June 27, 2011 Letter

Hello! This week has been exciting!

Well...I just got the news that I am getting transferred! I'm not going to lie, I was kind of praying that I would. Who knows where I'm going...I guess you'll have to wait until next week's email to find out! I'm assuming that we'll be able to email as part of our Tuesday mormon.orgtime again, but we won't know for sure until then. But I don't remember if I told you or not...but last transfer they did make a sisters' bike area.

Needless to say, I'm hoping that I DON'T get sent there.

President and I might have words if I do.

And I'll probably cry.

Anyways, I gave Sister Hammond your cell phone number. She's excited to meet up with you so I'm sure she'll be calling soon. I'm assuming we're going to stop by there later tonight so that I can say good-bye, so I'll make sure to let them know what's going on and to make sure they call you. :)

So, miracle of the week: we were teaching our 10 year old investigator, Sebastian and his aunt, Becky was kind of wandering in and out of the room, cooking dinner. She would make the occasional comment or two, trying to help Sebastian understand the order of the Plan of Salvation with us, which was kind of weird since she's not a member, haha! So, then after the lesson she walked in and kind of looked at us and said "So..."

And I thought, jokingly, "Hey, we should ask her 'So...when can you get baptized?'"

And then she said..."...Who do I need to talk to about getting baptized myself?"

WOAAAAAAAAAAH!!!!!! How many people ask that?

So we just kind of looked at her and said, "Well...that would be us!"

So we put her on date for baptism for July 16th. Before she was even an investigator.

It was even funnier because earlier that day at district meeting we passed our planners around and the Elders noticed that we didn't have anyone written down in our "Potential Investigators" and they were all shocked since we've had so many baptisms and so many solid investigators, one Elder asked us, "Sisters, how in the world do you find you're investigators!?"

And we both just shrugged and said "We don't!"

Which is true in that our investigators have all been referrals or found us themselves. And in that we don't do finding activities! But it's okay!

We also put our investigator Tad (brother of RC Amber) on date for baptism on July 9th. I should be able to come visit for his baptism, assuming that he invites me himself. =)

On Saturday we spent the better part of the day shoveling gravel for a single woman in our ward. I'm still pretty sore, but her backyard looks lovely now!

Now I'm running out of time, because I've been very distracted between the email and the list of people that I want to visit before tomorrow afternoon when we go down for transfers....so sorry this was so short. Sorry, Dad, for not responding to your email directly, but it sounds like everything is going good with work and with your band; keep up the good work!

Anyways, keep me updated on everything in your lives! I'll be getting your package tomorrow, but I did get all the postcards and your singing letter. I enjoyed it a lot, despite the apostate nature of the song ;)

Love you all! Talk to you next week, hopefully!

-Sister Heather Holdsworth

June 20, 2011 Letter

Sounds like you've all been very busy! it sounds like girls camp was fun, and I enjoyed hearing about Dad's gigs.

So, as I'm sure you're wondering: why did the e-mail take so much longer today than normal? Well, once or twice a transfer we have p-day with our district. Today we went out to the beach on Camano Island (and I think I got a little sunburnt! who would have thought!) to play frisbee. We ended up playing frisbee in the church parking lot while we waited for two of the elders to arrive, and then just spent time at the beach exploring the driftwood and looking for crabs. We named them after Book of Mormon prophets when we found them. And then decided we're all definitely missionaries.

The Elders and I spent some time hypothizing about where Jimmer is headed, but we've all been out of the loop long enough we only came to the conclusion that none of us knew what's going on! So definitely keep us updated!

After that we went to a member's house and he cooked us some of the best hot dogs ever. Sister Blackburn (my companion) wasn't that impressed with them after I'd been hyping them up all weekend, but I like them at least. Now we're at the library in one of the elder's areas to save our miles...and they don't have stools for our computers, and we only have our computers for a half hour...so this is probably going to be short.

Anyways, this week was pretty uneventful. We've started teaching the brother of our recent convert, Amber. I might have mentioned him last week. We got our new branch mission leader! So that made church a little more exciting than normal. We also started teaching the grandson of a couple in our ward; they themselves are just recently returning from inactivity but things are going great for them!

Hope you have a good week!

Love you all,

Sister Heather Holdsworth

June 13 Letter

Sounds like you had lots of fun on the cruise! I can't wait to hear about it from Jon and Grandma, too! I got a postcard from Grandma....I don't know if you sent any others...?

If you're planning a cruise around Europe I definitely think summer of 2013 would be a good time for you to do that.............Not that I have any ulterior motives for suggesting that or anything...

Speaking of vacations...Bishop Hammond (bishop of our ward) and his family are heading down to Disneyland for July 5-7th...I told them how much we love Disneyland and they said they would love to meet up with you if at all possible! I don't remember you cell phone number or if you want me to give them the home phone if you want to try and work that out with them...? They're a lot of fun, and I thought you'd like to hear their report on how I've been doing, too.

The baptism last Saturday was amazing! We had a lot of the branch members come and support Dustin, which I think really surprised him since he'd met so few of them. Everyone's really excited to have him though, and I think he's going to do great! After his baptism, he bore his testimony, and the Spirt was SO strong! Everyone was really impressed, and everyone talking about it at church on Sunday said it was definitely the highlight of a really wonderful baptism.

Yesterday we had a lesson with Amber's brother, Tad. He's been attending church himself for about six months and is really excited to learn more. I think seeing his sister be baptized last week was a really great spring board for him. We're meeting with him again on Thursday! Woohoo!

The two young women who had been on date for the 18th are no longer getting baptized. That was pretty saddening this week, but it happens. The YW are going to keep reaching out to them, so hopefully the seeds are planted and will keep being nourished by the ward.

Yesterday, Sister Blackburn, a member of the branch and I did a musical number for the branch's sacrament meeting. Sister Blackburn sang "O My Father" to the tune of "Come Thou Fount." The member played the piano and I borrowed her flute. It went really well, and when we told Sister Davis about it when we got home she asked if we would do it for the ward (she's the organist and I guess the ward is really in need of some musical numbers!). So, we'll probably be doing that again! One of the girls from the branch is (or is auditioning to be?) a piano performance major at BYU and she really wants to play a piano/flute piece with me now that my "secret" is out, as everyone was saying afterwards (I didn't think I was that secretive about it, but I guess they disagree!), so it sounds like I'm getting some good practice in while I'm here!

Those are really the big updates I have...we're officially wihtout a branch mission leader, so we'll see how that goes I guess! Hopefully a new one gets called soon!

Hm...what am I learning? I guess I'm learning how to be patient with people that don't metacommunicate...and how to relate to people that aren't very self-aware....and how to deal with pet hair.

No one warned me about the pet hair. =P

I hope girls camp goes well!! I'm sure your lanturns will be a hit and that the pin trading will go well. Do you trade the pins with all the campers, or just the leaders and YCLs? Do you have to do something to get a pin or do you just trade for fun? Who are the YCLs this year; who from Chaffey are getting their camp names?

Also...I think you should get on facebook and remind Stephanie that while I'd love to write her back for her last letter to me...I need her new address!! haha! =)

Happy Father's Day to Dad! Sorry I don't get to call you for your day! haha

Love you! See you next week!

Sister Heather Holdsworth

June 6, 2011 Letter

(Last week there was no e-mail letter as it was Memorial Day and Heather couldn't use the Public Library computer. I have officially declared no more Monday holidays while Heather is on her mission, don't think it will do much that I have declared this...but I do it anyway)

Hello everyone! Right now I'm picturing Grandma and Mom fighting over the computer screen on the ship to see who can read my email first...but maybe you'll be okay taking turns lol (yes, this pretty much describes how we were at the ship's internet cafe)

I have been getting all of the cards you are sending my way. I really appreciate getting all the letters! It adds some variety to my lunch breaks...So please keep the mail coming =)

The baptism on Saturday was wonderful! We had a really good turn out, and we were able to set an appointment to begin teaching Amber's (our RECENT CONVERT's ;) ) brother! And Amber's grandmother seemed to really enjoy the baptism too...When I talked to her she didn't seem very interested in learning more about the Church, but our bishop seems to think otherwise...I guess we'll just wait and see.

So! I don't remember if I metioned Dustin in my last email...but some elders in another ward who have been teaching this YSA age investigator turned him over to us for the branch last week...and his baptism is going to be on the 11th! The branch is really excited...we haven't had any investigators for the branch since January. He hasn't even met most of the branch because he was only able to stay for Sacrament meeting yesterday, and a lot of people sound like they're planning on coming. =) So...hoorah! Baptism!

I'm trying to work hard and stay positive. I'm so thankful we're getting referrals for new investigators because it really seems like we haven't been putting much time into finding activities...It's been really frustrating for me. but like I said, I'm trying to stay positive.

...ANYWAYS!

So...not much else is new. I'm worried about one of our investigators--the man from Taiwan--because we haven't seen him in almost three weeks and I'm fairly certain he still has no idea why we had to cancel our last appointment (...three weeks ago...). I'm trying to figure things out though...and to not be too hard on myself...or on my companion. We just got a new ward mission leader after not having one for almost the whole time I've been here...and we just found out yesterday that we're getting a new mission leader for the branch...That should be interesting. I think I'm having a delayed anxiety attack over Sister Townsend leaving now that he is being released...I coped with a lot of my worries about the area at her leaving because I knew I'd still be working with him, and he really did a fantastic job magnifying his calling. But that's the way of things. I'm sure the new BML will be just as good.

So far my joints haven't been too much of a bother. My knee hurts some nights when we get home but it's usually fine by the morning.

Last week was pretty rainy, but yesterday and today have been beautiful! I'm even in a 3/4 length shirt today! I guess you brought the sunshine with you! Thanks!

I hope you enjoy your cruise! You should send me a few pictures so I can see the things you did.

Love you all!

Sister Heather Holdsworth