Monday, July 11, 2016

Week 38--I'm a "Mom"! Welcome to the missionary world, Hermana Hull!


Everyone, meet my "baby" Hermana Emma Hull! She's the cutest and sweetest thing ever! I'm so excited to be a trainer! More on that in a little bit.

Monday was the Fourth of July and was actually a pretty good day. They changed the schedule of our P-day a bit, because President wanted us to be in our apartments by 6pm just in case, for safety. Usually our P-day is from 10am-6pm, but last week we did 10-3, and then 6-9, that way some work could get done in our areas. It was pretty weird, but nice that we had plenty of time to pack Hermana Marble all up and ready to go. She was pretty excited about my packing skills because she used to carry four suitcases and a box, and I got it all into three suitcases! Woo hoo! (Thank you Leggett genes!) It was pretty fun to pack, but weird being the one that's staying! It's my first time being the companion that stays and takes over the area. Tuesday we went around to all of our investigators, less active members, and a few favorite members to say goodbye. It was so sad! But we are all really excited for Hna. M, who gets to "die" where she was "born"!

 July 4th at Panoramic Point


 Last District photos before transfers


 Larissa with Hna M. I think this is so ADORABLE!

 She wanted to hug me, too, even though I'm not saying goodbye!

The Drehobls

Wednesday we woke up at six and hurried and got ready and finished the last minute packing. Then we drove to Lyle, to the Hovinghoff's house (they were the ones that let us sleep over after the train explosion a few weeks ago.) They drove us up to Goldendale (the transfer site) where we met up with a bunch of other missionaries who were leaving. It was hard in those last few moments with Hna. M. I love her so much, and it was so hard to say goodbye! 

Goodbye Hna. M! I will miss you! 


Goodbye present I made for Hna M.

Pretty soon a big van pulled up, Elder Oliver, and Elder Shugart were driving (they both used to be my zone leaders, and are now the AP's Iit was so fun to see them!) And out of the van popped Elder Wilde (SO EXCITED HE'S IN MY ZONE AGAIN!) and Hna. Paulsen (Texan!) and then HERMANA HULL, my greenie!!! I was like OMG SHE IS SO CUTE! I HAVE THE CUTEST BABY EVER!

Ya’ll ready for the best part? She's from TEXAS! Woo hoo! She was born in Arizona but then when she was 10 days old she was adopted by a family in Austin Texas. She is named after Emma Smith (cool!) and has two brothers, Eric who is 27 and her parent's biological son, and Nathan who is 18 and who is actually her biological brother! It's truly amazing the story of how her family ended up together. Heavenly Father Is so cool!! She is so, so, so pretty, too, and about the size of my pinky toe. That is really fortunate, because I found a cute dress at the thrift store a few weeks ago, thinking that Hna. Luevano would look good in it. But it was slightly too small, and now I have an even teenier companion that can fit in it! I'll have to take a picture.



It's been really fun all week introducing her to the members, when they ask her where she's from and she says "Texas" they're all like "Oh no! Not two Texans! The Texas pride is just ooozing everywhere!" It's so fun! But I guess I have to say goodbye to my nickname for a while (a lot of people call me Tex or Texas here.) She also is a GREAT singer and loves country music. She plays the fiddle and piano! We have a lot of fun together. She does like the best Miranda impression I have ever seen. Seriously, put some red lipstick on her and it’s just like Miranda!

On our way home from Goldendale, the Hovinghoffs took an eight minute detour and took us to this random zoo?! It was so strange, a mini zoo with giraffes, zebras, camels, and donkeys in the middle of the mountains of Oregon... but it was a really exciting and a fun thing for Hna. Hull on her first day here! Then when we got to their house they made us some lunch. It turns out Hna. Hull has Celiac's disease, which is cool for our comp unity, because we both have dietary restrictions. Now neither one of us has to feel bad about making the other person not get to have bread at member dinners.

Mini-zoo 





After we got home she told me I was actually in charge of giving her orientation, because her flight got delayed nine hours! So she didn't get to the mission home until about 12:30 the night before. She actually stayed up for 24 hours straight and then only got to sleep four hours until she had to wake up and get in the van to come down here to me! Poor girl! So I was going to let her take a nap, but she didn't want to. She's a really hard worker, which I LOVE. It's been amazing seeing the miracles already from her greenie fire! After we unpacked her and I gave her orientation, we went out and tracted for a while. I personally don't believe in tracting, because when I was at the MTC, they gave us tracting statistics, and on average, a missionary would have to knock on a THOUSAND doors before finding someone who would actually be interested in the gospel, and I can definitely testify to that. I have had exactly ONE investigator in my entire mission who came out of knocking, and she only had like 2 lessons before she dropped us... but I feel like it's a good experience for the missionaries, to break them in and get rid of their fear. She had a really hard time actually talking when people opened the doors, but after a while she loosened up a bit. We're not planning on spending a ton of time knocking, but we want to go at least a couple of times a week just to help her boost her confidence and courage.

 Fun "mother/daughter" pictures!



Hna. Hull in the cute dress I found

Thursday something REALLY cool happened. One of our Spanish members texted us and said she had a friend who was interested in the church and wanted to talk to us, and could we meet them on Saturday. We were like, “Holy cow, yes! We can totally do that!” So we met on Saturday and he literally said, "I have been learning about the church from my girlfriend and I really want to get  baptized, what do I have to do to get baptized?"

*OKAY LET ME PICK MY JAW UP OFF THE FLOOR*

We met with him the second day, yesterday and committed him to prepare for baptism on 7/30! It will be so exciting to have a baptism on my sister's birthday! His name is Ramon, and he is so prepared by the Lord to receive this. I LOVE MEMBER REFERALS. Hna. Hull and I were so excited after the lesson last night we actually cried a little. This has been a really hard area to work in. I feel like I've been working harder the last two transfers than I have in my entire mission with little or no results, and now we have someone on-date for baptism! We are so happy for Ramon! Please keep him in your prayers.


I guess that's it for this week.  I love being a trainer! :)

Pictionary for language study 


Cute baby deer that came up close to our car

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