This one's a dosie

This week started off with a bang. We spent the day with the Tew family on Wednesday, and then they fed us dinner. We were finishing eating and we get a text from the Poughkeepsie sisters that says.. "So, you are our new sister training leaders?!" What the... We were just over the Newburgh zone and Poughkeepsie had their own! So we call the sisters that texted us & SURPRISE! The Poughkeepsie STL got ET'd. So instead of having 2 companionships and the senior sisters, we have 5 and the senior sisters. And half of them live over an hour away. So.. That's fantastic. :)

Thursday we weekly planned... And then we had service at a members house. I know you are all going to die when I tell you what we did. I thought about not even telling you.

But..

We scooped poop.
Literally.
Manure. For her garden.

Sister Matthews tried to tell me that it wasn't just poop... That manure had other things mixed into it, like grass. I spent enough time at the farm to know better.

Friday was my last ever MLC. It was so good but so sad. A lot of the leadership in the mission is getting close to the end of their missions, so president had a YSA bishop come and talk to us about going home. :/ not my favorite thing! Between that, my blessing from bishop, and stake conference this weekend I am feeling the pressure.

President asked each of us to talk about the strengths and weaknesses of our zones. He said there is something powerful about being open and honest.. I agree. Especially about our weaknesses. It's so nice to be able to say "oh, I am not the only one" there is also something humbling about talking about your strengths. For me, it's really hard to admit to any strength. I think it takes a lot of humility to do so. After each zone had shared theirs, he asked us what gospel principles we could focus on to help us overcome our weaknesses. He shared Ether 12:27<x-apple-data-detectors:/

/0> and talked about how the closer we get to God, the less we will feel personally enabled. He asked us to keep in mind that 2015 is coming up, and we should do everything we can to be ready for it. Part of living the gospel is progress.... Being better today that you were yesterday or last year. And isn't it such a blessing to know we have the gospel and doctrine of Jesus Christ to help us & give us a pattern for change.

We were grounded Friday night<x-apple-data-detectors://1> so we tried to make good use of our time... And then we made a haunted gingerbread house :) it was pretty fun.

Saturday was stake conference! We working during the day and then met our district for pizza from Primas before conference. Apparently Primas is the best in the nation... It even ships nation wide :) stake conference was SO good. They played this video of people who had been reactivated recently. It was amazing and refreshing to see that often, their testimonies haven't faltered. And that it takes a lot of love, patience and time for change to occur, but that doesn't mean it won't ever happen.

Sunday was also stake conference. The talks were SO good. There was one about missing out on blessings because we aren't fully living the commandments. He talked about the word of wisdom and how no one talks about the things we SHOULD eat. He quoted a prophet who said "moderation in all things justifies moderation in commitment" wow! How true is that. They also talked about hastening the work of salvation within our families and how important it is to lift where you stand.

President and Sister Morgan spoke. I love listening to them, but I especially love listening to sister Morgan. She talked about families. My favorite part was when she started talking about Lucy Mack Smith and how she imagined that when Lucy got stressed or needed answers, she would go to the woods behind her house to pray. She said it should come to no surprise that when Joseph sincerely needed answers and guidance, that he would go to a grove of trees near their house to pray because he saw his mother do it so many times before. How true it is that when we look at our lives, so many of the things we know to be true stem from something our mothers taught us. How much of our testimonies can be followed by "we did not doubt, our mothers knew it"?

I think scooping poop on Thursday just set me up for failure. I'm sure at some point I said to myself "well, it doesn't get worse than this!" But SURPRISE! It does :) SUNDAY after conference, there was a YSA luncheon. We needed to plan zone meeting with the zone leaders, so they asked us to stay for lunch and then we could plan after. We walked into the gym and there was about seven tables full of men and one table with two girls on it. Naturally we, as sister missionaries, flock to the table with the girls. Oh, did I mention our 15 year old investigator is hanging out for ALL of this? Poor girl.

Okay, so we are all sitting around the table and some married lady says that we all have to get up and sit by people we don't know. Well my companion and I are NOT going to sit at a table full of cadets. Hello awkward nation. So we stay put. And one single brave cadet comes to sit at our table. Full of girls. And two sister missionaries. And one underage teenager. And the poor girls about eat the cadet to death! They ask him a million questions and he barely has time to eat. Sister Matthews, Kyla and I eat and run out of there as soon as we can. I resolved to never go to a YSA activity again.

Monday was zone meeting. I really love our zone leaders... Or I am trying to, at least. Zone meeting went well but it wasn't as planned as it should have been and the zone leaders didn't seem to care.. So sister Matthews and I taught a lot of it. After zone meeting we split with the Newburgh sisters. I was going to Newburgh to be with sister Morgan, who has only been out a few weeks. It was fun! But my awkward streak followed me, unfortunately.

We were helping a member of their ward move with a set of elders. I had served with one of the elders in south man, so we were catching up. He is a super nice kid and an awesome missionary. He and I were organizing things in the moving truck as our companions were putting things in the truck.

Side tangent; I play this game with all of my companions called right now. If I say right now, they have to tell me exactly what they are thinking right then, and vice versa. It helps keep our thoughts consecrated.

So, I explain this game to this elder. He thinks it's fun, and we play it back and forth for a few minutes. It's all just innocent, I promise. And consecrated. Until.... 15ish minutes later. We are still moving things and I am waiting with something in my arms to put away. I look at him and say "right now" and this is his response.

"Well, right in the moment, I was thinking you had cute eyes."
Ohmigosh. Not the point of the game, elder. He follows that with "yeah, not my most consecrated thought ever... Those don't happen very often"

I wanted to die. I reassured him with "welp, we can just pretend like that never happened!" I was DYING. I just slowly walked away.

The next day (I'm still on the split) we had mountain service! What is that, you ask? Well let me tell you. It is service! On a mountain! And we get to hike to it! The district is helping this museum make a new hiking trail. So we hiked up a mountain for 30 minutes and then spent two hours with pick-axes digging a trail! And lucky me got to do it right next to the elder with that bomb of a comment from the night before! The hike was actually really hard. I was so tired! And after we only had 15 minutes to shower and get ready....so I was lookin like a dog all day. :)

After we unsplit, sister Matthews and I went to go see Abi. We helped her put up this wallpaper stuff around the island in her kitchen because it was dirty and she didn't want to wash it :) typical New Yorker. We spent some time just talking. Abi is probably one of my best friends here in Middletown. She told me that if school didn't work out, I had a home there and I could stay with her until something worked out in the city for me. :) she told me there was something different about me and that I belonged in the city. I told her she was right!

I remember, at the beginning of my mission I wrote home about my "firsts" and I was so excited to be done with my first everything. My first zone conference, transfer meeting, split, etc. this last week was my last zone meeting and next week is my last zone conference. I'm running out of "lasts". It has been a tender mercy to be a sister training leader. I have been able to go on splits with younger missionaries and see how far I have come. At MLC, president gave everyone a leaf from the sacred grove. He asked each of us to look at our leaves. Each of them are unique in color. If you look closely, though, only one side has color to it. It's the side that faces the sun. How true that is with us. The Son gives us our color and character. The more we turn ourselves to Him, the more he can make of us & the closer we get to our divine potential. I feel like I finally know who I am... And I know that because I have learned how to love the doctrine of Jesus Christ. He has made me so much more than I could ever make on my own.

I love you!
-sister Toone