This week has been busy! We are planning a ward missionary activity for July 4th and are super excited! It’s going to be great! We have been inviting everyone so hopefully it will be a good turn out!

 I am sick of mangoes! I think me and my companion have been eating our weight in mangoes and I don't want to see another one again! Members and neighbors keep giving them to us! But one thing i could eat my weight in is street churros! I had my first real Mexican street churro and it was the best thing in the whole wide world! So yummy! Mom would die!

This week has been a cockroach week and I don't know how long I can take. They are in our bed, in our bathroom and my companion found one on her tooth brush. They are in the kitchen just everywhere and they are huge! We have like 20 different poisons for them and nothing works! Ugh!

Cockroaches watch out!!

This week was also busy but hard as well. I really learned what it means to forgive and forget about the natural man. Me and my companion are so alike, very hard headed and like to be in charge and my patience was definitely tested this week. I would hold grudges and finally I realized because of that the spirit wasn't in our lessons, i wasn’t happy and neither was my companion. I learned that it doesn't matter if she talks the whole time of if what she said made me mad all that matters is our investigators and their progression. I realized that I need to just let things go or talk to her about it. After that the rest of this week went awesome and our friendship grew so much! We are working better and we have received so many blessings because of that.

This week I prayed really hard for the gift of tongues to help my Spanish speaking and studied so hard. I also prayed for my mission leader, and this week heavenly father made sure I had opportunities to use my Spanish. We went on exchanges and I took over the area and I was with an English speaking sister and had to speak all the Spanish by myself and had to try and understand them. It was so scary but the Holy Ghost was with me and somehow I understood and remembered what I studied.

Studying hard!

I also bore my testimony on Sunday in Spanish and was so scared but oh what an amazing experience it was as the Spirit testified to me that what I was saying was true. During correlation it was my turn to tell our mission leader about our investigators and I was really scared about that but he was able to understand me and said I was improving. I was so relieved.  

This week and I came across this hymn and it’s called When Faith Endures and it says "I will not doubt, I will not fear, God’s love and strength are always near. His promised gifts help me find an inner strength and peace of mind. I give the Father willing my trust, my prayers and my humility. His spirit guides, His loves assures that fear departs when faith endures".

I realized that I needed to replace my fear with faith and as I put that to the test I have definitely seen the blessings that come from that. There are so many things in life that are scary but as we just turn that fear into faith our Heavenly Father will bless us so much and help us. We are never alone. He is always right there. And i know that with all my heart :)

Daisy is doing amazing! She is coming to church, keeping all the commitments and is growing and changing. Without us telling her, she went and bought modest clothes for church on Sunday! She is making so much changes and has such strong testimony! We are like best friends! She has a baptism date for the 13th and we are so excited!! Her family is amazing too! They feed us amazing Cuban food all the time and say that they want me to marry a Cuban so I don't have to leave Florida. They want me to stay forever! I love watching investigators change and gain a testimony. It’s something amazing and the best thing is hearing them pray. When your investigator prays for the first time it is the best experience ever the spirit is so strong! 

With an investigator named Celia and a member of the church.

  As with the new mission president, we get to meet him this Wednesday and we are excited. It’s so weird, a couple weeks ago before he came he was set apart by an apostle and its so weird but when he was set apart we missionaries could feel it. All of a sudden our thoughts and focus changed. We could feel the change then our president left. I don’t know how to explain it but it was so weird and amazing. We are all so excited for something new!!

Love,

Briaunna :))

Hey Family! 

Man i cannot believe you guys have a senior, fifth grader and an 8th grader. Mom and Dad are getting old haha just kidding!

  I drink plenty of water. I drink 6 bottles a day and love it, and here it hasn’t been that hot only in the mornings then it rains and storms the rest of the day. In the summer it rains, go figure but i love it. The other day it rained so much while we were driving, it was a big storm and i couldn’t see two feet in front of me so we had to go to a taco bell and wait till it stopped so we could drive. scary.

 I am eating great and the members are really good about feeding us. For lunches I usually have some days a tuna sandwich with fruit and a veggie, nuts and cheese, or i will be have a quesadilla with beans fruits and veggies. Hahah. I am not that creative but trying to stay healthy because Cuban food is so greasy and really heavy blah no Bueno.

 This week was such a blur! The days go by slow but the weeks goes by so fast. It has been crazy here with the World cup going on. We have member dinner appointments every night and they always have the game on so we have watched quite a few. My companion likes soccer and has me getting into it. One night at a members house we were watching soccer and eating hamburgers and hot dogs. We got really into the game. It was quite a party. Latin people love soccer.

The highlight of this week was the temple! The temple is so big and so beautiful!! A lot of the paintings in the temple are original and were painted just for this temple so it was so cool to see all different points of view from the painters. Being able to go through the temple with my zone was so amazing and so powerful! it brought new excitement and energy into our work. The celestial room was beautiful! Our president said that the carpet in there was handmade. The workers would come every day and sew it little by little.

Temple Trip to new Fort Lauderdale Temple

I learned so much this temple trip. I learned a lot about Eve and her role and her wisdom behind the choice to eat the fruit. How she longed to be a mother and fulfill her purpose. It really inspired me how much she loved Heavenly Father and how she wanted to obey all his commandments. She knew what she had to do. I also learned what the difference is between a transgression and a sin and how what Adam and Eve did was a transgression because there was no other way. It’s just amazing how much the spirit can teach you when you are open and ready to learn. This temple trip was also the last time we got to see our mission president and his wife. They leave this week and the new president comes in this Friday.  It is sad but we are so excited for what’s to come and the fresh ideas this president will have. I know that with this new president we will have great success as well.

This week was challenging with investigators. Some have dropped us and others we have had to drop them. It has been frustrating but this week we did have an investigator come to church which was a great miracle!   Her name is Daisy and she is 17. We have been teaching her mom and she never sat in on our lessons until like a week ago she got really interested and asked for a copy of the Book of Mormon immediately. She was so excited for church on Sunday! When we arrived to see if they could go she was already! Her mom couldn’t go but her parents were really supportive and she had such a good experience with the ward and the Young Women. I and she became fast friends. She is so awesome and I know next week she will get baptized for sure. I hope we find more people like her this week!

Daisy

 Investigators have been a challenge and so has the language. It has been becoming difficult lately. For example we call our mission leader every night and usually my companion talks to him because he talks like hard core Cuban. But the other day she said it was my turn and he refused to talk to me because my Spanish wasn’t good enough. That killed me. I was frustrated and hate grew inside me. But then i remembered what it said in my blessing before I left. It said the language wouldn’t be a barrier for me and i decided to humble myself and use this experience to motivate me to do better and study even harder then i was. I have been improving and my vocab has been expanding. I know that with the Lord’s help and faith in that blessing that i will be fluent in no time and soon i will be able to talk to him and show him how amazing i am.

    A quote I liked this week was “the more clearly we understand our divine destiny the more immune we become to Satan”. It’s so true as we realize who we are and where we came from and what our purpose is here Satan cannot win! We cannot fall and will always progress and always do what is right.  

  Also this week i have been thinking a lot about pioneers and how you are going on trek soon and I found this poem that I really liked, it’s called Faith Enough.

Faith enough …

To form molten stones of glass

Seeking the Creator’s touch

Faith enough …

In the midst of the tempest to say,

“Take me up, and cast me forth into the sea”

Faith enough …

To serve earthly royalty with hidden, burning testimony,

To recognize one sent from God

Faith enough …

To let go of the boat

And step out onto the billowing wave

Faith enough …

To follow God’s newly called Moses

In wagon and handcart, across the unknown plains

Though my story is still being written,

In reading theirs I find I too have

… Faith enough

Also this week at a member’s house, she gave us to drink blended cantaloupe.... yup just blended melon and milk. Eben would have loved it but it was so hard for me to choke down. I wanted to puke it was so gross. I think i would have liked to have warm jello like grandpa had haha. Oo different. I miss you guys so much and love you all!! Keep me updated on everything and all the summer fun!! :) Oh and my sunglasses work great! :) I also love that quote and yeah my companion is soo excited for the new branch in Cuba she started crying, it’s so amazing!! :))) 

 Have a good week!! :)

 Love Briaunna :)

Hola Family!!

Yes it is true this place is a Little Havana.  People here are really poor. No two story houses, most of them smell like smoke. These people sacrificed everything they had to come to here. A lot of the men here are working like 3 little paying jobs to bring the rest of there family from cuba to here. Its sad but so humbling.  Being around rich areas makes me feel weird now. A lot of the older people have amazing stories some have been locked in jail in cuba for 20 years because of government stuff. It's crazy. They remind me of the pioneers because of how much they have sacrificed to come to this promise land. I am defiantly grateful for what I have and I just love the people here so much!

   So, last week we crashed into a pole, this week we got a flat tire. Yay. Changing the tire in the light of the Walgreen's sign wasn't my ideal ending to a day of hard work but it turned out to be a time of laughter as we hurried to get it done before it started raining. It defiantly was a memorable time as we tried to figure everything out. Thank goodness for young womens and the class years ago on cars! Because of that we were able to get it changed fast. Thank goodness.  This week to save miles we have been doing a lot of biking, so much fun! It's so relaxing and makes me feel like an actual missionary. As I was riding my bike the other day I was thinking about how when I was younger I would always get excited when I saw the missionaries riding their bikes and I would wave and smile. It's strange to think that now I am that missionary on the bike and people now honk and wave at me. Everytime me and my companion ride bikes we like to sing "I hope they call me on a mission" to enhance the missionary experience, haha!

 So, after being here for three weeks I have come figure out that everyone has a small dog. I mean everyone and their grandma has a small annoying dog. And they are vicious little things. Some days I want to kick them! But anyways, yeah, a small dog equals a annoyed missionary. K, so enough about my dog rant haha! 

Last week me and my companion decided that this week we were going to start fresh.  Last week we dropped all our non progressing investigators and decided to clean up our area. We were determined that this week was going to be a week of miracles.    And with lots of prayer and faith we ended up getting 8 new investigators this week! We saw so many miracles! One was on Tuesday after zone training. We got a text from the very first guy we blessed on my first day. He said that he saw us on Monday and said we could come by. So me and my companion left for his house immediately so excited. When we got there Lazador and his father opened the door and greeted us. His father was really interested in what we had to say so he participated in the lesson too. We shared a message about the restoration and the Book of Mormon. Afterward, we invited them to be baptized. Lazador wasn't sure and his father said that they wouldn't get baptized right this moment but they will for sure get baptized after they learn more because he knew we were sent there for a reason! We left that appointment grinning from ear to ear. 

Another miracle was meeting Yanedllies. We were walking to our car after an appointment and passed by her house. She was sitting outside with her baby and looked miserable. We both saw her and knew right way that we needed to say a prayer with her. So we did just that. She let us in and we said a prayer with her. After her eyes were filled with tears and she felt the spirit so strong as she told us how her and her family just moved here from Cuba and they were really poor. They lived in a 2 room house. She told us how hard life had been for her and her family and how she was searching for truth and light. We were there for about a half hour talking to her about our church and bearing our testimonies and what this gospel had to offer.  And we have been teaching her ever since, she and her 11 year old daughter Rachel are so elect. Rachel loves the book of Mormon and reads it all the time.  They are planning on going to church this Sunday. The only problem is her husband who is santeria which means he believes in witches and magic stuff like most Cubans do. He doesn't like us so we are praying that his heart will be softened and that he will let us keep teaching his wife and daughter. The people here are so amazing and so humble. They want the truth so bad! 

This week it rained so much! we have had some crazing storms. People here don't know how to drive in the rain. Ugh! Hahah! 

Anyways this week I realized I love love fried sweet potatoes and Plantain mash which is a huge long green banana. It's kinda like mashed potatoes only better haha! I also love Honduran food! So much better then Cuban. Hondurans know how to make the best homemade tortillas ever! Soo good! Also Cubans love flan! I have eaten flan like 10 times this week but its yummy :)  Also if I had a dollar for every time I was called a Gringo I would be rich. A gringo is what Cubans call blond hair and blue eye people. 

Oh, so another small detail I was proposed to this week..... yeah by one of the member's nephews who swears that after my mission we are going to be boyfriend and girlfriend. Yeah, creepy part he is 40... No thank you! blah blah so creepy!! I told him no and that I already had a boyfriend but thanks for the offer. So gross!! Another thing that is gross is bugs!! There are so many mosquitoes here and cockroaches at our house uggh! I have gotten good at killing them. 

This week I was reading in Mosiah 15 and in verse 9 it says "He is the light and life of the world, yeah, a light that is endless, that can never be darkened" I just love that scripture! It's so true the light of Christ is endless and we have that same light within us! We can never be darkened. No matter how many trials we go through or how times we are rejected or how many times Satan tries to stop us. We cannot be darkened if we have his power,if we have faith we can accomplish anything :) 

Tell Danyon good luck! And to chew gum! I love flying, it's fun. Take off is the best part! Hopefully there is no turbulence. Thanks so much for your story about your mission Dad, I loved it:)) And thanks for article too:)) I am printing it our right now. Hope you had a great fathers day too!! :)) Love you guys so much! Have a good week!! :))

Love Briaunna :))  

 

Us under a big umbrella during a rain storm walking to our car.

 

A newly converted family! They are awesome!! Love them and their kids!