Week 11---Snow!

Well, another transfer is almost over. And that's CRAZY! I can't believe how fast time is going! It feels like this transfer started maybe a week or two ago.

So, some of you (Mom) were freaking out because we started emailing a little late this morning. Let me explain! There has been a lot of...SNOW! And ice.

Yup. On Thursday night, we started getting freezing rain, and then it snowed through most of Friday. This picture was taken near the end of the snowing.

I don't have as much time to email today, because the community college was closed, and we have to be at the public library. They only allow an hour for emailing (or maybe two... we're not really sure). But I got my SD card reader, so I'll try to send more photos than normal!

Monday, we had our district P-Day, and the theme was "Farmville." Just kidding... Mostly. We went out to a member from Dexter's farm, and he showed us around. We watered cows, saw an all-white peacock (it was so cool!), rode around in the back of a truck... And the main attraction was a giant zip line. I did NOT ride it. To get attached, you had to climb what was basically a telephone pole with giant nails sticking out the side. Then you had to stand on a tiny, rickety platform. Nuh uh. I got queasy just looking up at it.

Tuesday was mission conference! We drove to Cape Girardeau, an hour and a half drive, then had six hours of meetings, then drove home. As you might imagine, THAT was a productive day... Haha. Well, it was productive. I learned a lot, but we didn't meet with many people. We learned some new ways to present the lessons, and the mission president's wife, Sister Morgan, taught us about table manners :) Our car got a 92% on the cleanliness checklist. We got docked because our engine was dirty. What? Who knew that you had to clean your engine? Oh well, now I know for next time!

We had a pretty slow week overall, as you might imagine with the weather. Some updates on our investigators...

Edna has been having surgery! She's getting a kidney removed, so she's been in the hospital in Cape. It's sad, because she really wants to get baptized, but she's going to have to wait a while, because she'll have a big old hole in her!

We visited Hannah twice. She's one of our "older" investigators, by which I mean that we have been teaching her for a long time. She's been struggling with many things, and it's going to be hard if we have to drop her. But when someone isn't progressing, and can't make the changes in their life, it can be better for them to not learn more. With greater knowledge comes greater responsibility, right?

We have a new investigator! Maggie is 15 years old, and we actually met her because she came to church with some ward members. That's always exciting, when someone comes to church! We had the first lesson with her and her member friends, and it went really well. She accepted the invitation to be baptized when she learns that the church is true.

That all pretty much happened before....

 That's me, getting ready to head out into the icy snow. Or snowy ice? I don't really know... Haha. But yeah, it got cold. And snowy. Church was fun. There were maybe 25 members there when we started sacrament meeting! So we only ended up having sacrament meeting.

Timeline of snowiness:

 Thursday at about 3:30 we were told that we had to park our cars, because WINTER WAS COMING. At that point, we were getting mostly just rain. Cold rain, but just rain. Then, before we went to bed, we got….

That is ice, by the way.

Then, Friday afternoon, we had that snow you saw before. BRRR.

But Mom, those boots you got me are boss. They keep my feet warm and dry, and they have good traction! And luckily, winter clothing is cute. But when Sister Richardson and I have tried to visit people recently, they look at us like we're crazy. "Why are you two girls out in the snow and cold? Get inside! That's what we're doing!" And seriously, people have been staying inside. It kind of reminds me of Camas when it snows :) The school got let out Thursday morning, and hasn't been back in session since. And obviously the college is closed too.

While the snow/ice was here, we were productive :) We decorated a little for Christmas (see your snowflakes? I've been making some too). Sister Richardson's been knitting. And we baked pie! That is the first pecan pie I have made, and it was delicious. 

You might notice that some of those pecans are small. That's because we actually hand cracked and peeled the pecans. There's a pecan tree in Ashley's backyard, and she gave us some. The pie recipe was from a member we know. We also made a pumpkin pie, because I haven't had any yet this year, and I couldn't let a Thanksgiving go by without pumpkin pie!

Anyway, my time is wrapping up... Spiritual thought time! Haha.

I've been reading in Alma, and I love this scripture. It had never stood out to me before:

"For that which ye do send out shall return unto you again, and be restored; therefore, the word restoration more fully condemneth the sinner and justifieth him not at all." (Alma 41:15)

It's almost like karma. We are sending things out in the world: good or bad feelings, good or bad relationships, good or bad messages. And they will return to us! Not necessarily in this life... In fact, probably NOT in this life. But they will return. So we need to make sure that, if we want good things, we are sending out good things!

Just got a notice that my time is almost up, so I'm going to wrap  this up! Love you all! Keep sending me letters :) And emails! only got a handful of emails this week :( Guilt trip! Guilt trip!

 Keep being missionaries!

Love,

Sister Barret

Week 10--Happy Thanksgiving!

Wow. Ten weeks already??? And it's December?????? Time flies! I'll probably talk about this a ton, but time moves weird on a mission. Some days go soooooooslowwwwwwww because every appointment falls through, you spend time tracting and driving around and you still don't get to teach any lessons, and by 8:30 you and your companion are racking your brains for ANYONE that you haven't tried to visit in the last 24 hours. But then you look back, or in this case, I'm looking back, and I've been in Poplar Bluff for more than two months and I'm coming up on the last two weeks of my second transfer. It's crazy! This week was a pretty good week. Happy Thanksgiving everyone! I hope everyone's Thanksgiving was wonderful, and full of food. Sister Richardson tried pecan pie for the first time ever, and now she thinks it's wonderful. We might go and buy a pecan pie at Walmart today. I did NOT get any pumpkin pie though! It's crazy, right? No pumpkin pie for Thanksgiving, and I went to three different Thanksgiving dinners.Four, actually, if you count the ward party, but I think there was pumpkin pie there, and plus that was like two weeks ago. Forever in missionary terms. That's another thing about "mission time": two weeks ago feels like forever ago. I can hardly remember everything that happened yesterday.

Tuesday, we delivered some boxes of food that the Young Men and Women of the ward made for some of the older single sisters of the ward. One of the boxes was meant for a Sister T, and she's such a great member. She's about 80 years old, and she's the same woman who gave Sister Richardson and I about 8 skirts. She is always giving the missionaries random things, like oatmeal. When we brought the box of food over, she just shook her head. "I told them to stop sending me food!" Then she starts going through the box:"Nope, won't eat that. Here, you take it. Nope, won't eat that either. Ugh, can't eat that, too much heavy syrup." I guess when you reach a certain point, you just know what you do and don't like--and you're not afraid to let everyone know! She is also impossible to escape from! We got there at about 2:45, and we told her straight off the bat that we had an appointment at 3:30 in south side. We barely got out by 3:35, and that was after telling her four times that we had to go. She is just full of stories! I love it.

On Wednesday, we had District Meeting, and I had to give a training. There are usually two trainings every week, one given by a missionary in the district and the other given by the district leader. My topic was "Discerning the Thoughts and Needs of Investigators through the Holy Ghost." I think the lesson went pretty well. I brought candy and passed it around at the start, so that always helps :)

Then... Thanksgiving! I wrote Mom/Lyvia/Quinn a pretty detailed letter about what we did on Thanksgiving, but here's the rundown: We got up at 6:30 (surprise!). We did our regular study schedule until 10, and then it was a free day! As a treat for us, we went shopping at Walmart, and got some stuff to clean our car. We looked at baby clothes (so cute). Then we went to the Dollar Tree, because I bet

Sister Richardson that we could find something there for more than a dollar. She won, because we couldn't find any POSTED prices above a dollar, but I'm still pretty sure that there were some books there that cost more than a dollar. Anyway, then we went home and cleaned our car. It's super clean now :)

Our first Thanksgiving dinner was with the R family. They had six missionaries there total, because our zone leaders came down and ate with them too. The food was delicious. Then a second Thanksgiving dinner! With the P family. They fed us a lot, and we felt fit to burst of too much food. By the end, when I had to eat a piece of delicious pecan pie, I really thought that it would be too much. I felt like I was so full of food that it was filling me all the way up my esophagus. But it wouldn't be a good Thanksgiving if

you didn't feel like that, right?  Then we went back to spend time with the R family just playing games

(not board games though, or video games). At about 7:30, we headed home and spent the rest of the night resting and writing our families.

Friday was a little dreary. All of our appointments fell through, which is always rough. I mean, it was the day after a holiday, so of course people were pretty busy. Never too busy for the gospel, though,

right? Haha. Saturday went well. We tracted and found two new investigators! Yay!

And Sunday was a normal Sunday. A fast Sunday, and none of our investigators came to church, so that was a little sad.

Overall, we kept pretty busy this week, which is good. The secret to missionary work is work, after all! I've already seen that. We are blessed so much more when we work and try our best and do everything

we can than when we just coast along or do the least we can do. On my mission, we try our best to have a plan for every hour, and then we go do our best to make those plans happen. I think that people can feel the Spirit more when they realize how important the gospel is to you, and you show that the gospel is important to you by working hard at it. It's like going to seminary every morning, or reading your

scriptures daily, or doing your visiting teacher. These things are work, and sometimes they can be hard or seem boring. But when we do them, we are showing to ourselves, to others, and to God that we

realize that they are important.

Love you all! Hope that you ate lots of pie and leftovers this week. Good luck giving away your copies of the Book of Mormon--remember, it's a lot easier than you might think!

Get ready for the holiday season! I think that Sister Richardson and I might go caroling with the Young Women this Wednesday--it seems way too early for that!

Sister Barret