Tuesday, October 4, 2016

two weeks of many first's

A compilation of stories from letters and emails that I have pieced together in, from what I can tell, is chronological order. 

Monday Sept. 26, 2016

The work is very slow here to be honest.  We are doing things but we don't have any progressing investigators and I've only ever taught one door step investigators lesson. It just takes patience and diligence. I've been struggling with knowing what God's expectations are for me. I know I just need to do my best, but what is my best?  These questions have been on my mind yesterday and today. I decided to pray and study about it and the answers I got didn't really answer my questions but made me realize that my questions weren't really important. The jist of my answer was from a talk someone gave on Sunday.  "Winning is getting up each time you fall down."

Sister Bambas and I were out visiting a potentials house one day. As we were walking, there was a little girl that came up to us on her scooter and said hi.  She was super friendly.  She asked us who we were and where we were going.  We said, "We are the missionaries out talking to people about Jesus".  She responded with something like, "I love Jesus! I know about him. God is good because he helps us."  We asked her where she learned that and she said,  "No one taught me, I just know."  If only everyone could be like little Katelyn.  We are going to stop by sometime in the future to see her and her family.   

Another fun story from last week was a first for me.  To tell you the truth I was just being silly me and left the spoon in the blender and the lid partially off as I turned it on.  And yep, you guessed it, Smoothie went everywhere!  from the counter, to the ceiling, to the top of my head.  I wasn't happy, but it was really funny. (smiley face) Funny story of the week.  

We visited the Newport Beach temple for a session on Friday (Sept. 23) It was beautiful. I got an answer to my questions. (pictures posted)

The Trip to the Mausses (Fri.23th?)
The Mausses are a member family in our ward that live outside of the mission but have special first presidency permission to live way out there and still be in our ward. So every once in a while the Mausses have the missionaries over for dinner and they drive down and pick us up.

The Mausses live way up in the Mountains in a little ranching neighborhood area.  it takes about 30- 45 minutes to drive up the winding and pretty schetchy road to their house.  Brother Mausse came to pick all four of us up ( a lot of families feed the elders and sisters in the ward altogether) for my first trip to the Mausses. I was told it would be quite the experience. The car was little so Elder Fullmer and Sister Bambas and I were squeezed in the back...a pretty awkward experience for missionaries, especially with the ride that was about to happen. 

Brother Mausse is quite the character: Always cracking jokes, telling very interesting stories, and driving confidently (with higher speeds than necessary) up the steep twist and turns of the mountain. It was pretty fun.  We finally got to his ranch/house and we meet the dogs, cats, horses, sheep, and people too. 
I think they sent pictures to you of us with the horse and maybe one with me holding a kitten.  (yes.  pictures are posted on new Live Oak Ward page)
O MY GOODNESS the KITTENS!!!  Their mom was an orange cat so they all had orange on them (smiley face)!  There were 5 kittens and they decided to name them after the little women characters because they matched their personalities exactly. Meg, Beth, Jo, Amy, and Teddy.  Amy was the one I held in the picture.  Anyway that was one of the highlights of the night for me.  Then we had dinner and talked and laughed.  I needed a good laugh. (smiley face)  Then we had a great lesson about the B.O.M. When it was time to go, Brother Mausse and the missionaries piled back into the little car.  The drive home was a lot scarier in the dark because occasionally Brother Mausse would flip off the headlights (his justification was that he had driven that road a billion times, but it was still terrifying.) Anyway we made it home in one piece and that was the trip to the Mausses. 

Women's Conference, Saturday 24th.  I loved it all.  Just sitting in the chapel with women of the church watching together made me feel so warm and welcomed.  The closing song was especially good because I was having a hard time and there was a down syndrome girl sitting next to me singing her out-of-tune little heart out and it just touched me so much.  

We sang that song (I Need Thee Every Hour, posted previously) in Sacrament meeting Sunday. The arrangement was really cool. from the Favorite Hymns of the Prophets book. Sister Kinnison, ward music coordinator/chorister, played for us.  Everyone loved it.  

(Wednesday Sept. 27th)
So, yesterday was a pretty amazing day. We had our very first real life lesson with an investigator.  Faith is golden and she committed to reading the B.O.M.and praying to know if it is true.  She also accepted a soft baptism invite.  I am just so excited and happy for her!  There really is nothing else quite like teaching someone of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I love that her name is Faith, too (smiley face). 

O.K. one last story from yesterday and then I have to go study and pack. We are going on exchanges starting tonight. Fun Stuff. Anyway, last night around 8:30 we were sitting in the car parked outside a house we had just dropped off a note at. 8 to 9 pm is a hard hour to fill so we were writing a B-day notes for people in the ward to deliver. Nest thing I know I seea police car pull up and stoop. They turn on their bright lights into our car and one officer walks around back to check our license plate. I was really confused at this point. The officer then taps on our window and asks for our licences and what we are doing there. Sister Bambas says, "We are missionaries delivering notes to people in our congregation." He says "missionaries in this area? O.K."(smiley face) Then another officer walks up and says "The reason we stopped you is because you are parked just down the street from a drug house. People often are parked around here smoking weed at night. You're not in trouble, but we just needed to check it out." We were like "Good to know" and then they let us go. So that was a first for me. Pretty funny that it happened on my mission. Just thought you guys might enjoy that story.

I just want you to know I'm doing well and having great adentures. I love you all and I know that through Jesus Christ everything will turn out right in the end Because He Lives. Don't give up, Keep praying, and Endure to the End.

(now an email from Monday Oct. 3)

I'm so glad to hear that your conference experience was awesome! It was for me too!

So as missionaries we went to the stake center to watch conference. Basically it was just all the missionaries from our area that were there. It was so Fun!! We brought blankets and snacks and had fun laughing at all the little missionary insights. I definitely took notes too though :) My favorites were Uchtdorf, Hales, Anderson, and Jaun C. Ucedas ( he spoke to us when I was in the MTC) talks. I remember the Earlier sessions better because by the last sessions my brain was on overload just like you, but it was all amazing! when I heard that it was the MTC choir I said rather too loudly " Man! I was Just There!" everyone laughed. But its ok. They were Amazing weren't they? They brought the spirit like no other young adult choir ever could.

I Love Conference. I know that the prophets and apostles words are the words of God and they can help us in our lives if we are Willing to receive them. D&C 1:38

This week has been so cool. I had my first exchanges. Exchanges bring miracles. I went to the lake forest ward and was in a trio with sister Sakurai (Japanese sister) and sister Hill (from the MTC). It was actually really cool to be in a trio. Our first real miracle was when we went tracting around the apartment complex. We were lead to a building and the top floor, first door. We knocked on the door and a man named Kabir (Indian name) answered. To make the long story short we stood there and talked with him for an hour and a half and shared most of the plan of Salvation lesson with him. He was very philosophical and a very deep thinker but as we began to testify, he was intrigued by the conviction on our faces and he listened more intently. He accepted a Book of Mormon and I know a Seed was Planted. I know that I was there on exchanges on that very day for very specific purposes. It is just so cool To think about just how Our Heavenly Father works every little detail out.

I started learning to play the Ukulele because every missionary who had President Orgill as there Mission President has one. I borrow sister Bambas' and she has a book of chords. It is really fun and super easy and I have Callouses already! I thought Derek would appreciate that :)

I Love you all and hope you are having a wonderful week so far!
I know that My Savior Lives. I Know he loves us. Our Heavenly Father is just one prayer away and he IS listening. I know that the Doctrine of Christ is an ongoing cycle that we must use in our lives to return to him and I Know it is true.

Love
Sister Crossett


(from a correspondence with her dad Oct.3)

Thank you for your awesome emails. They always make me smile :) 
Yes, sister Bambas is a really great trainer. We are soooo much a like. The work is picking up. The first few weeks were really slow but I have my first Investigator Named Faith and she is Golden. We don't really have rules for what we are allowed to do during the day so we do knock doors but not all the time. It depends on what we plan for. 

Well I better get going but I want you to know that I love you too and everything is going well. I know that everything happens for a reason and I know our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ will always be at our sides. A cool little phrase I learned from Conference is that God is always listening to us so we need to listen to him. I hope you have a wonderful week dad!


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