Reno Nevada Group Photo

Dear Missionary Parent,

I am sending you a photo of the group of missionaries that your sweet missionary came with.  (Actually, she arrived the day after.) None the less, we are so happy to have her here and hope this opportunity  will enrich her missionary experience.

Best Wishes,

Sister Douglas

Nevada Reno Mission Secretary

Reno!

Well, everyone, I made it! I don't know where to start...

Okay, we'll start with  back at Temple Square!

Our Zone service Project was going to the Spencer's to pull weeds. Which was fun! They provide us with a lot of delicious tomatoes and other stuff, so we were all glad to go and pull.

The count down to coming to Reno was slow. Packing for a place that no one around you can tell you anything about is a little hard, some people said warm.... most people said warm. One soul said it was going to be cold and see snow. That one soul was correct. 

We had a meeting for Outbound sisters to kind of prep us a bit for our new adventure!

I had my final phone call with Dan from chat. He is so prepared, I really hope he gets baptized while I am gone, that would be great. So when I come back I can see a picture! Woot!

Funny story, we cannot be alone unless we are in the bathroom. The new training sisters and the outbound sisters were all at the trax at the same time on Wednesday. The trax for the trainers came, they got on, but Sis. Matheny from Texas got left behind, and she couldn't come with us and our trax was coming. We told her to go to the Square and then call whoever she could to tell them she was there alone. So, in three months I get to learn how that goes!

Sister Smith A and I enjoyed our airplane ride, and as we got closer we got pretty excited. The plane to Reno was just a little puddle jumper.

Now, guess what? I am in a trio, but not just any trio, I am with two sister training leaders, which is like sister zone leaders, but they don't do numbers or weekly interviews, or anything that a zone leader does. They are there to have exchanges with sisters in the zone, I think. I laughed inwardly because that is really funny, I can't escape being a leader's companion, and this time I have two in one transfer! HA! Sister Smith A. and I are in the same zone!

Oh my goodness there is so much to talk about!

So they evacuated the Puerto Rico Mission, and so our mission just got two new sisters and four new elders... on top of 31 new missionaries with the new transfer. So there are going to be a lot of trios!

Now these sisters used to have a slide phone but it stopped getting texts. Now we have the LG flip! Woot! which are a pain to text with especially because they text a ton every single day. It is like getting the texts on square, but having to respond to every single one of them. 

But we had the idea to type the messages on note of the slide phone, bluetooth it to the flip phone and send the texts that way! So much faster!

Now I talked about leaving a ton really good teaching pool with sister Leavitt. That was heart breaking because the whole of my mission it was never that great! But as I come here, there are FIVEFIVE  people on date! And I think one was set after I came! We teach all the time! There is almost no time for anything else! And we do service in the community weekly.

Now this is almost a whole new world of missionary work! We haven't done any tracting or door knocking (I think this mission has said no to that) because we are busy driving allover the place. We are YSA and Tongan, so you really can't tract for that, you need ask all the time for referrals. We work with less active and I can't believe it all! It is so fun! I kind of went into "I don't know what to do" shell, this past week, but I've been here almost a week and I've been a missionary for over a year (Just past my year mark woot! didn't do anything cool, but teach people in person, so that was the best way to celebrate!), so I'll snap out of it super fast! 

Instead of one hour of church I had 4! Yay!

That's all folks!

Sister Glanzer, I'am from Washington... the dry side, non humid side, like Reno, and Salt Lake City. \_(' ' )_/ I can't escape it. 

Pulling weeds at the Spencer's

My new companions

Sister Tuttle, Sister Wu and me in guest services

Last pictures with the Zone!

Last pictures with the Zone!

Last pictures with the Zone!

Last pictures with the Zone!

Sister Calderon and I are checked out! Her to Spain, me to Reno!

SO MUCH EXCITEMENT! And I Am Leaving It All. ;)

It is very long! 

This week has definitely been pretty WHOA! WOW! WHOA! REALLY? NO WAY! GET THIS! WHOA!

Thursday I got to go to Welfare Square again! Yeah! It was pretty slow. Sister Leavitt did her last exchange for the transfer on Friday, so I got to go to WFS again with Sisters Trevino and Calderon! Now since they speak Spanish, they were asked to join the Spanish VIP tour, they were giving but they were there... and so was I! I only knew what was happening because WFS tours don't really differ. I was just in the back quietly trying to see how much Spanish I knew.

Saturday was Gary's baptism. That was so neat, Sister Leavitt was just smiling the whole time! It was rather interesting to hear elders share The Restoration lesson (they did that while Gary and Bro. Porter were changing) because every meeting, every tour, every companionship study I pass by is always sisters. I don't know how I am going to survive teaching just The Restoration lesson in 45 minutes.  That is gonna be rough. 

Sunday we went to a local ward to speak! We went with three other sisters who sang and gave three minutes little talks. Sister Leavitt and I were to share The Restoration lesson together in five minutes (which what we are aces at). The chorister for the congregation was louder than everybody else. When he started we all almost had a laughing attack! Way to go him, get those people to sing!

Monday... Let me set up everything for you. Typically, they will send out a text the second to last Thursday of the transfer for sisters going outbound. Weeeeell, the Risenmay's went somewhere and weren't going to get back until Monday...  All of us anticipating outbound.

SOOOOO Sunday night, Sister Tuttle wanted to be with us until I got the text, and then Sister Smith S. from New Zealand and Mazza (when I was w/Sis. Tripptree (AKA Jess)) were locked out so they joined us. We had hot chocolate, then the text came! They left.
Sister Smith M. came home, super excited so we ran around telling everyone what was going on!

Now Monday, 10 of us are going. We are all lined up to get the new assignment!
badadadadadddadadaddadaddadadddadadadaddadadaddadadadadaddadadaddaddaddadadadaddadadadadddadadaddadddaddadadadaddadadadadaddadaddadddadaddadadadadadadadadadadaddadadaddaddadadadada

RENO NEVADA MISSION! WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! The boundaries are huge! I go from the smallest mission to one of the bigger ones in the US. Trading Desert for desert.  Sister Smith A. and I are going there! 

https://classic.lds.org/maps/#ll=35.139328,-83.9859&z=4&m=google.road&layers=ward&q=renonevada mission&find=mission:1480588 

This is the link to where it is! 

Now, a funny thought about outbounds, I always thought it would be funny if I got assigned to Peter's mission while he was still out. Now he is barely home, but they are sending three sisters there! Ha! Fun!
For out bound (three months), I can only bring one 50 lb suitcase, a carry on and a bag. Now, there are things I will need when I get back to TS, so I get to leave my other suitcase and a big box of stuff for when I get back! YAY! 

Tuesday, we had a great flap pole tour. There were three older couples from, the USA, Australia, and NE England. Fun group. 

Wednesday, today. A week ago I sent a lady from the UK to the locals. Called her today, she is on date for baptism for 9-22-17, . That is super amazing! Heavenly Father is just blessing us left and right these past few weeks! And I am leaving it all behind, but for something just as good, to be there in person to teach! 

We actually have three investigators in Florida, so we hare praying super hard for them. As far as we know they're okay. Dan is one of them, and he is super cool. He is 62 and still working hard. I grabbed his chat from the que and he was asking about the Humanitarian Aid we as a church were providing for Huston. Which lead to me asking if he want to keep in touch so we could teach him the reason why we are so effective (The Restoration). When we finally called, this is how it ended. 

Sis. Leavitt: Dan, when you find these things to be true, will you follow the example of Chirst, and be baptized by someone who holds the proper priesthood of God?
Dan: Yeah, I want to learn more though. Is there someone here I can talk to? Something I can read?
Me: YEAH! There are local missionaries and the Book of Mormon and......

So Dan is pretty golden.

That's the week!
Sister Glanzer from WA State!

PS. So as I have made cookies here I was having trouble getting them to  be like the cookies I made at home. I had a hard time thinking that elevation was the effect. AND I WAS RIGHT TO JUDGE THAT AS WRONG! I have been using baking POWDER instead of baking SODA this whole time. Eleven months, it took me 11 months to figure that out. They were kind of bready. 

PPS. Sis. Smith M. - Blond sister from Gilbert AZ and was in my MTC district, has been my roommate the last three months.

Sis. Smith A. - Brunette sister from Gilbert AZ, was in the MTC district next door, was in my district last transfer, going to Reno with me.

Sis. Smith S. - She is from New Zealand, Maori (pronounced  moe-T), visa waited in her country. 

All the Brazilians!

Gary is the bald man, and these are the missionaries who taught him (except me, I just jumped in)

Got our Texts

8 of 10 sister going out, front to back. Sis. Blocker TX, Coleman TX, Boutille (boo-twah) France, Smith M. AZ, Shin Myanmar (Burma), Me! Zeller MA, Smith A. AZ. Not pictured Richey WA (She told everyone she didn't get a text-She lied to us)  Gemio Bolivia/ VI.

The district plus the Elders giving us the tour!

We were chewing gum and I was too lazy to take it off

The long awaited text

Seriously, the busy season is practically gone, and I can almost sit on my hair!

Miracles and Blessings!

Okay okay okay.

So life is going by so fast sometimes that I don't even remember what has happened. Oops. Maybe this is a great time to repent and write in my journal more often. 

Now I haven't been to Welfare Square for the longest time, so I don't have any fun stories from there. Sad, I know. This transfer we only go on Thursdays, so, so far I have missed two days because of zone conference and interviews and the potential to have the last Thursday of the transfer be our service project. So it really is like Square is my assignment, not Welfare Square. 

Zone Conference was amazing, as always. The thing that stood out to me the most was a training given by the Zone Leaders of the East 2 Zone. They took snippets from the movie "Ephraim's Rescue" (which is one of the three movies we are approved to watch). There was a phrase that he said, "A desire that was planted in my heart." There are callings I would have like to have had or served in, but I didn't desire it. It was never planted in my heart, perhaps my head for a time. And that is fine. There are some sisters that want to have certain callings soooooooo bad, that when they get or don't get texts it is a very dramatic response. That has a lasting effect for quite some time after.

Now lets talk about miracles and blessings!

These past few days we have found some very open and golden folks online. Really, we have! Super exciting! Sister Leavitt says that I will be leaving her with a huge teaching pool if I go outbound (We don't know yet). We can see that there are quite a few people around the US that are on date for baptism (5) and we are actually going to a baptism this Saturday! 

This was the event I am going to tell is HUGE! So sister Leavitt and I got done taking a GP of a big Polynesian family. Then a man came asking of it in Spanish, so we went searching for Spanish sisters. We found him again telling him they were on their way. Now, as we sent them in with the sisters, two men come up to us. One was a member I have talked with a few times as he has brought people to the Square, and the other is a man that Sister Leavitt taught her 2nd and 3rd transfer, Gary. Now right then and there we learned that Gary will be getting baptized this Saturday! Gary is like in his 60's, and was homeless when she started teaching him, but know, she says, he looks a lot better. He has also been meeting with local missionaries for the last 3 months and has finally found these things to be true! It was so amazing. 

This transfer has been a pretty interesting transfer. Most of it I have asked to keep confidential, but it has been CRAZY CRAZY at times. So we view these people as blessings from Heavenly Father for our diligence, and I think more for Sister Leavitt than for me, being a district leader isn't easy. I know, all but one of my companions has been one! But then even later she became one. 

I forgot to say! So a few weeks ago, when ever it was transfer time for the Yakima mission, there was quite a few fresh returned missionaries roaming The Square with their families, like fresh off the plan. One of them was Elder Dalton! Granted he was only in Oroville/Tonasket for a couple weeks before I left, but that was still neat to see him. Then, later on there was sister just kind of like, "oh look sister missionaries!" She too had returned home from Yakima, I don't remember her name, but she had served in the Ephrata area for a time Spanish speaking. 

The Mormon community for some people is SUPER small. There was a sister that served 12 years ago who came by herself to see the basement. She was very emotional as she walked around, remembering her mission, but her mission president is friends with the Risenmays. Go figure. Part of me wants to live in super Mormon place so I can have things like that happen, then the other part is.... that is too many people, how will my children know what the world is like.... maybe a mild Mormon place, Like the Ephrata ratio! That seems pretty good. But they have to have the joy of early morning seminary like me and many that came before them. 

Good day all!

Sister Glanzer

Sister Leavitt drying her shirt in the bathroom

This is the usual Welfare Square Thursday Shift, minus three of us. Sister Colemen form TX, Sister Jeong from South Korea and Sister Jansen from Brazil

Our zone activity was last P-day, but I thought I need to make up for the lack of pics last week

Zone activity

Zone activity

The only squirrel I have seen here in Utah

We celebrated Sister Smith A's Bday as well. She is now 20. The other sister is Sister Newlin from North Carolina

Our distrct activity, we went to the Central Bishop Store House. IT WAS HUGE! So I took a few pictures, and sister Calderon had the rest.

Bishop's Storehouse

Bishop's Storehouse

Bishop's Storehouse

Look Who Found Allison!

Kyle Adrus found Allison!

"It was very odd kind of how it happened. I was on a temporary exchange with Sister Jansen from Brazil and Sister Leavitt comes into the TC saying, your brother's best friend is here. My thought was Kyle? But then she kept talking and said that he had a brown dog with him, so then I thought, Andy is here under disguise with Sammi? So we walked towards the door that are up the steps of the NVC and I totally thought it was Andy because I couldn't see the face, whaaat? No. but then this random lady came up to and said that someone here really want to see me. Random. It was Kyle's mom! That was fun!!