First Transfer Complete!

Hey, hey!

So, my first transfer is over and I'm staying in Aurora! Which is exciting but a little scary at the same time because I'm companions with Hermana Adams and she's only been out for two transfers - her first transfer was here in Aurora and her second one was in an english speaking area, so basically we each only have 6 weeks of speaking spanish!!

Haha yesterday when the ward member found out that it was Hermana Adams and I staying there were a few of them that came up to us and were like, "if you need anything just call me. You can come over to our house any time you need to." And I'm sure they were thinking, "oh my heck, these poor sisters need all the help they can get..." and it's true! Hahaha :)

Hermana Adams and I dropped Hermana Lopez off at the mission home last night and she is currently on an airplane on her way home to Texas! Soooo crazy.

We all got to go to the temple last Friday for the departure session with President and Sister Ely. It was nice to go to the temple again! I got used to going every week in the MTC. It's a really pretty temple.

I really wish I could somehow convey people's voices over email because there are some stories that would be so much funnier if you could hear the people saying them! I will tell you this story and hope that it's still funny even though you can't hear the lady's voice :)

So the Relief Society president in our ward is this crazy old lady who speaks pretty good english but she has a super heavy accent. She's a nanny for the bishops kids who are CRAZY! I feel bad for her that she has to watch them because they're just wild little children.

So the other week were eating at her house and she was talking to us in english and she was talkin about how crazy the kids were being the day before and she said "sometimes I just have to threathen them that I'll do things I really never would do just so they'll listen to me! Like yesterday it was time for their nap and Yesenia and Kimberly were jumping on the their beds and I said, 'if you two don't stop jumping and go to sleep I'm going to go get the dog leash, tie you up in the closet and shut the door!'

And Kimberly real quick laid down and went to sleep, but Yesenia, oh Yesenia, she just wouldn't stop! So I grabbed her and put her in the closet and said, 'you stay right here! I'm going to get the dog leash!' and she looked up at me terrified and said, 'no! Hermana, I'll go to sleep! I promise!' so I said, 'you better!'"

Hahaha we were laughing SO hard when she was telling us this story! She's the craziest old lady! She said she has to tell the bishop that his daughters will tell him stuff she almost did to them, but not to worry about it because she never will, she just had to threaten them! Haha :)

So we've got two baptisms set for July 2nd, Cesar and Nancy, and one on the July 9th - my personal favorite, Genesis! The other day one of the elders asked me who my favorite investigator was and before I could answer Hermana Lopez was like, "I know - Genesis!" Haha she's just so cute :) She's such a good kid and she just wants so badly to be even better! She came to church yesterday too! She says she really likes it :)

The missionaries actually started teaching her mom before her and her mom has to work every sunday and Gensis is just so sad that her mom's not able to go to church. And I was about to drop her mom as an investigator because she just seems to lack motivation to change, she likes hearing our message and participating, but she just doesn't do stuff like read and pray unless we're there. But I'm hoping that seeing her daughter get baptized will give her the motivation she needs.

Well, this is kind of a boring letter, but not a whole ton happened this week!

I love you all very, very much :)

-Kelsey

First Transfer Complete!

Hey, hey!

So, my first transfer is over and I'm staying in Aurora! Which is exciting but a little scary at the same time because I'm companions with Hermana Adams and she's only been out for two transfers - her first transfer was here in Aurora and her second one was in an english speaking area, so basically we each only have 6 weeks of speaking spanish!!

Haha yesterday when the ward member found out that it was Hermana Adams and I staying there were a few of them that came up to us and were like, "if you need anything just call me. You can come over to our house any time you need to." And I'm sure they were thinking, "oh my heck, these poor sisters need all the help they can get..." and it's true! Hahaha :)

Hermana Adams and I dropped Hermana Lopez off at the mission home last night and she is currently on an airplane on her way home to Texas! Soooo crazy.

We all got to go to the temple last Friday for the departure session with President and Sister Ely. It was nice to go to the temple again! I got used to going every week in the MTC. It's a really pretty temple.

I really wish I could somehow convey people's voices over email because there are some stories that would be so much funnier if you could hear the people saying them! I will tell you this story and hope that it's still funny even though you can't hear the lady's voice :)

So the Relief Society president in our ward is this crazy old lady who speaks pretty good english but she has a super heavy accent. She's a nanny for the bishops kids who are CRAZY! I feel bad for her that she has to watch them because they're just wild little children.

So the other week were eating at her house and she was talking to us in english and she was talkin about how crazy the kids were being the day before and she said "sometimes I just have to threathen them that I'll do things I really never would do just so they'll listen to me! Like yesterday it was time for their nap and Yesenia and Kimberly were jumping on the their beds and I said, 'if you two don't stop jumping and go to sleep I'm going to go get the dog leash, tie you up in the closet and shut the door!'

And Kimberly real quick laid down and went to sleep, but Yesenia, oh Yesenia, she just wouldn't stop! So I grabbed her and put her in the closet and said, 'you stay right here! I'm going to get the dog leash!' and she looked up at me terrified and said, 'no! Hermana, I'll go to sleep! I promise!' so I said, 'you better!'"

Hahaha we were laughing SO hard when she was telling us this story! She's the craziest old lady! She said she has to tell the bishop that his daughters will tell him stuff she almost did to them, but not to worry about it because she never will, she just had to threaten them! Haha :)

So we've got two baptisms set for July 2nd, Cesar and Nancy, and one on the July 9th - my personal favorite, Genesis! The other day one of the elders asked me who my favorite investigator was and before I could answer Hermana Lopez was like, "I know - Genesis!" Haha she's just so cute :) She's such a good kid and she just wants so badly to be even better! She came to church yesterday too! She says she really likes it :)

The missionaries actually started teaching her mom before her and her mom has to work every sunday and Gensis is just so sad that her mom's not able to go to church. And I was about to drop her mom as an investigator because she just seems to lack motivation to change, she likes hearing our message and participating, but she just doesn't do stuff like read and pray unless we're there. But I'm hoping that seeing her daughter get baptized will give her the motivation she needs.

Well, this is kind of a boring letter, but not a whole ton happened this week!

I love you all very, very much :)

-Kelsey

Hey Hey!

So, there is this family, the Bailon family, who I loooove! There two daughters who are 18 and 14 are some of my FAVORITE people out here :) But the parents have been converts for like a year and a half I think, the 14 year old has been a member for about a year and the 18 year old just got baptized in January! So they are all fairly recent converts (there's 2 daughters under the age of 8 and one 16 year old boy who is taking the lessons currently) and they're really strong in the church and a couple weeks ago we found out they were getting sealed in the temple! We were so excited for them!! Then two days later Hna. Bailon was crying at church and said that the sealing was off because she felt like she didn't know enough and was kind of freaking out. She didn't straight up say she was freaking out, but I could tell.

Then on Tuesday at Institute we found out it was back on! We were happy again! Then on Thursday we went over to their house and everyone was super awkward and quiet and looked down and Hna Bailon was avoiding us at all costs. So I asked Carmen, the 14 year old, if they were going to the stake activity the on Saturday and she was like, "no. My mom doesn't want to go. She doesn't want to go to church anymore and she doesn't want to talk to anyone. She's not even talking to us anymore." I was like, "what?!" So we left and told the girls that if they needed anything to call us.

So we prayed for them, A LOT, those next couple days and on Saturday we saw them pull up the stake activity and we were SOOO excited! Hna. Bailon even brought a lady she had just met a couple days ago who did her daughters nails and the lady was interested in the church. She even brought the lady to church the next day. So a few days after church, I guess like a week ago, we went over because they had questions about the sealing and temple and stuff and Hna. Bailon said that the last week she was having a really hard time with everything and so she just decided to call the sealing off. She didn't want to go to church, she didn't want to talk to any members, she didn't want anything to do with the church. 

Then she took her daughter to get her nails done and the lady started asking her questions about the church and she said she REALLY didn't want to answer the lady's quesionts, but then she said, "I realized it would so selfish and ungrateful of me to NOT share this message with other people. I thought about all the blessings it's brought me in my life and how wrong it is to not let other people know about it."

This story just makes me laugh because Hna. Bailon was dead set on not getting sealed or talking to anyone in the ward, or even her own kids for that matter, but Heavenly Father knew EXACTLY what she needed, she needed someone to ask her about it so she could realize how blessed she's been to have this in her life and how amazing this gospel is. It just reiterated just how much Heavenly Father knows is individually and he knows perfectly well what we need in our lives.

So, the sealing is back on (this Saturday and we get to go!) and everything is seemingly great. I'm super excited to go to their sealing - it's going to be awesome!

Ok, I know I wrote about Genesis the 15 yeard old girl last week, but I will probably write about her every single week because I just LOVE this girl! So, on Tuesday we left her a For the Strenght of the Youth booklet and on Saturday we stopped by to see if she could go to church on Sunday so we could have the Bailons pick her up and we ended up teaching her a lesson, but before we started the lesson lesson I asked her if she had read some of the booklet and if she had any questions about it. She said, "Yeah, I read it-" And at this point I cut her off and said, "you read the whole thing?!" And she was like, "yeah!" So I said, "que bueno!!" Haha :) But then she continued and was like, "I read it, but I felt sad (and I thought, oh crap, what is she going to say? Does she not want to be baptized anymore??) because it says not to have tattoos and I do." And then I just wanted to laugh because she's so stinkin' cute! Then she was saying how much she regrets it and how she wishes she hadn't done it because people judge you buy your outward appearance. So I told her that it doesn't matter who she was (which I HIGHLY doubt she was ever a horrible kid because she's just so good!) in the past, it only matters how she acts now and that it doesn't matter what other people think.

She also has a tiny little nose ring and she said something about it saying that in the pamphlet too. So we taught about the Word of Wisdom and invited her to keep it and I know she totally will because she's amazing like that. SO, she FINALLY was able to come to church yesterday and we had the Bailons pick her up and at the beginning of church I could tell she was quite uncomfortable, which is totally understandable, but she seemed to get along with Carmen quite well (which I'm glad because Carmen could be a real brat if she wanted to :) ) and she met  a lot of the other girls and after church she seemed a lot more comfortable and said she really liked it! Oh! She also took her nose ring out which made me smile :)

There happened to be a baptism after church so she stayed for that too and she thought it was pretty cool! I asked her what she thought of everything and if it was weird and she just smiled and said, "it was a little weird, but I really liked it! I just wish my mom would come." And I asked her if the girls were nice to her and she said yeah! I asked Carmen what she thought of her and she's like, "she's cool! We were like.... laughing." Hahaha :)

Those are the two main stories of the week. It's kind of been a slow-ish week. Well, not slow but uneventful I guess. Some stories I would tell but I think they're only funny if you actually know the people, just because of their personalities and they way they talk. I wish I could somehow portray that over email :) 

Oh! I  guess this was quite the event - we are now a trio! Meaning there's three of us instead of two of us :) Last Wednesday we got a call from our mission pres. and he was like, "hey, do you guys have room for one more person?" so we said, "um, yeah." When really there's not any room, but we decided we'd be nice and make room :) But her name is Hermana Adams and her companion went back home to Kentucky for some reason so she joined our little companionship. But, here's the scary part... She came out one transfer before me (I actually met her in the MTC!), so 6 weeks before me, and Pres. said Hna Adams and I would probably stay here next transfer, which is SUPER exciting because that's what I wanted, but horribly horrifying because neither of us really even know Spanish!! It'll be tough if it really does happen but it'll be the best way to learn Spanish. I'm just worried I won't be able to teach people and fail miserably... haha :) But, I guess that's what relying on the Spirit is for :)

Well, I guess that is pretty much all for the week... I will write again next week and hopefully have some more interesting things to say :)

I loooooooove you all :)

-Kelsey

Hello everyone!

Let me tell you what, it's been quite a challenge getting to this point of writing my email... yesterday was Memorial Day so all the libraries were closed, so we were told we could come today. First we tried to go to the library super close to it, it's closed on Tuesday. Then we tried to go to another one about 10 minutes away, it doesn't open until 12. Then we went to this other library that GPS told us to go to, it was not there anymore. So, I'm FINALLY here :)

So.... where to start? Well, I've learned a new phrase from Kentucky that is quite weird: Burnt-slap up. It means hot. Like if you're outside and you get hot you say, "man, I'm burnt-slap up!" Weird, I know, but I guess that's the way it is. There's this Sister from Kentucky here and she said that and I was like, "what the crap does that mean?!" It's so funny to meet all these different people and hear the different phrases they use in their hometowns :)

Something they don't warn us about before coming and teaching Hispanics is that they talk FOREVER! Sometimes we have an hour lesson and only teach for like 15 minutes because they talk, and talk, and talk! We can't just stop by when we have an extra 10 minutes because we know we'll be there for at LEAST 45 minutes. It's ridiculous! I guess it's good in a way because than we really get to know them and understand what they're needs are. But sometimes I'm like, "seriously? How are you even able to talk this much?"

Remember Tony? Well, he came to church AGAIN! We were SO happy! It's pretty rare to have investigators come to church twice in a row, but ESPECIALLY when you've only taught them one lesson! We've tried to get in to see him again but twice we've gone and he hasn't been there because he's forgotten. So, we need to start calling him the night before to remind him. That happens soooo frequently, people are either forgetting their appointments and they're purposely gone when our appointment is - sometimes I can't figure out which one :) With Tony though I think he just genuinely forgets!

After church I asked him what he learned in class and he said "I learned there's more to the 10 commandments than I thought there was! Like with adultery  you don't have to actually be commited it, just looking at a girl and wanting to is a sin. When I heard that I was like, 'oh shoot!!'" Hahaha I laughed so hard :) But he seemed a lot more comfortable this week and he seemed a lot happier too! I'm so excited to teach him (if we can ever get in to see him!)

This last week I met the daughter of one of the investigators who's 15, her name is Genesis, and she's been taught a couple times before, been given a Book of Mormon, but she has been gone like the last 5 weeks the missionaries have gone over. So, she was finally there today and she is so stinkin' cute! And she asks really good questions so we know she's really listening and thinking about the stuff we're teaching her, like we were reading in 1 Nephi somewhere and she asked "so, what happens to people like in North Korea who don't have the opportunity to hear about this stuff on the earth?". She just seems super ready to accept the gospel so I'm excited to teach her too!

At the end of our lesson with her and her mom we invited them to pray about what we had talked about that day and she said, "last time I prayed I just felt so peaceful and so calm. I don't know why!" And both Hermana Lopez and I just started smiling because we were so excited that she had felt the Spirit! So we told her that is was the Spirit and she just smiled. But, she's way stinkin' cute and I can just tell she's a really good person.

So the Elders had a baptism on Saturday of this cute old lady who's 70-something years old! She was really excited and said she felt really peaceful and calm, and then she didn't show up on Sunday to get the gift of the Holy Ghost! I felt so bad for the Elders, they were super bummed because they were worried on Friday she was going to bail on them. They tried calling her but she didn't answer, so I hope she didn't freak out and that she'll come to church next week!

There's 6 missionaries in our ward here and we all had kind of a crappy week! Tons of our appointments cancelled, a lot of our investigators didn't come to church, etc. etc. But, this week will be better! By the way, if any of you are asked to go out with the missionaries and you tell them you'll go, please go! It's uber frustrating when we can't go teach a single man because we had set up with a priesthood holder to come and then they bail on us. It's funny the things you think about once you're a missionary that you never had thought too big of a deal of before :)

Everything is going quite good here -- especially the food! It's SO delicious! The Elders told me I had to try this soup and it's got cow stomach, corn and something else in it, so I did and they were all shocked I actually did it! It really didn't taste bad, but the texture of it was quite nasty! It gives me the chills a little bit to think of it :)

Hahaha last night we had dinner with La Familia Pizarro and their little 3 year old granddaughter was there and her brother who's like 10 came in and was like, "who drank all the orange soda?" And his grandma (the one that was feeding us) says, "it wasn't me or grandpa because we only drink diet." So the boy just jokingly looks and the dog and says, "she probably drank it!" And the little first says, "don't look at her! She didn't drink it! She's a girl -- she drinks diet!!" Hahaha we all laughed so hard! She's only 3 and she's already got that whole idea about girls needs to drink diet soda!

I'm slowly, very very slowly, starting to understand a little bit more Spanish than when I first got here. I don't get too frustrated unless I study Indirect and Direct object pronouns because I never understand that and I get frustrated when people talk to me and just expect me to understand them and get irritated when I don't because they know I've only been here for three weeks! But I love when people are surprised to find out that I've only been here for three weeks because they say I speak Spanish pretty well -- that always makes me happy :)

This ward has really been trying to help get the members involved in doing missionary work, like giving the missionaries references, talking to their non-member friends and family about the gospel but people are just so scared to do it (which I don't blame them, I was too before my mission) so tonight Hermana Lopez and I are doing a little lesson about how it's our responsibility to share the gospel with others and then we're going to have them role-play talking to their friends about the church and giving them a Book of Mormon. Hopefully it will help!

It's CRAZY how many people there are that are less-active. I didn't realize how many there were, not just here but all over the world, until coming on my mission. There are SO many people who get baptized and then a month or two later become inactive. It's pretty crazy.

Well, I must get back to the world of missionary work now. I will write next week (hopefully we don't have library problems... haha )

Love you guys :)

Hey Hey! We're The Monkeys. (That song has been stuck in my head all week)

Hi everybody!

 

So, I accidentally left my planner at the house and it had all my notes of things I wanted to write, so I hope I remember everything!

 

Last Sunday we got a referral for this guy named Tony, so we called him and set up an appointment and he seemed super nice. So we went over on Wednesday morning and taught him the first lesson, but he told his a ton of his life story and I thought it was quite interesting... He grew up catholic but they didn't really go to church at all and he never really read the bible or prayed. So now he's 29 years old, not married, doesn't have a girlfriend and he's got at least 4 kids who don't live with him. So he used to be in a gang and he said he's done pretty much every illegal thing in the book except for rape. He went to prison when he was 21 (we're not quite sure for what, and we probably don't want to know), but he was in prison for 5 and a half years! During this time he started reading the Bible. He read it all the way through and started to change his life, he decided he wasn't going to smoke or drink anymore. So he gets out of jail (I think about 2 years ago) and continues to live his new life of no drinking, smoking, and actually obeying the law :) But he said it's super hard because his friends and family all still smoke and drink and they always bug him to do it, they just don't understand it, and he doesn't want to leave his friends behind because he'll feel bad.

 

But as he was talking I was just thinking, "oh my crap, he has TOTALLY been prepared for our message!" So he keeps talking and all the sudden he's like, "yeah, sometimes I wonder what the purpose of life is." And I had to keep myself from laughing and yelling "that's exactly what our message is about!!" I almost started laughing because of how ridiculously ready he is to hear this message! We invited him to read the intro of the Book of Mormon and come to church on Sunday and he said he would. I've begun to notice how hard it is to get people to commit to things, or they will commit to reading or praying or whatever, but it's surprising if they follow through. So he said he's read the intro AND come to church and he seemed like he genuinely meant it.

 

We called him on Saturday night to remind him of church and he seemed a little iffy about it but on Sunday he showed up! After sacrament (oh yeah, I had to give a talk in sacrament, in SPANISH! yesterday... .hahaha it was actually fine, I just wrote it on a piece of paper and read it straight from that :) ) I asked him how how it was and he said, "good." and I was like, "did you think it was weird?" And I just laughed and he smiled and was like, "yeah, a little bit!" Haha but I think he liked it! AND he actually read the intro of the Book of Mormon, so I think the fact that he actually kept his commitments from the very first time we met with him just shows how ready he is! I'm super, super excited to teach him!

 

So Hermana Lopez and I actually live with some members, not of our ward, but he's the bishop of an english speaking ward in our area and they're nice enough to let the Spanish speaking sisters stay with them. But, they have these little neighbors who come over to their house all the time and kids aren't members so they're super fascinated with the missionaries. The boy's name is Bradley and he's like 3 or 4 and yesterday he was over while I was eating lunch and he came over and said in his cute little voice, "Hi Sister Robert!" So I said, "Hi Bradley!" while I had food in my mouth and he says, "Hey, don't talk with your mouth full!" Hahahaha I laughed so hard! He's so cute :) He thought it was pretty weird my name was Sister Roberts :)

 

So when we have dinner appointments we share a message at the end and Hermana Lopez has this favorite story of hers that she shares and it's about this women who is super, super poor and is homeless and has a tiny little baby to support, but she doesn't have a job, house, money, nothing. One day this man walks by and she asks him for help so he says he has a house and she can go in for exactly one minute and get anything that she needs for her baby and then after the minute the door automatically shuts and locks and she can't go back in. At this point we asked the people what they would grab, and most people say either food, clothes (one lady said a cow, I'm not sure who keeps cows in their house, but whatever...haha) or money.

 

Well, the other night we had dinner with the Relief President and we got done with dinner and told her the story and asked her what she would get and she looked us in the eye and said "a bible." Hermana Lopez and I just sat there for a second and stared at each other because we were so shocked by the answer! We asked her why and she said, "because it's the word of God. If I have that and the Book of Mormon than nothing else matters." And some people I think would just say that because they knew that was the "right answer" or whatever, but she was totally genuine. It was just amazing though because honestly out of all the time Hermana Lopez has told that story I have never once that about getting the BOM or the Bible.

 

So the end of the story goes that the lady grabbed the stuff and ran out of the house just and just as she shut the door she heard it lock. She got out and caught her breath and then realized she had left the baby in the house! So the point of the story is that Heavenly Father (the man) lets us come to the Earth for "one minute", but if we get so distracted by the materialistic things and all the hundreds of other distractions in this life then we forgot what's really important in this life. And it's doing the simple things everyday, like reading the scriptures and praying that help keep us focused on the real goal -- eternal life and joy.

 

I'm starting to be able to understand more and more Spanish (slowly, very slowly) but I still just sit and listen most the time :) Haha, last night we went to visit these investigators and there was a lady there who is a member and she's friends with them, and the lady, Hermana Fryer, speaks english as her second language (she knows quite a bit of english, but she's not fluent) and her niece was there and her niece was telling me about this work in Peru that they use all the time and they were trying to figure out what the english translation would be and they were like, "would it be shoot, dang, etc?" And Hna Fryer yells, " I know!" And she proceeds to say the d word like three times and we all just started busted up laughing and Hna Lopez was like "haha don't say that!" and she just covered her mouth and was like "Sorry!" Haha it was so funny :)

 

There was a baptism on Saturday of this kid who's probably like 16 and next week his sister is getting baptized! It's always interesting to me when teenagers and people from their 20's-late 30's want to change their lives and get baptized. I don't know why, but it just seems so amazing to me that people at that age, especially the teenagers, would have such a strong desire and that they would care so much. I just wonder what exactly got them to that point that they want to change when they are probably going to have to get new friends and stop doing all these things like smoking and drinking. I don't know, it's interesting, but I guess it just goes to show that the gospel can change anyone.

 

All the time I wish that I was a convert because I wish SO badly that I could see things the way people who have never heard about the church or the Book of Mormon or about all these different things. I don't know, I think it would be super interesting to understand exactly what they were thinking and how they were feeling as we were teaching them.

 

Will you all pray for the investigators out there in the world as well as the missionaries? Gracias :)

 

Well, I gotta go, but I will write next week!

 

I love you all sooooo stinkin' much :)

 

-Kelsey

First Week in the Field

So, it has officially been a week and it feel like I've been here forever! But not in a bad way, it just feels like I've been here forever because of all the many things we do in one day!

 

The people here are super, super nice and even though I've only met most of them like once I already love them :) The first day we got here we taught two lessons (well, I mostly just sat and listened because I had no idea what they were saying....haha) and then we went tracting and I gave out two Books of Mormon! It's a little intimidating knocking on random people's doors and telling them about the church, but once I start doing it it's really not that bad.

 

My companion's name is Hermana Lopez and she's from Texas! She's a native speaker which is super nice because I can ask her for help on my horrible Spanish. The funny thing is that because she's a native if I ask her if something is conditional, or why this word goes there or ask her about indirect and direct objects she's like, " I have no idea! That's just the way it is!" But I totally understand because I had absolutely no idea what those were until I started learning Spanish :) I've decided the best way to learn English is to learn another language, you learn so much about english!

 

So the first day we got here we went to the meet one of the counselors in the Relief Society Presidency and they were eating dinner (Oh, we had a dinner appointment in like an hour) but we told them we had an appointment and we weren't really hungry, BUT they forced us to eat :) And then I was cutting my meat with my fork and knife and they were like, "use your fingers! use your fingers!" so they made me just tear it apart with my hands... hahaha it was so funny!  The food is soooo good though!

 

The second day we went and talk this man, Fidel, and he is a super, super nice guy. He's been a little iffy about letting the missionaries come over and teach him, but he's reading the Book of Mormon and he really loves reading it, but we WON'T pray specifically about it and ask if it's true and just from the first time meeting him I can tell he KNOWS it's true already, but he won't pray about it because then he'll know he knows it's true! Oh, he also wouldn't even start reading the BOM because one of his co-workers told him that when his dad read the promise in Moroni that he instantly started to feel it was true, so Fidel wouldn't even OPEN the book because he didn't want to feel that!

 

It's weird, I don't know why he's so scared to feel that it's true. He's a super, super nice guy and he really wouldn't have to change his lifestyle at all! He doesn't smoke or drink or anything! So we just keep praying he'll have the desire to know he knows it's true :)

 

So we already have an investigator with a a baptismal date! Her name is Isabela Simon and I feel super bad for her, she's got a rough life. She's 40, has three children and the two oldest are from a different dad than her youngest one. She's divorced from her first husband and her boyfriend that she had the third baby with got deported back to Mexico. So, she's single, has three kids and absoultely no money (she used her last 5 dollars to pay a taxi to take her to church yesterday because she understand how important it is to come to church!) and no permanent place to stay. Her kids are 13, 11, and 7 months and the older two are mad at her because of their life situation so she just cries when we teach her because she feels like she's a horrible mother and is scared about what's going to happen to them.... It's ridiculous how blessed we are and we don't even realize it!

 

But, she's super excited to get baptized! We told her to just keep praying, reading the BOM, and have faith.

 

The people here are super nice and they always are super willing to help me with my Spanish :) We were at the ward mission leaders house the other day and his wife asked me something in Spanish and I knew she said something about the amount of time someone had been a member of the church for so I assumed she was talking about me so I answered that I'd been a member my whole life and she said, "No...." and asked me again. So, I just sat there and was trying to figure it out in my head and her husband said (in english) "She asked like what generation you are of being a member in your family." And she hits him and says, "Only speak in Spanish to her!!" Haha it was so funny :) But it's true, I just need to keep hearing and speaking it, if they speak english to me than I'll never learn spanish very well :)

 

A lot of them do speak English really well so it's nice because if I have no idea how to say a word they tell me what it is in spanish :) But, most the time I really just sit there and have absoultely no idea what's going on! I can understand a ton of stuff about the gospel because that's practically all we learned in the MTC, but when Hna. Lopez starts talking to them about every day things I just sit and listen really hard and hope one day I'll be able to understand them :)

 

The kids here are so stinkin' cute! They don't even know me and they run up to me and give me hugs :) They all speak really good spanish and english and I have no idea why, but I think it's SOOOO cute when they speak spanish!! :)

 

Yesterday we had 5 investigators at church and that's the most Hermana Lopez says she's EVER had! Oh, and this is her last transfer, so that's the most she's ever had in the entirety of her mission! It was pretty cool. I just say hi to everyone and I meet like 30 people a day so I don't remember their names but one of the investigators came and Hermana Lopez was super disappointed we didn't get to say hi to her and church because she (the investigator) left super fast, so we called her after and Hna. Lopez told her she was sorry we didn't get to talk to her at church and over the phone I hear our investigator tell her that she met her companion and church and I just started laughing and Hermana Lopez knows I don't remember anyones name I meet so she explained that and that I met a gazillion people at church and didn't remember her so I told the investigator sorry and she just started laughing :)

 

Oh! And Saturday one of the members took 10 of us missionaries out to breakfast at this buffet and she is the funniest lady! Her name is Hermana Unger and I have a feeling this story sums up her life: She moved to Utah from Venezuela a LONG time ago. When she moved there she assumed everyone was LDS, so she got married and THEN discovered that her husband wasn't LDS! Hahaha I have no idea how they dated and never talked about religion, or going to church together!

 

Apparently every time she takes the missionaries out to breakfast (every other week) she picks on this one elder, Elder Budge, EVERY time! He said sometimes she picks on him for not eating enough food, or the right type of food, or for speaking spanish to her and then for speaking english to her - so basically whatever he does she picks on  him :) But this time it was because he touched his watermelon and then ate it and she says to him (in her spanish accent) "what you touching your food for? you might as well touch everything and then eat it with your hands!!" Hahaha we were all trying so hard not to laugh!! It was great :)

 

Well, my time is almost up, but I love it here! And hopefully one day I'll be able to understand what people are saying to me and I'll be able to respond :)

 

I miss you all SOOOOOO much and love you even more! :)

 

Looooooove,

Hermana Roberts!

Last P-Day in the MTC!

So, on my rush to get over here I forgot the paper that had everything that I wanted to write about.... hahaha, so sorry if this email is lame.

 

Let's see, obviously I am super excited because this is my last week in the MTC! I leave on Monday and I'm so super excited/ a little bit nervous. Mostly I'm just nervous about the Spanish, but that will come as I go along my mission and have to hear it and speak it all the time. Our teachers have warned us that we might be learning a lot of Spanglish since we're serving in the States, which I hope isn't true for me because I want to learn legit Spanish! :)

 

So this week we had our last TRC (the place where we go practice teaching and there's volunteers from the outside world) but this week there weren't enough volunteers so we had our teacher just pretent to be an investigator so we had someone to teach. She played a real investigator that she had on her mission, and we had to teach her the second lesson (The Plan of Salvation) in Spanish along with Tithing. So, we start teaching and everything is going fine, but then she just wasn't understanding the importance of the stuff that we were teaching her and we had her read scriptures to try and help her understand the questions she had and the scriptures totally answered the questions, it just wasn't clicking in her head. So that was a little bit frustrating, but then she's leaning forward on the table and is resting her head with her hand under her chin and I'm talking and all the sudden her eyes close and I chuckled and was like esta bien?" and she's flings her eyes open and is like, "¨¡sí!" so then I was trying WAY hard not to laugh! I was really trying to contain myself because I didn't think it would be very good if I just started busted up laughing!

 

Anyways, we finished the lesson and it was probably the most horrible lesson we've taught (even worse than our very first lesson ever when we got here) and I was a little bit frustrated but mostly I just couldn't stop laughing and how funny it was that she had "fallen asleep" during our lesson! But our teacher afterwards said she really taught someone like that and she worked all through the night at the airport so whenever they taught her she was super exhausted and had a hard time staying awake. And I'm sure it will happen in the field too, so it was a good experience I guess :)

 

So normally people only have 2 or 4 teachers during their MTC time, but we've counted and our district has had 9!! It's crazy! We've had so many substitutes. We got a totally brand new teacher last week but then he got married so we had a sub for him, but then the sub when to Mexico yesterday so we have another sub today. So basically we have a sub for the sub. Haha it's crazy! It's interesting though because they all teach so differently and they all teach you the things that they think are the most important, so I like it in that aspect that we get to see what all these people think is the most important part of being a missionary.

 

The Spanish is coming along fairly well! I'm still having a hard time with the grammer stuff, but I know I've learned a ton more than when I first got here! And I try not to dwell too much on the grammar stuff because I know that they still understand me (for the most part...haha). But I'm really grateful that I'm able to learn Spanish and I'm sure it will be useful for the rest of my life!

 

The very first day new missionaries come to the MTC they do this teaching demonstration thing where basically this huge group of new missionaries come in and they sit down and there's a fake investigator in this room and two missionaries who have been in the MTC for a while come in and begin the first part of teaching so the new missionaries are able to see how it works. Honestly, the missionaries we had in our demonstration were not that great and I didn't learn a whole lot from it :) But, last night Hermana Johansen and I got volunteered to be the missionaries doing the demonstration and it was SO crazy to think that we were in the same spot as the new missionaries but we were there 8 weeks ago! It doesn't feel like it was that long ago AT ALL! It's insane, but I'm definitely ready to leave the MTC.

 

The other day I was writing in my journal and I thought, "I wonder how long it's going to take me to fill this up. Then I'll have to go buy a new one." And then I realized that I would be out in the field and I could go to a NORMAL STORE and buy any journal that I wanted!! Haha it was so funny, I was like, "oh my heck! That's going to be so weird!!" But then it also got me super excited! I'm excited to be able to go teach real people and to be forced to speak Spanish so I can learn it better and quicker! It's going to be exciting, but I'll probably be freaking out a little bit on Sunday night :)

 

There's 6 people in our district and 2 of us are leaving this Monday and then the rest are leaving on Wednesday and they're all so jealous! I know 2 days doesn't sound like much, but it can feel like an eternity when it comes to MTC time :)

 

I'm trying to think of what else happened this week................. we went to the temple this morning for the last time! I wonder how often I'll be able to go once I'm in Denver. I've heard it totally depends on your mission president, but I hope I'm able to go at least a couple time while I'm out in the field.

 

I've been reading Jesus the Christ lately and I recommend you all read it! It's a HUGE book and he uses big words, but it's really good. It's interesting reading stuff like that and getting a new perspective on things, but I love it. I have to be in the right mood to read it or else everything just goes over my head and I have no idea what it's saying :)

 

The other thing I am MOST excited for is that on Monday I will be able to listen to music finally!! Not that we haven't listened to ANY music here, but we're not even allowed to listen to hymns in our classrooms while studying, and that's what I'm most excited about, is listening to hymns while I'm studying because that helps me a lot. My teacher yesterday was talking about a really cool version of Come Thou Fount he likes and the rest of the day I so badly wanted to listen to the version I had! And I said, "Thanks a lot, Hermano Airmet! Now I REALLY, REALLY want to listen to that song!" And he's all, "don't worry Hermana Roberts, just wait until Monday..." But Monday seems really far away sometimes :)

 

I'm pretty sure that when I come home I am going to sleep for two weeks straight, so no one bother me when I come home :) I don't believe I will ever get used to waking up at 6:30, but it's all good because it's for 16 months and that's really not that long in the grand scheme of things.

 

Well, sorry if this email is boring and really random :) Next week I'll remember to bring my paper of good things I want to talk about!

 

I will write you all next week sometime! I'm not sure when because my P-day will probably be different, but I miss you and love you ALL!

 

-Hermana Roberts