Week Twenty Five

Well... what a long and great week! It was so nice to be able to talk to my family this week on Christmas through skype. Fue muy muy bueno! Estoy muy agrecido to have that chance to talk to my familia! Their doing great and my brother still loves busting my chops. Gotta love Gi- what a stud he is. 

So this week was crazy busy with tons of holiday stuff and people to visit. It was great! I cant tell you how much I have eaten in the last week... I literally think that I am going to pop. The amount of tomales that we ate was out of this world. It’s all about the experiencia. Here since they celebrate Christmas the 24th at 12 pm  everyone is nuts the next day..  every one is either dead tired from the actividades durante la noche or hungover haha. But Christmas here is way differente. They blast music and all the families dance, eat and have a great time together. Then the amount of fireworks that go off is crazy wild... it is INSANE. They are piros haha. Pero fue muy muy divertido. At 12 pm pa pais goes insane- fireworks like no other... i was wide awake because it literally was so loud. Entonces, that was pretty cool. Just a little insight to what navidad is like here. 

The day after christmas we did some service. What does that mean? Well we brought our machetis and did some servicio por algunos personas que conocemos. Fue muy divertido. We chopped a bunch of little trees and shrubry. It was a good time. Dont teach a lot the day after christmas because everyone is dead from the night before. 

We had an actividad este semana donde esta el temple. It was a great activity. It was for recente conversos y investagadores. It was really good! It was all about Christ and how for the new year we can make and set great goals and center our vidas more on jesucristo y cosas que realamente son importante! So, that was really neat. 

Oh, algo kinda cool. So here it’s a tradition to make like a fake person. So here there are like all these manakins that people make. They put them in front of their houses. They are legit. They dress them up y todo. Son muy buenos y la tradition es 31 the people burn these manicans that they have made. It represents burning and gettting rid of todo la mal cosas de el ano pasado. So that’s pretty diferente de los estados. So everyone is making these man size dolls and they are out in front of the houses. It’s kinda funny and cool at the same time. There called Puchungas in Spanish. 

Well what a great time to refelct en nuestro vidas este semana. tenemos la opportunity to start a new year pretty soon- what a great time to reflect and set metas/goals for this new upcoming year. What are we going to change? What are we going to accomplish? What will we do differently? Who will we try and help? Who are we going to serve? What are we going to do to have a better relationship with our friends and familia? How are we going to better our relationship our Heavenly Father? How are we going to be more spiritually in tune?

We all have so much that we can change, do differently, or do better. Lets all try and make it a great year. Lets not just talk about what we want to do... but lets all actually do it. Sometimes we need to sacrifice, but in the end we can do it. I have seen people here change when it involved things that are nearly impossible to change or quit.  With the Lords help everything is possible.  Remember with Gods help everything can be completed or achieved. Make it a great new year and get after it!!!!!!!!!

The highlight of our week was having two very special people to me baptized this past Sunday yesterday. Each of them is special and I love baptisms and the spirit that is there with us. After feeling this spirit numerous times during baptisms I can’t deny the power of the spirit nor can I deny that the covenants made at baptism are real and true. I am thankful for the knowledge that I have regarding baptismal covenants. How great it is to know that these families can be together forever with the Lords plan. This is just the first step in getting there.

If there is anything that I can ever do for you guys just let me know. I love each and every single one of you. Make it a great week and a great start to a new year!!! Aim high in all that you do, and put your mejor foot forward cada dia! 

Con mucho amor!!

Elder Long