1-20-2014: Happy Birthday, Daddy!

Hello Family!

 

First of all, HAPPY BIRTHDAY DADDY!  You must be getting old, huh? haha Just kidding :)  I hope you get lots of running in so that you can properly enjoy a large amount of cake and goodies. 

 

TRANSFER NEWS:  I am officially Staying in Hurst for another transfer!  At the end of these 6weeks, I will have officially been in this area for 7 and a half months!  That's a long time, but I absolutely LOVE it here so I can't complain :)

 

Business meeting:  Yes, I did get my new drivers license!  Thank you so much for getting that done for me!

 

This week was a great one, of course!  The Lord really loves us, we see so much that when we make goals and have faith in those goals, then the Lord will provide for us and put us in the places that we need to be so that we can fulfill those goals and plans. 

 

We saw B and A again this week, they made us Abuelita's hot chocolate and we brought Hermana Carreon who made EMPANADAS but like super legit ones with Pineapple and Grape jelly.  Soooooooooo I'll be getting fat this transfer.  Doesn't the average Sister Missionary gain like 30 pounds on her mission?  Don't worry, it's for the Lord.  I love food.  Also: B's still on date for the 22nd of February.  We're so excited for her!

On a less exciting note: N and E will have to be postponing their wedding-baptism party this weekend.  They're dealing with some legal issues (papers) that would be easier to be resolved without them getting married.  We're trying to help them figure out how to make it work and such, but they still have TONS of faith and we love them SO much, so we keep them in just about every prayer we say.  Something I've realized after being a missionary for 6 months is that your heart opens up and doubles in size.  It is insane how much love I have for these people.  I love it. 

 

This Saturday we'll have a super awesome conference with President Ames and all the Spanish Ward/Stake leadership to figure out how we can increase baptisms in the Spanish speaking community.  Man, my mission president is the best!  He is just recieving revelation up the wazoo of what we can do to improve our Spanish abilities (language wise and baptism wise!)  I'm super excited. 

 

AAAAND we went to the doctor today because Hermana Gwynn hurt her ankle in her last area and wanted to see if it had been healing well, and so it turns out that she has a stress fracture in her ankle...oops!  She has been walking/running on it and it hasn't been hurting except for a little bit so she had no idea...We'll be going to a specialist to see what to do next, but for now she's got a great attitude and a stylish looking medical boot to keep her ankle stable.  :) 

 

Have fun for the next couple months doing all your ward visists for Ward Conference and such, Mom!  Nice and busy, but a good kind of busy, I'm sure.  Bummer that Jeremy still has some complications with his visa!  Hopefully that will be resolved soon.  Or maybe the Lord just needs him in Texas for a little bit longer...Quien sabe.

I am really sorry to hear about Tyler N.  It's never easy to hear about the death of a friend.  I'm glad that Nat is finding peace throughout this trial and I will keep him and Tyler's family in my prayers.  Lately we've been dealing with the question lately of "why is there so much suffering in the world?"  My conclusion through prayer and reading the Book of Mormon is pretty much what you said, Mom, and what Father Ryan said.  We have our agency and that is an important gift that God needed us to have.  Sometimes, people misuse their agency to hurt themselves or the ones around them, but we know that this life is nothing but a tiny dot in the line of eternity.  Right now, Tyler is learning more and more about the love that God has for him and he's finding answers to questions that may have troubled his mind.  Thank goodness we have the plan of salvation to give us guidance and peace in our lives.  Many times, I don't know why certain things happen, none of us do, but I do know that God loves us and he wants the best for us. 

 

I hope y'all have a great week this week and know that I love you all SOOOOO much!  Thank you so much for all that you do and your testimonies. 

 

Con amor,

Hermana Sangre

 

1-13-2014: Sometimes, we look for service opportunities so that we can feel apostate and wear pants....

Just kidding, we look for service opportunities because we LOVE SERVICE!

 

But the reality is that I feel apostate every time I put on my jeans....Which is hardly ever, but it does happen!

 

This week we spent a lot of time with E and N, who are GETTING MARRIED ON MY BIRTHDAY!!!!!!!  Can you say best birthday present ever?! Then N is going to get baptized the next day!  So E is a member and N is an investigator and they are moving into this mobile home that needs a toooooooooon of fixing up to do, so we've been going over to help her paint and on Saturday all of the missionaries and some of the people from Elders Quorum went over to help them with their remodeling stuff and it was SO FUN! We took out their floor, and cleaned the walls so they could be painted and scrubbed all sorts of kitchen stuff, it was pretty successful.  There's still a ton to do so we'll be going back in a week to put in their new floor and such.

*sometimes, da memberss let us do service.  Ees da beeeeest* <--my best Nacho Libre impression? hmm.....

 

 

We also have been teaching this really cool kid named E.  He has been in the U.S for about a year and he works 2 jobs, so it's really hard to teach him more than once a week, but he is SO golden!  He has tons of great questions and he's basically already living the Word of Wisdom so he's practically mormon already...haha but really, he's legit.  We're excited to see how things go with him.

 

AND we have been talking with la familia S (we thought their last name was C, but that is actually the mom's maiden name...whoops.  Good thing they finally corrected us!) and they came to church last week and their kids LOVED primary and participated and we're pretty convinced that they're gonna get baptized and then she'll be called to Relief Society Presidency and he'll be EQ President.  So it's no big deal.

 

B y A are doing great!  B is still good to get baptized the 22nd of Febuary and we're going to eat empanadas and Hot chocolate with them and Hermana Carreon this thursday, so that's gonna be dope.

 

Teaching lots of people, having tons of fun, it's just awesome to be a missionary!

 

Oh, the Gamboa family are members!  Hermano just got called to be one of the assistants to the obra misional and they are super awesome.

 

I'm glad things have been going well at home!  Have a fun trip in the Netherlands, Dad!  And I hope Nat's procedure goes well, and that will be fun for when Caleb and Michele get to officialy move to LA!  Also, Mom, it sounds like you don't have enough on your plate--you need to take up some kind of time-consuming hobby, like quilt-making or miniature ship building. :)

 

The weather has been pretty nice lately, low 60's and mostly sunny with some wind, so nothing I can't handle (after all, I already survived that sick-nasty ice storm)!  But Hopefully y'all will get some rain in california instead of water conservation stuff (the phrase comes to mind "If its yellow, let it mellow.  If it's brown, flush it down"....eww. I regret typing that.) Good thing I'm not home right now to take super long showers! :) haha

 

For the Birthday box, I'm good on mascara and scarves, and I bought a mini Spanish himnal in the MTC, but maybe some cute earrings and a hat or two from my winter box?  Nothing I really need comes to mind.  And Transfers are officially the 22nd of January, so I'll know next monday if I'm staying or going. 

 

Thanks so much for the updates and I love you all so much!

Con amor,

Hermana Sangre

1-6-2014: Happy (Officially!) New Year!!!

Buenas tardes, familia!

Well...this week was an awesome week!  (of course, I'm a missionary, so every week is awesome!)  Unfortunately, it's like approximately zero degrees outside (give or take zero degrees...slash it's really 20 degrees.) But that's ok because we have a car with a working heater! And it's probably way colder in Utah or something...But annnnyways...

We had INTERVIEWS with President this past week!  I looove interviews.  President Ames is way cool and super inspired.  We talked alot about making goals and things of that nature and he challenged us all to make goals in 5 categories for this year: Spiritual, Physical, Mental, Intellectual, and Social.  Some of my goals for this year are to know the scriptures better and to be fluent in Spanish, among others.  Goals are awesome.

Unfortunately, I can't remember all the 500 things that I wanted to tell y'all about this week, because I totally left my planner in the apartment (d'ough! Homer Simpson...?  anyone?) buuuuuut from what I can remember, this week was just amazing and we taught a ton of people and saw B and A (B might be getting baptized this month!  We invited her to pray about it, and so she'll give us her answer tonight!) Also, I've started to read the Old Testament from the beginning....we'll see if I finish by the end of this year... :) haha

Mexican Food update for this week: I love food.  Of course.  :)  Yay for arroz y frijoles! 

This week just went by like a blur, sorry I don't have more updates for you!  But we're doing tons of work and it's been super fun and awesome and all that good stuff!

I love that quote from Joseph Fielding Smith, by the way!  And it's always so great to hear from you.  I'm glad that Jake is being super productive (keep the beard) and that Nat is getting ready to be a 2nd semester senior and that Mom and Dad are being asked to share their musical talents and whatnot (it sounds like Dad was actually the one to ASK to sing/volunteer for it...yes? yes. I'm glad you're watching lots of sports and hanging out and all that fun stuff, keep up the good work :)

And as for Karenna's mission prediction: I, too predict Fort Worth.  Don't worry, I'll be her trainer :)

I love you all soooo much!  And here are some pictures from the past little bit!

Me and Sister Gwynn, Christmas Eve in Hurst!

Bro & Sis Gamboa & family!

Love you sooooooo much!

Love,

Hermana Sangre

12-30-2013: It's already 2014? No big deal

It was so great to talk to you on Christmas!  I'm so glad it sounds like everyone is doing well! :)

 

Sorry I'm a little late today emailing...We got on earlier for like 5 minutes and then one of the Elders that we drive around had to go to Urgent Care for a sinus infection and that took a bit of time.  Unfortunately, he didn't go to visit with my BFF Dr. Tasneem, but I supose other doctors are pretty good too....hah

 

This week was so good!  We got to celebrate Noche Buena (Christmas Eve) and Navidad with the members and we got to eat lots of rice, beans, and tortillas this week.  OH, and tamales. :)  Lots of yummy food, lots of awesome people, just overall AWESOME.  We got to see B y A on Christmas night and they are doing really well!  B is going to be praying about whether or not she should be baptized without A, and they're even inviting friends to church AND A came with B to church on Sunday even though he's basically lying on his deathbed with the flu/cold type of thing.  I've decided I'm going to go visit B and her family in Mexico one day and just hang out with her and pretend to be Mexican.  I stinking love her.  We're actually seeing her on New Years Eve, so we'll probably do a suuuuuper early celebration by eating a little bit of her Choco-flan and talking about Jesus. Otherwise, just the same awesome business that we get to do every day!

 

AND we had 5 investigators at church yesterday! It was really great, and we've been seeing a TON of blessings from the Lord in our work this week.  We also got to see one of our Less Active youth members really understand the Atonement in her life and it was so cool that the Lord let us witness that experience.  Basically, I love being a missionary. 

 

I don't have a ton of time because we still have to go do other Preparation day stuff, but I wanted to say thanks again for all the letters and Packages! (I got the package from Caleb and Michele and Grandma and Grandpa Blood! Thank you so much!)  I'll be sending thank you cards/letters sometime soon, I promise!  I feel so loved.

 

Sounds like the rest of y'alls week went well!  Glad you could say gbye to Emma Watkins, I'm sure she'll be a great missionary.  And glad it was a good Sacrament meeting, and I'm sure Dad that you'll never follow BYU sports ever again....until Basketball season starts... :)

Thanks again for EVERYTHING!

 

Les quiero mucho y que tengan una semana maravillosa :)

Con amor,

Hermana Sangre

12-23-2013: Feliz Navidad (casi)!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

BUSINESS MEETING:

1.) no skype this year.  Y'all would have to move to Spain or Africa or something if you wanted me to skype you (only missionaries with families outside the continental US can use skype this year) So it will be a phone call on wednesday!  I'll go ahead and call the home phone.  And it actually turns out that I'll be calling sometime between the hours of 1:30 and 2:30 ish, so ponganse listos :) (be ready)

2.) I got your package, Mom (don't worry, I haven't opened the presents yet!) and a lovely card in a mailer from Aunt Sharon! (I'm going to be writing her a thank you note very soon)  I haven't seen the package from Caleb and Michele yet, but I'm sure it will be here soon :) And I'm sure I'll be getting Jake's letter soon, too :)

What a week!  We had some crazy spiritual experiences and really we were in the right place at the right time on multiple occasions.  Last monday night, we had some pretty firm appointments that all ended up falling through at the last minute.  We didn't really know what to do, but then we remembered that some Elders in our ward told us to visit this Less Active sister that just moved into our ward.  We called her up and she told us to come by, so we did!  Turns out--she had been active all growing up and had a really strong testimony of the gospel, until life kind of took a turn for the worse for her and she ended up making some poor decisions that made it really hard for her to feel comfortable going to church.  We ended up sharing a few scriptures and thoughts about repentance and the love of God that really touched her and basically everyone was crying by the end of the lesson.  The spirit was really strong there and she committed to read in the Book of Mormon and come to church on Sunday, and she did both of those things!  She is so sweet and it was really interesting how the Lord works--sometimes when people aren't home, he's really just trying to tell us that our plans need to change. 

We also went to our ward Christmas party!  It was a little different in that it was more like a show and a dinner and the show was the Nativity story (attatched is a picture from the nativity scene).  We helped make the FIVE HUNDRED TAMALES for the ward, and I have decided that making tamales is the hardest thing ever.  When I heard all the steps to do it, it didn't sound too hard, but then we started making them and I wanted to die.  We were only there for about an hour helping, but the other relief society sisters were there from 8 until 5 making them.  Ridiculous.  We got some left-overs, though, so I'm satisfied.  :)

Hurst Nativity!

Our Christmas Devotional was this week with a few other zones in our area, and we got to open the special hand-written letters from our familes and President Carter and Bishop Smith!  That was a cool Christmas gift.  Thank you so much! :)

Well, I suppose I'll be talking to y'all this Wednesday, so I'll tell you then about all the tamales y arroz y frijoles that i'll be eating in the next few days :) 

AND it's so great to read a blurb from each of you!  Dad--our Christmas Devotional last week was our Mission gathering, so that was really fun!  President and Sister Ames made us some Texas Sloppy Joes and potato salad and beans.  It was pretty darn yummy.  Nat--I'm glad you're keeping it real and being too cool since the family hangs out with you and not vice versa...I'll be expecting straight A's this report card, so lets hope Multi brings that grade up those .5 percentage points. haha And i bet you thought you were soooo funny in your card by saying Mom and Dad got you a car for Christmas...I was not as amused. :) Caleb--I'm excited to get the package from you and Michele!  And congrats for being a college gradiate and stuff, I guess that's kind of a big deal, huh. That must mean you actually have to be a grown up now instead of just pretending.  Jake--Hopefully I'll be able to read this amazing letter you speak of later when we check the mail.  Man, don't wear yourself out TOO much doing absolutely nothing and watching Modern Family or whatever other show is cool now.  I'm sure you're just preparing yourself to do that "research" in Las Vegas... Michele-- thank you for keeping those presents pretty!  I don't even want to know how horrendously they looked pre-bowed...haha oh man, those two bobby pins...I'll be really missing them :) thankfully we have a christmas tree (it's pink!) from a member and we'll be putting up some Christmas lights that we found in our apartment later. I expect you to keep up with the "no food left behind" policy!

I love you all so much and I'm excited to talk to you on Wednesday!  Que disfruten sus dias de descanso. :)

Les quiero muchisisisisisisimo

Hermana Sangre

12-16-20: On the Fourth day of Christmas my Investigator gave to me....

I think that's what we're on...but I lose count so quien sabe. 

 

My new companion: Hermana Gwynn! (pronounced Gwen because it's welsh?) She is really cool.  She is from Minnesota (i already asked and she doesn't know the Frazers unfortunately...) and she has been out 6 weeks more than I have.  She spent her first 6 months in the Lewisville area and so now she's here in Hurst the best Stake in Texas!  :)  It makes me feel like I know stuff when she asks questions about the ward and who we're teaching and I can answer in detail.  AND that means that I'm designated driver for this transfer, since I've been here longer, and I find it's not nearly as scary as I thought it would be.  I can actually get to most places we've been to without a GPS.  I am reaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaally excited to spend Christmas here because I've grown so close with the members here and the people we're teaching.  And Christmas falls on the day when we usually have District meetings, so that'd be fun!  I really like the district here, we spend a toooon of time together since we're all in the same ward.

 

Updates on the people we're teaching: B is back from Mexico!  She went for some health testing things and she won't get the results back for a while, but she is doing so well!  I love B and A.  They're pretty darn cool.

 

We're also teaching this super cool family named the C family.  They are really interested and want to know what makes us different.  They'll be coming to church this sunday so we're really excited for them!

 

Something crazy, so ya know how we drive around the bike elders to all sorts of meetings and whatnot, well, there's usually 4 of us in the car, and I'm the ONLY one in the car that isn't new to the district/area/stake.  So i feel like there's all this power in my hands with all these newbies.  But it's pretty fun.  One of the new bike elders is brand new from the Mexico MTC, he says that the MTC down there is pretty cool, so I'm not gonna lie, I am a little jealous that he got to learn spanish in mexico...andele pues.  O esta todo bien.

 

Actually, really cool story.  So hermana Dominguez from the ward is super cool and gives us like 5gazillion referrals every time we talk to her, and one day she was a little more hesitent as she was telling us to visit her older friend S who is just kind of lonely and needs some company, but also pretty cranky.  So we asked if Hermana Dominguez would be willing to go with us to visit her, and she was a little nervous because S is suuuuuuper catholic and she thought we'd walk through the door and her friend would start throwing her saints at us or something.  BUT--we went in, got to know her, said a prayer with her and shared a brief, simple message about the love that God has for her and we even sang a song for her (we actually do that pretty frequently, Dad).  S LOVED it!  Hermana Dominguez was absolutely shocked that she let us come back, but I guess we never know which hearts the Lord could be softening and preparing to recieve us. 

 

Overall, really good week this week. 

 

I'm glad that the concert went well and that everyone will be coming in for the Holidays pretty soon!  And it sounds like Mom did really well on her talk this sunday, nicely done :)  Tell Caleb that since he'll be a gradiate pretty soon he should be able to say that he "knows stuff."  Have fun caroling and whatnot tonight, let the festivities begin!

 

Mom-I haven't gotten the package yet, but I'll check today again.  And as for Christmas, we just got a text from our Zone Leaders saying that we will be doing a phone call for 30 to 40 minutes and it's just whenever works best in our schedule.  We'll be talking about that more this Thursday so I'll let you know more firmly when I'll be calling, but it will probably be anywhere from 10:00 to noon Texas time?  I don't remember how far behind California is, sorry.

Before transfers: us and Elder Kaelin from the English District!  Don't mind Hermana Gomez's churro

 

Les quiero mucho, y que tengan una semana maravillosa! :)

Con amor,

Hermana Sangre

12-9-2013: Cold Snap!

Hey, remember that time I got my mission call to Finland...?

yeah, me either.

THIS WEEK WAS SO COLD. Thursday night we had some freezing rain and then by friday morning it snowed a good amount, and then saturday everything that had already fallen snow-wise just froze over, and finally Sunday afternoon it started melting slowly but surely.  I understand why there were probably only 7 people at the game in Dallas...While we were walking we felt a little bit like the movie "The Day After Tomorrow" which was pretty cool! 

Of course, President Ames didn't want anyone driving on the dangerous/icy roads, so our directions were to keep cars parked at our apartments for all of friday and saturday and most of sunday.  We didn't want to just stay in our apartment all day so we usually just put on every piece of clothing in our closet and made the mile trek into our area (our apartment is actually just barely outside of our area, so that was slightly inconvenient.)  But it was super fun and for a second we thought seriously about investing in ice skates.

I kid you not, I wore 2 pairs of tights and 3 pairs of pants underneath my skirt those days.  We were sure to be inside by the time it was dark and the only members that were able to drive in the weather (their mighty SUV dominated the ice) picked us up a few times to feed us and we watched the Christmas Devotional with them.

Chilly...for Texas!

On Saturday, it was pretty cold and our Less-Actives that we were visiting gave us blankets so we wore those over our 12,000 scarves and my trench coat so I may or may not have looked like a hobo walking home that afternoon.  It was actually pretty fun, but I am VERY grateful that we have been given driving privilages for today.  (And don't worry, this doesn't happen super often so I should be fine without a warmer coat.)

Sooooo......TRANSFERS!  It looks like I'll be.........staying!!!!  I will be here in Hurst still for the next transfer and Hermana Gomez is being transfered to Arlington. So I'll be here with Hermana Gwynn (for Christmas!!! I'm so excited!) who will be coming here from somewhere up north on Wednesday.  I hear she's been out for a while and that she's really cool, so that's good!  It's been super fun with Hermana Gomez and I'm a little sad that she's leaving but at the same time, that's how missionary work goes!  And I'm super excited to show Hermana Gwynn how stinking awesome these people in the Hurst 3rd ward are.  (So Mom, you can go ahead and send my Christmas package to the Haltom City address) :)

Because the majority of the week we spent in a 3.5 mile radius around our apartment, we weren't really able to see a lot of our investigators, but hopefully we'll be able to see them this week! 

This week we had some REALLY good turkey Floutas/Enchiladas with NB and A.  I love Mexican food. AND A is doing super awesome.  She is all ready to get baptized, we're just waiting on her Dad's approval :)

Sounds like your trip, Mom, went well and that you had a good time in Seattle with family and whatnot! Also: I may or may not have seen a clip of that fish-throwing thing on an episode of the Bachelor...? I will neither confirm nor deny that. But it looks cool! And I'm glad to hear that all the various concerts went well :)  And I send my love and greetings to everyone you saw there

And don't worry, Dad, I'll make sure to stay nice and warm and healthy and avoiding grease fires whatnot :)

Thank you so much for your love and prayers and everything!

I love you so much!
Hermana Sangre

P.S.

BUSINISS MEETING:

For the missionary plaque, I really like the scripture Moroni 7:47, and yes to Hermana Kate Blood (instead of Sister).  I trust you to pick a picture that looks halfway decent :)

C.T.R.