Happy New Year!

I hope everyone had a Happy New Year! or a Feliz Ano Nuevo! Mine was pretty uneventful but I kind of liked it that way. We had to be home by 6 so that we didn't die on the streets or anything. One of my roommates is Italian (like legit from Italy and is learning English for her mission. Cool!) and so she made us deep dish pizza and this fried dough thing that is sort of like fried pizza but doesn't have a name in English. It was so great! Then we played some games and made some duct tape mustaches. You know, the normal things that missionaries do when their home early and don't have much else that their able to do. =]

This week has been kind of a poopier one. Every appointment we set up has canceled on us. It's making me pretty sad. But then I read this scripture this morning in Alma 38 verse 5 (ok I'm making up the verse. I can't really remember but it's definitely in the beginning of the chapter) and it's Alma telling Shiblon that he needs to have trust in God. So I decided that I definitely need to have more trust in God and so even though this week has been kind of poopie, I know it's going to get better because I know that God will help us do whatever he wants us to do. We do have a baptism on the 12th for William and Solimari. They are so great! Solimari was pretty much jumping in excitement on Sunday because she loved it so much. I'm really excited for them because they have been SUPER prepared by God for us to find them. In between the first time we met and the second time, both of them had read up to chapter 4 in 1 Nephi and their only 13 and 11 so it takes them even longer to read and understand what is going on. Sadly their brother Enrique can't get baptized because he's only 7. He's sad about it, which makes us sad. But he won't have to wait long. We maybe have another baptism this weekend for Caren and Mariela. I think I already told you all about them last week. They have been coming to church since September but they are super hard to meet with because their mom doesn't care if they get baptized and so because she's indifferent, she pretty much always has some reason why we can't come over. If we can meet with them tonight and have the interview tomorrow, then they can still get baptized but I think it will probably be postponed for later on in January.

We got a phone call from the Zone Leaders yesterday and President Morgan has decided that he wants the entire mission to go down to Rockaway on Saturday for one last time. I'm excited about it, especially since it sounds like the whole mission will be together. Plus we had Caren and Mariela's baptism set for Saturday and President Morgan asked us to try to change the day, so it must be pretty important to him that everyone goes. So that should be really good!

Today for p-day, Sister Alvarez is going to teach me how to make some Dominican food and then we're going to try to make this Honduran bread and some other random stuff. So hopefully when I get back from my mission, I'll know how to cook all sorts of random Hispanic stuff. I'm pretty excited about that! Maybe my family should be a little scared though because their going to be the first people I try my Hispanic cooking skills on. Except for maybe a companion here and there.

Thanks for all the support and love! I hope you all have a great start to the New Year! Love you all!

Hermana Parkin