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