happy 4th belated

hollllla!!!!

hi all. i hope your fourth of july was real great and patriotic. mine wasn´t. we had our zone and district meeting type of thing on wednesday morning and i kept wishing everyone a happy 4th of july. i think the latinos were getting a bit annoyed. but i dont care. and i wore red white and blue clothes. wooo! but then in the night at least my compy is cool and we had smores, using a candle. because it is something american. yay!! but i missed the celebration that we normally would have. saddest. but the mission is great and i have had some verrrrrrrrry grand ol experiences this week! here they comeeeeee(like one of the scary imaginations that the chubby red-headed kid has from the big green).

okay, so this week at church, the investigator assistance was SOOOO high. in Magdalena it is NEVER this high. we had 11 investigators!!!! bueno--we are only currently teaching 5 of them. but STILL. we were so so so so happy. and the gospel principles class was packed! it was sooooooo great. and we had the wonderful family of Santa Elena, Mirium, and Soyla. and Gary!!! those are the ones i was MOST happy about. eeeeeek!! and they all stayed for all 3 hours, too. this is quiiiiite rare as well.

Santa Elena wants the best for her family, and she knows that the church is true. we left with her to buy some food from the market one night this past week, and we ran into one of her friends, and she was like, oh! i should introduce you guys to him. so she did, and we we were talking to him about the book of mormon, and we gave him one. and then she was like, ´´leave the introduction for him to read so that he knows more about the book´´ and she said it all whispery-like. oh man. it was the cutest and greatest. so all of them are progressing reallllllly great. the dad still doesnt have very much time to listen to us, but late in the future he will. we´re praying for him to have more time.

we´ve seen gary almost everyday this week. he is sooooooooooo great and is like our little brother. we love him a whole whole lot.

and, for the greatest news of my whole life----remember Hugo?he was the first person i got the privlidge of teaching and helping him to be baptized.  wellllllll hna. carazas and i would always joke-ish with him about how he was going to make a great missionary one day. and he was sooooooo against it. (you guys--if only you could see the background he is coming from. they basically live in a shack with cockroaches and rats.) and the place where he lives, like the ´´neighborhood´´ is super worldly and people are drinking and smoking and doing all sorts of nasty little things all the time. so the fact that he was baptized was a miracle.

anyway, he recently received the priesthood. for some reaosn. i dont know why it took him so long to receive the priesthood after being baptized, but for some reason, it did. anyway. now he has it, and it has made allllllll the difference. you guys--my testimony of the priesthood has grown soooooo much this week. and about the church and everything. anyway. so he came up to me at church and was like, ´´soo, um. hna. fleming. so, like, what would i need to do to prepare for a mission?...´´ and he was trying not to smile when he asked me, to make it seem like it was no big deal that he was asking me, but he couldnt help it!! and he wanted to know how he could answer the quesitons of his friends about the gospel, and what he needs to study and everything.and that he wants to accompanion us in lessons.  you guys---i was sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo happy. i almost cried right there in front of him from sheer happiness, but thankfully controlled myself until he left. it confirmed to me that baptism is just the door to the greatest life in the whole world and to soo much change for the best. oh my gosh. it makes me want to work as hard as i can now so that i dont rob anyone of having the same blessings of hugo. you guys. he is THE GREATEST. i love him soooo much.

okay. well, my time is just about up. i attached some pictures of the pday last week and the pday this week. last week was at the beach with my compy in our sector. and then this week we went to Matukana. it was an all uphill hike and i realized howwwwww out of shape i am. eeeek! but it was sooooo beautiful and wonderful and great. the pics dont do it justice. and i have a pic of me and mirium and soyla. they are soooo cute and great!

well, thanks for everything family. thatnks for all my emails. sorry i dont have time to respond to all this week, but know that i love you all and miss you SOOOO much.

love,

jilly pants