Aye Yaway!

Mi familia! Gracias por los e-mails y todo lo que hacen para mi!Yo les amo muchisimo! Well we had a pretty good week! As always, right? Of course! Not too many appointments fell through, so that's always good.

We saw David a couple of times, and he still isn't reading. Hmmm. I'm not sure how to help people get it. He himself admitted that when he reads everyday, that he's happier. Things are better. And when he stops those little things, everything goes downhill pretty fast. So...we'll see. Neither he nor Vanessa was able to come to church on Sunday. But on Saturday he seemed a little happier, a little less down. He even told us a story where he referred to himself as a Mormon. That was something he always used to do, but we hadn't heard for a long time. We like it. As long as he understands he still has to be baptized for it to count! Hay un poquito progresso. Pero hay progresso!

We also have a new family we're teaching. The Spanish elders knocked into them and passed them to us: the Gonzalez family, a mom and three girls. Mom was busy last week with work, but we taught the girls twice and invited the two oldest to be baptized, and they said yes. August 30. I thought it would be a good b-day present for me, if I'm still here then. This week we'll invite their mom to be baptized too. It's great because they actually have family who are members in the mission next to us and the teenage daughter, Jordan, has gone to mutual there, and years ago they went to church. We're excited!

It was just a good week because we were able to get in contact with a lot of people and set appointments that haven't happened for a while. The La Habra ward is really good with doing the ward mission process that Elder Perry has set out. North Hills is starting to catch on. They tried in the past to get us some names, but they didn't work, but now they've given us a bunch of new ones. And now we're really excited about the potential of working some more in that area. We're still knocking in the North Hills area a lot, and I know that success will come out of that somehow. It's all about that faith! It's exciting because our mission continues to do really well. A couple of weeks ago we had more baptisms than they had all of 2008. Yeah!

On Saturday we did exchanges. S. Lewis went to Yorba Linda/Placentia with S. Chriswell, and one of the new sisters, S. Peterson, came here with us. It went really well! And this week we ate tongue. Mmmm! We were eating with some recent converts, the Reyes. And they made us tacos. I've heard lots about tacos de lengua, but somehow I never had the pleasure of having them while I was in Santa Ana. I looked down at the tacos and thought the meat was an interesting gray color. Then I almost immediately saw the taste buds! Mmm! I looked at my companeras and they didn't seem to know. They said, "Oh, its beef." So I let them think that, because really, there was no choice. We had to eat them. Funny though, because the kids at one point mentioned "Oh, she wants to eat more lengua," and I looked at Sister Lewis and she had finally realized it. Ha ha ha! Then we told S. Patten later. Honestly though, other that some sinew type stuff, tongue is the weirdest thing I've eaten. It's not bad. All mental. Just weird to see taste buds. What else? Oh yeah. A couple of times I've been told that I have an accent. A couple of times people think I'm European, and the others they think I'm Midwestern. Just yesterday a ward member guessed I was from Minnesota. Interesting. Who knew! Oh yes, also exciting news to me. Another recent convert, Alex, who is 25, mentioned one time that her grandma "abuelita" used to be a housekeeper for one of the Beatles who had a home in LA. Crazy! But she couldn't remember for which Beatle, even when I told her it was important for her to remember. Oh well. That's the closest I've ever gotten to a Beatle! We played badminton today, and I think I should join a professional league. Oh yeah, and we gave talks yesterday in sacrament. I talked about the joys of being a missionary and talked about Ammon. He was a funny guy; he was always fainting when he got excited.

This week we have a lot planned and scheduled and we're all excited to work hard and find more people to teach and improve our numbers. Not that they completely show success, but high numbers are encouraging!

I love love love you all so much! It's wonderful to be a missionary and I pray for you all and know that you're praying for me! I hope everything is going well! Thanks for everything!

Exchanges

Hello!
We are teaching one guy, Juan Carlos, who used to live in Logan with a brother and knows a little about the church. We taught him about the Plan of Salvation last week and before we started, he had questions about baptisms for the dead. Funny the things people find out about. He's still a little confused about the spirit world, but he's really interested in learning. He's been saying he would come to church the last three Sundays, and he's always had a valid excuse for why he hasn't come. Somehow I'm still sucked into trusting everybody who says they will come; it just doesn't get old being disappointed. But anyway, I called him after church and he was like “Hermana, believe me, I'm not playing, I really want to come to church.” He randomly had to pick his grandma up from church though. Anyway, I do have hope for him. He's had multiple contacts with the church and hopefully we are that seventh contact/interaction that will help him get baptized. He's a young guy and works at a golf course.
Exchanges last week were sooooo nice. I needed to get out of my area. I went around with Sister Jessop and we drove a lot. Their area is basically the whole mission anywhere there are Samoans. It was interesting teaching all day in English. Sometimes Sister Jessop would talk to people in Samoan, mostly if they were older people. But otherwise it was English. It was nice to be with an experienced missionary. And in the morning, we did some studying and role playing with the other sisters in the apartment: Sister Chriswell and her companion, Sister Kioa. Sister Kioa and Sister Jessop both came out with Sister Fatkin from the MTC and they all go home in July. No! Then we will be the “oldest.” My chances of ever being with anyone besides a newer missionary are getting smaller. It was a fun day.
I realized this weekend how much I really enjoy knocking doors and how much I just want to stay out every day as late as possible talking to people. At about 8:15 my comps just wanted to go home, and I just feel too guilty doing that. I want to knock every door and keep going.
I have to talk in sacrament on Sunday, so I suppose I will be preparing something all week. I would be nice if I could just teach the Restoration lesson. Maybe it will end up being a farewell talk for me. We have a lot of appointments planned for this week, so it will probably go by pretty fast. Things are going good around here and I love you all!