Week 71: Family History, we are doing it!

Hello people of the world!

This week has been one crazy adventure. So I'll start of with the awkward moment of the week. Thursday evening we had a dinner appointment at the Bishop's home. We got to their house about 5 minutes early, and their car wasn't in front of their house. "That's weird" I thought, so we decided to make some phone calls for those remaining minutes before we went inside. As we were sitting on a wall, the Bishop pulled up in the drive and then invited us inside. Phew! They didn't forget! I was relieved. So we walked in and sat down, and after about 5 minutes of awkward small talk they come in asking "So, what brings you here today?" Turns out they actually thought they were having us over the next week for dinner, not that night... and they didn't have any food for us! Awkward.. SO we biked out of there quickly to our flat to get some nice food :) 

This week we had a Nuneaton change in history! Sister Grant and I got a stand set up in the market on Wednesday for family history. The only bad side of it was that we had to get there by 8am, so we had to leave the flat by 7:30 to get there. We were good sports and biked in the rain, and got there and talked to people for the next 6 hours. It was awesome! I don't think I've ever gotten so many people to stop and talk to us in Nuneaton. It was so fun to connect to families, and to share with others about mine, and to have them connect it back to our Heavenly Father. As the stake president said, "Discover yourself, discover your family, and then discover the Father and the Son." We met some pretty interesting people, even some people who claim they "don't believe in families" but we still were nice to them and gave them some cards haha. 

Later that same day, we met with Sabrina. Yes, the miracle from two weeks ago. She is so wonderful. She has had such a rough life, but she realized that God is the only one who can help her, and that He truly does make everything better. She has the cutest 1year old son! She really is looking for ways to improve her life and to have the best life for her family.

We are still working with Kerry. She is so humble, and so teachable. We taught her about keeping the sabbath day holy, and she explained how she is trying so hard to live her life the right way. She is such a good example to us of diligence, and also of overcoming trials. Plus, she just got the cutest puppy named Rio. 7 weeks old, and tiny! He's adorable.

Sunday we got to teach Singing time to all the primary kids :) It was amazing to see the enthusiasm, and also how teachable they are. All of them want to do the right thing, and Sister Grant and I had a blast going through all of the primary songs. Of course we had to bring them candy, so I think we are on the good side of all the children now. 

Side note: Today I found a sweater for £1. And it is amazing. 

I love being here in England. The people are incredible, especially the members. Those that we get to work with really have been prepared by the Lord for great things. I thank my Heavenly Father every day that I get to be here. I am so glad we can have that two way communication with Him.

I love you all, thank you for being the best family and friends I could ask for :) 

Take care,

Sister Slack

Puppy!

missionaries

waiting for a lesson

Week 70: (No Subject)

HEY EVERYONE!!!

Seems like my time management is getting worse.. well what can I say pday time is precious and no one really wants to spend it all in front of a computer screen! We went to Stratford Upon Avon today, and it was beautiful. There was a butterfly farm there, and plus Shakespeare everything. It was pretty legit. Plus, we went with one of our favorite members, Sister Brown!

This week I learned and re-learned one thing. Things will work out perfectly in missionary work, because God is in charge. Many days this week we had our plans, back up plans, and back-up of back-up plans thrown around more than a monkey throws around banana peels. Each time things like that happened, something else would come up, or someone would offer us a lift, and we definitely saw the Lord helping us out every day. Remember how our bikes were broken? yup. We had a meeting with our ward mission leader, and the 2nd counselor of the mission presidency just so happened to come into the meeting. During that, he offered to give us a bike which he had bought for his wife, and then found out that she hates riding bikes. MIRACLE. Free bike?? Amazing. Hopefully we should get it soon.

A few days later our bikes got fixed, so for now we are mobile again! Woot! It's amazing not to have to spend millions of pounds on bus and rail tickets. However, it's totally worth it when you meet amazing people, and get to see wonderful families in the ward. We had dinner with a family called the Corbishley's, and they had an enthusiastic son who told us a wonderful story all about hippos and how they had watermelon bombs and how they lived on an island. Creative minds. wow. 

MIRACLE:

The whole edwards family came to church this week. 

And we have to go now...

BUT I LOVE YOU ALL!

Love,
Sister Slack

Pictures:

 We love Sister Brown!

We tract old buildings in Stratford.

Shakespeare's house!

Week 69: MIRACLES on MIRACLES

Welcome to the weekly update with Sister Slack! Surprise, it's Monday. Every week I tell myself that I'll be better at thinking about what I want to put in an email, but every week my mind goes totally blank, so we'll see how this works out. 

Last Monday I crashed on my bike for the very first time on my mission. I wish I could say it was epic, but really what happened was it had been raining all morning and I tried to go up the curb and my tire slipped... and I was thrown onto the road. Luckily, I was unharmed! I do have a sweet bruise on the back of my leg, but that's it. Turns out that this was just the beginning to all of our bike problems in the week. Tuesday we made the mistake of lending our bikes to the elders, and they came back and Sister Grant's back tire was messed up, and my front tire was flat. Poor kids had to walk them back to the church for us, but hey! No one got hurt. We have an extra bike at the flat, and we managed to bring the wheel down to try and fix it, but really all that happened was that our wrench broke. Exciting stuff. 

This week Coventry got to see the return of Sister Slack! Yes, I got to go on exchange back to my old area. I was with Sister Sorensen, and it was kinda funny because when I was in Coventry, she came there with me on exchange. We got to run around like mad women (literally.. we were 10 minutes late and needed to get there!) and teach lots of people and I got to see some old friends. We got to see Uche, and I reminded him that reading the Book of Mormon is the best thing he can do! I also got to see Grace (remember Grace? Baptised back in may). She has come back from China and she is amazing!!! We got to sit down with her and talk about how she's been applying the gospel. As we were speaking, I was just so filled with love for all of the people I've taught. It is such a blessing that we get to see the gospel change lives. She also gave us chocolate, so that's always nice. 

(Back to Nuneaton) We also got to see the less active named Catherine again, and she is just amazing. She read 5 chapters of the Book of Mormon and had marked them. She is so sweet, and she is just taking all the right steps to come back to church. Kerry (another less active) came to church again this week! She is so brave and she is doing so good. She loves learning about the gospel and being reminded of everything she was taught as a kid. She has decided she wants to give up smoking, and wants to help her family have the best life possible. The members just love seeing her at church! Also, our ginger (ginger power!) friend we are teaching came to church! His name is Darren. He takes a while to absorb the things we teach, but he definitely is determined to learn. He has had a rough life, but he is so full of hope. 

The biggest miracle of the week happened on Sunday. The whole Coventry zone was fasting this last sunday for us all to be able to see success. It seems things have been rough over the last few weeks, and this definitely was there to boost us up. I was pondering all day of who we could teach or focus on to help them see the gospel in their lives. Really, we are constantly looking for new people to teach. We have seemed to have quite a few people meet with us once, but just never show up again. After church we went into town and started talking to people, and literally everyone rejected us until we met this nice guy named Kyle. Turns out his best friend's brother is a Mormon, and they are both interested to learn what it's all about! Yay! But things get better, Sister Brown (a member) later picked us up for a dinner appointment and it was lovely, and then dropped us off at our flat. We were about to walk inside when the lady that lives below us came up to us and asked "What is it that you do?" She explained that she had once seen the inside of our flat due to water leaking into hers, and she saw all of the copies of the Book of Mormon. She has been wondering for ages. We explained that we were missionaries and that we teach people about God and Jesus Christ all the time. She then told us, "I knew you were. I really need you in my life right now." Pretty sure my heart stopped. With tears in her eyes she told us she has had a crazy past, and that about a year ago she cleaned up her life and found God. She explained that she really needs good people in her life, and a good church. Her name is Sabrina.

God literally dropped her into our laps. We set up a time to come and see her this week, and we are so excited. As we walked into our flat, Sister Grant and I were so grateful that we had fasted that day, and that God loves each one of His children so much! I know that there is nothing better in the world than our own personal relationship with God, and seeing it being built in other peoples lives.

I hope you all enjoy the sunshine and rain this week! I know I will :) 

Much love,

Sister Slack

Grace!

"Cheeeeese"!

Me and Sister Sorensen

Chili Pepper that caused the red face....HOOOOOOOOOOOOT!

Week 68: Red hot chilli face

Hello family and friends. Today I don't have much time because we are
going to the garden centre. So I'm writing this with my voice if it
doesn't come out the right way don't worry about it.

Yesterday was in a conference we are got to go to Coventry to watch it
in the chapel. It was incredible and I learned so much. And of course
we got three new apostles, so that was amazing! I know that God has
given us such wonderful leaders today. Since we all got to go to the
stake centre, all the missionaries were there as well. One of my
friends from the MTC was there, and he had brought 3 chilli peppers
(apparently the 3rd hottest in the world or something). So he asked me
and Sister Lamb to eat them, and we didn't see why not. Well, mistake
on my part. We ate them all at the same time, and Elder Nogueroles was
fine. However, Sister Lamb's and my mouths were on FIRE. Literally my
face turned as red as the pepper, and tears were coming out of my
eyes. Apparently bread is supposed to help cool it down, and so is
milk. Well, I can't eat bread, and there was no milk. Wow. Let's just
say that after about half an hour my mouth decided to stop burning. So
I ate tomatoes instead to cool it down.

Something amazing happened while at Coventry. 9 months ago Sister
Powley and I found a guy named Uche while on exchange. My companions
and I worked so hard to help him see the importance of coming to
church. Sadly I never got to see it happen while I was there. However,
as the first session was about to start, I looked over and saw him
walk through the door of the church. My heart was so filled with
happiness! I couldn't believe it! After the session of conference, I
got to speak to him and he told me "now I see why you've been trying
to get me to come this whole time." This gospel is for everyone!

That's all I had time for now. I'm being bullied by everyone around me
to stop writing. So blame them because you don't get to hear all the
stories of this week but I'm sure you'll hear something about it later
on in life. I love you and have a wonderful week!

Love,
Sister Slack