March 2nd

Wow, this week has been crazy!! Monday was P-day, like normal, and we bought material with a member who is going to make us dresses! They are going to be super cute and I hope they will look good on us, as well! Ha ha! Well, Monday night, I started not feeling good- I was freezing and we still had visits, which is normal...I mean we are missionaries after all… didn’t sleep good at all that night -I was super cold and had a fever and just didn’t hardly sleep.

Tuesday, we had a district reunion then went from there straight to lunch… even though I really didn’ want anything to eat and hardly ate anything at lunch. Afterwards, we went home and packed for our trip to Quito. I was not looking forward to this trip! It is a 5 hour trip-- 4 to the terminal in Quitumbe, then another hour in the thing that is like Trax, but a million times more packed with smelly people. It didn’t turn out too badly, I slept all the way there and that helped a ton!! We stayed in the house of the secretaries with another, like, 6 Hermanas-- there was at least a dozen of us in the house!! It was fun and would have been even more fun had I felt better!!

Wednesday was amazing! It was the first ever Hermana conference! Pres. Christensen organized all of it and we had good food and great trainings. Pres and Sister Christensen gave a couple lessons then each of the 3 companionships of Hermana leaders gave one and they were all sooo good!! The best part was being able to see all of my friends!  I got to see Hna Castillo and we laughed because neither of us is really enjoying this Cambio. But we keep putting one foot in front of the other!  

Thursday we had our reunion de Zona and that was great, followed by a very interesting lunch with a family. The mom is a convert and the rest of the family are not members- the daughter and son are investigators of ours, but the dad… -well, the best way to describe him is he’s a hippie!! His kids hate him, his wife isn’t happy because it, the relationship between her husband and kids, is ripping the family apart… it is a mess!! But, we had an amazing lesson that night, as well with, what was a reference, but turns out that he is a less-active, but he is living with his girlfriend, who is not a member but she wants to get baptized and knows that they have to get married first.  They have fecha for the 24th of April, but we are working with them hoping that we can get the date moved up, because they told us that they have no reason that they are waiting that long, they have been engaged for like a 8 months or so. So, if we can get them married and her baptized and help him in his process to come back that will be so great!!  Friday...I completed 6 months in the mission!!!!!!! Our DL, who, yes, is feeling much better, was in Quito and we needed to have Mayra´s interview- if she was going to get baptized on Saturday..so our ZL’s, we talked to them on Thursday, and they said that if we did it Friday morning they would do the interview for us! Fantastic! So, we went to talk to her and we set everything up- including help her paint in the morning before her interview. So my comp and I went to help paint and we started with the sanding and what not, then our ZL’s showed up and Elder Nielson took Mayra into the back room to have her interview and they didn’t even get started when her boyfriend walked in and was like, I need you to exchange this, I need the other kind,...so she got up and left.. sad day, but when Elder Nielson came out looking a little shocked, said that if she came back we would continue with the interview, if not we were all leaving. She did come back...only to grab her keys and walk out again...so we left...we will try calling her this weekend, but this was her third chance of having her interview and it hasn’t happened on her part...so, we´ll see what is going to happen with her.

Saturday, we had a service project that was supposed to be with the entire ward, but no one but us showed up, so the 6 of us cleaned the entire chapel! Afterwards, it looked soooooo much better! Then we had some great lessons, we had a great ndh with the Mayo family, the family of our branch pres. but he and his wife weren’t there, they were at the temple! But, it was a really great lesson and we have another one on Saturday and I am going to cook something… don’t know what exactly yet, but it will be good!!  

Sunday, we had  a lesson after lunch, which was super fun, with the family of one of the RM´s of the branch, then he came with us to visit the dad of the convert, the hippie, and it is a good thing he was there, that man is so weird! I have no idea what to say to him! -and it is weird, he is perfectly pleasant when we are there, but all the stories we hear from his family, he is the opposite...! Then we had the best ndh, with a less-active, it was sooo much fun!!

We are definitely doing a ton more contacting in this sector! and we also do a lot more riding in taxis and buses than we did in Latacunga. Our sector is huge and our investigators don’t live close to one another which is a pain! But all good!  I think we had 140ish at church on Sunday… not too bad, ´eh?!

I love you all sooo much! and I love my mission! It is the hardest thing I’ve done in my life, but also the best decision I have made in my life! It is the best-- getting to meet millions of new people, learn a new language and travel to and live in a different country, there is nothing like it!! It is amazing to see the Lord in my life every single day, and something I am not as good at as I should be about thanking him for all the blessings and miracles, but that is one of my goals for this week! My DL was talking to me on Sunday and recommended trying that for at least a week at night-- offer just a prayer of thanks, and let the Lord see your love and He will bless you with everything you thought you needed and more!!

So here is to another week that is going to be the best one yet!!! I know the church is true and that my Savior lives and that because of him we have the opportunity to live with our families for all of eternity!! 

I love you alll sooo much!

hugs and kisses!

always and forever

Karlee Jo




23 February 2015 Hard Work and Learning

Well, this week was another adventure!  As all of this next transfer is going to be!! I am trying hard and it is getting better, but not perfect yet!   As you’ve said, we can’t change someone´s ways after only two weeks… especially when they are from a different stubborn country..Peru..what..and have no freaking sense of time!  We are still trying as I said and it is getting better.  Your emails were perfect for what I needed to hear and definitely give hope and something to keep trying and keep moving forward to! 

Where are all of you in your scripture studies?   I would love to hear where you’re at and what you’ve learned!  And I hope you are going to the temple and taking advantage of that amazing opportunity that you have with the temple so close! 

This week wasn’t too bad-- not as good as I wanted it to be, but all we can do is keep putting our best foot forward-- 110%.   For me…, we will see what the Lord has in store, maybe a baptism, maybe a new companion.. we´ll see!  Have you listened to the new songs they have for the youth on the church page?  They´re great! 

Anyway, on Tuesday, we had divisions with the Hermana leaders and they really are great!  Having that day apart really helped me get a grip on things, besides being able to talk to someone else about it and receive immediate answers and feedback.   Wednesday we had a lesson with Alexandra and her daughter, Leidi, who is 7 ½, they are so cute!  They..well she, accepted fecha for the 14th of March, but that will have to be changed to the 21st since they didn’t come to church yesterday like they said they would :( 

On Thursday, we had our normal district meeting followed by a short zone meeting, and lo, and behold, who should show up...?  President Christensen!  It was good to see him, it was pretty funny too because he asked me how I was liking Rio Bamba and I was like: it’s great!  Not all that great, but we will change that and make it better.  For all I know, I could be getting an even harder companion after this one and I guess I should just be grateful for what I have now!  

Our investigator, Mayra had fecha for Saturday, but something happened with her dad and she had to travel to the Orient until Tuesday and was supposed to have her interview on Thursday, but she didn’t feel ready, so she didn’t have it,. so we set it up for Friday at noon, and we told her we would come pick her up since we were going to be up there for a service project, and we went and she wasn’t there… didn’t answer her phone, and so we are hoping she can have her interview on Wednesday when we will be able to visit her since she has to do stuff for work on Tuesday..  and hopefully the elders will be able to stop by and at least see how she is doing since we won’t be here-- we will be in Quito for our Hermana conference!

I am so excited to see Hna. Castillo again! I am not, however, looking forward to the 4 hour trip to Quito!  I think we are leaving tomorrow night or afternoon staying with the nurses... and then have the conference Wednesday and come home. 

Saturday we had a district study with our dL and practiced lesson one to help my companion and I know what we can do better in our teaching!  It was pretty good! 

Sunday our dL was super sick, he had something wrong before-- I think parasites-- and I guess it wasn’t all the way gone--he came to church for the first two hours and was just miserable and then the elders did divisions and he went home and stayed all day.. now we just hope that the rest of us don’t end up with anything.  All six of us are in the same branch here and there are two or three other branches here in Rio Bamba.  

So, it hasn’t been too bad of a week!

I send my hellos and love to all the umpires from down here in Ecuador!!

The internet place is pretty close to our house..basically across the street. 

We only contacted 10 or 11 people today and He has so many more for us to talk to!!!   Our area is really pretty-- we are in El Centro again, but it seems a lot more calm here then in Latacunga! 

It is kind of like watching the kids here play from what i can picture of your Blue and Gold banquet--they just play with what they have--they don’t’ have a full bucket of toys like all the kids at home.. and the toys are all a lot more expensive here! 

Well, you will have to send all my love to the fam!  Lots of hugs and kisses!!

I love you all soooooooooo much- thanks for all of your love and support and I am so grateful for this opportunity to learn and grow... despite how hard it is, ..but as my nana kept reminding me before I left,  [ I CAN DO HARD THINGS ] I know that my Savior lives, that he loves me, and has a plan for me! I know it is hard now, but there is so much to learn from this experience! 

Have a spectacular week!!

Love always and forever

karlee jo

16 February 2015

Hi, all!   Well,  I think this has been one of the hardest weeks of the mission!! Hard companion and I am learning a lot more patience than I really want to be learning! But, hopefully all will work itself out!

So, as I said, my comp is from Peru and when I was talking to Hna. Castillo last week, before cambios, we were talking about which ‘type’ of companion had been the hardest and she said, for her, it was Peruvians...and I now know why.. and I don’t really know how to explain it...she has absolutely no concept of time- so we are late to everything...and you know how much I love that!

Like our district mtg. the other day, she never seems to want to shower until half way through our studies or like 15-20 minutes until we need to be somewhere so after we had shared what we had studied in personal study, I was like ‘k’ if you’re going to shower go a head and do it… and this was at 9:30 and our reunion was at 11...we were still a half an hour late!!  How does that happen!!??   She is 22 and I think she acts like an immature 12 year old! and it is hard too because I am in a new area which is really nice, and don’t know anything and she talks and talks and talks in lessons, which is fine except that when I have finished the lesson and she brings up another point or has another question for them...then the lesson goes on for another 30+minutes...which means that we are late to our next appt. ....how can I make us hurry faster...?  Okay, well, in our district there are six of us for the branch, elder Leach is our DL from California, his comp elder Marcos from Peru, elder Barton from Provo, and elder Moscera from Columbia. .. there are 8 Hermanas in the zone and I don’t remember how many of us there are in the zone.  But it is a fun district!!  Today we played carníval!!   It is a holiday of sorts that they have here where it is basically a water fight, they have cans of foam- cans like they have for silly string, and they play with that and water balloons and arena..flour, and eggs and sometimes the arena has coloring in it.  It was sooo much fun; we played everyone against everyone!  We were all soaked and coated in flour by the time we were done!  We changed and went to the mall here for lunch and talked and enjoyed the day! 

Okay, so last week our time got crunched so I am going to answer the rest of your questions now, then tell you more about my week then answer questions from this week

No, we don’t’ make our food we have mamitas that cook for us for lunch, and it is a service that they do for us, for right now, starting in March we are going to have what they are calling a pensionista and we will be paying them and it will be one lady for lunch and dinner, but this way we can tell them how much and what we want or don’t want to eat because we are paying them and we will be with them everyday. They said that this is in an effort to keep the missionaries from getting sick so often from food being not well prepared at investigators houses and such.

Okay, now to this week as a district and as a zone we have the goal of 8 contacts minimum every day and if we don’t complete this goal we have to buy everyone bread.. which isn’t too big of a deal since there are panadarias everywhere, but on our budget it is still a lot, if we aren’t completing this goal. So that makes it a little more fun to have a competition between the 3 companionships to see who has the most for the day.. clearly the contacts are still people and we still take it seriously, but it gives us a motive to contact even more because it is just something that no one likes to do all that much. 

This week we have visited a few different people, but the few that I want to talk about are Myra Gomez, she is I think 27, and has fecha for this Saturday!  So that is super exciting and she is great!  The other is the Flia Ortiz, it is a mom and her 6 year old and her 1 month old baby and they live with the papa of the two boys and she knows the church is true she knows what she needs to do...they just have to get married first! --like everyone here in Ecuador! 

I am really learning a lot in this cambio already, as I said before, my patience is really being tried, but I am learning a lot of Spanish -having to use it all the time!! And it is definitely a growing experience to be comp mayor! It is full of new possibilities to learn and grow- this change- and hopefully we will make it through!  Though I am sure, not with out a few more tears. But my DL is great! He kind of knows what is going on and knows that I am frustrated and said he’d talk to her… but how can I let him or have him talk to her if I can’t have the guts to say something first..?  If it is bothering me that badly, I have to put on the big girl pants and talk to her myself, if it still doesn’t get any better then I can let him talk to her.  

Well, we have had a good long first week, but I am hoping to learn and practice more patience and let it roll off and have some fun this change- so that will definitely be something we will personally working on! 

Our branch president and his wife are super young, but, hey, are really great!  I think that it is going to be a great experience working with them in this branch and hopefully we can help it grow!!

It is so good to see that some of the beautiful little flowers are starting to open up and bring a little more life and sunshine to life! 

Well, this picture is one of our district before the carnival fight and one of our zone afterwards! 

Lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots of love! Oh, and daddy, I made sure to eat some chocolate for v-day!!  Hope yours was fantabulous!!

Love you

Always and forever!

Karlee Jo

9 February 2015

Wow!  This week was a full and super fast week!   Monday was p-day and we hung out with the elders, went to the mall and ate some ‘mexican’ food..not that good...Tuesday started so early!  We got a text from our querido obisbo (Bishop?) at 5:38am --we had somehow forgotten to put the phone on silent so it was a loud ring that startled us awake,  I tried to read it and couldn’t get my eyes to focus, but after a few attempts I got it-- but neither of us could make sense of it, so we went back to bed for the last hour.  When we got up, we reread the text and this time understood….Hna Vero, that had cancer, passed away Monday night and would we please basically coordinate everything!!   So, at 6:33am we called the elders and they were quite shocked to get a call from us so early!  But, we told them what was going on and they said to keep them posted with what they could do to help.  So, at 7 we went downstairs to talk to Anita and Milton, but they weren’t there, so we went back down at 7:30  (we were thinking of the funerals in the states and were thinking like, yeah, we will have the funeral on Thursday no big deal we have time to plan and get everything figured out....NOT the funeral is the same day and they told us that it was going to be at 11!! WHAT!!)  

We called the RS president to see if she knew what was going on and she was on her way to Quito when we called and gave us a list of stuff we needed to do before the funeral for the funeral.  So we ran upstairs and changed, called the elders to see if they could help us clean the chapel while we went to buy flowers and get a picture of her printed and framed and all that jazz. The elders are amazing!  So, they of course headed over and got that set up and cleaned and then we met them there once we had the flowers, they came back with us to the house to pick up the frame and then we were going to go back to the church to get their stuff they had left and then we were going to lunch and then back to the church to meet the family and open the church.. well it was us and our DL and his companion, --the other elders don’t have a phone so we had no way to get a hold of them- and it was the weirdest thing!!!  Honestly, they don’t make the body look very good- her mouth was still open and she had dried blood in both nostrils and her make up was crappy!  She and her sisters are members, but her parents are not, they are some indigenous people which means that the whole family and friends that came were as well and they don’t smell all that good.. and the mom was like sobbing/chanting/singing ...it was so weird and people kept giving her money...idk fue ful raro!!!  We were there all day, when the normal LDS part of the funeral started, the four of us sang Nearer, My God to Thee, it sounded kinda good...really good for here!  We left at 9:15 PM and went home.  

Wednesday we had a study in Ambato with all the hnas in the zone, with our Hna leaders, it was fun but we didn’t get home from that until 3:00, so went straight from the terminal to the church because they think they need to have more than one day to see the body- the mom wanted until Saturday...! But they settled on Wednesday afternoon, so we went, sang a different song, then finally they all left when they took the casket to the cemetery.   We stayed got everything cleaned up and then finally we were good to go.   We went to lunch with the elders and then to our lessons that we had for that night, we visited Hipatia, a part active and got her to commit to coming to church again on Sunday, and Maribel, she has fecha to get married and we just need to work with her husband to let her come to church, because if she can’t there is no point in baptizing her…

Thursday we had a mini-conference in Ambato and then came back and had lunch, then went to a reference from Joel and she couldn’t meet with us so he showed us the house of a different one and they weren’t home so we went to visit a ex obisbo and happened to be able to talk to him, then had our correlation mtg.   Friday we went and did a fecal test for my comp and found out she has an intestinal infection.. poor thing!   Then had a few citas. Saturday we had a district study and made pancakes and talked then went to the bishop’s moms house and did service for 3 1/2 hrs!  Moving a mountain of dirt from the main street level to the third floor...we all hurt so bad yesterday because we had to take and carry bags of little rocks mixed with dirt by the shovel full!!!  The elders only could carry so many and us too, so it was a slow process in which the bishop and his family did nothing to help except offer us soda and ask if we were tired...what kind of question is that?!!!!  I just carried like 50 lbs., at least, of dirt up the stairs --how many times?!!! and you are asking if I’m tired?!!! Sorry, it was just annoying!  Then we went to lunch and did visits. We visited the familia Hidalgo and found out that Lisseth is pregnant and her mom hates her and blah blah blah..that family needs to come to church!!  They need the help that only living the gospel can bring!!  

Then Sunday after church, we had consejo and it was the best one I have ever had!  Guess why...the stake president was there!  Then we had lunch and talked with the elders for a bit hoping they would get the call to know the cambios, but we ended up going home after a bit and then they called us and asked us if we wanted to find out over the phone or in person.. in person of course!!!  So they came over and first played a mean joke on my comp. telling her that she was going to be an hermana leader and she doesn’t want to be and almost started crying and then they told her that she was staying and training and I was leaving to Rio Bamba and going to be comp. mayor (senior companion)! and here we are, we went last night to say goodbye to the familia Hidalgo and hna Encalada..you have pictures.   It was so sad!, but I am hoping that this change goes just as fast as the last one and that I can learn a lot and my Spanish will improve! 

Well, that was my week!

In the last sector they cooked for us, but we will see what is going to happen with this sector.. I am assuming it will be the same, but we shall see.  Hope you know how much I love all of you!! HAPPY VALENTINES DAY!!!!  I LOVE YOU ALLLL SOOOOOO MUCH!!!!

Have an amazing week and know you are loved from all the way down here in Ecuador!!

Love always and forever

Karlee Jo