Emily sent the following email yesterday, Monday, February 3, 2014.  The Chavez family (German & Francisca, and their son, Erick) she refers to at the beginning of her letter is a family she met in her very first area.  She taught them and really bonded with them.  They were baptized before she was transferred.  She loves them dearly.

Dear Familia,

You'll never guess what happened to me yesterday!  I got a phone call in the morning form the mission office and they told me that a family was there to see me.  I knew that you guys wouldn't pull a thing like that so I was really confused.  Then, I heard German Chavez's voice on the other side of the phone.  They had decided to come and visit me.  I had sent them a letter for Christmas and they came to the return address to find me.  They found the mission office and they looked me up and we gave them the address so they could come to church with me.  I basically danced everywhere I went from the moment I received the news on!  I was really worried that they would get lost, and after receiving one call from a perdido German, they made it to the church in Canyon Country!  They told me that they had wanted to surprise me and I told them that they definitely had!  Wow! :)  I'll send you a picture next week, but I think Erick was really happy to see me and Francisca hugged me a lot and so did German.  German gave me a sweet little letter that I will show you next time too.  Adrian passed the sacrament to Meliton and German and Francisca and Erick.  It was a beautiful moment!

We had an amazing zone conference and I feel like I learned a lot of things that I am going to change and implement to make this area blow up a little.  I had been thinking that I would probably get moved at the end of this transfer (which would be 3 more weeks), but now I'm thinking I have this one and the next one and I'm super pumped!  I have decided that people and the spirit respond really well to commitments and commandments.  I think sometimes people don't receive answers from Heavenly Father about the validity of Joseph Smith (lesson 1) until they have had to make personal sacrifices and changes like living the word of wisdom.  This is not always the case, but I think teaching the commandments a little sooner in the line up is going to be a good thing.  I want to start teaching dia de reposo every time we teach the first lesson.  If we have people that don't work Sundays and don't come to church, we have to drop them.  Church is so important!  When people start listening to us, they are already committing time and attention, and we will invite them to repent.

I love you so much!  I'm excited to talk to you next week! :)

Love, Emily