October 22, 2012

HELLO!!!!!!!!! How are ya???

 

I am great! This week has been a good one.   We are finding more people to teach, which is such a good thing!  There is a family that I am really excited about.  We were riding our bikes and they were outside so we started talking to them.  They said that their son loves reading the Book of Mormon--and it turns out that he was baptized a little over a year ago.  So we are teaching his parents and they are really open to the message:) Hope that they will start reading the Book of Mormon and coming to church. There names are J** and B** and they are so sweet! We are going to go over and paint their fence one day--I am excited for that! But we have had lots of little things going on and it has been really fun to see the every day little miracles. 

 

Recently we have been doing a lot of work in our english ward, which is great...but then again it makes the spanish a bit hard to learn.  But anyway, there are lots of part member families and inactive members and potential investigators that members have been asking us to go visit.  Right now we are only actively teaching 1 person in that ward...if everything goes like we have planned (ha!) then by the end of the week we should have 7 investigators.  So we will go forward with faith behind our goal and see how it turns out :D

 

Here is the random...and kind of gross story for the week.   So it is super fun to go scorpion hunting at night with black lights.  The scorpions have a green glow and it is super freaky.  But our district leader told us that if you catch a scorpion and put a ring of hand sanitizer around it and light the ring on fire, then the scorpion gets freaked out and stings itself.  Well, being sheltered like we missionaries are thought this sounded like fun...haha.  So we went and found our scorpion and we caught it in a jar....honestly I feel a little bad about it, poor thing! But any way.  We put the ring of fire around it and fire ring was pretty small...and the scorpion just caught on fire and burned to death.  I feel like an awful person! haha, but not really...it was just a scorpion.  So our little experiment didn't work.....I am thinking that these elders are planting really strange ideas in my head, haha :)

 

Well anyway.  There you have it. Lots of missionary work and a story about a scorpion.  I love you all lots and hope you have a super good week!!!!!!

October 15, 2012

Well I miss you all and hope all is well.  OHHHHHHH..... before I forget!!!!!! I didn't know that heaven could fit in such a small package!!!!!! But you managed to do it!!!! I was so happy when I saw COFFEE CAKE!!!! haha.  That ABSOLUTELY made my day, thanks for thinking of me:) It tasted SOOOO good:D true story

 

Well lets see, tons of good things this week! Transfers happen on Wednesday and we had transfer calls last night, and I am staying in the same place still with Hermana Taylor. I am super excited about that because I love it here.  There are more cows and horses than people I am pretty sure (that is probably and exaggeration) but it is just great!  We had a baptism for H** on Sunday and everything was so good! Happy day!

 

The most exciting thing is that our investigator E** came to church on SUNDAY! I was so excited I thought that my soul was going to burst! She came with her 2 youngest kids, they are such a great family:) If everything goes as planned, they are going to be baptized on the 27th, that will be such a great day! Her husband L** is such a great guy.  He loves to have us over and sits his kids down in front of us so we can teach them, but he won't stay...I think he has been there for parts of 2 lessons but that is all.  He is so great though, and the biggest miracle of all would be if her were baptized with his wife.  It could happen :)  Anyway, the longer I am here the more I am realizing that there are so many small miracles everyday that are SO amazing!

 

We were walking through an apartment complex in Gilbert yesterday, the person that we were going to go see wasn't there.  So anyway, we saw this man pushing a stroller and so we talked to him.  We said that we were missionaries, and he said that we had talked to his wife 2 weeks ago at Walgreen's (it was actually the other Spanish elders in our ward) There is lots of background to their story...but the overall point is that--we had no idea where they lived, at Walgreen's she said she was interested in family history and that she would call the missionaries back, she had tried to call the number and the answering machine was in English so she hung up, and then we all thought she fell off the face of the earth.  But Heavenly Father knew where she was!  Coincidentally we found her husband walking around Gilbert, I just love it :) Turns out she is in jail right now, but she gets out in a few days and she wants to change her life and take the lessons.  So happy day, the Lord is always watching out for us :)

There is another story about someone we randomly found that the church has been looking for for about 5 years--Cool huh? Mom, I wrote the story in your letter, so you can share it if you like :)  But basically, after her son was killed 8 years ago she fell away from the church.  She pushed everything away and tried to cope with that hard trial by herself. Well that didn't work (surprise) and she is so heartbroken.  But we knocked on her house just doing some tracting and she said that she was a member and she said her name and Hermana and I got so happy because the bishop had just told us that he had never met her.  HAPPY DAY:) I just love seeing the Lord work in peoples lives, it is the COOLEST thing EVER!

 

I love you all, and hope you remember that.  Thanks for the letters and packages:) LOVE YOU!!!!!!!!

October 8, 2012

Highlight of this week--CONFERENCE!! How great is that!? Changing the ages of missionaries to 18 for elders and 19 for sister? Crazy! All of the missionaries in my area were super excited about that.  There is
so much work to do, and there are only so many hours in a day--definitely need more missionaries.  So they are changing the MTC time too.  If they are English speaking it is 2 weeks, if they are Spanish speaking it is 6 weeks (not 8 like mine) and if it is a super hard language it is only 8 weeks.  They are trying to get a lot more
missionaries in the field!

But I especially loved the Saturday sessions, of course they were all good, but I love them!  I loved how mainly all of the talks were about missionary work, the plan of salvation, finding joy even in the hard
times, and becoming a converted servant of the Lord.  It was neat how the apostle Peter was mentioned SO many times.  I really like learning about him.  Best General Conference ever.

Did you watch the talk on Saturday by Larry Echo Hawk? Well, it was great! He shared a lot about how the book of Mormon is written for the Lamanite descendants and how it is a blessing to his people.  Well we have an investigator that NEEDED that talk.  He is native american and reads the Book of Mormon and comes to church with his family, but it hasn't really connected with him yet.  We are going to watch that talk with his on Wednesday and I have no doubt that it is going to be powerful.  I am excited for it!

Well after conference was over on Sunday we had a baptism, it was so good.  It was just a spiritually uplifting day all around :)

The rest of the week has been awesome as well.  We have been finding a lot more families to teach.  There is 1 that I am super excited about. The mom's name is E**, and her son and J** have been talking lessons for a bit and they really have a desire to learn more.  They ask the most sincere questions and are trying there hardest to come to church and to read.  Her husband, L**, is one of the nicest people I have met.  He is not interested in learning about the church, or so he says, but he has been sneaking in the room a little for lessons
lately....it makes Hermana Taylor and I so happy.  The last time we had lesson with them L** brought their 2 other kids, A** and B**, in the room and wanted them to sit in on the lesson too.  So, maybe he isn't quite willing to really learn more about the church, but he can see a difference in J** y E**'s life and he wants the rest of his family to have that too.  E** is set for baptism on the 27, and hopefully the whole family can be ready by then.  They are such a great family and I know that the gospel will bless their life so much!
Happy day:)

Well, I love you all.  Hope you got to or will get to watch every session of conference because it was so good, how lucky we are to know that there is a prophet that guides Christs church on the earth today. Lots of love :)

October 1, 2012

HELLLLLOOO!!!! Oh I love checking my e-mail:) I miss you and love you all so so sos osoooooooooo much:) (thats a lot in case you didn't know).

 

This week has been GREAT! The highlight of the week happened yesterday.  There is a girl we are teaching named marisela, she is 20....and thankfully she prefers english...bwhahah, just kidding.  But any way, she has been taking the lessons for over a year now.  She loves the sister missionaries and she has been taught the lessons countless times, and we were trying to think of a way to make it more meaning full to her.  Well yesterday there was a mission president fireside in spanish for investigators.  A recent convert came and shared her conversion story and it was really powerfull.  On the way home I was sitting next to her in the back seat and we were just chatting, Hermana Taylor was sitting in the front with the member that drove us and was talking to her.  Marisela told me about how she just wants to learn more than what she has been taught for the past year.  She knows all about joseph smith and the book of mormon, she says she just wants to learn what else there is to know.  Well, I told her all about the Holy Ghost and how that is how we learn more.  The missionaries can keep coming by day after day, but unless she does her part the words won't mean anything to her.  I challenged her to be baptised right there in the back seat so she could recieve the gift of the holy ghost....and she said yes! Then we pulled in the drive way and she had to get out, but she said yes!!!! Hermana taylor had no idea what happened, it was pretty funny :) But SSSSSSSSOOOOO cool! The next time we teach her is on Thursday, and I can't wait for Thursday to come!

 

Happy day :)

 

Well, there is this other lady too in our english ward that has been on my mind too. Her name is Lori, (I just think the world of that name :) Anyway, She and her husband are not members, but their son is a recent convert and is on a mission in Italy right now.  He gets back this spring.  But Lori ahs read the entire book of mormon because her son asked her too.  She says she wants to be baptized but won't do it until her son gets back....which is alright, but until then she needs to be reading and going to church and praying...and she is not really.  She has had all of the lessons before.  We decided to stop by the other day and had a  good ole talk about the gospel.  She says that her and her husband want to do this on their own, without the missionaries, they feel like they need to do it on their own.......well they had that chance for 6 months now.  So we are going to politely try to work ourselves back in to their lives and help get them ready for baptism.  She is a really sweet person and Her and I really hit it off. and I feel like she is one of the people that I was sent here to try to help.  So help I shall.  :) I am excited to work with her!

 

And we have a baptism next sunday after conference!!!!! His name is Hector and he is 8! His parents are not members and he is living with his Aunt right now, his parents got deported, so that is why it is a missionary baptism instead of the wards.  But he is so COOL! I am so excited for him!!

 

Well the weather is cooling off (YEAHHHHHH!) Had a ward fiesta the other night, la dia de hispanidad.  Best food ever! It was really fun and a few of our investigators came too, so it was super great!

 

I love you all and hope things are going great! You are all so special to me :) True story.  Thanks for the e-mails and letters, it was a fantastic week because of them.  LOVE YOU ALL!!!!!