You're Not Gonna Believe This One..............

Misioneros Street in Bahia.....gonna miss it.

So here's the DL, the 411, etc....

I got transferred. YES. I know that it was an inspired process for sure, but I think the cookies and brownies I made for the office Elders helped a little... 

maybe a lot :)

- So, we got transfer calls at 1 in the afternoon Saturday, and ALL the office Elders knew what was happening to me before I did. I guess I was the one most anxious to leave that they all wanted to know what happened. BUT, they couldn't tell me! Goobers! So I had to wait 2 hours and I found out I would be going to......

PUERTO MAR DEL PLATA! With... Hermana BATISTA and Hermana MANSILLA!! Yep, I'm in a trio. And YUP with my hija!! I was super surprised and thought it was a joke. But here we are! We are thinking it's because no new hermanas came and that Hna Batista has to train when the 14 new hermanas come next transfer... We'll see! I'm super stoked to be here. I secretly wanted to be companions with Hna Mansilla. She is a super hard worker. She's 24, from Buenos Aires, and we have the same amount of time in the mission. Her mom owns a salon, so she knows a bajillion beauty secrets. Today, they were putting mayonnaise in each others hair... it's supposed to make it way soft... but I'm not convinced, yet. We"ll see if y'all get a pic of me with mayo in my hair!!! She is AMAZING. She said something like this "I think that we were best friends with all of our companions in the Pre-existence. But we all knew that we would be living far away from each other, so we had to come to the mission so that we could find each other again". It's so true! She also told me that they had various people that were close to baptism but things came up and they weren't baptized. She said that maybe the Lord put me here because these people need something more that they couldn't offer them. Yup, I love her already. I know that God has great plans for us! It's not very common that ex-companions return to being companions again! He has great things in store for the three of us. 

- So, I left Bahia yesterday at 5 and got to Mar del Plata at 12:30 at night. I traveled with a few Elders and we chatted for a bit and then it got dark and I thought, "super, I'll rest for a bit." We stopped in Tres Arroyos and a man got on and sat right next to me and SNORED THE WHOLE WAY!!!! Flip. But I got here safe and sound with my GIANT suitcases and Hna Carson, Mansilla and Batista were waiting for me. Hna Carson had to wait for her comp to come, so she stayed with us. We went to bed at like at 2:30 that night, so I'm runnin'  on about 4 hours of sleep!!  WOO! SO, we had to travel to Centro this morning to pick up Hna Carson's comp and leave them to travel to their area but WOW centro is SO BEAUTIFUL! I felt like I was on vacation! Beach, Hotels, Shopping... I was like "you're a MISSIONARY! Not a TOURIST! FOCUS!"  Haha, but one day I'll come back. Puerto is... well a Port. It smells like fish. All of the time. We can see the ocean!! It's so pretty, and our area is like 2 and 1/2 times the size of Villa Mitre. AND IT'S MOSTLY PAVED! No more dirty shoes! No more dirt in the face and mouth! WOOO! AND! It's not as hot! I think the Lord heard my prayers.. or He knew that I would probably DIE in Villa Mitre. I'm super happy!

 - The hardest part was leaving... as we all know. I gave a talk in church about missionary work and I sorta bajar´d the caña... pero bueno. (**lowered the cane, oh well...) Poor Rosita cried! It was so sad! She said, "oh no, don't tell me. I grew to love you so much!" She's the little lady in the pic. Erika cried as she was hugging me and all of my girls were so sad. I didn't expect so many tears! We ate with the Familia Saghin and they told me how special I was to them and how much they thought of me as their own family. It was a very sad day, with lots of tears. I will miss them all very dearly. The best part of the day was when all of my converts came to church in SKIRTS!!!  That was the icing on the cake and made me want to cry. I love these girls, and I will forever be grateful that God put them in my path. They were BEYOND ready to receive the gospel.

-Shoutouts: MIKAYLA MCCHESNEY!!!! I forgot to say in the last email CONGRATULATIONS on getting called to serve in the best country!!! You will love the Argentine people!!!!  You will also be speaking the best form of Spanish there is... Castellano.... so work on your "sha"s!! 

MOM AND DAD!!! New mission prep teachers! I AM SOOOO PROUD!!! WOOOO!!! 

JAKEEE!!!!!! WOOOO! Congrats on your mission call! I'm beyond stoked for you!!! 

VENICE!! I'M DYING! WRITE ME, YOU GOOBER FACE!!!!! AHHHH! Flip, three amigas DOWN.

 OK everyone, really quick, last Sunday we had a lesson, and Cindi Luna (love that girl) challenged us to look for the Lord's hand in our life. I challenge you to do that. Look for the blessings that the Lord gives to you every day. Big and small. For example, that very day, we were walking home in the heat, and some nice lady stopped and said, "I'll take you to your house, it's hot, hop in!"  So we did and she took us to the corner where we live. I'm not sure if that was against the rules or not... but hey, not the point. The point is that the Lord is VERY aware of EACH of His children. Look for His hand in your life and write down what you find. I promise if you start looking, every day,  you will find out that He is very involved in our lives.

I love you all very much. 

Have an amazing week.

Hermana Squire

pics:

#1 My District in Bahia!!!

#2 The "Dream Team"; Elders Cruz & Gravelle; Hermana Gomez

#3 My sweet little Rosita! Love her!

#4 My girls in Bahia; Liz who is a future missionary, in pink; Bella, the little one, a future baptism;  next 3 our converts:Tatiana next to me;.Barbara and Erika

What a great day.

#5 Hermanas Mansilla, Batista and myself (don't know about the mayonnaise....in the hair....:-)

#6 "Misioneros" Street in Bahia..the best.....gonna miss it....not gonna lie.

My district in Bahia

The "Dream Team": Elders Cruz, Gravelle,& Hermana Gomez

Our Rosita

My girls: Liz, Bella(little one), Tatiana, Barbara & Erika

Hermanas Mansilla, Batista, & Squire

Andamos un poquito perdidas...y locas....(We're a little lost...and crazy..)

Queridos!

-Ok, SO! UHHHH where do I start!? So, Hna Leguizamón got shipped to Bahia on Wednesday, and the Elders called us on THURSDAY to say we were leaving on Saturday to Bahia as well! We are in the Area Villa Mitre 2 (Veesha Meetrae) sharing an area with THE ASSISTANTS TO THE PRESIDENT!!!! WAH! And I'm still comps with Hna Israelsen. Everyone's pretty surprised that this is our 4th transfer together, usually THE MOST comps stay together is 3 transfers. I was ready for a change but...Sea lo que Dios quiera....

- Ok, let's start from the beginning. So we kinda had a feeling we'd be shipped out too, we kinda had a forewarning that Presidente was thinking of putting Elders in Pringles. So after we got the news, we went to all the investigators, converses,(*converts) and menos activos(**Less active) that we've been seeing, to tell them the news and say goodbye. Everyone was SO sad! Belén looked like she was going to cry, Presidente was sad they were taking "las ángeles de Dios",(**angels of God) and Amanda... oh that ripped my heart out. She cried and said that she would miss us so bad, and that we gave her life and helped her find the true church. She was super super sad. Ah, it broke my heart. I'll sure miss her. We visited the menos activos and the reaction that surpised me the most was that of the Familia Bailone. They always made light of things and laughed a lot and just bashed on the members. But they got way sad too! They said we were the only missionaries that were consistent in visiting and they loved when we came over. They wrote some pretty nice things in my contact journal. Anyway, it was just really sad to say goodbye, but I hope the Elders can do some great work in Pringles and help the rama(**Branch) to grow. 

- The APs (***Assistants to the President) came with the new Elders on Saturday to do the exchange. We had to get things pretty organized and write a bunch of stuff about the investigators, menos activos,(**Less actives) and miembros(**members) and where to find stuff!! It was stressful, but they got to Pringles and went crazy over how clean the house was and that it was stocked with food!! The APs went nuts because they hadn't had breakfast. So we rode back in Presidente's car with Elder Constanzi (Argentina) and Elder Caicedo (Columbia). Elder Constanzi is A CRAZY DRIVER!! I thought we would die, but we made it. They are SOOO FUNNY! We were listening to Enya and they were interpretive dancing in the car. We were laughing so hard all the way to Bahia! We spent Saturday organizing a bunch of stuff and copying the area book. We'll be working with Elder Caicedo and Elder Gravelle. Both EXCELLENT missionaries. The ward is stoked to have us 4, and HERMANAS. It's been 2 years since they've had Hermanas. We're living in Puyerredón (Heart of Bahia) with Hna VAUGHN! AHHH I love her! It's so nice to talk to someone new!! WAHH! The apartment is on the 11th floor, ITS TINY! like 1/8 the size of our house in Pringles, we have to slide past the bunks to get into the bedroom, there's no shower curtain so we spray water everywhere when we shower, the hot water lasts 5 minutes so we have to turn it off when we lather up, there's no place for us to study, the elevators are the ghetto gate kind and play 80s music, BUT NO IMPORTA! I LOVE LIVING WITH THE VAUGHN! She's the best and a girl after my own heart!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'm so happy!

- SUNDAY WAS THE NUTTIEST DAY OF MY LIFE! We have to take a bus to our area, and we took it going the wrong way!! We're still trying to figure out all of the bus routes and times, but it's kinda hard! We thought, "well it'll just go in a circle and it'll be fine." BUT NO! It stops at the end of the route and the drivers all chill out in this hut in the middle of nowhere and drink mate for 15 minutes!!!!!!! AHHH! We were pacing around waiting for this driver to get done!!!! We FINALLY headed to the capilla.(**chapel) WE WERE 2 HOURS LATE FOR CHURCH! What a great first impression, eh? Thank goodness sacrament meeting was last! The Elders were like "don't worry hermanas! It's fine!" But I was way stressed!!!!  The members are SO NICE! AND WE HAVE A WARD MISSION LEADER!!! AHHHH so nice!! We ate lunch with the Elders... we might be switching off lunches, and sometimes eating together with the members... that'll be way weird. We already had like 4 sisters come to us and say "Call me when you want a member lesson!" MISSIONARY DREAM COME TRUEEEEE! AHHHHH. A WARD! So stoked!!!!!!! Side note: The first door we knocked on Saturday night was a menos activo! She was like, "did bishop send you?" And we're like "ummmm no"...... what a BLESSING!!!!! She showed us where the church was and our bus stop and everything. SO NICE! 

Shoutouts! TREVOR! You look like a MAN!!! Whoa!! Love my Dunn cousins. Hugs to them all and a belly rub to my little pregnant cousins!! Yay babies! VENICE YOU GRADUATED! Write me you goober. Everyone! I hope everything is going great! I'm happy to be here in Bahía! We are ready to pull our tights up to our armpits and get to work! (Remember Elder Holland's talk to us in the MTC?). We gotta work super hard to find the Lord's elect in Villa Mitre!!!!!! Have an amazing week!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hermana Squire

Last Zone Conference with Hermana Detlefsen

Pension in Coronel Pringles