"IT'S! OK! IF! YOU! WANT! TO! DIE!"

¡Hello Amigos y Familia!

So there are these workouts in every apartment called "Insanity Workouts" and towards the end of one ab workout the teacher yells that phrase. Sometimes I'll be walking around, really drained, really sweaty, and really not knowledgeable in Spanish, and I'll think about him yelling "It's! Ok! If! You! Want! To! Die! It's! Ok! If! You! Want! To! Max! Out!" I feel it.

So I kind of forgot everything that happened this week and realized as I sat down to write this that Christmas happened! I hope everyone had an awesome Christmas! I spent my Christmas......drumroll......in my APARTMENT! After talking to our families, Hermana V. and I went back to our apartment to lay low until our dinner with the Bishop and his family. We weren't allowed to proselyte or contact on Christmas, mostly because everyone is hungover and sleeping, so I was really looking forward to dinner with the Bishop. His family is going through some really hard stuff so I was pretty excited to make brownies with his daughters, braid their hair, paint nails, etc. All the fun stuff that 8-12 year olds enjoy. The Bishop decided to call us an hour before we were supposed to show up at their house to cancel our dinner with his family. I guess he decided to have dinner with some other family and......I don't really now. Anyways, we spent ALL of Christmas day in our apartment!.....and it was so so so sad ahahaha. It wasn't a bad Christmas, just super boring and hot. Like I mentioned in my last email, it doesn't feel like Christmas which is probably a big blessing because I love Christmas with my family. Anyways, 1 down, 1 more to go. Thanks again to everyone who helped pitch in on my Christmas packages. Those made my whole month of December.

Spent 20 hours on a bus this week to get to the mission home. All the missionaries that were "born" (aka came into the mission at the same time as me) had to go to Salta for our "6 Week Reunion." I'm in my eighth week in the mission field but Christmas transfers threw off the schedule a bit. It was good, but a lot of time on a bus, so I'm glad I don't have to do it again. Except I do hahaha. In a few weeks I have to go back to Salta to fill out a ton more paperwork for my visa. Gotta love it when your mission is 4 provinces.

So this was funny. I've been doing a LOT of talking and a LOT of contacting these past two weeks. Yesterday, Hermana V. and I went to contact a family that was a reference from another investigator. We met the husband who was working on the porch and out of nowhere he just started throwing out all these questions. Anytime I'd ask him a question he'd turn it back around on me so I had to start getting really creative with my limited Spanish. I asked him what he believed faith was and, I should have seen it coming, he responded with, "I don't know. You tell me." I wasn't prepared for that but I guess the Spirit was because Hermana V. told me my response, along with my Spanish (AYE-O!) was killer. I wanted to give him a metaphor or something though because he was pretty convinced if you can't see something it doesn't exist. So I whipped out something I had heard in sacrament meeting wayyyyy back in the day, hace muchos años. I told him just because we can't see God, or Jesus Christ, or the Holy Ghost does not at all in ANY way mean they don't exist. I testified of all the many miracles I have seen since being in Argentina and shared all the many times I have seen God's hand in my life. I compared the gospel of Jesus Christ to wind. We can't see it, but we can very much see its effects. I don't know what came over me hahahaha but all of the sudden I was waving my little missionary agenda in front of this man's face and asking him if he could feel the wind. Hahahahaha Hermana V.'s eyes just about bulged out of her face. Anyways, we have an appointment with them this week.

I finished the Book of Mormon in three months! My goal is to read it 6 times in my mission and I'm thinking I'm going to try and attack this next three month reading period with my Spanish Book of Mormon. Not quite sure though. Will keep you updated.

Weird to think I'm going to be on my mission this WHOLE next year. I've got a lot of goals to try and complete. This is going to be a year of GRINDING for sure. The other day I was walking around and thought, "Wow. I'm not going to sleep past 7am this whole year." But there are so many things I WILL BE ABLE TO DO! This is going to be the year I become fluent (-ish), and become a senior missionary, and actually learn all the things (-ish) I need to learn about being a missionary. This year will be the first year I have a baptism and confirmation in a period of 2 days (#rip #yael). It will be the first, and only, year I celebrate my birthday during winter. I'll get a new mission president in July, and smartphones are coming to the Salta Mission around that time too. Don't know how I feel about it but you can ask me in 2020. I'll hit my 6 month, and year mark this upcoming year. It will probably be the year I get robbed (I do not want to serve in Tucuman but it's sort of not up to me) and also bit by a dog (I'm one of the few that has yet to be attacked by a dog and my dog dozer battery is dead so SOS!). Anyways, lots of good stuff around the corner for this Hermana.

Just like every other email I send out there's a million more things to write and I'll remember everything I forgot to explain as soon as I send this email. I'm forgetting everything I swear.

Love you all. Have an awesome new year!

Love love loveeeee,

Hermana McKinlay

My cute board!!!

Hermana V. decided to take a picture of me to show me what I look like when I'm being impatient hahahahaha. This was while we waited for the Bishop to scale the wall to his second story house to open up the front door from the inside......