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