welcome to planet mars.

So, right now I am sitting in the Kent library, sweating buckets. Summer has officially begun in Ohio. It's probably 85 degrees outside and the library DOES NOT HAVE AC ON. Yeah. It's sick. I'm sick. Don't worry about it. It was crazy....the day I arrived in Ravenna on March 30, it was snowing and then there really wasn't a spring....it just rained for a few weeks straight...and now it's FULL ON summer. I forgot how hot and sticky you get. One of these days, I'm going to need to go shopping so that I can get nicer short sleeved shirts that I don't have to wear a cardigan with...it's really gross here!

Before I get into details of the week, let me first apologize to everyone who has written in the last two weeks, especially Evelin & Merick.....THINGS ARE CRAZY HERE!!! With moving and just getting settled in and all this business, I've had no time to write. I don't hate you, I haven't forgotten you, I WILL write you back....just give me a little bit of time!

P.S. Sonhee Cho, if you want me to write back to you my love (and I want to) I need your new address. :)

So this was probably one of the busiest and BEST weeks of my mission. I'll give you the play by play, day by day.

TUESDAY (25th): KIRTLAND! Good stuff. I had an awesome phone call to a lady named Patti. I talked with her and told her the purpose of missionaries and she was like "wow it's funny that you're calling me right now. I've been wanting to get closer to God lately." Consider my testimony of the fact that God knows each of us and our needs strengthened.

WEDNESDAY (26th): District Meeting in Alliance. JULIE coming teaching with us for the majority of the day. AWESOME lessons with Brother Fortson and Bobbi. Bobbi's was especially amazing. Let me quote her directly: "I'm grateful for you coming and bringing me something I've been searching for almost all of my life." AHHHHHHHHHH. Let me just tell you that there is no greater feeling than knowing that you have been an instrument in the Lord's hands and the Holy Ghost truly has worked through you to bless and benefit other people. IT IS THE BEST FEELING IN THE WORLD!!

After that lesson we were spiritually exhausted. For real. We had correlation at the church that night which was so rudely interrupted by a TORNADO WARNING. We ran outside to get our phone out of the car and Brother Snyder was upset, yelling at us to get inside because there were definitely swirling clouds above. Scary business! That was definitely the first time I've ever taken shelter in the furnace room of a church to hide from a potential tornado. It didn't end up doing any harm but it was an adventure.
THURSDAY (27th): Oh, we did service at Kent Social Services and Sister Mars drove us there. On our way back , we asked her to drop us off at Days Inn and she was like "You're staying in the days inn?! That is not safe! This is not a good area. Why don't you just come live with us? We have another room." WHAT!!

 The Kent sisters live with the Mars and they are out of our area so we never even considered going with them. But, it would save the mission a lot of money and we'll be in a house. So...after talking with Sister Smith in the mission office, we are officially moving to Planet Mars!! Most of our stuff is at their house now. So..flexibility is the name of the game I'm playing these days. We "broke up" with the Townend girls because they want to be baptized in a different church and 13-year-old Paul Morgan cooked us a delicious spaghetti dinner.

Then, we watched the Joseph Smith movie with Brother Fortson! He loved it. He asked about the "curse of darkness" it talks about in 2 Nephi 5 and said that he didn't feel cursed. Sister McAlister explained so simply that he is not cursed. She was like "Have you ever met someone who has devoted their life to serving others and they just like glow?" and Brother Fortson was like "Yeah, you and Sister Webb!" GAHHHHHHH I LOVE THAT MAN SO MUCH! He is in ALMA in the Book of Mormon now. Seriously, I am so excited for Saturday. Joy full. CHECK!


Friday was busy but not terribly exciting. SATURDAY? JOHNSON HOME!!! :) We totally took Brad Wilcox on tour! He's like a John Bytheway motivational youth speaker person. He's great. It was good but scary because that was the first tour that we took by ourselves.

Oh, we were also asked to give a musical number at zone conference (tomorrow) so we practiced with Sister Kloepfer, who used to teach music. We are singing "Brightly Beams Our Father's Mercy" to the tune of "In Humility, Our Savior". It should be good. Hopefully. No one in the Youngstown Zone plays piano so we're going acapellaaaaaa. Oh dear!

SUNDAY (29th): We went over to Brother Fortson's after church. Usually it's super calm over there but the WHOLE FORTSON CLAN was there! Did I mention that I love black people?!?! I really do! They were like, "there is power in unity! we need you to come down here and say a prayer with us on this food." So us and Sis. Logan, the only 3 whities there, went down and held hands as they blessed the food. LOVE IT LOVE IT LOVE IT! It was super cool too because Brother Fortson was introducing us to like everyone and saying "These are the missionaries from MY church." It was neat because most of his family goes to the Church of God in Christ. A lot of them are coming to support him at his baptism though!!! It'll be so good.

MONDAY (30th): Memorial Day! We were in KIRTLAND <3 and we took 3 tours!! It was crazy. It became clear to me that there is a huge difference when we do things because we feel like we're supposed to or because we actually want to do it. (Like go on tours of church history sites). It doesn't count unless your heart is in it. Otherwise, you do it in vain. Anyway, we had a delicious barbecue to finish off the evening. It was like 90 degrees and once again, I was drenched in sweat. CRAZY!!!!! :) But summer. Yay.
I am excited for this week! It should be good. Last week, like I said, busy but AWESOME. I love the gospel. I feel so much JOY in my life right now. I feel the joyness, I really do. Give yourself  away in helping others and in serving God, and you can too. A mission is the best decision I have EVER EVER EVER made.

Love you all!

Sister Webb