Exchanges, Interviews, & a Baby Squirrel

Hey Y'all!

This past week went by super fast. I guess that's good because it means we were busy doing the Lord's work. On Tuesday we drove to Charleston for interviews with President Lindhardt. He was running a little behind so we ended up waiting in the Mission office for like two hours before our interviews. It was okay though because the office is such a wonderful place. We got to talk to other missionaries who were also waiting for interviews and the office missionaries who are so fun. The whole office is just filled with the Spirit and a love so deep you can almost reach out and touch it. 

Our District Meeting at a Park in Charleston

After interviews, Sister Condie and I went on exchanges with the Sister Training Leaders, Sisters Sorenson and Schoemig. I went with Sister Schoemig and we covered South Hills for the day. She is AWESOME and we had a blast, laughing most of the day. So something pretty cool, we saw an albino deer! I didn't even know they existed but apparently they do.

Albino Deer

We also got more random free stuff this week. So we got a referral from the Zone Leaders to talk to a girl they met in Charleston and we went over to her house to see if she was home but instead her dad answered the door. We talked to him for a little bit and found out he was a hard core Baptist and had a line of preachers in his family. He was kinda interesting and tried to tell us the scripture "Jesus wept" was in Ecclesiastes. Anyways, he lives on this street where we teach like everyone so we're there basically every other day. And for some reason we see him every time we're there. He always waves to us and is usually pretty nice. Then one day, he stops us in our truck and puts a volleyball net in the back. We're just like uhh ok... Something else to add to our collection.

 Baby Squirrel! A family we teach saved it from their cat and are now raising it.

We had one of our investigators who has been having lessons with the missionaries since November come to church for the first time yesterday! He was super nervous about coming to a new church but had a great time! He even brought his 4 year old who really enjoyed primary. I'm so excited for them and know this gospel could help them come closer as a family! 

 My Freinemy Mo

Another funny story, we went to visit this member who moved to West Virginia a couple months ago and hasn't been to church since. He talked about how he is putting finding a job as his first priority and doesn't have time for church right now. Sister Condie gave a smack down lesson and told him that God always comes first and basically put him in his place. And what do you know... the next week he was at church:)

License plates we got from Elder Tooley at the mission office

What I heard while I was praying last night: "....I know you're praying but there's a ladybug on my bed.... That one multiplied!...*closet door open* *vacuum starts*.....*vacuum starts again*...*laughing*" Gotta love my companion

I hope everyone has a great week and remember I love you!

Sister de la Cruz

Imposter Missionaries

Hi Y'all!

So something really interesting/weird happened this week. We knocked on this guys door and he said that missionaries had stopped by a couple days ago and he was actually just about to call them. I was like "oh, that might have been a different church" and he said nope, they were from our church. I said "The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints?" And he said yep! He also said they were riding bikes and were Elders. We were really confused but he wanted to make a return appointment to we were happy. 

But then it gets weirder. We were talking to our District Leader yesterday and he said that they knocked on a door and the guy said missionaries had just stopped by his door too! And they had given him a Book of Mormon and Restoration pamphlet! Now, if you don't know, us missionaries have very specific areas we are assigned to and there are only one companionship per area. And there are no bike areas even close to us. The District leader and his companion are even an hour and a half away from us. We have no idea who is going around pretending to be missionaries but this is just getting weird. 

We found this car and we had to

Another awesome thing that we found out yesterday is that Elder Quintin L. Cook of the Twelve Apostles is coming September 8-10th! It's kinda funny because earlier this week I was telling Sister Condie about when I met him at Stake Conference in Seattle he told me he was coming this year and I was wondering when that would be. And then we find out that he's coming in a few weeks! He's going to be having a special meeting with all of the missionaries in our mission on the 9th and I'm really excited to hear him speak again! 

Me and Sister Condie :)

Some other interesting things to note from this week:

1. Sprickets are real - they're half spider half cricket and like to hide in laundry rooms and attack us. 

2. We are teaching a blind investigator which is a really interesting experience. He is hilarious though and love to make jokes about being blind. "You ladies look great today!"

3. We had lunch with our elderly neighbors and Bill asked if we would marry someone who wasn't Mormon. When we said probably not because we wouldn't be able to be married in the temple his wife Lois, got quite, look around, leaned in a whispered, "Would you marry someone who's Black?" We almost died because she was dead serious. 

4. Gumbo is sooo good <3 A member made it for us for dinner and her fiancé is from Louisiana. It had sausage, shrimp, crab, and a whole lot of other stuff.

5. My new favorite song is "When the Son of Man" by David Archuleta, check it out, you won't regret it :)

Have a great week everyone! I love you all!

Sister de la Cruz

Everyone had their turn with the hat

Random West Virginia rain storm

Mosquitos, Old People, and Free Stuff

Hey Y'all!

Another week down here in West Virginia! This week was interesting to say the least. First of all, there are soooo many mosquitos here. They have always loved me and these ones are no exception. My legs have been eaten alive and irritatingly my companion got bit like twice! Not fair. 

Earlier in the week we went to an assisted living facility to visit a member. As we were walking around the building trying to find him we ran into a lady in a wheelchair and she asked us if we knew where the bathroom was. We told her we didn't because it was our first day here and she said "Me too!" We offered to help her find it and wheeled her around. When we finally found it she asked us if we could help her and we were just like ...uhhh...sure.... And then when she was done we asked her if she knew where she was going and she said no. So we found a nurse and figured out where her room was and took her there, which had it's own bathroom and we could tell she'd been living there for a long time. A very interesting experience to say the least.

Another cool thing that happened yesterday was that we taught a lesson in Spanish! Well, we more or less just sat there as our Ward Mission leader taught but same thing. The investigator came to the US from Mexico when he was 14 and it now in his 40's I think but still has some trouble with English. We can talk to him pretty well but it's really hard for him to understand us while we're teaching. I was really surprised though that I could actually follow along as Bro Haupt taught! Either I know more Spanish than I thought I did or the Gift of Tongues really pulled through for me. I had a lot of fun in that lesson and can't wait to teach him again. Something else that's kinda cool about this guy is that a couple years ago he was a really bad alcoholic and smoker but one day just woke up and decided to change his life. He never drank or smoked again and to thank God he built a small chapel outside his house in Mexico. 

Sister Condie & I repping West Virginia

On Saturday there was a city wide garage sale and so Sister Condie and I decided to walk around talking to people. While passing by one house a guy called out to us so we went over and talked to him for a little bit. He was about done with his sale and when we were turning to leave he stopped us again and insisted we take something so he didn't have to get rid of it himself. We declined but he pushed a lamp at us and told us to take it. So that's how we ended up with a free lamp.

At another house a couple days before we were talking to this lady who had been a missionary for her church when she was younger. She made us take a couple bottles of water from the fridge and after we gave her a Book of Mormon she made us take this candle light thing that she had because she felt like she had to give us something too. Sister Condie and I are just magnets for free stuff.

Gotta love the wildlife 

GIANT moth

Being a missionary is really hard but I have also never felt more comfort and love from my Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. I have come to love and have a testimony of D&C 84:88

"And whoso receiveth you, there I will be also, for I will go before your face. I will be on your right hand and on your left, and my Spirit shall be in your hearts, and mine angels round about you, to bear you up." I'm so happy to have this opportunity to be a missionary and have so much help from Christ and other unseen helpers.

Have a great week everyone! I love you!

Sister de la Cruz

Week 5

Hi Ya'll!

I've officially been out a month! Sister Condie and I celebrated by getting Cold Stone on Saturday. This week has been pretty good. We've been able to teach more people now that we've got a foundation going here. There's this one guy who's super solid and when we taught him the Restoration he had a lot of questions but said he already believes it's true! I'm excited to see his journey in the gospel. We had Zone Conference on Wednesday in Charleston. I love when we can gather together as missionaries and learn from each other and President Lindhardt. It's like a jolt of spirituality. We were also supposed to have a district meeting this week but since our district leader lives like an hour and a half away we just had a district conference call with everyone. We'll only be able to meet in person once this transfer which is unfortunate.

My Cute Companion & I

This week I got to meet a lot of members in the Teay's Valley Ward. Most of them are awesome and help us out by coming to lessons, some are .... interesting.... to say the least. There's this one sister who is from Hungry and has a really strong Hungarian accent. I'm not really sure how to describe her, In the words of Sister Condie: "She's NUTS! She's Crazy!" Let's just say she has no filter and has a kinda sideways take on a lot of things. She always calls us darling and gives us lot's of kisses. She had us over for dinner on Saturday and made this really good Hungarian dish that was a lot like the Mexican dish albondigas.

Every Friday we help a sister who has cerebral palsy with getting ready for bed and have dinner with her. She is hilarious. Last Friday she was helping us train and we were practicing teaching her the restoration when she said "Show me where it says that in the Bible!" and so we were like okay, and Sister Condie went into her back room and brought out one of her old Bibles and we showed her. Then we flipped to the back of her bible and found $500! "The Church is True! God answers prayers!" she yelled. She had no idea that that money was there. She said she hadn't opened that Bible since she joined the church over 20 years ago. We were dying for a good 10 minutes.

There's an old couple, Bill and Louis, who live below us and love the missionaries. They aren't members but are super supportive of everything we do. Bill is almost 90 years old and was a engineer. Every time he sees us he has to show us his really old "calculator" that he used when he was in college. It's a ruler like thing that you slide around to do calculations. It's actually pretty cool. They are really nice and have asked to take us out to lunch soon.

Every Wednesday we have dinner and meet with our ward mission leader Bro Haupt. Him and his wife are so much fun and they have two adorable kids, Amelia who is 4 and Stevie who is 2. There's never a dull moment when we're at their house.

Our truck that won us cleanest car at Zone conference and got us cookies

One thing I love about West Virginia is that almost everyone here has a dog. In one day we met 3 puppies. There was this one family that has a 3 month old Great Dane and I fell in love with it. We were out tracting and I saw a guy on his porch so we decided to go talk to him. We introduced ourselves and he said that he was so glad we stopped by because he's been having a hard time lately. His mom and grandma are both in the hospital and his dad can no longer work and is on disability. They've had a really hard life and if anyone has room to complain it's them. However, this is the most optimistic and hopeful family I have ever met. It was so inspiring to hear them talk about how they always try to see the blessings in everything and see how God is working in their lives. We shared the Book of Mormon with them and the Dad said that it could only add more to what they know and invited us to come back and share our message with their whole family. I know the gospel can bless their lives even more and can't wait to meet with them again.

I know Jesus Christ is our Savior and can help us with every single thing in our lives. I know this because I have seen it in my own life. I love teaching people our message because I know it can only bring them even more happiness. I can't wait for another 17 months of bringing others to Christ!

Have a great week! Love you! Send me some letters!

Sister de la Cruz

Week 4

Hey Ya'll!

I finally made it to West Virginia! The last week in the MTC was just as great and spiritual as the previous two. I got to see Eldste Cribbs before I left so that was fun to say hi! On our last Sunday we were able to go visit the temple grounds with our Branch President and his wife and have a small devotional. I absolutely love the grounds there. It was sad to say goodbye to my district because we had all grown so close to each other but I'm excited for everyone to be out in the field!

Eldste Cribbs and I with our Companions.

Something else cool that happened: Each Sunday after the devotional we get to choose a video that is playing and so we decided to go watch a talk by Elder Holland. There were a couple hundred missionaries in the room waiting for the video to start but they couldn't get the sound to work. For the first ten minutes everyone was just talking to each other in the dark with the room only being lit by the emergency exit signs. Then out of nowhere someone starts singing A Child's Prayer and immediately everyone starts joining in. It was such a powerful experience to have that many missionaries singing in the dark together. We then sang several more hymns and eventually the video was able to play. I'm really going to miss experiences like that at the MTC. You can't find them anywhere else.

Provo Temple

I have already had so many blessings since being out here. When we got on the plane in Salt Lake to fly to Atlanta for our layover the captain told us that there were some mechanical issues and they were going to have to get checked. We ended up leaving about an hour late and our layover was only supposed to be like 45 minutes. We thought for sure we were going to miss our flight to Charleston. We ended up getting into Atlanta 10 minutes after our plane was scheduled to take off but by some miracle the flight had been delayed and we were able to run and catch it before it left! 

We met our Mission President and family at the airport and they took us to their house which is where we spent the next couple days doing a little bit more training. They are AMAZING and I can't wait to work with them for the next 18 months. We also got to go visit the State Capitol and the West Virginia State museum which were both really cool.

The Moses Mural

My first area is Teay's Valley West Viginia! It includes Hurricane, Teay's Valley, St. Albans, and Scott Depot. Most of the people here are really nice and are always asking if there is anything they can do to help us. It seems like they are either really poor or really well off. Not much of an in between. The ward is a pretty good size and very welcoming. We have had dinner with a couple families already. My trainer's name is Sister Condie and she is great! She's been on her mission for 13 months and I'm the third missionaries she's trained. She's from Idaho and went to BYU-I for a year before coming here. I think we're gonna have a lot of fun together.

Sister Condie playing with a stray cat that was following us around.

Our apartment is okay. We took the area over from Elder's and so they didn't keep it very clean. We also have to do a lot of contacting people because we don't know much of what's going on in the area and we get a truck to drive around. I have to back Sister Condie out every time she back's up because that's a rule so that's really annoying.

I'm having a really great time here and love the people already! I have grown so much and can't wait to see where I am in 18 months!

Have a great week! Love you all!

Sister de la Cruz