Wednesday, January 13, 2016

Life in the "Aussie D.C."

All is well in the Otai Kingdom. It was an interesting week where we tried to never stopped going, but when we caught a moment, there was Otai awaiting us. Haha. I'm so grateful that members in my past areas have let me spend time in the kitchen with them so when I'm lacking certain things, I know how to overload my system. Otai is pretty much 4 servings of fruit in one beautiful Tongan drink, so we made some on Monday to survive the heat of the week. After we had our p-day we had a discussion with an investigator then went to a part member family's home for family home evening. Such a sweet family! The first time I met the D family, I was just ridiculously impressed with how polite and calm everything was handled. I know I'll never be that calm of a parent, but they're good examples to look to.
Tuesday was rough. It was the funeral for the toddler I mentioned last week, so we did a lot of preparing with that with the Relief Society. Aah, I love that family so much. It was a hard time but their faith was beautiful. All of the talks were just testimonies of the Plan of Salvation. They also ended the funeral service with a huge Haka. Oh how I love the Polynesian culture with all of my heart. It was so beautiful. After the funeral we went and visited a sister that has been in the hospital then we went to another part member family's home. Then we went and saw one of my favorite families and had a little family night with them. It was the mum's birthday so naturally we had to crash the evening. :) 
Wednesday was great. We started off the morning by doing service for Anna. We had a great conversation with her and her husband about temples since they're building one right around the corner from where he grew up in Italy. Then we went and saw a recent convert that hasn't been coming to church for a bit and went on a crazy drive trying to find less active members. We met one family where the mum is blind and when we introduced ourselves as Sisters, she thought we were nuns. So we were talking for a bit and she said, "Oh I'm so glad you Sisters are here and it wasn't those Mormon boys knocking on the door." Hahaha... Awkward. But we saved it and she ended up not hating us by the end of the conversation. 
Thursday was really good. We went and saw Nana Julie with Sister K and it was fun. I love them so much. Then we had a lesson with Bruce and he loved the Plan of Salvation. He said he's going to start preparing for baptism but he wants to read a lot more of the Book of Mormon. That is totally okay with us! He's great. After Bruce's we went and saw a family in our ward and it was a really nice evening. We were able to learn more about how they came into contact with the church and to hear their testimonies. It was really nice to hear their testimonies. After our visit with them we went and saw Amanda! She's a single mum and really opened up to us about her trials and what she's been through. So we talked for a while and then she asked us to give her something to read so she can know what we believe. So we gave her some info about the Plan of Salvation and then gave her a Book of Mormon and we'll go back in a few days to see what she thought! 
Friday was hectic. We had our Zone Training Meeting in the morning but it went WAY over the time it was supposed to, so we were running like mad trying to see the people that we had planned for the day. We were able to visit quite a few and we were even able to take a young woman out with us in the evening to try to find some people. It was fun.
Saturday we went and saw a few less active families that the ward council had requested for us to visit and it was a lot of fun. I hadn't met quite a few of them and it was great getting to know them.
Sunday we had meetings all morning, church all afternoon, and trying to find people in the evening. It wasn't an overly exciting day but it's the Sabbath, so nothing too crazy should be going on anyways. ;) 
Every day we join together as a mission at 12 noon in prayer and ask God for His help. We ask to have unity to be led by the Spirit and to find those whom God has prepared. It's great and I can absolutely testify of the Lord's hand in our lives every day. Life is good when you turn it to God. I need to do it more often than I do.

Have a beautiful week. Stay cool, err, warm I guess. I'll try to stay cool here.

Love,
Sister Danielle Laree Stott



Sorry for not taking pictures this week, but here's me in front of Parliament House. Yayy for living in the "Aussie D.C." ;)

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