Feliz Navidad

Well guys I`ve been doing pretty darn good here! I kinda feel like Shay though and I`m not sure why, I`m just not in the Christmas spirit this year, and it feels weird. I think I felt like this last year as well though so it`s okay. It`s cool though because I will always remember this Christmas! It`s kinda weird, I really haven`t even got that excited to talk to you guys yet, just cause I know that I will have one hour of heaven then I will have to come back to real life. I`m pretty sure a million years could pass like this and I would still miss you guys like crazy. It`s easy to forget about you guys during the week and focus on working but just seeing you and being able to talk to you will just make things that much more real that I am super far away and I miss you. It`s all good though, I wouldn`t give this opportunity away for anything! SO our skype plans still aren`t that concrete BUT we do know that we will be doing it on 2 different days, so that makes it a bit easier to tell you guys when I will be skyping. So We´ll just do it from 7:30 to 8:30 at night on the 26th my time here, which would be 4:30 to 5:30 your time, remember I`m on east coast time. I`m saying 7:30 just if we have any mishaps like last time so I will try to be on and ready around that time ok! Sounds good right! I`m super excited!!!!!

Oh mom me pegaste un susto por la mañana!!!! I honestly can´t imagine how other missionaries feel when all of the members of their family don´t write them. I copied and pasted dads and shays and spent like 5 minutes dumbfounded because moms letter hadn`t come yet. I honestly felt like the world had come to an end and was never going to be happy again. Then I realized that a problem had probably occured because my mom ALWAYS WRITES ME!! haha it was just a little reminder on how I STILL take you guys for granted a ton. Hopefully you could find the humor in my litte note in the morning and yes I have calmed down and THANK YOU FOR THE MUSIC:) it`s gonna be so fun to learn! even though I have very limited time here on how much I can practice, I think I`ll be able to master it here. 

SO I went on splits with Elder Hicken last Tuesday and we always have a blast. I think we spent the whole day talking, to ourselves and to others. He`s one of the kids that just has made this part of my mission so much more fun. We always have such good days when we work together! We work hard and have tons of fun too! haha they have a gym right outside their house and we went down in the morning, needless to say after warming up a bit I made a beeline for the bench, the guy that was there put on like 85 pounds for me and I did that once like a toothpick, then I jumped off and jacked up the weight to 180 like the good ol days back home. I was able to do it, but not as many times as I was doing when I was home, the owner guy then proceeded to say este man tan berraco! I`m pretty sure thats not in the dictionary but it means like a stud or something along those lines. SO lets just say I woke up the morning after that with a pretty sore chest lol. But then we ended the wonderful split when we went to district meeting and had to go back to our normal comps which was good:)

So kinda bad news about our couple that was going to get married this week. They had everything good to go, to go to the marriage place (notaria) and get a date for their marriage. HOWEVER I guess there are no slots until next January. We had told them this like in the middle of November but the lady (Mayerli) said that she had investigated and the place that they were going to go could just marry them like 5 days afterwards or something so we agreed and she was wrong. SO as a last ditch effort we borrowed a phone book and started to call all of the marriage places in Bogota. There are 77 notarias lol. SO my comp called the first 20 with no luck then the second call I made was a hit! They told me that they could do it this month no problem, but I don`t know who I talked to because when our 2 investigators went the marriage place rejected them until january. So It was a real bummer for me once again to have setbacks with a complete family (remember Tunja?) yeah the complete family has been quite elusive for me and my time here. But our investigators told us the 18th of January they would be married and baptized. I`m sure they will be it was just a bummer that it wasn`t this week, I think I was relating my Christmas this year with their marriage and baptism, but I didn`t get as down on myself as I did the first time in Tunja. That feeling lasted for my whole first change in Cucuta so I`m trying to be an optimist. BUT I WANT TO SEE A COMPLETE FAMILY BAPTISED!!! and I haven`t yet. But theres still hope, and the good thing was that it wasn`t anything about their efforts it was just bad planning, they were pretty bummed too. Their names are Diego and Mayerli.  Maybe if you could keep them in your prayers and we could witness a christmas miracle in january!!!

SO I was reminiscing on my p-day last year:) haha it was the first p-day of mi hijo elder Escobar and I`m sure you can remember that we had a great 4by4 adventure on those mini fourwheelers:) I don`t know if I would do that again, but it sure was sweet!!! that was such a special time in Tunja with Escobar , Larsen and Avila:) this year we didn`t do anything that extravagante. But I did go to a sweet mexican restaurant and eat SUPER NACHOS!!!  They were pretty darn good and I savoured every bite. Then I just hung out with Elder Hicken and our other gringo bud elder Benson, I think goofing around with the dudes oops uhh Elders lol is just about the best you can get!!

OH BABY I forgot to tell you, our stake president loves us so much that he invited the whole zone tomorrow for lunch in the chapel. Who knows what we`ll eat but I`m stoked!!! Our president is so cool and we have a great relationship with him, so more on that next week.....wait no THURSDAY WHOOOOOOO HOOOOOOOO!!!!! Love you guys sooooo much! hope I won`t cry when I see you like last time on mothers day. I don`t think soo this time I`m a LOT HAPPIER!!!!! LOVE YOU ALLLLLLLL HAVE A GOOD SAFE NEXT 2 DAYS AND I`LL SEE YOU THURSDAY!!!!!