Ecuadorable: House Hunters International With Fleas!

Hola Familia!

Cambios!!! I am still here in Calderon, but I have a new companion! Her name is Hermana Wright! I met Hermana Wright back in Otavalo and I like her a lot! I am really glad that we are companions! She is from Maine, but has a lot of family in Utah and went to BYU for a year before her mission. I am really really glad that I have a little more time here in Calderon. We are working with some really great people right now and I am excited about the work!

So this was a pretty great week! Last Monday we went to make cookies with the Stake President and his family. It was really fun to hang out with them and after we went and delivered cookies and a Book of Mormon to their neighbors. It was really cool to do that with them! None of them wanted to listen to us but, that's OK. It was fun to help that family feel the spirit of missionary work!

Friday we had the baptism and it was awesome! Abigail`s husband baptized her and it was so sweet to see them both in white! My talk went well and Hermana Page played a song on the piano which was beautiful! After the baptism, Abigail bore her testimony and it was so amazing! They also talked a lot about how their goal is the temple! Yay! After the baptism she pulled us over and gave us a big hug and thanked us for "coming to soften her heart" and told us that it was the best decision that she has ever made. I love her and her family so much! There were also a ton of people there from the ward to support her. It was wonderful!

Janneth is doing really great. She is still really excited for her baptism on the 20th of this month! This week she told us that about a month ago (before we started teaching her) She saw us on the bus! She said that she saw me talking to a man and his kids and that I invited them to church before we had to get off. She said that she felt really offended that we didn't invite her to church too, and she almost followed us off the bus to ask where our church was, but she was too late. She spent the next few weeks trying to ask someone when and where the Mormons had their church, but then she gave up. Then a few weeks later she saw us on the street and stopped us to ask us and we have been teaching her since then! I know that she is prepared to accept the gospel and I am so glad that we have had the opportunity to teach her. I feel like she is definitely one of the people I was supposed to teach and one of the big reasons that I am here on the mission! .... also she gave me a pair of earrings this week that remind me of Lord of the Rings haha I`ll send a picture!

We now have a total of 6 investigators that can't get baptized because they need to get married and they don't have the money. Its really sad. :( Two of them are named Carla and Pedro and they have two little kids that are 1 and 3 years old. We saw them on the street the other day and they told us that they literally didn't have anything to feed their kids because Pedro lost his job and he can't find a new one. We felt so bad and we really can't give them any money as missionaries so we just went to a panadaria (bread store) and bought them a big bag of bread and left it on their doorstep. It really is heart breaking to see how poor people are here.

So they are going to bring two more missionaries in our ward! (making the total 8!) We have been put in charge of finding an apartment for the new missionaries! I told Hermana Page that it's just like House Hunters International, but we aren't as rich. We have looked at quite a few house,s but they are either WAY too crappy or WAY too much money. On Thursday night we went to go look at an apartment that seemed perfect! It had two bedrooms, a kitchen, two bathrooms, a place to study, and a place to wash clothes! We were super excited so we called the owner to ask if we could come look at it and he said we could! After we had been looking around for about 2 minutes I looked down and saw tons of little black bugs jumping onto my legs! Of course I started freaking out and slapping my legs like a crazy person. The man that was showing us the house was really old and just kept on asking Hermana Page what was wrong with me. hahaha Then I just ran out of the house. I was really concerned the rest of the night that I was now infested with fleas and I really didn't want them to get into our house! When we got home we put all of our clothes in plastic bags and ran to take a burning hot shower hoping to kill them or get them off of us. I think that it must have worked because we haven't had any problems! Point is that we didn't buy that apartment.

I love you guys and miss you so much! I love the gospel, I love my mission, I love the church, and I love Jesus Christ!