I Am AWAKE!

Good morning! 

How is everyone? I hope you are all doing well. Can you believe it is almost the end of September? We have about three weeks left in the transfer, too. Wow...But hey, we had a good week this week. Started out a little tricky, especially with zone conference, but it was a good week. :D Let me tell you all about it!

For P-day last week, we went shopping all over town looking for some more clothes for Sister Kelly. It was all right *shrugs* We didn't find anything, and I am not much of a shopper. After that, we came home and wrote letters before going to our dinner appointment. It was a pretty relaxed day. We didn't get to go to FHE, because we needed to clean our car (they do car inspections at zone conference).

On Tuesday, we had Zone Conference in Monterrey. It was really good. We talked about being consecrated missionaries and about "elevating" our work as missionaries. President Mella shared something really cool with us: Bald eagles have no enemies because they soar over them. He encouraged us to soar as well. It was neat. Sister Mella talked about scripture study and different ways to study the scriptures. The Assistants then did some training with us before we had a lunch break. Then, President Mella talked to us more and then we practiced teaching skills with our zones. President Mella then wrapped it all up and we were free to go. All in all, it was a little over six hours. It was great, though! Plus, I have friends in the other two zones that we met with. :) After Zone Conference, a ward missionary from one of our wards called us and asked us to come over to dinner the next day and teach one of her friends! We were so excited! That night, we also had dinner with the Branch President of our YSA Branch. That was fun. We then met with Krystal and had a great lesson with her. 

On Wednesday, we were busy! After the morning schedule, we met with Rina and read scriptures with her. After that, we had lunch before teaching Nicolette. We finished the commandments with her and next time we are having a lesson all about the temple! I am excited! We also met with a member named Tanya and her son. It was fun to share a message with them about families. We then went to dinner. The friend we were supposed to teach really wasn't interested. Oh well. We can't say we didn't try. After dinner, we went on splits with the Capitola ward. Well, kind of. Some of the members of Elders Quorum all met at the church and went out inviting people to the Elders Quorum Barbecue this weekend. Sister Kelly and I went, too, but we were together because we were the only girls. Hopefully, more people come to it! :D 

On Thursday, the coordinating sister training leaders came down from San Jose to spend the morning with us. They brought stuff to make pancakes, so we made pancakes and studied. We then had a talk about finding people to teach. That, and Zone Conference, really encouraged Sister Kelly and me with finding! We were supposed to meet with Michael that day, but he had to reschedule. Dang it. We then went and saw Glenna and taught her. She was talking with us a lot about emergency preparedness. After training, we decided to contact some old referrals and called up a girl named Liz. She asked if we could meet that afternoon! That afternoon, we waited for her at the park and she came! We sat down and had a chat with her and ended up teaching her The Restoration. She has a friend who is LDS, so she already knows some of what we believe and even has a copy of the Book of Mormon that she has been reading from! During the lesson, we invited her to be baptized and she said yes! We set another appointment for Saturday. We were so excited! We then went and saw Renee. We were sent at a good time. She had just gotten some bad news from home and needed someone to tell her that God loved her. Thank you promptings! :) That night, we met with Brenda and had a great lesson with her as well.

On Friday, we weekly planned and had a few appointments cancel. Drat. We did, however, get to see Rhonda and have a lesson with her. We also did a lot of finding. Next week, we are hoping to go to the soup kitchen again. We haven't been in a couple of weeks. We had dinner with a couple in one of our wards, and they took us to ihop! I haven't been there in years! :D It was a good day, even with our plans all falling apart.

On Saturday, we had our second lesson with Liz! It was great! We met up at a cafe and had brunch before teaching her The Plan of Salvation (in a coffee shop! Ha!). She really felt the Spirit and started to cry when we were teaching her about after this life! At the end of the lesson, we set a baptismal date with her for October 10th!!!!!! We were soooooooo excited! :D We told the whole zone and they were super excited too! After that, we went to SLV and met with Alice. We had a great lesson with her about service (we used the talk "Our Personal Ministries" by Hugo Martinez). We were then going to see Sister Dallenbach, but she wasn't home or something (no one answered the door). So, we came back to Santa Cruz and did finding. All in all, it was a good day! :D 

On Sunday, we did our eight hour stretch of church. In Santa Cruz ward, they did the primary program and that was super cute. We didn't get to hear the speakers in Capitola, because we needed to get lunch. The speakers in Ocean Branch were both from the Stake, so I had heard one of their talks at least twice already. They were good talks, though. In Sunday School, we talked about Christlike Attributes and studied from Preach My Gospel Chapter 6. In Relief Society, we read Ezra Taft Benson's "Beware of Pride". I definitely had a lot to think about when we left church! We then went and saw a member named Fether and had a lesson with her before going to dinner with the Kings. I love them! :D After dinner, we went home and prepared for my sleep study. 

I got to the sleep lab half an hour early for the appointment and they had me wait a little bit before getting all of the wires on me. Holy cow that is a lot of stuff they put on you! My sleep tech then helped me into bed and I tried to sleep. I felt like I laid awake for hours when I asked if I could go to the bathroom. My sleep tech helped me get into the restroom and I cried because I thought I hadn't slept and I was ruining my chances to have the study done. When I came out, she came back with a CPAP  mask and told me that I had been sleeping, and that I met the "respiratory requirements" for a split study: meaning that I got to use a CPAP machine for the rest of the night! Apparently, my breathing was so bad that I couldn't tell that I had been asleep (which has happened before)! Anyways, I got the mask on, practiced with it and then they let me go back to sleep. Which I did! I woke up and I didn't feel like I had a "sleep hangover". No headaches and I was AWAKE! They then took all the wires and stuff off me and sent me home. My follow up is in a couple of weeks. I am glad that I finally got the test done! Hopefully I can get a machine and get the sleep that I need! 

Random quotes for the week:

*practicing a baptismal invite with Sister Kelly, using my iPad as a fake investigator*

Me: There. Now you try.

Sister Kelly: *groans*

Me: Will you follow the example of missionaries before you and invite my iPad to be baptized?

Me: I am just going to go into it with low expectations...

Krystal (a member we see): I do the same thing with people...

Me: Man, if Bre did that to me I would be so mad! I would be like "No kidney for you!" 

*random guy in front of Sister Kelly and me whirls around and stares at us in confusion*

Me: Satan makes the GPSes! 

Well, that is about all for here. I haven't had a nap since my test, and I know that I am going to crash soon, since I only slept a couple of hours with the machine. We are going to do our errands and then I am going to take a nap. The sisters in Seaside may be coming up, and we have dinner and FHE, but that is about it.

Have a great day, and a great week! :D

Love, 

Sara