Greetings Peeps!

Hola familia - thanks for all the sweet mail. I enjoy Elena´s emails and yours too. It sounds like quite the party at the CCM in the DR. Actually that is cool that they get out and about! Today we went to the other little town where the zone leaders live to drop off some baptism forms and pick up mail. I got the package with the new shirt and a card from the 18th. I didn´t get any DearElders this time, but I am guessing that some weeks if they come late they don´t get in the mail bag for Saturday. But that just means more the next time. Thanks for everything. (The elders here asked where all my letters were today, but the one card and the package is more than most of them get in a whole change. They are funny. Some of the things they say at the dinner table are entertaining and sometimes they say oops there is a sister here that can understand us. One of them the other day said something that I thought was something Dad would say. One of them asked if I had brothers and I said no. He said that I am learning a lot being around them. They are crazy! But it is fun and I enjoy eating with them.) It will be fun to have something different to wear. Maybe I will wear it for our interviews with the president on Thursday.  Life is going well here. I am feeling better and we had some good success this week. We found this one guy a couple weeks ago. He is about 70 years old and really positive. He came to church yesterday and actually knows quite a few people there so that was exciting. We have been teaching a family too. They were a referral and were pretty positive. The whole family came to the wedding and baptism the elders had on Saturday. Last month we did do well with retention. We had all of the people on our list of people who were baptized in the last year come at least once. So that´s what is going on here. On Friday we had a funny experience. The elders had a wedding on Saturday and wanted to get a dress for the girl and they were going to lend the groom a coat and tie. They said my companion was about the same size as the bride so we went with them to the store. They had a dress and my comp tried it on over her clothes. We had the elders look at it. It was pretty entertaining this whole episode. Apparently that dress didn´t work out, but they ended up getting one at another clothing store. The man at the store gave it to them for free since it was for a wedding and baptism. She looked nice on Saturday. Well, life is going well here. We will see if I stay or go since changes are next week. I am pretty open to whatever except I would be sad to leave these people here that we are teaching but that´s part of the mission. I enjoyed reading Elder Scott´s talk about marriage this morning. I thought of you both when he said that he and his wife never fought. You are such good examples for me. I also like in Preach My Gospel where it says that heaven is the continuation of an ideal home and the scripture in D&C 130:2. Elder Scott said that he thinks he will be more in love with his wife when he sees her again because of the time they have spent apart since her death. I feel like this time on my mission has made me more appreciative of you all and helped me realize the importance of the family. I am so happy and blessed to be in this family! The Gospel's true! I am doing well and happy here. I can´t believe it is already August! Hope your tooth gets better. I love you all tons and tons! Love, Alexis