Sister Pratt's Adventures in Richmond: It's Spring!

So guess what. Last night, we were planning and adding up our numbers for the week and while we were trying to figure out how many progressing investigators we have, suddenly Hermana Depablos points to a spot about 3 or 4 feet away from me and made a disgusted/horrifed face. I looked over, expecting to see a tiny little bug or maybe a little spider or something, because that is what usually happens, but guess what I saw?

THIS:

In case you are wondering, that is a REALLY BIG spider. INSIDE our house. Needless to say, I immediately began some evasive maneuvers and pranced gracefully away, whilst making some beautiful noises to lull it into a false sense of security. It worked, of course, and the spider didn't move.

We were about to go get the Elders to kill it for us, but then we remembered they can't come into our apartment. We thought of a member couple that live two houses away in the other direction, and immediately ran to their house. Bro M answered and we explained that their was a HUGE spider in our house and he sighed and was like, "And you want me to come kill it?" And we were like, "Please....." So he went and got some shoes and a book and his wife and then they came over and he threw the book on the spider and we thought he got it, but that thing is fast! He finally got it and killed it and took it with him as they went back to their house. We're going to take them some cupcakes today.

Normally I don't mind spiders, or killing spiders, but that thing was just not ok. Notice the glowing eyes in the picture and the horribleness of it all. I have no idea what would have happened if the members weren't home. We would have tried our neighbor who was outside smoking at the time, probably. And next, probably just evacuated and moved in with the other sisters for a while.

But anyways. So, some excitement.

Another funny story. So, every Friday, "F" takes us out to dinner. This Friday we went to Chili's. I love Chili's. But I answered a few of his questions about English, which he usually has prepared for me, and then we moved on to his other questions, usually about the Gospel. But this time he was asking us if the church celebrates Halloween. Or, as he spells it (He always writes everything down), Halowin. He is still learning. Then he started explaining why they have Halloween. First, he was telling us some of the day of the dead stuff they do in his country (Mexico), which is on Nov 1 and 2. Then he told us that Halloween is (and now I will use his own words, which he was also writing down for us): "El cumpleanos - el Happy Birthday - de Satanas." Which, being translated, is Satan's birthday. Or, according to "F", the happy birthday of Satan. Hermana Depablos didn't notice because she is still learning English too, but it took everything I had not to die of laughter in that moment. He was SO serious, too. He legitimately thought Halloween was Satan's happy birthday. We explained to him that Satan doesn't have a birthday because he was never born. And he was just like, "Oh, of course, Hermanas, claro!" and started laughing. But then he just kept going into all this other superstitious stuff. But it was just really funny.

I am really excited for my birthday! I am reaching a landmark.... 20 years old.... Man, I'm getting ancient. I'm going to die an old maid, I know it.

This morning in my studies I was reading from the Doctrine and Covenants. First, I read the Introduction to the D&C, which is really interesting. I had no idea that even existed til like 4 or 5 months ago, but it is WAY cool. Then I was reading in sections 27-29. I think about 96% of D&C is just the Lord chastising people and being like, "No, Joseph/Oliver, that's not right. If you keep doing that, you'll get eternal condemnation. You should probably fix that and do this instead. Then you'll get Eternal Life." But in Section 29, it talks about the Millennium and it is super cool. It talks about how the Millennium will be, what will happen before (signs) and what will happen after. You should all go read it.

And also, on May 3rd, there will be a mission conference (+the Chesapeake mission) and guess who is coming? ELDER BEDNAR!!!!! WOOOOOOOOOOOoooo! I am way excited.

Well, anyways. Enjoy the loveliness of this week! Love you lots!

Love,

Hermana Emily Pratt

(Just for clarification - Bees seem to love Emily. She has been stung several times, seemingly for no reason!) OH ps. There are about 55,889,237 bees/wasps around. And of course, the moment I step outside, they begin to swarm. The other day, I was walking into the church, with Hermana Depablos about 15 feet behind me, and suddenly as I was about to get to the door to unlock it, a GIGANTIC wasp flies out of the bushes, and hits me in the face. I began some evasive maneuvers that involved a lot of ducking, noises, and flailing. I ran about 20 yards away, back into the parking lot, and stopped and looked around to see if it had followed me. It was just chilling on my shoulder the whole time! I threw the keys at Hermana Depablos and yelled to go open the door as I once again began to demonstrate my beautiful bee avoiding skills. She finally got the door open and by this point the wasp was off my shoulder and flying angrily around me. I booked it inside, my bag falling off and my skirt doing who knows what (it was a windy day) and my hair in my mouth. It was the most graceful of all the moments.

Pps other awkward story. This morning during companionship study the Elders called us and were like, "Hey we have 4 referrals for you!" and we were like, "Sweet, who are they?" and they said, "I don't know, but they are right outside our house doing some construction! They are all Hispanic! Go talk to them! Adios!" And I wasn't all the way dressed up for the day and neither was my companion, so we hurried and put ourselves together, preparing for some major awkwardness, and went outside and struck up an extremely awkward conversation. The Elders were in their house watching us the whole time, we found out. But we got their number and they live out of our area, so we'll pass them on. Man. They just like totally threw us under the bus. But it is fine, I think probably a miracle will happen and they will get baptized. Just loving the awkwardness!

Ppps Congrats to Dad for sharing the Gospel! Even though it wasn't with a Hispanic, he still gets a full point! Yay for Dad! :D