Hola! How are you all doing? First of all, Happy Birthday yesterday Hallie! I was thinking of her and I hope that her party and everything went really well. I hope that the picture works that I sent... very fun.
And how is everyone else doing? I got letters from Lisa and AK last week. Gracias! Lisa, it made me giggle that you were praying for them not to catch a fish. I wasn´t surprised.
Mom, I read part of your email that you wrote while I was waiting for the pictures to download. You mentioned that you need Heavenly Father every minute. Me too. I have no doubt that you can pray to Heavenly Father about every little thing, including and especially Scotty, and He will help you to know what to do.
Well, what a week! It has been great. First off, before I forget, I have a favor to ask everyone. Will you tell me next time you write, the reasons that you go to church on Sunday? What are the blessings that you feel that you receive from doing so? Why do you go every week? I have been thinking about it recently as I have thought about teaching the importance of going to church and keeping the sabbath day holy.
Well, Hermana Celis hurt her knee this last week. We´re not sure what happened... if it was something with the exercises, or what. But, Tuesday it really started to bother her. We were eating lunch with Flia. Beltran (yes Mom we eat lunch with members every day, and I´ll write more about it later). We had stayed there for a little longer because her knee was bothering her. But then we left to an appointment, Monica Troncoso, who lives just close by. Monica wasn´t there.
Hermana Celis decided that her knee was bothering her too much, so she said she wanted to ask Paula (daugher of Flia. Beltran) if she could go on divisions with me the rest of the day. She basically told me that she was going to ask Paula, there really was no asking me if I was okay with it. :)
So we go, and Paula agrees to come with me, and Hermana Celis stays with Hermana Beltran (who reminds me a lot of Ann Lewis :D ). I at this point am feeling very nervous and inadequate to go out and teach as the senior companion without Hermana Celis. I feel okay about lesson 1 and 2 these days, but lesson 3... I´m still working on it. And we had several lesson threes planned. But, I carried my ¨Preach My Gospel¨along with me, we all said a prayer together, and we headed out.
Paula is also 21. She has been a member for one year and five months. She is great, and very nice. As we got to talking, she mentioned that her brother Raimundo, who is our ward mission leader that just got his call, wants her to go on a mission. She said that she didn´t want to, because she gets so nervous. She is very shy. She would be worried about learning the language, and she doesn´t feel like she knows the doctrine really well because she didn´t have seminary or anything.
She told me the story of her conversion, and it was really neat to hear.
Our first couple of appointments weren´t there. I just kept praying and praying that Heavenly Father would help me, especially in speaking and understanding the Spanish, and that He would help her to have a good experience because I wanted her to have a good impression of the mission field.
We talked to a couple people, and finally talked to one lady in her front yard and gave the first part of the Restoration lesson, and then we headed off. She asked what we were going to do next, and I had no idea. We didn´t have another appointment for like 1 1/2 to 2 hours, because the others hadn´t been home. So we started walking.
We walked past one house, and the door was open. We said ¨hola¨and kept walking. We got like 5 or 10 steps, I stopped, and asked if we could go back and talk to that lady. I felt like we needed to talk to her.We went back, and she told us how she doesn´t live there, but she´s watching her mom´s house for a couple of weeks. Her mom had met with missionaries in the past. She let us teach her lesson one. It was such a good lesson. She expressed some of her concerns, about Joseph Smith, but I could really testify to her that it was no accident that we were on her patio, that very minute, teaching her about the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I knew that Heavenly Father led us there. It was so amazing. And I gave my first baptismal invitation! Yay!
Paula was amazing. She had told me she was nervous, but I just told her to share her testimony. That it was the most important part. She taught, shared a little bit about how she came to know, and she helped me understand the spanish if I didn´t understand.
We had one other appointment, and then it was the night. We headed to choir. It was such a good experience. It just reminded me that this is not the work of men - it´s the work of our Heavenly Father and His son, Jesus Christ. Even in our weakness we can serve.
We stopped by Flia Beltran´s house Saturday to check on Hermana Beltran because she had been sick. Paula drilled us with a million questions about the life of a missionary. It was very fun.
Last night we had choir practice again. We were getting ready to leave, and Paula told us that she is now preparing to serve a mission! Wow! Isn´t that amazing? She told us how she just felt something really special when she was out teaching on Tuesday. I told Hermana Celis last night, that it´s pretty amazing how Heavenly Father works. He gave Hermana Celis a hurt knee so Paula could decided to serve a mission. It reminded me how very often we don´t see the big picture, and that we don´t understand why things happen the way they do, but that Heavenly Father does. He knows all things, we just need to trust Him.
Scriptures for the week I love: King Benjamins address in the beginning of Mosiah. Especially Mosiah 2:34.
So I hope you´re all doing well. That was a really long story, but I wanted to share it. I need to go, but know I am always praying for all of you. I love you all so much, and am so grateful that you continue to share your lives with me through email. I´m always very interested in every detail. Thanks for all, and I love you tons!
Con Mucho Amor,
Hermana Jana Banana Pincock
The second is the baptism of Gabriela and Adrian 
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