Sushi and lesson mastery

Sushi!  YUM!

What is this?

Lunch on my Preparation Day!

I am surviving the rainy season.  I can feel summer.  It's coming!  The only memories I have are of sweat, sweat, humidity and sweat.  I can't wait!  Transfers are coming up next week.  I have no idea what will happen.  We just had a wonderful zone conference this past week and our mission president said that because of the size of our mission and the number of missionaries in it that missionaries will be staying in their areas longer.  I can't complain about that.  Okinawa has been my absolute favorite.  I completely forgot about March Madness!  BYU made it!  Yay!  Hopefully they can win a game :) 

This week went by so fast.  Time is flying!  This must be what it feels like to get old.  Last preparation day we played volleyball as a zone.  It was a blast.  Then we went and spent time with our investigator.  Misa San!  She is adorable and has a cute son who is always dressed to the nines in... Disney gear :)  So cute!  On our way back home we decided to stop by Sister Wedekind's house.  She is the world's greatest missionary.  She let us right in, fed us, and then invited us to Family Home Evening.  It was wonderful for Misa to see that kind of environment and feel the spirit in their home.  Spending family home evening with them reminded me of you guys!  It felt like home.  I love the people here in Okinawa. 

Lesson Mastery Pin!

I passed off my lesson mastery!  It's a mission wide program to help us with our teaching ability and language skills.  It feels so good to have it done and I feel like my Japanese and knowledge of the gospel is really improving.  I am growing.  Another exciting thing happened this week!  We have consistently been visiting a cute part member/less active family for the last month.  This week we stopped by shared a message and on our way out we asked this family's youngest son to say the prayer.  It was absolutely adorable and when he said "amen" he was just beaming.  On our way out his mom said to us, "That was his first prayer." They came to church this Sunday.  Happiness and pure joy doesn't even begin to describe how I felt. 

This week in a blur, my many miracles and fun times:

***Sister Takei role playing with her "English bear" in Spanish...

***Running down the trash guys and having the neighborhood kids cheer you on and even a passing by car honk to help :)

***Building testimonies and having a family that is investigating the church ALL come to church :)

***Eating eel and not losing your lunch

***Having perfect timing. Making bus connections perfectly. Arriving at a station seconds before the bus pulls up. 

***Playing soccer with our less actives and investigators and people telling me "You're not terrible anymore" :) 

***And last but not least, scheduling a baptism for this Saturday!

The dear Williams couple…..they got us a table for our new apartment!

Our cute high school student investigator is getting baptized this Saturday!  Having taught her from the very beginning and watch her grow and learn has been a privilege.  And now she is super excited to be baptized this week.  She has been taught all the lessons, is living all the commandments and is really progressing. The members are doing a great job of fellowshipping her. Especially our wonderful young women's program.  The girls all really do love her and I think they love having her as the newest addition to their group.  We are so excited for her! Her mom is extremely supportive. When we followed up on the word of wisdom with her, she said not only had she been keeping it but her mom had been helping her.  That is wonderful!  Exciting things are happening in Okinawa. 

I am so grateful to be serving in Japan.  I love these people!  I hope you have a wonderful week!

Hawkins Shimai