Hereford Week 6

More Cows....of course!!!

I hope you are ready to go shopping... Because you're going to need to buy a New Mexico State Flag! Whoo! At the beginning of my mission I really wanted to go to New Mexico, but then I heard that if you stay in Texas your whole mission you get "Texas Ranger" status. Well, I guess I just lost that. It's ok though. I'm super excited to go out there! Elder Walker is leaving Hereford too. Sad day for both of us. It's super funny though because Elder Walker is going to be companions with Elder Powell for his last transfer! And my new companion's name is Elder Ramirez. And guess what? I'm training! He's a new missionary. This should be super exciting. It's always been my dream to become a trainer. I will also be a district leader out there. Since my only form of leadership before has been senior companion, I am nervous. So, please send all the extra prayers this week that I will be able to help out my district the best I can and most importantly that I will be able to help Elder Ramirez adjust into the mission field and be a good companion for him.

Typical Texas, having beautiful skies. I wonder how New Mexico will be... That's where Javier and Flo are from, so it must be pretty cool I imagine :)

Here we are last night over with Sergio's family. Everyone isn't there in this picture though. Silvia (in the back) made us Pasole. It's a super good Mexican soup. It's like the same as Menudo (that gross stuff), but with actually good meat. You can see the huge chunks of it sticking out.

 

This week we went out to Friona again. Before we made the road trip back I had the bright idea of stopping at DQ. How could we not?

And after we took this second picture, we all couldn't stop laughing for like 5 minutes because my eyes look like they're about to pop out of my head. And I got Sergio to try an orange Julius, and he loved it. In fact, he got a dog that day and he name his Julius because of that. haha!

My planner for this transfer

Since we didn't have a baptism this last transfer I am really praying hard that we can have one this coming transfer. I think that would be especially cool for Elder Ramirez. And summer starts this transfer and I was just thinking of water, so that's the second reason for the baptism pictures. Oh, and the name of the place in New Mexico that I am going to is Artesia. I know nothing about it, except that Elder Ramirez and I will be in for a surprise because both of us will be new there. I've never done that before either.

Guess who learned how to do some minor sewing?

I won't go into too much detail about all the investigators that we have since I will be moving on. However, I will tell you that Silvia is really close to being baptized. She is doing better on smoking, but still not off it quite yet. And this week we met both of Sergio's sisters. They are really nice, and we are having a lesson with one of them tonight. His family is for sure my favorite family in Hereford. I will miss them a bunch. Silvia came to church on Sunday. So did Shawn and Abigale. Abigale is the sister-in-law of another recent convert out in Friona. There is a lot going on here in Hereford right now. I pray that the new missionaries coming in here will be able to baptize all these investigators that are so close!

Well family, it's been a short run here in Hereford, but a good one. I'll try to get pictures with a few more cows here in town before I leave, but I don't know if I will get them all. Dad, it looks like your prediction of me staying a while didn't come true, but your theory of me steadily moving west proved to be correct. Make sure you all go the pool for me every week! I love you mom! I love you dad! I love you Meagan! I love you Courtney!

Hereford week 5

I found Virginia Street.

 Not gonna lie.....it didn't look very much like Virginia!

Missionaries really do have special powers!

Friona is apparently the hamburger capital of Texas?

I don't know how all these things are decided because I didn't even see a hamburger joint in town!

SELFIE! So, this week Elder Walker informed me that if you take a Selfie from down low, it makes you look fat. I think he's right.... You know.

You saw me yesterday. I'm not fat, right? Anyway, this picture is in front of a cool Mexican restaurant called Baldo's. Baldo is a super nice guy we met last week. His son served a mission in Mexico. He told us that he loves the missionaries and invited us to eat at his restaurant once a week for free. Sweet! New tradition. He didn't seem like he wanted us to teach him or anything, but I guess if we go over ever week, eventually we'll get to teach him something right?

Ink Spot

Happy State Bank

Really.....I wasn't kidding, every business in town has a Hereford in front of it!

This week we went down to "el campo" which is the ghetto part of town. Poor places are always ideal for finding people to teach. Elder Walker wasn't too fond of the idea of going down there. But, I really felt that we should pay it a visit, so he conceded. While down there we also found out that every missionary in Texas is given the superpower of controlling tumbleweeds. Check it out! I can make it float around. Anyway, we found this cool family down there that speaks Spanish and last night we ended up teaching them a lesson. The mom, Rosa was super interested the whole time. She didn't know that Jesus gave his power to other people like the apostles. She thought that was cool. Then when we told her about how it was restored to Joseph Smith, boom. She said she wants to be baptized by someone with that power. The only issue is that her live in guy friend doesn't like us very much. He loved us when we came over. But he got offended because he thought we were focusing too much on her (well, we were. But that's because she was the one who was actually paying attention). We'll see what happens there. Rosa has 5 kids that live there with them too.

Now to learn about out investigators: Shawn is a friend of Zack (who's going back on his mission in 2 months). Shawn has been to church several times now. It's just been really difficult to meet up with him and teach him. He is pretty close to baptism though. He likes all the things we've taught him and his best friend is a member, so he's got a lot going for him. He's 20 and he reminds me of a mix of Michael Nokes and Tanner Coombs (my home teaching companion at BYU). So basically, he's a cool guy.

We found out this week that Saul has not gone off to jail yet. He's just waiting at home until the Sheriff comes to pick him up. He is going in for 20 months for stealing a car, which he told us he didn't steal. We don't know what happened, but we'll trust him on this one. 

Tina had to work on Mother's day! Her boss seems like a jerk if you ask me. Therefore, she was not able to make it to church. Silvia didn't come to church; we're not sure why. Essentially all she needs to do to be baptized is stop smoking. Since we gave her a blessing and got her some lollipops to suck on instead of cigarettes we're praying that this week is the week for her to stop.

JT came to church. He has a smoking problem. Joe was doing good the one time we saw him this week. But then he went out of town all weekend so we don't know what's up with him right now.

Well, I loved talking to everyone yesterday. It was super fun. And it was great to see everyone. Guess what? Only one more call home before I actually just come home. Crazy stuff. Now we're on the downhill. I hear it just picks up speed from here. I'm happy with the speed right now though. Not too slow. Not too fast. I am excited to see all the blog books when I get home. I know they'll be so fun to look at. That one you sent me was awesome. I love you mom! I love you dad! I love you Meagan! I love you Courtney!