Week 73: A week in pictures :)

Ok I am going to try to do something a little bit different and tell yall about my week using pictures. We will see how it goes.  But first we got Transfer Doctrine this week! There is a lot of changes happening in the mission with the new mission president. But as far as me. I am staying here in the South to finish up my mission! I am so happy. Hermana Applegate will also be staying with me BUT Hermana Hernandez is going to join the crew and we are going to be in a trio! I've got a lot of mixed feelings about it, but I'm sure it will be a lot of fun. I don't know where she is going to sleep or study or put her clothes in our tiny apartment (I'm 99% sure we have the smallest apartment in the mission) but we will figure it all out. Elder Barry and Elder Barrett are staying together. So we are just adding Hermana Hernandez to the branch. It will be good. Some other transfer news. Hermana Medeiros is training! She she is getting a brand new missionary in Texas! I am so excited for her. that means I am going to be a "grandma". I'm so pumped for her. Elder Moe got the boot and is heading up to the North. After about 10 and a half months serving together it will be sad to say bye, but he will do amazing in the North.

So Monday! We had a lot of fun on P-day and went shopping. I can't remember if I don't you but our district all got matching shirts and we went crazy at sports! It was tons and tons of fun. elder barry got so sweaty and he started scooting around on the floor. If you look carefully you can see the sweat trail on the floor. His new nickname is Garry from Sponge bob.

On Tuesday we met our new mission president. President Mansell. He is a great man. We each got to meet him individually and then he talked to us. He has a lot of high expectations for this mission. He shared something that really hit me hard. He told us about the process that it takes to be called as a mission president. He said he was called into an interview with an apostale and he was asked three questions 

1. are you worthy?

2. are you able?

3. are you willing?

I think those are all questions that we should ask ourselves daily. Especially when we get callings in the church. If we can answer possitivly to each of those, the Lord will bless us immensely. 

something else he said was "If you don't think God is in the details of your life, YOUR CRAZY!"

We spent most of our day with President Mansell and his family. It was a really neat experience. I have so much to learn from him. 

On a random side note, he played tennis for BYU and so I am trying to play a match with him! 

 Wednesday was a blast! We had service at food bank and I helped this super duper nice guatamalen family. If felt like we had been life-long friends, but it was the first time that I met them. Then we taught Ashley and Irvin the plan of salvation. Irvin is so funny the whole time he just asked, "then why do we have ghosts?? I know ghosts are real because I watch Ghost Adventures, so where are they in the plan?" Oh man I died. this kid. We tried our best to help him understand. Then after the lesson we went to the farwell party for Johnathan Espinosa. He is going into the marines. It was so much fun. We got to socialize with a lot of people and take all kinds of pictures will all kinds of little kids! here are the Ochoa's two kids :) 

Thursday we helped Yesika Cordier set up a yard sale. I didn't know people could have so much stuff..... It was crazy..... But we had a lot of fun going through all of their clothes and setting out kids toys. We had dinner with Rosa and Miguel like we do every thursday, except for this time Miguel tried to help cook the food. He cooked us corn on the cob smothered in mayonnaise and Parmesan cheese. he was sooooo proud of is crazy corn. To end off the day we had a lesson with the Garcia family. They are a less active family that we have been working with for a while. Their son, Alex is 9 and isn't baptized. So we decided to set a baptismal date with him. After a super powerful lesson on the plan of salvation Alex said he wanted to be baptized and we set the goal for August 6th! We also talked to his dad Cesar about renewing his priesthood power so that he can do the baptism. Cesar got really excited and the family is on fire! we are praying so hard that they will be able to keep up the progression. I love them so much! 

Friday!!! I'm running out of time but I will get in as much as I can! Elder Barry's mom send us these super sick shirts!!! I love it so much!!!! We got in with Reyna and we had a heart to heart with her. She admitted to drinking and smoking again and broke down into tears. She said that when she isn't at church that she really just wants to go but that it is super hard for her to come. She told us that for the past little bit she has been really really angry with God. She realized though that distancing herself from Him wasn't solving any of her problems. She asked us if we could go visit the temple again. She said, I need to feel peace again. It's awesome to know that we have somewhere we can go when we need to feel peace. keep Reyna in your prayers. I love her so much it hurts. 

oh and this is a random guy we saw..... okalhomians are so weird. haha 

Saturday we spend a big chunck of our day helping out at Hermana Escobar's house again! It was so much fun I got to know Paola her granddaughter pretty well. We had a lot of fun picking up a bunch of trash out of the lawn while everyone else was inside tearing down more drywall. At one point Elder Barrett and I were dragging a big tree we had chopped down from the front yard to the back yard. We were getting pretty close when Elder Barrett dropped the tree which caused the whole thing to land on my ankle! My foot was stuck under the tree and I couldn't get it out for a while. I have a pretty good battle wound from it. After service I went on exchanges with Sister Call. We had a lot of fun talking to everyone we saw! 

and last but not least, Sunday! We had quite a few people at church. Reyna came for sacrament, so I was super duper happy about that! So ready for a major fail. I am sitting behind the piano playing prelude and looking at everyone when one of the members tells Irvin to go sit with the people that pass the sacrament so that he can pass the sacrament. And I'm thinking in my head, "wait what?? Irvin can't pass the sacrament because he doesn't have the priesthood yet... or does he have it... no I don't think he does... Do I stop playing the piano and go talk to someone...... uh oh....." As I was thinking Uh oh the meeting started. We sang the first hymn and then during the prayer I scooted over to the first counciler and asked quickly if Irvin had the priesthood. He said yup, so Irvin passed the sacrament. We talked to Irvin afterwards and asked when he got the priesthood. He had no idea what we were talking about. We said, you know when they put their hands on your head for the second time. he gave us a strange look and then said.... they never did that.  Uh oh.... So we ran off to the branch presidents office and asked him about it again and we looked on the church website to be sure and it turns out that Irvin doesn't have the priesthood yet! woops!!! It was super funny. The good thing is that it was an honest mistake and Irvin had no idea that he shouldn't have done it. On the bright side Irvin really enjoyed passing the sacrament to everyone so maybe it will motivate him to get the priesthood so that he can actually do it. haha  

This is Hermano Cabello and his mom!

When you can't wake up your companion and decide to use a boat horn