him before we came here and we can return to live with him again through Christ's Atonement! Ah that just gets me everytime! How merciful our Heavenly Father is for sending his son to die for us so that we can return to him. Christ suffered for everyone we will ever come in contact with in our lives. He FULLY atoned for each and everyone of our sins! Ah! We had a devo on tues. and Sister Robbins said, even when you can't fully converse with the people, LOVE THEM! haha that hit home, because I know I'll be struggling for the first couple months with the language, but I know that if I love the people they will know that they have a Father in Heaven who loves them. Brother Robbins said, "success is going from failure to failure without any loss of enthusiasm." ha how motivating! You just have to keep going and keep going! You can't let thoughts of doubt and failure get in the way of serving our Lord! I'm so excited to develop charity! I am ready to give my heart out to serving and loving and bringing people unto Christ. I know I was called by God to serve in the Paraguay Asuncion North mission. It's not just by chance. I am supposed to be going to this mission! How exciting! I love yall so much and am so thankful to have been raised by goodly parents and to have had such amazing church leaders and friends who have been such good examples to me! Life is good, huh?! Go and tell all those young men who are of missionary age and who aren't on missions that they need to go!!! It's so important and so key for the rest of their lives! PREPARE, PREPARE, PREPARE and then God will come in and provide the way. Don't let things of the world get in the way, whether it be school, work, or girlfriends! You'll regret it! The mission is SO AMAZING! Love yall soo soo much! Mom make sure Alisa and Ty got my letters and let me know if they did or didn't! I'm going to write Hary and Mary Lou and Grandpa Bill today! So let them know it's coming! Thank Sister Wariner for the letter, I love them! And I'm writing her and Chels back today (and Emily) and Angela! G2G!!! Love yall!Hermana Nelson

Week 3...Loving the MTC

2009-10-15T12:29:00.000-07:00

This morning Hermana G and I got to travel to the OUTSIDE world!!! All the way to Orem! Crazy huh?! She's having some problems with her knee so we had to go to an Orthopedic Dr. (pray for her). But when we got back we still had enough time to go to the temple and it was so great! We did initiatories (my first time from since I went through). And then afterwards I was sitting on a chair waiting for Hermana G and this Hermana came up and asked me where I was going on my mission and I said Paraguay and that's where she served too! But in the South mission! But she was all excited and taught us some Guarani phrases and is going to try and come to the MTC tomorrow for lunch and teach us more or she'll send us some phrases and what not! Cool, huh?! Speaking of Paraguay..I was in this meeting and the lady that was teaching was the former mission president's wife in the Paraguay Asuncion North MissioN! Right before the Wade's! The Andersons. So she told me to stop by her husbands office sometime and ask more questions and look at pictures and what not! Love it!!! Ok this week was just great! Minus the fact that Hermana Miller left us this morning at 3 a.m.!!! No bueno! Elder Matautia, Gates, and Russel also left this morning, so now our district is down to 8! Weird! But I'm really excited because I think we'll all become really good friends! A group of Elders..like 7ish left to Paraguay North on Monday! They are such studs! I can't wait to see them out in the field! So now it's just Hna G and I! Lol we have to much fun sometimes so we need to step it up! Oh and on Sunday we went to the zone meeting with Hna M because she's the coordinating sister and at the very end when we were leaving Hno Llewellen asked if I would be the new coordinating sister..yikes!!! Ha I definitely feel the least adequate for the position, the other hermanas are so much more spiritual and everything, but it will be good for me I think. I definitely have been humbled! So yesterday at dinner it was us hna's and we were sitting across from these two elders, so naturally we start talking to them and asking how the MTC is going and everything, and they've only been here a week. So one of the Elder's said he just HATES the MTC and just went on and complained about it..well ha I was not ok with that..so me being me drilled him. (It probably didn't help that we had just got done watching a devotional by Elder Holland from a couple years ago). So I was all in passion mode and I just gave it to him. I said, "Elder let me tell you a little something something.. one of my really good friends told me that you can either look at the MTC like it's a prison because you're just stuck inside all day and you have to be in classes and study all the time and you have to eat the same food every single week and there's no free time, etc. OR you can change your attitude and take it as an opportunity to learn and to grown and to recognize how strong the Spirit is and how inspirational your teachers are and the speakers are and to just take it all in! We have been given 18 months/2 years to become closer to our Lord and Savior and to bring his children unto his fold. How dare you complain and feel sorry for yourself. NO it's not easy, but first off you are not here for YOU. You are here to serve the Lord. It's not about YOU anymore. Elder Holland said, "SALVATION IS NOT A CHEAP EXPERIENCE. It was NOT meant to be easy and it never will be! It was not cheap or easy of convenient for the Savior as he suffered on the cross" If you're going to be a missionary and sahre his word how can you think that you won't feel a tsp. of what the Savior felt? If you're going to be his disciples, YOU BETTER HAVE SOMETHING TO SHOW FOR IT! He said be able to stand and bear testimony when you return from you mission and say that 'you sufferened the will of the Father from the beginning." YOU'RE DOING THE MOST IMPORTANT THING IN YOUR LIFE!" Your mission should mean EVERYTHING to you! He also said, DON'T YOU GO HOME, DON'T YOU DARE LEAVE FOR YOUR SAKE!" ha he is good huh?! Anyways I'm sure I probably scared that Elder, but his companion thanked me afterwards! How hard would it be to have an unmotivated companion? How blessed I am to have such an AMAZING companion, district, and zone! How great this work is!!! And we also were taught a lot about the importance of the Book of Mormon..here's what it comes down to...it is either ABSOLUTELY TRUE or it is FALSE..there is NO middle ground! Ahhh I just love the BOM and its converting power! I can't remember who but someone said "have confidence that the Holy Ghost will witness to anyone who will sincerly read and pray about it of its truthfulness". The Spirit is SO AMAZING! Without it we are nothing! If any of you who are reading this have not read the Book of Mormon, PLEASE DO! You know me and you know my family..you know that we are not some physcho people with some physcho religion. We believe in Christ and we know him to be our Savior and we have every desire to follow him. We know that the Book of Mormon is a true book, another testament of Jesus Christ. We love the Lord and we know he loves us. The gospel of Jesus Christ is once again restored to this earth and we have living prophets today who love us and who help us and guide us so that we can live with our Father in Heaven and our families once again when we leave this earth. This is my testimony. Please please ask my family for a copy of the Book of Mormon and please please pray to your Heavenly Father and ask him if it is true. My family can help answer any questions you have. I love yall all so much! This gospel is so good and so true!
Love always,
Hermana Nelson

Moroni 7:33

Week 2 at the MTC

2009-10-15T12:26:00.000-07:00

Hey yall!!! How's everybody doing?! This week has been super amazing!! It's already flying by and I just want it to slow down! I love the MTC!!! We have a blast all the time! I love having cinco hermanas en mi distrito! It's the best! We already have plans to room together when we come back home to BYU :) Crazy to think that I will continue to meet amazing hermanas y elders on this AMAZING journey! So conference! Oh man!! It was sooo cool watching it as a missionary! We all gathered in the gym and the Spirit was just so strong. It seemed like every talk was directed right towards me and it seemed like they all had to do with missionary work! One thing that I learned this week that es muy importante is teaching with the Spirit! Because in all honesty if we don't have the Spirit then how are the people we're teaching going to know that we're saying is la verdad?! We have a progressive investigator, Gabriel, who just happens to be a teacher that served in Paraguay so we were really excited to teach him! BUT the first time we taught him it was NO BUENO!! I think that Heavenly Father wanted us to humble ourselves because we really needed to learn that the Spirit has to be with us when we teach! And then all during conference and at devotionals and firesides and LGM's they talked about how having the Spirit is so important to the work! So I think I've learned my lesson! So right now I'm trying really hard to pray for the Spirit as I plan and as we teach! Our lessons are so much better when we have the Spirit guiding us! So a couple nights ago Hno. Stone (a member of the branch presidency) was talking to us after the Tuesday night devo. and he promised us that by March 1, 2010 we will be talking and thinking in Spanish only!!! As long as we do our part and give our all and trust in the Lord! How amazing is that!!! So I'm going to strive really hard to reach that! It would be so helpful and then I'd be able to learn Guarani and help the people even more! While he was talking to us he also randomly said, "Hermana Nelson, I know you were called exactly where you were supposed to be called because it's the first time in your life where you're going to feel tall." I was like haha oh thanks so much! Not exactly what I was expecting lol. Oh today I saw Sister Buchanan in the temple!!! Talk about amazing!!! I was soo excited to see her! The temple is so amazing!! I love going once a week and I'm really excited that we'll actually be able to go in Paraguay! Ha ok funny story (probably funnier if you were actually there but yeah..) so we were teaching this week in the TRC (where volunteers will come in and pretend like they're not members and they're supposed to stay in "pretend" character the whole time!) So we were getting ready to teach a guy named Spencer and then all of a sudden one of the workers came in and told us that we would also be teaching his long lost sister Vanessa! Oh Vanessa...she has only been a member for a couple of months and it was her first time at the TRC so she had no idea what she was supposed to do and had no idea she was supposed to not really be a member. haha so we were teaching the first principle and all of a sudden she's like oh my gosh I know that to be true..let me tell you my conversion story! Ha so for the next like 5 min she goes on about how she found the church (it was actually a really good story but sooo funny) oh! and then before that even happened we told them we were going to say a prayer to invite the Spirit and then at the end of the lesson we were going to have one of them say the prayer..so right as Hna. G is about to start saying the prayer Vanessa busts out in prayer in Spanish!! lol I almost peed my pants! It was hilarious! And then she says this beautiful prayer I'm sure..I couldn't really understand it but I bet it was great! So all through the lesson she would interrupt us and tell these stories about a principle we were teaching and she never caught on that she wasn't supposed to already be a member UNTIL the very end of the lesson, when I did the baptismal committment to Spencer..."Spencer as you read and pray for yourself to know that these things are true, will you follow the example of Jesus Christ and be baptized by someone holding the proper priesthood authority of God" and before he answered she looked at us and then looked at him and was like "WAIT, you're not a member?!!" lol it was hilarious! He looked at us apolegetically and then said yes I'll be baptized if it's true! Oh man it was hilarious. But what I did learn was how to teach with a member, which I'm sure I'll be doing all the time in the mission field so bueno! And she really did bring in a strong spirit when she was sharing personal stories about how she found out the truth for herself! And it was so cool to hear how her life had been changed because of the gospel and it makes me really excited to be a tool in the Lord's hands and help people come unto Christ! So Spanish is pretty good! I love learning it and I just wish like there was more time in a day...weird because I've never been as productive as I am in the MTC in one day ever in my life, but it still seems like I don't have enough time to ready and study from the BOM and PMG and everything else! It's all so good! I wish I had more time! Nuestro distrito is really coming along. We're a lot more united now and es muy divertido! I'm beginning to see the challenges of a trio but it's all good :) At the devotional Brother Banks shared a quote with us from President Hinckley that said, "I regard you as my companions in this work." How amazing is that! A prophet of God considers me a companion in this work! Ahh! And the work is good! Oh and there's been a couple times when the speakers have shared testimony of how we were called exactly where the Lord wanted us to be and how they really recieve revelation from the Lord on each individual! Brother Banks told a story about how he was there when they were going through each name and they had gone through a pile and then he told them to go back a couple names and then went on to say how he had messed up and the Lord wanted that person somewhere else! Ah Paraguay Asuncion North! I know and I knew from the first moment I saw where I was going that that is where I'm supposed to be! I'm so excited! There's a whole district of elders in my zone that are going there in a couple of weeks and they are all studs! I can't wait to meet the people and love them and share with them the gospel! And one thing I really want to do while I'm there is keep a high retention rate with the people I teach! I don't want them to fall away after a year! I'm going to really work hard on committing each member and helping them know and see how the gospel can truly bless their lives! I love the gospel and the changes I can already see it bringing into my own life! It's just soo good!! I love yall and miss yall but I'm ok with that now! The time is already flying by and I'll be back before you know it and then I'll just want to go back and visit all the time!!! lol ahh I got to go! I'm writing a letter home about family stuff so you should get that soon! Love yall love ya love!!! Miss ya too! Yall are the best family ever! Keep the letters coming :)
Love,
Hermana Nelson

E-mail from Amanda

2009-10-01T20:37:00.001-07:00

First off Hermana Galbraith is my companion!!! Crazy huh?! Thank you Sister Curtis! I also have another companion, Hermana Miller! We're in a threesome :) It's kinda crazy sometimes but I feel like we're always having fun! It's awesome! We get along muy bueno! Hermana Miller is going to Puerto Rico and leaves to the DR MTC in two weeks so then it will just be me and Hna G. P.S. mom find her mom on the mission mom site or w/e. So there's 12 people in our district right now but 4 people are leaving in two weeks for the DR, so then it will just be 8! Crazy but I'm really excited to get really close to everyone. There's another companionship of hermanas in our district and they are super cute and I love everyone to death! Elder Sims (one of the elders I met on facebook) is also in my district and him and his comp are both going to Paraguay. The remaining 4 people that will be with us for the rest of the time are all going to Argentina Mendoza! We're the only heremanas in our whole zone and we're all in the same district..obviously our elders needed some hermanas to shape them up! They love us :) My branch president is Pres. Dickerson and he is AMAZING!!! He has the strongest testimony of the BOM and he is just inspiring! He makes me really excited to learn more! He doesn't speak any spanish besides beuno goodo..which isn't spanish for those of you who didn't know. I have dos maestros..Hermano Hellewell y Chandler. They are both pretty tyte but if I had a favorite it would probably by H.H. because he is a stud and makes learning really fun! We taught in the TRC the other day. We taught the first lesson to Hermano Gonzales and it was so LEGIT! The Spirit was so strong and he seemed like a real investigator! It was super exciting! I love all the letters and dearelders I get so KEEP THEM COMING!!! I love hearing about what's going on and I wish I had time to write back about every little thing, but I don't :( We went to the temple today and it was so fun! Please keep praying for me! It was so so so hard that first day but the Lord has really blessed me! Everyday just flies by but we do soo much! We've learned how to pray and bear testimony (thanks Skyler) and we memorized the purpose in English y Espanol and oh! Pres. Dickerson challenged us to commit people to baptism..so our districts goal was 40 for the week..well of course our companionship already has like 80 each..but I learned it in espanol so I'm going to try and beat the record before the time I leave (the record is 592 for a week) ha YIKES yo se! But it would be legit! And it's a great way to meet people! He challenged us to do that so we could get over our fear of commiting people to be baptized. FAITH NOT FEAR! ha it's exciting! I feel like I'm praying ALL OF THE TIME!!! It's great! I love being here because I am constantly feeling the spirit! But at the same time I'm having a BLAST! Hna G and I probably have to much fun sometimes! Everyone is finally being themselves so our district is a lot more united than it was the first week, we were kinda nervous, but now it's awesome! I laugh A LOT! In fact I've gotten the giggles so many times! They know me as the laugher and the crier..haha yeah. We have to do comp inventories where you tell eachother your strengths and weaknesses and they said that they loved my humor and how I'm always laughing and happy and how I just enjoy life. They also said I was great at bringing the Spirit into the lessons. I don't know about any of that but it made me feel good and it makes me want to be a better person! I love mis companeras y districto! Ok I have like no time and I'll try to send a couple pics but we'll see! PLEASE KEEP THE LETTERS COMING ALL THE TIME! I LOVE THEM!! 10 SEC..AHHH I LOVE YALL SO MUCH!!!

First Letter Home

2009-09-27T15:54:00.000-07:00

We received a letter from Amanda yesterday...so here it is:

Dear Parentals!
Ah yesterday was the HARDEST day of my life! After y'all left I couldn't hold it together. I cried all day and I miss yall so much! I just don't feel up to the task, but I know why I'm here and I know I'm supposed to be here, so I'll be fine. I know this is going to be one of the hardest things in my life but also so rewarding. Please pary for me. Mom, the card you gave me was so perfect! But really don't worry about me, its great. They keep us so busy. But I know I can do hard things and I just have to keep telling myself that (smiley face). Right now I just need to be 100% dependant upon God and have total faith in Him. I love this work and the gospel. I've finally begun to LOVE learning! Its awesome! I wish I could call home for advice, but emails will have to work. Oh write me @ Dear Elder, my box # is 257 (put that on facebook...another smiley face) LOVE YALL SO MUCH & MISS YOU TO DEATH!
(heart) Hermana Nelson

At the MTC

2009-09-25T08:22:00.000-07:00

Hermana Nelson's scheduled arrival time for the MTC was September 20, 1:15 pm. In true Nelson fashion we were cutting it close. Parking at the MTC on a Wednesday is at a premium. Bobby took Tyler and Kylee and Nate with him to a friends house and the rest of us drove to the MTC. Only one car can go through the official drive-thru so Ty and Alisa scrambled to find parking places around the MTC area and met us in the MTC parking lot. We still hadn't taken Hermana Nelson's photo for her missionary plaque so we quickly did that and then all stuffed ourselves into our car. It was a tight squeeze considering Hermana Nelson's luggage took up half the car. We only had about three minutes while the Elders took the luggage out of our car to snap a couple of photos and have some hugs good-bye. Maybe it is better that way. We love our sweet Hermana Nelson and can't wait to post her own words about this wonderful mission she is serving for our Savior.

The Last Supper

2009-09-25T07:54:00.000-07:00

Before taking Amanda to the Provo MTC our family wanted to meet up for her "last supper". One of our family favorite hangouts is Chiles and so we met up at the Chiles in Orem, UT. Alisa and Nate came from St. George; Angela and Bobby, Tyler and Kylee from Logan and Ty from Ephraim. We all converged at Chile's around 11:45 on September 20. Amanda's check in time for the MTC was 1:15. It was fun just hanging out and goofing around with each other one last time. We tried (or at least I tried) not to think about the separation ahead and focused on just what an amazing family we have and how much fun we have together. Chile's must be a popular before MTC tradition because we saw several other families there enjoying their "last supper", too.

Hermana Nelson's Mission *Paraguay Asuncion North*