Staying in Passaic!

Sister Haycock and I celebrated my year mark with some milkshakes from Carvel. They have this Nutella flavor that I am OBSESSED with.

 

Sister Haycock and me after going to the Filipino breadhouse in Jersey city.  This basically explains our companionship :)  this cake was super yummy, too...just so ya know. I'm taking my family there

I don't know if I mentioned this last week, but this week is transfers!! Sister Haycock and I weren't really worried about it. We knew we weren't going anywhere because we got doubled in and Sister Haycock dies next transfer so it would be super weird for either one of us to move. This also means that I am set up to train next transfer. I am super excited for that. Basically everyone in the mission has to train by next transfer. It's going to be a bit crazy. There is like Spanish sisters going home on Wednesday and there was 6 that come in today and I think around 6 or 7 that come in next transfer. I remember seeing the incoming list at the mission office last transfer. Anyways. Basically our mission shrunk for one transfer but it's going to bulge next transfer. It is so crazy how the mission does that. I feel like for the past year there hasn't been this huge influx of Spanish sisters coming in. Now it is happening again! Super exciting, the mission is just going to keep changing and getting better.

Sister Haycock and me.

So, 6 more weeks in Passaic with Sister Haycock! I am so excited. We grew so much together last transfer. These past 6 weeks flew by! It was super crazy! I know time will probably just keep going by faster and faster, which is even weirder. Its weird to think that I only have 4 transfers left... I think I might actually die in Passaic. That would be sweet! I really really love this area. Our investigators are incredible. Especially Marcial. I don't know how on earth I got picked out of all the missionaries in our mission to teach him. Yesterday after church, our branch president pulled us aside and said, "I just wanted to tell you sisters that I met with Marcial and I am EXTREMELY impressed with him. I look at him and I see a great future leader of the church. He has his own personal testimony and it radiates. Congratulations on your good work sisters." IT was super cool! I  mean, I don't really feel like I did anything. Marcial was converted purely by the spirit and the Book of Mormon. He is so awesome.

OK, the highlight of this week though... are you ready for this?

ALONZO GOT BAPTIZED!!!

ahhhh I am so stinkin excited about that. And his Dad Julio baptized him. 

I am so glad he got baptized yesterday in stead of when I was in Morristown. I mean yeah, I was really sad that I couldn't be there, but the timing was just perfect for him. August 3 was good for him, I can feel it. That way his Dad got to baptize him and his little brother is preparing for baptism too and has a testimony. Awwww wow so much happiness!! Also, Ivonne is doing very well. From what Sister Heule told me, the branch has just embraced her and they help her with her kids and they just love her. I am so happy about that. 

Sister Heule said that last night after Alonzo's baptism, all he could talk about was how happy he was to have made a covenant with God and how he made a promise that he would stick with it for the rest of his life and that he was all the way in. AHHHH I AM SO PROUD OF HIM!! I hope he goes on a mission.... I will pay for it if I have to. His little brother too :)

I have huuuuuuuge hopes for Marcial. He wants to wait to get baptized in September because he has "una persona querido" (a special friend) who needs to come, aka his girlfriend *cough cough. uhhhh. Haha we talked to her on the phone a while ago. She is an active member in Peru and she referred him. I am picturing her and him getting sealed in the temple sometime next year and it makes my heart happy! Life is GOOD!!!!

Also, Adele is playing in the library right now and I am totally having flashbacks to our Yellowstone trip when Julie and I listened to it over and over again and Rod got super bugged! hahahaha good times. Sorry I was a pill.

I think that is all I really have to report on this week... other than we have a GREAT week set up already. I am so excited for this week. It is going to be non stop work.. Just the way it should be. Sister Haycock read me a talk by Elder Holland this week about mediocrity. One thing that he said caught my attention. He said something along the lines of "you should be so dead tired after your mission that you need to be carried you off the plane." That is my goal! These next 6 months I am going to work so hard that you are going to have to carry me off the plane!! hahahaha

Oh yeah, we had a really fun service project on Friday. It started at 8 and ended at 2. It was this guy who bought his ex wife's house that was repossessed and it was COMPLETELY DISGUSTING!! I swear it was one of the grossest things I have ever seen. He wants to fix it all up though. Sister Haycock and I called dibs on the kitchen... it was so gross. I wish I would have taken pictures. We cleared off this whole pantry with broken dishes that were covered in stickiness, dust and MOUSE POOP! Seriously, there was a mountain of mouse poop in this kitchen. I have never seen so much poop. And everything was just sticky and greasy and rusty. We threw out all the bad dishes, organized and washed the good ones, threw away the bad food (sis Haycock and I had a lot of fun secretly throwing away all the alcohol, hahahaha :) Then we cleaned the stove and the counter tops and the floor. The floor took forever. It was covered in grease so all the cracks were full of nasty sticky black grease. We had to put some elbow grease to get it out. ha. Then we moved everything to the center and started painting. All the walls in the house are brown or red and he wants it white. We got one wall done. We are going back next Saturday. I am super stoked! It felt good to get some good work done and to see the results. It was super rewarding... We need that break from missionary work sometimes!

Me, sister Haycock and Sister Larsen with the toilet paper that Sister Larsen helped me sneak out of the mission home... We were out of toilet paper and it was only Wednesday...we were desperate. hahahaha. We probably could have just asked, but it was more fun this way :)

 

The toilet paper experiment hehehe

That's about it.... Love you all! hope you have a good week! Talk to you later!

-Becca