Time keeps flying!

Hola familia! First off....A couple of SHOUT OUTS---Congrats to Becca
for graduating and all of your cool friends (you know who you are). I
heard the party was a great success and Im so happy for you!!! Also
HAPPY BIRTHDAY Becca! The Big 18. Youre an ADULT. Now you can know how
cool it feels to be old and mature like me. Also Happy Birthday to Jen
and Karen Westerkamp! Hope its the best! If anyone wants to write me
on Dear Elder, send it to the Nicaragua North mission or else it will
come hear and I might not get it for a long time. Thanks for all who
have been writing! The funny stories and spiritual thoughts have been
so wonderful to receive. This week I have had some amazing spiritual
experiences. Last Saturday was a hard one. After we checked email my
companion was down in the dumps. I thought maybe she just really
missed her family, but something was not right. She told me later that
a close family friend (just 12 years old) had passed away. He had
headaches one day and the next day went brain dead. It was so sad. She
has been really struggling. At times like these, it is when we really
put Heavenly Father to the test. He has given us the Plan of Salvation
through his son Jesus Christ and promises us that we will see our
families and receive eternal life. This week my testimony has been
strengthened so much in the gift of the atonement of Jesus Christ as I
have watched my companion put her faith in this amazing plan we have.
I love Ecclesiates 12. 7 and Mosiah 2. 41 that write about the promise
that we will return to live with the God that gave us life. We have
had a couple of lessons to teach this week about the Plan of
Salvation, and each time we have taught it, even in our broken
Spanish, the spirit has testified of the truth to me and those being
taught. I know that everyone can know the truth of the gospel of Jesus
Christ once again restored to the earth if they pray to know for
themselves. Im so grateful for this knowledge.  This week I have been
praying to understand and speak Spanish better. I have a goal to read
the Book of Mormon in spanish every day to practice pronunciation. Two
days this week as I was practicing specifically for pronunciation, I
realized that I was actually understanding what I was reading. The
Lord is helping me. This week we went out to contact people and hand
out pamphlets and book of mormons. I had a latina companion, so it was
a lot better. The people are so friendly here. We talked to some
people that really seemed interested in our message of Jesus Christ.
for the most part, people could understand me, but I couldn{t really
understand them. But I know it will come. To answer moms questions,
all my teachers are RMs and all from Guatemala. Thanks for all your
support and love. My roommate is from Nicaragua so she has taught me
some awesome new words that mean cool in Spanish---- Tuanis and
salvaje! I love it. There are 99 missionaries here right now. All the
north americans that have been here for  6 weeks and the latinos all
leave on Monday and tuesday. There will only be 19 of us on Tuesday
and we will get a new group on Wed. I love all that Im learning!!!
love you all so much!!!! Cant wait to see BEN!!!!




love,

Anne