Grateful

 November 23, 2020

¡hola y'all!

   How are y'all doing this weeeeek?? I hope so super well:) well, I guess this is officially my last full week here in my beautiful golden state and whoa, there are so many thoughts and feelings running through my head and my heart. But mostly, I'm so grateful. I'm so so grateful for these past 18 months, for every soul I've met, for everything I've learned, and seriously so much more. It's the best thing in the whole wide world:)!! But this past week has been sweet, so let's do a little recap:

☆last Monday we had a cute zone breakfast, and I made grits for everyone and it was sooo fun:') 

☆covid is back:( I don't think she ever really went away, but California got put on lockdown again, SO church was cancelled again and a bunch of other stuff we were looking forward too. But it's all good, we're still doing that good zoom church and we can still visit our amigos outside. Love that. 

☆we also met a new amiga!! Yolanda!! She's super sweet:) she's been having some struggles trying to find peace in all of the craziness here, so we showed her the little video that President Nelson did and she lovvvved it. Her son was pretty interesting, but that's a story for another day aha. 

☆but yeah so our prophet, President Nelson, gave a beautiful message on Friday morning!! If you haven't seen it yet PLEASE go watch it!! That's why you've probably seen a bunch of people doing 7 days of gratitude on Facebook, and hey ya know it's never to late to start!! 

☆okay and one last thing, we have been super lucky and we've been able to do a TON of service these past few days!! We made a bunch of cute cards for cute kids in hospitals, we went back to the thrift shop at WHW and sorted more clothes, and then we got to hand out some early Thanksgiving dinners to some friendos. Also someone gave us a big stack of blankets to start handing out to some homeless amigos around, and we got to meet some of the sweetest people:') service is actually the best

   Also this week, Elder Bednar gave a beautiful devotional to all of the missionaries and wow I loved it. One thing that he said was that we should just try to be a little better each day, and that's enough. He kept repeating over and over again, "just be good, and go," and I love that. Just be good, be a little better today than you were yesterday, and go. God loves you and He's proud of every effort you're making:)

   I love y'all so much!! Don't forget it!! And I hope everyone has the most amazing week and a super happy Thanksgiving!!!!

Con amor,

Hermana Brayton:)

our little baby departure dinner with Pres and Sister Platt bc the real one got canceled

 I just love California, miran que hermosa🤩

I. Love. The. Beach.

making the cute cards with my cute friends for some cute kiddos

Me and God

 November 16, 2020

¡holaaa y'all!

    How was everyone's week?? So good I hope!:) Honestly this week went by too fast and it's all just kind of a blur, but gosh life is so good. Tonight Hermana Doman and I went on a little drive right as the sun was setting, and y'all California is so beautiful. Everything just looked pink and we had the windows down and the heat turned all the way up with our good ~wholesome~ music playing super loud. That's my element. It's like one of those moments where you feel so completely content with life and all of your cares are gone for a minute, but at the same time you can just feel God smiling down at you bc he's happy with your happiness, and it's just you and God and your comp riding down the freeway like the happiest little trio there ever was. Idk if that makes sense, but anyways, this week was fun:) 

☆do y'all remember our good friend Ivan? He is doing so well! He's so diligent in praying and reading his scriptures and everything, but he is very set on not making any moves until God specifically tells him too. Sometimes though, I've learned that God doesn't always tell us exactly what to do. He gave us the gift and ability to make choices on our own, so sometimes we just have to jump first with mucha fe and good intentions and try to do what's right.

☆Genesis and Angelik!!!!!!!!! They are my favorite amigas. Last week they realized I was leaving here pretty soon, so this week they got us Christmas presents since I'm leaving before Christmas:') I actually almost cried. Also with them this week, we talked a ton about the Spirit and how beautiful and personal it is when we receive answers and promptings and revelations from it. 

☆we made some new amigos this week!! La Familia Portillo! We got to meet the two parents this week, and we sat and chatted with them over some goooood tamales for like 2 hours. They are so cool. 

☆also! We got to do a super fun service project on Saturday with almost our whole zone. We helped out at this super cool organization where they help people prepare for and get jobs. We helped put in their little thrift shop part of things and sorted through a TON of clothes, fun times:) 

    This week for a little spiritual thought, my inspiration comes from a not so friendly friend that was un poco confused on who God is to me. So I just wanted to say that without one single doubt in my mind, God is my Heavenly Father. He knows me and He loves me perfectly, way better than I could ever know or love myself. He loves me and you just as much as He loves the people of India or Uganda or Ukraine. He is a God of miracles, joy, light, little and big things, snow storms and smooth seas, and eternally equal opportunity. We are created in His image!! We lived with Him before this life, and He is cheering us on every. single. day. so that at the end this life we will be able to live with Him again. I could never have the words to express all of my thoughts and feelings for my Heavenly Father, but I know that He is looking down on you and me with more than all of the love in the world. 

   Well hey, I love y'all a whole ton too and I hope that everyone has an amazing weeeeeek!! Hasta luegoooo

Con amor,

Hermana Brayton:)

portos=heaven

joes=heaven

service y luego almuerzo!

us and genesis and angelik🤩🥰

17 Months & All the Good Vibes

 November 09, 2020

¡¡¡hola y'all!!!

    How is everyone doing?? I hope SO well:) Gosh this week was so amazing, but it went by wayyy to fast. Also yeah on the fourth I hit my 17 months como misionera and Hermana Doman hit her 3 months, kinda crazy stuff hahah. But let's see what all happened this week ! 

    We've been calling soooo so many people, especially a lot of the hermanos y hermanas here that are kind of under the radar, and finally someone answered us and said we could come to their house!! So we went and met the cutest sweetest family that just moved here from Huntington Beach. Yeah they were super cute, so we're excited to start teaching their kiddos:) 

   Another actual miracle that happened was when we got to meet with the dad AND sister of our bestest amiga Genesis!! Her sister Angelik is so cool, and wow they both blow me away bc they just want so badly to follow Christ. After our lesson, we went back by their house and Angelik was straight sobbing bc the spirit was so strong in the lesson and she just felt so good and so much of God's love. It was such an incredible experience just to be there and to know her:')

     Okay oops I am totally out of time wow so sorry y'all. But I love yall a whole bunch! Ooh something yall should do this week is look up the talk from Elder Dieter F Uchtdorf from 2012 called "Of Regrets and Resolutions"!! It's soooo good and it will for surely change your perspective on life!! 

Con amor,

Hermana Brayton

cute quote boy!

rainbow!

joe's!!!

Cheetah Girls y MUCHA Fe

 November 02, 2020

¡hola y'all!!!!

    How is everyone doing this week?? So well I hope:) this week has honestly been sooo so fun, I love this place and these people and truly being a missionary is the best ever. I don't have a ton of time (who's surprised) so I'll just make a little list guy of what happened here in socal:)

☆we had zone conference!! And after lunch we all played knockout so that was super fun. I LOVE President and Sister Platt with my whole heart also, it was the best to get to see them again and talk with them and hear their wise words of wisdom. And a few of us hermanas accidentally matched with the cheetah print hahah I love themmm 

☆we found a new amigo named Walter! He's super cool, super humble, and super ready for this beautiful gospel we have to share. Please pray for him!!

☆on wednesday we had a little going away drive by party for our buddy Elder hunter, it was too fun

☆on Thursday we had SUCH and amazing lesson with Genesis and she is SO excited for her baptism coming up soon!! She decided to postpone it a little bit bc she wants her dad and sister to learn as well!! That's where the mucha fe part comes in bc they aren't super excited to hear about our church or that she's wanting to be baptized, so pls pls PLS keep those three in your prays as well!!

☆on spooky day Halloween we got to help set up a little church party, and then we went back to help serve food at the party for a few hours. It was a blast. Our amigo Ruben came with his whole family!! And we matched again with the cheetah (but like on purpose this time) yeehaw!!

   Also okay, this week I read 1 Nephi 13, and whoa. Y'all have to read this one. It's a little bit intense at first, but it's soooo good bc it literally just explains so clearly that the Book of Mormon and the Bible support each other, and it explains why they're both necessary. In verse 40 he says, "And the angel spake unto me, saying: These last records, which thou hast seen among the Gentiles, shall establish the truth of the first, which are of the twelve apostles of the Lamb, and shall make known the plain and precious things which have been taken away from them; and shall make known to all kindreds, tongues, and people, that the Lamb of God is the Son of the Eternal Father, and the Savior of the world; and that all men must come unto him, or they cannot be saved." So the "last records" (which make up the Book of Mormon) are here to establish the truth of the first (the Bible) and both are to testify of Jesus Christ!! It's just so amazing bc it was written almost 600 years before Christ was even born, so it's pure revelation given to Nephi for us to read and learn today!! God really does know what He's doing up there with His whole timeline. It's beautiful honestly. 

    Okay pues I love y'all soooo much and I'm so v grateful for each of you!! Que tengan una BONITA semana!!

Con amor,

Hermana Brayton:)

¡¡BBQ Fiesta!!

 October 26, 2020

¡hola y'aaall!

    How is everyone this week?? I hope so good!! My first week here with cute Hermana Doman has been such a good ole time! Not a whole ton of stuff happened, but it was a party that's for sure:)

    First of all I just have to say, I seriously have some of my favorite people in the world here with me in my district and in my zone, so I could not ask for a better place to spend my last 5 weeks here. We had district council on Wednesday, and it was the best. Gosh I'm so grateful for these people and for their choices to serve the Lord and for the impact that each of them are having on my life. People are amazing. 

    One of the people I've met this week is Genesis!! She is 16, and she just started talking to missionaries about a month ago, and she is such a gem!! She was trying to decide if she wanted to get baptized, and so she wanted to fast for a day and pray super hard about it. Whenever we went and talked to her on Thursday, she told us about how beautifully she got an answer, seriously it gave me the chills, and so now she's getting baptized on November 8th!! It never fails to blow me away at how genuine people's hearts are, it's so beautiful. 

     On Saturday, our ward had a whole Latino BBQ and wow what a party that was. They said they were going to start at 10am, and since things in this lovely culture usually don't run on time, Hermana Doman and I thought it would be fine if we got there around 10:30 or 10:45, so we did and the ppl in charge had just barely gotten there right as we did hahahah. So we helped them set up and they started grilling. Then at noon the whole thing finally started and we had a whole feast!! Gosh it was so good. I need my amigos to teach me how to cook before I have to go back home hahah. But it was so fun just to be able to sit and talk with all of our sweet hermanos and hermanas (with masks and socially distanced of course;)) bc truly honestly these people are my family now. I have so much love in my heart for all of them and their sweet souls. 

     Also okay, for our little spiritual thought today! I found this song that I LOVE called "Give" by Stan Walker, and one of the lyrics says, "how're you ever going to change the world if you can't change yourself?" and to be so honest, the first time I heard that it kind of hit different! Bc that's one of my dreams ya know, I want to make an impact and try to change the world for the good! But it really starts with such small things. Baby steps, right? There are so many many things that I still want and need to work on to better myself, and so something that I've started doing is writing down each of the Christlike attributes that are represented in each chapter of the Book of Mormon. So far I've gone through the first 9 chapters and there is a whole lot of faith, obedience, and trust in the Lord. How lucky are we to have such prime examples to look to, to see how we can change ourselves and just become a little bit better?:)

    I think you're all pretty great though, and I love y'all sooo much!! I actually cannot believe it's already spooky szn again hahah but I hope everyone has a happy and safe Halloween!! 

Con amor,

Hermana Brayton:)

the district

joes!!

saying bye to our girl hna Hansen

lil Nino the Guinea pig 

not a cute picture at all, but we got sooo lost one morning on our run, and we actually ran like 3 miles and we were dead and so we took this pic to remember it 😊

¡Buenos Días Buena Park!

 October 24, 2020

¡¡holaaaa  y'all!! 

     Well I hope everyone is just having the time of their lives this week bc it has been SUCH a good one over here in Cali:) I'll update y'all on the exciting stuff!:

- Nicolas AND Facundo came to church on Sunday and it was honestly one of the very best days of my whole entire mission. 

- we went to go see Monica and we were just sitting and talking with her for so long, and then she started going off about how grateful she was to have us as friends and wow :''))) I love her

- we were having a lesson with Nicolas and I started sharing my testimony about Jesus and His atonement and whoa the spirit was sooo strong. I LOVE teaching people about repentance and new beginnings and the absolute pure love of Jesus, it's the best.

- we got news that Hermana Nitta and I are getting split up, and that I'm getting sent away to my 7th area!! That's wild!! So I'm going back to the Buena Park ward (but a different area) and I'm going to be with cutie pie little Hermana Doman!! She just got here five weeks ago and I'm soooooo excited to be here with her!!

Well I hope y'all know how much God loves you and how much Jesus loved you and also how much I love you too!! Sorry I don't have a ton of time to write more, but I hope everyone has an amazing week!!!

Con amor,

Hermana Brayton

us and monica🥰

the homiieesss

one last time at the beach

Hermana Doman and some cutie lil clown and me

Nicolas at church!!!!!

cute lil zone

The Happiest Place on Earth

 October 12, 2020

¡hola y'all!!!

    How is everyone doingggg this week?? Espero que so good!! Okay this week was actually such a blast and half. It was Hermana Nitta's BDAY so ya saben we had a good ole time:) We drove down to the Newport Beach temple (the HAPPIEST place on earth) so that we could video call our best amigo Atenco and show him how beautiful it is and how truly strongly you can feel the spirit there (even through technology)! But, sad days, he didn't answer:'(( but it's okay bc we just got to walk around a little bit and we met the coolest man ever. His name is Hermano Pimienta, and he's an actual super missionary. He asked us for 8 Libros de Mormón to give to some of his coworkers, and in return he gave us each a piece of marble from inside the temple (bc they were doing renovations and stuff)! He's a homie now and we love him and we love the temple.

    Also this week we went to church again and Facundo came with us!!!!! It took us a while to find him so we could walk with him into the chapel hahah but we did and it was the best ever. He liked it a lot, even though sometimes it makes me un poquito sad that it's so so different from pre-covid church. Like I miss singing the hymns and hearing more talks and being able to talk with a bunch of people after. But it's still so good, and Facundo loved it and wants to come next week too! 

    In my scripture studies this week, I finished the Book of Mormon again!! And can I just say, those last few chapters in Moroni and SO good. Wow. Like honestly I don't even know what all to say to try and summarize them bc there's just so so much good stuff, so y'all should for surely read that and I would LOVE to talk more about it with you. But I'll just share the third to last verse in the whole Book of Mormon, which is Moroni 10:32, that says, "Yea, come unto Christ, and be perfected in him, and deny yourselves of all ungodliness; and if ye shall deny yourselves of all ungodliness, and love God with all your might, mind and strength, then is his grace sufficient for you, that by his grace ye may be perfect in Christ; and if by the grace of God ye are perfect in Christ, ye can in nowise deny the power of God." I LOVE THAT. Get rid of all the things in your life that are keeping you from feeling God's love, and then love God with every part of your soul, everything that you are, and His grace will encircle you and lift you to eternal life and to eternal perfection. I know from the bottom of my heart that that is true. 

    Well I hope y'all know how grateful I am for each of you, and I hope you each know how infinite God's love is for you. He wants us to be happy, and I promise if you read the Book of Mormon and even just drive to look at the outside of a temple, you will feel a piece of the eternal happiness He has in store for you. Les amo!!!

Con amor,

Hermana Brayton 😊

our buddy hno pimienta

tortuga

puppy 😍

templo

birthday lunch

y bday cake that the Elders made 😋

Galletas, Fiestas, y Conference

 October 05, 2020

¡¡¡hola y'all!!!

    How is everyone doing this week?? So, so well I hope! This week feels like it was about a month long, but I don't have a ton of time so sit tight for a quick recap!!

•we made SO many cookies with our Elder buddies that we share our ward with. SO. many.

•we made some new friends, Elias and Maria! They're pretty interesting hahah

•we also met a new amigo named Ariel, he's a big ole sweetie pie:)

•we became actual bestfriends with our amigo Nicolas, he's so funny and such a sweetheart even though he tries to act all tough sometimes 

•we got to call my CUTE cousin Avery who is getting baptized this week!! That honestly was such a highlight to see her cute face and talk with her some:)

•we talked a TON with our bestest bud Atenco! Please please keep him in your prayers!!

•GENERAL CONFERENCE!! It was so so so good, send me your thoughts! I'll probably talk about it more next week hehe

•right at the end of our lesson with our pal Facundo, another guy came from the back room and asked if we were hungry, and then he brought us out to the back yard where they were having a whole fiesta!! They had carne on the grill and a real life mariachi band!! It was soooo fun and we met some new migos who said they'll come to church with us next Sunday:))

•hna nitta and I found the prettiest place in the whole world called Corona del Mar, 10/10 would recommend!

   Okay pues, I love y'all a whole ton!! If you didn't get the chance to watch all of conference, I promise it will be worth your time to go back and listen to/read the talks that were given. There's no doubt in my mind that they are all inspired by the Lord and truly meant for all of us to hear in this moment! I hope y'all have an amazing week!!!!

Con amor,

Hermana Brayton 😊

Corona del mar!!

our amigos from the party, Facundo y Edwin

talking with Avery and Evan 💖

our cute matching shirts

cena