Week 32

I'm sure you were all dying to know how this past week went.

Hermana Cobb: Did you see that Restaurant we passed? It's called Thai Away Home. Do they know that doesn't even make sense?
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While eating Thai food at a Thai restaurant (no, not Thai Away Home)...

Hermana Cobb: What level of hot did you get (scale of 1-5, 1 being nothing and 5 being you are addicted to spice and need a beer to help you out...)?

Hermana Lewis: I don't know. They never asked. But I think it was a five.
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We used the washroom in a library before we met with Rufino, a recent convert, and his non-member daughters, for dinner. We were sitting waiting at a table in the library, and just immediately went into this huge production of us being secret agents and talking about the secret file we had to destroy. Hermana Cobb was going to back out of the operation, but we couldn't let her for fear that she would sell us out. The best part was that we just went right into it.
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Hermana Cendreda: We were companions for only two days. We were on the island but neither of us knew how to drive. And we couldn't ride bikes. Because we were too short. So we were emergency transferred.
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Hermana Cobb: [to Hna Cendreda] Tell us your favorite quotes from Emperor's New Groove.
Hermana Cendreda: [completely uninterested in the game] I don't want to be a squirrel.

Hermana Lewis: Have you ever seen that movie? 

Hermana Cobb: Probably NOT!
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Hermana Cendreda was sending a text to someone and it sounded so fast.

Hermana Cobb: I'm sorry ma'am, but I'm going to have to arrest you for going WAY over the Speed Limit.
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Those were just pieces of the crazy week we had. We had a moving day, where we moved everything from Hermana Cobb's and Cendreda's apartment to mine, and then got back to work.

We ended the week with 9 hours of church on Sunday. We saw so many miracles and tender mercies. We had 3 baptismal dates, 3 investigators at Sacrament meeting, plus one who came after, 21 member present lessons, 7 other lessons, 8 progressing investigators, 1 received, 1 contacted, 4 new investigators, and 13 LARCS. It was just teaching appointment after teaching appointment. We have been exhausted, but a good exhausted!

I'm not sure where to start off! There was so much that happened this week!

In our companionship, we have been having such amazing studies in the morning. We are learning so much from each other, and every morning we leave feeling super edified.

On Thursday, a member texted us and told us they, Brother and Sister Lee (from Korea), had contacted one of our investigators from Korea, Simone*, and that they set up a lunch with her and invited us, too! We went to a Korean-Chinese restaurant and the food was amazing! We talked and taught her the Word of Wisdom. She would drink tea and coffee. Sister Lee bore her testimony about the Word of Wisdom, and we told her about one of our recent converts who had a problem with coffee and that we told him every time he wanted to drink coffee, to drink something else instead, and now we always see him with chocolate milk. She said she would live the Word of Wisdom, even though it made her so sad at first to be giving those things up, because she knew it was what God wanted. She had only been taught 2 before, but was so prepared by the Lord!

Sister Lee told us she was texting Simone Sunday morning to make sure she was coming to church.

Simone: I woke up so tired this morning. But I drank chocolate milk.

We taught her the Plan of Salvation on Friday, and she loved it. It was such a cool lesson. We reviewed part of the Restoration with her and asked about the apostasy and she applied it to her life talking about how God gave her a benefit (to learn about the gospel) in Korea, but she rejected it. And then he gave her another benefit to learn, but she rejected it. And that this was her third benefit and she would do whatever God wants because he gave her 2 other benefits and she can't reject it again. She is getting baptized August 23rd!

We met with Christina and set another baptismal date with her. We met with her twice last week and taught the Plan of Salvation, and did a follow-up lesson on the Book of Mormon and other principles we have talked about with her. She is still reading and loving the Book of Mormon. She also told us that her father really approves of her wanting to join our church because he sees how happy it is making her! She is so excited to be a part of the "beautiful Mormon religion". She came to Gospel Principles yesterday and participated and took notes during the whole class, regardless of how much anxiety she felt.

On Saturday it was Hermana Cendreda's birthday! The whole day was filled with lessons! After lunch with Brother and Sister Lee and Simone, Simone found out it was Sister Cendreda's birthday and bought her a Mango Pudding Cake from Saint Germain's. We put it in the car, and relied on it being a cooler, overcast day. By the end of the day, we checked on the cake, and part of it had melted in the heat and was falling apart. When we got home, we put it in the freezer and tried to save it a little bit. Sister Cendreda was sad, especially since we weren't going to be able to celebrate together like we had planned. We quickly did nightly planning. Sister Cendreda then took a call from our new district leader, Elder Zamano (his companion is Elder Salazar. We are now in a Spanish Zone!), and we left the room. We fixed the cake as best we could and tried to light the three candles that we had by the burner, but it just melted the wax. So it started to smell like a candle. We quickly made flames out of sticky notes and tape and stuck them on the top of the candles. We got it all ready, and celebrated! We got the end result on video! It was such a fun day! I love Hermana Cendreda!

There is so much to say and not enough time to say it all. But the church is true. Jesus Christ lives. And I know that with all my heart.

Love you!

Hermana Lewis

Simone! And Brother and Sister Lee!

Christina wore a long skirt to match us:)

Between Saturday sessions of General Conference earlier this year, we ate at a Chinese restaurant, and dessert was a mango Hello Kitty.

And Chancho was there.

Planning!

Susan and Hermana Cobb<3

Hermana Cendreda spreads everything with a spoon

Nancy and Hermana Cendreda!

Driving in our car.

Happy 21st!

Lunch with Simone! (Simone on left, Sister Lee on the right)

Selfie-stick...

With the cake!

Perritos<3

West Vancouver

Us with Luis*, Val*, and Estelle*!

Happy Birthday!

Remember Miriam? We love her!

Week 31

Hey! Transfer news!

I am staying in Vancouver! For transfer number 5! Hermana Wilson is going to Surrey to follow-up train Hermana Kartchner. The Hermana from Guatemala is not coming any time soon, because she doesn't have her visa yet. I am going to be companions with Hermana Cobb and Sister Cendreda! I'm so excited! We are being the missionaries for their English ward and our Spanish ward and splitting the work. Of course I already love Hermana Cobb and I am so excited to be companions with her again! Sister Cendreda has been Hermana Cobb's companion for the past 2 transfers and she is amazing, too! The four of us have been doing so much recently during p-day, as well as we took them to Zone Conference, Zone Meeting, and some lessons since they don't have a car:) I'm going to miss Hermana Wilson, but she is going to do so great in Surrey!

I went on exchanges twice this week! Once to Vancouver YSA with Sister McKee, and right after, to Surrey, with Hermana Kartchner.

We spent P-day with the Van South Sisters (Hermanas Cobb and Cendreda), the Sister Training Leaders (Sisters Schroeder and McKee), and the Surrey Hermanas (Hermanas Johnson and Kartchner) as Hermana Johnson's last p-day. We went around Deer Lake Park and laughed and took pictures and laughed some more. I'm gonna miss that one!

Edmundo* and Patricia*, 2 members of our ward, recently had a baby. Edmundo's mom came to visit, and we were able to start teaching her! She went back to the Dominican Republic this Saturday night, so we got to see her and say bye before. She told us she was going to keep going to church and reading the Book of Mormon. She invited us to visit her there and stay at her house when we finish our missions! We asked her if she had packed her Book of Mormon the Friday before she left and she said no because she hadn't read it yet for the day! She's so sweet! Love her!

I saved a raccoon this week! #pleasepleaseholdtheapplause

It was stuck in a dumpster. It was so cute!

On exchanges in Surrey, I was singing all day. Made up songs about the gospel of course. I was singing on my way up a hill and stopped to have a conversation with a lady waiting for the bus. I said hi and she was startled because she didn't hear us! Turns out she was singing some gospel songs too! We had the most energetic and crazy gospel conversation I have ever had! She was so cute! Her name is Anh* and she is from Vietnam! We taught about Baptism and that this is the church of Jesus Christ on the earth today! She can't wait to sing in ward choir!

I met this really cool guy on the skytrain the other day. And he had great hair. I asked him what he did and he said he put bananas in his hair to make it healthy. We had some bad bananas, and so last night we put bananas in our hair. Oh my goodness. Not a mission activity everyone. Save it for home. I had banana dripping down my face for an hour last night and it still wont wash out all the way! I have banana fibers or something in my hair. But it was fun!!!!

Ariana bought us visors! She is so sweet!

I've been studying the scriptures a lot this week, as well as studying about the scriptures! I love them so much!

2 Nefi 25:26 "And we talk of Christ, we rejoice in Christ, we preach of Christ, we prophesy of Christ, and we write according to our prophecies, that our children may know to what source they may look for a remission of their sins."

Isn't that just amazing? We have the scriptures today for that reason. To help us better know Christ and have hope through the remission of sins!

23 For we labor diligently to write, to persuade our children, and also our brethren, to believe in Christ, and to be reconciled to God; for we know that it is by grace that we are saved, after all we can do.

The prophets labored so diligently to bring them to us, and having them is a fulfillment of a promise that our loving Heavenly Father made thousands of years ago.

I commit you all to "feast upon the words of Christ; for behold, the words of Christ will tell you all things what ye should do" (2 Nefi 32:3) and read daily!

Love you all!

Hermana Lewis

How to tweet.

Me, Hermana Kartchner, and Hermana Cendreda

Don't mind the elbow.

My little bunny!

Taking the afternoon off for some yoga.

casual.

Let's pretend the dragonfly was supposed to be blurry.

Sister Schroeder!!!

They have all these awesome pianos all over (maybe just the lower mainland), that are just on street corners and in parks, and anyone can play! It is so cool! I heard Heaven has pianos on street corners. Also food trucks and free ice cream.

Transit!

Fresh-squeezed lemonade downtown City Center! It was so good but also really acidic. The guy in the back was playing "Baby You Can Drive My Car" and a bunch of other hits as a medley on his guitar. It was good:)

Hasta Pronto, Valeria*!

Haha I keep seeing this everywhere!  You know you are in Vancouver when_____.

We were forgotten.

Maya*!

So hot!  On exchanges.

Bye Sister Mathialagin!

Bye Sister Shahamati!

Anh!

From Ariana!

For fun before the bananas.