Welll yeah.

Familia y amigos! 

The subject of this email basically describes this week. It was one of those weeks where you do SO much but there isn't anything to show for it. No fruits. Yet! It was kind of ironic how things worked out. We'd start out the day and be excited for how much we had planned and then things would fall through left and right. Ridiculous timing and everything. And that's not normal for this area. People are usually good about keeping appointments. So we did a LOT of contacting referrals. Which isn't always very successful in the middle of the day. But worth the try and a few times we did actually catch people. Plus, it was nice and sunny a few of the days, so we enjoyed the opportunity to just walk outside. Through contacting, we actually ran into a few people that really needed our visit. One of which is Jesus Garcia. He's a senior in high school, and when we first met him, he said he's heard of the church through friends. Believe it or not, that doesn't actually happen too often. But we were reallllly excited about that. Being a friend missionary WORKS! Good examples to other people makes a difference and blesses people's lives. That was really cool to see! 

On to what I learned this week. We have a lot of investigators who are really open to us visiting and teaching but who don't see how our church is different from others or why it's important. Because of that, I studied about how to have a desire to know the truth and how to know that this church and this gospel is the one truth on the earth. With the restoration of the gospel, part of that was the coming forth of the Book of Mormon. It really built my testimony to remember and learn that the ONE true way to know if our gospel is true is by reading the Book of Mormon and praying. The Book of Mormon is the cornerstone of our religion. It really is true. It has the fullness of the gospel in it. What Jesus Christ taught is all in there! I know it's a true book, the most true in all the world, in fact. And TRULY, reading it will bless your life in so many different ways. I have seen that in my life and especially since I've been here. 

Hope you all stay safe and have a great week! 

Con amor, 

Hermanita Shirley

PS

1) My favorite street so far in Idaho. 

2) We went to a little Mexican bakery while on exchanges. "Anything with pink is good" -H. Barnes

A Bunny and a Puppy

Familia y Amigos!

How are you all doing?! I hope life is good and you're all staying safe.

I feel like as we get busy and do things, we have more funny experiences. Or maybe I just notice them more. This week was very eventful and a few things happened that I will never forget.

The first is the sleep talking that has happened. Hermana Barnes and I share a bunkbed and I sleep on the bottom. So every once in awhile, I half-wake up in the night to her sleep talking. She legit sleep talks. Full on sentences and conversations. Sometimes in Spanish. It is suuuuper entertaining. This week, apparently, I started sleep talking as well. I have always kiiinda sleep talked, mostly mumbles or words here and there, but not really sentences or anything too inteligable. But this week, as I'm told by Hna. Turner, Hna Barnes and I had a sleep conversation. I don't know what we really talked about, but we went back and forth and she responded to my talking. HA! So funny.

Another thing that happened was at a Melba scout auction. For those who aren't familiar, it's a ward activity fundraiser for boy scouts where they make cakes and other things and they auction it off to fund their campouts and other things. Usually people are really generous because it's just going to their boys in their ward. Awesome, huh? Anyways, so it was really fun being there and we went because some of our investigators were asked to make the food--to make genuine, delicious tacos. We saw them and talked to them and then stayed for part of the auction. They started with the cakes. We were sitting with Brother Zeyer, the ward mission leader in Melba. We were joking around about this one cake that was shaped like a rabbit. Then he bought it! AND he gave it to us. HA! Then later on in the auction, they has this basket full of puppy stuff--dog food and a bowl and toys, etc.--that they started telling everyone about and then out of nowhere, one of the littlest boys walks in carrying a golden retreiver puppy about the size of him! THEY WERE AUCTIONING A PUPPY! After the initial excitement died down, they started actually selling it. Everyone's attention was on this, but no one was ready to have a puppy. Then, the auctioneer started pointing to people, "You want it? You want it? Will you take him home?" sort of thing. He pointed out Brother Zeyer and he actually agreed! He got a beautiful puppy and all this stuff for $90!! All the little kids gathered around, of course. We couldn't believe he had just done that. We asked him about it and what he was going to do with it and he said he would give it to the Melba elders (they live with the Zeyers). HA! So he bought animals for both of us missionary sets: a bunny for us and a puppy for the elders!! Kinda ironic. The elders left partway through and we couldn't see their reaction. We'll have to see what they think next time we see them!

Then another funny thing that happened was with our little Joanna. We were contacting referrals in her neighborhood, so we decided to stop by and say hi. We went in and she was eating a chunk of cheese that looked like a slice of cheddar. She offered us some, so we said sure. Then she pulls out this huge block of American cheese slices and rips off a very significant chunk of the slices and gives them to us. Alriiight. What were we going to do? I would not be able to eat that much American cheese. So I start nibbling on it as we're talking and I'm just waiting til we're done so I can get rid of the extra. Then Hna Barnes asks me to hold the rest of hers as she shares a scripture. She gave me this look of "HA!" as she gave it to me. Then we finished up and I got the brilliant idea to just slip it in the trash as Joanna was giving the others goodbye hugs. And of course right as everything gets quiet, it hits the garbage sack. Joanna hears it and asks, "What did you do with her cheese?" I'm pretty sure I said something about accidentally dropping it in the trash but was suuuuper embarrassed and felt rude. Joanna offered Hna. B more cheese, but she just said, "Oh, no. You already put it away..." Sooo yeah. We got out of there pretty fast and had to keep ourselves composed as we walked down the street to our car. Then we burst out laughing. Ridiculous.

Last Tuesday, we had zone conference. It was all day and surprisingly really good. We read a talk by Elder Holland about the Atonement. He gave it at the MTC. It was SOO good. He talked about how the Atonement is so sacred and so necessary. And just about how amazing it is. It was really powerful. I can't even do it justice. Maybe next week I'll bring it with me and send some quotes from it. But truly, the Atonement and Jesus Christ's sacrifice is what this gospel is all about. It's why I'm here. Because I know that it's the only way we can feel clean and real joy. I know how it's changed my life and I want to share my love for Jesus Christ with others. A few scriptures I found as well are:

2 Nephi 22:2

Alma 26:12

Moroni 10:32

Truly, we can get physical strength through Him. I know this and have felt this in my life.

Con amor,

Hermana Shirley

 

PS No pictures this week because my camera couldn't connect with the computer I used.

"Y" vs. "And" (Week 9 in Kuna?!)

Familia y Amigos!!

It's hard to believe I've been here so long, but it still seems like I just got here. The reason for my subject is one of the times I laugh-cried this week was because of this little Spanish word: Y. It means "and" in Spanish and when talking in English, it is an infamous word for Spanish missionaries. Being here in Idaho, we talk a lot of English, whether we want to or not. So we have to make sure to turn off the Spanish thinking and words. Sometimes that doesn't completely happen. One specific time was when we were at a less active member's house and we had talked and shared a scripture and were about to leave. We were closing with a prayer and Hermana Barnes was saying it. She was saying it in English when she says "y" and then paused for just a split second when she realized what she had said. That split second was JUST enough time for us to let out a giggle/chuckle/breath of air and it just went downhill from there. She was trying really hard to compose herself to finish the prayer and to contain the laughter until after. Then it was released. We all had a pretty good laugh from that. Of course I was crying with laughter. But I love those moments.

Another thing that I wanted to tell you all about is one of the Ward Mission Leaders in Melba. He is legit. This last week, we got to Melba (it's about half an hour away, so we try to carpool with a member) and he had a little map with red dots on it. The dots were houses we should stop by. We were amazed that he had found all these Spanish-speaking houses and asked him his secret. He told us how he had actually gone around to houses that looked like they might be Hispanic and actually knocked on the door. When the person answered, he would just ask if a random thing in their front yard was for sale. It wasn't threatening for them, and he found out if they spoke Spanish. PERFECT! It saved a lot of time and was really funny.

Also, I wanted to tell you about one of our little investigators here. She is the sweetest 72-year old lady and is super spunky. Her name is Joanna. She actually speaks English, but because she is married to a Spaniard, we were told to visit them and that's how we originally met them. When we first walked in to their home, they were both smoking and Eduardo was drinking up a storm. I was a bit hesitant, but still talked to them. Who knew where it would go! That was just a few weeks ago, but we've gone back and helped them paint their ceiling as a service project and we've been able to just visit them and get to know them. Nowadays, we go back mostly to visit Joanna because Eduardo is always drunk. I love this lady. She is one of the kindest, most open and loving people. And her smile and love just makes me happy. On one of my hardest days, we had an appointment with her and she just made me feel so much better. She has an amazing spirit and you can tell that she cares. So this last week, we had an appointment with her and we actually taught her the first lesson. And I invited her to be baptized when she finds out for herself that it's true. She straightup said no. The reason was because she felt like she couldn't change. She had been smoking her whole life and it was a part of her. And she didn't want to be a hypocrite Mormon who smoked and did bad things while pretending to be someone else. That's amazing. Even though she agrees with what we teach and can feel the Spirit, she knows that she wants to be honest to decisions she makes. She really is close to the spirit even though she doesn't recognize it. And I can't wait for the gospel to help her through her health problems and other things she's going through. We're going to visit her this week and talk to her about hope and change. She is going to need a lot of prayers and faith, but she can do it. She already knows her habits are bad, she just needs a reason to quit.

This made me think a lot about change and how it's hard, but it brings joy. The gospel of Jesus Christ brings about change for the better. And when we're striving to be better while staying strong to what we know is true, we can feel fulfilled while having motivation to keep going. And that perspective brings joy. That is why people need the gospel. When we understand this, it's crazy how it can help us through the hard times and give us purpose in everything. Super cool.

I'm loving it here and hope you are all doing well.

Con mucho amor,

Hermana Shirley

1) Another sunset. :)

2) When we had our bonfire, we were wearing the randomest clothes to stay warm.

A legit crazy week. No other words. (week 8 in Kuna)

Familia y amigos.

I may have been saying that past weeks were crazy, but this one tops it off. It was really different and tough getting used to a new companion, but then one day, she opened up to me and told me what was going on. To sum it up, Hermana Morales was having a really hard time, struggled a bit with depression, and received revelation that she was supposed to go home. So we talked a ton with President Cannon and prayed and fasted a bunch. AND, we went on emergency exchanges a few times with the Sister Training Leader. This all happened early and in the middle of the week and then by Friday, we got the call that she would go home Saturday morning. So Friday was crazy getting all packed and moving and saying goodbyes to people while still doing missionary work. I can't believe I just summed up all that we did that day in one sentence! HA! It was wild.

So now I'm in a trio with the other Kuna Hermanas Barnes and Turner. The areas are (temporarily?) combined again and we have 18 wards that we cover. BUT, we are a TON more organized now and really on top of things. We actually had a super good planning session on Thursday where we planned the month and the week and the day. We really organized everything and wrote out all of our investigators and what they need and how we can help. We have about 15 households, and that's not including the kids and families and everything. We have a lot on our plates. And people are always giving us more referrals, which is super great. So we are nice and busy. But back to our planning session, it was a REALLY cool experience. We did lots of prayers for specific things and pondered a lot about what each person needed and what our goals SHOULD be. What Heavenly Father wanted. During that time, we had one family text us and "drop" us, which was hard, but we also saw a bunch of blessings. Like when we would only have a few hours open to set up appointments and those times were exactly perfect for the people. Or someone would be super willing and open to help us in exactly the way we needed. AND, we were setting up our goals and thinking of specific numbers that we wanted to make our goal and we'd each ponder for awhile and then when we told each other what we were thinking, it was the exact same number. WHAAAAT?! Coincidence? I think not. So even though it was a really tough week in ways, we PHYSICALLY saw so many blessings. We almost wanted to cry with how cool it was. Another thing that we're doing is fasting more this month to have success and to truly change lives. I can't believe we hadn't thought of this before. We are going to fast each Thursday if you want to pray for us or fast with us. Prayer and fasting is powerful and we're exercising our faith that we will be blessed with baptisms this month. If you want someone to pray for, please pray for the Garcia family (specifically Imelda and Antonio) and Angel Bravo.

That's something that I've really learned this week. Prayer works. Prayer changes everything. We can't do work and be missionaries without it. If we expect Heavenly Father to answer us, we have to do our part and establish that line of communication. He is our Father in Heaven and we have the ability to have a REAL relationship with Him. And we have to develop and nurture that relationship just like how we do any other relationship. It's one of my favorite things to just have someone who I can tell everything to. And He knows exactly where we're at and what we need. It's so cool!

I love my Heavenly Father and this gospel so much. It is true.

Con amor,

Hermana Shirley

Pictures:

1) Hermana Morales.

2) During our planning, we realized we had 5 different preach my gospels out. That's what happens when we're dual language. HAHA!

3) A car we drove behind. MISUENO. My dream. HA!

Being with Hermanas Barnes and Turner is really fun. And we're taking more pictures. :)

1) Hermanas Turner and Barnes

2) THE SUNSETS ARE SO BEAUTIFUL!

Con mucho amor,

Hermana Shirley