¡Feliz Dia de Independecia! 

Okay so I'm not really sure where I'm supposed to start. I guess Ill just answer some questions. So the weather here is similar to home in temperature and humidity. Its a little chilly in the morning but not too bad, the hottest it gets is maybe 75 but usually like 72 degrees id say. And it rains almost every single evening. There have only been like 2 days that it hasn't. And that includes thunder and lightning. its kind of awesome. We do get to exercise every day. Except some days that just includes a district ping pong tournament. Hermana Shumway and Elder Allred are basically professional ping pong players. 

We try to speak to the natives here at the CCM a lot but we don{t do it as much as we should. Its good practice though. We actually became really good friends with these two elders from mexico and panama. They are sooooo funny. And they would just mess with us gringos all the time but its all good. we like it. They taught us some slang words so we can say "thats cool". "que padre" "chido" and "chebere" but apparently they only say "chebere" in panama. Anyway, we started saying those a lot and then i accidentally said que chido to one of my maestros and he got mad at me... it was funny though. we{re not allowed to use slang... But i gotta know how to be cool right? Anyway, those elders left already so now we have to find new natives to be friends with. 

Also on like the second day, Hermano Sanchez (our maestro) told us that our district will most likely be splitting up in week four and we´ll be put in native districts. Which will be really cool!! Hermana Shumway really doesn't want to though. it would help us so much with our spanish though. And it would be such a great opportunity because they rarely do this. Spanish is tiring though. Some days i feel so good about my spanish and it doesn't take much out of me and i can speak a little faster than other days but then there are the days where i feel like i cant say anything. Its kind of frustrating. pero está bien. 

We finished our lessons with Carlos and now he is our night teacher, Hermano villegas. Night classes are sooo hard because we´re all falling asleep. Plus Hno Villegas asks much harder questions and expects us to answer within 1 second of asking the question which is pretty difficult but I think its good for us. Now we have two new investigators (our teachers) but with new names. Eduardo and Alejandro. After our first lesson with Eduardo (hno sanchez) he told us that we did a really bad job and we were so surprised because we thought it went well. So basically we have a lot of work to do but we´re learning a lot every day and improving so its all good. 

We never get to leave the CCM to go proselyting. They used to do that but there are too many missionaries now. But today was awesome because we got to go to the temple!!!Sunday was the re-dedication and so we got to watch it in one of the auditoriums which was an extension of the temple. It was awesome! Elder Holland and President Eyring were here for it. So this morning we got to go to the temple and do an endowment session and it was so cool! I didn't ask for headphones so it was all in spanish and i loved it. A little scary, but cool. The temple is beautiful! AND right before we walked into the temple a GATO walked right in front of me and i really wanted to chase after it and kidnap it and take it back to the CCM. But i didn't. It felt awesome to get out of the CCM though. Mexico City is seriously awesome. There have been some crazy celebrations down here for el dia de independencia. fireworks and gunshots and music all night long. 

Okay so heres my missionary message for the week. Our propósito as missionaries is invitar a las personas a venir a Cristo al ayudarlas a que reciban el evangelio restaurado mediante la fe en Jesucristo y su expiación, el arrepentimiento, el bautismo, la recepción del don del Espíritu Santo, y el perseverar hasta el fin. (sorry i don't know it word for word in english but you can figure that out) Anyway, notice how it was invitar a LAS PERSONAS. It doesn't say nonmembers. Our job as missionaries, whether or not we are set apart to be missionaries or not (because we should all be missionaries), is to invite others to come unto Christ. That means members, nonmembers, less actives, your teachers or students or parents or friends or classmates or whoever. That's why it doesn't matter whether or not our investigators here in the CCM are real. Because our job is to invite them to come unto Christ no matter who they are. 

Love you all! 

-Hermana DeGraw

OH by they way, I ATE FISH. COOKED FISH. Everyone should be proud of me. I chose the fish instead of the chicken to prepare myself for Xalapa. It wasn't too bad, but still not too good either so...