Ta-ta... Tap-a-What?

Hey everyone! 

We got transfer calls this past Saturday and I'm getting transferred!  So anyone who still has my physical East Wenatchee address, please send to my mission home address from now on. I'm headed to Toppenish... I hope that's how you spell it.  My new companion is Hermana Taua, a Hermana I served with in the Wenatchee zone, but she served in Chelan.  She's only been there for 1 transfer, and

Farewell from East Wenatchee 

was doubled into an area with a new companion who hadn't been there before.  We are basically trading companions.  Hermana Alcocer will be receiving Hermana Dee, Hermana Taua's companion right now.  Drum Roll please...... Hermana Alcocer will be staying here, receiving Hermana Dee, and will become a Sister Training Leader!  I can say for her she has been waiting for this day to come... ;)  Just kidding, she's nervous, but I know she'll do great!

This week has yet been another roller coaster.  Wendy, our investigator with down-syndrome will not be getting baptized.  Heavenly Father testified to both of us that she is not ready, but she WILL be ready in the future.  We pray that Heavenly Father will prepare her for the future missionaries :)

Conchita told us she is moving, and will be going back to her home in Mexico for a time to take care of her elderly parents. She is very ready, but we will be passing her to the elders in her area once she moves back to the states again :)

This week has been a crazy week of knocking like crazy.  We've lost 2 investigators this week so we are determined to find!  We had a super sweet lesson with Sabino about trails and hardships.  We both shared experiences with him about how the gospel has blessed us in our times of need, and while I was baring my testimony, I asked Hermana Alcocer for a few Spanish words while I felt lost, but with the spirit in trying to say everything in Spanish.  As she was helping me, he chimed in and commented and said, "That is why you two sisters are together, you complete each other."  That got to me hard, it made me so thankful she and  have been together this transfer. She's truly helped me so much!

Later that same day we had a lesson with Allejandro. He LOVES the idea of a modern prophet and of priesthood. We've loved visiting him, and have a return appointment this week before I get transfered.  

Saturday was pretty special because of transfer calls, but also because Hermana Alcocer and I were asked to join in on a musical number for a baptism that some elders were having at our stake center. All four of us sang "I know my redeemer lives" in Spanish, and let me just say, I've NEVER felt the spirit burn so strong within me.  I was asked to give a short solo and lead the music.  Let's just say I lost the knowledge of how to lead, and how many verses we were going to sing... because every verse I was about to walk down, so it looked like I was doing a lunge between verses.  The Spanish members didn't even mind :)

Me and my favorite street on exchanges in Wenatchee this past week

That's the gist of my last full week in East Wenatchee... I'm going to miss it so much! I've loved serving with our bishopric, with the Spanish speaking members, and most of all, the wonderful people I had the opportunity I had to teach.  I love everyone here, and I wont ever forget all the amazing members and investigators we had up here. I will greatly miss it!

Have a wonderful week everyone! 

"Fiddler on the Roof" Miracles, Miracles!

Top of the Mornin' to you all!

We've found some awesome new people this week, miracles are happening in East Wenatchee! :)

Just about every day this week we've had 3 set appointments! The first three appointments on Tuesday were ALL invited to be baptized and they all said yes once they confirm their decision with their families!  Marisella and Sabino, Woo hoo!  That same day I gave my very first District Meeting training on Giving Out of Love.  I was truly able to express what I saw in each of my missionaries (The missionaries in my District).  We are all in the zone of remembering our purpose every day and with every person we talk to.  I talked about the "Current Bush" talk by Hugh B. Brown.  It's one of my favorite talks and it helped in my training so much!

On Wednesday we had ANOTHER 3 lessons.  They were ALL invited for baptism!  Conchita again for confirmation that she wanted to be baptized (still no date) and Evonne and Victor.  Evonne has been taught by the missionaries before, but she was in a serious relationship which kept her and him from being baptized.  They also broke up along with all the drama.  He's moved out (which helps with her baptism) and she also expressed how ready she is to be baptized, ready for the lessons! :)  She speaks more English than Spanish so we are planning a hand off lesson for her and we will DEFINITELY be at her baptism :) 

Con Amor, Hermana Marble

Thursday went pretty slow, but we had dinner with the Merrill family, who's son just left for his mission in Brazil, and Brother and Sister Merrill are headed to the Provo MTC in two weeks to become service missionaries in Peru!  They had us over for dinner while their daughters' kids were playing.  Their grandson, LeRoy tried leaving with us to go teach people.  "Mommy, I have to go help the missionaries! I have to help Jesus!"  I just about died, cutest 4 year old ever!  We had a lesson planned with Wendy, which didn't go as planned... She was super distracted and nothing was clicking for her, so we decided we would come back another day.

Friday we planned all day and then went on exchanges with Hermana Capi and Sister Larsen. They are the SWEETEST Sister Training Leaders we've ever both had!  Super fun exchanges helping them with their on dates investigators and contacting their referrals all day. 

Yesterday Wendy didn't come to church, and this time none of her family came.  It was super sad and we were so looking forward to it, but we have plans to go by Tuesday with a member.  We drove up to Orondo for a return appointment, but it fell through, so we stopped by Angelita and Elizabeth.  Remember them from a few weeks ago?  Well, they are going through a divorce right now and they are looking for some divine comfort and help.  We invited them both to be baptized and they both said yes!  They didn't have a specific date set, but we will be putting them on date this week!  Then we had a sweet member dinner with the Olson family, Cutest family ever! They are so much fun!  We grabbed some dessert from them after a fallen through appointment.  Later that night we found our Less Active/Recent Covert Salvador at the church while we were waiting for a member to come with us to a lesson. He told us a wild story about something that was happening in his apartment building and asked for our help...  We didn't end up helping him, but we sent some other help for him.  We were both pretty nervous for him, but we do know he's been having some mental health issues.  If you could, please Keep Salvador in your prayers. 

We are planning on fasting for him this week. There's so much that's happening and we are so excited for these stake changes to happen soon!   

Love you all, have a wonderful week!

Wendy's on date!!

Last Pday trip to Chelan for a Zone pday of Scatterball!

Hi everyone!

This week has been a little crazy!  Earlier this week we talked to a lady who started crying at the doorstep because she hates God for taking away her mother.  She let off her struggles to us and then later let out all of her stress on us with why she can't believe that someone would murder her mother and God wouldn't punish him... she slammed the door, but it's okay.  We prayed for her that night!  

Then we met Ricardo, who we talked to about scriptures and he started quoting off like 10 scriptures from the Bible by memorization!  I think I know what I'll be doing this week for studies... 

Tuesday we did some solid knocking and we have found at least 6 referrals we've given to the English sisters! They've given us two this week and we are contacting them tonight!

Wednesday, everything went downhill.  Hermana Alcocer and I became sick with some kind of stomach bug, and she continued to be sick all week.  We received permission from Sister Lewis, our mission president's wife to stay home and rest.  While she was continuing to be sick, I did some more phone OYM's to past investigators and potentials in our area book, which we had at least 12 pages of... we started on them about two weeks ago and only got through maybe 6 or 7 pages, but this day I finished all of the lists.  It was a miracle, and we received 3 return appointments with people and moved a lot of people to the future/potential list. 

Thursday was a mess, but we were able to continue making return appointments with our fall-throughs.  This week we've been having members drop off food to us, which has been easier for them and easier for us, since we've been a bit sick.  We were staying home for dinner and only I ate, while Hermana Alcocer was in bed.  She woke up and she said she had a dream that Wendy was waiting for us.  We followed the spirit and went and visited her.  She was home!  We taught her the Plan of Salvation, which made so much more sense to her this time.  We were so happy she understood more!  She has started to understand more and more of what we are teaching her.  And by the title, you can see we have her on date for August 1st!  But we also received news from her mother that she will be undergoing an extreme surgery on August 4th.  We are praying for her every day, and we have faith she will be better after her surgery. 

Enjoying the sun and the rain!

Friday we had interviews with President and Sister Lewis.  Holy Canoli, do I love them!  They are such a sweet couple and we have loved having them in our mission so far!  We had to cancel an appointment with a potential because of a HUGE accident on the highway outside of her house. 

Then on Saturday we had Zone Training Meeting, which was focused on Our Purpose!  We got some sweet trainings from our District Leaders and our Zone Leaders.  It was a blast!  Then after we left, we grabbed some lunch and headed to Wendy's.  Unfortunately she wasn't home, but we were able to talk with her Mom about coming to church.  She and her family are afraid of attending the English ward, but once we explained more about our Spanish group we are starting, she got really excited and offered her help to get people to come to church.  She kept expressing her love for Wendy, and for us to be helping her.  We are so extremely happy to help their family come back to church.  Wendy's two older less active sisters attended this week, and we also said farewell to our 3rd counselor in the bishopric of the Spanish ward, and he's been set to be the Spanish Ward's Bishop across the river at a different chapel!  There's a lot more exciting news for our area, which I will only be able to announce in about 2 weeks.  Our stake presidency has super exciting plans for our area we can't wait to tell everyone!

I hope you all are safe and well, Love you all!

Only UP from 104... WILL WILL WILL

President and Sister Ware

Hey everyone!  What a WEEK!

Como... Wow. It just flew by! And by the title... It's been 104 degrees... all week. This week should cool off though. So, from the beginning!

Last week as I mentioned it was my privilege to say goodbye to President Ware.  I couldn't have been a more happy missionary to serve beside him and to be able to connect with him so well.  It was a hard goodbye, but he made me promise I would visit him after my mission.. of course! 

But this past week was insane.  Nothing was happening, and what more could happen than a companionship not getting along... and I'm not gonna lie, it killed me to see that we work so well together, and we couldn't even get along.  We have been neck to neck for the past week, and we finally decided to turn in early with permission from our DL so we both returned to the house to take a break.  I can say that I have never prayed so hard to feel the spirit. I finished as soon as she finished and came out of the next room.  I've never felt the spirit so strongly with a companion.  We sat and talked about what we both could do better, and we decided to ask our DL for some blessings.  We drove to the most west church building to meet them, and we both received some absolutely amazing blessings.  I can truly say that I've never felt more united as a companionship after receiving direct counsel from the Lord.  She and are back in business!

We've also had the privilege to meet President and Sister Lewis.  They both served missions in Switzerland and in Africa.  We heard some amazing mission stories from them both.  They promised that if we promise ourselves and continue to work hard, we will start to see the buds of the fruits of our labors.

Then later during the week, I received a SWEET 4th of July package from my Sister-in-law, Aimee.  Thank you Aimee!  We partied it up on the 4th after returning home at 6 pm as directed on holidays.   We had sweet plans to hang out, do whatever, and then we both clunked out before 10:30... yeah, it was insane. 

Orchards for... Days.. and days. and days...

We had a lesson with Wendy this week!  We brought a member who has a little brother with the exact same problems as her with medical and down syndrome affects.  She got so excited and begged for Kelly to come back with us, and we promised we would!  We had plans to put her on date this week, but we didn't quite get to it.  She kept becoming fascinated with how we all had the same pamphlet in our hands, and every single same page. it was the cutest thing ever!  She also tends to get distracted during our lessons, but she WILL progress. She WILL get baptized. 

We attended Church yesterday receiving no confirmation of any one attending.  No less actives, no Wendy.  Well, Wendy's family are all mostly less active, and they ALL SHOWED UP!  But not Wendy, she was sick.  But Jessica, her older sister asked Sister Alcocer if she could translate her testimony for her.  She gladly went up and translated her testimony with a full heart and some tears. 

We've also found 5 new investigators this week!  Two solid couples who are golden, and one older woman named Marisella.  We have return appointments this week and are so excited to get started with our new pool!

We are extremely excited and ready for a new week.  We've also moved in with some different members this week during the Shurtz's daughter's wedding and we will be staying at the Lacy's for two months.  You may still send mail to my Lyle address, but please see my new mission address in Yakima, listed below this post.

Love you all!  The Atonement is real, Christ in the reason for the season! 

Quail egg

Elders and Sisters,

Please inform all your friends and family of our mission address so it doesn’t have to be forwarded from Kennewick.

The label should read as follows:

Your Name

Washington Yakima Mission

1006 S. 16^th Ave.

Yakima, WA 98902-4260

Keep up the good work!!!

Elder Steve Call

Referral Manager