Happy Birthday To You!

Even though I forgot to mention it in last weeks email, I did wish you a happy birthday. I was the first one to do it because when I said my morning prayer at 6:30 here (3:30 there) I prayed for you to have a good birthday. I hope it was great and full of everything good!

About the high school reunion... have they sent around questionnaires or anything? If they do will you respond in my behalf? Thanks!

Davy... I bought him a t shirt and sent it home in that suitcase... I don´t exactly want you to go digging for it because that would ruin all the surprises, but I´m afraid he might grow out of it. I say we just wait and see and if it doesn´t fit him, then oops, we can put it on a teddy bear or something. What do you shink?

Nata – your last letter said just the right things and made me feel happy! Have a ton of fun in Spain with Marta! Tell her hello for me and buy me something nice!

Advice for the sister missionary – buy a good sleeping bag. It will be your best friend. But tight spandex pants to wear under your skirts. Invest in good water boots. The ones we found me are perfect! A giant two-person umbrella is convenient being that we are always with a companion. Fabrics... it´s obvious – go light in the summer, layer up in the winter. Buy a good outlet converter. Bring a dropper to purify your water, or you can buy one in a pharmacy here. You´ll want to double up on socks and bring a good pair of gloves.

Daddy – We got a record high of 7 referrals this past week, but it was not quite as amazing as it sounds because 4 of them were repeat referrals and the people rejected us for a second time. But hey. They try. We don´t knock doors that much because it doesn´t work. We street contact... all day long. We go from street contact to street contact. When you stop them in the street you try to get their address and then we go and visit them a few days later to teach them. It´s called an appointment to return – and it is what we do a ton. I LOVED the advice you gave me and it is just what I have been worrying about. Today in the celestial room I was praying and I told my Heavenly Father that I had so much I still wanted to do and that the time is flying by. The answer I felt was “be still” and I decided to just keep doing what I´m doing and try not to have a “cram it all in attitude.” How perfect that you advised me to do the same. I value this counsel more than you know.

Mommy – could you do me a favor and try to find the sheet music to the CDs you sent me of Spanish songs. Especifically the song “all my days” – “toda mi vida” I would like to sing it in my last transfer meeting and will need to start practicing asap.

About the sponge foam fight... we were filling plastic bags with the little foam pieces and then they make pillows with them. So of course as you fill the bags you have to fight a little bit. In the video – you can´t tell, but I was almost throwing up at the end with my back turned because I accidentally swallowed one and was quite unwell as it went down. But it was super fun! It is service we do for the family that sells the pillows.
Quote that I love: the intelligent learn from their mistakes; the wise learn from the mistakes of everybody else. “Los inteligentes aprenden de sus errores, los sabios, de los demás.” Pretty deep isn´t it!

Nata – Could you write to Hermana Barrera and tell her I sent her a bag of stuff with the mission mail and to bug the Elders for it. And could you ask her to send you the recipe with the measurements of all the ingredients needed to make milanesa? Thanks!

This week we did service weeding a small, I mean small garden of an 84 year old woman. I felt just like Mommy using a giant kitchen knife to make the dirt all pretty where it hits the cement. It was super fun and made me decide to have a SMALL garden of my own some day. We took cool pictures like that old farmer couple with the shovel and pitch fork! My back hurts. Low back. I can´t make it go away. I stretch, I do everything. I need my daddy to pop my back. Oh where oh where could he be?

Have you been receiving real letters from me lately? I have sent 2 home lately and I want to know if they are getting to you.

We are in week 6 of my first transfer without baptisms since I arrived to Argentina. Let me just say that a transfer without baptisms drags by like 2 transfers. It is so frustrating to work and work and work and have “nothing” to show for it. (Yes, seeds planted...) but it is depressing and makes me feel like a crummy missionary. The President wasn´t too hard on me in my interview, he just said to try and baptize one of the people we had... but none of them are ready.

Well, I am surprised at how well I am taking the news of Matt's death. That goes to show just how protected I am by the Lord. It was Tuesday at 9 pm Argentina time when the closure finally just came to me. I knew that it had a lot to do with the “closure vibes” my mommy was surely sending me from the memorial service. I felt very blessed to know that you were thinking of me and the feelings of peace that I received have stayed with me. I couldn´t see the words very well on the scanned program, but the pictures were crystal clear. I am super glad you found the donut falls pictures and feel glad that they were able to use them.

On other notes...

The other day I had this deeper realization as we walked in the street that we are all children of God. I stopped dumbfounded as I tried to think that He literally knows me personally, and my companion, and every single person in the street. He knows their names, their fears, their sins, their thoughts, everything. It is literally mind boggling. Ponder it for a second and you too will be literally confused at the grandness of the simple statement “I am a child of God.”

I had this one day last week that I actually didn´t want to go out in the street to proselyte after lunch. It was freezing and raining and even with my umbrella and gloves and coat and scarf and everything... I just looked outside and thought to myself, “do we really have to go out in that?” I felt ashamed at my lack of desire. Obviously we went out in it anyways because we´re obedient, but for the first time in the mission I was tempted to just say “nah, we´ll just chill here in the chapel for a bit.” Rest assured that we did not.

Story about today... for some unknown reason I lost the hot water in my morning shower. I stood their freezing and soapy and pled with the Lord to give me just 30 seconds of hot water to rinse off and get out. He said no. I admit that I actually shed tears as I freezingly rinsed off and got out. Then I cried to my companion telling her how much I hate the shower (and this is in the dream apartment...) She made me feel all better telling me that I should throw my flip-flop at it ... which made me feel much better. Then she had me say things like “I didn´t want to take a hot shower, hot showers are for wimps!” It is powerful what that can do because I felt all better afterwards. But the tears that fell from my eyes were warmer than the water that washed away the suds from my shivering body this morning. Wahoo! Gotta love the mission!

When somebody comes to the door with their keys to open the gate and let us in I get all excited like a dog that hears the keys or his chain and knows he´s going to go for a walk. The reason for this is that lessons taught on the inside of the gate count for our numbers... lessons taught where they don´t let us in the gate don´t count for jack squat. So the sound of keys is super happy. I feel so much like a dog. Does that make you laugh?

Story of the week: We were finishing a lesson with this woman and her busy, busy grandson
threw a teddy bear at her just as she started to say the prayer. Luckily I had delayed just a second closing my eyes and saw the little stuffed dog flying straight for her head. I stretched out my hand and grabbed the dog about 3 inches before it struck the praying grandmother. It was like this awesome superman moment and I saved the day... or prayer! I felt so glad that my Daddy had invested his time teaching me to play catch because it came in handy!

The miracle and the failure of the week was this sweet old widowed man (84) that we found, taught, and committed to be baptized. We lost him 3 days later because his family prohibited him from receiving us ever again. So sad....he just wanted to be with his wife again... The other cool part of the story was that after the lesson we taught him he took us around for an hour and we contacted 13 referrals from his neighbors and family that live nearby. Everyone we passed by he stopped and said, “Listen to these girls, they brought me a message of peace!” It was amazing and then it about broke our poor hearts when he told us on the phone he couldn´t receive us anymore. He was almost crying. I hope he passes away soon so Grandpa Olson can teach him the gospel for me in the Spirit World.

FYI : lessons taught to less active members depress me and scare me because no one is safe from personal apostasy. Ex- bishops, ex- missionaries, anybody and everybody can just up and decide not to go to church anymore. I just die a little bit every time I teach someone that they need to endure to the end. I swear I will NEVER quit going to church. NEVER. And I absolutely refuse to let anyone of you do it either! I will drag you kicking and screaming to church before I ever just give up and let you throw away your exaltation.

There are twins in my ward that had their little farewell to go on their missions and there was this movie of their big brother on his mission. It was shown to get them excited and show them all of the fun they are going to have. As I watched the video with pictures set to music – you can only imagine the plans that I was making in my mind for the video I am going to make of my mission. It is going to be so cool! I have tons of pictures I still need to take to realize this dream. Yes Dad, more pictures to take!

So then. I am super excited to be transferred. In case you couldn´t tell. I hope to go to campo, but I´m not sure what the Lord has in store for me. Actually I think it would be really cool to replace Elders, but at the same time that scares me because you´d have to figure everything out yourself without being taught the area....but I just have to wait until the meeting on Monday to find out what my fate is.

Gotta go!

Love you, thanks for sending me closure... I really felt like it just came S.W.A.K. too!

The church is true!
Hermana Jensen