What a roller coaster of a week. Transfers are on Tuesday, and my mission president said in the middle of the transfer that he was going to transfer me somewhere else at the end of this transfer. I was so not ready. I love sister Zamora too much to leave her yet. And I love all the people I work with too much. So I prayed super super hard and I emailed President Browning. I was sick not knowing what was going to happen. But we got calls on Saturday and... I AM STAYING IN THATCHER!! Miracle. Really. Every other companionship in the zone is being split up. And most people are training. So it's been a crazy transfer.
I am so tired. I don't know why, but this week just wiped me out. Mentally, emotionally, physically! It was so funny actually. So we go to our ward mission leaders house every Sunday night. And last night I just walked in and was like, guys I'm done. So I fell asleep on the couch. They have really nice automatic recliner couches. It was wonderful.
This week the missionaries had the amazing opportunity to clean the Gila Valley temple. It was one of the coolest experiences I've ever had. Just going to the temple and feeling the spirit there and receiving the answers I was praying for while on my hands and knees just cleaning every little thing in the chapel of the temple. It was powerful. We didn't use any chemicals. Only distilled water and some rags, paint brushes to dust, and canned air. I mean we cleaned every spec of dust from that room. Then what was really cool was after we finished we got a tour of the temple. Not all the rooms, but the behind the scenes of the temple. So we got to go down into the basement and see all the security cameras. They have 1 extra of every single thing in the temple for any and all accidents. He showed us pretty much everything that makes the temple run. We even got to go to the roof. My favorite part though was that he took us to the top of the steeple! We had to climb like 3 or 4 flights of ladders to get to the top. But the view was so cool. Only a couple people could go at a time because the higher you went the tighter it was. But on one of the levels he had all of us stand to look out the window and then he told us that we were standing on top of the sign that says the holiness to the Lord, the house of the Lord. It was way cool. So I went all the way to the top window and looked out. And from there we could look up from the inside and see the bottom of the angel moroni!
Another fun part of the week was Commodities with the missionaries. I love going to serve there because we get to see a ton of people that we teach and meet others that are being taught by the other missionaries. And we are always just having a good time. We hand out soooooo much food. So we always say that we might not be Jesus, but we sure feed the 5 thousand. hahaha! And we made sure to get pictures with grandma! She is so cute! She is the one in charge and she doesn't let us call her anything else. She even refers to herself as grandma. We love her! And because so many of us were leaving the Gila, we all sang called to serve for her before we left. It was so cute, she cries any time one of us leaves. It was a tender moment for sure, she takes such good care of all of us.
This week felt so good. The sun was so nice, but the air was nice and crisp. I don't know what I am going to do when it actually starts getting hot. I'm not ready. But this week was soooo windy. Like it was 30-40 mph winds for a good part of the week. So that made things fun.
Another fun thing we did this week was some service for an older man in our ward named Jigs! He is the sweetest! He was in his yard the other day and we were riding by and so we stopped to say hi and he was really upset. The city just bought out the trailer park that he lives in and is going to rip it all out. So he was outside trying to move all of these bricks and stones to get ready to move out. So we offered to help him and he just laughed and didn't think we would because we were sisters. So we said we would bring some elders with us and be back in a few days to move all the stones in his yard. We got there and he was all ready for us. He went out and bought all kinds of snacks, and drinks and gloves for us. He even got a camera to take pictures of all of us helping. So he had everyone who came sign this paper so he could remember the day. It was so precious. He was so happy I thought he was going to cry! And then the best part is that he came to church on Sunday he had printed out all the pictures he took and made copies for all the missionaries and he put it together is a sheet protector and he wrote on all of them so that we would all remember! It was sooooo sweet!
Today has already been really fun. Because half of the zone is leaving we had a big zone breakfast. It was super fun, we all brought tons of food and had a big roast for all the people leaving. It'll be way different, but I'm sure happy I'm staying for another 6 weeks.
Hope you're all doing well!
Love,
Sister Grant