The Multi-Mission Conference and Pancakes

This is the main road we walk every day to get from our
apartment to the area where we proselyte.

Wow! I got a lot of emails this week!! I love to read them all -- best part of my week!

Oh no! I was sad to hear that Micheal Jensen's grandfather passed away. I got to meet him a few times, and he was a really cool guy. I'll have to send a note, but my condolences to the Jensen family again.

One of the side paths off of the main road to get to our area.

OK, so for my week this past week. Well, the Multi-Mission Conference was really good, but there was no announcement for any new Nicaragua Managua West Mission. I got to see Elder Hirschi, one of my friends from Copper Hills who is serving in the Nicaragua Managua North Mission, and we overlapped 2 weeks in the CCM. He is really the only missionary I know in the North Mission. At any rate, there wasn't a single, official word said about a new West Mission, but that doesn't mean they won't announce it in April or May. A lot of missionaries now think it might just be rumors and speculation, ha ha. BUT, all of the Zone Leaders had heard stuff about the new mission, so we'll have to wait and see. We also had a nice reunion with our CCM District, with the addition of Elder Sanchez because he arrived alone at our cambio, and sadly, we were missing Elder Bronson. I sure hope he is doing well.

Our CCM District and Elder Sanchez reunited at the Multi-Mission Conference (except sadly minus Elder Bronson)

So this is a picture of us playing soccer with one of our investigators
in this big peanut field. They do grow peanuts here, but at the time it
was just soft dirt. It was hard to play and we got super dirty, ha ha.
I am not in this picture because I am the one taking the picture
with my camera, but I was really dirty.

Another awesome thing about the Multi-Mission Conference is that I got a bunch of packages!!!! THANK YOU!! I have already read through all of the articles, and I am slowly eating the chocolates. My Dad burned a CD with the homecoming talks of my sister, Erin, and my cousin, Kaitlyn, when they returned home from their missions last November and December, and those were sweet!!! My sister served in Peru, but her Spanish has such a gringa accent and it's awesome!!! The absolute best part, though -- not gonna lie -- was the new Ogio backpack from my Uncle Jared!!! Holy cow it is amazing!! Everyone wants to buy it off of me, or trade me for it, ha ha. No way!! I'm in love with it!! I also like the ties from Uncle Joel! Also, I did get a letter from my cousin, Hollie, but I still don't know where to find a post office here in Ciudad Sandino to mail any letters back home, so I haven't been able to respond yet. In fact, I sent a letter back in November to my cousin Jeffrey, and it came back to me unable to be delivered. Not sure why, but please tell him that I am trying to respond still. The mail is just a little more random here in Nicaragua, I guess, ha ha.

As for the work in our area, we have three people scheduled for baptism, with two more possible, this next Saturday (all from the same large family of investigators that we have been working with). We are also still working on the weddings for this family, but so far none of the paperwork has been started by the lawyer. That will be a problem and take some time unless a miracle happens, so prayers would be appreciated. We also rebounded a little bit from last week and we brought a large group off people to church again yesterday, with this large family as well as some new people. We'll see how much progress we can make with all of these people this week!!!

Also this week, I got sick again!! It was the same stomach issue that I had in Masaya. One morning I threw up about 10 times, and since then I haven't puked, but my stomach has been bothering me. I was supposed to go get checked for a parasite, but last time the doctor just assured me it was not a parasite and told me that the food is too greasy and I don't get enough fruit, so it is really hard on my digestive system. So I have already tried to change my diet again here and I have been eating some of the more expensive, packaged American food lately. I am already feeling a ton better -- I just need to be careful what I eat until my stomach is back to 100% again, ha ha.

My District Leader, Elder Hironaka, and me holding up a plate
of some of the pancakes we whipped up.

Today for P-Day, we went had a super fun day with our District Leader and almost our whole district.  Our District Leader is Elder Hironaka, who has become a super cool friend. He is originally from Arizona and also had Elder Castro as his trainer, so he is my brother in the mish, but he finished his training just before I came to the mission. First, we played baseball and basketball in the morning. After that, our district went and ate pancakes together at a member's house that let us use their "kitchen" area to cook them up. This family had never eaten pancakes before in their whole life! Pancakes are a rare, special treat here. So we bought the ingredients and made a big stack of them for everyone to eat.

Well, that's about it for this week. I got a lot of people to try and write today. Thanks again for all of the packages from everyone back home!!!

This is (most of) our district eating pancakes for P-Day today!!