Hermana Pratt, Korina, "M", Said, Hermana Chambers

District - November 2013

Hermana Pratt with one of her trainers - Hermana Brown on her last day

So yesterday was the baptism for Korina and Said. They are so great! Both of them have such strong spirits and testimonies. I have really high hopes for them. But yeah, the baptism was so great! The Spirit was so strong the whole time. They were confirmed in the service, which is unusual for converts, but if they hadn't been they would have had to wait a whole week. But in Said's blessing, it said that he was going to be a missionary someday! And Hermana Chambers and I were both super excited and she was crying and it was funny. And Korina was crying too. They are the greatest! It was really cute how nervous Said was and he wanted to practice everything a lot. We went through the baptismal interview questions every day this week with him and after the interview he told me and Hermana Chambers separately "thanks for teaching/helping me!" He is so precious. And Korina has so much faith she would stop drinking water if we told her it was against the word of wisdom. It was really funny teaching Said fasting. Telling a 9-year-old boy he has to go without food for any length of time is really hard. He was practically in tears. He finally told us he'd go without breakfast on fast Sunday though. It was good. 

The reason I didn't write much last week is because not much happened that week. And not a lot happened this week either. Mostly just things fell through. Except for the baptism. 

Oh, there was one funny story though. So we were tracting this apartment complex where several Spanish speakers live and this guy answers a door and he looks white and speaks English too us, but he was clearly struggling and had an accent. So we spoke Spanish to him and he was really relieved and we told him about us and the church a bit and he got really excited and told us he was going to come to church and bring his kids and he wanted to change his life and stuff. So we set an appointment to come back and teach him (it fell through later though) and left. We started knocking other doors and then "B" (the same guy) comes outside and tells us that all the Spanish speakers were at work, so we were like, "Ok.... Well do you have time for a lesson?" And he said sure, so we went over and he invited us in and we asked if there was a woman in the house and he said no, so we explained that it is a rule that we can't go in unless there is a woman in the house, but we could do it outside. And he's like, "Oh, ok. I understand." Then we asked if we could start the lesson with a prayer to invite the spirit and he said, "Yeah, come on in!" and so we explained again. Then we finally said a prayer and he was like, "Ok, see you on Sunday! Thanks for coming by!" and we were just like, "Ummm.... Ok, bye!" and it was really awkward. He clearly wasn't doing it on purpose, I think he was just really confused. But it was funny. Good try, but not really that good of a try. It was almost a lesson. So close. Oh well. 

Ummm.... Let's see... I translated for President Wilson at the baptism after ours. It was a lady that has been taught for 3 years and has wanted to get baptized for 2 of them, but couldn't because she wasn't married. But they finally got married a couple weeks ago and tonight she got baptized! But yeah, it was interesting translating. Man, they talk so fast sometimes! Poor President Wilson probably missed half the service. I also kept doing awkward direct translations, like instead of Holy Ghost, I kept almost saying Spirit Holy because in Spanish it is Espiritu Santo. And lots of other things. But yeah, it was lovely and both the services were fantastic and there were a lot of people at the first one, with Korina and Said and "M" (the other Hermana's 9 year old investigator, but she's the daughter of some less actives that are coming back). Like more people than were at church. It was awesome.

Well..... I don't think anything else really happened this week.

The largest of spiders you've ever seen in your life. Oh my gosh it was so terrifying. And it may not look huge in the picture, but it is HUGE. Like the size of my hand. Well, not that big. But bigger than my palm.

 It was a good week!

Love you all lots! Eat lots of chicken... And hot chocolate... And soup... And basically whatever you want. Bye!

Hermana Emily Pratt