Happy Mom's Day!

¡¡FELIZ DIA DE LA MADRE!!

Wow! OK so where do I even start with this week...its been a wild one.

So last Monday we had fun in a zone activity playing volleyball and my companion was really excited to be able to touch a soccer ball even though we couldn't play with the elders. hna Murdock showed me how to do a rainbow! She impressed the Latino elders with her skills too. 

As soon as we got to 6:30 Monday night we HIT the ground running!! We were both determined to work our heart out this week and that went super super great until about Wednesday afternoon and I don't know what happened exactly but I turned into a ZOMBIE. Like i COULD not function even if I wanted to and it was SO frustrating because we had a SUPER important appointment with our investigator that night who was supposed to get baptized on Saturday. and I had become basically mute! hna Murdock was tired to but we got to the appointment and literally all I could do was just look at her and smile and occasionally offer a few inspired words. but hna Murdock had to basically be in charge of the whole lesson. She didn't like it but I was actually pretty amazed at how well she did. I think it might have been divine intervention that was making me keep my mouth shut so that hna Murdock could be able to have that experience to prepare her for lessons when I won't be there not there to help her. But it was a wonderful lesson and the spirit was very strong, because we were both just 100%relying on the spirit. Afterward we made cheesecakes with the familia Aramayo and the familia Fernandez. Los amamos tanto!! les encantaron los cheesecakes tambien!!!

On Thursday we had an English class and also Natalia Aramayo had her baptismal interview. Turns out she needs a little bit more time. We're okay with that. The English class we had hyped everyone up about a LOT and we thought a lot of people would come. So we made the cheesecakes AND brownie bites. well we had a nice class with our 3 students and ate a LOT of sugar that night. My companion had a lot of fun teaching English. 

On Friday it rained a lot all morning and I had come down with a cold. We had planning all morning which was good but going out in the cold in the evening was hard. 

On Saturday we woke up ready to work at full gear again and we had a successful day. We had some great lessons and taught some great people about the Restoration and the Plan of Salvation. My companion has been practicing how to invite people how to pray. She's getting really good at teaching now. We got home feeling like we had worked our hardest to the very last minute and we were feeling good until the call from our zone leaders came. Turns out that they are CLOSING OUR AREA :(  that was really hard for hna Murdock. She will be finishing her training with hna Acevedo in La Colorado. They are bringing in elders to Guaracal. It could be that there's just really not any hnas in the mission right now but the elders that are coming seem pretty excited to pick up where were left off and I think they are gonna take good care of the area for us. It is hard though.

Sunday we finished the first six weeks of Hna Murdock's training. She's progressed so much. We had decided to not worry about picking up the familia Aramayo to go to church this week because we wanted to see if they had the strong enough desire to be able to come to church on their own. 

They arrived just before the sacrament!! and they stayed all three hours!! They'll be okay after we leave. The ward was all pretty shocked and sad to find out that we were both leaving. Literally the sacrament meeting hymns were "placentero nos es trabajar" which only exists in Spanish but is what they sing to say goodbye to people also "called to serve" for the rest hymn and "God be with you till we meet again" for the ending hymn. This ward sure knows how to send off a missionary. Honestly I'm so glad I got to end my mission in Guaracal. We loved the people so much this cambio, and we realized on Sunday that they had really really come to love us as well. 

We were busy all day running from one house to the other and we were ready to throw up from all the food people were giving us. masaco, arroz con leche, emanadas. One member felt bad for never being able to teach us how to make cuñape so we went over and she showed us how. I'll make it when I get home its super good. But we were ready to explode that's for sure. We also made our video phone calls for mothers day and had some wonderfully bittersweet goodbyes.

This is God's work and it is a work of Love. Our only job is to love the people. If we can do that, then we've succeeded in our calling as missionaries of the Lord. We did our job. We loved the people, and that's really all that people really need, is to feel loved. I've really striven to do God's will this cambio and we weren't perfect and not all our plans followed through, but we had willing hearts, the spirit, a positive attitude, and a desire to serve, and I feel like that's exactly what He expected of us. Being a missionary, is a special and sacred calling. I love being a missionary. 

So this weeks gonna be weird. I'll see y'all on Saturday. 

I testify that God loves us and that it is truly a Joy to share His gospel. 

I am a representative of Jesus Christ, and a member or His Church. I testify that He lives, he is our Savior, and that repentance brings up true and lasting happiness and peace. 

Love you guys. have a great week, see y'all on the other side,

Love and Luck from Santa Cruz, Bolivia

Hermana Brown