Week 30, 5/3/2021

PICKLEBALL PROS

There are some skills that I never thought I would develop so much on my mission. For example: baking cookies, we bake so many cookies for members and less actives, I've got it nailed down to the tea! Another example: ending conversations, in the south you've got to get kind of good at ending conversations or you might be talking to someone (or being talked at) for over an hour. Last example: PICKLEBALL! My district is obsessed with pickleball, apparently some of them play it every morning for exercise, so when pday comes around they are all ready to go! We play pretty much every Monday, and this last Monday we played for around 4 hours! It was a blast and I'm proud to say that I've gotten quite good. 

So for anyone who's reading this who's thinking about going on a mission, make sure you practice your baking skills and bring pickleball paddles! 

Midweek exhaustion at the library

Anyway now to the missionary work stuff

This week was very average! Here are some of the best quotes of the week:

"I just love seeing you two girls exercise in the mornings, I watch you everyday"

"I looove kissin, but man her breath was horrible!"

"You might not wanna kill them, but you might wanna shoot em in the foot sometimes"

"No matter how bad my foot hurt I never stopped reading the book of Mormon"

This week we also:

-got attacked by a huge bulldog

-Learned that NO ONE uses their front door in the south, its always the back door and I've been knocking on the peoples wrong doors for 6 months

-We had a low country boil for a members birthday outside under a pecan tree and it was the best night ever

-scraped dirt off walls for service

-Went to Okefenokee swamp

Can you see the 5 alligators hiding in this photo?

Our people are progressing but just very slowly and its starting to test my patience 😅 Connor came to church last week and he loved it! But he couldn't come this week because he's in a band and he had a gig. 

We were able to find someone new to teach! Well we didn't really find her, she kind of just fell into our laps. Her name is Brittany and she was being taught in Florida and she just moved to Waycross. She was taught a few of the lessons and wants to be baptized! We got in contact with her and she wants to meet this upcoming week:) This may seem like a normal missionary thing, but in the small town of Waycross, it can be very hard to find people to teach. We've been praying to find someone that's prepared to accept the gospel, so it's super cool that someone who is so prepared just came right to us! I hope that we can understand her needs and continue to help her progress towards baptism. 

Beautiful Waycross scenery - colorful and flat, endless horizons

Another cool thing: we've been trying to teach a member's friend and we hadn't been able to get her contact info. One day we were doing weekly planning at a local diner and right as we were talking about her she walked right through the front door! She said hi to us and sat down. We were like uhhhhh, ok I guess we're supposed to talk to her! So we talked for a bit and got her contact info and she wants to meet with us! 

So just some cool little experiences to remind me that God does answer our prayers and he's aware of us and our desires.

A wise person told us this week that if we have righteous desires, then we will have spiritual experiences. If we don't really care and don't put in any effort, then we won't have those type of experiences. You may be like, well duh! We can have spiritual experiences if we are living worthily but you also must have a desire for them. 

I hope y'all can have an amazing week, and if its not a good week just think of Sister Bonny scraping dirt off walls in Waycross Georgia 😇😇 

Love and miss y'all!

-Sister Bonny ❤