Hay Siempre Gozo

Hey everyone!!!

This week was insane, no other way to describe it. Here's my lil summary: learned how to war dance, thought we burned the apartment down with banana bread, had a lovely spontaneous trip to the ER, TRANSFERS, had video calls with a guy who lives in the middle east, crashed a baptism, and spent hours under tornado watch. Gotta keep it lively around here :)

Hermana Peine hadn't been feeling super well the past few days, and by Tuesday she was starting to feel a lot of pain. I made banana bread for our friend Roseliin while she rested, and then while it was in the oven we decided to risk it and run to the store to get her some meds. We ended up taking longer in the store, and then got stuck at lights all the way home, and the bread had been in for like an hour already, so we were a little panicked. We rushed home and opened the oven and the bread wasn't too bad, a little burnt on top, but the apartment was not up in flames, counting our blessings with that one. She took the meds throughout the day, and eventually we called her doctor cause she wasn't getting better. We were told to go to urgent care, so we head over and tell them about her stomach pains, and she says we need to go to the ER. So we drive over there and they bring her in, stick her on a bed, take her blood, and get her an IV. We ended up in there for a couple hours, it was night by then. Come to find out she had a cyst on her right side and they said most likely the pain was from a cyst that had ruptured on the left side. They finally let us go, got her a heat pad, and called the elders for a blessing. They being the best ever came over at night and gave us both blessings!

The next few days we were inside for most of the time as she recovered. We were still able to have some lessons, and we've started teaching this guy in the middle east through video calls who found me through Facebook! He first reached out a couple months ago, but we were never able to have a call with him so we had to stop teaching him. Then, a couple weeks ago he reached out again and we were able to have a few videocalls to answer his questions. He's so open to us and pays such good attention, it's honestly just amazing to me that we are able to have experiences like these with people from across the world.

We got transfer news on Wednesday and I get to STAY!!! I love Hermana Peine and the area and just all the people here so much, I really didn't want to leave!!!

We ended up at a baptism for this 8 year old on Sunday, kinda crashed it, but we knew the family from soccer nights. We all sat down in there and listened to the talks which were so sweet and spiritual, and then the grandpa gets up and asks all the kids and missionaries to stand up and sing I am a Child of God. We all kinda looked at each other like what?! Did not sign up for that lol. But we sang the first verse for him and I could feel the Spirit so strongly, it was a really beautiful baptism.

After the baptism Kentucky just let loose on us. We were driving home as the rain came down and the tornado sirens started, thankfully we were inside before it got too crazy. We got green skies, thunder and lightning, hail, and this strong wind that blew down a ton of trees. I've honestly never seen a storm like that before, just insane. 

My little spiritual thought for yall is just to find joy no matter the circumstance. Even when life gets chaotic and stressful, there are always tender mercies from Heavenly Father, He is the true source of joy, the kind of joy that overcomes any hurt, pain, or challenge we experience, the kind of joy that's everlasting.

I love yall so much!!! Have a great week!

- Hermana Neil

Sorry about the lack of photos, I'll send yall a bunch next week!