22 - Headless horseman waiting at the gates

Email address (preferred):
rachael.clark@myldsmail.net

 Mission address:
 Sister Rachael Geniel Clark
 California Long Beach Mission
 6500 E Atherton St.
 Long Beach, CA 90815

Got to go to Buena park on exchanges this week, SO COOL!!!! We got to go air mattress shopping since we have tons of new missionaries this transfer we are short beds for exchanges. I got to see Knotts berry farm theme park too! They had a headless horseman waiting at the gates to go in for knots scary farm for October! I was impressed, the horse wasn't even flinching with everything going on around him, a sign of a well trained horse for sure, and good anatomy of the bones painted on him,it was cool. The Sisters live right across the street from the park so we got to see the park quite often. I hope I get to go there again, it reminds me of Cerritos, only more East. I went with Sister Skelton and we met this lady named Bessie, a very nice gypsy lineage lady. At first she wasn't interested, but then after Sister Skelton offered to share a scripture she said yes and had us come inside (it was 117 degrees F both days there... and humid...). We shared one about the attributes of Christ from The Book of Mormon (I forgot the exact chapter and verse), and she said it described Christ. I shared the poem on Footprints in the Sand and Christ never leaving us, especially during our hard times, Bessie then started crying and her daughter too because she had been going through a rough year, hadn't gone in church for awhile and even thought about taking her life from pills. Her husband then walked by and asked what was wrong and her daughter said she was feeling the Spirit, it was so amazing! I almost started crying too, the feeling was so strong that I just wanted to hug her and let her know how much I cared for her even though we just met each other! She then asked about our church location and time and hopefully she will continue to learn and find the peace and happiness that learning the lessons and being baptized will give her. It won't fix everything, but it definitely helps! We went by several other less actives in their ward and I loved them so much too, that ward feels like home, it was sad to leave! We did get to have lunch at Portillos. It was neat because it was themed like a Chicago café from the 30's and 40's and is similar to Iceburg as far as shakes are concerned (many say they have good shakes but they taste like cold milk with flavoring, not good). Just pumpkin for me, regular flavors aren't that great around here I learned. It was so cool!

We got to teach Johnny again. Still not interested, but definitely OK about us coming over to teach him! It was so neat to feel the spirit as we recounted the first vision and he even sorta agreed with our teachings. I can definitely see him joining in time. Such a great experience! Especially since he is our only investigator.

Almost all the less actives bailed on us this week. Brother Zeragoza had an excuse since he got called in last minute to a court case and was on duty till late into our exchange so that's OK, I figured that was what happened. 

Its been an interesting week, we had a lot of people who we visited late because we have to work till 9pm. Needless to say, they weren't too happy to see us and a dog almost charged at us after bursting through the screen door. Gave us quite the scare and we agreed to only put cards at doors after 8pm for now on. People here hate us coming by later than 7pm because kids are going to bed, they themselves are sleeping, or they are busy.

Not much else this week, we did get to go to the beach, not the sand, but still it was cool. Dog beach was pretty! So fun to watch the surfers and dogs play in the water!

Finally got a photo of Amelia's baptism. I will try and get a better quality one soon, this one is a copy of a copy. Neat photos from this morning and some of the night time at our apartment one day. Nighttime ones finally and first of shiplies.
Till next week!