First Email From Washington!

Wow, what a week. Seriously it has been insane. I will not be able to cover a tenth of it all, but I will try my best to get in some sweet details. ;)

Sooo, Tuesday we woke up at at 2:30 in order to get the bus to SLC airport and catch our flight to WA. President Eaton and his wife drove me and some of the other sisters to their house where all of us new missionaries went. We had little interviews and whatnot... we were all exhausted. Their home is in Maple Valley Washington and it's beautiful! I had REAL food for the first time in forever so that was nice. Later, we met at the Stake center and awaited the moment where we were going to be told who our companion/trainer would be and what area we would be serving in.

I was the last one to go up, so I kinda had an idea of who my comp would be. ;) She is Sister Cox from St. George UT. She's been out like 4 months, but I'm already her 3rd trainee. After her first transfer they made her a trainer. She loves to cook, clean, and do laundry as stress relief... haha! :) She is awesome. And I'm learning a lot from her. Funny thing is we have really similar family lives and I don't think President Eaton even knew that. She is really into Theater and make up design stuff to. She's awesome.

So my area is in Renton Washington. I'm serving in the Fairwood ward. Upon arrival at our little apartment which happens to be in the G-Unit, I realized that I had 23402784 times more clothes than my companion, but all is well she gets to use some so that's okay. :) Haha. My desk smells like sardines, but other than that the apartment is sweet. :)

The first day went right at it even thought I felt like a fool. For future notice, I am going to use fake names for the people I talk about (ward members, investigators and people like that) just because. :) Anywho, we went to my very first dinner at the Smith's house and they made delicious shiskabobs and rice and it was delicious. So my first meal was sweet. Weird thing is members only sign up for Sunday and Monday night dinners so we ate 234 PB&J's for the most part...which I'm okay with. Haha. :)

We are teaching a skitsophrenic 66 year old man... who seems like he's probably 100 yrs old. It's incredible what situations you put yourself in as a missionary that you wouldn't when you're not one. Something that will come easier with time, but that I'm already to see with myself is my ability to see others as God sees them... as what they can become rather than what they are right now. You look into this scraggly old man's shining blue eyes and just think, you really are God's son. Although he rolls cigarettes while we read the Book of Mormon to him, I so enjoy meeting with him. He actually came to church yesterday which was insane progress! (even if he left 30 minutes into it because he hadn't slept all night) His right foot is basically amputated. He hasn't taken a shower in months because he's scared because he fell down a while ago. We're working on getting a shower chair and we are doing is laundry today or tomorrow. He is awesome.

It's funny how God really does prepare people that you're going to teach. We met with a lady who formerly ignored the missionaries for a while, but we finally met with her. :) She is like automatically super into it and ontop of everything. Talking about how she wants to strengthen her relationship with God and it's time for her to get back to church. She even quite smoking and we hadn't even talked about that AT ALL.

One of the investigators that Sister Cox and her previous companion was teaching is getting baptized this Saturday and I am soooo excited! She is so cute. She's 20 and the girlfriend of one of the members in the ward. She knows it is right for her and it's awesome to see the light in her eyes when she talks about it.

Another thing is, people seem SOOOO familiar. Like they remind me of someone and I don't know who. People say that's because we probably met before in Heaven. Some of these people are people that are meant to meat me. :) It makes it a lot more important when you think of it that way.

The Bishop here is pretty awesome. He's super into missionary work which is sweet.

My area has both kinda ghettoish places and SUPER rich places. The nuggetest place like seriously it is beautiful would be Maple Valley which isn't in my area, but we drive through it to get to church. Literally, the little porch houses with flowers and ahhhh, it is awesome!

Anyways, I was feeling a little discouraged the other day. Just little things adding upon each other... and I like started to cry out of nowhere. Like we went up to a ladies door and I was trying to hold back the tears. Haha, embarrassing. But I prayed to have some thicker skin. To be able to take the constructive criticism from my Trainer and to not take it to heart when people are really rude to me. It helped SO much. :) My testimony of prayer is definitely growing and I KNOW I am out here for a reason. There is not anything I would rather be doing right now than being a missionary for Jesus Christ and His restored gospel.

RANDOM THINGS:

It's actually been sunny here, so I don't know what the rain is like at all yet. BUT I will see soon. I did see my first cloud yesterday though which was nice. Haha:)

Luckily I brought that iPod... my companion loves it! Haha. We have a nice car, so I just plug it into it and it brightens the day for sure.

I will probably inhale more smoke on my mission than ever before.

The recycle bins are WAY bigger than their trash cans here.

It's normal to park half on the sidewalk, half on the street.

A lot of people seem to get their milk delivered to them in the richer areas.

Hmmm, their church has a bunch of step stools everywhere for the kids.

Ranier cherries are delicious!

 Okay, I better be off. Talk to you all next Monday!

Love, 

Sister Pearson. :)