Adventure Week!

Hello all!

This has been a pretty good week! We had some memorable things happen!
It varied from funny, sad, exciting, frustrating and exhilarating. But
that's kinda how every week is.

So Monday was great! I had a really good birthday then we had a few
lessons. We had dinner at the young women's presidents home and her
daughter made me red velvet cupcakes! And they gave me a card! It was
a good day! Another member and her kids brought me a gift and tracked
us down as we rode our bikes home. It was so sweet!

Tuesday was a pretty good day. I woke up kinda grumpy but we made
contacting fun in between our 5 lessons we had! It was insane! We had
some good lessons and the ward mission leader has us over for dinner
and made me more red velvet cupcakes! Yum! We also picked up a new
family!!! We are so excited! They're a typical family, religious,
close, happy, love each other, we are stoaked! We have our return
appointment tonight. We also had a good lesson with one of our
investigators where we went over the plan of salvation using
scriptures in all the books. She loved it!

Wednesday was hard. We didn't have any set lessons but we were able to
get a lesson with our recent convert and that was okay.

Thursday was good! We had a good district meeting. There are 8 of us
in our district and two sets of elders are whitewashing and so there
were 5 new elders and one that was from our last district and Sister
Thatcher and me. Crazy! But we are planning to do a ton with Facebook!
By the end of the year we should be teaching 150 lessons a week. We
are hitting between 15-20 right now without Facebook so we have a
little catching up to do! But a lot of Facebook work is through
members inviting their friends to talk to the missionaries online.
It's pretty cool, we just started it with one of the young men in the
ward. He is all into Facebook missionary work! But after district
meeting we brought cupcakes and they sang me happy birthday then we
rode home for lunch where I opened my presents! (Cause we got mail) It
was great! Then we were off for 6-week training in Arcadia for new
missionaries and trainers. It was a good meeting. I felt a bit
overwhelmed because our unity hasn't been the best recently and I have
felt like a failure training. But it helped me out a lot. Then we rode
the bus home and bus contacts are always so funny! I was talking to a
Hispanic lady about the her job then I asked about if she believes in
Jesus Christ and she said she didn't speak English...after she was
just fine before. Funny people! Another guy tried hitting on me and
when I told him I was a missionary he stopped talking fast then told
me about the elders that had come to his house and started talking
about prayer and how he feels when he doesn't pray and how it has
blessed him when he does. Which turned he to a good conversation! But
after the bus ride back- about 2 hours to go 30 miles- we did some
service for a less active lady. We helped dust and sweep her patio. So
I was going around picking up things, wiping them down and dusting
under and sister Thatcher was sweeping and vacuuming. We are about
done and I pick up this gallon zip lock bag that has thread and a
kitchen mitt and the bag was open so I pick it up making sure not to
drop anything and I see the over mitt has a urine spot from a rat or
mouse probably cause it was outside and then I'm thinking rat and see
something furry inside the bag, look down thinking it's probably just
a cat toy or something and see a POSSUM FACE!!!!!!!!!!!!! I drop the
bag and scream and run away in hysterics! Sister Thatcher starts
laughing at me and my eyes are watering-she said I was crying, they
were watering- and she doesn't believe it's real cause it's just lying
there! So I take the broom thinking if it's real it'll move if it's
dead it'll stay there if it's a stuffed animal it'll be soft so I hit
it on the head with the handle of the broom and it hits something hard
and blinks!!! I realized I hit it's skull kinda hard and it WAS alive!
Scared us both into the giggles! It's still playing dead and the lady
comes out and asks what we are laughing about and we ask if she has a
possum. Her face drops! She gets real nervous and asks where! She said
it's real and not a pet! So we all start freaking out with the
reconfirmation that it's real! So we call a few people to help us get
rid of it but no one can come help. So Sister Thatcher made a trap for
it and broomed the possum and bag into a garbage bag and then the
sister took it to the dumpster. It's kinda sad because it was only a
few months old but not cause that's gross!! So that was our eventful
Thursday!

Friday we got our bikes tuned up then had weekly planning. We both
ended up venting about everything that as bothering us and it was a
great companion inventory!! We were both crying like crazy and that
made us a little late for our dinner appointment and we went out to
work but all our appointments got cancelled so we went to downtown
Claremont aka the village and got ice cream and talked to people. One
guy (his name is Christopher Siera la sphynx). He was a drummer for
the bad la sphynx but how he introduced himself made us think that was
part of his name! Funny guy! He gave us the best thing in the world to
him- a bobby pin. So we gave him a finding faith in Christ card! And
we asked if he had Facebook and told us he didn't do social media
because he likes face to face conversations because over the internet
you can do this...and proceeded with arms wide open and hugged us. It
was hilarious!! We tried rolling out of his arms and he was just like
am I right!? Haha so funny! Everyone who walked by noticed and saw the
awkwardness happening cause we were both trying to turn out of his
hug! Hahah so funny!!! Then we saw a lady who we complimented her
shirt and she said oh I got it from ross and I was wearing a skirt
Spenser and Crystal got me for my birthday from ross and I said hey! I
got this from ross! And she laughed and said how it was like we were
in a commercial! She was lost so we helped her find her car. She was
nice.

Saturday was BUSY! We taught 6 lessons! 2 less active and 4 member
present! It was great! We were both exhausted!!

Sunday was good. Sister Thatcher talked in sacrament and she did an
amazing job! We had only two investigators there a progressing one and
a potential we were supposed to teach later that day but ended up
having to go help her mom. But the less active we did service for, she
came to church. She hasn't been in years! She came this week and last!
It is so great!

Today was good! We hung out at the Anderson's house and they are
awesome members of our ward! We did facials with Sister Anderson and
then talked, emailed, went to target, it was nice. I love them!!!

I love being a missionary! There are the hard times but that makes the
good times even more enjoyable! I love you all and pray for you all. I
know this gospel is true and that Jesus Christ is our savior and that
we can do nothing without him but everything with him!

Love, Sister Riches