The Bicycle Strikes Back

Hello you lovely people!! How are we all this fine day? I hope you're doing well, because I am too and it's great!
This week was a bit of a mess, but hey that's missionary life for ya! ;) The main reason for said mess would be our primary mode of transportation: to bikes. We got a record of 3 flats with some other random problems thrown in there within like 4 days. So that was fun. I managed to pop both my tires somehow, my comp popper her front one, my chain got messed up, and Christensen's front wheel got busted, so we had to replace that. It was as much of a nightmare as it was an enormous headache. I think I was not meant to be on a bike ;) but! All's well now and (for the time being) our bikes are fully-functioning.

Funny story with Christensen's wheel though. So it got messed up because she cut it too close and hit a parked car while we were riding to a lesson (she's fine, I promise). Anyway, we were walking our bikes to the nearest bus stop when some random guy working at a palette factory stopped us. Turns out he's a member?? So he's like "leave your tire with me, I'll get it fixed. Come back tomorrow." So we did, and he did fix it! Well, he went out and bought a new wheel... but he did eventually fix the old wheel too :) but that was just such a miracle that we desperately needed in the moment.

To go along with that, we saw an enormous outpouring of love throughout the week from many others around us :) I think they could tell (and definitely Heavenly Father knew) that Hna Christensen and I had just about reached the end of our ropes. There were a lot of those I-don't-know-if-I-should-laugh-or-cry situations and somehow, after each one, someone showed up and offered some simple service or said something kind we needed to hear or just generally was there to remind us we weren't in this alone. It was very humbling for me, but I learned a lot. And I'm so so grateful for these sweet people around us (sean otros misioneros, members, or total strangers) who were willing to help out a pair of frazzled hermanas.

Other miracles this week: I went to bed at 9:30 Saturday night! Hot dog it felt so good! ;) seriously, that was amazing. I also have been recruited to play piano in sacrament meeting and I didn't mess it up (very badly)!! Also we had a baptism!!! A cute 9-year-old named Yuri :) she was so excited!!! (She is, even if she doesn't look it in the picture) It was easily the least stressful baptism Ive ever had a hand in, which in and of itself is a miracle (baptisms always tend to be incredibly stressful to put together and smoothly pull of). It was great though :) we were so excited and happy for her! And to top off the week we rode our bike through a drive-in/drive-thru donut shop shaped like a donut!

-Hermanita Johnson

*brain short circuits* *sparks fly*

I have not been more exhausted in my life.
That being said, we had a long week full of finding, but that's okay because we found some really neat people :) we're hoping to set them on date for baptism next week.

In all honesty, I don't really remember much of what else happened because my brain is just so fried right now and I'm probably going to use my remaining p-day time to take a nap. We used most of our time earlier bowling with the elders and Robert and Darlene--aka the cutest couple I ever met. We're buds. But yeah...

Sorry!

-Hermanita Johnson

#notdeadyet

What an exhausting week! My goodness!! Haha it was a crazy whirlwind of a week, but I'm not dead yet!
So new things about being here in the lovely (or not so lovely) city of La Puente, California: first and foremost, I'm on a bike! Upon learning that I quickly developed an intense fear of it because I have to bike on the actual ROAD next to CARS that are a lot bigger and faster than I am??? It's terrifying. Buuuut I promptly got over that because my companion isn't fazed by it in the slightest. We're also in a real hilly area, so that's been a struggle on the bike for sure, but I'm not dead yet!

Also it's a lot hotter now and being in the sun all day is killer. It's doable, but not fun. I don't think I've ever been so sweaty in my life... It should cool down soon enough though :) this heat can't stop me!! Hah jk it totally can because I'm a wuss. But whatevs. Ya do what ya gotta do. And I'm not dead yet, so we're cool :)

Then there's my new comp, Hna Christensen! She's adorable and I love her :) she's from Arizona and has 4 months left in the mission. She's only 5'2" but her personality more than makes up for that! ;) haha she's sweet. We're going to have a lot of fun together :) I can feel it.

So highlights from the week: we found a golden investigator named Jose!! He just gets it... I don't know how else to explain it. I can tell he's been prepared by the Spirit to receive the Gospel :) only downside is that he lives about as far away from us in our area as you can get... so that's a 30 minute bike ride every time we want to go and see him. Also we had a big stake activity in which every ward/branch performed a song from a broadway musical! We got Circle of Life from the Lion King and it was so great!!! We KILLED IT! Ours was easily the best, probably because we put twice as much effort into it than anyone else. But they were all good and all fun :) This stake is cool too because we have Samoan, Korean, and Chinese wards along with the Spanish and English :)

Not as high of lights: yesterday we, as a district, somehow ended up pressuring each other into each eating a hot dog, a hamburger, salad, a bag of chips, an ice cream cone, 3 pieces of pizza, about a gallon of water, and 2 slices of chocolate mousse cake... all within maybe 4 hours. Haha I thought I was gonna pop!! But somehow, I'm not dead yet ;)

So it was an exhausting week, but it's been good :) I'm excited for all the amazing experiences I know I'll have out here in the coming weeks :)

-Hermanita Johnson

Los Bajos y Los Altos

Dear friends and family, I've lovingly titled my email "the highs and the lows" (more or less) mainly because....
I'VE BEEN TRANSFERRED!? And my new area se llama "Los Altos" ;) hah, clever, right? I thought so. But anyway here are los bajos y los altos de mi semana:

BAJOS:
Having to eat weird pig feet/knee thing... I dunno. It was like straight fat though. Bleh!!
Having to drop Victor, our seemingly golden investigator :(
Being told (more of less) that I'm like really fat and being asked if I'm pregnant?? C'mon guys.

But that's about it! There were A LOT more altos this week :)

Fidela and her girls

First off, I am SO happy :) like, SOOO happy. I LOVE where I'm at and I never want to leave or come home (which is unfortunate since I'm being transferred...) But really, we had an amazing week. Well, the last 3 weeks actually have just been so good as we've been trying to change and improve and be better. We're getting SOLID support form our branch members and we have some AMAZING investigators!! One of them is Fidela and I adore this woman. She's suuuper pregnant with her 4th daughter, is in a pretty crumby place in life right now, and has a lot of trials. Plus her boyfriend/husband just left her. And in spite of that she came to church with all her girls and stayed the whole 3 hours!!! That's seriously a miracle. She's just so sweet and she recognizes how important our message is for her and her family. She waves to us when she sees us outside of lessons and things, and her girls love us too! (Super sad side note though, after church I told them I'd be leaving and her 2nd daughter got all sad and held my hand and then gave me her cookie she got in primary.) Oh man. I absolutely guarantee she'll be baptized though, no doubt about it. And I'm so excited for her!! I haven't felt like this before with any of my other investigators, but I want to have this same excitement with all of them!! Other altos include having an AWESOME member come with us for lessons (that would be Ruby. Basically she's the best member missionary ever. She's one of the young women I "adopted")

Anyway, like I said before, today I got transferred. I'm off to Los Altos. I'm feeling like I'mma hit some highs here ;) hah get it? Cuz Los Altos.... Anyway, perks of my area include WALMART (hot dog! I nearly had a heart attack when I found out), Krispy Kreme donuts, Chick-Fil-A, biking (which I'm terrified of actually), and I'll get to be around the Korean, Chinese, Samoan, and English elders, so I'm gonna learn a lot! I've only interacted with Spanish missionaries so far.

My new companion, Hna Christensen, is super cool and really cute! She's from Arizona and has been out 3 months longer than I have. I'm really excited to work with her. It'll be a lot of fun :)

My adopted kids who broke my heart saying goodbye

So I'm excited :) saying goodbye to everyone yesterday was really hard (I cried more than once and it broke my heart) but I feel good leaving. I don't have regrets and I know the Lord is please with the work we've done in El Molino ❤️ We helped a lot of people and I love that. It's always neat to be ablate look back at the end of something and see what ripples you've cause and how far they've gone. I think a lot of the time we don't realize just how far they'll make it, and we also don't usually get an opportunity to see the end of our ripples. So getting a glimpse as to how far my ripples have spread was really neat for me :) and then seeing how many of these people have changed me and helped me learn and grow... It's beautiful :)

Love you all
-Hermanita Johnson

Cars Are a Blessing #zumzum

Hello hello!! How are you all?? I hope you're surviving the crazy heat! Cuídense, okay?
So we had a BOMB week!! As far as numbers go, we taught 26 lessons total and picked up 10 new investigates!! That's huge for us. Like, those numbers are UNHEARD OF here. Okay maybe not unheard of, but for this mission it's still really stinking awesome :) so, suffice it to say, we're happy <3

Some of you might be wondering the reason for this wonderful miracle of perfect numbers. Pues, dicho milagro took place because we had the blessing of using a CAR this week!! Our wonderfully perfect STL's helped us out with that and we HAULED butt. It's amazing what you can do when you eliminate the HOUR AND A HALF it takes to travel (by bus/train/foot/etc) from one end of our area to the other. Oof! And that time adds up, since most of our investigators either live right around where we do on the west side of the area, or literally on the east border. Not so many in-between.

Other highlights of the week include myself falling asleep on one of the many buses we took and my dear companion taking terrible fotos in the which I look... feo. Also we passed by this park and this super gringo band was playing "latino" music. The only distinguishable words were "pájaro lindo zum zum" (pretty bird...zoom zoom?) So we've been saying "zum zum" every chance we get because that's hilarious ;)

In other news, Hna Scott (or Herman Scoot as I like to call her--it's a long story) both got weird rash/bite things. I got prescribed some medicine, she got. member to put plant boogers on hers. Hers is better, mine is not (but it's getting there don't worry mom. Maybe I just need plant boogers too.)

Also I sang in church again. Twice! They liked our musical number from sacrament meeting so much that they had us do it again in Sunday school. So there ya go :) sharing talent is fun.

Anyway, it's not deathly hot and we're happy and life is good. The work of the Lord is AWESOME! I love being able to share the Gospel with others and watch their lives changes as they strive to apply the principles we teach :) and it's also really sad when they choose not to... but hey, we do our best and the Lord makes up the rest!

-Hermanita Johnson

And this is how we motivate ourselves to contact people ;)