Week 6 (June 20th)

So this week had been really good and thank you so much for all of your prayers for me because I really needed them. We had exchanges on Tuesday and they of course were amazing I learned a lot. Hnas Corbridge and Keele are amazing and they really helped me and boosted my confidence in things I'm struggling in. So little by little things are steadily getting better.We have a baptism coming up this Saturday!!!! Mariela is getting baptized. I'm so excited!!!! 

We had transfers today, so my companion and I are still in Broadway and if President Crawford (new mission President) keeps the pattern, I will be here for at least another two transfers, but Broadway 2 is the best ward in the mission, so I hope I get to stay for a while. 

Saturday the was the Father's Day party and I learned the true meaning of Spanish Time. So the poster said it started at 6, but apparently that's in hopes that people will all be there by 7pm, but they don't start the party until 8pm and then at around 8:15pm they start serving the food and then the entertainment and games don't start until 8:45pm and we go home at 9:15pm to get back in time, but apparently the party goes until after 11pm which is crazy and this is what apparently happens at every ward party in Broadway 2. The building has a stage and so they have actual entertainment. A few of the primary girls did a cultural dance, and the young women did some sort of lip synching thing, and then the relief society did a 50's type dance. And then they had games and competitions for the men and it was really funny. I took pictures and videos and I planned to upload them and send them to you, but I forgot my cable at the apartment so that will have to wait until next week.

 Guess what? For once in my life I have a noticeable tan! Go figure. I saw Hna Rivera when all of the Hnas met up for exchanges and she said that I looked good with a little color it makes me look a little more Mexican. Which by the way I am practically a giant here. I am taller than most of the people around here except for the other missionaries. 

The weather is hot and still no rain. We use the car more now because of the heat and it's easier to stay hydrated, but on cooler days when it's only like 80 degrees we stick to the bikes. 

So I ate a Jalapeno on Tuesday, it was a pickled one so it wasn't as bad, but it was still really spicy especially closer to the stem. I don't know why people eat just plain pickled jalapenos, they don't even have good flavor, they're kind of sour. Not my thing, but I am beginning to like salsa and I have the feeling that someday soon jars of salsa will taste like ketchup to me, but it's all good. 

We had a service project with Susana our investigator this week and we helped her make tortillas again. We did it on Friday morning before district meeting at 10am, but we were only able to finish cooking 13 dozen before we left and she had another 6 dozen left to make. It is a lot of tortillas. 

Overall things are pretty good here. They feed us well and although there are many foods such as tomatoes that I don't like, I have mastered the art of loving the members enough to finish pretty much everything on my plate at least until I'm too full to eat. I love you all and all of your letters. All my love!!!!

 

Ari

Week: 6 (June 13th)

 I can't believe it's the last week before transfers!!! I have one more transfer with my companion more than likely and then she'll probably leave. But I kind of hoping that one of us gets transferred this time because she's really nice and I've learned a lot from her, but it's been really hard on me working with her because she's really trunky, and she still has a year left, trunky means that she talks about home all of the time and she's emotionally ready to leave now but she's only staying so she doesn't have to say that she never finished. But she's really nice and really good at working with the members and she's really good at explaining things without making it complicated, but from time to time I do get homesick. We're almost done teaching Mariela and we have an appointment with her tomorrow to teach her the Word of Wisdom. She is so ready!!!! She pays her tithing and we haven't even taught her the tithing lesson yet!!!! Spanish is coming much easier and as I open myself up I begin to understand and love more readily. We're going to be doing exchanges tomorrow which I'm really excited about. My companion is going to be going to Jacinto City and I'll be here with Hermana Keele who's in Pasadena and Hermana Corbridge who's in Jacinto City will be coming here.  I think it's going to be fun!! Hermana Keele is really awesome and bold and this is probably the only chance I'm going to have to work with her because she only has one transfer left before she leaves.
 The weather is warm and I'm drinking much more water so the headaches are going away, I have sunglasses that are big enough to go over my regular glasses when I ride my bike. Lately I've heard all of these horror stories about bikes getting stolen and mine is really pretty so I bought a u lock which you can't just cut with a pair of wire cutters, it's heavy in the backpack, but it makes me feel safer when I lock up my bike especially when there are a lot of people around. It still hasn't rained for more than five minutes since I got here which is really unusual for the area but it's still super humid. Please pray for some rain to cool it down here a little bit. 
 We had a zone conference this past Friday with President and Sister Moldenhauer. It's really sad that they're leaving soon! I'm going to miss them. They hugged each of the missionaries at the end. So, before I got here I didn't realize that hispanic people hug and kiss when they say hello and goodbye to pretty much everyone, it was definitely weird at first but I'm getting used to it. People tell me that I'm going to come here as Hermana Arianne Dilzer but I'm going to come home as Maria Lupita Lopez, I guess it shows their faith and love for me.
 The ward is really amazing, I just want to get them fired up for missionary work. Some of them already are, it's just getting the rest to get on board with them. Hermano Palacios, the ward mission leader, is setting up a big fourth of July party for the missionaries and their investigators, it's going to be fun. 
We're going knocking again with Hermana Flores this saturday, which I'm really pumped for because she loves to go knocking!!!! Personally I'd rather give lessons than go knocking, but I think most missionaries feel that way. If you ever think of anyone you know who needs the gospel in their lives and might possibly accept it give the name to the missionaries. Referrals are so much help!!!! Anyway I'm really excited and can't wait to hear form you!!! Tell me everything. I love you, and it's hard but this work is AMAZING!!!!

Love Arianne 

Week 4 & 5 (June 6 )

Week: 4


So this week is really good!!!! I got a letter from Megan Lewis and that was really awesome and we had new missionary training.  So we get a new mission president in a couple of weeks he seems nice enough and he comes in of June 29. We're working with an awesome new investigator she's been dating a member of the ward for several years and going to their family home evenings and she wants to marry him and she had a dream that they were being taken to heaven as a family but she was left behind because she wasn't a member so she's agreed to visit with us and she's so amazing, you can just tell that she's ready. The weather is really hot and humid and I sweat like crazy. If I keep hydrated and everything will be alright. Still no tolerance for spices, but I'm working on it.  My companion and I are good and all is well. Transfers are coming up in two weeks and we think we might be getting two new spanish sisters but all of the spanish sisters right now are either in training or being trained, so who knows what's going to happen. Everything's kind of up in the air. 



Week: 5

Things are really good here. I'm really starting to like the ward though I would be lying if I didn't say that I think the Lord sent me here to humble me. I've been really happy, and most of our investigators are really progressing, but apparently they run at the mention of baptism, so I just have to go slow, but the girlfriend of the member Mariela is amazing!!!!! She's really really nice, and you can just tell that she's ready, we finished the first lesson and she has so many questions and I'm just excited. The ward doesn't have a pianist, and in relief society they practice the sacrament hymns because 90 percent of the ward is made of recent converts, so the relief society presidency is having me lead all of the music in relief society because I'm the only one that  that knows the hymns well enough. The spanish is slow but the members say I'm doing a lot better. They randomly come up to me and tell me how much better my spanish is getting which is a great confidence booster. So is Richelle getting back from Arizona soon? I imagine she would be. 
 I love you all tons and I love the work, and although it's really hard I wouldn't trade it for anything!!!!

Hermana Dilzer

Mission home address:

2815 W. Lake Houston Pkwy
Kingwood, TX 77339

week 3

So this week has been great this week!!! I still don't understand the spanish people are speaking here but that will come in time. The weather is ridiculously warm here and I've been sick from the heat. But it's all good because it's all in the Lord's work!
 We have an awesome investigator and I thought we would have to drop him because he didn't want to do any of the work (pray & read the Book of Mormon). So we kind of had to kick his butt into gear. We said if he didn't do the work he wouldn't know whether it was true or not and it was up to him to find out, so he started to do his part!!! And he's gaining his own testimony!! 
 We met a new family this week, we went knocking and my companion wanted to go to a certain street but as we were riding along I was like this is not a Spanish neighborhood, why are we going here, so we get to the end of the street and we find this one rundown house. So my companion was like let's start here and we rode up the driveway and found a family of eight people. A woman Eva, and her brother and all of their children and they were just sitting around talking. They let us in the yard and we talked for over an hour it was amazing. She wanted us to go visit her daughter in jail because we are Americans but unfortunately the jail is not only outside my area but outside of the mission, so we had to tell her we couldn't go. They then told us that they received 10 tickets from the city about things they needed to clean up in their yard because the neighbors complained. So today we had a service project with the Elders in our district. We cleaned the yard and made the outside look nicer. They are an awesome family and they're coming to activities tomorrow night at church and they're coming  on Sunday too!!!
 I miss you all and think about you tons. I can't wait to see you all again, but I love the work. Ooh, I learned a new skill, it's big among the Polynesians in the states for graduations and birthdays and baptisms they make candy leas and you wrap individual candies in cellophane and then you sew it them together and they look like leas. One of the youth in the ward is graduating this week and we were invited to his graduation so I made him one and so did my companion. They look awesome!!! Not much else. Keep me updated! I love you all!!!
Love, Hermana Dilzer

Week Two

 This week has been awesome with the work!!! We have about five or six new investigators.(For those of you who aren't familiar with this LDS term. We refer to anyone who is interested in the church an "investigator" )There's a woman named Marina, she's from Honduras and she has two children Anna 11 and Luis 12. It's really awesome she had them come and sit with her for the lesson and they all participated!!! I think we are going to commit her and her children to be baptized on the next lesson! Then there's Susana, she's a friend of Hermana Berrueto and we asked her to be baptized on the first lesson and she said she'd pray about it. It was an amazing lesson she's from Mexico and she's a sweetheart. We showed up to our lesson with her and she'd forgotten and was in the middle of making tortillas so we asked if we could help so she showed us how to make the tortillas and it was really cool and easy, and of course she didn't measure anything. She sells them to all of the local women and many of them are in our ward. Susana said the trick was not to completely cook them so when the women heat them up they're completely done and their husbands and families think that they made them. When we were done she gave us two dozen tortillas and then we had the lesson and the spirit was so strong!!! We gave her the Book of Mormon, and talked to her about baptism she said she would read, but she didn't want to commit until she was completely sure this was the right church. She said that her home felt different when we were there!!! Then there's Guadalupe, but we haven't had a chance to meet with her again because her coworker is really sick and she's working crazy hours right now, but we call every couple of days to talk to her and check up on her. She's reading the Book of Mormon on her own and she says she's looking for a church. I want to commit her to be baptized because she's awesome and so ready! Then there's Mari, she's getting baptized on the 4th, we have a couple of more lessons with her, and we have to ask her husband for permission, which I'm a little worried about because the only reason my companion and I are teaching her is because her husband won't let her talk with other men. She lives in the Elder's area but if she wants to have the lessons she had to meet with sisters. So we have permission to meet with her. So we were a little worried what her husband will say when he finds out that a Elder has to baptize her.... pray that all goes well and that his heart will be softened. We're also teaching a part member family. We are also trying to get a lesson with two girls that we met one day when we were contacting a referral, their home life is a little upside down now but the girls are really sweet. One is 14 and the other is 8... Heather and Hazel has made some huge changes in their lives right now so I'm hoping they'll have a chance to meet with us again. We also taught this family Karen and Leider and they are really cool!!! They just had a new baby and they have a 4 year old son. We taught the first lesson, and gave them a Book of Mormon. Leider started reading right after we gave him the book, as we were finishing the lesson and he had a lot of questions and it was really good. I'm starting to get used to the area. It's kind of ghetto I'll be honest but the members are really nice and of course they love to feed the sisters. Thankfully after last week either the food is more normal or I'm getting used to it. I still have no tolerance for spicy food yet...but I now like pineapple, and melons and beans & rice and a lot of other things I wouldn't normally eat. I've got to say either the food is really good or I'm just hungry maybe it's a mixture of both but everything tastes good on the mission. They feed us a lot of food and like you sit down and they give you your plate and it's piled over, we were at this one appointment and she gave us 5 flautas and tons of rice and salad and I mean tons and my companion can just pack it in and I'm struggling to finish. Let's just say I'm thankful for a bike and that our area is so big because we spend more time riding our bikes than we do in the appointments. My trainer has leadership meetings all day on Tuesday and Wednesday so all of the greenies (new missionaries) are going to be paired up with each other because we have 5 trainers and 5 greenies here in Spanish land. Supposedly I'm going to be paired with Hermana Sorensen who is in Pasadena right now, but my trainer made appointments during that time she's gone so I have to be able to navigate my way there with another greenie!!! I don't know my way around yet so please pray that we don't get lost because there are very few people here who speak English because apparently in Texas English is optional at schools and you can choose whether you want to learn in English or Spanish... go figure. Although, everyone is really nice!  I'm getting to know the other missionaries much better here too. Apparently Elder Esplin and Mandernac, the other Elders in our ward ran into a man the other day that said the world was going to end this past Saturday and to beware of zombies and so we received tons of texts about zombie protection because as our district leader Elder Esplin said that he needed to make sure we were safe. Anyway there's a good camaraderie here, and I'll be here until the beginning of August if it works out like it usually does... I'll be here for about half of my mission! It's crazy to think it's been two and a half months!!! I love you all and miss everyone so much. 

Love, Hermana Dilzer

1st week in the mission field

Hey everyone!!!
     I was really happy to talk you you on Wednesday, It's been a really crazy week this week. So I got to Houston on Wednesday in the early afternoon and it was wicked hot and humid!!!! So we met the mission president and his wife, President and Sister Moldenhauer. They're really nice. They took us to this BBQ place for lunch and when you walk in and the first thing you do is you choose your piece of meat and they cut it. Then you pick out the rest of what you want the vegetables and the macaroni and cheese and beans and other things. Pretty awesome. Afterwards we went back to the mission home and we had our interviews and they gave us some info and then at around 5:30 we were introduced to our companions and told which area we would be serving in. My companion's name is Hermana Naufahu and her family came to the US in the late sixties from Tonga, and she grew up in the Bay area of California. My companion is very nice but we a definitely different people and we are still working out the kinks of our companionship.
Our area is in the Broadway 2 which is technically in the Houston south mission boundaries but our Spanish areas overlap their English areas so Broadway 2,3, and Pasadena are actually part of our mission but not within the mission boundaries because they have a Spanish Stake.


 The language they taught me in the MTC is not the language that I hear and I barely understand any of it. When I went to church on Sunday I only understood one word and that was because the said it in English.
 The ward members here are nice but I have to get used to the hugging and the kissing me. They also like to feed us and so we have a meal appointment almost every day. They give us a lot of food and my companion and the members can pack it in, but I can't at all. Not nearly to the degree that they can! The food is super spicy and they're all telling me that it's not spicy at all. We had this meat cooked with chocolate and peppers and  my companion thought it was sweet but it was the spiciest thing I had ever eaten. The Pelacio family fed us Sunday afternoon and they made ham grinders with some other sort of spicy meat, mayonnaise with lime and guacamole, and they packed on the onions. Oh my gosh I could barely get it down. Suffice it to say I don't like guacamole, mangoes, or warm pasta salad. Hopefully, as time passes I'll get used to the food, but until then I'll keep drinking lots of water to fill me up.
. 
The land is really flat here which makes it a great place for biking and we bike most of the time. I always push to bike, so I can get out of driving. My companion used to drive before I got here but for some reason she doesn't anymore. I don't know why, she hasn't told me, but apparently the mission president knows so I'm the designated driver. On my first night here I had to drive the freeway all the way in from Kingwood into Houston because our area is in the city. 
 The area is taking me a lot of getting used to but my heart is softening. I'm starting to come out of the "crazed"... I don't understand anything zone and I'm beginning to really enjoy it.
 So, funny story the other night when I arrived my companion told me that we have a cockroach problem here every once in a while. So, the next evening when we got back to our apartment, in the kitchen there were tons of cockroaches and it was disgusting!!!! BECAUSE you just don't allow things to get that bad!!!! So I freaked out. I was on the verge of asking to be transferred to English speaking area (they are the nicer areas) or go home. Well, we called Elder House and found boric acid kills them and so I'm in cockroach killing mode and we have boric acid everywhere!!! 
I love and miss you all, Hermana Dilzer

Week 9 & 10 :

Dear Family & Friends,

      So we're in the final stretch to the end of the time here at the MTC. I'm kinda getting nervous but I'm still excited at the same time. It's kind of crazy but I can't wait to get into the field. It's weird to think that in six days I will be off doing the Lord's work. Apparently I will  be with my trainer for three months which I think will be good to set me off on the right foot.  I know that this is the Lord's work and that I'm learning so much from this and please pray for my future investigators that they will be prepared and that I may be able to discover their needs.

      Today was our last temple trip which is a bummer because it's the last one I'll have before I get off of my mission because the temple is in the Houston mission not the Houston East.

      I'm almost done with reading through the Book of Mormon and now I'm going to read the new testament the whole way through too.

      Oh if I get a phone in the airport and can call, it's not necessarily a sure thing depending on how much time we have between getting to the airport and our flight. Please wake Casey up so I can talk to her too. It was nice to hear about your garden and I definitely miss digging my hands in the dirt and planting flowers. I just miss the sun, but in just a couple of days I will be getting my fair share of warm sweaty humid sun.

  Happy Mother's Day to everyone! 

 Love,  Hermana Dilzer

Dear Families,

Your Missionary has arrived safely to T.H.E. Mission! They were treated to a Texas BBQ and we enjoyed a great afternoon together. Wednesday evening they met their new companion and arrived safely in their new areas. They are now out diligently searching for our Heavenly Father's children and doing the work of the Lord. Thank you for sending your daughters and sons to us, they have added great strength to our small army here in the Texas Houston East Mission. We love them and are so grateful to have them with us. You will find attached a picture of  your newly arrived missionary with Sister Moldenhauer and myself and a picture with their trainer. 
We are delighted that your Missionary is here and look forward to working with them.
Sincerely,
President and Sister Moldenhauer