WEEK 25

hola!

yep that's right, week 25 here in good old San Pedro! Transfers were today, and it looks like this area just can't get rid of me, I'll be here for at least another 6 weeks. I'M SO HAPPY ABOUT IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Me and Hna P are gonna tear it up this transfer.

Sad news...............................J: we got a text from him on sunday night that said he can't be baptized because his dad doesn't think he is ready :( but it's ok, we are going over there tonight to reassure him that this is the right thing and that his padre celestial will tell him if he is ready or not.

Really embarrassing moment this week. We were eating at a member's house with some investigators, and I ran upstairs to go to the bathroom. Their house is like 150 years old and the steps are really slippery, and many people (my comp, ward mission leader, and several others) have been known to fall on the stairs. Anyways they were going to start eating so I ran down the stairs (which are right next to the dining room table, and totally fell down the WHOLE FLIGHT!!!!!!!!!!! It was like I was a kid in a sleeping bag sliding down the stairs all over again, just missionary style. So embarrassing. There are still times when I will be praying and my comp will just start busting up and then after the prayer I ask her why she is laughing and then she just says that she was just picturing me fall down the stairs again....oy yoy yoy. so embarrassing!

We had a really fun family home evening at the R's this week with G and E! It was really fun, we watched The restoration video and then played a little game and ate some gluten free banana bread. I will attach a few pics

We were able to see a less active this week, Hermana T, and usually she is very quiet and doesn't talk much at all (which is weird for the Mexican culture, usually they can talk for DAYS). Anyways we taught her the restoration and afterwards she opened up a lot and told us that she really is trying to com eback to church and that she wants to, and so she has been taking small steps to get back, it was super awesome that she finally opened up to us!

So there is this lady named T. She is from Chicago and has the cutest little family ever. She calls us "her girls" and loves us so much. her fiancé just got out of jail and they are planning on getting married and then they want to get baptized, so we are excited to see where that goes. She is the funniest person I have ever met, and her prayers are to die for. She loves praying and, she has been known to pray more than twice in one lesson. funny lady.

B is doing so good, best little missionary ever! He just wants to share it with everyone and invites everyone to church, even if he doesn't know them! And he stands up to his friends when they make fun of his religion and just tells them that "They haven't read the Mormon Book" (I have never once heard him call it the book of Mormon haha) It's super gratifying to see one of your converts continue to be so active in the church and fulfilling their calling and doing missionary work! I love little B!

So today we went to New Ulm, and of course I took a picture by the sign so I will send that in the email! It is different than the one on the movie, but it's still cool. The town is basically all germans, and so all the stores and signs and everything is in German. It's kinda cool. so the sign said "welcome to New ulm" just in german.

We ate dinner at the church here in town called "Jesus Assembly of God" and so that's what the other picture is, those signs were ALL OVER the bathroom, like 3 in every stall haha. Our investigator A invited us there. He likes meeting with us because he wants to know why people think Mormons are so crazy. But now he knows that we are not and told me that when I told him that I know God is our heavenly father that he felt a barrier break down and that he knew what I was saying is true and that he just didn't understand other people and why they didn't like us. It was a cool moment. Then One of the pastors there, pastor B, asked Adam why he was hanging out with us, and he told him that we were very nice and told him good things about God and pastor B was all "It's all a trick. They send the pretty ones out to trick you, stay away from them" right in front of our face! I just felt sad for people who won't even give the truth a chance. Oh well, we will just find the ones who are LISTO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Well that's all for this week, va pues!

Hermana Jones

"Do you carry tasers or a hand gun?"

Yep we got asked that question this week! When we knock on white people's doors, they almost always look at us like we are aliens and they look so afraid of us...which I don't understand why because we don't look threatening at all...but anyways, we knocked on this guys door this week, and the first thing he asks is "Do you carry a taser or a hand gun?" with this frightened look on his face hahaha some people. But we taught the guy a restoration and we are going back to see him tonight!

BEST THING EVER HAPPENED!!!!!!!!!!! So there is a less active in the ward named E. She has had a hard life, and she got baptized last may. Anyways she is dating this guy who used to worship the devil (he was still a part of that religion when I first got to the area but now he isn't a part of it), but he still wouldn't let her go to church or let us come over or anything. We even tried to get her to come joint teaching but he wouldn't let her. Anyways his heart has softened A TON and he has come to church the past 3 weeks with her. And then we invited them to a member's home to have a lesson this week, and they came!! So she brought all her kids and they played with the D's kids and we taught A (the esposo of E)  the restauracion, it was awesome! We are planning on going this Saturday to have a fhe activity with the families.

Later that day we had a "cottage meeting" idk if they have those in Utah but the first time I ever heard of it was here....so the members invite their friends or family or whoever and other members and the missionaries invite their investigators and we just have some snacks and socialize and then the missionaries share a gospel message. so we had one this week at the T's, and it was a success I guess you could say. Haha like 10 members on 2 investigators. It was fun though! J and T were the investigators, and they stayed until 10 talking with the T's, so that was pretty cool. Seems like they had a good time. Hermano C is just too generous sometimes......I think I told you about the bike situation, but I can't remember. Long story short, Hermana P didn't have a bike, and Hna W left her's at Hno. C's because she knew he would take it, so I figured maybe hna P could use it. She can buy another bike, but that was an option. So we ask hno C, and he told us no, but then went and BOUGHT hna p a bike and she wouldn't accept it because it was way too nice of him and she felt like she was taking advantage of his niceness....anyways she ended up accepting the bike. So basically hno C is just too nice. So to the cottage meeting he brought 15 frozen pizzas, 4 gallons of ice creams, 2 cases of water, 3 boxes of hi-c, and silverware and plates.....hahaha all for the 12 of us that were there. We got to take a lot of the pizzas home though so that was nice!

We taught this girl who goes to Gustavus named A this week, and she was super tight! I love working with college age kids! She asked us our first names, and after a lot of convincing we finally told her (I know, it's bad but I really felt like she was my friend and like we knew each other before this life) and in the closing prayer, she was like "I'm grateful for my friends Sarah and I..." and then some other stuff but it was kind of nice to be called Sarah again, a little weird, but I liked it.

So we taught R this week, this nice jarocho, and he brought his Guatemalan friend M along! R had to work this Sunday, but M came to church! He told us he will come again next week, he is super awesome and always wears wife beaters, even to church. Last week R came to church, and it's super awesome because he told us he hasn't missed work in 5 years, but he skipped work last Sunday to try church out, and it was the first time in 5 years!

It's kind of bad, I have always been a bad giggler, but I can always keep it under control unless I am with another giggler. And Hermana P is a giggler. Sometimes we just laugh over the stupidest things and can't stop FOREVER and it is so embarrassing, especially in serious times. I always just sit there and pray for help from Heavenly Father so I don't offend anyone. But it is also a blessing because we can always laugh in any situation, which helps me a lot and that I didn't get to do a lot with my other comps.

Well that's all that I can think of to talk about, thanks for all the support guys!!!!

odele pues

Hermana jones

"they gonna be on bikes, they gonna ride their skates to California​!"

hola!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So the title of this comes from this black lady from Chicago we are teaching. We had just finished saying the opening prayer, and her little 9 month old had crawled in the room, and she shouted at him "they gon be on bikes, the gonna ride their skates to California!!!" haha I have no idea why

Well mom sounds like you got the picture of C and E! We were teaching them a while back, but they weren't progressing. however, we went over to see how they were doing and invite them to take English classes from Elder and Sister C, and they were super happy that we came over. So we went to their house with the C's to teach English, and C basically invited himself to church, and I had to do a double take, because we had tried SO MANY TIMES to get them to come to church, and for some reason, he just decided it was the time! so guess what, him and his wife came yesterday!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! milagro!!!!!!!

Oh so guess who else came to church??? G!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! He got work off!! And came!! His prayers are so cute and special, so I asked him to say the closing prayer in sunday school, and it was amazing, he talked about how grateful he was for us and he told heavenly father that he loved how he was feeling and wanted to keep coming back to church! He has a set work schedule, and they are changing it around so he doesn't know if he will have sunday off every week, but we are praying that he does. He is such a great little person!! If he can come two more times, he will be baptized march 22nd WOOOOOO!!!!!

We have been teaching these kids out in Madelia, J, W and W, for a LONG time, before I even got here. It has been really inconsistent though. And it has been so hard to get them to church. but we have been getting J to weekly activities and church, and we taught him this week, and set a baptisimal date! He will be baptized the 22nd as well!!!!!!!!!!! He is kind of like G, like they just have this humble spirit to them. When you around them, you just feel good. he will get a great addition to the church, and great future missionary! estoy tan animada!!!!!!

So last sunday we were tracting, and knocked on this guy named J's door. We taught him the restoration, and it didn't seem like anything too out of the ordinary, but then we met with him and his friend a little later that week, and J said that he had prayed and received the greatest feeling in the world that this was what he needed to do with his life, and so he is planning to be baptized on the 22nd as well!!! It depends on if he can come to church every sunday until then, but he wants this and loves church! We have been having a good week.

Sometimes being a missionary is super hard. We have been trying to get members more involved here in St. Peter (there are only 2 member families here) and we had so many great things set up for this Tuesday. Someone was going to take G to institute, someone was going to have an investigator over for dinner, and we were going to teach a restoration with a member, so it was going to be an awesome day, and then all the investigators fell through. We got pretty discouraged because no matter how hard we were trying, it just wasn't working. anyways, then we saw SO MANY miracles later on throughout the week, and so I don't know what the Lord is trying to teach us right now, but I guess when things look like they are just completely falling apart, something great can happen! We had 7 people at church (which is really good for the area), and the zone leaders told us that was more than the whole zone combined!

I love Jarochos. We met a lot this week, and they make these really good dulce things. They look like a tortilla but they are sweet and you put azucar and canela on them....mmmmm! oh, and I found someone who can make tortillas better than café rio...yep E!!!!!!! I want her to teach me, because they were so yummy! And ya'll know how much I love café rio tortillas......We taught D this week and ate dinner with him at the R's. It was so funny because D burped really loud while we were eating dinner and I don't think he knows that that is bad manners here in the USA but I was laughing so hard inside, and then I couldn't handle it anymore so I went to the bathroom, and just laughed for like 3 minutes and then got my composure again and went out. hahahaha its a good thing that my comp doesn't mind burping, in fact, she does it too! We have burping contests (in the apt of course)

Today we ate at El agave, and it was so good. I love it, everyone who works there knows us so they always talk to us in Spanish and everything, it is the best

well I think that's it for the week. Things are still cold, we were tracting in -10 plus wind chill the other night.....wooo!

Hermana Jones

Hola

hola!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! For some reason I was super excited to email this week, even though I don't have much to say

SO CHURCH YESTERDAY WAS THE BEST!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! J came!!!!! He is this super cool kid. I've been teaching him my whole time here, off and on. He lives really far away and so It's hard to teach him and his fam consistently. All his uncles, aunts, and grandmas are less active members of the church, and he is 17 from el Salvador and wants to learn more. we've been trying for, well, about 5 months to get him to church and he came yesterday! He loved priests quorum. G wasn't able to come, but he called us Saturday night really late and told us that he can come next sunday! WOOOOOO! To celebrate he is going to make us some Mexican food this week, I can't complain about that! Maybe he will make Guatemalan food too

Speaking of food, it's one of the things I love most about the mission. Yesterday we ate dinner with C and Z, and they made us enchiladas and gorditas and jugo de Jamaica and jugo de pina and it was all so yummy! They showed us how to make it and everything. They just keep putting more and more and more on our plates and I felt like I was going to explode. Then afterwards we had to go home for a few minutes to take some pepto because our stomachs hurt so bad haha, but vale la pena.

We have been finding a lot more Mexicans around town lately, it's awesome. We taught a lot of Spanish restorations this week. As much as white people scare me, I like teaching in English as well.

Our car was grounded again this week, so we walked outside all day in a snow storm, and it was really fun! We were soaking wet all day, but it didn't stop us. It snowed like 16 inches that day! Then that night, the wind picked up. Hno C called us and was like freaking out that we were outside, and then he told everyone in the ward that we were outside that night and they got all mad at us and we were like "why are you getting mad at us for doing our job?" we were still working really hard. Apparently Hno C thought that we were walking on the freeway and was afraid we would get hit by a car, haha but we would never do that.

The Mankato ward is super awesome. A family was talking to us about how they have kind of gotten out of the missionary grove this last month and want to get back into it, and they said they made a list of people to share the gospel with. Then he asked us if we were teaching  a single mom with 3 kids because the spirit told them that there was someone in st peter who they needed to help that fit that description. oddly enough, we are teaching a single mom with 3 kids! it will be awesome to get them involved more! The ward is seriously so awesome.

One of the elders had a baptism this Saturday, a mom and her 2 daughters. It got me really excited for our next baptism, G!

I love my comp. She reminds me SO much of Hanny V haha. long hair, skinny little thing, cheerleader, and yeah they are basically the same person!

Pres and Sister C are in Utah right now for business purposes, and so the 1st counselor in the mission presidency, President E, is filling in for him for a few weeks. We miss him a lot!

hasta luego!

hna jones

6 meses........

I think I am finally used to the cold. It is to the point now where I want it to snow everyday because at least the temperature will be in the teens! Today we got stuck on a hill in the snow, and it took us awhile to get down the hill haha but good times. I seriously think the Lord is blessing me to be fearless at snow driving, because it utah i was terrified but here it is so fun for some reason!!!

G wasn't able to come to church this sunday:(:(:(:( i was soooooooooooooo sad! We fasted with him saturday, and he talked to his boss but he still said no. They just don't have enough workers. Blah!!!!!! It was so cute though, we told him that we wanted to fast with him and hna P asked him if he knew what fasting was and he was all "yeah I am fasting right now, i fast all the time" haha so it was no biggie for him. We are really praying hard that he will be able to come. He is one of the most sincere, faith filled people I have ever met. Just talking to him brings the spirit. He has such good values and morals and he will be a great addition to the church, he just needs to come first! 

Happy/sad story. So we taught this guy named G and he told us to go talk to his friends in casa 25 so we went there and there were SO many mexican men who lived there, so we taught a few of them the restoration, and it was late and they didn't seem too interested, but we went back another day and taught one of the guys again, A, and he was actually super interested! He said that he was happy in his life, but that something was missing, So we invited him to come to church to see what was missing, and he wouldn't come, even though we pushed it more than we normally do. Then, 20 mins later, he calls us up and tells us that he changed his mind and wanted to come to church!!!!!!! it made me so happy!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! So he came yesterday, and really loved it. But it is sad because he says that he doesn't want to join the church for the wrong reasons, and that my companera calls his attention, so he asked us to not come back. I wish we could teach more women because this is  a problem we run into all the time!!!!!!!!!!! President likes the elders to teach young single men and vice versa for the sisters, but with the language barrier, it's hard to do that. Blah. I guess I wish we were more ugly?

Wednesday we had a zone conference, and it was super awesome and much needed! We learned a lot about repentance and working with members. i love president and sister C so much! i am convinced they are the best mission president couple in the world!!!!!!!! I am going to miss them dearly. the new mission president ( I heard his name is president F?) will come in july, so it will be an interesting switch. After the zone conference, we went on a blitz in Lakeville with the Lakeville sisters! It was basically an exchange where we worked in the same area during the day as the other sisters. I went with the one and only sister T. She is a convert to the church and super funny. I had a blast, and i learned a lot from it!

Then we came home Thursday and got lost. Oh my goodness our gps is the worst gps in the world, never ever get a Magellan, always get a garmin. So the Magellan took us this super weird way and we were out in the middle of nowhere, and we finally find a gas station and found out that we were way off track. So we take this freeway going the complete opposite direction of our house and somehow ended up back in St. Peter that night on time! It was super stressful because we have to go to the cities a lot this month, and we are already super low on miles, and that didn't help us to be lost in the middle of nowhere!!!!!!!

We had a really bad lesson with D this week. We had a joint teacher, hno O with us and D was not respecting us at all. He interrupted like every 5 seconds and was talking about super unimportant things and hno O basically just told him to pay attention really boldly, and it worked! We have decided to take it a lot slower with D, because he can't read and no one has been able to read the book of Mormon with him, he hasn't been progressing and we know he won't with the book of Mormon. We are trying to get it on cds so that he can listen to it, and then gain a testimony. We are just praying that he will be able to understand it!!!!

But yeah, a year from tomorrow is my release date and I'm 6 months in this Friday......craziness!!!!! 

Training is really fun. Really hard, but really fun. It's crazy how much my spanish has improved over the last 2 weeks. Like from not fluent, to fluent. It's crazy how the Lord gives you the extra measure of what you need to do his work!!! I don't know if i would love my mission as much if I didn't speak spanish or work with the latin people, because it has made me so happy! i am really grateful that I was able to pick up the language so fast and that I get to do this everyday!!!

That's all, now ya'll keep it real in the real world for me! (we teach a lot of black people from chicago, so picture me saying this like they would haha)

Hermana Jones

Manty'osh

?que tal?! manty'osh means "thank you" in quiche, the Guatemalans are teaching us but that basically the only thing I ever remember haha

so this week has been super fun.

Tuesday: Went to Eden Prairie for the day. I got to work with a sister that came out the same transfer I did! her name is Sister S. Her companion also went home so we just stayed in that area and had fun. The area is closing so we had to clean the apartment really good

Wednesday: went to a bunch of meeting with pres and then spent the day with Sister R, who was also training. We just tried visiting some less actives in Bloomington, but got to teach a restoration and meet a bunch of cool people from Liberia! It was awesome! She is a Karen speaking missionary, which is the language the Karen people in Myanmar speak, its super cool! When she prayed in that language it gave me chills. She is training a new missionary that is Karen, which will help the work so much! Especially since they don't have a book of Mormon or any church materials in Karen. Then we got to meet our new missionaries!

My new comp's name is Hermana P. She's from Pleasant Grove and just turned 19 not too long ago. She was in the CCM en Mexico!!!!!!!! She's this super cute awesome little missionary and we have a lot of fun together. I'm super excited to be training her, even though it feels like I just barely finished my own training. Anyways, after we met, we had to go to the car dealership to get our car looked at because it was leaking oil, but they fixed it and we were on our way

G!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Is one of our invesitgators who is SSSSSSSSSSSOOOO awesome, loves reading en el libro de Mormon y lo hace todos los dias and prays and knows everything is true and just is such a great kid!!!!!!!!!!! But he just can't get work off on sundays...........he asks his boss all the time but they are short staffed and so no one else can......it's hard because he is so prepared and just has to come to church to get baptized. Pray that he can get work off!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Just some "D" lingo for ya ( he doesn't speak Spanish as a first language and says things super funny)

1. !Hace Friiii!

2. siempre means always pero el dice "siempo"

He always just makes me laugh so hard, and I really hope he gets baptized while I am still here in St. Peter.

Well that's my life right now, just chilling in the cold and teaching the gospel to the Guatemalans! I would have never in a million years pictured myself doing what I'm doing here, but IT"S LO MEJOR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Love you all!

Hermana Jones

Transfers!!!

well hello familia y amigos!

 

Today I am emailing from Mankato because we went out to eat at this restaruant in mapleton with our whole district, and it was SO GOOD!!!!!!!!!!!!! It is called Token BBQ and it is owned by a member. He gave us each a rack of ribs (and I ate 3/4 of it, which I am proud of, it was HUGE!!!!!!!!!!!) and fries and these things called turds. they sound gross but they are delicious. they are a hollow jalepeno with creme cheese in it and a little baby hot dog wrapped in bacon. SO YUMMY! And then we tried this SUPER tart cherry stuff, like it hurt my throat terribly and i had to drink boiling hot water to make the pain go away haha. I guess it's just cherry concentrate for the sauces they make. Basically got peer pressured into it. If we ever come visit minnesota one day, we will go eat there Dad would love it!

 

So transfer news.............I'm training! it's a long story....

 

So I had an interview with president in the beginning of Jan, and I was telling him that having companions that are going home soon is hard sometimes, and he told me not to worry because I would be training the next transfer. Anyways, then we started talking more and he asked me about my goal setting and I was dead honest with him.....that I don't like goals haha.  He was astonished (that was the word he used) because he said I seemed like a really goal oriented person. Anyways, he committed me to work on my goal setting and planning. So then he interviewed Sis. M and something funny about president is he tries to convince EVERYONE to go to BYU idaho, no one knows why but yeah, so he tried to convince her to go there and she was not happy about it, but she went back later to talk to him about it again, and then he called me in his office again. He told me that he was nervous for me to train a new missionary if i wasn't a good goal setter. So......not wanting to let down president C.....I started to make goals. Thats right, not just "desires to change" but real GOALS!!!!!! and not just long term goals but even short term ones.  I know, the mission is changing me. So, as hard as it was, I've become a MUCH better missionary and worked really hard this transfer. So president called me up on Friday and asked if I felt ready and I said Yeah and he called me again this morning and told me that I would be training! She is the only spanish sister coming out this transfer, and he says she is a very accomplished person. I am excited to meet her on Wednesday! And yes, I will be staying here in St. Peter woot woot! Probably for another 2 transfers.....so I will probably be here a little over 6 months and 6 transfers....they can't get rid of me!

 

I love the ward here in Mankato, it seriously is the best. The members are always so willing to help, even though most of them live really far away. The mankato ward boundaries are HUGE, and most of the members live in Mankato. It's not super far, but sometimes it's hard to get them involved a ton, especially with the language barrier. Yesterday our ward mission leader bore a great testimony in sacrament meeting about coming to church even though it is hard with the language barrier. There are some ASL people in the ward too, and so he bore his testimony in sign language and english, and i translated for our spanish invesitgators into spanish. it was so cool that everyone who was in that room, no matter what they spoke, could understand his testimony and it just really brought the spirit. He and his wife are HUGE examples to me.

 

 

ok i am already out of time, transfers take a lot of time but anways have a great week!

 

Hermana Jones