Monday, January 26, 2015

Agua de Morona Cocha‏

Well, this week was full of miracles. We started out the week great. For Pday we played volleyball with the zone and ate ice cream and had a lot of fun.
We are teaching a family that are really special, they are going to get baptized on the 21st of February, but this last week we found a little problem. The mom likes to think A LOT and talks A LOT during the lessons. The majority of the lesson is her talking and we just say a few sentences. But we went to go visit her and we started to talk about the sacrament and she started to express her concern about the Catholic Church. She explained that her daughter was still preparing to be baptized in the Catholic Church and that she knows that the church is true and everything but she doesn't know how to let go of the Catholic Church. We listened to her for an hour and a half and in the end she said she knows the church is true. It was an interesting lesson. We are visiting her and helping her with her anxiety, but we know that we are going to see miracles with this family. :)
We are visiting another family that is amazing, I seriously love this family. A lot of missionaries have visited this family. The whole family are members and the son just barely got baptized in November, except for the dad. He got sick a couple weeks back and he prayed and made a promise with God that if He would cure him from his diabetes he would get baptized in the church. At that moment the missionaries weren't visiting him. They had dropped him as an investigator about 5 months ago. But when we came to this area we started to visit him. His diabetes is gone and he told us he wanted to get baptized. It has seriously been a miracle. He is so sweet and he is accepting everything we say and reading and praying and attending church. He is going to get baptized on the 21st as well. 
There is another family that we are teaching that we could not find for the life of us this last week because when the other sisters left they didn't leave an address to the house. We just knew that these people existed, but we didn't know where they lived. So we searched and searched and asked everyone that we knew and we finally found them this last week. We found the wife and we taught her a little bit and they came to church this last week. The husband is in a wheelchair and they have two kids. When we were in a class on Sunday, the husband raised his hand and wanted to bear his testimony. He started to tell us that he is a member and that he got baptized 20 years ago and that he wanted to return to church. He wanted his wife to get baptized. It was amazing! He started to cry. This next week we have plans to visit them and assist them in getting married. AHHH!!! It has been so incredible. 
Another cool thing that happened this last week when we were doing service with a sister on Wednesday. We helped her cook and we watched her kill a chicken....it was terrible......but while we were helping her we got a phone call of a reference. So this day we went to go visit this reference. We were searching and searching and finally we saw a man waving his arms at the end of the street. We went over and we found a North American, another man, and a woman. The North American is from Las Vegas and is a member. He sponsors people in Peru to go to school and study. He has been to Iquitos 17 times. He started to talk with me. He doesn't know anything of Spanish. He travels with this guy and he translates for him. They are super funny and super sweet. The North American gave us a ton of presents and talked with us. He loved to bear his testimony. They are awesome. 
This week was full of excitement and we are super excited for another one :) 
I hope everyone has a great week :) I love you all :) 
 
Hermana Larsen
 
 

Monday, January 19, 2015

Iquitos otra vez‏

This last week has been quite a job.Well, we started out the week with transfers and SURPRISE! Hermana Larsen has transfers she is going to Iquitos! I was shocked, I thought it was a joke because I seriously thought that I was going to finish my mission in Pucallpa but now I am here in Iquitos. We are in a small area and we are opening it. We have been getting lost all week and getting to know the people that the other missionaries were teaching before they got transferred. We have gotten to know some really cool people.
It has been great to be in iquitos again because I have been able to see some people from my first area. In our pensionistas house she has an aweesome view of the river that we work by. Our area is called Morona Cocha we work right next to a river that is super pretty. I will send pictures so that everyone can see. 
My companion is awesome, she is super funny and was companions in Tarapoto with my companion that I trained, so we get a long really well ;)  I hope everyone has a wonderful week and sees some miracles :) 
 
Hermana Larsen
 
 

Monday, January 12, 2015

Trabajo, trabajo, trabajo‏

This last week I can only describe that we worked... A LOT. We worked to find new people and to get to know our area a little bit more. Our area is HUGE. I still get lost. I will die today in transfers if my companion gets transferred because I do not know our area that well... AT ALL! But I can feel that God is helping me in a way because when we go on divisions and I am not with my companion I always get led to the house that we need to get to in one way or another. So I know everything will be fine.
We are teaching our Pensionista´s son and his girlfriend. He is awesome. Not too long ago he got in a huge accident because he was driving a motokar drunk and his wife and his little 6 month baby were in the back. They went to the hospital and the baby almost died. The baby is completely better now and the family is recuperating but for my Pensionista´s son it was like a wake up call. Now he wants to get married to his girlfriend and wants to move and wants to go to church more. He is starting to not drink as much or smoke. He wants us to visit more. He is awesome. He told us that he wants to get baptized and married soon but he doesn't want to set a date yet. I love this guy, he is seriously awesome. 
We had a little birthday party with a less active that we are teaching Friday. We ate cake and sang happy birthday. She is so sweet, she feels embarrassed to attend church with things that have happened with her family and the ward. But I think this birthday party helped her a little bit because members of the ward came and it was really good. :) 
I don't have much time. But I want to say that I love you all, especially the my family on my dad's side. I wish I were there to see you guys. I love you all so much and hope that you are all okay. One huge hug for all of you! 
Hermana Larsen
 
 Feliz Año Nuevo!

                                                            When I fell in the mud!
 
My Pensionista's family and the doll that we stuffed and burned!
                                     
 
 

Monday, January 5, 2015

Fuegos Artificiales‏

Happy New Year!!!!!! It has been quite a week, we have worked SUPER hard, We have walked, sweated, burned, taught, and learned lots of things. We started out the week good, finding new people, and I started to remember how to get to the different houses in our gigantic area.
Wednesday for service it was New Years Eve and we, well, there is a tradition in Peru that for New Years where you burn a stuffed person basically, you make like a stuffed person on new years eve and then at midnight you burn it like a symbol to start the new year out fresh! So for service we helped our pensionista make her stuffed person, we made a missionary that was pretty fun. Then at night we ate dinner with them and we had fun, it was a blast :) 
We also had a work visit this last week went to the area of the sister leaders and my companion stayed in our area. It was super short because the next day we had a training with our zone. It went well. We had fun and found some really cool people. 
I think that the funniest thing that happened this last week was that yesterday we left with a couple of young adults to go visit people and we went to go find a reference and we were crossing this dirt and when you are in Pucallpa you have to find a certain rhythm on how you walk so that you don't fall. Well, my companion went one way and I thought that I would be okay going the other way and well....my whole leg suddenly sunk in this bright red dirt. My companion had to pull me out and the guy we were trying to find came to his window and the funny thing is that when my foot was still in the dirt, I looked over and asked his name. He started to laugh and let me use his shower to clean off my leg. Haha, but it broke the ice and he let us teach him :) 
Well, there is not much else to tell about this week, there hasn't been much rain lately just a lot of sun and I think it rained one time this last week. 
I hope everyone has an amazing week :) 
Hermana Larsen