Shaelyn in Chicago: The Cubs game was awesome! Surprisingly they won, I guess mormons are a good luck charm.

6-4-2012
Familia,

Well its been quite the week. Super fun, and super exhausting.

Lets start with Tuesday. The Cubs game was awesome! Surprisingly they won, I guess mormons are a good luck charm. Almost the whole mission showed up, so it was an awesome social event, plus a sweet Chicago experience. Then we had quite the adventure trying to get home. First of all, we all piled onto the L with everyone else leaving the game, make it down one stop and then get told the line is closed because of a fire. So the options are take a bus, which is ridiculously crowded and during rush hour, or walk to downtown (5 miles) to bypass the fire and catch the train again. So what do we do? Well obviously about 30 of us missionaries all walk into the city. It was a little missionary parade. And it was hot, and smoky, and super ridiculous. But fun. It took us about 2 hours to get to downtown, and then we had to ride the train back to cicero. Everyone had to cancel their night time apointments. We didn't even get home until 10 pm. But it was a blast.

Wednesday we went to a mini birthday party for one of the granddaughters of a recent convert. We went with the elders and we ate dinner (a ton of food) at like 8:30 pm. And Hna Carlson still isn't used to eating as much food as they give us, so when the hermana wasn't looking I took some of her tostadas. And then she poured us giant classes of vitamin d milk, ugh, and i downed mine, and then hna Carlson's as well. Super fast. Needless to say, as soon as we walked out her door I vomited in the street. Yay! And that made Elder Allen puke. Overall it was an awesome night. :P Gotta love the Spanish program.

Thursday night we went to MCM, the meeting we have with the crazy mission leader, and as usual it was ridiculous. But while we were there I got a text from President asking us to call him when we are in for the night. Obviously nothing good can come from needing to call Pres, so I'm pretty stressed. We get home and I call Pres, and of course he doesn't answer. Finally our District Leader calls us to tell us he talked to the English sisters in our district, one of whom is also a visa waiter, to tell us she got her visa. Which means Hermana Carlson got her visa. Finally Pres calls us back and tells us Carlson is leaving on Monday (today!) and that I will be put with the English sister who is also losing her comp. That means that I am now a zebra. We are covering two wards, English and Spanish, and my comp speaks no Spanish. Fetch. I'm going to kill myself. I do not want to be in an English ward. At all. Sorry Americans, but you just aren't as cool as Mexicans.

Saturday we had a baptism! YAY! Everything appeared to be going smoothly, nothing had gone wrong up to the point that we got there to fill the font. And of course I was super nervous, because something ALWAYS goes wrong, right? So I'm thinking something terrible is going to happen because everything has been so easy up that point. Luckily the terrible thing was just that the elders fetchin lost the keys for the font. So we were kind of out of luck for a while until Elder Findlay showed up and broke us in with his credit card. :P Liz showed up an hour early, all of the speakers came, we started boiling pots of water early, so the water was warm. It all went well. And the spirit was SO strong. It was amazing. Hermana Carlson and I went around to the side of the font to wait for Liz to come out, and after she came out of the water she just started bawling. They shut the doors to the font, and Liz came up the stairs and just stood there sopping wet and cried, telling us how good she felt. It was amazing. I can't even explain it. And then afterwards she bore her testimony and told us how the last week has been crazy hard, and she knew it would be because I warned her that Satan always works hard the week before a baptism, and the Bishop did too, but she still couldn't believe how hard it was. But she kept saying, no matter what happens, I WILL be baptized on Saturday. :) and she WAS! And she felt the spirit so strong! And then she got confirmed on Sunday and it was awesome. I love this woman so much.

Sunday was great too. The Rivera family came and Imelda again. They are all on track to be baptized next Saturday! :) We sat with the Rivera's and they drew us pictures again. :) They painted us pictures too between our appointments. Yesterday we went over to teach them and so that Hermana Carlson could say goodbye and they were soooo sad. Marlen, the 7 year old just hugged her and cried and cried and cried. She is such a sweet girl.

Oh and I forgot to tell you last week! Last Friday someone got shot outside of our appointment! We were at the last appointment for the night, and we heard the shot, but just thought it was fireworks, but then we went out side and there was cops EVERYWHERE. and they told everyone to go back inside cos the shooter was still out there somewhere, but instead Carlson and I booked it to the car and sped home. It was super exciting. :P

Well I think thats about all the news I have for you this week. It was a great week. Next week should be interesting, being with the english sisiter and all. I'll be sure to let you know how it goes.

Love you love you love you

les quiero,

Shaelyn

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