natalie ann: week 4: thanksgiving in the 80s ☀

Monday, November 23, 2015

HELLO! I will try to respond to all of your emails but it is quite hard! This week went by so fast!

I can't remember if I told you guys this or not but we are helping Lynn Luong, our recent convert from Vietnam with her homework each week, she is adorable and i love her! Her family is so awesome and her dad Hieu gave his first talk in English this week and it was so awesome! We helped him practice and he is such an inspiration to me! He talked about how we need to be grateful now! It's so true, we can't say oh I'll be grateful once I finish school or get a better job. He has such a strong testimony about the gospel and wants to share it so much with his family! He is the one who helped convert his wife and step daughter and brought them to the states. His wife Nguyen is so sweet and her English is improving. They have a son, dean who is just a crazy child. He reminds me of a monkey. They always bring us water when we go over and I feel so at home. It's hard to be the new missionary sometimes cause they don't know you and maybe don't trust you as much. But we had dinner with them at the winterhollers last night. There house is SO nice. And they invited the Luongs and we had no idea they were going to be there but it was so great and fun. They made turkey and pie. It was a pre thanksgiving dinner. We had jack
fruit from Vietnam, best fruit ever....AND they brought their son jayson who is my age who is not a member and we got to give him a short lesson. He lives in California though but heiu is so excited for us to teach him more this week, he will be here just for a week.

We got Pete Rossi on date this week! I don't know if I have talked about him or his family before but they already seem like members! Pete is 17 and is an outstanding kid, he reminds me a lot of j.d. W. Because he has been going to church for about a year now. I'm SO excited for him! He is getting baptized dec 19! His mom and dad are so awesome and are the best hosts. Like seriously if I didn't know them I would think they are members, which i actually did before I met them. They are Catholic and the mom, Jen thinks she will be breaking her covenant with God cause she got baptized in the Catholic Church. Long story but we are working on her. His dad Vince is going to be a bishop some day I promise. Last night in our lesson he was asking so many questions and want to know so much. He says he wants to get baptized beginning of next year. Pete will be able to baptize him! They have other older sons and the ysa sisters are teaching one of their other sons! It's awesome!

Theresa another investigator is so awesome. We taught her the plan of salvation this week and it went well! Her kids were pretty crazy though. She said she had been wondering about where we are going and came from and such. She is just a perfect investigator. She wants to be part of a church before she is baptized so we invited her to church and she is coming next week! We were supposed to give her a church tour tonight but she rescheduled. I'm really excited for her and I'm glad I get to watch her grow. She is in her mid 20s and is going through a lot. She is going through a divorce and has two kids. She is a photographer and we can bond over that!

We have been meeting we other less actives or recent converts. They are so awesome. We try to see as many people as we can. A lot of people don't answer. We get fed too well here! Mom don't worry I am getting fed. We have two thanksgiving dinners, one at a less actives, the Ross family and another at members. The members are so nice here! It's hard to get members at lessons though. We will get them though. I give a talk on charity this week at church!

We had zone conference this week! It was in Mesa and it was great! We talked a lot about the talk "what lack I yet?" And how elders and sisters should interact. It was hilarious. Sister Taylor went home this week :( there are gonna be a lot of goodbyes on the mission...we had car inspections and the elder that checked them accidentally put sister oldham and sister devlins keys in our car....we were driving home in bad traffic and we were already late to our dinner apt...and then I look down and the sisters keys were there so they were stuck at the church and we had to go back! We were so late to dinner but he was forgiving. He is older and so great. He studied in Jerusalem for a year. I have a lot of connections with people here. We ate at this Chinese restaurant called flos it was so good but he literally bought us everything on the menu cause he wanted us to try everything lol. He is so nice and funny. We were stuffed but the food was soo good. We of course brought home leftovers.

We visit a lot of apts and they are so confusing! Also everyone and their mom has a dog here. I don't mind and it hasn't been a problem yet. It's a great way to start a conversation! I love it when people say no thanks we are christians! I'm like no way we are too! We teach a lot of older less actives which is so funny. We did a few doorstep lessons.

Funny story so we were walking in a complex and I was like we should knock on their door and they ended up being members but it was so good! They made us feel so important cause they kept telling their kids to be quiet because we are special and are God's servants. It's so awesome being a missionary! But it was good we met them cause they just had a baby and said they never have missionaries over. As we were leaving their son tried to hug my companion and accidentally groped her lol. The dad was like no touching breasts! Baha.

Everything is going well here. Thanks so much for all the emails I promise I read all of them even though I don't respond! I LOVE MY DISTRICT. the sisters are the nicest and all of the elders are the best! our apt is getting bug bombed today...so we are at the stls for today and possibly sleeping over. it was annoying cause we had to put all of our stuff away....also my eyes are weirdly not dry here and dont get that red. mission miracles? cause they were so red in utah. but i think that was also lack of sleep in the mtc i try to go to bed early here. i still hate waking up.

This week I am working on looking for miracles each day. I encourage you to write a miracle that happened each day and write it down! It's perfect for thanksgiving!