Happy New Year!

Wow, it was soooo good to see your beautiful faces and hear your voices and basically BE with you for those 40 short little minutes on Christmas.  Thanks for making it an incredible experience for me and for being the best family in the world.  I loved feeling of your love and joking and laughing with you as though I was there for a little while.  And on a random more shallow note,  you are all SUPER beautiful people. For hours Hermana Castillo couldn't stop talking about how beautiful my Mom and sister are, how handsome and charming my dad is ( oh Tim!), and how HANDSOME and manly my little bro is.  ;) But seriously, thanks for letting me share my experiences with you and especially for letting me share my testimony.  It was a phone call I'll never forget.

As far as life goes here in San Justo, it's pretty great.  The only thing that's not so great is the little feeling that constantly gnaws at my stomach knowing that every day is one day less that Hermana Castillo and I have together. On Thursday, we had our weekly planning and the usual companionship inventory, and when we got to the part where we talk about eachother's strengths, we started bawling like little babies.  It's been three amazing transfers together, and now we'll see what new adventure Heavenly Father has in store for both of us! When I remind myself that this mission isn't about me and that I'm out here to find and teach Heavenly Father's wonderful children in Argentina, I'm happy and excited again. 

Christmas Day was absolutely wonderful for many reasons in addition to talking with my beautiful fam.  The day before in the Christmas devotional, President had asked us to make Christmas a sacred day and spend our time doing what Jesus would want us to be doing.  We really took that to heart and spent the entire day from morning to night (apart from talking to you) going to as many houses of members and investigators as possible singing Christmas carols at their doorstep and then going in to share a quick spiritual message about Christ.  And we were completely surprised by the effect that those little visits had.  Time after time, the members or investigators would come to the door and just cry as they listened to our little Christmas hymn.  We felt the "Spirit of Christmas" just bursting from our hearts as we went from house to house, and I felt that I was truly representing Jesus Christ on His special day.  It was truly a sacred day for us. 

We have been blessed to find lots of wonderful people to teach this week, the challenge is still just getting them to church so that they can progress towards baptism. And I have a renewed desire to teach FAMILIES again, so we're going to be focusing on finding and teaching families.  I'll let you know how it goes. 

Everyone here has been in a sweaty frenzy buying fireworks and food for New Year's, and yep, it looks like we'll have another HOT Monday night with triple the fireworks that we saw on Christmas Eve from what I've heard.  I love the busy hustle, colectivos crammed with people, familes all getting together.  That's one thing I love about Argentina, the crazy amount of people that get together as families, and the obsession with families. It reminds me of us crazy Leavitt's.  :) And it creates a great environment to teach about the plan that Heavenly Father has for families through the Gospel of Jesus Christ.     

Well, gotta run, but love you all sooooo much.  Talk to ya next week!

Love, 

Hermana Leavitt