¿Hola? :)

HerMama Thomas' note: And with this post, I am officially caught up with blog posts! We LOVED talking to Hermana Thomas on Christmas Day. She looked beautiful and I was comforted to feel how at peace she is in her life right now! I miss her every single second but am so thankful she is healthy, happy and still full of FUN!

HOLA FAMILIA.

¿Como estan? Les extraño mucho. Y ¿como fue su año nuevo? AND THAT'S ALL THE SPANISH I'M GOING TO DO because I feel like if I do any more, the Spanish speakers that are reading this are going to judge hard core my imperfect spanish. So.

This week was interesting! It was good, but just...interesting. We got humbled. We had about two days straight of pure contacting. "Hola, ¿como esta? Bueno, queremos presentarnos porque somos misioneras...de la Iglesia de Jesucristo de los santos de los ultimos días. ¿Usted ha hablado con misioneros antes? Oh, ¿su hija esta enferma/usted va a salir ahorita/tiene visitas? Esta bien. ¿Podemos regressar otro dia, entonces? ¿Si? ¿No? Bueno, esta bien, pasaremos, entonces. ¡Chow, Gracias!" Literally...no one was letting us into their house. We usually offer to just enter their house, sing a hymn and offer a prayer, which pretty much gets us invited in at least half the time. But these people were not havin it this week! We felt a little down for these two days, since we had such a rocking week last week! But we just kept on rollin and we ended up having some pretty good success in the end. But still...those days were a little rough. Go ask any missionary if contacting for two days is fun.

Also, ¡Feliz año nuevo! Holy cow, we're in 2014!! I can't believe it. It doesn't feel like I've been in the mission for (almost) six months. Time really flies. Hermana Kenney and I were talking about how these last two weeks have been the absolute fastest of the mission.

Speaking of New Years...the missionaries in our mission had to be in their casas before 7pm that night, since I guess the Chileans go a little crazy with the fiestas and the drinking and all that. So we had a nice little dinner with our new roomies (Hermana Gonzales and Hermana Villareal.) It was really nice! Then we planned and updated our carpeta, and got ready to sleep. 

The next morning, I turned to Hermana Kenney and commented on how surprised I was that I hadn't heard any fiestas, loud shouting, chanting, music, or ANYTHING the night before. In fact, I felt really unusually rested. She agreed with me, that it was weird we hadn't heard anything. We decided between ourselves that Chileans don't really care about New Years Eve after all. Well, then we walked out into the living room to find a very frazzled Hermana Gonzales, followed my an extremely drowsy Hermana Villareal, both sleep deprived and seeming to be falling apart from exhaustion. They said they MAYBE got an hours sleep in the night before, due to all the HARD-CORE PARTYING that was going on from all sides all night (above us, below us, next to us, in the plaza, etc.) But Hermana Kenney and I had been dying of heat in the night, and we'd even slept with the window WIDE OPEN. AND IT'S A BIG WINDOW. LIKE, A HUGE WINDOW. LIKE IT'S SLIDING DOORS. (I guess I could have said sliding doors from the beginning.) The Hermanas said that they'd shut both their windows and covered their faces, but the noise was so loud. Personally, I had kicked off all the blankets I had on me during the night, and I really had no ear protection at all. But Hermana Kenney and I had slept the night away like little rocks! 

Working really REALLY hard pays off, people! You can sleep through anything, apparently! 

I've also had some classic moments this week with my companion. We went looking for an old investigator who was living with her boyfriend before, and when we got to her boyfriend's house, we shouted "alo!" and a drunk old lady shouted "¿Que quieres?!?" So we said we wanted to visit Flor, to which the old lady shouted, "¡No vive aqui...no más!" (This is really good news, since the boyfriend was the person telling Flor that she should drop the missionaries, so obviously, we wanted to know where she lived now so that we could continue teaching her!) So Hermana Kenney asked where she lived now, and the old lady grumbled something. (By the way, we can't see this lady because of this huge wooden gate.) Hermana Kenney asked again, and again the old drunk lady grumbled something again. Hermana Kenney asked one more time, and this time, clear as day, the old lady shouted, "NO. VIVE. AQUI. PORFIADA." ("Porfiada" is a word that chileans use to describe someone super annoying and super persistent.) Needless to say, we have no idea where Flor lives now.

My companion also grew up without any TV. I keep forgetting this, and quoting TV commercials. Anyway, the other day I told her a joke with the punchline "Silly Rabbit, Trix are for kids," and she just stared at me like she was still waiting for the end of the joke. So this began a big long discussion of catching her up with the popular phrases of almost everyone's childhood. Then we started a guessing game, where I would say the catch phrase and she had to guess what product it referred to. We were doing things like "it's magically delicious!" or "looks like cookies, tastes like 'em too, but it's a breakfast cereal!" or "the taste you can see!" or "cinna-man is the winna-man." And she was actually doing really good at guessing...then I got to "they're grrrrrRRREAT!" She looked a little stumped, then innocently guessed, "...grape-nuts?" I think I died three times from laughing so hard. I am such a punk.

Maria Elizabeth is getting baptized this Saturday! We are so excited. This has been the first person who has progressed to baptism in my mission, and it has been amazing to watch her life be so blessed, and for her to find so much joy in learning about the gospel of Christ and drawing nearer to our Savior. She is so enthusiastic for her baptism. The other day she bore a simple testimony of gratitude to us in a lesson, and I felt this emotion well up in my chest that is indescribable. I am excited to take pictures and send them to you next week! Please pray that everything will work out well in these next coming days!

The gospel is true. I know that Jesus Christ is my Savior and loving Older Brother. Every day I learn a little more about the atonement, and how he really did suffer for each and every one of us. He is in the details of everything in our lives. He has a hand in everything. There is no such thing as coincidences. I know that every good thing that comes to a person comes through our Father in Heaven and his Son, Jesus Christ. I know that I am preaching the only true gospel in the world. I know I'm exactly where I need to be, and although I'm weak, I know the Lord will help me magnify this calling..."For I know in whom I have trusted" (2 Nefi 4. Read it.) 

I LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH. I REALLY DO. Oh, and a very happy 39th birthday to my Auntie Chelle! 

KEEP READING AND PRAYING AND WRITING ME AND ALSO GOING TO CHURCH. Because it's all important. Especially the reading and praying and going to church part.

KEEP ME UPDATED. Love yas!

Love, Hermana Thomas

¡Hey thur!

¡FAMILIA Y AMIGOS!

How I've missed you all this week. I can't believe that's one Christmas down...and maybe only one more to go! (Who knows when I'll be home...) It was a little sad to think that the family was at home in a temperature other than scorching, with a big ol' tree and a reason to drink hot chocolate...but then again...I'M IN CHILE. And when I remembered that, everything was good again. 

Really, this Christmas was one to remember. We didn't really do much...first of all, we really did have a Christmas miracle. Hermana Kenney and I woke up to a "white" Christmas--every day up until the 25th had been absolutely smoldering with heat in the mornings, but that morning the entire sky was white with cloud-cover, and it was nice and cool outside! No one was in the streets. Everything was quiet. We baked cupcakes for the people we'd visit that day, then we decorated them, had a little devotional as a zone, went and ate some delicious food...then I talked with my FAMILY! THAT WAS AWESOME. Hey I miss you guys! That might have been the shortest hour of my life. But it was so fun to see you! And I agree, my mission-timing is perfect...I'll get to talk to you again at about my year-mark, and by next Christmas, I'll practically be home! That is so weird to think about. I don't want to think about that.

This week was really, really awesome. Hermana Kenney and I worked so hard, and it really paid off. I know the Lord had a huge hand in our work! Tuesday was probably my favorite day. We went out to this little campo-part of our sector, Olivar. (I think I've talked about this place before. It's pretty golden with people wanting to listen to and learn about the gospel.) Anyway, we decided to try a specific prayer that day. We decided that we wanted to find a family of five who where waiting for the gospel and that they'd have a way to get to church. (Olivar is super far from our chapel.) Anyway, we promised that we'd contact two streets, and literally talk to EVERYONE we saw, and invite all of them to church and ask if they'd ever heard of or seen a Book of Mormon (something practically unheard of in this town.) If they said they owned a Book of Mormon, that would be the way we'd recognize that this was the family we'd prayed for. 

Things got crazy pretty fast. Before we prayed our specific prayer, there was hardly anyone in this street...but as soon as we said amen, people flooded it! I swear, it was like people started just dropping out of the sky! But we'd made a promise to contact EVERYONE we saw......! So....we did! There were times when two or more people were walking in different directions, and without seeming too desparate, we basically had to chase after them individually to contact them. There was one point when I thought Hermana Kenney was going to eat it running after this guy on a bike. Anyway, we contacted, contacted, contacted, taught a few lessons...but no one had ever seen un Libro de Mormòn! But we kept going, going, going...and then we contacted this lady with her kid, and they seemed a little...grumpy...but we asked her if she'd ever seen a Book of Mormon, and she said, "¡si! ¡tengo uno en mi casa!" Well, we were pretty shocked. But she told us we should visit her another day because she was leaving, so she asked for our number (yes, she asked for OUR number first,) and then we got her number...and we're going to visit her the next time we go up! 

That was really cool, because we really felt like instruments in the Lord's hands. Maybe she might not be the exact answer to our prayers, but we have seen the Lord's blessings poured upon us every day since then. First of all, it really changed the way we contact with people--we've been a lot more creative and sincere when we talk to people in the streets every day after that. We also proved to ourselves that we can work really hard and not burn out, and that at the end of the day, we feel SO GOOD. Being a missionary is great.

We're going to keep it up this next week! I know we just need to keep depending on the Lord and working our hardest.

WHICH REMINDS ME...YAY! I GET TO STAY WITH HERMANA KENNEY! We are so psyched, because we both had a feeling that we were going to get switched...I don't know why. But I am so excited, because Hermana Kenney is such a hard worker, and we laugh together and work together really great. We also got two more sisters to come live with us...Hermana Gonzales and Hermana Villareal, both Latinos! So I'm hoping my spanish wont suffer too much...

Side-note: this morning, Hermana Kenney said that when she doesn't brush her teeth soon enough in the morning, her teeth feel like they have "little sweaters on them." So...this is my companion. I laughed for a good five minutes.

All our investigators are progressing well! We had all three of our people with fechas in church this week, which was a miracle! Maria Elizabeth is still good for the eleventh of January! (HOLY COW. JANUARY?!? How is it almost January?!?!?)

You guys! I love being a missionary! I really do. Although I still think of home and how fun it will be to see everyone again, every day I feel that feeling a little more...that feeling that missionaries always talk about, how they don't want to go home by the end? That feeling. It just keeps growing. 

I love you all with all my heart. Keep reading and praying and writing me because i LOVE GETTING YOUR LETTERS so much. Also, of course Taylor won that Ticket to Ride tournament. Come on, guys. We had a good to years prep for that. What happened.

I LOVE YOU.

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR. I'M SERIOUS.

Love, Hermana Thomas!