I Think it's Spring!

Hello my friends!!

So we had an amazing week!!!
We have been working so much with  members to get referrals and it's
working! We have a few things set up with our members where they can
introduce us to their friends.
Also another miracle is that Jillian MOVED UP HER BAPTISMAL DATE TO
THE 13th of February!!!
We are so pumped!! This week our mission president is coming with us
to teach her! And we are so stoked!
We were able to get a good amount of new investigators and we are so
blessed right now!
The one new investigator we are really excited about is Cristian, his
whole family are members and he isn't and he has been coming to church
for over a month now and we have been setting a good foundation with
him and he's super nice and totally prepared to receive the gospel!
His family has been so patient with him, we see that they don't push
or pressure anything on him and just let him be. But they have not
given up hope. Last week me and Hermana French have prayed all week
that the Sunday that just passed we will be able to ask Cristian to
have a lesson with us and that he would be accepting. And he was!! :)
his sister sat in the lesson and her face screamed pure joy as she
testified of the gospel and how much she loves him! And it was such a
sweet lesson , he was very accepting and humble. So we are very
excited for that!
Another miracle that happened this week that a few minutes after
sacrament started these two guy walked in and us and the elders and
the bishopric were making faces to each to figure out who invited them
and no one knew. So we all had our eyes on them and a member sat next
to them and was super nice to them and we see that they shook our
members hands and got up to leave , me and an elder make eye contact
and mouth "GO TALK TO THEM" . And he goes and then after sacrament all
of us missionaries (there's 6 of us) get together to find out who
those guys were. And the elder that talked with them said that they
were walking by the church and felt like they should go inside. He got
their information and they are in our area, we gave them a call and
said that they plan on coming back to church next Sunday!
Things are BLOOMING like its spring!!!
You know what I did the last 8 weeks before all this beautiful things
been happening? Knocking doors for 6 hours straight and talking to
people on the street. Was it hard? Yes, especially in the cold. Was is
a little discouraging ? Yes it was. But NO EFFORT IS WASTED! And we
are seeing wonderful things happening!! We are so excited! Please pray
for Jillian to stay on date for the 13th of February and for Cristian
and our other investigators to progress!

We went on exchanges! I got to be with Hermana Hayward who is a new
missionary and I loved being with her greenie Fire! !! She has the
strongest testimony of the plan of salvation I ever heard! She's going
to accomplish beautiful things in this mission!
Every week as I go on exchanges with hermanas I can see that those
exchanges are more for me to learn from them then for them to learn
from me! I am grateful for the position the Lord has given me so that
I can be more worthy to be called his daughter and be the person he
needs me to be and to learn the things he needs me to learn.

This is how I feel every time we leave the apartment 

And then this is how I feel when we didn't have the day we expected 

The Savior is there. He loves us. Sssoooo much!!
Love you all!!
Have a great week!
And know that He knows better. When we really trust in Heavenly Father,  What we don't know or   Don't understand doesn't matter.
Keep going.

It's COLD!!!

Hello all!!

 This week has been cold!!!! So cold!! You all have no idea!!!!
But besides it being really cold , the work does not stop! We have
been trying very hard this  week to be grateful we get to do the Lords
work with cold feet and cold noses! Like seriously when will be the
next time in my life that I get to be a full time set apart servant of
God in below 0 degrees trying to bring happiness to others with
nothing else in my kind and nothing else to do BUT to do the Lords
work! IM SO HAPPY TO BE HERE IN THIS BEAUTIFUL STRANGE LAND CALLED
CHICAGO AND ENJOYING ALL THAT COMES WITH IT. cold weather, loud
noises, crazy driving, trains, talented people at every corner trying
to get known, crazy people , delicious food, meeting every race you
can think of and learning a few words in their language and eating
their food, CHICAGO IS AMAZING! THIS WORK IS AMAZING! I rather be no
where else.
So that was me letting everyone know that positivity is KEY!!



I will NOT tolerate damaged thinking!!! I have decided get any negative or discouraging thought out of my head as fast as any person would when they have a bad thought! I will not dwell on any sort of negativity . NEGATIVITY WAS NOT MADE BY MY FATHER IN HEAVEN SO IT IS NOT A PART OF ME.  I embrace hard times where I grow and learn but having a bad attitude is something that I have decided to not get to
me. There's enough of that in the world and if I remember correctly we are not of this world.
Okay I'm done with the ranting. Before I get to some highlights , I testify that the hope of Gods light is real. Being in darkness is a choice. God is right there and
is ready to help us and uplift us, but we must be humble enough to have our hearts and eyes open to small victories every day and accept the small and big victories that we caused in our day. And seeing our
blessings ! That's what this week is about.
Small victories and blessings !!

Victory
Finding 2 more new investigators

Blessing
Having a heater in our apartment

Victory
Being able to go to zone conference, the zone leaders contacted us to
use our STL Magic and uplift our whole zone and be proud of them!

Blessing / victory
An older member who literally forces us to call her grandma fed us 1
giant plate of rice with gandules and meat and once we were done she
took our plates and pounded pasta on our plates and told us we had to
finish it all

Victory /blessing
Having investigators at church :)

Blessing
Having an awesome companion that I love so much

Blessing
Having an electric blanket cause our apartment is freezing and our
heater only warms our living room.

Victory
Being able to not slow down with freezing wind whipping us in the face.


COUNT YOUR BLESSINGS AND VICTORIES THIS WEEK! I dare you!

Love you all !

The Last Two Weeks

Hello friends and family!!
So sorry I haven't been able to email last week but here's some info
about what happened.

It was a wonderful week as a trio!!
Since my companion left a week before the transfer , I been in a trio
with some other hermanas and its been the time of our lives! Mostly
because we have been working so hard and everything is just so much
more powerful with three people.
I've learned so much from Hermana warnok and Quintana , it was the
perfect way to
start the new year!!
Something that's actually pretty cool is that I've actually been on
this mission a year round and the other night I was just thinking of
each month of the year and the area I was in, my companion, my
investigators and less actives and I am so grateful for all the new
people in my life! And I can't imagine my life without any of them.
Also I can't imagine my life without the good and hard challenges of
every month the past year. I am so grateful for every moment, every
challenge, every companion!
So as 2015 was going through my head in flashes I came across a video.
It's a Mormon message called "New Years : look not behind thee and I
felt so complete after watching this. It's a video where they
interview some people about Lots wife who was turned into a pillar of
salt because she looked back . when God commanded them to leave the
wicked city , his only instructions was "don't look back" and she
looked back.
What a great lesson this is for a new year!! Why did this happen to
her , for just looking back? It was because she was looking back with
longing. Her heart was still there and could not let go. She didn't
trust in God that he would probably give her a better life if she was
to let go of Sodom and Gomorrah . PLEASE WATCH THIS VIDEO  New Year's:
Look Not behind Thee (3:09) on LDS.ORG IT WILL UPLIFT YOU AND FREE
YOU!!

HERMANA FRENCH is my new companion and she is lovely! She also
finishes her mission this transfer so I'm killing off another one. So
weird to be getting a new companion again so soon!
We have been working hard! We have great plans for this area!!
I've been able to really refocus and rededicate myself to this area,
we have been putting all of our ideas together and creating beautiful
things for Logan Square.
We have already seen a lot of success, Including getting an
investigator on date! Her name is Jillian and has been taught for 5
years and never had been baptized, we both strongly felt like we
needed to lay down the law and be,p her understand our purpose, it was
clear to her and she even set her date for the 21st of February . So
please pray for her!!



Weekly highlights!!!
- we took this picture as the last picture of 2015 and it's an awful
picture because I'm actually not the best photo taker



- News years ward party! Like I said before Hispanics know how to party. They made a ballon net and on midnight they untie it and balloons go everywhere. Unfortunately we weren't there. But we heard it was a lot of fun. Our mission president did let us go for an hour got to be home by 8:45. 


- Meeting a lot of cool people. Sorry let me rephrase that, we met nice people!! That was awesome . We contacted Chicagoans , Russian, Polish, Philippinos, ppl from Thailand and Jordan. And it was really funny talking to most of those people cause most of them didn't speak English, and we only speak English and Spanish. Good times. 
- It being 9 degrees outside and feeling comfortable and full of happiness. 
- Getting to know more members and just feeling so much love for them!! 
- Having less actives at church :) 
- Grateful to live in 2016 where beautiful fast and effective heaters exist.

- Having FHE with awesome members and investigators 


- Walking 10 miles for chick fil a since there's not a lot in Chicago and I haven't had any since I left home. 



- Being cheesy Mormons and taking a picture of this .

And this!!!