"Pure Gratitude"...

Familia! 
I have officially burst through my first skirt...I think I´ll celebrate with some more food! JOKE! But seriously, my skirt ripped as I sat down this morning...Don´t worry mom and dad! Diet starts Monday! 
Birthdays! Auntie Steph-happy birthday! You have always been amazing. Hunter-happy birthday buddy! Love you!
Shout Outs- ELIZABETH ALDREDGE! I cried when I heard your are going to LATVIA. OH MY GOODNESS! I´m going to try to get you a letter! LOVE YOU! oooo....call to repentence to EVERYONE but my parents and the grandparents Bourne. Thanks for the emails. But the biggest shout out goes to.....MY MOM! HOly shrapnel, I received TWO packages this week with a record 8 dirty looks from the other elders in my zone. THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU! The Christmas newsletter was phenominal and will continue to be so for the rest of my mission. Mom, the tights were exactly what I needed and I love the picture book (it makes me trunky). Wow, the hymn books and liahonas are flying out of the box thank you mom thank you mom! YOu are amazing!
Wow, a lot to say. We had our first really good weather two days in a row this week. I sweated for the very first time and it was beautiful. I am in Ovejeria which is a lot more beautiful than Rahue Alto...Still kind of dirty, but a lot more campo (fieldish). That picture of me with the cow is at the very end of our area in la calle averena. That street is FULL of investigators who are amazing.

People, I´m not going to lie, my comps have the awesome combination of LOVING to sing at every cita and absolutely NO singing ability whatsoever. They also have no shame either. This makes for super awesome slash awkward moments with me deciding whether I should follow THEIR tone or the tone of the song...still haven´t decided which to follow yet. Wow, I could draw so many spiritual parallels from this example about obedience to what we know is right, or about the atonement...but I won´t. YOu can all draw your own spiritual conclusions from my parable of the singing latinas.

BLob LeBlaron. I saw the Chilean YOU walking down the street the other day. (Ps you are still on my call to repentence list...get me your address,... or a letter)

I had my favorite day of the mission this week.This week was a week of Little miracles. Monday through Thursday we did everything we could to help members, serve them, share with them, and have them come out with us. When Thursday arrived, we had TWO lessons with member (around this time we should have around 10). I was so discouraged and didn´t understand. We had also fasted for Viky (the cute 18 year old who was taking discussions in secret) who spoke to her parents. We called her 5 times on Thursday but she didn´t answer because she had lost her phone. I did everything I could all morning on Friday to be perfectly obedient and learn and serve and then when three o´clock hit, we prayed that somehow we´d run into Viky and headed for the church where we were going to meet Carolina (most recently baptised amazing woman) to do divisions. To our surprise, Viky was standing there next to her with the biggest smile on her face. I felt like crying for joy! We all hugged. They told us that Caronlina had fasted for Viky the same day we had and Viky had spoken to her parents and they are changing. They didn´t forbid her anymore to listen to us and she couldn´t be more excited to be baptised on the 26th! We asked her why she came down to the church and she said ¨so you could teach me more.¨Wow. Its moments like that that make all the walking and rain and wind and closed doors completely seem like nothing. That moment when we saw viky at the doors of the church with a huge smile filled me with pure joy and I´m so grateful I got to have that experience. My favorite part, however, is that Carolina has taken Viky under her wing and they are very close now because they are in the same situation. (Carolina´s grandparents still haven´t spoken to her since the baptism). To see this kind of love and support between people just fills me with such joy. I´ve never been this happy (or stressed, tired, discouraged, or FULL of happiness and joy!) This is why I´m out here!

All of yesterday was sunny and breezy and lovely. I had about a million moments of pure gratitude and love for people or my comps or Heavenly Father and then we ended the day with an enormous Noche de Hogar (Family HOme Evening) in the house of an investigator who lives where the cow picture is (thats what the other picture is). We had the best time and the neighbors were bumping Enya´s ¨Sail Away¨ for hours. I loved it. Perfect day. It´s funny how something as small as someone wanting to listen, or someone who comes to church, or someone like Carolina who takes someone new under her wing and helps her grow while she herself is growing! Pure joy comes from the simple, happy things.

I love Ovejeria, I love my companions, I love to serve the Lord, I love a lot of the people out here, and I love you all. This morning I read in Luke 10 about the good samaritan. I love vs. 34-35. CHIRST is the good Samaritan and SAVES the people. We are the host who is expected to ¨take care of ¨them and whatsoever we spend more, Christ will repay when He comes again. Christ has essetially given me a blank check out here. I realized that I need to ¨spend more.¨ And I aim to do it.
President Lovell spoke about Samuel in the last conference and how he said ¨here am I¨ every time the lord Called. I love that and plan to be a ¨here am I¨ missionary. Dad, that´s my vote for your awesome Ebeneezer idea. (or you could just carve ¨bah, humbug¨ on it. Love you and your crazy ideas.
I have Pday on Saturdays because we are in the zone with the office elders and they have to work on mondays. If I get transfered, Ill have pday on monday. But for now...Saturday. All of us hate it because saturday should be our last push...but we have pday. LAME.
Well, my time is up. Sorry I can never write all that I want to or all that Im learning or all that jazz. But know that I love you all and am happy and working down here in the extremities of the earth. And please pardon me for all my spelling errors...the Spanish keyboard combined with limited time and the fact that I can´t speak Spanish OR English anymore all contribute...and I never was a good speller anyways. Love you all!
Hna. Bourne