I am eating Thanksgiving dinner at the Hernandez family's house. I have no idea what it will be like. We had a ward thanksgiving party on Saturday and it was super fun! It was basically the same as most Mexican parties. Loud Mexican music and dancing. There was "Thanksgiving food" but it was heavily mexicanized with a lot of chile. It was really good! Basically the Mexican American tradition is to skip Thanksgiving and start celebrating Christmas waaayyyyyyy tooo early.

 

Everyday is usually a good day here, but yesterday was extra happy-making. So much goodness kept happening to us!

 

1. We are not the best at street contacting. We prefer to knock doors, so we usually just say hi and other normal stuff to people we run into. This one guy that lives in our apartment complex is always super nice to us and always asks us how we are doing and random stuff like that. Yesterday morning we ran into him on the way to our car and started talking to him. We told him we were on our way to church. He started to look really nervous and then asked if he could come with us next week. He has been having what he has called spiritual difficulties and thinks that the best thing for him would to be learn more about God and what he wants. He told us he could tell that God loved us and he wants us to teach him what we know. We were like actually, that is what we do. He was like what! No way! And then we set up an appointment. He looked so relieved! We should have asked him weeks ago! Poor thing.

 

2. Four of our investigators came to church. We felt like shepards making sure they all went to the classes they were supposed to and had friends and stuff like that. Plus we had to babysit one of the Elders' investigators. Don't ask me why. It was so hectic! I am so looking forward to the day when my investigators are my own children and I can teach them from the beginning the right what so that they know what's up.

 

3. I helped the Spanish ward coordinate when they could use the building by translating what he said into English, which another missionary translated into Korean for his ward member. I don't know why I thought this was so cool but I just love me the Garden Grove Culture Clash.

 

4. We went to a baptism for some of my companion's old investigators after church. It was so beautiful! She had taught them for a long time and was so happy for them. Watching her face was just as much pleasurable as watching the baptism.

 

5. We ran into the Ap's at that church building. Ahh they're so cool. Plus we got to see a lot of other missionaries there.

 

6. The Bowens were at the baptism. They are so nice! President Bowen even gave a short talk in Spanish. It was so cute!

 

7. The Gomez family came to the baptism. The girls were both so excited. Valerie, the one who is 7, held my hand the whole time.

 

8. We had dinner at Hermana Estudillo's house. She is an amazing cook! And super helpful and nice.

 

9. We finished off the day by having an amazing lesson at the Gomez's. You can feel the Spirit so strongly there. After our planned lesson we talked about all the little events, including their son's death that have led them and us to all be where we are now at this moment. It was amazing to see God's hand in all of our lives and even cooler that they realize that and can feel His love so strongly.

 

Love you!

Hola!

 

 

The members here are interesting. Most of them are converts and they have very strong testimonies. Testimony meeting is the best thing ever! They also really love each other and are pretty united. But at the same time this is the most dysfunctional ward I've ever been in. It's just very unorganized. Setting things for specific times is a joke. They don't care that much about rules or procedures. We told them about the white bible and they thought we were joking. Church is super fun and always exciting, but sometimes I stop and think, "Is ward council supposed to be this fun?" Probably not. So I can't decide it their version of Mormon culture is worse or better. The one thing that I do definitely like, is how much they adore missionaries. We're like angels to them. We do a million things for the ward that they are probably supposed to be doing for themselves but at the same time they take very good care of us. 

Right now my favorite family is Gomez. They are the family whose son died. We're still teaching the parents and their two girls because the girls need to be baptized. They were completely inactive before but now they go to church every week and want all the blessings of God! We've become best friends. We are at their house all the time. They are super funny. Last night we were talking about baptisms for the dead and Max was like I want their to be a whole arena of people thanking me for doing their work when I die. They'll be like Whooooohh Yeahhhh!!! I should probably start working on that. Technically they're Mexican but they both grew up here and are racist against Mexicans. Every time we go over we leave with bags of food. Max (the dad) tried to sign up to feed us every day this week but Michelle (the mom) told him that wasn't nice. They are super sassy. Especially the girls. The girls don't speak Spanish very well so we have to tell them what words mean in church. On Saturday we took them to a tour of the Newport Temple grounds. It was so cool! They want to be sealed as a family as soon as possible. They want us to come over every day but we only have time to go there every few days.

 

Thanks! Love you!

Hi  mom!

 

I did get the package! Thank you so much! You need to keep sending me stuff so that my zone knows you love me. Haha just kidding. We get mail whenever our zone leaders go to the office which is at least every Monday and Wednesday, but they also sometimes go on other random days of the week if they have a meeting or need to get supplies. On Friday night I got an envelope with a million thank you notes (yes, I counted) from women in our ward. Tell them thank you from me! I really appreciate them. Also tell them to be thankful for the ward they are in because the ward I'm in right now is SO dysfunctional! They all mean well and have amazing testimonies but because almost all of them are converts they don't quite know how to do the not spiritual stuff. I think I'm up to 6 unofficial callings now. Haha it's a party.

 

I'm glad you liked my letters! I love each of you a whole lot. Good, good, and good. Make sure to remind them that I am the most important member of the family while their minds are still young and impressionable. My mission is chill! And I know that his would be too because he's smart enough to not take things personally. He would be such a hard working missionary too! Charles has still not written me!

 

Mine and my companion's relationship gets better every week. We're still not to the point where we break out into "L! is for the way..." every time we try to have companionship inventory, like with my last companion but we have gotten to the "I'm about to tell you something that I've never told anyone" phase. So that's grand. The other day one of the Elders asked us, "Do you guys EVER fight?" We looked at each other both trying to think of a time where we had fought, but we couldn't think of anything so we just said, "We're fighting right now... telepathically" And the best part of this story is that even though transfers is next week we know that we both won't be moved because training takes two transfers and that would be like a mother abandoning her baby before she was old enough to live on her own. Her mom's name is Kari so must be a different person.

 

Yeah that first family is the Garcias/Gomez. We visited them again last night. When we teach them the spirit is always really strong but we still haven't been able to get them to go back to church. And the other family is the familia Gomez. We are teaching them because their two daughters, 9 and 7, have not been baptized. We also have become really good friends. We sit with them at church and eat dinner at their house at least once a week. When we leave they always give us food to take home too. Their daughters are obsessed with us. Whenever we try to make a return appointment with their parents, they say "Tomorrow tomorrow!!" On Sunday Victoria asked her mom if we could have a sleepover because she didn't want us to leave. They're a really cool family. Her sister lives in Orem so you may get to meet them one day if we have a reunion. The love H and M and organic food so I think you would get along.

 

 Last week was hard. We helped set up for the funeral and then we sang during the funeral, so that took up most of Tuesday. I don't think I've ever seen a dead body before so that really bothered me. Both me and my companion have been having nightmares all week about her dying so we haven't been able to sleep.

 

We got a car! A Ford Fusion. It is very nice.

 

Love you!

 

Hola!

 

Yes, I have a fantastic companion. She is very in tune with the Spirit to the point that I don't think we've ever actually taught what we planned to teach. I usually just follow her lead but I often get promptings about what to do too. And they are always the same as hers! So she calls me a good mi hija, pats me on the head, and says that that means it is definitely from the spirit. I just wish I got more promptings more often, but I guess it's something you just have to practice.

We have A LOT of investigators, but that's just because everyone is so friendly and nice here not because they want to join the church. Last week we got 15 new investigators! Which is crazy even for here. Once people understand that we want to share a message about Christ, a lot of them will let us into their house because Christ is very important to them. Especially the women will always say something like, "Oh, I always have time for Christ!" and then give us food or soda. Because white and Asian people also live here we occasionally teach one at the door. None of the Asians speak any English. And the white people are so rude! And never want to talk with us. The Hispanics are also super nice to us because we speak Spanish and we're obviously white, and we live in America. They are touched that we took the trouble to learn it.

 

The problem is that in their culture they are not good at doing things at designated times, so it doesn't matter if we're late but it also doesn't matter if they're not there. It can sometimes be hard to find people again. We have three people with baptismal dates right now. Also, our Bishop cares A LOT about his ward and is super on top of things so we are also constantly teaching inactive members.

 

All of the missionaries I've met so far are very obedient. President and Sister Bowen have set a tone of love and dedication, but they're also not super serious either. I really like this mission. I am worried about my future companions though. The other sisters I have met mean well but do not have very good people skills. I feel like this is very important for a missionary! I feel like I will constantly be having to apologize to investigators and members. Right now I love being in this companionship because we have pretty similar personalities. We like listening to people talk about theirr problems and we have become pros at gossiping with Hispanic housewives. People constantly tell us that we bring the Spirit with us and that they love telling us stories.

 

I would love to be a trainer! I think it would be fun and that I would be good at it. Which probably means that I won't get the chance to because the President will probably assign someone who doesn't want to do it.

 

Thereis an inactive couple in our ward. They haven't been going to church for at least 10 years. The bishop has been trying to find where they live and wanted us to visit them but he couldn't find their address. On Sunday night their two year old son got out to their backyard pool and drowned. The mother found him and took him to the hospital. There, they found a member who worked there and he gave the boy a blessing. He then asked for their address and gave it to the bishop. The bishop asked us to visit them on Tuesday. We didn't want to because we had no idea what to say, especially in Spanish. So we took our member friend, Claudia. She often goes to appointments with us or helps us knock. She is super crazy. her catchphrase is, "I'm Mexican so I just don't care!" We wanted to take her because she speaks Spanish fluently and she is a naturally talkative person and she always has something to say.

 

I wasn't sure how the visit went. We mostly talked to the Grandma and I didn't feel like we had helped the family much by going. But the bishop told us to go again, this time alone, so we went again on Saturday. This time we talked more with the family. They told us that they did not like anyone from the ward, especially Claudia. They said they did not like all these people who had never met them or their son, coming to their house and asking too many questions. But they do like us, who knows for what reason. They said we didn't ask questions, that we brought the Spirit with us, and that they know that God has a message for us to give them. This freaked us out because we hadn't prepared any lesson because we have absolutely no idea what they need to hear. So we shared a very simple message that we felt guided by the Spirit to say. God wanted them to know that he loved them and that his peace was available to them if they would ask for it.

 

We teach them again tonight. We were both prompted separately to speak about developing the Christ Attribute of Hope. So we will be talking about that. And then next time maybe the Plan of Salvation? I don't know. I feel like the Spirit is only allowed to give me inspiration for 24 hours at a time.

 

Teaching other people is a breeze compared to these lessons. And all the members of our ward are super nice. Hmo Torrez wants me to come back after my mission so that he can pick out my husband for me. And I joined a pregnancy pact with my companion and two other ladies in our ward. We're all going to get pregnant at the same time and breastfeed each other's babies.... I don't know, they made it sound fun.

 

Hermana Smith

 

I had to buy a bike. But they did it a really weird way where they bought it but I have to pay them back. Could you send me a $300 check. I forget who it is supposed to me made out to... I'll tell you next time.

 

I bought bike shorts to wear underneath. Riding in a skirt seems pretty normal now but at first it was weird. My area is huge! At least for this mission. And it is super big for having to ride bikes, but I think we might get a car because our bishop complained to the Mission President so then we can use that for going to far places and things outside our area. We haven't even gone to a lot of our area because it would take an hour. My area is completely flat which I like. I haven't seen any hills in my mission but right now I'm in Newport and there are hills here. I live in Garden Grove.

Yeah we have a phone which is nice. We don't use facebook, but we might in the future. I heard that everyone might get Ipads in January. Each person gets one instead of one per companionship and you get to keep it after your mission so that you'll have more incentive to keep it nice. But these might just be rumours.

 

There is a whole Spanish Speaking Stake! I think 8 wards maybe? There are two sets of elders and then me and my companion in my ward. Haha impromptu talks are the worst! We are having Zone Conference on Friday and Elder Ellis is calling missionaries from the audience to talk. Not quite impromptu but still scary! I really don't want to talk but then I remember that it's in English and it seems  realllllllllllllly reaaaaalllly easy. Haha

I'm fine. The weather is nice here and so is our apartment. I bought a comforter at Target because I was cold. It's fluffy!

I had an interesting experience this week. One night my companion and I were struggling with everything. We couldn't find any of the addresses we were looking for. Nobody was home anywhere and an apartment complex we tried to knock had been JWd so no one was interested.

 

Then my companion felt like we should go to this random member's house that was on our ward list. We didn't know who they were but we didn't know most people in our ward. We got there without any problem. Their door was open and the mother immediately let us in as if she was expecting us. She has three teenage children and we were surprised to learn that they hadn't gone to church in about a year. We started to teach them about the 4 principles of the gospel very simply. In the middle of the lesson we asked the mother to share an experience where her prayers had been answered. She replied, "Right now." And we were like yeah, you don't need to share anything too personal but yeah go ahead and share it right now. Then she said, "No, my prayers have been answered right now. I have been praying all day that someone would come and remind my family about God. Because I know I couldn't bring my children back to church by myself."

 

I love you!

Hola!

 

I am having so much fun! I'm on bike! When my mission president told me I was going to be on bike my pupils turned into bikes, he asked me if I could handle it, and I tried to say yes but I was so excited that I don't really know what came out. I get to do all my favorite things every day! Gospel it! Bike it! Spanish it! Cali it! If I sound brainwashed that's because I am!Whooo...!

 

My trainer, district, ward, zone, and new friends are all awesome. We are whitewashing so we've mostly been knocking doors and trying to get to know the members in our area. Apparently the elders that had our area before us creeped out all their investigators so they don't have any? What. Oh yeah! And they threw away the area book? DOUBLE WHAT. Who does that? Go get some help people! So anyway we've been going around visitng people telling them that 1. we're relatively normal 2. we're refreshingly female and 3. the restored Gospel is here on the earth so you should probably get baptized.

 

I can't understand my bishop. Usually my Spanish is ok and I just fill in whatever I don't understand with what I would like the person to say but with him I got nothing. He is from Panama, doesn't speak English, and apparently his mother forgot to inform him that cosonants exist. Whatever. I'm not bitter.

 

I have talked to real people now! It is so much easier.

 

Les Amo!

Hermana Smith

Hola! I'm in Cali now. My mission president is super nice. My trip was tiring. I started at 2 in the morning. On our way to the airport we drove past this huge parade of protesters. I don't understand why they were out that early.

On the plane I was super confused as to wether I should be speaking English or Spanish. Especially to people who were obviously Mexican but could speak better English than I can speak Spanish. Also I have discovered that the bad side to speaking Spanglish for a month is that I have lost track of what is English and what is Spanish. It is hard to speak only English!

Right now I'm at the mission presidents house just chilling. My companion will come and get me in 30 minutes. There are two sisters here who are waiting on their visas to go to brazil. I can understand their Portuguese! Kinda. The weather is perfect here. I really like it. I like meeting new people.

Why are there so many missionaries there! Do we really need that many? I met a lot of people going to our mission from el CCM. But they all said they were only going to be in Chicago.

Yay obra de misionero!

Love you!