Monday, April 27, 2015

Summary/Training 10 July 2013

Hello! So I did not have time to email on Monday due to transfers but President allowed us to email today while our new companions email their families to say they've arrived safe. Wow, I honestly cannot believe that I am training already. I have definitely been humbled and I'm a little terrified but I know it will be a good experience. More about that later, Let me tell you about our week last week. 

Monday we had that scheduled FHE lesson with the Wight family... That was so fun! The kids love us. Gabe and Ethan (the younger boys) taught us how to make ninja throwing stars out of paper, so I decided to show them how to make those little origami frogs. They had an absolute blast jumping those around the room. It was such a treat to spend time with that family, they are going through a rough time but we can see the peace we bring into their home, I love that we can help out. We had a lovely dinner and lesson, Abbie (the 17 year old) is so sweet, she participated and gave us good comments, we were really happy. 

The Fourth of July is seriously crazy around here, talk about loving the US of A! On the 3rd Malta has their party, this includes the Malta 1st and 2nd Ward as well as anyone else that wants to come. They had a carousell set up as well as corral type thing where little kids could rodeo it up and rope goats. It was so fun to see. They had free sno cones and cotton candy (bet you can't guess how many I had... hehe) and for dinner it was pulled pork, potato salad, all sorts of treats for desert. The highlight of that was probably the pie eating contest. Oh my heavens, Sis. Rex and I were asked to join so we did... she definitely beat me. It was so fun though, I wish we could have gotten pictures. We had to be home by 9 so we didn't do much else that day. 

The 4th we went out to the celebration in Elba where they had food (more pulled pork and potatoes, of course--I'm in heaven!) and other activities. We weren't able to stay long but we talked to members and got a few referrals. In the afternoon we went with the Kathy Zollinger to the Raft River party. THAT was... interesting. The family that owns the property has turned it into a sort of water park. They have a HUGE slip-n-slide, I'm talking like HUGE. They have a zipline too.. For the celebration they had a live band playing and more than 100 people showed up. It was really good for us to get to know members and non-members alike but it was hard to be there while music was playing, it made me miss home WAY too much. Something about Rascal Flatts and 4th of July just makes me lose focus, haha. 

Friday we had a miracle... our WML was unable to take us around so we had to contact one of the graduated YW to take us around town. Most of our appointments had fallen through and we were confused as to what to do. We tried visiting a home we had visited before and had not found anyone... We found the father in the garage and we set an appoinment and took off. Well, Sis. Rex, as inspired as she is said we should probably go back. So we did. We asked to meet his whole family and agreed (only after giving us a weird look for coming back after 20 minutes..). We met the whole Ramos family. Javier and Carmen are from mexico, the wife arrived not long ago and was attempting to getting used to living in the middle of nowhere. She felt lonely and was concerned about the winters out here. they have three daughters, Francisca, Genesis, Y Brisia. We talked to them for about an hour and realized they have had missionaries before. They loved what they have been taught and are anxious to learn more. We were so happy we met the Ramos family, miracles will always happen when you work up to the very end of the day. Often it is the last house that we visit that we get the most out of. We will be returning this week, we are super anxious to teach more. 

We attended the Elba ward on Sunday and ate dinner with the Ward Mission Leader then headed home to teach the Gomez family! Ah, this family has my heart and soul. We love them so much. We had promised to bring BOMs for everyone so we did, even the little boy who is super catholic like his mom wanted one. Miracle: we got the mom to pray!! We have been trying to get her  to pray at the lessons and she never wanted to. She mentioned how different our prayers were compared to hers but that she liked it. Edgar, the one who took seminary, was so happy to see his mom pray, we could just see it. We had a wonderful lesson and they were all engaged and asking good questions. We answered Edgar's question about the HG and how we believe that they are 3 not just 1. He seemed more at ease with our answer but this brought up other questions from Vicky, the second oldest. She bore her testimony to us about feeling the HG and how much she wanted to feel like that all the time. We had come in with the thought of committing them all to baptism in that lesson, however we know how much they love their mom and how much they respect her. For them to accept to baptism would go against everything, they don't want to disappoint their mom. Well, things were going so well we decided to do it anyway. I was so nervous, I knew I was the one to do it because I had yet to do it... Well, we now have a soft commitment from all of them!--except mom, of course. They said that they believe all these things are true but they are afraid to disappoint mom. We are praying daily that Sister Gomez's heart is softened and we can teach her and have her join her family in testimony.

Monday was transfers. We stayed at the mission home and got to travel to Sis. Rex's new area. She will be serving in Jerome, basically shotgunning that area. there are no spanish sisters out there so her and her new companion (Hermana Maese, fluent in spanish--working on English) will cover a large area but only one spanish branch. We spend monday night and Tuesday morning learning about how to train effectively and all that good stuff. Basically, I walked away even more terrified than I had began. We are to have these 2 new spanish sisters trained as best as we can so that in 3-6 weeks they can train. It is quite the task, especially for me but I know we can do it! My companion's name is Hermana Zamurio, she is from Texas, is fluent in English but she can only read and write but can't really speak Spanish. We have quite the Spanish population so we will be working hard on helping her Spanish improve. Today we have a dinner in Elba and will be visiting some less actives. My companion seems excited and anxious to learn so I'm pretty stoked about it. My goal is to work together, so we can both learn because I definitely don't know as much as I should! haha. 

Saying goodbye to Sis. Rex was a lot harder than I thought it would be! I have really grown to love and appreciate her, even if we only spent 3 weeks together. We won't get to see each other because she's in a different area but I know she will be great. We hope to see each other for Jill's baptism though. We both cried, shocker, but we are really excited for each other. 

I hope that updates you enough on all that's been going on. I will talk to you on Monday. I love you! 

Hermana Calero 

p.s. mom thanks for the package! They actually delivered it earlier to the office so I was able to pick it up today. I also sent home a letter talking about packages so they don't get stuck at the mission office. Just send everything to the Twin Falls mission address, I won't be able to pick up anything from the Boise office

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