Hi family! I got your letter Mom. Give Sister Levi a big hug for me! I sent her a card yesterday. I sent off a package yesterday with Lila's birthday present and a few other things that I want to save but I'm not going to use on my mission like some potholders a sister made for me, a cd set of a sister here in Atwater that does country music and some jewelry I've been given that isn't missionary appropriate but it will work for after. I also sent some pictures of the vineyard.
Could I have James and Natalie and Brian's addresses? That would be great.
I love you all so much and am more thankful for you all every day. Glad to hear you're all doing well. You are all amazing! I am amazed at all of your accomplishments! The more I see on my mission the more amazed at how awesome our family is! Everybody keep being nice to Mom! To all the diabetics, take care of yourselves! I want to have a family to come back to at the end of my mission!
Hello again from Atwater. I'm still just living each day and trying my best to do the Lord's work. We set a baptismal date with Sandy and her daughter Kaylee. Kaylee will be baptized no problem. Sandy really wants to be baptized and hopes she will be able to. She just needs to get married to the guy she's living with. We are hoping and praying that it will work out. She has a really strong testimony and knows a lot. We had a fun lesson with them about the plan of salvation. We moved from the living room (pre-earth life) to the kitchen (earth-life) then to the laundry room (spirit world) and then back to the living room (judgment/resurrection/eternal life.) We made little finger puppets to represent our bodies with our fingers as our spirits. The kids loved it.
My companion and I sang a song in sacrament meeting. "Because I have been given much." We sang two verses in English and two in Spanish. It went really well. A few sisters said we made them cry. In the good way. :-)
There's one sister here that is a fairly recent convert that has gone inactive. She was going really strong until she had a trial that really shook her. I know from experience too that when something big and bad happens it's really easy to see everything in that light. When we're faced with a crisis it magnifies little things that would otherwise not bother us very much. For example you might fail a test at school. You feel sad and discouraged. You get home and go to the fridge and realize you forgot to get more milk. Woe is you, you cannot have your cookies with your milk! But wait, your roommate (or brother or spouse) has actually eaten the last of the cookies. Didn't they think of you? How rude is it to take the last cookie?!?! Everything is going wrong today! One thing leads to another and lo and behold, it's the end of the world. That was kind of a silly example but it's the basic idea. If I was in that situation and I had passed the test, feeling good about myself, I would probably just shrug and plan to buy more milk and make more cookies the next day. I would like to challenge everyone to make a personal promise to always count your blessings. It's ok to feel upset or sad about something in your life but don't let it take over your life. One lost battle does not constitute a world crisis. The 2000 stripling warriors in the Book of Mormon were all wounded but they were all alive and everyone counted that as a miracle and reason to rejoice. I'm not saying I'm perfect at this either so I'll be working on it too.
I can't tell if I'm doing better at Spanish or not. It's kind of hard when you have a fluent companion because I only get one chance to understand what someone says. If I don't get it the first time, they'll call my companion over and talk to her. If they repeat it a few times, most of the time I'll get it. Oh well. I'll just keep trying.
Hope everyone has a good week! I love you all! Keep smiling!
Hermana Evans
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