Can I get a number one with rootbeer? Thanks! Oh and extra fry sauce! (week 30)

Hello Family!

 

I am wearing sweatpants under my skirt today.....just because I can! (don't even worry Jennifer you can't see them because they are capris. Thanks for teaching me your ways Jess)

Patricia and Lorena went to church yesterday! We started teaching another joven who is the son of a former menos activo. He is going to get baptized some day. He had never prayed before and we kneeled down and prayed at the end of the lesson and he prayed to know if there really was a God. At the end he was crying....so I think that is a good sign! So that is exciting!

 

This week we helped a bunch with the Relief Society Anniversary party. The presidency went all out. It was really nice. We make cupcake toppers (that is actually what they call them here too haha.) They went all out. It was a fun experience. We had some people we are teaching go too. So that was awesome.

 

Anyway I want to share some of my thoughts that I had yesterday as we were walking home from church. I was thinking about how lucky I am to have all of you, no but really. I am glad that every time I open my email there is more than one email. That I get letters from just about everyone every week. One of the Hermanas has yet to get an email from her parents. Her Dad has Alzheimers so he doesn't even remember her anymore....so sad! Then I was thinking about some missionaries who leave and don't have support at all from their families. Their families don't understand why they left because they are not even members. Then they have to go back to a family who doesn't get it. I feel so blessed to be part of a family where everyone is a member. Not just members, but active in the church and sealed in the temple. I don't know if you think about it or have really thought about it before, but it is a HUGE blessing that we have all known about the church since birth. That we were tortured with hair rollers weekly and woken up early to go to church. WE ARE BLESSED! SO BLESSED! Also it has come to my attention that people don't talk to their family members all that much. They don't call and communicate like we do. That is so important. It is part of taking care of the people around us. We are really really lucky. Keep working on staying united. That is what God wants. He wants us to be happy and unified.

 

Anyway not much else to tell about the week....nothing else different really happened, except Hermana Williams ran into the glass door this morning and I died laughing. Oh and Hermana Gracia is sick :( Poor thing. Got the same thing as Hermana Williams........some throat virus or something. So pray for her. Hermana Williams is still kind of sick but mostly better.

 

Prayers for the week: Javier, Patricia, Lorena.

 

Read and Pray Everyday!

 

Miss you like crazy!

 

Hermana Makin

Arrival of the Suitcase (week 29)

Wow! Almost out of time! Dang! Anyway this week was good.... I got the suitcase last night....I about died! Cadburry eggs and Reeses and shoes and ST: PATIRCKS DAY STUFF!!!! I know I am forgetting something else that I love, but there is just not time to stop typing and think right now. Thank you so much! You guys are so good to me! I am sure my companion hates me. ANYWAY on the amazing news front. LORENA WENT TO CHURCH!!!! I about died! WOOOOOHOOOO!!! Please keep praying for her. Patricia didn't end up going (have I told you about her yet?) Her brother was hospitalized. Satan works on all ends. Can you pray for her. We really need to visit her this week. We finally finished everything with the move this week. Elder and Hermana Johnson came and helped us fix up our apartments. We now have everything including fun curtains! We all sleep in the same room which is fun. The living room....because who really uses their living room for anything else?

This week we have a special mission conference....I will tell you more about it next week....because I don't really know anything at this point.

 

Did you all call my beautiful Belle and sing her happy birthday? I sure hope so! Happy Birthday Liv! I love you and have been praying for you lots lately! (Hopefully she has recovered by now) Also Emma.....hope her surgery went well too. Could you all stop with the surgery thing? Thanks! Also you can all stop getting sick! How is Dad? Haven't heard about him in a while.....

 

Hermana Williams got really really sick this weekend.....we sleep in the same room and breathe the same air. The only good thing about getting sick is that you get to sleep....but that isn't why I am here....so I am going to avoid getting sick. I gave her some Dayquil....the drugs just aren't as effective here. Hopefully I don't get many more colds. Oh, thanks for the airborne haha. I probably have enough for the rest of my life. JK Marissa, thank you for the chapstick. It is my favorite kind! You are so thoughtful to think of me. I was especially excited about the cards from Jennifer and Mom. I didn't wait Jen haha....but I will read it again tomorrow. Are you all going to wear green? I don't have any......oh well.....I do have my eyes! Oh and I was so excited about the picture of our family too! Now I can put it in my scriptures and when people ask me about my family I can show them the pic. Hna. Stringham always had hers and it was fun. I was jealous haha.....in a not sinful way.

 

Anyway I am down to one minute.....so I must depart. Please take care of my babies. Give them lots of kisses and work hard on that brainwashing ;)

 

My challenge for you all this week is to make sure you do your FHE. It is very important or the prophet wouldn't have told us to do it. Make the time, because your family is the only thing you get to take with you, so you better make it good while you are here.

Miss you all very much! Thank you for the extra prayers this week, I felt them. It helped me a lot. If you could include in your prayers Patricia, Lorena, and Jean (Yahn). P-we need to visit L-is having a little health problem and J-Needs an answer to his prayer if the church is true.

Read and Pray Everyday!

Hermana Makin

PS Hope my rambling makes sense.....

Pics, pics, pics!!!

Brooms in Chile (week 28)

Hey Yall! 

Have I told you about brooms in Chile.....they are very indispensable here. Like a lot. They use them for everything! They can even convert into mops? Did you know that? The broom here would be like the equivalent of paper towels in the US. Just a fun fact for the readers out there. 

So this week was pretty crazy! We moved! To the fourth floor of an apartment. Reminds me of you Jill haha Anyhoo they called us Tuesday night at 10:30 and told us we needed to be ready to move by Thursday morning......so that was fun. Then we just had problem after problem with that. For example....now we have no fridge or washing machine.....yep I am on my last pair....so it looks like I will need to hand wash some things today.... The apartment is really nice though, and once everything gets settled it will be an enjoyable place to live. Meanwhile things are unorganized and driving me crazy! I think that is why bad stuff keeps happening too. It’s because the spirit can’t protect us because the spirit can’t dwell in chaos. Anyway so the iron fell on Hermana Williams foot and she’s pretty sure she broke her toe.. but she won’t call the nurse. Hna. Gracia fell out of the shower and hit her head....I so far have not had any major incidents, which is good because you know how prone I am. Hopefully everything gets fixed. 

Patricia came to church this week! I was so excited! She really liked it and wants to come next week! I just love her to pieces. She is one of my favorite people here in Chile. I think some people stick with you more........I think it has something to do with pre-earth life, but I don’t know.

Last week we got a challenge from the President to read the Book of Mormon from the beginning to the end before end of April. I finished first Nephi this week. Woot! One day I am going to write a letter about my testimony of the Book of Mormon for you to put on the blog. I just love that book so much! 

Anyway I love you all very much. I am going to give you a challenge now. Ya ready? Read the Book of Mormon before my birthday. You all have the app so listening you could even do it. It is only like 8 pages a day....which okay is kind of a lot, but it will change your life and you won’t ever regret it. Please take care of each other and love each other. Family is the most important thing. It is what the gospel was made for.

Read (a lot) and Pray Every day!

Hermana Makin

PS if you could pray for my back that would be really good. It is all kinds of messed up lately. Don’t worry I am going to call the nurse today and ask her what to do.

If I never eat corn again I will be one happy camper......just the smell reminds me of Jill and her chicken salad sandwich (week 27)

Hi Family!

 

(It is corn season and there are a few Chilean dishes that use corn......naturally we have eaten corn a lot :) the members try and introduce us to Chile.)

 

I have been missing you this week. I think everytime there is a change it makes me miss you more...kind of weird how that works out. We had a pretty good week here in Recreo. Not to much to report. We walked a lot and I used a whole lot more Spanish because my companion is from Peru.......and yeah it was kind of a normal missionary week. Wow I have officially gotten boring......

 

Wait! Hermana Williams got legit bit by a dog. It was pretty bad. It took a big chuck out of her clothes and it was all bloody and such. The poor thing had to go and get a bunch of anti rabis injections today.....please pray for me....I just wouldnt make it if I had to get a bunch of injections in another country.

 

I talked to the President and he told me that I should go buy another retainer...so I will be going to Santiago probably this week. 

 

Oh....and we are moving to another house....either this week or next week. I will tell you why later....after we move.

 

A couple of weeks ago Hermana Stringham and I contacted a woman who was outside cleaning up her patio. We of course tried to share with her, but she said no I really am not interested, I am busy, and I am going on vacation. (There is always more than one excuse it seems.) Anyway turns out she didn't make it to her vacation because she passed away. She wasn't even that old. It was very unexpected for her whole family. I just kept thinking about how sad it was that she didn't get the opportunity to hear the gospel in her life. I don't know if she had talked with missionaries before or if she knew some who was a member, but it just made me really sad. I kept thinking would I have tried harder if I had known or did I really do everything I could have to help her feel the spirit and desire to know. I came to the conclusion that I really did try my best to offer her the opportunity. Everyone gets to choose as my grandma always says. My next thought went to the people who could have influenced her. Neighbors, or other missionaires who perhaps passed. We all can make a difference in someones life even if it is small. God needs our help to do this work. It is more important than any other thing we do. we should never buy into Satans lie that we don't have time.....because God gave us this time to do his work. Everything else we get to do is just a bonus.

 

I testify of the importance of missionary work. We are here to help God with his work. It is not our time, it is Gods time that he gave to us. Even small things can make a big impact. I love you all so much and I am so glad that our family will be together forever! I have all the incentive in the world to work hard and do my best so that I can be with you all forever. I hope that you all work hard too! Try a little harder to be a little better everyday. It isn't about perfection it is about growth and progress.

 

Challenge of the week: Everyone go and visit Grandma. She needs to feel the love. (I don't know why that popped into my head, but just do it......because I can't.)

Miss you more than the mountain is tall!

 

Read and Pray EVERYDAY!!!!!

 

Hermana Makin

Hi... (week 26)

Hi,

Well.....cambios went about just as we expected. Hermana Stringham is abandoning me :( I am sad.....also stressed. I still don't know all of the people and it is a hard sector...but I have faith that it will all work out.

Hermana Stringham is doing well. I think she is nervous about going to a new sector and leaving her first sector, but I think it is mostly because of the bikes and the dogs. She is afraid of both of those things. Oh well you should probably know that the dogs here chase cars and bikes and they get so close to the wheels that it doesn't surprise you that many of the dogs in the street are lame. I imagine more than one dog has kocked a missionary off their bike....

 

Anyway, we had a pretty good week here in Recreo. We are still working really hard as usual. This week we decided that we were going to have animo all week long and we did it. We found 5 nuevos this week! I don't really know if they will progress or not....but I am excited to have some new people to teach! Four of the nuevos are a family of sorts and they are very Evangelico...so I don't know what is going to end up happening with them. 

 

Javier is going to the temple this week! Also we are going to challenge him to enroll in seminary and he is going to recieve the priesthood on Sunday. He is such a good egg. He is one of those investigators de oro.....and now a converso de oro! I am excited for his future. He is now in Mosiah! He set a personal goal to finish the Book of Mormon. So now my goal is to finish the Book of Mormon before he does. 

 

I was reading in Jesus the Christ this week and it said Jesus Christ is full of grace and truth. As I want to be more like Jesus I decided I needed to learn more about grace. I always thought it was more like an attribute one could acquire, but I came to find through my studies that it is more of like a power. We can be better because of the grace of Jesus Christ, or through the power of Jesus Christ.  There are so many scriptures that are fantastic that talk about grace too. Also I really loved the bible dictionary definition.  I loved studying it. I recommend it!

 

So not too much more exciting going on here. I would ask that you pray for Lorena though. She was going to go to church this week like if it was the last thing that she did because she just wants to know if it is where she is suppossed to be....and her husband invited people over again....I think he is trying to put things in the way. He is a good person....I just....well.....he thinks it's a cult and we have weird rituals or something. Anyway Lorena is starting to think it shouldn't be this hard and....I think she is loosing her desire to know.....please pray for her. She is so so great! Also you could pray for Alejandro her husband.

 

I miss you all quite a lot. Its really annoying. I loved all the letters I got from Mom this week. It was funny watching the Elders pulling down all the letters from the shelf and all of them being for me. (There were like 5 plus the package from Gill. Thanks Sister! Or rather...your welcome haha) They were all like what the freak! It was funny. I feel the love. You should all take advantage of me being in this zone. This one and the last one that I was in are the only ones where you get to check the mail every week. In any other zone.....well I just won't ever get mail. Like every 4 months or something.....so take advantage :)

Read and Pray Everyday!

 

Hermana Makin

Week 6! Cambios are coming......ah! (PS didnt this cambio go by fast!) (week 25)

Hello Family!

 

So I hope that I didn't give you the wrong impression with my last letter. I am doing really good! My sector is a challenge, but it's just a challenge, I don't take it personally. What I do take personally is the heat! So hot! Its okay though, we but popsicles :) They are pretty darn cheap....like 20 cents American.

 

So we had a baptism on Saturday! It was pretty great. We had a few problems with the font, but in the end it all worked out really well :) It was a really challenging day though. I woke up sick.....again. I know right? (You can't say I´m not exercising Dad. You could say that I am not eating right, but the members here are all over that, so you can't say that either. I get plenty of protein!) Then, just the font situation was really stressful. BUT! After he got baptised Javier got up to bear his testimony and he started crying. He couldn't even talk. It was just a really sweet experience! I guess you had to be there. We had mormon messages going on during the part where he was changing his clothes and his step dad was getting emtional. Then someone told us he is a non active member. His whole family came to support him, even his sister who doesn't believe in God. His friends came too. They came to the confirmation the next day too. (With their marijuana leaf necklaces and all lol) They were really interested and everything. Javier told us that they were talking about how missionaries are so persistent and the mormons and all that and he was all well I am going to be one of them. Then started telling them about the church. Hes already a missionary! And in his confirmation the missionary thing got brought up too. Miracles people miracles!

 

Oh and guess what! Hna. Sheehan told me that Samuel came to church in Graneros yesterday. I about lost it! He's back! I hope the Elders take good care of him. He is apparently going to go south after this....I just hope he keeps staying strong in the church. I had a dream this week he came back fat and an alcoholic......so then I was really worried this week.

 

ALSO!!!! Carlos( remember the one who couldn't leave his house) got called to be in the Young Mens presidency! My heart just fills with joy! I am so so so happy about this!

 

Oh! And! Lorena said she is going to go to church this next Sunday even if her husband doesn't come with her. Pray for them! She also said, I just decided to believe in the Book of Mormon....not really what we were going for when we asked her to pray for a testimony, I think she is just so afraid of the answer because she will have to change everything and her husband isn't really on board. We taught her about the Word of wisdom this week and she told us that she said it didn't make sense logically. What about self control etc. Then we read a scroipture from the bible and she was all....okay but how am I going to explain this to my husband? I think she knows it's true its just hard for her to accept it or something.

 

Everyday has a miracle in it, you just have to look for it. I prayed for you all a lot this week. I hope everyone is well. Keep me updated! Love you all to pieces!

 

Read and Pray Everyday!

 

Hermana Makin