SURPRISE!!!

February 25, 2013

Remember when I got set apart and President Terry told me that I would have many challenges on my mission and seek them out? Well, get ready for the story of the week! :)

So, Monday night while we are planning, Sister Smith comes over and says, “Hey, are the new sisters here yet?”

(P.S. Training was actually in Corpus, not Laredo. :(

We were very confused and said no they are coming tomorrow and

she said, O really, the Choules (housing coordinators) said they are coming up tonight.

(Sister Giles and Sister Dudding confused).

THEN we get a text from Sister Trayner that says “Hey we’re at HEB right now. We have 2 new sisters for you to meet. We'll be there in 10.

Jaw drop

Clean the apartment AGAIN

Wait for new sisters

President and Sister Trayner show up with two greenies that got in on Monday morning.

SURPRISE!

We then worked with the two greenies and a companionship from Laredo for the next three days (two trios).

Then, at the end of the conference, President Traynor announces that Sister Dudding is taking over the island, I'm staying on the Bluff, and we’re both training. Effectively immediately.

Jaw drop. AGAIN.

SOOOOOOOOO, I'm a mommy again. Maybe fifth times a charm. :)

The Leadership Conference was AMAZING! I probably had way more fun than I should have. I just had such an amazing realization this week of how much I LOVE being a missionary and how much I LOVE everyone here. It was interesting being at the point I am in my mission and a lot of my friends being around the same point too and realizing that we all don't have much time left together. It's weird, but fun to all be in the same boat and kicking it up a notch together! I'll have to tell you more of the stories from Leadership Conference post mission if you know what I mean. But one of my favorite moments was role-playing in a group with my district leader and one of my zone leaders and telling my district leader that I would make him cookies if he cried. He had tears streaming down his face. It was NUTS! But seriously, I can't even tell you how much I love everyone here. I hope you are excited to meet my mission friends because I think I have invited every single one of them to our house. :) I can't help myself!

In other news, investigators are doing great! We are looking for two of them to have a baptism on Wednesday. Then we are having one on Sunday and then a few more in the coming weeks! The work up here is progressing amazingly! I can't think of anywhere else I would rather be!

I wish that I could truly tell you everything in my mind right now but I have never been more of an ADD person in my life. I am filled with so much joy that I think I might just burst!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Kate

Go Bluff or Go Home

February 18, 2013

Sister Dudding and I think up new "Bluff" slogans almost every day. We're making t-shirts today for us and the DL and the ZLS with all the funny phrases we have. We're pretty excited. :) We have a leadership conference tomorrow through Thursday of this week and I am super excited! We are having a lot of Sisters come in the field in the next two transfers (15!?!?!) so we Sisters have to get ourselves into gear! But it is cool because our area is SO prepared that they are looking for a place to house the missionaries on the island! What does that mean? It means that they will be splitting our area pretty soon with Sisters in the Bluff AND the island! SO MUCH WORK TO DO! But what will probably end up happening is Sister Dudding and I will get split up and we'll each take over an area. It's nice to know that in advance because we're making sure both areas are set up so that the work continues to go forth without hiccups after the split. So much exciting news up north!

So any cool experiences.....mmmm, when we’re all up in heaven and watching our videos, you can see it all! That is the great thing about this area. Every single moment is a cool experience! We leave every lesson saying "Only on the bluff." I have the hiccups constantly and am probably the happiest I've been on my mission. I love that I can just walk outside and my hair is already a curly mess that looks like I've been at the beach all day. I love being able to contact on the beach. I love being able to visit with people SO prepared to hear the gospel. I love being part of a branch turning into a ward. I love serving with missionaries that are focused on our goal. I love having the goal of baptizing be our zone goal. I love having investigators fall into our laps. I am in the Promised Land, people. It's real.

One such awesome story is this - A super cool, recently-activated family that are starting a BMX track down here in CC. They are hysterical! We went by on Saturday so they could fix Sister Dudding's bike and they told us about the meteor that hit Russia. After a long series of ADD-style comments, we all ended up around the table eating Oreos and talking about who let the autobots into the Celestial kingdom because their 17-year-old son is going to baptize all the autobots that were the real cause of the meteor in Russia. THINGS LIKE THAT DON'T HAPPEN ANYWHERE ELSE BUT THE BLUFF! It is literally a movie all the time.

We also have a wonderful, one-legged Native American member in our area that makes jewelry and every time we go over, he has made us some other new thing. He is making me another necklace right now and a medicine bag. Perhaps, a dream catcher after that. And he always makes us take his food. That is one thing that is the blessing and the curse of Flour Bluff. Because we have a branch all to ourselves of the rock stars of CC, we have a meal appointment literally every day. I am going to become a fatty again. They are so great but it means we eat, A LOT. Then they make us take the leftovers, SO we don't have to buy food besides breakfast items. Ya I know, it's more of a blessing than a curse.

I can't wait to show you all my mission! It is awesome because I have come to terms with the fact that I am going home, and it just makes me work harder. I was in denial about it for a while, but I am past that now. I will be a strong finisher because people remember how you finish your mission, not how you started it. I am ready to rock and roll and BAPTIZE THE BLUFF!

Well, I am off to bigger and better things! (Hobby Lobby. :) ) Talk to you soon!

Sister Giles

New Address

Sister Kate Giles
3917 Sweet Bay Dr.
Corpus Christi, TX 78418

Flour Bluff is Heaven!!

February 11, 2013

So I just told Dad in my email to him that Flour Bluff is HEAVEN! Up here we just call it "the bluff" and it is CRAZY! I wish I could explain it to you but everyone here is just a little bit off, which makes me appreciate it even more! The people are seriously just CRAZY! For example, we got a referral for a guy named Tarzan and a little black girl asked me where my weave was. I feel like I have arrived! The Bluff is the gem of the mission that no one knows about. The Lord is blessing me so much by sending me up here for the end of my mission. Especially with Sister Dudding. She is like the hippy version of me. HYSTERICAL! I have had the hiccups for a week straight.

The bluff missionaries have lived in a little house on a member’s property for years now and because they are doing some stuff to their house, we moved into a smaller apartment they have just behind it. These members are LEGIT and are seriously the best neighbors in the WORLD! So our new apartment is SUPER tiny, but it has a washer and dryer AND an AMAZING shower! But what I love the most is that they have 3 cats and they have stories like a British drama as my companion puts it. It is so funny. Anywho, we have been moving stuff all week and the Elders came today to help us out with the last bit. I think it's good now.

The missionaries up here in Corpus I think are like the unique ones of the mission or something because they are all AWESOME! These are what make them so awesome:

Phrases I have heard in Corpus: (All relate to the work)

You gotta pay the cost to be the boss

Scared money don't make no money

O my swagga stupid

Give it to 'em chunky

And so many more....

We have FUN doing the work up here! And the members are very involved so it helps us out a lot. We are currently helping 7 people come to the waters of baptism! All of whom are LEGIT! One has even purchased tickets for her son to fly down here from Washington to baptize her. I have never been in a place where the people have been SO prepared. I mean, we just had 2 people yesterday show up out of nowhere to church and now want to get baptized. Bring on the miracles! Whoever said the North doesn't baptize is CRAZY!

Another part of the amazingness that is the Bluff; we have North Padre Island in our area. (Mom, look up Hawthorn by Wyndam. I saw it on the island on Saturday) What that means is that half our area is on the beach! People have canals as backyards that they can just take their boats out to the ocean. So we have the bluff, then the bridge, then the island. So where we live on the bluff is a block away from the laguna madre, the body of water between the bluff and the island. It is amazing. In a 5 minute walk, we can see the water. WOW! Anywho, on Saturday we took our bikes to the island and rode them around and went with a member to the beach to help her find some seashells. It was GREAT! I was in awe the whole time that I am literally serving on an island of prepared people. WOW! In the next 3 months, we are getting 15 new sisters, so the rumor is that they are going to split our area and put sisters on the island. I don't know exactly when, but if it’s this transfer, Sister Dudding and I will get split and each work one of the areas. O man. I love everything about this area.

Also, yesterday we had to speak in the YSA ward. We both spoke about becoming and how we can become the people Christ wants and needs us to become. It was great! What was really interesting though is that Sister Dudding and I were singing the sacrament hymn and we were harmonizing and it sounded amazing so I started laughing (naturally) because of how funny it was. I was just thinking like hmmm, I am in the best area with the best people with an awesome companion that can sing, what else is there! HAHA! GOD IS GOOD!

I wish I could more fully put into words how good God is. I am literally SO HAPPY serving up here! The people, the members, the area, my companion, the outrageously small apartment, EVERYTHING seems like it was just made for me. The bluff and its quirkiness is just, perfect. I will send you home some pictures after I figure out how one does that up here. :) We have the best leaders, and the best missionaries. I am just so proud to be a part of the mission and especially a part of the Corpus Zone. We have a leadership training next week in Laredo, so I will get to see Laredo (yay!) but I can't wait to see what crazy things the CC Zone will do. One of our zone leaders came out with me and he is from Miami and has Miami pride, like crazy! So everything is always about Miami. I LOVE IT!

O man, I guess I have to go now. Sister Dudding is going to dye my hair today and then we’re going to go back to work! I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY!!!!!!!!!

I LOVE YOU ALL!

Sister Giles

(Mom-my address is 3917 Sweet Bay Corpus Christi. I don't know the zip. Also, google North Padre Island and Flour Bluff and you can see pictures of my area. And I really do live like a block from the water. It's heaven!)

Kate's District in Brownsville

Corpus Christi -- Here I Come!!

February 4, 2013

I don't know how you figure transfers but you are always a week off. :) That being said, yes, yours truly is getting transferred and replaced by the lovely Sister Holmes! I love her. I will be getting shipped out tomorrow to the land northward known as.....CORPUS CRISTI! I'm really excited. I am going to an area called Flowerbluff and everyone just keeps telling me how beautiful it is. I have the beach in my new area. Just sayin'. Corpus is right on the ocean so that will be a new change. I am going to be with Sister Dudding, who is the Sister I sang with during Christmas. She is great so I am super excited to just hit the ground running tomorrow! Corpus has the reputation of not baptizing as much because it has less of the Hispanic culture, but that won't stop me. If the Lord didn't have prepared people there too, he wouldn't put it in our mission. We are a baptizing mission.

Everything else this week has been good! We have been keeping our heads up as lesson after lesson gets cancelled. :) Such is the life of a missionary. I still love it. We have been doing awesome work down here and I know that Sister Holmes will be able to step in and take over just fine. :)

Well, the rest of the things this week...well...I have to think of something unique that happened. That is the hard part about writing home, everything all just blends together! :)

I got one. I made tamales this week. We helped out the Spanish ward and made a billion tamales for a Relief Society activity. So, I'm basically pro now. :) Except now, I don't want to make them because they have like a billion pounds of Manteca in them. AKA lard. So I'm going to make them with olive oil. Don't judge me. I've had them and they are good.

That is one thing I will miss is being so close to the Spanish and yummy food! And I'll have to use my English tag. :( But I am excited! I actually know English so this should be good!

I think one of my goals should be to baptize someone in the ocean. That would be neat right? I think I'm going to. One of the other Elders did, (heard the story yesterday) so I think it's very possible.  

So, I'm not very good at writing today because I have packing and getting everything ready to go on the brain. I am a very efficient packer though. :) I will be able to get it all done but I think I will be sending some stuff home.

We’re going to lunch today which should be fun. Not entirely sure where we are going but a member suggested it so I'm game. I've really learned how to go with the flow down here. But only when it comes to some things. Other things I say all right, there is definitely a more effective way of doing this. We’re changing it. :) Gotta love that!

Well, gotta go get the laundry. I wish clothes could just wash themselves. I will be inventing that post mission; self-washing clothes. Wish me luck!

Sister Giles