Wow, where to start? I'll start with earlier this week in my old area. It was sad to say goodbye to everyone and to pack up. We had a lot of appointments and the last one I had in the area was at a member's house where they had invited less actives to have us teach them the lessons. We had actually had our first lesson last Tuesday and we were just going to make it a set appointment every week. The last week went great and this week one of the men brought his son with him. His son, Colton, wants to be baptized, but his mom won't let him. He's been coming to church and he even goes to seminary. We taught the Restoration again and we asked Colton if he'd like to take the lessons since his mom wants to know why he wants to get baptized (and I'm assuming she wants a "good" reason, which is understandable). Colton's parents have been divorced and his dad just started coming back to church. What a neat experience to have a new investigator on my last night in the area!
Transfers were on Wednesday morning since Sister Huefner and I had to be there early for the trainers meeting. While we're sitting in the meeting with the Assistants training us, President Nattress came in and said he needed to talk to me. My heart started racing and I had no idea what he was going to say. So we stepped outside into the hall and he said I was going to be also training a sister who just got out of the MTC. So not only was a second half training, but also training a new missionary. SURPRISE! Plus he said the area was not doing so well (surprise, surprise. I wasn't expecting anything different since all of the areas I've been, I've had clean up duty) and he's putting me in there to get the area going. He said the stake president of the wards I just left wasn't very happy with him for moving me. He also said he might be pulling me out soon and that he usually doesn't tell anyone what his thought process is with transfers. So basically he was telling me to get the area going quick because he wants to put me somewhere else.
My new companion's are Sister Wallace, from Austin Texas, and Sister Camilletti, from Denver Colorado. They're both 21. Sister Wallace went to BYU-ID and Sister Camilletti went to BYU. Sister Wallace has been here in Arizona for 4 weeks since she's a visa waiter, so I'm second half training her. She's going to Brazil and she's speaking Portuguese. Sister Camilletti just got here from the MTC and she's also a visa waiter and she's going to New Zealand and she's speaking Samoan. It's definitely been interesting!!
I actually moved out of Gilbert! I'm now in Queen Creek which is south of Gilbert. It's the farm country. I live on the property of members in an annex house. They have a minature farm! They have turkey's, chickens, the whole shabang. We even have goats. They are penned in on the side of our house where our bedroom is. Every morning we get a good morning for the goats at 5AM... yep, I'm definitely not in Gilbert. It's been an interesting adjustment. We cover one ward and the ward boundaries are huge compared to what I'm used to. The ward goes all the way up in these mountains to what the call the "proving grounds." We even have to go off roading up there to get to a recent convert's house. It takes us about 20 minutes to just get there. CRAZY!
We currently have no investigators. The sisters have been working with the members with the temple video presentation and they've been trying to visit all of the members. We have 2 recent converts in the ward. I'm not used to just having one ward; church on Sunday was very short- only 3 hours! The ward members seem nice which is good! They do try hard to reach out which is good. I know we'll be seeing miracles this week! I know we will find investigators.
I am excited to be in this area. I know I'm supposed to be here for a reason and I'm making the best of it! The Lord knows me better than I know myself. Again, I love this Gospel- it's makes me so happy!
Love,
Sister Collins
Living with animals!
The House
The goats!
The 3 Amigas!
