Sorry I didn't send out a weekly last week.  I will give a brief
update of both weeks.

Week of April 6-13th:
We started out the week by taking a trip to the Brooklyn Bridge on
Monday.  It was a lot of fun!  It was the first day we had really nice
weather here, so it was pretty crowded.  As we were taking pictures, a
family walked up to us and introduced themselves to us.  They are
members of this church back in Spanish Fork, Utah.  It was their
daughters birthday that day and her name was Kaitlin.  They were so
sweet.  I will add some pictures from this fun Pday.

We were able to meet with Kristina and Dorain this week.  Our lesson
with Kristina went really well!  She agreed to read the Book of Mormon
and pray about it.  She is searching for truth and the Gospel.  We
have a good feeling about her.

We met with Dorain for the first time.  She is fantastic!  She is from
Jamaica and is a Christian artist.  She asked a lot of really great
questions. For example, how do you integrate the gospel into your
family if the family is so important in your church?  we left her with
the restoration pamphlet to read.

We met Joe twice this week. Sister Hawkins found him when we were
fearlessing on the street. He is a little older and has one leg
amputated.  He is not very positive about life right now.   He really
likes to talk to us sisters because we are some of the only
communication he has throughout his day. He mostly just watch his
movies and read books. So we are trying to help him see the good in
life and understand how much happiness this gospel can bring him.

Week of April 14-20th:
We met with Dorain again, she is fantastic!  She read over the whole
pamphlet that we gave her and wrote down questions that she had about
it.  We read over the proclamation to the family with her and she said
she agrees with everything it had to say. She really likes that our
church is centered on building/strengthening families.

The next day we went to drop off the book of Mormon to Dorain and on
the way I heard a lady in a corner store say, " yeah, they have Elders
too."  After we walk past it I turned to sister Hawkins and said "did
you hear what that woman said?" she said she didn't.   But after that
I hear a voice behind us yell "sisters!"so we stopped and turned
around.   She told us her name was Shannon and that she was a member
of the church, but she hadn't been to church for few years. She asked
us if we were going in meeting at the women's shelter that was near
there. We told her we were not didn't know about it, she said it would
be a really good place for us to go and try and help some people.
Because we are women we would be able to get in.  We said that we
would look into it.  We exchanged information and had plans to meet
with her on Friday, but she canceled on her because she had to work.
So hopefully this next week we will be able to meet with her for
scheduled appointment. She said that she really wants to be coming
back to church so we are really excited we found Shannon. Or actually,
that she found us!

We also found out this past week that Dorain, our one progressing
investigator, is not actually in our area boundaries. :-(. So this
week we will be handing her off to the Richmond Hill sisters. We were
really bummed about that, but we know that she needs to be taught by
sisters in that area because that is where the priesthood keys for her
are held. Sadly enough we will not be teaching Dorain anymore. But we
have high hopes that she will be baptized!

I have felt like we need more service opportunities because we don't
have a set weekly service here in the city.  So one day before we left
the house I prayed that we would find some service opportunities
through out our day.  Boy did we ever!  At the train platform a
teenager threw up right in front of us.  Everyone ran away from her,
and I felt really bad.  She was so embarrassed and had it all over her
hands and shoes.  I dug through my purse and found a couple tissues
and a pack of gum to give her.   We just sat and talked to her until
the train came.  We didn't do anything big, but I know that that she
was very grateful for the support we tried to give her.  Nothing big
or miraculous came from this experience other than an answer to
prayers.  I asked for service opportunities, and through out the whole
day we were given many little ones.  I was so grateful for that little
testimony builder and the chance I had to serve.

I also met a lady named Latesina and taught her for the first time.
She is really sweet, has two girls and a 2 month old boy.  We talked
to her about God being our heavenly father and how much he loves and
cares about her family and is watching over them.  She seemed a little
distracted by her kids but she invited us to come back.  So we will
see how this next lesson goes.

We had 3 investigators come to church Sunday and one less active!  It
was amazing!  One media referral that we met once showed up.  It was
great!  It was also the Sunday I was giving a talk in church. Haha I
spoke about Elder Christofferson's talk called Why Marriage, Why
Family.  It wasn't my favorite talk I've given.  But oh well, it's
over.

We also went and got Sushi at a super cool Japanese restaurant for one
of the ASL sisters birthday.  It was beautiful!  Each dish had a
picture drawn in the sauce.

Have a good week everyone!

Happy Easter/General Conference everyone!

This week was amazing.  Heavenly Father has so much confidence in this
little area of Brooklyn.  We had a lot of lows and highs, but the
miracles that we experienced are what made this week special.
Heavenly Father put 3 pure in heart people into our path and is
allowing us to begin teaching them.  We are so excited!

The first one is Kristina.  She has 3 kids (who are all over the age
of 8, yay!) and is the sweetest lady.  Her name was on the old
potential investigators list.  We were able to set up an appointment
with her and go meet her family last Wednesday.  She had never met
with missionaries before, and made us feel so welcomed in her home.
We showed her the Because He Lives video and talked about the
importance of relying on our Savior.  She has a good catholic
background and has been going back to her church recently.  I felt
like we were talking to a member, she is very spiritually in-tune.

Then after her lesson we went to the bus stop to head home.  This
Brooklyn-Italian man was there and was a little impatient for the bus
to come.  We talked to him a little bit about the weather and then he
asked us "are you two nuns or somethin?".  Haha we told him no and he
went on about the bus being late again.  Then a couple minutes later I
asked him if he had ever met any Mormons before.  He said he knew what
they were and that Joe Smith started the religion.  (Usually people
here don't even know that!)  Well I told him we teach people about
Jesus Christ and His Gospel and ask if we could come stop by and talk
to him sometime.  He said no he wasn't really interested.  But then my
companion asked if he wanted to watch an Easter video (Because He
Lives, we show that thing like crazy).  He said sure but he had to
make a phone call to his AA sponsor first.  We were thinking he was
calling him to complain about the bus and what not.  But when the
other end answers he says, "hey, guess who I'm talkin to here at the
bus stop?  Two young Mowmon girls....yeah, you know how I was tryin to
find God, well maybe he sent these two to my bus stop.  Maybe by the
end of this bus ride I'll be a mowmon. Hahaha"  We were not expecting
that.  Then we showed him the video and he opened up to us about
everything in his life and how he needed God.  He started crying and
told us he would definitely be in contact with us this next week.  How
cool was that!  Also, he asked us if we have any literature...I have
never had anyone ask me for a Book of Mormon like that before!  The
whole thing was such a blessing.  We have tried calling him a few
times since then, but we are going to give him some time to see if he
will call us back.

The last one we met on a bus coming home from an appointment.  Her
name is Dorain and she is the sweetest human.  She was from the Bronx
and told us she use to see the Elders riding their bikes there.  She
told us she was going home from her churches Easter program and
told us how cute the little kids were.  I asked her name and she said
dorain.  (Do-rain)  Then she asked for our number and we gave her a
card.  I got her number and she said she was so excited to meet with
us.  She said she has always wanted to be a part of something like
this and that this has been a long time waiting.  She was wonderful!
We told her we would call her and meet up with her this week.  She was
so excited and she texted us that night!  I have a good feeling about
her.

Good Friday was interesting.  In the morning, the ASL sisters (they
live right next to us) came and told us about a bonfire down the
block.  Apparently all the Jewish men and children were outside making
this bonfire right outside the park.  We went to check it out right as
the fire truck pulled up.  We have no idea what it was for, but it was
crazy to see a bonfire in the middle of the city.  Later on with the
Elders we did a street sweep on Broadway (the major road the trains
follow) to help promote Easter.  We showed the video and passed out
Easter eggs that we put Because He Lives pass along cards and a little
tootsie roll inside of them.  I showed the video to a lady outside of
a seafood restaurant.  The line for that place was going out he door!
She started telling me about Good Friday and how no eats meat on that
day except for fish.  That explains why everyone was hitting up that
restaurant even though it was 3 in the afternoon.  She also told me
she is a Catholic and her church had a march that morning carrying
crosses and a "pretend body" down the road.  We talked to the Elders
about it later and they showed us a video of that march.  I will
attach a small section of the video.

We were also able to meet many of the less active or part member
families in the branch this week.  It has been an amazing week that
Heavenly Father has definitely been guiding us through.
Then to end it with General Conference and Easter was just the icing
on top.  I loved having G.C. on Easter!  It felt like the apostles all
had extra strength behind their testimonies of the Savior.  How
blessed we are to have a Prophet of God and Apostles who lead and
guide this church.  I encourage everyone to re-read/watch those talks
again in a week.  I know that if we apply the teachings we learn in
conference to our lives and really strive to change, we will see the
blessings unfold.

I love you all!  Hope you had a great Easter :)
Sister Beecher

This picture isn't the best, but here is the firemen putting out the fire.