Happy Valentines Day

Hey Family,

Happy Valentines Day! and Happy Birthday Erin and Dad! Cards are in the mail sorry I haven't been sending anything else cool. I owe all of you something cool from Puerto Rico. Sounds like you are all doing fun things. Thanks for doing all the temple names, sounds like you have had some really cool experiences. That's one thing I really miss, oh well maybe one day Puerto Rico will get a temple.

This week has been pretty crazy, with the last intercambio there was a lot of time spent driving and we had a hard time finding members to come out with us but it was also really great because we were able to see the baptism of Emma Gamboa. So amazing to see my first baptism and for someone that we love so much. It is so cool to see someone change so much from the first time you meet them to hugging them as they get out of the baptismal font. She was so happy. She loved the baptism service and the spirit was so strong. It was a crazy day though. We had a ton of other appointments and we had to change the baptism from Saturday to Friday just a few days before. Because of that some of the members that were planning on talking at the baptism some of them weren't able to so we had to change the program last minute at a members house and then go print it out and we went to go visit Emma before because we couldn't get a hold of her. Well the baptism started at 6 and at 5:20 we were waiting for her outside her house. She showed up crying becuase she had just been to the Veteranarian, and found out her dog had cancer. She loves her dog so much because after her husband died her dog is like a little kid. So we said a little prayer with her show she wouldn't be as nervous, then we ran to office max to make copies of the program, we had to drop off the member that was with us going to an appointment we had before and of course there was traffic. So we sat in traffic for like fifteen minutes. It was crazy but we got there about 6:03 and everything worked out in the end. Crazy, Crazy day. But the baptism was amazing. She is so happy. There were three women from the Relief Society that were standing outside waiting for there to give her a hug and congratulate her. She said that she had never felt so loved or been so well received in any place like this. She was so happy and on sunday she celebrated her first Valentines Day in 40 years, because as a Jehovist Witness she didn't celebrate. She bought roses and tied them with little bows and gave one to each of the women in Relief Society when they did a little Valentine Card exchange. She is so happy and she told us that this is the best thing that has ever happened to her. Its been so good to see that change in someone.

We have had a hard week having to drop a few investigators that weren't progressing but we have also found two amazing families that we taught the first lesson two that we are really excited for. One of the families is a mom with five kids and when we showed her the picture of the first vision she covered her face with her hands and began to cry because she said that she had seen something like that in a dream two nights ago. She and all of her kids said that they would read the Book of Mormon. The are a really great family with kids that are 23, 19, 17, 13 and 2 years old. We are really excited to go back and teach them.

It will be very strange to start a new transfer without Hermana Venegas but it will be good, we have a lot of really great investigators that we have just started to teach and I am excited to get to know a new companion and learn from her as well, even though I know it will be very different I know I will learn a lot from Hermana Lopez. Hermana Venegas goes home tommorrow and Hermana Lopez, who I know pretty well because she serves in our sister ward is going to be my new companion. She is super nice and is from El Salvador and speaks no english so it will be really good for my spanish.

Hey thanks for asking what I want for my birthday. There isn't a ton that I want. I know that it is winter back home but another button up shirt or two would be nice sometimes when p-days get changed or when we get soaking wet in the rain it would be nice to have another one. Also could you send me my old spanish bible? It should be in a box in the garage or something. It is burgundy. Sorry I know that you sent it to me in the MTC and I sent it back but it weighs a whole lot less than the new one they gave me in the MTC and my bag gets pretty big carrying all the stuff that we need. There is also a possibility that we will be sharing cars with the Elders in our ward, meaning they would have it for half the week and us for the other half. Meaning that I will have to carry more stuff with me throughout the day instead of leaving it in the car so a smaller bible would be nice. Also if you are looking for birthday gifts church cds are good, because we can listen to them in the car. If you can find any in spanish that would be better seeing as many of my companions don't speak english and all the music I have is in english. If not just send whatever you think would be fun. By the way, mom asked about the new mission president. President Martineau and the president of the East Mission end in June a new president as been called who is Puerto Rican.

Love you all. Thanks so much for your emails and blog updates. I'll try and send pictures next week when we have more time. The computers here are so slow it takes forever to load anything. Maybe I'll send you a cd with all my pictures.

Love you all a ton.