Raegan's Mission to Mexico: August 11, 2014: Everyone knows I'm a Gringa!

Hola familia! How is everyone? Lagoon and Park City sounded like a blast! I am glad you guys had fun!! I love you all so much!!

Well, this week I have seen and experienced things I did not even know were out there! But I still love my mission! It’s super-hot here. I am about 5 shades darker than I was when I got here. I think I am starting to blend in!! Not really...everyone here knows I am a gringa. But there are clouds sometimes in the sky...oh I am so grateful for clouds. Oh random, can you send me face wash, granola bars, 20 of those small CTR rings that are green in Spanish for the Primary, and mints please...those are some things I need and cannot get what I want here. There is no face wash so I need that for sure! Okay, back to my train of thought....Hermana Sutton is the BEST!! If you think she sounds cool on her blog, you should meet her in person. She is a great trainer; the Lord has really blessed me! She likes to sing and run. I love it!! So we go running every morning and sing hymns when we contact people. The ward here is really into missionary work too, the Bishop is young. He has a baby and it’s his first kid, but he is a huge advocate of missionary work so I think this ward will be great to work with. The people are so friendly and loving and the primary kids said they would help me with my Spanish if I helped them with English, ha-ha. Oh man, I have the Spanish mind of a 5 month old, but it’s okay...I will one day be fluent! I am trying and being patient with myself. The food here is really good! It’s sometimes really spicy, but it hasn’t made me sick. We are moving houses this week, so I will give you an address to look up next week on Google Earth. This week we got caught in a rainstorm and got soaked in the middle of the day. It just came and went super-fast!! I got drenched. I’ve been praying for it to cool down here, and so it’s actually rained a bit. The streets flooded pretty badly one night, as you will see in the picture I sent. I am loving my mission, it’s NOT easy and it’s HARD work, but I don’t mind working hard so it’s all good. Opening a new area is hard because right now we are searching for investigators, and some of them are not as interested in our message as they are in talking to Americans. So we have to be pretty direct with some people sometimes. But we found one this week who I think will be great to teach. It was an adjustment coming here to Mexico for sure, but I have survived and it’s becoming my new normal. I have just accepted the fact my clothes will never be completely clean and that my shoes won’t stay shiny for more than 20 minutes. My feet have blisters, I’ve got a pretty bad sunburn, and I’m exhausted, but I AM SO HAPPY! I think it’s because it’s impossible to be sad when you’re doing the right thing WITH a right attitude. I came here deciding I was going to love it and I have. I love the people here! They are so warm and kind and easy to connect with even though I don’t talk that well. They are patient and will repeat themselves slowly, give me time to translate, and then try to spit out some Spanish back. I know I’m where I need to be. So don’t worry too much about me. We have so much to be grateful for!!

You guys should start reading Our Heritage from the missionary library. It’s my soap opera! I look forward to reading it every morning! It really motivates me and reminds me how much I love this Gospel! Ah, HAPPY FACE!!! Okay, so everyone be safe and have a great week!! I love you guys!! XOXOXXO. And please...send me music!!

Con Amor,

Hermana Anderton