Anyway... so if you didn't know how much I loved my companion Hermana Morla, let this be a warning to you... Half of this email will be dedicated to her, now ANA MORLA, my favorite person in the world who went home this last week. Maaaaaaa :(
So let me tell you a story... My favorite Elder Trusty asked me to help out on getting Ana Morla a goodbye gift, and I couldn't have been happier with his idea. Are you ready for this? A du rag... Cocoa butter (which she hates), and hair grease... All wrapped in a KFC bag. She almost died of laughter when she got it. Shoooot I love her. Hahaha She got me a gift too! Why didn't I think of gift giving?! She got me an accordion binder for papers. She had one and I always told her how genius I thought it was... Then she bought me one! She gave it to me with. Sticky note that said "Tina Fey." *dead* I was a mess when she left. Booooooo.
I did get to go to the final testimony meeting though. So I got to see her share her testimony for the last time as a missionary, y tu sabe que I was crying like a baby. Then a bunch of sisters and I sang a special musical number "Jesus, Savior, Pilot Me." Talk about a tear jerker! Even Pres. McCune said he was holding back tears. After telling me how amazing he thought the song was, he said "I'm just glad I wasn't speaking after that... My "allergies" would have kicked in." Hahaha
Pero bueno... I got to have a mini reunion with Ana and my favorite sisters, and I got to meet Ana's friend Cade. He'd been a "fellowshipper" for some online lessons, but now I know him in real life! Hah It was so so so good though to see her before she left. I reemphasized the fact that I NEED her to come out on splits with me. I miss serving with her. I miss living with her and being able to talk to her all the time. Pero I'll have constant communication with her after the mission, so I won't stress.
New companion: American style. She Sister Wright, from Washington state. My very first American!! :) She's a super hard worker and GUESS WHAT!! She's organized (nazi status) so she agrees with me on how to organize things, and clean things, aaaand it's good. It's a good, healthy OCD. It's weird being with an American after 10 months of native speakers, but she's right up there next to native speakers where her spanish is concerned. On. point. And she's really up front, so I'm finally seeing things I really need to improve on. This is going to be a rough transfer, full of progress. Bring it on!
Fun fact: I often feel like Scott Pilgrim when I eat bread and oil (my weakness, more so than sugary foods). Literally every time I eat bread I hear Ramona Flowers telling me "Bread makes you fat."
Something someone said yesterday really just smacked me right in the butt. "When you stop reading the Book of Mormon, everything falls apart." If you're not currently reading it, vamoooos. Read it. Your life will be better. Dale.
Saturday we went to a baptism in Saratoga Springs, and guess who was there... HERMANA MALDONADO! I see her everywhere! Sheesh I love her :)
So yesterday in our lessons were amazing. We found a new investigator who's AMAZING. She just absorbs it all, and asks questions and everything. She's even read the Book of Mormon before! And now she's going to read it more, since she knows what it is and what's going on! :) Anyway, we only had 3 lessons yesterday, pero in each lesson, the thought came to me "You're a representative of Jesus Christ... You've got power. USE IT!" So I boldly testified "como representante de Jesucristo, y en el nombre de Él." And now it's a goal of mine to do that every day. I'm only going to have this power and authority once, and I don't want a day to go by without using it and taking advantage of it. It always makes words more powerful when you include Christ and authority and stuff... But yes. I really love that. Using what I've been given while I've got it :)
OH HEY, there's this sister in our branch who I love so much, and she was diagnosed with Leukemia. The doctors said she's only got about a year left. Please pray for her family, and her, and her less active husband. Her name is Maria.
A couple weeks ago we had a Spanish missionaries conference with elder Don Clark (he's either a 70 or works in the missionary dept.) Anyway, he's the most straight forward (and at times just straight offensive) speaker I've ever heard, and I loved every second of it. It was amazing. I got kicked in the shins a couple times by his words, and it felt great. SHOW ME HOW TO IMPROVE! It was amazing. I got SEVEN pages of notes. Something he kept repeating that punched me in the teeth is "You don't have enough faith!" He yelled that to a cultural hall filled with missionaries. TALK ABOUT BOLD! We don't have faith enough to baptize thousands, to double sacrament meeting attendance, to change lives, etc. these things haven't been happening because we didn't have the faith to do it. We really can preform miracles like in the Book of Mormon when Alma preached and baptized hundreds, ONLY if we have faith. He said we're not doing that because we don't have the faith. Now some people can really take offense to that, but because I was raised with 6 men, I took it with a grain of salt (or however the saying goes). So instead of saying "Aww... He doesn't think I have faith. I guess I don't..." I said "How can I have more faith? How can I strengthen my faith to the point of performing miracles and even beyond?" YESSS. I'm a big kid.
Also my brilliant mission president said this little gem:
"Conversion has a short shelf life."
IT SO DOES! You have to keep praying and asking for a new confirmation of the things you know in order to have a strong testimony of those things. Man, that was great.
Anyway, I don't know why I haven't really done this before... Sharing things I've learned? People probably think I'm terribly distracted by reading my emails. HAH! I just keep notes of things that have happened and write a summary of those things on Monday. Now I'm including the more spiritual thingsies in my notes :) BRILLIANT! Hahah
Anyhow, I love you all a whole whole lot. Stay fresh!
Hermana Willis
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| Me and Ana our NEW WML's daughter. She's my little BFF :) |
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| WML's other daughter, my OTHER little BFF. I love this little thing! |
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| Me and Hna Abellan. You know how I do :) |
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| This is me saying "Hasta luego" to my very best friend in the world! And that's Cade Benson, her friend. Just hopped in the picture to say hello :) Hahaha |
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| This is the gift Ana gave to me. I LOVE HER. |
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| Transporting our bikes with some fellowshippers... They almost fell out TWICE :) |
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