Lotts of catching up to do !!!!

 So I have been a huge slacker.  Here is what as been going on the past months in our lives.

                                                                 March 22, 2021

¡Hola todos! ¿Cómo han estado? ¡Pues esta semana fue muy fantástica y loco! 

P-day was super fun. I played a cool game with the elders. It reminded me of Catan, but also different. Elder Tatro made it! Needless to say I lost. I am going to bring some more games to play to keep me occupied in the future.

We went to Yorktown yet again! It was a super cold day! We had a cold front move in so the weather is rainy, windy, and cold 🥶. We did something I had never done before... we cleaned the girls bathroom by the gift shop. We weren't even on the boat😂. It was still fun though. Attitude is everything! If we don't have a good attitude we don't have anything. Later, we went over to Hermana Mendez's house. She taught us how to cook an easy Mexican meal. We made pollo, arroz, and green spaghetti (Hermana Bowen did most of the work. Hermana Kurns and I peeled peppers and took out the seeds.) I figured out I need to study cooking/baking vocabulary😅. But the food still tasted really good! I got to play with her son Diego's gerbil/hamster. It was super cute and tiny. It bit me through the glove😂. It is still adorable and I want to hold it again.

My 4th Zone Conference was on Thursday! It was awesome! We have one every transfer to receive training. Sister Monson talked about Charity and gossiping. It was really good. In
Moroni 7:47, “But charity is the pure love of Christ, and it endureth forever; and whoso is found possessed of it at the last day, it shall be well with him.” Charity isn’t something that we do, it is something that we become. I challenge you all to study charity and act on what you find. I have seen in my life that as I study charity and try to change myself, my days are better and I am happier. President Monson talked about the tutoring of Joseph Smith. He saw around 60 angels from the first vision to his death in 1844. He may not have known a lot or had a lot of education of worldly things, but Heavenly Father made sure he was educated spiritually. 

When la noche de fútbol comes around all I can do is watch. So I essentially have a little break watching fútbol. So, I actually taught voice lessons. For the first 30 minutes I taught Saima how to sing hymns (She is this cute old lady who just went through the temple on Saturday). I was able to play the top hand and attempt to explain how to hear your note, note counts, and some other stuff. We sang Venid a Mi around 10 times! She wants to do it again next week. I am going to have to practice singing vocabulary now too😂

Saturday was super crazy. We had a lesson with Mirko and Jean set up and they said that they were going to feed us. We got there and there was no food out so we thought it was going to be a super short lesson… nope. They had a ton of questions and we had to explain the Law of Moses and why we don’t do it anymore. Jean is on date and he said that if we still worshiped on Saturday that he would be baptized this week. So we are super confused, but he still wants to learn more and keep coming. He came to church on Sunday so all is not lost. We just need to explain some things a little more. He is super awesome and so is Mirko! Right as we were about to leave they were like oh we have food... SIT! So, we ate dinner before going to a party. We ended up be an hour late to the fiesta😅 But right when we got there they started to eat. We had these big taco things. We shared one of them with the three of us because it was sooo huge. Then we had dessert...needless to say I went to bed full.

We went over to Joanne y Eduardo’s house for a lesson with Vondel. We ate arepas with ham and eggs. We also had Platanos Fritos as a snack. I prefer Patacones because they aren't sweet. The food was delicious and the lesson was fun. Vondel is still deciding about baptism. He wants to visit another church to see the difference. He wants to be baptized before Hermana Bowen leaves so hopefully within the next two weeks!

Love you all! Have a great week!

<3 Hermana Lott

Here are some pictures!

March 29, 2021

Hola mis amigos y mi familia!

I also totally forgot to add last week that I went to the Little Bethel Pentecostal Church of Holiness. We found some named Robert at Popeyes 3-3 1/2 weeks ago. We started teaching him and then passed him off to the English elders. We had a church tour all together and he promised to come to church if we went to his. He was 30 minutes late but still went, so we had to keep our promise. We drove over to his church and got lost for 10 minutes😂. Google Maps isn't always the smartest. It kept trying to take us through a padlocked school parking lot. Luckily we got there on time. They started 20 minutes late starting so we only got to see 10 minutes of the action. They started to sing and it was pretty (5 singers and a full band). Then one of the ladies started yelling, in the microphone, "Jesus we love you." My ears felt like they were going to fall off. The song had a great message but it was too loud.

During DCM we talked about personal revelation and all the things that we have to do to receive it. A cool thing to see as a missionary is the growth of the people we are teaching. We are able to see as they come to understand and receive personal revelation. On the off note, we have these baptismal cards as a mission and Elder Skousen said, "Hand them out like candy."😂 We are going to start handing more of them out. After we had DCM lunch and we made pancakes🥞! It was super fun! I cut the bananas and Elder Frewing peeled them for me. We invited the other district which only has 4 elders to join us so we became a Mega district. The pancakes were delicious and it was fun to converse with everyone!

I had another doctors appointment. You'd think it was my birthday because I was so excited to go. I had been counting down the 3 weeks.😂 Well...we took a new x-ray and nothing had changed. I am not in pain really anymore, maybe I just got used to it 🤷‍♀️. The doctors pressed on the break and it didn't hurt much, but it started to feel sore AFTER I left. I am going back in two weeks. They want me to move my arm and do some exercises to see if it hurts or my bone does this popping thing. I'm crossing my fingers that everything goes well.

We had exchanges from Thursday-Friday! Sister Bertolio came again! But this time I didn't have to teach the lessons alone😂, Hermana Kurns and I taught them. Get some practice for when we might be companions alone. President told us we will probably be staying together in our interviews. Hermana Kurns and I had a really good lesson with a guy named Jorge. He is super nice and had been taught a little before. Turns out Hermana Berry and I dropped him because we couldn't get into contact. It was cool to see how excited he was to talk to us and learn more about Christ.

Something that was said in Zone Conference was, "The field is white and already to harvest! It isn't brown, needing to be watered or planted. It is ready, and there are people ready." Sometimes we find people that aren't ready and we plant a seed, then we move on. Which isn't easy because we like them and want them to have the happiness we have. But they might be ready when someone else comes along. It can become easy to be down on yourself when that happens all the time. We invite and help people and they have the decision to act on it, that includes members or missionaries.

English class is usually great and there are people there. When we taught it on Thursday the only people in our class were Phelippe and Roger. So we taught them the lesson and it was a blast. Sister Bertolio didn’t get to experience the normal english class that we do. 

Hermana Kurns, Bowen, and I went to the Pulga. It is a flea market 5 minutes away from our apartment. We went and handed out English class fliers. I had never been there before but it is awesome! We ran into two people who were taught by the missionaries before and got their numbers. It was soooo hot outside. I don’t know how I am going to survive the summer with the humidity. We bought some ice cream and it was delicious because it was hot and I was starving.

Sunday was awesome. All of our lessons fell through, but we had two really good member lessons. We went over to Roger's house to learn how to cook Patacones. I absolutely love them and they are delicious. Last time it was hard squishing them with two hands😂, but I did it. Apparently my right arm is super buff right now, jk. We talked about Roger opening up a Venezuelan restaurant or truck and we will name it “Patacones de las Princesas.” We will run it and keep the money but Roger will teach us how to make the food.

General Conference is April 3-4th! I invite you all to watch it. Write down some questions that you have and watch it! You will receive your answers!

Well I hope that you all have a great week! Love you all!

<3 Hermana Lott

Here are some pictures!

                                                                     April 12, 2021

Wow! Another week up and gone! ¿Cómo está? ¡Tenemos traslados mañana! Hermana Bowen va a regresar a su casa!😳 Pues eso es loco! She is sad to leave, but excited to see her family. She keeps rubbing in our face that she can hold a baby after Friday. We just have to look😔. (A rule we have is we aren't allowed to hold babies👼)

Last P-day was really fun. We went to the museum of Charleston. We walked around and looked at things and took pictures. While doing this we ran into two women who has missionaries out. They are from Dallas, Texas and they know people Elder Tatro knows. What a small world! Then we got five guys and ate it at a park. We lured in a squirrel with fries. Hermana Kurns said that she felt like a Disney princess and it reminded of the movie Enchanted.

We had a lesson with Marisela and her daughter Aldry. They fed us homemade taquitos, and of course they were delicious. Then we finished teaching them the restoration. They gave us all their attention and were wowed when we talked about the first vision. 

So we thought that Vondel fell off the face of the earth but he finally texted us back. He had been sick😔. We were super excited to call him even though we were tired. We read Alma 36:12-21. We had him read it and explain what was happening. At the end we asked him if he wanted forgiveness and that joy, and he said yes. It was a really touching lesson. He has gone through a lot of hard things this year but he doesn't want to give up. He told us that he is about to finish 1 Nephi!!😄 We have been praying that he will read more of the Book of Mormon.

Surprise! We went to Yorktown again. It was cool because the drive was really foggy and you couldn't see the boat from the parking lot. Hermana Kurns, Bowen, and I swept tour #1 which I have never done before. It was super cool because we got to see the part where the engine room was. If the boat was actually moving (needing the engines), the room would be 3rd degree burns just waiting to happen.😂 I could get a matching burn on my right arm!

So we planned on playing a little gospel game we made up after English class. I even made a banana cake for dessert. No one stayed after😭. We weren't just not going to eat the cake, so the Elders, Phelippe, Roger, and us at the cake. It was really good! 

General Conference was amazing. Six months ago I watched it in the MTC with my family and now it's over again! For the first session we went to the Hroneks. We had this yummy Peruvian dish for lunch. I liked a lot of the talks! (I am going to talk more about it in my next email). After we went over to the Hernandez family and did service for them. We were filling a trailer with scrap metal. I couldn't do much so I picked up trash and played with their puppy. We watched the 2nd session with them. (What I liked). Later that night we finally had a lesson with Vondel. He fell off the face of the earth for a week and we were worried. He watched the men's session with the Elders and Phelippe. 

Sunday morning we watched it at church... en Español! Fue un poco difícil para entender todo pero entendí muy bien.  For the second session we went over to Hermana Tapia's house. She invited us over for a late lunch. We had this seafood pasta. It was really good. We watched it in Spanish again. Let me tell you, Spanish is really hard to understand when you are tired. 

Because it is transfer week Monday was just a normal day dreaded by the missionaries. It turned out to be a great day for us. We did a dinner with all the sisters in our zone...which isn't a lot. We had Crumble Cookies for dessert and I shouldn't have eaten as much as I did. I may have eaten just the cookies. After we raced over to a lesson. A member referred his sister who is less active. We got there and apparently he didn't tell them we were coming. We talked about the gospel blessing families and raising children in the gospel. Her little girl Lixi is 9 years old and loves coming to church! 

We got transfer news! I am staying in Charleston again! I have been here since December and I'm still going. Hermana Kurns are now a duo, her first in the mission! I am super happy that I'm staying. Elder DeMille is staying too! It is hilarious and will keep being a blast.

It is weird being just with Hermana Kurns now, but in a good way. The apartment is quieter without Hermana Bowen. Her energy and enthusiasm will be missed. 😫

Here are some pictures!!! Les amo!

April 19, 2021

(This past week has been crazy! Here is some stuff that happened after transfers... I didn't have time to right it last week.)

The pday before transfer was a blast! We had a water balloon fight as a district. It took forever to fill up the balloons, but it was so fun. I stood on the side line and videoed. Everytime I threw a balloon it just bounced off the person, so I had to go up to them and pop it over them with my hand. Being on the side line had a perk, I was able to get some pretty funny videos. After Phelippe took us out to dinner for Hermana Bowen's last dinner. We went to a Brazilian Steak house. The pineapple is my favorite part. Then after we went to Marisa Mendez's house so she could say goodbye. We took some photos.

Transfers was fun and crazy. I had to explain my brokenness a couple of times. I saw Sister Donahoo again! She was going back to Nauvoo for her other part of her historical service mission. When we got to the apartment after it was weird. We did a little Spring Cleaning. It is nice to have our fridge cleaned out of all the weird sauces and things Hermana Bowen ate. 

At fútbol night, I talked to this lady for about a hour. She is super nice and wants to do a Bible study. We set one up and she told us that she has 25 inside cats! We are still going over anyway. Hermana Kurns and I went and knocked a door looking for Gerson's aunt. We talked to her and set up a lesson without Hermana Bowen!! We were sooo proud of ourselves. Usually Hermana Bowen would take over, but now we only have us. God is good!!

I bore my testimony in church. It was absolutely terrifying. I had a feeling the whole time that I needed to get up. I finally stood up at the end and walked up to wait. Then Hermana Kurns came and sat by me. I remember when it was fast Sunday af home and two sister sister missionaries both bore their testimonies first. We were like them but we did it at the end. Freddi and Linda came to church. He speaks Spanish and she speaks English and they are together. Linda is ready to be baptized, so we started to teach Freddi. He wants to be baptized! He said after we went to a little girl's baptism that that would be him in the future.

We had a zone pday on Monday and needless to say it was awesome. We went to some property that Elder & Sister Peterson the military missionaries own. We had a little water balloon fight and then played volleyball. I stayed on the other side of the little pond a fished. I caught a fish!! I haven't since I was 5, so this was awesome! It's pretty funny because while I was fishing I said in my head, "You know what Heavenly Father it would just make my day if I catch a fish." Then I caught one a little later! And then I thanked Heavenly  Father! :) It wasn't as big as the one that Elder Farr caught but it's still a fish. 🐟l

Hermana Bowen or now known as Melia and I were trying fo meet with this member for 2-3 months. Hermana Kurns and I finally got to visit with Veronica. We went to Yorktown in the morning and swept a tour (this time we brought a big broom so it didn't take forever). She fed us Chilaquiles for lunch. It was delicious!! We had this meat, beans, chopped up avocado/tomatoes, Horchata, and Chilaquiles (which is tortilla crisp things with this sauce and cheese over it.) We talked while we ate and she bore her testimony to us. She hasn't been very active but she wants her kids to grow up singing hymns. She misses church and she said she is going to come back!

Before we went into Veronica's house, I felt that we needed to call Julieth, someone we were going to visit that day. We called and she didn't answer so we called one more time. She answed and told us that she was going to be home later. We switched one of our lessons so we could go later and visit. We ended up getting to her house at 9:30pm. Julieth was still at work so we talked to her daughter Natalia. (We met Julieth at la noche de  fútbol) We are going to start teaching her with her mom. She wants to come to church and see what we do. They didn't end up coming but she said after we visited her for the second time that we are welcome in her house whenever. This one cat came and sat on my lap and then he started taking a bath😂. According to Julieth, that cat hates everyone but he likes me. I then said that the cat is very intelligent! Fue un chiste. 

We went and visited a member named Yolanda again. She is super awesome 

I have been visiting the Hernandez family for about 5 months. They are such a great family. They were the ones we did service for before Conference. I have never seen the whole family at church before. After Conference they said they wanted to start coming back and we still didn't see them. We called them yesterday and they said they were getting ready! And... they ALL came to church, even the mom. It was awesome and a big miracle. I have been waiting for this for sooo long. God truly does answer prayers!!

I absolutely loved Conference! It was amazing! It was cool that I was able to get a lot out of it listening to it in Spanish. I really loved the talk by Timothy J Dyches called "Light Cleaveth Unto Light." I love the quote, "You are never alone. He hears and answers every prayer. He has 'called you out of darkness into his marvellous light.' When you ask, 'Father, Father, are You there?' He will always reply, 'I’m here, child of mine; I’m right here.'" No matter how dark our lives may seem, Heavenly Father is always right there beside us. We just can't see him, but the way that we can reach Him is through pray. I also loved how it talked about following promptings from the Holy Ghost. We might be standing at the edge of a hypothetical cliff and be protected, but we NEED to follow the promptings we recieve. Hermana Kurns is helping me not second guess the promptings I recieve, and we have seen many blessings happen. 

Something hilarious that happened is Hermana Kurns said, "Que cute!" She meant to say "Que dulce."

Here are some pictures:

                                                                April 26, 2021

Wow! April is over already. How time passes in the mission never ceases to amaze me. It is so slow but fast.

This late pday was pretty chill. Hermana Kurns I had to take our car to get the oil changed. We became EMTs for about 20 minutes. One of the elders got really bad blisters from playing basketball. (See a pattern there?) There was no first aid in the church so we went back to the apartment and brought stuff. The blisters are about a little smaller than a 50 cent piece. Then we went out to dinner with the sisters in my zone at Texas Roadhouse. It was NOT cheap. I just won't be eating for the next week.😂 I may regret it this coming week.

For DCM, Hermana Kurns and I gave the discussion on Christlike attributes. It went really well and lots of good ideas were shared. We discussed a talk called "What Manner of Men and Women Ought Ye To Be." It is such a good talk. I invite you all to read it (Here's a link: https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2011/04/what-manner-of-men-and-women-ought-ye-to-be?lang=eng

What Manner of Men and Women Ought Ye to Be? “To be, or not to be” is actually a very good question. 1 The Savior posed the question in a far more profound way, making it a vital doctrinal question for each of us: “What manner of men [and women] ought ye to be?Verily I say unto you, even as I am” (3 Nephi 27:27; emphasis added).The first-person present tense of the verb be is I Am. He invites us to take upon us His name and His ... www.churchofjesuschrist.org

) When I read this I changed my mindset about Christlike attributes. I loved the whole talk. Elder Lynn G. Robbins said, “To be and to do are inseparable. As interdependent doctrines they reinforce and promote each other. Faith inspires one to pray, for example, and prayer in turn strengthens one’s faith.” We must do and be. There cannot be one without the other. He explained, “Many of us create to do lists to remind us of things we want to accomplish. But people rarely have to be lists. Why? To do’s are activities or events that can be checked off the list when done. To be, however, is never done. You can’t earn checkmarks with to be’s.” This really stood out to me. It is very easy to mark Christlike attributes off of a list after we have worked on them for a little while. But, the thing is that should be a part of the rest of our life. Along with all the things that we say we will DO and BE as a disciple of Jesus Christ. Think of some things that you could do to make you more Christlike and be that way.

I had another doctors appointment Wednesday morning and the x-ray pretty much looks identical to the last one I had. I spent around 3 hours there for the appointment and filling out paperwork. So I could send the x-rays and information to some people so they could look at it. That kind of threw off our day, but we were able to get everything on track. We were asked if we could help someone move out in June. Turns out it was our neighbor and she moved out sooner than planned. There wasn’t much to do so we just mopped her floor, but she was grateful. She had written a book and gave it to Hermana Bowen and I, so I figured we could do the same. We gave her a Book of Mormon with Hermana Kurns and I’s testimonies and some pumpkin chocolate chip cookies. I hope she reads it and receives answers to the questions in her life.

On Thursday, we had an hour mission wide zoom call. President and Sister Monson clarified a lot of questions and certain rules. Then after that Sister Robinson, Egbert, and Mabb came over to do companionship study with us. It was awesome. We did an activity with Christlike attributes. So it worked out great because Hermana Kurns and I studied them earlier for our discussion. We went through Preach My Gospel and did the Christlike attribute activity. I chose many of them to work on but the one that stood out was prayer. I am trying to make my prayers more meaningful and not just like I am checking it off a list. It will take time but I am excited to see the change that it will bring into my day. We had a lesson with Freddi and he told us that he wants his daughter to be a missionary like us. Hermana Kurns and I were like well we know how to set that into motion. We talked about baptism, and we are having him pray about a date.

I got to see another baptism on Saturday. It was a guy named Juan. The Spanish Elders taught and baptized him with the English Elders. He speaks mostly Spanish but speaks English all right, but he lives closer to the English ward (he also doesn’t have a car). We went out to lunch with Phelippe, Juan and his kids, and the elders to a Chinese Buffet. My favorite things were these little scone doughnuts covered in sugar. Not healthy, but delicious. We had a lesson with Cesar and it went really well. He had surgery on his hand and is recovering. He is so adorable and just loves talking with us about Jesus.

On Friday or Saturday, I found out officially that I need surgery and that I have to go home. I won’t be able to have the medication or the physical therapy that I need out here as a missionary. The surgery will be to put a plate over my bone and screw it in. Then I have to have my arm immobile for a month as the incision heals and my bone starts to heal. After that I have 6-8 weeks of physical therapy. President and Sister Monson, our mission nurse, and my doctor out here thinks it is best if I go home. They said that it would be easier to heal at home and then I can come back out stronger. Also, that it will be better to have the care from my family instead of Hermana Kurns becoming my nurse. I have started packing and I will most likely fly home this Saturday. Sister Monson said that my mission will be put on a pause and then I will have my 11 months still left to serve when I get back. The end is near for this chapter in my mission, but I still have a whole book left to go!

Sunday was hard because I had to say goodbye to all the members in my branch. Now all these members want to have me over for dinner before I leave. I made some bracelets and gave them to the members that I know the most and that helped me out a lot here. I am going to miss them so much. It is weird because next week I will be in my own ward that speaks English. It is going to be a transition. I haven’t been to a meeting in English for 5 months. This week will be full of member meals and goodbyes. It is hard because all the people I am teaching I just have to leave. I was told to just think of this as a transfer, but I am just transferring home and then back out here. I am totally going to come back and visit this branch. When I come back out I probably will get sent to a different place in South Carolina.

We went to downtown Charleston today and it was super fun! We went to the Pineapple fountain and Hermana Kurns thought that it was awesome. We walked through the market and I was reminded of how broke I am right now. MSF only gives you so much, but the prices in Charleston are expensive. Walking down the streets and window shopping is so much fun. We are going to Hermana Tapia’s house tonight to eat for one last time.

I might send out one more email when I get home so you all can know how my last week of being out in Charleston went.

Have a great week!! ¡Les amo muchísimo! ¡Espero que tengan una linda semana! ¡Nos vemos pronto!

Here are some pictures!:

   Tears of joy as we reunited with Hermana Lott

 on May 1, 2021

I am happy to report she did not end up needing surgery.  It was decided by the surgeon to wait it out and allow her bones to heal on it's own.  What a miracle.  She was able to return to the mission field in July of 2021.  

Jaime had some special things that happened on the plane ride home where she was able to share the gospel with someone and be a traveling companion to a lady who only knew Spanish.  I know these encounters were not a coincidence.  Also while home, she was able to continue to teach with the full time missionaries serving in our area.  Both families they taught were later baptized.  One family knew Spanish, which came in handy for her because the elders did not.  Again, this was in the Lord's plan for her coming home.  She was released while she was home and set apart again the night before leaving again.  We are so proud of her and her faith in the Lord, as He lead her on this little detour from her original "normal" mission.