Bones, Birthdays, and Beautiful Views

Happy Birthday to my companion!

Happy 1-year anniversary to Hermana Perry on divisions

Family Photo of 4 Generations

From left to right: Hermana Mendoza (Amy's trainer or mom), Amy, then Hermana Geronimo (Amy's trainee/daughter), then the missionary Hna. Geronimo is training (Amy's granddaughter)!

Baptism

Week 41

HOLAAAAAA!!!

Well this week flew by!! Here are the highlights!!

Monday:

We went to the museum (I sent some pictures) that is here in Estanzuela. Then in the evening my companions had to do something for President, so I went to a few Family Home Evenings with some members. That was fun! :)

Tuesday:

Multi zone conference, that was awesome!!! We got a call while we were in the bus from the Assistants asking if we could give a 30 min workshop on how to help investigators go to church. So that was crazy!!!! But it went well! And now in theory we should be off the hook for a little bit! :)

Wednesday:

Maribell had her interview, and it went super well. She was so excited afterwards. 

Thursday:

We had divisions with the sisters from Teculatan. They are pretty great and we were able to have lots of wonderful moments. It was also my companions birthday and we surprised her with a cake!! :)

Friday:

We contacted a reference, and she ended up being super pilas (cool)!! Her name is Beatrice. She even attempted to go to church yesterday, but she didn't know where it was, and the tuk tuk drove her all over the place trying to find it, and then her daughter was crying so she decided to go back home, but this next week we are going to walk with her to church! :)

Saturday:

MARIBEL GOT BAPTIZED!!! It went so smoothly!! It was so great to see her all in white. She has been working with the missionaries for 6 months. She is a miracle. Then after the baptism we went to visit Jorge, and he is doing well. His brother joined us in the lesson, and at the end of the lesson he said the prayer and it was so powerful.

Sunday:

We had 5 investigators at church! And Maribel told us a story, that when she got home from church her neighbor started to make fun of her saying that ¨she is a mormon and that she doesnt even believe in God¨, and Maribel said ¨yes, I am 100% Mormon, every part of my body, and you cannot judge me, because you havent even talked to the missionaries.¨ Well last night she was there in our lesson and said that we could come back on Tuesday. Her name in Milagro. which means miracle. 

Ponderizing: D&C 105:19 I love this because it says that God always hears our prayers, but sometimes we have to have trials of our faith. 

Well love you all!!!

-Hermana Garrett

YAY!!

Food and Fun

We made a cake-ish thing for my comp's birthday!
It had carrot, banana, and lots of other random things!! :)

 

Happy 9 months!!! My comp just gave me the watermelon because it's healthy haha

from the movie night

Week 40

HOLA!!!

Well folks, this week was one for the books! First off, I am 9 months into the mission. THAT IS CRAZY!!! And well here is a quick overview of the rest of the week!

-We had a Family Home Evening with a family that we have reactivated and with some investigators, and it went suuuuuuper well! And the reactivated family is now on the ball. They are always giving us names of people we can visit.

-We are now able to do 3 way divisions!! That is just about the coolest thing because we are 3X more effective!!! :) The sisters in the branch are sure helping us a ton! And for the first time in my mission we had more lessons with members than we did without!! 

-Rebecca: So she is 24 yrs old. The only family member that hasn't passed away is her aunt. She lives alone and is going to school. She is really great, and this week she read the pamphlet that talks about the plan of salvation and was super happy when we told her that she really can be with her family again. 

-We found a new family!! Ana Virginia and Victor Alejandro! They are so awesome! More to come on them next week!

-We had divisions with the Hermanas in San Jorge. That was fun. We got eaten alive by mosquitoes! That was not fun. But it sure made me thankful for my area! :)

-We had a movie night with the branch, and we had 15 investigators show up! That was pretty awesome!! And when we got there they were having problems with the disk. So us missionaries got together and said a prayer that everything would work out. Well a few moments later the other missionary remembered that he also had Meet the Mormons on his USB that was in his house. So they ran to their house to get the USB. Well the USB worked, and it taught me a lesson that Heavenly Father does answer our prayers, but not always in the way we expect! 

-Maribel is getting baptized this Saturday!! Pray that everything goes smoothly!! :)

Ponderizing: D&C 101:36 ¨Wherefore, fear not even unto death; for in this world your joy is not full, but in me your joy is full.¨ This just reminds me that even if we think we are happy here, we are going to be EVEN MORE happy after this life!! But I also thought about how the world offers lots of THINGS to make us ¨happy¨, phones, money, advancements, movies, etc, but these things will not bring us JOY. We find JOY in Jesus Christ and in his church. We find JOY in living the Gospel. We find JOY in being obedient. And if we can find JOY in these things while here on the earth, we are going to be so very joyful in the life to come.

Well I love you all. Have a great week!

-Hermana Garrett

Joana's Baptism

Beautiful Views and Beautiful Food

Week 39

HOLA!!!

Well this week was pretty great! 

-Okay first thing is first. Last P-day we played soccer. On turf fields. That in and of itself was enough to make my whole week!!! But other than that we had a super great week! Here is what happened!

-Joana got baptized!!!! We had so many members and investigators that came that we had to make 2 trips! That was a great problem to have! She was glowing after she got out of the water. And it was sure a tender mercy when we had the interview, because normally her dad is at home (she is 24, but lives with her dad and sister), but he wasn't there when we went for the interview. But we needed a male so that the Elders could have the interview... So we started to pray, and a few moments later, Francisco, one of our other investigators walked by. And he was willing to go and be at the interview with us. What a blessing!

-Maribell this week told us that she is ready to get baptized! She said the wait is over, and now I am ready!!!

-We had divisions with the Hermanas from La Reforma this week. They were sure awesome! There was one moment when we were with a member of the branch, and all of our plans had fallen through, and I honestly didn't know where we should go. So we said a prayer, and the hermana from the branch said, I know where we need to go, and took us to a less active, and it ended up being such a spiritual lesson!! 

-Heavenly Father really does prepare people, and then help us find them when they are ready. We have been teaching a part member family, and this week the brother of the mother of this family (his name is Ronny) was there for one lesson. Well yesterday when we passed by their house to take them to church, he was all ready to go! And we hadn't even planned on him going! He told us as we were walking to church that he want´s to get baptized, he wants to change, and we explained that he has to change some things in his life, but he was all smiles and like yes, I can work on that!!

Well this week I am ponderizing D&C 90:24 Search diligently, pray always, and be believing, and all things shall work together for your good, if ye walk uprightly and remember the covenant wherewith ye have covenanted one with another.

LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH!!!

-Hermana Garrett

Week 38

HOLA!!!

So this week was a pretty great one! Here are the highlights!!

-We had been teaching Kareni for a while, but then she started to not have time, or was about to leave, so we stopped visiting her (this was about 5 weeks ago). Well, this week we decided to stop by her house and she was so receptive! She kept asking when we could come back. It was great timing because she had been reading the Book of Mormon just a few days before we visited her and had questions!

-We had a lesson with Maribell last week, and she was really distraught and didn't want to accept what we were saying about the temple. Well this week when we passed by to visit her, she was so much better. She was more open, and said that she is starting to accept it more. She was caught on the fact that even if a person is bad here on earth, they can end up with God after this life. She did't think that was fair, and so she didn't think that the temple was necessary... Well, after lots of prayer, some from her, more from us, she is all good now and understands how merciful our Heavenly Father is.

-We had a little challenge on Saturday to see how many people we could invite to church, and although we spent a lot of time teaching English classes, and also classes to learn how to read and write, we were able to invite 54 people. And Sunday we had 54 people! :) Obviously not all from our invitations, but I thought that was pretty cool that we invited the same number of people that came! :)

-Well Johana is going to get baptized this week!!! She is so awesome! Last week we told her that she should start to read the Book of Mormon from the beginning, and when we asked her how it was going she was like, well I am in 2 Nephi 10.... And started telling us all about everything! It was awesome!

Funny Moments:

-One investigator asked in her prayer that ¨these sisters might have strength like the buffalo¨ ... That was a first :) I guess buffalos are pretty strong. :)

-Oh and you know you are in Guatemala when you have to have a fish in your pila (sink) to eat all the larvae so that you don't have a ton of mosquitoes in your house!

-My companion, well Hermana Bertha is vegetarian, and her mom sent a whole package full of beef jerky!!!! FULL!!! It was for someone in her last area, but she died*! SO MUCH MEAT!! haha

-We have changed tortillas in Guatemala. Revolutionary movement. We have started making tortillas in the shape of stars, butterflies, flowers, moons, and suns! The kids love it, and the moms look at us like, what are you doing? Tortillas only come in circles? Were you raised making tortillas? :) But they always end up smiling and trying to make one too! :) 

Ponderizing: D&C 84:85, 88

Neither take ye thought beforehand what ye shall say; but treasure up in your minds continually the words of life, and it shall be given you in the very hour that portion that shall be meted unto every man.

And whoso receiveth you, there I will be also, for I will go before your face. I will be on your right hand and on your left, and my Spirit shall be in your hearts, and mine angels round about you, to bear you up.

Well love you all!!

-Hermana Garrett

*CLARIFICATION: in the mission, there is quite a bit of jargon. "To die" means to end the mission, not physically dying!