La Semana de las Madres :)

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Entonces familia, mi mamá me dijo en la semana pasada con nuestra llamada por el día de los madres que debo incluir más en mi correo electrónico en español, y no soy una persona bochinchosa, entonces you le prometí que escribiría más en español para los correos siguientes. Esta semana que ya pasó fue muy interesante y exitosa. Pusimos una meta para nuestra area y comañerismo a tener 7 fechas bautismales y 70 personas en la reunión sacramental.

Now I'll write in English so that you all understand me easier and don't have to put this all into Google Translate, haha :) Hello everyone, glad that I have you all here. I would like to start off this week's email a little bit different that normally, because I had quite the experience yesterday, an unforgettable experience really. I saved a life! And I'm not talking spiritually, like we baptized someone, no, I'm talking about a real living thing's life. Now that I have your attention, let me describe my heroism. We were walking back to the house at about 1:00 in the afternoon after we had church, Bradford and I. We saw a dog jump up on a ledge at a house near ours, across the way, and it was tied with a leash. Somehow it managed to jump up that high to like a 7 foot ledge, fence. So it sat up there for a second, then saw other stray dogs walk by, started barking at them, and then jumped over the ledge to try and follow them. So if you don't realize by now, the dog jumped over the fence with a leash, and started hanging itself. It was twitching all over the place and biting at the air, and I saw it start happening and screamed at Bradford to run into the house to get a knife to cut this dog down before it killed itself. I ran over there and then it was snapping at the air, almost bit me, but then I just lifted the dog up so it would stop choking. It had a little clip leash, so I unclipped it as it was in my arms, then set it down on the ground and it walked away slowly...wow! That was a terrifying moment, because if we hadn't been there and seen the dog start hanging, it would've died that way. What was even weirder is that all the lady dogs here have had litters and they have giant nipples...I know, kinda gross, but they all look like that. So when this dog was choking, and when I grabbed it, I got dog milk on my arms...weird! Haha, but it was seriously a powerful experience, and the spirit was really strong that we had saved this dog's life.

Another exciting event that passed this week was Mother's Day, woo! Happy Mother's Day to all you mothers out there! I am certainly grateful for my Mom. She has given me my life, and always been there for me during that life of which she gave me. I have the best Mother ever, and I am reminded of that every day when I kneel down to pray and thank my Heavenly Father for the family and parents that I have been blessed with. I got to call my Mom for Mother's Day this past week on Skype and talk to her and my stepdad, Roy for quite sometime. Glad to hear that all is well back home with them, and it made me really happy to see them face-to-blurry-face as opposed to just on the phone. Happy Mother's Day to my 2nd mom, Mama T, I love you very much, hope all is well with the family. I know that Max is doing well, I write him every week :)

This week at district meeting, we had a surprise guest that obviously no one expected would come...President Ward! It was so random walking in and seeing him there solo because he always comes with his wife. But I guess he just wanted to stop by and see how we were doing as a zone. As a zone we all set goals, (like what I said above at the beginning in Spanish), for our companionships. And to achieve your goal means that you get this Mission Panama shirt that the APs designed. The goal we set for Veracruz was 7 baptismal dates and 70 people to be there at church. This week...we achieved out goal! Oh yeah, we set 3 fechas this week with the young guys that were coming to church to be baptized this Saturday and got some less-actives to come. It was great, the most people that we had seen there ever for sure. We had another surprise in that we had to talk in Sacrament meeting... again. We didn't prepare anything, the Branch President said it should be on la obra misional. I get up there and said, "Well I'm going to talk about my Mama because today in the US it's Mother's Day and I want her to know how much I love and appreciate her, and that I am a missionary and without my mom I wouldn't be here to be a part of mission work"...so I tied it in perfectly, haha :)

Good week this week, lots of powerful spiritual moments, like saying a prayer in the chapel late at night with Hermano Gonzalez, an investigator, as he cried about his baby girl who is having surgery in the hospital. This is what I live for as a missionary, and a son of God, to help others, no matter what that may entail. I do what I am called to do, and nothing else.

This week I've got some good scriptures for you, the first is a machete scripture about the Apostasy, having many false churches rise up and false prophets, it's in 2 Nephi 26:20-22, and the other is the very first scripture of the Book of Mormon that I'm sure most of you have all read, and I include this solely because, I, like Nephi, give thanks to my parents, being raised by goodly parents and being taught to walk righteously before the eyes of God.

I love you family, friends, and Mom :) Have a wonderful week, study hard.