Hola mi familia!!
Hello from your newest mother!! Man, motherhood is hard! But I love it. (In the mission, when they are training a brand new companion, they call it "having a baby") Sister Ramirez is a trooper, that is for sure. We have had one of the weirdest weeks in a while. Last week, starting with Thursday, basically all our appointments decided to cancel. On Saturday we ended up tracting for about 4 hours... Hahaha. Oh man, welcome to missionary life, Sister Ramirez! No, just kidding, missionary life is a lot different than that. It has been wonderful to introduce her to what missionary life really is like. Part of me just wants to call missionary work Miracle work. Because in reality, that is what it is! God is letting us see little miracles every day, and we get to be part of miracles for other people! I keep telling Sister Ramirez that God just throws miracles at us, and all we have to do catch them! I don't think she understands that phrase... It has been pretty funny this week to realize that I say a lot of phrases that really make no sense, unless you are me, or if you know English pretty well. I keep teaching her different Sadie phrases to say. She is going be all set up with a pretty interesting English vocabulary by the time we are done together! Haha.
It has been such a blessing to have Sister Ramirez. She is from a small town in Central Mexico that I cannot say. She actually attended school at the MTC, so that was pretty funny! Her english is at the level my spanish was when I came out to NYC. Basically, she can read english, we can talk in both languages, but when it comes to an appointment or a meeting in English, she struggles understanding. I was the exact same when I came out. I couldn't understand any Spanish in appointments or meetings, but could understand reading or just talking slowly. We are both currently fluent in Spanish! We are really teaching each other so much. She is also a FABULOUS teacher, and that is not only just because she can speak Spanish... haha. She really knows how to bring the Spirit to a lesson and knows the doctrine so well. She definitely knows it better than me. She was baptized into the church when she was 11 with her mother and sister.
She is also a huge jokester! She is always laughing and playing little tricks. For example the other day we went in the Subway, but needed to cross to the other side. I said let's cross! She starts heading right to the track, like she is going to jump down and run across the electrified rails!! Haha. I was like, "Uh, Hermana! WAIT!" It was pretty hilarious. Especially since before I yelled, some random man waiting for the train starting yelling at her. I love her already. I cannot wait to see what kinds of miracles we can accomplish!
Yesterday we had a lesson with a former investigator, Irene! She is AMAZING. Her husband's side of the family are all members in the DR, and she has always loved our church. I taught her once in December, and then she headed back to the DR. FINALLY she came back!! It was super exciting to hear that she was finally back! We had a really quick but spiritually strong lesson about the Restoration. Her face just lit up when we talked about Joseph Smith. You knew she felt something. She told us that she always has felt something, like a big peace when we teach her, something that she doesn't feel at any other church. At the end of the lesson we read with her in 2 Nephi 31, which talks about baptism. After we read the verse, before we could say anything, she says, "How long does it take before someone can be baptized?"!! She is SO prepared to be baptized. We are currently working on getting her a date for the end of March. Irene is such a gem, and it is a blessing to teach her. She loves the missionaries so much, and spoils us. Plus she is one of the best Dominican cooks out there, and ya tu sabe how much I enjoy a good Dominican meal. Haha.
We are also working with Gina, an investigator who is so prepared as well. We had an amazing lesson with her yesterday as well, and you could see her just glow. She talked about how she hates the feeling she gets when she does something wrong. Gina is our investigator whose husband has been less active for years. (I don't remember if I have talked about her or not!) We looove teaching her! Back when I was with Sister Richardson, she told me something about myself that I didn't really quite believe, until the other day when Sister Ramirez said that exact same thing about me. They both said that I have a real gift with the youth. I LOVE working with the youth, and have always had good lessons with them, but I never thought it was a gift. I just thought that the youth were awesome and we clicked easily. I will be honest though, I think this gift is genetic, and not just Spiritually genetic. Mom and Dad have always had chances to work with youth, and they are practically worshipped at the YSA ward ;) I am finding that our Loving Heavenly Father gives us gifts, and whether we realize it or not (or whether we realize that we even have them or not), they are given for us to build up the Kingdom of God on the earth!
I love you guys tons!! Thank you all for your prayers and loves! I feel so spoiled here. Happy Valentines Day!! We will be spreading love all around NYC :)
Love,
Sister Dodson
p.s. GO USA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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