A Week of Unfortunate Events

   So this week has been very eventful, even though it has been two days less than the others.  Elder Franco got turf toe on Thursday and we had to go to the hospital to get it checked out.  (I had never heard of such a thing before, so I looked it up and got more info here.)   We had Exchanges on Friday and Saturday.  I was with our District Leader, Elder Shearer, from Massachusetts, and we were speaking English.  It was cool to try to teach in English and it was just slightly easier in Spanish.  There are not many people willing to hear the message in that area so a lot of the time was spent walking, looking for people.  We were walking by a river and looked down and saw blue stones.  We got them out and found they were polished gems and that there were many more in the river.  We spent some time digging them all out and some looked like they were stolen and others looked like they were taken from necklaces.  Some had price tags of up to 100 dollars per stone.  (I wish I knew what happened once they got the stones out.)
   We had stake conference on Sunday and President Chesnut spoke.  Our one progressing investigator dropped us, but later that day we had an awesome lesson with a family named Juanita and Victor.  We taught about the importance of the Book of Mormon and it was such a great experience!  The spirit was so strong and Juanita was crying from the Spirit. 
   We got pulled over today and got a huge ticket so that will be interesting. 
   I am thankful for the Spirit and how it can change peoples lives! 

   During this Christmas Season, we are especially thankful for Brayden and his willingness to sacrifice two years of his life to help share the love and light of Jesus Christ.  We especially love this video that helps us reflect on these truths.