November Happenings

November truly flew by in an instant.  There was so much going on with school, work, church, & the holidays that we blinked & it was gone.  But we did have a lot of fun in November along the way.

We had a really fun date night with several couple from our neighborhood.  We played board games & ate a yummy dinner together.  It was a lot of fun.

Trek & I took the youth of our ward to the temple for a temple trip to do baptisms & that was a lot of fun.  We got some of the boys to come this time & that made the experience more diverse & fun.

Trek hiked up to the U (above the University of Utah).  He's always finding fun hikes & trails to run & bike on.  It makes him happy.  And don't mind that UGLY mustache on his face. . . eeeew!  "No Shave November" was in full effect for the month of November in his squadron.  Everybody had mustaches growing.

I made a delicious turkey for Trek's squadron Thanksgiving dinner.  We were going to San Francisco for Thanksgiving this year so I thought I might actually get out of making a turkey, but he caught me.  The cadets thought it was delicious & I'm happy I got to make their Thanksgiving special for them.

Trek's cadets did a fruit carving contest between the different branches of the military.  Trek was assigned & pineapple that had to represent the Air Force.  His pineapple jet was SO COOL.

Again with the No Shave November Stache!

I got my Disney Christmas tree up in our bedroom & it was beautiful.  It made me so happy every time I looked at it.

I also loved pulling out my nativity collection from all around the world.  We love buying nativities from every new place we visit.

After 3 years of hard work, I finally finished a needlepoint cross stitch picture for my friend Nancy for Christmas.  I was very proud of it.

And Trek found the perfect place to set up his nutcracker collection.

The Christmas season was in full swing even in November.  Utahns know how to decorate for Christmas & it was beautiful.  

 

Movin' On Up

Craiger joined Civil Air Patrol the very end of September, but was ready to rank up to his first official rank in November.  He was SO excited.  Civil Air Patrol has been SO GOOD for him.  It's like a mix of boy scouts & the military.  You learn about leadership, working together, aerospaces/planes/flying, & more.  He's learned to march, he's learned to lead, he's learned all about lift & thrust & everything that happens when a plane is in the air. . . & he even started drone technician training for emergency services search & rescue.  He's flown a glider & he's loving every minute & every opportunity CAP has given him.

To rank up you have to complete a series of things. . . a 30+ page lesson on leadership that you have to read, then study, then take a test on. . . . then do a CBT (computer based training) online which takes some significant time.

Then you have to complete a full aerospace lesson which consists of reading 60+ pages that require extensive learning in aerospace things & several activities that require building airplanes, gliders, lift & thrust to help the cadets learn aerospace.

After you complete those, you are required to take a PT test & take part in some kind of a physical training activity whether that be basketball, soccer, or some other fun activity with the other cadets.

The final things you must do is a character interview, a drill test (to make sure you are marching correctly), reciting the CAP oath, & a few other minor things.  He worked hard for 2 months to accomplish this advancement in rank.  We are SO proud of him.

We love you Craiger.

 

Decorating the Christmas Tree

As soon as we took down the Halloween decorations, we immediately put up our Christmas tree.  Lorien wasn't going to be able to come visit us at our house much during December so we opted for the first week of November so she could be there with us. 

We learned very quickly that our Christmas tree was TOO BIG for our new house.

We had to bend the top over just to get it inside the living room & there was NO WAY our little angel was going to be able to stand upright at the top.

Everybody took turns attempting to put our angel on the top of our bent over tree.  She broke in the center half way through our trying which made us sad.  But we taped her up & still managed to get her up there though her head was touching the ceiling the entire time.

It was going to be a great year.  I love putting up the Christmas tree!

 

Cadence - Middle School & Faith Bashing - November 20, 2023

Сайн байцгаана уу? How are you guys this wonderful week? This week has been full of fun adventures!

Tuesday:

Last pday, we met up with some other sisters and went thrift shopping! I bought a bunch of souvenirs for my siblings and enjoyed hanging out with all the city sisters. We also went to the stake center and my companion played basketball while I wrote more essays haha.

Wednesday:

On Wednesday, we successfully met with a Facebook referral! This is the first time a Facebook referral has been successful for me so that was pretty exciting! And she seemed really interested! She asked us so many difficult questions that really pushed my language abilities which was a great experience. She also asked really important questions such as "what do you do during your church services?" "Are the church services in your church's other buildings the same?" "What are things your church members are not allowed to do?" And many many other questions. It was difficult because the questions were so good but we had to try and explain them without overwhelming her with too much information. I think we did well because we were able to schedule a follow up lesson with her and she said she felt the Spirit strongly in our first lesson! It was super amazing and I'm thankful to work with her! We also did studies, contacting, and taught piano and english which all went well. Our students were a little crazy because they were only ages 9-12 but they seemed to learn a lot about jobs so that was fun!

Thursday:

We started the day off by trying to find the address of an inactive young woman with our new YW's president. We unfortunately didn't find the young woman, but we were able to contact two other young women we were trying to find with our President. We also bonded with our yw president and built trust with her so now we'll be working closely with her to support all of our yw new members and inactive youth! Then we did studies because two referrals flaked on their appointments with us. After that, we went to visit a member with the elders but we found out that she lived all the way in Khan Uul...but we couldn't back out of the appointment because she was already mad that we were running late. Long story short, we traveled 5 hours there and back to visit her but it was a very good visit. I think she needed it and she said missionaries don't visit her much because she lives far away. So that was a miracle and we all felt the Spirit!

Friday:

Friday was a party! We taught 4th, 5th, 7th, and 8th graders at the middle school for 3 hours, then went straight to a ward karaoke activity. It was the most fun ward activity I've ever been to in Mongolia! The members taught us so many songs and we just had a party! They also snuck snacks into the karaoke room we reserved so we were stocked up. If you ever get the chance to sing old songs with 60 year olds, definitely don't pass it up! Both those things took up the whole day so besides those, we just did studies haha.

Saturday:

We cleaned the church by ourselves because the ward members didn't show up. We also jammed out to the elf soundtrack while we cleaned haha. Then we did studies and had a fun mutual. We played different games with sheep ankle bones and played ping pong with our youth. Not many people showed up but thankfully 1 investigator and 1 new member came! Then we had a leadership training with all the stake leaders and the adult session of stake conference. Both were super motivating and spirit filled and many people came!

Sunday:

We had two lessons in the morning. One was a follow up lesson with our Facebook referral and she still seems super interested and excited to learn more! So we gave her a Book of Mormon, taught her about Joseph Smith, and invited her to read! We also had a lesson with one of our super progressing investigators and actually put her on date for baptism! She seems excited and nervous so we planned for a month away to give her time to prep for it. She also told us that she will start practicing reading the Book of Mormon so that she will be able to understand it before her baptism. She is so ready and I am so happy to work with her as well! She also told us she will start to work on convincing her husband and kids to take lessons from us so we might get to baptize her whole family eventually! Then we were late to stake conference because of our awesome lessons, but that was okay. Stake Conference was great and so many people came! It honestly surprised me to see so many people there! I got to see so many people from my previous areas that I missed a lot! It was pretty special!

Then we had a member visit that was honestly so difficult to get through. The whole time, the member was bashing us for being bad missionaries. He was especially hostile towards me because I was the oldest missionary there. He criticized my language a lot and then criticized all of our faith and our teaching abilities saying we weren't strong or faithful enough. He said a bunch of other stuff I won't get into but needless to say, it was a hard visit for the four of us missionaries and left us kind of disappointed in ourselves. But after a sincere prayer, I felt peace from Christ and He helped me remember that none of us are perfect but He had called us to do His work despite this. This motivated me so we're still going strong!

Monday:

We taught at the middle school again and taught the kids about Thanksgiving! It was fun to get them in a festive mood for it even though they don't celebrate it. We also did studies, and had 2 investigators flake on us. But despite this we kept busy and had a good day!

This week was full of highs and lows but I am thankful for all the experiences we had this week. The mission is always hard but also always rewarding and fun. I am so thankful for all the things the mission has taught me. This week, I was reading in 3 Nephi and came across one of my favorite gospel principles. 3 Nephi 12 says:

14 Verily, verily, I say unto you, I give unto you to be the light of this people. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hid.

15 Behold, do men light a candle and put it under a bushel? Nay, but on a candlestick, and it giveth light to all that are in the house;

16 Therefore let your light so shine before this people, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven.

I love that we are all given Christ's light. It is our responsibility to share His light with everyone around us. Instead of complaining about the problems around us, we can instead see things with optimism. We can show others the joy we choose to feel, which will help them feel the light of Christ. I want to always choose joy, no matter how difficult my circumstances become.

Choosing joy will bring light into your life. I am thankful for the joy and light of Christ's gospel. It has blessed my life and it will bless yours too. I love you all and hope you have a wonderful week!

Love,

Sister Potter

 

Cadence - Bowling & Address Finding - November 14, 2023

 Сайн байцгаана уу? How are you all doing this week? Sorry I didn't write last week...things have been super busy here on pdays. Since coming back to the city, our pdays have been spent running every which way so I don't have much downtime to write haha.

Anyways, I was thinking about a different layout for my emails so I'll try that today. I'll just try writing the highlights of each day and see how it goes:

Tuesday:

Last Tuesday, we went out to lunch with Sister Stark and Sister Quincy. We found this pretty fun chicken sandwich restaurant and it was an americanized style restaurant. It was pretty good but not worth the travel to get there haha. Then we went to the stake center and my comp played basketball while I wrote college scholarship application essays (I can't believe I have to think about that now haha). We bought groceries, came home, then went to a member's house for dinner and it was super fun!

Wednesday:

We would usually have to teach at the middle school on Wednesdays but this week, the school was out for fall break. So instead we did lots of contacting because this area had a bunch of referrals built up over the past couple transfers. Not gonna lie, contacting was long and hard but we successfully invited 24 people to a family history activity our stake is putting on next week. We also did some social media work, designed English cards for our church class to pass out, and attempted to meet with one of our flaky investigators. We also taught piano and english at the church and those went well.

Thursday: 

We had district counsel today and I gave a training on finding people. I didn't have much time to prep but it turned out fine. Then we got lunch as a district at pizza hut, went home and did studies, tried to meet with a new member who flaked on us, did social media work, and then visited Elder Gendendaram's family. They made us tsuivan with bansh and French fries in it. That was an interesting combination haha

Friday:

Today was super chaotic...the ward youth leaders planned a fun bowling activity for mutual today and we told them we'd help out because the missionaries always run mutual here. Because we volunteered to help, the leaders took that as we volunteered to lead the activity so no leaders showed up to help us. Meaning we also didn't get any ward funds to pay for the bus rides for the kids, bowling for the kids, or food for the kids. We spent a lot of money because all the youth showed up expecting this grand activity the leaders talked up. It turned out fine but we were just surprised that we got no support. Also, the leaders chose a bowling alley so far away to go to, so it took 3 hours to get there with traffic. After mutual, my comp and I attempted to meet with a referral we've never met with before but she flaked on us so we just did studies and passed out English cards instead.

Saturday:

Today we attempted to meet with 3 new referrals we received - all three of them flaked on us...but I was expecting that so thankfully we made good backup plans. We helped the ward clean the church in the morning, then finished a few advertisements for our church Facebook page. Then we did some roleplays, lots of contacting, and taught an amazing lesson to this family that's been interested for a while. The mother, Bayrmaa was so sweet and even made us dinner! Also, when we got to their house, we realized she moved, so we had to find her new address via verbal directions over the phone. That was my first time successfully finding a house on my own through being told directions in Mongolian so that was a success! The lesson was honestly so great and they are progressing so well!

Sunday:

Today we super spiritual! Sacrament and second hour went great as usual in this ward. Everyone does a good job at their calling here so all classes run super smoothly without the help of the missionaries. Then after church, we found out everyone was invited to a member's son's funeral so we went to their funeral. Mongolian funerals are so interesting! We all crowded into the deceased person's house and their family made all the guests soup, rice, and salads. We all feasted while a Buddhist priest blessed the body and performed some cool rituals. We also got to talk to one of the deceased son's relatives who speaks perfect Russian and English. She talked to us all about her travels around the world which was super fun! We also tried to meet with 3 more referrals and they all flaked on us so we did our studies instead. In the evening, we did our weekly plan and filled out our KIs, then had a district miracle share over zoom.

Monday:

We did studies, made some cookies for the member who's son just passed away, then taught one of our investigators about following the Prophet. He is so solid and honestly already ready to be baptized. Unfortunately his parents don't want him to get baptized so keep him in your prayers. We're working on reaching out to his relatives who are members to see what we can do. We planned English, had 2 more referrals flake on us, and delivered cookies to our sweet member. Then we went back to the church, taught English and piano, and did some last minute contacting about our family history stake activity.

I think I like the layout of this email a lot more so I'll start doing my weeklies like this. Anyways, despite the fact that so many people flaked on us, we always had backup plans and kept busy so it felt like a productive week. Sometimes the mission can be discouraging because of how often we get shut down. But despite this, I am thankful for Christ's strength to keep pushing forward and ignore these set backs as if they never happened. I found this really cool scripture in Helaman 14 about agency this week:

30 And now remember, remember, my brethren, that whosoever perisheth, perisheth unto himself; and whosoever doeth iniquity, doeth it unto himself; for behold, ye are free; ye are permitted to act for yourselves; for behold, God hath given unto you a knowledge and he hath made you free.

31 He hath given unto you that ye might know good from evil, and he hath given unto you that ye might choose life or death; and ye can do good and be restored unto that which is good, or have that which is good restored unto you; or ye can do evil, and have that which is evil restored unto you

I really love the Gift of agency. Heavenly Father gave everyone the option to choose to follow His Son, or to choose their own path. This is because He loves us so much. I try to remember this when people cancel on us and it helps me feel more love for those people. I know that God wants what's best for each of us. That is why He sent us His Son. I know that if we choose to follow His Son, we are choosing good and we will be blessed because of it. I am thankful for my Savior's example and His strength! Have a wonderful week everyone!

Love,

Sister Potter