Loving My Life Here in Lodi

Dearest Familia,

Lodi is way different but I love it here so much! I was a little worried about how everything would go here in Lodi because I didn't know if it could get any better than East Sac. It's amazing how your heart can grow and open up even bigger. Seriously though, soon it won't be able to fit in my chest anymore because there are so many great people to love. It's amazing how fast you come to love others when you see them as a Child of God and only desire their salvation. I have the best life ever! Hermana Pitcher is so great, we are working hard and having a great time. We are going to be very busy with all the meetings we attend as Sister Training leaders. Sis. Pitcher and I are so excited.  To answer your question---A Sister Training Leader is like a zone leader pretty much but more spread out. We have exchanges, lots of meetings, write transfer reports, do projects from the President etc. My new district leader is Trevor Bennett from the 1st ward in our Heatheridge Stake from Orem, Utah.

I know you have a lot of questions so I will do my best to answer them. All the Hispanics here are really into "Herbal Life" and there are lots of vineyards. Free wine tasting signs everywhere in the fields. The fields cover a lot of our area.  So we are a little branch out here.  It is Lodi and Galt Spanish members combined. The branch is incredible! The members are so awesome, love missionary work and love the missionaries. We get fed every single night haha. Also our ward mission leader, Hermano Ku, is great and really focused on doing everything he can to help us succeed. Everyone is really into missionary work, it's like a dream come true. Brenda is my new best friend. She is 20 and waiting for her call right now. She goes out with us all the time and has such a pure heart. I love her so much! We are so lucky she comes with us and testifies during lessons, so powerful. Hopefully she will get her call soon, she has been waiting since July!

We have a mixed district here which is weird haha but its good. Our district has the zone leaders, 2 of the English Sister Training leaders, the Lodi Spanish elders and Lodi English elders (so our district leader is an English Elder). It is way different but good so far, lots of great missionaries out here!

Friday I was invited to the new leadership meeting for newly called district leaders, zone leaders and sister training leaders. Somehow the assistants found out I can play the piano and asked me to play for the meeting. The playing went ok, but it was a really good meeting! I learned a lot about my responsibilities, how to be a good leader and do my best!

Investigators: We have Gabriela and she is great. She is a manager of Burger King, I only met with her for a minutes because she is so busy but she wants to be baptized this month so that is exciting!

The best story of all is about la familia Campos and their son Isaac. He is 14 and already starting to be a missionary! This week he decided to invite his friend Juan to seminary. Guess what!? Every morning Juan came! He really liked it and accepted the invitation to come to church. So yesterday was testimony meeting and very powerful. Isaac bore his testimony to and Juan seemed to really enjoy church. We got to meet him after and are having an FHE tonight with Juan and the Campos family. We are so excited! They are such a great family and look what happened all because Isaac invited him to seminary? We can all be missionaries!! I encourage all of you to think about ways you can invite nonmembers to church activities. 

Jesus is 21 and is a searcher! He is Catholic so he is held back a bit. but just by talking to him you can tell he is yearning for the truth. We had a great lesson with him at church.  We talked about what we do during our block of meetings. The spirit that exists in this holy place.  Everyone felt the spirit so strong.  We had to cancel our first lesson.  He didn't end up coming because his girlfriend called him from the Navy (she only gets to talk for a short time and it's random). So hopefully he will come next week. Something funny happened though. We met his grandfather visiting from Mexico and when he shook my hand he said, "Oh... la huera. Sientate conmigo" hahahaha. We were all laughing so hard. Translated---white girl, speaking Spanish, confounding all.

We were able to watch the Relief Society Broadcast in Spanish and it was so powerful. I loved how the Relief Society talked about the importance of keeping our sacred covenants. It is so vital, and I am coming to understand that more and more each day. How truly blessed are we to be able to partake of the Sacrament every week, attend the temple and make and keep promises.

Sorry this letter is so scattered, but I love you all so much. I hope you have a great week and I can't wait to hear about which talks from General Conference really stood out to you!

Con Amor,
Hermana Thomas

My new companion Sis. Pitcher from Park City 

My new friend Brenda (back seat) preparing to serve a mission