Nicholas Cage Fan

Hola! This week was great and went by super fast. Something funny happened during one of our lessons. Hermana Manuela is a widow that lives alone so we drop by once in awhile to teach a lesson. This week she asked me if I knew Nicholas Cage personally..... uh no but that would be awesome. Finding national treasure with Cage would definitely be one of my favorite past times. She then left the room and came back with a notebook with hundreds of cut outs of him. It was so funny. Cage fever to the max but who doesn't, right? Haha!

I also had a very humbling experience this week. A man in our ward died of a heart attack. His wife asked me to play the piano for the funeral on Sunday. At the funeral, while I was playing prelude, she came up to the casket to say goodbye. Her back was facing the crowd so I was the only one to see her say goodbye. Heartbreaking as it was, I could tell she had some sense of peace. She had the knowledge that families can be together forever. This made me think of my family and my gratitude that my parents were sealed in the temple. 

There is a talk by Elder Oaks, ¨Opposition in All Things¨, in which he says "Our mortal life, however, was never meant to be easy or consistently pleasant. Our Heavenly Father... knows that we learn and grow and become refined through hard challenges, heart breaking sorrow and difficult choices. Opposition permits us to grow toward what our Heavenly Father would have us become.¨ I love this because when we have an understanding of why we have hard times we can also have the peace that these things are only earthly. They don't last forever and when we are obedient and endure with faith we can have eternal happiness. 

I love you all and your words of encouragement mean so much to me. 

Hermana Herrera 

Package, so exciting!

Last district meeting before exchanges this week

We sang A Child's Prayer in Primary.  I got a little teary eyed because
 my sweet Katia sang this to me before I left.

Mexico Pollo Norte Mission

Hola! This week flew by! First of all, guess how many times we had pozole this week?  SEVEN, its been grand! This week on the 16th was Independence Day for Mexico. Our ward had a great party with horchata, chalupas, helotes and you guessed it pozole. Our ward is so big we have about 250 active members and 5 missionaries. 

This Sunday Hermana Flores and I had the opportunity to give talks in church. I talked about the Plan of Salvation and also extended the commitment in Doctrine and Covenants 11:19 through 21. I encourage you guys to read it! I also talked about our purpose as members sharing the Gospel. I can tell you how powerful it is when members share their conversion stories with our investigators. I think it really helps them gain confidence and a desire to learn more. 

After the invitation in D&C I love that Heavenly Father always promises blessings. One that I would like to share is actually my mission scripture in D&C 15: 4-6. This includes temple work. I'm grateful for the opportunity to share the gospel with everyone. Sometimes I get a little overwhelmed about all the things a new missionary has to learn but something important to remember is that my biggest job is to testify of Christ. That makes it easy because it's the truth! I love you all and I hope you have a great week! 

Hermana Herrera

 

Post talk bliss

The crew

Rain, rain, rain!

Hermana Chaparita

I have officially received my nickname. Chaparita means shortie. Sarcasm is the best right? Ha ha! This week flew by and we had a lot of really great lessons. One especially tugs at my heart strings. We are teaching a family that has 5 GIRLS (sound familiar)?  Anyways, we've been trying to get them excited to come to church. We decided to teach about the 2000 stripling warriors in Alma 56: 47-56. I love this story because it talks about the impact parents have on their children, especially moms.

In this day, we are all currently in a war, a war between darkness and light. For this our new generation needs to be prepared. I love that our prophet and apostles have made programs for our youth.  These things help us have more faith and gain an eternal perspective. 

I'm so grateful for the example of my parents. They taught me that I can do hard things and inspire me every day. I love you all and hope you have a great week! 

Hermana Herrera 

Hermana Angelita

Independence day is the 16th.  IT'S GOING TO BE HUGE!

People have the coolest pets here

My sweet Mom on her mission

2 month mark

Something that I have been thinking a lot about is being truly converted to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. In order to be truly converted, we must believe not only with our minds but with our hearts. Ah how I wish that I could always be like the people of King Benjamin in Mosiah 5:2. ¨With no desire to do evil¨ Let me ask you guys a question, why do you think that being truly converted takes a consistent and daily effort? Please send me your thoughts. 

This week we had the opportunity to teach Hermana Angelita. She's a sweet little old lady down the street. She is a less active member and most of her kids are not active as well.  We prayed about what we should teach her and decided to talk about Lehi´s Dream ( found in 1 Nephi  8). In the dream, there were people that partook of the fruit but threw it away because they were ashamed. They knew the truth but decided to go follow the ways of the world named ¨The great and spacious building".  This is very relevant in our lives because we all have great and spacious buildings. The way to be truly converted really matters in the little things: following the commandments, praying, daily repentance, attending church.

I love the promise Elder Holland gives,"Please remember tomorrow and all the days after that, that the Lord blesses those who want to improve, who accept the commandments and try to keep them. If you stumble in your pursuit, so does everyone. The Savior is there to help you keep going.¨ 

I know that when we strive to do our best we can see our progress. I hope you all have a great week and I'm pleased to say that Hermana Angelita came to church last Sunday! Also side note: we had the opportunity to sing in the choir for stake conference. I mustered all my past experience of Shakira, Juanes and Mana. I think I did alright. Thanks Papi! 

Content because I just had mole

Rain! Rain! Rain!

Downtown Puebla on our way to buy rain boots

Combi, carne, and contacts

Hello! This week has been a little hectic but super great. Something that stood out to me this week is the importance of street contacts. As missionaries, we are encouraged to talk to everyone. This has been a little bit of a challenge but actually kind of fun at the same time. There is a poem that an Elder wrote that I think describes the importance of sharing the Gospel with everyone. 

I have my life

my thoughts, my sorrows

I have my life 

my joys and furies 

I have my friends

That are close to me 

That man over there? 

well, he's just a passerby 

He has his life

his joy his fame

he has his life

his trials and pain

he has his story 

he's a little shy 

I would never know this 

'cause I'm just a passerby 

we all have a life 

and we all have a story 

amazing things to be told 

of passion and glory 

the people we pass

in a blink of an eye 

we need to think 

are they just a passerby? 

Elder Nielson 

I know that when we take the time to share with our friends this precious gift, we can gain a greater appreciation of the Gospel and develop stronger relationships with others. Also, missionary work definitely requires the help of the ward members. I'm extremely grateful for the members in my ward who are always willing to feed us yummy food and join us for lessons.

 

I hope you all have a great week!

Hermana Herrera 

Tacos down the street are the bomb.com

Combis, my greatest enemy! I really don't know how people don't fall all the time.
  It goes from 0 to 60 in 2 seconds.

In front of the church with Hermana Flores

Puebla crew: Hermanas Platt, Robertson, Hemming, Stewart, Zutz, Shoenfield and Elder Sterling

El Campo

Hello! I'm offically in the field. My area is called Independencia 1. Something special about my first day in the field is that its' the same day as my great grandmother's bday. Because of my Mama Rebecca's decision to accept the gospel, I'm able to have the gospel in my life. 

My companera is Hermana Flores and she is from Morelia, Michoacan. Hna. Flores has been so pacient with me and I'm super grateful. I also think that I need to make a rule that you can't be my companera unless you're below my shoulder haha because that seems to be the norm. 

Since we are opening an area, most of this week has been getting to know the members and trying to find investigators. One of our investigators is Miguel Angel and his 3 sons. They work at a cemetary so we usually have our lessons there. Yesterday, we were talking about the commandments. Miguel had some pretty great questions and we had a great conversation. One of his questions was, why do we have to be obedient to all of Gods commandments? This is something really important and to some degree I think we all struggle with. I love a quote from Elder Uchtdorf about this, "Obedience, it is the process by which we discover what we truly are made of. " Sometimes being obedient is hard, it's against the natural man. I know when we are obedient we can have a closer relationship with Heavenly Father. 

I hope you all have a great week. I love you all.

Hermana Herrera 

My teacher in the CCM

Vaca

Hermana Flores 

Love my CCM district and teachers

First day in Puebla

I just got into my area called Independence in the Liberated Stake and of course my companion Hermana Flores doesn't speak a lick of English pero es ok because I think I'm going to learn Spanish a lot faster this way.  I'm already being challenged.  She's a cutie and is from Mexico.  She is the first missionary in her family and she's a great example to me. I'm excited to start teaching with her!

I really like my mission president.  We had a really great interview.  I expressed my concerns and he gave some great advice.  We left the chapel and got into a taxi to go to my area and it started raining like crazy!

I will write more next week! I love you all.

Hermana Herrera

My District