Yo, if you liked last weeks letter, buckle up and hold on tight because this week was a crazy one!! I just can't even believe how much Heavenly Father loves His children. Man, and He helps them in so many different ways! But before I go on a whole theme about that, let me tell you about my week!!
We started off the week by doing garten work at an investigators house like normal. It was SUPER funny because she spent the first 20 minutes pointing out things that were NOT weeds- and I had definitely pulled them up the week before! Also, the little octopus things Sister Grisham found? Tulip bulbs! I was dying laughing when I realized that Grisham dug up nearly ALL of the tulip bulbs that this lady had planted just a few weeks before. We felt so bad too, though. Oh my gosh we are the worst gardeners ever haha. But it was okay because she totally didn't want us to feel bad, she said she is just teaching us "proper" gardening a.k.a. not digging up all of her plants. Oh it was such a good time. She also gave us lunch after (I'm going to save this story for my weekly email though ;) and we sang "Nearer My God to Thee". It was so sweet, she knew it too and danced through the house cooking and singing it! Makes me miss my Grandma.
Wednesday we had a Relief Society activity about essential oils! It was probably the most mormon mom type of thing I've ever witnessed but it was really good! I also made a friend there, Heike! Sch. Jähn brought her neighbor (bless her, I love that woman) to the activity. She is actually blind, which somehow just made me love her all the more. I stuck by her the whole night, making a hand scrub with her and putting things into her hands so she could feel them too. It was so fascinating to hear about her life, and especially the tools that she uses to overcome challenges! Braille is so dang cool. She invited us to come to her school for the blind on the 8th to test out her Braille writing machine and participate in her English class! Talk about super cool!!
We planned a bit more "finding" this week, and in all honesty, I haven't done a lot of it before. It's a bit nerve wracking to me! However, this week, I had one goal: Trust Heavenly Father. Seems easy, right? There are times it was hard, but it was SOOOO worth it!! Last week we asked a member to pray over a street that we could go finding on in Reichenbach. It was an awesome lesson, and he gave us the street early on in the week. We planned to go there on Thursday, and we just KNEW we were going to find people there!! I'm the senior companion in this whole thing, trainer in fact, so heck no I wasn't going to say I was nervous or look it at all! I had no idea how these people were going to react or whatever, but let's just say, I prayed a LOT! Haha. We got to the street and it was a pretty big one. I just felt so certain that we needed to and were going to find success on this street, because not only would we find people prepared for the gospel, we would strengthen our testimonies as well as this member who gave us this street!! We set a goal to contact every single person on the street AND WE DID! It was so awesome, and we had so so much fun doing it. No, we didn't convert the whole street (maybe next time!), but 2 huge outcomes. 1. We met Lina!! We klingeled her house and her mom answered but didn't really want anything to do with us. Her mom walked away, but she just stayed and talked with us. We talked for quite awhile and found out their family is new in the area and she's been pretty bored and lonely. We were like, hey! We'll be your friends! We even took a selfie together! But now we talk on WhatsApp (technology is seriously a blessing!!) and we'll see where things go! It would be awesome to start meeting with her family! 2. Dang right we klingeled and contacted every person on that street! We felt so good by the end of the street. It's so funny, it actually made me happy when people answered the door and weren't the nicest or expressed interest. I just felt like Satan was trying to get us to give up, but we didn't! By halfway, I was like "Sister Grisham, this is SO awesome. Satan totally thought we were going to give up on the 2nd house, but look, here we are!!" This day totally changed my perspective on finding. I absolutely love it. It may not be the most effective way to find people to teach all the time, but now it means something to me. I feel like I am showing Heavenly Father that I trust Him, and that no matter what He commands me to do or where He commands me to go, I'm going to do it! My favorite thing to quote from the scriptures is that "I fear NO man!" That's right, I'm on the Lord's errand, and His opinion is the only one that I'm going to care about!! Lol sorry I don't know if you can tell but I get a bit passionate about missionary work.
The other AWESOME finding activity was in Hohenstein, our district leaders area! Best part? We took Janina along with us! After our Reichenbach experience, we were more than excited to bring Janina along and really show her how to work hard while finding! We met up in the morning and it was super cute- she dressed like a missionary!! P.S. she's submitting her papers in January and its basically the most exciting thing that will ever happen on my mission!! But we prepped her a bit before and gave her a BofM to highlight a scripture. We got to Hohenstein and were PUMPED to "paint the town blue"! (That's what I call finding! Hee hee because the BofM is blue, I'm so funny) The elders prepared a survey to ask people to get to the point of eternal families and family history (if they didn't want anything to do with religion). Naturally, they told us our "area" would be the center of the town, I guess because statistically saying, people will talk to the sisters more (It helped that we were smiling and laughing the whole time). We got to the town center, all excited, only to find out that it was basically one road on a hill.. We were like uhhhhhh where are the people? Zwickau is always decently buzzing so there's always people to talk to! But there was like one kid sitting on a bench playing a video game. We were like okay lets do this!! Anyway, the first person came around and we handed the clipboard to Janina and were like, alright go talk to them! She's such a boss, she was like okay and did it!! Later we found out she used to have to do stuff like this a lot for work, so it wasn't really anything hard, especially because it was now for like, salvation!! We talked to everyone, and had some really awesome conversations! We ended up getting 4 really solid contacts (which I think is more than Hohenstein has had in like, months combined... It's a hard area) and reached the ultimate goal of really just letting go of fears and just doing it, and getting Janina excited about it too! I ended up giving out all my cards, but G and Janina even put the rest of theirs in mailboxes on the way to lunch. We really gave it our all and I know the elders really appreciated it!! I've found its all about your attitude towards it and having the faith that you will find people that are interested! We will definitely be incorporating more finding into our weeks, its so awesome!!
Okay, I should probably answer your email before I take up too much time. Haha, needless to say, it was such an amazing week. :) I really gave it my all, and in return, Heavenly Father helped me to feel so fulfilled.
Your email was so awesome! I'm so glad that you are MY mom! Yeah yeah yeah you have other kids, and siblings are wonderful, but I just don't know how I got so lucky with the parents I have. I totally have to tell you a secret... I miss you and Dad like crazy. You commented about me possibly going back to school and never visiting or just getting used to living away from home. "WRONG". -Trump. I miss you so much!! I miss Minnesota and pretty little Duluth and Taylors Falls and Grandma's house and Grandpa's garage (those are two separate things you know!) and my family. Frankly, I'm super sad I'm not there while Sara is pregnant and to see my new little cousin. All of my whining and nagging basically got those two married, so like this new cousin totally has me to thank for his life.... But yeah, I don't know that you really have to worry about me never coming back. I'm pretty set on living in Minnesota. Vacations are good enough for me to see the rest of the world, anywhere but Minnesota doesn't feel like home to me. Can't promise you that it will be in the next couple of years, but I think I can give you a good assurance that I want my little kiddos to spend Monday's with their Grandma just like I got to do as a kid.
That shirt turned out awesome! I especially like the picture of Grandma wearing it haha! Dang she looks good. And good job sewing that! If I would have made that, I'm pretty sure it would have ended up as a sock or a headband or something. [I sewed a Latin ballroon dance shirt for Logan's upcoming dance competition. - MOM] Are you going to get to watch a lot of the ballroom competitions! That's like this next week you're going out there, exciting!! Anything else fun planned? You should somehow run into Brittney and buy her lunch. She'd definitely appreciate that and I miss her. Just pretend she's me or something.
That package you sent was so sweet and I loved everything about it, right down to you cramming every bit of space with something!! I love you lots, and thank you for taking care of me :)
As for my Christmas package, I can think of a few small things!! 1. PENS. I flipping miss American pens. Preferably the cheap ones you use that aren't super inky. Also 1 or 2 "G-2" pens in black. 2. Cookies and Creme Hershey's chocolate drops! You can't get them here, so that'd mean so much to me!!! 3. A dress? Like a longer one? Or a black one that I can put with everything? I wish I had a few more dresses instead of skirts all the time! 4. Peppermint Hersheys kisses and/or Reeses.... Other than that, I'm really good on necessities and shouldn't have a lot of sweets! 5. I'd love a laminated copy of my patriarchal blessing and idk, some pictures of the family! You are really good at giving gifts, and I will love anything that you send! Don't stress though, I dont need or want anything big, fancy or expensive. Another toothbrush head would be good too. Oh, also possibly my essential oils?! I've been using Grisham's peppermint to stop getting car sick lol. Also, the diffuser would be AMAZING but it would probably be too big to send in a Christmas package. If not, I'd totally be down for those too... I'm converted to essential oils (I like peppermint, lemon and lavender!)
GOSH, DANG IT, CONNER, I KNEW HE HAD MY DANG PANTS. That nerd. Well, I wouldn't mind you sending those too. They are my favorite pants. OH! I would love a black longsleeve shirt!! Or my maroon one!! Don't buy any, look through my clothes because I really wish that I would have brought those with me!!
Dang, that's a sad story about fitness. Believe me mom, I am trying!! I won't give up.. It's hard but I won't. Even if my body does change a little bit, I know that I have my mom to bug me about it for the rest of my life so I have support ;) Thank you for caring. I still run and work out even though its hard and cold outside. I can't really function well in the morning without it!
Well Mommy, I've basically taken all of my time writing this but that's totally okay. It's not the same as getting to Facetime you for hours while I was just cooking or cleaning my room in college, or better yet hanging out together, but its okay. 5 months has already flown completely away (wahhhh!!!), so I know these next 13 will be incredibly fast. Maybe take advantage of me not jumping on you for awhile.
I love you a million Minnesota Christmas times! I'm super excited to send this christmas package your way, I got things that are special to the region that I'm in!!
Love, Sister Macey Ingalls
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