Semana 18: ITS CHRISTMAS TIME BABYYYYY

Hellooooo everybody! I hope y'all are staying safe out there and partying hard. Christmas season is the BEST out here on the mish because so many more hearts are open and receptive to the message of the restored gospel. We have seen so many miracles here in Norwich and in the Syracuse Mission. Boy this week was a longgggg one and a great one. I am so beyond blessed to be here during these exciting times! 

Before the Nor'easter

And After.....this AZ boy is like, whoa!!!

So it turns out one of our friends, Barbara, lives outside of our area. We had to refer her off which was such a sad day because she was so sweet and loving. We gave her a call and broke the sad news to her and she was very understanding. But before we hung up, she started serenading us to some Christian hymn and it was really sweet. A little off tune, but hey I don't blame her because I can't carry a tune myself. We had to mute the phone for some of it because we were laughing so hard that this 80 year old grandma was singing to us but it was definitely a memory that will never be forgotten ahahah. 

We met with our friend, Bobbie, who is on date for baptism January 2nd and this particular lesson was very interesting and funny. We taught her obedience and Elder Wilson said "Well you know there's certain commandments that I struggle seeing the blessings that come from them" and Bobbie started CRYING laughing and couldn't stop for literally 15 minutes and we started laughing because she couldn't control it and my comps and I were so confused. We didn't know if it was because we taught the Law of Chastity the lesson before and we couldn't do... you know... before marriage or what but it was a very very funny situation hahahaha!

Just Chillin!

Speaking of Bobbie, you know that your friend is way elect when you join second hour zoom church late and she is leading the discussion with the Branch. Yeah... that actually happened and it was awesome! We joined the zoom call and Bobbie is straight up talking about grace and mercy in front of the entire branch when she hasn't even met most of them. Like I said before, Bobbie keeps me sane and I love her desire to strengthen her relationship with Christ!

Elder Jurdas!!!

I discovered how annoyingly persistent missionaries are when we called one of our friends this past Friday and his wife answered saying that he's in the hospital because of a heart attack he had that morning, and Elder Culebro hit us with the "So yeah we'll give him a call in a couple days and try to set up a lesson with him". THE MAN JUST HAD A HEART ATTACK at least give him a week or so to recover so he can actually get home! We don't want to stress him out in the hospital and cause another one ahahha! Gosh I'm still trying to get over how annoying we are sometimes but I guess we get a pass because our message is also the most important!

More Chillin!

So we were doing some finding through the phonebook and we came across this name 'China King'. Elder Wilson looks at me and says, "This sounds like a Chinese restaurant". I simply replied (knowing for a 100% fact that it is a Chinese restaurant), "Nah I don't think so, you should give them a call". Elder Wilson gives them a call and begins to testify about Jesus Christ and this man replies in very broken English, "Hello? Dis is uh China King restaurant". Elder Wilson puts the phone down and gives me the death glare as I am crying laughing hahahah! Ahhhhhh the memories!  (Please forgive my child Elder Wilson)

Too cool for...

We were calling in the Phonebook and we came across the "Golden investigator". Her name is Tracy (just like mi madre) and she is so kind and genuine. She is going and has gone through a lot in her life. She struggles with mental health and alcohol and it's had a huge affect on her marriage and her family life. She has 4 kids and has been married to her husband for 22 years. If she can get her Word of Wisdom problem under control, she will 100% be baptized. Her entire family is also joining in on the lessons which is so amazing! How cool would it be to baptize a family of 6!! We dropped off a Book of Mormon at her house and the next day she told us she read all of the pamphlets we gave her! That does not happen very often. Whenever one of our friends tells us "oH I dIdNt HaVe TiMe tO ReAd tHe ThReE VeRsES YoU tOLd Me To", I want to tell them that our friend Tracy over here takes care of 4 kids and has a job and STILL manages to find time to talk to us and read the information we give her. We love her.

Just two gentlemen on a pile of snow

We had an INSANE amount of snow this week! We got 2.5-3 feet of snow all at once and it was amazing! We got to play around in the snow during our walks and climb the 25 foot mountains of snow pushed by the snow plows it was great. It was one of the best snow storms they've had in years. I'm still in the process of trying to make an awesome igloo so we can do comp study inside of it. I'll let y'all know how that turns out. 

I got some crazy awesome news this last Saturday.... I got my flight plans to visit the Consulate office in Salt Lake City!!!! It's going to be a longggg day for real. I fly out of Syracuse at 6am and I get back to Syracuse the same day at 10pm! 10 and a half hours of flying baby lets go! But the best news is that I should be going to Mexico real soon! IM SO EXCITED!! If any of y'all are in Salt Lake City on Monday, December 28th hmu for a quick lunch ahaha. Great way to spend my first full day of being 19 holla!

I love you all! I hope you have a Merry Christmas! I am so excited this week is going to be phenomenal. Stay safe out there!

-Elder Scown

Love this companion of mine