I love to see the Temple

October 26, 2015

¡Hola Mamacita! 

Haha that's funny I was actually thinking it would be a fun idea to go into foreign housing. Haha I do great with Spanish when talking about the gospel, but outside of that I'm not too fluent. I got that dress when Sister Lalomanu and I were cleaning out the Wilton Hilton. There was a ton of old missionary clothes! Haha

I told Jose that he should be your friend on Facebook, he's so funny!

The Pardo girls are for sure being baptized in the 7th of November and we are planning for Jose to baptize his dad, Jesus, on the 14th. Jose has his interview for the priesthood on Wednesday and we are praying that everything goes well. Not too much has happened this week. It was busy as always, life as a missionary is never not busy! We got our flu shots this week, Hna Stout was hilarious! She's afraid of needles. 

We had a lesson with the Ivarras about the priesthood and we brought our old Ward mission leader, Johan, who is a recent (sort of) return missionary. All the boys in the family were there and it was so powerful!! Johan made me realize how much I don't know about the priesthood, but he helped us teach it in such a simple way! Then he was able to share experiences that he had on his mission with the priesthood. It was so awesome! The priesthood is so amazing and I am so thankful that we have it on the earth again today!! It is so important and vital to our salvation! I am so thankful for the priesthood holders in our family and that they are living worthily of it.

Para Siempre Dios esté con Vos

Con Amor

Hermana Twitchell

Not being transferred

¡Hola Mamacita!

This week has been great! This transfer has probably been the most uneventful transfer of my entire mission. I'm staying, my companions staying, woo! So we went to work and didn't have to think too much more of it. All the missionaries in our Ward are staying except for Elder Tena, but he just switched to English work to be our Zone Leader and his replacement is Elder Ortega, who I served with in Elk Grove a transfer ago. So not too much of a difference. Hna Kaaa was called to be a Sister Training Leader! But since Hnas Clark and Torres are staying here as STLs, Hna Kaaa is now in English work! Crazy! There weren't any Hermanas in English work last transfer, but now she's in English work and there's a trio of Hermanas somewhere in the mission. Fun stuff! 

So, I attached a picture of my schedule last week, so if you really want to know what happened, there it is! All the green boxes are trying to find people, all the blue are appointments we had. It's different on the iPad than on the little paper planners we used to have... I miss those. But the iPad is really useful! 

Last P-day, our district leader brought a bunch of Thai peppers for our zone to eat, so I also have a video of that, it was pretty funny, my companion was crying, another sister threw up later, everyone was rather red in the face. It was silly.

We are also going to the temple today! And I realized that I don't have more family names... Oops! I'm so excited though!

So a miracle happened on Sunday. First, the whole Ivarra Family came to church! It's been a struggle with them because ever since the kids were baptized, they've kind of lost the fire and desire to keep going. So we've been working with them a ton and we have been stressing going to all 3 hours of church! We might have to back up Jesus Ivarra's date because it's been harder to find a good time to come by his house and Jose just barely got an interview with the bishop about the priesthood. We'll see. The second miracle is that we came to church and the Pardo girls were already there. We asked them why they were there so early and they said, " Well, we couldn't make it to sacrament meeting at 12pm, because we have to pick up our mom from work, so we thought we would come to take the sacrament at 9am." Oh my gosh! They are the most amazing investigators I've ever had. Most members don't even do that!

I'm super excited for this transfer, miracles are going to happen! I know that the Lord is fighting with us as we strive to bring his children unto Christ!

Para Siempre Dios esté con Vos,

Con Amor,

Hermana Twitchell

PS take a family picture! It doesn't matter if I'm not in it. I want to show my whole family off to people I meet! All I have is the old one that doesn't have the new grandbabies on it

Hermana Clark, Hermana Torres, Hermana Stout, Hermana Twitchell

Hermana Twitchell and Stout

All the Spanish missionaries in our Ward, plus José in the middle, plus some kids, and Elder Ward who is now an RM who came back to visit with a beard :P lots of missionaries like to come back and visit.

Us singing at a baptism

Columbus Day

October 12, 2015

Hola Mamacita!

To be honest, I'm only going to be on my mission for 2 more months after Christmas... sooooo I really don't need anything.  Seriously.  Thank you for being so thoughtful though!  Everything is going well with our investigators on date! We stopped by the Pardo's home and Nathalia and Karen were painting their fence. So we talked with them and they were just talking about how much better their life was since we have been visiting them. They are so darling! 

The Elders in our ward had a baptism and it was so beautiful. The woman being baptized is named Zaira and she had been taught for 7 months. So there were 5 Elders that came that had all previously taught her. Then President Jardine baptized her (she got the idea from Jose's baptism). There were senior office missionaries there and the APs were there. Half the people there were missionaries! One of the Elders came from Rama 7 in South Sac and he came with a member, Hno Ramirez!  

He baptized the Claros girls back in February when I was there!  I was so happy to see him!!  Anyone from Sacramento Rama 7 makes me happy!  Hna Stout and I gave the missionary moment.  Hna Stout is doing so well with her Spanish!  I am so happy for her!  She has become very discourage about her Spanish lately, but everyone that I talked to after the baptism commented on how good her Spanish was.  I am so proud of her!  She has only been out for 5 months and she is so good at really bringing in the spirit!

If I am transferred next week, everything will be okay.  I'll come back for the baptisms!  Haha I'm at the point where I really don't care if I get transferred.  Bring on packing and moving number 7 if needs be!  I love my area, but if it's not where the Lord wants me next transfer, then I don't want to be here. 

Para Siempre Dios este con Vos

Con Amor,

Hermana Twitchell

We did service on Saturday where we raked leaves at a camp site. This fun native Central American thing was going on! It was so cool! They were doing it from 5am to 8pm!

The Tongan Ward having a party....  like Always!!

Conference was GREAT

October 5, 2015

¡Hola Mamacita!

Dad is silly, everyone needs to hear the talks on women whether they are women or not. I absolutely loved Elder Jeffrey R Holland's talk on mothers. He said there are two people that are messianic beings: Jesus Christ and mothers. It made me and all the women in the room cry. I love how much the general authorities love and respect women! There was also another talk that I loved on Saturday that was given by a seventy. He talked about the simplicity of listening to the spirit and the answered that we can receive. I loved conference. It reminded me of simple the gospel really is! Sometimes I over think how I can listen to the spirit or teach a lesson, but on reality it is so simple!! I also have my "ponderize" scripture for the week! Ether 12:27!    27 And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them.

I love your emails during the week! They're great! 

This week has been super great! We visited the Pardo family and we asked them how they felt about their baptismal date. Karen said, "Well, I prayed about it, and I feel like it would be better to be baptized on November 7th." Wow, of course! If she prayed and received that answer, I think that's amazing! So the 3 girls are getting baptized on November 7th! They are so great! 

We also talked with Jesus Ivarra and he wants to get baptized, so we have him on date for the 30th of October! 

The Lord has blessed us so much!! 

The only companions that I have had that aren't in Sacramento are Hna Griffith & Flores, and they are both off their missions... So the rest you can write :) 

Para Siempre Dios esté con Vos

Con Amor,

Hermana Twitchell 

Hemana Twitchell and Stout helping paint.  It's a good thing she helped me paint our house in Erda, UT

We went bowling today!!!