HOW TO MAKE A GROWN MAN CRY...

My companion made me a birthday card!

My companion, Hermana Manzano, and me!

Isabel and the machete! She WHACKED that snake!

They had a little birthday party for me at a member's house! Here's me and my birthday cake!

I'm 21 years old today!

Isabel, her cute kids, my companion and me!

Our investigator, his name is Vicente. He is really funny. I teach him English every time we visit him. He read the libro de Mormón in 4 weeks, but he really hated all of the war chapters...

Hernama Claudia and her daughters; don't worry we will be having a lesson in modesty soon.

Me and Hermana Smith. She is from Arizona. She is my sister training leader!

This week was just a party! So I left you off last week on how we were going to teach Claudia about the law of chastity. Well, it went great! She is honestly a golden investigator. The Lord really did prepare her to be taught. After we taught her we asked her to pray to know that what we taught her was true, and she said she would, but she didn’t need to because she already knew it was true! It was really cool. She is progressing fast and came to church for the first time yesterday and stayed for all 3 hours! It was great; we have a member that is now her little friend. They go to the English classes together and then tell me what they learned and ask me more questions on how to say stuff, ha-ha.

So, on Wednesday for my birthday my companion made me a cute little card and wrote in it, but I couldn’t understand much, but what I did understand was...”I know you can’t read this yet, but when you do”....and then I couldn’t understand too much more, ha-ha! We got to go eat at a members house. The food was really good and they bought me a cake and made jello! It was really cute. They sang to me for about 5 minutes; 2 songs in Spanish, then 2 times in kind of English. They sang the words “Aappy birday to ooo” over and over and over again, for about a minute or two. I was trying so hard not to laugh at it. So then I just started laughing really hard and then they just laughed at me and then it was just a weird funny moment, ha-ha! I won’t ever forget those beautiful words coming out of their mouths ha-ha, best birthday song ever! Then after that we went and taught some people. We went and taught Isabel. She is the one with the 3 children. I have a picture with them that I sent. While we were teaching the lesson the kids were playing over by the next house, and in the middle of the lesson the kids started screaming and running towards us. There was a snake over where they were playing and I looked over at Isabel and she was running inside the house. I didn’t really know what was going on so my companion kind of explained to me, then all of a sudden we see Isabel running towards the other house holding a machete! The kids followed her and I just sat there thinking...was that a machete? no...? Yeah, yeah it was. The next thing we heard was a knife hit the ground and the kids cheering! She walked towards us and showed us the snake and she was really proud of herself, but it was just the funniest thing to see her running with that machete and the kids following her, ha-ha!

On our way to another appointment, while we were walking a man came and stopped us and asked us for a pamphlet. He was very drunk so my companion gave him one of the Word of Wisdom. I don’t really know what he was saying, because it was super slurred out. He then shook my companion’s hand, then mine, and then he grabbed my hand and kissed it. I tried to pull it away, but he laid one right on my hand. Ha-ha, my companion was just laughing as we walked away and I pulled out my hand sanitizer as fast as I could, ha-ha He had some nasty facial hair going on and it was just gross, ha-ha!

This past week we got to go to Centro 3 times. It’s the big city where the offices are. It’s like a Salt Lake City to Merida. It’s really cool; they have a lot of old buildings and churches - it’s really pretty. It’s about 30 minutes away from us. We had interviews with the President. It was the first time where I actually noticed how much I have been improving in the language. My very first interview with him I felt like I couldn’t speak anything, but this time it went really, really well, and I’m feeling a little bit better with the language. I can’t speak that great, but I can get by. Ha-ha, “poco a poco” is what everyone tells me. Which is all true. With the faith in the Lord, the Holy Ghost, and the gift of tongues, all is possible. 

On Saturday we taught a new investigator and a member came with us. We read the Book of Mormon with him; it was about having faith in the Lord. It was an amazing lesson and you could feel the spirit so strongly. At the end of the lesson we had him pray. During the prayer he just started crying and he just said that he felt peace and happiness. It was really, really amazing how the Holy Ghost touched him in that lesson. 

Oh, mom, I got your letter today! It was very cute and sweet! I loved the scriptures you put on the back! I also got Jacob’s “dear elder” that he sent about a month ago! Ha-ha - it made my day to get them all! Well I love you all and hope you have a great week! 

Love, Hermana Velasquez

D&C 88:119 IT’S TRUE! 

Organize yourselves; prepare every needful thing; and establish a house, even a house of prayer, a house of fasting, a house of faith, a house of learning, a house of glory, a house of order, a house of God;