Deportes Acuáticos

We've had another great week here in Juan de Salazar.

This week has been a lot of heat, but we've been received more than we have ever been before, or since I've been here anyway, so that's been really nice. We've been working hard trying to help our investigators learn the gospel and know it's true for themselves as well as finding new people to teach.

On Wednesday we contacted a house who had two baby goats. We got to watch them play/jump-run around for a minute and the family let us pet them - that was definitely a highlight of my week. Later that same day we visited one of the menos activos we are working with and while we were talking with her she just started giving my comp a mini-manicure. That was a good/funny day.

Every Friday we have weekly planning and to celebrate we usually make popcorn to snack on. When we poured out the popcorn kernels into the pot there were a TON of these little black beetle-like bugs. Luckily we caught them before they spread into all of our food - we cleared off the shelves and mata-todoed everything. We're now thoroughly inspecting all of the bags of kernels we get from our dispensa.

Later on Friday we decided to go contact a different part of our area and we found a looonnngg street that reminded me of the fields of america. While we were walking it became SO humid, we felt like we were breathing water. Our joke of the week has been, "Does walking in 100% humidity count as deportes acuáticos? cuz that's against the rules."

This Sunday we had a great turnout. Lots of our menos activos came, one of the families we've been working to reactivate received callings and we had a contact that actually came to church!!! For every 500 contacts we make we usually only have 1 actually come to church. This Sunday was the day one came!

As a companionship we've been working on contacting. The more we contact people and the more we explore our area, the more we find menos activos and old investigators that know the truth of the gospel and have let go of the truths they know. They choose to neglect their spiritual progress and it breaks my heart. Really, there's just three things you've gotta do to stay active - a) Pray, b) read/study the scriptures and, c) attend church. If you've got these three things, por lo menos, you're on a good track. Don't let anything get in the way of your spiritual progress with these three things!

With love sent from Paraguay,

Hermana Carr

p.s: It's Sandia season!!!!

Ponderize scripture this week: Salmos 40:8

TotesMyGoats

¡Hola Familia y amigos!

We started off this week on a low - it was super rainy and our lunch appointments had been canceling on us. Knowing we wouldn't have lunches with members we bought some ravioli's from Stock - a chuchi grocery store that opened near our area. The raviolis ended up upsetting our stomachs and making our Tuesday somewhat of a struggle. My comp also left her agenda in the capilla where we have our district meeting and that didn't help anything either. After planning on Tuesday night I decided to check on a pain I'd been having on one of my big toes. After making sure my nails were still well trimmed and examining my foot more closely I found another spot of pique and this time there were two piques under to the top of my big toe nail! That was gross. With the help of Hermana Getz I didn't freak out and we got the pique out - I have been watching my feet to make sure there aren't any more.

On Wednesday things started turning around - whenever you're at a low that just means a high is coming! We received a call from one of our recent converts who has not been coming to church and has not received us for over a month. We were able to visit her and she is now back on track reading her scriptures and saying her prayers - we're hoping to help her get back on track and to stay on track with the gospel!

On Friday while I was filling in my agenda during weekly planning my comp looked through the Area book and found a registro of an old investigator who lives close to the house of our Friday lunch appointment. We finished weekly planning early and went to contact the street listed on the registro in the hopes of finding her. We walked in the street a little ways and decided to clap at a random house to ask if the investigator on our registro lived close by. The random house ended up being hers! We had a lesson with her and found out she understands the importance of baptism and expresses desires to follow the commandments. Calidad! We are so excited to work with her! We probably never would have found her if my comp hadn't left her agenda in the district meeting - the Lord works in mysterious ways.

Later that day we went to visit the Abuelito of the Bosque, a menos activo who has been coming to church these last few weeks. Lessons with Abuelito are usually a little random, but this time Abuelito told us about his plans to further the missionary work by going out in groups to different countries and sharing the gospel. Due to our inability to speak Jopara, we weren't quite able to help him understand how missionary work works in the church, but we were able to help him give some advice on how to share the gospel in his neighborhood. At the end of our visit he asked us what we thought of his plans and all we could say was they were very nice. He then told us he was determined to present his plans in the second class of church. After our lesson we could not stop laughing - our Sunday School class did not know what was coming.

This week we also got a new ward mission leader. Hermano Oviedo is SO COOL. He was baptized a few years ago and is very humble in this new calling. Even though he is unfamiliar with his calling, he has the spirit so strongly with him and really understands that we need to work with the ward in order to help our investigators be truly converted.

On Saturday we did service for the familia Dure. We helped them take down part of their current house and carry it over to their new land where they are building a new house with the same materials. Afterwards we did some yard work in another member's house. We were sore and sunburned the day after, but it always feels good to do service.

On Sunday I gave my first talk in Spanish! It was on missionary work and I talked about how we can be missionaries as members of the church in our daily lives through knowing the word of God/studying the scriptures, being good examples and fellowshipping new members and less active members.

Sunday afternoon we decided to "explore" a part of our area and find new people. We had a few good contacts and will be following up on those and we also saw a bunch of goats. Later that night we saw a goat standing on a table or something, just chillin. We have no idea how it got up there. or how it would get down.

The days are long, the sopa Paraguaya is as big as my face, and this work is satisfying.

With love sent from Paraguay,

Hermana Carr

Ponderize scripture for this week: DyC 31:5-6

#estadoParaguayo

¡Hola!

We have had a full week of sun/heat and then rain/cold.

At the beginning of this week I got a little sunburned because I forgot to put on sun block and the sun was super strong, so the following days I decided to use my umbrella. What started out as protection from the sun turned into protection from the rain- it's been sprinkling/misting/raining pretty steadily for the past few days now. Hermana Getz and I decided to trade mark the hashtag "estado Paraguayo" for all of the occasions when we need umbrellas. I have definitely been super grateful for my rain boots this week- they help with all the mud and wet and cold, loving them!

On one of the hot days a future investigator we visited gave us a thing of "dulce de batata". Dulce de batata is like Thanksgiving in a chilly jello/jam-like block, it tastes just like candied yams. SO GOOD!

On Thursday Hermana Gomez gave us cow hoof again... this time Heavenly Father had my back- I'd been prompted to bring a plastic grocery bag to put my scriptures in if it started to rain again, but instead my compañera and I slyly put the parts of lunch we couldn't stomach in the empty grocery bag and then later threw it to some dogs. #blessed

This weekend we've had a rough time finding people ready to receive us because of the rain. We started "exploring" the limits of our area trying to find more people and we found a SUPER Catholic lady that told us she prays for an hour every morning and goes to church three times a week. We had a nice lesson with her revolving around our common beliefs about the importance of family and strengthening the youth in this generation. We left her with a Book of Mormon and are hoping to follow up this week.

On Sunday it was rainy and our lessons were few and far between, but there we saw a full-arch rainbow that was way bright that made our day.

I hope all is well at home!

Much love sent from Paraguay,

Hermana Carr

My ponderize scripture this week: 1 Nefi 17: 2-3

It's Problablamente Conferencia

Dear Friends and Family,

This week has been a long and awesome one.

Last P-day we made a trip to a chuchi supermarket store called "Stock" and we found expensive peanut-butter. Instead of buying the peanut-butter we opted to buy toasted peanuts for a third of the cost and we made our own en casa. I don't know if I'm ever going back - homemade peanut butter is so good! We've been snacking on peanut butter and honey sandwiches and peanut butter with apples throughout this week.

On Tuesday we had Zone Conference and learned about working with members. Our mission president also animated us for this change and ministered to our Zone a bit - last change we didn't do very well with the numbers, but this is a new change! We are working with more focus in the work and with more obedience so we can see the blessings.

On Friday it rained off and on all day and Juan de Salazar turned into a rainy ghost town - there was no one out in the streets. We still had a few lessons and after planning we made Malta - a bitter/sweet hot drink I've found I love from here.

Saturday and Sunday was General Conference. I paid attention through all of the meetings and learned a TON -  I feel very instructed and more able and animated to share the gospel after viewing conference. What a blessing we have to have this modern revelation here for us in our day! So cool!

Funny story: Sunday morning Hermana Getz and I woke up, got ready for the day and went out to try and have some lessons before conference. We were eating breakfast and the Elders called us and said (translated to English) "the hour of Paraguay changed - the ward-sponsored collectivo to conference will leave at 11am instead of 12". Thinking the time of the transmission of Conference for Paraguay had been changed and knowing we had been telling people all week the collectivo would leave at noon, we booked it to the nearest houses to spread the word. We passed by the bishop's house to get a number of one of our menos activos and he informed us that the time of the transmission from Salt Lake hadn't changed, it was the global time change that'd happened! Que verguenza. We went back to the houses we had passed and corrected ourselves. Even though we're pretty informed, every now and then we forget about time changes and the language barrier leads us astray.

Today while doing compras we found the Paraguay version of Ramen Noodles - ¡Aji-no-men! We don't have a member feeding us lunch tomorrow and we are excited to try it out.

En serio, if you didn't get to view all of conference or you just want some more direction/solace in your life, go watch Conference! The apostles and our prophet are truly called of God and have given us guidance for us today.

With love sent from Paraguay,

Hermana Carr

Signs of the Times

Hola!

This week started out with a TON of heat. On Tuesday we woke up, started sweating during exercises and then didn't stop sweating for the rest of the day. Even though it was demasiado calor early in the week, by Sunday I had my sweater and leggings on. I think Paraguay has Utah beat for the bipolar weather award. The humidity magnifies whatever the heat or cold is and we have had both heat and cold this week.

Recently my compañera and I have been working on contacting. While contacting we kept hearing about a guy everyone calls the "abuelito" in the Bosque. On Wednesday we finally met him! Turns out there is a grandpa with a whole family up in the Bosque that haven't been to church in over two years. When we came to visit abuelito was so excited! He made us juice and gave us a bunch of "bananas de oro"- mini bananas. It was so cute. He came to church on Sunday and participated a lot in the Principios del Evangelio class.

Earlier this week we were walking by the bishops house when we saw this HUGE bonfire going in the field across the road. We asked people if it was ok and they said it was normal- some guy was just cleaning out his yard. That's spring cleaning in Paraguay for ya.

On Saturday we did divisions with the Hermana Leaders and I was Hermana Jones' companion for the day in Limpio. I was able to understand a lot of what was going on (even though I was out of context with the people) and that made me feel a lot more confident in my Spanish-speaking abilities. I'm still nowhere near where I need to be with Spanish, but it's coming! Poco a poco.

Last night we were able to view the "blood moon" from our patio. It was very cool to see and very cold outside. To celebrate the occasion I have been reading up on the "signs of the times" and the prophecies concerning our day in the scriptures. Scary/cool things, but what's most important is to continue to strive to live righteously and wait with hope for the second coming of our Savior!

Love you all!

Hermana Carr

When it's hot it's hot

And when it's cold it's cold

Spring cleaning in Paraguay

First Day of Spring

Hey everybody!

It is the first day of Spring and man oh man, it is HOT.

This week has been a great week full of service. After our district meeting last Tuesday we received a call that one of our future investigators needed a priesthood blessing. We grabbed the Elders and ran over to where they were. The priesthood is very real and I am so grateful we have it today. Before the blessing our investigator, Isa, told us her situation and it broke all of our hearts. After a blessing of comfort there was almost a tangible change in the mood of everyone in the room. We all went from sad/ no hope to a feeling of peace and hope. So cool. Now she is wanting to know more about the gospel!!!

On Wednesday night we helped Isa and her son Mauricio move their things to a new place. I'm going to be coming home so buff - we carried a bed frame, chairs and other miscellaneous items over 1/4 of a mile. The next day we were sore, but we would do it again in a heartbeat.
On Thursday we had our weekly lunch with Hermana Gomez, the "mama de Paraguay". They set a bowl of something (I've stopped asking what it is) in front of me and said "do you know how to eat that?" Not wanting a further explanation both me and my companion said "yes". It was a sort of stew with rice and beans and some chunk of something in the middle that made the rice around it taste weird. Without acknowledging the island in my stew I ate all of the beans and rice and simply poked at the chunk of meat thing. After she took the plate away she explained that it was COW HOOF. Yup. I ate cow hoof, rice, bean stew.

Saturday morning we did service for a young family in our ward. We cleared out the growing weeds and grass around their trees and bushes and put dirt on their yard/land. It was hard labor in the hot sun and I don't think I've ever sweat so much in my life. Since that day it's just been hot and am I getting used to just living with sweat and a little sunburn.

Sunday night we "dropped cane" (calling to repentance with love) on one of our progressing menos activo couples. They aren't keeping the law of chastity and we've come to the topic in the missionary lessons. That was very nerve racking- we felt very awkward beforehand - but the spirit was there during the lesson and we were able to teach/call to repentance just fine.

Today is the first day of Spring and tomorrow is the end of my first change, so to celebrate we cleaned out our house! Spring cleaning woo! It was really nice to sweep out the piling dirt/dust on the floors and clean out what has been left of the dying ants from two weeks ago. Now we have a clean house to go back to!

Even though it is just barely spring, it is getting super hot. I pulled out my umbrella and will most likely be using at the sun gets stronger and stronger.

With love,

Hermana Carr

Somos Teletuvis!

Hola familia y amigos!

This week has been so crazy random and so crazy long.

Lately we have been having a hard time finding people who have time or are willing to receive us, so we've been walking a lot and doing everything and anything we can to serve and find new people.

We have an investigator named Liz who has been making a lot of changes in her life, including building/moving into a new house and working long hours at work. One night we came by to see if she had time to share, but we ended up helping her move her fridge and heavy cabinets into her new house instead. We are definitely working with our might, mind and STRENGTH hahaha.

We have been contacting a lot of people in their houses and finding all of the people in Juan de Salazar that don't want the restored gospel, so we decided to shake things up and inviting people to Noche de Barrio (ward night). This last Friday we made a sort of walk-through representation of Lehi's dream, and activity I remember participating in when I was in Primary. We had a string set up to lead people through a few rooms and past "temptations" and then a mini-Christmas tree we found in our house at the end for the tree of life. With the help of some of the youth in the ward, people passed by a game of soccer, juice (with salt in it) to tempt them and a "fiesta" right before the room with the tree of life and a small treat. It was fun for the ward members - our investigators thought it was weird - but the spiritual thought at the end was good for them. We had three potential investigators come, which is more than we've been able to meet in over a week of contacting! We are so excited to work with them!

Story time:

One day we contacted a lady and her nephew and she was FULL of questions - we felt like we were being tested - but we love people with questions because that usually means they're ready or might be ready to progress. While we were talking though she told us that in Guarani Hermana is Teletuvi (pronounced like telly-tubby). My compañera and I laughed so hard afterwards - somos Teletuvis! We are not 100% sure if that's the most common word in Guarani for Hermana, but it's still pretty funny.

On Saturday we came back to the house to use the restroom and my compañera saw Hermana Alceivia (our dueña and the Relief Society President) out in her yard with her husband killing two chickens and de-feathering them. We talked to them for a minute and were informed that those were the chickens we would be given to us for lunch the following day. Sure enough, we had a chicken, rice stew/sauce the next day. Only in Paraguay do you get food so fresh you saw it alive yesterday.

Today we went traveling a bit and went to a Ciclovia in San Lorenzo. We rented bikes for an hour and rode around the park's different areas. The bikes were super small and after a while my muscles got tired from trying to ride the bike, so I just ran next to my compañera for half the time. It was a very pretty park, great to stretch my legs and run and I may be going back there again in future changes.

Although it's been slow and going getting lessons and we've been walking and contacting a ton, I have a lot of hope for our area. The members are starting to really get into bringing friends/extended family to the gospel and our menos activos are slowly, but surely coming back to church.

The days are long, but the work is great!

Hermana Carr

P.S. Sorry about pics - the computers we're on aren't working with our cameras. Next week!