Diciembre ya! [December already!]

¡Buen dia!

Good to hear from you all! Hope you all enjoyed a fantastic week and a nice break from school. I am a bit jealous of the snow as we have been having some HOT weather lately. At least it makes the cold showers every morning not seem so bad! I am still suffering a bit from this awful cold! I finally gave in to my companion and all the members that kept telling me I needed to see the doctor or go to the hospital (people go to the hospital for EVERYTHING here, it is quite funny) so I called up the mission doctor and told him my symptoms. He basically told me if I dont have a fever then it is just allergies... so he just recommended some medicine for allegies y left it at that. Looks like I just gotta tough it out!

Tuesday morning we found an awesome new investigator named Alba while we were doing contacts. She answered in the window shaking her finger at us like she didnt want anything to do with us... and I felt that I should just ask her "why not?" She went on to explain to us that the missionaries had passed by her house several times in the past and always invited her to church, etc. and that she felt bad because she never did what they invited her to. We asked if we could come in and share a message with her and she accepted. She said she had never let the missionaries in before. As we started to talk about the Book of Mormon... she told us she already HAD a book like that, and went and pulled a Triple of her book shelf that she said she recovered from the street after some missionaries had gotten robbed y that she never had the chance to give it back to them. Apparently her sister is going in for cancer treatment this week y she was really preoccupied thinking about her. We taught her about prayer y the blessings that come from talking out our worries/desires with our Heavenly Father y she gave a great prayer at the end of the lesson!

Wednesday we had our interviews with Pres. Stapley. Our district was the first up for interviews and while we were waiting we all enjoyed eating some tasty facturas y chocolate-covered, dulce-de-leche-filled CHURROS while talking with Hna. Stapley. She has learned spanish super fast y is always studying y learning new words/expressions. She already speaks portuguese... and as we talked she was making a list of all the words that trip her up because of their similarities to portuguese. My interview with President went really well. He shared a scripture in Jacob 1:19 that talks about the responsibility that Jacob felt as a prophet to teach the people.. to the point that if he didnt do his job well that he felt accountable for the sins of his people. He also talked about preparing NOW to report my mission when I finish y to make the most of the time I have left. He asked what the most important thing I have learned in the mission is which I quickly responded was OBEDIENCE. Looking back now, it is definitely a principle I wish I would have understood better before the mission. The Lord is always willing to strengthen and bless us and only asks for us to be obedient in return. Lots of great examples of obedience in the scriptures!

Sounds like you all enjoyed a great Thanksgiving! I cant say we did much to celebrate here... however on Saturday we enjoyed a great lunch with Soledad y her family. We had pollo al horno (baked chicken) y a variety of salads with peaches for desert. Besides the FANTASTIC food it was great to be there with all the family including her husband y her sister y several of her neices who were visiting from Capital. After the meal we read "the family proclamation" with them which they all agreed was a perfect explanation of how a family should work. It has been a WHILE since I have read it, but I am always amazed how inspired Pres. Hinckley y the other apostles and prophets were in writing this declaration to the world over 15 years ago!

Well everyone thats it for now! Hope you all have a great week back in school! I have got a 3 day training with Pres. Stapley for all the leaders in the mission Tuesday Wednesday and Thursday... so hopefully my comp will have a good experience running the area all on his own for a couple days! Looking forward to hearing from you all next week!

les amo!
Elder Ian Wheelhouse