Dear Mom and Dad,

Keep me posted on Grandma Beth...your last email was seven days ago...is she alright? Is she still in the hospital? Are you still in UT?

I feel bad just spilling out all that I´m doing here and how great it is when I don´t know how you are doing and if things are exploding at home or not. But here I go anyway:

The Portuguese sisters left Tuesday along with Elder Pyne (Mikayla´s previous companion) and a few others. Those Sisters were amazing and we became good friends. Coming on a mission was a challenge for each of them. Irma de Almeida´s mom had asked her to stay and help work for the family because her family had done so much for her and they didn´t have a lot of money. Something in her patriarcle blessing helped her and she decided to put the Lord first. Their sacrifices taught me to be grateful for how much I have been blessed. For me, coming on a mission was super easy because I had both motivational and financial support from you. Sometimes I feel bad for having it so easy but it is a lot like the Atonement: We have blessings we don´t deserve, we get to repent and be clean so easily which we also don´t deserve. I was born to a family that can afford my mission and education which I don´t deserve - and yet here I am at the beautiful CCM. Here´s the deal: life is not fair and we got lucky in a lot of ways. Here´s what we do about it, the only thing we can do: accept it, be so so grateful, and then give all we can to others - love, support, forgiveness, patience, and material support where possible, etc.

Favorite Scripture of the week: Alma 34:31 -
I used to think I should wait until I got things right to repent for all the times I messed up because I thought the Lord would get tired of hearing me repent for the same things all the time. "Seriously, she did that again! I thought we went over that 421 times already!" I thought that I would repent for missing so many days of scripture study as soon as I was a scripture scholar, or repent for being mean to my sister as soon as we had a perfect relationship. This scripture says if we harden not our hearts and repent, "immediately shall the great plan of redemption be brought about unto you." That means the moment we think "oh my, why did I do that!" We can get on our knees and repent and ask forgiveness and for help not to do the same thing again and we are forgiven. Pres. Earl pointed out the funny thing about sins: there are some that are so easy to stay away from (ie killing someone or robbing a bank) but the sins we´ve committed are the ones we have to watch out for because we are more prone to doing them. - That´s why they happen 421 times before we get it right ;)I am so grateful for the Atonment. I´m finally starting to figure out how to use it every day and it is such a blessing - that´s the point of being on a mission: to bring this blessing to people now, so they can feel clean and be happy now!

Love you!!! Love, Shayla

Not for Blog:
Mom, Irma de Almeida tried that eyeliner you bought me and liked it, so the night she was packing up to leave I stuck the new pencil in her suitcase. I felt pretty good about it. Thanks.

(Note from the Poster, aka, Mom...... I thought that story was neat so I added it anyway!)

Love you!!!! I will write a letter today!

Can you email me Colleen´s address for next week?