Happy Birthday Hermana Ford!!

 We raced some of the other elder's in our ward in a 3-legged race...we won(but just barely:)

Cynthia and Johanna threw a little party for me at Griffith park. Pinatas and little baby Alegria.

This has been the longest, craziest week. Seriously, it's hard to explain. A week can feel like a month just because soooo many things happen. This week we were working on patience, and boy did things happen that tried our patience and endurance. Rough lessons, struggling with spanish and just trying to be a good missionary, but even after all those hard things we just had to keep praying for patience and being able to have faith that if we worked hard that we knew we were doing what we could and everything would be ok. As we did this we just had so many tender mercies and miracles that as we were looking back over our week last night I had totally forgotten that that hard lesson or day of spanish had happen this week!

I was reading an ensign last weekend and I came across this: "As you emphasize your faith and not your doubts, your faith will grow"-Quentin L. Cook. This helped me so much this week because I had started to realize that I was disqualifiing? my spanish and saying things like "oh, I haven't learned anything" or "It's really not that good" and I realized that it was kinda showing my lack of faith and I wasn't going to progress if I kept saying that to myself. Well, turns out that as I just kept having faith and confidence in myself I found myself talking more in lessons whether I knew how to say something or not and while I can't really see my progress I have felt a little bit more comfortable.(funny how faith works huh?:) You think I would have realized that earlier) I also taught/said the first vision for the first time! Took a while for me to finally have the courage to offer to do it, but I made a goal, and the Lord certaintly helped me to be able to explain it, and for them to understand.

Anyways, I guess I will tell you about my birthday. It was awesome! This is a little what I wrote in my journal because I was super tired then I will expound:)

"woke up. ran. studies. district meetin(ate cake)...did service at a less active's house(ate pupusas and a cupcake)...Had 2 pinatas at Griffith park with Johanna and Cynthia(ate cake). Went to the ward's fathers day activity(ate carne asada)."

Seriously, so much food, but it was so nice to feel and know how much the people I have been serving not just appreciate what I'm doing but actually love me! It may not seem like a big deal, but it really meant a lot to me because being the less out-going one and being in a ward with 9 other missionaries it is easy to feel lost in the crowd, but that is certainly not the case!

Yesterday was the world-wide broadcast for missionaries...which was awesome! Do you have access to that? I forgot to bring my notes with me, but I guess the biggest things I got out of it was working with the members to do missionary work. It's the best way to find people, and I have learned already that if you want people to be converted to the gospel/church and not just the missionaries the ward and members play such a vital role. 

There are so many things I want to tell you all, but I guess I will just have to stick with this little story. Last night one of our lessons fell threw(one that is usually a set plan, but I guess we still have to keep learning to always set back up plans) but we were walking down a street to go visit a potential and we saw a street that we have never been down before, but we decided to hit it on the way back because we only had an hour before we had to go home for the night. Well, when we were walking down the street on our way back we ran into a family, and the dad said that he thought his mom or sister might have been baptized back in guatemala, and he asked how long it takes to get baptized and we told him about family history(first time I've ever used that while contacting) and told him there was a way he could find out. Such a cool experience and guy to talk to and we found out that his wife actually has an uncle that is super active. We run into so many people that have a family member back in central america that are members or they use to meet with or remember seeing missionaries when they use to live in their country. There are so many people that are prepared to hear the gospel, and have had a seed planted for many years. We need so many missionaries, and lowering the ages is exactly what the world needs! Last night, I felt like I wanted more missionaries in my area just so I could focus only on the members, or the less actives or just going and finding people!

Out of time...darn.

I love you all thank you for your weekly letters and prayers! They mean the world to me!

Love,

Hermana Ford