Transfers Week 6!!

Hello everyone!

So due to transfers, I am emailing you today! =) So good news is Elder Richins and I are both staying in Farnborough together! This week has been a little hectic but I have really learned so much and A LOT has happened... It's been a a great week overall though so no worries there. But again, the England weather hasn't been to nice to us, its been raining so much these past couple of weeks haha. But we have MLC (Missionary Leadership Council) coming up this Friday so we are both really looking forward to that! Other than that, this week will just be a lot of other missionaries moving to their new areas and us preparing for MLC!

Tuesday: August 25th, 2015
Today was a very long day... all day rain again and then we went and practiced for our driver's test online. After we headed to Tony's for a lesson on the 10 commandments. Solid teach! After Tony, we visited Victor (family speaks Portuguese and Spanish) so Victor speaks English but everyone else doesn't so its hard to understand anything...(wish I could remember what I "learned" from Spanish class) Finished up the night by checking up on the Baker family and they are doing great. So proud of what they have accomplished together, it's truly been a miracle.

Wednesday: August 26th, 2015
Exchanges round two!!! Elder Avanesjan came down to Farnborough again so I got to work with him for a day and let me tell you, we got some work done! We started off on a hot start. We ran into these two ladies that were from Germany so Elder Avanesjan took that advantage to speak German to them. Lo and behold, I couldn't understand a single word they were saying but they were excited. He was telling them what we teach others and then we finally started talking in English with them again so I got to finally say some stuff. But after them, we met a great kid named Allen, he is a chef and we stopped and talked to him for a bit and then invited him to sit down with us right then and there and he agreed so, we taught him the restoration and then invited him to be baptized. He said the closing prayer and agreed for the 19th of September! He's a solid kid, he took a copy of the Book of Mormon and a pamphlet and then we had dinner at the Johnson's and then finished off by visiting the Baker's again. Today was really full of miracles and we seized the opportunities that were given to us by the Lord.

Exchanges with Elder Avanesjan and Wesley!

Thursday: August 27th, 2015
Finally stopped raining after three days and we just re-exchanged back with our normal companions. But I made my first successful dish of curry. (all from scratch) I was proud of myself as I didn't burn anything and the rice was perfect! But the rest of today was just tons of service. We helped the Reed's pack up a bed frame that was very hard to take apart, but I brought out my inner handy man skills and managed to do it! We had to then carry it down two flights of stairs but hey, it was worth it as we then got to pop a little bit of bubble wrap as we covered the frames haha.


Friday: August 28th, 2015
Today was umm... interesting? We got a call very early in the morning from President Gubler during our study time and he had asked us what our schedule looked like today and if we could make it to his house for dinner. We were like what... so we had to reschedule a lot of things and we got all jumbled up but we managed to get everything set up. We had to go to Basingstoke to give the sisters a blessing and then we headed to the nearby hospital to do a baptismal interview for one of their investigators. (Alex is golden!) But then we had to RUN to

Elder Richins, Myself, Elder Redd, and Elder Avanesjan
(Reading Zone Leaders)

the bus stop and make it to the train station within seven minutes and then catch the train to Oxshott to make it to President's in time. We barely... and I mean barely made it to the train. We got on and the doors closed right behind us... 1 hour later we arrive and President picked us up and took us to his home. There were six elders total (including us) and we had dinner, then President interviewed each of us and he took myself and Elder Richins in together and he asked us some questions about our companionship and all, and we are now the
Zone Leaders over the Reading Zone. So we were really excited that night but tons of nerves kicked in... but we both know we can do great things with this calling from the Lord.

Saturday: August 29th, 2015
So yeah, now that we will have a car, we will both have to learn to drive on the wrong side of
the road haha. (the test here is SO different than the one in the states) We studied today and then were
with the zone leaders the rest of the day so they could show us the ropes of things and all the accounting sheets and such. That was about it.

Sunday: August 30th, 2015
Another great Sunday!(as always) but today was just church and then we
headed to Basingstoke to clean the Elder's flat for the new ones coming in and then stayed in Reading to learn more from Elder Redd and Elder Avanesjan.

Accounting on Sunday

Monday: August 31st, 2015
Not a bad day. Most of the day was traveling back to Farnborough from Reading and then lunch so we didn't have much of the day to work with. So we set up our white boards and other stuff for the upcoming transfer and then went to dinner at a member's home and then finished off the night with the Baker' and Andrew.

So a lot of stuff happened last week and SO MUCH is going on this week so we are going to be traveling a lot this week and preparing presentations for MLC on Friday so we are going to be very busy and stressed... but I love it! Hope you are all doing swell and I'll talk to you soon!

-Elder Rivera