Say Cheese!: Happy Mother's Day!

It feels weird emailing since I just got to skype my family yesterday.

This week we are going to the temple in Chicago on Friday, so we have to use Friday as our pday for next week. So I get to email again, too.

I can't even remember what happened this week. #missionprobs

I FINALLY got to snuggle a kitten!!!! Actually. I got to snuggle THREE kittens and a ferret. My family can tell you that story, cause its a good one.

We had FHE with the Cook fambam and Deidre and watched JSPOTR (Jospeh Smith Prophet of the Restoration, for those who don't know mission lingo) and it was so good.

Tuesday was a crazy day because we biked ALLLLLL DAY LONG in true missionary fashion. And no one we had apps with was home, so that was laaaaaaaaaame. But we found other people to talk to and got flowers from cute little girls and a HQ referall. And we pretty much fell over with exhaustion and slept our faces off that night.

Elders fixing my bike when my brakes went out. Sister Jardine: "How many white shirts does it take to fix a bike?" hahaha

The bruises on my legs take talent to obtain. Seriously......I don't even know where they come from.

Wednesday was SO fun. We met with Sister Pike and she taught/helped Sister Jardine and Elkington how to mend some of their clothes that needed mending. I didnt bring anything, so I just played with her deaf dog, Darby. Best ever.

The Spanish elders are the greatest and sent us on a scavenger hunt all over town during our lunch hour. They bought us pizza and sent us to the library, Traxler Park, the church for different clues, and then the last clue made us wait until Book of Mormon class that night for the rest of the clues.

So we saw Theresa and Nancy and Karen and Mark and tried to see Jody and then had a lesson with Mikayla at the church in the mean time. Then they stole our keys and moved our car and hid brownies in it. hahaha. They are clever.

Thursday was Zone Conference in Madtown. And much to mostly everyones dismay, the rumors of us getting Ipads and internet proselyting did not come true. But it was a great meeting! I love missionary meetings. Especially ZC's because they are combined and so I got to see all of my Mad-West Zone (I just got transferred to the Mad-East Zone, btw) friends like Sister Lybbert and the Parkinsons and Sister Asper and Elder Dickey and Elder Steiner and Elder Stevenson and all of those cool cats.

We talked a lot about families. We studied the doctrine of the Abrahamic covenant and why and how it is going to bless all the families of the earth and what our part as missionaries is in order to do that. We talked about why the earth would be "utterly wasted at His coming" if the hearts of the children weren't turned to the fathers. UHM. LIGHTBULB! The whole point of living on earth is to be in families and to learn and make and keep covenants and be sealed in the temple. If we don't do this and help our ancestors do this, the earth is utterly wasted. Those are strrroooonnngggg words, friends.

We are feeling a HUGE push on family history. Not only as missionaries and from our mission President, but from General Authorities and church leaders. We have been trying to use family history as a way to contact and find people. We have been invited to use family history as a way to introduce the church and the doctrines in the Book of Mormon. (And guess what?! It TOTALLY works. The Spirit of Elijah is on FIRE in Janesville. Everyone we've used this method of contacting on has given us a phone number and been interested in learning more.

Say whaaaaaaa? Thats huge.)

We had a lesson with Jeff and we totally love him. He has so many good questions of the soul and we feel like we just can't teach him fast enough! haha.

We found a lake that we didn't know existed in our area. hahahaha. Only in Wisconsin.....

Friday we went to breakfast with Deidre at a place called the Citrus Cafe and I died and went to heaven. BEST FOOD EVER. Literally. We had a lesson about the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the Word of Wisdom in the library and it was great. She is getting baptized on the 24th! She's awesome and SO prepared. Like.... Stephanie prepared.

We tried to meet with Angie and I was so excited to play with kittens again, but she didnt answer :/ There were a bunch of people outside at her neighbors house and I KNEW we had to talk to them (i've been working on talking to everyone I see) but I had no idea what to say. Its always so awkward to talk to people when they just saw you knock on the door next to them and I kinda dread it everytime. But I said "Heavenly Father, please help me talk to these people" and literally the second later, we were having a conversation and I dont even remember what I said but I do know that God is good(:

Saturday was another busy day. We had breakfast at Bishops. Oh my goodness. I cannot even describe the amount of food there. Like... crepes, three different kinds of quiche, stuffed french toast, muffins, sausage, eggs, bacon, three different kinds of cinnamon rolls, fruit, donuts, ect. A bunch of families and the other 4 elders and recent converts Harvey and Jacob came and it was a blast and a half.

We got a call from some lady from the West Allis ward who was in town with nothing to do and asked if she could come out with us. We thought it was weird, but we met her at Culvers and she came to our appointments with us. She just got baptized last month! She has a spirit that is so strong. She testified and shared her experience with people and helped us knock on doors and it was so great. She helped us clean the Primus's house and I love her. #trueconversion She is coming out with us every other Saturday and we are stoked. #memberpresentlessons!

Sunday was literally a day of just calling home and going to church. We sang "Armies of Helaman" with the primary for mothers day. It was cute. We did some planning and took a lunch hour nap and then went to the Cook's for dinner and skype time! YAY! It was another blast and a half and I love my family.

<3 <3 <3

Its crazy. I literally feel like it was Christmas like...yesterday. Like, no joke. And so I'm really scared because the next phone call home will be my last and then I go home a month after. SCARY. Someone tell time to stop moving so fast. I'm going to tape my eyelids open so that I stop blinking. Its a serious problem. I can't go home. Ever. I have so much work to do!