This email will include LOTS of pictures because we pretty much only did one thing worth mentioning this week (well, since Tuesday).
We went to a member's home on a giant ranch about 30 minutes West of the city of Andrews!! Sister Smith is so amazing and she is the relief society president in our branch. Her husband, Lane, is not a member of the church, but he is so amazing! He doesn't own the ranch, but he is the one who takes care of it - it's a cattle ranch, so he gets to go out and take care of the cows all day long! He is the most Texan cowboy I have ever met in my life - he's really awesome. For fun, he goes out on random spots on his ranch and goes arrowhead hunting! He has also found several painted pot shards on the ranch along with rattle snake rattles!! He showed us the whole collection and it was AWESOME.
We went to the ranch because Sister Smith noticed a teeny little cemetery on the ranch that contains headstones from the people who first owned the ranch. The cemetery had become completely overgrown with these big nasty plants called allthorns - they are adequately named because they are seriously covered with nasty big inch long thorns that will go through just about everything. Luckily, my Mommy sent me some pig skin gloves to work with and they definitely came in handy that day! So, we went to the cemetery and cleared out the weeds and the nastiness and cleared away the gunk around the headstones and took pictures of them to put on Find-A-Grave!!! It was so much fun over there!!! Because we were 30 minutes away from town, we had lunch over at their house and Lane made us some AWESOME burgers! Unfortunately, the meat was from the store and not from his cows. . . :( It was still a very, very good burger! ;)
We saw everything from scorpions and rattle snakes to roadrunners and turtles! It was seriously the most fun I have had on my mission and I wish we could go back and just spend a p-day there with that awesome couple and go arrowhead hunting and ride horses into the sunset! (You can actually do that in Texas because there's no mountains in the way to block the sunset)
Another amazing thing we did was exchanges with the Sister Training Leaders in Midland and I got to spend a whole day and a half with Sister Slater again! I also got to see Adrian and Dakota, the recent coverts from Midland who changed my life, and I got to see their not-so-little-anymore baby Luna! She is so big now and she smiles so so much!! It made me so happy that they were so excited to see me and before we left, they told me, "Pray for a transfer to Midland!" Aww! They are so so sweet.
I learned a lot of really amazing things on exchanges and Sister Slater is helping me become a better person and a better missionary. I am still struggling (I think I've reached a quarter mission crisis right now), but because of Sister Slater's help and comfort, I have an idea of how to become better and I have a newfound hope for the future!
I just want to bare my testimony of how much I know I am supposed to be a missionary in Andrews with Sister Kynaston and Sister Snell right now. I am learning so much about myself and about the gospel! I know God wanted me here and that even though it can be very hard sometimes, I am enough for the Lord to work with and qualify to do this important work. We have found so many new investigators recently and have so many people to teach! I am so grateful for this opportunity to serve my Father in Heaven and to serve those around me! I love the gospel! The church is true!
I love you all and I'm so grateful for everyone who is supporting me, whether it be a vocal prayer, a prayer in your heart, or in other ways - thank you so much!
Love,
Sister Heather Overson
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