Back on Bikes Aug. 19

Biking season has come back quick...After a 10 day break we are back on bikes and ready to work. My week started in Sierra Vista (Is that where Natalie is from because I was looking for her around every corner ALL DAY). Nobody knows why we do exchanges so often but I guess every once in a while the whole Tucson mission does exchanges and they call it THE DAY! It's supposed to be a day dedicated to nothing but finding. Well...my companion Sister Peirce doesn't believe in the day so we just did whatever she wanted. Nobody warned me that Sierra Vista Sisters are on bikes so riding a bike without leggings was terrifying! I think all of Sierra Vista saw all of Sister Barton! Ahhh haha maybe don't put that in the blog. ANYWAYS!! The day taught me a lot about what kind of missionary I want to be. It was a really long and hard day. Sister Peirce and I got to learn from each other and see different ways of doing things. I learned a lot on the day. I gotta tell you about my neighbor Bootsie. The man who owns our duplex is a really great member named Brother Blake. He called us Wednesday morning and told us that our neighbors granddaughter had recently passed away. We decided to go over and see if she was okay. At first Bootsie was really stiff and cold towards us but she let us in anyways. As soon as we sat down she told us all about her life! She has been through some pretty crazy stuff in her 89 years of life. Then she looked at both of us and commented on our hair and how she misses having long hair. Before I new it she was playing with our hair and asking us to sing to her. We sang I know that my redeemer lives. She loved it! She's a very strict Roman Catholic. As soon as our song was done she got all emotional and started singing to us. After 5 songs we had to leave but she told us that we can come by and sing to her whenever we want! Missionary work comes in all different ways. It was soooo cool to feel the spirit with cute Bootsie through singing. By the end of this week I was getting really down on myself. I was looking back on the transfer and thinking, "Where are the fruits of our labors?" We try so hard to be exactly obedient. It had just been one of those days where nobody had time to talk to us. I prayed about it and oh boy were those prayers answered. The next day at church we had so many less actives show up to sacrament and most of them stayed all three hours! Then after church we had calls from 2 investigators asking us to come by as soon as we can. Okay. Yeah I learned pretty quickly that having lessons every single second and a baptism all the time doesn't measure your success. Then yesterday Sister Smyth and I spent the whole day saying goodbye to people. That right then was the fruit of our labors. I love so many people here. They have so much faith in me to keep the work going in their wards. They trust and love me. I feel so blessed to be here. This week I learned the definition of a broken home. We went and visited a less active woman who currently has some of her kids and 5 of her grandchildren living with her. Her son is involved in a lot of negative things which really caused a lot of contention and hard feeling in the home. The house was really really...broken. They currently don't have utilities or enough furniture so the kids sleep on the floor. Looking around that house made realized how luck I am. My parents took care of me. I always had a roof over my head. I never worried about if there would be food in the fridge or clothes in my closet. All of these are blessings that I so easily overlooked. Just having both of my parents be members of this church is huge! The kids didn't know how to pray or anything about religion so we taught each of them one by one how to talk to their Heavenly Father. The grandmother and kids were at church on Sunday. We were blown away at how much the kids likes church. As soon as we walked into the building we were attacked with hugs from 5 crazy kidos! I was in heaven. Now it's time to talk about companions. Yikes. Saying goodbye to Sister Smyth was an all week process. We went through all stages of denial, pep talks, crying, and then the final farewell. That girl really knows how to scatter sunshine. She is so awesome. Sister Smyth is another one of my big sisters. It was really hard for her to leave her mission. It was really hard to see her leave but I've got Sister Rhodes her to help me further the work! She is from Morgan, Utah and I met her a good hour ago. She has been on her mission for 12 whole weeks and seems really sweet. I'm excited to get to work and learn from her. Taking over the area is really intimidating because I still feel so new but Heavenly Father knew what he was doing when he put me here. This transfer I plan on completely relying on him to tell me what to do. If he has faith in me and everyone here has faith in me then it's time for me to have faith in myself! That's something that I've never been good at but that's what I'm going to do! HAPPY BIRTHDAY MICHAEL AND KALLI! I will try to get letters to you this week! I haven't been able to write a letter or go grocery shopping in 2 weeks (don't worry mom I've still had food) so be patient :) Love ya! Reading assignment. I'm glad last weeks went so well! This week read: 2 Peter 1, D&C 138 (that will blow ya'll away), Do things that make a difference by Elder Ballard, and D&C 98:1-3 ENJOY :) THANKS FOR THE PRAYERS AND KIND WORDS! YOU'RE THE BEST -Sister Barton