Also I petted a Squirrel!!!

Dear Mamma,

 

I got the photo album you sent me, and let me tell you! I had to put it up in the closet because its hard to look at! I miss Utah soo much!! I know that you didn't expect this, but I've been really homesick a lot since I've been out here! It was therefore bittersweet to receive a full photo album of everyone at home and realize that I'm all the way across the country!

My week has been interesting! First I don't sleep--like at all. Elder Heluo is a notorious snorer, and I get roughly 2-3 hours of sleep a night. Well, this catches up to a person after 2 consecutive weeks! I had some down time on Friday because my body literally shut down. Other than the lack of sleep I've had a great week! 

I had the opportunity to go to a specialized training program at the University of Southern Florida AKA METRO. The assistants to the President (Elder Dance and Elder Morris) run this training program to help missionaries be conscious of body language, posture, speech, eye contact, hair length, eyebrows (not kidding), and basically anything and everything that you could think of that would have an effect on the first impression that someone might have. They reinforced cleanliness, and the importance of ironing shirts properly, (I'm a serious pro at ironing!)

The second day of Metro is a hoot! We woke up and did the classic Chuck Norris workout that I've become accustomed to here in Florida. After we worked out close to death, we went onto campus and put the training that we had received into action. We basically had the next three hours to talk to as many college students as we could find! Seriously its a completely different task than our regular proselyting. We were walking up to kids who were ready and willing to learn, they come on campus everyday to learn something new! They are coming into their own and are pretty much clueless 90% of the time, so we would just walk up being overly confident showing that we've got ourselves somewhat figured out and they would latch onto us! We spoke to a bunch of different people and the conversations moved a lot quicker than what we have seen in the past! it was a great experience to test my confidence level with talking with everyone!

I learned a lot about myself at this training program and a lot about how to talk to people and present the Gospel clear and powerful in as short as time as possible! This was a great chance for me to try new things and become more comfortable with myself! Also I petted a Squirrel!!!

I love what I do!! Every single day I see countless miracles! We meet precious souls every single day!!

This week my highlight has been a family that we met last Sunday! We were walking through a neighborhood and we met this Hispanic man sitting outside with his two kids: Aaron and Josie. Aaron is the cutest three year old ever!! He speaks Spanglish and talks a MILLION MILES PER HOUR! It's so hard to understand but I just listen and play along like I know what is being said! We were sitting there really just catching our breaths not really teaching anything when their mom pulled up and came over to us. She was extremely impressed that me and Aaron were getting along so well ( I guess he's usually pretty shy). Well this made her happy and really open to what we had to share. She shared that the timing of our visit could not have been more perfect!  

We came back a couple days later and shared the message of the restoration with their family. Luz (the mother), told us about a dream that she has had continually for roughly 10 years  about a light coming down from Heaven and Heavenly Father Standing next to Jesus Christ just like in the first vision. She's had this dream a lot and described the feeling that she has waking up from that dream!  As we started to share the first vision with them the spirit was really strong and at the end of the lesson Luz goes "so what am I supposed to take away from this? What does God want me to know that he's been hinting at for 10 years?" We told her that she has to ask God what she should do, what the right path was for her and their family! Well they were all with us on Sunday at the Easter Service at church and it sounds like they are going to keep moving forward. It's interesting, we learned in the MTC that angels will be preparing the way for us to teach those who are ready. I never thought that we would come across sooooo many People!

I'm seriously so humbled to be apart of this great work! I learn something new every single day!

I hope that everyone has a wonderful week and knows how much they are loved and missed by Me and Their Father in Heaven!

God Bless all of you!  

Elder Street