My Dear Family,
Hello!! I hope you all have had a great week! I know I sure have! Oh my goodness where to even start. I had so many unexpected visitors this week it was amazing! holy cow! I know Heavenly Father is aware of my needs and I think that is why He is being so generous and giving me tons of visitors, because He knows how hard it would be for me to be away from all of you without a little reminder of home here and there :) So I am just going to go through my week day by dayish:
So on Monday I was talking to this family at the visitors center and they told me they go down to Atlanta a lot on business. We got talking about the temple down there and I told them that if they ever go do a session on a Thursday night to keep a look out for a little British man. Then the dad made a funny face and said he had gone to the temple on a Thursday night, that it was a very small session, and that he had met Papa! What a small world! Just another tender mercy reminding me that I'm never too far from those I love :) His name was Brother Stark I think... He said he had gone about a month ago. Do you remember him Papa?
On to Tuesday. One of the VC trainers asked me to go with her to train the host couples that were coming in for the night to walk around the grounds and invite people to come into the visitors center. So since I was out doing the training with her during prep meeting I had missed the announcement of all of the sisters posts for the night. When we came back inside I was informed that Sister Fors (sweet Espanol speaking sister from Cali) would be on the outside greet for our first post and that we would be announcing the concert that night. Oh gosh I was soo nervous! So of course when you are dreading something it always seems that time just flies by- and that is exactly what happened! Before I knew it, it was time to go and announce the concert and I hadn't even gotten a chance to look over the script. So I quickly went into the back and practiced it a few times with Sister Lewis and then it was time to go. I told everyone to pray for me haha. The crowd was pretty big that night- we had a local high school choir preforming. The lady in charge of putting on the concerts first got up and welcomed everyone. She then announced who would be saying the opening prayer and.... he didn't show up. So, the lady then comes down off the stage and told me I would be saying it. Ya know one great thing about missions is that they teach you to just go. you just do it. Just get up there and preform. So she announced that I would be saying the prayer instead. haha So I say the prayer and then Sister Fors comes and joins me and I introduce the concert/invite to the visitors center in English and Sister Fors does the same in Spanish (speaking of Spanish I have been trying to learn some! The Spanish speaking sisters tell me i'm doing pretty good :) Anyways, so that whole experience was really cool, and I really am grateful that she asked me to say the prayer because it made me feel peaceful and it took away my nervousness. So after the concert we all go back in the visitors center and guess who I meet? Samantha Coffey's cousins yayy I finally met the Coffey clan! haha they were soo sweet and said they would come back and visit me again. They even asked me what I wanted for Christmas People are so nice:) So that was super cool.
Then onto Wednesday- let me just say that although Christmas lights basically take over my life right now, Sister Sshurtz, Lewis and I are dedicated to working super hard in our area when have time there. We said 12 prayers this week with nonmembers that we met on the street! Normally our district averages maybe 5 a week. We are setting new records! :)- I was determined to find prepared people in the visitors center on Wednesday night. I prayed really hard for them. And they came! One of them was one that I got to personally talk to and she was a sweet 16 year old girl. Her friend is a member and brought her into the vc. The other came from a sweet girl I got to testify to at the end of God's plan for the family. Life is just so good! and so incredibly busy! So during the last hour of our shift (9-10) I saw a couple talking on the other side of the room. So I went over to talk to them and found out they were looking for me! Another visitor! :) I can't remember their names, but I guess Bro Coffey told them to come and see me since they were at the lights. haha Thanks Brother Coffey! :) They used to live in the old Alpharetta ward and now they live in Texas. It was so cool! Oh another random side note, I think it was this last Sunday night- not yesterday- I had another visitor. He was the brother and his family of one of my roommates from back at ByU-I! Tiffany Galovich :D It was so cool! Who knew I would meet so many people in Mesa! Strangely small world. Also I was told my old piano teacher came in looking for me the other day- I'm guessing Sarah Ray? I keep missing her though! darn!
I honestly can't remember what happened on Thursday, but I'm sure it was amazing and inspiring just like all of the other days of the week.
So onto Friday. I was dreading Friday because my companions insisted that we go on triple splits. I totally felt inadequate and was just really nervous that I would let them down. Also you know how directionally challenged I am... I am still working on figuring out the area! Well the time came and Sister Shurtz said it would all be fine and told me I could go with the Sister from our YSA ward who is an RM. So I went for it. We go to the parking lot. Bridget- an 18 year old pre-missionary was the first to show up and when Sister Shurtz told her she would be going with Sister Lewis... Well Sister Lewis really wanted to go with the RM. So I let her have her and decided to be brave and go with Bridget. I really had to step up my game and be the leader. It ended up being an amazing experience! It showed me that although I am weak and new and hardly know what I am doing- if I put my trust in the Lord and show Him that I am willing to do hard things, He always makes up the difference. reminds me of what that guy from p90x always says, "Do your best and forget the rest". I live by that out here. Bridget and I got 2 new potential investigators, contacted referrals, visited 2 less active families, talked to EVERYONE, and said prayers with 3 nonmembers. Who would have thought a premie and a greenie would make such a great team! One thing I am learning a lot out here on the mission is that if what your doing is hard, then it's probably good for you. You just have to keep going! So that was our great Friday.
Saturday... again can't really remember. Oh! I do remember one thing from Saturday. I was talking to this sweet little nonmember man at the vc from Germany. It was so cool testifying to him about the Book of Mormon because you could tell he just got it. He then stopped me and gave me a really sweet compliment. He told me that I speak with my eyes. I just thought that was really sweet- and no worries this man was 80 years old, and he now is going to be meeting with missionaries!! :D So cool.
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So onto Sunday- the busiest day of the week! For missionaries it is not the day of rest haha So we only ended up going to one hour of church on Sunday because we had soo many meetings and appointments. I can't remember if I told you all this before, but a few weeks ago we taught a lesson in high priests about using Preach my Gospel. Then yesterday we taught the lesson in Elders quorum on Preach my Gospel as well. It was really cool! So then that night guess who my companion at the vc was... HERMANA SHWARTZ! yayyyyy team Georgia! We were so happy to finally be companions. we set some high goals for ourselves that night and we were determined to work hard. We saw so many miracles! I love Sundays :) So the visitors I saw Yesterday were: Sister Coppel! awww that made me so happy! I felt bad though because it was incredibly busy last night so I didn't really have a ton of time to talk. Oh on Saturday night we had 6,000 visitors and I'm guessing last night was even more than that! So my other visitor that night... Sister Collins!!!!!! as in Lauren Collins!!!!!! ahhh!!!!! She came with some investigators to the vc :) It was soooo cool to see her there as a missionary! We are both missionaries! It was just a really weird/cool moment. Then we had to be dignified again and go back to work haha but it was just sooo cool! :) I just feel so blessed. Heavenly Father must really love me because He keeps putting so many amazingly wonderful people in my life. I am so blessed, and I really don't deserve it. I am just so happy! Also, Hermana Shwartz and I beat our goals for the night! Georgia pride :D
Anyways, thanks for all of your letters this week!! I will write back asap! another hard thing about Christmas lights is that our pday gets shortened by about 4 hours... so it may take me a little longer than normal to write back, but I promise I will! Mom good luck on your test! I will definitely pray for you!!! keep up the good studying! Oh my yes thank you sooo much for the package!! I will send you pics of our cute apartment :)
Unfortunately it won't let me look at your pic of the xmas card! I guess I'll just have to see it when it comes in the mail :) Mom thank you for always taking the time to write me all of the updates from life back home! I love hearing what's going on in everyone's lives :) You all are the best! Love you all soooo much! I pray every morning and every night and every moment in between for all of you! You are all so precious to me.
I love you all!!!!!
Love,
Sister Hamstead