1 message
| Maren Hale <maren.hale@myldsmail.net> | Mon, Apr 22, 2013 at 3:08 PM | |
|
To:
The Hale Family <thehalefamily10@gmail.com>
| ||
| ||
Monday, April 22, 2013
April 22, 2013 Stephanie
April 22,
2013
Dear family!!!!
I can’t tell you how much I needed
your letters this week. Mom thank you
for your prayers. They were felt and I literally felt uplifted and
strengthened when I didn't have anything left. This week has
been a little harder than others. We are teaching a family with 3 kids and their
parents. The father and son were baptized this last week and we are working
with the mom and the kids. But, wow family, I have never seen a family with
more problems and well I am growing in my gratitude and love for my own family.
The kids are, well, terrors and they run around and through things, brake
glass, hit their brothers and sisters with brooms, and literally hit and
punch you for no reason whatsoever. Ha, my patients has been tried
this week. What is hard is that the parents do
not correct or discipline. I am shocked at how the mom and dad treat each
other. I have learned how I do not want
my family ...... It’s been hard because I
know that the gospel is what they need but we have not had a chance
to actually teach them because every time we get there
the kids are off the wall, the spirit is gone, and the house is a mess and
we help clean and try to keep the kids from burning down the house. I
am at a loss to know how to help... God
is helping and I am learning....
Dad and mom thank you for what
you wrote. Dad thank you for the analogy of the net I loved it and I
needed to hear it. I am realizing that
my net has a couple of holes that I need to mend so that the Lord can use me
better and really trust me with his children... This week has been hard
just because well I have never had to work harder to find
investigator to teach...... My area,
sorry, it’s a city called Santa Tecla. That is the city I am working in. The
colonial Quesaltepeque. The ward is called Girasoles (hah sunflowers
in Spanish. My favorite flower) my area is so small that I
feel I am walking the same streets 3 to 4 times a day. The members are great to
help and everything but the references they give, the people don’t want to hear
the gospel. We are trying to find our own investigators but like I said it
never has been harder. I am living in a richer part of El Salvador right now
and well, hah, I miss my humble poor
people that live day to day on the grace and blessings of God. .... Why are we
as humans so prideful and trust in our own ability so much? The
people here don’t see the need for God or they already have their church and
are good. I have never had to talk to people like this and truly sometimes I am
at a loss of what to say. I know they need what I have and that it will bless their
lives but to help them see that is another matter. There are some
people that have the most random and strange ideas here, ha. But I am
realizing that I need to be more prepared to open my mouth on the street and in
the bus and everywhere. I need to learn to pay closer attention to the spirit
so that I can know what to say and the moment to say it. God
is preparing people to hear me but if I never open my mouth I will
never find them.
It’s been a hard week one of
humbling and lots of prayers. Today we also have interviews with the President
and I have a feeling I will learn lots and will I have lots to change. Sometimes change can hurt but it’s
for the best and I know God will bless so I would appreciate your
prayers.....and know that I do feel them. Prayer changes things!!! I
have seen it.
We are moving houses this next week!!!
It’s exciting and kind of sad we don't want to leave the
house we are in. It’s really fun to live with four girls in one
house. We also have changes this week.... weird I know we had changes like 3
weeks ago but I think the President is getting ready for the
mission division this upcoming July and is trying to get everything
ready. The amount of missionaries that are coming in is
also affecting things. We have a lot of missionaries that are waiting
for visas for other missions serving in their country until the visas
come. They never know when the visas
will come so that could be another reason why we are having changes so fast but
we will see what happens. I really doubt that I will change. We just got
here, hah, but the President said that the senior companions were
going to be the ones leaving this change, so we needed to make sure
that our companions knew the area. I am lucky cause, well I feel like
my companion knows the area better than me, ha. We both are new and
trying to get the hang of things.
We are writing really early this
morning and I feel bad cause I won’t be able to see Jake’s and Maren’s letters
this week until next week. Sorry Jake and Maren I pray for you both so much and
I am so proud of you for the choices you are making. We had zone conference
this week and we talked a lot of humility and wow, we all have pride to some degree
and we all need and depend on our Father in Heaven. I am learning that I am
prideful in many different ways ........one that I am trying to work on is letting
the atonement work in my life. There are times that I feel like I try to take too
much upon myself and feel like I have to do it alone. I get really stressed but we have a source of
strength and power of knowledge and ideas that
is infinite and well all knowing and if we turn to him and let ....,let
being the key word, him help us we and our ability to achieve great
things becomes even bigger our potential is unlimited with him. I am working on
bring the atonement in to my life daily ... one thing that Elder Holland said
hit me, God is always working with imperfect servants. He has
learned to deal with it. God knows me he knows my weaknesses
and imperfections and knows how best to help me. But I have
to open the door and invite him to do so and that is where humility is so
important. We need to ask and when we do
we will receive. I have seen it and felt it. I just need to remember
it so much more often. Why are we humans
so forgetful. Why must we have to learn the
same lesson over and over again, hah. My poor Father in Heaven must be
smiling down on me and saying ...oh Stephanie we need to relearn this again? Let’s start from the beginning.....I am
so grateful for a loving Heavenly Father who has
the patience and the love to teach me and help me be better
and the faith in me to see what I can become and then do everything in his
power to help me become that. Why hesitate to put our hearts and
lives into the hands of him who has our happiness and progress in mind. Why do
we let pride rule us and stop our progression ... I don't know but I
am so grateful that God has given us a way to overcome
our weakness and put aside our pride and decide to become
better. I am so grateful for the blessing
and opportunity of repentance in my life and I am
so grateful for my Savior who made it possible for me to
repent. I love my Savior so much, I have never realized how much we need him before.... daily, hourly
... minute by minute, We need his grace and forgiveness and love.
I am so grateful that he gives
it to us freely ......Family I know that this gospel is true. I have felt the
spirit testify of it so many times. I know God loves us and the
greatest demonstration of this love is his son Jesus Christ. If you
want to feel God’s love, come closer to Christ and use
his atonement. There is peace and forgiveness and love waiting
for all who do. I love this gospel. I love being a missionary even
though sometimes it is hard. hah.
Family I am
so grateful for you and love you all. Pray and read your scriptures. These
will keep you close to the lord. Through small and simple things...
With all my love
Hermana Hale
April 22, 2013 Jacob
Hey family!!!
So the last couple of days have been better. Every morning I would
wake up and have this deppressing feeling in my heart, in my gut. But
the last couple of days I've noticed that its starting to wayne. That
the more I'm here, the more this is home, and the more I feel the love
of God, and christ in my life.
So I'm going to start off my letter with a really funnt but
embarrasing story. I was at the Home of Jo Wakefields, a lovely recent
convert who is the mission mom in this area, and we were having a DA
(Dinner Apointment). While we were eating we got on the topic of
something very spiritual. Well during this very spiritual moment I was
telling the story of a girl who back at home we would call her very
spastic, or a spaz. As I described her as being very spastic, forks
dropped, and mouths fell out. My companion looked at me like I was a
ghost, and asked me what I had just said. I repeated the word and again
everyone looked at me like I was the most rude person on the planet. I
asked my companion what just happened and the table quickly explained to
me that the term "spastic" was a very derogatory term for someone who
is crazy. I quickly learned some others words I probably shouldnt say
such as crap, phanny, randy, and a couple of other terms. Dont ask what
they mean, I'm a missionary, I wont tell you. Haha pretty awkward and
embarrassing experience.
So the work his is still going pretty slow. We went to a DA the
other night and was talking to the Marshall family, to see if they knew
anyone that was interested in learning about the gospel. The mother had
already left to go to another appointment, but the father said that some
people in their neighborhood had commented on their family life. Such
as the things they teach their children, how close they are as a family,
and also their basic morals. The father said that the wife was the one
who knew their names and that unfortunatly he had no idea where they
lived, or their names. So me and my companion talked about it and
decided to just go knock the entire neighborhood. We thought it might be
smart to knock along all the streets where some members lives, just to
see if anyone noticed something different about them.
I want to tell you guys somestuff about my companion that honestly
is amazing. Elder Harrison has a compacity to love beyond anyone I have
ever met (except for maybe mom). I noticed he was a little up tight last
night and asked what for. He then told me that sunday night was the
night where he decided what he was going to write to the people back
home. He is worried about them but he doesnt want that worry to
influence his work out in the field so he tries not to think about them
until sunday night. He told me a story about a girl from his home word
who fell about because of her boyfriend that was not a member and into
somepretty bad stuff. She eventually ended up commiting suicide. I
realized then how lucky I was. I worry about you guys. But not that much
(although hearing about nate and the cops has gotten me a little
worried). He tries to write his family, friends, YSA from his home ward,
all trying to give them some insperation in their lives. To try and
keep them anchored in the truth. He truly loves like christ. And its not
just the people at home, but also the people here in the mission. I
asked him if he ever got home sick and he said yes, but the weird thing
he gets is area sick. Haha he will miss some of the areas hes served in
because he loved the people there so much. Oh and he is also a great
cheff. Honestly, I have to watch how much food I eat. Well how much food
im going to eat once my stomach catches up to the time here, and the
schedules. Its hard to want to eat in the morning because back home is
when im usually going to bed. He also is very knowledable in the
scriptues. The amount of scripture stories he knows and scriptures
memorized is amazing. He can give a spiritual thought to a family on a
dime. I can't wait to become like that.
So guess what, Im taking on President Monsons challenge. Im tryint
to memorize a scripture every day. Hopefully if I do that I can get a
photographic memory by the end of my mission. So I've felt like ive
written a ton and I want to go buy my english suit (people say here that
I look like the new James Bond and im wondering how much the english
suit is going to make that even more apparent) and I also want to go and
try to talk to some other missionarys who stayed with us last night and
who are in the area for the day (two missionarys stayed with us, two
are coming from another area). Elder Oscerson is the distric leader and
he is about This close <-----------------------------
I want to leave you guys with something I learned in my study this
last few days. In preach my gospel there is a chapter that talks about
christ like attributes and how to get them. I want to love this area,
and my mission, and this area so I though become more like christ
would make me better in those aspects. The first attribute they talk
about is faith which is something that I feel like I never fully
received. Reading in the different scriptues I eventually hit upon
Alma 32. That whole chapter is the best thing ever if you want to get a
basic knowledge and foundation on faith. It can tell you how to get it
and what is is, as well as other insights. The thing that I pulled from
it was this. Faith is like a seed inside of you. Having the desire to
have faith is that basic seed. Now I've always been told that if you
nourish it, it will grow, but I always thought that when I got it that
it would be a big spiritual revelation. But the more i read the more I
realized why they used the allusion of a seed that will eventually grow
to become a seed. IT TAKES TIME. It takes trials and obedience, and
light, and nourishment. A seed grows to become a sappling. And during is
growth it experiences storms, and bugs, and winds, and snow and
everything. but it only makes it stronger. I always thought that as a
missionary my faith in Christ, and what im doing, would just come to me.
But I've realized that its going to take time and obedience to the
lords commandments. 100% obedience mind you. But eventually in maybe a
month, or two months, or a year, or maybe two years, Ill right you, and
you wont recognize me. Ill be wrapped in the love that is having faith
and hope in christ. But Ill go into hope next letter, cause that blew my
mind as well.
I love you guys so much, Caleb I need to tell you that I wear your
Pocket Watch you gave me every day and that I get comments on it. Thank
you for caring enough, and thinking enough about me to get me such a
thoughtfull gift. I miss you, and I want to give you a challenge to
nourish your seed. And to read a chapter in the book of mormon every
day. Can you do that for me? Can you write me a letter every week, or
month, or six or whatever to tell me what you've learned from reading? I
know that if you do that then you can be able to have the tree of life
grow with in you and then you can go out into the field and life without
having the hard struggles I'm having. Nate..... Really? Seriously? I
ran into the cops three times my entire highschool year and you've
somehow managed to have three before then end of your sophomore year.
Issac. Your a stud, develop all the talents you have. Sing out loud and
you should probably learn how to play futball, so when I get back we can
play. Ill be the keeper. Thats all im good at. Simeon. I have not
forgotten the promise to take you to Disneyland. ;) Ill take you right
when I get back. If I can get the money. Tania. Your awesome. I see a
lot of qualities in you that I see from senior missionarys out in the
field. I should have listened to you more and learned more from you. Mom
and Dad, Thanks for the letters. It was nice to read them and learn
from them. Ill try to forget myself and go to work. Maren and
Stephanie. I love you guys. I need Stephs address so that I can send her
a letter from england. Your gonna love the stamps. Maren I send off
your letter today. It should arrive in about a week. Its fun to receive
actual written letters out in the field. I love you guys, if you get the
chance tell Josh that he is in for a ride. Buckel UP. Chears! Till next
week.
P.S.
You all should send me emails. ;)
Tuesday, April 16, 2013
April 15th 2013 Stephanie
April
15th 2013
Dear family
WOW, a monumental week.
The Hale family has 3 missionaries out in the field at the same time!!!! Jake
how are you doing? How is England? I am so jealous that you are there!!! Have a
blast and learn tons and take lots of pictures. You only have two years on a mission
and your whole life to look back on it.
Maren I hope your health is better. It’s
the worse being sick in the mission field. I don’t even know what you have but I
am praying for you and I know god is watching over you.
So this week, I am not going to lie,
was kind of hard. Being in a new area and opening that area is hard. We have
been walking the same streets over and over again trying to find someone to
listen to us and we have been praying to find a family to teach. Our area is so
small!!!! My companion is from Guatemala and she is so short. Hah!! I feel huge
next to her. I’ll try and send a picture. Oh, but story really fast. So flippin
cool, we had the coolest experience....so Hermana Massina and her companion
contacted a director of a school in our area and get this she wanted us to come
to her school and teach the children the gospel!!!! Wow right. Apparently, they
are having lots of problems in the school. So we went with our zone and wow so
much fun. We got to use Mormon messages. We talked about seeds and how they
have such potential to grow into something big and then related it to them. How
they have so much potential and if they let God help them, they can achieve
lots more!! It was so much fun. We played a game and then related it to the
message. Our age group was 15 year olds and it was incredible how much they
were paying attention. We got a lot of references. The director was so happy
but she wanted us to come back and well ....practically call them to repentance
with terror and fear, because we gave a lesson of the love of God for each of
them. But she wanted us to teach them that is was wrong to steal and to be disrespectful
and to not fight, drink and smoke. So we will see if the President will let us
go back and we will see what we will teach if we do. It was an amazing experience
one I will never forget. I love teaching the young people today because they
are so ready to hear the gospel.
We also had a baptism
this week. We baptized a family Hermana Massina taught and we got here and our
job was to baptize them. Man it was a scary time because we were suppose to
start at 7:00 and well we ended up waiting almost an hour for Rudy the father
of the family to get there. We baptized him and his son and we are working with
the mom now. They are a really great family but wow I am learning patience with
them. They have 3 kids and well to put it nicely, I have never seen more
disobedient children in my life. We go and help them get ready for the baptism
and for church and it literally takes an hour and half to get out the door. Once
we do one of the kids is throwing a tantrum and we can’t leave. Wow, sorry I am
not complaining. This family really is amazing they have been being taught by the
missionaries for a long time and finally they were baptized!!!! I got to hear
the father’s testimony too and wow that was amazing.
Oh and we have been
trying to find people and we contacted a man on the street one day and he didn’t
seam really interested but he invited us back to his house. On Sunday, we went
to visit him and when we got there he seemed a little annoyed at the first but
as we started to teach him I could see a change. It was so incredible. The
spirit came so strong and I was able to testify of well you guys about our
family and well I started to cry no surprise there, ( hope you all know how
much I love you all family grandparents aunts uncle the whole crew ) but the
spirit came so strong and he started to ask simple questions. He was accepting
the answers and he even asked the question why are there so many churches? We were like sweet. Let us tell you of a boy
who had the same question and ah it was so perfect. At the end he took the pamphlet
in his hands and said thank you the message was ....well bonita or pretty in English.
I wanted to shout and say yes it is pretty and true. It shows the love of our God
and you can have so much peace and joy in your life if you will work to know
that it is true. He said he would pray and I told him that we had a movie of
the first vision and that we were going to pass by and give it to him to watch
with his family. Ha I walked out of the lesson thinking oh shoot I don’t have a
movie to give him hah ......but don’t worry I found one now so we are good.
I love seeing the
understanding come into the faces of the people. I love being a missionary. This
last week was hard but I am so grateful for the things I have learned through
it. I have never prayed more. I have never worked harder to find a new person
to teach. After that lesson I was like already planning his baptism I was so excited.
Hah my companion thought I was crazy.
Well family I don’t
have much time. Know that I love you tons. Read this scripture if you get time.
I am learning about humility and wow it’s so good. D&C 67:10. We have the
promise that we can come to know god!!! How cool is that. In the scriptures it
also says that this is life eternal that they may know the one true god. ....I don’t
know I really liked it. Family this gospel is true!!! I have felt the spirit
testify to me so many times in every lesson I give. I am coming to have a
greater love for my Savoir and redeemer. His atonement is infinite and eternal;
it can reach anyone at anytime if we come to him and ask for his help. I loved
what Elder Holland said that if we are facing a trail of faith that we need to
hold on to what we already know until further knowledge will come. I felt like I
learned that lesson this week. God teaches us through trials. Many times it’s
the only way we learn. Try and find what it is that God wants us to learn. The faster you learn it the less you have to
be in the trial. Hah. I love you all and pray for you all. I am so amazed that
we have 3 missionaries out now. I hope you all can feel the blessings ....I saw
the picture of Disneyland and wow people and changed so much!!! Stop it all. You
all don’t grow any more. Hah Nate looks like you have put on weight congrats!! aha
I’ll try and send
pictures.
Love Hermana Hale
April 15th 2913 Maren
Hey Family!
Along with that, this week we talked to the branch about
starting a consistent community activity at the church every month. As
me and sister Madsen thought about better ways to find people we came up
with this vision of there being a fun, family friendly activity every
third weekend (or something like that) at the church so that the
community would start to see us as a part of them. We presented it to
the Branch in correlation meeting and they liked the idea. The key now
will be setting everything up so it will run smoothly no matter which
missionaries are here. Next month we are planning on a game night. We
hope to start advertising at the culture night. I am excited to see
where this could go. A lot of getting this up and running is going to
fall on me, me and my new companion. Pray for us and that we will be
able to get the support from everyone that we need to to really make it
worth while.
O man... I have so many
people I want to write and not much time. I will do my best. Don't
worry, you are first on the priority list.
First order of business.... I finally went to the doctor today. I am
okay. Actually I am 100% healthy from what they could tell from their
exam. They said if anything it sounds like Cold Induced Athsma. They
prescribed me an inhaler and some allergy medicine. I should be good.
They want to see me in two weeks just to make sure nothing is worse,
when they listened to me breath they couldn't even hear a wheeze so I
think I am okay.
Secondly, we got a call from our mission president
this morning at about 10:00. My companion answered not knowing who it
was, talked for a while, about 15 second in I realized that this was no
normal phone call. She was surprised by a lot of what was being said (I
didn't know who was on the phone at this point). After about 3 minutes
she says "okay, she's right here," and precedes to hand me the phone. I
kinda mouth "What is going on?!" and all she says back to me is "A lot."
So I say hello and hear the mission presidents voice on the other end.
At this point I am thinking that Sister Madsen has been called to train
someone new and I am being transferred. Come to find out... I was kinda
right, except for the transfer part. He told me that we would need to be
at the mission office tomorrow at 10:00 to meet... our new companion,
she is coming from the MTC early because she already knows the language.
He said that S Madsen will train both of us for the next 4 weeks and
then when she leaves I will finish training her. HOLY COW! I am a
trainer! Me and sister madsen have decided that to make things easier on
all of us I will just begin training S Peacock (that is her name) as
soon as she gets here and she will basically train me on how to train.
That way it will be less of a role switch when she leaves.
From day 1 S Madsen has given me a little bit of a
hard time, saying that she bet I would train right after I was done
training... I told her she was crazy... I guess not.
I am so humbled by this. I am scared and excited and nervous, humbled
and well... shocked. I didn't expect this. I just hope that I can
inspire in her the same things that S. Madsen has inspired in me. She
always told me that I could work miracles with my faith, the faith of a
greenie. I want her to feel the same way, like she really can do
anything and Angels will bear her up.
Its is going to be an interesting few days. Lots of changes. Pray for me.
Other
than that our week was pretty boring. We had a lot of appointments set
but when we got there no one was there. It is super frustrating but we
have built some really strong relationships with some of the members and
they are starting to produce referrals and opportunities to serve.
I love the members. This weekend we are having a bit
culture night and we, me and my companion, have been adopted as
honorary Honduranians (?). Basically that means we get to carry in their
flag. Should be lots of fun.
Sorry. I know this is shorter than usual.
Family.
I am humbled every day at how blessed I am to have been born into this
gospel, to parents who have been sealed in the temple and who raised me
with gospel principles. I marvel at how blessed I am. How did I get so
lucky? Why me? All I know is this. I have been so blessed and so I have a
great responsibility to share it with the world. I have a
responsibility to give everyone else that chance to be blessed by the
Gospel in their life. Its a huge responsibility but I am so grateful for
the chance.
I love you all!
Love,
Hermana Maren Hale
Wednesday, April 10, 2013
April 8th 2013 Maren
Hey Family!
How
are you all? First of all, I am so sorry to make you all so worried. I
really am OKAY! I promise. I haven't been able to see a doctor yet, I
had an appointment but when I got there they wouldn't take UnitedHealth
care even though they're on the provider list for the missionary health
insurance... very frustrating... I'll find a different doctor... their
service was horrible anyways.
As for what is wrong with me. Like I said before I
just go into coughing fits. Nothing super bad just annoying enough to
check out. I'll keep you updated.
This week was weird... it started out really cool with some awesome
appointments. We taught two people on Monday night and had really good
experiences with both. The first one was to a woman named Olga, she is a
really awesome lady, she lives above a less active and so the
missionaries talked to her a while back while they were trying to find
the less active. I guess she got lost when transfers happened and no one
ever came back... but we did :D and we had an awesome lesson. We used
the pamphlets and were able to keep it relatively short.
She committed to read and pray about everything and said something along
the lines of "I just need time to get to where you are..." Like she
could already see that the church is different in some way she would
just need time to figure out exactly how. It was a "WOW" moment.
Unfortunately we haven't been able to get a hold of her since then. :(
We'll keep trying though. Next step is to try and just stop by right?
Haha.
Later that night we taught Santos. I can't remember
if I've ever mentioned Santos but we knocked into him one of my first
weeks here. He seemed prepared from that first meeting... we didn't see
him for a few weeks because he found work but we stopped by one night
and were able to teach him and had an amazing lesson. It was interesting
because as we had planned for him the week before we had felt an
overwhelming feeling that he was more ready than we realized and God
wanted to move things along with him. A few days later we went back and
invited him to be baptized. He didn't say yes but he said he would pray
about it. He missed our next appointment with him, he was at work again,
so we'll be trying to stop by again soon. Things are going to get hard
out here as soon as the work season starts, everyone is going to be busy
all the time... getting Sunday's off is going to be even harder. But
God prepares the way for people to keep his commandments, I have faith
that the work will still move forward.
On Thursday me and my companion both woke up feeling
just a little under the weather. I immediately took all
the vitamin's mom sent with me but we weren't very effective all day,
the next morning I woke up and felt perfect... my companion felt like
she'd been hit by a truck though... so we didn't go anywhere. There is a
part of me that wonders if that was God's way of telling her that she
needed to rest physically and me that I needed to rest emotionally and
spiritually... It was nice to have a day not stressing that our planners
weren't 100% full all the time. I think I needed it.
General Conference was AMAZING! Every talk was
amazingly personal. I loved all the talks on families, it makes me love
my major that much more. I love you guys. I think one of my favorite
lines was when someone said something along the lines of "People blame
their bad parenting on there being no "parenting school," I've got news
for you... there is one... its called the HOME!" I love it! Its so true.
When we have good examples of good parenting and of family values and
unity we carry that with us when we start families of our own. I guess
what I am trying to say is thanks Mom and Dad for being excellent
teachers in our Parenting School.
Another part that I absolutely loved was President
Eyring's talk. He said one line that was something like "As we leave our
families to do the Lord's work and be on his errand and draw near unto
him, he will draw near unto our families." It was just another witness
to me that my family is being taken care of.
There were so many strong themes this conference. It
makes me a little worried for what is to come. Satan has already been
attacking the family... what new tactic is he going to use? Its a war,
its going to intensify... again. I am so grateful for our generals, our
prophets who warn us and lead us and guide us to safety. In the end
Satan will lose... that much is certain, We will be victories if we hold
to what we have been taught and listen to the counsel of the prophets.
Another theme was obedience. This is something me
and my companion have been striving to improve on, not that we not
obedient we've just been paying more attention so that we can be exactly
obedient. We're getting a little better everyday. I would hate to hold
one of our investigators back simply because I cannot be obedient.
On Sunday we had someone show up to watch conference
that we were not expecting. She is the friend of one of the members who
recently had a baby, she wasn't quite ready with everything a new baby
needs, clothes, bottles, etc. and many members of the branch stepped up
and helped out, donating their baby girl clothes that their girls had
outgrown. We have been visiting her ever since but still haven't taught
her. We gave her an invitation to conference though... and she came!
When she walked in I did a double take. I didn't recognize her at first
because I honestly didn't think she would come! But I was so happy! She
had brought her adorable two little boys with her too, one who is 7 and
one who is 4 or 5. In between sessions the boys wanted to go home...
they were bored but it sounded like Elisa wanted to stay... so... I took
the boys to the nursery for some good play time to get their wiggle out
(don't worry mom came too so it wasn't against the rules). The only
problem was we couldn't get the cabinets with the toys in them open so
all we had to play with were 2 basketballs. I started out playing
rolly-polly with the younger boy, then the older boy joined in and then
we played keep away with my companion. It was Sooo good to hear the
laughter of little boys. It reminded me so much of my little brothers (I
miss you guys). Then that turned into red light, green light, and then
hide and seek, and then they ran a few races, and then we
played Simon Says. We still had about 30 minutes left and I was out of
games! But we had some major fun together and I think Elisa was
grateful. I certainly had fun! Haha.
Then that night we went to one of our investigators
houses to start a Family Home Evening with them. They are such an
awesome family. We met the older daughter for the first time and she is
so cool! Long story short we had a SHORT lesson and then played
Pictionary and they had so much fun! Again, the laughter that filled
that home made me think of you guys and all the family home evenings
over the years. People ask me all the time what my favorite memory is
and I always respond that any moment where we were all laughing as a
family is my favorite, they are the sweetest. I think the whole family
had a good time and are excited to do it again next week. It really is
an inspired program, we may get to teach this whole family yet. :D
I am so grateful for my family. I have already
talked you guys up quite a lot in this letter but I am going to do it
again. On the mission you hear lots of stories about people and their
backgrounds, all different kinds of families too. Everyday I am grateful
for mine. I have two parents that love each other and honor the
covenants they have made in the temple. I have two big sisters who have
always set really good examples for me and walked a path that I can
follow, not having to worry where its going to lead. I can follow in
their footsteps with confidence and have my whole life. They are my
heroes and my best friends. I have five younger brothers who teach me
new things everyday. They keep me laughing and help me learn patience.
They have given me good advice and help me want to be the best I can to
set a good example for them. I love the love that I can feel at home and
know that no matter what is happening in my life or how far away I am
there is a place that I belong.
I love you guys.
Love,
Hermana Maren Hale
P.S. Pictures!
1. The adorable little girl we went to the aquarium with last week.
2. A beautiful butterfly that we saw at the aquarium The whole room was just full of beautiful butterflies like this one.
3. Another awesome boy in the ward, his mom took us to lunch on Saturday afternoon. He is also very cute.
4.
An amazing sunset we captured Saturday night at a DA. Really the
picture doesn't do it justice at all... it was the most beautiful sight
I've ever seen... so surreal.
... sorry I don't send pictures of
me... I think its a side effect of being a photographer. 1 you don't
really take pictures of yourself and 2... you don't really like pictures
of yourself... that is why you are always the one holding the camera
(you thought I just liked to take pictures, really its my evil plan so
I'm never in them. haha.)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)