Hi again!!

Welcome to Kirtland

All in all, I would say it was a pretty decent week.

We were able to see Kia Monday night so that was really good. I don’t like when we go a week without seeing her. It makes me sad! She and her family are just great. I love them!



Me & Kia



Me & Camaria...I wish the window wasn't in the background...her
hair was a legit affro! 

Tuesday was a power day! Training meeting was AWESOME. It was just really enlightening and it made me think. Sister Butterfield shared this awesome thought with us…she used to serve on the General Relief Society Board or something like that, under Sister Smoot. She said Sister Smoot’s vision was that every sister would kneel down to pray, stand up to serve and reach out to rescue. I LOVE IT. Alliteration just speaks to me, especially when that’s the message it’s sending! That definitely has been sticky-noted and is on my wall now! Elder Butterfield was talking about love…and he was like ‘have you ever noticed how love never sucks the energy out of your soul…but anger and hatred and negative things do?” I had never really dwelled on that thought but that’s so true. We really shouldn’t even bother with them. Obviously that’s easier said than done but I think its something worth working towards.

I had my first interview with President Sorensen that day. I don’t really know why everyone gets all nervous for those…he’s really not that scary. But anyway, I was telling him that I get really frustrated with myself because in my head I see the missionary that I want to be and I’m not there and I just get upset with myself. He told me to sit down and write out my vision. He said not long after I do that, I will see myself reach that vision. Then, he said to write out a new one. He said that as I do that, it’s like I see a light at the end of the tunnel…and then I reach the light and realize there’s even more. It’s basically all that sanctification process of becoming better one step at a time. Cool.

 

District meeting was so good that day too! First of all, Elder McClellan committed us to every morning, bow down before the Lord and dedicate our whole selves to Him that day FOR THE REST OF OUR LIVES. We’re like Dang! That’s a big commitment Elder McClellan! But…it’s also one that is so important and that should be happening in our lives on a daily basis anyway. But also during district meeting, Elder Bills gave a workshop on the role of the Holy Ghost in conversion. We were talking about how the Holy Ghost is the Comforter. …and then it HIT me! The Holy Ghost comforts me too! (Duh, right? But sometimes you just have to be smacked in the face by Captain Obvious.) Change of any sort is scary because it’s new and it’s unfamiliar. But when we change to bring our will in alignment with God’s will, that Spirit is with us and will comfort us. And that includes me…as I’m still adjusting to this change of going from “Alicia” to “Sister Webb”.

Let me tell you a story. One time Bishop Anderson gave me this book called “18 Months” when I was filling out my mission papers. It has a stories from like 20 previous sister missionaries. One of them was talking about how she had an identity crisis when she got to the mission field and I remember reading it and being like “oh gosh can we quit being so dramatic?!” Ha…and then I experienced it, to some extent! It’s hard because it is a time of change…but it’s the bad things that are dropping out of me as a person and better things are being instituted in their place. So yeah…….

Can you see why Tuesday was a power day?! I swear I thought my brain was going to explode by the end of the day. It was awesome though.

Moving on to Thursday…We had a zone service project that morning which was way fun! We helped out at Willoughby Hills Friendship Church because, according to Elder Jensen (our old zone leader who now is going to be AP), “they don’t like us so we’re going to do service for them.” AWESOME. Then we all got Subway and ate lunch at the chapel. It was really fun to be able to spend time together as a zone.

So every month, we’re allotted a certain number of miles we can go on our car. In the last couple months, they’ve taken away 400 of our miles so now we get 1100/month. Thursday was the last day of September. Well…we were going to go over on miles sooooo Sister Park & I definitely walked in our area that day. We walked down to Sister Jankowski’s house which is the closest thing to our apartment. It usually takes us maybe 7 minutes to drive there…definitely took an hour walking! It was a really neat experience though because we were able to contact so many people as we walked! I passed out more pass-along cards that day than I have in my entire mission.



What the...?! Sister Park & I ran into this while walking in our area.



Ohhh also we were able to stop by Joyce’s store that night. We hadn’t heard from her or seen her since the Relief Society Broadcast. She is so adorable! Ah. She watched the entire broadcast and LOVED it!!! She was like “oh, that Indian woman’s talk was so powerful!” (Haha Sister Allred)Like I said, her talk was written for Joyce Ely. Then she told us that she looked around the website and figured out you can watch past ones and she started looking up Sarah Kimball. I wasn’t even sure who that was! Kimball…kind of a big name in the Church but apparently Sarah was big with Relief Society back in the 1800s. And “she knew that she named her daughter Sarah for a reason!” FOR REAL WOMAN! GET BAPTIZED!!!!! Haha We found out that she was going out of town this weekend and she will be out of town next weekend but she told us she was excited to go online and watch conference! YAYYY!! I love that woman so much.

Saturday and Sunday….two words: GENERAL CONFERENCE.

Amazing! I loved, loved, LOVEDDDDDDDDDDD it! It’s so cool to realize that none of the speakers are given assigned topics. They all pray over what they should speak on and then they “coincidentally” (or NOT) happen to mesh together. I loved picking out the themes this time: prophets, FAITH, agency, and trusting in the Lord. It was also so neat to be able to watch conference from an investigators point of view. I’d never done that before. My mind was enlightened, my soul was filled with love, and I feel better prepared to go out and face the next 6 months. Do you know what? 6 months goes by fast. I was thinking about this yesterday morning…last Sunday morning conference it was Easter, and I had Miller 6 come over for German pancakes before the session started! That really doesn’t seem like all that long ago….WEIRD.

I loved Elder Oaks’ talk on the 2 lines of revelation: the personal line and the Priesthood line. So many people out here don’t understand why we have a prophet! They think that we have to pray through him or go through him in some way…but that is obviously not the case. I loved his and I loved President Monson’s talk on gratitude. This week let’s all try to cultivate this kind of attitude. Send a thank you note to someone who has blessed your life that you appreciate!
I’m so grateful for all of the prayers and thoughts of anyone reading this right now. I can always use them and they are definitely helping. THANK YOU! I love you all so much.

Love love love,

Sister Webb

Sister Decker, me, & Sister Schwanke...aren't we cute?