HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!!!!!!

Hey All!

Another SUPER week! The highlight was of course speaking with my family on Mother's day. They are all doing so well and look so great! It was good to hear from them. I think they are about 20x more excited for me to go home than I am! :) Every time I think of leaving here I get kinda sick to my stomach. I just have to finish strong though and have no regrets! Colton is huge and such a stud, Chloe is a little princess, and mom and dad...they are the same! :) Just kidding! I can see how much they've changed as people too. They seem so converted and so conscious of the blessings in their lives. I see them as more grateful, in trials and blessings. As always they are my very best examples!

Other highlight would have to be getting smacked by a drunk guy on Saturday and having a big bruise along my cheek bone! SWEET! We were walking to go to teach a family and a man we taught a long time ago called us over. We could tell as soon as we got close and gave him the customary kiss on the cheek that he was REALLY drunk! He said he'd been partying for about two days now and that he finally was making his way home...wow. He gave us a huge hug and just kept telling us how much he loved us. I think that is something I've heard from just about every drunk person I've talked to here. At the end he gave us a loving "pat" on the cheek which turned out to be an open hand full on with-all-you-got slap to the face. He had a HUGE gold ring on his thumb and when that found it's way to my cheekbone it left a nice little mark! Really spiced up my day! :)

And something that we've seen as a miracle is that even though we have hard some difficulties this last week, someone always was there to keep our emotions and hope up. It reminded me so much of a talk by Jefferey R Holland, one of the twelve apostles  that says "Good things will come, don't you give up! Don't you look back! It will all be worth it in the end!" We are now seeing the fruits of our labors and feel grateful to have endured difficulties to receive miracles.

That is a lesson that I began to learn with my mother and am coming to really understand here on my own. Her mantra of "You can do hard things" always picks me up and keeps me on track because I can! I CAN do hard things! And I will have to if I ever want to become who I want to be and if I ever want to make a difference in my life and in the lives of others. The hard things are what give value to life and make it all worth living. Why do we worship Christ? Because he did the HARDEST things and never shrunk down, never backed out, and never looked behind. He did the hard things that we could never do alone, and THAT is why we worship Him. Because He is the one that showed us first,"You can do hard things" and "it will all be worth it in the end."

I love you all! Happy Mother's day Mommy! I love you so much,

Elder Anderson