It's A Girl!!

Dear family,

Please do not be alarmed by the subject of this letter. But do know that I am indeed going to have a child! I'm TRAINING!! Let me explain. In the mission, we refer to our trainers as our mom, and our trainees as our babies! So when we get training calls, we are pregnant! And I am pregnant!! I'm so excited! Hermana G-G goes home this week, and I will pick up my new companion Thursday morning. I can't wait! So my last two transfers in the mission I will be training. 

Hermana Kofford is so excited to be a grandma, but she goes home this week as well, so she won't get to meet her grandbaby. :( But Mom, you're right, Hermana Kofford ended up finding an internship in Alabama, so she is moving out there for a couple months after she gets home. But thanks for being willing to take her in! 

So Bryce is in the MTC!! Oh my gosh! I'm so excited. I bet it's so weird to only have 2 kids at home! Hey Dad, if you do end up selling the truck and getting something smaller, start looking for me too. That's going to be a purchase that I'll probably want to make soon after getting home. 

So it's crazy, but I've been thinking about Bryce all week. I thought about him when he got set apart, and when he entered the MTC, and it's been amazing because I've felt a difference. I've really felt blessings from having another missionary in the family. I've had more energy and I've been able to get things done more effectively. It's awesome. Missionary work truly does bring blessings!

This week we also got to go to women's conference. I LOVE that meeting. The talks were all so good, and I was going to bring my notes to share some of my thoughts with you, but I forgot. Whoops! But I loved the focus on the temple. And I loved how they talked about preparing for the temple. Something that I took from that is that each time we go to the temple we need to prepare ourselves to go. We should think of things we need help with, questions we have, or just things that we are grateful for, and prepare ourselves to be spiritually uplifted. We get to go to the temple next week and that's something I'm going to try to do. I really want to prepare myself to go and feel the spirit in that sacred building. 

So guess what? We just found out that we get to have a special missionary screening of "Meet the Mormons!" I'm super excited. Hermana Fuentes has already seen it because she was serving on Temple Square, and she said it was really good. Rumor is that it's playing for free at the Joseph Smith Memorial building, so that would be a good place to go see it, but also paying to go to a theater to see it will keep it in theaters longer. So that's something to consider! But I say, go see it! I hear it's awesome and really good. So go see Meet the Mormons. I haven't seen it, so I can't tell you anything other than to go see it, but I bet it's worth it! 

I love you all, and I hope you have a great week. I'm praying for all of you! Wish me luck with the greenie!! I'm so excited! Love you all!

Love,

Hermana Bingham

 Me, Adairis, Angelo, Miguel, and Hermana Kofford. This family is one of our old investigators in our first area. They still aren't members, but they are the best!

 My mommy and me!

 This is the closest thing to a 3 generation picture we will get. 

Kofford, me, and her hand on my pregnant belly. :) 

  Pregnancy pics. Yeah, we're nuts! But doesn't that look kind of real? :)

Hermana G-G and me :)

You know how people take pictures of their naked bellies? 

Well, this is mine. Yup, I used my laundry bag. :)

This is it!

HELLO FAMILY!

Oh my goodness, Bryce gets set apart tonight!! In just a couple hours! That is so exciting! I've been dying all day! I just can't wait! I'll  be in an appointment with an investigator, but I'll think of you! Go get them dude! 

Also, sorry for emailing so late! We took a bus down to Santa Cruz for pday yesterday. It was fun, and I got pretty sunburnt, but Today it doesn't hurt very bad so it's all good. But it took all day, so that's why I am emailing today! 

It's been a crazy week. The most exciting piece of news is that we got another sister! So I told y'all about how Sister Quintana got emergency transfered so Sister Boyd was companions with us again right? Well, Thursday morning we went and picked up Sister Fuentes to be Sister Boyd's new companion! Sister Fuentes is from Chile, and she is currently serving a mission in the temple square mission. But something cool about temple square sisters is that for 3 months they get assigned to another mission, so they get to come out and have a totally different experience! Their transfers are different than ours, so she came in on Thursday, and will go back to Utah on December 10th, 7 days before I do! So I told her I would come see her on Temple Square. She's awesome, and Hermana Boyd is so happy to have a companion again. They are working hard, and things are going great. And Hermana Fuentes is super fun. She's a sweetheart. I'll take you all to temple square to meet her. You'll love her. :)

Here's another crazy story of the week! So yesterday when we got back from Santa Cruz, we had just enough time left to go grocery shopping. So we went to Grocery Outlet, and shopped there. I only took my wallet in, because my purse had clothes and stuff in it. We did all our shopping, and took the groceries out to the car, and took them home, and went about our nightly business, came home, and cleaned a little, and fell asleep. Well, this morning I woke up and realized my wallet wasn't in my purse, or anywhere in the apartment. So I prayed to know what to do and to be able to find it. I decided that after studies we would go to the car to look for it, but ALL during personal study I couldn't stop thinking about where it could be. And I got really nervous, because my companion can't drive, so if my drivers license was gone, then we would have to walk, or bike, and I would have to cancel all my cards, and I wouldn't have any money, and I was so nervous. So I asked Hermana G-G if we could go look for it in the car, so we did, but it wasn't there. We searched the ENTIRE car, but nothing. So by then I'm close to tears and throwing up because my tummy hurt and I was nervous (bad combo), but we go inside and I call 411 to get the number for Grocery Outlet. Then I call them, and THEY FOUND IT! I was so happy I cried. Big surprise right?  But we couldn't go get it until later in the day. So i came to terms with the fact that probably something would be missing out of it, but when we went and got it, everything was still inside. Nothing was missing. It was a HUGE tender mercy, and a miracle. I am so grateful that Heavenly Father answers prayers, and that there are still good people on earth! :) But really, it seems like something so simple, but for me it was a huge miracle. I know my Heavenly Father knows me and loves me and wants the best for me. I'm so grateful for that. 

I hope you all have a fantastic week. I love you all, and I'm praying for you all! I love you Bryce, you will make an amazing missionary! Get me your info ASAP! I love you!

Love,

Hermana Bingham

GG and I sharing a shake for a birthday lunch for another sister

 Saying goodbye to Hermana Quintana

 Helping at a stake 5K

 Diana made this beautiful sticker decorating person thing. It's suppose to be me. :)

We look exactly the same, right?

 At the beach, under the wharf.

 Me under the wharf

 Missionary tag

 Roomies! Hermana Boyd, Hermana Fuentes, me, Hermana GG

Selfie of Hermana Boyd, Hermana Fuentes and me. I look kind of like a tomato. :)

Back in a trio--at Chipotle!

I'm a nerd... how many can you name?

Ward culture night!

One Crazy Week

Dear family,

Sounds like you all had a fun week! The tough mudder looks like it was a blast! We'll all have to do it sometime!

That's so funny that this week went by fast for you, because it was really slow over here! It was mostly just CRAZY, so time went by slower. Let me start at the beginning:

Monday night I was folding our laundry from early, when all of a sudden Hermanas Boyd and Quintana come out of their room and toss their phone at me, both of them crying. Immediately, I knew something bad was going to happen, and when I saw President's name on the phone, I knew someone was either leaving, or someone had died. So I picked up the phone and talked to President, and he had me put it on speaker. He explained to us that hermana Fischetti (remember her from like a year ago) is super sick and has to end her mission 9 weeks early. Problem is that that leaves her companion companion-less. This companion is also a brand new missionary. So President felt like Hermana Quintana needed to be emergency transferred to go up and finish training this new missionary, and that she would go to her new area Wednesday morning. So we spent the night crying, and then Wednesday morning we drove Hermana Quintana to San Jose to be picked up by her new trainee. It was really sad. So that left Hermana Boyd, Hermana G-G and I back in a trio, but this time covering two areas. Problem is that our areas are pretty far away from each other, and there's usually lots of traffic getting from one to the other. So we have been left with the challenge of working in both areas, reporting numbers separately, trying to find members to come help us, and dividing time between the two areas. Lets just say it's been insane. It's super hard, because we all have things that we need to do in our different areas, but trying to condense that down so we can work 50-50 in each area is really difficult. But we're working on it, and we think we have something figured out. in two weeks we'll go back up to 4 missionaries, but the two weeks will be hard. But we'll do it! It's been really fun though. 

Friday we got to have our ward Cultural night activity in honor of the 16 of September, which is Mexican Independence day. I bet you all thought that was 5 de Mayo huh? Well, it's actually el 16 de septiembre! surprise! But we had a fun activity, and you got to see the videos and everything. We got special permission to do the dance, and it was super fun. I felt like a real Mexican. :) Just kidding. But it was really fun to be able to participate and learn a little bit about the culture. They also asked the missionaries to sing something, so that was fun too. :) The member that keeps sending you videos and pictures is Hermana Martinez. Her son is serving in SLC so she is super good to missionaries, and always wants to send pictures and videos home to parents--she gets it. :) She's a sweetheart. I love her so much! 

Then on Sunday we found out that the sewer pipes had been backed up at our church building, and the carpets needed to be cleaned and none of the bathrooms were working. So church was cancelled, and we spent an hour yesterday morning calling and texting the whole ward and getting information on different spanish services. We ended up going and visiting in a little branch that's pretty close to our house. A lot of our members were there too, and it was really fun. I think we tripled the attendance of the branch yesterday. :) 

It's been a crazy week, but a big learning experience and I'm grateful for every minute. I hope you all have a great week. Good luck with final mission preparations, with school, with work, and whatever else you have going on! I love you all, and hope you have a fantastic week!

Love,

Hermana Bingham

Here are the pictures and videos I received from Hermana Martinez this week: 

1 Hacker Way

Dear family,

I'm glad you got the pictures from Hermana Ponce. She is an active member that we work with a lot because she's going through a really rough time right now. She's a sweetheart and takes good care of us. In the pictures we are about to eat some pan dulce, so basically bread with lots of sugar on top. That specific one we were eating is called a concha. It's super delicious. Usually you eat them with hot chocolate or milk or coffee if you aren't Mormon. :) I would suggest hot chocolate. But the good Mexican kind. Don't worry, I'll bring some home. :) Probably not the bread, because it would get stale. We'll just have to ask the Finkenthals where a good panaderia is. :) Or I'll just go to the Mexican stores. they'll probably have it. :)

That's so crazy that Bryce is leaving in two and a half weeks! and shortly after that I'll be starting my second to last transfer. Crazy! It's so weird how fast time flies. Bryce, the mission will the the longest, hardest, but shortest thing you have ever done. That sounds really weird, but I'm serious. Days are long, but the weeks and months and transfers FLY by. You'll be so exhausted, but you won't want to trade it for the world. And then at the end of your time, you'll wish you had more. Trust me. So just live it up from the first minute. Enjoy EVERYTHING! 

I'm super excited to come home and help you with those sealings! It will be super fun. I'll just live in the temple my first week home. Sound good? We'll do all the names you can find, and then go home and find more! I'm excited. I miss being able to go to the temple all the time. 

This week has been full of miracles AGAIN! Wow, this area is amazing. So I was all stressed out this week because Amada and Bernardo are now members, so the problem of "what do we do now?" arouse. But only for a second, because we know we just have to go find. But sometimes it's stressful! But we were do blessed for our diligence. I was on exchanges up in Menlo Park on Thursday, and Hermana GG and another sister went and stopped by Adriana's house. Adriana is a recently re-activated member that introduced Amada and Bernardo to the gospel. She lives with the father (Andres) of her two girls, who is not a member. They are planning on getting married in November (hopefully we can push that up). So Andres has not really been interested in learning more. We've taught him a couple times, and the last time we went we thought that there was no potential there. That he was completely uninterested, and that we needed to give him some time. But, on Thursday when Hermana GG stopped by, he was there. And he was a totally different person. He brought out chairs for them, smiled, was happy, and told them he was planning on coming to church on Sunday, because he asked for Sundays off. They only had time to talk him for a minute, but then on Sunday he showed up to church, and was a COMPLETELY different person. He was happy, and he really enjoyed it! Then Sunday night we talked to him more, and taught him the restoration. He was really interested, had a smile on his face the whole time, and said that he wants to gain a testimony of his own. He wants to know for himself. He accepted a baptismal invitation, and is going to pray about a date. It was a miracle. He is completely changed. The Lord really does soften people's hearts and has prepared people to receive the gospel. It was such a testimony building experience. 

Thanks for all the support and love you give. I love you all, and I pray for you all the time. I hope you have a fantastic week. Love you!

Love,

Hermana Bingham

Amada gave us ice cream, and 10 year old Nicole topped it with a cheezit. Yum

Drove past FB headquarters while in Menlo Park on exchanges. No big deal. 

Amada and Bernardo

Hello family!

Yesterday I kept thinking about how Bryce was giving his farewell talk! That's so crazy!! I bet he did wonderfully! I would love a copy of the talk! (hint to Bryce). Also, if you want any information about Argentina, we have a member of our ward from Argentina, and she said you could give her a call. Her name is Claudia Auxier, and her english is really good, so no worries there! But if you want to ask her some questions, she is up for it. She has some family in Mendoza so maybe she can give you a few hints as to what to expect. Her number is (650) 400-2169. 

Our week was awesome. Amada and Bernardo got baptized!!! It was so incredible! Their 10 year old daughter Nicole didn't though, but that's alright. That was super up in the air. Nicole has some learning disabilities, and her mental stage is that of a 3 or 4 year old. But she retains information about Christ, and how we can live with him in the sun someday, and she knows baptism makes you clean, and she LOVES learning about Joseph Smith. They found the Joseph Smith movie on youtube for her. She's adorable. She wants to be baptized, but she wants to wait a while. President Mella met her and said she could get baptized now or later, but he would baptize her now, but Amada and Bernardo decided to let her pick (they had wanted her to wait and learn a little more so that she understands what she's doing). Nicole decided she wanted to wait and get baptized with her little sister. Problem is that Diana is only 6. so we're going to keep working and see if we can get Nicole baptized before I go home. :) But Amada and Bernardo got baptized, and it was incredible experience. Even the baptismal service was focused on the temple. They talked about how they were so excited to get sealed, and the RS president gave them a picture of the temple, the bishop talked about their sealing... it was incredible. President Mella's big focus has been "Beginning with the end in mind" and to me, the Chavez family really has done that. They have begun with the end in mind. They temple is the centerpiece of their conversion, and they are doing everything they can to get there. they come to ever activity, participate in church, read their scriptures and pray as a family, they hung up a "Family: Proclamation to the world" in their home, along with pictures of them at the temple... wow. They have allowed the gospel to enter into their home and change their lives. It's amazing. I just feel so blessed to be a part of their story. The other day they asked when I go home, so I told them December, and they asked if we can have a big reunion in January. They want us to come back quick. But I promised them I would be back for their sealing. So just so ya'll know, I will need to be back in California the end of next August or the beginning of next September. That's something I can't miss. :) It's just so incredible to see the changes in their lives. Yesterday was Amada's birthday, and it was so perfect. she received the gift of the Holy Ghost on her birthday. But we got to talk to them about how they felt after, and they feel this new found sense of energy--like they aren't tired and feel like they've been on vacation. :) They are the sweetest family, and are making so many changes in their lives. We have a recent convert temple baptism trip this Saturday, and we're hoping to get them to come to that. And then Bernardo will start preparing to receive the priesthood really soon here. Bishop is on top of things. It's so amazing. 

It's been a good week. This upcoming week we're going to have to do a lot of finding, because our most progressing investigators just got baptized! But we are also very excited to work with the family to teach the recent convert lessons, and to help Nicole prepare for baptism. Keep her in your prayers so that she'll be able to get baptized soon! 

I love you all, and I hope you have a fantastic week. Keep going to the temple, and keep up the good work with everything else! Endure to the End!!! Yeah! Have a great Labor day, and a great week! 

Lots of love,

Hermana Bingham

Familia Chavez, Hermana GG and me, and Bishop Haight.

La familia Chavez with Adriana Mayoral and her daughters Genesis and Andrea. They are the members that introduced Amada and Bernardo to the church!