Holli - July 3, 2016

Hey Everyone!

Oh my lands this week was super great!

So this is Sister Cook's last transfer but she extended for a bit so
she'll leave early September. But she is seriously the bomb.com.
She is like the perfect missionary. Knows how to get return
appointments, loves talking to everyone, invites everyone to come to
church and be baptized. It's great! Haha, she lived in Emmett for a
while and we both love Idaho so she's the best. She is the youngest of
10 kids and has quite the story! (I'll include that in the journal I
send home). We have done so much this past week that I've just been so
exhausted but it's good :)

So get this . . . 3 people came to church yesterday, all of whom we've
met this week. Crazy!

We met this awesome family the other night. The mom (Natalie) hasn't
been to church for a long time and her brother Carlos hasn't either
but he came to church yesterday with his three kids and it was
amazing. They are a super sweet family who a lot of bad things have
happened to so it's kind of sad but they're doing well. They have the
cutest 4 year old named Danny and I occupied him while Sister Cook
talked to the rest of the family. He was hilarious! I showed him a few
Bible videos and had him point out whenever Jesus appeared on the
screen - pretty fun :)

We met this awesome guy named Sam the other day. We were walking down
the street and started to talk with him outside his home. He had just
returned from a chemo treatment but told us we could come back so a
few days later we popped by and he was like, "You came back?!" And
then he brought us a lot of fruit and we sat outside his house and
taught him a little bit of the Restoration and invited him to church
the next day. And he showed up! Right at the end of gospel principles.
One of the members made a remark about how the commandment to keep the
Sabbath Day Holy is more like a gift and if we can see it as a gift
we'll have a greater desire to come to church etc. Sam then raises his
hand and asks the class "What is a humane way to catch a monkey?"

Sister Cook and I are like, "Oh great, here we go." But he went on to
say that the humane way to catch a monkey is to set a banana in a trap
and then when the monkey grabs the banana to close the trap and once
the monkey has the banana he won't let go to free himself from the
trap. Then Sam said that he felt like the monkey, holding onto this
banana because that morning he had been contemplating whether or not
to go to church etc. Then he said that he was letting go of the banana
now :) He's super cool. He told us he would be at church next week
too!

We met this sweet girl named Emma the other day. She had been taught
by missionaries about a year ago but she lives with her grandma who is
very against Emma learning about Christianity or going to a Christian
church so she had to tell the Sisters she couldn't meet again. But we
sat with her for a little and talked with her about her life and then
went into the Restoration and before we knew it she was bawling. Kind
of the way she described her life was like modern Cinderella - super
sad but she was really stressed out so we sat with her as she cried
and then asked if we could continue to meet with her. Though her life
is hard she agreed so we hope to see her this week. Prayers for Emma!

We met this sweet lady named Juliet the other night. She's from the
Philippines in the Cauayan province is what she said so I was 
super pumped :) We shared a brief message about the gospel and asked
if she would be interested in meeting again and she said yes! She told
us she had this intense stomach pain for the past few days and she had
been praying to a God for help and that day it had eased somewhat. So
as she started her walk she continued to pray for help and that's when
we stopped her :) We went to Starbucks the next morning and she bought
us some juice and we taught her the Restoration and gave her a BofM
and she seemed to enjoy it. Her job prevents her from going to church
but she really wants to come to our church so it was a cool
experience.

One last cool experience. We were walking down the street (haha, we
tend to do that a lot) and we ran into this lady named Sylvia walking
her dog. As we stopped to talk with her she got really curious about
who we were and what we did. We shared a brief message with her and
invited her to learn more. She told us she had been having some family
problems and was struggling but she didn't have the time to meet but
said she might check out the church. So we gave her the address and
encouraged her to come. Super sweet lady!

Well that's about it from here in Glendale! Thanks for all of the
letters and pic.'s mom of Taylor's return :) Sister Cook said she was crying for me 
haha :) I love you so much and hope this next week is a good one!

Love, Sister Dunn