July 19, 2010

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

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

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!!!!

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

June 28, 2010

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

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

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