Mouse in the House!

I hope y'all are doing great! This week has been a little better than the last!

Sadly, we found out that our only progressing investigator who we thought was moving in alone is actually moving in with some other guy so that was not the best news. She is still the most solid investigator we have though. She really wants to be baptized and is doing everything she has to except for living alone. It is hard to help her understand how that is possible because she is a single mom and is about to have another baby next month so she is currently not working.

My bike got here this week! Since mine had been on back order I had been borrowing one from Lubbock. It got here Tuesday and one of our district leaders put it together that night and we came to their apartment Wednesday to get it. When I tried it out I went to turn and somehow when you turn the handlebars it hits the pedals (no that is not supposed to happen) so I asked him what was wrong and he said he had no idea but it was really hard to put on and he had to take apart the whole brake system to get the front tire on (no you are not supposed to do that). I had to get the tires pumped up so I went to one of our members houses who knows about bikes and when he filled it up I asked him and he said the front wheel was on backwards. The Elder that put it together was so mad when he found out. So Brother Stromberg had to re-take apart the brakes Elder Wilkins took apart so that he could flip the wheel around. Luckily he knew what was wrong and was able to fix it really quick while he was on his lunch break and his wife even made us lunch! The members here are great! Since I now have my own bike with lights and everything we were able to bike all day which was kind of crazy. It wasn't as bad as I thought it would be though! Luckily the weather on Thursday was super nice! 

That night a member took us out to eat at a steak house and it was soooo good! I got a chicken fried steak that was literally bigger than my head!

We tried a bunch of people Friday but only one person let us in. We knocked on his door and were really confused and concerned when he let us in immediately because that doesn't happen. The first thing he said was "did they not warn you about me?" turns out he has met with missionaries before and he knows a lot of the members in that neighborhood. He is a Lutheran Minister and loves to talk about religion and hear what we have to say but not willing to change. 

Friday night it actually started to snow!! (remember how I said Thursday the weather was super nice? that's Texas for ya!) It got cold and flurried and snowed hard for a couple hours but nothing stuck. I thought for sure we would wake up to snow but we didn't.

Saturday night we got a text about a referral, as soon as Sister Acosta read the name I recognized it as one of the people we help out at Catholic Charities! We were super excited and we called him right up and set up an appointment. The appointment went alright but we had to teach at the door because there wasn't a woman there and he was having a hard time standing so we are hopefully coming back this week. He really likes to get off topic but I see some potential in him!

We got a new zone leader and he is from Australia so that is cool!

We have been trying to find new people to teach so we have been trying a bunch of formers and not many of them answered but we tried some of their neighbors and one of them said he was making lunch but that we could come back in half an hour (that doesn't ever happen!) We did and we were able to have a great lesson, I am excited to go back and see him again!

Luckily the mouse I referred to was not in our house but that of one of our investigators. We were sitting there teaching about the priesthood when I glanced up to see a mouse sitting in her kitchen, not scared one bit. I was terrified but of course I didn't say anything. It just scurried around the kitchen for the next few minutes. When we got out of the lesson I asked sister Acosta if she had seen what I saw and she said she did. Ewwwww! Sister Acosta then informed me that that was not the first mouse she had seen, apparently she sees them at one of the less active peoples house we visit but she didn't say anything so I wouldn't freak out. I guess I will just have to be careful where I step from now on!

Well, that about sums up my week! For those of you wondering, we have not gotten to watch the misisonary broadcast yet (we will at zone conference in 2 weeks) so we will not be making any schedule changes until then.

Thanks for all your love and support!

Hermana Peterson

Odessa is looking up!

Hey y'all!

Best news of the week is that yesterday we found out that our only progressing investigator (Taylor) that was moving will be only moving with him for a couple weeks until her place that is in our boundaries is ready!!! We are super pumped because that means she is SO ready for baptism. That really was the only big hurdle we had left with her was that she was living with someone so everyone pray that her housing situation here will work out! Also, one of our recent converts who is less active came to church this week!! We have been seeing her every week since I got here and she finally made it! Sister Acosta leaned over to me after the meeting had started to point them out to me and when I saw her and her three kids sitting on the bench I literally started to cry, it is the best feeling ever to be able to help people come unto Christ! 

Also, at church we received records for several new young families, one of them being a part member family who is totally up for taking lessons. She seemed totally comfortable at church and so we are not sure if she was being taught before but we are excited to get to know them! 

On Thursday we went to a care center to do some service. We normally go to the memory care facility and just talk to the people there. This week they asked me to play the piano while they made valentines cards. I ended up playing the piano for about an hour and a half and it probably sounded horrible but they all said it sounded great (and no one will remember it). This week we are planning on bringing a hymn book so that I actually know what I am playing! 

We got to "teach" someone new this week, we went to try and visit Roger and he wasn't there but his roommates invited us in and they had a friend there from out of town. He had visited with missionaries before but all he wanted to do was argue with us. It was a really interesting experience because we basically just continued to bear our testimony to him whenever he gave us 2 seconds to talk. It was hard but I liked being able to have that experience.

We got to go to the temple on Saturday!! It was so great! I love the way we can feel when we go to the temple and make those promises with Heavenly Father. The family we went with is super nice, I love them! You can tell by the pictures we tried to take what our daily struggle is here in Texas, that would be wind, wind, and more wind! On our way back we had to stop for a bathroom for one of their kids and when we walked out she grabbed on to him because he seriously couldn't walk because of how strong the winds were. Let's just say if I wasn't a missionary I would probably never wear a skirt here (;

This week when we were at the food bank doing service we came out and the elders saw a paper on their windshield and thought they got a ticket. Upon further inspection it was a way nice note from a return missionary who happened to see our cars. We got one too and it was so nice and she had some good scriptures written on there as well. She did call us elders though hahaha!

Hope you all had a grand week as well!

Love y'all!

Hermana Peterson

Crane or Bust!

So another uneventful week here in Odessa. Transfer calls came and our whole district will be here for another 6 weeks! We are also getting 2 new sisters added so that should be exciting!

We don't have a lot of time today because sister Acosta is pretty sick so we have to get home. I will just tell you about the most eventful part of our week. We have a city called Crane in our area and no one really goes out there because it is a tiny town where the few members there are less active and all the investigators have been dropped. Crane is about 40 minutes south of our house. We decided to go out there one day because we had a referral about half way there in a place called Pleasant Farms (I think) people kind of make fun of it cause they are not really sure what it belongs to and people say it is not a city so they just call it a "place" not a town haha. The referral didn't answer so we headed the rest of the day to Crane. We tried all the less actives and none of them answered or the address didn't exist or the house did not look like anyone still lived there so we made our way to the last place and there was someone sitting on the front porch. We asked for the person we were coming to see and he yelled to her that someone was here to see her. She came out, took one look at us and invited us in very happily! We were so excited! She has been a member for about 2 years and was so sad when they pulled the church and missionaries out of Crane. She is a truck driver and so she is not able to make it to church but she told us that she uses LDS.org to study which is awesome! She was super nice and she wants to be able to go to the temple. We are hoping to be able to make it down to Crane at least once a transfer to at least see her. It was an awesome experience to see how us showing up was an answer to her prayers!

Anyways, I encourage you all to go look up David Archuletta's "Little Prayer" song. One of the Elder's gave it to us and it is such a good song!!! I love it so much! I wouldn't be surprised if it was popular and you have all seen it already but go watch it again and really listen to the words.

Have an amazing week!

Read your scriptures EVERY day and the Lord can't help but to bless you!

Hermana Peterson