12-15-2014: The Last Missionary E-mail...

The first email of the day from Hermana Kate:

See you Thursday!

Love, 

Hermanita Sangre

The next email of the day:

Just kidding, I'm writing a legit email right now
hah I'm funny, right?

The third and final email of the day:

Helloooooooo!

Ok, Business meeting: 

I Would loooooove to go see the shop around the corner at stanford on saturday night.  Just saying.  All the other ideas sound fantastic as well. :)  

and a mommy daughter lunch date with patty and kathryn sounds great!  i love those ladies. 

end business meeting.

This week has been loco.  But awesome!  I love sister Gentry and Sister Christensen.  Sister Gentry is actually going home on thursday as well, so we call Sister C the assassin since she's killing us both off. :)  hah.  They're in the english ward, so we've been having to balance a lot of their appointments and I've been preparing the spanish sisters area for a "whitewash" (when two brand new missionaries come into an area) AND it turns out it's going to be Sister Ford (my trainee!) and she's going to be training a new missionary! Again!  So my trainee will get to come serve in her mission mama's area.  She's awesome, she's going to do great here. 

But We've been balancing the two areas pretty well, I've had to say bye to a lot of people so that they know two brand new missionaries are going to be teaching them, but it's been good.  Sad, but good.  At the end of Relief Society the Bishop's wife got up and announced to everyone that I was going home and they all did the unison "awwww".  I LOVE this ward and these people so much! 

We went caroling (in spanish) with allll the missionaries in the ward and the ward mission leader to some less actives on Friday, it was so fun!  We sang Away in a Manger and Silent Night about 500 times and I loved it.  Then we finished the night off with some "Pay de queso" aka cheesecake HOMEMADE with some abuelitas hot chocolate, that was one of the highlights of the week. 

AND I had my exit interview with President Ames on Wednesday, it was amazing!  So much revelation received.  One of the things that he told me that I really liked was that he told me that we never get released from our covenants, and that is where the real power lies.  Truth. I'm excited to tell you all the other cool things he told me, it was a really powerful interview.  I love and respect President and Sister Ames so much, they are amazing.  And I love being around missionaries.  I'm not going to lie, I'm a little nervous about finishing this part of my life, because I feel like the only thing I know about life right now is being a missionary!  But my nametag doesn't define me.  It's awesome to have, but I can share the gospel no matter where I am.  

Missions end, and that's OK.  

I love you all so much.  Thank you for the support and love.  I am excited to see y'all on Thursday! Make sure to tell the boys to not forget their muscles at home, because they will be hauling around some prettttttty hefty suitcases for me! (kidding. I will comply to the under 50 weight limit)

Les quiero. Yo se que la iglesia es verdadera y que Dios nos ama.  Yo se que Dios nos escucha a nuestras oraciones y que el nos cuida en todo momento.  Jesucristo es nuestro salvador y redentor y hermano mayor.  Sin el no podemos vencer la muerte fisica ni la espiritual.  Y gracias a el la muerte y todo lo que nos impide de ser mejor no tiene aguijon. 

Con mucho carino,

Hermanita Sangre

12-8-2014: Mom asks, "Is it too soon to countdown?"

Hello Family!

So here's a curveball for the week!  :)  On Thursday we got a call from the mission office (here I was expecting it to be them wanting to schedule my exit interview with president...) to let us know that Sister Kofe got her visa to panama!! BUT that means that she needs to leave on TUESDAY. aka tomorrow. aka a week before transfers.  So, since I am not allowed to be without a companion, (duh) I will be going to live with my English Sister Training Leaders in the Highland Station ward.  I began my mission in a trio, and I will end my mission in a trio. :) 

 So that means I'm basically already packed and will be living out of a suitcase for a week. #sleepover  My bags are packed, literally the definition of trunky. :) haha But don't worry, I've still got LOTS to do to prepare our investigators and the area to receive two new sisters.  Lots of notes to write and people to visit.  On the plus side, the Highland Station sisters have a really nice apartment.  And a gym.  I will be putting those treadmills to good use during morning workouts!

We're going caroling tonight!  That will be fun. 

Hermanita Sangre with some pre-Christmas Puppy Chow,
scarf & other treats.

So a family in an English ward called us and had us over for dinner on Thursday because their aunt from Honduras was in town and wanted to give her an opportunity to meet the missionaries and hear a message in her own language.  So we had these REAAAAALLY good enchiladas (yum)  and watched the "He is the Gift" video with them.  (christmas.mormon.org)  So sweet.  She's leaving to go back to Honduras soon, but we stopped by last night to teach her the restoration and she accepted a copy of the Book of Mormon!  Super cool.  A good seed planted.  

Played the piano in Sacrament again.  It's fun :)  The ward is very patient with me and my many messups but it's a fun way to serve.  

Our investigators are doing well!  We'll be trying to visit everyone this week to let them know about the changes and everything.  And we are going to be having LOTS of meals this week, since our meal calendar is full and so is the Highland Station meal calendar....Don't be surprised if I come home 100 pounds heavier.  It will be a fun surprise.  hah

To answer your question, Mom, our transfer meeting is on Wednesday, so Wednesday afternoon President and Sister Ames take all the departing missionaries to the temple and we're there basically all day until dinner at the mission home and a testimony meeting.  Then we get up Thursday morning for our return flights!  Any set-in-stone plans for the weekend with the whole family? :)  AND I am A-OK with keeping the In-n-Out tradition. In fact, I've been planning on it.  Already read your minds.

Hope you all have a good week this week, love you all!  Cuidense y portense bien, ok?

Les quiero,

Hermanita Sangre

12-1-2014: When You Read This, It Will Be DECEMBER!

Sup. :)

This week was SUPER full, and just overall awesome.  I think I say that every week is good, but forreal, this week was REALLY good.  

But then again, only in Texas does the temperature drop 40 degrees in less than 12 hours.  It's fine.

Yesterday we were at church for like a gazillion hours. We had studies in the morning and then we went to our Ward Council meeting at noon. Then church started at 1:30.  Then we had a baptism right after scheduled for 5 BUT the husband of the couple being baptized was waiting for his Dad to drive in from Dallas, so the baptism didn't really start till 5:45, so we didn't end up leaving until like 6:30.  It was like a marathon!  But all good things.  And the spirit was suuuper strong during the baptism.  The couple being baptized were super cool and super prepared, everyone there could feel the spiritual confirmation that God was pleased with their decision.  Man, I love covenants.

So, of course, I was playing prelude for the baptism and the Bishop's wife was like, "Let's sing some Christmas hymns while we wait for Jose's Dad" so we sang Christmas hymns for like 45 minutes.  My hands were cramping.  And she directs realllly fast.  So imagine me running after a moving train, and that's basically what I felt like. haha it was fun.  I give Murlene props for accompanying basically every musical number ever in the history of the world because that is tiring stuff!

Our Thanksgiving day was super fun.  We spent the morning doing weekly planning and then we went and visited some of my favorite families, the Gamboa family and the Franco family.  LOTS of really good food.  Mostly traditional stuff, no rice or beans.  But don't worry, we got our fill of all that the rest of the week.  ;)

Then on Friday we did some service as a district and our Ward Mission Leader invited us all over afterwards to go eat Pupusas--a dish from El Salvador that is really really good.  Man, I love pupusas.  THEN, we had a visit from Hermana Gomez, one of my trainers!! She finished her mission in August and has been at BYU, but she was in town for the weekend visiting the mission and she spent basically the rest of Friday with us going around visiting people.  It was soooo fun!  She's at BYU so I'll see her soon.  I got some pictures with her.  

Saturday night we had dinner with another one of my favorite families, the Bonillas. :)  They are so awesome, they're from Puerto Rico, and they have toooons of health problems so it's hard for them to come to church, but they come when they can and they have the strongest testimonies ever.  So they invited a friend over for the dinner, too.  (i think I've mentioned him before?  His name is Saul.)  And we taught him and he accepted the invitation to be baptized once he knows it's true!  The spirit was really strong in that lesson.  

Sorry, Dad.  No bubba yet.  Don't worry, I've still got 2 and a half weeks, there's still hope.  

I'm glad y'all could have a good Thanksgiving weekend!  And good thing Mom went out to run some errands so that BYU could finally win a game. :) hah 

I like that question about Faith, I'm going to ponder that and get back to you.  

Thanks for being great examples of strength and faith and enduring to the end.  I love you so much.  

Portense bien, ok?

Hermanita Sangre