9/9/14 Week 26

This week was a little bit on the strange side...seeing as how I can't account for pretty much any of what happened on Wednesday.  Haha - yep, we have the Word of Wisdom for a reason people! Drugs do STRANGE things to you!!  So I got my metal screw yanked out of my mouth on Wednesday and whatever drugs they gave me were INTENSE!  I have some brief memories of running around a self serve yogurt store, sampling all of the flavors and deciding it made sense to buy the largest tub I could and overload it with rainbow sprinkles because, according to Hna Limon I said they were "vewy pwetty".  I was pretty high.  Then the next thing I remember is waking up in the evening and freaking out because we were late for planning!  And also, I woke up for like 5 minutes so I could throw up all my frozen yogurt.  EEEEEWW!  

In case you can't tell, I'm pretty drugged.  Why else would I try to consume a metric TON of yogurt?!

So it was pretty exciting I guess....or just awful and strange.  But then Thursday it was back to work!:)  Yipeee!  And guess what?  We now have 5 baptism dates!  I'm REALLY praying hard that they will come through.  All of these people have the strongest faith and the strongest testimonies...just NO ganas para hacer nada (they don't act on it at all). I don't quite understand how someone could tell us that they feel the spirit and believe the church is true, but they don't want to read the scriptures. It just makes no sense! So if any of you fellow missionaries who actually have time to read this email have any advice in the "keeping commitments" area, it would be much appreciated:) 

The stress level of training is definitely going down.  We have more solid investigators and TONS to do!  This week was just a little hard on me physically.  My body feels exhausted all the time and I'm not quite sure what to do about that. Going from greenie to trainer has been an intense transition!  One of strangest parts has been the difference in my companions. Sis Black had a lot of mission experience and was very particular, quiet and reserved, but in some ways Hna Limon is like her opposite!  She's very open and talkative!  But she's super funny and we definitely have fun!  But the mission has taught me a lot about learning to have unity and work well with different personality types.  I'm also trying to work on being more bold with people.  I just have such a hard time saying things how they are because I don't want to offend anyone. I guess sometimes its just what they need to hear.

6 month sock burning party!  Woot, woot!

Cool, creepy story!! (But before you read you must promise to not judge me. Yes? Ok great you may proceed)   Last night I woke up at 3am and I just had this feeling like I should go check and see if the keys were on the counter...very strange and random thought to have at that specific hour.  Usually my thoughts when I wake up at that time are about whatever I've been dreaming about, which lately has been mainly Oreo milkshakes.  Anyways, I sat there for awhile but I just could not get back to sleep. I had to go check. So I did and they weren't there!  They were always there!  Then after some midnight searching I found them.  ha..still in the outside of the door (that's where the no judging part comes in).  I don't know what would have happened if I would have left them there all night, but all I know is that god really does protect his children:) 

Love ya'll! Until next week!

love Hna bonny 

9/2/14 Week 25

Mission Control Center

Oh man what a week!  I know I probably say that every time, but with my trainee, craziness is just my life now!  This week pretty much all of our investigators decided to spontaneously leave to Mexico and Maryland for the week...so that made things a little depressing when I would look at my schedule and literally see NO scheduled citas!  But we decided not to let it get the best of us, and that since we can't see our existing people, we really need to find some more!  So we spent much of this week doing some serious hardcore biking, melting, and finding of new investigators.   And guess what...with some pretty intense prayers, sunburns, and bike chain tattoos, we now have SEVEN new investigators and EIGHT return citas!:) YAHOOOOOO!!

This week was seriously one the biggest miracles of my life!  Just by fearlessly opening our mouths, talking with everyone, and bearing testimony, the spirit really does touch these people! 

 

Texas sunset out of our apartment window - no mountains but still gorgeous!

Example: There was a guy who was out working on his truck that we decided to go talk to.  At first he didn't even want to look at us, but then we asked (in Spanish) "Hey would you mind if we just showed you a few pictures of Jesus Christ?", and he said "ya fine".  So then we just started bearing testimony while showing him the images from the restoration pamphlet, and by the end he was nodding and talking with us.  Now tonight we get to go back and teach him and his whole family!  Its sooo cool to watch the spirit testify of truth to these people right before your eyes! Have I ever mentioned that I love being a missionary?

In other news...I'm now officially the ward organist.  Don't ask how that happened.  I'm really gonna have to brush up on my hymns...and organ skills that I've never had.   Wish me luck!

Also in other news I have surgery tomorrow! Yaaaayy:(  I'm just glad that this time there won't be anyone there to video me and put my embarrassment on YouTube (thanks Dad)!  Sierra after Dental Surgery  (you're welcome)

 

Well I believe that is all. Oh, Hna Limon is awesome! She literally has me laughing in tears! Haha but yes...she definitely still is a greenie.  Let's just say there have been a few awkward moments in our lessons, but her testimony is of steel!  So I'm not worried.

The church is true! Love y'all TONS!!

Love Hermanita Bonita!

How's my form Mom?

8/25/14 Week 24

Busy, crazy, exhausting, awesome week!

Wow - what a freakin' week!  I feel like I just need to go sit and do nothing but stare at a wall for 24 hours, then I will feel like myself again! This training thing is EXHAUSTING!!   For all of you who are like "Wow that's awesome that you are training, you must be so great at speaking Spanish",  ya'll are wrong!!  I'm still trying to figure out what happened when President assigned ME to train...but hey, we are gonna make this work and baptize the world:)  

 Training itself is exhausting; calling everyone (which I already had a phobia of in English..) setting up all the citas, leading all the lessons, remembering everyone's names, problems, and schedules, and then throw in being asked to talk on Sunday!  I'm barely holding my brain in my head right now!! I legitimately feel like I've had to grow up 10 years all in 2 days. (Deep breath)  I will thank Heavenly Father for this opportunity one day. 

Introducing...Hermana Limon!

But on the plus side my new comp is super cool!  Her name is Hermana Limon.  She's from Colorado Springs and she speaks pretty awesome Spanish - which I am so grateful for.  But right now I still teach pretty much everything.  But hey guess what?... I hate blog bragging, but we made top 8 again in the mission!  And that's like a HUGE deal, since it was my first week organizing and teaching everything, so that definitely gives me hope.

 

Hermana Limon has only been a member for a little over a year.  Her conversion story is sooo cool! She was hard core Catholic then met the missionaries and all this other stuff that I don't know if she wants me to tell the world, but pretty much like the situation of half the people we teach.  So I'm pretty pumped to watch her testimony help our work!  And guess what?  It already is!  Our family (the Martinez) have the most solid baptism date that there has ever been!  I know I've said this before, but right now I have no doubt that they will get baptized on October 4th.   We took this family (Condes, love them!) who also used to be super Catholic to have a bbq with them, and afterwards our lesson just turned into this awesome testimony session.  I asked the dad if he still feels like baptism is just something in the future and he said "no un dia mas pronto" eeeeeeepppp!! (and this is after he said he prayed about it)  So we set the date for Oct 4th!  PRAY FOR THEM!

In other news I have officially lost 12 pounds since the MTC!  Woot woot!!  Of course, I did gain like 8 pounds on Nutella there...but still:)   All I do is eat fruits and veggies.  No joke - zucchini, yams, bananas, and blue berries are my favorite foods now.  Hna Black introduced me to some amazingly delicious health foods!  Haha - Grandma and I are going to get along so good when I get back!  Nutrition is fascinating to me.  

Fabain and Margarita. They are from Ecuador and feed us BASTANTE!!...but we love them:)

I don't have too much more time, because my dearly beloved daughter took 2 and half hours buying groceries...oh I remember the good ole greenie days...so ya, pretty much I have no time.  But I love all of you! La iglesia es verdadera!:) 

Love Hermana bonny

8/18/14 Week 23

The beautiful Botanical Gardens

Yesterday Jenny and Eric got baptized!  HOORAY!!  She is 10 and he is 8, and they are 2 kids that really grew on me.  I'm not gonna lie, at first I had a harder time loving them.  The feeling was mutual because initially they DID NOT want to meet with us, but then as time went on, we got to know them well and they really warmed up to us!   I'll never forget our lesson last week when we were walking out to our car after the lesson, Jenny ran out of her house, gave us hugs and said "I love you."  Awww!  And this is coming from the same girl who would say "Missionaries! Hide!" when we were knocking on the door and they thought we couldn't hear them.  It just goes to show that if you just spend time with someone, love will connect you….and everyone wants to be loved:)   Cheesy but so true!  These were my first baptisms and Hna Black's last (sniff sniff..I try not to think about it).

Jenny

In other news....I'm going to be training!!!  AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  I'm more than a little nervous.....actually when President Ames called me I about had an aneurism.  So yep, Wednesday I get to go pick up my little greenie who won't know any Spanish (gulp).  Any prayers for the Spanish speaking ability of my greenie would be much appreciated. 

New Trainers and District Leaders

On the plus side I did get to go to an awesome leadership and training meeting on Friday!  It was so spiritually awesome! And then afterwards our ride got lost so we got to hang out at the church with President and Sister Ames for an hour, so I can't complain:) They are the most amazing people ever! 

 

Sorry, I know my picture looks kind of evil.  Thankfully Hma Black stayed classy.
 

It's been a pretty crazy week just trying to get everything ready for next week, and watching Hna Black pack up all her stuff …I'm still not going to talk about it:'(  If her family ever reads my blog,  I just want them to know that Hna Black is literally one of the most amazing people I know!  Her testimony and her positive attitude about everything, really set the perfect tone for what I needed for my mission, and is exactly what our investigators needed also!  She is the kind of missionary I want to be in a year.  So thanks for raising an awesome daughter/sister.  Oh and thanks for feeding her super strange healthy foods that she could share with me to help fix my horrible Nutella diet:)  

We can fly!!

  

So it looks like I'm officially going to be staying here in Fort Worth hasta Noviembre. Woot Woot!  The work keeps rolling along:) Love all of you tons! 

 love Hna Bonny

District jump photo fail