BUSY AWESOME WEEK OF MIRACLES

Hey Mom remember that onetime i wanted to play soccer, but I choseto dance instead? BIG MISTAKE!!! It´s all we do on P days and the onetime I tried to play, I got laughed to shame and they kicked me out. It´s awful… I just wish Iwas latinsometimes. (the spacebar stinks on thiscomputer. Sorry)

So this week was nuts. We had so many miraclesandI don´teven know where to start.

Let´s start with this. BAPTISM!!!  Federico Corrales is 83 years old, his wife died a long time ago, his son is our Elders Quorum President, and he quitdrinking 2 years ago for God. He came to church last Sunday and told us he wants to be baptized thisweek. We visited him every day this week and he was baptized on Sunday after church. I cried when hisson bore histestimony. It was such a special momentbecause I KNOW he isconverted and I do not have to worry about him falling away. I have decided I am not going to let someone be baptized if I know they aren´t ready. They will be onemore inactive member, andI don´t want that. I want to haveCONVERTS not baptisms.  He is the sweetest thing I have ever met. He has one little brown tooth and only speaks quechua,but his son translated for us. He understands EVERYTHING and we barely had to explain anything cuzhe already knew.  Wow. I love him. He had a hard timein the font cuz he can´t move very well, but he was so happy after and the ward is welcoming him with open arms.

OH! The first lesson with him was great, and after we got to see his brand new grandson. I walked in the room, saw the baby, and started bawling. I couldn´t explain how I felt to anyone. I was thinking about Brittany´s lil baby to be and just AH! I couldn´t help it. I miss you guys and after such a good lesson (after a week ofnothing but crap), seeing a brand newbaby, just all these weird emotionsexploded at once and everyone was confused. It´s fine. Just allergies haha.

We haveanother baptismthis weekend of a 9 year old girl, and SHE IS READY! No doubts about her. I love when we don´t have to worry about baptisms falling through. Stay tuned for pictures. J

I have so much to say but I can´t think… gah. Elder cook. You know, that apostle guy, yeah… HE WAS HERE! We got to listen to him and his wife for a whole hour in Cusco yesterday. The coolest thing ever. I SHOOK HIS HAND!!!! So cool. No words. I was in the choir too. I realized that every time I join a choir, it´s because I either want a good seat, orsomeone famous will be there and I want to stand closer to them haha. Carrie Underwood in Stadium of Fire, MTC choir (it´s impossible to get seats unless you´re in the choir), and Mission Choir haha. That, and singing is pretty cool.

Our area isexploding with success and Transfers are next week and I have no idea if I will be leaving or not. AH! I hope not. I love this area and have work to do.

Jennie- HAPPY WEDDING WEEK! So sad I can´t be there, but know Ilove you so much andi am so proud that you are getting married in the temple to such a great guy. I LOVE MIKE! Tell himIlove him and YAY!!! Congratulations.

Sister and brother  Conlee- I got your letters!! THANK you so much. Tell madd I love her andcongrats on making club.

OH YEAH! last week we went to Machu Pitumarca (not machu picchu) for Pday and hiked up a huge mountain for 2 hours. I LOVED IT! I forgot how much I love hiking. Although I was dying because of the altitude. 11,000 ft. The fact that I hate working out doesn´t help haha. 

--
Hermana Allred

AV LA cultura 2417

frente a la urbanizacion santa ursola

capilla mormona

cuzco, peru

Learning Learning and more Learning

This week was ROUGH. We started out with a million companionship goals and we felt sooo good and thought we would have a great week, but it turns out when you pray for Charity, God is going to try you. There are christlike attribute activities in Preach my Gospel, and I am going to do one every week. I have a feeling a lot more trails are coming, but this also means more blessings for me and my lovely family back home.

Speaking of family, I was reading in D and C chapter 100 and WOW it hit me so hard. I don´t need to worry about you guys. I KNOW I am doing my best when I get good news from home. NOTHING makes me happier than letters from home with great news. I love you all so much and you all are what keeps me going some days. I was super homesick the other day, but I stopped and thought... Why? I wanted this so bad, and I´m finally here. I´m doing it. I´m teaching poor people in their huts in the mountains of peru. WHY would I want to go home right now? So I slapped myself in the face and got to work. 

Some funny things that happened this week:

1-- My BFFs (tiny children with dirty faces) ALWAYS ask for more stickers. Dad sent me stickers for my birthday and I ran out last week. Oh my goodness... big mistake. There were 5 children who wanted stickers, and all I had were pictures of Jesus. I gave them each one, and oh my gosh... it wasn´t enough. THEY ALMOST KILLED ME! Hermana Inga just watched. she did nothing while 5 children grabbed at my nametag, ripped open my backpack, reached in my pockets and leeched onto my leg. So yeah. If you give a kid a sticker, they will expect you to give them a sticker every time you see them.

2-- We were teaching a very serious lesson about Keeping the Sabbath Day Holy (please know that it took me 1 minute to remember how to say that in English) in the front dirt walkway of a "house", and at the most spiritual part, the bench we were sitting on collapsed and we fell backwards into the dirt. Needless to say, the spirit was gone haha. She didn´t come to church... Dang it Satan. Stop breaking things. it´s distracting.

3-- Someone in our ward was telling us that she asked another member "How do you expain what happened to the dinosaurs" he responded.... get this... "They all died in the flood".... um, bro, you gotta read the bible. haha. 

4-- Language problems... in a lesson practice with Hna. Inga, after saying that we need to live the gospel in this life I said "Todos murieron" which means everyone DIED instead of "todos moriran" Everyone dies. Good thing it was just a practice or they might think that if we get baptized, we die. haha. oops. 

5-- There is a train that goes through our little town at 3pm every day. We call it the Gringo train. The gringos always stand at the back and wave to us. THEY LOVE ME! Cuz really, who expects a random blonde girl to be in the middle of the mountains of peru. I feel famous every day at 3pm... until they leave and people slam their doors in our faces and hide when they see us coming. Esta bien. Es la obra.

6-- Our investigator Ambrosia is so funny. She literally is like a child and I love it. The stickers that I gave her kids were little suns, and she didn´t know where they were coming from, but it started when we started teaching her. We were in a lesson one day and there was a sun sticker on the wall. She said "ooooh! Xiomara, give me that sticker. It is from God." She put the sticker on her forehead and asked us to pray. I just thought... "um... no, it´s probably from Walmart, but if it builds your faith and makes you want to listen to us, then shoot. God sent that sticker. Let´s pray"

7-- People yell at me a lot. I just barely started being able to understand them. Here´s a few of the gems this week

  "Dame la llave de su cuarto" (Give me the key to your room) NOPE! not gunna happen

  "Regalame su cabello" (Give me your hair). um. nope.

  there are more, but I forgot what they are haha. maybe that´s a good thing. 

ILOVE YOU ALL!!! 

Seee kwahhh neee

Well, we once again almost had a baptism. This story is actually kinda funny. but devastating at the same time. We were in the church waiting for her to show up (the 70 year old lady that only speaks Quechua) and 2.5 hours later, we decided to leave. We had no idea what happened until Sunday. Her daughter said she drank on Friday to celebrate her baptism the next day. hahaha. Obviously somewhere along the way the Word of Wisdom was lost in translation. She also said she almost got to the church, but felt bad and said "NO NO NO NO NO I will not be baptized." and turned around and went home haha. She{s a hoot, and she will be baptized eventually, but we need to make sure she understands the doctrice first.

We had a cool experience with a member this week. We usually turn right out of our apartment, but hna. inga said we should go left because it is shorter. I usually don{t follow her when she wants to go another way, but for some reason I followed her. We ran into a friend of a member named CAMILLA that we{re really close to (she reminds me of Amy, so we talk a lot). She said CAMILLA called her crying and to come to the hospital. I thought it was her grandma, because she is always sick, but we got there and she had a tube up her nose. She and her mom had gotten in a fight, and had taken 8 of her grandma{s super strong medication. She almost died... If we hadn{t followed that prompting, we wouldn{t have been there for her. I looked at her and said "CAMILLA, no one called us to come here but God. We are representatives of Jesus Christ and he wants you to know he loves you." I just hugged her and she said "Allred, I love you so much." I just cried and CRIED like a baby. I love this girl and I{m so glad Hna. Inga listened to that prompting. We went and talked to her mom after, and wow... I felt so bad. She told us the story of the fight and I KNOW God wanted me to hear it because it is the exact same fight that I{ve had with Mom a million times. About stupid things and being ungrateful for everything she has done for me, and not understanding how SHE feels. I told her about Mom and I, and told her that every time we had a fight, even if it was 100% my fault, mom would always apologize within an hour. And I would always feel terrible. In that hour, all I wanted was Mom. I told her that she should apologize to her daughter and love the heck out of her, because she doesn{t have a dad and it would be terrible to lose her relationship with her mom too. She thanked us for helping her and we prayed. This was hands down the most spiritual moment of my mission. I never had recognized that I was being guided by the Lord until this moment. I KNOW God guides his missionaries in every aspect of the work if we are worthy. I am so grateful to be here helping the people of Peru. 

Random stuff

1-- once again, I misunderstood a conversation. "apoyo" is not the same as "pollo" one is help, one is chicken. That was a longgggg hour. I was trying to figure out a story about a chicken, and in the end, it was about helping someone... freak. 

2-- I GOT A PACKAGE! It was sent to the old address, so it took a while to get here, but I got it. One from Brandon, and the other one I think is from Mom. I{m going to pick it up after we{re done emailing. I also got Jennie{s wedding invite. I WILL BE THERE!!! haha... joke. I{m in peru.I{ll be there in spirit. I{m bummed I can{t be in the temple with you, but I{m so proud of you for GOING TO THE TEMPLE! It{s the best place in the entire world. 

3-- I{m really sorry about my punctuation mistakes. these keyboards are the worst. And it takes so much effort to capitolize things, entonces, lo siento.

4-- I{m getting to the point where I can{t use the fact that I don{t understand Spanish as an excuse. Which stinks because sometimes it hurts my head to concentrate on the conversation, so i stop listening for a minute, then they ask me a question and I have no idea what they said and feel really bad. It{s fine when it{s a new investigator and they don{t know I understand them, but when it{s a long term investigator, I don{t have an excuse. God is blessing me with the gift of tongues and interpretations, and I LOVE that I finally feel somewhat confident in the language. But... I really really don{t want to train someone in the next transfer, so I{m not telling anyone haha. But, if I do end up training, I hope she speaks Spanish. I don{t think I can train a gringo yet... 

5-- Embarrassingly enough, I have taken up scrapbooking. It{s actually really cool. I have pages full of pictures from Sicuani and the MTC and letters and reciepts and random crap that I probably shouldn{t save,but I hate throwing things away, so I am gluing them into a scrapbook instead of putting them in the trash. I{m going to end up on extreme hoarders.. I just know it. 

Well, I LOVE YOU ALL, and thank you all for your letters. I print them off every week and glue them in my scrapbook haha. 

LOVE,

--
Hermana Allred

AV LA cultura 2417

frente a la urbanizacion santa ursola

capilla mormona

cuzco, peru