July 14, 2014

Hello Family and Friends!

This week wrapped up to be a great one! There was a Pow-wow on the Pechanga Reservation here in Temecula, so twice as many people wound up at the great a spacious building this weekend (the Pechanga Casino) so it was slower than usual for a weekend. But we could hear war drums pounding almost all throughout the whole valley so it was neat. 

We had our Zone Training Meeting on Wednesday, and it went great! Elder Smith is a really great teacher and is a rock at planning out meetings. I did something cool, where I took a graph of member present lessons, and turned it into a baptism symbol, which is pretty much a zig zag line with a little 'swoosh' on the end of it making it look like a looped arrow going in and out of the water. It seems simple, but it was totally inspired by the spirit. but, I also slipped up, I meant to say, in closing, that"Temecula is known for hot weather and great members!" but what I actually said was "Temecula has hot weather and hot members!". So that was pretty bad, everyone almost died laughing. I feel like it was okay, because at least no one can say that our meeting was boring, and they will actually remember something from it for once.

At the Temple on Thursday, I got to see a lot of people from Twin Oaks Valley Ward :) I saw Sister Craney (I ate Thanksgiving Dinner at her house) and Sister Skousen (she was the RSP for a month or two when I first got there). And then, Brother Moore was one the officiator's and when saw him I was really excited, because I love his whole family, and I knew that his wife worked at the Temple at the same time as him usually. We ate dinner at their house at least twice a month while I was there, and I was there for 8 months, so I got really close to them. So I met up with him after and caught up a little, and then on the way out I saw Sister Moore standing at the top of the stairs! She is so awesome! I love that ward!

We got to meet with our investigator Garrison, he is in the YSA Branch. He is currently making a lot of restitution for some things that he did in his past, but he is being steadfast in his desire to follow Jesus Christ. I feel really lucky to be able to teach him, and be apart of his journey. His girlfriend, Abby is a member who comes from a less than active, non typical mormon family. They told me that after the first lesson, one of the reasons they wanted to keep meeting with us was because I complimented Garrison on his Wu-Tang Clan t-shirt haha. We were on splits to go to both of our wards again, so I was really lucky that it was my turn to go to YSA.

 

Love you!