Not everyone who looks Hispanic, IS Hispanic.

So we were in a parade yesterday.  I think I mentioned that last week, but it was the best.  I love parades.  So we walked around and handed out #lighttheworld cards with candy canes stapled to them.  And yeah.  It was really fun.

 Christmas parade

The whole time we were keeping an eye out for hispanics, because that's just how we roll in the spanish zone.  We weren't seeing ANY, so that was pretty sad.  But then as we were turning around the corner we saw a big hispanic family.  We thought, FINALLY. A HUGE FAMILY!  We ran over and gave them all spanish #lighttheworld cards and said hola and stuff.  But they didn't say hola back.  They just said thank you.  In english.  But we were like, maybe they are americanized hispanics or something, so we moved on.  But then we ended up passing them again and another missionary was like "Hola, como esta??"  And then mom of the "big hispanic family" was like, "not spanish."  BUT WE HAD GIVEN THEM ALL SPANISH PASS ALONG CARDS!  So we might've ruined the chances of them investigating the church or something.... but oh well.

Hermana Thornton also hit her 6 months this week! WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO So we celebrated by going to take some pictures in front of a big pink wall. My mom is so old!

Oh, how could I forget?!?  We got a Christmas tree this week!... and fought over who is the Christmas Queen.   We thought we were going to go get a medium sized tree.  Like not too small, but obviously not a full sized tree.  But then we drove past a tree farm this week and Hermana Thornton got really excited because her family does real trees, so we went to go check it out. ......and then we got a little carried away.......... But I love it so, #sorrynotsorry

Decorating the tree.

We had four baptismal dates this week but then they all dropped yesterday because no one came to church, which is really depressing.  I guess that also means that there's tons to do this week still!  I love being a missionary.  I love Christmas!  #realChristmasQueen  I love #lighingtheworld and sharing the light of Christ.  Go do something for someone else today. Love you tons!

Love, Arianna

P.S.  I got your package on Friday.  That made me really happy too.  It's like Christmas every time I get a package!  

Memphis temple.

<Hermana Thornton sent me her letter for the week.  It's fun to hear another perspective of the same events!>

HOLA!  HAPPY DAY OF MARIA... OR SOMETHING!  So hey, I hit my SIX MONTH mark last Thursday.  WHAT I KNO  It's crazy and it kinda stresses me out bc I'm still like i don't know how to speak Spanish or how to missionary buts aight.  I also hit my six month mark of being off of caffeine!  I CAN DO HARD THINGS, I'm not sure if I was supposed to burn something, but hey, let me know if that's a thing. but seriously they've been the best.  I've never this happy before.  I love being a missionary, and the gospel, and Arkansas.  Not gonna lie tho, it's been hard too.  Some days I just want a car to hit me so I can take a nap! lol  But life is good.

This week was good, a little hard but still good.  We bought a fricken Christmas tree!  It's huge and I love it so much!  As we were checking out of a store and the cashier was asking us where we were from and then was like, well, what are you doing here??  And for a second I was like, wait, what am I doing here?  And it hit me that I wasn't going to be with my family this Christmas but then all

of sudden a overwhelming amount of peace came and I knew I'm supposed to be here, serving a mission and then I responded with "spreading the word" or something southern like that.

Christmas as a missionary rocks!!!!  Everyone loves Christmas.  That's my go to line, "Like Christmas??" and they're always like, Of course!"   Light the world is awesome, check it out if you haven't and actually do it!!! Christmas just makes everyone more open and nice, inactives, ppl in stores, investigators it's awesome. also we were in a parade and passed out tons of pass along cards, it was soooo fun. the best part was when me and Hna Keller were fricken racist, we were looking for Hispanics the whole time and when we finally found a family that looked slightly Hispanic and were like hola como esta gave them all Spanish cards turns out they weren't lolololol , probably just ruined their chance of joining the church. blah esta bien

I can't remember a whole lot from this week, on Sunday 4 of our dates dropped so that was rough,.  It's because they didn't come to church after going and waking them up in the morning.  But I know there's people out there that are ready for the gospel, we just need to find them!!  But we're doing great.  Hermana Keller's the best, glad I get to spend Christmas with her.  We've gotten really close, like to the point we're just straight up mean to each other.  So now we have a kindness jar.  Pray for us this week too.  We're on bikes and I might have to cut my fingers off from frostbite.  The church is true.  Life is good.  Love you.  Have a good week.

-hermana thornton

Look!  I'm Hermana Keller!  LOL!

If I lay here, would you just lay here?