Week 35 - Service, Food, Reels, and Other Things

 Hey everyone :)

I feel like I have no idea what even happened this last week... all I know is that I've somehow made it to see another pday! It's been a kinda off week where I know that I did things, but at the same time it feels like nothing happened. 

One thing I know for a fact DID happen though was lots and lots of service! I love service, so that was a plus. We handed out some boxes of produce for the Great Plains Food Bank again, and it was such a blast. Lots of us missionaries have gone and helped out there before, but I'm always the one who coordinates it with the organization, so it's always me, my companion, and 0-8 others. As a result, everyone there knows me, so I show up and just chat with all these awesome people! There was a new face this time though, a guy named Will. Will is now my favorite person ever. He has a million stories! From being in the marines for 15 years to working as a chef at Disney's Club 33. He told me how to say "sit down, shut up, and drop your gun" in around 8 languages and told me stories about throwing famous people out of restaurants and how much of a brat Nicholas Cage's son is. It was awesome. 

Then there were the services from the elders. Oh boy. We were told by one set of elders to go volunteer for a suicide walk. We were told the mall... then White Drug... then Thrifty White Pharmacy... then the Biesiot Activities Center, then 4 more phone calls, then back to the mall. Yeah... we were an hour late. It was a cool event though! During that one, we got a call from the other elders telling us that they were dumping their service project on us for that afternoon. Whoopee. The chick we were helping out was MEAN. The elders (all of them) definitely owe us haha. I even made them all chocolate chip banana bread muffins earlier this week! Nah, we bug them to do things for us all the time, that's just the missionary life. 

Alrighty, let's talk food. Oh boy. So... somehow the entire district ended up broke. Not sure how that happened. We also haven't been getting fed by members at all for quite some time now. So what option did we have? Prayer! I'm not sure if I included this in a previous email or not, so sorry if this is a repeat, but when we were making the oreo balls for our members we weren't going to have enough chocolate chips to cover them all. We prayed, and somehow we ended up with plenty leftover! God is a God of miracles, so it should work again, right? 100%. All of a sudden every single person we talked to was asking to feed us and sending us home with leftovers. It definitely felt like a 5 fish and 2 loaves of bread kind of situation!

Another thing that definitely helped is... we can now eat inside again! Not sure how long it'll last this time since last time it was only a week, but we're hoping this change is around to stay, especially since it's getting cold quick here. It gets pretty warm during the day, but when the sun is down it is BRISK. 

Wow, I feel like I am really rambling this week. Wish I could say I was sorry, but you're the one choosing to read this!

So, reels. Kudos to you if you know what the heck these are. It's a new Instagram feature, and since Sister Astle and I are on Instagram, we're now expected to know how to make them. If you don't know what I'm talking about, think TikTok. If you don't know what that is, think longer Vines. Still lost? Essentially a reel is a 15 second long video. They have a unique feel/style to them, but until you watch a hundred of them or so, you don't really get it. I still don't, and yet I've made three of them now. It's been pretty tricky and time consuming, but I think I have the basic basic basic gist of it down.

K, update on the missionary work. Uggh. This week was a slow one as far as finding and teaching. Hoping to have this week be better! An update on Ted and Angela though: they had us over for dinner the other night which was great, but it gets even better. We walked in, and I looked over and both of them had the quad set of scriptures out on the coffee table, plus another Book of Mormon by the lamp, and a "Come, Follow Me" manual as well. Let me tell ya, nothing could have made me happier! We also got to sit down and set up their church accounts, teach them how to pay tithing online, and just chat with them. I love them SOO much, and while we were there, Angela gave me a blanket she made for me and a bracelet Denise made for me before she left. These people are going to be lifelong friends of mine, that's for sure. 

Anyway, I think that's about all I feel like writing this week. Love you all, the church is true, Christ loves you. Until next week!

Sister Balls