CDSM Transfer 8

Week 1

We started off the week with an investigator (name withheld for now) who really needed a DTR (Determine The Relationship aka why are we still teaching you if you aren't going to do anything about it?). We brought a recently returned missionary who totally brought out the big guns and was very straight forward. We all were straight forward but her experience was greatly needed in that lesson. Said investigator says they will pray to find out if what we are teaching is true. Fingers crossed that they will get an answer and we can move on.

The miracle new investigator of the week is Diana. She was one of those awesome people who invited us in to sit down before we really explained why we knocked on her door in the first place. We taught her about the Book of Mormon and she gladly took one saying, "I need all the help I can get." She was super open to learning but added the disclaimer that if she ever lost interested, she'd tell us (which is wonderful because so many people just avoid us). She said she'd read this week, meet with us in a week and let us know how interested she is. We're praying hard that she feels the spirit as she reads because she seems so prepared!

Another tender mercy happened yesterday. I'm trying really hard to keep my head up despite the lack of success we're seeing but it really got to me yesterday. As we drove to our next destination, a couple tears leaked out and I prayed that we'd see some sort of miracle in this area because I was on the verge of pulling over and just having a melt down. The first door we knocked on, we were invited in and talked to a very nice lady. Although she didn't become a new investigator and sated up front that she wasn't interested in meeting with us, she still listened to us, congratulated us on the hard work we were doing, agreed to call us if she ever needed service and sent us off with big hugs. It was an answer to my prayer big time. She wasn't interested in learning about the gospel but she recognized the good we are doing and showed us love for that. I felt much happier for the rest of the day, knowing that there are people out there who care about us end encourage us to keep searching for those who are ready to hear.

Well, that's pretty much the highlights of the week. But can I tell you about 6 Points? Coolest thrift store of my life and we get to volunteer there! The prices are way cheap and the people who work there are great. The main point of the business is to help adults with learning, social and mental disabilities to have a job so we get to work around some very special people. I could stay there to hang clothes and tag them all day and be perfectly happy. If I ever happen to live in Gunnison, I may spend every spare minute there.

Have a good one!

P.S. I don't have any pictures this week.

Week 2

So I feel totally lame not having any fun stories to tell this many weeks in a row. Bad news: any miracle investigators we've found in the last few weeks have already dropped us. Good news: we picked Carrie back up. Yay! Hoping and praying that she starts progressing and not forgetting to do her assignments and such. Oh and we finally saw our long lost (and officially dropped for awhile) investigators, Jeff and Kathy. They've not been very contactable due to Kathy's mom being super sick for months and passing away a few weeks ago. But now they are back and humbled. So that's good news.

*crickets chirping*

Ummm... Well...the Nelsons, a family in the branch, apparently make waffles every Sunday afternoon for the college students (and hungry missionaries) during the school year so we got cake batter waffles yesterday! If you have any good waffle recipes pass them on. They're always looking for fun new waffles to try.

Pizza waffle.

*more crickets*

Soooo...yeah I got nothing. Here are some other random things to talk about. First, the Fort Collins temple open house is going on right now. It's not in my mission (big bummer right there) but there is still quite a buzz about it across Colorado.

 http://www.mormonnewsroom.org/article/public-invited-tour-fort-collins-mormon-temple?cid=HP_TU_16-8-2016_dPAD_fCNWS_xLIDyL2-1_

These are the basic pamphlets that we hand out on the daily. The second to last and third to last pamphlets are pretty new and super awesome!

https://www.lds.org/manual/missionary?lang=eng

Okaaaay so that's what I got. A couple random pictures attached and toodles til next week!

Our pet mint plant!

We got a new vacuum this week. I was super happy. I won't tell you how long it was since we had a working vacuum but it was longer than it should have been. Our floors were nasty. Now they're not and my clean-freak self is satisfied. 

Week 3

We started off the week with guests of honor here in little 'ol Gunnison. President and sister Gifford were passing through and took us to lunch on P-day. President Gifford has passed through Gunnison on his cross-Colorado motorcycle route many a time so he was just reliving the old days. Yes, my mission president is a biker (sort of). Be jealous. Haha poor President can't ride a motorcycle for 3 years. The sacrifices. He's a good man.

Tuesday we had zone conference. The Giffords and the new second counselor in the mission presidency, President Hall, and his wife were there. It was a really good meeting. Sometimes it doesn't feel worth the drive to go to meetings (nearly 3 hours in the car and that isn't even as long as other missionaries have to drive) but this one was totally worth it. The main training was on repentance. I don't have any crazy insights but a whole new light has been shed on the topic. If we aren't inviting those that we teach to repent, we aren't doing out job. It's so true. Repentance isn't always about some big sin that you have to fix. It's more about changing the little things you do to become a better, more Christ-like person. If our investigators (let alone us) aren't catching onto this vision, either we aren't teaching them the way that they learn best or they aren't ready. So much to apply to our teaching. We now have great, revised lessons more focused on repentance. Now we just need to meet with the people so we can teach them... That right there is the trick. For now, we're just doing a lot of service and tracting. Oh but guess who is in my zone now that I got to see? My good friend Sista B! I didn't get any pictures with her tho. I know. *facepalm*

Last night we got a text from the Spanish sisters in Montrose saying that one of their investigators has a friend in Gunnison that wanted to meet with us. We were super excited to find this woman. When we met her we found out that she had been baptized a few years ago and had shortly thereafter become a druggie because of some horrible things that happened in her life that she wanted to run away from. Well, just a few weeks ago she decided that running away was not working and that she needed to turn her life around. So she moved to Gunnison a few days ago and figured out how to get in contact with us. She's a sweet woman who sincerely want's to change and find peace in the gospel. She's not a new investigator but she has brought a new purpose to our work and we are so excited to be the ones to remind her of the blessings of the gospel.

We haven't met many promising people through tracting this week but we did meet this college kid that was overflowing with happiness topped off with a big smile. It reminded me how effective a bright smile is to make you more approachable. I'll be trying to remember that. More people will want to talk to me if I look happy! It's a no duh kind of thing but it's always good to have that reminder.

School is in full swing here in Gunnison. Both grade school and college wise. Now we have to work around all the football games and such. Didn't football just end? Apparently summer happened when I wasn't looking and it's basically fall now.

Week 4

Hello all!

It's been a slow week for the most part but fun stuff all around. We've kept in close contact with Elena, the less-active that we met last week. She is doing everything she can to change her life, get help and give back. She's just great!

We spent a lot of our efforts on inviting literally everyone we know in Gunnison (even if we've only met them once) to the branch BBQ that was on Saturday. There were a lot of people who sounded like they'd go but then hardly anyone showed up. That was disappointing but the few who did show up had a nice time. Lots of food. Food is good.

While going around giving invitations to everyone, we knocked on the door of some former investigators to invite them to the BBQ. As we approached their door, we realized that everything that they used to have hanging on their door and in their window was gone. We had a feeling they might have moved recently but we knocked anyway. Best decision of the week. They had in fact moved but the woman who answered was super nice and invited us in. Because she was still moving in, her furniture wasn't there yet so we just stood there and got to know her. Come to find out, she had LDS friends as a child who invited her to church and activities. She has happy memories from those experiences. But wait, it get's better. She explained that the church she is attending only has a youth program for young children and ends at 6th grade and her daughter is in 6th grade. Soooo she asked if we have a youth program for that age! Why, in fact we do. And she's considering bringing her daughter to our church. Happy day, all is well!

So this week, I learned that I can in fact write a full length sacrament meeting talk in an hour. True story. Granted, it's not the best talk I've ever written but it worked. It's funny how members think that missionaries have talk writing super powers or something but every time I've been asked to give a talk on my mission, I've had less and less time to prepare. In this case, we got called at 9pm on Saturday (both of us were asked to fill in for the next morning) which didn't give us any time since we still had to plan for the next day and get to bed on time and then we had a meeting at 8 in the morning. So in all the spare minutes we had (that added up to about an hour), we quickly prepared talks. And we nailed it. But, Bishop Bennion, please don't get any ideas. I won't have missionary super powers when I get home.

And that's a wrap! Lots of pictures today. Yay!

Cute cards that a little girl in the branch gave us.

Week 5

The big five-zero. That's a lot of weeks!

So, this week we had the most lesson-y lesson we've ever had with Abel. We started teaching the Plan of Salvation and got all the way to Adam and Eve and blew his mind with the concept of why we need opposition in this life. Haha he just sat there for a second with wide eyes and then asked if we could stop there so he could process that. But seriously, if you want a good blow-your-mind read, read 2 Nephi chapter 2 in the Book of Mormon.

A while back we knocked on this womans door and she said that now wasn't a good time but that we could try her another time. We kind of forgot about that for awhile but we remembered a few days ago and tried her again. She talked to us and was the nicest person I've met in awhile and ahhh it was nice. She said we could come back in a few weeks. So that's great!

We were at Carries house a few days ago and she said that this young, single mom had just moved in down the street. So we decided to try her and welcome her to Gunnison. She was also super nice and appreciated that we had stopped by. Another yay! Woah...she walked into the library just now. Haha this is awesome.

For service this week, we threw a lot of rocks in a big hole. Some members in the branch have this pasture that they want to reseed but, we're in the Rocky Mountains so there are a loooot of rocks. It's pretty fun because we keep pretending that we're doing shot put and discus with the rocks. But that makes me miss track and field too (even tho I gave up field years ago because I can't throw).

I was reading in the book "Jesus the Christ" (https://www.lds.org/manual/jesus-the-christ?lang=eng) and I loved this footnote. It was my mind blowing thing that I learned this week.

Chapter 17, footnote 5: Relative Perfection.”Our Lord's admonition to men to become perfect, even as the Father is perfect(Matthew 5:48) cannot rationally be construed otherwise than as implying the possibility of such achievement. Plainly, however, man cannot become perfect in mortality in the sense in which God is perfect as a supremely glorified Being. It is possible,though, for man to be perfect in his sphere in a sense analogous to that in which superior intelligences are perfect in their several spheres; yet the relative perfection of the lower is infinitely inferior to that of the higher. A college student in his freshman or sophomore year may be perfect as freshman or sophomore; his record may possibly be a hundred per cent on the scale of efficiency and achievement;yet the honors of the upper class man are beyond him, and the attainment of graduation is to him remote, but of assured possibility, if he do but continue faithful and devoted to the end.

Well, that's what I got this week. Next week I'll know if I'll be getting transferred or not. Also, as a heads up, we have to spend most of next Monday deep cleaning our apartments (which I have no idea what we'll do that whole time because I'm a clean freak and keep our house pretty deep cleaned but whatever) so we're only allowed 30 minutes next week to email so I probably won't be sending any individual emails next week. Just look forward to this one!

 Wednesday night we had to go clean our car because the windshield was smeared with bugs and I wasn't about to drive all the way to district meeting with it like that. Also the front looked like it had a 3 day old beard with all those bugs. That all got on the car in 2 days. #CountryLife

"I'm a mermaid." -Sister Sanofsky

Vaccum boxes are made for loopy missionaries.

Week 6

So much to report so little time arrrghhh! 

Miracles happened this week! To start it off, we stopped by Carries Monday evening. She was having a hard day and sister Sanofsky suggested that she get a blessing. She said that would be great but then the topic changed so we figured she wasn't really serious. But a few minutes later, she brought it up again and asked how to get a blessing. We quickly called brother Price from the branch who immediately came with his wife. As soon as they walked in, brother Price started explaining to Carrie what the priesthood is, what a priesthood blessing is, and how to receive the blessings promised, that is, to act on her faith. He then gave her a powerful blessing of guidance, basically reiterating what he had just explained to her. After the blessing, he sat back down and continued to teach her about faith and what she needs to do: keep the commandments, listen to the guidance we (the sisters) are giving to her, repent, come to church, etc. She sat there nodding and looking excited. After he was done, she turned to us and said, "next lesson, I want to learn about repentance." Our jaws just about hit the floor. This is what we've been trying to tell her basically since I got here. When the right member is there, it's the best! Unfortunately she hasn't made a whole lot of steps since then but she gets it just a little bit more. There is hope!

We keep stopping by to visit the mother that I talked about last week. She has appreciated the friendship and yesterday as we talked, the subject of religion came up. We compared her background to ours and then she mentioned that she might be interested in learning about our religion. Yussss.

And to top off the day, we visited a freshman girl going to Western who we met about a week and a half ago. We had just talked to her for a few minutes on the street and she agreed to meet with us but of course I had my doubts. Well, yesterday as we taught her the first lesson, the Spirit was strong and at the end we asked her if she had any questions, comments or concerns. She smiled and said, "I'm still processing it all but it makes sense!" Tender mercies and miracles right there. 

In other news, the fall is definitely here with winter right at its tail. We had a couple of really nippy days this week. But its sooo beautiful!

Also, we got a random text from an 816 number (Kansas City) the other day. Kinda freaked me out and I was wondering what friend was crazy enough to get a hold of my number and thought that it would be funny to prank text me. I don't really think it was anyone I know but it was still really weird.

I also tested the fire detector on accident. Lets just say, our stove heats up real fast and things spill over all the time but it was extra smoky this time. Sister Sanofsky was pretty exasperated with me. Haha whoops!
Friday was homecoming for Western and they have this tradition of setting the W on the mountain on fire. It looked so cool!

And here's a plot twist: Sister Sanofsky is getting transferred...and I'm staying in Gunnsion. Say whaaaa? Yeah no one saw that one coming. 

Well that's about all the time I have folks!