Christmas Missionary Moments

Christmas:

Christmas was warm and windy! It was 85 degrees I think, so we definitely didn't feel a cold, white Christmas. We had a normal morning: woke up and exercised at 6:30, did some studies, etc.  We had a zone activity in the morning and all ate breakfast together, and then we had a lunch appointment with a member. I had heard that I would eat a million tamales during the Christmas season (since that's a traditional Mexican Christmas tradition), but I have yet to have eaten 1 Tamale this month of December. Instead we've eaten more Thanksgiving-esque food than we did around thanksgiving! After that, we went around and sang to members, had a meeting with the Assistants, talked to people, pretty normal day :)

Road Trips:

Now we get to have exchanges with the sisters all over the mission! When we go to the far-away places (Corpus, Laredo, Brownsville) we drive with the Assistants and they do exchanges with the Zone Leaders. We usually have 3 hours in the car as we drive up, and the assistants have been trying "to get us out of our box, and out of professional mode." ha ha. On the latest trip to Laredo, they made us play the slug-bug game (where every time you see a Volkswagen Bug or a PT Cruiser you punch the person next to you), except we had to punch them. We both learned that we need to improve our punching abilities. We also got to tell a lot of fun stories and ask for advice, etc. It's amazing how much you can fit into 3 hours! 

Exchanges:

I never really understood the purpose of exchanges until the last couple of transfers. In our new calling they're one of the most important things we do. It gives us a chance to work in the other sisters' areas and help them have more animo and faith and purely just get to help - it's a great opportunity to be completely selfless, since we're not in our own area thinking about what needs to get done, and just help and serve - and learn a lot in the process. We get to come up with a goal and a focus for each exchange (for example, we'll focus on faith and the goal will be to find 3 new investigators) and then we'll each work with a different sister and work on those things and talk about them throughout the day. We've had lots of really cool miracles happen as we've helped and served. If I've learned anything on my mission so far, it's that God is merciful, and as you forget yourself and serve others He takes care of everything else. It's super cool. 

Okay, well I hope you all had a very Merry Christmas and that New Year's is equally magical :)

Love you all!

-- 

Hermana Reynolds

(late) missionary moments

Hi all! 

Merry Christmas! Here are this week's brief missionary moments;

member missionary work: totally different in every area. In Laredo to find new investigators, we hit the streets, talk to lots of people, people are super humble, you find new investigators, then you'll bring members to lessons. When you're new in a branch the members are super friendly, but you have to go up to them and introduce yourself and set up appointments, etc. Here in "the 'burg" it's completely different - the members have been calling us to feed us, and we've already had 2 experiences with people bringing us people to teach or saying "you need to go by this part-member family! They were super interested and you can try again - they need to get baptized!" 

Christmas Conference: Since this is the last Christmas that the Maluendas will be here as mission president,  they had a special Christmas Conference today where the entire mission came to McAllen. We had a little devotional in the morning, and then we had lunch and played games and got gifts and each zone made a skit. 

That's it for this week! See you soon!

--

Hermana Reynolds

Missionary Moments

Missionary Moments!

The Forgetfulness: We have a lot on our minds, all the time. Lots of things to coordinate, etc.and sometimes things just slip through the crack. Like remembering to send emails. ha ha. I had a whole email typed out last week and realized after we had left the library that I didn't send it. You'll just get twice the love this week! 

Transfers: Today is transfers! The exciting thing about transfers is that ANYTHING CAN HAPPEN. Nobody is ever safe. It all starts on Monday - sometime during the course of the day the Assistants to the President call the Zone Leaders and then tell them what's going to happen, and then they send out a voicemail to the whole zone letting us know what happens. Sometimes they tell us where we're going and who will be replacing us, but sometimes we only get told if we need to pack our bags. There have been a couple of transfers where that call has come on Monday Morning, but more often than not it comes in the evening, or, if we're really lucky, around 10 or 11. That always makes packing fun :) It makes for a little anxiety ever Sunday and Monday before transfers, especially because it's not as if you stay in an area for 2 transfers and then leave. Some people move areas every transfer, some stay for 7, there's just no way to know. Everyone who gets transferred has to go to the mission office in McAllen, so Tuesday morning we all congregate there and they have a little meeting and the greenies get assigned to their new companions and they switch around luggage and cars and we head back. 

The Mornings: We have to be awake by 6:30, but we usually get up a little earlier than that, like around 5:50-6:00. Sister Medina and I have adopted the habit of "morning pillow talk," and it's lovely. The alarm rings (okay, actually the other sisters' alarm rings 5 minutes before ours and I lay there trying to make myself pretend to be asleep... usually not super successful), and then we turn it off and talk about if we had interesting dreams or anything on our minds. Then we eventually decide we should get up and be productive, and so we say our prayers and get dressed, etc, and put 2 Pop Tarts in the toaster. I guess someone once said that if you eat a super simple carb before exercising it gives you more energy more constantly during the morning or something? I don't know, I just think it's a great excuse to eat a pop tart. Then we drive down the street to the park (We drive to avoid being eaten by the ravenous dogs). There's a pavilion and a track, and a few members of the zone usually come and exercise or play basketball. We usually jump rope (because running is overrated) and do other things to strengthen our bodies. We then return home, and somehow the 4 of us all get showered in our 1 shower, and we eat, etc, and then start studies at 8. 

Christmas: It's the best! It's definitely a different experience in Texas, because it's not very cold and just doesn't feel like winter. At night time there are lots of Christmas lights, and then it feels more christmasy. The houses here either have no decorations or have too many with lots of lights. :) Every Christmas the church puts out a Christmas Video (A Savior is Born is the video this year, last year was He is the Gift) and then we get cool little pass-along cards. It's great because we can go up to people and just say "hey, can we share a card with you with a video about Christmas?" and then start teaching. Evidently the Mexican Culture eats Tamales during the Christmas season like they're going out of style, but I have yet to experience that. 

Mormon.Org Time: Once a week we get an hour to go to the church websites and read talks, watch little videos, etc. I had no idea how wonderful church websites were until my mission! It's this fun little opportunity to catch up on church news, etc. Usually it actually consists of finding a couple of talks to read depending on what I want to study that week, and then watching church videos because they're wonderful (like the I'm a Mormon videos, mormon messages, 12-step videos, they're all great). 

Okay, well I think that's it for this week! Love you all!

Love,

Hermana Reynolds 

P.S. Only one more emailing session before Christmas! Crazy!