Its raining its pouring!!

HOLLLLLA!!!!

It has been another wonderful week here in Ecuador. It has continued to pour rain every day, thunder lightning the whole nine yards. 

We have had a great week working, working and working. The mission is hard, wouldn’t it be nice if you could all of the sudden just speak a language and understand everything?! If you find out a pill or something my mom can give you my address. Learning a language and trying to preach at the same time is hard.  But who said this was going to be easy, some blonde being plopped in the middle of a random country in South America. The mission is just a huge test of faith, a test of strength, a test of patience. 

We have been working on a couple investigators this past week, Manolo the older man from a part member family, he is an eternal investigator. He is so nice his wife and family are so good to us and he is progressing well towards baptism. We got so many references on Sunday and have lots of lessons set up with people that came to church. It’s the best when you have investigators come to church. We also have been teaching a family with the ZLs.  A mom dad and two sons, the mom’s testimony is so strong already they all plan to be baptized next week. She was the first person I taught on the mission, the first day in Concocoto!!

We had a BBQ is basically how you say it in English, with some members this week, we made them cookies and they got out the Ecuadorian grill. It was super fun and so tasty. I love that family. They are so good to us. We also had a couple zone studies this week. We studied our PB and did tons of discussing and practicing.

Nothing funny like falling out of a bus this week.  Just lots of rain; and more rain. I swear it sprinkles back home and rains here. I am so grateful to be here, giving my all to this church at to the Lord. Though it may be hard, it’s the best thing I could be doing, the best way to grow and become closer to our Savior Jesus Christ.

Stay tuned the day of the dead is on Sunday, and we live across from the cemetery in the middle of town, it is going to be CRAZY!! We will be drinking so much colada morada this week.

LOVE YOU ALL, thank you for all your support

HAVE A GREAT WEEK!!

para siempre dios este con vos

xoxoxoxo

HERMANA MERRILL

Here are some pics from this week!!

poppi pollo, the BBQ and a typical road we work on here

3 months

BUENOS TARDES from the center of the earth!!:)

It has been such a great week!! Conocoto has been same ole. I think I have eaten everything maracuya (Passion Friut) in town. It is the best fruit in the world the states should really start importing it. I could eat them all day.

We have got so much done and finally have some baptisms set. Opening an area and being trained is a lot of work, we have to pave the path for all the other sisters that will serve here in the future. We continued to teach the Mora family, they seem to be slowly but sure progressing. Since they only live like 4 houses down, daily contact is nice and easy! We also have been focusing on part member families which includes Hermano Calvache, He has had over 10 elders teach him years ago, has attended church for 20 years, longer than me and has never gotten baptized. He said he has been waiting for the correct time and told us  the time is now. We love him and his wife owns the church book store in Quito. He doesn’t have to change much he is soo ready to be baptized!! Also we are teaching 86 year old Maria. Her birthday was this week and don’t worry we celebrated with her!! She is our little Ecuadorian grandma and also from a part member family. Her daughter lives in the states and her grandson lives with her. For her birthday her granddaughter came over with her husband, she went on a mission to Kentucky so she knows perfect English; it was nice to talk to someone in English.

We had Zone Conference on Wednesday in San Rafel. President and Sister Christensen came down here to Los Chillos. It was great to hear words from him and the zone leaders, we spend a lot of time with them as they are in our ward(zone leaders.) We were taught a lot about contacting and of course Sister Christensen helped remind the elders about cleaning apartments! Our president is so kind to us; he cares so much and always brings the spirit in while speaking. The entire morning we all learned so much and then just like that we were on the bus to go back out to work.

Sorry to bore you now comes the funny things, I fell out of a bus on Wednesday, completely wiped out, turns out I thought the bus was stopped and it was still going a good 20 mph. I was completely lying on the ground, my dress flew all the way up, some blood, a bruised bum, and almost a broken tail bone and Hermana Castillo could not stop laughing cause I was dying laughing. But don’t worry it was in front of the bishops house and his wife thought I got ran over. So funny, the buses here are insane, they are so crazy, you would think you are on an Indiana Jones ride with a 100 Ecuadorians who do not believe in this great thing called deodorant. It’s lovely.

Anyway, today for P-day our district took some bus somewhere to some place that sells root beer, which you cannot find anywhere here. It was AMAZING!! Root beer has never tasted so good and the one Brazilian elder finally understood why we would travel long and far to find root beer. Also my Spanish is coming along I can pretty much understand about 85% of things and speak like 50% so good for a good 3 months out here in the best land of Ecuador.

I hope all is well back home, I love getting your thoughtful letters and words of encouragement. Have a great week I love you each.

Para Siempre Dios este con vos

xoxoxo

Hermana Merrill:)

Here are some Pics from this week

1. me and Maria

2. some crazy house a couple doors down

3. pretty flowers

4. rain selfie with castillo

When it pours rain , it pours

It’s been so rainy; I feel like Ecuador is how people speak of Seattle. It never stops!! 

I started my 7th week here, the 2nd transfer in the mission. We have goals set and things we hope to accomplish this combio. We started teaching a couple new families one of which owns the ice cream chop a couple doors down; they are a family of 5, the Mora Family. The husband is a bus driver and the mom owns her little ice cream place, they have 3 daughters Seriah is 18, Alison is 8 and Martina is 5. They are so nice, the girls are super cute and be sure to feed us lots of ice cream and corn when we are there. I love them and hope they start to progress. Their last name is Mora which means blackberry, the most common fruit in Ecuador. The even gave us Mora juice, which we drink at least once a day, it is amazing!  

This is the week our Ward went to the temple!! It was somewhat of a ghost town with all the members gone. We waved to them as they left on the bus and they all made it back for church on Sunday. The people were more excited than I had ever seen someone to leave to go to the temple. We had a missionary from our ward come home this week, he went to Guatemala. He spoke on Sunday and gave such an amazing talk on the atonement changing lives. 

That is about it for this week in Concocoto, it was somewhat of a rough week. Next week will be better. 

I love you all so much, thank you for the letters and prayers

Para Siempre Dios este con vos

xoxoxo

Hermana Merrill:)

Transfers, Mentos & General Conference‏

Well folks it has been a BIG week! 

Let´s start out with I have been here for an entire transfer!! Made it through 6 weeks, in the best place in the world. Hermana Castillo,is going to continue to train me for the next 6 weeks for my last 6 weeks of training. I am soooooo happy we are going to be together for another 6 weeks in Conocoto. The work for us together here has not been completed and there is much to be done. 

On Tuesday we went back to Quito to meet up with all the elders I got here with for a big meeting to follow up on the past 6 weeks. It was great to see the President his wife and all the elders. We heard inspiring words from the President ate some American food and made more goals. After our meeting we all went up to the Panecillo. This is a huge monument that overlooks all of Quito, the volcanos and the valley of the mountains. The view was beautiful from the center of the earth. Most importantly, why we went up there was because that is where 60+ years ago David O McKay dedicated and announced that the Gospel could be preached to the people of Ecuador. We read the dedicatory prayer with the president and felt the sweet spirit of knowing the work here is not near to being done. Preparing the prepared, to meet with our Savior. That experience is one of tradition, a special one.

I got to watch General Conference in ENGLISH!! It was such a blessing to be able to understand and hear all 4 sessions. We went to our stake center in San Rafel, there with all the English speaking missionaries from the 2 Los Chillos Zones. The faithful people here in Ecuador take general Conference very seriously. Everyone always attends at the stake center, never watches it in their home, the women all buy new dresses and people are always taking pictures after. It is an example to me of how important hearing from our leaders of the church really is. Let’s just start off with how happy I was they sang my Favorite hymn HOW FIRM A FOUNDATION in the Sunday session.  Elder Klebingat on Saturday afternoon spoke so directly and strong. He spoke of our responsibility for agency, physical well-being, embracing the commandments, not justifying, not being casual with our matters, and being really really good at repenting & forgiving. He spoke about facing our weaknesses, basically what I have been doing here in Ecuador for 6 weeks. Trusting in the Lord that I will be okay and facing my weakest link of speaking a different language, living in a different culture to try and preach the gospel of Jesus Christ. I also loved when our beloved prophet spoke of walking on the correct path. He talked about having a pattern of prayer, choosing and pondering the path of thy feet, following the life of our Savior. Elder Scott spoke about the basics, Prayer, Study, FHE and going to temple, he always included that nothing is more important the testimony and knowledge we gain on in this life through those basic things. Lastly my last favorite was Elder Bednar speaking to the investigators of the church. Sorry to bore all of you for an entire paragraph but I hope you all enjoyed conference as much as I did!!!! 

As for our investigators this week, we continue to teach, teach, teach and hope that people will start progressing for baptism. We work a lot with the inactive members or the church. The president expects that we work 50/50 with investigators and members. We have some new contacts with appointments this week. We are both praying that we can progress the work here and find the humble hearts to share the gospel with. 

Concocto itself is GREAT. The rain never stops; the mud is amazing, and more poppi pollo. I have discovered strawberry Mentos and they are like heaven on earth. Also our fridge broke so we have been making some strange food and living at the pizza place down the street. Ecuador will never get boring, lots of crazy people and fun times with Hermana Castillo. I think I may have a 6 pack we laugh so much. I love her to death. 

I hope everyone has a great week! I think and pray for each of you. I love you all:)

Para Siempre Dios este con vos

xoxoxo

Hermana Merrill:)

PICTURES: view of Quito...my group at the monument with the president...my first zone conference weekend