Nothing like a clean kitchen!

Today it was funny because in our letters from President Wagner he talked about how we need to clean our houses better and I was happy because I feel like our house is clean today. This is a picture of our kitchen. 

It is so nice because our house is so small, we can clean it really well.  The house in Guzman never really got that clean because of our laziness and the size of the house. 

I really enjoyed cleaning and washing my clothes today even though it sounds crazy, whenever I am enjoying cleaning or washing I think of what you told me one time about how, one time, one of the Bundy girls told her mom that she was not going to clean her house when she was older, that she was going to hire a maid to do it, and her mom told her, “ok well, then the maid will be happy and you will not be”.  

There are so many ups and downs out here.  Tuesday was one of the best days of my life, and Wednesday was absolutely awful.  Sundays always seem to be good here, and Mondays and Tuesdays as well. Monday, we only had one lesson. It was with a less active member, Sebastian, but it was a totally awesome lesson. You know the lessons where you and your companion are on the same page, it is guided by the spirit, the person who you are teaching is paying attention and understanding, that sort of a lesson, and the best part, was that at the end of the lesson, he was super happy and so that was awesome.

Sebastian was baptized about 25 years ago, when they were building the church here, I think that he actually helped to build it, but he was not active for very long. His wife died a while ago as well and I think that that made things harder for him as well. 

Wednesday and Thursday and Friday and really Saturday as well, were all very tough days, it seems like that is usually how it goes, the middle of the week always seems to be tougher for me, there are times when I am excited to be here, and other times when I think to myself, who else can we visit, we have already visited everyone! 

Chain Contacting?.......

So, Monday and Tuesday were absolutely awesome, you know those days when you feel like you are walking around just absolutely full of the spirit? Yea, they were some of those days! Tuesday we did not have anyone to teach and so we decided to try something that Elder Gonzalez taught me in Guzman. So, we are not allowed to knock on doors now, but if we see someone outside of their house or something we can talk to them, and make a contact. And so, we saw a couple and their kids that were inside of their house but with the door open and so we contacted them, and they did not want anything.  But what we do, is, it is called chain contacting, we just ask for all of the names of their neighbors, and then they are referrals and we can go and knock on their doors because we know who they are. Anyways, they gave us some of the names of some of their neighbors and we went to contact them, and one of them, Maria de Jesus is totally awesome.  She was reading the Bible when we got there, and is not catholic. She could not come to church this Sunday, but I am confident that she will be able to in the future.

Then, later on, we were walking down that same street and saw a mom and her daughter and felt like we should talk to them, and so we did.  The mom´s name is Carmen, and her daughter is Magda.  Carmen is having many family problems right now, and it seemed like we were able to share something with her that helped her. And she willingly offered the closing prayer, without us having to convince her or anything, which is very uncommon. And in her prayer she mentioned something about how she felt something when she saw us, and it was just one of those moments when you feel like, yes! We do have the spirit with us, and it was just awesome.

From Left to right, Iselda, Carmen, and Lupita, I do not know their last name. Carmen is the one that said that she felt something when she saw us the other day.

Jennifer Urdiales, she came to the activity by herself on Friday.  Her mom could not come, they could not come to church yesterday because her little sister is sick and because they went to Tianguis. They came to the activity along with 3 investigators, Carmen, who I talked about earlier and two of her daughters, Lupita and Iselda. The other daughter who we taught earlier, Magda was not able to come.

Yesterday night we had awesome lessons with Jennifer Urdiales, who now has a baptismal date for the 3rd of August, and with Karen and Mosiah, they are the kids of Alicia, a less active member here, and they are not members, but Karen accepted a baptismal challenge for the 10th of August, Karen has been to church one time, Mosiah 2 times, and their mom alicia, 2 times, Mosiah is 8 years old and Karen is 12 years old, actually she turned 12 yesterday and they gave us a piece of her cake, tres leches, super awesome!

We have to hitch ride back, but only from Coayuote, where the first counselor and a few other members live, it is just like 10 minutes away from Tuxpan and we have never had any problems, going there and back. I still get along well with E Hernandez, not perfectly, but well. I am really lucky, all of my companions have been easy to get along with, and especially the mexican ones, both of my Hernandez companions and Elder De La Mora have just been some of the best people that I have ever met in my life. 

 I am glad that Nate´s talk went well. I also spoke in church yesterday as well, and I felt like it went well. I spoke about the Body of Christ from Corinthians 12.

Love you guys, write to you next week!