Last transfer call!!

So this week has been very long, mostly because of all the stress that comes with changing your return date, being a missionary, and having transfers coming up! So we did really good work, but we didn't see any HUGE miraculous miracles, which can be disheartening....really disheartening, but I have learned so much about Obedience and Diligence this week!

So first off, I'm really sad because Sister Stevens is getting transferred!!!! :( I really wanted her to kill me off, but it was kind of expected since she's already been here for 6 months, but still.  I'm getting one of the 4 Sister Smith's, I don't know which one, but I know as long as we're faithful we'll be eternal friends.  I know because I got a blessing on Wednesday night from my Bishop and God promised me that!!

So, onto my learning the importance of Obedience.  So since I've talked with President Shaw and President Weaver and have changed my date to come home God has opened my eyes to the importance of being EXACTLY obedient! It's easy to be obedient to the big rules (don't watch TV, don't listen to music, etc) but sometimes the smaller rules can be harder to follow (dinner at 4pm, being out of the house by 10:15) they're things that seem so small, but can really change your effectiveness as a missionary.  And my eyes have been so opened to some of those little rules that I have been less worried about following that I don't want to let get in my way anymore.  So I have been trying so hard to be exactly obedient, it's not easy, but it's so worth it!!!! I have already noticed a difference!! A successful missionary can be defined with two words....obedience and diligence! I want to be a more successful missionary this last 6 weeks. 

Well, that's kind of all I have this week, sorry my emails have gotten less exciting....but this last transfer will be full of MIRACLES so be ready! :)

Love you all!!

Sister Thomas

This is Tenino

So this week was another pretty lame week....not really lame, but just slow I should say, it has just been hard working with solid people that have a ways to go....they all want to be baptized they're just working through different things!!

This week was the first week of my entire mission where no one took a book of Mormon!! We handed out 0!! It's kind of disheartening, but the work will continue!  It just goes to prove the pattern of life, before something great happens you have pain and sorrow.  The great thing that's happening is I get to go to the temple tomorrow!!!!!!!!

Tomorrow is our mission temple trip and I'm SO EXCITED!!! It has been so long since I've been to the temple, and I honestly am freaking out!! I can't wait to share that experience with all my mission friends, well a third of them, our mission is too big to go in one day! It will be such an amazing experience!!

Last night we got to go and talk to the youth in our ward about missionary work and how to prepare for a mission! I realized that I did not do as much preparation as I wish that I had! But one thing I realized also was that whom the Lord calls he qualifies!! I realized how much I had changed because I said I didn't talk to anyone really before the mission and all the youth were shocked!! Who would have ever thought people wouldn't know I was shy? haha!! I love the spirit and progression, it is INCREDIBLE!!!!

Anyway, sorry I don't have more exciting things to share this week, I'm just being a servant of the lord and growing closer to the Savior everyday....I'm doing the greatest work that I or anybody could be doing right now!!  I love being a missionary!

Well, I hope you all have a good week! And to make this email more exciting I hope you enjoy these pictures with me, Sister Stevens, and our cow possie! They followed us all down the fence! It was funny!!!!  They didn't want a BOM though.... :( haha!!

I hope you all have a great week!!!

I LOVE YOU!!!!!

An Attitude of Gratitude

This week was great!! It was still kind of a slow week for missionary work, but we were able to be out and about and enjoying both the rain and shine!!! On Wednesday we had interviews with President, it was good to be able to just talk to him, and know he cares.  I'm getting tired of talking about how I'm feeling physical wise, but I know he only asks because he wants me to be ok, and he loves me!

Also this week was of course General Conference!!!! Ah man! I love General Conference!! I feel like as a missionary it just becomes even more and more of a joy!!! One of my favorite talks was President Uchtdorf's!! Gratitude is one thing that is hard for me to focus on when in the midst of turmoil, it was cool to hear him encourage us to do so, and I know that as I do so it will make life so much better and I'll have so much joy!!!

One of the coolest parts of conference was watching it Saturday morning at the Mayberry's house.  They made us a delicious breakfast, and we watched it with Aaron, our investigator, and Eddie, our Recent Convert!! It was awesome! Every time they talked about a missionary, or showed a missionary Eddie would yell out, "Only 11 more months!!!" he is so excited to serve a mission, he gets to go this Saturday to do baptisms in the temple, he's really excited for that too!!

And Aaron was so focused on what was being said, he is such a scholar at the bible, him and his grandfather started their own Christian church, and he's only 18 years old!! He knows way more about scriptures and stuff then I do! He's a tough sell though, he has 100% attendance in seminary this year, and he can't write off the Book of Mormon, but he's not sure about Joseph Smith......all I can say is he obviously hasn't sincerely prayed about it yet, or he'd be baptized in a second!! But he'll get baptized, it's just a matter of time, especially because he wants to go on a mission and get married in the temple and that requires being a member so one day. :) 

Well, that was pretty much it for this week!! The Bishopric LOVED the brownies, they said they didn't last long!! :) apparently we only live 3 blocks from my bishop's niece, the Tolman's.  I think they're in our stake and the name sounds familiar, the ones around my age are Chelsea Tolman, and Riley Tolman.....I feel like I should know them....?

Well, I hope you all have a great week!! Remember to be grateful and to have an attitude of Gratitude, it will help you to be happier and more joyful in life!!

I love you all so much!!!  

Sister Thomas

CRAZY slow week, legit lessons, Women's Meeting

This week has been interesting.  It has been CRAZY slow, but we have had legit lessons when we've had them!!

I don't have much time, I've been reading and watching videos, and looking at pics, so I'll try to sum up some awesome things that happened. 

So the greatest thing this week would probably have to be the Women's Meeting!! It was so great!! The spirit was so strong, I felt like it was really showing that crazy "ordain women" group that women don't need the priesthood, we have such a divine heritage, our divine nature is so great.  They may have the priesthood, but we have motherhood.  We are equally yoked....sorry about that, we've met a lot of feminists lately :) haha!!

Anyway, cool story!!

So at the meeting we were sitting behind this family and afterwards we talked to them.  Turns out they just moved up to Washington from the Northridge 12th ward in Orem, UT!!!! It was crazy!! They lived behind the Weenig's over by the Elementary school!! It was cool! We talked about different people, and the 2 girls (11 and 13) took a picture with me so they could show their friends that might know me, it was fun!! It's cool when the church makes the world small!!

We have been struggling a little bit with the work, just lack of interest, but we had 3 investigators at church yesterday, so we were renewed!!

I'm so excited for General Conference this week!! It's going to be exactly what I, and the world need!!!

I love you all and hope you have a great week!!!

I LOVE YOU!!!!

Sister Thomas

Is this real life?

This week has been the weirdest, fastest, slowest, lame, cool week in a long while.  It was the worst of times, it was the best of times.....really it was just strange.  So it was transfer week! I stayed as you know and so transfer meeting was able to be purely spiritual with no stress of getting all your stuff moved!! It was nice.  I  became the designated driver! WOO!!

Thursday I got a blessing because I had been feeling very weak and dizzy and tired, and it was a great blessing! I have felt so good since then and since I talked to this member, whose an EMT, and he gave me tips on how to help.  He thinks it could do with anemia or iron deficiency so I started taking iron and eating a lot healthier and I've been feeling great.  So with the spiritual help, and the physical help I am feeling great!!!

We're in that awkward moment of an area where your entire teaching pool gets baptized and all your potentials and new investigators are super flaky, it's pretty annoying, but we're getting some really good prospects so we're hopeful for another great transfer!!

All of our recent converts are doing amazing.  Jacob is just enjoying learning more and growing each week! Eddie got the priesthood last week and is still so excited about a mission in a year! Tom got confirmed yesterday and his parents told us he's changed so much, his teachers are asking what happened to help him open up! And Linda is one of those converts that if you met you'd think she'd been a member for like 20 years!! I am so blessed to have the opportunity to help God's children find the Gospel!!! I love being a missionary!!!!!

Yesterday church was great!!! I got to sing in a quartet!! I swear, apparently God has blessed me to get over my fear because that's now 2 solo's (I sang a solo in one of the songs yesterday) who would have ever thought that I would do that? It's crazy!!!

Well, I hope you have a great week!! I'm so glad I have the opportunity to be a missionary, it is such a privilege!!!  I'm out of time, and those were the highlights!!

Have a great week!!!

I LOVE YOU!!!

Sister Thomas

PS Oh you'll be getting a visit in a couple weeks from my current bishopric, they are going down to Utah for general conference and they said they'd bring some stuff down for me and so you'll get some boxes of my stuff, and get to meet my current bishopric, they're awesome!!

Have a great week!!

T9O - Land of Miracles

First off! On Saturday we got our transfer calls....and Sister Stevens and I are both staying in Tenino!!! I'm so excited!!! This is gonna be the 2 time when I've had a companion for more than 1 transfer! Well, Sister Halll til the ET, but besides that just my baby Sister Downs has been my companion for 12 weeks!! Hopefully there won't be an ET to ruin this one! Sister Stevens and I are having such a good time, and we're being blessed to find so many incredible people!!

This week we had the baptism of Linda Goolsby.  She is so awesome!! I haven't felt the spirit so strong at a baptism in a long time!! It was so incredible, we had more non-members there than members, she invited her friends and family, hopefully we'll be able to start teaching them.  Well, her granddaughter, not her friend she's from Aberdeen! Anyway, she got confirmed yesterday, and it's like she's already been a member for years, she is so awesome!

Another awesome thing that happened yesterday is that Eddie got the Priesthood!!!! Bishop told us he came up to him at church last week and said, "So I've already decided I'm taking this next year to work and save up money for my mission and prepare, and I'm gonna need the priesthood to go on a mission, so when can I get that?" haha!! Yeah, he is so awesome!!! I haven't really been able to see recent converts progress, it will be awesome to stay here another week, and see all those we've been able to teach, grow in the gospel!! I'm so excited!!!

Also this week we got some awesome referrals! The coolest is the girlfriend of this boy in the Centralia ward.  She is 17 has been coming to church for a while, and her adopted grandpa is a bishop in the Winlock ward nearby.  We said, oh so he wouldn't mind baptizing you...and she said, "yeah, he'd love to do that, he'll totally have to!"  We haven't even taught her yet! She is elect, I can feel it!!

Man, God truly is a God of miracles! I see that everyday!! I'm so grateful that I get to be His missionary and do His work!! Especially at this time, he has prepared SO MANY of his children to accept the Gospel.  We aren't hastening the work, he is, and we just need enough people to teach who HE is preparing!!

I am so grateful for this Gospel! It truly is Jesus Christ's church fully restored to the earth!! I know that God is our Heavenly Father, that He loves us and that he sent His only begotten son to pay the price for each of our sins!! I am so grateful for that knowledge, that even though life sucks, it can get better.  I'm so grateful to know too that this life in the whole scheme of things is so short!! After this life we will be able to be PERFECT!!! It will be a great day!!! I won't ever get sick, that would be nice!! :)

Well, I hope that you all have a great week, and remember all the blessings that God has given you!! I LOVE YOU!!!!

Sister Thomas

"I can't tonight, it's my mom's birthday"

This week has been a week of miracles,

First Miracle....Eddie Fonua!

So, Thursday Feb 20 we tracted into this 18 year old kid named Eddie.  We taught him the Restoration on his doorstep and he said, yeah that's awesome, he's read the BoM and has been praying about baptism, and then he went on to explain that Elder Penney and Elder Baxter had taught him that.....that's right...THEY POACHED!! Anyway, I'm over that now.....anyway, we texted them pretending to be super upset about it and they said we could have him.  We thought, alright, we'll check up on him sometime....Fast forward to Monday.  We get a call from the elders and they say Eddie just called and said he wanted to get baptized!!! But he "can't tonight because it's his moms birthday!" haha...oh we can help you, we thought!

So we taught him, and still let the Elders be involved, and he was baptized last Friday by his Best Friend Cory Richardson!! He is incredible!! He honestly has so much faith, he doesn't fully understand everything, but he knows that the Church is true, and the rest will come!! I've never grown so close so quickly to an investigator!! He's awesome!!!

Miracle #2....The Hess Kids

This last Thursday, Feb 27 we were tracting again, and we knocked into this member family that is in the Lacey Spanish branch!!  The Mino's family! They are awesome!! Anyway, we asked them about the Hess family and they said, yeah, we're like best friends with them, so seconds later Caleb calls, and they tell him to come over, and we end up teaching him a super awesome lesson, then, yesterday we taught him and his sister the full Restoration, and they are tentatively on date for the 16!!

Miracle #3....Linda Goolsby

Linda is a referral from Spanish that has been in Utah for weeks visiting her Mormon boyfriend.  She called us last night and asked the soonest time that she could be baptized, so she also is on date for the 16th!!!

Man the work truly is just hastening like crazy!!!! The Lord is preparing his people and I'm lucky enough to have a part in helping them come into the gospel!!

There were so many other miracles this week, but if I kept going I would have a forever long email, and I wouldn't have time to finish....so that's all I'm going to share for now!!! I hope you all have a great week!!

I LOVE YOU so much!!!!

Love,

Sister Thomas