pues.....

Well its last week of transfers (I cant believe it). So next week is transfers...and well this whole transfer we just figured that Hna Randall would be leaving because we have had 2 transfers together and she has been here for 4 tansfers now. Yeah....BUT then this week happened...I dont really want to say too much because it doesnt really matter but like the last couple days have been some of the hardest of my mission. Some stuff is changing and all....bla bla bla. Anyway so after it all me and my companion were almost 100 percent positive that I would be leaving or we both would. BUT THEN we had interviews with President today as a zone and it looks like we both might stay here. But who knows...anyway all that just to say if I dont write next week its because I got transfered ok :)

AND DONT WORRY ALL IS WELL. I LOVE MY AREA SO MUCH!

Speaking of love this week I had felt the love of God a lot. Well I always do but some funny random things happened. So me and my companion have been trying to just live off the food we have for 2 weeks and well...things are kinda bland hahaha. So after lunch I was like I really just want something bubbly to drink..like a sprite...that just sounds so good. Haha so we were out knocking like two hours later and this guy was like do you want some water? and we said sure...but then he comes out with two cans of sprite!!! I was like no way..haha. THEN a couple days later me and my companion were talking about some stuff and grapes came up and I was like "well...I havent really had grapes in a while, we have been in like a grape drought" I said that at night and the next day some one gave us a huge bag of grapes...and onions. It was awesome.

Gen 29:20. Totally true when I read it I was just stuck so hard about how much I love this work and how fast it goes.

We had to drop Rodrigo this week...we havent been able to find him. Im sad about it but I know he will get baptized some day.

BUT we still have so many people preparing to be baptized. Antonia is so amazing and was 100 percent willing to live the word of wisdom. Mostly because Carlos had already talked to her about it and shared a scripture in the bible about our bodies being temples (I am so proud of him sometimes)

We are teaching this family who is just so awesome. They read the Book of Mormon, they tell us how they can feel the difference in their home when we are over ext. We are just fighting to get them to church right now.

We had an amazing family home evening yesterday. We were able to play SOCCER!!!!!!! Woo hoo. I felt so spanish. By the end of the game I was even saying everything in spanish (soccer terms are just so natural for me to come out in english). Mely and Antonia were there...Mely is one of our investigators who lives with Carlos and Alvaro. Hes pretty awesome too and he came to church for the first time this week!! He also was able to see Mario get the priesthood which really affected him.

Sorry this is kinda short I dont have too much time BUT THE WEATHER IS AMAZING RIGHT NOW!!!! I LOVE IT SO MUCH!

OH...and the temple sounds so amazing. Give Jamie a huge hug for me and tell her that I felt the same way after my first time haha. I couldnt even handle going out to eat with people hahaha. But its amazing. Make sure you take a picture after all of the kids are sealed and send it to me :) thanks.

Im trying to think of other things to tell you that are important but we just had so many good lessons this week and amazing experiences. The mission is so cool. There are really little miracles every day that I cant remember to tell you every week but dont worry I write in my journal every single night so one day youll be able to hear everything.

Thank you so much for always writing me and for being an amazing family. I love you all so much. Tell Mariah to keep it up, its so good that shes able to do all of that. I know it will bless her life. Also if shes not taking institute tell her that she needs to make it a priority and find room for it.


LOVE YOU ALL!!!!!

-Hermana Kayla Tippetts

Pictures

Elders and their football...

Good afternoon family! How is everyone doing? Really busy I am sure...which is wonderful. Also can I just say CONGRATS JAMIE!!!!!!!! That is amazing. I had not heard anything about that so Im super happy to know. You all will have to let me know how it goes. Im sure it will be so beautiful!!! I love the temple so much. Also the primary program sounded really cute. I cant believe it is Kendall and Ryanne's last year in primary...and that Eryka is in primary too. So weird!!! So this week....so much happened (as always. I should probably stop saying that now haha) One cool thing happened...we were thinking about going to visit a former investigator who is a sibling of a member. We hurried and looked through the records and my companion wrote down the address. So we went to go visit them....and it totally wasnt the person who we thought it would be. It was a different person with the same name. BUT she totally needed the gospel and was so excited to have us back and now that her husband is back in the picture she has more support. Its a miracle for us not looking so perfectly :) haha. Also...so we were teaching this 16 year old boy for a while. His mom works with a less active member and said her son is super interested in religion. So we went over a few times but all he wanted to do was fight with us and we always left spiritually exhausted. Plus he wouldnt do anything. So we hadnt gone by for almost 3 weeks and the member kept telling us that the mom wanted us to come over. We were thinking...why? all her son does is fight with us. So we kinda just pushed it to the side and we would put their names as back up plans but we wouldnt really get over there. SO then we were walking down the street a couple days later and she totally pulls over and she was like when are you going to come over again? So we set up an appointment with her like a week later. We go for the appointment and she had totally forgot that we were coming over but the MEMBER was at the house and we were able to have a really short lesson with her but the spirit was so strong. We talked about what she could have if she did her part. We read the conversion of the anti nephi lehis. It was pretty awesome. We have another appointment with her tonight. So a lot of times if we dont have appointments in the morning its a little hard because everyone is out working. We still knock and find people but its just a little less. So we asked the Elders for some ideas of what they do. They suggested going around and talking to people in the park. We thought it was a great idea because there is a big park here in Arvin and there are always old men there playing card...wearing white cowboy hats. So we went. ha...well first off I got really excited about baptizing them all and then coming back after the mission wearing a white cowboy hat and walking up to play card games with them...but pull out a huge sack of candy and tell them we were going to play with that instead of money. Hahah..it was funny in my mind...BUT then we went back today and they are just a bunch of creepy old men...but also children of God. Ha. Another funny thing that happened this week is we were studying in the morning and we hear someone coming up our stairs..and then a knock on our door. The only people who know where we live is our manager and we figured it was something like that. Well I looked out the peep hole and it was a family...so we answered it and realized that they were all dressed really nice and the guy starts talking and is like "hey we are in the neighborhood today encouraging people to read the bible"..."9/11 this...satan that..." (They were Jehovah's Witnesses) and in that moment I realized my hair was covering my name tag so i just pushed my hair back and he looked right at it and was like "oh..." "you probably already know about the bible"...then he read us a verse and left. He was really nice though. I just dont think he expected to knock on missionaries door. I was bummed to because I have this goal to give any missionary that knocks on my door water and some fruit...but he got away too fast. haha. GENERAL CONFERENCE IS SOO CLOSE!!! I am so excited. I hope you all are thinking of questions you want answered and are preparing to listen to the prophets. Also read Mosiah 2:1-9 and see how the prepared for general conference in the book of mormon times Antonia has a new baptismal date! Shes getting baptized on the 29th of October. Its amazing the difference a month can make in someones life when they actually do the work. Like ....she is SO HAPPY. So happy. She hasnt missed church since she came 4 weeks ago, actually she missed once. But now she has her car back so she doesnt have to worry about rides. Shes just amazing. She brings her book of mormon to work and reads with one of her friends who is a member and her prayers are so sincere. I just love her so much it just gives me such a testimony that we can choose to change, we can choose to be happy and we do that by following God's commandments. How is everything going with everyone else? How are all the kids? Chelsea? I have some letters for her but I dont have Kimbers address anymore, I dont know what happened to it. Could you send it to me? Are you going to do anything for Brandens birthday? OK LOVE YOU ALL. Take care!

run for the hills....no wait don't...They are on Fire!!!!!

Buenas dias! Well....heres your email so you dont have to call President. Hahaha. I was wondering if you would here about the fires. They are crazy! Seriously our whole back yard was on fire here in Arvin. We are fine though. So we woke up saturday morning to lightening and we decided we were just going to work out inside (we are babies ok?). Then during studies it started raining. Well we went out and everything was fine but you could see smoke coming from the hills. Well once it got a little dark you could see the red surrounding the fire. It looked like lava! Pretty crazy. Then it got to be 8 o clock and we had appointments still but it got really smokey and really windy with ash in the air so we had to drop by and reschedule our appointments (seeing as they were with men and we would have to teach them inside). It was alright I guess because we hadnt taken a dinner so we only got home like 30 min early and ate dinner. But yeah its been burning for a couple days but it looks like they have them under control. Im in no danger here....except for maybe the way nasty air. BUT ALL IS WELL.

MARIO GOT BAPTIZED!!!!!!!!!!!! highlight of the week of course. He got baptized on Friday. Well there is a little joke that one thing goes wrong with a baptism....but let me just tell you. So this is the first baptism ive been in charge of being the senior companion...so I was a little stressed and my companion has never done one before. So we were just doing our best. We made plenty of follow up phone calls ext. Then everyone kept asking me if we were going to have refreshments (spanish people....) and I wasnt planning on it....but EVERYONE kept asking so I decided id call someone in the Relief Society Presidency to organize something. Ok. So I called, asked if they were in the relief society presidency...they said yes...I asked if they could bring stuff...she said yes...all was well. Well then the day of the baptism I called Mario to make sure he had a ride with his friend still and he told me yes and I told him to be there like 20 minutes before. Well....on the way to the baptism the ward mission leader calls us and was like "Why didnt you call anyone from the relief society like you said you would?" ........long story short I called the wrong number and it was just someone in the relief society haha. But she showed up with food...whoops. So then we are sitting there waiting and 640 rolls around and I call Mario to make sure hes almost there. He then tells me hes still at home and Anastacio is coming for him now. So then I call Anastacio who is still in Arvin...BAH. Long story short the baptism started 40 minutes late, but it was beautiful and hes a member of the church. HES AWESOME and the baptism turned out just fine.

So investigators...

Luis Angel- still reading, hes in second Nephi now. Hes praying every time he reads but its really hard for him to just go by everything by feeling. Hes never done that before but he is trying SO HARD to recieve an answer from God. Its awesome. Hes having a hard time getting to church because he works nights and comes home at 6 am...so getting to church at 11 is hard for him, but hes going to try this week.

Antonia- our schedules have not been matching up very well this week but we have been able to have a couple quick lessons with her this week between our other lessons. SHES AMAZING as well. When we first asked her to be baptized she was kinda hesitant about it but said yes. Then it had come up again she had gotten a little defensive about wanting to be ready. BUT just the other day we were over there and she was telling us about how she was talking to her sister about how shes going to get baptized and her sister was teasing her. Bad that her sister was teasing her but good that shes now so open about getting baptized. I just love her so much and its so amazing to see the spirit work on her little by little. I know its because she has been so prepared and is so willing to do the things God wants her to do.

Rodrigo- HE QUIT HIS JOB AND GOT A NEW ONE SO HE COULD COME TO CHURCH EVERY WEEK!!!!! This has been the one thing that has kind of stopped him from totally progressing but we had a lesson about faith to follow the comandments of God. We read the story of Abraham and Isaac. A couple days later he called us and told us he was coming to church and he came! Hes getting baptized on the 8th of October! YAY YAY YAY!

Mely- hes a friend of the guys in the "man house". He now lives there and has been going to our English class...then family home evening...and now he is taking the lessons. Hes another one who just is reading..and praying right after we ask him to do it. We asked him to be baptized last night and he said yes but he didnt feel comfortable with a date...yet. Right after his lesson we had a really good family home evening that Carlos taught which talked a lot about baptism. (perfect for him to hear).

Hahaha...so this being a missionary is so awesome and so funny. The things we do....so the other day it was night and we had dinner planned for the last half hour of the day but I just really felt like there was someone who needed us. So we went by to check on this person that Carlos had told us we should visit. So it was dark and we go to this trailer park and knock on the door...we hear "quien es?"...we walk around the side and there is a guy sticking his head out the window. Well we ended up teaching him a lesson right then and there. I wish I had a picture of us teaching this man..at night in a trailer park while his head was sticking out the window. So great.

Anastacio cant go on a mission. I guess they changed the rules and now you cant go if you are over 25 and hes turning 26 in December. Ah. broke my heart. He wanted to go really bad but I know he recieved an answer and is going to do something really good.

We are having exchanges this week. Hna Randall and Sister Dalton will be in Arvin and me and Hna Doxey will be in Lamont for the day. Itll be fun, Im really excited.

Well thats all the time I have for today! Have a good day and take care of yourselves! THANK YOU FOR ALL YOU DO FOR ME. I WONT EVER BE ABLE TO PAY IT BACK!

One week older...and wiser too?

BUENNNNNAAAAS! Pues estoy aqui. Ha.

First things first. I did get a letter in the mail from you today...im assuming it was suppose to have the SD cards in it because it was like priority mail...it was like a big white envelope. So I was super pumped. But then I opened it and all it had in it was stamps (thank you by the way) and another little envelope. No SD cards. Your note said that you were planning on sending the SD cards, I dont know if that meant in that actual letter or not? But I did notice that the bottom corner of the envelope had been ripped and taped. Did you do that? So anyway I havent gotten it yet. Hope it wasnt suppose to be in that envelope.

So I dont really know whats new...

I guess I will tell you a little happy moment I had. So we have this one recent convert we teach Carlos. He might be the death of me. No. Not really. Hes really awesome but sometimes I feel like everything I tell him just goes one ear and out the other. (sometimes). But the other day he came with us to an appointment with Antonia (she is his friend) and she asked some kind of question and he pulled out a scripture I had shared with him to help him understand what he was going through. HE LISTENS!!! I was super happy. Then that sunday he went to go pick her up for church and she was kinda down and he was totally like "no we are going...lets go". I was proud of him. Especially since....

Antonia totally recieved revelation at church that day. She has had a few hard things happen recently and the lesson in relief society was exactly for her. EXACTLY. She knows how much God loves her and she is doing all she can to learn and change. I just love her so much.

Oh...Saturday we taught 10 lessons in one day. It was awesome. One of our lessons fell through that we had planned and we thought...well...lets go check on Fransico (this guy we had taught twice). We went and he was home with his whole family and they all sat and listened and want to learn more. We are really excited about them.

Also..I just started reading the Bible along with the Book of Mormon (start to finish) and well....maybe you could ask sister handy to explain to me what the heck happened in Gen. 9. Im sure I had it explained to me before but Im totally confused and don't know how to figure it out (the part where Noah is drunk and Canaan is cursed. Why Canaan?) Thanks.

I like the Bible a lot though. I love reading about Adam and Eve and Noah ext. One phrase that ive read a few times in the Bible now that kinda sticks out to me is "walked with God". What do you all think it means to walk with God? I love that imagery and I know its so true especially in missionary work.

Oh the sisters conference in Ventura was AMAZING. We totally needed it. It was super nice being in Ventura too, it was only like 40 degrees cooler. hahaha. Running in the morning there felt super nice too. President and Sister Castro are super amazing people. I just love them so much.

I sent you a letter this morning so hopefully you will get it soon.

I think that is pretty much all that is super new. I love these people. I love this area and ward. There is this family that we eat with every Sunday. It just feels like eating with the family. They are all super nice and super understanding of me not eating meat. The other day they made me BBQed napalas (cactus). SOOOO yummy. Haha but the new missionary was like what is that? Hahah. Greenies...

Well I love you all and hope you have a really good week!

"I'm the person that give Sister Missionaries a bad name"

Wow...so I was surprised I didnt get a call from the mission office because my parents had called wondering what happened to me...HA. Im alive but super busy. So you already know that we have to email on tuesdays instead of Mondays here because the library is closed on Mondays...well as we were planning on Friday we get a call from the "traveling sisters" and they tell us that we have to be in Ventura Monday because we are going to have a "sisters conference"..I was like ok ok thats cool...(I was a little stressed because we had a million appointments we had to reschedule on tuesday and monday but thats ok).So Sunday night we get home and we are planning and eating a dinner (scheduling dinner is for babies) and we hear this SUPER loud noise in our bedroom...so we are like frozen but grab our keys and run outside. As we run to our door some one knocks on the door (heart attack please). So we answer the door and it was our manager. She told us we had to move our car. So we leave and get in the car. We were still super freaked out and while we were in the car the zone leaders called. Ah. So we told them what was going on and they told us to call someone in the area to come check. Its almost 10 by now so we call one of the hermanas and her husband...they come right over and check it out. Everything was fine. (Hence us giving sisters a bad name...I felt super needy) Anyway..so we are getting ready to leave the next day and I go to get my luggage out of our extra closet and it was all soaking wet. I looked up and found the source of the noise from the previous night. The whole ceiling was wet with mold. Some kind of pipe started leaking/burst. So yeah...we told the apartment people and left for Ventura.So we were in Ventura on tuesday and didnt get home til like 8 o clock, we hurried and taught a lesson and came home. It was crazy. So then we planned on writing our emails on wednesday when we were in Lamont.....well Wednesday deserves its own little paragraph so here it comes..

Yesterday.. so in the morning the repair people came to fix our ceiling and that is obviously not condusive to studying so we drove out to bakersfield to study (because we had district meeting there at 11). So after district meeting we had to get our car checked because the brakes had been making funny noises. We thought it would take about an hour and then we could head up to Lamont where we had packed schedule. Well...they tell us its going to take like 6 hours. Ah. Sooo..we called everyone to cancel our appointments except for Mario (our investigator that is getting baptized next week and was having his interview that night). As we were walking we hear "Hermanas!", we turned around and it was Mario riding his bike! He had come to Bakersfield for some kind of appointment and was riding his bike to meet his friend to get a ride. So we were able to teach him a lesson right there on the side of the street. HELLO, what a miracle. It still seems so surreal to me that it happened. I know that God is really watching over Mario and is making sure he gets everything he needs for his baptism. So then we were still stuck in Bakersfield so we decided to just go knocking in one of the Elders areas...for 5 hours straight. It was CRAZY. Then when we felt like we might die a little toyota corolla full of Elders drives up with dinner and water for us. It was super sweet. BUTTTTTTT....then we get a call from Mario and the person who was suppose to give him a ride to his interview forgot about it and he didnt have a ride....and his interview was in like 20 min. So we called someone from Arvin (anastacio) to come pick him up...and of course he did because Anastacio is amazing. So Mario gets there and we are talking to anastacio (hes a recent convert that we teach..hes like 25) and I asked him how his prayers have been going about serving a mission. Oh my goodness, Im not even going to try to describe his experience because its just to sweet to describe over email, but hes amazing and is now preparing to serve a mission!!!!!! AHHHH the fruits of missionary work. Like he just got baptized this year..and because of that he will go on a mission and baptize people...his children will go...their children will go. Can I just tell you that this is the Lords work????

Ok ive used up wayyyy too much of my time telling you about these last 3 days. They have just been amazing.

Oh yes, I am still in Arvin Lamont and Tehachapi with Hna Randall.

Random American Mexican thing me and my companion have discovered= Mac and cheese with black beans and tapatio. Its cheap ok? Dont judge us.

Antonia is so amazinnngggggggggggggg. Seriously. We gave her 3 Nefi 11 to read and when we came back she brought up how amazing it was that when christ came he gave them the AUTHORITY to baptize. She told us that when she reads the book of mormon she just feels more desires to live and to be happy. THE BOOK OF MORMON IS TRUE!!!!!!!!!

So much has happened. I want to reply to all that you wrote me, thank you for the emails. I cant believe the kids are growing up so much. Its crazy. I also got a email from Chrissy and all seems super well with them. Also give Lisa a huge hug for me please. Oh and tell Cody hey and yeah he should write me for sure.

The mission is so awesome, there is nothing I would be rather doing...every day I feel like Im fighting and searching for one more hour because everything just goes by way way way way too fast.

Oh and I reformated my sd card this morning and now its working...go figure. Oh and what video did you think was so funny? Also please do not put my sweaty picture on the blog...I mean the whole world doesnt need to see that.

Tell Grandpa happy birthday for me and I love his soooooo much!!!!! I hope you guys have fun when you go out to dinner!


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