June 14, 2010

Dear Family,

Well, I am here in Tampa.....back in the same place that I was in before....and I am LOVING it! Holy cow...you will not believe the success that we have been having! We are working with an entire family from Columbia (who I absolutely ADORE). It is a Mom named Lilianna and her three children Christian (14) Milton (12) and Luigi (10) and this family is truly incredible. We worked with them this week and they were so great and so we extended a baptismal date to them and they thought about it overnight, and they ended up telling us yesterday that they want to be baptized but that they want to wait until later.... which is sad, but they are a true treat to work with. I love them with all that I am. The problem is with Christian....he is the one having some doubts. He is wonderful though and I know that he will get things all figured out and that things will be AWESOME!!!!! I love this family!

Also, we are working with 2 men from Mexico City and one of them Jaun, has already accepted a baptismal date (we extended it on Saturday) and it is for the sat after this next one....and Alejandro is the other, and he too believes in the gospel, but is hesitant to be baptized.....and my therapy skills are finally starting to come in handy!!!! Alejandro experienced abuse when he was a child and I have been helping him to process through it so that he feels that he can be baptized.....it is thougouhly amazing!!!! He started talking to me one day, and I was struggling to understand his spanish because he was speaking so fast (but for the record I am getting much better...YIPPEE!) and then Hermana Murray came over and was listening for a second, and she told him that I was a therapist before coming on my mission, and he said that he felt like I was and that is the reason that he knew that he could talk to me. He said that he needs to get the bad cylces of abuse out of his life becuase he has 2 children and 1 on the way at home, and he needs to return to them in October a better man than he has been before. I am very excited about the whole thing. It is truly amazing.

So anyway, I am in my same apartment and I am loving it there....it feels like home there to me. It really is such a nice and comfy place. I feel very at home and good there. But this morning while I was writing letters on my bed, I found a little bug on my bed that looked like a bed bug!!!!! And I got really stressed and I tried to kill it, but it kept jumping away from me. But eventually, I squished it. I sure hope that it was NOT a bed bug! And if it was a bed bug I sure hope that it was the only one! And I hope that it was squished to smitherings!!!!! I HATE THEM!!!! I don't know for sure....but I really do not want another problem with those little devils! Other than that....life is good here. The work is great and I am learning so much.

The spanish is finally coming along. I do most of our phone calls now, and I struggle at times, but it is getting more and more easy. It is really exciting when I am having a conversation with someone and we are talking and it is all going great! I am getting pretty good at understanding most everything, but the challenge is still making my own sentences sound right, and expressing myself decently. But I know that it will come. I have faith in the Lord, and I was called to this work and set apart for it. I will learn spanish and be able to speak and understand it because the Lord will help me. I love this gospel.

Well, I love you all so much!

Love Always, Jenna