Investigators:
So "Sarah" has been doing really good. We have been meeting with her a lot and she accepts everything
we teach... which is also a little nerve wracking. She doesn't talk a ton, other than when we ask her questions, so it is really hard to figure out what her concerns are or what she needs. But she prays every night and says that when she prays she feels "paz y tranquil", aka peace and calm, so at least she is sort of recognizing the spirit. She still doesn't feel that she has totally gotten an answer yet to whether Joseph Smith is a prophet or not, but she still has us come back as much as we can, so I'm taking that as a good sign. We had a really awesome zone training this week that talked about using "teach ask ask", where basically you teach the principle, ask a question to make sure they understand, and then ask to make sure they know how to apply it in their life. So we have been working on doing that more, trying to get her to open up. She has two adorable children, who can sometimes be really distracting because she has to get up and down a lot. But yesterday, she came to church with us!! She was only able to stay for sacrament meeting, but I think she really liked it. Her kids were kind of crazy, but an awesome family that was sitting next to them helped to keep them occupied so she could listen. President Killpack and his Wife were the ones who came and spoke (we got super lucky!) and they both bore really strong testimonies. Sister Killpacks testimony about brought me to tears. She knows pretty much no Spanish, and gave her talk in English with someone translating, but for her testimony, she bore it in as much Spanish as she knows. The spirit was so thick you could reach out and grab a handful. "Sarah" seemed to really be touched by it as well. At the end of Sacrament meeting she said "so when are you guys going to come by my house". We are so excited for her and cant wait to see what this next week holds for her.
We have another girl we are teaching who is about 15 years old and is from Honduras. Her name is "Lisa". She and her family have been in the US for about a year now.The missionaries found them and have been teaching them for about a year now. They were teaching the older sisters and mother too, but just since right before I got here, we have started working mostly with Lisa. She has such a desire to get baptized and usually comes to church every Sunday. It is hard sometimes with her because we aren't really sure if she has a testimony of these things, or just believes they are true because they have been taught to her for so long. We have a baptismal date set with her for about 3 weeks out, but have decided we just really need to focus on helping her gain a testimony of these things first. It will be a challenge because sometimes she has a hard time focusing, and it is always really loud and crazy at her house, but we talked with our District Leader about it and have some really awesome ideas. Cant wait to see what happens in this next week with her either.We have been focusing a lot on trying to find some new people but were really booked with a lot of less active lessons this week. We have some really cool people that we are teaching and I am excited as we watch the light of the gospel come back into the eyes of these people as they realize what they need to do.
Food: This week Lisa and her mom taught us how to make these things called "papoosas". They are sooo good but soooo unhealthy! They are basically like a cheese quesadilla from Honduras. You make this type of dough with a certain kind of flour, then you form the dough into a bowl shape, but this cheese called "oaxaca" (i think that's how it is spelled. It is pronounced Wha-haw-ka) in the bowl part and then cover up the cheese, form it into a tortilla shape, put it in a pan with some oil and boom! So stinking good. They also made us these things called Platanos. You know the things at the grocery store that look like bananas but are bigger and green? Well that's them. You just cut them up and fry them. You cant eat them raw. But they taste kind of like potatoes. Really strange haha. Hermana Hardy and I went into this place called El Super and its pretty much like the Spanish version of Walmart! We are considering doing all our shopping there haha.
Well I love you all so much! Thanks for being so supportive and incredible! Happy Valentines Day! Eat a lot of chocolate for me(:
Love,
Hermana Lundquist