May 1, 2017 – Omak

Had to get a pic with all of us before I left.
Jose is so cool!! I miss him and his kids.

Hey so this week has been pretty sweet. I had to say goodbye to a lot of really cool people in Wenatchee, which was kinda sad, but it's been super fun to meet everyone up here in Omak. To give you a little info about my area - I am actually serving in an English ward that has a little tiny Spanish group attached to it, and because of this I am actually doing both English work and Spanish work, which is super new to me. There are a lot of areas like this in the mission but up until now I haven't been in one. I've been fortunate I guess you could say but I am super excited to be doing some English work as well. It'll be a little different but it's going to be super fun. Elder Allsop and I have already seen some pretty amazing things happen.

I'm serving in the Omak Ward which is part of the Ephrata stake and I am one of two sets of missionaries in the ward. Our area is technically the towns of Okanagon and Mallott, which are two towns just south of Omak. There's not a whole lot of people in those areas and even fewer Hispanics, but there are certainly a lot of Native Americans. Just outside of Omak there is an Indian reservation and so a lot of the people that we talk to have direct Native American descent which is pretty cool. It's also really interesting because most of them have no Christian background.

The Purple Palace! Our apartment in Omak.
We live in the upstairs apartment.

The ward members are super cool. I may or may not be related to one of them. One is actually from Cedar Hills and went to Lone Peak back in 2008, the rest are pretty amazing. We are the only ward that uses our building so it's pretty small. Our chapel back home could probably eat it three times. It's kinda funny everyone here in Omak and Okanagon know exactly where the church building is. It's right in the parking lot of the only Wal-Mart around.  

So I got to jump right into working with some pretty cool

This is the Villalobos family. They are such a strong family.
Brother Villalobos would literally do anything we asked
him to, and he has been a huge part of the
success of the ward recently in Wenatchee. ​

investigators. One is this small family of 4. The parents are Jeff and Amanda and the kids Quinn and Ty. When I got here they had never come to church but had met a lot with Elder Allsop and Elder Harman, they'd been to the church building several times for activities and for a church tour but for some reason the idea of going to the church was scary for them. So Saturday night we had a lesson with them and our only goal was to make sure they got to church. So we talked about church for 45 minutes with them, and just broke down every excuse they may have, and gave them as many good reasons to go as possible. We focused a lot on their kids, and how going to church would affect their kids more than anything. Our member, Sister White (she's the wife of the guy form Cedar Hills), bore some seriously strong testimony about how the only way their kids are going to learn about God is by them doing things. She got pretty bold with them which was super awesome! And they came to church Sunday morning!! They only stayed for Sacrament, that's all that they would commit for, but at least they got there, and they really enjoyed it. Hopefully next week we can get them to come for all three hours.

This is Nancy. She's the one Elder Cannon
and I were working a lot with before I left.
She's hopefully is getting baptized this month.

We also taught this really cool girl named Eva who is super prepared. She loves the Gospel and really wants it in her life. She loves church and loves the ward. She's also doing super well. We had a lesson with her on Saturday and we taught the Plan of Salvation, and she totally loved it. She thought it was so cool. She didn't come to church yesterday because she got really sick in the night but we have a lesson set up with her for tonight.

This is Brother and Sister Clive and their little boy Russell. He is the Ward Mission Leader in the Spanish Ward in Wenatchee and he is a lot like Brother Villalobos. He would do anything for us, and they fed us every Thursday, and the food was always so good! Brother Clive has probably some of the best Spanish I have ever heard, and he's teaching little Russell which is so cool! Russell's Spanish is amazing.

I am super stoked to be in this area and to work with Elder Allsop. I love teaching with Elder Allsop, it already feels like we've been companions for a long time. In the MTC we thought it was funny because we had basically the same personality and ideas, and now actually working together is super cool. I feel like I'm working with myself. It's kinda strange, but I love it! We honestly work so well together. 

-- 

Elder Miles

Washington Yakima Mission

This is Ivan and Melissa! They're Jose's kids and they are probably the cutest kids I have ever met. They look like twins but Melissa is a year and a half older than Ivan. He just turned four and she's been five for a while, but he's bigger than her which is pretty funny.

This is Jr. and Julissa Zavala. There family came to church once and we were working with them for a little while. They're pretty cool. 

This is Esteban, Liliana, and Aldo. They would feed us the best Mexican food every Wednesday. Liliana was our "Mom" in the Spanish ward. She made such good Mexican food and I'm super stoked to show some of it to you all.