YES!!!!

October 17, 2011
First and greatest exciting news!!! MIGUEL IS GETTING BAPTIZED!!! THIS SATURDAY!!! Oh man, as you probably  have read in all my emails, he has been quite a concern for us for a while. But after tons and tons of prayer, careful planning, fasting, and more prayer, we were able to talk to him about his doubts, then he came to church telling us that he is ready for this weekend. I'M SO HAPPY! I had a long hard winter here with no baptisms, and I worked so so so hard to see something happen because it was just getting so hard to not see anyone make this awesome covenant with God that blesses your life SOO much. But Miguel is incredible. I couldn't be happier for him. And in some coming weeks we should also be baptizing Julietta, Gicela, Nico, and Samantha. Things are going WONDERFULLY in Funes :-)
So this week we had the opportunity to listen to the area leader, Elder Arnold. He came and spoke to our mission. They called a few days in advance and asked if Hermana Kastigar and I could sing a special musical number for the conference. Kastigar has a great voice, but everyone who knows me and has watched me play Singstar knows my voice is mediocre at best. I was pretty dang nervous. But we sang with 2 other Elders "más cerca Dios de ti", and did parts and such (I had to sing solo at some parts!!!) but it turned out really well. The spirit was definitely there. But it was intimidating to sing in front of over half the mission and the president of our mission and also someone of the 70. Anyway, he was fantastic. He dropped cane on us like a good area authority, but with lots of love. I was stuck with one of the seats in the front row so I found at times he was right in front of me yelling very loudly, and it was also a stormy day that day so the thunder was intense, but i loved it. I learned a lot. I learned mostly to just trust in myself more. I think that one of the ways Satan tries to work with missionaries is by making them feel inadequate. I was feeling bummed before the conference because Miguel was such a great investigator but not progressing to baptism and sometimes I had thoughts like "gosh maybe if they had elders teaching him he would get baptized" but after the conference I felt a ton more confident that it doesn't matter if I'm an elder or an hermana, I was called by God to preach His gospel, and through Him I can do anything. After Hermana Kastigar felt more confident in ourselves is when we could remove the doubt for Miguel and help him commit to a date :-)
The other cool part about the conference was that I got to see Hermana Rentfro (MTC buddy) and Hermana Reyes. Man I miss them so much! It was good to see all the other cool hermanas.
So one last story about this week. One day while we were working we got thirsty so we took a break by going to a kiosco (like a little lemonade stand-ish thing, hard to explain) and bought some water and sat down to drink for a second. Usually we speak Spanish in the streets, but we took a little break and spoke in English. I told her how it would be funny if we would speak in Japanese because no one understands us anyways when we speak in English. We then broke out blabbing and blabbing in "Japanese" (of course all I know is "domo arugatu mr. roboto") and people gave us the FUNNIEST looks. I was laughing pretty hard at us. ok sorry I'm so crazy. That's just one small story of the crazy, funny things hermana kastigar and I do everyday.
I love you all!!! take care!! Hey Karissa and Marlee leave the mtc soon! so weird! I feel like they just entered yesterday. Does Karissa leave a little earlier than the date she entered? Transfers are a little earlier for us this transfer because of some conference our president has, and I assume the Cordoba peeps are coming with the Rosario peeps as well. quien sabe. love you!
hermana collins