Roasted Pig anyone?!? 12/9/13

This week has been really good. I've been stressing about Transfers, which we are finding out today at 12 so I will let you guys know about that later today probably. I am done with training, so anything is possible, and it's kind of scary. 

On Tuesday we did some walking around and we met a lady named Tricia, she is really cool. She does personal training for Geriatrics. She told us that she was Catholic and her husband was Protestant and that she was looking for a church around here to bring them both together. We went back on Saturday and talked to her and we sat down and she was giving us chocolate and a blanket and some fuzzy socks, we had been there for maybe 5 minutes, ahh I love her. We answered some of her questions and got to know her better. Taught a little about the Restoration. She talked about how she had seen Books of Mormon in the Best Westerns that they stay in, but she couldn't just steal one. We gave her a Book of Mormon, and she was SO excited, It was like a little kid on Christmas. She had us write our names and the date so she could remember. It is her B-day tomorrow and she wants to improve her life, She is getting baptized, I know it!

Thursday we had exchanges/splits with the Hermanas. Hermana Jones came with Sis. Davis and I and Hermana Sudweeks went with the other sisters. That Exchange was one of the best things of my life! Hermana Jones is kind of like my missionary idol, probably because she is one of the few older missionaries out here. Sis. Davis and I learned so much from her. Part of training is that I get to take lead in teaching and planning. This was hard for both of us because Sis. Davis likes to take charge, and I like to go with the flow. I think I got this boost of confidence with Hermana Jones, because I was talking to people more and just being BOLD. Friday was probably the best day on my mission so far. I was the happiest that I have been in a long time and it was because I was sharing the gospel, and I wasn't afraid of anything. I don't know where it came from, but I loved it and now that I know what it is like I want to have that all the time! We went over to Mataeo and Hermana Jones was talking with him. I understood very little of what was going on, but he has been reading the Book of Mormon, he asked why Nephi killed Laban, but as Hermana Jones was talking to him, I knew I needed to bear my testimony. I bore my Testimony on The Book of Mormon, and then Hermana Jones translated after. It was the coolest thing, to have him feel the spirit.

On Sunday, Betty taught the Relief Society lesson. She did awesome. It was on Joseph Smith. She has been a member for a month and she did so well. Well we have to get going to DHS but I will email about transfers later today! I love you all, Thank you for your support!

Love,

Sister Kellee Gardner

Yes that is a roasted pig. The Constantinos had us over for their family Christmas party. They are Filipino so there was lots of food! The second picture is from Betty's lesson. She made scriptures with the Hershey Treasures candy and since it was on Joseph Smith she did "we believe" for the Articles of Faith. It was super cute! So for Transfers, I am staying here in Yucca! All of our district are staying actually but we are getting 2 sets of Elders, one for our ward and one for the other ward. It will be exciting and very helpful. Im glad that we don't have to worry about moving or anything and I don't have to stress anymore, the only bad thing about being in Yucca right now is that it is Freezing. When we went to DHS today the other missionaries were freezing, it was 49 or 50 degrees, we thought it felt great. It is about 36 or 37 right now, but the wind is ridiculous. I'm kind of glad I'm not in Utah right now with the way it sounds there. No snow yet, but I'm sure we will get some soon. 

Love ya,

Sister Gardner

Is it really December? 12/2/13

Wow, I can't believe it is December, mostly because it is still about 58-62 degrees most days. December in the desert is different :D

So This week has been alright. We had several lessons fall through, but we were able to visit lots of people. Tuesday we taught Vic, that lesson went pretty well, but we haven't heard from him since. I think he really liked talking to us, but I hope he still has an interest, he cancelled our appointment on Fri. Emily is doing great! She has a sincere desire to do what is right and find out if this is what she needs to do in her life. Her sister is a great example and helps answer questions. The Bueno family also cancelled this week, I guess thats what you get when everyone is off of school for the entire week and Thanksgiving. We were able to talk with Lisa for a bit on Wednesday, and we shared a Mormon Message with her family. She knows the next lesson we are planning on teaching her is the Plan of Salvation, we just have to be able to meet with her.. She's really busy and so it is hard to get an appointment. The other sisters had to go to the dentist today and it is the office she works at so we told them to say hi to her, hopefully shes there. On wednesday we went out walking and we met a few people, one of them is Lalo, he is really cool.  Anyways as we were talking to him he asked us what was the difference between our church and other churches.. In my head I was like "Well let me tell ya ":D we briefly went over the Restoration and how we have a Prophet who leads us today. He seemed to like that. We brought our dvd player with us and we showed him the Mormon message about the Restoration, The spirit was there and I think he really liked what we had to say. He was glad we celebrated holidays because he is pretty into those :D. He is Catholic but likes learning about religion. I am excited to teach him more. 

Thanksgiving was really good. Betty invited us to eat with her, she always invites single elderly people to Thanksgiving and some of them we met at her Baptism. We kept that short and tried not to eat too much because we had dinner at the Prudholms. That was yummy too. Between dinners we went and passed out pass along cards at a restaurant in town that does free thanksgiving dinner every year. That was fun and slightly awkward, mostly fun. Hopefully something will come out of that. 

Friday we had an appointment with a Less active part member family. The Fassbinders, He actually has a son who lives in PG, who might be in a Stake presidency somewhere, I figured mom probably knows him :D. Anyways his daughter( I think) Joyce, is not a member, but I'm not really sure their relation, who takes care of him and her granddaughter. He isn't in good heath and wasn't really interested in us, but we did set up an appointment with Joyce. 

That wasn't really grammatically correct I'm sure, but I hope you get the point. 

Saturday was a baptism. Mom had asked if we had had one on Sat, which would have been the Somers, but we haven't been able to really get in contact with them since we put them on date.. so that didn't happen, but the other sisters had Adam's baptism. They had one back in September, Carmel, and Adam is her husband, so that was cool to see him become interested, stop smoking and everything. Bruce was able to come watch the baptism, and we have been trying to help him understand the importance of being baptized because he really does know it is true, but there have been so many things holding him back, that are little things. Not to mention that he had told the Branch president 2 weeks ago that he wanted to be baptized but he hadn't told us. Which leads toSunday.

We had church, which went well. We were at Linger longer/Break the fast for the ysa branch and all of the sudden, Bruce is like "So I've been thinking about a date for me to get baptized. The 4th is a Saturday and then the 5th has always been a significant number..." Us:" So January 4th? Will you prepare yourself to be baptized on that day?" anyways long story short he finally committed to baptism. He has learned and grown a lot, and there's a lot we still have to teach, but it is nice to know that he is understanding.

So It has been a pretty good week and one more to go for this transfer, Sister Davis and I are hoping we don't get transferred yet.. who knows though. Anything can happen. 

I love you all!

Sister Gardner

So I just remembered something else. A few weeks ago we were teaching Chante(Shawntae) and Jason and then they moved to DHS. well our Zone leaders have been able to meet with them and they have a baptism date for Jan. 11th! Also Karen dropped us this week. Anyways, Love ya all!

Sister Gardner

11/25/13

Dear Family, 

Well I had an email in the works and then the draft got deleted.. Oh well it wasn't that good anyways. This week was pretty good. Monday we had dinner with the Nelsons and they invited Emily and a guy named Jay, who is a former member.. long story. But they have 2 ball pythons and I held one. Only because it was not moving it just sat in a ball the whole time.On Tuesday we had a really good District Meeting and a great reminder that I am not here for me.. My purpose is to invite others to come unto Christ. As I focus on serving others, I will grow as well but if I am focusing on myself, I am not helping others. I was having a hard time with studying for lessons because I was studying what I wanted and not what my investigators needed. That is something that I am continually working on. 

It got really cold and rainy on Thursday and Friday. That was no fun.. On Friday we taught Alicia again. She had a few questions about the Plan of Salvation, but said that she would do anything to get to the Celestial Kingdom. She also said the closing prayer and was pretty nervous but asked if she could give the closing prayer after every lesson! Shes so golden! She just wants to be the best mom and have a happy family. We are meeting with her again tonight and hopefully her husband joins in.On Friday night we picked up a Laurel from the Palm Desert Stake. She got to stay the night and be a missionary for a day. It was a cool experience, I think it would be cool to actually go out with the missionaries for a day and see what it is like. It was cool to get her perspective as a "normal person" of what she thought missionary work was. 

Anyways, sorry this was short, but I better wrap it up.  This pic is in 29, there are a couple of streets that we want to take pictures of, but so far Mormon tr. and Utah tr. are the only ones we have done so far. There's a Memory ln and Boo ln. also Kickapoo tr. is a fun one. Old Woman Springs rd is one of the main roads we drive on, at first I thought that was a weird name for a street but I've gotten used to it and some of the other weird names. The other picture is a sign we found in front of a house, there are several people who have posted signs about how they have a religion already and they don't want missionaries. This is the biggest one ive seen.. Anyways I love you all! and remember that God loves you.

Love, 

Sister Kellee Gardner