HURRICANE MARIA !!!

This is Eliza's mom-
As many of you know Hurricane Maria had a direct hit on the whole Island of Puerto Rico. Tues. afternoon all the missionaries were given the instruction to get straight to the mission home. I was so grateful for President and Sister Smart for gathering them together so that they would all be accounted for. The Hurricane ended up absolutely devastating the Island and took out cell towers and creating a complete power outage for all of Puerto Rico. Eliza was able to call me Wed. after the worst of the storm had passed to let me know that they were all safe, and had plenty of food and water. She said, I grabbed my scriptures and journals. I'm not sure what else she was able to grab, because we didn't talk too long. She told me she was planning on returning to her apt. within a couple of days. As we here at home saw pictures coming in showing just how bad things were, and hearing that roads were not passable I knew she wouldn't be returning to her area. She would not be able to go back and get anything. Friday I read in the  Deseret News saying that they were evacuating all the missionaries temporarily from Puerto Rico. They would all be reassigned to stateside missions. We received a call from the Church Sat. informing us that Eliza was reassigned to the Arcadia, California mission.
Today is Sept. 26, 2017 - Last weekend 36 Sister missionaries were able to make it out and to their new missions. Eliza was one of 17 Sisters still in Puerto Rico. I heard today that the Church chartered a plane to get all the missionaries out and fly them to Miami. I'm hoping I will hear from her soon. Thanks to Facebook someone posted these pictures and it was so great to see her in the group. I know she is safe, and will have many stories to tell of the miracles and tender mercies that she's been able to see this past week. Thank you to all who have prayed for her and all the missionaries and people of Puerto Rico. I hope in a few months she will be able to return to the people of Puerto Rico and help them rebuild their country. I've talked to Eliza's new mission Pres. wife and she is ready to welcome her and help take care of her immediate needs. There has been an outpouring of love and concern and a willingness to help Eliza with the things she needs. My heart is full of gratitude and love!!  I am grateful to be a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints, where we unite in our wards everywhere to help watch over and take care of each other. This has been the case with these missionaries!
I hope the next entry will be from Eliza herself. Much love, mamma Zimm

Hopefully getting on a plane for the States :D

Milagro after Milagro!

Hola HOLA hola!

This week has been so incredible!  First I got my hija last monday!!  Her name is Hermana Rich, she is from Roy Utah and an absolute sweetheart!  We have had so much fun this week and she really is just amazing i love her dearly!!  It definitely has been an adjustment trying to learn how to train but I can't even describe how much the Lord has helped me, and my greenie is such a blessing to me!

First a little about our week, we truly did see so many miracles this week especially when finding.  It has been so amazing to truly see the hand of the Lord in the work and in our lives, he is so incredibly aware of us!  We saw this everyday!  While contacting a lot of times we were able to find someone and it was usually the last house we contacted, sometimes we don't know why we are lead to certain houses but the Lord does, he knows our hearts and he knows theres, this is something that I can testify of with my whole heart!

one miracle we saw was last night! it was kinda a crazy day as we had stake conference and got to see lots of mission friends!  we didn't get out of the house until later and still had a good hour walk in front of us!  we had a good lesson teaching the book of mormon but didn't have time to go to our other appointment becaue it was too late and too far:(  which we were kinda bummed about it but we felt impressed to contact for the time we had and as we were walking this lady came out running to us!  she had us write our number down and wants us to come visit her! she said she didn't know anything about us but was just so curious what we were doing! haha she was a huge milagro!  THE LORD IS SO AWARE:)

Things I learned this week!

1) the 2 different meaning of the word en, it means in and on!  We recieved a reference from the elders and they gave a street and and urb but i mixed them up becuase i thought they said it was en a certain urbinization, but really it was on a certain street.... haha okay so I'm not sure i explained that well but lets just say we went to the complete opposite area and ended up getting lost for about 3 hours... ah man it was a CRAZY adventure but we had so much fun!  (a lot of this week I accidentally got us very lost... haha Hermana Rich definitely knows the face I make when Im not sure where we are....:) haha but we have so much fun and are learning caguas together!

2)  I learned that after a long day my hair looks even crazier than I thought, in a contact a lady was kind and told us we should put some hair product into our hair and gave us hers! she was so kind:D hahaa

3) learned to chizzle ice!  we were in a lesson with a lady named carmen we found this week, she is very sweet:)  We asked for some water adn she took us to her kitchen and wanted to get us some ice, so we go to the fridge and she pulls out the frozen carton of water, she rips it open and gives me a huge knife and just tells me to cut it! it didn't work super well as you can imagine so she leaves and comes back with a huge stick! she has me hold the knife while my comp hits the knife and the top with this stick as tall as me!  it was a huge adventure to say the least, you learn things everyday on the mission!

anyways but overall life is very good now:D so many funny things happen too like stepping in an ant hill, and being told i need to find a puerto rican boyfriend from one of our investigators:D  haha I am so grateful for the opportunity i have to serve here and to truly grow my testimony every day as i feel the love of my savior and for these people!

We also have another huricane coming, hurricane maria who right now is supposedly coming straight for us,  we went shopping satuday night and I think hurricane Irma has prepared us a little for it because now we know what we have to do,  I know that the Lord will watch over us:)

I love you all so much!!

con mucho amor, Hermana Zimmerman:)

 My new companion Hermana Rich (first day) ! Enjoying a nutritional lunch of Ramen and popcorn :D

 Our apt. 

 at stake conference and hermana smart! (the caguas zone sisters

                                      a map of where we wanted to go, and where we did go!

 a dead iguana! :0!

My trainer H. Green and my new trainee H. Rich :D

HURIcAnE Irma!!

Buenasdias todos!

This week was definitely one of the craziest and scariest weeks of my mission!  First I just want to say a sincere thankyou for all of your prayers, this week Hurricane Irma came and had the potential to pass right through Puerto Rico which made this last week pretty insane I'm really not sure where to start!

First all of the missionaries on the island are safe, many were moved who were on the border or in a tsunami zone but all are okay!  We here in Puerto Rico are also very very grateful that within the last day it went farther north, still hitting us but not doing half as much damage as it could have and what we were all expecting. The only horrible part is that it did hit some of our islands that are in our mission, so now we all pray for them and for florida who is now in the midst of this crazy hurricane.

Okay but I guess Ill give a little run down of my week:)  So first on monday night is when we all found out the extent of this hurricane, I am grateful that our leaders had us prepare with food and money the satuday before because it was only within one day that everything escalated.  But  my companion Hermana Johnson was finsihing her mission so she left tuesday morning and for the last week i have been in a trio with Hermana Franco and Hermana Guido!  On tuesday we still went out and worked and for the first time i saw a picture of the storm as we were at an investigators house, she turned on the news and for the fist time we all got to see how big it was and then soon after we got instructions to go straight to the house and bunkered oursleves in, we tried to tie down our car as well as put our fridge in front of our little door, we then moved all of the beds to our back room and put cardboard between our shutters and screens(here in Puerto rico nobody has windows) but we also put tons of food in there and filled up everything thing we could with water! literally EVERY CONTAINER! But then for the next two days we were just bunkered in our little room without light,  There definitley were huge winds and rain but luckily the worst of it was only for about 4 hours but it rained for about 2 days straight.  OUr house is on a tilt so nothing flooded and everything was good!  As we were all huddled in our little room we did lots of studies and played games, as a missionary I think it gtave us all a lot of perspective and we were able to study a lot together, talking more about what things we then should teach and studying together! after the two days as sooon as we got the okay to go out and check the damage we were all just soooo excited to get out of the house and find people to teach and check on our investigators!  I think that for all of us our desire and love for the gospel and his plan grew incredibly!    But really we are just very luckily that everything is okay here, here in caguas all of the stores were up again fast the only thing is that about half of the city is still without light and running water.  WE got our light restored about 2 days ago but still come in from working before dark.  I forgot how much we used light and electricity for so now we are all very very very grateful for that!

Yesterday some of my zone was also able to do a service project, we unloaded supplies from the humanitarian crate we have at the church to send to the islands!  Our zone leader thought we were going to be putting things together in the church so we all wore our sunday clothes... haha lets just say we may not bei using them again!  The things in the crate had been there for about 10 years, and lets just say after 10 years things get wet, and when things get wet they get magots, and when there are tons of magots on the boxes you are trying to carry there are tons of magots on you... haha I think i may still be having nightmares...! haha just kiddin but man yeah i have never see so many magots and cocroaches!  B ut the good news is that we were able to salavage a lot of it to send to the islands and i think i might just go inside of the boxes so they can just send me to help too, i mean i am a whole person!

Also because of the hurricane the new missionaries weren't able to come in on tuesday but they are tonight!  So tonight I am getting my hija and i am excited but also pretty nervous! 

sorry this is so super long, but I cannot thank you all enought for you love, suppoert and dear prayers.  We are all safe and happy and eternally grateful for the prayers for the missionaries and PUerto Rico!  Heavenly Father is always listeingin to our prayers and he will always answer them.  I love this island, this gospel and all of you dearly!!:)

con mucho amor, Hermana Zimmerman:)

 our bunker in our room:D

                                    

 Entertaining ourselves during the Hurricane :D

 the fridge we put against the door

 service project:)

also i forgot to say that a huge tender mercy was that we got to call our families :D  I love my family dearly!!!

I've been out 7 months!

Beunas!!

Hola todos!

Well I just finished first transfer here in Caguas!  We had transfer calls last night and I was called to be a trainer! ahhhh so I will be getting her tomorrow!  I am pretty nervous but also really excited:D  I definitely have seen many tender mercies here and am excited to see many more with my hija:)  

This week the ward had a really cool mutual activity where it was an MTC experience!  Every youth got a call, they went to the MTC, took a language class and then went to work and knocked doors!  We as missionaries got to all come and help out at it and it was super fun!  The youth were all so so cute and so excited and they did an incredible job putting it together,  It even gave me a little more perspective for me as I really am here on a mission.  The work truly is just so important and we have someting that can truly bring so much light to peoples lives!

This week we also had Ilda come to church!  She is so sweet and loved it!  We were so so happy and in our lesson this past week she really talked about how much peace she always feels as she reads in the book of mormon, she has read so much in it, and we are so excited to conintually teach her because she is just the best and I love her and her family so much!

Anyways but overall this transfer I really have grown very close to my Savior, I know that he lives and loves us!!

con mucho amor, Hermana Zimmerman:)

nutella yummy pastry:)

also i forgot to mention in my email about the hurricane that might hit right over Puerto Rico,  We are very prepared with food and water as well as bags packs, And I know that as we are strictly obedient we will be okay:)  love you all!!

 the mutual activity!

our district in aguas buenas!