Week 18 - Yo Mama is A Jailbird

Hello! Hello! Hello! This week was an interesting one! Lot's of strange miracles. like the scriptures say "by small and simple things great things come to pass" - only it wasn't small and simple things.
Monday I spent the whole day sleeping on the stage as my companions played sports and whatever they did. I wrote a few letters but didn't have the mental stamina to keep writing. I was tired. But after P-day was over we went to Sister Willoughby's house to have our last meal with Elder McDaniel,( he is being transferred to fill in the spot of a missionary who had to go home.) He was a cool Elder. After dinner we went to Steffanie's house and helped her clean up a little and talked with her for a few minutes. We didn't have much luck but she is definitely getting better! We had exchanges with the Auburn Hills sisters, Sister Howell and Sister Beus. We took sister Howell and Sister Christenot stayed there.
Tuesday I started studying out specific topics in the scriptures. so I focused on baptism for today and I learned quite a few scriptures. One of the scriptures I loved was in the Book of Mormon when it is describing the representation of baptism by immersion. how it represents different things , like life, death, and the resurrection. It was fascinating to be able to just flip through the scriptures and see how many scriptures have answers to even the smallest thing.  I went to the office at 10 and proceeded to help Elder Hachtel organize Mission Vehicle paperwork into the right vehicle folder. I also opened mail and created folders for the new missionaries who are sending in their driving records. There are quite a few people who look very different in their driving license picture than they do on their mission pictures. I did random jobs for people here and there.   Before I knew it, I was leaving to go drop off the sisters in Auburn Hills.   We were very late to our dinner appointment with the Atwoods. but we enjoyed a good meal with them and showed them the Mormon message about the Book of Mormon.   After being at the Atwoods for a while we went to Steffanies house and tried teaching her some things.  The College Hill Sisters came as well and we enjoyed an opportunity to teach her a spiritual lesson as well as helping her clean up a little.

Wednesday I continued my study on baptism and my discoveries continued to pile upon each other. I also drew some little fuzz balls in my planner.  I went to the Office and I went out with Sister Chumbley to go shopping for the new apartments that we will be renting out. We spent over 700 dollars. I had a shopping cart full of pots, pans, brooms, mops, silverware, dishes, etc. it was really interesting. I helped her unload all of it in the storage unit. There are a lot of brooms in there ( ha,ha. )
We ate dinner at home and then went over to Steffanie's house to help her clean some more. Someday we will create a dent in her house. and then she will maybe keep her house clean for longer than 2 days.  While we were in Steffanie's house cleaning, the Elders called and informed us that they had been in a car accident, and how they were glad it wasn't in their car.  It was a minor fender bender. They were on a team up with the younger Gonda boy, Ethan.   They were rear ended by this other lady.  It was shocking... but not as shocking as what we found out later
Thursday Morning. We got a phone call from Elder Holbrook and Elder Allen. informing us that our investigator sister JoAnn Harris was arrested last night and had been sitting in Jail for a while.  She announced it to us by saying "Yo Mama is a Jail Bird!" she then told us the story. We were shocked! JoAnn Harris a 78 year old woman. She had gone to Texas to try and talk to her family, but they called the cops on her saying that she and her best friend Ferrill were stalking them and they didn't know who they were.  So the police came right as they were about to walk up on the porch of one of her children’s homes. The police tackled her and her friend to the ground and handcuffed them.  Now remember she is 78 and Ferrill is 79 and he uses a walker to get around. It was insane. But that night her children came into the station and admitted that she was actually their mother.  All charges were dropped. but that didn't stop her from being furious with her children. But luckily they talked to her. All three of them came and talked with her, and she finally got the opportunity to discuss things with them and they will now be coming up for Christmas.  The only sad part is that they did not want to hear anything about us the missionaries or even look at pictures of us.  We were just happy to hear that she had come in contact with her kids. even if it meant that she had to be arrested.  Ferrill is suing her children.   All of her Children's friends aren't talking to them because they are all shocked as to how they could treat their mother that way.  It was a long day sitting in the office working on paper work and praying that she had more conversation with her children and that her needs were met.  That night we ate dinner at the Cluff’s.  It was a wonderful meal of chicken and mashed potatoes. We taught them the lesson on Shrek, the sheep and they thought it was really interesting and funny.

Friday we had district Training. and it was one of the best training's that I have had yet. Perhaps because we moved around a lot. and the spiritual messages were amazing but... yeah it was awesome. We talked about how we need to control our stress and that if we don't take time to take care of ourselves, we will take time to be sick. and we are suppose to work at our most prime condition.  We ate lunch together at Freddy's and while we were there we came upon the scene of a crime.  A lady had met a guy that was going to "sell" her a used phone.  They met in a public place and everything, but she made the mistake of handing him the money before he handed her the phone.   He took her money and started driving off.  She reached in the car to get her money, but he rolled up her arm in the window and punched her in the face. and drove off... well robbing someone in the clear view of 20 people is not that great of an idea. It was sad.  I went back to the office after that and continued my office work.
 We ate dinner with Sister Wolford.  She forgot to order the pizza so she ordered it and we had to wait 30 minutes before we could go and get it. She can't drive because she is really old.  After we ate with her we went out and tried a few less actives and then went to Steffanies house. We cleaned her house for a little while and then drove out to Andover to do exchanges with Sister Hager and Sister Taylor. We took Sister Taylor and left Sister Murray. We returned home and planned for our next day.
Saturday was a long day, we went out after lunch and tried a few less actives.  In between walking to the less actives we tried talking to as many people as we could see because we were told that if we talk with 10 people a day that our success within the mission will triple. Not many people are very happy to see us.  In fact many people close their doors or walk on the other side of the street when they see us coming.  After a long day of trying to come in contact with people we drove back to Andover and traded back. We then drove all the way back and got the Combined Bel Aire and College Hill ward Halloween Party ready. We enjoyed a great night of trunk-o-treating and it was very successful for everyone that had investigators show up.

Sunday was church, sacrament meeting was Awesome because it was the Primary children’s program. and when is the primary children’s program not awesome!?!  We went to Sunday school and talked about developing our "Talents" and we read the story about the 3 servants and the Talents. It was an interesting lesson. Remember that God gives us talents to use them. Don't hide them so that no one else can enjoy the talents we have. We taught the Relief Society lesson, they asked us to talk about the progress of the Mission and how things were going with missionary work. We talked about miracles in the mission and then gave them these forms to help them keep track of their plans of inviting their friends to church. Take things one step at a time. After church we went to JoAnn Harris house because she had just got home and we were helping her take her stuff back into her house and talked to her about how her day went. After our conversation with sister Harris we went home and did our studies and then headed out to dinner with the Walbruch family as well as the Labrum's. We enjoyed an awesome meal of salad and chicken. The chicken was the size of my face... not even lying.  It was huge! We would cut them up in 4ths to share with each other.  After going to dinner with the Walbruch's, we went to Steffanie's house and helped her clean.  I brushed her dogs and got all of the sticklers out of their fur.Hher dog's names are Bear and King. Bear is such a sweet dog; she just sat there as I brushed her. King was good about sitting there while I brushed him, but I was trying to get him to move and I guess it kind of spooked him or something but he ended up biting me.  Luckily I was quick enough to pull my arm away from him before he could actually chomp down hard on my arm. He is an old dog so his teeth didn't puncture my skin so it was all good. It freaked out my companions more than it freaked me out. haha. We are making wonderful progress with Steffanie she is keeping her house in better shape and is letting us throw things away! hurrah!
Well missionary life keeps the interesting level to a 100%!
Love you all!
Sister Call