What About Second Conference?

I couldn't resist opening with a joke. XD  Someone showed me a Conference meme and I love it!

1- P-Day

2- Book of Mormon read with our friend! :D

3- Sister McDevitt

4- Restore

5- Dinner with Sister Belcourt

6- Meeting with our friend again. :)

7- The Lyons!

8- District Council

9- Dinner with the MacLeods. :)

10- Sister Harrison. :)

11- Weekly planning

12- Sister Price and a surprise on our walk! :O

13- Sister Dylke and Sister Pickett

14- Surprise lesson Friday morning

15- Visiting the Ramsays

16- GENERAL CONFERENCE! Whoohoo! :D

17- We've had one, yes, but what about second Conference? (Brownie points if you get the modified reference. XD)

18- Lunch/dinner from the Wolseys

19- Conference with the Hetchlers

20- Book of Mormon read to finish up the night

1- P-Day was pretty good! I got to talk to my family quite a bit. It was odd seeing Paden at home. :l  My mom was wearing a T-shirt and then Paden had long sleeves and pants. XD  It was around 55 Fahrenheit, I believe. And then for me it was about 28 Fahrenheit. 

1- Shopping was pretty quick; we had a good idea of what we wanted. We got some snacks for Conference! :D  We also got a car wash because it wasn't too far below freezing. And then it snowed later in the day. -_-  The weather never cooperates when we want to wash our poor car.

2- Monday evening, we had a Book of Mormon read with one of our awesome friends! She's the one that's reading in 1 Nephi right now. We read 1 Nephi 6-9 with her. In chapter 7, Nephi's older brothers, Laman and Lemuel, tie him up and leave him to die because they get really fed up with him. Nephi prays for the strength to break through the cords they tied him with... but his prayer isn't answered exactly the way he wants. Instead, his bands were 'loosed'. Nephi wanted to be able to just flex and break the ropes, but instead, he was able to wriggle out of them. Sometimes, our prayers are answered like that. We ask God for one thing and he gives us another. It may not be exactly what we want, but the Lord knows what's best for us.

2- Shortly after Nephi gets free, Laman and Lemuel feel awful for what they've done. They beg Nephi for forgiveness. And in one of my favorite verses, 1 Nephi 7:21, it says, "And it came to pass that I did frankly forgive them all that they had done..."  To do something frankly means there are no strings attached, 'no ifs ands or buts about it'. Nephi didn't hesitate; he forgave his brothers immediately without expecting anything from them. Then, he encouraged them to seek forgiveness from the Lord by praying and truly repenting. 

2- Going along with Nephi... I had a thought the other day. I've had rough things happen with my family; everyone does. Sometimes I've been upset at parents or siblings, and sometimes they've been upset at me. And sometimes it's hard to forgive. But take a look at some of the prophets in the Book of Mormon. Nephi's brothers tried to kill him! Alma the younger disobeyed his father and rebelled against the church, along with King Mosiah's sons. Amulek got rejected and disowned by his friends and family. Don't think that families are perfect in the Bible either! Abraham's father tried to sacrifice him to Egyptian gods, Joseph's brothers sold him as a slave, and Cain--one of Adam and Eve's kids, so one of the first people in the world--murdered his brother! 

2- Despite all these challenges, the people God called kept moving on and following the commandments. (Except poor Abel, RIP.) Nephi didn't take back the things he said to his brothers; he knew God's commandments and what was right. Alma the Younger and the sons of Mosiah had a sharp turnaround. And even before that, their parents didn't give up and stop praying for them. Amulek kept preaching with Alma (the Older) despite all his challenges. Abraham followed every commandment he was given, even when God told him to sacrifice his son--though luckily that was just a test of faith. And Joseph didn't complain about all his hardships; he eventually became one of the leaders of Egypt, second only to the Pharaoh! And when the time came, he buried the hatchet and forgave his brothers.

2- Forgiveness is hard sometimes, but there are so many wonderful examples of forgiveness in the scriptures. The Savior Himself is the best example. As He was on the cross, He prayed to our Father in heaven and asked Him to forgive the people who were crucifying Him because they didn't understand what they were doing. Jesus Christ was able to forgive people, and I know that as we pray and turn to Him, we will be able to access His atonement and He can help us to overcome any obstacle--even the intimidating mountain that forgiveness can be.

3- We got to visit Sister McDevitt again this Tuesday. I love her Siamese cat! She's so pretty and friendly! While we shared a scripture with Sister McDevitt, her cat sat on the couch behind me and licked my hair. XD We invited Sister McDevitt to come up with a question to take to Conference. We'll be visiting her again soon!

4- I actually had a lot of fun at the Restore this Tuesday. We did a price check run. We went around with a pair of price guns. If anything had been priced over two weeks ago and hadn't sold, we were to give it a 20% or more discount. (If some things were two bucks, we'd make them a dollar.) I got pretty good at making quick calculations. XD  And one of the volunteers had me help put together a bunk bed. He asked where I was from, and when I told him I was from Utah, he demanded to know if I'd ever drag-raced or tried to break the sound barrier. I was deeply confused... He went on to tell me about some crazy guys who went to the Utah Salt Flats to break speed records for cars. XD  

5- That evening, we went over to Sister Belcourt's for dinner. We had chicken and rice with broccoli. She put lemon juice on the broccoli so it was really tangy! Sister Harrison came over too, so we got to talk to both of them. We shared Helaman 5:12, about building a strong foundation, and invited them to watch Conference this weekend. :)

6- We had another great lesson with our most progressing friend. Sister Gillis joined in a bit late, but she was able to share some awesome personal experiences. We talked a lot about faith and invited our friend to watch Conference too. She might be able to come watch it with us at the church building! :D

7- We visited the Lyons (younger Lyons; the older Lyons are on vacation until the end of June) on Wednesday morning. We had the kids draw pictures of things they were grateful for. Both of them were using books under their papers so that they had something hard to draw on. After they drew for a bit, they started flipping through the books to show us all sorts of animals. One was a bug encyclopedia and the other had a lot of different animals. I could have read those books for hours! I don't know if I miss fiction or animal fact books more. XD It was funny because neither of the kids knew how to read, so they kept guessing the animals. And when they'd ask us to read the name, they'd say, "Oh, I knew it was called that." XD

8- District Council was pretty good. We read some scriptures and did practice roleplays for contacting people. The Elders were making jokes and pretending to be each other; it cracked me up! XD

9- On Wednesday evening, we drove to Bittern Lake (bitterns are really weird birds; you should look up a picture!) for dinner with the MacLeods. Their dog still barked at us like crazy, but at least she didn't try to bite me this time. (:  Sister MacLeod made chili. It was really good, but also spicy. XD  She kept saying that she should have added more banana peppers and sriracha sauce. I was like, :l  "Please no..." XD   But dessert more than made up for it! Tasty ice cream with fresh raspberries and blueberries. She also sent us home with a jar of super potent mint chocolates! They're like Yorks on steroids! I had one and it was so minty it made my eyes water. XD  I could taste it for a couple of hours, and after the taste faded, I was still burping up mint until bedtime. XD

9- We also went over the Plan of Salvation with the MacLeods. We were planning on sharing it with our Lutheran friends, but they had some other stuff going on Wednesday. Hopefully we'll be able to meet with them later! I got to share some verses from Alma 40, one of my favorite chapters! They talk about the spirit world, and what happens to our spirits after we die and before we're resurrected. All in all, it was a pretty good lesson that I enjoyed. The MacLeods are awesome! :)

10- On Thursday morning, we went to visit Sister Harrison. She was so hyped up for conference! Since we'd already shared Helaman 5:12 with her earlier this week, we shared a verse in Alma about the atonement (can't remember the exact verse off the top of my head). Her big gray and white tabby, Catmandoo, was all over me again. He jumped on the arm of the couch and leaned into me while I pet him. I had so much fur on my sleeve when we left. XD But he's such a friendly cat; I can't resist!

11- Did some weekly planning at the church. Once again, a bit long but productive. We went over goals for our people and who we're going to meet with this week. I'm excited for some of the stuff we're going to do! We're definitely going to teach the Plan of Salvation to our Lutheran friends. :) 

12- Shortly after weekly planning we went to visit Sister Price. We shared Helaman 5:12 with her and set up a return appointment to talk about her favorite part of Conference. Then, we went on a walk around her apartment. It was a couple degrees above freezing and rather breezy, so we stayed along the city streets instead of going to Mirror Lake. 

12- While we were walking, a truck honked its horn at us and we heard someone yell, "Heeeeeeyyyyy!"  I was a bit nervous, because I haven't had anyone honk at me since I left Utah. XD  But we turned to look, and it was one of our Lutheran friends! We were walking close to CLBI (Canadian Lutheran Bible Institute). We waved back at her and she drove on. Then, a minute later, we saw her walking up the street towards us. She was like, "I didn't get to say hi!" so we had a brief conversation with her. 

12- She and our other friend are going to be super busy this weekend because of a huge youth activity they're hosting at CLBI. Sadly, they won't have time to watch Conference, because the activity is an all-day thing running from Friday to Sunday. :(  But we did set up a time to meet Tuesday morning, so I'm excited about that!

13- To wrap up our crazy Thursday, we went to visit Sister Dylke. Sister Pickett was there;  I didn't realize she was Sister Dylke's daughter. We had a pretty good lesson with them. :) Sister Dylke gave us some snacks and her little dog Venger kept trying to get them. Sister Dylke kept having to hold him, but he'd go limp and slide out of her arms, then sneak over to the couch and try to snag stuff off our laps. XD

14- Our sweet friend that we've been doing Book of Mormon reads with messaged us Friday morning just after we'd started our personal studies. She told us she had some time that day and wanted to do a video call. We asked if she wanted to call in the evening, because usually evenings work for her. She replied, "I have time right now."

14- Sister Curry and I grabbed our stuff and bolted to our kitchen table--which is where we do most of our video calls when we're at the apartment. We had a great call with her! Her family is going through a bit of a tough spot, including a loss. :(  However, the fact that she reached out and asked to read the scriptures with us is very encouraging! :)  We read 1 Nephi 10-12 with her. 

14- A little earlier in 1 Nephi, Lehi--Nephi's father--has a vision about the Tree of Life. I won't go into a ton of detail because I already had a bit of a scripture moment earlier in this email. In 1 Nephi 8, Lehi has his vision, but it's a little confusing if one has never read it before. In 1 Nephi 11-12, Nephi prays to know the interpretation of Lehi's vision. He is visited by an angel, and the angel teaches him what his father's vision meant. There's a cool Book of Mormon video about Lehi's vision too! Sister Curry and I watched it during lunch one day. We're going to suggest that our friend watch the Book of Mormon videos that correspond with what she's reading to help her understand a bit more. I feel like she's more of a visual learner, like me. :)

15- We got to visit the Ramsays on Friday afternoon. They were super sweet. We shared Helaman 5:12 and invited them to strengthen their foundation in Jesus Christ by watching Conference! (That's what we've been doing with most member visits if I didn't explain that already. Last Conference, President Russel M. Nelson told us we all need to have firm testimony foundations.)  The Ramsays also love art, so they always ask me if I've drawn anything new. It's kind of cute when they try to guess what I've drawn, especially if it's a creature I made up for one of my stories or something. XD  But this week, I've been working on some hippos for Sister Curry, because she loves hippos!

16- Conference was so awesome! We watched the three Saturday sessions at our apartment because none of our friends could come to the church with us to watch. We had lots of snacks and took tons of notes. I loved so many of the talks! President Nelson's first talk blew me away! I also laughed a bunch during Elder Holland's; he just has such dry wit! Also, when President Eyring read Helaman 5:12, Sister Curry and I just stared at each other in shock. That was the scripture we'd been sharing with members all week! We were so excited that he referenced it! :O

16- We honestly didn't do much else on Saturday. We went on a walk after the first session of Conference, then had lunch. After the second session, we had dinner and did some Facebook. We did more Facebook after the evening session because we weren't able to set up any member lessons or visits with our friends.

17- The Sunday sessions of Conference were awesome too! We went to the church on Sunday morning because one of our friends could come! The Hetchlers were at the church so that they could hook their phone up to the church TV. The kids all sat near us and wrote down the names of the speakers during Conference. Elsbeth kept asking me how to spell them because she couldn't read my handwriting. XD  Rose drew me a cute picture! 

18- The Wolseys couldn't have us over for lunch this Sunday because Sister Wolsey is out of town, but Brother Wolsey said we could pick up some food. He gave us roast beef, potatoes, carrots, and salad. We had it for dinner and it was so delicious! I didn't finish all of mine, so I have leftovers for tonight. :D

19- The Hetchlers invited us over for the next session of Sunday Conference. :)  We came over and had a lot of fun. The kids were coloring and showing us lots of books. XD  Walter sat by me and little Vance kept trying to eat stuff out of my bag. XD  They reminded me so much of my siblings! 

20- After dinner, we had a video call with one of our friends. We finished Helaman from the Book of Mormon. He was in chapter 13, and we read all the way through 16. It was pretty neat; the prophecies of Samuel the Lamanite. Our friend had some good questions and insights. Not much else happened; we just did some Facebook for the rest of the evening.

Hope everyone's doing well! Love you all!

 Not a ton of pictures this week... A little park that we go walk in, the hippos I'm drawing for Sister Curry (they look soulless because I haven't colored the eyes yet), and then the two of us by the church. :)