Ramona - Week #10 - July 9, 2013

Chicken pox, eating dust--brok​en knee, 4th of July, more miracles.

Hola Familia!

Did I scare you with the subject?  I sure hope so! :) Haha I don't have the chicken pox, but it sure looks like it from all the bug bites I have. Our apartment was infested with bugs the past couple weeks and we finally got an exterminator to come.  My companion and I started to feel lonely without all of our insectos amigos hanging around.. chiste! (joke)  The other day, we were playing ultimate frisbee with our zone for morning exercise and one of the Elders threw me a low pass and I went to stop the frisbee with my foot and ended up doing the splits and tumble-rolling onto my knee! Haha! I landed pretty hard and scraped up my knee pretty bad but I have a bruise the size of an cantelope which is pretty cool.  It was probably the funniest eating dust experience I've ever had or heard of. My whole zone was laughing their heads off... haha luckily there's no long-term damage.  Man, from the dog bite, the chicken pox bug bites, and my eating dust experience, it sure seems like some adversary has some evil plan to stop me. But his plan has failed so far... HE CAN'T STOP ME! Mwuahaha.

So, we have this amazing family with 7 kids that we are teaching right now and everything about them is a miracle from the time we found them 2 weeks ago until now.  The parents' names are Marisol and Jose and they are so incredible.  I invited them to be baptized during our first visit with them and they said yes. Every single time after that, they say they feel better and better about this church but are still praying for a confirmation on whether they are ready to get baptized yet.  One of the daughters, Valerie who is 10 years old, is such a huge factor in this family's success.  She always asks us how much she should read from the Book of Mormon, and said she reads every night! Then she told us she has been praying really hard to receive an answer about getting baptized. She's 10 years old! What a little angel and great example for the rest of the family. I love this family so much, please pray for them!

For 4th of July, we had a big breakfast with many of the wards and branches in the area I'm serving in.  It was a huge success! A bunch of our investigators came which was so amazing to see.  We gave them a tour of the church and they really enjoyed it.  We went to a barbecue at a less active member in our branch and that was really fun as well.  But this year is the first year that I haven't seen fireworks on the 4th!  Instead, all the missionaries received things to study because we had to be in our apartment a lot earlier than usual.  I hope you all had a fun 4th of July boating without me! That is one of the things I ALMOST miss, boating with the family. ;) I really do love all of you though, I just love it here too much!

We visited a less active family that hasn't been to church in over a year, and they must have felt the spirit during our visit because they came to church the very next day! It was another miracle.  It was fast and testimony meeting and I bore my testimony! It was the coolest gift of tongues experience I have had so far.  One of the members of the branch even came up to me and gave me his tie after sacrament meeting! Haha I love all those members so much.  They are so humble, grateful, hilarious, and so willing to do their own missionary work.  It's amazing.  I feel so blessed to be serving in this area at this time. I know the Lord has huge plans for this branch.  Apparently it is where the entire mission wants to be right now, that is what everyone has been saying.  So much work is to be done here and I feel so honored to be a part of this marvelous work!

Well, I hope you all have a wonderful week! Make sure to tell Mom happy birthday as many times as you can!  Les quiero tanto!

Con mucho amor desde Ramona,

Hermana Barnes