Feliz Navidad. 6 months.

I need a nap. Last Zone Conference, President asked us to commit to doing one thing. “Make memories this Christmas.” It's been amazing.

Christmas Eve, just a couple people came, but stayed the whole evening and we went through every Christmas song in the Hymn book. I wouldn't have been able to do it without the warm up of caroling to less actives and the homebound all week, bringing them banana bread from our awesome ward mission leader.

There was a happenin arts n crafts party at the Senior Couple apartments till 11pm, so we were hyper by the end of the evening and stayed up late and then got up at 5:30 to go to a breakfast at the visitor center in the morning. Sister Williams sang Cantique de Noel, she's German and speaks every language on the planet and her parents are opera singers, so it was memorable. Then we all swapped gifts and I should have known my companion was my secret Santa. I'm so clueless. She gave me lip gloss (subtle hints :-).

We went home opened presents...sure 'nough, they were Peruvian. My companion was jealous, her gifts came from the Gap. Ha! We made cookies and went to visit a lady from the ward in the rest home. She was super sweet and was sad because she couldn't get up. We sang with her and were singing one more song as we were leaving the building, but the orderly marched up to us and asked us who we were with and told us to follow her. She led us into a cafeteria with at least a hundred people and asked us to sing again. No pressure. Then we went to another cafeteria. Then
another. Then a little plaza. Then a few more people's rooms, so we put on an impromptu concert to an entire facility yesterday. That was memorable.

Calling Mom and Dad was great, sorry I didn't have enough time to call all the siblings. Too much to say. I'll just have to write. I want to hear Benjamin's voice. Somebody, send me a tape or a sound byte or something.

We went back to the visitor center and a family gave us a concert. Christmas afternoon and the VC is dead and I'm thinking of starting a movie, when a 14-seater Mormon Attack Vehicle pulls up with a big family. I say “Welcome to the Mormon Visitor Center.” Grandma says. “We're Restorationists.” A little staunch, but her kids were nice and her son and I talked all about missions as the rest of the family looked at the nativities. He seemed like he would like to know more, but not with
Grannie around, but he offered to sing me a song...um, okay. They're an A Capella group and the whole family sang a gospel song for the missionaries in like 20 part harmony. Elder Dana made me run out to see if they'd made a CD he could buy. They said they'd like to record, but with that many kids, it's money they don't have, so if anyone's looking for a good investment opportunity, lemme know.

We watched “A Labor of Love.” Hehehe. We ate Ramen. I studied the scriptures a bit, ate some of the other sisters leftovers...got fatter. Then 3 families arrived at once and I took the hispanic one. They're more fun. It ended up being a 3 hour tour, because they were movin slow and wanted to see everything. So I mostly talked with an older gentleman from DF/Monterrey about the visitor center at the temple in Mexico City and the geography of Chiapas and the Rojas family, because everyone knows
them, and linguistics and it was just great to be talking to someone on the same page as me. Especially, since I couldn't call Kellen. Heavenly Father knew I needed that conversation.

We went to a later Dinner at one of the Senior couple's homes and got to bed late, once again...they're such party animals. We love em. We're off to laundry and then straight to la cama. I hope you all had very Merry Christmas and find lots of missionary opportunities in the new year. Feliz Ano Nuevo! See ya next Christmas!

Hermana Deb