"Ha! I need a good humility slap right now ..." (Sam)

HERE COMES THE SUN!

   Hello! We´ve got some cool news this week!

   The transfer ended yesterday and president told us we are getting another elder in our ward. Elder Vergara. He is colombian, has about 6ish months in the mission I think, and he is coming from the ward in Huércal-Overa! My first area! It´ll be super fun to be able to catch up on everything going on there.

Other news.............. Three people in Alcoy that Elder Pascua and I taught FINALLY got baptized! :D Sooooo good to hear! A girl named J from Ecuador ... her mom wouldn´t let her get baptized for a loooong time... but because of her diligence and prayers and a fast that she did, her mom finally said yes. :)  And a father and son from Bolivia. The mom was less active and she got reactivated when her husband and son were baptized. :) YAAY.

   It hit 95º the other day here in the pueblos of Sevilla. Sevilla is by far the hottest part of the mission. I don´t know about the rest of Spain but I wouldn´t be surprised if it was the hottest place in the country. It gets up to 50º celcius. Go look that up for some clean internet fun..... :)

Hmmm, I'm not sure I'm as proud of this photo as he is

Oh haha, that picture of the car? YEAH. Welcome to spain. In three weeks, I learned to drive stick, in a busy european country, and parallel park like that. :) Ha! I need a good humility slap right now....... put that picture on the blog though, I wanna see it again. :) Thanks!

   I´m gonna get the passport pictures, the photocopy of the front and back of the drivers licence and the mission office address today, and send it all to you in a letter. Elder Larios has learned how to drive and has his own permit and stuff so its not urgent urgent. When you get the letter just get it done when you can and then send it to me. Thanks mama!

  Thats funny that Ryan Fonseca got his call to Madrid! he´s gonna have the true spanish zeta!! :)

   Hey i´m running out of time. We had a good week. We have three very solid investigators ... Each has their own situation ... working towards baptism. They will all be baptized... just with time. We´re just trying to balance our work between supporting them and keeping them excited about being baptized one day and finding new stable investigators. Pray for them please! :)

   I love you all! Write me letters! My new address is

c/ Convento #42, 3ªA

41950, Castilleja Cuesta (Sevilla)

ESPAÑA

   we are living in the same building complex.. just a different apartment. We already moved........ hah they gave us like 4 days of notice... ITS A GOOD THING WE´RE MISSIONARIES OF JESUS CHRIST AND WE´VE BEEN DEVELOPING THE CHRISTLIKE ATTRIBUTES OF PATIENCE AND LONG SUFFERING........ :) just kidding... hahah

Love you all! SEE you soon! MOTHER´S DAY IS THE BEST.

-Elder Norton

"I love my mission. I love being here. Its hard but there are many days that I don´t want it to ever end." (Sam)

Hello and welcome to a brand new week! 

Learn something new this week. Change something you´ve been wanting to change this week. Be a little more obedient this week.

Hey, it's Elder Warburton! One of Sam's friends from Pleasant Grove!

       Things are going as faaaaast as ever here in the mission. WOW. This is the last week of my first transfer with Elder Larios. An entire transfer has flown by! He´s super surprised as well but we´re happy and working hard.

Our dueño....... landlord?..... came by this morning and told us he is thinking about selling our apartment and that he´s willing to offer us another apartment in our same building for the same price. I think its a little bit smaller but its a little nicer as well with a lot greater view than our apartment right now. We´ve talked with the office and we´re going to go through with it... So we will be changing addresses within the next week probably..... haha sorry for CONSTANTLY changing addresses. If you don´t send anything else until I get the new address, nothing will get lost in the change. Thanks for everything you send to me. I love getting letters and packages. :)

   My comp and I are getting along really well. Its amazing the things i´ve experienced and the time i´ve already been out here. Along with the spiritual side of the mission, it really helps you mature and kind of have a better focus. I love my mission. I love being here. Its hard but there are many days that I don´t want it to ever end. I do also look forward to the adventures that the new chapter of my life holds. The plan of salvation is so perfect. Life is great.

   The ward is doing well. Elder Blanch was an amazing missionary. He did great things for this ward. He basically visited every single person on the entire ward list... 11 pages or people.... active member, less active, not active.... whoever it was. And because of that he ended up rescuing/reactivating quite a few people... the hard part falls on the missionaries that follow him........ :) The rest of the people left on the list are the ´´never knock my door again´´ people. :) We´re just trying to work with the recently baptized people and the recently activated people to find new stable investigators. If there is something you could do for us it would be pray fervently that we find consistent, stable investigators.

   I AM learning how to cook! You should see the awesome breakfasts i´ve made for my comp. :) You'd be proud mom! I stay away from fish. I´ve never been a fish guy... and the Spanish members give us enough of it anyways. :)

   Mama, the keyboards here in Spain are super different. All of the letters are in the same order but all of the punctuation and whatnot are in all different places. The Ñ for example is just to the right of the L... and the key that makes an A to an Á is just to the right of the Ñ. Its just a different keyboard.. I don´t know how to do it on other keyboards.

   The baptism we had programed didn´t end up happening. F, his name is, has a lot going on in his life right now.. including his father´s death and his mother not wanting him to be baptized.... so he decided not to go through with the baptism for now but told us he is praying that his life calms down a little so he can better focus on the gospel and be baptized. He will be baptized. When, I don´t know... :\

   As for the man on the crutches and his daughter.. We have passed by his place several times with no success. We called him the other day and he answered very groggy sounding and told us he was living in his mother home and taking a lot of medication for his back problems and recent surgery. :( because of the medication and the long period of time that we weren´t able to visit him he has basically forgotten about what we talked about and what he felt. :\ Satan works in interesting ways. Alma 47. We are still working with the Dominican Republic people. They speak spanish as well. They are here in Spain for the same reason many other south americans are here. about 10 or 15 years ago, spain opened its borders more and let in quite a few more people. Since then the economy has fallen and now its hard to find work. Due to all that, right now, we are seeing a LOT of south americans go back to their countries. Lots of wards are loosing valiant members just cuz they are moving home. :\ 

The two Spanish cds we bought had a bunch of hymns sung in spanish. A recent convert here in this ward wants to learn the hymns better and I told her that I have some cd´s... anyways.. I don´t know where they´d be. Maybe take a look through my stuff in my room. There will be a big stack of cd´s that I left. It should be one of them. If you can´t find them, take a look around some church stores for me. :) thanks!

   Mom! Good work on the stake activity. You are amazing... I don´t know how you do it sometimes.... YOU DO EVERYTHING. :)

   Love you all! See you soon for MOTHER´S DAY.

-Elder Norton

  

" Faith is knowing that the Lord will hear my prayers each time I pray" (Hilary)

Hi everyone! How are you all doing? I hope you had a great week! It flew by so quickly, didn't it? I don't think time has ever moved so quickly.

We had an amazing week. I am loving my mission so much. We have been working really hard, focusing on doing the "best" things and making the "best" decisions. I don't think I have been happier in the mission or more in love with what I am doing. I really feel privileged to be serving.

We had quite a few appointments during the week and have been finding new people. Saturday and Sunday we fasted and saw the blessing Sunday. Many of our investigators attended church Sunday and they are doing really well.

G will be baptized this Saturday and she is looking forward to it. She is very involved in the Catholic church and was a little hesitant at first to accept the baptismal invitation. But after attending conference and reading the Book of Mormon, she has received a witness of the truth. She was inviting everyone at church to her baptism.

The other day knocking doors we found a family of members that recently arrived from Spain. They had gone less active in Spain and moved here and not taken the time to look for the church. We got them excited to come back to church and the daughter will be baptized in May. Her dad is looking forward to reactivating his family. Yesterday he was interviewed by the bishop to work out how he will be worthy to baptize his daughter. The ward did an excellent job of accepting them.

Another investigator that attended church yesterday is named M. He is a very difficult, hard-headed person who has not been good to his wife (who is a less-active member). They came to church yesterday and had a really interesting, positive experience. I know he will be baptized. If I am not here for it I hope to be able to return for the day they get sealed. He really wants to change. I love their family.

Okay, what else.

Yesterday was also great because we gave talks and afterward our stake president and his counselor complimented me on my talk. It was cool because I really respect them a lot and felt good about how it turned out. I talked about the Atonement and its relationship with the obra misional (missionary work) and afterward many members offered to help us. It was really cool. Sundays are usually super stressful during the mission, but yesterday was awesome.

Okay, I love you all. Hope Adam is doing well. What are Mitch and Jen up to? I think about them so much. I hope they are well. I love you Dad. Love you Mom. Love you all! Thanks for all the support.

Hermana Norton

"wait wait wait, you don´t have to do anything. Just listen." (Sam)

--BUENOS DÍAS Y BIENVENIDO AL MENSAJE SEMANAL DEL ÉLDER NORTON--     

Things are startin to get HOT here in the mission! Good thing we´ve got a car and good AC! :)

   Hello and good morning! I hope you are all doing well! If you´re not, go do some service, you´ll be feeling better after.:)
   Thanks for all your emails this week. Let´s see if I can answer some of your questions and comments... Dad, I´m glad you enjoyed your video message. Sorry it wasn´t any longer.. hah we´ll be talking soon! I hope you had a great 30th birthday! 30th, right?... Mom, keep getting better! Don´t let this get you down! Read Nephi´s ´´2 nephi 4, rejoice my soul, wake up!´´ so this surgery doesn´t get you down :)... Adam, keep kicking trash in sports... just be sure to kick all trash with charity........ :)... ha! Pointers: On the mound, take a longer stride. In the infield, lighter on your feet. In the batters-box, LOAD, EXPLODE. ¿te acuerdas?...To the chickens out back, don´t eat each other and don´t try to get out of the inescapable fence I made. :)... To the Elders living in my room in the basement, when you do your exercise in the morning, don´t do any jumping exercises.. the basement ceilings are significantly lower than normal.

   We had a really solid week this week. We are hoping our baptism goes through for this upcoming Sunday night. F, a friend of an investigator has been pulled into the ward by members and friends that he has made. He is spanish and is a very relaxed, easy-going guy... so its hard for him to really get excited and just decide, ´´yes, i´m going to do it´´. He knows its all true. He has felt what he calls ´´paz y tranquilidad´´ or like ´´peace and tranquility´´ in church and really enjoyed General Conference, but he´s just kind of scared of making such a big decision without being 100% sure. We are planning on teaching one final lesson about faith and how a sure knowledge is not necessary. Pray for him! We have quite a few other investigators, 8 news from this week that may or may not invite us back or open the door when we come...... :) So I guess we´ll see! We found a building in one of our pueblos called San Juan and its FULL of Dominican Republic people. AWESOME. :) So we have found a lot of people to teach in that building alone.. We´re hoping to have a baptism then bring him to every door in the building as a member support for all his ´´paisanos´´ :) (other spanish word you can translate if you´d like).

   Most spiritual moment of the week, AN AWESOME LESSON WE TAUGHT ON TUESDAY. We found a guy in a building when our plans didn´t go as planned (like you mentioned mama)... We were knocking the doors in the building and a man started walking up the stairs and came to the door we were waiting at. He was moving very slowly and with crutches from an ankle surgury he had had (sound familiar???) and severe back problems. He is Spanish and didn´t seem too interested but we shared testimony and he said to come by another time. We tried back on tuesday and kind of caught him by surprise.( He didn´t think we would come back.) So anyways, he leans up against his door frame and says... basically... ´´alright talk to me. Tell me what the message is´´.... kind of like..´´i don´t really want you to come in.. just tell me right here so I can tell you your wrong and so you can leave´´... :) but I felt directed to push a little bit more and explain that we need to sit down and begin with a prayer so that he can understand the message through the spirit. He looked at me for a second..... and said.. ´´alright fine, come on in.´´ We honestly had like 18 minutes till we had to be back out the door cuz we were almost already late for something else,  so we told him that and I actually think that helped cuz he didn't want us to be long. :D haha  We got inside, his daughter was doing homework, there wasn´t anyone else home,  he sat down on the couch clearly in pain and invited us to sit as well. We broke the ice a little just talking a little and then started right up. We explained the importance of the Spirit and asked if we could start with a prayer. He said it was fine but the daughter immediately said., "I don´t do that kind of stuff.". ... so I was like "wait wait wait, you don´t have to do anything. Just listen. " :)  So we said a prayer and probably had the shortest and most powerful lesson I have had my whole mission. We explained how God loves both of them, how Christ can help both of them and can help the father with his physical pains.. and to end we explained how God has chosen a prophet one the earth today and I quoted the first vision. The two of them just sat there.. staring.. in silence... and we closed by inviting them to know. To pray for themselves and know. The father closed the lesson with a short simple prayer and we walked out basically jumping for joy!! :) It was awesome. We have had a hard time finding them in their house again, but we´ll keep you updated.
   I´m out of time... cuz I wanted to share that story. :) Hope you liked it!!!

 LOVE YOU ALL!

Mom, if you can send me the two spanish church hymns CD´s that we bought that would be great. I want to give them to a recently baptised member. You´re the best. Bye!
-Elder Norton

"It felt like an 'Ammon' moment ..." (Hilary)

Bueno, hi everyone! I hope you are all doing well! Please keep me updated! I pray for you all daily.

Okay, we had a great week and I feel really good about it. It is the best feeling. We have been working really hard and we have found a lot of new investigators. It is really rewarding. I feel like we are getting back into the swing of things. We are working well together and I hope to be able to see the fruits of our labors.

Something I have been practicing on my mission is following every prompting I receive. Sometimes you don't know whether a thought comes from the Holy Ghost or is simply your own. But what I have learned is to follow every impression to do good. Sometimes I feel like I need to knock a certain door, and no one answers. But it's okay because I am trying to show my gratitude for the Spirit's guidance. Well, during Conference last week, during the talk by Sister Dalton, I felt strongly prompted to protect the women we meet. Since that talk, we have had a couple opportunities to help women. Monday night we were contacting and knocked the door of a woman who seemed uninterested but said we could return Tuesday morning. We arrived Tuesday morning just after the father of her children had been beating her. We helped her pack her things because she said she had enough and was going to leave. It felt like an Ammon moment, when we were able to gain her trust through service and then share with her afterward. She moved, so we won't be able to work with her. But we have her information to turn into the offices. It is very evident that Heavenly Father sends us where we need to be to be able to help His children that He cares for so much.

Friday we were walking to an appointment when once again I felt prompted to knock a certain door. The woman behind the door, E, is very prepared. She has studied the Bible and is searching for the correct church. She is progressing well. She knows a few members that live nearby who are working hard to be good hermanadores. She wouldn't attend church Sunday but I know that this coming Sunday she will. I am grateful for Heavenly Father's willingness to guide us to those who are prepared.

G is also progressing very well. She had an amazing experience during conference last week and knows the church is true. She also has a lot of friends who are members and they are helping in a few ways.

As for us, we are doing well. Hermana Rodriguez does a good job of making me laugh a lot. We have been working harder than ever and it feels great. I am basically back to normal with my health. Randomly I will get sick because of something I eat, but my diet isn't up to me... I look forward to being able to choose what I eat again. (We are working with the greatest sister who is less active and trying to convert her husband. Every night we visit them they give us a giant glass of hot milk. It is so painful and makes me sick until the following day, but it's all they have and are so excited to offer. I haven't figured out what to do yet.)

Dad, so glad you got the video! I hope that you had a great week! Can someone send me some pictures of Trevor's wedding?
Adam, I love you! Hope you are doing well! Keep me updated with the baseball games!

Okay, ¿algo más? I am sorry my emails are so boring. I run out of things to say. I struggle with knowing what will actually interest others.

Hermana Norton

P.S. I just sent a package today with some things I wanted to give to a couple families. Could you divide those up and send them to them? Thank you so much! Sounds like your birthday party for Dad was a success! Congrats, Mom. You are really great!

"THANK YOU to every single one of you supporting the missionaries" (Sam)

Helllooo!

   Wow! What an amazing conference!!! I was SOAKING in every second of it! I filled like a thousand pages of notes in my notebook. The bummer is that with the time change, they don´t aire the Sunday afternoon session here in the capilla cuz it would start at 10 pm and end at 12-midnight....... :/// so we missed ELDER HOLLANDS TALK. Please please please send me a copy! Or even better, a copy of it on a CD. POR FAVOR.

   :) thanks mom. You always find the good things about me and my emails and teach me from my own letters. Thanks for what you said about me choosing to try the hard things. Often times I don´t really realize, but you always point out the good attributes in me and help me learn. I really enjoy translating. I love languages as well. I really really would like to learn at least one other language when I get home... and I don´t know how plausable this is but i would love to go live in france or germany or somewhere where they speak a language I don´t speak, just to go learn the langauge. I would love to learn french.

   I do play piano in the ward. Well I did. Elder Larios is basically mozart............ so when he got here we started switching off between the second counselor (the american that was out of town), elder Larios, and myself. I am little by little forgetting ALLL the other music I used to play. I´m gonna spend more time on the piano when I get home.

   FINALLY I HEAR SOMETHING ABOUT WILL MONTGOMERY. I have been wondering!! I wrote him a letter a while ago but I sent it to his house in georgia. They may not even live there anymore. Anyways, good for him. He´s so awesome. I spoke with him like one day for I went into the MTC. I was walking around some... like.. ´´Staples´´ I think it was.. buying pens and my backpack... and we talked on the phone. If you read this Will, WRITE ME A LETTER. :D....... plus will you teach me french when I get home???? :)

   Well, things are good here. I can get around fine in our area... but its tough cuz I don´t know PEOPLE..... Elder Blanch knew how to get around and he also could just be driving along and name 10 houses in any different town where less actives lived... or old investigators.. or members..... and I´m still kinda lost. We teach a lot of the same people as before but we are needing to branch out a little more to find more people and its difficult to do when you don´t know where anyone lives.. You can actually waste a lot more time than you think and a lot more GAS than you want looking for one family. :) We had a slower week.. we have been trying newer, different techniques for finding and they haven´t given fruit yet.. we´ll see!!

   I´m a little behind on writing people so I´m gonna close there. Sorry its been short, its whats on my mind. :)

   A couple things...... THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU to every single one of you supporting me/us as missionaries. This is a difficult thing. The words of support. The prayer every night, the letter in the mail, the faithful tithing for our materials, IT IS MUCH APPRECIATED. Thank you.

   Thats all! Love you!
-Elder Norton

WHAT E'RE THOU ART, ACT WELL THY PART (Hilary)

Hi family! Love you.

Okay, Conference was so great, right? We feel that way every six months. I love Conference as a missionary; it is a very different experience. We had a couple investigators who were able to attend. They really enjoyed and are really committed. They're progressing and it is so cool to see.

Okay, I loved the talks by Elder Holland, Elder Scott, Sister Dalton, Elder Perry, and also President Monson. I loved the talks about the restoration (sp?). I felt like the main themes were repentance, obedience, and focusing on the home. Anyway, I really loved President's talk because generally his talks are stories, but this time it was doctrinal and really cool. I love conference. What a privilege.                CLICK HERE to learn the secrets of this historic stone

Okay, we have been working with a lot of new people and it is so great. We have a few new investigators every day and we are really stepping it up. I love it. A few people I will quickly mention: G, M, Familia B, Familia G. Please pray for them! I don't have much time to write about all of them, but they are all great. 

Okay, so glad you met Stacia! She's literally the greatest! I miss her a lot, but know she is where Heavenly Father needs her to be. I was thinking about her as Sister Dalton spoke about the people who "acted well their part". Sister Ellis came to my mind. I know that Heavenly Father is pleased and grateful for all the she did. 

Hermana Rodriguez's family has visited the states a few times and she is showing me pictures of her in the Bean museum right now! (Hermana Norton used to work at the Monty L. Bean Museum on the Brigham Young University campus in Provo, Utah)

We got our water back about mid week! Don't worry! Thanks anyway. Please let me know when you get the package with the SD card.

Okay, I apologize, we don't have much time left! I hope you are all doing well! Please send me Sam's email!

<3 Hermana Norton

for Sister Dalton's message go HERE

Monday morning traffic jam...?

Sometimes here in Utah we see this: 

Or this:

But I've never seen this:

Something for Everyone ...

Need INSPIRATION? DIRECTION? COMFORT?

LOOK HERE FOR ANSWERS

"I didn´t hear, THANKS TO MY DEEP SLEEPING, but my comp didn´t sleep a wink." (Sam)

Hello family and friends!

   What an awesome week! I hope you all had an enjoyable week and Easter as well.

   What´s new here in Spain and the mission field?? President visited our zone last week and we had an awesome meeting with the zones combined. I asked to translate.. :) which I ended up kind of shooting myself in the foot. I thought I was just going to translate Hermana Deere´s talk into Spanish for the natives here that don´t speak English but what ended up happening was that I translated that part to spanish and the rest of the meeting into english for this senior couple of missionaries. :) Hah it was fun though cuz it made me realize how BAD my english is right now. I was saying english words but putting it in spanish order and with spanish grammer.... ha! I need to practice both languages now!

   We have really great investigators right now that are very stable and have very bright futures... there are obstacles that  need to be overcome so they can be baptized...but, It is almost innevitable that they will all be baptized. How long? We don´t know.. Haha so we are all looking forward to this general conference and the fast sunday after for some direction and divine help.

   DAD. HAPPY BIRTHDAY IN A COUPLE OF DAYS. Sorry to jump the gun.. :) I just won´t be able to email you on your birthday so i´ll send it to you now. Hey fill me in on the golf tourney that you played in when you were in italy!! I wanna hear how it went! Hey, Elder Olsen comes into the field next transfer I think... If not next transfer it will be the next. We´ll see where he goes and who he´ll be with. I´ll keep you updated.

 

Semana Santa in Spain

 The week of easter is CRAZY in spain!! Look up ´´semana santa´´ in google. It isn´t just a one day celebration. It is a week long celebration. Random fairs or circuses. Random bands walking through the streets at random hours of the day or night. I think thursday night every single person in spain was awake the entire night... they had a celebration and played drums and trumpets all night. I didn´t hear THANKS TO MY DEEP SLEEPING, but my comp didn´t sleep a wink. :(((( :D So anyways, its super crazy here. Look on the mission blog. Hermana Deere posted a couple pictures and some explainations of the week. We as a mission decided to really try to plan the week ahead of time.. so people were expecting our visits instead of trying to plan it as we went. That way people would be waiting for us instead of trying to ask them to make time during "Semana Santa". It worked well and we had a successful week. President Deere is extremely smart and very imspired.

   Our ward right now is a very small ward. In fact, it is the same size as a fairly large branch. The average attendance is like 55 people... Our second counselor, american btw, that is living with his family in spain for work, has been traveling europe with the fam this last three weeks. So I´ve been taking over teaching the young mens class. I LOVE IT. I LOVE IT. Yesterday was the last class i´ll teach and it was on the doctrine of Jesus Christ. I use the classes to prep the boys for their missions.. aka I make THEM teach ME... :) and then I tie it back to them to help them apply the lessons to their own lives. I LOVE TEACHING YOUTH.

   Sorry my memory card took a long time. I´m glad you enjoyed the photos.  And, keep going mama! Use this time wisely! You have the right to be ´´on vacation´´ right now. :) you need to recuperate so don´t let people expect you to do things! Relax and read the Book of Mormon or spanish. Everyone wishes they could have a ´´break´´ like you have right now. Relájate y disfruta. :)

   Tell all the one-year-older-than-me guys ´´hi and to go get married´´ -from elder norton. :)

   I love you all! Reread the story of Abinadi and recommit to having greater faith in the 

Lord´s will.

-Elder Norton

Mosiah 17: 20 And now, when Abinadi had said these words, he fell, having suffered death by fire; yea, having been put to death because he would not deny the commandments of God, having sealed the truth of his words by his death.

Don't know the story? CLICK HERE

"Well, since Friday we have been without water ... " (Hilary)

Okay, how is everyone? You all sound like you are doing well! I love hearing from you! Thanks for updating me and keeping me in mind. Know that, even though sometimes I can't respond, I am always so grateful for your support and thoughts! From each and every one of you!

So much has happened this week. I thought you would have found out by now. I'll start from last Monday.
We finished our p-day early because Hermana E had a medical appointment. They were doing some physical therapy on her and it caused her a lot of pain, so we couldn't work that night. We had to go back to the physical therapist Tuesday and Hermana E was miserable afterward....  it seemed to be making her worse. She couldn't really walk or stand up. So Tuesday we couldn't do much and Wednesday we spoke with President. We expressed a few concerns and he told Hermana Ellis that she should go home so that she can get well. We went to the house of the stake president for lunch and there she Skyped with her Mom and they got things figured out. That night we stayed in the nearest sister apartment to the airport and Hermana E left at 5 am Thursday Morning.

My new companion's name is Hermana Rodriguez. I am finishing her training and I will be with her until she gets her visa because her mission is Argentina Cordoba (!!) and she is just waiting in her home country until they get her visa problems worked out. She is excellent. She is a really great missionary, super smart and funny. We are having fun. Things have been a little tough in the work and just in general, but everything is going to work out! Today we headed to the offices and ran into Hermana Marca and Hermana Samantha Harris. I was having a really hard day then they walked in and I remembered how much Heavenly Father loves me and is aware of every one of his children. Hermana Harris is the greatest and we talked for a long time and went to lunch and it was so good. We are planning to be companions someday. If we have enough faith, it will happen, right? :)

Well, since Friday we have been without water. All of Calderon. It is interesting. Luckily we had a couple big bottles of water here (that Hermana Ellis and I had felt impressed to buy a couple weeks ago) so we have been bathing and washing the dishes with those. Saturday Raquel was baptized because the church is really on the ball and although the whole neighborhood/city is without water, the font is connected to a reserve. The water was cold and dirty and yellowish brown, but she was baptized and loved it and is so strong. It was a really special baptism. I love her a lot and am so happy for her!

Dad, HAPPY BIRTHDAY THIS WEEK. I have sent a couple things your way and I pray that they get to you in time. Dad, just know that I love you with all of my heart and I look forward to a lot of good daddy daughter time in about seven months. Hope you have an excellent week!

Love you, Adam!  Hope all is well with Mitch and Jen!  I love hearing about the calling, Dad! How cool that you spent the weekend w/ Mel. I hope that Bryce gets to serve a mission! What an incredible story! I'm so glad that you've been able to have these experiences. I learn so much from you! And glad that you're having fun with the Elders. Don't let them get too comfortable :) 

Well, we didn't do much for Easter, but I did a lot of meditating on my own. I am very grateful for Christ's life and His sacrifice and His love for us. We really can't comprehend it all, but I try really hard to be as grateful as possible. As everyone in Calderòn has been outside with buckets waiting for a big truck with water to pass by I think about how Christ is the living water. Si fuera asì la misiòn con gente esperando en una fila para recibir el agua viva. No tendrían sed jamàs. Really, His gospel has all the answers. It is the what and the why and the how. There is no complete happiness without it.

Well, I love you all. And I love this work. Thanks for everything! Keep writing. Keep moving forward.

Hermana Norton