Sister Wilson in Wa-Tac: August 11th

The baptism on Saturday went SO GOOD! Cala is absolutely amazing, I can't even say. I love her so much!! She bore her testimony after she got baptized and she is so ready to change her life and everything! Even being a single mom with no family nearby she is so strong - she made a comment in Gospel Essentials class yesterday that we were just like "YES! *fistpumping* GO CALA!" I absolutely love her and am so excited for her!

Speaking of church yesterday, Sister Julien and I got to teach Relief Society! (Eleanor was supposed to teach but it was the anniversary of her daughter's death so she went out of town with family so she asked us to take over this Sunday) And so, yes. The sister missionaries taught Relief Society. On none other than Eternal Marriage. (why yes it was super ironic and many jokes were made) but it was pretty good! We team-taught which was good because I don't get a whole lot of opportunities to speak (Sister Julien knows a lot and she's usually the one talking and it's hard to jump in) But it was good! We had a bunch of sisters come up to us after and say we did better than most married people would have so I mean.. it wasn't too bad! haha

We didn't get to go to the temple with Eleanor either :( When we called President for the ok he said actually he just wants members baptized -after he made that announcement to go with their missionaries... So. That's a bummer. BUT we can go with Cala in a couple weeks and take Eleanor along >:) #loopholes

Also - I'm not eating whole fruit yet Mama don't get too excited. But I almost did a couple times.. so it's coming. Just cooked fruit I can do. And that is quite wonderful. But we had peaches on top of angel food cake at a dinner last night and I couldn't... so I hid them under a napkin. By the way.. did I ever tell you about a couple weeks ago and the pickles?... I'll tell you even if I already did. So we had lunch with a member and then went to meet at another member's for an appt with Rena but Rena cancelled last minute so we just hung out and Sis Brown (the member) said well hey let me make you some lunch then (we call this double-stuffing in the mission life) so she made us sandwiches and salads and on my sandwich she's like "do you like pickles?" and I said "I do not.." but she missed the "not"... so, she piled on a lot full of pickles and fruit is one thing but pickles are just nasty.. and so I was internally struggling like "ohno ohno ohno" because it was too late! So I tried a bite with it and felt sick and was trying not to gag so I made a plan. I let some of the lettuce fall out (she was commenting as she made it as the lettuce might not stay in and laughing whatnot) so I casually let some pickles fall out like oh no big deal but I couldn't let them all just fall out I mean that was too obvious. So I looked around and their big dog was sitting by me looking up and I was like hmm.. yes.. but then thought what if he doesn't like pickles and spits them out over on the carpet and she's like.. heeey.. so I couldn't do that (and they're too loud to chomp on for the dog anyway and she'd be like what is he eating) so.. I had my bag on my lap and "accidentally" let some fall in there and I shoved a little stack in the pocket and let the little nasties fester in there until we left. So when we got back to the car I threw them in a bush and Sister Julien just looked at me like "what.." and my bag had a light stench of pickles for a bit. BUT I escaped that one successfully. So that was exciting.

Okay. Anyway. Honestly this is going by SO fast and all the days blur together... and I don't remember hardly anything. But alas, here's some things I remember:

Knocking doors the other day we met a crazy lady named Roslyn from Australia who was absolutely unhealthily obsessed with quantum physics. That was a super interesting - she doesn't shave (Zac you'd be proud) and she had this toothpick she was picking with as she leaned against the door smirking at us the whole time but she was funny. "God is love-he is inside all of us!" "We believe God is a being who is our Heavenly Father who lo-" "OH that is a looney! Now if you only knew ..[quantum physics things that were way over our head]" and the like for about 15 minutes. We also met a guy who I'm pretty sure hadn't showered in weeks if not months who approached us and said "can you tell me a little bit about what you are teaching people?..." and we were like why yes, yes we can.

It's funny how this whole thing works - one day tracting/knocking this past week we has 0's all around for anything and no success anywhere - I think only 2 people opened their doors in 2 hours and they were both 2 second conversations and rude words. Then the next day, we had 5 new potential investigators and return appointments and it was the best day ever! One of the guys we met was Eli, and he's this young guy who had a bunch of questions and asked for a Book of Mormon and I was just so excited. We gave him our number for when he's done reading (he was excited to read it) and I really hope he follows through cause he seemed different and we talked about prayer and God and stuff cause he was unsure about God and I was able to tell him how I experienced almost everything he was thinking about and going through and we connected and I think he'd be super great.. so I really hope that works out.

Also, school started?!?! Everyone has to tell me how it goes!! Please!! I'm so excited! How was Jeremy's first day of high school?? And Matt in middle school?? How is Sam all by himself at HH? And Zac's an upper classmen? Emily... oh wait. Yay! I want to know!

I have to go now, but this week was crazy. It is insane how different every day is. You never know what is gonna happen! We're really trying to get members more involved because they're in the mindset of "the missionary's got it-go them" and they don't realize how important they are. So any ideas on how to get that started would be awesome. We're gonna try this week (if we can get into anyone's home) to talk to RM's and get them thinking about their mish and hopefully it'll kickstart a "hey-I miss that. I wanna help" So. Pray we can get more members involved cause that's strugglin.

One more thing I AM SO EXCITED FOR DEVIN AND BROOKE I CAN'T EVEN SAY!! They are going to be SO great in Sweden and Spain!! AHHHH I love them!!!