1/11/16

The funny thing about Logan is I miss him and Carl a lot. Also Wesley and the Thackers and Alexandria and Matthew. Oh and Delany. I talk about them all the time haha. And you, everyone wants to meet you and I think Elder Center has a man crush on you even though y'all have never met. Typical... :P It's cool that you're getting a ton of work done, blessings! Is Matthew getting his hair cut because I told him to in my letter? Does he even get and read my letters? He never writes me. >:U I had simultaneously the worst and best week ever this week. I've been having this prompting which I haven't been listening too since I left home and I've been having this debilitating fear of contacting. So I finally followed the prompting and even though Sister Shober and I were having a terrible day we went out contacting and my fear was just gone. We got 65 contacts and placed a Book of Mormon in like 45 minutes. We were on fire! I could tell that it was the Lord removing my stumbling blocks for being obedient. We ended up getting 142 contacts this week. We still don't have any investigators though. It can be hard because people here don't necessarily feel like they need the gospel and everyone goes to Mariners church. "oh no thank you I already go to Mariners" - Everyone We also visit this less active lady who has a bunch of health problems so she can't really go to church. Apparently she's always hated the sisters and right before I came the Elders took Sister Shober and Sister Ward over there and she flipped a pancake. She loves us though and calls us her little ones. She calls me her littlest one haha. One time she asked me what my favorite color was and then told me I need a new favorite color. She's super blunt and always says offensive stuff and nobody has every been able to share a spiritual though with her, but I love her so much. We always feel the spirit when we go over there. She made me tell her my conversion story and laughed at me and then SHE SHARED A SPIRITUAL THOUGHT. It was a miracle. One of the first things President Orgill said to me when I got to the field was something like "There's an Elder serving in this mission right now who came out after being a member for a year and a half like you whose mom is flying down in a few weeks so that he can baptize her." I got to go to that baptism and it was so cool. I got a blessing the other day for these weird headaches that I always have and in the blessing it said that my friends and family at home would follow my example. That could mean like 50 different things but all of them would just be really awesome. Even though all this good stuff has been happening I feel like a terrible missionary a lot. I have to constantly remind myself that I'm brand new and I'm doing my best and I can't be perfect. It also helps to remind myself of the members that I may be helping to build up. Another thing that helps is just thinking everything is hilarious and focusing on how much I love being here and how funny everything always is. I laugh literally all the time. So I'm basically going to put a lot of funny quotes after this:

Apparently I say "thanks friend" a lot so now if anyone else says it Elder Dayton said "your welcome Sister Atchley"

"I lost a Green Day CD and a Carrie Underwood CD to the same CD player. I was way more upset about the Carrie Underwood CD even though she's a stinkin liberal and a vegetarian and she hates farmers and ranchers and I hate her stinkin guts, but her voice is good so it's ok." - Elder Center

"I was super lame in highschool I used to get my Ipod and go snowboarding and I would listen to Green Day and Skillet and Linkin Park and a sorts of other stupid stuff." - Elder Center in a really hick sounding voice

"Sister Atchley always takes a ton of pictures of us being.... not very.... photogenic..." - Elder Blue

"Oh Sister Atchley I didn't see you there. I just looked right over your head sorry." - Elder Center about 50 times this week

"What are y'all on splits with the primary?" - Elder Center after I said people think I look 12

I can't remember what Voltorb evolves into and it's driving me crazy. We went to Buffalo Wild Wings and I apparently had like the 3rd hottest wings there and they were like nothing and people were like is this sister even real what do they feed you in Texas? It was just habanero peppers though.

Anyway I love it here and I can't believe I've already been gone a month.

Love y'all Sister Atchley

OH and your reading assignment for this week: Read Alma 36, 38, and 39 and look for ways you can relate to different people in these chapters. Also notice that Alma 36 is a chiasmus.