I Wonder Where I'll Find Them

Hey everyone!

This week has been pretty good.  It's been full of finding.  There is
an area in our area that I'd never been to before, and Sister Johnson
had only been to once since she'd been here because it's so far away,
and we don't have the miles for that kind of trip, but we knew we had
to go up there because there was a lot of potential up there.  We
decided this was the week we were going to go, and it was a good thing
we did because we found three houses of people who aren't just going
to let us come back, they're excited to have us come back!

One of those people we saw was Sheila.  She's so spunky and has so
much energy.  I love her!  She's a member, but she has the mind of an
investigator, and her husband isn't a member.  We actually didn't see
her husband the last time we went over.  We saw him briefly about a
week before, but Sheila thought that it was so cool that we were on a
mission, and we taught her a little bit about prophets.  She seemed so
excited to have us come back and teach her and her husband.  Hopefully,
we'll be able to see her again this week!  *fingers crossed*

We saw Beverly once this week, and things are still going great with
her.  She's still thinking a lot about baptism, so hopefully soon we
can commit her to that.

Oh, I just thought I should let you all know...  It snowed this week!
But it didn't stick at all....  Oh well, maybe some day I'll have a
snowball fight again....

Anyway, I hope you all have a great week!  It's been great out here!

Sincerely,
Sister Shelton

Happy New Year Y'ns!

Hola familia y amigos!

Oh. *cough* Sorry ya'll....  Happy New Year!  I hope y'ns had a great
celebration into 2016.  I sure did.  I slept.  My dear companion,
Sister Johnson, put an alarm on for 11:58, so we could wake up and
celebrate together, which was so far from what I wanted to do, but I
just went with it.  Apparently, when the alarm went off, I stirred and
just went right back to sleep, and she celebrated by listening to the
fireworks going off.  I didn't remember it in the slightest, so yay!
We both got our wishes!

A lady in our ward celebrated by getting an emergency surgery, so we
bought her flowers and babysat her for about an hour while her
husband ran home to shower.  She's back home now and is doing much
better, so no worries there.  It was nice doing that service for her
and her husband because I really felt like we were helping by being
there, and it was nice and relaxing.  A good change of pace from
normal missionary work, where we just got to help her when she needed
and I got to read the "Teachings of Spencer W. Kimball" the rest of the
time.

Something cool that happened this week is a kid in our ward got his
mission call!  Kid.... He's older than me.... This guy got his mission
call.  He's going to Vegas!  It was just so interesting going to a
mission call opening being on the other side of things.  I knew what
it was like to be him for that moment.... But I went to the Bible Belt
and he's going to Sin City.... So.... Kinda!....

We went to see Beverly this week!  You guys, she's golden!  We were a
little scared that we were pushing too hard with baptism, so we
stepped back for a moment, but the last lesson or two she's been the
one to bring up the idea of baptism.  The last time we saw her we read
Lehi's Dream with her, and she really connected with the people who
ate the fruit and knew how great it was, and then felt ashamed because
of the mocking coming from the people in the great and spacious
building.  She wants to stay strong even with her friends who question
why she is meeting with us.  She says that she feels so happy meeting
with us and reading from the Book of Mormon. It's really amazing
seeing her progress like this.  She's the first person I've seen
progress right from the first lesson, and get so far, so it's really
exciting to me!

I hope ya'll are doing great!  Have an awesome week!

Sincerely,
Sister Shelton

A duck egg from the Philippines.  I would have eaten it, but i think I may have left it out of the fridge too long.

 

Sister Shelton and baby water ballon Sheldon.

I think I may anger Sister Johnson and Elder Brown...

My zone (Cumberland) with Elder Zwick of the Seventy.

  

Our combined Christmas zone conference with the Knoxville zone.  We got TKM flags for Christmas!

Christmas!

CHRISTMAS WAS THIS WEEK!

I just thought I should let you all know in case you missed the memo.
WHICH MEANT I GOT TO SKYPE MY FAMILY!  Aw... :) They're the best.  And
they're doing well in case you were wondering.  I hope someone more
than my family is reading this email, or this was a very unimportant
paragraph.

Other than that, normal missionary work has been going great!  We saw
Beverly this week, and we attempted to soft commit her to baptism.  I
honestly wasn't thinking she would, but that wasn't our intention.  We
mostly just wanted to make sure she knew that that was what we were
hoping she would progress towards, and now she knows it, so I'm happy
with it.

I hope everyone had a great Christmas and was able to focus on the
true meaning, and have a happy New Year!

THE EXCITEMENT THOUGH!!!

Hey everyone!

This week was so crazy!  It started off with a new investigator we got
about a week or two ago.  Her name is Beverly.  We gave her a
Restoration Pamphlet and a Book of Mormon to read so we could talk
about the next time we saw her. When we saw her next, she said she read
the Restoration pamphlet, but not The Book of Mormon because it was
too small of print for her to read.  So we got her a bigger one, and wrapped it
up for her like a Christmas present.  When we gave it to her, she was
so excited!  She tore the plastic right off and started flipping
through it.

The next time we saw her we asked if she'd read from it, and she said
that she'd read the introduction, the testimonies, and had read random
bits and pieces throughout.  She said that she loved it, and that she
understood it better than the King James Bible, and the best part
(wait for it...) SHE SAID SHE KNEW IT WAS TRUE!!!  It was insane!
She's dying for us to come back and read with her because she loves
how we make it even easier for her to understand.  I'm so excited to
see what happens with her.

Then, the next big day was Saturday.  We had our Christmas zone
conference, which was mostly just a Christmas party.  We got a
Christmas present (which was a TKM flag!), then we played dodge ball (I
got a big welt on my arm), and then.... the best part.... (Wait for
it...) WE WATCHED BIG HERO 6!  Yeah!  It was so good!  I'd already
seen it, but guys, we got to watch a movie!

Then..... DEE GOT BAPTIZED!!!  Oh my goodness!  It was so great!  She
had to be dunked three times, but she's a member now!  It was so
wonderful. :) She was so ready.  She was so happy afterwards and so
clean and pure!  So many members came to support her, too!

I loved this week, and I hope everyone has a Merry Christmas!

Sincerely,
Sister Shelton

It's Friday!

Hey ya'll!

So this week has been really fun!  Friday was a big day.  We had a
tri-zone conference with Elder Zwick of the Seventy.  It was so cool!
We were able to listen to him, his wife, President Griffin, and Sister
Griffin talk.  Those are some of the best people to listen to.  The
spirit was so strong the whole time.  I feel like the message I
learned the most from what they said was I can do it.  I have that
ability to make great things happen, and so do all of us.  It was a
big confidence booster.

In the middle of the conference we had a lunch, and I had a group of
missionary friends who I was going to sit with, and then all of a
sudden, one of the elders I was going to sit with said, "Hey, there's
open seats next to Elder Zwick!"  So yeah. I had lunch with a Seventy.
To be more exact, I sat on the right hand of him. ;) Yeah, I just went
there.  But no, really.  It was so cool! He was the nicest man I think
I've ever met.  I felt like that's the closest I've ever been to sitting
next to Jesus.  That kinda sounds weird, but he really does an amazing
job at being a representative of Jesus Christ.  I hope I can be like
that some day.  :)

Later on that day we had a nativity at our church.  Everyone brought
their nativities from home and set them out, and there were so many
gorgeous trees.  It was breathtaking.  It gave me hope for cultural
hall wedding receptions.  (Not saying that's how I'm doing mine, Mom.)
There were so many people who came that weren't members.  We had a
potential investigator come.  And there was a man who didn't believe
Mormons are Christian who came, and by the end of the night he changed
his mind on that subject!

I just love how people are around this time of year. Never forget the
true meaning of Christmas!

Sincerely,
Sister Shelton

Movie Missionary Week

Hey ya'll!

So, this week was fun!  It was like a movie!

It started out with exchanges.  I went over to Pleasant Ridge with
Sister Wright.  She came out with me, so we're both greenies.  It was
an adventure.  We had our whole day planned out, but it pretty much
all fell through, and so we did tracting for about four hours... In the
pouring rain.... Totally brought the wrong shoes for rain, too!
Couldn't do anything about it, either, because I was on exchanges.  But
it was so fulfilling!  I loved every minute of it because I was doing
God's work.  We even got a return appointment.  I guess I won't
because I was on exchanges, but they got one! Yay!

On Friday, we were going out to find some less active members, and we
just tried one who wasn't there, so we went on.  We were just in our
car listening to the amazing David Archuleta sing "The First Noel"
(because that song is gorgeous!) when my dear companion, Sister Johnson,
turned to me and said, "We need to go to [insert specific street
here].  When we drove past it, I just got a feeling that we really need
to go there, and I've been fighting it off for a moment, but I'm not
going to any more." So we pulled out our area book to see who lived
there, and we had a potential investigator named Pam, and a less
active member.  We decided to go to Pam.

We found her house, or I should say the ginormous hill that went to
what should be her house.  We were about to go up when a car started
coming down it going to a house that was a little below the hill so we
got scared and almost backed down, but then I said, "Sister Johnson,
we're going to this house. That was a prompting from God."  So we did.
We drove up that hill that was easily more than 45 degrees, and we
were so scared.  We were gonna die, but alas, here I am writing, so
obviously we didn't.  We got to the top of the hill and knocked on
the door.  A man's voice yelled, "Come in!"  So we did and asked for
Pam.  He said she just went to the house at the bottom of the hill.
Her mother who was the less active member lived there, and she was just
visiting her.  We went to the door and she let us right in.  She told
us that she was usually busy working, and it was hard to catch her, but
she was home taking care of her husband since he just had a surgery.
She is so willing to let us come back, too! So, yay! We got a new
investigator.

On Saturday we ran through all of our plans in about two hours, until
some set appointments later on in the day.  So we went to help an
elderly lady clean her house.  Then, we had an appointment with our
second new investigator, Beverly!  She is so awesome! I love her.  She
had such fantastic questions, and I'm so excited to teach her.

On Sunday we got to go over to a member's house and watch the Christmas
devotional with Elder Hoyt and Lunceford.  It was really nice.  It
really brought the Christmas spirit. I really liked Pres. Uchtdorf's talk.
I hope you were all able to watch it. If not, go track it down. I hope
you're all able to bring more of the Christmas spirit into your life.
Have a wonderful white week!

Sincerely,
Sister Shelton

My first ponytail in two and a half years!  It made me so happy even
though I know it doesn't look that great.  #treasureplanet

This is my district!  They're so great (from left to right: Stark, Cook, Dillard, Johnson, Lunceford, Shelton, Gerig, Hoyt)

November 2, 2015 (continued)