Monday: We carved pumpkins with the Mitchell's after dinner, and Paige was my helper! We did a pretty good job. It was a fun little game we played, actually. We started out in teams and grabbed a pumpkin. We cleaned it out, then set it back in the middle. Then we all pulled something out with instructions on it (ex: carve an eye! or carve the mouth!) and grabbed a different pumpkin. We kept rotating the pumpkins and carving different parts. They looked very cute and thrown together at the end. Paige was on my team, and we got very good at carving eyes and noses!
Tuesday: So, remember how I said I got sick on Sunday night? Well, if you don't... I did! I was still a bit sick on Monday, but by the evening I was feeling much better. I jokingly told Sister Paddock and Sister Jones that they were next.
One should never joke about such things.
And it came to pass that Sister Paddock got way sick on Tuesday. Because she felt so awful, we decided we'd better stay in until she felt better. We knew it would help her feel better faster, and we also knew that going out and doing missionary work would be unproductive when she felt like she might throw up any minute. Stomach bugs are not fun! Anyways, since we were stuck in our apartment, I studied. I read the Book of Mormon- in English and in Portuguese- and wrote in my journal, and read some more scriptures and did some things in Preach My Gospel, and read some more scriptures, and wrote a letter, and read some scriptures, and wrote in my journal. Finally an idea popped into my head! President said it was okay for me to occasionally contact Derrick to help him and encourage him. So I decided to send him a quick text! I just let him know that I still pray for him and his family, and that I hoped he was still doing well. He said, and I quote, "Thank u I need it. I am doing so good and I know this church is true!! Happy belated birthday!"
That made my day, and I felt soooo happy when I read that! I replied, saying that I was glad his testimony was so strong and asked when he was planning to get baptized. He said, it make some time because Chera and I have to get married first. But, I attend church every week and I even started paying tithes so I'm staying active!"
It made me SOOOO happy that he is going to church every week AND paying tithing! Here's how the rest of the short conversation went;
Me: Gotcha. Thats fine because Heavenly Father will sure help y'all out :) everything will work out when its supposed to. I'm so happy that you're going to church and paying tithing even though you haven't been baptized yet! Heavenly Father will bless you extra for doing that. Does Chera want to get baptized too now?
Derrick: Yes!!! I'm so happy! Heavenly Father is really blessing me
Me: That's so awesome! I'm so happy for y'all! Heavenly Father really is blessing you for trying your best to choose the right. Goodness I'm so happy right now!
Derrick: Thank u for all your help. miss u.
Me: You're welcome :) I'm glad I could help somehow. miss ya too
Derrick: :)
That conversation via text made my whole day! Seriously, it felt so good to read that and to know I really did make a difference in someone's life! I really, strongly feel like Derrick was one of the main reasons I needed to come to Texas. Even though... I didn't really do anything. I just gave him some info, and Heavenly Father and His Spirit did the rest. I guess Heavenly Father knew that we would understand each other, and that somehow I would be able to help him. I just feel so blessed that he gave me that opportunity.
Wednesday: Lo and behold, Sister Jones got sick and Sister Paddock stayed sick for today! I got a little stir crazy, sitting in the apartment again... studying my brains out, cleaning because it was something different, and furiously writing in my journal, reading President's emails that we've printed out, reading basically anything in the apartment, reading old letters, reading scriptures, etc. :P Let's just say... it was frustrating to not do anything. But it was best because towards the end of the day, they were both feeling a bit better. Thank goodness! We were able to go to Mary's for dinner and share a nice scripture with her. She is so humble and helpful. I love her so much. She asked us to help her clean out her gutters this Wednesday, so I'll let you know how that goes!
Thursday: Happy Halloween!!
Imagine my extreme excitement as this unfolds... Sister Shell wakes up, her companions are feeling better, she's super excited to finally get out of the apartment and do something fabulous today, she looks at what day it is... and her hopes plummet because she realizes that its weekly planning day and that they will be inside the apartment yet again for several hours. Just... just picture that.
Anyways, we went and dropped off a small talk about Patriarchal Blessings for Dan and Margaret and chatted with them for a few minutes. They were very grateful that we brought it over and were excited to read it and prepare some more for Sunday. After that, we went over to Jenn's for a "Halloween-o" dinner. We had "mummies" (aka hot dogs in crescent rolls), "eye balls" (frozen grapes), "albino bat wings and zombie guts" (chips and salsa) and "worms and dirt" (pudding and jello worms). It was pretty fun. We had to be in by 6:30 that night, so we borrowed Ephraim's Rescue from the Mitchells- a church movie that kind of goes with 17 Miracles. So we watched that when we got home. Needless to say, my eyes were a bit wet, and Sister Jones was bawling. Sister Paddock didn't cry. I didn't either, but my eyes did glisten. Still, it is such a very touching movie and I really loved watching it. Its inspiring what the Pioneer saints went through.
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| Happy Halloween, Sister Shell and Sister Jones |
Friday: Zone Meeting! That was pretty fun. It was all about how to find people. We did some great scenarios for contacting people. Of course, they chose me and a sister named Sister Newhouse to go up and try to street contact Elder Hill, who was told that he was "a guy on campus, walking around and messing with his phone, and listening to music through headphones." Yeah, that was pretty interesting. The first time, Sister Newhouse may or may not have body checked him in an attempt to try and bump into him to start a conversation. Everyone laughed and we started over. This time, I just stepped right in front of him and asked him what he was listening to. He said that it was rap, and I asked if he ever listened to Christian rap. Long story short, of course he said we could stop by later and tell him more about the church and that was that. I'm just saying... it was rough for me, because I felt super awkward doing that. Oh well! It was also a bit frustrating to me because... okay so our zone only has 2 districts. The other district is all around A&M campus. So they have lots of opportunities to street contact and talk to everyone and stuff. But us out in Caldwell... well, we're in Caldwell. And our town is tiny, and not many people just go traipsing about the town. I was being a bit.... I can't think of the right word, but lets just go with negative. Because... well, how can this apply when we never have those scenarios way out in the boonies? It just doesn't happen.
Once again, Heavenly Father humbled Sister Shell! That night, we stopped by Judy's to teach her. She hadn't read any in the Book of Mormon, so we read all the introduction stuff with her to help explain it to her. Then we committed her to reading the 1st chapter this week, since she was feeling a bit overwhelmed. We walked outside,and a cute old man was out inspecting his grass, so we went up and talked to him. Good thing we'd practiced street contacting earlier! He walked away before we could really talk about religion, but I'm sure we'll see him again since we are always trying to stop by Judy's house.
Then... well, back up a bit. Before our lesson with Judy, we saw her next door neighbor outside, and I had this totally random thought; "If she's still outside when we get done at Judy's, we should talk to her!"
Fast forward. We got done at Judy's and just finished talking to the old man, and she's still outside. We got into Antonio just as I was thinking that we should go talk to her, and then Sister Paddock suggested it out loud. Sister Jones asked if that would be weird, since we'd have to traipse through her yard to the side of her house where she was sitting on some porch steps. But I said "We already look weird!" and Sister Paddock said, "Well, we're already here." and Sister Jones said, "Why the heck not, everyone deserves to be invited!" So, there we went, directly charging through her yard to where she was sitting on the steps. Sis Jones felt prompted to ask her about her huge, beautiful house. The lady started talking about her 108 yo house that is absolutely BEAUTIFUL. Then her phone rang. We felt awkward but stayed. She got off, apologized and told us to wait a minute while she made one more quick phone call. Then, when she was done, she told us more about her house and offered to give us a TOUR of the inside! Of course, we said yes! They've still got a lot of renovating to do on the upstairs, but its absolutely beautiful. We offered our help if she ever needed some more man power... well, woman power.. and gave her our number, conveniently written on a mormon.org card. She said she'd call us soon, as she's planning on staining the upstairs wood floors soon, and told us her name was Dawn.
It was really neat, and I laughed at myself for having such a bad attitude at Zone Meeting earlier.. Clearly we DO randomly contact people here in Caldwell! It was a pretty good experience for me :)
Then we went over to the Arellano's for dinner. We got to know Brother Arellano a bit better, and found out he's really been struggling the past few months and hasn't come to church since the beginning of the summer. We had a really good talk with him, and for some reason I felt prompted to tell him to watch Elder Holland's talk from the most recent General Conference. He said he would that night, and that he would come to church on Sunday.
Saturday: We went and visited the Farmers for a while, and met their home help lady! I can't remember her name... but she seems like a very lovely person. I really love Sister Farmer. Shes' so sweet and nice to us. I feel bad that they're just so sick. I can't really figure out how to help them right now. After that long visit, we helped Jenn deliver a cake. That was pretty fun, as her girls in the van were very entertaining. Except for Samara, who was, in fact, asleep the whole time despite the squealing and shrieking of her older sisters :P Then we went over to the Gambles and chatted, and ate dinner. It got dark pretty early so we were unable to do a whole lot of service this week there. This week we'll have to go earlier!
Sunday: Daylight savings!! EXTRA HOUR OF SLEEP! Halleluyer! It was a really great Fast Sunday. We had a total of 37 people at church. Y'all don't understand- thats HUGE for us!!! AND as we started to sing the opening hymn, Bro Arellano walked in and sat down in the back!!! Halleluyer!! It made me so happy. We heard some really awesome testimonies, and all of the missionaries got up to bear ours. It was Sister Jones' last Fast Sunday in the mission. Her testimony was beautiful. Dan and Margaret got up and bore theirs too, and I felt so happy for them and proud of them. They talked about how grateful they were to the members and the missionaries who have helped them so much, and how excited they were to get their Patriarchal Blessings that night. Then, at the last second, Bro Arellano got up and bore his testimony!! What a FABULOUS day it was for me! I felt the Spirit so strongly. Even though Bro Arellano left after sacrament meeting, it was a step in the right direction for him and I was just so happy for him and his family. I'm so proud he got the courage to stand up and do that, because I know it must have been difficult for him to do so after all these months.
That afternoon, we went to a little get together at the Arellano's with the Gambles and had some yummy dinner, and talked. We left and tried to go visit Dan and Margaret to see how last night went for them, but no luck. I'll let you know how they felt about everything next week! Then we stopped by the Mitchell's since we were in the area. They're such wonderful people, and Jenn always knows how to make us laugh. What a good way to end the week!
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| Sister Shell and some of the primary children at church. |
Even though this week was a little difficult for me, I still love what I'm doing. Its amazing that Heavenly Father is blessing me with this opportunity. I just feel such... love and happiness, and peace all the time.
This church is true. I know it.
I love being a missionary!!!
love y'all tons!!!
Sister Shell
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| Sister Shell her caption said "Just how I feel sometimes" |
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