West is Best: Week 10- siempre trabajano

Hey everyone! I hope y'all had a great week! Ours was pretty good. We had way more lessons than the previous ones bc people are finally back in town. Yay!

But Monday was a chill pday. We didn't feel like doing anything so we just did out shopping and then hung out at home until that night. Then we went and contacted a new referral that we got from the elders on the other side of magna. She was taking the lessons for like a year at her boyfriends house, and their relationship was kinda bad. Off and on. So she moved out and is living in our area now and she's kinda hard to read. She's pretty closed off and didn't say much but her kids are pretty funny! So we will see how that goes.

Tuesday we had a new missionary meeting with president palmer and it was great! It was also great to see the other missionaries I came out with. Then we went to a place called pizza rev with everyone and it was SO good. Omg. Some of the best pizza I've ever had except for pizza in Italy haha. But then that night for dinner we accidentally stayed way too long bc the people would not stop talking! They were cool and super funny, but we ended up missing 2 appointments. (Both of which cancelled anyway during dinner, but we didn't see the texts until after we left). But we had some time to try and fill so we tried to contact some referrals that we hadn't seen yet and they all weren't home. So it was 8:47pm, and we aren't supposed to be home until 9pm. And we were just driving around trying to figure out what to do, when Ávalos saw the light of a house of a previous referral was on. Background story, they went to that house to find the referral and ended up finding her boyfriend whom she had left recently. He was crying and playing sad music, so they talked to him and started meeting with him, and then one day he wasn't home for the lessons and they hadn't been able to catch him home since. So we stopped and knocked on the door and it was the girl! She was the original referral. So she let us in and talked to us and she's really cool. Her name is vianey and she's from Mexico. But she expressed her interest in our message and asked if it was something that would benefit her family and help her relationship with them. And we were all like OMG YES IT WILL WE PROMISE! So we talked about the church organizations for a while and how the gospel has blessed our families and set up a time to meet with her that week.

Wednesday was rough. It snowed a tooooon. Like a ton. And it was freezing. Like less than 20 degrees outside. But anyway we had a lesson with our girl jade who's getting baptized this Saturday! Woo! We're pumped for her. Her dad recently was re activated and blessed the sacrament a few weeks ago! So he is going to be able to baptize her. She's so crazy and funny I love it. But we taught her about the word of wisdom and the law of Chastity and she was like I already knew that stuff. Of course I'll do it! Shes so smart and so awesome.

Thursday was SOOOOO COLD YALL. SO COLD. But we had another great lunch with an Ecuadorian lady in the ward. Her food is my fav seriously. She cooks the best rice I've ever tasted. We had some good chats then headed over to some less actives to visit, and we visited this lady Luz Gamboa and her sister who isn't a member and they are so sweet. Luz works a lot so she can't come to church as much as she would like. But her sister is awesome and really liked the message we shared about how we can complete our goals in this new year with the help of our Heavenly Father! Because he is always there and is always willing to help if we just ask for it. Then later we went to another referral who we haven't caught home at all. So we were walking up to the house to knock on the door but all the lights were out. So we were like uhhhh idk of we should. But then we noticed one light on in one of the basement windows so we were like nah. Let's just do it. And then it was her! Jessica was there! Milagros. Follow the spirit y'all.

Friday was Día del Reyes! It's a Mexican holiday where they celebrate the 3 wise men coming and bringing gifts to Christ. But first we had a zone training with the 2 Spanish zones and we talked about having more fervent prayers for our investigators and the people in our area. That's been one of my goals for the new year and it's already been helping a ton. Y'all god really is there and hears our prayers! Then afterwards we came home and Ávalos and I had some bomb studies together. For my language studies we usually read the scriptures out loud in Spanish so that I can work on my accent and pronunciation, and we discuss them together in Spanish! It's sooooo good y'all. We read some bomb chapters in alma about when alma and amulek were talking about their missions and how all the miracles that they performed were from God. They couldn't take credit for any of it because they knew that He is always watching over them and was preparing people to receive the gospel. But then we went to dinner with la familia Solís. One thing thats been getting me real good is that because my companion is Latina and brown, almost everyone we go talk to only talks to her and it's pretty annoying. They automatically assume my Spanish is bad (which it still isn't that great) and kinda don't really try and talk to me that much. Which I honestly understand. Haha I'm always wishing I was Mexican or something, but I'm not! So I've been working really hard on my Spanish for the past few days. Oh yeah and this dinner was great! We had this seafood soup stuff. And normally I do not like seafood but this was amazing! It had crab, shrimp, and tuna in it with lime and cilantro and omggg. I died. And then after we were so stuffed with food, we went to an appt with some less actives and they had MORE food ready for us. Haha omg. 2nd most full in my life after the incident on my second day in the field. Lol. But they made tortas, which is basically a Mexican panini and it was amazing. They had this cinnamon hot chocolate stuff with some other good stuff In it. Then we had rosca, which is this circle cake pasty thing and there's little plastic baby Jesus' cooked in it. And if you get one, you have to have a party and make tamales on Feb 2. So I didn't get any, but Ávalos did! She actually got 2, so she is going to teach me how to make them if she's still here...

🏼. But the lesson was great! We taught them about service and how important it is for us to serve those people around is every day.

Saturday morning we had to wake up at 5am, because we had a meeting with President Maluenda, who is basically the mission president over the Spanish missionaries. Kinda. He's one of the presidents counselors. But we had a meeting with him and it was all in Spanish. And I was pumped bc I could understand all of what he said! But anyway he talked about how it's important for us to have faith like nephi. And he had a lot of faith. But he said we needed to exercise that faith and follow our schedule more obediently/work out every single day no matter what. And to also have faith to follow the spirit more closely. Which I thought we did but we can obviously do better! It was amazing seriously. Ávalos and I left sooooooo stoked and pumped up to apply what we learned. He challenged us to be able to do 3 sets of 100 push ups by the time we leave our mission. Omg. So we're gonna see if we can do that.

Then on Sunday, it was fast Sunday and it was great! The testimony meeting at church was amazing. Everyone bore their testimonies on Jesus Christ and his atonement and what it could do in our lives and it was seriously so perfect. We had 8 people at church so we couldn't have asked for something better! After church we then had a meeting with the stake mission leader about some baptisms we have coming up and the ward. We have a really hard time getting members to come out with us. There's maybe only 2 families that ever do it. Our bishop and ward mission leader have been out of town for the past month and we have zero ward missionaries. So it's a struggle, but the bishop finally comes back this week so we're gonna figure some things out! But then at dinner, we ate with the Avilés family and they are from El Salvador/Nicaragua. And they are awesome! They gave us some really good referrals and their son is getting ready to turn in his mission papers so he said he wants to come out with us! Miracles! Right when we thought we had nobody haha. But then we had a lesson with this recent convert and her husband who has not been baptized. And they are from the same place in Mexico as my companion! But we talked about how at church we all teach and we all learn from each other. They expressed what they learned at church that they and their insights were great. They are awesome people!

I love the mission y'all! It's so great to be able to meet with so many different people from all over the world and talk about the gospel with them. All of their lives are so different so their experiences with the gospel always get me so good. I hope everyone has a great week!

Here's some pics.

Con amor,

Hermana Anderson