December 16, 2013

Feliz navidad my friends!!!

Well ho ho ho to you too! I just want to start out by saying how much I love all of you!! Thank you for writing me I love to hear from y’all and I am glad to hear that things are going well!!! I miss you too and trust me mom I have put up more Christmas decor than ever in my life! But it has been pretty fun and anytime the people out here will let us serve we do it!! 

Christmas will just be great to talk to y’all! As for skyping we will probably do it at Sister Teresa’s and Bishop Ferris’s house but we will hopefully have them call you the day before or something and have you add them so it takes less of our Christmas time. We are trying to figure it out so I will keep you posted! But anyways as for out here... I am having a bit of trouble speaking.  I swear my IQ goes down the longer I am out here because I start saying "its right der and things like I’m pitiful and ima tarred and dat der tree over yonder and your foolish... haha I’m just kidding but if you heard some things I say you-- would think I grew up in the woods or something!  As for dignified language, my Mission Pres is huge on not saying cool so I say neat and y’all and we can’t say awesome either or freakin’ or sucks so it takes time but I am getting there... haha  As for this week-- it has been another great one!!! We have spent most of it either doing service or at Brother Lee Goodman’s house... the black man of the ward... he is literally the most mysterious man I have ever met. He lives with Mary who lives in a separate part of the house and is half his age... but they have a daughter and the whole ward always talks about who the actual parents are because Brother Lee’s wife is in the military and they have another daughter.  Brother Lee has money coming from somewhere but no one knows because he doesn’t work and he always talks about this shop... oh and he just recently became active and he is the one who always has us teach random people at his house.  Since we have been spending so much time with their family we have been finding more and more out about them... it is like a puzzle.  For the first time we went to the shop this week... and the shop is a man cave of all man caves!! It has like 8 different old really expensive old cars inside, a ton of machinery to cut wood and make things-- it has a wall full of hammers and anything else you can think of that would make a lumberjack smile!! So we go to this shop and then afterwards, he is like, “Do you want to see my restaurant?”  So we go and it  literally looked like the world ended and there were people killed inside this place!! The lights were all dim and things were torn down from the walls. Then we look around and there is everything you could imagine inside-- picture all the ingredients in Sweet Tomatoes… all moldy and shut down and turned every which way. Then we walk into the freezer room and there was a light twitching, it was nuts!! Oh and as we walk through, there are just random rotting knives on the tables everywhere... I just looked at Sister Lewis and whispered, “I hope we don’t find a dead body somewhere.”  We were dying and he just acted like it was nothing... so we went there and and I guess that was good. We have been teaching Stefanie over there-- she is the one that asked the weird snake question the first night and she has the crazy husband but she is doing really well and we are so excited for her.  Then on Friday night we went to teach her again and Brother Lee brought a whole different  family over at the same time.  We found out that he wants us to teach as many  people as we can from Rowland because they think he is the devil and that he has many wives, he is the only member that lives in Rowland.  Rowland is like Globe but worse!!  We hear shooting all the time out there and we really aren’t allowed to go down there alone which we don’t most of the time but Brother Goodman is really great!   I love them and he is really a good man, he is just quiet so everyone makes up a lot of stuff about him.  Anyways Stefanie came to church!  She said that the Book of Mormon brings her peace so whenever she needs it, which is a lot, she just goes in her little world with her book! hahah it is great!! We love her!  As for Summer-- she didn’t get baptized and we are pushing it back for a while because they are having trouble coming to church... I will let you know more as it comes about,  but pretty much she just sings songs for us every time we go and I just have to smile and bob my head to keep from laughing!  So we were given those names that I told you about from the lost record that church headquarters sends us, and we have been trying to find them  Did I tell you one called us back and left a message and just said,  “This is Denise and Richards father... they got dead."  We tried hard not to laugh but that was all it said. Then we  tried to find another person  and used the GPS and it took us on this dirt road that literally was a roller coaster I swear!! It was sooo bumpy and I am pretty sure Sister Lewis was carsick afterwards--I took videos so you can see it. It is pitiful that now sometimes we will comment on how nice someone’s dirt road is!  Not very many people have driveways so sometimes we will catch ourselves saying wow this is a nice dirt road hahaha!  I guess that is what happens out in the country.  Anyways we had the most amazing Christmas program! They set it up like we were in Bethlehem and it was really a great experience! We really do a lot of missionary stuff out here and it really is great I just like to tell y’all the crazy experiences because they are funny but I want you all to know that I love being a missionary! This is the Lord’s work and I am so lucky to be able to teach from the Book of Mormon everyday. I know that Christmas is fun and all but I have really been so grateful for my Savior this season, without the Lord I could not be out here serving.  I have such a testimony of the enabling power of the Atonement and I hope that each of you know that you have a Father in Heaven that loves you so much that He sent His son to die for you.  I am so grateful to be a daughter of God and that we know we can one day return to live with Him again. I am so grateful for the Book of Mormon and I know that anyone who takes the time to do what Moroni challenges them to do, will find the truthfulness of the Restored Gospel. I love my Savior and my Heavenly Father and I will do everything I can to help His children one day return to live with Him again. That is what we are sent here to do and I hope that you all know how much I love you! You are my motivation to give others the opportunity that I have been given to be with my family for time and all eternity! I love you all and hope you have a great week!! Ten days and I will be seeing your faces!! yippy!

Love you always and forever! 

Cass