Our Area is Haunted?

Happy Monday!

So P-day last week was pretty fun, I took a good minute making my heart shaped tye dye shirt, and I don't think I want to tye dye for years. If anyone has their hands dyed and they can't get it off, diluted bleach works WONDERS!

 

Whenever I wear this shirt, I'll think about Covington and the sister missionaries I served with!

It was Elder and Sister Lamph's last district meeting (they are the senior couple serving in my ward), so they took us out to lunch one last time at the Mystic Grill- famously known because of the TV show the Vampire Diaries. We're going to miss them greatly. Saturday evening we had a Southern Flair Farewell Dinner for them, and it was a huge success! Many members who haven't stepped foot in the church building in years came to say goodbye to the Lamph's. Since we were close to them, they asked if we would sing a duet for them during the program. I hadn't sung a duet since the first Christmas I've been out, but I told myself I wanted to develop my singing abilities. We ended up singing, "I'll Go Where You Want Me To Go" and I survived haha! I should be careful on what I wish for because now we're singing next Sunday in sacrament meeting!

A Piece of Trivia: 
Fans of the Vampire Diaries will know all about the Mystic Grill from the show, but until recently it was not an actual restaurant.  However, the building that housed the Mystic Grill for the show has been transformed into an actual restaurant in downtown Covington in 2014.

The Exterior of the Mystic Grill--made famous by The Vampire Diaries

We taught Sh. and her family again this week, and Satan does not want this family to progress in the gospel! We had a strong impression to show The Restoration DVD and Satan did everything in his power to prevent the DVD player, X-box, and TV to work. The kids were working on the wires and buttons for a good twenty minutes, and I got up and tried to figure it out before I suggested watching it on a laptop. They agreed and we started the movie. The CD was skipping whenever a really important scene was happening, and especially during the First Vision! We had just cleaned the CD and I was praying the entire time the movie was playing. Sister Stewart was sweating like a sinner at church, and I'm pretty sure Sister Seegmiller was praying it would work too. But we're really glad that Sh. came in for this lesson, and she was asking us questions on what denomination we were. We let them keep the movie so they could watch it again after it's been cleaned again. Sh. told us that they were planning on coming to church the first week we saw them because Sh. quit her job and is no longer working weekends. :) But they were stopped in their tracks because of darn Satan. The family committed to come to church again yesterday, but just this morning Sh. texted us and told us she got sick on Saturday, and wasn't able to make it. Since she has to go to the doctors on Wednesday, we had to reschedule our appointment. We just know that this family is going to be such a strong family once they're baptized!

So I have this crazy theory that the entire mission is going to get whitewashed. We've been asked to have a lot of organization papers when we go to zone training this week and next week. (We're going next Tuesday) and these are the type of papers missionaries would love to have if they were getting whitewashed in (meaning, two missionaries come to an area at the same time, knowing nothing.) We had our email from President this morning, and it makes it sound like it's more possible than not. "We are taking a new step up in out-planning the adversary and building a great foundation so that any area you are transferred into will be better organized for success." So if I get transferred on the 25th, I wonder where I'll go! :P

 

Sister Traina (who we live with), Sister Weng (ward missionary), the Elders, Lamphs, our WML, and us! :)

We taught V. and Sha. again this week, and we taught them the Gospel of Jesus Christ. They were planning on coming to church yesterday, but W. (their son) was up all night screaming with V., so she didn't get any sleep. Sha. has type two diabetes, and he woke up really sick yesterday so they were unable to go. Ca. officially moved to Atlanta, and now he's going to the ward that I was in originally! :D We think that's the best for him so he can be close to his two sons, and also there's a YSA ward up North that he'll be able to transition to once the missionaries get in contact with him. I'm so glad that I knew where the Atlanta ward was or Ca. wouldn't know where to go.

This week we've been focusing a lot more on seeing members to heed to the prophet's invitation to help the missionaries and members unite together in helping the work of salvation hasten. We had to intricately plan on being down south in our area all day on Friday to see a lot of the members that we're working with. After our last appointment, we had to drive all the way back up to our house (over 20 miles away) and it was really dark as we were taking the shortest way back. The back roads, dirt roads, and abandoned houses don't look intimidating in broad daylight, but it looks a LOT scarier in the dark. There aren't any streetlights, and we got a really eerie feeling as we were driving back. This wasn't the first time we had to drive home from the South, but it felt a lot different than the other times. We started blasting some hymns to drown out our creepy thoughts, and I was focused on the road. Sister Stewart gasped as she looked past my window, and told me saw a ghost in one of the houses. I flipped out and I told her not to tell me anything else, and we kept locking the doors over and over again. She looked so white, and I'm getting the heebie jeebies writing about this. It appears that a good chunk of our tracting area is haunted, and I never want to go on those roads ever again!

My favorite quotes that I've encountered this week,

"If you don't know where you're going, then which path you take doesn't matter." -Chesire Cat

I think that quote is so fitting when it comes to the Plan of Salvation, and when it comes to planning on where you want your life to head in the next direction. We should always have goals and plans on how we can become more like our Savior Jesus Christ.

-Sister Sudweeks

 

P.S.  This is Sweetie.  The member who owns the goats that we helped out with also owns this cat. She's the fluffiest cat I've ever seen in my life. Sister Stewart and I thought about buying a cat this fluffy when we're grandparents, but then we thought about all of the grand kids and their sticky hands all over this cat. -shudder- Thanks, but no thanks! :P