Hey hey hey!!
It's been a great week! How are you all? ... It did my heart good to hear about your temple trip! That's pretty rough to get up at 5:30 on your Saturday, but oh so worth it! And very special that you could do family names. That's really neat that you all shared your testimonies. And that's good you all practiced your etiquette, it's about time! :) tee hee
It's really rainy here today. We were going to play something called cabbage ball outside with our district (I don't know if that includes an actual cabbage... :) but now we're just gonna go to the church and play games instead, after we get everything done. Should be fun. Sister Carolan and I have grown so close. It's really awesome. I don't really know how to explain her. Well, I do know y'all would love her! She's just very real. She's diligent and has a great perspective. She's dedicated and doesn't mind doing things, like cooking with me! We actually don't really have anything (furniture wise) in our apartment so we quite often get to have a picnic! (on the floor haha!). She loves creating things out of good food and she's also good at making something out of nothing, whether that be some sort of taco, or something good out of a tough situation! We have a really great trust that we've built.
... We began teaching Claudia and Greysi the Restoration this week. She has lots of questions and so we're trying to find the balance of which one's to answer then, and what one's not to because we know they'll mostly be answered in the lessons we have. So we didn't finish teaching the Restoration (1st vision or the Book of Mormon) during our lesson. Also, she had so much to do this week - we could tell from the MOUNTAIN of laundry she was folding when we got there. She also really needed to clean and do projects around her house that she didn't really have time for another lesson. We kind of hinted that we could help clean, but she did NOT like that! So instead we just showed up the next day in jeans ready to clean. That's what she was doing when we got there, and she tried super hard to not let us help, but she eventually agreed! It was really good to just help her for awhile. The hungry man won't be able to read or pray or do whatever you ask him if all he can think about is how hungry he is. Likewise, the stressed out and tired mom and wife won't be able to either when she has a mountain of things to do. It was a good way for us to show that we genuinely love her and want to serve her.
And then her and Carlos were at church Sunday!!! We'd never even met Carlos before, and last we heard, he did not want to come to church. But they came for Sacrament meeting. We're not really sure yet what they thought, but that afternoon we started getting a lot of weird texts from Claudia about polygamy, Joseph Smith, gay marriage, etc. Oh boy. I'd wondered if she'd try to look stuff up and had told her about mormon.org and lds.org but instead they used Google. Not good. We have a solid friendship so that's good, otherwise I'd be afraid that we'd just stop hearing from her. But we're hopeful she'll just continue asking us. We need her in the Book of Mormon! It's hard to deny truth! Especially since during the lesson we had with her she told us that she's been praying, and then even though she feels silly, she's just been sitting quietly after she prays trying to hear an answer. What faith! She has all the good questions. How is she going to know the real answer when it comes? What if she misses it? So we had a good discussion about that this week while she cooked dinner and taught us to make tortillas. :) We will have to be very prepared when we go over this week for a lesson. She just has such great potential to be so strong of a member so fast that we feel like Satan is working so hard on her and on all those around her to tell her things that confuse her or aren't true. So, we decided, we'll just have to work harder. Study harder and be more worthy of the Spirit so that when we teach, she'll desire to follow our invitations to act, and that through that and her faith, her prayers will be answered and she won't be distracted by other things or give anti material the time of day.
Greysi, on the other hand, is doing AMAZING! At soccer on Saturday I was sitting down on the sidelines with her and we were just looking at the clouds when all of a sudden she said, "I want to be baptized." Ok, that was kind of out of no where. I asked her if she'd told Claudia. She responded that she told Carlos, but that he said she needed her papers. When I told her she didn't, she asked what she does need to do so I explained that. She truly is like the scriptures say - humble, submissive, meek, full of love, believing. She just recognizes something good. Her spirit is so strong, and for a 9 year old too! I asked her why she wanted to be baptized, and the sweetest and simplest answer came, "Well, I believe in God. And I want to be His child." It just melted my heart! So that's my update on my favorite family!
I hope you're doing great Dad! Know that I just love you SOOOOOO much!!! You hold such a very dear and special place in my heart. I tell people and my companion about you all the time. Things you've taught me, or memories I have. So thank you! :) Do you still write things in the morning, thoughts that you have? That could one day become a book? Just wondering. :)
I hope you all have a fantastic week!!! Mom, and I haven't forgotten that it's your B-day! Look for a card/letter in the mail from me, I just hope it makes it by Wednesday! I hope it's ok that that's what I got you!! I love you all dearly, remember that our lives are made up of moments, so make each one count! It's easy to follow the Savior one day at a time, so remember to do that, and one day we'll find that we've become the people and family we want to be. Sis. Carolan told me something last night that really stuck with me. We were talking about diligence and the little things and she said, "Life by the yard is hard, but by an inch it's a cinch."
Love you all!
Hermana Marks
It's been a great week! How are you all? ... It did my heart good to hear about your temple trip! That's pretty rough to get up at 5:30 on your Saturday, but oh so worth it! And very special that you could do family names. That's really neat that you all shared your testimonies. And that's good you all practiced your etiquette, it's about time! :) tee hee
It's really rainy here today. We were going to play something called cabbage ball outside with our district (I don't know if that includes an actual cabbage... :) but now we're just gonna go to the church and play games instead, after we get everything done. Should be fun. Sister Carolan and I have grown so close. It's really awesome. I don't really know how to explain her. Well, I do know y'all would love her! She's just very real. She's diligent and has a great perspective. She's dedicated and doesn't mind doing things, like cooking with me! We actually don't really have anything (furniture wise) in our apartment so we quite often get to have a picnic! (on the floor haha!). She loves creating things out of good food and she's also good at making something out of nothing, whether that be some sort of taco, or something good out of a tough situation! We have a really great trust that we've built.
... We began teaching Claudia and Greysi the Restoration this week. She has lots of questions and so we're trying to find the balance of which one's to answer then, and what one's not to because we know they'll mostly be answered in the lessons we have. So we didn't finish teaching the Restoration (1st vision or the Book of Mormon) during our lesson. Also, she had so much to do this week - we could tell from the MOUNTAIN of laundry she was folding when we got there. She also really needed to clean and do projects around her house that she didn't really have time for another lesson. We kind of hinted that we could help clean, but she did NOT like that! So instead we just showed up the next day in jeans ready to clean. That's what she was doing when we got there, and she tried super hard to not let us help, but she eventually agreed! It was really good to just help her for awhile. The hungry man won't be able to read or pray or do whatever you ask him if all he can think about is how hungry he is. Likewise, the stressed out and tired mom and wife won't be able to either when she has a mountain of things to do. It was a good way for us to show that we genuinely love her and want to serve her.
And then her and Carlos were at church Sunday!!! We'd never even met Carlos before, and last we heard, he did not want to come to church. But they came for Sacrament meeting. We're not really sure yet what they thought, but that afternoon we started getting a lot of weird texts from Claudia about polygamy, Joseph Smith, gay marriage, etc. Oh boy. I'd wondered if she'd try to look stuff up and had told her about mormon.org and lds.org but instead they used Google. Not good. We have a solid friendship so that's good, otherwise I'd be afraid that we'd just stop hearing from her. But we're hopeful she'll just continue asking us. We need her in the Book of Mormon! It's hard to deny truth! Especially since during the lesson we had with her she told us that she's been praying, and then even though she feels silly, she's just been sitting quietly after she prays trying to hear an answer. What faith! She has all the good questions. How is she going to know the real answer when it comes? What if she misses it? So we had a good discussion about that this week while she cooked dinner and taught us to make tortillas. :) We will have to be very prepared when we go over this week for a lesson. She just has such great potential to be so strong of a member so fast that we feel like Satan is working so hard on her and on all those around her to tell her things that confuse her or aren't true. So, we decided, we'll just have to work harder. Study harder and be more worthy of the Spirit so that when we teach, she'll desire to follow our invitations to act, and that through that and her faith, her prayers will be answered and she won't be distracted by other things or give anti material the time of day.
Greysi, on the other hand, is doing AMAZING! At soccer on Saturday I was sitting down on the sidelines with her and we were just looking at the clouds when all of a sudden she said, "I want to be baptized." Ok, that was kind of out of no where. I asked her if she'd told Claudia. She responded that she told Carlos, but that he said she needed her papers. When I told her she didn't, she asked what she does need to do so I explained that. She truly is like the scriptures say - humble, submissive, meek, full of love, believing. She just recognizes something good. Her spirit is so strong, and for a 9 year old too! I asked her why she wanted to be baptized, and the sweetest and simplest answer came, "Well, I believe in God. And I want to be His child." It just melted my heart! So that's my update on my favorite family!
I hope you're doing great Dad! Know that I just love you SOOOOOO much!!! You hold such a very dear and special place in my heart. I tell people and my companion about you all the time. Things you've taught me, or memories I have. So thank you! :) Do you still write things in the morning, thoughts that you have? That could one day become a book? Just wondering. :)
I hope you all have a fantastic week!!! Mom, and I haven't forgotten that it's your B-day! Look for a card/letter in the mail from me, I just hope it makes it by Wednesday! I hope it's ok that that's what I got you!! I love you all dearly, remember that our lives are made up of moments, so make each one count! It's easy to follow the Savior one day at a time, so remember to do that, and one day we'll find that we've become the people and family we want to be. Sis. Carolan told me something last night that really stuck with me. We were talking about diligence and the little things and she said, "Life by the yard is hard, but by an inch it's a cinch."
Love you all!
Hermana Marks