Hey

Glad everything is going well :) Sounds like you are busy!! But I'm glad you are hanging in there. It's kind of weird that school is starting again for everyone- Make it a good one!! Glad you had fun in Portland :) I love it out there with the family! And I'm so excited for Becca!!! She will do great :) Wish I could've been there for her talk. Thanks for the quotes- I took a picture of them and will read through them later today :)

This week has certainly been pretty great :) We sent Hermana DeLeon on her way Tuesday morning, and went out to fend for ourselves! We miss Hermana DeLeon, but imagine she has been enjoying her time off, mostly by sleeping haha :)

   

Hermana Toney and I got a mini missionary this week! Our Stake did a little mini missionary thing just like Belvidere. It was great! Her name was Giovanna. She was kind of quiet and shy- she didn't say too much, but she was awesome. It was great, too because she is a native Spanish-speaker, so she was able to help us with our Spanish. We tried really hard to have a schedule-packed couple of days for her, but as Friday moved on, half of our appointments canceled. And all but one appointment for Saturday cancelled. Great. All we had left was back ups. And none of them were home or answering their phones. So Saturday, we spent almost the whole day knocking doors. Not what I had in mind for our Mini Missionary. But Hermana Toney and I decided to have an adventure and did the best we could. We taught a couple lessons, and shared testimony, and walked around A LOT. We did the best we could. Later that night at dinner before MCM, I asked what her favorite experience was so far. She just said "Bearing my testimony". I told her that was great, and asked if there was a specific time or experience (I remembered a specific lesson earlier that day that she had done a particularly awesome job bearing testimony and I felt the Spirit very strongly). But she just said "All of it. I just like to bear my testimony." She talked about how she is one of 2 active members in her school. She is a convert, with her family, and moved her from Mexico 10 years ago with her family. She didn't say much, but I got bits and pieces of how much she has gone through throughout her life. She is amazing.

At the Mini Missionary closing meeting Sunday night, the mini missionaries bore testimony. Other missionaries shared experiences of a ton of eating appointments, or meeting with solid investigators, or committing people to baptism, or how their missioanries made them their own little nametag to wear, or how they had a blast wrestling over a pop tart or whatever. Hermana Toney and I started to feel kinda bad. It didn't sound like we did or said as much as the other missionaries. We started to feel like we fell short. We tried SO HARD to get apopintments, but somethings fall out of your control sometimes. We wanted her to have the best experience. We did the best we could, and felt that we fell short. Then at the meeting, we heard of how other missionaries excelled and we felt that we fell even more short.

I started thinking about it more as the night went on. I was still a little discouraged, though. Then I remembered that the Lord is in control. He's got it all taken care of. We did the best we could, and that's where we remember that he will come in and take care of the rest. We didn't have the weekend I wanted for our mini missionary. But I feel that we had the weekend HE wanted for her, for whatever reason. "Your imperfections make you perfect for me". I thought about my first trainer, and my second trainer, and my third trainer, and Hermana Toney. They ALL have strengths, and they ALL have imperfections (only like one or two though ;)). But I realized that just as their strengths and how good of a trainer they were, were perfect for me, Their Imperfections were also perfect for me. I learned and gained from all of their strengths. And their imperfections (all one or two of them :)) helped me grow and improve and learn as well.

In the Patience section of PMG, it says "You must be patient with all people, yourself included, as you work to overcome faults and weaknesses". It doesn't say 'you must be patient with all people as THEY overcome faults and weaknesses.' It says 'you must be patient with all people as YOU work to overcome faults and weaknesses'. Their imperfections can help you grow, improve, and develop Christlike Attributes. I think it was Jeffrey R Holland who said something along the lines of, "dont' look for the weaknesses of your companion (or of anyone else)- he has plenty of them. Look for their strengths." As I learn to develop Christlike Attributes, I can remember that the weaknesses of others can help me learn and grow, as I focus on their strengths.

So to bring it back in, I know that even when I fall short, the Lord can still get what he needs to done. As long as I am constantly trying to be better, and doing the best I can to listen to and follow the promptings of the Spirit, it will all be good :) Like I said- we did the best we could, and the rest was in the Lord's hands. We didn't have the weekend that WE wanted for our missionary, but I know it worked out that we had the weekend the LORD wanted for her :)

Side note: The mini-mission program is awesome. While as a missionary I felt bad that we just ended up having to tract the whole weekend, I have only seen good things come from this program. A lot of the youth when they bore their testimonies talked about how they underestimated missionary work, how we pray for EVERYTHING (yes, we do, my young friends), how you feel the Spirit all the time (you forget that sometimes, but you really do feel the Spirit all the time in this work), and how you work hard and it's tiring and tough, but it's so worth it and you feel so good at the end of the day, and lastly how their testimony grew, and it strengthened their desire to serve a mission when the time came. It's an awesome program.

MY ESPANOL! Haha well, that's just a funny little deal. Haha Hermana Toney and I are the quirkiest missionary couple ever. Here we are in the middle of South Side Chicago, cute little white girls from the west trying to speak spanish to every living creature. haha It's funny. Hermana Toney is awesome. She is better at Spanish than she thinks she is. I on the other hand, only know "The Restoration Lesson Spanish" and how to say "como esta", "como se llama", "Tengo hambre", and "Podria usar su bano". Very important phrases, but it doesn't make me fluent! The Lord certainly has a sense of humor, and I try to make adventures out of it. I can't tell you how many phone calls and lessons we've had that have gone something like this:

Me and my memorized script to call and confirm appointments: Hola! Como esta! Somos las misioneras! Estamos llamando para confirmar a nuestra cita manana a las 4 de la tarde!

Them:  jdfa perro klfj dkl bano afj difjfd iglesia kljsfklajs klfdj

Me: Uh....

Them: a kjfkdl;jasiopfeuwiojsdkfa

Me: Hermana Toney!!!!!!!!

Hermana Toney: Bueno?

Them: adsj fdka;sfkdslaj;f kdsljaf;kdj

Hermana Toney: Uh.....

Them: jakds fjkla;jdfi soaj;fidkl;s

Hermana Toney: Oh! Ok, pues podriamos passar manana a las 4 de la tarde?

Them: ajkdsl; fajkds; fjdkal;f jdkaf djksla; fjdkl;asf jdkl;asj fdkl;aujfiej akflsdjfcie9oanc d ioasdj nfjkejicenagdj9iroenfvjdaljioejrioajkdnkjgi ajidfls jaiofejndsk nci8e0w9oajf kjdnckeajifoejn cjkjheiofj ikjk  djsioajfe kncioejfidkolj

Hermana Toney: Ok! Pues, nos vemos y tenga un buen dia!

*hang up*

Me: What did they say?

Hermana Toney: I dunno, but all I got was that they can't meet with us tomorrow

Me: Ha ok.

Welcome to our life. Bienvenido a nuestras vidas.

Having members meet investigators and come to lessons is important for a lot of reasons. But it became especially important to Hermana Toney and I because neither of us really speak Spanish. The members in our lessons have been stellar at stepping in and helping answer questions or explain concepts where we kind of fall short. It is so helpful.

And I want to send out a warning to all my little future missionary friends. The minute you mention to someone that you could maybe fill-in and muddle your way through playing "Choose the Right" on the piano or something, the minute you loose your ability to hide from ever playing the piano again. I recommend to you all for your Zone Leader's, Bishop's, and Mission President's sanity to learn at least 5 hymns that you could play like the back of your hand to save baptisms, Sacrament, and other meetings. Just do it. Piano-playing is a rare talent out here, and even if you can only play "Mary had a little lamb", you WILL get roped into saving a meeting (Like I did with Sacrament meeting yesterday). So just save yourself the stress and Learn now. Even if it's only the right hand that you can play, DO IT. I promise you won't regret it. And then, when your dearly-beloved convert named Edyn says that she wants "Battle Hymn of the Republic" to be one of the songs sung at her baptism, you won't have a heart-attack. Yes, that did happen. No, I couldn't make it through the intro.... Yes, that one ended up being a capella.

Gosh I love the mission.

It's an adventure every day, but you hang in there and enjoy the ride because you know that the Lord's in charge, and you just trust Him with it all and sometimes that's all you can do :)

I know that this church is true. We ended up teaching the Plan of Salvation lesson a couple times this week, and ended up spending most of it on the Atonement of our Savior Jesus Christ. What precious moments. This Gospel is the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. In the lessons when I bore my testimony, I told them that he was my best friend. He is. I love Him so much. So much in this mission (and life) is made possible through Him. Because of Him, I can return to my Heavenly Father, despite my imperfections. He went through the Atonement, not just for our sins, but for the ability to strengthen us, succor us, know us, understand us, and help us. I love Him so much. I read Jeffrey R Hollands talk from last Oct conference called something like "The First and great Commandment". Read it. It's awesome.

Well.... that was a lot!

I'm gonna go memorize some irregular Spanish verbs now. Whoooo, PARTAY! I mean.... FIESTA! Haha love you all :)

-Hermana Walton