Adulthood

Well folks the transfer calls are in and sadly I'll be pushing Hermana Shaffer out of the nest and into...GILBERT! I (very very gladly) get to stay in Queen Creek another transfer! I love this area so much and being able to see the progress we have made here is truly amazing. I love my people!

It will be hard to see Hermana Shaffer go though. Although I "trained" her, she truly has taught me so much about being a better missionary and I have so much love for her. Her example has taught me the importance of being bold and enjoying the small picture worthy moments. She is an amazing missionary and she 'll do great things in the North (although lets be real the South is the best). I will miss though pointing out not-our-area and impersonating the Lion King by telling her never to go over to the shadowlands or our random dance parties or our weather reports. I love her but like all parents I must let her be free... My days are over of being a teen mom...sad.

But wow what a week! We had lessons everyday and picked up three new investigators! I definitely saw the Lord bless us as Sister Shaffer and I tried to really follow the guidelines put out for us and help our investigators on the path to true conversion. The hard/best part about the mission is that you are constantly growing, constantly striving to be better. It is something that really pushes you out of your comfort zone as you try to become more like the Savior and a better missionary. I still have a loooooong way to go before I'll be half the missionary-half the person- I want to be but the awesome thing is, is that I know that I can change through the atonement of Christ. It for sure isn't easy but it is so worth it.

Anyways your weekly Gloria update...SHE IS AWESOME. I wish you could have all been there in church yesterday. Her baptism is in two weeks and she was running around handing out invites to her baptism and it may be the cutest thing I have ever seen. Gloria is so excited. We also have travel plans after the mission so you could say we're pretty tight.

In other miracles though we stopped by a potential/ kind of investigator we have that is really hard to get a hold of. The other week we had dropped of a child's Book of Mormon with her although she hadn't had time really to talk. Well Alejandra wasn't home BUT her sister was and she told us that they had all been reading the book and really liked it....we haven't even taught her about the restoration yet but she knew who Joseph Smith was!! It was amazing and the spirit was so strong as we had the opportunity to testify to her the truthfulness of it. I love being a missionary.

But two of our new investigators I'm in love with already. Their names are William and Antonietta and they are adorable. They also proved me very wrong when I thought that no one likes to talk more than Gloria. I have never met a man with more stories but they are legitimately awesome. I think they have definitely been prepared and I am so excited to see what happens with them :) Also shout out to my dad and brother for the random soccer knowledge I now have that has helped me bond with them and other random individuals.

I love being a missionary. I love being able to stand in my Saviors place and I love love love love the Book of Mormon!

To the Moon and Back!
Hermana Showalter

Sunset hike for our own sermon on the mount

The WINDS of CHANGE

PEOPLE OF THE WORLD (aka everyone that reads my email (aka basically just my family)) THINGS ARE HAPPENING IN GILBERT!

Our mission is the greatest (I mean this is already an established fact) but it is about to become even more great. For many months now we have been the only mission in AZ without technology (re: Ipads) and although I truly love our rock phone I also miss the Gospel Library app. Also all the other AZ missions like to rub it in that we are isolated from the world....BUT NO LONGER.

FOR WE (the ARIZONA GILBERT MISSION) ARE GOING TO BE THE PILOT MISSION FOR....(wait for it)....... SMART PHONES!!!!! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

Right?! Missionaries with smart phones! What is the world coming to?? It is kind of mind blowing! It means that we are going to see a lot of apostles and our mission is really going to have to step up our game since they'll be filming us (finally I'll be able to live out my dream of being on the big screen...haha). It was funny though because President Wheeler can't keep a secret to save his life so everyone basically knew before the Zone Leaders announced it.

But other change that happened was mostly my birthday...yup the big 20 this week. It was an awesome birthday though! I felt so much love from everyone in my zone but especially from my companion! Hna Shaffer decorated our study room, got me a cute necklace and more importantly got me PIE! I was literally crying. I have the best comp. My best birthday gift though was definitely the fact that no one cancelled on us! We had three awesome lessons and one of our recent converts (whose birthday was the day before) sent us a long happy birthday text :) It truly was one of the best birthdays I've had. I'd also like to give a shoutout to Aunt Jess for sending me a birthday card with a lot of shirtless old men on it. I was dying.

 

Birthday banners (one from Katie and the other from the fam)

Katie's bday card to me ft. the growing cat

Me and Nohelia!!!

Shout out to my dads drawing skills!

In other funny news....Jimmy. Jimmy is our 58 year old investigator that lives in a trailer behind mattress firm. Getting to him is always an adventure as we have to bring chairs for our lessons that usually happen at 8:30 at night in the light of the mattress firm. Anyways we are trying to help him quit cigarettes and he is down to 3 a day (he started at 10 #progress). But we decided to drop by and surprise him and as he sees us coming he chucks the cigarette away. Then he starts telling us of this one time he burst in the temple demanding a recommend and all the people in there were like trying to shush him and he was like "HOW DO I GET ONE OF THOSE PIECE OF PAPER???". Sister Shaffer and I were literally crying. Then he proceeded to ask us if Heaven is like the temple and if we could tell him. He said he was wondering because "there were a lot of pretty pictures and it smelled really good". It is always an experience with Jimmy!

It was an awesome week though! We had a ton of lessons, got a lot of referrals, and are determined to work as hard as we can. Sad news is that this is Hermana Shaffer and I's last week together. Next week is transfers and one of us for sure will be leaving Queen Creek :( I would love to stay here another transfer but we will see! Something I've definitely learned is that God knows what we need much better than we do!

Something that has also really struck Hermana Shaffer and I recently is the importance of the Sabbath day. A lot of our investigators have been struggling with making it to church and it made us really reflect on why Sunday is so important and why we have been commanded to keep it holy. It really made me change the way I was viewing the opportunity to go to church and leave with a stronger testimony than ever on the importance of the Sabbath day.

There is so much more I want to say but this is already a giant email! Just know that I love each and everyone of you and am truly grateful for the outpouring of love (and rain!) I felt this week. Being a missionary is the best!

To the Moon and Back!
Hermana Showalter

PS. We got to go to a Greek Monastery.  It was awesome!

Bella Vista Relief Society Zone rocking the modest Greek clothes.

Sister Shaffer celebrating almost being done with training!

It rained!!

Sweat

Sister Shaffer and I used our miles a little carelessly at the beginning of this month (it's just a rush when you get new miles) so we have been trying to figure out ways everyday to use our miles wisely while still really working our area. The answer we came to: Bikes.

I know that there is one great reason why I was sent Spanish  (besides my ability to eat a lot of tacos) and that is that bikes are not my friends. But on the plus side I have definitely been burning off those tacos! The past week we dedicated part of our day to picking an area and biking around in it and we definitely saw miracles... and a lot of sweat.

The awesome part about bikes is that we get the chance to talk to a lot more people which means a lot more Spanish referrals for us. We actually got a few solid ones and it made all the sweat worth it for sure. At one point Sister Shaffer frantically looked at me and was like "touch my back". After I did I told her that was the nearest I was going to get to a swimming pool for the next year and a half. I honestly didn't know people could sweat so much but the Arizona heat and now humidity (thanks monsoon season) have definitely set new records. But with the heat comes tender mercies! After 3+ weeks of our A/C not working it got fixed this weekend! Being able to come home to a place that is less than 80 degrees is truly a blessing and it's nice that we don't have to sleep on the couches anymore (that room was cooler).

Funny moment of the week happened with our 13 yr old investigator Nohelia. She is awesome and really wants to get baptized and her parents have given permission as long as she actually shows a change and a true commitment to following the Savior. So as we have been working with her, we've also developed a friendship with her parents (we are trying to work with them). So we had a lesson with her last Wednesday and as we were about to leave to go to our dinner appointment, her dad yells "ninas vengan" and we were like "um us?" and he shuffled us into the kitchen and told us that they had food for us. We told him we were fine and he was like " I didn't ask..I told you!". It was literally the most delicious food of my life but we had dinner 20 mins later. I have never been so full before. At the end I had to sneakily slid food over to Sister Hanson to help me out. She's the real MVP.

It was a great week but a hard one. It definitely pushed Sister Shaffer and I too our limits physically, mentally and spiritually. At one point as we were frustrated after a long day of tracting and little success. I pulled the car over and looked at Sister Shaffer and said "Gosh dang it I'm going to be happy! This is a gospel of joy and I'm going to be JOYFUL!". It definitely helped pull us out of our funk and after we found a potential and a goldenish English person. It was definitely a moment where we pushed through some barriers of faith.

My mission has stretched and shaped me. It has broken me down and challenged me. And although it's rough sometimes - I love it because I love my Savior. I know that He died for me and for each person I meet. I know that it is through the Gospel of Jesus Christ, through baptism, that we can one day reunite with our Father in Heaven. I am grateful for the sweat, the stress, the hard moments because it is the least I could do for the One who has already done it all for me.

I know this church is true.

"And they departed from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for his name."
                - Acts 5:41

To the Moon and Back
Hermana Showalter

We have a creepy zone mascot named sister travis and decorated the ZLs car with her.

Zone tshirt proofs we are making to surprise the ZLs

Zone Hike

"The Monsoon Season"

For the past few weeks a lot of people have been telling us to just make it to "The Monsoon Season". I was under the impression this just meant that it was going to rain a lot. Well "The Monsoon Season" has come....it does involve a little bit of rain but mostly DUST.

Sister Shaffer and I were knocking some doors, trying to find those sneaky Spanish people. We had just tracted into a members house who very helpfully told us her neighbors were Spanish and after sharing a quick spiritual message headed out the door. Then we got hit by a lot of dust. We thought it was just a random breeze until it kept hitting us again over and over. We literally couldn't see anything. So we turned back to try and find our car as we were getting pummeled by dust and hot air. Anyways the struggle was real! We didn't think we were going to make it back to our car because if we opened our eyes they got filled with dust. Anyway the member ended up running outside yelling "SISTERS SISTERS" and pushed us into her van and drove us to our car. I guess her son had run in and said  "MOM there is a MASSIVE dust storm" and she dropped everything, yelled "Watch the babies" and saved us. Let me tell you - it was a tender mercy. We had to hunker down in our car for a solid 15 mins until it had passed. Who knew Gilbert could be so dangerous?

So to summarize: monsoons = dust storms = danger

But this week has also been AWESOME. First of all - AMERICA! I am so pumped to be a part of this wonderful country and be able to celebrate the freedoms that we have. Because of fireworks and other "hazards" we couldn't work on the fourth after 6 PM. It was kind of like a reverse Pday which was weird. Our whole zone got together to play scatterball (think dodgeball but more intense) and chair soccer (involves more running than you would think). We also had a little devotional and IT. WAS. HILARIOUS. One of our zone leaders is from France and got up with these huge American Flag glasses and talked about how proud he was to be from this country. Elder Romero was wearing a giant American Flag (he's from Mexico) and as we sang the National Anthem our Zone leaders pulled out these huge flags and waved them around. Everyone was in tears. To cap it off Elder Feusner (other ZL) found a scripture that TALKED ABOUT JULY 4th and just like mic dropped it and then we had a closing prayer by Donald Trump (Elder Ray who actually really looks like him). It is a night I will never forget. I'm proud to be an American.

Also Sister Baggaley and I had exchanges this week! It was so fun and we started the day off by going to the temple! Our alarm didn't go off when it was set so I woke up to a frantic "SISTER SHOWALTER ITS 6 O'CLOCK".  We had to be at the temple at 6:30 and its about a 20 min drive. I literally got ready in 6 minutes and we still beat half the zone there... @MormonStandardTime. But it was amazing to be able to go and sit in the temple. It was just what I needed to recharge my batteries.

After our zone breakfast SIster Baggaley and I got to work. Although 2 of our 3 lessons that day cancelled we still had a great day. Sister Baggaley doesn't speak spanish but it was amazing to see her work. We ended up having an unplanned lesson with Jimmy and it was super powerful. She talked in English and I talked in Spanish and we were able to promise him some pretty amazing things. I love being a missionary!

Then JImmy came to church as well as Federico and his family (less active we are working with)! We also got in with this miracle OYM from last transfer and taught her the Restoration. After teaching her we asked her if she would be baptized if she knew it was true the 29th...she said yes! It was a rough week at some points but Hermana Shaffer and I truly saw miracles. I am so grateful to be a part of this amazing work and to be here in Gilbert (Greatest Mission in the World)!

To the Moon and Back!

Hermana Showalter

Man Crush Monday

Spanish district band at dinner with the Lopez family

I have a crush. His name is Paul. You may have heard of him if you're into reading the New Testament.

But for real though. I. LOVE. PAUL. Recently I have been reading a lot our of the Book of Acts in the New Testament and if you haven't read it, I'm going to invite all of you to read it ASAP. Especially if you are a missionary. Paul is one of, if not THE, best missionaries ever. He taught with power and boldness and has changed the way I do missionary work. He is the ultimate example of fearing no man, only God. Literally almost every city he visited wanted to kill him. He was beaten, persecuted and imprisoned yet never stopped, never took a break. He was truly converted to Christ and wanted everyone to know about Him so they too could be saved. The funny thing is before his conversion he wanted to kill the Christians and was on his way to do it when Christ appeared to him and was like "Stop this nonsense" and then Paul was blinded and so Christ appeared to one of His disciples and was like "Go visit this guy" and the disciple was like "um...isn't he the one that is trying to kill us?? so lets think about this..." but then he went and healed Paul and the first thing Paul did was go preach about Christ #converted 

I. LOVE. PAUL. Poor Sister Shaffer is probably tired of hearing me talk about him all the time but he is awesome and I'm obsessed so #Can'tStopWon'tStop

But in other news it was a great week (every week here is great tbh). Our zone has set a goal for 18 baptisms this month and with the training we received at Zone Conference this week we can totally reach it! Our whole zone is pumped and working hard to reach it and let me tell you the miracles are real! #18Bap'$

On our end of things..Letty and Diana are on date! Letty wants to get baptized so bad so we are really working hard with her so they can be baptized on the 22nd! Please keep them in your prayers! The only thing in her way is getting married to Rodolfo. Not even that...it's just getting the marriage license! Let me tell you if anyone in the Gilbert area needs to get married I can hook you up. I know a lot about it now. 

Gloria is still doing awesome! She got us frostys the other day and as we were eating them we talked about her baptism. She has big plans let me tell you. She knows who she wants to baptize her, who she wants doing the music and all that. She decided I probably shouldn't sing which is a good decision all around but she asked me to make invitations for her to give out....SHE IS THE CUTEST! Also she was at church the other day and it was fast Sunday and she came up to us and was like "I started my fast yesterday". WE DIDN'T EVEN REMIND HER! Gloria is so so special to me. I love this woman with all my heart and am so so grateful for this time I have to be with her.

Cool experience happened this week. Hermana Shaffer and I were visiting a potential when we passed by some landscaping guys. I had this feeling to go talk to them but 1) they are usually from Phoenix and 2) probably not interested. So I drove right by them. After stopping by the potential, we drove by them again and the thought kept coming to my mind... "Go talk to them". I, of course, ignored it and kept driving. After about 5 minutes of driving away from them I just couldn't shake the feeling we had to go talk to these men so I flipped a U-turn and drove like mad back. Sis. Shaffer was a little confused and scared. Anyways Pancho, Miguel and two others were all on their lunch break and although they were indeed from Phoenix we were able to share a message with them and give out 4 copies of el Libro de Mormon!!!! We also have a loose return appt for the next time they are in the area on their lunch break so #blessings. It was so cute to see as we were walking away them all flipping through it and talking about it.

But in all seriousness I love being a missionary. It is hard work but so rewarding. We have two amazing recent converts who have almost been baptized a year so we get to work with them on going to the temple. Seeing their excitement makes me so grateful for being a part of this and eternally grateful for Heavenly Father sending me here to Gilbert. I will never be able to thank Him enough.

To the Moon and Back

Hermana Showalter

The Dog, The Jimmy Johns Guy and the Sandwich AC fixed

Bahama bucks for life

I guess I'll start this weeks email with the weirdest/funniest experience we've had this week.

Four of us live in our house (it's a Spanish party up in there) and we all ended up being home for lunch at the same time. We'll Sister Shaffer and I were going to get the mail but she was probably like 10 steps ahead of me but was turning around to say something as she opened the door. Then this GIANT dog sticks his head in the door so I screamed which made Sister Shaffer scream and the dog was just smiling at us (but like really actually). Anyways the dog was just like chilling outside our house so as we all tried to figure out where he had come from, I bonded with him by feeding him part of my sandwich. Anyways like 3 minutes later this Jimmy Johns delivery guy comes around the corner and told us that the dog had run out of a house he had just delivered some sandwiches to. So he starts trying to drag this dog away by the collar but I did too good of a job of bonding with the dog so he refused to leave. Anyways I ended up having to give the JJ guy my half eaten sandwich so the dog would go (turned out he had bonded to my grilled cheese and not to me)  And the guy just kind of looked at me and was like "...um do you want me to return it....?". I told him it was good. So Jimmy Johns owes me a sandwich now. I may have just butchered that story but trust me IT WAS HILARIOUS!

But it was also a week a miracles! Katie aka Hermana Nash inspired me to really work with the less actives in our area. So last week someone had mentioned this Federico guy who turned out to be in our area! I couldn't believe we had never heard of him before especially since he lives behind a members house. So we stopped by there and although he wasn't there his mom was..who is not a member! We ended up sharing a message with her, giving her a Book of Mormon and inviting her to read it. We stopped by 3 days later and not only was she there but also Federico and his dad (also not a member)! We taught the Restoration and they loved it! We have another appointment with them all tomorrow and can't wait to keep working with them!

Then there is this referral we have had for about 2 weeks now that we have been trying to get in touch with. The thing is he works at least 12 hours a day and the only address we had was "He lives west of the Mattress Firm and behind the house in a trailer"..... (#theSpanishMissionaryLife) But we have been talking to him on the phone and he seems awesome! So the other day we decided we weren't going to rest until we found him. So we were calling the Tempe Missionaries who referred him to us to find out where he lived. Using google maps, Sister Shaffer and I's sleuthing, and many many miles we found him at 8:40 at night on the darkest sketchiest street I have ever been on. The Tempe elders were a little concerned about our safety but I told them I was from NY and made Sister Shaffer hang up. I figured worse comes to worse I could outrun Sister Shaffer. 

But after knocking on the sketchy trailer behind the sketchy house on the sketchy street.... WE FOUND JIMMY! Turns out he is a former investigator from like 25 years ago and is ready to be baptized (#BLESSINGS) but is trying to start a business so can't make it to church quite yet. He told us that he likes our "persistance" and thinks we will "be the ones to finally baptize him". He is quite the interesting old man and after a 30 min lesson in the dark, outside (well his phone light was on so not completely dark) we are pumped to keep working with him!

But the crowning moment of this week was when I got to play soccer against Mexicans (people in our ward started a game) and SCORED THE FIRST GOAL. I think I won them over too so that's a win. Strangely I've started to like sports more on my mission so go figure.

Other than that transfers have come and gone and Sister Shaffer and I are pumped to work in our area for another transfer. But I would just like to say that I don't know why people lived here before the invention of AC. The high we hit was at least 122 degrees and it has been over 110 everyday this week. Luckily it wasn't until the day after the high that our AC in the house decided to break....and didn't get fixed until today. We managed to survive thankfully because it didn't break in the stairwell area so we moved everyones beds into there and just had like a giant slumber party for like 5 days. The hottest our house got was about 87 but that is still 30 degrees cooler than outside so I'll take it. #AZproblems (Also I named our car Hades because it gets ridiculously hot it there because the interior and exterior are black).

Where we have been sleeping.

Anyways it has been a crazy, hot, amazing week! I know that as the temperatures go up peoples hearts are going to soften and we are going to see miracles! I love this work and I am truly thankful for all that my Savior has done for me. As Peter and John in the book of Acts I rejoice to be counted worthy to suffer in His name (and really what is a little heat?). I am humbled and honored everyday to be called His disciple and to do His work. 

To the Moon and Back!

Hermana Showalter​​

When the temple is in your area #blessed

Annahi - literally my fave human in AZ who came out on splits with us!

random goat I bonded with

pretty sunset

@ Katie Nash

When you run into Annie (from my home stake!) in Walmart.

I am Usain Bolt

Bella Vista Zone shirts designed by yours truly (back says relief society because there are 10 sisters and 8 elders in this zone)

Man I feel like I blinked and this week was gone!

But to start out Happy Fathers Day to the best dad on the planet! Shoutout to Rog for being my #1, helping me with calculus in my past life, teaching me how to drive stick and fixing my many, many car (life) problems. I really have been so blessed and I thank Heavenly Father every night for the family I have.

Also HAPPY BIRTHDAY JENNAFER! Way to make it to 20 (for those who don't know Jenn we've been best friends since we were like 7 so I owe her this).

Okay now to recap on my week....

We had exchanges this week! It was nice to drive 5 minutes away to work in Sister Sorenson's area for the day (lol @ the small mission life). I found out the reason I wasn't called English here mainly has to do with the fact that I would die if I was put on a bike 24/7. The following day most of my body was in pain (half because of the bike the other half because of the sunburn). We were able to teach some bomb lessons and also bike a lot! We were probably on a bike for half the day but I really enjoyed finding out more about missionary work from Sister Sorenson. She is an amazing missionary and we were able to bond more over our east coastness ( she is from Boston). 

Highlight of the night ended when we were switching back. I realized that sister Baggaley had left her scriptures in our car but they had already started to pull away. Scriptures are important. SO I BOOKED IT AFTER THEM. I literally have never ran so fast in my life. I CAUGHT UP WITH A SPEEDING VEHICLE.....and they didn't hear me screaming and banging on their car. Between that and the never ending bike ride I laid down on the road and took a breather. After Sister Shaffer was done laughing she called them and they drove back. It was pretty funny.

Other than that the work here is continuing to progress little by little. We have some less actives that we are working with on top of our investigators and I love them all so much. 

I also learned a lot of lessons this week. It really is so important as missionaries to make sure we are sanctifying not only our actions but thoughts to the Lord and working in every moment we have. I know that is something i want to continue being better on as I go forth.

It is an honor to represent the Savior and His church. I love it with all my heart and wouldn't want to be anywhere else but this hot (very very very hot) place called Gilbert Arizona. 

To the Moon and Back

Hermana Showalter

Sister Shaffer and I rocking it in the back seat

Me and this cow that wasn't having it