STILL IN LEOPARDI

"Hello!!! I feel like its been forever! You are all going to be surprised to hear that we had transfers yesterday and I am still in LeoPardi with Hermana Castaneda. Yep, transfer number 3 with her. Not having a transfer totally threw me for a loop..Tues afternoon was rough. However, I know the Lord has a plan. And thats what has been getting me through. If He needs me with her for another 6 weeks, I can do it. I really need to rely on His help!"

"We are continuing to teach alot. We prob average about 7 or 8 lessons a day. However, still searching for those are really prepared! About Maria Teresa...her daughter is hardcore Catholic and doesn´t want us to do anything with her family. Whenever we´ve tried to find her at her house her daughter comes out and says she is ´sleeping´or ´not home´. It's sad. We´ve been working with Ismael, a 17 year old, who is the Caballeros neighbor. He came to church last week and we are hoping he will come again this week! One of our ´front runners´is a 65 year old woman, Laura, who is so fun. When we teach her she´ll always say íncredible!!´..it's like she knew it before but hadn´t but 2 and 2 together! I hope we are able to get some people progressing and preparing for baptism soon!"

"One morning last week before lunch we clapped at a fence and an older woman came out. She spoke Guarani-Spanish so I couldn´t really understand her. Def more Guarani words than Spanish. And she couldn´t understand me like at all. I like to think that its because she is older and possibly had problems with hearing...but I think it was because I´m still pretty valley girl no matter how hard I try and prob the first American shes ever talked to! I was kinda nervous to teach her because I thought there was no way she´ll understand what I´m saying! So, I decided to say a quick little prayer asking Heavenly Father for the ability to communicate. When it came to my part of the lesson I started to talk and this little older woman was just staring at me. After a few minutes she stopped me and said, ´I don´t know what happened--but I can understand every word now!´ This little experience strengthened my testimony of two things. First off, Heavenly Father hears our prayers....all of them...even our little pleas for help! And second, the gift of tongues really is so real! We seriously see small miracles like this each day!"

"Funny story....little 9 year old Myra in our ward (who reminds me of Lex) came running up to me on Sunday holding a Liahona and said, hermana! hermana! Your name is in the magazine. I looked down at the page and it said ´Hermana Sanchez´. Lots of little ones here can´t say Sargent so they think my name is Sanchez! Too cute!!"

"Last pday Hermana Karduzo taught us how to make empanadas and I taught her to make waffles! It was so much fun! And pretty tasty too. Or, as we say here in Paraguay... ´!que rico!"

"At our district meeting on the 19th all 6 elders showed up wearing matching pink ties. Ha. They didn´t want us to feel left out so they brought us a present....pink headbands. Funny!! Nice of them. As a thank you, on just this past Tuesday, for our last district meeting before transfers, I showed up with about 30 waffles and a couple jars of jam. They downed them so fast!! With transfers, 2 elders in our district left, and we are getting 2 newbies (who arrived yesterday I guess). I´m excited. Our district is pretty awesome! We have the zone leaders, and now 2 elders that are trainers...good elders in my district!"

"We don´t have pday on Monday. Its on Tuesday, the Feb 2nd (my 5 month mark on the mish!) because we are going to the temple that day! We are going as a zone, and I can´t wait! Not sure what time our session is. I´ll def look out for my fellow Arizonans who are in the temple presidency! After the temple my district has plans to go out to lunch and then if we can get permission, we´re going to the centro....downtown Asuncion. So we´ll see! If thats the case...I may not have time to write on Tuesday. So, it may be a while again. We´ll see!"

"I am so grateful for this opportunity to serve a mission. At times, its tough..but the Lords hand is always there. For all of us. I love sharing this happy message with the people here. I love Paraguay and being here in the jungla more and more each day! Its amazing!!"