Hola Everyone!!!!
Wow what an incredible week!!! I don't even know where to begin. FLorida is incredible OH my Gosh its beautiful here. I am in an area called Bradenton. Well I got my new companions. Hermana Hafen and Hermana Hatton. Hermana Hatton is our trainer. Hermana Hafen has only been out 7 weeks. So we are both new. Its great. They are so great. Hermana Hafen and I get along soo soo great!! We are so similar and we just relate in almost every way. Its so great. Hermana Hatton is great as well. So patient and loving. We got our companions on tuesday. And I had to go teach that same day as well. We went and visited this man who is a recent convert his name is Lazaro. He only has one leg and rides his tricycle to church every week. He is so faithful and so awesome. He doesn't speak english and its really hard to understand him but he is very understanding in the fact I don't speak spanish ha ha he is great. Then that evening we went and visited a 17 year old girl who doesn't like it when we speak spanish and so we speak english the whole time its great. She is 17 like I said and full of sass and attitude. My companions warned me before hand that she is sassy and has an attitude and probably won't like me and won't be very nice.She also has depression issues. She has been investigating for about 10 months now. She has had the lessons 3 times each. Well we said a prayer before going in and we were going in with the lesson on prayer and how to prayer correctly and how to receive answers. It was an amazing lesson. She was so nice to me and so happy. The lesson was amazing and she was responsive and knew what the Book of Mormon was saying. It was an incredible lesson. We went out of that lesson so happy and so full of hope. My companions said she has never been that nice or happy to anyone. But while we were teaching the lesson I felt that she was meant for me. That the reason she was investigating for so long was because she was meant for me to find. The spirit bore witness that that was true! My companions were so happy. We met with her again on thursday and again she was the same girl from tuesday. Happy and nice. We were going to teach a lesson on obedience but decided not to. We shared a mormon message with her and then bore our testimonies on the book of mormon because we watched the one where Elder Jeffrey R Holland talks about how can the book of mormon not be true. Why would a couple of men risk their lives over a book. Its amazing I encourage all to watch it. Anyway, we bore testimony that it was true and then I asked her if she knew that this church was true or not and the book of mormon and she said yes then I felt prompted to ask her about baptism. If she knows that this is right and true then why hasn't she gotten baptized? What was stopping her? Well she said that she was worried about her face and hair when she came up. And I said well Pamela that doesn't matter I promise, you will be so wrapped up in gods love and you will be so happy and you will be able to feel instant gratification that it won't matter. And she didn't say anything to that. We kinda sat there and I said can we set a baptism date? And she said yes!!!! So we set the date for April 27 this saturday!!!! AHHHHHHH I ALREADY HAVE A BAPTISM AND ITS A BAPTISM AT THE BEACH!!!! IM SO EXCITED!!!!! Best day of my life! This is why I am a missionary to bring others closer to Christ! Best thing ever! There is this other investigator his name is juan and he is getting baptized in june. Super super knowledgable and faithful. He speaks spanish and I Can't understand a word it is so frustrating I always have a headache after his house. This past week I had a breakdown and was just like I can't do this spanish crap its so hard and teared up a little then I was good cause my companions cheered me up and made me feel better. They are great!! So it was my birthday this past Saturday. My golden birthday! My companions woke up and made me blueberry muffins with a candle sang me happy birthday and it was soooo awesome! They are so sweet. The night before we went to this less actives house and she had cake and ice cream for me and it was the best surprise it was sooo sweet of her. The people her just amazing and so welcoming and loving. Anyway so my birthday started out great!!! Funny story........ so Lazaro went to the hospital and we went to visit him and he wanted us to go back to his house which was in a trailer park and get his phone charger. So we were going to go after our appointment. We had a Family Home Evening planned at a members house with some investigators. We went to go get the investigators and the mom and dad were totally arguing. The dad was drunk and the mom didn't want to leave with us because she didn't want her husband to drive, it was just really bad. So we got the kids and said a prayer and then we loaded the kids up and the dad up and decided that he was going to come with us so we went to the members house The Calvillo family. They are great people we text her and gave her a heads up about Estaban who is the dad. We got there and Estaban stayed in the car while everyone else was going inside. The Calvillos were like counselors. They talked to the wife while we played with the kids. It was going forever and we still needed to get lazaro's phone charger. So We did splits and Hermana Hafen stayed with Hermana Calvillo and hermana Hatton and I went to go get Lazaro's phone charger. We went to his trailer grabbed his charger, hermana Hatton was shutting the door and its kinda hard to shut and I don't know exactly what happened but there were panels of glass on the door and she shut it and the glass shattered and cut hermana hatton's leg and she was bleeding way bad. Then we went to go get kleenex in the car and couldn't get in because we had locked the keys in the car. So we couldn't get in. It was great cause hermana hatton was still bleeding and her leg was just bloody. So we went to the neighbors trailer and asked if he could help us. He said he would certainly try he grabbed paper towel and gave it to my companion. Then he went to go see what he could do about the car. It was like a neighborhood gathering. It was crazy. We just had the whole neighborhood around our car. And there was this super crazy guy there that didn't believe we were missionaries and that we were really run aways and had like 12 heads in the trunk. It was insane. He was drunk. And then he started hitting on my like I want your number you so called missionary. It was the funniest and craziest experience of my life. So the guy that was trying to help us with the car had someone else helping him and they eventually got it unlocked with only a tiny dent in the car which was really good and now we owe him cookies. It was the craziest birthday ever. Then we finally went and gave Lazaro his phone charger and we accidentally parked on the wrong side of the hospital cause the main entrance closed at 8 and it was 8;05 and so we had to go to the opposite side. And then we got lost and the while I was going to the bathroom my companion got stopped by some creepy 50 year old and we still hadn't had dinner and then we finally got out of there and picked up our other companion and finally went home! It was the most insane birthday I have ever had. We saw the Elders and they promised me cookies and cream ice cream the next day which was sunday. And they pink swore and I saw them sunday and they had my ice cream it was the best. The elders and President Summerhays called me on my birthday and sang happy birthday to me. It was definitely quite the interesting day. Definitely memorable!! ha ha ha!!! Spanish will eventually come... its just patience. Its hard but I need to be patient. Well I love you all sooo sooo much you guys are all amazing. YAY MISSIONARY WORK!!!!! I LOVE IT!!!! BEST THING IN THE WORLD!!!! I have learned so much and am so grateful for this gospel and this great work. I know with all my heart this church is true. Its truely incredible. I love each and every one of you and your great support. Love you and miss you!!
All my Love, Hermana Risa Daines
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