January 25th, 2016

This week was a good one! Crazy, but good. So last week I forgot to tell you something that was pretty funny. We got a referral from church headquarters to bring someone a bible, so we went to the address and it was a jail...... So we called the Elders and were like uhh, we can't go there! Bahah, so they got ahold of the person who requested it and they had to mail a bible to this guy in jail. I thought it was pretty funny. 

Also I am slightly upset because for the past few days it has been in the high 20's and it feels SO warm. I never thought I would say or think that! Hahah. Monday night all of our appointments fell through so we were left at 7:00 at night with 2 hours left and nothing to do. OH and 4 degree weather PLUS windchill. Yeah-it was like negative 20. But it's not like we can just go home, so we went tracting! Most people didn't even answer, one guy let us in and we had a nice conversation about family history and one guy told us we were crazy! I thought- yes we are, but what can you do? Bahah, being a missionary is so weird. 

Wednesday morning there was a Worldwide Missionary Broadcast, and they said there were 75,000 missionaries watching live. It was SO cool. I learned so much, the apostles and general authorities are just amazing. I love learning from them. It really inspired me to work harder and be better and just do so much more! I loved it. It was really cool knowing too that all the missionaries in the world were watching. 

There also is this nice member that took us to this delicious fancy restaurant called the grapevine. It was so yummy, and then she had us over again sunday night to make earrings! She makes jewelry so she taught us how to make our own earrings. It was so fun, and I made some way cute ones. You'll never guess what color they are. 

Wednesday night we felt like we should try this one potential, so we went to her house and once we got there we realized we had met her earlier and St. Vincent's (where we do service) so yeah she was TOTALLY placed right in our path. She was talking about how she loves God and wants to listen to Him, and how she loves when he puts things together for her (like this!!!) so we pointed out that we were led to her, and we told her a little about the BOM and she said she already had one and wasn't interested... So we talked about the plan of salvation and then she got way off topic talking about how she decorates cakes. She told us about it for like 30 minutes.. so finally we brought it back to the gospel and she told us she doesn't believe in organized religion and she only wants her relationship with God to be between her and she doesn't need a church.. so that was a bust. Hahah, she's in the area book, so maybe later we can try her and maybe someday she will come around! 

We also met another really cool couple that invited us back to teach them. We taught about the restoration and the BOM, we have this cool little BOM map that explains where it came from and what it is and all that, so we did that with them. And they said their church highly discourages them from reading anything but the bible so they wouldn't even take a BOM. we bore our testimonies and asked if we could come back, they said not for now but then told us about their baby that had passed away, and how God helped them through that, but then it was time to leave so i gave them a plan of salvation pamphlet and told them to call us, so I hope they do. Or I hope they at least read it. That's another one that might come around later. We meet a lot of people like that. Hahah. 

We were really worried about the B's for a while.. they cancelled 3 appts with us and didn't come to church last week and they wouldn't text or call us back so we thought they were dropping us and we were so sad! So we called S one night this week and just asked how she was doing and talked to her for a bit. She had finals this week so it was a busy and stressful week for her. She then said she hadn't been reading the BOM but!!! She has been praying for help all week with finals and she said it worked, and she did really well and knew that the prayers helped!! Wow I was so excited! So we committed her to come to church this week and she did! Her, bro B and her sister W (who hides when we come over) came to church!!! IT was so awesome! Bro B was even sick, and he still came. They had to leave after sacrament to take w to violin, but I didn't even care. And the sacrament talks were all SO good. It was all about the youth theme this year, so pressing forward and all that good stuff. Just what they needed. And S said she loved one of the talks. Oh it was the best thing ever. We have an appt with them tonight, so I hope it goes well. (my comp is really discouraged about them and just thinks nothing will help them so I am nervous about that) hopefully we can have the spirit with us as we teach and help them know how important this is!! I know they can do it. It's just going to take a lot of work. 

So yeah, it's been a good week. Crazy, we had so many cancellations at the beginning of the week so we just prayed so hard that our other appts wouldn't fall through and once we did that, nothing cancelled! It was cool. We were so busy saturday and sunday, it was great. I hope we can keep that up. 

We are also doing a church tour later today with a lady that won't come to church bc she doesn't feel worthy, but she is so excited for the church tour, and so are we! hopefully we can show her that you don't have to be perfect to come to church, that's why we go to church, because we aren't perfect!! i am really excited for this lesson. I think it's going to be really good. 

Well I think that's all. I love you all and hope you have the best week ever!!

A nice email from the Young Women's President in Sydney's ward

Hello!

We had your daughter and her companion over for dinner last night and I just wanted to tell you how much we love her! She is always happy and smiling and she works so hard. I see them frequently around town at the library and at our local thrift shop doing their weekly service and she just shines with light. Thank you for sharing her with us!

January 18th, 2016

Well this week was kinda rough. But I am still doing so great. We had so many appointments this week and we were so excited because being busy is wonderful! But. Just about every appointment we had fell through. Some people cancelled the morning of, some only right before the appt. One lady left a note on her door that said she wasn't feeling well and please don't knock on the door. Lots of people just didn't even show up... It was rough! Luckily we had back up plans for most of those times but the problem with back up plans is well, they are backups and you don't really focus on them so when you have to use them then it's kinda rough! But oh well! It also got down to the negative degrees. Plus wind chill. So yeah, like -25 sometimes. That is not fun. But I have lots of warm clothes and boots and everything so thank you for making sure I had nice warm things!!! 

This week was also transfers and I don't like them! I was getting to know the missionaries here really well and we were all really good friends and it's so sad that now they are just gone and a lot of them (really most of them) I will probably never see in my life again! That's a sad thought. But oh well. (honestly I'll probably forget about a lot of them too, hahah) We did go to Olive Garden with our STL's since sister Straight was getting transferred, so that was a lot of fun too! 

Everything else is going pretty well, it's kind of weird but I have become a clean freak since being out. I don't know what happened hahah.  like this morning we woke up and did laundry and then I cleaned and scrubbed the bathroom and then I vacuumed our room and cleaned that up and wiped everything down and made sure everything was spotless.  

But yeah, mission life is good! We have people to teach, although everyone is progressing soooo slowly. We just need to keep working hard and doing what we can to help them progress and then just let them use their agency, that's the hard thing! It seems so easy for us because we know the blessings that come from living the gospel and we know it's true but they have to take that leap of faith and that's hard for them. 

Also I have been doing a gratitude journal since like the middle of December and wow it's the best thing ever. It helps me so much. I have so so many things to be thankful for and I love ending my day by writing about the things I am thankful for. If you want to try it, I would definitely recommend it. We truly have so much to be thankful for and it's so important to remember that. 

Emma just pointed out to me that I have been out 2 months today! It's the 18! So that's exciting! Time is already going so fast, I can't believe it. I love being a missionary, and I am so thankful I can be.(: it sure is hard work, but it's so wonderful and more than worth it. I love this gospel so much and I am so glad I can share it with other.

I hope everyone has a great week, I love you all!!

This week was great. Last week it rained and melted a lot of the snow but then starting saturday night it got FREEZING. it's like 4 degrees right now so that's fun.. Guess it's just time to really start dressing warm, thank goodness we have a car or I don't know what I would do..

We had zone training meeting this week which was great. I learned lots and we are really working on making the goals we set and improving more. We went out to lunch with the sisters in our zone afterwards to noodles and company which was a blast. It's just so much fun being with other missionaries, especially sisters!

Thursday night we drove down to Manitowoc and stayed with the spanish sisters in their apartment. That was fun except we had to sleep on the floor which meant I didn't sleep like at all. But oh well! We drove down to Milwaukee with them Friday for the new missionary training. It was such a long drive, but the training was awesome. And it was so much fun to see everyone from the MTC!! I was so happy to see Sister Tidwell. She is the greatest, and she is doing really well so I'm glad(: Also sister Cutler is the best cook so for lunch we had the yummiest soup, salad and bread. Oh my goodness it was delicious. We learned a lot about using the Book of Mormon more so we are trying to do that. Then on the drive home me and Sister Brian (the spanish sister) got talking a lot (she also is the one whose uncle lives in eagle mountain) and we are like the same person. Seriously we just talked and laughed the entire drive home and it was so much fun. She is the oldest of 4 little brothers so it was so fun to have that in common and talk about having little brothers and just everything else! We already have many plans of hanging out when we get home. Bahah, she is so cool. 

There also is this flash drive of music around our mission and the Manitowoc Sisters have it so they put it on our flash drives and it's wonderful. It's lots of awesome hymns and other mission music. OUR MISSION ALSO HAS A RAP. For real, it's the best thing ever. I will see if I can email it to you guys. ANd it has a bunch of funny songs about missions on it that missionaries have written and it's wonderful. So that's the best thing ever. Also like everyone is getting transferred. We play volleyball a lot with the STL's and 4 sets of Elders and one from every companionship is getting transferred and I am so sad! But oh well, I will get to meet more people which will be fun! 

S went to a baptism on Friday by herself! Her family couldn't go so we got her a ride and she went, and she loved it which was so amazing and she even stayed for church when her family left. She is so amazing and SO close to getting baptized. I can't wait for her. T is getting discouraged bc it's taking so long so he isn't as excited anymore so we need to get him excited again. They are all progressing a lot. their mom came to church but left 3rd hour to take their other daughter to violin but still she did come which was awesome! We had 4 investigators at church. It was great. 

This week was good, time is already going so fast I just can't believe it's already another pday!! But yeah I think that's all for now. I love you all!!!

2016

Well last Monday after we emailed, we went to Walmart, and as soon as we walked out of there it was snowing so much!! Seriously it snowed non stop the entire day and night. It was insane. We went with the Sister Training Leaders to Lambeau Field and that was so much fun. We got to do a tour and go sit in one of the suites and learn all about the history. We got to go down the tunnel the Green Bay Packers go out of and they played the song they listen to and it was pretty dang cool. Bahaha. Sadly it was snowing so much so they covered up the field and we couldn't see it and we couldn't really get good pics but oh well, it was a ton of fun. It was crazy driving around monday and tuesday, and even still now. There is just so much snow everywhere! I love it so much. Tuesday morning though we woke up at like 5:45 and helped plow the driveway and shovel and that wasn't much fun, but oh well, it had to be done. After district meeting on Tuesday all the Elders got into a big snow fight, it was hilarious. I got nailed a few times and threw a few snowballs myself, but luckily I wasn't in the middle of it. They were pushing each other in big piles of snow and they were all soaked afterwards. It was hilarious. 

For New Year's Eve when we got home we played Rummikub with mama B and drank sparking grape cider. It was fun, but it didn't feel like a New year since we didn't stay up until midnight! Oh well! I can't believe it's 2016, seriously it's just so crazy! 

Also I am loving the Book of Mormon. Ok like I have never noticed how much it has to do with missionary work. Like when reading it in the past that's not what stuck out to me. But reading it now that's all that sticks out to me! I am learning so much about my mission and wow it's just so relatable to whatever is going on in your life, it's so cool. I am so thankful we have the Book of Mormon. 

We are teaching so many awesome people right now, and we are so close to getting baptism dates with lots of them! But people are progressing and it's so cool to see that! Yesterday we got 3 new investigators. It was crazy. We just felt like we should stop by and see some old potentials that were in the area book and we got return appts with all 3 of them! How crazy! We are meeting with 2 of them today, so wish us luck! 

We have new missionary training in milwaukee this week and I am so excited bc I will get to see everyone from my MTC district, and I just can't wait! It'll be so much fun! I miss them all and I miss Sister Tidwell lots too so it'll be so great to see her. She was a wonderful companion. 

Well that's all for now. I hope everyone has an awesome week, and had an awesome New Year's also. I love you all!