Florida: hot, humid, and lots of lizards!! - June 1, 2015

Hello family!!
It was so great to hear from ya'll! I officially made 

it to Florida!! Yay! And I've survived my first 

week!!! Yay!! I want to let ya'll know especially 

mom and dad that I am doing 100 times better 

than I was when I talked to you at the airport! 

When I was talking to you I just wanted to say 

"come pick me up, I'm done.. I can't do this!" 

But I am so glad I didn't! I am loving every 

minute of this now!!! Well, I am serving in 

Jacksonville! I am currently serving in the 

Mandarin 1st ward!! Now before you have 

a panic attack like I did let me explain 

that it is not Mandarin Chinese.. It is mandarin 

like the oranges! Haha when I first found out that 

was where I was going I thought I would have to 

learn Chinese! Haha my companion is Sister
Sorensen! She is from Orem, Utah. She is super 

good at singing and has been out for about a year 

now! We are whitewashing this area so we both 

keep getting super lost and it's been rough trying 

to get hold of all of our investigators and meet 

all the ward members! We have had to drop a 

lot of investigators this week. I think the other 

sisters were just holding on to them for the 

numbers...Most of them are really not interested.

Well I will tell you about my first day miracle 

this week. We dropped our stuff off at the 

apartment and then went out tracting.  We had 

about 15 minutes before we had to go to our 

dinner appointment so we each decided to 

pick a house. Well Sister Sorensen's house 

was no success.. I chose a cute house that had

an American flag out front. I was sure if they 

loved America they had to love Jesus as well.. 

Haha well we met Robby at this house and 

we were able to share a message about the Book 

of Mormon and gave him a copy and he invited 

us back! Yay! My first investigator!! Well sad 

news about Robby.. We went back to his house 

yesterday for our appointment and he didn't 

answer so we tried calling him and he had 

given us the wrong number..haha oh well! 

I invited some guy named Tim to be baptized! 

We found him on the street.. Of course 

he said no..,haha oh well, at least I invited him
to be baptized!

We do a lot of service! On the first night we 

went and cleaned an inactive lady in the wards 

home. She is on hospice so she can't do it
herself. We cleaned bathrooms and then cleaned 

out a room full of junk.. And finally vacuumed 

the house. It looked so good when we were done! 

The next day we went to our investigator Lianne's 

house. I am pretty sure she just used the 

missionaries for service cause she had us cut out 

glitter lettering for tee shirts she was making and 

then hardly let us give her a lesson.. We are 

probably dropping her this week.. And then on 

Friday, we went to the church and cut fruit for a
ward members wedding. We also helped set up 

and decorate for the wedding on Saturday. Oh 

and on Saturday we had a ward bbq! It was
great! I was able to meet lots of ward members 

and they had sweeto burrito! It was yummy!!
The ward members are so good at getting 

involved in the missionary work which is

great! Ok so funny story about the first night 

here. So we were driving home that night and 

Sister Sorensen's GPS had died so we were 

trying to use a little map on the iPad when 

that died as well..We were totally lost! It's 

my first day in Florida and her first day in 

the area..Haha let's just say we ended up 

about 20 minutes outside of our area

and we didn't make it home until 10:30.. 

Haha let's just say the power of prayer works 

cause we managed to find our way home!!

Let me tell you all about the weather here...

It's sooooo hot!!!! When we get up it is 

usually 85 degrees already!! By noon it is 

usually 95 degrees or hotter! And then it 

usually cools off again to around 85 when 

we go home at night.. Not to mention the 

humidity!!!! Oh boy!! It makes it even hotter!! 

Everyone keeps telling me that this is nothing 

and the humidity will really hit come July... 

I am not looking forward to that! Haha I may

just die!!

There are so many lizards and frogs everywhere!!! 

I jump every time one runs out in front of me on 

the sidewalk! And I usually have to refrain from 

screaming! Haha hopefully I get use to them 

quick! Oh and I can no longer do my hair 

straight.. It's too humid! I am now going with 

the all natural curl look. Which is just a wavy 

frizzy hot mess!  Haha

So let me tell you about church yesterday! I got 

welcomed into the ward by being asked to speak 

in sacrament meeting! It went good! I spoke on the 

light of Christ! I did get out of singing yesterday. 

I was suppose to sing in sacrament meeting as 

well...But that will happen soon cause my 

companion loves to sing! 

We had 4 investigators at church yesterday!! 

Yay!!  Andrea is 14 she came with her school 

teacher who is in our ward! We are going to 

get permission from her dad to start teaching 

the lessons to her after school at the ward 

members home.  Aldion is our next investigator 

who came to church and brought his

girls who are 9 and 10 years old. So they are 

our other investigators. Aldion is from Albania! 

He just moved here 3 weeks ago so his English 

is very little and it was quite a trick to 

communicate with him! We are planning to 

get Google translate and hope his daughters 

can help translate our lessons for us! Otherwise 

I will be learning Albanian in the next few days! 

Haha Aldion has already read the Book of 

Mormon when he was living in Albania 

and knows it is true!  So hopefully we have a 

baptism real soon for him and his daughters 

Angel and Anjeza! They are so sweet and I am 

so excited to teach them!!

I know I just complained about the heat but I 

get so cold here too!  Everyone keeps their house 

at 68-72 degrees so I freeze! At night I sleep in 

sweats and a long sleeve shirt and socks and 

then I have 2 blankets on my bed! Hahaha I need 

my 90 degree apartment back! Haha I probably 

look ridiculous because it is really not that cold 

but ya'll know how I am and I am always freezing! 

Hopefully I get use to all this heat though! It 

really hits you when you walk outside and
instantly start sweating! Haha
Ok so my final miracle story happened last night! 

We were out tracking and we needed to find 2 

new investigators so we could meet our daily
goal as well as our weekly goal! Well it was 

about 8:15 and we were having no success. 

People either were not home or just not interested
and slammed the door in our face. Finally I 

decided that we should go try visiting one of the 

new investigators on our list that we had not
met yet. Her name was Tiffany. Well we got to 

Tiffani's house and she was not home... But Jemere 

and Ray were her friends who were their and
let us talk to them! Jemere is this big black kid 

who had tattoos all up his arms, his pants were 

at his ankles and he had an afro with a pick in his 

hair and kept telling me all about the hood.. Haha 

Ray was really nice he had tattoos as ell but he 

had a real religious background and know lots 

about Jesus Christ already! Well we shared
about the Book of Mormon and Jemere kept 

asking questions regarding the Plan of Salvation. 

We showed him a video on our iPad and then out
of no where he started to tell me about the time 

he got shot in the mouth and lost his tooth and 

the bullet came out his right cheek! I was trying 

not to laugh and the only thing I could think to 

say was "you are so lucky to be alive, God really 

does love you!" Haha anyways 8:50 started to 

roll around and we needed to head home so I 

invited them to meet with us again for another 

lesson and a church tour. They said yes!! 

Success!!!! I call this my 8:50 miracle! We were 

able to quickly put their lesson for the night in 

and we managed to meet our goals!! Yay!

Well that is all of my crazy stories for the week. 

Nothing else exciting has happened.
We are an iPad mission. I should be getting 

Facebook with in the next month. They took all 

missions off of Facebook but we will be one of
the first to get it back!
Mom, you will probably get a bill for my iPad.. 

Just use to money in my savings to pay for it!
I didn't have to buy a bike I managed to get one 

for free from another sister going home. The brakes 

are broken so I just have to go get that
fixed.
My new address is 3900 Oldfield Crossing Dr. #613
Jacksonville, Florida  32223
I sent letters today but I may have put them in 

the wrong box to be mailed.. So if they don't come 

sorry! I am a blonde and really having
a ton of blonde moments! Haha
Mom could you please find the book called 

"Power of Everyday Missionaries" it's by 

Clayton Christensen. I want to read it and it is
approved for my mission!
Here is the address for my missions blog:
jacksonvillefloridamissiomnews.blogspot.com
It is for all the moms to keep up with the mission. 

I think they posted some pictures from my first 

day if you want to check it out.  I think that is 

about it! I love you all and can't wait til I can hear
from all of you again! Oh and my p-days are 

Monday's! Have a good week!
Linsey I am so excited for you! I hope you got 

everything worked out with finding someone to 

marry you!! Good luck! I wish I could be there!!
Mom, make sure to take Hunter on a date! And get their 

address! I want to write Hunter!
Love and miss you all!
Love
Sister Webb
Ps I hope you get all my pictures :)