Day of the Kings


 The Spanish seem to know how to stretch a holiday season for as long as possible. The 6th of January is the "Dia de los Reyes" or "day of the kings" or "3 kings day". It represents when the Magi brought gifts to Jesus, and it is when most of the gifts are given during the holiday season. Last year, we had heard about the big parade that happens on Dia de los Reyes, but didn't feel like fighting the crowds to get there. This year, we almost did the same, but realized that this would be the last opportunity that we would have to experience it. So, we rode the Metro down to the area where the parade would end which just happened to be near where the old bull-fighting-ring-turned-mall is. It was pretty chilly, but the atmosphere was fun and the anticipation in the crowd was infectious. As we were waiting for the parade to get to us, we had a chance to watch the amazing fountain by Montjuic. I have a couple of videos that I will share, but they do NOT do it justice. We are actually really lucky to be able to see it at all, because this is the first year in about 3 years that they have even had water in the fountain because of drought. Overall, the parade was really fun, and was definitely worth the effort to go. 

President and Hermana Heckmann were gone most of the week over to the Islands for interviews, and to deal with mission district business. As the Mission President, he has the ecclesiastical responsibility over the District in the Islands. So, he also has to act like the Stake President. The man is busier than Walmart on Black Friday!

It is finally starting to act like winter here. We have had a couple of really cold days. With this humidity, the cold seems to go right through to your bones no matter what you are wearing. Along with the cold we have had some of the missionaries tell us that they have no heat. Of course, we do our best to get things fixed, but some of them have known that things weren't working for a while, but just never got around to saying anything! 

Well, tomorrow marks 17 months in the mission field, and only 6 months left until we come home. The time is still flying by. We still feel that we are exactly where the Lord wants us to be even though we miss our family. This week was especially hard because yesterday 5 of our grandchildren had a special temple day. Peter and Jeremy as new priests can now baptize in the temple and got to baptize the rest of them and each other. How we wished we could have been there to witness that! We'll just have to schedule a "repeat" this summer some time!

This week's "Come Follow Me" study was wonderful. I love how the Lord kept affirming that Moses and Abraham are His "sons". Each and every one of us is also His son or daughter. I  know that he loves us. We listened to Jared give a talk in church and a couple of times he said that Heavenly Father does everything He can do outside our own agency to bring us home to Him. He will never violate our agency. It was wonderful to ponder the first scripture that I ever really memorized Moses 1:39. As Jeffrey R. Holland said "Heavenly Father loves each of us with all of His heart, might, mind, and strength". It is His work and His glory to help us choose to come home to Him. I hope and pray that I will never abandon my desire to do just that; to come home to Him so I can live forever with my sweet family. That choice means EVERYTHING!

We hope that this coming week is wonderful for each one of you. We love you billions!

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