And that's a WRAP!!!

I have so many emotions going through my head right now!! Joy, PEACE, love, gratitude, ALL OF THE ABOVE!! Truly my heart hurts and I have no words to explain how I feel. But I will try. I am so grateful for the opportunity I have had to serve a mission and serve my savior. I have been changed in so many ways and can see how the Lords hand was in every step of my mission. He has become my Friend and I know I can turn to Him for anything. I am so sad it’s over but so excited and enthusiastic for the future. 

The people here in Puerto Rico have my heart and I am forever changed because of them. They have taught me how to truly love, to forgive and forget, and to look at things from the bright side. I have met some of my best friends here on this island and can’t even fathom the fact that I will soon be leaving them all behind. 

I want to thank you all for your support, letters and encouraging words! You truly have helped me serve my mission to the fullness of my capabilities. I have become who I am today because of my mission and all your support and I will never forget all of you who have helped and encouraged me every week!! 

This week was bittersweet because we have seen a lot of progress!! 

Iqui is so ready to be baptized he’s almost done with the book of Mosiah!!! and he can’t wait to enter into the waters of baptism and follow his Savior!

Ana! (we found her the other week) we taught lesson one and she just sat there and LISTENED!! She understood it all and it was so cool to see how the Lord has prepared her to meet us at THIS SPECIFIC TIME!! She ended the lesson with the most powerful and sweet prayer i’ve ever heard and I just KNOW we found her when God needed us to!!

ALSO hermana erickson and I gave our Argentinean companions their first american christmas!! it was so fun to be able to set it all up and make a cute christmas tree and see how happy they were with the presents we got them!! It’s so fun to serve and see how happy they get! (I got a glimpse of what it’s going to be like to be a parent and it was so fun!!) jajaja 

well. this is it. here are some pictures of me saying goodbye to my people here down in puerto rico and i’ll see you guys soon. thanks for everything puerto rico, you changed my life. I never knew I would have such a hard time saying goodbye. 

 for the last time, hermana gray:)

Merry Christmas in Puerto Rico

Teaching

Hermana Gray and Erickson

Investigators 

Tis the Season

Last Companionship

Teaching

All the Hermana's in last apartment

Semana 72!!!

Wow another week!! This week was a great one! 

Iqui is learning more and more and is getting super excited for his baptism! He has such a sincere strong testimony he really is an example to us all!! We have been working hard to help the people here progress! 

We found this guy named Ricky who works at a pizza place! He’s 24 and just recently got out of jail. He was there for 5 years and wants to change his life! We shared the book of Mormon with him and he LOVED the fact that God really does talk to us and that he loves ALL his children! We invited him to be baptized and he happily accepted and couldn’t  wipe the smile off his face!! Its so cool to be able to see the change in people:) 

We are also teaching a family! The Mercados! The Dad is a member but the wife and son aren’t! They have a lot of faith they just need to come to church!  Christmas time really is full of miracles! 

We have started to carol to people while contacting and its so fun to see their faces light up when we sing!! (We are NOT very good but we bring the christmas spirit!) :) 

Well thats about it! I really do love this work and the opportunity i have to be a part of it!! It sure isn’t easy but it is SO worth it! LOVE YOU ALL HAVE A GREAT WEEK!! 

Ohhhhh and also pablo from ponce came to church and surprised me with cake!! I turned around and saw him and cried:) hahahha it was a cool tender mercy!

Semana 71!!!

Hello friends!!! This week was a great one! Full of walking and trying to find new people to teach!!! Margarita got baptised and it makes me SO happy!! for those of you who don't remember she is the one who had SO MANY questions!!! She is doing great and is such an example of faith!!! WE also had a mission conference this week and I was able to see all my old comps!!

    We only have 30ish minutes to write so I don't have a lot of time but I want to share something with you guys,  God loves us so very much, we really are his CHILDREN!!!! He wants us to talk to him and to tell him our feelings, happiness and complaints.  He wants to bless us and he knows what we need, BUT we have to humble ourselves and ask him so that we can become more christlike and so he can bless us!!! If one day we wake up and feel farther away from Him, think about it.. who moved? YOU DID!!! He will never distance himself from us, we are the ones who put up the walls and distance ourselves from him! He loves us and wants to bless us, but we need to draw closer to him!!! So I invite you all to pray to him and to express your concerns and your feelings and ask for the blessings and miracles that you need and he WILL help you!!! He will also use you to bless other people's lives, he really does!!! I have witnessed that so much on my mission and I love seeing how everything really does workout in the end and that God really does live his children!!

LOVE YOU ALL!!! have a great week!!!

MARGARITAA!!!

My 3 babies

MTC Companions

Me and my companion

Puerto Rico Hermana's

Semana 70!!!

This week was a good week!! Full of giving thanks and holidays down here in PR!! Not a lot happened this week because no one was home!! everyone was gone celebrating with their family! Seriously no. one. was. home. But we made the best out of it!!! 

On monday we had a cool miracle, we went to visit this 16 year old girl named Nionellys who we had met a couple weeks early, she let us in and we taught her about the Book of Mormon and the entire time she had the biggest smile on her face, she said, "I always wondered why God only spoke to the people in israel in the olden days', but now i know he speaks to us NOW!" and when we told her the book was hers she just about cried and said "Really? I don't have to pay you?" and of course we told her that it was free! We read the introduction with her and she had so many questions and honestly just had the BIGGEST desire to LEARN!!! it was amazing!!! We are praying she will continue to progress!!!

We also had zone conference with a special guest, Brother Corbet and we talked a lot about faith and how when God makes a promise, its already basically completed because he ALWAYS completes his promises!! And we learned about how we need to have more faith to be able to view His promises as already completed because they are!! It was really eye opening! 

We left zone conference and went to our car just to see that we had a Flat Tire... the elders put on the spare and we spent the next 3 hours at pep boys! but we got a cool picture so it was worth it!!

That's about it!! I hope you all had a great thanksgiving and ate lots of pavo!!! 

-Hermanita Gray

Tire shop

Semana 69!!! Decorating for Navidad ya :)

This week was full of contacting and trying to find more people to teach!!!

We decided to use the ward list and visit less actives and also to look in the area book and visit antiguos! And we had a couple miracles! We were walking  around trying to find casa #711 and we literally could NOT find it for an hour and finally after an hour we found the streets of 700s and walked and walked and there was a house #710 and then #715 (for those of you who dont know... it's rare for the streets in puerto rico to have a street sign... let alone a number on a house!) haha. anyway we pulled up to the house in between #715 and #710 and right as we did a car pulled in and we asked them where #711 was and they said "aqui mismo!"! it was so cool 'cause if we had found their house any sooner they wouldn't have been there!!! it was truly a cool little miracle!!!

We also had a really cool lesson with a 19 year old named Mikarla! Her mom passed away cuando tenia 19 anos so we shared the plan of salvation and she loved it!! we asked her how she felt about it and she said "I had no idea God had a plan for all his children and it really does give me hope!" it was a sweet lesson!!! 

Iqui is still progressing and wants to get baptized! We are going to be working with him to see if he can be baptized this December!!! Pray for him!!1

Welp that's it! I love my comp so much she's the cutest thing! Oh and also we found a christmas tree in the middle of the road, broke off a branch, took it home and made a little christmas tree!!! #missionlife!! have a great Thanksgiving week!!!!

A Snake

Our little Tree

Semana 68!!! 2 bloggsdWhites and 2 latinos

So first off saying goodbye to Ponce was actually one of the hardest things EVER!!! just like leaving Aibonito was SO hard... so was leaving Ponce!!! but i am HAPPY to be here in CABO ROJO!!!!! My new companion is Hermana gulete from ARGENTINA and we live with 2 other hermanas, hermana espinosa (from argentina also) and herman erickson (from wyoming!!) and it is a BLAST!!!

 We dont have alot of people to currently teach, so we contact ALOT. but there is this one guy named Iqui!!!! he is the SWEETEST thing and is so excited to get baptized!!! He understands everything so well and cant wait to enter into the waters of baptism!!! 

I also got burned 3 times this week, we are right by the ocean so the sun i s SUPER FUERTE!!!! so thats fun! 

Well thats about it!!! i love you all have a great week!!!!!

The rodriguez family from Aibonito (thalis siblings and mom) got BAPTIZED!!!!!!

My New Companion

USA and Argentina 

2 Whites and 2 Argentinas 

Semana 67!!! Goodbye Ponce :(

So this week was an AWESOME one!!!

We had a goal to find more people to teach and we had some amazing miracles and ended up finding 5 new people!! and one of them.. his name is Rad so that's super cool haha!

While trying to find people to teach we went and visited this old guy in our ward, Hermano Tito!! and turns out he had 2 of his friends over and we were able to share with them our message and we had a super powerful lesson!! So we are excited to go back this week and see what happens!!! 

Also we are still teaching margarita and the other day we went and taught her lesson 2, the plan of salvation and it was amazing!! We brought a member and she was able to answer a lot of margaritas questions and it was an amazing lesson, she said that her faith is growing! Then yesterday she came to stake conference and loved it!!! 

I would have to say, the highlight of my week was definitely seeing Ramoncito get baptized !! He was so excited to follow christ and to be more like him it was the cutest little baptism!!! We are hoping that his moms boyfriend will be getting baptised soon once they get married!!!

Baptism

After his baptism 

Ponce House

Lyn Torres the Queen

We got transfer calls last night and I will be leaving Ponce and be heading over to Caba Rojo! where i will be training a Latina from Argentina!! So let's just say my spanish is about to be amazing!!(hopefully)!!!

I'm so sad to leave Ponce and all the people here, i have seen so much growth and i just love it here so much!!!  But I am excited to head to a new area and to hopefully impact the lives of people there!!!

Ramoncito and his brother!!