"Honestly, I just looked down for a second..."

Well Anyways,

 Not a whole lot to report this week but that I GAVE AWAY MY FIRST BOOK OF MORMON ALL ON MY LONESOME! I also INVITED SOMEONE TO BE BAPTIZED AND SHE SAID YES!!!..........if she knew it was true. haha yeah President wants us to be bold and invite in the first lesson. So i did. And i hope it will all turn out. Her name is Maria Hernandez #1 (because we are currently teaching 3 of the same name). Her husband is a member but hasn't gone to church for about......thirty years. Yeah but he has been really awesome in helping us testify to Maria during lessons. None of the people we wanted to come to church (including Maria) came this week. In Texas, it can be particularly difficult to encourage someone to make and keep promises. I am working hard though. ya'll would be proud. 

I find many people here want to just chat about everything...not necessarily join the church or hear about the gospel. Oooohhh i forgot to tell you last week: i ran into my trainer while we were riding bikes. Yeeaaahh good moment for me. Hahaha. We were riding and she stopped and i literally looked down for maybe two seconds to make sure my skirt wasn't blowing up into the air to reveal some of my covenants when...i look up just in time to slam right into her. Yeah it was quite humiliating but i am better for it. I think it brought us closer together as a companionship...knowing she can not trust me to ride a bike without hitting her. This week went without incident so I'm crossing my fingers to keep up the trend. 

Thank you so much Susu and Gus for your letters. MEG! I GOT YOUR LETTER! thank YOU- I WILL BE WRITING YOU BACK TODAY. mOM- did you by any chance talk to the Whipples? I just got the nicest letter and large group of quotes from them. If you see them again, please let them know how awesome they are and how kind that was of them. I have received a lot of comments on my blog though so bangarang mom and dad and Libbi and who else contributes to it. Thank you. Ya'll are so awesome.

So this last week we had Zone conference. It was pretty awesome. It was just a large pump up meeting and training to help us to be more bold when sharing the gospel. Was that timely or what for me?! Well it worked because, like i said, i was able to give away a book of Mormon and invite someone to be baptized. I'm sorry, today i am tired and so i am not as animated as i usually am but this whole mission thing, is hard. Hard adjustment in so many ways. I am really fighting some demons within myself right now but i will keep going. 

We met the nicest older couple in one of our poorer areas near the border that we hope will possibly be some new investigators. We're going to visit them tonight so all is well. We have to bike a ton because our miles were all used up when our trainers had to pick us up from San Antonio. I guess the border is pretty unique because we spend a lot of time with the elders. We eat dinner with the elders and we have a car-share with them. We also spend p-day together. I don't know what its like elsewhere but that's what its like here. i really enjoy it though. It keeps things fresh. 

I am working hard and am so blessed to have such love and support from home. Thank you for being an awesome family and helping me be the best i can be. Thank you for loving me and sending me love through the mail and through thoughts. I can not express how much i appreciate it. Laura- i got your letters!!! Thank you sooo much and you better believe you have a letter coming your way. Thanks for being such an awesome friend to Libbi. I miss her tons. Larry- WOW! I DO NOT DESERVE THAT! Thank you for your kindness and thoughtfulness when writing me. I am truly blessed. I pray for ya'll siempre. Please don't ever forget how much i love ya'll.

How is Daphne? How is Dan Vera? How is Greg Mudrow? How is Chicka? Mom you write the best letters. i love you. Thank you family. Thank you friends. Thanks for making my life a blessing! Hope ya'll are doing well and are happy. I hope you feel the love God has for every one of us always. He truly knows us individually and though it may be hard, he has a plan for us. He wants us to be happy. Its our choice to see and experience the happiness he has laid out for us. Read your scriptures and pray always. Go to church because you never know who needs you there or what you need to learn that day. Be the best you can be! Con la fuerza de un campion. Les amo mucho! 

 

Hna. Sorensen 

 

Wow...one week down and a billion more to go

Oh mommy thank you for your letter. I miss you so much. Wow...one week down and a billion more to go.
To quote my trainer " i have never experienced so much rejection on my mission. I"m sorry sister"...yeah that about sums up my first week. We have been working REALLY REALLY REALLY HARD and i thought for sure it would pay off and seriously, all we saw this week was rejection and it was mean. NOt the nice - oh I'm not interested or now is not a good time - it was like 'Ya'll are stupid get out of here and never come back" type of rejection. I"m not gonna lie, it got me waaay down towards Friday and Saturday but a tender mercy came on Friday. SPRING CLEANING. We all cleaned out our apartments. it was gross. We found a crock pot in a specialized crock pot carrying case. I nearly died laughing but it was good times. I am...at a loss. I truly am working hard but it is tough. Libbi- the mission is rough but sooooo worth it. I feel like this is gonna be the week that everything happens. And if its not this week....i have the next week and the next and the next. I will beat Satan!! I am learning a lot though. Thank you for your letter Libbi. I miss you so much. I dreamt about you that night and i woke up missing you even more. Don't you worry, your getting a letter. I am going to send home some more pictures. Last p-day after i talked to you, we went out to "little Mexico" and it all worked out. I went right up to the Rio Grand and took some pictures with myself, my companion, and Mexico. I literally threw a rock into Mexico. Then we saw some boarder patrol people and we left. Life is so different here but its good. EVery day i know that if i had my family here, we would baptize a nation. My family rocks. Yesterday i spoke in sacrament meeting (playing in district meeting went well. Nothing special but one of the members of the mission presidency was there. He is in our English branch here) Yeah i spoke about plan de salvacion. Also, that morning, Sis. Deleon asked if we could play a musical number. So we ended up playing in church as well. A traveling circus act for sure. We also played in Spanish branch as well. Just an arrangement that sister Deleon had. She played the piano. I love my violin because it seems to be the only thing that i am success full in here. Life is good and i am working hard. I want to ask how i can help you but i know there is little i can do. MAKE GOOD DECISIONS AND YOUR LIFE WILL BE HAPPY. Serve others unconditionally and you will be happy. Work on some Christ LIke attributes. OH there is a boarder song here that only the boarder zone gets to sing and its all in Spanish. Its awesome. ITs about having the force of a champion. WE ARE ALL CHAMPIONS. BANGARANG!!
I love you. Please don't hesitate to send me letters :) Tell lauren Keller that i stinkin love her guts and when i heard she was home, i dreamt that she was teaching me how to teach the first vision. Please tell her that. Tell her that i love her so much. I miss her like crazy.
I miss ya'll like crazy. seriously. I love you. I need to write president. love love love you! Mom i love you. Dad, i love you. Ben and Pete- how is school? I love you. Sarah, Rae- i love you! hope all is well with ya'lls jobs. Libbi and Meg- LOVES OF MY LIFE! I MISS YA'LL SOOO MUCH. I LOVE YOU!
Friends: ya'll know who you are-ya'll getting letters. We'll chitty chat soon but i love you. thank you for your letters and support. I love you. nUMERO? hOW ARE YOU?
Entoneces, i love you i love you i love you. Grandparents- i love you. Extended family: i love you too. Thank you for your letters and support. you make my day and my life. i Love ya;ll!
Hermana Sorensen
Hey thanks Bugle-a while ago- for your letter. I am soo happy for your mission. You will awesome. STATE SIDE PRIDE!

First Shots from Texas

Hermana Sorensen with President & Sister Jones of the Texas, San Antonio Mission - March 2, 2011



Strength in numbers.  Hermana Sorensen with the group of newly arriving missionaries.



Sarah's time at the MTC - December 29th through March 2nd

Hermana Sorensen



I'm starting to like make up...



Sarah's companions

Sister Sorensen, Sister Furman and Sister Gneiting



I love to see the Temple...



Elder Gunnel (on the left) hit the pinnacle of fame as a young teen riding the bus with Napoleon Dynamite and asking him,"what are you gonna do today Napoleon." Sarah is magnetized to the rich and famous...

Dispatches from Del Rio

HOOOOOLLLLAAAAAA FAMILIA Y AMIGOS!!

HAPPY HAPPY HAPPY HAPPY HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM! OOOHHH HOW I WISH I WAS THERE. I HOPE IT IS A FANTASTIC DAY. i AM SENDING YOU A LETTER BUT I HAVE NO IDEA WHEN IT WILL GET THERE. I LOVE YOU SOOOO MUCH. Rae i hope you had a fantastic birthday as well. i love you too! HAPPY HAPPY TIMES EN MI FAMILIA!

Si yo hablo espanol. I don't know if ya'll heard but.....I MADE IT TO THE BOARDER!! i literally stuck my foot across the fence to say that i made it out of the country on my mission! haha technically i am not out of the country till i cross the Rio Gran pero its a nice thought. Ok so i am in a town just a few miles from the boarder. Its one of the 3 coveted missions here so i am sooo blessed. I get to speak Spanish and English every day. Too bad i can't speak Spanish so i end up looking dumbly at the Hispanics and they look at me like i am an idiot. I am trying though and the lord will bless me for my efforts. My companion is Sister DeLeon. Yes. sister of lion. She is a lion. She is tall and is pretty much the epitome of 'perfect' missionary. She lives by her white hand book and she doesn't mess around. She is really driven and is perfect at Spanish. (she learned it on her mission) - this gave me motivation to learn it myself but i am SOOOO intimidated. President really loves her. I am blessed because she is patient and will help me learn my Spanish. We are part of a tester program for the church in training new missionaries so.....EVEN BETTER NEWS......I AM GUARANTEED TO BE HERE FOR 12 WEEKS!! YAAAAHHHHOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!! OH I'M SOOO BLESSED. Please pray that i will get this language. Please pray that i can learn fast because after my 12 weeks with sister De Leon, i AM GOING TO TRAIN A NEW MISSIONARY!!!!! bbbbbbbbeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeppppppppppppppppppppppp!!

Yes, its quite a task ahead of me. I think president likes me....i hope. I get to play my violin this week at district meeting. (we have a guest coming and so are our zone leaders whom i have not met). I am so baffled by how much the Lord blesses me every day. I will give you a little run down on how this happened when i got here. So i woke up at 3 got on the bus to the airport at 4 and then went through security and it was about 6:30. Called all y'all and almost missed my flight. I was the last one to board the plane. Petrified i would miss it again (and in actuality i only had like 20 min) i didn't call when i got to Arizona. Well when i finally got to Texas, i was pooped but the President and his wife and the A.P. met us there. They were all very happy and helpful. We went to the President's house for lunch and then had a little orientation meeting. Then we went promptly to the Alamo where we were read the story of the Alamo and then asked to cross the line and be on the Lord's side. Sounds cheesy but it was actually pretty cool. Then we were all given a book of Mormon and with no other instruction, were told, in a half hour to give it away. Easy enough....NOT! I started walking towards a man and he literally ran away from me. I laughed out loud because it reminded me of when Libbi was the blood drop and tried to give that boy a hug and he ran away....oh it was so funny. That happened for the next 20 minutes because there were 18 missionaries going out and giving books of Mormon within a block radius of one another. It was soooo fun. Wwwaaaayyy harder than i thought it would be but i met a man and he told me he already had one sitting in his basement. I committed him to read the intro to the b.o.m. and it was awesome cuz he was like uummm yeah i think i need that. Thank you. i was like if you have any questions or anything you can always come find us. We're always around -because i didn't have a house or anything i knew to say where to find us. It was cool. The next day we got assigned our companions. Holy trip. Its like a giant round of cattle branding because you break off in your different zones once you've been assigned. Yeah....my zone....a companionship of elders and us. We have Eagle Pass in our zone but they weren't training so none of them were at this meeting. It was way cool though. Then we got in the car and drove for 3 hours to the boarder. It is so stinkin flat here. I miss the mountains and will miss the mountains till i return. I guess we just missed all the bad weather of 110 degrees. Its been fairly cold here though (60-75) lately.

Its hard to sum up everything that has happened because its so much....and so different than any experience in the MTC but its soo cool working on talking to REAL people. Door approaches and contacting kick me in the trash every day. I get so scared to ask them if we can come back. A lot of people are nice for the most part -besides the occasional GET OFF MY PORCH. But its good. Sometimes its in Spanish and I can't tell what they are saying to me so i just smile and nod my head till i receive some sort of hand sweep that i can only assume that they want me to get off their porch. haha i am so lost here but i truly am trying. I am determined to learn and to be the best missionary.

A fun story that i will leave you with is this: My first real day as a missionary, we were called to help a less active member. Her name is Kim Smith. Sounds awesome! Well i was stoked. We show up at her house and before she even opens the door, i am dying from second hand smoke. ok so she smokes...wuppy who doesn't? Well when she opens the door, her baby dog took that opportunity to run at me. Don't worry, she caught the dog by the scruff of the neck and it yelped. I felt terrible. Despuace said perro experiencia, we entered su casa. It was hard to breathe at first but my lungs soon acclimatized as we were lead to a back room. One look at that room and i though i would die. There was a closet in the back corner that had clothes vomiting from it. There was a deflated blow up mattress in the middle of the floor with boxes, clothes and garbage on top of it. We did not realize till later that there was also a desk mixed in there. Well we started just boxing up these clothes - a combination of both male and female clothing. Libbi you would be proud, i found several spiders and killed them all. Yeah. gross . red spiders. gross gross grossss!!! Entonses, We start talking to Sister Smith and she starts telling us that she hated that her son and this "hill billy skank" -as she referred to her- lived under her roof out of wedlock. She said she knew it was against God and his will. We tried to enforce that but as the conversation went on, we found out that both were in prison. yeah...and then she just said that they did "the crime" together. And then i said 'oh boy. sounds complicated. Will they be there for a while" and she said. Yes. Probably for the rest of their lives. They bludgeoned a man to death....................................WWWWWWWHHHHHHAAAAAATTTTTTTTTTTT!!!!! yeah. We handled murder's clothing. Two of them in fact. But don't worry. The murderous girlfriend had been friends with the missionaries. How do i know this? Oh we found pictures. of them. inside the apartment in which i now live. yEAH. Life is crazy here in Texas.  I am having fun. I am eating the best Mexican food i have ever tasted in my life. I am sure i have already gained  about 15 dress sizes. OH another reason why my area rocks---i get to ride a bike part time. (the elders and us share a car). I am blessed. sooo many blessings in mi vida.

Well this was suuuper long. I"m sorry about that but its been a crazy time. I can't tell you how aw3esome it was to talk to ya'll. I wish we could have talked for longer. I wish i could have a hug but i chose a different path and i need to stick with it. I miss you so much. Please don't ever forget how much i love ya'll. God is real and he is in the details of our lives. I need to learn this language and i have a heart attack every day because i am so bad but i know in whom i trust.

To finish up: i need everyone's hard address because i only have an hour of e-mail time and i have to write president. If you send me letters to the mission home, i won't get them for months because i live so far away. Seriously, send them to my address here. How is David Phillips? How is Ben Lariviera? Jimmy my love how are you?- i'ma write you a song..uuuhhh i mean a letter. :) NO seriously. i am going to write y'all. Its trippy though. Mutti Papa- i love you. Gus sus-i love you (Thank you for your letters both)  I am trying to be all that i can be. I miss you all sooo much. God bless each and every one of you. Utah is so beautiful. Don't take it for granted. Soo much love all an e-mail can contain.

Hermana Sarah Cate Sorensen

219 Avondale #77

Del Rio, Texas

78840

Gracias por su ejemplos en mi vida. Te amo!!!!!

Hermana Sorensen

It looks like Hermana Sorensen is excited to get to Texas!!



Last Words from Provo...On to San Antone

Sorry i live in a bubble here and i don't get to hear much from the outside world. ya'll recieving dos packetas esta semana. Lo siento it took me so long. So the reality of leaving is really hitting me right now. I am dying a little inside. I have gotten so comfortable being here and knowing the people that i've known.

 

So i lied to you. When i said last week was awesome and there was just a little drama....that was an understatement. it was a STINKIN HARD WEEK. Since i am coordinating sister, i had to deal with EVERYONE AND THEIR DOG'S PROBLEMS. And it was just right back in highschool. it killed me. I wish we could all be a little mature sometimes but people must excersice their agency. Oh and on a side note- my spelling has gone from about 5 to a 2 on a scale from 1-10. lo siento. I can't spell or speak in either language now. Es muy divertido no? Entonses, i am growing like a beanstalk. spiritually...and probably physically around but life is fo serious, so good.

 

I have such an amazing support. Thank you rockin family. Thank you rockin family, thank you rockin friends. I just am so stinkin blessed and i don't know why God continues to bless with so much. Tender mercy this week- i have a stalker here. hahah he knows sign language and i signed to him one day. I must have said please stalk me because he does now. Its all good though because its kind of fun remembering that beautiful language. I miss it. I do love espanol though...probably more. Maybe less...no its definitely more.

 

Sooooo the details about my departure: i leave on Wednesday. My companions leave on Monday. i will be a solo sister for a couple of days with two elders as my companions. (Elder Naylor and Elder Baker) - i am sooo  stoked.  I need to be at the travel office on Wednesday at 4 in the a.m. Yeah so i figure i'll probably calling you around 5:45 or 6:00 in the a.m. DON'T ACT LIKE YOUR NOT EXCITED!! yeahh i know its early but i may be able to call a little later but not for long because my plane leaves at 7:10 from salt lake and i go to Phoenix Arizona and get there around 8:55. Then i leave around 9:55. I get to San Antonio around 1:09. Now you know as much as i do.

MY NEW ADDRESS AND PLEASE USE IT!!!

 

hERMANA SARAH CATE SORENSEN

Texas, San Antonio Mission

404 E. Ramsey Rd. ste. 105

San Antonio, Tx. 78216-4665

 

I STINKIN LOVE YOU ALL!! WRITE ME BECASUE I WILL LOVE YOU. hEY COUSINS ON YOUR MISSIONS I LOVE YOU TOO. wHERE MY COUSINS AT THAT LIVE IN sALT LAKE? hOW ARE THEY? hOW THE STINK IS MY FAMILIY? hOW B MY BROS? hOW IS EVERYONE?! I MISS YA'LL I LOVE YOU!

 

CHOW CHOW

 

HERMANA sORENSEN