Monday, January 26, 2015

Hola!

Things are so good here in Cultral Có! I'm really loving the area. The ward is so strong and so big. haha It was shocking to come from Chos Malal and to see so many people in the reunión sacramental. We are working really hard here. We have an investigadora de 8 anos. She has a fecha de bautismo for this 7 de Febrero. Her mom is inactive but they came to church together the other sunday. We're excited about the progress that she is making.  We only found her 2 weeks ago and I have faith she really will llegar a su fecha.

Hermana Bailey seriously is so amazing. She's such an amazing missionary. I'm learning so much from her. I love training actually even though the first week was a little hard, because I had no idea how to do 12 semanas, but we figured out a way that we can both work together and learn from it, so it's good! She's really progressing, not just with the idioma but spiritually too. She just has so much energy and I just feel like I've had a fresh start in the mission. Because really I'm kinda just so tired, and it's hard for me to get up in the morning but with her I'm like "Let's go! Today is a new day!". I'm loving it. it's so awesome and exactly what I needed at this time. To refocus and make the most of my mission. Someone to help give me the desire and example to just finish the mission with all my heart, might, mind and strength.

I'm doing so awesome! Just really enjoying every moment of the mission!!! =) Seriously, now I really feel like I am disfrutando de cada momento en la misión! Hermana Bailey is really exactly what I needed and I'm so grateful that I can lean from her this transfer!! =) 

This week was crazy. We went and contacted this one house and it ended up just being like the craziest old lady I've ever seen. First we get almost attacked by 10 dogs and the lady comes over and she's said "thank God they didn't bite you" and I'm thinking, "oh my gosh we're dead." Also she lives on top of this mountain so it's not like we could have ran away. Then she shows us around and there was a church on top and this little worshiping spot and she takes us there and makes us repeat her prayer, it was so crazy. Hermana Bailey is dying laughing and I'm trying to stay serious and repeat this ridiculous prayer. It was so crazy, went something like "please give these girls the joy I have in my life," Then she said "look at the sun" and we looked and she said "what do you see now". (cause we looked at it before) 

We said "it's brighter?" She said "there's colors - can't you see them?" We're like ugh ya.... She's just staring into the sun for like a minute and she says "oh God hasn't given you the joy yet." Then she shows us this temple. haha it's so crazy, there was this chair with a red blanket and she said "Jesus is sitting there right now."  Then she made us look at the sun again and Hermana Bailey stepped on this red carpet thing and the lady starts screaming. Hermana Bailey jumps and the lady is yelling "GIVE THEM THE JOY I HAVE LORD." It was so crazy. Then a thought came into my head. "Get out now."  So we left. 

So much happened this week but I'm out of time. 

Love you,

Hermana Miller

Monday, January 19, 2015

Hola,

Hey so this is going to be a quick one because I don't have a lot of time. But seriously this week was so awesome, we saw so many miracles happen this week.

My companion, Hermana Bailey seriously is so awesome and such a huge example. I'm so tired, I've never worked this hard before hahaha no but she's just so obedient and such an example and reminding me how important it is to give the mission your everything. It's awesome, I feel like I've started the mission over again, because I was kinda dying and getting tired. Every day was the same and I was so tired of doing the same thing but I got here and I'm like alright, "let's get to work". It's awesome, I love it. It's like I'm making my mission what I wanted from it.  I felt like my last transfer was super hard and I felt like I was doing nothing. So this is really good. It's seriously awesome. I love her.

Ok so this week. Miracle - we went out to an area that is about an hour outside of Cultral Có and that's walking. In the hot hot sun. Seriously, it is SO HOT HERE I AM DYING. I sleep in like nothing. No blanket, no fan is going - I'm sweating and then I get up and walk all day in the sun. I'm kinda burnt too haha but I also love it at the same time. My companion is always walking in the shade and I'm in the sun. So I figure if it's hot, I may as well get a tan. haha and then I think of you guys freezing and it makes me love the heat even more. So we're walking to filli dei is what this area is called and we meet with an investigator, then a menos activo and her daughter of 8 YEARS OLD BUT SHE'S NOT BAPTIZED. So hello, we put a fecha and they came to church yesterday, talk about  a MILAGRO!!!!!!! At church the mom was kinda teary eyed - totally feeling the Spirit. It was so amazing. I loved it. 

Also here's some funny things that happened this week.

-my companion picked up this almost dying dog out of a Hermanas lawn becasue it wasn't hers and she couldn't get it out. So funny, I was dying. She picks it up with this rag and is running with this almost dead dog yelling "open the gate". I open it then she still has the rag in her hand and the Hermana is yelling "throw the rag", with the grossest look on her face. I'm like dying. Seriously, you know when I laugh really hard like cry laugh. I've done that twice a day, every day, this week with Hermana Bailey. Seriously she kills me.

-we're crossing the street and a car is coming. I just wait while Hermana Bailey runs and she's like doing this funny run because she had to pee. I'm seriously dying. Then we're in the reunión and she just bursts out laughing cause she remembered the experience. Then she apologized when everyone looked at her. Then we all busted out laughing, so funny. 

Maybe these stories aren't funny to you but I just die even thinking about them.  I'm so excited for this transfer and these next transfers, to make them the best out of my mission.

ALSO ALDANA'S GRANDMA (MARISOL'S MOM) CAME TO CHURCH ON SUNDAY- HERE IN CULTRAL CÓ AND I GOT TO TALK TO MARISOL AND ALDANA. They say they're going to come to church here next Sunday!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! FREAKING OUT!!! Aldana bawled talking to me. Then I cried of course. Man I love it here.

Love you guys

xoxoxooxo

Hermana Miller

Monday, January 12, 2014 - Cultral Có

Well I'm not in Chos Malal. That was a sad day, seriously. I definitely thought I wasn't going to leave, then when they said I'm leaving I just was like well this sucks. I seriously cried and so did my companion.

Now I'm here in Cultral Có...training. Haha can you believe it. It's so crazy. I'm training Hermana Bailey. She's from Lehi, Utah. She's so cute and so fun. She's made me laugh so much and we've been together not even a day. So I'm excited. 

It was so hard to say goodbye to the people I love here. Especially Mayra and Nadia. Wow it was hard. It was hard to say goodbye to Richard too. He seriously bawled, so I just gave him a hug and we cried together. =( waaaa 

Then I left Chos Malal at like 1:30 in the morning. We were super late leaving because our taxi that we called 3 times wasn't coming. Ughhhh, it was so stressful. We get to the terminal, the Elders there waiting grabbed our bags, ran to the collectivo and we left. It was so stressful because it almost left without us. We were on for about 3 hours when Hermana Christensen got off in her new area at about 4:30 and there is no one waiting for her. Poor girl, good thing she had our phone. The rest of us kept travelling and I got off in my area at about 6:30. Good thing the Elders were there because my comp wasn't. Seriously transfers are so frustrating haha I was scheduled to get there at like 1 in the afternoon. The zone leader was like ughhhh kinda freaking out. Haha it was funny. So we took 2 taxis over to try and find the Hermanas pension. They didn't know where it was. But we found it and woke them up and I slept maybe 30 minutes. Now I'm here with like 30 minutes of sleepy time. whoooo

Anyway, things here in the mission are changing a lot. We had capacitacion this last week and they have changed so much. In the mission we don't use numbers anymore. Lessons with members, miembros inactivo, everything. No importa. It's so crazy. We only focus on the baptisms. So that's a change, and also on working with inactive members. It's so cool, I'm so excited about this change because I feel like as missionaries we were focusing more on numbers than on the people and their progress. So that's awesome and different! =) I'm excited about it.

Also the new mission president got called. Carlos Casariego, he's from Uruguay, but I won't know him because I leave with the President in July. 

But hey that's me. Super crazy, no? I've been thinking that I'll probably only have 1 area after here. It scares me and man the time is just flying by now. But I'm feeling like this is a good change, maybe not one I wanted but maybe one I needed. Obviously I'm here for a reason and the Lord needs me here. I love what Carson Foggin said in one of his letters, "every time there's a change or transfer I ask myself. I need my companion or my companion needs me or I need my area or my area needs me. Sometimes it's one, sometimes it's all four. I'm excited to see what Cultral Có has in store for me.

Love you guys! Have a super good week! I'll send pics next week because I don't know where my cord is in all my suitcases. 

Love you guys 

xoxoxo 

Hermana Miller

Monday, January 5, 2015

This week was super good, but super hard at the same time. We were able to work with Mayra, our new investigadore, so much. She es so capa! She was an antigua but we found her again and she just has so much ganas to get baptized. She's so spiritual and says we found her in the time when she most needed us. She is 16 and has a religious background. We've taught her 5 times and she just understand and accepts things so easily. She downloaded the Book of Mormon on her phone and reads it every night. She was telling us, "I'll text someone, then read, then text someone, then read". Just always reading it on her phone, and she says she marks her favorite scriptures and saves them in her phone. One day we went over and asked if she liked anything and basically quoted 1 Nephi 3:7. She's so amazing!!!! She's accepted a fecha for January 31, so we're going to work with her so much, because she has so much potencial! She came to church yesterday with us too! Re capa!

Other than Mayra, our other investigadores have been really difficult. N is going through a really hard time in her life and is living her old life of drinking, drugs, and prostitution. She's just to a point where we don't even know what to do anymore. She called us a few weeks ago and she had tried to kill herself, cut her wrist and choke herself. When we got there she was out of breath and crying. It scared me so much. We really did calm her down and helped her make a list of why she wants to die, and then a list of her blessings and why she should want to live.  I really think it made her realize how blessed she is. We're working with her right now from the book for addiciones and it has been helping a lot!! We can't drop her because she still comes to church, reads the Book of Mormon and prays. We're pretty straight with her and she knows our purpose here. I'm just so torn and don't know what to do. 

Chos Malal is really good, it's been a hard month because all the members left. I looked at our numbers this past month and just felt really depressed because they're nothing close to how they used to be. It's so frustrating and sometimes I just feel like a crappy missionary. But I guess everything doesn't depend all on numbers which is something I need to remember. The assistencia has been really down as well, we're hoping that this next month we can improve everything. We're working with the group to do the quien no vino hoy and it really is helping and strengthening the group. Which is awesome. 

My companion is so awesome. Really, I feel so blessed to have her as my companion.  I always tell her that God knew I needed her, because she has changed my mission and made me a better missionary. 

Some cool things that happened this week. We live super close to this huge park, like a plaza type deal and there has been 2 concerts this week. We can hear them all night long haha. We went and took some sweet videos. It's funny, Argentina is so weird, they're just sitting out there watching the people sing and drinking mate. haha 

Also I completed a year this week. Can we freak out? It scares the crap out of me. Haha 

Oh also I bought some sweettttttttttt regalos this week! =) Also do you guys have anything you WANT from Argentina? Let me know. I'm just kinda freaking out cause I go home soon and need to buy gifts, so let me know! 

Anyway, have a super good week! Love you guys!

xoxoxoxo

Hermana Miller

Christmas morning, when we climbed the mountain!

New Year's Eve

NEW YEAR'S DAY!