11 Months!

What a long week. But a good one! We were so drained, as soon as p-day started today, we pretty much laid on the floor.  

Monday, we went on another hike with some members from our ward, which was pretty fun! We went back to the tunnels again. We love it there. At FHE that night, the ward played HUMAN ANGRY BIRDS (Carson will love this). It was pretty funny to watch.

Tuesday we had District Meeting, as usual. We worked on our map, and finally got it finished (hooray for actually knowing where our area is). We got to go and help feed the homeless at a church downtown. It was really fun, there were GIANT pots and we made a TON of food in them for the people. It was sweet. That night we had an amazing lesson with Ken. That morning, we really felt like the Elder's that passed him off to us should be there. They came to the lesson too. Ken just asked questions about the history and really hard stuff about The Book of Mormon. Of course that was one of the Elder's forte, so he took over and answered all his questions perfectly. What a blessing. During the whole lesson I felt sooooo sick. I was pretty much just praying that I wouldn't throw up during the lesson.  So of course as soon as the lesson was over, Sister Cook and I RAN outside to the car, drove down the street, and I made her blast Mo-Tab while I spewed our dinner on the side of the road. But, on the bright side, we got out of doing exchanges that night... 

Wednesday we took a few members out with us to contact potential investigators. It was so embarrassing because they were people we had never tried to contact, so we were just following our GPS. At one point, the GPS took us back to Anthem... Yeah. We apologized like 5475409 times to our member, but he'll probably never come out with us again, hahaha. We did some more contacting in Boulder City that night, had dinner at our Bishop's house. I got sick again. We had coordination meeting and then a few lessons. We met with Ivanneth, and there was a skirt party going on... talk about tempting for a sister missionary... But guess who walked away empty handed? THIS KID. You should be proud mom. Some of the skirts were even called "Cassie Skirts". They literally HAD my name on them.  We've been meeting with a less active and we went to his house after that. We read the "You Were Born to Lead, You Were Born for Glory" talk by Sheri L Dew. It was awesome. If you haven't read that talk, you should. It'll pretty much make you feel like a trillion dollars. 

That night we went to meet with Steve, an investigator. We have been a little worried about teaching him about the word of wisdom... But we taught it. At first, he was like, "yeah, I'm never giving up coffee." But as we talked about it, he said he would try to drink a little less. The next morning, he texted us and said he stopped drinking coffee completely. YES! We were sooooo excited! 

Thursday was long. Good lesson with another less active, read the same talk. We met with Eddie, who we are pretty sure just doesn't get it. We had dinner, and then went to Institute. I remember it was a terrible day, and I'm reading my journal right now, but I can't remember why it was so bad.  That night we went to Institute, we were supposed to be meeting someone there. We checked in the classrooms and she wasn't there. We looked in the last one, and no luck. But then, I heard some noise in the classroom, and the door burst open, and all of a sudden, someone was hugging me. IT WAS MISSY!!!!!!! BEST DAY EVER! I was so happy that I cried! She was there for Institute, and Ben was there too! Ahhhh! We talked and talked and talked. I was so happy - definitely a tender mercy. 

Friday was good. We met with one of our less actives in the morning to read the scriptures. Weekly planned. Then, we went to Boulder City for a lesson with Nick, who we haven't been able to get a hold of. He wasn't there, so we waited for him to come home. He was really in and out while we were talking to him and his friend, and then he was being really awkward and asking when we would let him take us on dates... so we're just going to give him back to the Elders. Then, we had the best restoration lesson EVER with a new investigator named Alan! A girl in our ward invited him to church and to take the lessons! We committed him to baptism, and the spirit in that lesson was so strong. We got out of the apartment at the end, and Sister Cook and I ran to the car, got in, and screamed. We were so, so happy! Then we had another awesome lesson with Ken. We taught him the 10 Commandments and Law of Chastity. He loved it and it was really good. We taught him the hand signals to the 10 commandments, and when we got to the not killing commandment, we all got a little off track talking about knives and stuff (the Elders... hahah). Elder McMullin showed us his pocket knives... yes, we know, off topic. Afterwards, he told me that we should have a knife, just in case for when we are walking around at night, so he gave me one of his.  It was really funny. I didn't know what to do with it, so I just put it in my bag. After that, we met for exchanges! 

Saturday, I was with Sister Baker in Black Mountain. She was companions with Sister Cook in the MTC. She is also from Michigan! So we had a lot of fun talking about that. She is really sweet. She is really inspiring. She has had a really hard past couple of years. Her mom passed away from cancer, and her dad (who is less active) told her that she shouldn't go on a mission, and when she told him that she had to go on one, he said that she doesn't have a home to come back to. My heart hurt for her, but it was really cool to see that despite all of that, she still chose to serve the Lord. We had a great day, filled with miracles! We invited a ton of people to church. And we walked a ton, which was soooo nice since we can't really do that in YSA... Our dinner was interesting. It was so awesome, we had cute bread bowls and soup... so it started out great. Then I was chewing, and all of a sudden something crunched really hard in my mouth. I took it out, and it was GLASS! I HAVE GLASS IN MY STOMACH! What the heck? Yeah. I guess I'm hardcore or something. It was crazy. We had a few lessons and exchanged back. 

Sunday was the craziest day of all. So many ups and downs and just plain draining stuff. We came home that night and fell on the floor. So, in the morning, we got to go to Adrian's patriarchal blessing! It was amazing, and super spiritual. He really wanted us there, and it was so special. I could feel his future children there. Then we went to the hospital. We got a text the night before from a member that said that her mom woke up from a coma in the hospital, and wanted a blessing and to join the church... so we went, of course. We went there and talked with her, and on the way inside we saw one of the member's of our mission presidency. President Cavalleri's wife has been in the hospital for a little while, and all of us missionaries have been praying for her. We saw him and asked him if we could come see her quickly right after - he was thrilled! We got to see them for a few minutes. Later that day he texted us to thank us again, it was so sweet. Then we ran off to church. Ken was there! He had gone to church in the family ward with the Elders and then wanted to come to the Singles Ward. After sacrament meeting, he raised some of his concerns, and we talked with him for TWO HOURS. We completely missed the rest of church, but it was so worth it to talk to him and help him. We are really hoping that we don't lose him. We are meeting with him again on Tuesday night. We were sooo drained after talking to him, we were working so hard. We had a lesson again with Alan, which was super good, then dinner, then a lesson with Jeremy. Jeremy loves the Book of Mormon! It was so cool, he talked about it a lot after we read a chapter! Then a lesson with Nathan, a less active. We pretty much just laughed the whole time, and tried to read a chapter of the BOM. Nathan is too funny. 

Today we have just been hanging out at the apartment. We went to the park with our district and played some ultimate frisbee. Nothing too exciting. 

I love Sister Cook! She is amazing. We have a ton of fun together. Our investigators are all progressing. We just need to find some new ones! Thanks for all the prayers and support!

 I love you!

 

Love, Sister Coltrin