January 25, 2016

My week was SUPER crazy! Okay first of... The baptisms!!!  So initally we were only planning on having 3, but we wound up having 5!!!!  Crazy right!  There were a couple investigators that I guess just really wanted to get baptized so at the last minute they told us and we had to make a bunch of arrangements but thats okay :)  So the people that got baptized are, Pablo, Orlando, Felix, Jose Fransisco, and Lynda!  And it went so well! President was there as well :) I was SUPER stressed through out the whole thing but it ended up just being super good. :)

So first off, Felix's interview was honestly the best thing ever.  So we were super worried about how he was going to have his interview with our district leader because well... he cant talk or hear.  So we went over early that morning and worked so hard with him on it.  We wrote out all of the questions one by one and had pictures and everything.  But we were still super nervous.  So we sent him in the the interview and after our district leader came out and said ´´wow... vacan hermanas, lo mejor entrevista que he tenido´´ (which means, wow awesome, that was the best interview I've had in my whole mission) and when we heard that we were super happy!  Felix walked out and just looked super happy too :)   I will send pictures of the baptisms! 

Also this week i found a bug in my head!  You know those bot fly videos we use to watch mom? Yeah kinda like that!  My head was itching so i felt around and there was a bump there and so i was kinda scratching at it and  pulled something out and it was a bug!!!  It left a hole in my head!  I am now paranoid!  

Oh and there were transfers this week! But.... me and Hna. Sandison are staying here together!  I am SOOO happy!  Also, we got a new assignment to be the Sister Leaders!  Its kinda like being a zone leader but for the sisters, and most of the ones we are in change of arent in our zone so we will have to be traveling!  But I am super excited!  We have a leadership meeting on thursday and then we have to be in charge of a part of our zone meeting on saturday!  I am exicted to get to know some other sisters in the misson though :)

We were also busy teaching and finding new people this week.  Most of our attention was on the baptisms so we kinda slacked off on finding new investigators but we are going to pick that up this week.  

Oh also we had a world wide mission broadcast!  And something that i was thinking about through the whole thing was about Preach my Gospel.  It really is an amazing book and honestly its not just for missionaries!  So if you havent had a chance to read it DO IT!  It teaches sooo much about everything! :)

Well, that is it for my week.  I am super excited to start a new transfer!  I love you all sooo much!  Have a great week! :)

Love,

Hermana Lauren Jane Mitchell :)

January 18, 2016

Momma!

Wow it sounds like you have some fun trips coming up!  Can i go when i get home? :)  I very much enjoy traveling :)  But that all sounds so fun!  And i cant believe how many people are going on missions now!  They are the best :)

Also, HAPPY BIRTHDAY THIS WEEK DALLIN!  :)  Hope its the best one ever! :)

This week was CRAZY!  So what we have been doing all week is pretty much just preparing our investigators for baptism because we are (hopefully) going to have 4 baptisms this saturday!!! Crazy right!  The 4 are Orlando, Pablo, Felix, and Jose Fransisco.  Please be praying for them!!! :)

Okay i have so much to write i dont know where to start... sorry if i make no sense this week haha :)

This week we found a new family we are teaching and they are soooo great!  They were a reference from a member in my old ward of Angamos!  The mom and the dad have not attended church yet but their kids have gone for the last 2 weeks and really like it.  She told us that she remembers doing Family Home Evenings with her extended family before and that she really liked them, so, of course, we are going to prepare a family home evening and teach them how they work!  I am super excited.  I really feel like they will progress :)  Their son Bruno is the CUTEST little kid ever.   He is 10 and he is so polite and gave the cutest prayer in the world at the end of our lesson.  I already love all of them so much :)

Next with Felix.  Okay i don't have favorite investigators, but if i did, he would be up there :)  So we have been teaching and he now has all the lessons!  So he will be getting baptized!  :)  Its super interesting how we have come to understand him so well!  The gift of tounges is SO REAL!  Sometimes he is just telling us a story and at the end me and Hna,. Sandison just look at each other and we are like ´´how did we understand that...?´´  but we totally get it!  Its CRAZY!  I wish i could video tape our lessons with him.  I am sure we look ridiculous because we have to draw, and act things out, and really it is pretty funny! But we are super excited for him.  

Our English class is going really well!  We have so many people that come!  We have kind of got a teaching plan down and people actually participate!  We found another new family through it so we are definitely succeeding :)

So also this week we were walking around and we had a feeling like we should go to the bishop's house.  So we went and asked how they were doing and his wife, Milagros, just broke down crying.  She said she had been feeling really depressed and that she was praying for something to help her and I guess we were her answer.  It was super cool.  Also she told us about a dream she had, where President Monson came into her room and talked with her.  Background to this story real quick, her son ran away a few months ago to live with a girl in Chile that he met on his mission.  So anyways, President Monson talked to her and told her that her son needed to come home.  So she woke up kind of sad because she thought he was never going to come back.  But, the next day, the day after we visted her, her son called her and told her he was coming home!  Crazy right?  She was so happy and she is now President Monson's #1 fan :)  

So today for pday was probably the funnest thing of my life!  We went SANDBOARDING.  Kinda like snowboarding, but in sand :)  We went out to these sand dunes with a couple other missonaries and it was sooo fun!  I will send pictures today :)

We saw soooo many other miracles this week but my mind is too scattered to remember all of them.  But really i am just sooo happy and things are going soooo good here.  Transfers are Saturday but i am pretty sure me and Hna. Sandison will stay together so i am pretty happy about that. :)

Well, that is it for this week.  I love you all sooo much!  Pray for missonary opportunities! :)

Love, 

Hermana Lauren Jane Mitchell :)

January 11, 2016

Buenas tardes familia!

It sounds like it was a pretty good week!  Happy Birthday Grandpa!  It sounded like quite the party haha :)

My week was another super good week!  We are teaching LOTS! and I love it :)

So first off we taught Alex again.... it was a super intense lesson. Okay intense isnt the best word haha but it was good.  It first off started with him almost not coming and telling a member that he didnt want to meet with us anymore or go to church.  So we were super disappointed but later he called us and told us he did want to meet with us so we ran over to the members home where he was at and talked to him.  I guess what happened is that he has had this girlfriend for like 2 years.  She is very much into drugs and i guess told him that she wanted him to get a tatoo.  He told her no and that he was trying to change and didnt want to do that stuff anymore.  Then i guess she got mad at him and asked him where the old Alex was and that hes changing too much and broke up with him.  I guess that made him really mad about everything and didnt want anything to do with us or the church anymore.  But then he went home and read this talk that we had given him and it made him change his mind so he called us and told us to come over.  We were able to talk to him and tried to get him to understand that if he keeps going down that path that it will bring him nothing good in life.  So he felt a little better afterwards.  Then we were able to take him to meet with the Elders and to get a blessing.  He really liked it!  He said while he was getting the blessing he just felt so good and so motivated.  We are still trying to help him everyday.... 

We also taught Pablo and Orlando this week.  They are both doing okay i guess.. They had dates for this saturday but... they didnt come to church!  So we have to postpone their dates a little more.  Pablo is 8 and Orlando is 21.  They are family of Carlos, a recent convert.  But they are doing really good.  Orlando is just a typical youth who is having a hard time giving up laziness and really just wants to live his life while he is young.  But he is progressing and is seeing the importance of the gospel a little more everyday. 

We were able to have a really good lesson with Felix as well! I love this kid haha!  We taught him the plan of salvation and we had to literally draw out every little part and write down what happens in each phase.  It was kind of hard.  And when we were talking about mortal death he started trying to tell us a story about when his grandpa died but we had no idea what was going on for like 20 minutes hahaha!  But we finally figured it out :)  President Rassmussen is trying to find us some missionaries that talk Peruvian sign language.  I have learneed a couple words but not enough to understand or be able to talk to him fluidly.  He also has a baptismal date for the end of this month. 

We had a really cool experience the other night too.  So there is this little girl that lives next to us named Sumi.  She is super cute haha and just wants to go to church and listen to us!  But her family doesnt so we cant teach her.  But the other night she saw us walking by and asked us to sit down and talk with her.  So we did and she decided to call over all her little friends to listen too.  So we had about 10 little kids circled around us in the street haha.  So we started with a prayer and Sumi made all of her friends get on their knees so we could say a prayer haha!  Then we shared a scripture about Jesus blessing all the little kids and then ended with another prayer, again kneeling.  They all just sat there quietly and listed to us!  It was such a cool moment :)  i think everyone looked at us like we were crazy in the middle of the street on our knees praying with 10 little kids but i really enjoyed it :)

We were not able to find Andre again this week which made me sad, but we are going to keep trying.  We also started teaching an English Class and we have lots of students actually!  We are hoping to be able to find new investigators through it as well :)

Okay so the Peru Trip!  So i do not need to wear a dress around the whole time when we are in Cusco.  If we are just walking around the street i do but other than that i do not.  Like to do the tours and stuff i am fine in normal clothes.  Also i am not sure what you and dad want to wear.....  I will ask around about that.  I think dad could wear normal clothes if he would like....

Also i have not gotten my debit card but i think i should soon.... The mail here is super slow haha.  I will tell you when i get it :)

Well, thats my week.  Thank you so much for everything!  I love you all soooo much and miss you tons!  Have a great week! 

Love,

Hermana Lauren Jane Mitchell :)

January 4, 2016

#Feliz2K16!!!!!

Wow another year has passed by already???  I do have to say that that was probably the fastest year of my whole life!  I cant believe that i come home this year!  i hope you all had fun new years!

My new years was super fun actually :)  So on the 31st we had to go pick up another sister that had to stay with us for a day.  Her name is sister Richin from salt lake.  Shes super great :)  so there were us three north americans together which was so fun!  We had to spend like 4 hours in the office which was not that fun... but afterwards we just went home and got ready for bed.  New Years here in Peru is NOTHING like new years at home.... its literally like 200 times better!  So yes mother we tried to go to bed at 10:30 haha but it was impossible because there is so much noise!  So we just laid in bed and talked until 12, then we heard like a billlion fireworks going off so we dicided to go on our patio thing we had and watch.  It was AMAZING.  Literally fireworks going off everywhere, in every direction!  Disneyland has nothing on Peru on New Years haha!  I will send some pictures.  I took a video but im not sure if i can send it.  I wll try :)

But as for working wise this week was also crazy.  I. Am. Exhausted!  We wound up finding 9 new investigators this week! The sad thing was is that our baptism didnt go through...  His dad couldnt be there so we had to change the date to a little later on this month.  But yes he is still getting baptized :)  We have 4 baptisms set up for the 16th of this month!  Please pray for all of them to work out! 

So this week we taught Alex again.  We were super nervous for the lesson because of his work of wisdom problems...  But we were talking to him and he is honestly doing SO GOOD.  He told us about how he has been tempted to drink or smoke but there is always this little voice in his head telling him no.  And also for our lesson he invited 3 of his friends to come!  It was sooo good!  It is sooo cool to watch him defend and testify about the church.  He has soo many desires to change.  He came to church again and is making a lot of new friends.  For new years he left his family and friends and we to the party that the church put on.  We are definitly seeing miracles in his life and it is so fun to see how happy he is with himself and his progress.  He has changed so much from the first time we met with him to now.  He is honestly a different person.  The church is sooo true!

We also had cool experience yesterday.  So we were out with 2 of the youth in our ward, Wilder and Jackie.  They are like our best friends haha :)  but anyways all of our lessons fell through so we asked them if they knew anyone we could visit.  So they took us to a less actives house.  He is 21 years old and is named Andre.  When we first got there he was kinda iffy if he wanted to listen, but finally we got him to let us in his house.  Then we just told him that we wanted to get to know him a little more and just to tell us about his life.  So he just opened up and started telling us everything.  He has had such a hard life and he was telling us that this week he has been the lowest of lows.  He said that that morning he was planning on committing suicide because he thought that God had forgotten about him and that his life wasnt worth it anymore.  But he told us that that same day he got a visit from a friend that helped him and then a visit from us that changed his mind.  He told us that thanks to us, he knows that God is watching out for him and does love him and sent us to his house in that moment.  We were able to testify about the love that God has for him.  The spirit was so strong in the lesson.  We were guided on what to say and what to do.  In that lesson i could honestly just feel the love that God had for him.  I know that God loves him, and thats why we were there, to remind him of that.  

Another lesson that really impacted me this week was our lesson with Felix.  Felix is our investigator that cant hear or speak.  It is super fun but super hard to teach him.  But i love him so much!  I was thinking about how that happens in the mission a lot... the fact that even when you can hardly communicate with people and they are sooooo different with you, you learn to love them and care about them soo much.  You get to see them how God sees them, and not as the world sees them.  It is really an amazing thing.  So we also got an assignment from the ward with Felix.  We will now be studing spanish sign language to be able to communicate with him.  I am actually super excited for it haha.  We just need to make sure that he understands whats going on before he gets baptized.  Drawing, writing and acting are fun and all haha but we need to make sure he really understands the covanenat he is making.  

This week we also had intercambios!  And i was with Hermana Christianson!  It was so good to be with her again and be able to teach with her and just see how we have both grown as missionaries :)

Me and Hermana Sandison really get along so well.  This was definitly an inspired companionship.  The things that i lack, she definitly makes up for and it just works!  People told us that this is an area where you dont baptize and the ward isnt that great and its really hard to find new investigators.  Well, we have 5 baptisms scheduled in the next couple weeks, have a great realaionship with the ward, and find at least 5 new investgators every week.  ATTITUDE IS EVERYTHING. :)

Well, that is it for this week.  I am honestly so happy.  I cant believe that i am in my last months... CRAZY.  

I love you all so much and thank you for everything!

Hasta luego! 

Love, 

Hermana Lauren Jane Mitchell :)