Call Me Maybe!!!

Hey everyone! How are you all?

This week was amazing, one of the best weeks of my mission. So my letter
home is about all the good things and especially all the good news from
this week :)

While all you at home are enjoying pumpkins and jack o lanterns, we here in
Costa Rica are enjoying MANDARIN season. Yep, baby oranges are blooming on
every tree and you better believe our apartment and stomaches are filled
with them. What great news, right? A little different than the Halloween and
October month I am used to, but I love it.

On Wednesday, the mission got to hear from Elder Amado of the 70! Let me
tell you a little about him...He is from Guatemala and is just the
littlest, funniest and cutest man there ever was. He has so much experience
in missionary work and has the answers to everything, I mean EVERYTHING! We
got to ask questions and listen to him talk to us all day long and it
was the greatest. I learned so much and it literally changed my whole
outlook on being here. I left with a happier, greater desire to work hard
and enjoy my missionary experience.

He also shared with us that prior to general conference, the prophets and
apostles spent an entire month preparing for their talks by studying just
one very special subject in particular: Faith in Jesus Christ. Super
interesting how it wasn't deep doctrine, or something extremely profound,
but the first principle of the gospel, faith in the Lord, Jesus Christ.
Which means to me, that we still have ALOT to learn and study about having
faith in our Savior.

We also enjoyed a yummy luncheon and Hermana Wilkinson invited me to sit by
her, so I spent an hour chatting with her, President, and Elder Amado. It
was the best. President told me some exciting news...that an older mission
couple is coming to the mission the next change and he is thinking about
sending them to Orotina! I am sooo excited about this idea.

Then for what could possibly be the greatest news of all.........

We got CELL PHONES!

That's right people, the mission of Costa Rica is movin on up in the
technology world of missionary work. And we are so excited about it.
Complete with texting and all. So, I texted for the first time in 7 months,
in Spanish baby! Haha goood stuff.

Then we got surprising news and found out we had to stay the night in San
Jose because we had to do legal papers in the morning. So after enjoying 3
delicious burritos at Taco Bell we had a sleepover with 10 other Hermanas
in San Jose. Taco Bell is like the fanciest restaurant here in
CR...needless to say I was in Heaven. I may or may not have stuffed
handfulls of hot sauce in my bag to take home...

So we finally arrive home to Orotina and got straight to work. But after
having been super spirtually uplifted we decided to contact and find some
brand new, fresh people. It wasn't our original plan, but we missed the bus
and it actually turned out to be a blessing in disguise. We taught this
lady named Flori, and the spirit was crazy strong. We bore firm testimony
of the Savior to her on her front porch while watching the beautiful sunset
and listening to the evening bugs and birds. A lesson doesn't get much
better than that.

Or does it?!

Friday we had to go to a city called Puntarenes for another meeting. We got
there a bit early, so we decided to do some contacting to help out the
elders in that area and we ended up teaching a family on the beach! They
were enjoyin the sun under a little hut made of sticks and palm trees just
waiting for us! So we taught them the first lesson and answered a bunch
their questions about God and why bad things happen and all that good
stuff. It was incredible.

And for the finale of happy news, we found a less active family of 8 years
that wants to come back to church! The youngest son has a baptism date and
the oldest wants to serve a mission! They all came to church this Sunday
and we are having family home evening with them tonight. I am so excited.
It's almost as if they were just waiting for someone, anyone, to find them,
invite them, and remind them of how important the gospel is.

Because of all the good news there is in this world, the good news of
the gospel is the BEST news of all.

XO, Hermana Starke

P.s. Update on Jeni and her family...she has a baptism date in November
along with her husband, and oldest son! We are so happy for them. They are
currently trying to quit drinking coffee! Haha looovee it!!!

Bye Bye old phone!

Hellooooo Cell Phone!!

So Happy for our new phone!