Missionary by Day, Math Tutor by Night

So I temporarily may have lost my camera cable, so this is the only picture I have for this week of cute Sister Harris (who lives in our complex) and I snuggling it up after a long day of missionary work.

Holy cow, where to begin?

So last P-day, after emailing, we went to get ice cream from La Micochana for Elder Thompson and Elder Frisbee because they had to walk 1.5 hours the Saturday before because the Zone Leaders "didn't have time to take them back to their apartment." So we felt bad and got them ice cream. And it started melting immediately. In the five-minute drive back to the church, it was EVERYWHERE. All over my skirt and my purse and the car. Like, straight ice cream massacre. Pics next week of this.

On Tuesday, one of our Hermanas forced us to eat 4X times what I normally eat (we all know I like to chow) of spaghetti. I almost died. Like, she just kept scooping and scooping and scooping...Also that night we went to see Kiwi, but since her parents weren't home we couldn't teach. So we helped her with her geometry homework instead. Definitely different.

Also, I had my first REAL baptism invite (the only other one was with kids that spoke English so does that even count?). We realized afterwards that there was a chance he was drunk so we couldn’t count it in reporting. MY FIRST REAL ONE AND HE WAS DRUNK. JUST MY LUCK.

Not Hermana Tonini

One day this week was super windy and some old man came out of his house while we were Buscando con Fe and I asked him if he came out to enjoy the weather and he responded, "No, I came out to see if your skirts were going to fly up!"

??

I had my first multi-zone today which was 9.5 hours long!!!!! ETERNITY.



COOL STORY FOR THE WEEK:

So President always encourages us to teach a lesson right then when we are Buscando con Fe, and we had just gotten off the phone with him, where he reminded us to do this. The first woman we talked to, we had to ask twice but she finally let us in to teach! Get this, her husband died of cancer, she has cancer, her son has cancer, her other son is in jail, and she just moved in four days previously. She was super emotional, and with her life, I could see why. However, she said she wants to know the truth and go to the true church!!!!! I am so excited for our next lesson with her!

Also, General Conference was INCREDIBLE! Especially the last session because that was the session that Maria came to, and then Elder Joaquin Costa gave that incredible talk directly for investigators!!!!  Like, I have never heard of a conference talk like that before, and it was the one time I had an investigator at conference! And then he talked about Alma 42 and we had JUST talked about using that chapter with one of our investigators who can't get baptized. Like, I had tears streaming down my face that entire talk. So powerful. Love conference.

Also, in this mission we don't use the word “greenie.” We are called “strippling warriors,” so I read the story and I love Alma 56: 45-48, 56 and 57: 20,21, and 27. Go read them and be inspired, because I know I was!!

Love you all, and I will let you know what happens with transfers this next week!

Sister Tonini
California Riverside Mission

Hermana Tonini Q&A

A couple of questions from me with answers from our favorite missionary!

Q: Did you ever tell President Mullen that you are related?
A: No, I have not told him. I did tell his wife though!

Q: Are you ever going to share with us your physical address?
A;  I will send you it after this week, once we know if we will be in this apartment next transfer.

Q:  Do you ever cook dinner for your companion?
A:  Yes, sometimes we make each other pancakes.

Another Hermana Tonini Sighting!

Drew's (Hermana Tonini's brother) sister-in-law, Rylee "accidentally" ran into Hermana Tonini at one of the sessions of General Conference today!

Companions, Corn and Cookies

HOLY MOLY.

We got to emailing late, so I have like eight minutes to write this.

Ready. Set. Go.

I GOT TO SEE HERMANA HARPER THIS WEEK! We had a trainer training meeting and so I got to see her and I definitely cried a little. Maybe a lot. Also, that was the longest day of my mission. I have never been so exhausted in my whole life.

I tried pupusas at a member's house this week, and they are SO GOOD. Also I tried elote at La Micochana. It's that corn from Nacho Libre that has mayo and cheese and chile.....SO GOOD. It has been my lifelong dream to try that corn, and it was everything I ever imagined. "Get that corn outta my face!" I love that movie.

Oh also, I got a package from Aunt Sheryl and Grandma and in it were homemade cookies from Grandma! I tried to take a selfie and my comp photobombed it. That cookies were def gone in one day, thanks to the many Elders we ran into that day. Gotta love cookies from Grandma.

So the coolest thing this week was Maria Rebatet. She came to General Women's Conference, and she hasn't even been to church yet? She came! And then the next day she came to church! I know this doesn't seem very significant, but I felt so much joy and bliss when I saw her at church. Like, indescribable joy. I have never felt that much happiness before. And all she did was go to conference. I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY.

Also, at service this week we were playing checkers with this old man and he asked if we could play strip checkers instead? Then apologized for being a "dirty old man"? I had to take a little lap in my seat because I was laughing so hard.

We finally got in with the Sanchez's this week. They didn't come to church this Sunday, but Hermano is really trying hard to quit smoking, so that is awesome!!

Women's Conference was incredible. Totally an answer to my prayers. I can't wait for conference this week!!!

We paused both of the Rios families this week...which is hard but if they aren't progressing and going to church, then we have to move on and find the elect.

I love you all so very much! We have Multi-Zone this week and our days are already filled this week, so pray that I will have the strength and energy to make it through the week.

Sister Tonini
California Riverside Mission

Hermana Tonini Sighting!

Drew's father-in-law is on the high council where Hermana Tonini is currently serving.  Look who he ran into while presiding at the General Women's Conference broadcast!

Bittersweet

So, last Monday we contacted a referral named Maria R***. Like without an appointment, we just swung by her house. She apologized for being in shorts but said she was in nicer clothes earlier because she was expecting us...? And we had about five people to choose form to go see, but the Spirit prompted me to choose Maria. I LOVE THE HOLY GHOST. She is a golden investigator, at least so far. She used to be a Catholic and later a Jehovah's Witness and she kind of lowkey bashed on both religions? Like, that night she offered the closing prayer and asked for forgiveness for how long it has been since she's prayed. And we didn't even call her to repentance! And when we mentioned prophets to her, she thought it made total sense. Like, I feel like she is elect and ready. And we met again this week and got her on date!!

On the 17th I hit my two-month mark! Isn't that just insane?? And my comp hits her halfway mark tomorrow!

During Buscando con Fe this week we climbed up this huge hill and we were having no luck. Because it was just a bunch of big houses spread apart. However, the LAST house at the top of this big hill we ran into NACHO (CAN I BORROW SOME SWEATS?) who was a gardener for this house and he was totally interested! However, he is in the Spanish Elders' area, so we had to send it off. But it was still cool!!!

Saturday was CRAZY! We were out Buscando con Fe and a Hispanic lady just invited us into her home, and we didn't even ask! She let us teach her most of the first lesson! We have another appointment with her this week, and I am so excited! But that has NEVER happened to me before! We are lucky to even get their information, not to mention getting invited into their home????? And then the Ramona Elders had a baptism that day which we were going because one of our investigators (the one on probation and can't get baptized) was going to attend. However, he last minute didn't show up which was hard, and then we had to teach the Restoration while we were waiting for Elder Eldridge and Lupe to get dressed, because that's what we do here in this mission? We teach the whole Restoration in like seven minutes? I am not a fan. I don't understand. So, they had us teach that and I accidentally skipped over half of the Restoration and then froze up in the middle of the First Vision. SO GREAT I LOVE IT. SO MUCH. WHY CAN'T I SPEAK SPANISH? Yeah...not a good time for me.

So, this week was hard. I feel like I don't know how to teach or speak or do anything right pretty much. But we were so blessed. We have so many investigators and so many on date, and the work is excellent. It was very bittersweet. I am just going to keep working hard through this, praying, and having faith in grace. That's all I can really do.

Love,

Hermana Tonini

Fourth Floor Last Door

HELLO LOVES!

So, a ton of stuff happened this week, but I just want to write about one single story that blew me away.

So, this story starts before I even left for Mexico. About eight weeks ago, a man saw Sister Harris and Sister Bradshaw in Walmart and talked to them. Just a nice casual conversation.

Fast-forward to this past Friday. Hermana Chandler and I were walking down a sort of busy street when a man stopped his car in the middle of the street trying to say something to us. He pulled over and then reversed back so he could talk to us. We ran across the street and he looked at me and asked if I was the missionary from Idaho that he had talked to in Walmart. Me: uh....no. But he was talking about how much he loves the missionaries, so we got his info and drove away with all of his kids in the car. Since he spoke English, we had to send it over to the Little Lake Sisters which kind of bummed me out. He stopped driving in the MIDDLE OF THE STREET  to talk to us, and we couldn't even teach him.

That night I had my first exchange, so I went with Sister Nai, who is from Australia and is the coolest human being I have ever met in my life, to her apartment with her trio. Can you guess which trio it was? The Little Lake Sisters.

So, as Sister Nai and I were out doing your typical missionary stuff Saturday evening, we finally got to our time to go contact Emmanuel. I was so excited, because I was actually going to have a chance to teach this family!! However, once we got to the address we realized it was a HUGE apartment complex...and we had no apartment number. We had two options: a. go to the next backup in our agenda b. go knock on random doors

So we looked at each other. Sis Nai: "My trio has been PRAYING for a family to teach, and I know Heavenly Father follows through on His promises." Me: "There is something special about this family and I want to find them." So, I said a prayer. I prayed knowing that we WOULD find this family.

We started with the front-facing apartments, and the first one we knocked on was a woman who said she didn't know an Emmanuel or an African American family, but that that inside and around the corner were some African American families and maybe we could look there. We went inside and there was a huge square plaza with a ton of apartments. We spent the next HOUR just going door to door knocking...looking for this family. And no one had ever seen this family before!! However, during this whole process we got two contacts, so I said to Sister Nai, "There is a reason we are out here knocking on these doors. Even if we don't find this family tonight, we were meant to knock on those two doors." And Sister Nai kept going on and on about how she was going to knock on every single door in that complex until she found this family. Even if it took a week.

So we finished that one section of that complex, and it was already 8:00 pm, which was the time we were supposed to be back at the Little Lake apt to get ready for exchanging back. However, we decided we were going to finish the last few front-facing apartments, where we started. So we went to the apartment right next to the woman who told us to go check more inside at those apartments. The one we skipped over. And I said, "How funny would it be if we wasted an hour searching when the family lived in the next apartment over?" And Hermana Nai was like, "I feel like this is it..." And the door opened and it was Immanuel's son who was sitting in the passenger seat the day before!!!
I have never smiled so hard in my life. He probably thought I was insane. I even said, "We have been searching for an hour for your family!!!!!!!!" We got his dad's number and as soon as the door closed I just cried. And maybe fist pumped. And then cried some more. We found a family WITHOUT AN APT NUMBER.  

What does this mean?

That woman didn't even know a large African American family (like legit the dad has an African accent) was living right next door to her. She didn't have to point us in the wrong direction to look for this family. But she did, and there was a reason. There were more people who needed our message. Heavenly Father wanted to see how badly we wanted this family and how hard we were willing to work to find them. I feel like His question for us is always: "How hard are you willing to work for it?" We wanted it. We wanted it bad. It was also a test of patience. We had to knock on doors for an hour to see if we had enough patience to know that our prayers are answered on His time, not ours. Heavenly Father always answers our prayers if we don't sit around expecting. We pray fervently, and then go out and do. He always follows through though, and I have a testimony of this.

He doesn't answer our prayers with the second door, he makes us work and grow until we finally open the last door of the night. then at that moment we can marvel at the love that Heavenly Father has for each of us individually and how personally he knows us. He loves His children and has a plan for each of us. I know it.

Love,
Hermana Tonini