Naps and Revelation.

Hello all! Another week has come and gone (how on earth? ...) and we're back at P-day.. again! SO! Without further adieu, I'll start out with Monday after we emailed. :)
 

Monday- played basketball at the stake center. It was intense. So fun! But INTENSE. I get so nervous when I get the ball so I just fling it at the first teammate I see. I made a couple shots, so that was fun. :) After that, we went home, wrote letters, got ready, and left to have dinner with the Zimmerman family! Turns out they love Doctor Who! Immediate bonding. They're spunky and fun and a little bit dweeby. My kind of people. :) After dinner we went to meet a potential investigator, but ran into some awkward times there so we left. We met up with a couple of Elders in our zone and discussed people we had swapped during the ward change. We went home and did planning and during our planning I felt strongly impressed that we needed to do service the next day. I told my companions, but we didn't know why I felt that, so we didn't think much of it and went to bed.

Tuesday- GREAT DAY. During companionship study, we found out who we needed to serve! It was so cool. We were sitting there studying when a sister from our ward (the same sister who needed help with the kitten) called and asked us if we could help her with her house. She's going through some REALLY hard things right now and she needed help cleaning up. So we cheerfully accepted (after I did a mental-spiritual fist pump. AW YEAH, INSPIRATION IS REAL.) and we planned out our day. We first went and visited an investigator that we were passing off to a couple other elders in our stake, and that was REALLY great (they're so cool! Their names are Rosalyn and Antoine), and then we went to help the sister in our ward. The Elders were there (Elder Mierau and Elder Tripp, who are in our ward with us) and we all got to work. We did some DEEP cleaning, and it was so fun! I loved it. During our work, I learned that if you make a belt out of aluminum foil and wrap it around a cat's waist, it wayyyyyyyy messes up their equilibrium and they look drunk. It doesn't hurt the cat. But it's fun to watch. We worked at her house for the majority of the day, then went and had dinner with the Rex family. I talked about fishing and hunting with Brother Rex and let me tell you, dad would be proud of me for my knowledge! :) Haha. After dinner we attempted to find a less active that lives in our area. Unfortunately, however, it was dark. And our new area is like ALLL country roads where there's about a mile between each house, so after trying to find her house and driving around for a while, we got frustrated and went home to plan.
 

Wednesday- Zone conference day! It was really good. Also really long. But we learned a lot about exact obedience and repentance. I think my favorite thing that I got from it was this- A truly repentant heart recognizes the importance to try again when they relapse the first time. Often, it takes multiple, repeated attempts to repent. There is something sacred in such striving.
AHH I loved that so much! How easy it can be to put ourselves down when we don't measure up to our own expectations! Everyone's worst critic is themself and it's so sad. Remember that you are constantly growing and adapting and becoming better, and Heavenly Father loves you as much as He loves the person you think is succeeding more at life! On the other side of the spectrum, as well, it can be hard to not be overly critical of those you see who don't uphold their standards or even the standards you unfairly set for them. Remember again- Heavenly Father loves them just as much as He loves you. They're just another Child of God trying to make it through life.

Anyway, after the conference we decided to do a bit of knocking before dinner. Sister Leavitt thinks I'm really inspired by the Spirit so she ALWAYS has me pick the streets we knock on. Anyway, so I picked a street, we went to it. Sister Clark saw a person outside and made the first move to walk up and talk to him, and Sister Leavitt did most of the talking. It went really well! His name is Ryan. He's a really cool guy. He works at a prison and was shanked in the leg once and has some crazyyyyyy stories. He's really nice though and you can just tell that he wants more out of life than just guarding a prison. That night we had dinner with a nice elderly couple in our ward, then went home.

Thursday- I wish I had more to say about what we did Thursday. We did next to nothing. Here's why- Thursday is our weekly planning day. Which is great. But on Thursday we had a lot to talk about and it ended up taking several hours. We went to the library (came to the library? I'm in the library right now.. anyway..) and searched for things on mormon.org/ read up on the world, according to the church. We didn't have a dinner appointment so we went back home, ate dinner, and sang together. It was a good day but I'm upset that we didn't do more.

Friday- We had a special zone training! It was really good. Basically we reviewed zone conference, talked about what we needed to fix as a zone as well as in our districts and our companionships, and reviewed the white handbook. It was really good. After that, we ate lunch, and did bike safety inspections because we wanted to ride bikes.. but.. my bike is not up to par :( Sadly. We have to fix a few things. Bums me out. We went and visited the Jingozians. They... they're truly amazing. They were homeless until recently. They now have an apartment and just got their water turned on 4 days ago, and they still don't have electricity. They have next to no furniture but still, they are so thankful for what they have. Talk about a humility check. They are wonderful people and I am honored to know them. I really am. More about them later.

After the Jingozians, we met with the Feasel family. Brother Feasel is a recently reactivated member, and he's the only member. His wife is so sweet and ready to learn, and their kids are the cutest! Anyway, after meeting with them, we went to the Trunk or Treat at the bishop's. It's a huuuuuuuuuuge event that everyone goes to every year. It was written down as our dinner on our dinner calendar. It was so fun! My companions and I manned the missionary "station" in the back of the Zone Leader's truck, and it was a blast. There were some GREAT costumes. My favorite- the mom who dressed up like Legolas, her sons were hobbits and her husband was Gandalf, or Brother Tucker, who walked around with a Dalek beanie on, carrying a plunger and a whisk.

People are so cool.
 

Saturday- I got sick. Pretty unfortunate but It's okay! I've been sick for the last couple days. Anyway, we went to correlation meeting. After that, we went home and planned to let me nap for an hour until our first appointment, but apparently people cancelled on us a couple times (I was asleep the whole time) and I woke up four hours later in a panic. "WE HAD APPOINTMENTS ALL DAY! WE MISSED THEM ALL!" My companions told me they'd been cancelled and they decided to let me sleep, so yeah. Against my choice, I slept a ton. We went to an appointment with the Feasels and MAN. Brother Feasel is revved to go about the gospel! It's so great to see his enthusiasm. And his wife is so nice and man. I love them. I really really do. ALSO, we set a baptismal date with her! AW YEAH. That night we had dinner with the Reynolds' and then our last appointment fell through so we went home and did training and planning. A cool thing that happened was that we were trying to decide what to teach one of our investigators. I hadn't looked at any records or anything about him, but I said, "We really need to teach him about the priesthood. He needs to know how Heavenly Father sees him and what his potential is." Sister Clark was like, "Sister Larson.. did you look at his record?" and I was like, "no, why?" "..Because the last people to visit with him wrote down that he was really interested in learning about the priesthood, and they thought it would be important for him to learn about it because it would help him realize his potential and worth as a Son of God."

Yep. Revelation is crazy.
 

Sunday- Great day! Man. Sister Barlow (a sister from the mission office) came down for the day and was on splits with Sister Leavitt. We went to church. All of the talks were directly about member missionary work. I love how much everyone is really realizing the importance of hastening the work! SO COOL. We taught the lesson in Relief society and got asked to teach the lesson in Gospel Principles next week. I don't think we've gone to church yet since I've gotten here without people asking us to teach in church. It's fun though, I enjoy it. :) After church we met with Annie. Man, talk about a young girl with a solid testimony of Christ. She knows exactly why the gospel is in her life and she is so grateful for it. She's counting down the days until she can be baptized (next May) and is so excited for it! She's sweet. Also Jared, her boyfriend. he's a great kid. He brings himself to church every Sunday, because his mom has to work. They're really solid. I love the youth here. We had dinner that night with the Davis family. They are genealogy fanatics. I never knew there was so much to know about Haun's Mill. They're really nice and really smart. That night we had an appointment with the Jingozians, and it was really really good. The spirit was so strong and it really helped me put my personal issues into perspective. There are so many things to be grateful for! The world is a beautiful place.
How blessed we are to be a part of this world at this time. Yes, the world is getting increasingly more scary and difficult, but I am so thankful that we have the knowledge of the gospel! The church is true. I know this. Joseph Smith restored the word of God. I know this. God loves me, and he loves you. I know this.

I love you all. Be safe, be strong, be good, be glad.
The world is a beautiful place. :)

Email dated October 28th