Happy New Year! December 30 ,2019

Hello family and friends!! It sure has been a great week here in Carrizo Springs, and our Christmas was so super special, I hope all of you had a great week as well and ate a lot of food, spent time with family and most importantly, remembered and celebrated the birth of our amazing older brother, Jesus Christ.
I am super excited to share our week full of miracles with you!! We don't have a ton of time this week because we are trying a new thing today of "changing" our proselyting hours on preparation day, and at zone conference a couple weeks ago our mission president said it is a great idea to try, because sometimes going out to visit people at 8:30 pm doesn't go too well, so we are ending our preparation day at 4 pm, going to visit people from 4 to 7 (usually it's from 6 to 9) and then coming back at 7 to finish our preparation day activities! We are also super excited for this next year and all of the amazing opportunities that new years give us in regards to setting new goals and continually improving ourselves!
Speaking of goals, this past week as a border zone we set a goal for each companionship to find 10 new people to teach, and we totally crushed that goal and we found THIRTEEN new people to teach the gospel to! We are currently teaching 35 people, which is a ton, haha but a lot of them might not be prepared to receive the gospel at this time, but I think that is a great thing about this goal of finding a lot is so that we can sift through everyone and find the people that are prepared to receive the gospel!

We were able to go to Eagle Pass last week and start our Christmas week off super fun!! We went around to some of the members and people that the elders are teaching in Eagle Pass and we caroled to them all and they loved it!! We definitely weren't the best group of carolers you've ever seen haha but we did good enough! The spirit was so strong at one of the people's house that they are teaching that the girl started to cry, so that was super special for us all to see!

Christmas Eve was such a fun day too! We drove back up to Eagle Pass and we had a super cute Christmas district council and I got to lead the music ( I learned how, don't worry) and the Spirit was so super strong the whole time, it was awesome. We also all went around and shared one of our favorite attributes of Christ, and I shared that I love his charity and love that He has for each and every one of us, that no matter what we do in life, He always loves us and is always waiting for us to accept Him as our Savior and use His Atonement to become better. -- We also had some hot chocolate at district council and gave the elders some presents (bags full of treats that my comps mom sent us that we WONT be able to finish because of a new year's goal haha)
After district council we came back home and we did our studies, and then we went over to Sister Bustamantes house! Sister Bustamante and her family is like half of the branch's members, haha so we went over and they always have big get-togethers so we went over and helped her set up for her family fiesta, and while we were helping her set up she mentioned how many dishes it had taken her to make the tamales, and so we offered to do her dishes and she was astonished haha but it took us AN HOUR to finish her dishes.. it was super worth it though haha because after, we ate FOURTEEN TAMALES.. EACH haha they are small ones, but still.. we felt super sick afterwards haha but I beat her cause we were having a contest at eating fastest haha

Christmas was a super special day, and one I will never forget!! A couple weeks ago my companion and I were a little bummed that we would be spending all of our holidays of our missions in Carrizo Springs (just because there isn't anything to do here) but I am just going to say that I am so happy I was able to spend my holidays with her, because without her, the holidays wouldn't have felt like the holidays haha. We woke up Christmas morning, and we did our missionary priorities and we started off by thinking of Christ and the amazing opportunities that we have to serve and represent Him, and that was awesome. Then, we opened our presents which was fun, we got soooo much candy that when we combined them, it filled up two shoe boxes haha so yeah, we've been handing some of it out to people so we don't gain 50 lbs :) but thank you so much to everyone who sent me ANYTHING for Christmas, even all of the emails meant so much to me and I am so very thankful for each and every one of you! After presents we ate some breakfast casserole and drank fresh orange juice that we had made! That was also fun because that is my family tradition at home, breakfast casserole and orangle juice! We did my companions Christmas traditions by making tres leches on Monday, and eating tamales on Tuesday! Being able to do our family traditions I think made it a little easier than it would have been. We were also able to talk to our families on Christmas, and wow I just love my family so much it's almost impossible to put into words! I was doing so good the whole day with not missing home or family until I called home and right before we ended the call my mom started to cry and she definitely got me haha but I was good after that!
We also spent a lot of our Christmas doing service, because we knew that people were with their families and wouldn't want missionaries coming over, so we got on our bikes and we rode around with a rake and asked people if we could rake their yards haha it was awesome and we were able to find a new person to teach because of it! It did take a LOT of time though and then we went back the next day and put them in bags which also took a while, but it was super worth it haha.
We also got to help paint Chito and Kathy's house.. haha.. yeah.. so they are moving in together, like bought a house and everything haha but Chito called us last week and asked if we could come help paint his house, so of course we said yes! They are apparently moving in it like today haha so we will go see if they need any more help. Update on them, we got kind of excited for them because Chito got Kathy an actual ring for Christmas, but we aren't sure if they are like "actually" engaged or not hahah Kathy is kind of a drama queen and she freaked out because he didn't ask her how she wanted him to?... and Chito was supposed to come to church yesterday but he ended up working on his house instead, so we have to move his baptism date back again... So yeah haha we aren't sure what exactly to do with them or how to help them anymore, but we are still working on it! Chito has a big desire to become a member but he just seems kind of lazy (that's at least what we think) or he is just putting on a front to us haha.

We also had the first like sit-down lesson with Jackie since the whole time I have been in this area!! For the past 2 months it has always been like contacts or little lessons, but we made a goal to make the most of every visit so we actually had a lesson with her and we taught the ten commandments as well as keeping the sabbath day holy, and then she started telling us about all of these scary things she watches and it took the lesson to a whole different place which was weird in the moment, and then after the lesson my comp told me that's how every lesson usually goes with Jackie haha.

We had another great Cotulla day on Saturday! We were able to have a great lesson with Liliana who is someone we found last weekend and the one that I gave the book of mormon to with my family picture in it, and our lesson with her went pretty good! She has been going through a lot recently and it seemed kind of like a therapy session because she was telling us a lot hahha but we found a way to relate it back to the gospel and just testified of the blessings that come from the Book of Mormon and she then asked what she should read, and she is super golden! She is without a car, so we are hoping to be able to find a ride for her to come to church this next week :)
We also did some service proselyting in Cotulla and we found someone named Erica, and she didn't accept service at the time but she began to tell us that after her father passed away, she kind of stopped going to church and believing in stuff, but that so many people have brought up God lately to her and how it is a sign, and now we show up, so it was definitely inspired that we stopped by! We were able to give her a Bible, a Book of Mormon and a Plan of Salvation pamphlet and she is the one that even said we could text her and set up a time that we can have a sit down visit next week, so we are excited for her! She even knows about our church because she went to highschool (a long time ago) with some of our members, so we have good fellowship too which will be perfect.
We did a little more tracting that night and there were some other apartments close to Liliana that I had seen earlier that day that I had a feeling we should go back to and find there, and you wouldn't believe it.. haha the first three doors we knocked on were old, crazy, single men and we gave our normal introduction to all three of them and they went fine, like nothing super crazy happened, but after the third door my comp was like "are we in a retirement center for men?" and so we walked to the entrance of the apartment complex and saw the handicapped sign on the main sign, and then left hahah it was a good experience and one I won't forget!
Another cool experience is that right before we were about to leave Cotulla, my companion really wanted to find 12 people this week (at that point we were at 11) so we drove down the street and saw a trailer and a house, both with lights on and she told me to choose, so I chose the trailer and we knocked it, and we found Christina! They were about to head out, but she accepted a Book of Mormon, agreed to read the introduction and accepted a return visit, so it was awesome! It was literally a one minute lesson haha we have gotten pretty professional at those (because nobody here has 5 minutes ever...)

Yesterday we had a great final Sunday of the year! We had three friends come to church, which were Esmeralda, Jackie and Ricardo (one of our members husbands who isn't a member) and church was awesome! We talked about setting goals, and then our Branch President asked my companion and I to speak as well haha so we got to talk about setting goals and why it is important, as well as how important it is to set realistic goals and not impossible ones!
We also had some awesome people visit our church yesterday! They are from Utah, and (I can't remember their names) but he had served here in Carrizo Springs 40 years ago, and came back to visit!! It was super cool, and it makes me excited for the day I get to come back and visit my mission and see people I got to meet and love!

After church we went to Asherton and we were able to have a few really awesome lessons!
We found someone named Alicia while we were tracting, and one of the first things she asked was "did someone send you here?" and it was cute to tell her no but we felt we should come by, and she told us of some health problems her son is having and how nobody from her own church has stopped by, so she appreciated our visit! We shared with her the Book of Mormon and even read the introduction with her, and she loved it! She also accepted a Plan of Salvation pamphlet and a return visit for next week!
We had another great lesson with Esmeralda and it was cool because temples were brought up in church (that was cool because this week on the 5th it will be 1 year since I went through the temple!) and it really sparked her interst (we haven't gotten to temples yet) and so we changed our lesson plan to talk about temples and she liked it! A lot of our lesson was figuring out what is holding her back from committing, because she always says she likes everything about our church and hasn't found anything bad yet, but she is still progressing super well and she even got a come follow me book to study the book of mormon this year, so it is super awesome haha we are very excited for her and her progression! She will for sure become a member one day :)
We went by Olga and her daughters and she had just started cooking dinner so we asked if we could just come in and chat while she cooked and we actually ended up watching a book of mormon video with all of the little girls! We also gave the two oldest girls their own book of mormons for Xmas, and they BOTH have been reading A TON! The oldest is already in MOSIAH, so we were super happy when she told us that! We are still strugging on finding them rides, and somehow we keep finding the people that are without cars haha but we still love them and are working with them a lot!!

Well I do have to get going to go buy groceries haha but I just want you all to know how much I love you all and appreciate you!! I encourage you all to set goals this year and acheive them!! I know that the only way to better ourselves is to work towards goals! Also, don't forget the challenge that our Prophet gave in October when he invited all of us to grow spiritually and prepare ourselves for this next general conference, so I hope everyone is doing that! I love you all and hope you have a wonderful new years this week!
Love, Hermana Griffin

Basketball for morning exercise!

Caroling in Cotulla!

Matching Pajamas!

I'm so LOVED!

 Christmas Morning Breakfast Casserole!

Christmas Day talking with my family!

Our desk!  :)

I forgot to write about this!  I found mold on my cake after I was almost

done eating it!  My comp about threw up then and there!

Watching Book of Mormon videos with the girls!

A recent convert family and a very amazing member!

I love my comp!

Caroling day!

Feliz Navidad! December 23, 2019

Hey everybody!! This past week was super super awesome and we are seeing so many mini miracles, but nonetheless miracles!! I realized that my emails have been suuuuper long because I tell every detail of the stories that I do share, so first of all, kudos to everyone who actually reads it haha and second of all I am going to try and tell the amazing experiences more briefly!! I also hope everyone has the best Christmas and that you all know how thankful I am for every single letter or email or package you have sent me, I sure am so blessed!!

Last Monday was a super awesome night after preparation day! We had a visit with an inactive family who is planning on reactivating themselves when the year starts, and it was a super awesome visit! They are the sweetest, and even gave us a box with a bunch of necessities such as shampoo/conditioner and toothpaste and things in that area haha they are seriously the sweetest. We were also asking all of the members if they had any extra blankets laying around that they weren't using that we could gift to Olga and her daughters (I mentioned that last week) and this awesome family said she would find some, and then Tuesday she texted us and told us there were blankets dropped off at our place, and we got home and she had purchased brand new blankets for her and her girls!!
We are so thankful for the (few) members that we have in this area, and for them being so generous and loving!! We were able to take the comforters to Olga and her girls and they were so appreciative and happy, it was so cute!

We had our branch family night this week and we were also on exchanges at that time! We drove to Dilley Wednesday morning and exchanged, and then went back to Carrizo, did studies, did some service at the nursing home, and then had the branch potluck and then drove to San Antonio (2 hours from here) so it was a crazy day full of driving haha. The branch potluck was so awesome though! We were able to have Olga and her daughters come, as well as 7 other friends and family of members came, it was super awesome!!
We had to leave in the middle of the potluck to make it to San Antonio by curfew, and we made it safely! Then we stayed with other sisters in their apartment that night, and it was a good time haha one of the other sisters had received a bag of old garments from a member and they had to figure all of that stuff out haha.

We woke up Thursday morning and went to zone conference and it was AMAZING and SPIRITUAL. This paragraph is going to be long because I want to tell you all how spoiled we are being missionaries here in the TSAM! We started our zone conference by having some trainings on how to better help people make and keep commitments, and it was awesome because that is exactly what we have been needing for the people down here in Carrizo! The trainings were super inspiring too and it definitely gave me some more motivation to continue bettering myself at this work! After all of the super amazing trainings, we went into the gym and we had lunch! But this was a super special lunch! There are members that have this business, such as every year at Christmas they feed the missionaries at their zone conference, and oh. my. goodness. it was SO DELICIOUS. They had smoked ham, turkey and brisket! Then potato salad and beans and corn, and also gave us peach cobbler for dessert!! It was so super awesome. The crew also gave us the cutest ornaments that is the Texas flag in shape of a heart, and they are just precious. One of the best parts about the crew that fed us was that I saw TWO people from my first area when I was serving in 9th ward in San Antonio! One of them was Sister Mcknight, who was the relief society president when I was serving there and she ran up to me and hugged me when she saw me, it was the BEST thing!! The other person I got to see and chat with was JOSH! He was someone we were teaching, and when I saw him I was sooo happy! He still hasn't become a member, but he was there helping feed the missionaries and it was just amazing to see him! He is doing good though and hopefully the elders are going to take good care of him!
After we finished eating all of the delicious food, we went into the Christmas part of the zone conference!! We started by doing some crafts and we made some snowflakes, and also made some little trees and cute heart baskets!! After we did crafts, we went back into the gym and had our Christmas music program! We started by singing Jingle Bells all together and when we did, our President and his whole family (including 5 kids) walked in with santa hats on and a bunch of stockings and gave all of us a stocking! It was the cutest thing ever! The stockings had our awesome TSAM Christmas card in it with all of the pictures of the missionaries in the mission at this time, so that was super awesome! Then they gave us all another present and everyone had to wait to open it at the same time, and it is the CUTEST apron with TSAM on it and then the shape of Texas underneath it! We all put them on and took our zone conference picture in them and we all looked so good haha. After the present section we had our music program start and so many missionaries are so amazingly talented! We had a few missionaries play musical instruments such as the cello and violin and piano, and quite a few missionaries sang, and it was such a beautiful program and the spirit of christmas was so amazing!
We had our interviews with our mission president after zone conference, and it was super awesome! I always come out of my interviews inspired, so that was awesome and definitely what I have been needing.
We had a long night ahead of us with driving home after zone conference and we stopped at a thai restaurant because we don't have anything of that sort down here, and we ate some delicious curry and I got extra to bring home, which I finished yesterday and it just hit the spot haha. We got home that night of zone conference, and when we drive up to our house we can see the front door, and we had PILES of boxes by our door haha I think we counted like NINE boxes??? We both just cried at how loved we are, it actually made my comp pretty sad and made her miss her family so she like actually cried cried, but we are all good now, haha just always super thankful for the love we have!!

Friday morning we had a sisters zoom call with our mission president, his wife and all of the sister missionaries in the mission, and just talked about questions we have, and also talked about like receiving gifts from single men and funny topics like that that only sisters have to worry about haha.
After the zoom call we did weekly planning, and then when we went to leave and go contact and find people, our car wouldn't start.. It like wouldn't even do anything haha I had to manually open the door with the physical key and the wheel wouldn't move and the brake was locked, so then we took an hour walking our neighborhood trying to find someone who could help us and come to find out, just one of the bolts on the battery was loose haha so not a big deal, just annoying because of all the car troubles we have been having.
Once we finally went out that night, we were able to contact Mario who has been taught in the past, and he wants to have us teach him more, so that was super awesome! What was even better was that we weren't planning on visiting him, but my comp was looking at people in the area close to where we were and felt inspired to go to him, so we did, and it was great!

Saturday was a FANTASTIC day in Cotulla! We spent a lot of our time finding, and we found this AMAZING and super prepared lady named Liliana, and we knocked her door and she walked around from out back and at first I thought she was gonna be scary cause she was saying like "who is knocking on my door" but then she saw us and kind of like stepped back physically, and we introduced who we were and how we would like to give her an uplifting message of Christ, and she said she hasn't gone to church in a long time because she hasn't found the right one for her, and we then invited her to church and she started to tear up immediately and tell us that God had sent us to her, and then she raised her arm to show us the goosebumps she had and we testified that it was the Spirit. She has been having a hard time lately, and is a single mom and doesn't get much help, and we shared the Book of Mormon with her, and it was especially awesome because at zone conference we had a picture of our family and someone from our families testimony, and we put them in a Book of Mormon and were supposed to "go on a mission" to find the prepared to give it to, and I gave mine to Liliana. I showed her my family picture in the front and I told her how much this gospel has blessed my life and my families life, and she looked at us and said "I want that, I don't have anything like that" and we were able to set up a return appointment (because she was busy in a situation with her sister) and we told her we would come next saturday and she told us "come find me!! please come find me!! sometimes I hide away in my room but come bother me and find me!!" As we were about to walk away we realized we didn't give her our number or get hers, so as we turned around, she also turned around and yelled at us and said "My Facebook is ..... if you want to contact me!!" and then we walked back to her and exchanged numbers instead. She is super awesome and prepared, and we are so excited to start helping her improve her life! We finished tracting the rest of the apartment complex where she was at, and those apartments seem pretty promising and we have a few other return appointments as well!
A funny thing that happened in Cotulla was we were driving on a street and we saw 3 girls walking and I told my comp to hand them a BOM out of the window, so I slowed down and (it was wrapped) when we went to give the present to them, all three of them were like "uh, uh, uh" and then took it and said thanks and walked away haha it was a good time. Then before we left Cotulla we went to an apartment complex and put church invitations in each door in hopes to have more people come to church but it didn't help haha.
That night we stopped in Big Wells and we did some finding there and we found a few other people to start teaching as well! We found Consuelo, and she seemed pretty interested! We also found George who is a father of two eight year olds and he seemed really interested and accepted us coming back by this upcoming week to have a lesson!
That night we had a lesson with Chito and Kathy, and we were like super straightforward haha we have been wanting to be straightforward with them for a while because that is what they have needed, and we were able to do it. We reviewed the gospel of Jesus Christ with them and talked about what Chito is willing to do to become a member, and he is like a super solid guy and has good intentions, but Kathy keeps holding him back which has been hard. There was a point when we almost gave up on them, but we are glad we didn't because they both committed to doing better and following the commandments so we will see how it goes! We are having dinner with them on Christmas day so that will be exciting :)

Yesterday we had our "special come and see sunday" and it was kind of rough because there were less people there than there has been my whole time serving in this area.. A few of our member families were out of town, and we had ZERO people we are teaching come to church, so that was difficult but we just have to keep our heads up and know that we are doing the best we can. We invite everybody we can, we commit them to come and if they don't come, they have their agency and we can't let it affect us as missionaries.
After church we went out to Asherton which has been like the gold mine lately, and we found two more people to teach! One of them is named Joe, and he told us his mom used to read the Book of Mormon to him when he was growing up, so that was super cool!! We are going back by him next week and so we are super excited for that!!
We also went by Olga and her daughters, and we were able to give them the gifts we had wrapped for them, which were BOM's, scrunchies and little CTR rings for the girls and they loved them and we started teaching the plan of salvation to them but then Olga received a phone call so she had to leave. We couldn't stay with the girls alone so we had to leave in the middle of the lesson as well, but Olga later texted us and thanked us for the gifts and so we are still hopeful for them. Two of her four girls are super sick and they didn't have a ride to church since the member that usually offers was out of town yesterday, and so she wasn't able to come to church but they said they enjoyed the potluck so that was good news!!
After Olga and her daughters we went by Esmeralda and we had a great lesson with her again! We taught the ten commandments and showed her the hand signs for them, and she loved them! Last visit we were worried that she was kind of going to give up on the gospel and learning more, but last night she said that soshe still wants to come to curch and learn more and read the Book of Mormon more too, and so we are still excited for her!!

I have a few very special people that I want to tell happy birthday to this week!! First, to my cute cousin Addy, Happy Birthday!  The next is one of my best friends ever, Tori Frampton! She has the same birthday as my cute littlest sister, Lindsey! I hope you all have the best birthday ever and you know how much I love and miss you!!

This week so looking like a good week! We are actually going to Eagle Pass tonight to go caroling with the elders in their area! Then we have Christmas!!! We also have some really good lessons lined up with people, and so we are excited!

Since this week is Christmas and the best time of the year since we get to remember and celebrate the birth of our Savior Jesus Christ, I just want to share with you all some of the most important things I have learned while on my mission, and how much I have truly grown.
I know without a doubt that I wouldn't be the same person I am today without my older brother Jesus Christ. I am so so so grateful to have this time of year to remember Him, and how miraculous His birth truly was. I am so thankful to have the knowledge of this gospel, of His gospel, and that He has felt every single thing that I have, or ever will feel. He was born with nothing, yet did everything to save everybody, and I am in awe with every single additional detail that I have learned about Christ and His birth and His life. I am most grateful for His sacrifice that He made for us. The Atonement will always be what I am most grateful for in life, because in no way am I perfect and without Him, I wouldn't have any hopes in becoming perfect. I am so grateful for the chance I have to better myself and strive to become as He is. I am just so thankful for Him and for this season that we have to remember Him and all He did for us.

I hope you all have the best Christmas ever, and that you never forget the true reason for the season!
Feliz Navidad!
Con amor,
Hermana Griffin

TSAM Zone Conference, Dec 18, 2019

Thai food.... curry.... mmmmmmmm!

District 8C from the CCM!

I love Sister Tanner!

And Sister Guerra!

And my little sis, Hermana Groll!

Branch Potluck!

Chito is on the right and Kathy is in the hat.

Parade! December 16, 2019

Hello family and friends!! This week has been super crazy and really fun and I'm excited to tell you about the awesome opportunity we were able to have to promote Light the World!

We have been able to have some good lessons and contacts with people we are teaching as well!
We started the week with going on ministering visits with one of our members (because we were carless and she was awesome enough to drive us around) and we had a great lesson with Olga and her four daughters! We taught them the importance of the gospel of jesus christ, and it has been a little challenging because they are all different ages and Olga has a hard time remembering things we have taught in the last lessons, but we are figuring it out :) Later in the week we were doing service proselyting and we had a prompting to go to her house and offer to give them service! It was great timing because they had just finished cleaning their whole house haha but we were able to help her oldest daughter with homework and it was awesome. We also talked to the girls about their favorite sports and the second youngest told us her favorite was soccer, so immediately I was so pumped! It was even more pefect that my awesome aunt Aliza sent me a package the next day and in it were a few soccer balls of different sizes, and so last night when we went back to Asherton we stopped by their house and just like usual, they have been going through some hard stuff but we were able to testify of the peace and happiness of the gospel! Then we gave the family a soccer ball and they were all so excited! It has been a hard time of year for Olga because she isn't working and she even told us that the girls don't have blankets to sleep with at night, so we are working on calling all of the shelters around here and finding them some.. It has been super humbling serving here in Carrizo Springs, that is for sure. Olga and her daughters backed out of coming to church at the last minute again and we were super sad :( But we still have high hopes for them and we hope they follow through with coming to our branch potluck this week and also to our special service on Sunday! We just have so much love for this family, it is crazy.
While we were out with our member we also went by Ashley and Janelle and we taught them the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ while standing on their porch and the two little boys were running everywhere haha but they understood it well and liked the message! Neither of them have ever been super religious so we are just focusing on helping them realize the importance of religion and all the blessings that can come to their family by believing in Jesus Christ and striving to follow Him. We also went by last night to see if we could have another lesson with them but they were about to head out so we invited them to church again and they said they will hopefully come! That used to get me excited when people would say that, but now I've realized that everybody just says that here haha.
We went by Esmeralda with our member as well and followed up on how she liked church, and she liked it! But she didn't have time for a lesson, so we decided we would go and give a spiritual message to our members husband, which is the same guy that we have been encouraged to limit our contact with, but we were also told we could visit with him if his wife was there and she keeps telling us she really wants us to keep having lessons with them so we finally agreed to it haha. I cannot even explain how crappy I felt as soon as we drove onto their property though.. We drove up to their trailer and I just had the most creepy and sketchy feeling.. Their trailer door was open and all of the lights were off, and there was stuff on the table that made it apparent that he is having problems with the word of wisdom and then when he wasn't there we drove around the ranch to find him (on the way we saw the cute new puppies they have) and we went back to the trailer and he was there and wow, I don't know exactly why but both my companion and I got the impression that we should never go back on that property again.. I am still confused about it, but I am also super thankful that we are so in tune with the spirit because something was definitely off about him, and he just isn't making the best decisions, and as a missionary it's super hard to see people like that because we just want to help them, especially when they are one of our members, but right now we aren't supposed to help him..

TUESDAY was such an interesting day! Other than Monday night when our member took us to our visits, this was the first day we were without our car... and bikes! We planned on having one of our members drive us from Carrizo to Crystal (because it would take all day to ride bikes there) but the sad thing was they didn't have a bike rack, soooo we were in Crystal without bikes, which meant we were walking... suuuuuuper fun let me tell you haha. We literally felt homeless the whole time. We had our members drop us off at one of our lessons, but then they told us they didn't have time for a lesson and just by our luck, we were on the outskirts of town.. so we walked, in the rain, to the middle of town haha. We called everybody we knew but nobody answered haha so we went to the dollar store, and we started buying stuff to prepare for the PARADE that we were going to be in!! I forgot to mention that haha. Tuesday morning we were thinking about what we can do down here in our area to promote light the world, because missionaries in San Antonio and Austin have so many events and big places they can go, but we literally have nothing haha but we found out there was going to be a parade and so we put ourselves in it! We told the members about it and they were all for it!! It took us all week to prepare for haha so we used some spare time we had in Crystal and started making our awesome posters! That night we went to one of our members houses and she sets up BIG TIME for Christmas, like she has SIX trees in her living room haha so we helped her set up for XMAS while listening to XMAS music and it was the best. It made us quite homesick and miss our families a lot, but it was so fun nonetheless.
Wednesday we had to film our introduction video to send to a group chat with other sisters, just to introduce ourselves and our drafts are super funny haha I'll attach one! We also weekly planned that day and while we were weekly planning, the people from the car body shop called us and told us our car was done! We were so thrilled because being without a car is so hard haha so we were super thankful!
Thursday we headed to Eagle Pass for our district council and we thought we were going to be having interviews with our president but he had something come up so they are now this week! But our awesome member drove us to Eagle Pass and napped during our meeting haha then we went and had lunch at WingStop and it was soooo good haha it's the closest thing we have to Buffalo Wild Wings and it's not as good as BWW but I dealt with it haha. Our member then took us to DQ for a blizzard and then we came back home!
After we got home we changed and went out to do some pros ball, and by that we went to one of our members house named Pearl (I mentioned her last week) and a couple of her boys asked us to play basketball with them when we have extra time, so we went and played with them! It was fun and it was even better because one of Pearls kids that isn't a member (her two oldest aren't) played with us so we had a good contact with him and it was nice for them to also see that missionaries are also normal people haha. He did almost break my ankles so that was pretty embarrassing.
That night we got home and I have to tell this story because it makes me laugh every time I think about it, just like when my companion fell on her bike.. Well we have this cool pull up bar in the door of our room, and my companion has to jump to reach it, well she went to jump once and pushed it off the top of the door and so it fell, and she also fell... she left a huge scratch on the door and it was quite the sight to see! We laughed for a solid ten minutes hahah it was the best.
Friday was a day full of fast food haha we had lunch with some members and they usually always cook a great home made meal, but this time they got pizza hut and we were still super grateful, it's just hard to always be eating fast food haha. Then we didn't originally have plans for dinner so we stopped at HEB and I grabbed a small salad, and then we got a call from one of our members and they asked if we had plans for dinner so we told them not really and they asked if they could buy us burgers haha so needless to say, i ate wayyy too much fast food that day.
We were able to stop by the Morales and chat with the wife that we are teaching and we have been wanting to serve her for the longest time and she finally let us haha so we did her dishes! They said they would come to church, but they didn't :( But we are still working on helping her understand that even though the women don't hold the priesthood, women in the church are still so important and so valued!
We got home that night and I had a few packages waiting for me, and I just have to thank everybody for their generosity!! I have definitely needed the uplifting messages and emails and packages lately, so I hope you all know how much I love and appreciate them!! Even better is they they have stuff I can give to other people, and I just love that :) so thank you all!!!

Saturday we had our parade!! It was sooo awesome!! We weren't ever able to find a truck to pull a trailer, so we just decorated one of our members cars, and put lots of signs on it and then streamed it with lights and our member even put a speaker on top and played music! We were also able to have the Elders come down from Eagle Pass and help us out! We all walked in the parade and we had hundreds of pass along cards that were promoting light the world and we handed them all out! We had two members walking holding lighttheworld.org signs as well, and then quite a few other members came and walked with us as well! It was so fun and there were soooo many people there! We even made it on the news is what it sounds like!! Then after the parade was over, there was an area downtown that there were a ton of tables set up and all of the different organizations had a table, and we were able to hand out lots of Book of Mormons and goodie bags with light the world on it and so many light the world calendars, and it was super duper awesome :) We are praying that something good comes out of the parade!

We had church yesterday, and it was kind of a bummer church :( We had absoluely zero nonmembers come to church.. We were counting all of the possibilities that we could have come, which adds up to 16 people that we are teaching that have told us they will "hopefully" come to church, and none of them came.. It was just a hard day all around yesterday haha and so if anyone has any encouraging or inspiring words about how to stay motivated even when people don't follow through on commitments, I would appreciate all of them!!

This week is looking to be pretty exciting! We have our branch potluck this week, as well as exchanges, as well as zone conference, as well as the special come and see sunday, so we are really really really hoping we have a good turn out for that!!

Thanks again to everybody for all of your love and support. I know that I am so blessed to have you all! I am so very grateful for all that I have been blessed with, especially with loving older brother, Jesus Christ and for the knowledge and testimony that I have been able to grow throughout my mission. I am very lucky to have this gospel in my life and the knowledge that I will never be alone no matter what I'm going through.
I love you all so much!
Have an amazing week!!
Con amor,
Hermana Griffin

10 Months! December 9, 2019

Hello everybody!! Sorry this is coming out a little later than usual haha we just dropped our car off at the shop like first thing this morning, so we had to run and get groceries and then ride our bikes back to the house after dropping off the car! This will be a fun week of biking for sure! I am so super excited to tell you all about our week and our people because we are finally seeing progress with a lot of them and some of them even followed through on their commitments!! We are so super thrilled and loving this time of year with Light the World, it is such a perfect way to introduce how amazing the gospel truly is!

I want to update you on all of the amazing people we have been meeting with! First we will start with Chito!
We had a lesson with Chito and we talked about if they were serious about the gospel and serious about following the commandments, and HE PROPOSED to her in front of us, right then and there, with a CTR ring of ours. hahahah it was awesome. she even said yes! the thing is we don't know if either of them took it very seriously.. because she hasn't stopped staying with him haha but she still wears the ring as if it were her engagement ring, so at least we are getting somewhere! We stopped by their apartment Sunday morning and gave her one of our dresses since she didn't have one, but they still didn't come to church :( Chito had gotten home like 4 hours earlier from work and so there wasn't much chance of getting him up to go to church. hopefully he comes this week!

We went on a road trip to Encinal to eat with and visit with one of our part member families and it was awesome, except it is an hour and a half drive to get there haha. We have awesome senior missionaries in Eagle Pass that drive us though, so we got to watch the restoration movie in spanish on the way to Encinal and it was sweet! We had a lesson about the Light the World video and how we can all be participating and it has been awesome every time we go to encinal because the husband is warming up and starting to participate more!

When we got home, I had received a message from Abimael, who was someone that Sister Schellenberg and I taught wayyyy back in my first area who was our miracle person! He sent me a message with a picture of one of his missionaries that he is meeting with right now in AZ, and asked if I knew him because the missionary said he knew me and I went to school with him! It was awesome to see Elder Glade and also to see Abimael is still striving to become a member of this gospel :)

We had district council this past week and talked about how we can help the people we are teaching more and the elders helped us get great ideas about how to help esmeralda and chito more!
We also still held our english class but it hasnt been as successful here because everybody and their dog speaks english, so we changed it to a spanish class and have started helping one of our members! She is the same member that we aren't allowed to do member on their ranch anymore because of her husband, and it was sooo awkard because it was like a therapy session and she just talked to us all about what's going on, and then she told us when we come have lessons we "need to be careful" and she said how much his husband loves the missionaries, but then she looked at me and said "but he sees you in a different light, so I would keep your distance" and it has been super uncomfortable knowing that and we haven't gone back, sooo we don't know what to do haha it's super terrible.

Thursday I hit 10 months in the mission field and it is blowing my mind how fast it has gone! It seriously feels like last week when I said goodbye to my family! I know these next 8 months will fly by too but I don't want it to, I looooove being a missionary and I just want time to stop so I can keep doing this forever!
That evening we went to Asherton and we tried to visit Olga and her daughters, but they weren't home :( We were super worried about them, so we texted them and didn't hear back until Saturday, but then she even said they would be able to come to church so we were super excited! Then she said something came up on Sunday morning, but she said they would love to come this week!
We had a lesson with Esmeralda and our amazing member came with us, and it was awesome to fellowship them and let them get to know each other! Then our member invited her to church and offered that she can swing by and she can follow her to church, and it actually happened! Esmeralda came to church yesterday and it was super awesome! She reallly loved when we would talk about the family community we have in the church and so it was awesome for her to see it herself!

Friday was such an awesome day in Crystal City! We were able to contact Nicole, and she is someone we have been trying to teach for a while now! Her 10 year old son really loves church and wants to be baptized, she just won't let him until he is 18. She has been going through a lot though and we have kept stopping by at the best moments when she needed to be uplifted or needed service, and this last week she told us she would "give it another shot" and learn about the gospel again! She even said one of these weeks her and her son will come to church because he has been begging her for weeks! We are super thrilled to help her improve her life through this gospel!

We stopped by one of our focus families, the Morales family, and only Brother Morales is a member so none of his 9 kids nor his wife are members. We stopped by at a good time when only 3 kids were home, so we finally had a moment that we could sit down and talk with his wife! We had some small talk like usual, and then I looked at his wife and said, "can i ask you a question?" and she said yes, so then I asked what the biggest reason or "holdback" was for her from joining the church, and she thought for a second and then looked at us and said "nothing" and it was like a moment of realization and it was awesome! She then talked about how she has always known she would become a member, but she just didn't know when and then she said "maybe now is the time" and it was so awesome! THEN, GUESS WHAT. They all came to church!! Brother morales and his wife, and 5 of their 9 kids!! One of them was Luke who is 15 who we just started teaching too and he seems interested as well! We are so super excited and we have a lesson set up for tomorrow afternoon to go serve her and then have a lesson! YAY!

That evening we stopped by Jackies house and she wasn't home, but her family was and they had been waiting all week for us to come by so we could show them how to make the famous pad thai that my companion told them all about and how good it is when I make it haha so we made pad thai with them! They also brought up stuff regarding the word of wisdom so we were able to teach them about that and how we should take care of our bodies. They didn't agree but it's ok haha they are funny people.

Saturday we had a crazy day!! We went to Cotulla, and we pretty much lived out of our car because we had snacks and a change of clothes and all of our light the world stuff haha we left right after our studies and drove a straight hour to get there! We did make a stop in Brundage though and we knocked the whole 3 houses there, and we were about to drive up to another one when we saw signs that said "if you can read this, you're in range" and another one talking about how deaths on this property aren't like "illegal" or something like that cause it was a ranch hah we didn't understand completely but we didn't feel good about it so we turned around and left as quick as possible! We started our time in Cotulla doing service proselyting so we changed in the gas station and went around the city on our bikes for a couple hours! There was like nobody outside haha but we found two people, one of whom we are going to start teaching! Her name is Hilda, and it is actually a funny story because she is the mother of the family we met last week! There is no way that wasn't Heavenly Father leading us to her, and she is super interested so it is awesome and we are excited to be teaching the whole family! We have high hopes for them all :) After visiting with her we did go stop by her sons house, and he had come ready with some questions about "if we are saved by works" and "where does it talk about the book of mormon in the bible" and all this stuff haha at first it seemed a little like bible bashing because he was just throwing bible verses at us like crazy, but at the end he softened up and it was good!

Our Sabbath day yesterday was super awesome! Like I mentioned earlier, we had Esmeralda and the Morales family, and we also had Pearl and her whole family come! Pearl is a recent convert of a few years, and has been inactive for about the last 2 years and we visited them on Monday and watched the Light the World video and she told us she knows she needs to come back to church, and then at church she told us it was crazy because she never has a weekend off, so she knows Heavenly Father was testing her! She brought four of her kids too!
We were also able to watch the Christmas devotional last night and it was amazing! We are super excited for this Christmas season, and we are so thankful for the reason for this season!

Other than being on bikes this week, we don't have much! We do have interviews with President Tveten on Thursday so that will be fun!

I want to invite you all to continue participating in Light the World! and watch the video if you haven't! It makes my companion and I cry every single time. The birth of our Savior is the most wonderful thing and I know He has helped me through so many things in my life, so I am so glad I have this special time of the year to remember Him always!

Happy birthday to my little cousin Ayla this Friday! I miss you lots little one, be nice to your baby brother!

I hope you all have the most amazing week ever! Thanks again for all of your love and prayers, we are seeing so many miracles and are just loving being a missionary at this time of year!
Have a wonderful week!
Con amor,
Hermana Griffin :)

Thanksgiving and the Newspaper! December 2, 2019

Howdy y'all!! This was such a good week and I was so happy to have Thanksgiving, and I'm excited to tell you all about it! I also hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving and were able to eat so much food :)

We were able to have two wonderful lessons with Esmeralda this week! The first one was last Monday evening, and we taught the Gospel of Jesus Christ and talked a lot about repentance and baptism and she was blown away at the fact that we can repent every single day, and be forgiven of all of the little mistakes we have made! She committed to coming to church... but then yesterday rolled around and she didn't come :( So we went to Asherton last night and we had a really successful night there! We saw Esmeralda again and she said she had slept in and woke up too late to come :( It is just so challenging to get people here to follow through with commitments haha. We taught the Word of Wisdom last night as well and how important it is to take care of the body that our Heavenly Father has given us, and she actually took it pretty well! We were worried that this lesson would be a turning point for her, but she opened up to us even more and shared that she knows she needs to quit, but she just doesn't have that desire yet. We are hoping and praying that she continues progressing, and comes to church this week!
While in Asherton last monday we also saw Janelle and Ashley and were able to talk about different religions and why she thinks the one she grew up in wasn't true and they agreed for us to come back and teach them our beliefs! They also said if they had their car on Sunday that they would come to church, but they didn't come either :(

Last week we also did more service at the womens shelter and they just recently got a whole bunch of canned food, so we took like two hours  putting the food away in the cupboards and organizing them and my companion has like major OCD because we got like 85% done and she wanted to restart and organize them by brand... she crazy ;)
While we were at service, we received some sad news from our branch president.. I mean, sad for us and for the members but it's kind of scary too. So we used to do service every Saturday on one of our members' ranch, but our branch president told us that we are no longer allowed to over there.. The couple is having some problems, and the husband is about to make some really bad choices, and we have no idea what those choices are, but we were just a little bummed because we loved and looked forward to service on the ranch haha. We just hope and pray that he stays with the gospel though, we have spent a lot of time with that couple!

Wednesday while we were doing service at the nursing home and playing bingo with them all, we saw the newspaper on one of the tables and we were in it!! The week before, we had gone to the newspaper place and asked if we could advertise three things and we didn't think we would get a whole article, but it reminded me back in the day of high school and how much I loved reading the newspaper every day after our soccer games!! I will add the picture of us in the newspaper, and it was super awesome because a few people have even mentioned that they saw us in the newspaper :)

Thanksgiving!!! Wow, this will be a day I never forget haha. We woke up that day super excited, right? We were going to eat lots of food and hang out with some awesome people and get to call our families!... Well yes, but it was a little miserable too hahah. Now, nobody make fun of me for this. But somewhere, I heard or I saw that if you drink a lot of water before a meal, it stretches your stomach so you can eat more food.. Well.. That morning, about an hour before our first Thanksgiving meal, I chugged a gallon of water.. It was definitely not a smart idea haha because first of all, my stomach hurt sooo bad and I actually threw up before we even ate our first meal... and second of all, I was sooo full the whole day from drinking that water haha. Our first meal was with Jackie and her family, and I had told them of the mistake I made by chugging that gallon before the meal, and they thought I was joking.. Well, I told them I wasn't joking.. Then they went on to tell me that that is what people do when they are trying to lose weight... They drink a glass of water before their meal, so they get full faster.. So pretty much I was like 150% full before I even had my first meal haha. Well I ate a full plate at Jackies house, and then some pie as well.. Then we headed straight to our second meal with a member and her family, and there I had a second plate of food.. I really don't think I have ever felt so sick hahaha BUT the food was all REALLY GOOD haha I wish I could have enjoyed it more!! I had to come home and almost as soon as I walked in the bathroom, I threw up again.. It wasn't super fun haha. I did get to talk to my family that afternoon though so that helped me feel a lot better :)

Friday we did our weekly planning and it was sooo stressful this week because we were trying to plan and think about how we are going to do all of the Light the World stuff and promote it to everyone, and it made us both a little sad because there isn't much here in Carrizo.. But we committed to doing the best that we can this Christmas season :) We would also like some ideas about how we can make the Christmas season special for us, because we don't have missionaries close to us at all and don't have many members here either haha so we want to do something that we can enjoy!!
IMPORTANT: I don't know if any of my friends or family were wanting to or planning on sending me anything for Christmas, but IF SO, please send me things that I could give to other people! I truly don't need anything and I would love to help other people have special Christmas this year. THANK YOU in advance :)
Friday evening we got a call from one of our members asking if we could come help her clean her house in preparation for her daughter coming to visit.. Well.. we got there and she was sitting on the floor and there were like knifes and scrapers on the floor with little rags haha and she told us we were going to scrape all of the dirt out of the cracks between her floor tile! So we were on our hands and knees for an hour cleaning her floor, and it was awesome because she was so happy afterwards and she even had us help her set up her christmas decorations!
After that service we went and had a great lesson with Chito, and we taught him and Kathy the plan of salvation, and he remembered a lot of it since he has had the lessons a ton, but he had some good questions too! We brought up the law of chastity when we were talking about our life on earth and what we need to do now to prepare for eternity, and they both know and understand the law of chastity and agreed to figuring out how they can live it.. we really hope we will be planning a wedding sometime soon :)

Saturday morning we did some more service at the nursing home and at the end of every month we go in and write their calendar for the upcoming month on some big boards, and it takes foreverrrr haha but we took some pics and they looked super good :) After that we headed to Cotulla which is an hour away, but we had a really successful day there! We had absolutely no members in town that night though so we resorted to subway as our meal before our fast haha we are always eating on the go. We did a ton of tracting and finding in Cotulla, since we don't have much work going on up there and we shared light the world with everyone :) WE FOUND AND WERE ABLE TO SHARE LIGHT THE WORLD WITH EIGHTEEN, YES 18 PEOPLE!! It was so cool and like everybody opened their door and listened to what we had to say and actually a lot of them said they would look into it! There was also a parade that night that we so happened to be at a gas station using the bathroom when the parade came by so that was fun haha.

Yesterday we had a wonderful day at church! Chito and his girlfriend Kathy came, and it was awesome because Kathy is a member, she was baptized a little over a year ago, and this is her first time coming back to church since she got baptized so it was awesome! Chito is still wanting to get baptized and it was awesome to see him at church :)
Last night we went to Asherton and were able to contact Olga and her daughters again! They had been out of town for about a week so that is why they were never home when we came by, but it was so awesome to see them again! They have been going through a few hard things right now, so if you all could pray for her and her daughters, that would be much appreciated! We have such high hopes for Olga and her four daughters, and it's amazing because like everything she says about what kind of church she would want her and her girls to go to is what our church is! We are going to go by again on Thursday and take a member with us, and let them get to know each other so they can come to church with our member this week :)

Well we also took our car in last week and got everything with that figured out, so we have scheduled to take our car to the shop next week on the 9th, and so all of next week we will be carless, so that will be pretty fun... haha bikes here we come!

The last couple of weeks we have had a clarification of rules in our mission regarding music standards and what we can and can't listen to, and so I have been deleting the majority of my music haha but we are allowed to listen to songs that are on the Sacred Music app, and I have come to absolutely love one of the youth songs called A Pillar of Light, and I highly recommend that you all go listen to it! It is awesome and makes me love the Restoration even more :)

I am also doing this awesome challenge, and it is to read a chapter of Luke every evening starting on the 1st through the 24th, and that way when Christmas comes, we can all understand more of why we celebrate it :) I invite you all to do it as well!

I love you all and I am so incredibly grateful for all you have done for me! I hit 10 months of my mission this week and it is absolutely crazy to me how fast it is flying by!!
I hope you all have a wonderful week :)
Hermana Griffin

Our article in the Newspaper!

A cool wall in Carrizo!

My cute comp!

I LOVE this book!

I'm so thankful for my family!

Our festive room!

Thanksgiving with Jackie and her family!

This was our ward Thanksgiving dinner a week ago!

Us making the calendars!

My drawings are the best!

Eating on the go!

The parade!

Making goodie bags for people this Christmas Season!