It's a party in Arizona!

This was pretty much a better version on butlerville days. It made me a bit homesick though

This week FLEW by. I can't believe it's already P-day again. At the same time I have much to say. :) I didn't really like my letter last week so I hope this one is a little better. Okay so first off....THANK YOU FOR THE PACKAGES, LETTERS, SWEET EMAILS, AND PRAYERS. I don't know what I would do without it. Nicole- I opened your package in front of like 5 kids. Those jolly ranchers won me some major brownie points! haha thank you girlie! The work here in Safford is crazy! We work with a lot of less active members and we have 6 main investigators. On top of all of those we try really hard to build relationships with the ward members and talk to pretty much everyone who is lucky enough to be in our path. It's non-stop chit chatting, teaching, and praying. LOVE IT! We don't get to do workout videos anymore because Sister Smyth and I decided the Holy Ghost speaks Spanish too and so Jillian was kind of offensive. Instead we try to go running but it's kinda a struggle since it gets so hot so fast. If any of ya'll have a good workout routine you just let me know! Mary- we do ten minutes of torcher (abdominal workouts. Yeah we love that). Any brilliant ideas would be great though. Right now we just do random things up and down the church parking lot. This week I got to meet one of our investigators named Janice. The Barton girls would die if they met her! Let me tell you about her. She drives a prius but I try to ignore that part. She is a professional colorist. What the heck is that you might ask? Well she tells people what colors they are allowed to wear based on their skin tone, eyes, hair, and contrast. (I still don't really get the contrast part) Sister Smyth warned me that we have to look our best when we meet here so I put on my favorite outfit and we biked over there. By the time we got there we were sweaty tomatoes but that's unavoidable. As soon as the lesson was done she looks at us and said. Please step into my closet. This lady lives in a really nice trailer parks but her closet takes up half of trailer! It's HUGE! She then told me that my shirt does nothing for me and only Asian women could pull off horizontal blue stripes. Hmmm. Apparently Sister Smyth and I are both Spring Greens and Gold. Next time we go over there we have to impress her! Oh and apparently bags and shoes are supposed to compliment your hair color so I'm not supposed to wear black. oops. That's Janice for you! She has a hard time with women not having the priesthood because her sister is a priest in her church. That has been a little hard. Another awesome investigator is named Kenzie. She is 12 years old and loves personal progress the only hard part is her mom doesn't think she should get baptized until she is 18. We started teaching her parents this week so we are pretty hopeful the Holy Ghost will help us out with softening her parents. Whenever we start meeting with new investigators we have kinda spiritual DTRs. (determine the relationship) It's pretty much where we explain to them our purpose as missionaries and help them understand that baptism is the goal but it doesn't stop there. Being a part of this church lasts eternity. At first I thought DTRs were way too bold and scary but I led my first one last night with out investigator, Ralph. He is incredible! He wasn't freaked out when we asked him about baptism! He just doesn't understand why he has to get baptized again since he was baptized in his Catholic church. His priest told him it's really disrespectful of God to get baptized twice so we will be teaching him about the priesthood next time! He has only read the book of Mormon once but he loves it! He was marking every verse that we showed him because he wanted to be able to find it again. Wow I really love Ralph! He said the closing prayer and had to stop half way because he started to cry. It was cool to be able to explain to him what he was feeling! The Holy Ghost is the best teacher! Get out your bibles right now and turn to Philippians 4:11-13 just because it's great and I love it! I've become a girl of post-it notes. I feel like I'm always writing something on a post-it note. This week I wrote down everything that I wanted to write to you all on a post-it note and now I feel like I'm just throwing random information and stories at you! Sorry about that. I have no clue why but Safford Arizona makes a bigger deal out of Pioneer day than Utah does.....They made a whole 2 day event out of it a week early so that everyone could celebrate it twice! This Friday and Saturday they had a huge community talent show that the missionaries were asked to sing in. Our song was at the very end so we had to stay the whole time. It was kinda funny to watch all the missionaries try to sit through "worldly" songs. By the third song at least all of the sister missionaries were in the halls trying to get the music out of their ears. While Sister Smyth and I were walking around the halls we ran into two young men from London! They are staying in Safford to coach at a soccer camp. They are staying with a member family so had a ton a questions for us about this strange church that they were convinced only exists in Arizona. We didn't have time to teach them before they were flying to California but we gave them information for the church websites and ways to get a hold of the missionaries wherever they are. Your welcome London missionaries! Pioneer days also included volleyball and basketball tournaments, a 5k, pancake breakfast, a parade, and a bbq that ended with a firework show! It was awesome! A few missionaries got to be on some of the floats. Did you get the pictures that Sister Evans texted and that Judge Holt emailed? Sister Evans is pretty much my missionary mom and Judge Holt is our mission Grandpa. They both seriously look out for us and spoil us. Next item on my list that needs to be discussed. You can tell how long a missionary has been out based on how obsessed with the movie Frozen they are. If they been out too long to see it them they are absolutely obsessed and blast it in their cars. If they have seen it then they don't really care. The zone leaders came over to fix my bike seat earlier this week and made me tell them the entire story of frozen. I almost had to act out a couple parts but I got out of it. It was worth it in order to have a bike seat! Sister Smyth and I always feel bad asking for help because we don't want to be "those sisters". Yeah get me? But the zone leaders are super nice. The work here is going great! I've met so many people that I absolutely love and my testimony is getting stronger and stronger everyday! I love my Savior! He is my very best friend. I love getting to feel the Holy Ghost helping me everyday. This work is hard. So hard! I fell asleep during companionship prayer the other night and Sister Smyth about died of laughter. We are working so hard to help people understand what this gospel can do for them. It will change their lives IF they let it. I've seen it. I've seen huge changes in our investigators every time that they learn something new. I love being a missionary. -Sister Barton