Dec 6, 2017 #IlluminaElMundo

Sister Blad and I at the beach

Hey Everybody! I hope you had a wonderful week! It's finally December and Christmas is right around the corner! I hope you are enjoying the Light the World. It's so awesome! We show the videos to anyone who will let us and they always love it and we help them serve and feel the Christmas spirit. 

This week has been interesting. It has been interesting to adjust to being an upstate missionary. It is definitely different than being a missionary in the city but it's still really awesome and I'm excited to keep learning here.  Connecticut is such a beautiful place and the members are super solid and strong. I'm really looking forward being in this area. 

 Though it is was really weird being in a bilingual ward. What happened was there was a Spanish ward but about 6 weeks ago it got dissolved and the Spanish members got split into two and got put in English wards so now there are 2 bilingual wards and no Spanish wards. So all the members are trying to adjust to being bilingual ward. So sacrament is in English with Spanish translation then Sunday school is split and is in either English or Spanish, then relief society and priesthood are in what ever language the teacher is speaking in with translation for the other language. It was just a testament that no matter what language we hear the gospel in It is the same. We all feel the same spirit and all worship the same god. I love this church! 

A miracle this week we had asked an investigator couple, Reina and Jose, to do their reading several times and they weren't doing it and weren't progressing so we had a lesson where we were very bold about how they couldn't progress and get their answer if the don't do the assignments we ask them to do. We asked them to read the testimony of Joseph Smith. When we came back we were following up on it and unfortunately Jose still had not done the reading like we had asked, but reina had! She loved what she read so much that she finished reading it and just kept on reading in to 1 Nephi. Though she's still not totally sure if the church is true she does strongly believe it and we know she is on the path to receive her answer. I know that when we were bold with love, the spirit touched her heart and helped her have the desire to change and do what she asked.

I love you all. Have a wonderful week full of the Christmas spirit and please find ways to light the World! 

Love, Hermana Dobson 

Questions from Mom: 

How are you feeling about the transfer?  Are you sad to leave?  I know you loved your ward?

I'm definitely sad  really did love the ward but I'm also really excited to have a new challenge. It will definitely be different! But when transfer calls I definitely cried that night and basically my entire prayer that night was just asking heavenly father to help me feel okay about it. But now I do and so it will be good.  The bilingual ward will be fun.  

Are most of the members in your new ward Latino even though many speak English? No most of them are white, the other ward that meets in our building is from the richest zip code in the country so there aren't a ton of Hispanic people just enough for one Spanish Hermana Companionship.

Tell me more about Hermana Blad.  

How long has she been out? She's been out 14 months 

How long has she been in the area? This is going to be her 4th cycle here in the area. 

Is she Senior Companion. Yep! 

Are there other sisters in your apartment? No there are two bed rooms and the English sisters from the ward used to live here but they don't any more so it's just our one companionship in the apartment but the apartment is really big! It has 2 bathrooms and a giant walk in closet so each of us get our own bathroom and a ton of space! It's really nice! 

 Were you surprised at the split or did you see it coming? I kinda saw it coming but still hoped that it wouldn't happen.

Thanks for the Christmas tree! It looks so cute in our new apartment!