"SANTA MARIA!!!!! ITS COLD!!!!!!"

Hi mom!

 It was so great to talk to all of you for christmas!!  Ok, so i have a huge long email for you today. This past week in a half was CRAZY!!! Ok, so...were to start?? ok, so i'll talk about Christmas and Christmas eve. IT WAS A BLAST!!! On christmas eve, we kept the tradition and we went to Denny's and got pancakes and all opened up one present together. It was so much fun! I opened up aunt michele and uncle steves gift (your package hadnt come yet). Then, after we were all fattned up from unlimited pancakes, we all went to the church and played basketball and soccer together. And blasted spanish music in the gym haha it was awesome. it was just the 7 of us and we had sooooooo much fun!! The 7 of us do EVERYTHING together. We are all basically best friends, its awesome. Theres Elder Strang (district leader) and his companion, Elder Newman. Then, Elder Albertson and Elder Olvera and then me and my companions. We see each other on a daily basis. Then, after sports at the church, we all went to Walmart. There were 2 families that were investigators and they didnt have anything for christmas. So, the 7 of us got together and bought them christmas. The hermanas bought a christmas dinner. Ham and potatoes and all that kinda stuff and then the elders bought toys for 15 kids. Then, we ding door ditched it and it was so fun!

Then, on christmas day...we had the ugly sweater party!! it was so cool! We had some dang ugly sweaters there, gotta love good will and grage sales! Then, we had our gift exchange! Elder Strang had me, and he got me a pillow pet giarffe (no idea how to spell that in english) and then bright neon socks and burts bees chapstick and sunglasses. Elder Newman got me a watch because my watches NEVER have the correct time except for one. So they'll ask, "Hermana Powell...a que hora es?" (what time is it) And i say ..."no se" (i dont know). So, Elder Newman bought me a working watch haha I have pictures for you today, A TON OF THEM!!!!!! After the ugly sweater party and gift exchange, we, the elders and us, went to Tiffany and Chuys. (nick name for Jesus. not Christ Jesus, the spanish name Jesus) and thats when i called you. Then, we went and took pictures in the snow and then after that we went out to the Francos house and then the Gamboas after that (ive never eaten so many tamales in my life!!) and then we went back home. That was our christmas and christmas eve! IT WAS SO MUCH FUN!!! Best christmas ever!

Laura (the lady who just got baptized) didnt have a cell phone and it was annoying as heck to try to get ahold of her, so we went out and bought her a cell phone! (it was one of those pre paid minutes ones) but she got a phone for christmas from us! Her baptism was quite a story. It was SUCH a STRESSFUL day. So, we have our ward coorlation with our ward mission leader and all the elders and he was late to that which through our whole day off, so this is how the day of the baptism went down. We got up and did some of our studies, and then had to leave early for coorlation. After that, the elders and us went to Subway and got lunch. Then came back and for the rest of lunch played basketball. Then, as we're finishing our studies, a man walks in and hands us a baptism program. I looked at it, and it was there was a baptism in one of the engligh wards at 7pm that night. Problem. Our baptism was at 7 that night as well. So, Then i called the elders who had set up the baptism and told them they needed to change theres to a different time because i had called and reserved the building and they didnt, therefore they were the ones who were going to change. So, after that, we went out and did some tracting and then picked up the elders for dinner. Dinner was 45 minutes late. Which by the way, was fish. So, i didnt eat that night. Then, I had to go and start filling the baptisimal font and it usually takes about 45 minutes to fill. Well, the elders earlier that day were making a joke and saying that i was gonna mess it up somehow. And i reassured them that it was simple and i could fill a font no problem. Two things, the knobs for the water were red and blue. so, one would assume that red = hot and blue = cold right? and the other thing, was that Laura and Mariel's ONLY fear about batpism was that the water would be cold. I reassured them saying that its like a jacuzzi and its all warm. Ok, with that being said, i went and pluged the font and turned on the RED knob and then shut the door to go to the library to make copies of the programs. Well, there was a issue with that too cause they didnt print out double sided and we had to cut and glue and re copy and then it got jammed and so im slightly frustrated with the dumb copier and then the elders came in and were talking with us and then i got this thought "go check the font". so, i told the elders to please go check the font. SO, they leave and about 1 minute later we here this LOUd "HERMANAS COME!!!!!" the thought that ran through my mind were "oh crap. what did i do?". So, we all 3 come bookin it around the corner and lo and behold, the baptismal font is overflowing. i am not kidding. but wait....it gets worse. Its not just over flowing with nice warm water, its over flowing with FREEZING COLD water. (the pipes were so cold, it was about 25 degrees outside). So, Elder Albertson says "i'll take care of it. go finish your programs and it'll be ok". So, we go call the other elders and see where they are cause we need help setting up chairs and such and it is 15 minutes before 7. (good thing we were going off of hispanic time and we had about 30 minutes til i would actually start). We werent exactly sure how elder albertson was gonna fix this, but we had a pretty good clue. Seeing as the plug is right smack damb in the middle of the font, at the bottom. We finish the programs and we go back to see whats going on and we then all here "SANTA MARIA!!!!! ITS COLD!!!!!!" You probably dont think the "santa maria" part is funny, but it is HILARIOUS for a spanish missionary because hispanics all worship the virgin mary aka santa maria. Then, we all just bust up laughing and we here elder olvera yell, "do you need help elder??" and elder albertson says "NO! Im already naked!!!" hahahahha at that point, i lost it. i could NOT stop laughing!!!! So, the other 2 elders get there and help us set up and they were all making fun of me says "oh yes elders, i can fill a font no problem". so, needless to say, they are filling up the font for our baptism this saturday. After all was said and done, it was a good baptism. Minus the fact that Laura and Mariel got baptized in FREEZING COLD WATER and were shiviering the rest of the night because the heater in the chapel wasnt working. of course, right? that would happen. I gave the talk on baptism and the rest of the night was ok. We all went out to get ice cream together and i was gonna buy elder albertson his but then a big ol' tongan guy comes up and said he was a inactive member but appreciates the missionaries and wanted to buy our ice cream. SWEET! So, that was our night for the baptism. absolute caos. But, in the end...all was well and they got batpized and are happy :)

next adventure for the week, because of course...its never an adventure without me. Yes, there was another big mishap that went down this week. Ok, so for our car, we get a certain amount of miles and we arent allowed to go over. With that being said, a long story made short...was that we were really low on our miles and we planned it out that we had 18 left for the day and we had used 14 but that our home was 4 miles away so we would be ok. Welp, someone mis calculated the math, im sure you can guess who...yes, me. and we only had 15 miles left. Bad news, were 4 miles from home and already at 12. So, i was not going to let us go over on miles due to all the other unfortunate things that had happened this week (recap. caught fire in the house. lost the phone. lost the keys. ran out of gas on sunday. and over filled the font with freezing cold water) i was SURE that we were gonna be ok. So, i started thinking and has this BRILLANT idea "if we put the car in nuetral and push it...that wont use our miles!!!!!" so, after a little convincing, me and hermana Olander got out of the car and pushed the car whilte hermana barrett was in the car steering and it was in nuetral. We got about a mile til we hit a hill. We had to push it UP the hill. not down, so we pushed and pushed and pushed and after a lot of pushing, we got over the hill. Only 1 car offered to help, but our pride was too big and i was determined to fix this on my own, we didnt let him help. So, pushed it til we got to the freeway. Got on the freeway and realized...."crap, we're still going to be over". the freeway was the longer route. So, we call the district leader and i tell him what was going on and all i could hear was pure laughter. After about a solid minute, he told me to get back in the car and drive home. So, i went over the milage allotement by 1 mile. ONE STINKIN MILE!!!!! The elders still tease me for that. As we were pushing the car, i asked hna. olander if she was mad at me and she said "are you kidding me? my mission would be boring without you" ha so im glad we were both able to laugh about it. but i tell ya...that was a rough night. i didnt wanna move at all the next day. 

I love you! I hope you have a great week!!!

Love, Hna. Powell