"And a lil bit of chicken fried"

Hola! yo agradecido por otra buena dia! (Psst Aunt Karla, did I say that right?) So yeah, I’m learning Spanish! I can only go so long without “school,” so obviously I needed to learn something new. Turns out it is a lot easier to feel motivated to learn Spanish when you are not getting tested or graded on it. My mission president wants this to eventually be a bilingual mission. What I find funny is the first day I got here, he told us that some of us would be having a language change to Spanish. I immediately started freaking out, and praying right then and there. basically saying “Heavenly Father, I cannot do this. Please, please, PLEASE, don’t do that to me.” Well, He listened to me (at least for now), and I got sent to an English-speaking area! So I’m shocked that I had the desire to start learning Spanish. But here I am! I like to break out into Spanish during prayers. I am actually remembering quite a bit from the two years I took in school, so I’m sure that makes my mom happy to know that time wasn’t completely wasted. Speaking of languages… I’m also learning some sign language! A little bit of background, sister Clayton took sign for like 4 years and studied it in college for a year. She is planning on majoring in it. Sister Lathrop also took it in high school for two years. Both of them had experiences where they knew they would use it on their missions. Well, miracle story of the week, we got a call from some sign elders in California who are teaching a deaf person right now who lives in our area! I guess President Weathersby saw sister Lathrop signing with another friend at transfers, and so he was able to tell those elders about her! They want to do a pass off lesson with us, and she has already been taught most of the lessons and is on date to be baptized April 10th! We are so excited. Obviously I barely know any sign, so that is a little scary. But, I trust my comps. But that means we now have an hour of language study every day, making our total study time 4 hours! Not gonna lie, that is the hardest part of my day. Studying for that long is tiring. I know the whole alphabet and some church terms, and I can say “My name is sister Wallace, and I don’t know sign language.” I can also pray though, so that will be my job in lessons. We were all freaking out when we got that call. We had a really slow week again and struggled to get a hold of people. So many of our lessons fell through, and we need more people to teach. So when we found out we were going to teach someone already set to be baptized, we basically all were almost in tears! Monday night for some reason was rough for us. We had a lesson with this guy who basically just lectured us the whole time about the bible and how he doesn’t believe we should identify as different denominations because it causes division. Every time we tried to bring up gospel principles or the Book of Mormon he would brush us off and talk for 10 minutes. It was pretty discouraging. Luckily though, that night we had Monday night call. On Monday night call, the whole mission meets on zoom as kind of a morale booster. We listen to miracle stories and get to listen to president. But what makes it extra good is a lot of us make it ice cream night! I’m sorry, but ice cream really solves emotional problems haha. I know that isn’t the healthiest mindset, but sometimes, you just need to accept the emotional side of life. But we all felt much better after our Monday night call and ice cream time. Speaking of the lecture guy, he actually ended up dropping us yesterday. We asked him if we could meet again (when we were planning on telling him we were backing off anyway) and he replied with screenshots of messages from his pastor telling him we were a cult and spread false doctrine, so he shouldn’t talk to us anymore. So that’s that. He kind of scared me, so it was a bit relieving. But we told him if he ever changes his mind, we are always here to talk. We also had zone conference this week which was so awesome! We got to be in person, which was such a blessing. it was nice to hear from President Weathersby and from some of our leaders. It was another good morale boost for me. President talked about how satan wants us to think we would be better off at home, but that that is a lie. Basically he told us to stop picking on ourselves and that we are here for a reason. I really needed to hear that. Of course sadly there were hard days this week where I forgot about that, but it is important to think back on. Sometimes being a missionary is discouraging. I tend to be so so hard on myself, and so every little thing I do I put under a microscope. But I know that God only expects me to do my best, and sometimes our best changes from day to day. And that’s ok! I have to remind myself I’m still a human. Also President patted my back and so did Sister Weathersby, and it made me so happy. I love them. We had a conversation with them about haircuts lol. Also, zone conference meant Chick Fil A!! The only Chick Fil A is out of our zone, so we only get to go when we have zone conference. When you know you can’t have Chick Fil A whenever you want, it suddenly becomes super desirable haha. It was yummy. And that night we went to the Williams' and had another 10/10 (sister Lathrop uses this phrase all the time so it is now always in my head lol) dinner. She even made it gluten free so she used almond flour in her meat loaf and in a peach crisp. It was so yummy! This ward is so awesome. I'm so touched at all these people making special stuff for me so I don't starve. Which speaking of… We had another dinner with the cutest lady, Kathy Johnson! She and sister Williams are besties and walking buddies. She made me almond flour rolls and brownies! And she let me take the leftovers home. She brought up Costco and I was like "oh I miss Costco." Then she was like "well I can get you anything you want from Costco!" So I told her about this gluten free pasta I love, and turns out she had some already! So she gave me a whole pack and a giant jar of marinara! I was so happy. I love her so much. And not just because she gives us good food, but she nis so sweet and fun to talk to. We had a really sweet conversation with her about hope and Easter. Her husband passed away recently, so she has been in the throes of grief. We felt happy to be able to help her feel less lonely and spend time with her, even if it meant we had to miss one of our other appointments… We did some service this week and it is starting to warm up here, which makes my Vegas heart happy. It rained the other day and it reminded me of home. Desert rain smells the best. I really do love our area. It reminds me so much of home. Well, I think that sums up my life this week! My weeks are always interesting because most days start off hard and tiring, but end happy. The weeks just keep going by faster and faster. Also I write way too much in my journal. If I keep it up, I will probably be coming home with a journal for every month… I'm long-winded. We are really excited for Easter and general conference. It's gonna be a good time. I'm so grateful for this time to truly focus on Jesus Christ. As you prepare for general conference, go into it with a list of questions. I had never done this until last October, and it made it so much more meaningful and personal to me. I'm very happy this pday! We went and got Starbucks this morning, did our grocery shopping, took a trip to the mission office to get packages for sister Clayton and Lathrop, and are going to the STLS (sister training leaders) apartment to watch Meet the Mormons and eat candy! It's gonna be a good week. And I always love when I get to video chat with my family. If you are planning on going on a mission, hands down you will miss your family the most. So spend as much time as you can with them. I wish I would have done more stuff with them pre-mission instead of binge watching the Big Bang Theory lol. But they will be your greatest support system while you are in the mission. Love you fam!!!!! Sorry this email is so long lol. Don't forget that Jesus loves you, Sister Wallace Pics 1. The best zone ever 2. joy from the food sister Johnson gave me!! 3. Waiting for the STLS when they were 40 mins late to our walk 4. Our 9 o'clock selfie

5. Talking with the fam! Kekeli was enjoying the filter and mom was showing me the new air hockey table 6. Shoutout to Elder Krantz and the best welcome to being a missionary package EVER! 7. Chick Fil A partay