Transfers...........

Well I am staying here on OSU! Sister Malloy is leaving (we don't know where she is going until tomorrow at Transfer Conference) so Sister Larsen and I will be staying together.
This week has been kind of all over the place haha...

We were starting a lesson with Kenny last week and he asked us what we would teach him if it were our last lesson with him. He ended up telling us that he had received a prompting that he needed to leave Columbus. He had the elders give him a blessing and still felt that he needed to go. He was doing so well! He had stopped smoking, drinking, everything, completely living all the commandments and was so in tune with the spirit and so happy and ready to be baptized. We all felt okay about his prompting, and said our goodbyes. He didn't want to go, but said he would be leaving that night or the morning. Well, he has still been hanging around and is still here, but hasn't met with us. We're not quite sure what happened, but I think that once you ignore a prompting long enough, it goes away. He said he is going to hop trains to Palmyra to go visit the sites. Ultimately he is using his agency, but we hope he turns it around. He is such a great guy!

Eric is doing so great. We were able to meet with him twice last week, and then he came to a baptism on Saturday, and then to all 3 hours of church and break the fast! It was so great! He fits right in. He is way smart, so he can grasp a lot at once. We've taught almost all the lessons now, and he is working towards baptism. He just needs to pray more about what he is learning and reading. He is already almost done with Alma! And he's not just reading it to read it as fast as he can, but he tells us all about hat he has learned it is insane! 

Sadly, Jeremy has not been responding to our texts and calls. It breaks my heart because he is so prepared. I know that this Gospel is exactly what he needs but he just doesn't know it yet. Sometimes I hate agency haha. We're going to keep trying to get a hold of him though.

Molly is doing great too. She went home to Cleveland for a few weeks so we won't be able to meet with her but hopefully we can still keep up with her progress through texting in the meantime.

I am not sure if we told you about Brent, but we met Brent outside a convenience store a few weeks ago, and began chatting with him. He has had a rough past with some other churches and has a bad taste in his mouth about church but we were able to talk about a lot of things and we set up another time to meet with him. Well he came to the institute and we gave him a chapel tour. It went really south really fast...We had a member with us, and Brent really didn't like him for some reason so whenever the member Joel would try to testify or add to anything, Brent would just be like, dude don't try to convince me of that. Then at the end, it just got really awkward for us because he began to be really closed off. We explained to him why we wanted to meet with him but he said that we were just trying to convert him and he left. Then he texted us later and apologized, saying he was on edge because of the experiences he had had. We totally understood, and we told him that and tried to tell him how we want him to have peace in his life and to be able to be happy but he said some pretty nasty things to us and said thanks for the sales pitch, but I don't need God, it's me myself and I from here on out. So we didn't reply. Last week, I felt really prompted to send him a text, so we sent one that just said that we didn't expect a reply, but that he had been in our thoughts and prayers. We never heard anything back. Well we were sitting in sacrament meeting and we turned around and he was in the foyer! He apologized for what he said and said he cleared his day so he could spend it here at church. He stayed for all meetings and even came and watched Joseph Smith the Prophet of the Restoration. The lesson in Sunday School was the Word of Wisdom, and he said that he knew that he needed to stop drinking and smoking and that the lesson was what he needed to hear. He didn't like the movie though, and ended up leaving quickly after it ended. We're not sure what he'll end up doing but at least he was able to recognize that he needs God in his life and he needs to change.

Kenneth is doing great, he has accepted the invitation for baptism and has been reading in the Book of Mormon. We got him to open up a little bit this last lesson, so we hope we will continue to make progress! He is such a sweet kid. And way smart. He graduated High School when he was 15! 

Cheyenne is doing good. We met with her this week. She is actually trying to get her boyfriend to learn about the church. She's read in the Book of Mormon and has been praying, and feels good about it. We invited her to be baptized and she is going to work towards it. 

We have a new investigator Chelita. She is homeless but looking to get off the streets. She was baptized into the Baptist church 4 years ago but we taught her part of the Restoration and invited her to be baptized by the right authority and she said, I would love to be baptized again! Haha I had never heard that one before. She knows that she needs to get back into going to church and letting Heavenly Father in. 

Well that's about it! I love the people here, especially our investigators. I am so thankful I get the opportunity to share my testimony with them.

The power of prayer is so unmeasurable. I know that Heavenly Father is there and that He listens and and answers our prayers.

Hope you have a great week!

OH-IO!

Hey!

Today we went to the State Fair! It was tons of fun. It was hard not riding the rides or eating the food (i'll explain later) but we all had fun as a district. But unfortunately I don't have a lot of time to write, which is particularly sad this week because we had miralces left and right! We taught so much this week it was incredible! This has been one of the best weeks of the mission for me.

So Kenny was the traveler who we invited to stay in Columbus. Our District Leader, Elder Bishop, promised him that if he would stay, that he would see huge changes in himself. Well not only did he stay, but he has come so far in the past week! We met with him everyday since then! Last monday, he came to our lesson, and I could tell he was drunk. I felt prompted to just be straight up, and bold. And I guess he needed that. The spirit was strong. He came to the next lesson sober, and it was so different! It was incredible. He asked for a blessing and since then, he has stopped drinking, smoking marajuana, and stopped smoking since yesterday! He has been a pack a day smoker for 7 years but is trying to quit cold turkey with the help of us and members. He has progressed so rapidly it's insane. He knows the book of Mormon is true and the church is true and he is getting baptized on the 16th of August! He even came to both wards on Sunday, so he came to 6 hours of church yesterday, and then an Open house at the Mission Home! He is so solid, such an example to us. So to help him quit smoking, we all have given up something. I chose sugar, which was particularly hard today at the state fair with all my favorite treats :( But it is so worth it!

Funny story of the week....Do yoou remember how I set traps (lint roller sheets) around our apartment to catch the millipedes?? Well we actually caught one! One of my greatest moments of accomplishment to date. Haha. I'll attach a picture. Also there's another picture of another we had to kill this week. Do you feel my pain? Haha

Jeremy has been a little lazy, sadly. We just love him so much, we want to force him to keep his commitments haha. But we have the faith that he will!

Eric is doing great too! We taught him the Plan of Salvation and he told us that he is going to read the Book of Mormon in 2 weeks (so by next wednesday) so that he can know for himself if this church is true. Can you believe that?! He is way open.

Molly came to church! We met with her twice last week and she came to church. She is so great. She is opening up to us and I think she really enjoyed church. I know that she definitely needs some peace in her life. When we met with her last Monday, she basically unloaded a bunch of trials she had been struggling with by herself. She has had a really rough life, I know this gospel will help her.

We are also teaching Derek, Kenneth, and Nick that I will tell you about more next week, I love our investigators, they are the best. I have realized this week how badly I want to stay on OSU this transfer. I really hope I don't get transfered because I can't leave these people! Pray that I will stay :) haha

Okay thanks for reading my ungathered thoughts. I hope you have a great week, Love ya!

Time flies....

This picture is because a lot of people looked at us weird because we all had really long skirts and buns, so we looked a little weird, people on the street kept asking us why we dress like that haha it was embarrassing! And we are wet because it was pouring rain during the seizure incident.

I can't believe it's been another week. Time flies by faster and faster each week.
It's been a great week for sure.

We had a great lesson with Jeremy on Tuesday. We were studying what we should teach him and we all decided that we still need to focus on God is our Loving Father in Heaven. I didn't think we should move on until he gets there, because everything else that we would teach him wouldn't have relateability to him. My companions agreed so we were able to share more about Heavenly Father and faith and show a Mormon Message. It was a powerful lesson, the spirit was so strong! While studying for him, I found a quote that we were able to share with him. "The power of our prayers depends on us." That was so profound to me. It really is up to us to make them meaningful. If prayer is not a priority, if we are not willing to do anything to receive an answer, then why should Heavenly Father be willing to make an answer known to us? He has been praying, but doesn't feel any differently, and doesn't feel that he is receiving any answers. We talked a lot about prayer with him and were able to share personal experiences. I shared a small experience that was pretty embarrasing haha I told him the struggles (to say the least haha) I've been having with the millipedes and how I haven't been sleeping well because I am too afraid to get up in the middle of the night to go use the restroom, so I've been praying and asking Heavenly Father to help me to not have to get up and use the restroom. haha. And He's been answering my prayers! Haha it was a small experience, but we were able to show Jeremy that even on a smaller scale, the things that are important to us are important to our Heavenly Father, and He wants to help us, we just have to ask for His help. We still feel like he is holding something back, though. I think that something has happened in the past that would prevent him from wanting a relationship with Heavenly Father, so we are going to try to find out that concern this week.

Later that night, Brother Kyees from one of the YSA Bishoprics took us out to dinner. It was way fun! He has daughters that live in L.A. and was telling us how one of them is the Celebrity nail artist, so she does Katy Perry, Britney Spears, Rhianna, and a ton of other celebrities' nails. It was pretty cool. Plus we got a great meal.

On Wednesday, we found a New Investigator, Jacqueline. She is way nice. She is Catholic, but is open to learning more. We are looking forward to meeting with her when she returns from vacation. On Wednesday night, we were making phone calls to set up return appointments with Potential Investigators we had met while contacting, and I really felt like we needed to call Eric. We had met Eric on July 4th. Here in Columbus, they celebrate Independance day on July 3rd, with an event called Red, White and Boom. So the morning of the 4th, we were out contacting on High Street, and were running into a lot of people that were hungover/still drunk from Red White and Boom. We walked past Panera, and we saw this guy sitting alone looking a little...haggard haha but we started talking to him. His name is Eric and he had had a crazy night from Red White and Boom and was still a little intoxicated, about to be picked up by a friend. But we just talked with him and got to know him a little more and his beliefs. He is Agnostic but open. Usually Potential's like him don't pan out, but when we called him, he wanted to meet with us! So we met with him Saturday. We were giving him a chapel tour, and he had a lot of questions. I told him that I didn't want to overwhelm with a lot of information but he said that he wouldn't mind at all, and that he actually likes getting a lot of information at once. So we taught him the Restoration in 5 minutes and he thought it was pretty interesting. He also came to church yesterday! He really liked it and afterwards, he said, well I still want to learn more. We were way happy!

On Thursday, we went on exchanges and Sister Malloy and I went to Worthington, where I knocked my first door! haha it was great, but no one was interested. I still enjoyed it but when we got back to OSU, it felt like home.

We had interviews with President Daines on Friday, they were great He is so caring and his wife is so funny! They are great to serve under.

On Saturday, we went to a baptism in Sister Malloy's old area. The members there are fantastic! I was a little sad though because Megan (the one I was teaching when I was at Temple Square) was supposed to be baptized that same day, so I was sad I couldn't see it, but I actually just found out today that she hasn't been baptized yet but is progressing towards it so I am not sure when she will be. She is so solid though!

Earlier in the week, we had met a traveler (I seem to be a magnet to them haha) named Kenny who stopped us and really wanted a Book of Mormon. He had lived with an LDS couple for a few m onths and had gone to church with them and met with missionaries. We set an appointment with him for the next day, but he missed it. We saw him a few days later and gave him a Book of Mormon, then last night, we were contacting and met him again, so we invited him to the institute to have a chapel tour. He said that this time he feels different, that usually he only spends a few days in one place, but that this time was different and that if God told him to stay, he would. So we gave him a chapel tour and showed the movie the Testaments and i9nvited him to be baptized and he said he would if he felt God wanted him to stay. We convinced him to stay another week and we have an appointment with him today so we will see if he shows up!

I just want to add my favorite part of the week. It was Monday night and we were getting ready to go home. One of the members came in and said that someone was having a seizure. We went out to help, and immediately, my District Leader began giving a blessing with his companion. The guy, Ryan, was foaming at the mouth and seizing everywhere. As soon as the words blessing of healing came out of his mouth, the seizure stopped and he relaxed and became alert. I saw the power of the Priesthood work miracles right before my eyes. I don't know how to convey that miracle to you in so short a time, but I hope you got goosebumps :) 

This church is way special because it is Christ's church, and the power that He held to heal people, is held today. I know that power and authority is real.

Well that's all that I have time for. I love you all and hope you have a great week!

Love,

OSU Adventures Continue!

The Adventures have been nonstop, haha it's been another great week.Because of weird boundaries, we are in 2 zones, so we had another zone activity today! For this one, we had a talent show. We decided to do a pie-eating contest for our talent haha it was so fun! Except for the fact that we got pumpkin pie everywhere, including up our noses. Haha. And I smell like whipped cream. I wish I could attach the video! But once again, I don't have much time to email because of the activity. Next week we will have full time!

Shoutout to the Somerville's for coming to see me in Ohio! :) That was way cool.

So to update you on our investigators' progress:

We taught Kevin again this week. We taught him about Obedience and the Word of Wisdom. At first he was a little flabbergasted that we don't drink tea or coffee, especially considering the Asian culture, they drink a lot of tea. But we were able to explain why we have the Word of Wisdom and what God promises to bless us with by keeping it. We also told him he can drink herbal tea and told him we would bring him some. He was pretty open about it and said that he would try to keep the Word of Wisdom. He is doing great, he is so open and willing to do anything for his newfound relationship with Jesus Christ. It's amazing to me that a month ago he had no belief in Heavenly Father or Jesus Christ but now, just 4 weeks later, he knows that they exist and that they love him.

I am not sure if I told you about Mohsen, but he dropped us. He said that he had spiritual confirmations from God that were telling him not to learn more about this church and that the Book of Mormon was enticing him to do evil things, so I'm not really sure what that is all about haha. I guess he just wasn't ready!

Here's a story to make ya laugh:

We were out street contacting and it was the end of the day on Tuesday, right after p-day where we had zone activity so we were exhausted. We stopped to get some water and it made us feel a lot better. So we're talking to this girl named Molly. She gives us her information and we start to make an appointment and she goes, wow you guys are really energetic. So I go, yeah, well we just drank water. Haha okay don't know why I said that. Haha needless to say, it's a miracle we are teaching her. Also, I ruined another contact a couple days later with a case of the hiccups. I would have thought my companions would save it, but no they just laughed at me.

We had lunch with Cheyenne. She hasn't read form the Book of Mormon and wasn't able to come to anything this week. Hopefully this week will be better!

I'm so excited to tell you about Jeremy!! So we found him on the street a little over a week ago. We contacted him outside the institute. We were asking about his beliefs, and he responded honestly. He wasn't intending to offend us, but he said some pretty offensive things about God that hurt! He wasn't raised with any religion, he is agnostic, so the whole bad things happening to good people thing makes him think that God is a mean person if he does exist. He was I guess you could say bold, so we were a little surprised when he gave us his information so he could learn more. We still didn't really think anything of it though because a lot of people who give us their information never respond when we try to get a hold of them. Well we texted him later and he ended up saying yeah I'll meet with you, how about tomorrow? We were like okay! So we met with him and he is just so sincere! We taught a lot about God is our Loving Heavenly Father and more about the nature of God. He was really receptive and asked questions like why would God allow a toddler to die of leukemia, etc. He even committed to pray. Later that day he texted and said, okay the people around the toddler that dies of leukemia get taught a lesson (by missionaries), I get that. But what about the toddler, are they just a pawn? He was thinking about what we taught him!! S we encouraged him to pray about it and we would talk about it in our next lesson. So we taught him again on Friday. This lesson went even better! He hadn't prayed however. He said he didn't forget but that he chose not to. Well we taught him about the Plan of Salvation, but simplified. He really liked it! He is so sincere. At one point of the lesson, we asked what he thought about the Plan of Salvation and he said "it's what I always hoped was true." We were basically speechless! That was a journal moment haha. He said that he really would pray this week, that he wanted to this time. We invited him to church but he ended up not feeling very good that day but he texted us a couple times and apologized and said he would come next week. Holy cow, this rough guy I never thought would want to listen to what we have to say is like way prepared and willing to act on the faith he didn't know he had! We are way excited to teach him again tomorrow. It just goes to show that you never know who is prepared! You never know. That's why we have to open our mouths to everyone!!

We found some way awesome people yesterday when we were contacting, we will be teaching them this week so we will keep you updated next p-day.

I wish I could share more but time is up!! Thanks for all the support.A quote for this week: "You can't kill time without injuring eternity." God blesses how we use our time :)

Love ya!

Happy 4th!

Zone activity!

Happy late Independence Day! Hope you had a great one, I sure did! We got fed by members and contacted the whole night, it was great!

So we had a Zone Activity today, we played Ultimate Frisbee and Softball and it was way fun but it took our whole P-day :( So I have absolutely no time so please forgive my wimpy letter, but hopefully attaching pictures will help.

It's been a great week! We were able to teach Kevin, and really figure out what's holding him back from being baptized. It turns out that he really wants to be baptized, but his family is a huge priority for him, and his family doesn't support him wanting to be baptized. He is from China, and all his family still lives there. He has been telling them about meeting with the missionaries, but his grandma is really unsupportive because she had a bad experience with another Christian church, s she thinks that all Christian churches are the same and that our church is like that one. We taught him about Fasting and how he could fast for his family on Fast Sunday and he was excited. He came to church with us on Fast Sunday and he was fasting! He said he felt great. We're excited t teach him again this week.

We also taught Cheyenne this week. We gave her a chapel tour and taught part of the Restoration. We learned that she needs to be taught very simply but she is very interested. Actually right before we contacted her, she had been praying that something would come into her life from Heavenly Father to help her feel closer to Him, and that's when we walked up! That's why she started crying because she knew it was an answer to her prayers. She really wants to come to church, but her boss makes her work on Sundays, so she is trying to find a solution. We have been praying for her, and will be meeting with her again tomorrow.

We contacted this guy Jerone on campus last week, and he is one of our new investigators. He is Atheist and has never known any religion. We were able to share some things with him and pray with him and he is sincerely interested. He is scared of coming to church though so we will have to work on that! But we know that once he feels God's love for him, he will begin to change! We are excited for that.

Well I am sorry this letter is so lame! It's been a wonderful week and I wish I had more time to tell you about it! Let me just say that I feel your prayers and that they are working miracles. We are so blessed to have the Gospel and the knowledge it gives us. Every morning is a decision of destiny that is in our hands. I love being a part of Heavenly Father's work.

Love you all!

Happy birthday to Adam and Nate this week, love ya!

Tripling in to.....OSU!

Holly and her companions in Ohio

Hey remember when I said I really wanted to serve on OSU campus? Well dreams do come true! I didn't even mention a word about wanting to serve there to the Mission President, but on Transfer Day, I was put in a trio and we all pinkwashed onto OSU. So that means that we all came to our area without serving there before. It was interesting because they have the same transfer days, and they had an even number of sisters, so it didn't really make sense why they had made two trios, I guess it's just meant to be! So my companions are Sister Malloy from Valencia, CA, and Sister Larsen from Pleasant Grove, UT. We are having tons of fun! It's pretty ironic actually because it is exactly what we do on Temple Square. We street contact all day on campus. I actually haven't even been tracting yet. Columbus is great, I love it! I've never smelled so much alcohol in my life. Haha. But it's beautiful if you can get passed the dead of summer humidity.

Man there is so much to tell you I don't even know where to start! There have been so many adventures, I'll make sure to tell you about them later. Haha

So we live a couple miles away from the institute on campus, and we don't have cars or bikes, we are just walkers, so we have to get rides from members a lot, or take the bus which doesn't run as often in the summer. The members here are so incredible, I am so impressed. They have taught me who I want to be when I return. In this mission, we have to have 100% Member Present Lessons, so in all lessons we teach, we have to have a member present. There are so many members who volunteer to teach with us anytime, and members feed us! And most of the members that teach with us are actually Recent Converts. Keep in mind, all these members are YSA kids going to college. That is so new to me that they would be willing to do all this! It's incredible. Like today, one of the members who got baptized just a year ago picked us up and drove us around so we could go grocery shopping. They're so awesome.

I am sure you are wondering what we do all day haha. Well, we have the normal morning schedule, and after companionship (or I guess it would be tripanionship) study, we go to the institute and if we don't have lessons, we street contact! We contact up and down High Street and on campus. We start most street contacts by asking them if we can give them a card (pass-along card). Then we ask them if they've heard of the Mormon church, or if they go to school here, or we'll find something that they're wearing or eating or doing that can start a conversation, and we will bridge it to the Gospel and invite them to learn more. Bridging is so fun, we do that a lot on Temple Square. We do lots of bridging roleplays so that when we are giving tours we can always relate everything to the Gospel. So I've been trying to do that here too. For example, yesterday we street contacted this guy Victor, who was in a Pizza Hut uniform. We talked to him a little bit, and I told him that we don't ask anyone to give up any good or truth they believe, but we invite them to come and get more, to add to it like Pizza toppings. He was really open, and we set up a return appointment to teach him more.

We contacted this girl named Cheyenne on campus on Friday. She had marroon hair and lots of piercings. We started to ask about her religious background and she said that she isn't as religious as she used to be, but that she wishes she was because she is having a hard time. We didn't ask about what she is going through, but we testified of how she is a daughter of God, and how He loves her, and how the Gospel can help her and she began to cry and said she really needed to hear that. We asked if we could meet with her and share more with her and she brightened up and said she would really like that. We have an appointment with her tomorrow! We are way excited.

Okay the coolest thing that I have been so excited to write home about!!!.....Yes I dreamed of serving on OSU campus, but even more than that, since I started serving on Temple Square and knew I would go outbound, I have dreamed of teaching someone that Temple Square sisters found. Well it came true!! We are teaching Kevin. He is from mainland China and goes to OSU. He went to Temple Square with his mom who was visiting the states. They were in Utah and KJevin told his mom they should go since he heard it was a good tourist place. So they went, and they had a tour from Sister Hsu and Sister Bomgren, two of my favorite Sisters on Temple Square!! While his mom was busy taking pictures (typical Asain haha), he was listening to what the Sisters had to say, and he wanted to learn more. So the sisters sent local missionaries to him, but because he is going to OSU and lives on campus, he was given to us!! He is the sweetest guy. When he came to Temple Square, he didn't have any religious background and didn't really know anything about God or Jesus Christ, and now he tells us that he is beginning to accept them and that he believes the church is true. We met with him and did some How to Begin Teaching, and he is really solid. He really likes learning about it and he reads the Book of Mormon in Mandarin. And he came to church on Sunday!!! Can I tell you how cool it is to be able to sit next to your investigators? Especially when it is one that Temple Square sisters referred! Man it is a dream come true. I can't wait until he is baptized! We are working on putting him on date, he is ready but doesn't want to be pushed, so we are having him pray about a baptismal date.

It's so similar in some aspects, but so different in others. Like on Temple Square, we only had one hour of church. On OSU, we have 6! We go to both YSA wards. I like it, but it's a little hard to stay awake haha. Oh, and the Mission President changed today, so I will have served under 4 Presidents. Hopefully I can help the new President, President Daines, understand more about Temple Square, how we are just as qualified as any other missionaries, because President Nilsen definitely didn't....haha

Something funny that happened this week to make you laugh...we were walking down High st. when this lady we said hi to turned around and said, are you mormons? She then proceeded to tell us her whole life story about how she was a member of the church but got excommunicated when she was 15 for arguing with her dad because she didn't want to marry the bishop...I'm not really sure it made sense haha we were thinking she might have been a member of one of the breakoff LDS churches so we invited her to return to church but she made a bunch of excuses and said that she already found God and that all churches and Books bring us to Him. Well, a scripture popped in my head, so I told her to look up what I thought was the reference. When I got home that night, I looked it up. I was 3 verses off. I was thinking of the scripture that says that God is mindful of all His children, and that He numbers them but the reference I gave her was for this verse instead: "For behold, they would take up arms against their brethren; they would not suffer themselves to be slain." Haha oops!! Hopefully she didn't go look that one up.

So some of the adventures....

-Because I haven't had a p-day in almost two weeks, I had to do laundry on Saturday. We don't have a washer and dryer, so we had to go to a neighboring complex and use theirs, but it doesn't take coins or cash, only a prepaid card. The sisters before us had left the cards, but it only had $2.25 on it. To wash it costs $1.50. So I threw everything in the wash and used the card. Then I realized we didn't have laundry soap....so my clothes were washed without soap. Then I realized there wasn't $1.50 left on the card to dry them so I had to hang my clothes all around the apartment. There were socks all over the kitchen cabinet handles, shirts hanging everywhere, it was a mess. And because of the humidity, they weren't dry by the morning...oh the struggles haha 

-Also, the first day we walked into our apartment, I about barfed at the smell. It stinks like mold! And I took off my shoes only to find that the carpet was soaking wet (hence the smell of mold). Come to find out, the rain storm from the day before had flooded the apartment. But I'm pretty sure there must be a leaky pipe or something too because the carpet will dry out but as soon as we use the kitchen sink or dishwasher, it becomes wet again. So I just have my shoes on constantly.

-One of the not-so-fun adventures....you guys should understand how bad this was for me...last night I got up at midnight to use the restroom. After I washed my hands I opened the door and there were 3 HUGE millipedes outside the door! And not the slow crunchy kind, but big FAT hairy really fast ones. One crawled into our bedroom, one was in the bathroom, and one right outside the bathroom. I started to have a little panic attack and yelled for my companions and they had to come kill them. They are really really fast though, and when you squish them, they just break into 2 millipedes instead of one! But Sister Larsen killed 2 and the other we couldn't find. Of course it was the one in our bedroom :( So I didn't sleep the entire rest of the night because I was convinced it was going to crawl across my face. I was so itchy! I seriously cannot handle the bugs here, I am going to go crazy if I see one more thing crawling in our apartment!

-One of the fun adventures would have to be that because we tripled in, none of us had food in the new area except what the other Sisters had left behind. So we had rice and a little oatmeal, teriyaki sauce, and strawberry syrup to live off of for 3 days haha. We had bought some eggs at a nearby grocery store, so my companion Sister Malloy made some fried rice. Well we didn't have a skillet, just a pot, so she mixed the white rice with the eggs and it made this not so tasty looking paste. Then the bottom burned and the top didn't really cook very well so it was a burned flavor rice and egg paste haha. We tried everything to make it edible. We dumped teryiaki sauce on it, my companion tried putting pretzels in it haha we tried everything but it was nasty!

-The last adventure I'll mention before you get tired of reading was when we didn't know the bus doesn't run on Saturdays so we were forced to walk to the institute.....there are no sidewalks and we didn't want to walk on the shoulder close to the cars so we had to walk through fields to the side of the road and bike paths. It took us over an hour and we got so sunburned and I got blisters on my feet haha it was not the funnest moment of my life.

Oh man the struggles are real haha but the adventures have been so fun, it's all a part of the best time of my life as a missionary. Times that we will look back on and laugh, we already do! I love being part of The Great Ohio Columbus Mission! Minus the bugs, I love it here. Oh but the fireflies are cool. The only things I don't like would be the bugs, the humidity, the fact that nothing ever dries here, including my hair, It's kinda miserable. So it's always in a bun, very attractive I'm sure haha but oh well it's all part of the experience! The people are really nice for the most part, we get a lot of rejection but we are doing our best and that is all that matters. It's kinda hard being tripled in but it's fun to learn together and I am excited for the teaching opportunities we have this week.

I love you!

The last place I thought I would go outbound to.......

Not only was I shocked to discover that I was going outbound, but I am going to a place that I would have never guessed!

I'm going to.......................................

..................................The Ohio Columbus Mission!!!

So I leave early in the morning on Wednesday and will be there until September 17th :)

No Temple Square sister has ever been there before so that makes me a little nervous, and no one else is going with me, but I know it will be great! I am way excited! I've known since Saturday, and have had to keep it a secret all week, but today they announced everyone that is going. They did it in a different way too. Usually President Poulsen just reads off the names of those that are going, and then they find out on the next Monday at Transfer Conference where they are going. But this time, the Assistant's pulled the missions where the sisters are going out of a hat and then said the sister's name. It was so awesome! Then we all sang the Temple Square version of Called to Serve. There is a video of it that I will try to attach but it's so big I don't think it will work.

Well it has been a great week!

We've been able to gain a lot of New Investigators and a lot of investigators are progressing! It's a little sad because I know that I won't be able to see their progression after I leave. There is a mission rule that we are not able to communicate with Sisters that are on Temple Square. We can only communicate with those that are also outbound. That is so that the outbound sisters can focus on the mission they're in, and not be thinking of Temple Square. So that means that I won't know who gets baptized or anything like that. But I will just have to wait until September!

So Tim's phone is not working, and I want to get a hold of him so he knows that someone else will be calling him for the next few weeks. His bishop hasn't been answering, so I really hope I can get in contact with him before I go!

Megan didn't get baptized :( Her mom said she would feel more comfortable with her decision if she had more time, so she pushed her date back to July 19th. I am really sad that I won't be able to see her be baptized over skype but it's not about me. I told her that I will be leaving for a while and she said that she was going to push the baptism back until I return. I was like heck no, Megan! It's not about me, it's about Jesus Christ and you need to be baptized. She is still planning on being baptized on the 19th. Sister Gearheart will get to skype in to it!

Cameron is doing great. He happened to be in Salt Lake today, so we had a lesson on the Square. He is making great choices and trying to be better each day. He is really excited for Saturday, and we are praying or a miracle that he will get approved by the First Presidency before then, we need a miracle!

We had a great lesson with Chad yesterday. He has been going through a hard time, so we were able to talk about the Atonement and the Restoration and what that means to him, and how the Book of Mormon can help him. He really softened up and he is looking forward to the local missionaries coming.

We had a really cool experience yesterday. We contacted these 2 men on the Square and offered to show them around Temple Square. They accepted, and I knew from the second we started talking to them that they were Anti's. We starting taking them on a tour, and we were asking questions about their religious beliefs and backgrounds, but they were really really elusive and wouldn't give any straight answers. We just continued bearing testimony and sharing beliefs. They started to ask a lot more questions during the middle of the tour. We took them to the "Scriptures and Revelation" area in the NVC and taught the Restoration. At this point, the Anti monsters were unleashed haha they began to interrupt and ask their best questions and bible bash. It was amazing though, usually I get really upset when people come here to our place and pose as sincere and interested and pretend to be someone else and then they turn anti, but we were just calm and answered their questions. I felt peace and the presence of the spirit. It was one of those moments that the Spirit spoke through me. I've had little moments like that, but this time, things came out of my mouth that were directly from the Preach my Gospel sections I had studied that week, they were not from me. They tried to catch us by saying, well you said you believe this, but what about this scripture in such and such book? And then out of nowhere, I would open up to another scripture that would explain how they were wrong, I have no idea how I knew the verses to share, because it wasn't me. It was just like the Spirit took over for me. I don't even know if this is making sense haha it was just one of those crazy moments where you're like, what just happened? There aren't even words to describe it. But we ended up needing to go because we had an appointment, and it ended great, they thanked us for our time and peacefully left. Usually they are really rude and security has to be called, but I was thankful that Heavenly Father was guiding us, and that they had a good experience with the church. Even if they are not open to the beliefs, they don't have a bad thing that they can say about their experience here.

Well that was the highlight of my week. In Preach my Gospel, it says something along the lines of "You can feel certain that the Lord is pleased when you feel the Spirit working through you." That was a humbling moment, and one of the coolest things that's happened on the mission. The promise that the Lord gives in D&C 100: "Therefore, verily I say unto you, lift up your voices unto this people; speak the thoughts that I shall put into your hearts, and you shall not be confounded before men;" was given to us. They didn't change and decide they want to learn about the church, they didn't break down crying and say that they were wrong, but we were not confounded, and they felt the spirit. That's all that matters!

Well enough of my ranting, I am so excited to serve the people in Columbus, Ohio! I hope to serve in a University ward, that would be way fun. There is a Temple in the mission as well! I feel so blessed, and I feel very strongly that there are people waiting there in Ohio. I am so excited to go find them!

Have a great week and I'll write you next time from Ohio :)