HOT DOG I'M STAYING IN O-SIDE!

Vanessa, our 13 year old investigator in the Palacios family gave a talk in sacrament meeting yesterday!  It was wonderful and I am so proud of her!! That family will be baptized before we know it!  We just need a huge miracle!  Lupita came to church again this week, for the 3rd week in a row after years of not coming, and she brings her husband with her every time! We picked up a new investigator named Jenny, she's a young mom with 2 little girls.  They live in a one bedroom apartment in the back of someone's house- this one bedroom literally means one bedroom- the kitchen, beds, dining area, are all in one room, and I think they use the lady's bathroom in the house they're at.  These people are so humble and yet to generous and willing to listen to the gospel, it amazes me.  I feel uncomfortable in large houses or nice houses now... it just makes me think about all of these people I've taught and how they'll never live in anything larger than a 2, maybe 3 bedroom house that's run down and infested with roaches.  I wish I could give them everything I have! 

This past transfer was absolutely wonderful and I'm happy to say that I'll be staying here with Hermana Woodruff for at least one more transfer!!! WOO HOO!!!! :D We were adding up our numbers last night from this transfer and we invited 881 people to learn about the gospel in contacts, taught around 150 lessons, picked up around 14 new investigators, and saw so many miracles!  What a great transfer!  I'm stoked for this next one, because I know we'll see even more miracles and baptisms!  We're working really hard on being consecrated missionaries, and it's by far one of the hardest things I've ever done, but it's amazing how great it feels to know you've given absolutely everything you have to the Lord and have nothing else to give.  You come home completely exhausted every night, but it feels so good!  I wish everybody could experience this! 

I'm especially grateful for the atonement this week, it is the greatest gift we could ever receive.  And that's just it- we have to RECEIVE it, we have to let the healing and enabling power of the atonement into our lives.  It upsets the Lord when we "stiff-arm" the mercy and grace he offers us.  

Congratulations Torie on getting into regional orchestra!  You rock!  I'm so proud of all of you!  Thanks mom for sharing that family history with me, our family is the best! 

I'm healthy and well and grateful and happy.  Thanks for everything.  I love you all and miss you!  Keep up the good work.

Love,

Hermana Inman

This is a picture of the Palacios Family (the ones that come to church)

 cute little ninos I teach.  Vanessa gave a talk

hermana woodruff and I!! dream team companionship.

Hermana Inman Letter January 21, 2014

Transfer week

Buenos dias! This week was pretty good.  We are still teaching a lot and finding new investigators!  

We started teaching a new investigator named Maria this week.  We found her by knocking doors at the end of December and finally taught her this past week! She says she and her family are Catholic, but she's never read the Bible and doesn't believe in "los santos," and she agreed with everything we taught her the other day haha so we'll see how "catholic" she really is in a few weeks! The girls we've been teaching all had a rough week this week, but we're not giving up on them!  Vanessa, one of our investigators who belongs to the Palacios family (the crazy family tree) is actually fellowshipping the girls we are teaching!  She's not even baptized yet but she is so awesome!  Their whole family came to stake conference this Sunday, including the non member husband of Lupita, the inactive sister who came to church last week!  That family is super.  We found a few more potential investigators this week that hopefully we'll start teaching soon! 

Transfer calls are this weekend and we're reaaalllllyyyy hoping and praying that we can stay together for at least one more transfer!  Hermana Woodruff and I work well together and enjoy each others' company. We'll see what happens! 

The language is going pretty well for me, it's so nice to be back in Spanish work and practice it every day.  For language study I've just started learning everything all over again from my grammar books to solidify the basics, and I'm still learning a lot!  I hope I will have lots of opportunities to use it throughout my life so that I don't forget it or get rusty.  Your Spanish was great dad!  It was fun to read your email in the Spanish language!  

We had an interesting contact in the street yesterday, and even though I've had this conversation with people many times, it wasn't until yesterday that I truly understood how blessed we are to know the nature of the Godhead. They are three separate beings that work together for one purpose. It seems so clear and simple to me and the assumption that they are all one person makes no sense to me, and would have me confused each time I read the scriptures, and I can only imagine how confused others are who don't know this precious truth about our Heavenly Father, His SON Jesus Christ, and the Holy Ghost. How grateful I am for the restoration of this Gospel and the knowledge it gives me. 

 It sounds like this week is a busy one for our family!  How fun that you get to put together the families for trek mom!  Put me in a good one!  I just got the email from Brother Butler today about my assignment as a Big Sister :)  I am STOKED!  Is Bailey really old enough to go on trek this year?! Wow! Who else is going?

Your date sounds fun mom and dad :) I'm glad you were able to go and relax and have a good time!  You deserve it!

I got your letter mom , thank you :)  I got it this Friday after I had already sent you my letter.  
 
Sorry this email is so short and choppy, time is really short today. 

I love you all and miss you!

Love,
Hermana Inman

 

I saw Hermana Magana at a conference this week.

Hermanas Inman and Woodruff

 

Just another day in Paradise

 

Hermana Inman Letter January 13, 2014

miracles all around!


What a week!  4 exchanges later and I'm exhausted, but it was a great week!

We saw so many miracles!  Jaqueline, our sweet little 8 year old investigator prayed to know if the Book of Mormon was true at the end of one of our lessons and it brought Hermana Woodruff and I to tears.  It was so sweet and precious.  She then prayed about it again between then and our next visit, and when we came back, she said "this morning before school I wanted to ask God again if the Book of Mormon was true, and my cousins were being really loud and annoying, so I locked them out of the room so that I could pray and concentrate.  And i got an answer that the Book of Mormon is really true!"  :) tears, again. She is such a doll.  Then Desiree, one of our 13 year old investigators that we picked up last week told us that she really enjoys reading the Book of Mormon and it makes her feel good, so she decided to keep reading more than what we asked her too, and in a week she has read all the way up to Alma 2!!

AND THEN, Vanessa, (12 years old, and one of the kids that wants to be baptized but needs permission from parents), came to church again, she comes every week, and I saw her go pay her tithing to bishop.  She does it every week and she's not even baptized. We actually talked to her dad this week.  We go over to their house at least twice a week, and whenever we're over there, Israel and Saul (the dad's/husbands/knuckleheads) always go through the back window so they don't have to talk to us- SO, we finally were able to catch him on his way out and talk to him about his kids' baptisms, and he said they can get baptized as soon as they stop saying swear words and fighting with each other! Which is a miracle!  So we're just working on them with their bad words and loving their brothers so they can get baptized hopefully in February. Another miracle in that household (this family tree is crazy: 4 different families live in this same house, all related, all the kids want to be baptized, dads are not members, all the women want the gospel, half of them are baptized). So, Lupita is the sister in law of Leti, our investigator, and she is an inactive member of 7 years. She decided to sit in on one of our lessons with Leti this week and she was the one who helped us catch Israel, and after seven years of never going to church, SHE CAME TO CHURCH YESTERDAY! That whole household is our main focus, with 5 potential baptisms.  We're just fasting and praying for Saul to let Leti get baptized and for the kids to behave. 

 

We taught Jacobo yesterday about the Word of Wisdom and he said that if it's a commandment from God to not drink coffee, then he will stop drinking coffee :).  We're trying to help him have the faith to talk to his boss about changing his work schedule on Sundays so that he can come to the full 3 hours instead of 30 mins of sacrament meeting.  He has to do that before he can be baptized, but as of right now, his baptismal date is on February 8. Oh, Jaqueline and Desiree also have baptismal dates for the 8th :).

 

We had another less active lady come to church yesterday who never comes :) and a non-member husband of a lady in our ward came 2 weeks in a row now!! It's so exciting to see these people progress :)!! Then on exchanges I got to go to my old area here in Oceanside for 2 days, and there is an inactive lady who missionaries have not seen in years because she's never home or never answers, and we found her!!! And she let us in to teach a lesson!! It was great! 

 

We ran into a couple more deaf people this week!  Heavenly Father has been putting them in Hermana Woodruff's path and it's so cool!  I don't really follow any of it, but it's still exciting anyways. We've been able to teach the one we met last week twice, but she might have to work with the english ward since nobody will be able to help her in the spanish ward when hermana woodruff leaves.  We'll see what happens.

 

Remember Blanca in Vista? Well, Hermana Magana is in my old area in Vista right now and is teaching Blanca and her husband, and they're going to be baptized!!! I'm not sure of the date, but I'm pretty sure I'll get to go!!!  

 

Scary story that happened last night- we were sitting in our car outside our investigator's house preparing for a lesson, and a man walks out of the neighbors house, comes and stands by our car, looks at us, and then goes to open hna. woodruff's door!  She screamed "lock the door!" so I did really fast and then he just stood there by our door, and we floored it out of there. I have no idea what he was going to do, but that was scary.  It was also in the dark ghetto, which makes it even better. 

So, that was my week :).  Exchanges were good but it's nice to be back in my own area.  Some of the exchanges were in English and some were in Spanish, but even on the English exchanges I ended up teaching or contacting in spanish anyways! I love my companion Hermana Woodruff!  She's so funny and obedient and hard working, I really enjoy serving with her and hope we get another transfer together. 

 

I love you all and hope you have a fun, safe week! I'm excited to read your talk dad, I'm sure it was great!  And thanks for that quote on sacrifice mom!  I love it! 

 

You guys are awesome and I'm proud of you all!

Love,

 

Hermana Inman

p.s. April 16th is the day, I'm pretty sure.  I don't like to talk about it, though. 

Hermana Inman Letter January 6, 2014

Happy New Year!


I started the new year off right, with food poisoning!  I went on exchanges Monday night, and as the night went on I didn't feel so good.  Long story short, it's because I had food poisoning(at least I think that's what it was), so I threw up all night Monday night and all Tuesday morning :) all over the other sister's bed! haha it was gross! But I'm fine now- well and healthy :).


It sounds like you guys had a fun New Years with Jesse's party!

Man, this week was AWESOME!  We met almost every single one of our goals again!  We picked up 4 new investigators, (technically 5, but we have to let somebody in the English ward teach them now.. she speaks ASL, which I'll tell you about in a minute), and we are so close to setting a few baptismal dates!!  This week the Elders told us about a lady they met who was deaf and they could only communicate by writing on paper.  Turns out, Hermana Woodruff speaks American Sign Language!  Fluently!  So I got to watch them have a real lesson in American Sign Language!  SO COOL!  Then, the other day, we were waiting to cross the street at a stop light and a lady rolled down her window and shouted, "hey!  can I give you my address?" we didn't know what to do with ourselves!  That never EVER happens!! So we ran over to her car and got her address and stopped by her house that night.  This lady is not a member, but her husband is and is really inactive.  They want the gospel :)  so the English sisters just started teaching them!  We picked up 4 girl investigators this week- Jackie and Desiree (an aunt and her 13yr old niece), and Erika and Jaqueline, a 13 yr old and 8 yr old who are sisters.  They are so sweet and cute! And humble. I taught a few lessons in roach-infested houses this week, including theirs.  Such a night and day difference between these people and the people I was teaching in Olivenhain a few weeks ago.  

I LOVE THIS WORK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  We're going to talk to Vanessa, Carlos, and Rogelio's parents this week (their the nieces and nephews of Leti) and ask for permission to baptize them this month!  They're so ready. 

I gave zone training with the zone leaders this week, it went pretty well!  Went on a few exchanges, and will be going on 4 exchanges this week.  It's pretty fun! 

Happy Anniversary Mom and Dad!!! 24 years! Wow!! I am so so grateful for your example of love and for our family!  Congratulations on your loving and eternal marriage :) and thank you for ensuring we'll all be together forever! 

Your sacrament meeting talks sound like fun haha.  Those are actually really neat topics to study- agency and sacrifice.  We actually studied about sacrifice today and are going to teach one of our members about it today. I wish I could write more about it but I only have 3 minutes left.. thanks for sharing those quotes with me about the plan of salvation, dad. I am so grateful for the knowledge of our Heavenly Father's plan for us.  It brings such peace and hope. 

Torie and Jesse sound like they're doing great :) I'm so proud of them.  

I love you mom and dad (and torie and jesse) and I miss you!  Keep up the good work!  To answer your question I'll be home in the beginning or middle of april- I don't know the exact date right now but can find out. 

Have a great week!  

Hermana Inman