We Can Do Hard Things: Merry Christmas From Sunny Florida!!

Hello!!! :)

Ahhh I don't even know where to start! But I love you all so much and hope and pray you have an amazing Christmas! :) Remember the best gift we can give is to LOVE!!!! It totally doesn't feel like Christmas here, but I love it anyways! The first day of winter was Saturday and it was like 85 degrees. I thought Christmas time would be so hard being away from home but it's not really that bad! The best gift we can give to the Savior is to help others come closer to Him, so of course I am loving that. And I have never felt closer to Him so that is a great gift that I have already received! Don't worry, I am excited to see my family on Wednesday too ;)

Sister Jacklin, my trainee!

So, we had an amazing week. First of all, Yvette got baptized! :) Don't worry, I will be sending pictures home soon. I am waiting till the Christmas mail chaos is over! Anyways, it was amazing. She had her interview and almost didn't pass so we were praying so so hard, but she was totally fine! :) Then she bore her testimony at the baptism and I just cried. She is so solid. We also went to a temple tour that same day and it was really special! She was confirmed yesterday and also sang in the ward choir! It seriously is the most amazing blessing to be able to see the changes that the Atonement can bring to people's lives.

So that was Saturday. Sunday was also cool because the elders met a lady and invited her to church and she came! And we got to teach her last night! Her name is Carolyn :) Then Friday was crazy! We had a meeting for trainers and trainees. That was good. Then we had a mission conference Christmas devotional with all the missionaries in the mission! It was so cool seeing all of them! Especially Sister Rogers! I miss her so much! There were just a lot of musical numbers mostly, then food and socializing. :) But, the best part, they announced that we will be able to go to temple!! :) We can only go on our last day in the mission then if one of our converts goes for their endowment. But they changed it so that we get to go twice a year in January and July! :) You should have heard the gasp that came from all the missionaries! It was awesome. So I will finally get to see the new video!! :) We also had interviews with president this week, which went well. Yeah, it was a crazy week as you can tell. Oh! Friday we also had the Night in Bethlehem! It was a stake activity and it was so cool! They did a live nativity and acted out some other things, then had a little concert, snacks, and the gym was set up like Bethlehem! It was really neat! They had an after party but we had to be home at ten :( So that was a bummer! But it was still really cool!

Another miracle for the week, we started teaching the Thomas family! They are the family of the Erbiti family in our ward. They have come to church a couple times and they invited us over to their house! We got to teach them and they fed us dinner. We are going to spend Christmas Eve with them and meet with them again this week :) So pray for them! I honestly don't remember what I have talked about in previous weeks, so I'm sorry if I repeat or forget to talk about certain people! It's just we have so little time I try to talk about the highlights! Can you believe I have been here for 8 months?!?!?!? Yeah, I cannot!! Today we are going ice skating... So that should be interesting. Last time I did that was sophomore year with Kameron and he just pulled me around the whole time so... Yikes! I will probably rip my jeans since they are so tight now. Ugh. Holidays! ;) Gotta love getting that winter coat!

xoxo

Love, Sister Lowry