End of July...Really?

This week we had a lot of fun! I'll put some pictures up in a minute.... I think I told you about Jennifer. A potential that we tried. anyways, she said that she wasn't particularly interested, but that we cold come back and help with her yard! So we went back this last week, and had a really good time! We helped weed, and sure enough, she started asking questions! We ended up teaching the whole first lesson to her while we weeded! It was so neat! She still isn't too sure about meeting with us, but we will help with her yard again on the 7th :) She is so cool. Also, she took us to lunch at this little place called Perea's, Tijuana Bar. We thought it looked cute, but didn't ever think to go in because it was a bar. But it's actually mostly restaurant with a little bar on the side, and it's a converted old house! (seriously, I can't wait to show you my quirky little Corrales village!)
We helped out RS pres with her alpaca's this week. I think I want an alpaca farm one day. They are so cute! :) I have a lot of pictures from that too.

Sister Smith had a family friend that was in town that got permission to take us out to dinner one night, so that was really fun!

Also, we park our car once a week in an effort to find more people, and to save miles. I got quite the sunburn.... so we snagged some aloe from a member, and we're going to invest in some sunscreen today. we were SO sweaty and nasty, and NO ONE was home. I wore a necklace.... and my sweat combined with the metal turned my neck GREEN. It was gross. haha :)

Also really fast, I heard a really cool analogy in sacrament yesterday. He was talking about Elder Uchtdorf's talk, 'you can do it now'. and how we need to keep going and pressing forward... like when you are on a bike. The faster you go, the better this 'invisible force' will keep you on the bike. But if you slow down, you are likely to fall. Works the same way with our lives, so we need to make sure that we keep pedaling! :)

Love you so much!! Miss you!! :) :)

love,
Sister Brown

This ward is awesome! : )

This week was pretty good!! We had 26 oyms (street contacting)!! which, is a record high for us. Nowhere near what we need... but much better than where we have been! We went on exchanges.. that was really nice. I stayed in the area.  I was a little sad about that. The sister we exchange with are in the Volcano Cliffs area, and they visited Christi! (which, she is putting in mission papers in a week! ah!) But, we were trying some potentials out in Corrales..... we met this lady named Jen. She is so cool! She said that missionaries came by like, 5 years ago when she was having a hard time. She said that she is not really interested, and her husband is anti religion... but she did call us, and ask if we could come and help with her yard, and she would make us lunch!! So, that's awesome :)

And did I tell you about the change in our dinner policy a few months ago? We are allowed to have dinners with active members 2 days a week, and the other days they need to be with less actives, or investigators. Or we can be at an active members home, if they invite a less active friend or nonmember. So this last week, we had 3 members invite friends over!!! No new investigators yet... but it was SO cool! I had never had that happen before. This ward is so awesome :)

Tell everyone hi for me!!!

Love,
Sis. Brown

Story from El Paso

Hi!

This week was good!! It's really neat to see the trust build with the ward. We have to build some damaged relationships.... I guess I'm good at that. I've had to do it to some degree in every area I've been in. Replace missionaries that the ward didn't love or trust all that much. So, it's nice when your WML comes to you and says, "I just want to let you know that you're doing things right.... I've gotten good reports from the ward members." Or the members approach you instead of waiting for you to approach them and say, "Hi! I'm sister so-and-so! I've heard a lot about you! Where are you from? :)"  .....it feels really good :)
Also this week we are racing the ZL's for OYM's (street contacts). So that's fun.

I sang in church on Sunday. Sister Smith played, and I convinced one of the ZL's to sing with me.... he didn't think he could sing. It's amazing what a little faith and some practice can do! ;) haha

We met a crazy lady this week.... I think she's schitzo. She told me to go get a boyfriend and have sex, god won't care. But she also told us that she told us that she talks to angels and all sorts of stuff... it was crazy.

A member made me scones, sort of like you do, mom... because I was craving them. And we found a Krispy Kreme :) It was a good week!

Story from when I was in El Paso:

We went over for blessings one Sunday, to the WML's home, and got the pep talk of a lifetime. It was so good :) Anyways, he had us write our full names, and then our start and end date with a dash in between right under. He asked us what was the most important part..... we both pointed to different parts of our names. But he explained that it was the DASH. The time between the start and end date. We have to make every second count, and let the dash grow nice and deep. Appreciate everything, and make the dash count. After that they would always ask us how our dashes were going :)  My dash is going really great :)

Have a fantastic week!

Love,

Sis. Brown

Happy 4th!

Hey there!
Happy 4th!  I don't know that I wished you one earlier.

I love being back in ABQ!  And I think I told you that most of our area is actually a village called Corrales.  It's awesome.  : )  It's so cool because this ward really feels like home.  There are a LOT of things that need some help.  And it's taking  a lot of work to get things going.  But it's really nice here.  The ward is super cool.  : )

Some adventures:
1.  Monsoon season has begun!  We spent some time the other night playing in the rain.  It was the bests.  : )
2.  We are meeting with this man, Gilbert.  He talks like no one I have ever seen talk.  Ever.  Serious, he scarcely breathes, I think  And it's impossible to really talk over him or anything...well, we took our WML the other day and Gilbert still talked incessantly, but he was a lot better.  I guess because he's a male Mexican, he won't be very receptive to meeting with females.  Aye.
3.  A ton o missionaries got our hair cut at the church last week by a lady in our ward.  She brought her friend from school...who is not a member.  So a couple days ago we dropped by to visit her!  She is o awesome, and we are teaching her again next week!...that is, if the Spanish elders don't take her.  That's annoying...they called and joked about us poaching.  It was so funny.  : )
4.  The 4th of July was pretty good.  We didn't really do anything spectacular.  We had to go to meetings that morning.  Those were good.  And then we met with a LA, and also with an investigator.  No barbecues or anything.  But when we got home we sat on the steps and watched some of the fireworks show that was happening at balloon fiesta park in ABQ.
5.  A lesson I learned this week...don't ever pray for humbling experiences for your investigators.  That was a suggestion made to me a while ago, so that they would be more receptive.  Well, we did that...and we had one in the hospital with pneumonia, and the another whose niece committed suicide.  it was sort of a rough week.

Hey, you know how you say that if there are cookies or something that if you just don't take the first bite, then it's easier to not have any, but if you take one bite it's so much harder to resist any more?  You should look up the talk, "Avoid  it" by Lynn G. Robins,under BYU speeches.

I hope that was more detailed for you this week.  I really miss you!

Love,
Sister Brown

Happy July

Hi!

It's been good here. I'm really excited to be back in ABQ.  It was super nice to see a lot of familiar faces at the baptism on Saturday. it felt kind of like going home a little. Sister Carter didn't know that I was going to be spending the night with her, so it was a really good surprise. It was SO good to see her :) And I should be able to see Christi, I just need to let her know that I'm here :)  It's really nice here in Cibola. I serve in ABQ, and a cute little village called Corrales.  It's DARLING. I love it a lot. I got to name our relief societies baby alpaca. His name is Harrison. We volunteer every Wednesday at the Corrales library, and it is seriously the cutest thing I have ever seen. also, it's cool cause everyone here seems so familiar in a way. Like, I know them, or they remind me of someone. I feel like I have a good work to do here.

Sorry things probably seem really scattered in this email... I feel like my thoughts are everywhere.

I love you so much. 

love,
sister brown

Transfer Time!

Mother!!

Well for transfer news, I'm moving!! and, I'm going North! I'm sad to leave the area, but more excited to be going north again! where exactly though, I'm not sure. normally I would go to transfers tomorrow.... but I guess they need a few of us to go up early so that there are enough seats to go up I guess... or something. So I'm going up this afternoon with all the departing missionaries, in the 'trunky truck'. It's a little sad because I had to try and cram in all my goodbye's yesterday, instead of also having tonight. But it's okay. Bishop had me bear my testimony yesterday in sacrament meeting which was really neat, and then everyone knew I was leaving, so I got a lot of really sweet hugs. I got some sweet cards from a lot of people, and some gifts too. A lei from the awesome Tongan family that helped us put on the luau, and some sage to burn.... it was a good day. The Brown family here that I love so much said that as long as I can get myself to EP, they will provide everything else. They're going to start the adoption papers soon ;) haha

Also a bonus of going up a day early... I get to go to the actual transfer meeting, and see a lot of missionaries I miss so much. AND, I get to stay the night with Sister Carter in my last area tonight!!!!!!!! I can't wait!!!! :) :)

How are all the missionary mom's and their missionaries doing? The sisters in our mission are good. There are a lot, but I know that a LOT go home. There was a time, when I was an STL, that in a matter of like, 3 months I witnessed 6 sisters go home. And since then many more. It's really hard to watch, and I know that we still have a lot going home. But overall I think we average about 90 sisters in the mission, of a total of about 250. So not too shabby.

Sister Mayberry is a little nervous to stay in the area. I feel bad because of all the hype and attention of me leaving yesterday. But the ward loves her, even if she doesn't see it, and I know that things will go really well for her here. Just pray that her new companion is as cool as me haha jk jk ;)

It's still hot here. This week was a little cooler... the mornings were in the 80's, and the average in the high 90's. A lot better than the last couple weeks averaging above 100 daily. But, monsoon season is starting. It doesn't really rain much, but I can feel some humidity setting in.

We found a new investigator this week. I think I'm really drawn to like, the only black people in EP haha. Her name is Annabell, and she is so cute. We helped her bring in some furniture, and they are teaching her the Plan Of Salvation tonight. I'm sad that I'll miss it.

I think that's the biggest news! I love it here, but I am so excited to go see where I will die! ;) haha

love you so much!!

Love,

Sister Brown

It's Tuesday...again

Hi!

Adventures...really not much this week.  Our dinner calendar is a little fuller, so that's nice.  We tried to roast marshmallows...but the guys we were gong to have a lesson with dropped us and no-showed.  And we didn't have a grill or anything...so just look at the pictures for our makeshift smores.  haha  ; )  We went to heuco tanks last week.  Look for pictures of those too.  It was a lot of fun.  : )  I can't really thing of anything else.  It was really slow.  This week should be better.  We came up with a point system for how we will get points when we contact people.  The one with the most points has to buy the other something at the end of the week.  i ow her elephant earrings, or she owes me a scarf.  But the most important part is that we are going to get better at talking to people, an we plan on finding a lot of new investigators.  We'll see.

Love you so much!!!

Love,
Sister Brown  : )