Week 42

Happy Monday!

I'm not really sure where this week even went. It feels like it happened without me noticing, but then I look back and so much happened. 

We started off the week with our last exchange of the transfer. I went to Cave Creek (shout out to Nate) with Sister Oldham. It was super cool because she came out a transfer before me, but because I was in the MTC for a full transfer we will be going home the same time. She is also planning on going to BYU for special education so it was fun to get to know her more - she is super awesome. It was such a good exchange. I loved Cave Creek, it was such a different atmosphere than downtown Phoenix, but I really liked the change. We got to have a bunch of really awesome lessons. My favorite was getting to have a lesson with their investigator. We taught about following the prophet and the word of wisdom. We had four members at the lesson plus her family so the lesson was getting a little out of hand at the very end, but we got to bring it all back together with the closing prayer. The investigator said it and it was the most powerful prayer I have ever heard. It was so sincere. At the end of the prayer she accepted a date for baptism. I was so grateful to have been able to be at that lesson. I love investigators who just want to follow what they believe and are willing to work to find out what is true.

Random exchange matching-ness

On exchanges we did service for this bird rescue and it was super crazy. We just cleaned, but there was a huge owl just chilling there next to a giant eagle. Not to mention the giant tub of dead rats next to them...

After exchanges we had a fairly normal week, we got to do some service for an older women who is in our ward. We did more yard work. And she also was super into birds so she had a bunch in this huge cage. So that was a random amount of service with birds (not really a fan of birds). 

The best part of my week by far was when our investigator got baptized. He is just the sweetest most humble man ever. Sister Jackson did a great job giving a talk on baptism and I did a less than great job at giving the talk on the Holy Ghost. But the spirit was there and that is all that matters. He got confirmed the next day at church and the whole ward was super supportive. 

Sadly before the baptism we had a little... problem. We were filling the font and left the room to go study (there were already Elders studying in that room so we didn't want to bug them). The water filled up WAY faster than any other time I have filled it. When we came back to check on where the water was at it was at the top of the stairs like .5 seconds away from overflowing. So we turned off the water and all was well. Until we realized that as soon as two men get in the water it would majorly overflow. So we called the Elders in our ward a little panicked and they just happened to be walking into the building. So the only thing we could do was to bucket water out of the font around the corner and out the back door of the church into the parking lot. Luckily we had five Elders to help us and they weren't judge-y about our really dumb mistake. We ended up having to bucket out 4 large trashcans of water and a few small ones. It took like 30 minutes to get the water back to normal and my dress was soaked by the end. Luckily this is Arizona, so I just stood outside for 15 minutes and it was practically dried by the time the baptism started. Fun times. 

We also got to sing at a fireside in my last area! So that was super cool to get to see all of the members of my old branch. Seeing my last branch president’s wife was the cutest thing ever. She just makes this face at me that I have no idea how to describe - her face just gets all scrunched up and adorable. So that was probably the best part. But the talks and testimonies at the fireside were amazing and I was super impressed with the whole thing. 

Overall we had a great week even if it was crazy fast and a little long :)

Have a great week!

Sister Doxey