E-Mail #47

E-Mail #47

April 30th, 2012

 

 

 

Hello to my fan club....haha....jk.

 

 

Hey everyone! i hope you all have had another great week. This week has been full of all sorts of surprises. This week i found out that my family is MOVING!!! CRAZY!!! I am actually very excited. I got a letter from my mom telling me all the spiritual experiences that led up to them making that choice to move. i also felt the spirit as i read her letter and i know this is what heavenly father has in plan for my whole family! It will be fun to see the blessings that come from listening to our heavenly father! I love following the spirit, you always know only good things are going to come from that! :) So that is one of the big adventures of the week. Another one was on friday my Kansas Barnum family came to the temple....and then they took us to dinner....at a casino....haha...i dont know if that is against mission rules or not. But we were not gambling, we were just eating! haha. The food was pretty amazing too! A winner of a buffett. The best part was i got to spend all that time with my family!!! I loved being around them, they are such a blast to be with! My uncle made me feel like i was with my dad. My cousins just made me laugh a ton, i just wanted to hug them non-stop. I got to flirt with my future cousin-husband (which is a total joke, i just love messing with my cousin he is pretty adorable!) It was just a blast. It was also kinda weird i have not heard my first name that much in my entire mission. It really freaked me out, everyone kept saying brooke....brooke....brookie....brookie....i was like, oh whoa...this is weird. haha. I guess thats normal to feel after being on a mission for 11 months. yep....11 months. CAN YOU BELIEVE IT?!!? because i cant! In a month is my year mark! SO WEIRD!!!!!! I just cant believe it is hear, it just weirds me out completely! I feel like i just had my half way mark, how is it possible to be at a year mark already!?! But its right around the corner.

 

 

On wednesday last week we went through the temple with Teresa, she works for the sperrys and helps with thier son, we see her every morning. We got to go through with her and her sister. It was such a fun experience for her to see the temple and know what they are, and why we have them! She is also the most hysterical person ever, so it was a fun night with her in general! On thursday, there was some seriously fun adventures that happened that day, none were planned, and yet it just all happened!!! I'll give you a little skim of what happened that day. We had our district meeting in Cameron....that was supposed to be at 1030, but got switched to 1145, we couldnt get ahold of our ride to tell her the time switched. We hunted her down and talked to her about the ride, and other things that was an interesting....unexpected conversation. So we head to district meeting, driving ourselves, are early so we decide to head out the Far West, because i have never been there. We run around far west getting pictures! and are now late for district meeting. We GPS our way to district meeting to get a back road. On the back road some very interesting things happen as we were passing a truck and trailer that was going super slow, and we for sure put our gardian angles to work!! They did a great job! We made it to district meeting...magically only 10 minutes late! I couldn't stop giggling during the opening song because i was reflecting on the crazy events that had all happened by noon! District meeting goes on, after the meeting we decide to head out to a small town we have never been to, to contact someone. Again we used our GPS and choose shortest distance to save miles, which of course puts you on ROADS LESS TRAVELED!!! haha, we only had to turn around once and find another way to get there. But we had some good adventures during that ride. The best part is if you remember the hay barrell story about me getting stuck and the school bus driving by?!?..........yea, well we were driving a saw a BIG hay barrell, next to a really small one, so we thought it would be funny to get a picture on it, just to go with the other one. Sister larson's legs broke out again, and i had a spider on me. It was a fun adventure. All in all that day i believe we were in the car for 4 hours. so we did not accomplish much missionary work, but its a day never to be forgotten!

 

 

Saturday was nice because we actually got to do some work. Unfortunatly everyone we talked to had no interest in us coming back, but at least we got some work done. Saturday night we were feeling pretty discouraged.Just feeling like nothing is happening we are teaching 3 people, one is getting baptized on sunday. So forth, just feeling lame. So sunday was fast sunday, because of the temple dedication next sunday. We decide to fast for a miracle, as well as to have our usual tuesday night family come back to church for the baptism, and to somehow find 3 new investigators! And let me tell you what....all of that came true!! ALL OF IT!!! We saw a miracle in our branch president, we saw our tuesday night family return for the baptism....making it that we had 2 new investigators. and we went to see someone we had taught previously that starting to be kinda cold to us, and ditch our appointments and he was super friendly and wanted to meet with us again. IT WAS A MIRACLE DAY!!! I was so excited to see it all go down, and to gain that added testimony of fasting and that it does work! it does bring miracles! That was a testimony that wasn't the strongest before i left, but it has just grown and grown on my mission. I am so thankful for fasting and knowing that when we make a small sacrafice of 2 meals, that heavenly father POURS BLESSINGS OUT!!! I love it!!! Mayanna was also baptized after church and it was so great to see her baptized. I know she was prepared and ready for that step! i am so excited that she has the gift of the holy ghost and that she is growing SO MUCH! She is just so great. The whole branch stayed after church for her baptism. Lots of love and support. It was great! I am so thankful for the time we were able to help her prepare for that step, and to feel her fathers love as she took that step! WOOHOO!

 

 

Even as sunday was full of spiritual experiences.....it was a day never to be forgotten in another way as well! After church, the baptism, the whole bit. There was this super friendly golden lab outside the church building. Without a collar on. He is a super nice dog, very obedient. We would tell him to sit and he would, he would walk next to us as we walked. Very good dog. Well we felt bad that he was wondering and lost, so we went to take him home. Assuming that his home was the neighbors. So we take him over to the neighbors....several of them, and none of them claim him, they all say he has been wandering around since this morning and they dont know where he belongs. So we go to take him back to the church. Well the house next to our church always has chickens and roosters that just wander around. Well the dog saw the chickens and took off after them. Thankfully they were all in the cage at this time. So he just ran back and forth by the fence barking at them. We just called him back and went to continue on to the church. Well he TAKES OFF, and there was a rooster that was not in the cage and he was going in for the kill. I see him grab the rooster and just know he is going to kill it so i turn around because i couldn't watch it happen. When my companion....being the smarter one takes off after the dog. She tries to seperate them. I see her take off and figure, well the least i can do is help, so i run after the dog and the rooster too. Sister Larson gets a hold of the dog, i keep the rooster pinned in a corner so it doesn't get hurt any more. The dog has all sorts of bird feathers in its mouth, the poor rooster lost a TON of feathers, but was totally fine. It was just a CRAZY SITUATION. So then we didn't know what to do. Well a member was watching this whole thing, and then just suggest we call the pound and just have him taken, so he doesnt kill the rooster and the owners can find him. The lady at the pound was super grumpy to us, and just wasn't listening. So we told her we would bring the dog in. Take the dog back to our truck, and get him to hop in the back. He hops in and hops back out.....so we tell him to get in again and go to shut it before he can get out. Well while that happened we get his foot stuck in the bend of the tailgate, somehow the tailgate comes off its bottom hinges. and then it just FELL!!! hanging there just by the wires that come down when you put the tailgate down. So we FREAK OUT!!! WHAT JUST HAPPENED!!! that kind of thing. We put the tailgate back on its hinges and try and get to dog in....and he just WONT GET IN!!! So we call the pound back and tell them he wont get in and to come get him. So we wait for a WHILE for her. Mind you the dog is just hanging out with us, doesn't head back for the rooster, is being very obedient. Just an adorable loving dog, that wanted to eat a rooster, i kept telling him i love him and hate him and love him! Cause he is so cute! The lady comes and gets the dog and we just had this horrible feeling the second she got him. We just felt super bad inside. we go to get ourselves cleaned up in the church, and i just feel like crying because of this dog. Well we go and visit a family later that night and tell them what happened, as we asked them if they wanted a dog, so we could get that dog out of the shelter. and they tell us that they KILL dogs who have been there 2 weeks and have not been claimed! SO WE FELT EVEN WORSE!!!! The poor dog doesn't deserve to DIE! So we ask our dinner people if they would take him, they couldn't because of where they live. So forth. We just feel awful! We asked the sperrys that we live with if they want him. they said they would think about it. We even named him............barson.....barnum and larson put together. We told them we would take care of him, and train him, and even come back and get him after our mission if they didn't want him. They are still thinking about it. So in a few days we are going to go to the pound and see if the owners came and got him. We pray that someone gets him and he doesn't get killed!!! he is such a great dog!!! Anyways that was our drama of sunday. So all of you need to keep barson in your prayers that he doesn't get killed! Good friendly well trained dogs do not deserve to die, they deserve to be in a home! :)

 

 

So that is another great adventure of the week. I hope barson finds a home. I'll attach a picture of the cute guy!

 

 

I love you all!!

 

hope to get letters this week.......(wink wink, nod nod!!)

 

 

OH MY GOODNESS, i just realized i left out the best things!!! Saturday is the big culteral event for the temple dedication. The one that all 200+ of us missionaries will be singing army of helaman in!!! YEA!!! ITS GOING TO BE SOOO COOL!!! OH I CANT WAIT!!! I heard a rumor that it wont hit BYU tv, but i say check byu tv anyways just in case. Also, if it doesnt i guess every youth that participates in it gets a dvd of it, and its okay to make copies of the DVD, so i'll just have to have a copy made of it to send home! Then sunday is the dedication!! ITS GOING TO BE A GREAT WEEKEND!!!

 

 

Sister Barnum.