Hay demasiado a decir!‏

You know how when I hear some thing super exciting and awesome I start punchinig the air and flaling my arms like crazy person? There's been a lot of that going on in this week.

So, remember Edgardo y Ramon? The two punk kids in Olanchito who were going to get baptized in April but then never did? Well, just a few minutes ago I read an email from Hermana Zamora (my companion from back in Olanchito) and she told me that they both got baptized this saturday!!! I AM SO EXCITED FOR THEM I CAN'T STAND IT!!!!! I love those kids! And she says they are going to seminary everyday. I'm so proud of them.

Angel and Zulma are getting baptized this friday! I am so happy to see how excited they are about the gospel. Also, we have plans for la familia Sosa to be baptized this friday, but Hermano Walter might have to go out town for work. We are praying his trip gets canceled. Tengo fe.

The Elders also have two baptisms so that means the ward will have SEVEN baptisms this week. Presidente Klein is coming and everything. It's a pretty big deal.

Hermana Klein has a blog called themissionpresidentswife.blogspot.com and she has post on there where she copy and pasted a bunch stuff from the blogs of the missionaries in our mission. She talked about how some of them are super funny and some of them are spiritual and you can see miracles. I read them and realized that there were a bunch of spiritual quotes and only two funny ones... and both of the funny ones were mine. Si hombre!! I made her blog twice because I'm hilarious.

I have a lot of these air punching moments during emailing, like when I found out katie Kershaw got engaged! Or when Sierra Tracey says something super hilarious. Every week Sierra says something funny to me and I start laughing and everyone asks Que paso? but I can't explain it because it won't be funny to anyone else. "You're supposed to say hola!!" It's awkward.

Sometimes we plan when we are going to visit specific investigadores based on the fact that we know that they always give us food so we should go at 3:00 not right before dinner. 

We gave a family a Libro de Mormon and we were going to leave them Enos to read. Hermana Alfaro was taking forever to find Enos and I was thinking, "Why is she taking so long? Doesn't she know where Enos is?" So I took the Libro de Mormon to find it but... it went straight from Jacob to Mosiah... It was missing about 30 pages! ha ha Problems in the BYU printing department.

When invited Hermana Vicky the relief society president to come with us to teach la familia Sosa and it was amazing!! She bore her testimony about Joseph Smith. She was also super straight forward with Walter. She talked about how she married a Catholic guy and he doesn't have the priesthood and how she knows her children are missing out on the blessings of having a priesthood holder in their home. She told Walter that he has the opportunity right now to be baptized and to provide the blessings of the priesthood to his wife and daughters. I almost cried. The spirit was so strong. 

When we got home that night I couldn't stop thinking about how grateful I am that I was raised in a home with a worthy priesthood holder and how blessed I am to have such a great dad. And how  Vicky re enforced my determination to marry a worthy priesthood holder some day.  

My mom sent me Jelly Beans and I realized that a pack of Jelly beans is terrifying! I don't know if I'm about to eat a mango flavored one or a popcorn flavored one. Unfortunately, I accidentally left the bag open on my desk over night and woke up to a bunch of ants in my Jelly beans... oh well. They were good while they lasted. 

Sometimes I worry I'm the third missionary.

I saw a Honduran man cook this week. Pedro Pablo made us scrambled eggs and beans. I've never seen a Honduran man cook before. 

I saw a crab climbing a tree yesterday... It was weird. 

We won Zona Celestial last month, so our zone got a pday on the beach with Presidente y Hermana Klein today. It was super awesome. Hermana Saylin and I fulfilled our dream of playing volleyball on the beach on pday. It started pouring rain half way through the day, but I enjoyed the rain. 

I just spilled a bunch of nacho cheese all over this key board in the church... oops...

Well, that's all for this week folks. Sorry to all my missionary friends who don't have time to read my super long emails.

Love you all! Pray Walter's trip gets cancelled por favor.

Love,

Hermana Odekirk

Happy Mother's Day!

I know some of  you might not really care about reading this, but I would like to publically wish my mom a Happy Mothers Day. I have the greatest mom ever. Any time I tell people a story about my mom they tell me, "Wow, you´re mom sounds so funny!" My mom is absolutely hilarious and doing the craziest things, whether it´s buying an ice cream bike, or getting escorted of the feild at a Raptors game for trying to start the wave, or getting excorted out the backstage area at the conference center. But more importantly, my mom is greatest example I know of Christ like love. She is always serving those around her. When the rest of the family is talking about how inconvenient it sounds to do some act of service she is talking about much it will help someone. She is the woman who taught me that "fair doens´t always mean equal" and how to lead music and how to drive a car and how to do my own laundry. She is always so supportive and shows her love for me in whatever decision I make. I love her so much. Happy Mothers Day!

 

I logged on to my email and got all excited because I had 14 new emails!! ...But then I realized more than half of them were one-liners from Sierra... Thanks for always being there buddy.

 

Angel and Zulma are getting baptized this Saturday. They are two really cute kids of a less active family who live next door to us.

 

Also, the familia Sosa still has the goal of getting baptized on the 24. I am so excited for them!! They are the cutest family I´ve ever seen!

 

I have always really loved reading Enos. Everyone always talks about how it is about prayer, but this last time I read I realized I think it is really about repentence. Sometimes it`s a wrestle. Also, every time I read Enos I always end up thinking, "What was this giant sin you had repent of??" Do think when we`re in heaven if I asked him nicely he would tell me?

 

When I had my very first interview with Presidente Klein he challenged me to read the New Testement. I finally finished it this last Tuesday, which means that I have now officially read the entire standard works. I feel super accomplished.

 

The word for handcuffed and the word for newlywed are the same in Spanish: despojado. ha ha Gives a whole new meaning to the phrase "The old ball and chain" right?

 

Shout out to all the "Friends" fans out there! I was helping Hermana Alfaro learn the days of the week in english and I taught her to say, "Monday oneday, tuesday twoday, wednesday what day? Thursday!!

 

Have a great week!! Love you all!

 

Love,

Herman Odekirk

Feliz Navidad! or Soy Come Jamo!‏

On the 30 of Abril I hit my six month mark. It's not weird to think that I've already been out six months, what is weird is that I'm going home in less than a year!!! I've done all the matematicas and transfers next Abril will be on the 29 which means I'll go home the 30. Exactly a year and a half! What are the chances of that!

Feliz Navidad a todos!! My christmas package got lost in the mail so my mom sent more and I got one of them this week!!

We had entrivistas with Presidente Klein on friday. That's always super exciting.  We just talked about how I'm adjusting to my new area and how excited I am to be in such a small branch and he said these exact words to me, "You're going to be a branch expcert!!" What does that mean?? Am I going to be in branches for the rest of my mission? Being in branches isn't a problem but that usually means being in smaller towns that don't have water and things like that. ha ha Vamos a ver. Good thing I don't have to worry about getting transfered for a while.

Presidente Klein also told me that we are getting a senior couple in the mission!! They aren't coming till July, but they're coming to Tela. I hope I stay here long enough that I'll get to work with them. Right now our mission has 0 senior couples in it. I always here good things from RMs who got to work with senior couples so I'm super excited about it. 

Funniest story of my week: We were teaching a recent convert named Fausto. He is 85 and hilarious. He mentioned that he has 11 kids, so naturally I said, Wow! That's a lot of kids. He then said, "Well back then we didn't have television or anything like that so we just went to bed early... that's why I have 11 children." Then he laughed super hard. We always laugh when we visit Fausto.

Our branch president's phone has that thing where when we call him we hear a song on our end while the phone is ringing on his end. That techno one that goes pow pow Americano, so naturally I jam out for a minute while the phone is ringing then he answers and all of a sudden I have to act a misionera again.

My Christmas package had new english scriptures in it. I was reading 1 Nefi 4 this morning and I realized something. In my old scriptures I have written at the top of that page, ''It's not a story about a journey, it's a story about faith." -Brother Slaughter  But I realized that that stroy is 100% about revelation. Everything Nephi did he did because the Spirit prompted him to. He needed to trust in revelation he had received, but that's faith, right? Turst. If you don't believe in revelation then you can't believe that this gospel is true. 

Shout out to Cassidy Lloyd who made my whole day by sending me the greatest sentence I've ever read in an email. "You just gotta free climb it."

And Shout out to Sierra who is going bowling on her pday. I told you bowling is awesome!

Well, that's all for now folks. Have a great week!

Love,

Hermana Odekirk

P.S. Baleadas eaten to date: 145