Your Assignment: Endure to the End.

daniela, soledad´s sister, handing out party favors.  soledad´s little house is in the background.

Editor's note:  Check out that little house in the background

 

birthday party of soledad´s daughter, celeste.  

this is soledad with her three girls (and one niece) and dad of her youngest.

 baptism of cristina and cristian

 after-baptism-refreshments.  does this dress make me look tall????
Editors answer to question:
No.  Who you stand next to makes you look tall.

this has got to be a quickie...new rules with email use...now we only have an hour to do everything (read, write to fam and pres, take care of other mission business).  it goes fast.

thanks to sis. stetson, rachel, gee, jmag and ma for your emails this week!  loved the photos, like always.  glad to hear everyone is good.

last week i forgot to write about meeting natalie.  hna sanchez and i were in a remis (taxi) going to the bus terminal for our trip to salta and we shared the remis with a young couple.  we struck up a conversation with them and natalie was so excited to hear that we are missionaries: "how exciting!  i´m just starting to know god!  missionaries have just begun teaching me!  (but from another church)  what message do you have for me?"  uhhhh.....no one has ever asked me to share something with them...so i start teaching the first lesson (prophets, apostacy, restauration), quick and basic, because we don´t have much time--and she gets it all.  is eating it all up.  i can tell she´ll accept a baptism invitation, so i lead the conversation to baptism.  and she got soooooooo excited.  she wants to get baptized so bad.  so i set a date.  only problem is that she lives outside of oran in a pueblo where there is no ward or branch.  she technically belongs to the oran branch, but the hnas don´t ever have time to visit where she lives.  i got her phone number and address and left her with some pamphets.  she seriously was so excited.  the only problem is that the other hnas haven´t been able to get in touch with her.  never is home.  never answers the phone.  and then, randomly (but not randomly because heavenly father knows his children), we were walking to our lunch appt and someone calls out to us from a car that is waiting in the street--natalie, in a remis.  our paths crossed for like 30 seconds--enough time for me to get a different phone number from her.  not sure if the hnas have been able to make contact with her since then.  but wow, there are prepared people out there.  we just have to open our mouths!

we had a zone conference with elder viñas, from the area presidency.  he was quoting scriptures like it was nothin, man.  like, it just was part of his everyday speach.  good stuff.  talked a lot about helping people get to the temple.  like, baptism isn´t enough.  it´s true.  retention is a challenge.  and getting people to the temple isn´t enough.  we all have to endure to the end.  that´s your asignment, k?

the church is true!
hermana magnusson