Thanksgiving

Hello my dear family and friends!

I hope and pray that you are all doing well! This past week has been a little interesting. We had the slowest week of my entire mission! We ended up walked for about 2 hours every day trying to find new people. Even though we ran out of people to see, we had seen all of our members, less actives, and investigators, we had a really grate week! We got members to come to our lessons, we helped the members with their missionary work, and did our best to make everyone feel loved,

I went on exchanges to good old San Bernadino this week! I was with Hermana Wong who was born in Samoa but grew up in Utah and Alaska. She actually went to Middle school in the same place! She is Sariah's age and she recognized a picture of her. It was a really fun exchange! We got to go and do service at "Lighthouse for the Blind." It is a place where blind people can go and learn how to do everyday things, eat lunch, and be around other people. We helped make lunch, passed out drinks and food, and then washed the dishes. It was so much fun. I wish there were more service opportunities in our area! Then we went and tried to contact some of the less-actives that she didn't know in her area. That was fun and they got 2 new investigators from it! Also, one of her investigators thought I was 16. :) That was fun considering everyone seems to think I am 25. 

Yesterday was the ward's primary program! It was so cute! All of the little kids had to do their part in Spanish and they all belted the primary songs in Spanish as well. What made it even better was a super stressful Sunday! There were a ton of new investigators at church that day and we were trying to find people to sit by all of them and make them feel at home. Also, Laura Espinosa showed up to church with her 5 kids! That in all honesty was a miracle. I got to go and sit by them and the ward members were such amazing helpers and friendshippers. I am so grateful for this ward! Laura was only going to stay for an hour but she liked it so much that she stayed for all three! I was exhausted after church but it was worth it!

Our ward is having their Thanksgiving party this Saturday! They are going to be cooking 16 turkeys and all of the other good things. As good sister missionaries we offered to help cook and I think they are going to have us cooking a turkey! Whoot! Thank you mom for teaching me how to do that and helping me know how to cook! I am glad that we get to help others in their work.

I am so grateful that this week is Thanksgiving and that we get to focus on the things that we are grateful for. I am so grateful for this opportunity that I have to be a missionary and to help my brothers and sisters feel the love of our Savior. I am so grateful for each and every one of you and for your prayers and support that you show for me. Thank you so much for everything! I wish I had words to better express my gratitude but I am doing my best to show my gratitude by giving my all to the Lord. 

I hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving and that you get to feel the love of our Heavenly Father as you spend time with friends and family!

Love always,
Hermana Morey

Time is Flying

Hello!!!

How are you all doing? I can't even believe that it is also so close to Thanksgiving! Time seriously is just flying by! I don't even know how to really handle it all. 

This week was pretty good! I am still used to our weeks just filling up with appointments but as we baptized most of our investigators we don't have as many people to see. That makes things a lot different in how we approach our work. We spend a lot of time trying to work with less-actives and members to try and get them working on their own missionary work and trying to get referrals of people that we can teach. As of right now we are still asking everyone that we talk to for referrals but haven't gotten much yet. However, we are still faithful and work hard to be finding people and helping the people around us.

On Friday we had Zone conference! It was such an amazing experience. I had been praying for several things for a little over a week had didn't feel like I was getting an answer; however, at the Zone Conference President Van Cott answered every single one of them! That really strengthened my testimony because I knew that the Lord had answered my prayers but not in the way that I had been expecting. We talked a lot about conversion and especially conversion of people in the Book of Mormon. We had an assignment to find as many stories as we could of how people are converted and then he called on people to share their stories. Even though I wasn't called to share my story I really was able to grow more in my conversion. I realized that there are conversion stories in the Book of Mormon that we don't really focus on. For example, Nephi didn't always just believe the words of his father, he went and prayed and then was willing to act on it. This was a really great assignment! I challenge you all to look at conversion stories!

As for investigators, we have a mom and a daughter named Maria y Dulce who like to be taught at 8 in the morning. While it is a little hard to be ready and at someone's house by this time it has been such a great experience to be able to work with them! It is worth it. All of the missionaries in our ward decided to wake up earlier than 6:30 so that we can get in more exercise time. All 4 Elders get up at 5:30 and we get up at 6. I feel like I have so much more energy during the day to go and work! Also, we have a little bit of time to stretch and I can almost tough my toes! I am so proud! However, the reason why we are doing this is so that we can be fit and healthy so we can be better instruments in the Lord's hands. It has really shown me why our bodies are so important and why it is so important to keep them healthy!

This week Hermana Zamora went to a baptism in her fist area and I needed to stay here and work. One of our recent converts, Yayis, became my companion for the evening! We had a lot of fun working and she really clicked with an investigator family that we were going to stop working with. It is really amazing how the Lord works! They invited us to come back and we will take her with us next time as well. 

That is all for this week! Just know that I love you all and am praying for you. Thank you so much for all of your love and support for me. Please let me know if I can do anything for you or if you need special prayers! Good luck with everything!

Love always,

Hermana Morey

Baptism Joys

Hello everyone!

I hope and pray that you all are doing well! This email is going to be a little jumbled and short.

This week was a hard week for teaching lessons. We were extremely busy all week but we just didn't get the numbers to prove it. The best part of the week was the Devi and Michael got baptized! We were working very hard to get them ready and excited for this baptism.

So details about the baptism. At the last baptism we had the water heater was broken and the water was freezing cold! We weren't about to let that happen so we got there two hours early and kept boiling water and dumping it in. We were prepared! We took our pots and everything. While we were waiting for the water to boil we practice a music number for the baptism. We did Nearer my God to thee and Hermana Zamora played the violin while I played the piano. When it was time for the baptism we were so excited! Everything was going well until we realized that we had forgotten to explain how the baptism works to Devi. Don't even ask me how we forgot that... we hurried back with her and tried to explain it and she got nervous because she didn't understand. Fortunately Elder Miller who was baptizing her was able to calmly explain it. Next problem... the water was FREEZING COLD! All of our work didn't make a degree of difference. Apparently it was bad. When Michael got in the water he looked at us and said that he didn't want to do it anymore, the water was too cold. Fortunately Hermano Teniza was able to soothe him and did it really quickly so they could go get warm. Gha. We felt so bad! There was nothing we could do about that though.

That really was the highlight for the week. Also, Transfers. I had forgotten that people change for transfers because it didn't feel like either of us would be moving. However, when I got to church on Sunday all of the Elders kept telling me to enjoy my last Sunday in this ward. They were all talking to me about how to make it the best last Sunday in a ward when one of the English sisters came up to me and said Congratulations! My heart dropped. I didn't want to leave! Apparently my face was pretty funny in that moment because everyone laughed for about 5 minutes. At lest I am entertaining! Fortunately they didn't really know and I am not moving areas. I am glad because I love working here! I feel like I still have so much more to do here and now I get the opportunity to do it.

I love you all so much! I hope that everything is going well. Don't forget to read your scriptures and say your prayers! 

Love always,

Hermana Morey

Locked Out

Buenos tardes mis amigos! Como estan?

I honestly can't believe that it is already November. I feel like it should still be September. How was everyone's Halloween? Did you do anything fun?

This week started off with our continuous round of bad luck. :) On Monday we accidentally locked our keys in the trunk of our car and when we called Elder Miller, the missionary in charge of cars, he was in Utah. We don't blame him in the slightest because he deserves a break! It was starting to get dark so we walked to Angie's house which was fairly close and waited for Elder Miller to get in contact with the APs. It turns out the APs couldn't get the key to us until the next morning and seeing as our Apartment keys were with the car keys we went back to the English Sisters apartment for take 2 of our sleepover. The APs were able to get the keys to our district leader and the sisters dropped us off at the Stake center for our District meeting. We had a great meeting and then proceeded to walk for 3 hours to get back to our car. Talk about adventure! It was really cool though because we stopped for a quick break, my back was hurting really badly and Hermana Zamora's hips where aching, and while we waited an old investigator saw us and pulled over to talk to us! I hadn't seen him in a long time and then we were able to set up an appointment to see him again. Coincidence? I think NOT! There are no coincidences in missionary work. :)

After that this week has been fairly normal! The weather completely changed and it is wonderful and even really cold at times. On Halloween we had to come in at 6 and weekly plan so that we weren't out on the street. It was fun because we had a really good planning session.

This week we have been working really hard with Debbie and Michael. They are both getting baptized this Saturday! They are both such great people and Michael is the sweetest 9 year-old boy. We are so excited for them and I will tell you more about the baptism next week!

We also have been working hard with Laura and her daughter Darlene. They both really love what we are teaching them but we are having a hard time getting them to come to church! We are praying and working hard to figure out the best ways to help them.

Well, that is all for this week! I hope you are all doing well and I want you all to know that there is no place I would rather be than out on a mission serving the Lord! Have a wonderful week!

Love always,

Hermana Morey