Recognizing Simple Things ...

Hey there fam! First I would like to shout out to Mama and Papa for the solid "missionary purpose" in espanol!! haha I LOVED IT. I'm proud of you mama, you're doing great :) Also, mamacita came through for the biggest win yet again with a package of twelve days of christmas scriptures! They look lovely under our 3 ft. tree! Wow, so I need to get goin on the week here.. First off, I received some more background on good ol Eladio. Not only was he a supreme court judge, but he fled the country with his family in the middle of the night in the trunk of a car! what?! haha he keeps getting cooler and cooler. He was confirmed yesterday in sacrament meeting and then interviewed after church to hold the aaronic priesthood. He will do great things, we're so so excited for him. Wednesday I had exchanges with a lil twist.. Sister Ward from Payson came to MY area and I was somehow the hefe for the day. Most stressful thing ever haha. I was also the only one of us who knew spanish (and by know, i mean not really at all hahaha), but somehow we both survived and the area is still in tact. I learned a lot that day- 1. that my incredible trainer does way more than I even thought she did! So now I'm trying really hard to even things out there. 2. I can speak spanish and I'm doing just fine. Obviously I'm not the best at spanish, and lessons go 100 times better with 2- there's a reason we teach in twos- but I can do it and the Lord is helping me! Much to my surprise, I gained more confidence that day. As for the rest of the week, we had lots of lessons fall through, but we did our best and that's what matters! Friday night was a bit of a drag and maybe some frustration building up. We went to an apartment complex to do come quick contacting before the ward party and the only door we knocked on, second floor, went something like this: The cutest person, Evalyn- probably about 25- opened the door with the biggest smile and said, "oh are you the mormons?" Come to find out her step brother is LDS and served a mission as well. She told us she understands how hard that would be and asked us if we wanted a treat or anything. We couldn't, but she told us to come back any time we needed to "rest and cry about things" haha. That right there told me that God is looking out for me as well and it was just what WE needed in the right time. Saturday night came around and it was starting to test me a lil bit. I found myself thinking, "make it to tomorrow" and instantly I smiled and thought, "NO, I have the choice to make the best out of this". I then thought of Mama and her quote, "it's not about you." I realized how important it is for me to create the type of atmosphere for the Lord to be able to work through me and reach the people of this area. Again, we were blessed with really sweet people to brighten our day. So although we didn't see the kind of success we've seen in the past few weeks in numbers or whatever else, we opened up to see the less-noticeable miracles and they were just as amazing! I'm truly loving my time here and couldn't be more grateful for this opportunity. I love that I get to be here for Christmas and think of the true meaning of it all. To learn of my savior all day every day and to bring other people to learn of him as well. I love you all, can't wait to talk to you :) speaking of, I'm thinkin 1 here. 11 Utah time and 7 Spain time (If my calculations are correct- finger to the bridge of the nose). Lemme know how that works for yall! preferably at the top of an email in bold capital letters.. 

XOXO, Hermana Jackson