The last Hermana standing, sort of

7 September 2015

This was the other thing we did-played the missionary game. 

Since we couldn't go out finding, we could at least do it on a board! :)

This week was a restful one. Wednesday morning during exercise, My companion collapsed and fell asleep on the floor. We worked as much as we could, but then she said, "I just gotta go home. I can't function anymore." So we went home and she passed out on her bed. She's had it before, she calls it "the 6-day sickness" because the last time she and her old companion had it, they were incapacitated for 6 days. :( Pobrecitas (Poor things). And so, she got it again and we've been staying home as much as possible so she can recover. We've only left the house for fixed appointments, emergency shopping, meetings, and church. She's doing lots better now. This is day 5. She can stay awake longer, but still doesn't have a lot of energy. While she's rested, I've been writing up notes from my iPad to my study journal because I want to, and I had the time for it and while it is true that I'm taking home my iPad, it's going to be wiped, so I will probably lose all my notes. :) so I've been busy with that. The other Hermana missionaries in our ward haven't been so great, either, so I've done mini-exchanges with them, Thursday was with one and last night with the other, because the other had a cold and the one also had a relapse of the 6-day sickness. So, the two more healthier ones go out and work and the two sicker ones stay home. There's just a bunch of sickas in this ward right now, that's all. :) 

What's really interesting is that I got cabin fever, which I never thought would be possible for me, because I liked being inside, last I checked, but when I was facing those days of staying inside all day, I thought, "I just want to go out. I don't want to be in here right now. This feels really weird!" But I survived, and am surviving, so don't worry about me, I'll be fine! :)

You could say I'm the last hermana standing, but I haven't been 100% whole, either. On Saturday, we had a ward sports activity and we were playing 5 Alive, where you kick a soccer ball into the goal and if the goalie blocks it, they get to have a chance to kick, too. Anyway, so I was goalie, and I tried to block the ball and I jammed my finger, instead! Right now, it's the size of a sausage with the coloration of a blackberry, but it's ok! It's not broken and it's healing. Slowly, but healing. :)

Yesterday, after church, we had a dinner for the ward. More people came to church than ever before while I've been here, and they all loved the new building. Also, they ate up all the food, which is always a good thing. :) it was good food, and it was fast Sunday. "Hunger makes the best sauce." :) 

That's about all the excitement there was for this week. We're working on getting better, so that this will be a good, busy week. I have my exit interview with President Huntsman tomorrow and it'll be my last district meeting! 

Toothless might fly through at any moment

31 August 2015

Friday was a normal planning and proselyting day, and then Saturday was a fun day. :D

We also helped with moving our ward to the new building. We brought stuff in, threw out magazines from the 1990s and early 2000s, and we helped clean out the cupboards where we were putting everything. There were things in those cupboards that had not been moved since the 60s...we also threw out a lot of that stuff because it had been chewed open and there were mouse homes in there...yeah, it was gross, but it's all clean now!

 

The new building is AWESOME!! There are skylights in the gym, which is in the bottom level, so there's natural lighting in there. The kitchen's next to the gym, with the young Women's rooms down there. On the upper level is everything else, but what's cool is that down the hall of the bishop's office, there's a wooden panel on the wall that when you open it, you can see down into the gym! It's so cool! And the chapel is in an A shape with dark wood, so it looks like a Viking hall. One of our zone leaders said, "watch out! Toothless might fly through at any moment." :)

So, we helped with that, then we had correlation, and we went home and I took another shower, then we went out and proselyted, then when we came home for dinner, there was my flight itinerary. After all the excitement and food, we went to stake conference. It was good! We learned about teaching the gospel to the family and that we need to keep the Sabbath day more holy.

Sunday was also Stake Conference. It was also good, and basically a further in-depth study if what we learned on Saturday.

Today, we just got back from our zone activity. It was good. We did some minute-to-win-it kind of games. Like you have skittles and a straw, and whoever can transfer the most Skittles from one bowl to the other in a minute wins. Another one is you put Vaseline on your nose and then, without using your hands, move as many cotton balls from one bowl to the other in a minute. Another one is how fast can you get all the tissues out of a tissue box with one hand? Or how fast can you move an Oreo from your forehead to your mouth using only your face muscles? Things like that. It was fun to watch, more than anything!

New ward and baptism

24 August 2015

This week was a little bit more sedate...just a little. :) We had zone conference on Tuesday. We talked about working with members a lot, how to help them know what to say,  how to ask them for what we need, investigator-wise. It was good. Writing about it, it sounds a little weird, because I realize I'm writing to members..but anyway. Afterward, we went to the mission office and I saw all the departure information on the desk of one of the senior sisters, so I know it's coming, I just don't know when.

Saturday, we had a ward sports activity. It was really fun. We played volleyball for an hour and a half, and then they played soccer for another hour (hna. Tate and I just watched.) It was so exhausting, but fun. That morning, we had done a hard-core workout video, and then we played volleyball...Yesterday, I was sore all over, from my neck to my feet. I really got to get into shape!  :) But it was fun. One game we did was the youth against the missionaries, all 8 of us. So two of us rotated out as we went, and the youth were supposed to rotate out, too, but I think they didn't know that, because there were 11 people on their side..but it was so much fun. One of the companionships of elders has really great companionship unity-one elder would set it and the other would spike it. They did it about 5 times in a row. It was really cool to watch. :)

Also last night we had a baptism! Yay! The lady we baptized had been investigating the church for almost a year, and because she works every single Sunday, she can never come to church. Even if she asks for it off, the one manager will put her back on. She's tried to get it off multiple times, the missionaries have gone and asked for it off for her, some of the members of the ward have gone and asked, and nothing. She still has to work Sundays. So, with special permission, she got baptized and confirmed last night, with the promise that if she continues faithful as much as she can, reading and so on, then she will be able to come to church one day. It was a great baptism, a very beautiful experience. 

During/after we have stake conference next week, the Tysons ward will be organized, and the Bella Vista ward will meet in a different building! Whoo! This also means that there will be missionaries called to the Tysons ward, so that will be exciting, but it's not really going to affect the Spanish program. 

Today, we had decided to go to D.C. Before we left, we stopped at the library to download our emails. A man there starts talking to us, we engage in a good conversation, and it turns out he's a less-active! He told us his story of how he joined the church, and he said, "Now you're making me excited! I would love the Elders to come by and give me another Book of Mormon, because I lost the other one I had."  OK! For sure! We'll send them over as soon as possible! :) It was awesome.

So, we went to D.C.  and saw the holocaust museum and the air and space museum. It's really cool. All about rockets and navigation, etc. I learned something really cool about longitude how it deals with time. Something like, if you sail for 24 hours west, you move 15 degrees from where you where. Because the earth rotates once in a day--or 360 degrees in 24 hours. 360 divided by 24 is 15. I don't quite get it, but that's what the video sailor captain said, and I figure he knows what he's talking about, so I guess I'll believe him. :) It's given me more drive, though, to learn more about sailing and astronomy and things like that.

Arlington Cemetery

17 August 2015

 The guard and the lieutenant and the new guard presenting arms.

 The carriage pulling a casket. We're pretty sure it was empty. :)

And this is the lieutenant checking the new guard's rifle, making sure it's up to snuff. You have to look into the fuzzier part. Sorry! But It made me really happy because it was like he was doing a few color guard spins. :)

So, this week, we went to the temple visitors center on Tuesday with an investigator who's getting baptized this Sunday and a member. The investigator loved it! We saw a cute little video about family. 

Then, Wednesday, we had district meeting and appointments-we were running around crazy. Por todos lados, as they say in Spanish. 

Thursday, I have no idea what happened with Thursday. We were visiting places, trying to find people to teach. 

Then Friday was weekly planning, and by the end of it, Hna. Tate had a migraine! (But not from planning. :)) so, we went to the two appointments that we had, and then came home so she could sleep it off. 

Then Saturday was correlation, and afterward, they asked us to help set up for an open house that evening. We got almost everything set up, and then there was a problem--the couple was stuck in Las Vegas! There were no flights coming in or going out of the D.C. Area, including Baltimore, the two airports here in Virginia, so they weren't going to be there, so we said, "why keep setting it up? They're not even going to be here!" There was a big debate about it, but in the end, we decided to take it all down, fridge the food, and do a smaller dinner-like thing on Sunday. So we took it all down. That was an evening also where we had a hard time finding people to teach.

Sunday, after the last English ward got out, we told the deacons to not take down the chairs in the gym, and we reset everything up, ate, and then dashed off to a charlafogonera (fireside), where I was playing piano. But! I had told them the wrong number for the opening hymn, because it's different between the Spanish and English hymn books. I meant for us to sing, "La Alba ya Rompe" (the day-dawn is breaking, #52 in the English) and instead we sang "Guíame a Ti" (Guide Me to Thee, #52 in the Spanish). I was so embarrassed. We couldn't change the hymn because there weren't any Spanish hymn books, the words were already printed on the back of the programs. So everyone learned a new hymn last night. It all worked out. It's fine.

So today, we went to Arlington Cemetery and saw the changing of the guards by the monument to the unknown soldiers. It was really neat to see. But it was really hot-sweat was running down my back. I felt bad for the soldiers. But, they're only there for an hour, and the ceremony takes like 15 minutes, so by the time it's over, they're only there for 45 minutes, so they're probably fine. 

The cemetery is HUGE! I had no idea it was that big. It has 400,000 gravestones there. All of them military people. Chaplains, médicos (what's that word in English?), lieutenants, colonels, etc. It was really cool. We also saw a horse-drawn casket! We're pretty sure it's empty, though. :) 

Then after the cemetery, we did our grocery shopping and came to write. We'll be heading out pretty soon to go wash our car for zone conference tomorrow and do our laundry. Hopefully there will be some time for a nap somewhere in there...

The Nationals won

10 August 2015

The temple here was pretty busy the day that we went on the temple trip. There were 4 groups of departing missionaries (including us), and in the time we were there, there were 5 weddings (which I thought was a lot, but then I found out there was going to be 27 the next day) and it was just busy, busy, busy! 

On Tuesday, we had Spanish Forum, and I learned a lot about finding joy in the mission, proselyting online, and working with members. It was funny because when president Burton spoke to us, he began by asking us what we learned today. And he approached one elder and he said, "Elder, what did you learn today? Stand up and tell us." And with one hand, grabbed him by the lapels and pulled him up on his feet. President Burton's funny. But he's great.

Wednesday was normal, then Thursday was transfers, Friday was the temple trip, Saturday was a stake missionary breakfast, where all the missionaries in the stake had breakfast with the Stake Presidency. It was good. There was food I could eat, so don't worry. :) then we had correlation right after, and that night there was the baseball game! We went to Red Robin right before with a member and she offered us a ride to the game because she was going, too! We we're so grateful because the Metro would have been packed like sardines in a can, and then it turned out that the line we would have taken home had been shut down, so that was a blessing! The Nationals won, if you were wondering. 6-1. It was a good game. We got home at 11:30 and went straight to bed.

Then church yesterday (it was so nice to have investigators at church!) and we had a nice long nap and dinner and then we went out to work.

I'm so grateful today is preparation day! It was a crazy week. Now the dust is settling and it's nice to rest a little. 

I've decided I'm never going to ask a missionary how much time they have or how much time they have left because when I went to the temple with the other sister missionaries, one of them was talking about the night before when her companion told a member, "yeah, my companion has 6 weeks left." The Sister said, "I could just see the member shut me out, as if I didn't matter because I was going home soon." And I thought it was so sad! So, I've decided not to ask about a missionary's time, so they can feel better about their service and that they can feel like they actually matter. 

93 degree, humid weather

3 August 2015

I'm at an Hermanas activity right now. I'm playing volleyball in the 93 degree, humid weather! :D it's ok. I'm almost used to it. The humidity, I mean. :)

Yesterday, we were in the Primary (I was playing piano). But we had forgotten that we had agreed to help in Relief Society! So, Hna. Peabody rushed over to help, and I stayed at my station on the bench. It all worked out.

The mosquitos continue to bite us. But it's ok. We'll live. :)

We had dinner on Saturday in a restaurant where a member works, and he said, "Hermanas, I'm so happy you came to visit me!" He was really cute about it. He's one of the ward missionaries.

Eventful week

 I drew this in personal study yesterday, trying to grasp more about

the plan of Salvation. My drawing skills still aren't the best in the

world...:)

Sister Frei and I at the Washington DC temple!

The temple was wonderful!

This week was eventful! We met a lot of people and taught a good amount of lessons. Our area is HUGE! We cover the Oakton Stake and half of the Ashburn Stake. City-wise, we cover Herndon, Reston, Sterling, Ashburn, and a corner of Chantilly and a corner of Great Falls. Sometimes we go into Leesburg if we have a member or an investigator up there. 

Investigator-wise, we had three who were really progressing who are just simply hard to get ahold of, so we can't teach them well, and they don't come to church, so they're not progressing as fast as they could...it's frustrating.

There was a baptism in Old Town that I went to on Saturday. It was two kids I had been teaching before I left, and the mom didn't want to give them permission before, but one day, she just had idea to give them permission, and now they're baptized! I was so happy! 

I had my first lesson with an older Hispanic who has Alzheimer's. She's so cute. She kept introducing her son to us and asking where the church was. It was cute. 

I made pancakes the other day, but I burned them and set off the smoke alarm! It was so sad, but funny, too. :) The alarm also went off when I burnt my bacon, too. Smoke alarms and I just don't get along, I guess. :) maybe I just need to refine my cooking skills. 

Other than that, there's nothing really new. Next week is going to be crazy, because we have an Hermanas activity on Monday, Spanish Forum on Tuesday, transfer meeting on Thursday, my temple trip on Friday, and the baseball game on Saturday. :) It'll be great. 

The first stranger the cat trusted

13 July 2015

This week, we found a couple with a cat and the poor kitten had just gotten her long fur trimmed back because she's a long-hair cat and it's a hot summer. She looked like a little white lion. But as we were talking to the couple, the cat came up to me, her eyes HUGE and she touched her nose to my hand. The wife said that I was the first stranger the cat trusted. It made me feel good. :) That couple was interesting. They believe in all the faiths and they read all the books that are considered holy-the Torah, the Koran, the Bible. We asked them if they had a Book of Mormon. They didn't, so we gave them one. :) Now they can read that, too!

The baptism was good! There were leftover refreshments, so the missionaries got to take a good portion of it. :) chips and soda for days, man...I'll just get some guacamole, it'll be fine! :)

I'm doing good with my Spanish goal! I'm actually a little bit ahead, which is good, because life threw some curve balls at me, like Zone Conference this Friday, we'll be going to the baseball game in August-that'll be fun for the TIWIs! I was just thinking about last year, and how we didn't get home until midnight....and the TIWIs mark if you're out later than10:30....yeah, we'll need to figure that out. :)

This week, we got a document about health-related things, like how to identify ticks and chiggers and poison ivy and hives and all that good stuff-only it gives me the heebie-geebies whenever I read it. But that's OK! It helps me to know I'm healthy, and it's good information to know. :)

This next week is zone conference. Next week, we'll also have interviews with President Huntsman. We didn't do both with President Riggs in the same transfer, but since President Huntsman is new, I guess that's why we're having both in the same transfer. I dunno.

Yesterday, I decided that I need to read the institute manuals. I've never been to institute, but I think I can learn a lot from it! So, I'm excited.

This is me, Hna. Mensinger, Hna. Moleli, and Sis. Otteman at the zoo! (Hna. Otteman is the one taking the picture, smiling at the camera)

A member gave us this interesting fruit. It looks like a red urchin, cause it's got lots of spines on it, but then you peel it open, and the fruit is white, with a white, almond-shaped seed in the middle. It's really sweet, not much flavor, but it's good! I forget what the name of it is.

This is the stainless steel mural that's in the Hispanic Division of the Library of Congress. It's pretty cool. Artists are still trying to figure out how it was made.

Ordinances

6 July 2015

Well, this week has been hard. I'm going through a period of growth right now, and it hurts, but it's just growing pains, right? :) Mostly it has to deal with over-scheduling. It's very stressful, I don't recommend it. What happens is that I'll say to a person, "Yeah, we'll see you Wednesday at 7!" and then to another person I'll say, "Yeah! We'll see you at 7 on Wednesday!" And then my sweet companion Hna. Peabody or the Holy Ghost will remind me we already scheduled something for Wednesday at 7 with the first person. Then I have to go back to person #2 and explain that we already have an appointment, can we reschedule?.........Merg. It's frustrating, but oh, well. It'll all work out.

We met the Huntsmans this week! President and Sister Huntsman have 8 kids. 5 of which are still living at home. President Huntsman is a soft-spoken, small person, but he's great. We love him. Hna. Peabody and I talked to a newer sister who came out on her mission a week ago and we asked her her opinion about President Huntsman. She said, "I love him! I don't really know much of anything about President Riggs, 'cause I only knew him for a week, but President Huntsman is going to be great!" So, all around, we're all excited. :)

We got our TIWI fixed! Turns out the problem was that it was falling off the window! One of the glue dots was loose, so the technician took it off and glued it back on again, and then Elder Lowe, the fleet manager, asked us to take it for a spin. It took us to reset it before it worked properly again, but it works now!

We taught the Young Women's class yesterday! All about ordinances. So, we started off with "What's the difference between an ordinance and a covenant?" Then we listed off all the ordinances, identified the saving ordinances, and did a little practice-teach with the girls where they explained to a friend why they needed to be baptized/needed to be rebaptized. I told them there are three things baptism needs to have in order to be acceptable before God: the proper authority, the age of accountability, and it has to be by immersion. They thought that was really cool.

I have come up with an ambitious Spanish goal. I counted, and to go through one of the books I wanted to finish, about Spanish, it has 39ish grammar principles that I want to go over before I leave, and I had a little less than 12 weeks when I calculated this. So, the ambitious Spanish goal is to cover 1 grammar principle every 1 or 2 days until the Monday before my release. I'm doing really well, so far. Granted, it's only been the first few days, but it makes me excited!

This next week, there's a baptism in the ward. They asked me to play piano for it, so we'll be going and inviting everyone to come. It'll be good.

Come unto Christ and be perfected in Him

29 June 2015

My new companion is Hna. Peabody! She's from Park City, Utah and she is amazing! She didn't even know she was being transferred until transfer meeting! They called out her name and she said, "Wait, what?" Usually, we get the call two nights before that we're being transferred, but the assistants forgot to tell her district leader, so he told her she was staying. So it was a good thing it was a whole mission conference because if it wasn't, she wouldn't had known she was getting transferred, and I would have been companionless! But, she was there, so it was good. 

We had a dinner appointment, so we went to that and then went back to her old apartment to pack her up. We got home late, but we got everything except the toothbrush and the toothpaste! Those we just bought the next day. Also, we took home 2 elders in our car (yes, we are allowed to take elders to and from meetings) and 3 bikes from transfer meeting-two for the Chinese elders and one for the Russian elders. Now I know how to work a bike rack! :) We had to take it off as soon as we were done delivering the bikes because Virginia law says it's illegal to have a bike rack on if you don't have any bikes on it! The elders helped us to do that. Thank heavens for the elders!

But, yeah, we're getting along great! She's still kind of in shock from being transferred on such short notice, but she's settling in well. This is her second area.

One of the great things about goals, beyond the fact that they're not set in stone, is that often God has us set goals higher than we can reach, but He has us set those higher goals because He knows we wouldn't get to where He needs us to be if He didn't have us set those goals. When I learned that, I realized that was why I didn't make many of my goals before my mission. God helped me to set higher goals than I could reach so that I would get to where He wanted me to be, even though I felt horrible that I didn't reach those goals. Now I understand better about goal-setting, and I'm not too scared to set them anymore. :) I'm still scared, but not too much! :)

I also forgot in my email last week about how we can achieve goals. Because the ultimate goal is to be like Christ, but how do we do it? Moroni 10:32 has the answer: "Come unto Christ and be perfected in him." I love John Bytheway's explanation about this. He quotes someone about a "spiritual dyslexia" and then says "It's like not going into the doctor because you're too sick. Can you just hear the doctor?--'Mr. Jones, you look terrible. Why didn't you come in sooner?' 'I couldn't come in, doctor, I was too sick!' And the doctor says, 'but I help sick people.' Or like not going into the orthodontist because your teeth aren't straight--'What happened to your teeth?' 'Well, I couldn't come in with crooked teeth, so I straightened out my incisors with the pliers!' And the orthodontist says, 'But that's what I do.' It's not fix your car and then take it into the mechanic-- 'Honey, I can't take our car to the mechanic! Do you want him to hear the squeaky fan belt? Have you no shame?!' Then they get there and the mechanic asks, 'why does it smell like I-hop in here?' 'Oh, I put bacon grease on the fan belt.' And then the mechanic says, 'but why didn't you come to me? I fix cars! That's what I do!' It's not stop the bleeding, set the bone straight, stitch yourself up, and then go to the ER--'Dude, did you stitch yourself up with fishing line?!' 'Yeah, I couldn't find the stapler. Or the duct tape.' And the paramedics are going, 'But that's our job. That's what we do.' And this one--'Honey, I thought you were sick and asked your sister to come help you clean the house.' 'Yeah, but I don't want her to see the house in this condition!' 'But that's what housekeepers do!' And too many of us think that we have to be perfect before we come unto Christ, and Christ is saying, 'no. You'll be perfected in me. That's what I do.'" That's why I'm so grateful for the Atonement, because I know I can change through it and eventually be perfected in Him.

There's another baptism coming up! Last night, I accidentally locked us out of the apartment (left the keys on my desk), so we walked to the church while we were waiting for the elders to come bring a spare key and I got a call from some Hermana missionaries from my last area and they said, "Gilberto wants to talk to you!" So Giberto got on the line and he said, "Hermana Brown, I told you before you left that you would be the first missionary to know when I was getting baptized. I'm picking my date right now." And he picked July 18! I'm so excited! He's come such a long way! He'll need all the prayers he can get, though, so please pray for him. 

President Riggs and his family are leaving this week! From what I understand, President Huntsman and his family will fly in, and he and President Riggs will spend one day together, and then President Riggs and his family will fly out! We're going to miss President Riggs, but we know President Huntsman is going to be just as great!

So, I have a confession to make, and that is that mother knows best. I know you warned me to be well-hydrated and drink lots of electrolytes, and I thought I was doing really well! But last Monday, we taught a lesson outside, in the hot humidity, and I almost passed out. Then the next day, after district meeting, we went back home and I slept the whole day. And I feel bad because it was Hna. Mensinger's birthday! But she was ok with it. So, I'm repenting and drinking lots of water and Gatorade and the Emergen-C Now hna. Peabody is kinda suffering from heat, too, so we'll work through it together! :)

Self! You're forgiven

22 June 2015

Speaking of tornados, it's true what they say about the sky turning green before tornados. There was a tornado warming for our area on Friday and we didn't realize it, so we were out and about, driving to our next appointment and I saw the sky was turning green, like a dark marine color. Then it poured out rain and so when we ran from our car to our appointment, we got soaking wet, water pouring from our eyebrows. Then Hna. Mensinger lost her watch, so we ran back and found it in the grass. We got to eat a really interesting-looking, really sweet fruit at our appointment, though. So it was worth it. :) We stayed there until the tornado warning was gone, then we went home. And then we found texts from the zone leaders asking us if we were ok because we were supposed to text them when we got under cover, but we didn't know, so we hadn't until we got home...yeah, that was fun.

This week, I tried to make dinner rolls without a recipe. I started off with the gluten-free flour and water, then hna. Mensinger helped me figure out that I needed to put a bit of baking soda, sugar, salt, and an egg. then I made six globs of dough on the pan and put it in the oven at 450 for 20 minutes. The end result was pretty decent. They tasted a bit like crepes. Couldn't complain.

I'm buying a GPS today. Hna. Mensinger's leaving the area with transfers this week, and she's taking her GPS with her, and our area is huge, so I'm getting a GPS to know where I'm going. :)

So, because of the service activity on Monday, we split our preparation day. We emailed on Monday, and then had the rest of the time on Wednesday because of Spanish Forum on Tuesday. So, on Wednesday, Hna. Mensinger wanted to get her hair done for her birthday. She wanted highlights. We have an investigator who is a hair-styling student, and she said, "Come to my school! We'll do your hair!" So we went there (took the Metro) and when we get there, we find it's a Hispanic hair school. They weren't available until 2, and then, 3 hours later, her hair was done..Hispanic style. Three bold, bright stripes on top of her head, and a lot more interspersed throughout her hair. She was horrified and devastated. So, later, she bought some stuff and made more highlights so that it looks better now. I didn't get any highlights, though. Then we also went shopping and we got toilet paper, then came home and realized we had gotten paper towels! :) ....TP and PT...don't get the two confused! :)

Spanish Forum was good! Just about the whole thing was in Spanish, except for President Riggs' address. During Spanish Forum, a returned missionary gave a talk on the doctrine of goal-setting. Because we read in Proverbs 29:18 "Where there is no vision, the people perish." So, we need a vision. Matthew 5:8 and 3 Nephi 12:48, Christ gives us that vision-we are to be perfect. And in order to reach that vision, we need goals. Setting goals are acts of faith, and we need to set goals that have meaning for us. So, if the goals change along the way because things we need to work on change, that's ok. Because goals are not set in stone. They are changeable. When I learned that, I was a lot easier about setting goals. We were invited to make 5 goals. Bold goals. And, honestly, simply setting the goals was bold enough for me. It was hard. But now I have them, 5 little things to work on everyday and I feel like I have more purpose in my life, now that I set goals for something that I really want to do. And sure, the past haunts me, but when that happens, I say to myself, "Self! You're forgiven. You don't need to think about that anymore. Let it go. 'Era yo, mas yo no soy.'" I'm so grateful for the Atonement!

We're also finding people to teach, so that's also exciting! People are finally accepting return appointments! Yay! 

God knows all that

15 June 2015

This week has been so....interesting and busy! Busily interesting, and interestingly busy! The lady who got married two Saturdays ago was baptized on the 13, with her son, so I went and gave the talk about the Holy Ghost. I was super nervous, but Hna. Mensinger said I did good, so yay. It was all in Spanish, too! :) It was really sweet to see that family come together. The dad baptized the son, and they were both crying when they bore their testimonies afterward. The daughter was crying, too. It was a very powerful, very spiritual event.

We had gone on the Metro to get to the baptism, and then a nice sister gave us a ride back. It took us 2 hours to get there by Metro, 30 minutes back...Aw, well. What do you do?

There was also another baptism yesterday that the mom asked me to play piano in, so we went. It was a really good experience, but let me tell you, it is hard to scroll sheet music on an I-pad while trying to play it at the same time. But, it worked out, so life's good!

We just got done with doing service for the World Police and Fire games. I worked up a sweat. All we did was stuff bags for the participants, but we worked so fast! We put in a booklet, several papers about the Fairfax area, a fyler for Piasanos, a carabineer, and a thing you can wrap ear-buds around. Pop quiz (this one's for dad): How long does it take 30 missionaries to fill 3000 bags, given that, on average, it takes 1 missionary 1.5 minutes to fill 1 bag? Answer: 1 hour and 45 minutes. We're proud of it. :) We worked hard. And then there was pizza at the end, so, you know, that helped too! :) We did it on Saturday, as well, from 9-1, and we did about 6000 bags. There were about 70 of us, then.

I had a brain-blowing thought yesterday. I thought about all the languages, all the professions, all the sports, all the technology, all the history in every single country, all the animals, all the plants, every climate, and I thought about how God knows all of that. Wow. And then I thought about how we are children of God and have the potential to become like Him. Which means we have the brain capacity enough to remember all of that! We just have to keep learning!

Plancakes

8 June 2015

You see, what had happened with the towing was is that we had parked in the visitor parking, then we went to our appointment. We came out at 8:30 and Hna. Mensinger pressed the button. There was no sound! We thought, for a brief moment, we thought someone had stolen the car, but there was a man sitting right in front of where our car had been, so we went up and asked him if he has seen the grua come by (grua means tow-truck.) he said, "Yeah, there was a white car here, but someone came out of a house and pointed to the car and the grua took it away about 15 minutes ago. It was really weird because the car was in visitor parking, and it wasn't when the grua usually comes by." Ay, ay, ay. So we went to the front of the complex that has a sign about "if you're towed, call this number." so we called that number, and sure enough, our car was there. We went back to our appointment's house and asked them if they could drive us to the lot, and they took us. It was $160. We split the cost, though. So we each paid $80. It wasn't too bad.

We did not find the apartment keys. What we did there was the office elders got the spare set from the office and drove to our apartment, they gave us the keys, then waited to take them back after we were done opening the door. However, when we explained the situation, they said, "OK. You can keep the keys until you get the new ones. Then get us a set of the new keys when you have them." So that's what we did. We now have new locks on our door and on our mailbox. :) Pretty fancy. :)

This week, we had lots of dinner appointments. That was awesome! I let the members know about my allergies, and so they fed us mostly rice and chicken. I love rice, though, so I was happy. One of the dinner appointments we went to was in beautiful house. The walls looked nice, there were antique-looking statues, staircases all over the place, going up and down. I loved it!

We went to another appointment on Wednesday night to a house that had a cat. My companion is allergic to cats, so she told me, "You need to take charge of this lesson because I will be useless." So I did, but one of the girls asked her, "Are you allergic to animals?" She said, "Yeah, I'm allergic to cats." The girl said, "Man, you're allergies must be going crazy because we've got six cats in the house right now."  Six cats! No wonder her allergies were going nuts! Turns out their cat had a litter of 5 kittens. We didn't look at them because we weren't sure of how the momma would've reacted, but knowing that they were there made me so happy!

We also spent a lot of time cleaning our apartment. To misquote Gandalf "There are older and fouler things than dust bunnies in the deep corners of the apartment." :) We cleaned out the closet of extras and the extra food that members gave us. We're going to give it away. :) But I feel so much better about the apartment. We also got new closet doors on that closet. The old one was too heavy-Maintenance tried to put it back up and the door broke the new pin!-So we got new closet doors. They look good though.

Our sister-training-leaders came over on Friday and made pancakes for our weekly planning. They called them, "plancakes." :)

The most exciting part about the week though is that I got to play piano for a wedding!!!!!!!! It was the wedding of one of my old investigators from Old Town. It was so great! The wedding was beautiful, the ceremony simple, and I was so happy! My cheeks hurt afterward from smiling so big. :) I was so happy! I'm so excited to get married, now. :)  

There's a local heron that stands in the lake we walk around everyday. he makes me smile. I saw some deer a couple nights ago. Also, there are turtles in the lake--we saw a couple of them up on the banks last week. We drive by a few flocks of geese and goslings. The goslings are growing up now, and they don't look quite so cute now... :) They were cute a few weeks ago when they were just balls of feathery fluff, but now they're looking more like adults, and so they aren't so cute. :) But it's ok. We saw some cardinals on our walk around the lake today, too.

Over all, things are good, here. The work is going forward, and life is good. :)

"Los Bendiciones no tienen pies, nosotros si." (Blessings don't have feet, we do!)

1 June 2015

We took the Metro into D.C. Man, I'm getting real good at taking it. :) I have a wedding I'm playing piano at this Friday, and it looks like we'll have to take the Metro to get there, too.

This week was really interesting...we got towed, lost our apartment keys, and one of our most promising investigators dropped us, but we had an AWESOME activity on Saturday with family history!

All the Spanish missionaries in the ward were asked to come help at this activity because there were going to be Spanish classes. So we went and helped out a member with indexing Spanish records, then we watched a video of a talk entitled, "Los Bendiciones no tienen pies, nosotros si." (Blessings don't have feet, we do!) I don't know if it's in English, but it was a very interesting video about family history, how it blesses our lives, and how we can get those blessings. One of the things that interested me most was that the speaker talked about an experience he had while serving in his country. A General Authority came and gave a prophecy about how the sparsely empty chapel would be filled to capacity by the next conference in 6 months. Then, as the man was driving the General Authority back to the airport, the Authority said to him, "If the prophecy is not fulfilled, it's your fault." The man thought about this on the way back to the meeting house and then shared it with the other leaders. They got very excited, worked hard, and by the time the conference rolled around, the little chapel was filled to capacity. It was really cool. Then we helped the members fill out the little Family booklet and open their accounts. I started filling out a little booklet, too, even though all of that work has been done already, but it was amazing to feel the love I have for my family grow as I wrote down memories and stories from their lives. I just love family history. I am anxious to work on it when I get back. We're not connected to Adam and Eve, yet, so there's work to be done! :)

We also got Tiwis this week. We still don't know what the acronym stands for, but the one we came up with was "Trust Issues With Individuals." :) The Tiwi acts as a driving mentor. It tells you when you're driving too fast and marks aggressive driving behavior, like suddenly accelerating or slamming on the brakes or swerving around a corner too fast. It's been tested in 25 missions in the U.S. and Canada, and now the Brethren want it in all missions in the U.S. and Canada. So after 6 hours of installation, we now have a Tiwi! It took 6 hours because the installation team had to plug it into the computer of the car, so if we tamper with it, we get our driving privileges revoked. :D It sounds tough, and it does make us a little nervous, but it's for the better. The church will need to pay less money to purchase vehicles, maintain, and repair them, and put that tithing money to good use, like building temples! :)  

So, yesterday, we practice-taught door approaches, and I did horribly! I've always thought I have about as many social skills as a slug and I couldn't do door approaches because of one thing or another, but this morning, it occurred to me that door approaches and talking to people is only hard and awkward because I make it hard and awkward. So we practice-taught door approaches again today and it went so much better! I just relaxed and the words came out! It was great! It's still slightly awkward, but I'm getting better!

This week, we get to deep clean the apartment :) I love cleaning. It helps me de-stress.

It's gotten hot and humid here. Welcome to June, right? :) 

Besitos

May 25, 2015

We can still go to D.C. We're allowed to go once every transfer, or in other words, once every six weeks. We went today, actually. We went to the Museum of the American Indian. It was really cool, especially to see all their hand-crafted stuff like the bead-weaving and the fabric weaving, etc. 

This week was busy, as usual. We taught lots of lessons, and yesterday we went to a baptism of a son of a member in our ward. 

Also yesterday, we went to church at the English ward for an hour because a less-active was going, so we supported her. That was in the morning, then we went to our own Spanish church in the afternoon. English wards are so strange..you don't have to give besitos (kiss on the cheek) to everybody, there's a lot more people, you can actually fit more than one speaker in between the sacrament and the intermediate hymn..English wards are really weird...it's ok, I'll get over it.

But I was told today that there are three baptisms in my old area this month! One for almost every Saturday! Best part is, they were all my investigators! So I'm going! I'm so excited! 

We're getting TIWIs this week. I have no idea what the acronym stands for, but it's a little gadget that goes in the car and lets you know when your driving gets scary. :D like, if you go more than five over, if you stop or start too suddenly, if you turn too fast, things like that. It'll be good. It'll will teach us good driving habits. Hopefully. 

Library of Congress

May 18, 2015

Things are going well, here. It's a slower area than the one I'm used to, but that's ok. Lots of work keeps me out of trouble. :) It's 3 times bigger than my previous area, and we're the only Hermanas in the ward, and we were stressed very much, but we gave some people to the elders, so we aren't so stressed now.

I wasn't able to go to the wedding on Saturday, but I did go to her baptism yesterday and she looked SO happy! And she was beautiful, all dressed in white. It was nice to see that last year's hopes finally came true. I was so happy for her and she was happy, and I think her husband will get baptized too, eventually.

So, the story of the Library of Congress goes like this: When Hna. Atkinson and I went to the Library of Congress, we ran into a member and he said, "I work in the Hispanic division of the Library of Congress. Come by sometime and I'll give you a tour." and he gave us a referral, so we decided to go visit him that day. We went, met his coworker-who was his referral-and he gave us a tour of the Hispanic division! It was so cool! He showed us this court case that had been painted by the native Americans that Cortez had stewardship over. The natives couldn't read or write a lick of Spanish, so instead, they painted what they wanted back as restitution for the heavy taxes the Spaniards put on them. It was cool. Also, I got to see the first Spanish dictionary and a stainless steel mural, made for Columbus. It was really cool! Also, I learned that there are 93 miles of shelving in the Library of Congress, and they still don't have enough space for all the books. It was cool. :)

Building

May 11, 2015

My most hopeful goal for this week is that I can feel the Holy Ghost every day. There is nothing quite like feeling the Holy Ghost telling me I've done a good job today, to feel satisfied with the work I did. 

We went to the Cheesecake Factory today. It's a restaurant. At first, I thought it was just a bakery for cheesecake, but it's a restaurant! With cheesecake for dessert. I had a slice of cherry cheesecake....I'm feeling it now. Probably shouldn't have eaten it...oh,well. That's what repentance is for, right?  It's a good thing it's a prominent part of our lives.

 

This week, President Riggs had us read Nehemiah chapters 1-6, about Nehemiah rebuilding the wall of Jerusalem. Then, he analyzed with us how we can apply that to our mission. Nehemiah was bold in telling the king that he was sad because the king had destroyed Jerusalem and asking leave to rebuild it. Then he was bold in telling the people of Jerusalem that they were a reproach, but there was something they could do to fix it-rebuild the wall! But since it was so big, they needed everybody to work "from the rising of the morning until the stars appeared", like missionaries work all day-and they all worked on different sections of the wall-like areas in a mission. And because they all worked so hard, all together, at their assigned areas, they got the wall rebuilt in 52 days....when President Riggs did this with us, he only had 53 days left in his mission, so we're building a wall! Which is strange, because you'd think that missionaries are to break down walls, but we're building a wall! We're building by being bold. Using scriptures boldly in our lessons, boldly inviting, making our prayers mighty, becoming bold like Nehemiah! It's going to be awesome! "The people [have] a mind to work."

And so, I'm going back to build! 

Many meetings

4 May 2015

My companions and I are good! We laugh together a lot. Mostly, we just laugh at silly things we do and my little emotional explosions. It helps me though, because when I express my anger and then they laugh, it helps me realize that I don't really need to be angry, and that I can laugh at my shortcomings, too.

Things have been very busy this week. Every single day, almost, had a meeting of some sort. Tuesday was Sister's Conference. We did an activity of expressing, on paper, the blessings and gifts we received in our patriarchal blessings in the form of "I will become" or "I have been blessed with." It was a good exercise.

Wednesday was district meeting, where we talked about revelation through church attendance and how we can help our investigators understand the importance of going to church.

Thursday was Zone Conference. Something I really liked was President's analogy of the Atonement to a Subway gift card- Someone had to earn the money and buy him that gift card. But, it has terms and conditions. In order to use that gift card, he has to go to a Subway, place an order(chicken chipotle on flatbread is the best, he says), then hand the gift card to the cashier. Likewise with the Atonement. Christ worked and bought us redemption at the cost of his own life. But, there are terms and conditions to using the Atonement. We have to come into Him, confess and forsake our sins, and follow His commandments. But the best part about this Redemption Card is that it never runs out. I really liked that. Also, he shared with us the date interview questions he would have with his daughter's dates. Before the date, he would take the young man aside and then start with, "Would you like to say the opening prayer or do you want me to do it?" Then, if the young man didn't ask for the Spirit to be with them on the date, President Riggs would say, "I noticed you didn't ask for the Spirit to be with you on the date. Is there a reason for that?" Then he'd remind them that he was once a young man too and say, "What are you plans for the date?" "If that falls through, what are your back-up plans?" Then he'd ask, "What are you going to do to make sure you are never alone with my daughter?" Then finally, "Where will you be going?" and "What time will you be getting back?" I think it's a great idea! I'm going to ask my husband to do it with our daughters. :)

Friday was weekly planning, not really a meeting, but it kind of is, when all of the missionaries of a companionship or tripanionship get together and we plan what we'll be doing next week. It helps us be productive, and when we're productive, we're happy.

Saturday was the adult session of stake conference. We were taught a lot about how ward councils help in the conversion process. It was really neat to see how people are benefitted from that.

Sunday was the general session of Stake Conference. We were taught about how to minister with kindness, and if necessary, use words. Then, in the evening, we went to a fireside, and 3 of our 4 recent converts spoke! We were all so proud of them! It was also great to see some people that I haven't seen in awhile.

But, along with the meetings, President Riggs asked us to fast over the weekend for more passion and boldness. Yesterday, as we were about to go break our fast, a car pulled up and the man in the passenger's side said, "Hey, sisters, can I talk to you a bit about Jesus?" We said, "Sure." So he talked to us about how, because Christ died on the cross for us, we're saved and we don't need to do anything else. While my companions talked with the man, I stood quietly by the car. Then, as the talk turned to the Book of Mormon, the thought came to me that we had been fasting for more passion and boldness, and this was an opportunity to express that. So I walked up to the car just as he was saying, "I can't take the Book of Mormon because if I take it, I'm showing God that what He has given me is not enough." I said, "Ever thought that the Book of Mormon is God's way of saying, 'yes, your offering is acceptable and I want to give you more'?" He still didn't take it, but the men in the back did. I'll probably never see those men again, but that's all the more reason to be bold now, right? We only have one shot at a strong first impression, so we better make it good. :)

Something funny that happened this week was that one of our recent converts was smelling his shoe (he's an 8-year-old), and his mom said, "Stop it! If you keep smelling your shoe, the bad bacteria will go into your brain and you will stop being smart!" the way she said it in her El Salvadoranian accent made it very funny. :)

Forsythia Hedge-the yellow made me happy!

Cherry Blossoms!

April 20th, 2015

This week, we went to the visitor's center with a returning member and his mom. We wanted to watch "Meet the Mormons," but it was too late to start it, so we watched the "Treasure in Heaven, the John Tanner Story" instead. It was really weird watching it in English....we wanted to watch it in Spanish, but they didn't have it, so we watched it in English (he speaks fluent English, so it's ok) and there's a quote at the beginning of the movie that I had never seen before! It said, "Consecration is the only surrender in which there is also victory." By Neal A. Maxwell. I'm still pondering about what it means, but so far, I found out the word "Surrender," if you go back to it's old English meanings, literally means "giving back above or beyond, to hand over to cause to be." I thought that was interesting. So, by consecrating ourselves, we are giving back to the Lord above and beyond what we normally give, and we're handing over whatever it is we have to cause to be and to become something better. But, this surrender is a victory because God blesses us and gives back to us what we need. (See also the Mormon Message "the Refiner's Fire", last line spoken). So, consecration is the only surrender where we give up ourselves and everything we have to the Lord and the Lord gives everything we need back to us! It's a win-win! But, I also thought it was interesting that the movie said John Tanner gave an equivalent of $250 million to the church. Wow. That's a lot.

Other than that, life has been a blur of activity! We decided we get more done as a trio. But it's been good. Hna. Tate drives the car, I drive the GPS, and Hna. Pettit drives the phone! It all works out! And then, when you're in a crowd of people, you can talk to everybody! It's great! They've helped me to laugh at my mistakes and get better with being social and Spanish-just about everything, really.

We almost have a date for the wedding for our investigator and we're going to help her with the shopping on Thursday. My companions are excited to go shopping. I'm not, but that's ok. I'll come along to support them, anyway. :)

Cherry Blossom pictures: