Aug. 3 This is crunchy and this smells good!

It has been pretty chill these last seven days, but it ended with a fantastic miracle yesterday. We've started teaching a family of a mom and four girls (7,8,11,and 13 years old)! We haven't met the dad and they said he wasn't interested in participating but hopefully we can change that. :) Last Sunday were trying less actives in a little suburb/town that we hadn't been to yet. We went and tried this less active couple that we haven't met before and nobody knows who they are. We knocked and they weren't home. As we were about to move onto the next address we noticed there was a trailer back behind the house. Then we noticed this teenage girl peeking her head out the front door. We talked to her for a little bit and asked if we could come teach her family about Jesus Christ. She was like yeah, let me go ask my mom real quick! She came back a minute later and said her mom was cool with it, and that we should come back next Sunday. We went back yesterday half expecting them to not be there. (That happens a lot) As soon as we pulled up they were at the door ready to welcome us in!!!! We taught them about the restoration and they are excited to read the Book of Mormon. They said they had never even prayed as a family before! None of the girls had really been taught how to pray or who God is. Teaching them was sooooo fun! We already love them so much! They have never met with missionaries before and basically know little to nothing about religion, so we are starting from square one with them. :) We took a little trip to Tucson this week for leadership training. I have always loved road trips so the trip from Silver City to Tucson with Sister Reid is always a good time. A sleepover at the Passey's home is a cherry on top! I love Tucson. Being able to be part of MLC is the best! I feel so lucky to get to be trained once a month on how to be a better missionary by the leaders of our mission. I always leave MLC with a whole new fire. Ready to get back to the area and work that much harder! This week I've been focusing a lot on developing humility and patience. Patience in the Lord, in other missionaries, in the area, in our investigators, and in myself! Pretty much in every way! I came across a talk called Continue in Patience by Elder Uchtdorf (He's the bomb). "Patience in a process of perfection." I'm not really sure what that means yet but I'm going to figure it out! Patients is something that I've never really had a whole lot of so that's the goal this next month. If any of you have some extra personal study time I highly recommend that talk. It's super good. I am so grateful for YOU and all the support and love you show me. I could never be grateful enough for you people who have helped me through the ups and downs and motivated me to always try a little bit harder and be a little bit better. We came home from Tucson so find a jar of peanut butter and a candle on our doorstep! It was SUPER random but hey we appreciated it! We then opened our mailbox to find Sister Reid and I both had letters from our mamas. Somehow we are always getting spoiled around here. I am so grateful for everyone that has shown me so much support and love this past year. It's been an incredible adventure! Please stay safe and stay cool in this heat. Love, Sister Barton