The Brazilian Heat........errr....I mean......

well i guess i shouldn't really complain because i am sure it is much hotter in hurricane right now, but it is probably more humid here :/ time here in tacoma has really started to slow down, which is going....cause it gives me time to think haha :D tacoma is a lot different than lakewood...mostly because it isn't filled with ghetto apartment complexes with humbled people....it is more like a lot of houses with old fogeys who have been around for 50+ years and are set in there religions :/ so i really have no idea what to say right now, so I'm just throwing in some random things lol :) I am serving in the Lincoln Ward in Tacoma as the Senior Companion to Elder Hepler...he has been out for 8 months I believe and he is a really good and motivated missionary, who was trained out in Forks (thats vampire land for all the girls out there) <_<....>_>.....^v^ lincoln is a bike area, but unfortunately i have to borrow another missionaries bike cause the bike i own is broken now :/ i guess i should have given heed to all the reviews that were on the internet when i got the bike haha... but it's ok, i should be able to get it fixed within the week or so :D

Jackie B.

TACOMA!!!!!!!!!

so i guess it has finally happened....i have gone to serve in the heartland of the mission....Tacoma Washington.....it is way different that lakewood...it is like 20 times bigger that lakewood, and there are so many ghetto houses crammed onto every street...i am guessing that i will probably be serving in the tacoma area for at least 4-6 months...so probably till about 20 months total :D which will probably fly by. not much really too exciting is happening though right now, except last week end we baptized 2 women who were supposed to get baptized with 3 other people a few weeks ago so that was exciting


215 S. 40th ST.
Tacoma, WA 98418

Week 6 of the 10th transfer

So i really have no idea what i wanna say in this blog, but i geuss i should say something since i didn't type one last week.....not much is going on here and things in lakewood have really started to slow down, which kinda is bad cause we don't have many baptisms coming up in the next couple of weeks...transfers are this monday (19)
and I have no idea if i am staying or leaving...i have been here for a very long time and i am starting to get burnt out of the area, i am very curious about what the next 9.5 months will be like....i know it is going to go by really fast, and i hope that i can continue to see success in the area i go to....right now i have been in washington 59 weeks and i have 33 baptisms which means i have an average of a baptism every other week which is really good and above average for most missionaries here....i would really like for me to hit weekly though, and come home with 104, but that won't probably happen haha, but we'll see. i guess that one thing worth noting and will probably be mentioned in my homecoming is that we have a homeless guy living with us at the moment haha (we got permission from the landlord)
so now we have a homeless guy, a less active drunk member and the landlord with his wife at our place, plus us 4 missionaries makes 8 people haha.

i really hope to hear from all of you soon, cause i miss all of you so much!!!

JACKIE B.
ps. if anyone is going to send a letter this week then send it to the mission office

4007 Bridgeport Way W. ste-d
university place, WA 98466

miracle baptism

so a few weeks ago there were a couple child of record baptisms...which don't count for missionaries...well apparently one of the kids that got baptized was never blessed as a baby and was actually living with his aunt...so it turned out to be a convert baptism, so im really happy about that :D not much else is going on...sorry i don't write any letters :/ i will try to write one this week and let people know a little more about what has been going on...i hope everbody is doing great and just wanna wish my sister a big HAPPY BIRTHDAY

MISS YOU ALL VERY MUCH

JACKIE B.

The Habanero Challenge!!!!!!!!!!

have any of you ever been in a time in your life when you think that nothing could possibly get any worse? that you have gone through so much pain and agony and suffering that the only thing left to do is hope that it miraculously goes away? that happened to me.....when i took the HABENORE CHALLENGE!!!! this was no small task....the habenero is a mexican pepper that is ridiculously hot (DO NOT EAT ONE!!!) they are gross and extremely painful...for about 4 hours i was sitting in my apartment in so much pain that the only thing in my mind was "i wanna kill myself" it hurt so bad, that i think i can honestly say that my appreciation of the atonement has grown dramatically. to give you an idea of how hot and painful it was here is a quote from a missionary after he took the challenge "i would rather have my arm cut off rather to have ever eaten that stupid pepper!" ~elder manuele

manuele just happens to be from st george so i give him mega props :D

not much else to crazy is going on right now...just the usual mission stuff :D i did go to coldstone for the first time and i just have to say that it was the greatest ice cream place i have ever eaten :D

hope to hear from you guys soon :D MISS YOU ALL!!

JACKIE B.

bummed yet pumped

so i am really sad to say that all 5 baptisms did not go through :( but at least 2 of them did so i am really happy about that :D transfer calls came last saturday and i found out that i was yet again staying in lakewood for another transfer, which blew me out of the water yet again....not to mention the new companions i got...first one is elder schull who actually lived with me and palmer in yelm....speaking of palmer he is also my companion AGAIN!!!! i served with palmer in yelm then i left for 2 transfers then we were comps in spanaway then i came to lakewood for 2 transfers now he got transferred to lakewood an i just happened to stay so this is our 3rd time together and will make a total of 6 months after this 6 week cycle.

My success as a missionary here in the great town of lakewood.

so this week end our companionship has 5 people on date for baptism...which will put me at a grand total of 34 (well i guess i should say "grand total" cause i still have 10 months left haha) but i realized that after these 5 baptisms i will have doubled my converts on my mission since i came back to lakewood 12 weeks ago. and i was wondering why it took me 7 transfers (42 weeks)to get my first 17 baptisms and only 2 more transfers (12 weeks) to double it to 34... and i really believe and know that it is because of my excitment towards being a missionary, not that i wasn't excited before, but i feel that i had other things on my mind that were slowing me down (things like home, family, what i want to get into for schooling and stuff). when i came back to lakewood it really hit me about how fast 2 years goes by. so i have been really focused on the people i have been teaching and progressing them rather that worrying about my own personal things that don't even need to be thought about at this time. hopefully i can keep this excitment up as i get transfered to new areas :D

i love you all and miss you guys so much

JACKIE B.