´Why are you so freaking butt ugly?´´

SHOUT. OUTS.

TO THE BEST LITTLE SISTER IN THE ENTIRE WORLD I CANT BELIEVE I'M MISSING THIS.

Happy Birthday, Ashley! I think of this girl at least every 5 minutes. She is my best friend even though she writes me about once a month, its fine. I LOVE YOU.

 (Nicole asked me to add pics of her and Ashley...)

 

ALSO. Happy Birthday to Bishop Blamires and my friend serving in Arizona, Dallin Hales. I hope its... AWESOME.

Not lots happened this week, but hey. It was a week.

So. Ive got to the point of.. annoyed beyond measure with the fact that my hair was like 20 different colors. SO... i bought 4 dollar hair color and made Hermana Blanco color my hair hahahahhaha

So now its the same color. If I could send videos... it was just hilarious. But hey, it worked! hahaha Aunt Char is going to kill me!

We had our Zone Conference on Wednesday with Presidente y Hermana Willard. It was SO good to see them again. They are the best. I learned a lot at zone conference. I want to be more CONFIDENT. I want to talk to everyone!

Because, honestly, if you think about it, I'm LITERALLY a representative of Christ.. yet, sometimes, I ride a bus all the way to my destination without talking to one person. When, if it was literally Christ sitting on the bus, He would've shared the gospel with every human being on that bus. Does that make sense? I want to be better at that.

On Friday it rained.. so. freaking. hard.

Literally, I've never seen it rain that hard on planet earth in my whole. entire. life.

The roads were literally rivers and crossing roads.. I thought it was going to bring me down so many times haha so scary.

We had a Noche de Hogar (FHE) planned with one of the families in my ward.. and we couldn't find any of our investigators. Or they just wouldn't answer the door because of the Mississippi rivers.  We were sooo frustrated, soooo wet, soooo discouraged because that was supposed to be a good day.

We went to the member´s house anyway, without anyone. And when they asked where our investigators were..
  I started crying. hahahha

They brought us in and Hermana Blanco and I, sopping wet from head to toe, sat on their couch. They brought us popcorn and chips and it actually turned into a night I needed. Hermano and Hermana Boswaldo talked to us, showed us pictures from Hermano Boswaldo´s mission and we laughed and laughed and it was just awesome.

I don't know what we would do without some of these members, I love them dearly.

We had inspections the next day and were told that we have to move out of our house becccaauuuuse... we are being invaded by MOLD.

nast.

BUT WE FOUND A HOUSE. And we are moving on Wednesday and its an AWESOME house. Its so much nicer than ours now and I'm so excited.

When the Zone leaders came to look at our new house to make sure it was okay for sisters, we started talking about my Spanish and how I need to speak it more, practice more, try.. more haha

Elder Pacheco: ´´El Español es en su sangre, Hermana, es en su sangre!´´

(spanish is in your blood, sister, its in your blood!)

Elder Gallego: ´´NOO Hermana, es en su Cabello.´´

(No, Sister. Its in your hair.)

It's somewhere.

The next day we went back to the Familia Boswaldo to eat lunch with the Elders, Elder Bailey and Elder Wilkinson. The Elders start telling Hermano Boswaldo to tell me ´´his favorite sentence in English´´..

so im like.. okay, lets hear it. And Hermano Boswaldo says:

´´Why are you so freaking butt ugly?´´

And the Elders are laughing and laughing and laughing.. haha Why are they teaching the members such things?

Okay, i was laughing too haha

Anyway, I'm great. I love it here. Its hot. And it rains. Its almost like being in Utah with the Bipolar weather, its great.

The church is true, love you all!

-Hermana Cedeño

´´WHAT. WHAT IS THIS? BIGGEST LOSER?´´

SHOUT OUTS!

Martin Luther King Jr. Happy Birthday, buddy.

My cute Cousin - Austin Reynolds. Happy Birthday, I love you love you LOVE YOU.

Landon Foust. My bestest friend. Happy Birthday. 20 YEARS OLD.

Hermana Blanco!! My sweet companion just hit 6 months. Holla.

AND ME. I HIT MY 100 DAY MARK LAST WEEK. HOLY CRAP.

OOOOhhhhh. kay.

So. If one more person in the country of Bolivia tells Hermana Blanco and I that we need to lose weight.. I'm going home. haha I made a ´´Bolivian South-Beach Diet Plan´´ and hung it up.

Hermana Blanco´s reaction:

´´WHAT. WHAT IS THIS? BIGGEST LOSER?´´

Yes. Yes it is.

Alllright. So. We found this AWESOME family. La familia Villa. I have never met a more prepared group of people. They are SO ready for the Gospel in their lives. We found them a couple weeks ago and they have already come to church TWICE! They loved it! But, last week after church, they were a little.. not so happy.

Hermana Blanco were so confused about what had changed their minds, what had happened to completely switch their attitudes towards the Gospel?

Anyway. So we go throughout our visits for the day, and we go visit a woman named MARTHA. Now, everyone remember Martha, she´s coming up later in the story too. So Martha is a member in our ward. And she is freakin´ weird, okay? After she tells us we´re fat, she starts showing us different exercises and then runs and gets her sewing kits and cook books to tell us that.. we´re not smart enough to be woman. And that she is going to help us. It was just a visit that I am totally okay with completely.. forgetting.

They next day, last p-day, Hna. Blanco and I are at lunch with La Familia Landivar, like always. And we are talking to Carmen, the Bishop´s wife, and we are telling her about this crazy visit with Martha and we´re just laughing and laughing about how.. weird she is.

So THEN we mention the Flia. Villa and how sad we are that they were sad after church. And then CARMEN ALL OF A SUDDEN REMEMBERS SOMETHING VERY IMPORTANT.

Carmen informs us of what happened on Sunday with the Familia Villa.

Apparently, after sacrament, Marianela Villa, the mom of the family, was walking with her sister to the next class and MARTHA (i told you she would come up again) has the nerve to approach Marianela and say:

´´You know what, here at the Church of Jesus Christ, we don´t wear mini skirts.´´

ARE YOU KIDDING ME.

The members can either fix everything. Or ruin everything.

So after that, Marianela had, fortunately, sat by Carmen Landivar and told her about what had happened. And Carmen informed her that she can wear whatever she feels comfortable in at church.

The poor woman. She is an investigator!! She doesn't know! ugh, Hna.

Blanco and I were so upset. We haven't been able to find them since, and they weren't at church yesterday. We are hoping to be able to meet with them on Tuesday, but we´ll have to see. Rough Stuff.

Yesterday was really awesome though. A lot happened.

In Relief Society we talked about Mothers. And the teacher was having us thing about our mothers. And I was getting.. ya know. A little choked up, I miss my Mom!

And the teacher, Celilia, turns to us Sister Misisonaries and says to Hermana Blanco:

´´What would you do if I had my phone right here and said you could talk to your Mom right now?´´

Hermana Blanco explained that we had just talked to our families Christmas and she would still be soo happy to hear her voice.

Then the teacher turns to me: ´´Hna. Cedeño, how would you feel?´´

And then I get so choked up I cant talk, and I just kind of laugh and stare at her and my tears are spilling over driving my mascara down my face.

And She says ´´Las esta extrañando mucho?´´

And I just shake my head yes, because I CAN'T TALK I'M CRYING SO HARD.  And then like 6 women hand me their rolls of toilet paper that they brought to church with them. Good thing I have so many mommies here.

We knocked on doors all day and that was rough.. and I was getting pretty bad blisters so we went home for a bit to change my shoes.

After I finished changing, I look up at Hermana Blanco and she is crying. Hard. And this was her 6 month breakdown, and I was lucky enough to be her companion.

She vented and cried for about 20 minutes and I sat and listened.

The mission is hard. Its just so hard. It broke my heart so see her like that, and I did what I could to comfort her after. But This. Is. Hard. Physically, emotionally, mentally. I don't know. But its just so worth it. Its so completely worth it.

Hermana Carmen Landivar gave us this scripture one day when we were having a hard time:

Alma 26:27&30

27 Now when our hearts were depressed, and we were about the turn back, behold, the Lord comforted us, and said: Goamongst thy brethren, the Lamanites, and bear with patience thine afflictions, and I will give unto you success.

30 And we have suffered all manner of afflictions, and all this, that perhaps we might be the means of saving some soul; and we supposed that our joy would be full if perhaps we could be the means of saving some.

That scripture.. I read it like every 10 minutes. haha THAT IS MY LIFE. I want to make a difference. I don't care if the person I'm supposed to meet, I'm not going to meet until the last week of my mission. But I'm going to work so hard. I'm going to work So hard.

Because honestly, what´s a year and a half compared to Eternity?

Sometimes the little time we spend in one persons life can change everything.

I bought Crocs, Please don't judge...

We did a service project cutting grass and when we asked someone to borrow their gardening tools... they gave us machetes hahaha!

Love you all,

Hermana Cedeño