Wednesday, February 4, 2015 - Week 76

Hey! Thanks everyone so much for the birthday wishes! They made my day! I´ve had a really great birthday so far! I got a call from our elders at 6:37 AM singing me happy birthday.... still had my morning voice... haha. My awesome companion gave me really awesome scripture cases from Guatemala for my English scriptures. I love them!! Our zone all went and ate pizza and ice cream and did a little shopping. It was fun. And tonight I´m visiting one of my favorite families that is making me my fav dominican dish! Yuca, salami, and egg. :) It will be great! Still can´t believe I´m 23 though! Pretty sure I don´t act it. Haha. But I got your package too! It was so perfect! Last night my comp and I decorated the house with all the decorations you sent! (not that I opened the package early.........) I´m sorry! Getting packages as a missionary is the best and I can´t wait to open them! But I woke up with all of them hanging on the ceiling above my head. It was great! And that was perfect to send socks! I needed just a couple more. And the pens... wow I LOVE them. Look at me going crazy over pens... but they are awesome! My planner is so colorful now! :) And the do it yourself bracelet thing was perfect too, those have been really popular here so I´m gonna have my neighbor make me one! And thanks for the stickers and letters and snacks. It was so fun to open it all! Well... other than today, it´s been another great week! A man we’ve been teaching has been progressing but we haven´t been able to visit him a ton in the past weeks. We had put a date for the 21st but still have a lot to teach him. But this week we visited him and he had read all we had left him and he said he knows he needs to be baptized! So we are going to start visiting him twice a week and see what happens. He´s really great. Nino and Geresly are both progressing very well for their dates this month. So on Sunday we got to hear from a Seventy, the YW general president, Elder Holland, and Pres Packer at the Carribean conference. It was amazing! They had super great messages that the Domincan members really needed to hear. Like paying tithing, and having spiritual homes, etc. And guess what!? Elder Holland did a lot of his talk in spanish! It was AWESOME! His accent is kinda like a brand new missionary, but he knows a lot. He even started crying during his spanish testimony. It was so cool. Pres Packer started his talk with a little spanish too. So Ivelice is getting a calling to be a counselor in the YW! So she´ll be with her daughter! It´s so great! She´ll do awesome! We went to interviews... my last one until the last day! Pres Douglas had us come with some of the questions from Alma 5 in mind... (Do you have the image of God in your countanence, have you been spiritually born of God, have you had a mighty change of heart?) So when I went in for my interview he asked me, ¨so what do you think? Have you had a mighty change of heart?¨ And I replied that I thought I had and he agreed that he had seen a lot of progress over my mission and had seen that change of heart in me. Then he asked if my family had mentioned anything to me about my progress. So I wanted to ask you guys if you´ve seen a change in me. I guess it´s kinda hard to say just from emails, but have you seen a change of heart in me? I really feel like I have in myself. I´m a new person. I feel really good about my mission experience and all I´ve been able to accomplish and become. He said I can go on a boat, but maybe it´s just better to do a couple simple things like go to calle del sol and in Puerto Plata there´s a cable car that you can go above the city to see all of the DR. I´ve heard it´s cool. Or there´s a place in Santo Domingo that is all the history of the country and Christopher Colombus and everything. We can decide later. I´m not sure what you could bring to people here???? I don´t know what they would like. I´m sure anything you decide on though! But I´ve been asked to request something for my 9 year old neighbor that we visit twice a week. He really wants a watch. Just like a little one that maybe has some superheros or something. Only if it´s not too much trouble. Him and his sister are so excited to meet you guys! They are having me translate some things into English so they can talk to you. Hahaha. It will be really cute. Maybe for Geresly a HLJ ring?? That was great for Emely and Johan when they got baptized. Well the days are counting down... only 3 weeks left. It´s so unreal. I can´t wait to see you all! I love you!!

Hermana Woolf