April 27, 2015
Hello family,

I hope all is well in good old Utah :) and that Kirsten is enjoying her new dog :)

Well today we had transfers.. Dont worry i am still with Hermana Gomez because we still have a lot of learning to do together :) but the other sister that we lived with left, and now we have Hermana Anhders here with us! She`s a gringa which i am prettty excited about! haha but they did a bunch of changes today. And some were so random and i guess it`s because they are getting ready to split the mission... So they are making all the final changes and then where you`re at in July is your new mission. I am just praying that me and Anna are still in the same mission... :)

Also tody we moved... Ya surprise :) We lived in this apartment that was seriously the size of our the family room.. TINY. and not enough space for four girls to live, study and put all our clothes.. plus we had crazy neighbors.. soo we called the lady that owns the apartments and she said that she had another apartment just under us that was bigger, for the same price, and that if we wanted to we could move today. so we said Okay :) and four little hermanas started taking all of our stuff down the stairs, our beds, desks, clothes, our little fridge, EVERYTHING. I think we will all be sore tomorrow. But i already like this apartment so much better :)

I will have to say that a highlight of my week was one little phone call i received. Remember Vic and his family that Hermana Holmes and i baptized? And how they disappeared, then came back and then disappeared again? Well every week Hermana Loza calls me for the retention because i am in charge of the retention for the zone and she is over like 4 zone, mine being one of them. So every Sunday we get to talk for a sec and every week i ask about this family, if she has found them. The answer was always no. This past Wednesday i got a phone call from her and she said, someone needs to talk to you, and then i hear the voice a Vic!! AHhh and he said "Peter Pan, you told me that you were going to be here to help me and you`re not here anymore... What am i going to do without Peter Pan?" i was about ready to cry knowing that finally he was in contact with the missionaries again, that he can go back to church, and that there is still hope to see this family in the temple!! We only talked for like 30 seconds, and then i had to go, but honestly was the best thing ever :)

Also i am loving my experience training. More than once my companion has been sad, or discouraged, like every new missionary. Satan really loves to try and get the newbies down.. but we arent letting him. But every time i start giving her a pep talk or giving her advice, the things i say are not my words, but really the spirit talking because every time i think it helps me more than it helps her. Sometimes as missionaries we think only in lessons and when we are talking to other people in the street we will have the words given to us that we need to say, but i now know that it is all the time, with everyone. Especially companions. :) 

oohh this week we found this little village thing this week i will send you pictures but it was crazy because it was just a bunch of houses that were destoried and we didnt really understand why but kept walking because we wanted to see what was at the end, and at the end lives2 little families . They told us that all the other house got destroyed by the river. When we went back i looked at the river.. it`s tiny. But i know with the rain starting soon, that will all change. Haha

Guess what family? We get to talk in less than two weeks :) ya i dont have any detail on when or how, but i am sure excited to be able to see all of you :)

Thank you so much for everything! I feel so blessed to be able to have you all as my family. This past Saturday the other sisters here had a baptism,  the husband and daughter of a member got baptized, completing her family as members. It was incredible to see the change that has happened in this family, and that will continue to happen as the prepare to be sealed in a year :) 

I hope you all have a wonderful week! i put more pictures in the dropbox so you can see them all there!

LOVE YOU ALL :)

Love,

Hermana Rachel Peters

April 20, 2015
Hello Family,

How is everyone doing? Getting ready to end school right? Cant believe how fast time is going...

This past week was great! We saw so many miracles, and worked really hard. So hard that almost every night we were crawling up our stairs to our apartment... haha it´s a good tired. A tired that is from really giving your all :) 

Right now we are working really hard with the families and members of the branch. We made these cute little arks and have been using the story of Noah and the ark. In Spanish Noah is spelled Noe, and so we used the name of Noah to teach families 3 things..

Noche de Hogar (Family Home Evening)

Oración Familiar (Family Prayers)

Estudio de las Escrituras (Studying the Scriptures)

 (yes Cameron i used you´re idea :)

So we made little arks, that had these three things on it and then put magnets on the back so that the families could put them on their fridges. It has been amazing to see changes in so many families as they start to do these three things. They are so simple but sooo important. Thank you mom and dad for always helping us live these three principles. I know that because of them, we are the family we are.

Also we are finding a lot more people to teach and more and more people want to listen to us. it is amazing to see the Lord helping us every day to know exactly who we need to talk to and where to go. I was getting used to having all of my appointments fall almost every day, but this past week we had so many people waiting for us to show up at there house, ready to listen and learn. We are still working with the family, 

. This past week they have been having a lot of problems in the home, with his job, and having a lot of doubts about the church... I was getting kind of down one day, not know what i was doing wrong, but then i realized that it is completely normal for someone to have doubts. Members of the church still how doubts. The thing that is the most important is the continue to have the faith. We gave them a Book of Mormon and Saturday, and i am hoping this will help  them, and know that if they read it, with an open heart, they will find answers.

 

Training is going great! i love it! I am learning a lot about how to love and how to teach. I taught my companion this week how to say "JK LOL" and she says it all the time hahaha i love it :) 

Well i love you all so much! Hope you all have a wonderful and safe week!!   Sorry it is short, there is lots on my mind but i am doing good! Sometimes i wish i could see more success, with baptisms, but i know that they will come. 

Love,

Hermana Peters

April 13, 2015
Well Family here we are again, another week has come and gone. i can´t believe how fast time goes here. it blows my mind.

This week was really good, full of so many miracles. First off, Wednesday we were working soo hard, but not finding anyone. no one wanted to listen or wasn't home. It was hard for me to keep being happy, and could see me and my companion both feeling pretty down. i just kept telling her that Heavenly Father has his hand in our lives, that if our plans our failing it is for a bigger reason, we just needed to be patient. By about 8 o´clock, my patience was about gone, and I was ready to just give up for the day. But we stopped by one more house. A man that we had talked to a few days before. I didn't have a lot of hope, because the day we found him he was smoking. But we went anyways. We had an amazing lesson, and at the end he accepted to prepare to be baptized on May 16.

Also Al and niel, the family we found last week that went to general conference with us. They are soo great!! niel has already listened to the missionaries before and really liked it, and Alba is really open to the gospel. They only problem is that they aren't married, and one of the first thing they told us is that they don't like it when people tell them that they need to get married and that they are sinning if they are living together. So we were a little nervous to talk to them about that... but knew that if we spoke with the spirit, we wouldn´t have to worry.Thursday we had a lesson with them, and when we started niel asked us what is the church´s view on marriage. he said "And i want you to tell me staight" basically to not beat around the bush. This was such a blessing to me because we told them how of course it´s something they need to do in order to progress in life, but then were able to testify about the family. That if they get married, and continue down this path, their lives will change and their families will change. At the end when we challenge them to be baptized and married on May 23, without even thinking they said yes. 

Then yesterday we went to visit an investigator. When we passed by she said to come back in an hour because she wanted us to meet all of her family. So of course we were more than happy to come back later :) haha and so then when we got back she had her 2 brothers there and one of their friends. We started and during the prayer I felt to strongly to teach them the plan of salvation. So right at the beginning I asked them if they knew why they were here on the earth. if they knew what the purpose was in life. They all sat there, and then one of them told us a story. The day before he was in a huge accident, I dont really know all the details, but he said that it really doesn't make sense with what happens, that he is still alive. So he said the past 24 hours, he has been asking himself that question a lot. The spirit was soo strong as we testifed and taught of the plan of salvation. At the end all three accepted to prepare to be baptized on May 30.

Also we had 2 amazing meetings this week. One was a multi zone conference and the other was a monthly check that they always have for the new missionaries. So the multi zone conference i learned sooo much. I was writing like crazy notes of things i want to change, and things i need to do better. Then today at the monthly check we all had to write our numbers on the board from the past week which was a little scary... And well our numbers weren't the best, but i felt good, i and knew that was because i knew that my Heavenly Father was happy with me and my companion. 

i just feel so blessed right now. The past 2 months we have been working sooo hard, and i have felt like nothing has been happening, but this week we really about to see the fruits of our labors. Alma 26:27 has never been more real for me. i know that this is the work of my heavenly father, that really he is in charge. he is guiding us, and helping us to find those that are prepared to be baptized. I know that this is just the beginning, that there are so many more trials and miracles that will come with these people, but i could not be happier to keep working. 

I love this work, i am so grateful for my calling, for all the hard times in the life that teach us, and help us to grow. Thank you for all your prayers  and love. 

LOVE YOU ALL,

Hermana Rachel Ruth Macha Gringa Peters Pan :) hehe

ps.i still dont have a very good picture of my haircut.. haha i will send one next week :) 

You can kinda see my hair here... haha i will try harder this week

4/6/15
These pictures were sent to us by Sister Petersen, who serves in the mission as a nurse. These are her words,  "Dear Sister Peters, I´m rather slow, but I wanted you to have these fotos of your sweet daughter, Hermana Peters. These were taken at our recent ¨changes¨. The middle fotos are when her ¨baby¨, as they call the new missionaries here, found out who her first companion and trainer would be. The bottom foto is all the new missionaries, their trainers, and the 2 assistants to Pres.Wilkinson (Elder Tai is on the front row in a suit and Elder Lopez is right behind him.

Thanks so much for sharing her with us.

Hermana Diane Petersen, RN

P.S. She looks so happy and healthy, just so you know. It´s a priviledge watching over her, so to speak, since we have such love and respect for Uncle Dave : )

Oh! I love to see Hermana Fowler!!!!!

April 6, 2015

Hello family,

I hope that you all enjoyed conference as much as i did. I was almost in tears of joy seeing the conference center and the beautiful temple in Salt Lake...yeah i was trunky for a second or two :) haha we had to go to Heredia to watch conference, but that means that i got to watch it in English :) They had a little room set up for those who wanted to watch it in English and then everyone else was in the chapel. I did watch the Sunday morning session in Spanish and was able to understand everything, there is just something so different being able to hear their voices and the passion they have behind every word. Something that you cant really tell or hear  with the Spanish translation... 

This conference i decided to be more like Dad. So i had my notebook and drew a line down one side of the page. I called the bigger part my Large Plates and the smaller part my Small Plates. I wrote down things that i liked that they were saying on my large plates, but on my small i wrote thoughts i had that came to me, or things i wanted to change, or answers that i was receiving. I went into conference with like 3 questions, but came out with about 20 answers, it was amazing.  

It was also fun to see the choir from Davis County. When they said that i was like "aww these are my people :)" then couldn't help but think of that country song.. these are my people,this is where i come from..:) haha

This past week we found 2 families to teach and they are amazing. One of them we were talking to about us being here away from our families. Usually people go on and on about how strong we must be to be away from our families for so long and all this stuff. But this mom went on and on about how hard it must be for our families at home. She couldn't believe that my mom would let me leave the country for so long. She just kept on hugging her little baby and saying "You cant leave me okay?" haha so mom and family, i am sorry if it´s hard for you guys. I hope you can feel the blessings from me serving a mission. 

Also we went to visit a less active family this week and the mom and little girl were really sick and asked for a priesthood blessing. We called two men in the branch and then waited for them to come. The thing that was hard, for all of us,is that her husband was home, he has the priesthood, but has made choices in his life, and now does not have the right to exercise his priesthood. All for a few little choices he made, that now are tearing apart his family, a family that has been sealed in the temple. I hope that this experience opened his eyes to help him want to change. And i just have to say thank you dad, for always being so worthy and willing to give me a blessing whenever i needed it. When sister Burton was talking in conference about the importance of fathers i wrote in my small plates. "find a man like dad" :) 

I hope everyone had a wonderful Easter, and that you all remember how much i love you all :)keep working hard, praying hard, and studying your scriptures. so simple, yet so important. 

LOVE;

Hermana Peters 

April, 1, 2015

Hello family,

Sorry that i am two days late emailing.. Our pday got changed because we went to the temple today :) Yes we went to the temple. It is so amazing to me how i can walk into the temple and feel right at home. It is something that i didn't really understand until coming here, the great feeling of being at home in the temple. I thought and prayed for every single one of you in the temple, because being in the temple, you cant help but think about your family. I hope you all know how much i love you. I feel so blessed to have a family that is strong in the gospel, that is FOREVER. 

This week was really good, and i learned soo much. I am lovin being able to train, because it is giving me the chance to remember all the little things that are so important in the mission. To make sure that i am ALWAYS being a missionary that my companion can look up to, and serving with all my heart. I caught myself a few times this past week feeling down as appointments were falling, but then when i looked over at my companion, seeing her face, knowing she felt the same way, maybe even worse, i hurried and change my attitude to help her feel better. Sunday night we were praying together and i heard her start to cry. Sunday was a hard day because we didn't have anyone investigators at church, and then that night had a very interesting talk with a man that is atheist. So easy to say that it was a hard day. So after our prayers i leaned over to hug her and we talked for a bit. She said, "Hermana, i didn't know that the mission was going to be so hard." awww poor thing. We talked a lot that night about the Atonement. 

Mom this week i got a whole big stack of letters from December that my zone leaders in guanacaste forgot to give to me... haha so i finally got your cute calender!! :) thank you soo much!! i love it!! I also got your talks that helped me so much this past week.

This week in Costa Rica is Semana Santa or Holy Week, which means all the Catholics have their big crosses up in the yards with a big purple piece of material that hangs around it. I guess that on Sunday, everyone will change the purple ribbon thing to a white one to remember Christ. Everyone here doesn't have school this week or work, like you guys on Spring Break, but here is is for semana santa. So that means that most of our investigators left for Guanacaste... But it also means that there are families that are all home together! We just need to search for them :) haha

So with Easter and all right now we are focusing a lot on the resurrection of Christ, telling everyone and anyone we see that Christ Lives. It has made me think a lot about my Savior Jesus Christ, and how amazing He is. That we have Him here with us, everyday, every second, all we need to do is not leave Him. He won´t ever leave us, only we can leave Him. It is soo sad to see broken hearts, and families falling apart, because they are leaving Christ. He LIVES. and is here with us. Don't let anything, anyone, or any situation take you away from Christ. He is the light and the life of the world, and the way we can make it back to our Father in Heaven. Oh how amazing is this gospel, and my older brother Jesus Christ. I wish that everyone could feel the way i feel, and am working so hard everyday to help them at least have a glimpse of His love. Maybe the slam the door in my face, or lie right to me, but hopefully their hearts our open enough to at least see the love of Christ the i am trying to hard to shine. 

We are seeing soo many miracles here, with people that are wanting to listen to us, and wanting to get baptized. I know that it is because of our faith and diligence in the work. I have been saying a lot of prayers lately to be directed in where i need to go, and i know that I am being guided in every footstep.

Well i love you all so much and hope that everyone has a wonderful week this week! Be safe in all of your adventures, and remember that i love you all, but more importantly, that your Heavenly Father loves you :) 

LOVE,

Hermana Peters

oh and it was sooo fun seeing your pictures on Sunday. Ya i was soooo shocked to see Lexi in my sacrament meeting... haha but was a fun surprise :) love you all!! 

Lexi at Sacrament meeting!

Hey family!   I am doing great!

My best friend Peters Pan!   Everyone here calls me Peter Pan

I don't really have words to describe this picture but my companion looks so cute!

Went to the temple today!!! Oh wonderful day!