Taylor - November 16, 2015

I'm holding my comp Elder Keys on my shoulders

Hey! 

Sounds like you had a busy week Mom.  So you get to decorate for the Ward Christmas Party?  I remember one time long ago when you sent me outside in the freezing cold to gather some pine cones for decor, yep good times :) Well good luck with that one! Wow I can't believe Stan and Ralynne were married. What a miracle! I'm glad they are doing well! Man that's a fun experience for Sam…not! Glad he's okay though! Oh man you'll have to send  pictures of the Christmas lights so I can see if you did anything new ;) Wow, Jess Hansen is getting wrecked, but I'm glad he's still doing good and hangin in there! I didn't know Mackenzie Kerr was going to the same mission as Lindsay, hmm I must have forgot but that will be cool! 

So this week was really good as we utilized the members, we had a lot of FHE's and are planning on having one tonight! It's really helping our members get involved and our investigators to continue to feel the awesome spirit from the members and help them to feel welcome at the church. We got some good referrals from members especially Hermana Cuparo who is from Uruguay! She definitely has an Uruguayan accent and they drink mate,  which I remember trying when Jordan Thompson gave that little presentation for mutual! Anyways, we are working hard with the members to get their friends to church and feel the light of the gospel! 

We do need to do better on our part at finding on our own. We are knocking each day diligently but don't seem to be finding anyone who is ready to accept the message. We really want to implement teaching more while finding by making sure we are carrying a Book of Mormon as we knock and opening our mouths to really testify of it! The Book of Mormon is something they really focused on in zone training and so we are going to implement that! If we can help people gain a testimony of the Book of Mormon, everything else just falls into place! 

Oh ya I don't have to do district training this week because we have zone conferences which should be good. I'm pretty excited! Oh man and transfers are coming up, I wonder if I'll stay or leave! 

Oh ya I got the birthday letter from Mike and Catherine.  It was funny.  I think Mike took a good amount of time drawing a big bed bug ;) 

The picture I sent was from a zone activity.  We had a pumpkin pie eating contest, played smash face, and we had a paint war, it was pretty fun! Anyways, that's about all but we're excited for the week to continue to do the Lord's work! Love you guys!

Elder Dunn

Lindsay - November 16, 2015

Sister Condie, Me, and Sister Grange

Hello everyone! 

I'm doing great here in Tucson! The weather is really
nice, and it was actually 82 degrees about a week ago! The winters are so nice! But since my blood is thinning, once it got to the high 40's- 50's I have been so cold! It is so weird because that is a nice day in Boise. I'm going to die when I get home!! Haha:) 

This week was awesome but crazy! I feel like I say that every week! But we are covering 3 wards so it is really hard to have a balance with the people that we see in different wards. But it has been good! On Monday, in one of the family wards that we cover, we are teaching someone named Dana. She is an amazing person! But It has been really hard for her to quit smoking. But the other day she called us and said that at the beginning of her day, she prayed to God to help her not be
tempted to smoke, and she didn't smoke once that day! The Lord is truly amazing! 

On Tuesday we met with another of our investigators in
the YSA ward named Michael. I believe I told you about him last week, but we had an amazing lesson with him! We talked about the Restoration, and he had really good questions that put me in a position where I had to stop and think for a moment! But it's ok! His perspective on life is so unique, and he loves smiling and making people happy. He literally is just like Jesus Christ. He believes whole heartedly in being charitable. The Spirit was literally speaking to him, and he set his own baptismal date! Then what was really weird
was when he was talking to us about the gospel principles book he randomly turned to a page that talked about baptism! How cool is that! God works in mysterious ways!! 

On Wednesday Sister Grange went on exchanges, so I just stayed with Sister Condie the whole day! It was weird not to have Sister Grange with us, but we had a busy day which was good! We met with Brian and Kara who are now engaged and going to get married! Kara is so excited for her baptism, and we have loved teaching her.  This week we have also worked with other people who we are passing off to the elders. We wish we could teach all of them, but
either they aren't in YSA, or they just aren't in our area. But it has been so fun to get to know people! One of the ladies that has been in our apartment complex one day said that she was interested in learning about our religion! We were so excited to meet with her! The moment we taught her, we knew she was a solid investigator! She believes in
saying hi to everyone everyday! She is so loving, and she speaks as though she has been a member her whole life! We were so sad when we had to pass her off to the elders. But they set a baptismal date for her, and she came to church the other day! So I know that the elders will teach her well! 

On Friday we went to the Guzman's for dinner. They are the cutest old couple in the whole world! Brother Guzman is from Peru, and I told him about how my grandparents are in Lima! He was so happy to hear that! I talked to them about how they went to Machu Picchu and he was excited to hear that as well. On Sunday, we had to go on a splits because YSA ward starts at 9 and so does the family ward we cover. So I went with Sister Condie, and Sister Grange  was companions with our awesome relief society president! Sister Grange had to speak in sacrament meeting, and we totally forgot until a day before Sunday that our ward mission leader asked
us to teach gospel principles! I felt so bad that we had to go on splits! But it all worked out, and we had a great day! 

That night, we went to another couple's house for dinner. They are both returned missionaries, and the husband shared interesting missionary stories. He served in Guatamala, and apparently their prized possession is a
huge tub that they wash their clothes in, take a shower in, pretty much do everything in. They usually give this tub/sink to a woman when she gets married. So he told us that one time, they were passing these men trying to put a huge sink in the back of their car, and so they stopped and helped them. Then they went to visit someone who ended up not being there, so they headed down the road the way they came. As they were walking a lady ran out of her house and screamed saying, "my sink, my sink!!" Apparently, they had helped those men steal her sink, and they didn't know
it. Wow! 

Anyways, that is my week! I wish all of you a Happy Thanksgiving! I know that when we focus on all of the wonderful little things in life and look at the positive, it is easier to overcome challenges in our lives! I love you all! Have a great week!

Sister Dunn

Chelsea - November 16, 2015

Hi everyone!

This week has been pretty good! It was Sister Balaoing’s birthday yesterday! Sister Hamblin made no bake cookies! Sister K choked on them because of so much sugar and Sister Balaoing didn’t like them after the first couple bites. That was fine with me cause I was like crying as I was eating them, they were so good! 

I got sick twice this week so we called Sister Rahlf again. Basically I’m going to be on omeprazole 40 mg a day for the rest of my mission. And Plasin or something like that twice a day. She said that I don’t need to avoid eating any foods and I should be fine. Ever since I started taking them,  I’ve been doing great! 

Sister Balaoing and I are doing good. We’ve worked a lot of things out and I’m learning to just enjoy the work with her. We were able to find 18 new investigators this week! Crazy! That is something that Sister B is really good at. Just finding. She'll see someone, go up to them, sit right down, and ask to teach. Even if they are so not interested, she just will. Which is definitely not my style, but she really sees potential in everyone! Haha funniest thing. So we were teaching a lesson to five teenage boys this week and like three bugs flew into Sister Balaoing’s shirt in the middle of the lesson and they were biting her. Hahaha so I started out the lesson and when it was her turn I looked at her and she was like Sister Dunn! They’re biting me! Haha the boys were laughing so hard. She had to go inside the house and get them out. Oh man so funny!

So we started to teach our recent convert Jessa's two sisters Leah and Marlene! We also commited them to baptism and they came to church yesterday!! Ahhh we hope they follow through. It would be so great to see her whole family in the church!

Oh man, we also started to teach the de la cruz couple-tatay and nanay. They have like 6 kids. Two of them are members. One is on a mission and the other is in our ward right now. But the parents are catholic. They are super nice but oh man, hardest lesson of my life. They debated so much and the nanay is so hard hearted. They also had really hard questions to answer. Like they said they prayed about if their church is the right one, and they felt like God was with them in the room when they did. What do you say to that?! They also don’t really believe that you have to be in a certain religion to be saved. Most of the time, I was just trying to understand them. Thank goodness Sister Balaoing is a really good teacher. I was able to testify at the end, even though I didn’t really know what was going on haha. I testified that God is a God of order and that he established a way for us to return to him and the things we must do. Then I just told them to open your hearts and I also told them my experience and that I had to pray for a long time before I felt a confirmation. So ya it was okay. Sister Balaoing told me that night, that everything that she said didn’t matter, it wasn’t reaching them, but when I testified, she said that she could see both of them soften their hearts. I was like ya right?! It was nice to hear that maybe once in a while I can make a difference. 

So ya that was the week! I’ve never felt more effective here in the mission! Sister Balaoing is definitely a worker! Love you all! And thanks so much for your letters and prayers!

Sister Dunn

Holli - November 16, 2015

Hello Everyone!

This week was pretty awesome!

So we have been trying tracting this week and we run into lots of Chinese people so Sister Maughan downloaded Because of Him in Chinese and we grabbed some pass along cards and we've shown the Chinese video more
times than we've shown the English one! So hopefully the Chinese sisters will have some work to do :)

We are offering service like crazy when we tract. We visit this lady (Sister Terrill) every week and she is 100 years old! Sweetest lady ever and so missionary minded. During our visit this week she didn't have her hearing aids in so we got to offer our services and help put her hearing aids in! Haha, actually Sister Maughan put them in because I was too afraid of destroying her ear canal.

We stopped by a referral from a member. Her name is Maria. She is the sweetest lady ever and has four children. She initially told us she was too busy to meet with us so we offered our help.  It was awesome because she let us clean the house and we got to talk about missionary work and temples and eternal families! We asked if we could say a prayer before we left and she told us that she was used to recited prayers. We gave her a rundown of how we pray and she gathered her kids together and she prayed. The Spirit was so strong and it was way awesome!

We had dinner one night with the Rossiters and the Ausen's joined us (Brother Ausen is the Ward Mission leader). Their whole family is so missionary minded - it's the best! 

One night we were walking home because all of our appointments fell through. We were about halfway home when this guy starts walking beside us. We start talking to him and he started telling us about his beliefs and his doubts and everything! It was awesome! He knew a little bit about Mormons but not a whole lot. It's amazing how the Spirit works with Heavenly Father's children. We ended up giving
him a Book of Mormon and told him about church. 

We had an awesome lesson yesterday with Ilene and Yang. Cute Chinese couple who want to learn more about God. Sister Maughan contacted him last week and set up a return appointment. When we came back they invited us in, gave us juice, and then sat down and just stared at us. I've never seen someone so eager to learn about God before! It was 

awesome! We taught them about half of the restoration before they were lost - kind of a language barrier. However they told us they would go to the Chinese Ward next week and meet up with the Chinese missionaries. They also want to go to our Ward so they can improve their English. We were about to show them Because of Him in Chinese when I asked Ilene, who Jesus Christ was to her. She said initially she thought He was God but we had told her He was the son of God so that's what she learned - Jesus Christ is the Son of God. She just automatically believed it! No doubt or hesitation - it was awesome!

That's about it here from Arcadia! The Lord is hastening His work - and He uses the weak and simple to do it! Loving the missionary life - can't thank you all enough for your prayers and support!

Love, Sister Dunn

Lindsay - November 9, 2015

The Sisters at Zone Conference

Hello everyone!! I hope you all had a fantastic week! This week has been awesome but crazy! Another sister from our zone had to return home early due to health reasons, so the other sister, Sister Condie is joining our companionship! So we are in a trio! It has been awesome!!! But we are also covering Pima and Hidden Valley wards! So basically we are covering 3 wards for 2 weeks! It has been crazy, but we are having So much fun together! We put our beds right next to each other so it feels like we are having a sleep over every night! Also Sister Grange likes to wrestle with me on the beds, and she always says, "you are a fighter!" She is preparing me for when I return home so I can be fit enough to wrestle Taylor and Spencer!! Haha!!! 

So here are the highlights of my week!  On Tuesday I went on exchanges with Sister Charles! She is an amazing missionary! She is also training, so that has been a stressful thing for her. But we had so much fun together! We also had a busy day too, so that was good! We helped a member sew some Christmas PJ's for her family! She sews 32 pairs of pajamas for all her children and grandchildren! It was so fun! And of course she took a lot of pictures and sent them to our moms:) she was such a sweet lady! We also taught a little girl who has Down syndrome! She was the cutest little thing! It was just such a great experience to be in a family ward for a day! I miss that atmosphere so much! Everyone becomes your family, and they just welcome you in! Not that YSA isn't like that, but it's just different:) 

On Wednesday we had an awesome lesson with Ria! She has had two or three baptismal dates, but she has postponed baptism for some reason. But we had an awesome lesson about the spirit and we brought a newly returned missionary with us! She was awesome and the spirit was so strong! And she set a date for December 11th!!! We about exploded when we left the house! We were so happy! And Sister Grange has taught her since May so she was flipping out! 

On Thursday we had zone conferences!! I love them so much! I got to see my trainer Sister Mizell and my MTC companion! They are actually companions right now! Isn't that crazy? The thing that stuck out to me in zone conferences was how to effectively study. Sister Passey did the training and she really helped me a lot! She said, "when you study with your investigators in mind, you also study for yourself". That is something that I struggle with! It is so hard for me to study for my investigators, when I want it study for myself so I can become a better and more effective teacher! But I realized that I will become a better teacher, if I forget about myself, study for my investigators' lessons and just go out and work! 

On Friday we served lunch at the YSA dollar lunch!! So fun! Then we also had another lunch with our neighbor! And we had a big dinner that night too! So on Friday, Sister Condie joined our companionship! It has been so much fun! That night we had an awesome dinner with a family in Sister Condie's wards. They also had the elders over too! The mother was hilarious! She would just tell story after story about her job and the interesting and hilarious customers that come in every day! By the end of each story, Sister Grange and I were literally crying because we were laughing so hard. Actually when Sister Grange laughs really hard, she always cries, so I laugh even harder when she does that:) Sister Condie and the elders weren't laughing that hard so it was kind of embarrassing:) 

On Saturday we had a lesson with a former investigator! He is a professional soccer player, so he is busy a lot. But he contacted us and so we set up a lesson with him! The spirit was so strong, and we set a baptismal date! And on top of that, he came to stake conference which was amazing! After that we had a lesson with an investigator from Sister Condie's area. He acted really strange throughout the whole lesson. He had made some wrong decisions in his life, and I know that Satan was working on him. He was really fidgety and nervous, and he talked about having voices in his head, belittling him, ridiculing him etc. It was scary! By the end of the lesson, we were literally emotionally drained. It was sad because he refused all of the invitations like coming to church and even receiving a priesthood blessing! I think at this point, he doesn't trust anyone, and he is scared of everyone, and he has reached a certain point of paranoia that is destructive!  

On Sunday we enjoyed going to Stake conference! Elder Oaks was the  apostle that gave the talk! It was so good! Elder Corbridge was also one of my favorite talks! He spoke about how the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints will not fall, and that the adversary will not destroy it! It was so powerful! We also had a lesson with Brian and Kara! They are our favorite! They are striving so hard to put God first in there lives! Kara is getting baptized on the 21st and we are so excited about that! Before we met them, Brian was less active and Kara didn't really believe in God, but now, Kara believes in God, loves the scriptures, and they both came to church on Sunday! It's amazing! 

Well, that's my week, I love you all!! 

Sister Dunn 

Doing service on exchanges with Sister Charles

Holli - November 9, 2015

Dinner with the Mission President and his wife and kids 

(Rickie and Becky) Those rolls were the bomb by the way :) 

Hello Everyone!

This week was pretty normal - nothing too exciting happened.

We are teaching this family (the Mak's) and it's pretty slow going. We are mainly teaching Anthony who is the husband and he is struggling with the idea of a loving Heavenly Father - he is pretty atheist but he has a desire to learn about God so we are working with that! During our lesson with him though, his mom (who only speaks Chinese) was
sitting on the couch watching this Chinese movie and the volume was turned up so loud and it made it so hard to listen to the Spirit! It was this really violent Chinese movie and we were trying to teach Anthony about faith, hope, love etc. so it was pretty tough! Thankfully the movie kept glitching so it got a little better - Heavenly Father was watching out for us!

We did splits on Wednesday with two girls from the young women (Lydia and Kyara) and it was pretty cool. We walked a lot, got lost, and finally when we were walking home we got ambushed by an anti. Interesting experience for Lydia but it was fun!

The Ausen's (Brother Ausen is our Ward mission leader) are an absolutely amazing family. Most of the Ward is so geared for missionary work and it's so awesome! However the Ausen's have been traveling a lot so our work has been a bit rocky but we sat down with them yesterday and they helped us with lots of different ideas to keep the Ward fired up about missionary work.

We had exchanges Saturday and I went to Sunland with Sister Thatcher.  They’re trying this new tracting approach where we try to get people to fill out this survey and teach them the Restoration at the same time. It kind of 

worked! We knocked doors from 3-6 and finally this one lady opened to us (Nancy) and she was way sweet! She had a daughter who was LDS who had passed away pretty recently. Nancy told us growing up she would go to 

church but it never fully clicked with her. One question on the survey was, do you want to be happier then you are now? Nancy said she had never really been happy her entire life. She felt she had always been kind of depressed. Super sad - she said she's just fine staying this way - she’s 

older and tired and has kind of given up ever since her daughter died.  However she did accept a return appointment - we gave her a rundown of the Plan of Salvation so hopefully she progresses and wants to keep learning more!

We had dinner with the Villanuevas Friday night! Talk about pressure! Sister Maughan came up with an awesome spiritual thought though so it worked great! We had an awesome lesson with Yiwei last night. He is super 

smart and was a referral from Brother Jensen. We taught him about the Restoration and and the Spirit was so strong! 

Yeah, overall kind of a rougher week here in Arcadia but it's still good! This area has lots of potential - the Lord knows what He's doing, and we are enjoying to the end!

Love you all so much - thank you for your love and support!

Love, Sister Dunn

Chelsea - November 9, 2015

Last pic of our apartment before Sister Mariano is transferred

Transfers and new companionships

Hello everyone! 

So this week has definitely been the hardest week of my life! So first on Monday, we were able to do an FHE with the Manibog family! So Jessa is the recent convert and the mom is a less active and the dad and the rest of the kids aren’t members. (We are gonna try to teach the fam later!) Anyways, the family home evening was so great and literally, watching them all gather around the hymnbook singing families can be together forever was probably the best moment this week. Also when we told them Sister Mariano was getting transferred, Jessa almost started crying. Ahhhh its so sad!!

So good news! We were eating dinner at the Martinez family on Tuesday night and our phone starts ringing and its President Rahlf. Sister Mariano is a new Sister Training Leader!!!! Oh my goodness she was just crying and crying and I went up to her and we were just hugging and crying and I was like I’m so proud of you!! Such a sweet moment with my nanay!!

So pretty much goodbyes were the worst. I was a mess on transfer day and I couldn’t stop crying. Oh and Sister Mariano is assigned in Cauayan!!! Haha! It was like the one place she didn’t want to go to, and I totally predicted Cauayan like 2 months ago and so when the ZL read the list off and he said Sister Mariano in Cauayan she and I both just screamed and laughed haha! But I know she’s gonna be great.

 

So my new companion is Sister Balaoing! She is Filippina (from Bikol or something like that) and she's 27! She and Sister Mariano are total opposites so its been a bit of an adjustment. She is so energetic and loud and oh man.. its been hard. But she is such a good teacher and really good in contacting. So we are always going to have about 100 contacts a week! haha. 

So at church yesterday, we had two less actives come! One is sister Jona de la cruz. She and her family are so poor that they have to work on Sunday. But she was able to come to sacrament meeting and sunday school. I literally almost cried when I saw her. She hasn’t been to church in more than a year! So it was a miracle! 

So this has definitely been a stressful week leading the area! But its been pretty fun. Lets just say that I have never talked more Tagalog in my life haha. The gross food for this week: Balut and bread with mayo. Dont worry, I didn’t eat it. I really don’t eat any food anymore because I just throw it all up or get a super upset stomach! haha. So anyway we were at an appointment and this lady fed us balut and bread with mayo and I literally almost threw up watching them eat it.  She gave me a pear! She’s so great! 

So ya, that’s about it this week! I definitely feel like God is magnifying what little efforts I can put forth! I’m trying my best, but I obviously have limited skills, but I think that God knows this would be a hard week so he definitely made my burden light. 

Love you all!

Sister Dunn

Haha we bought marshmallows and the next day there were like a thousand ants in the package, but since we are so poor, we just ate them anyway! hhahahah

Taylor - November 9, 2015

Hey! Doing pretty good, just loving the mission life! I don't have to give District Training this week because of Zone Training.  Zone conferences are also coming up so that should be fun! 

We are still working with the two part member families and they came to church and they loved it! Unfortunately neither of them are married so we have a lot of work to do.  We are really using the ward members well and I know as we continue to work with the ward we will be able to get them married and baptized! The Latin members in the ward will probably throw a huge fiesta for them when they get married. It will be awesome! 

We did have a hard time finding new investigators this week and we feel part of it is that we need to work on inspired finding. We need to make sure we are really following the spirit and aware of it constantly so we don't miss the opportunities to find those that are ready and waiting and that have been prepared by the Lord. The District did well this week and both sisters had baptisms so that was great! 

Wow mom sounds like you had a big week with all the yard work and fun activities, super cool! Be careful Dad you don't want to go too hard, you are getting up there in years! ;) 

Dad you're totally right, sometimes we need to take the leap of faith even when we think we can't do something and the Lord will help us and guide us through. I had a comp study recently with the Palm Beach sisters and I had no idea what I was going to do it on. I had tried to prepare and had a few notes. I started off with some questions that I had written down from preach my gospel. At this moment I can't remember them sorry.(by the way do you guys study preach my gospel? If not Hint: it's the best thing ever and it's not just for missionaries!) Anyways, so I asked the questions and then somehow with discussion I felt impressed to talk about how they are working as a companionship and how they can use the talents and skills that they both have and combine them to become better missionaries! They said it was just what they needed and super inspired! Anyways miracles do happen! And thanks for the thoughts on being a leader mom. I'm definitely trying to get better but there is always room to improve! Well sorry I have to go but thanks so much for the email! 

Love you guys!

Elder Dunn

Chelsea - November 2, 2015

Ian!  Siyang he’s closing his eyes! Haha he’s literally the cutest kid ever

My Batch!

Sister Mariano is being transferred…my nanay is leaving me!

Welllll...... Sister Mariano is getting transferred!! She is so excited haha. Five months in an area is kinda a long time. But you know, still sad, cause im getting a new companion and my nanay is leaving me! But it will all be good :)

So this week we had zone conference in Solano! So fun! Elder and Sister Schwitzer both spoke and so did President and Sister Rahlf (oh and Elder Schwitzer spoke at general conference) so it was pretty cool! I got to see Sister Ngkuru which was awesome! (shes my batch) and Elder Pandaog my tatay! That was super fun! One of my favorite things that was said is what makes a good missionary is a missionary who is willing to love the people. He told about a companionship in Russia. One missionary was surrounded by the members at the ward and the other was studying a russian language book. One member said that the misisonary surrounded by the members was amazing. Everyone loved him, even though his Russian was horrible. The other missionary was newer, and the members didnt really like him even though he had amazing Russian. So pretty much, even though my Tagalog is not good, I can still make connections with my investigators and the members here. So ya that was definitely revelation, ha! But oh man, on the ride home, Sister De Guzman was just throwing up, and literally, the drive to Solano is the worst. Its so windy and our driver kept stopping really abruptly... so for the next two days I was absolutely sick to my stomach. It was the worst. But Im good now! haha

So this week we were so punted. We went out on Wednesday for 8 hours, and we taught.... 2 lessons! And to members! All of our investigators didnt want us to teach them and it was the worst! And then on Sunday, same thing. But since its November 1st, all souls day, everyone is in the cemetery. So we went out for an hour, tried everyone we knew, and no one was there, so we went home and just did our studies first haha. 

So one of our investigators kids is super sick. So we visited them in the Diffun hospital. Scariest hospital of my life. Theres a ton of cats just walking around, cockroaches, spider webs, no aircon or even fans. And the poor baby. He was in so much pain, that the whole time we were there he was just screaming. The nurse was talking to us and she was saying that other countries are so lucky. They have ventilation and a lot of access to medicine. Its really sad…

So we are working with one of our new investigators, Jennifer. She's been okay to work with, she's receptive and will listen to us, but not really commited. So we recently taught her lesson 1 principle 4-6 about the true church on the earth, the apostasy, and Joseph Smith. We then asked her to pray to know these things are true. And so she asked in her prayer for the closing prayer. After her prayer, she was just crying. Super sweet :) 

So thats it for this week! Love you all! 

Sister Dunn

Taylor - November 2, 2015

Hey! The week was good We were able to find some cool people knocking and opening our mouths constantly as well as find some part member families through referrals and miracles! Unfortunately we weren't able to get all of them to church and so that's something we are going to work on! 

We miraculously ran into one part member family that had recently moved from New Jersey. We were talking to them and we were going to say a prayer with them but then we figured out she was a member.  Kind of awkward but super cool at the same time! We are excited to work with the husband who isn't a member! Hooray for eternal families! :) We are going to get even more members out with us to make sure with their help the people we are teaching can come to church and have friends there! 

The District Leader thing is going good but I can definitely relate to you mom where sometimes I'm ready to go and I feel good about it and sometimes where I just don't know if the training helped that much or not. It's definitely a process though to continually progress and get better! 

Oh ya about the bedbugs don't worry we threw out the mattress and box spring and now we have a steamer and they also sprayed so it's definitely better now! 

For the DPA (Doctrine, Principle, Application) it's just hard because we have to tie it into a role play so they can apply it in their daily missionary work.  Sometimes I just overthink it but I'm getting better! 

Oh Domingo passed the sacrament and shared his testimony on Sunday. He is so solid! Also we had a little missionary work fireside (noche fogonera) in our ward which was super cool and we are excited to get the members ever more pumped for missionary work and teach them how to do it better :) 

Oh man another trailer for Star Wars! It's going to be so epic! Those Boise State helmets are super sick by the way.  My comps are all in agreement! The Halloween activity looked super fun. Thanks for all the pics. They were great! Ya Bro. Hansen is the best! Looks like Jess is doing well. He pulled off wolverine pretty well! That's really not fun with Jill breaking her elbow and losing her dog. I hope she gets better and hopefully can turn to the Lord in her times of trial. Man Spence is just partying it up. As long as he has good friends though I'm content. 

Anyways that's about all i've got but thanks so much for the emails. Love you guys! Oh and thanks so much for the Halloween package it was totally unexpected but we loved it! :) Bye!  

Elder Dunn

Lindsay - November 2, 2015

Hello everyone! How are you all? This week was amazing! Sister Grange and I worked so hard, and we had fun doing it! :) On Wednesday we had the most amazing district meeting! We talked about diligence and obedience. Sister Grange gave an awesome training on diligence! We talked about 1st Nephi 3 and talked about each verse and how Nephi was diligent. It is amazing when you dissect a chapter of scripture, and the amazing things that stick out to you! The thing that stood out to me was that even though Nephi failed to get the plates 2 times, he knew that he had to accomplish the thing which the Lord commanded him to do. He was so diligent, and even though he failed, he got back up and tried again! And the Lord blessed him! I think that in our lives, if we fail at something we are tempted to give up. I know that Satan is trying to keep us from trying again because he knows that we have the potential to have an awesome spiritual experience if we do try again! We just need to trust in God and know that something good will come out of our diligent actions. 

On Thursday we went to go and teach Ruby who is our new investigator! She has met with the missionaries before, but we don't know what happened. Her desire to be baptized isn't really there, and she is a little off, if you know what I mean! She has a really hard time comprehending what we say, and so I believe that she is pretty set in her ways. When we asked her about her day she responded by saying that she watched movies all day. Wow! So it has been really hard for us to teach  her, because she doesn't seem like she wants to change. Her family's religion is the one she clings to, and apparently she doesn't know too much about it cause she doesn't practice it! But since her family is involved, she kind of is involved. We were really bold with her, and I felt the spirit so strongly! We were pretty much pouring out our souls to her, and I felt the spirit like a brick. But every time we would finish, she would shrug her shoulders and say, "I already have been baptized multiple times." We explained the priesthood power many times, and with boldness, but she just doesn't get it! Sister Grange and I want the gospel to be a part of her life so bad! But I know that she is in a state of laziness and not wanting to do anything with her life. She used to have a job, but she quit. And so she doesn't do much. It is so hard to help people to change when they don't want to, or they are afraid. Because she told us she is afraid that God will tell her to change. But we are still working on her! And I know someday she will get there! 

On Friday Sister Grange took me to a Mexican fast food restaurant  to get a Sonoran dog! They homemake their hot dog buns, put a hotdog wrapped in bacon on the bun, put mayo, mustard, tomato, onion, and jalapeño sauce on top! It was the most amazing thing I have ever tasted! Spence, I'm tellin you buddy, you would love a Sonoran dog so much! And then Sister Grange took me to get a raspado. They have different flavorings; I chose pecan. Then they put shave ice, a scoop of ice cream, and then pour sweetened condensed milk all over it! Soooo good! 

On Saturday, which was Halloween, our mission president told us not to go tract-or- treating!  It was hard to do a lot, but we tried a lot of people! But thank goodness we weekly planned that night! It would have been so hard to get a hold of people, especially in a YSA ward on Halloween night! 

On Sunday 3 of our investigators came to church, and 2 of our recent converts invited a nonmember family member and nonmember friend to Church!!!! I seriously love this ward!!! There is so much potential in our investigators! Michael, one of our new investigators said that he felt something that he couldn't explain!!  Sister Grange was flipping out with joy! Sister Grange was bouncing off the walls! Not that I wasn't, but I was literally in a state of shock and speechlessness. Even though it has been really hard to have this area really progress, slowly but surely it has! And we witness miracles every week! I am so happy, and so glad to be here in Tucson! I hope you all had an awesome Halloween! I love you all!  

Sincerely,
Sister Dunn

Holli - November 2, 2015

Me, Simoan, and the chinchilla

Hello Everyone!

Hope you are all doing well and had a wonderful Halloween :) Thanks for all the pics mom - they were awesome!

So we had such an explosive lesson with the Ludwig family last Monday - literally! Sister Maughan had this great idea of teaching the gospel of Jesus Christ as an object lesson. An egg represents us, we take a marker and scribble on it (representing sin) and then we "baptize" it in isopropyl alcohol. Then we take a liter bottle and the egg has to
get through the straight and narrow neck of the bottle to get to heaven (which is inside the bottle) so we take a match and light it in the bottle, representing the baptism of fire and the egg is supposed to be able to get sucked into the bottle.
Well . . . We forgot that the egg needed to be hard boiled, our
matches wouldn't light and the Ludwig kids literally used their entire box trying to make it work. We smashed two of their eggs trying to get it to go in and finally we just said that getting into heaven is really hard and damaging sometimes. We told the kids there was no way we could fix those sad broken eggs, but the Savior could!
#mostmemorablelessonever

It was a big service week for us! We were out doing some proselyting when we saw this guy trying to fix his bike on the side of the road. We (being the bike experts that we are) went over to offer our help. We held it still for him while he tried to fix the gears but it just didn't work. I think we may have made it worse actually, haha.

One day we had been busing it around pretty much all day. It was late at night and we got on one of the buses and the driver was like, "Hermanitas!" And he wouldn't let us pay for the ride. Then when we got off our stop was right by these sprinklers and a big puddle of water but he had us wait and he pulled forward to where it was dry. Super nice, right?

On that same night one of our members had this really scary experience happen to where she lost the hearing in one of her ears. Completely out of the blue it was gone! She's going to get a priesthood blessing and she has maybe 20% of her hearing back but the doctors don't know if she'll ever fully recover. Kind of scary but she has so much faith and is hanging in there!

Accident report for this week: I ran into two trash cans. I had seen them from a distance and I had to tell Sister Maughan something so I half turned around and the next thing I knew my bike caught both cans and they went right over! Thankfully the only thing that was injured was my pride haha :) and thank goodness those trash cans were empty!

So we had a rough lesson with one of our eternigators (Randy) - he has been investigating the church for 5 years, but honestly the missionaries and the Ward probably want it more than he does right now. He told us he doesn't know why we need the Book of Mormon because it teaches exactly what is taught in the Bible and basically he has no
desire to find out if the Book of Mormon is true. He's had a nasty life though and has come an amazingly long way I these past five years, but his trust level is pretty low, both in himself and in the Lord.

After Randy's lesson we were walking home kind of dejected when we ran into Dwayne. He was walking his girlfriend's dog and we got to talking. He is kind of a conspiracy theorist so he was talking about astronauts on the moon and Benghazi and everything and then he was talking about religion and how this world is so confusing. So we gave
him a Book of Mormon and told him a bit about what we believe. While we were talking though, I recognized his dog and asked if his girlfriend's name was Irma. We had met Irma street contacting about a month ago and had talked to her about her beliefs and she basically just wanted to find truth. Anyways, kind of a cool miracle to run into Dwayne. So Irma has the restoration pamphlet and Dwayne has the Book
of Mormon so hopefully they can find truth together! And then get married :)

We were at the Mak's house (cute Chinese family - dad has been investigating for six years) and they have a cute one year old named Cordelia. Anthony loves the church members, but whenever we talk about God he kind of veers it back to us. They love the church socially but their personal relationships with God aren't so good. The struggle
with Anthony is getting him to keep commitments like reading, praying, and coming to church. Anyways, we were talking about the Book of Mormon and little Cordelia is having a tug of war with Sister Maughan for her Book of Mormon so I pull out a soft copy and hand it to her and she held it like her favorite stuffed animal for the rest of the time. It was so funny! She got on the couch and started reading it and
then she towed it around and danced with it. We were like, it's a sign! You need to read this book!

We helped this family in Monrovia pack up and move out on Saturday. They aren't members but they are way nice. They have a chinchilla and I got to hold it. Her name is Lucy :)

Sister Maughan found this awesome talk given by President Hinckley way back in 1973 or something in which he tells a story of meeting a young Chinese naval officer. He had come to the U.S. For training or something and found out about our church and eventually decided to be baptized. President Hinckley asked this young man how his family would
react when he got home. The man said his family would cut him off and act as if he were dead. President Hinckley asked about his work. The man said he would be fired and getting another job would be nearly impossible. President Hinckley inquired if it was worth it for that young man to sacrifice all of that. The young man thought a moment and then said, "it's true isn't it?"

President Hinckley said Yes of course :)

The young man replied, "Then what else matters?"

Amazing story right? If we honestly and sincerely seek after the truth, what else matters in this life?

That's about it here from Arcadia! Hope you are all doing well and have an amazing week next week! Thank you so much for all your love and support!

Sincerely, Sister Dunn

Pics from our Ward Halloween Party:

 President and Sister Villanueva...they are in our ward!