Leaving Craig, "I'm splitting WHAT area?!?", and 3 more hospital visits

So remember how I said last week was the craziest week of my mission? Well I fibbed, because this definitely tops all of the craziest of the crazy weeks I have ever had.

 

Ok So on Tuesday morningthey (my zone leaders) called me and told me that I would be splitting the......wait for it.......The Assistants to the President's Area!!!!!! What?! I know! I didn't think they were serious. But it really did happen. They shipped me back over the mountain and I am in the Orchard South area. This area touches my old area where I first started my mission, that is in the new mission now. (sister waters is still there) The people we live with have a GIGANTIC DOG! His name is Eli and he is a mastiff. He is probably close to 4 feet tall. Now it makes sense about why the elders were asking me about dogs. We work super closely with the Assistants  now. I hope they can show us all their secret ways of being amazing missionaries. We are in one of the richest areas in the entire United states. Cherry Hills Village. You need to google it. When we go to church we pass HUGE multimillion dollar homes. It's insane. We have members of the ward how have servants and I'm pretty sure we could fit every student of moses lake high school into their houses and each student would have their own room and ipad to play with haha . And then we have members who live in low income houses who can barely put food on their tables. It is really weird. The elders have all of the lower class people in their area and we have the super high income families and middle class families. I keep looking around for all the trailer parks and then I remember that I'm not in craig any more :(.

Oh man it was so hard to say goodbye to craig. I was fine until one of our investigators (who was super drunk) got really upset that I was leaving. He even cried and said that he didn't care if they sent me to affrica ( imagine this being said in a super drunk voice) if he got well enough to get baptized (he is an alchoholic) he would take out a loan and fly me back to see his baptism. I lost it. It was so hard not to cry after that. Then we had dinner with Brother Ence and Sister Ence and brother ence told me that I was a ray of sunshine and said so many nice things that I don't deserve and then asked for a hug. Oh my gosh that was sooooo hard. I then said goodbye to brother st. john and he told me that I was like a daughter to him and that he would always remember me and would love me forever. I was an emotional wreck the entire night. It was really weird saying goodbye to sister robinson too. But I know she will be ok. Her new greenie seems super sweet.

So my new companion is Sister gregerson. She is the sweetest person I have ever met. She is from Ervin, California and she is 19. She went to byu for a year before her mission. So Wednesday we had district meeting and that was crazy. In our district we have our district leader, the zone leaders, the assistants, and then us......super funny. After district meeting we had a couple appointments then we started tracking. Then the craziness started. Sister Gregerson puked in the gutter 3 times and I took her home after getting some medicine in the store. She got a fever and it wouldn't go away. We went to urgent care and they said it was a stomach bug and she would just have to wait it out. They gave her some anti-nausea medicine and then sent us home.

The next day she had extreme dizziness, extremely bad headache that went to her neck and she was going to the bathroom every 5 minutes. (not exaggerating) On the little paper it had a warning sign and said if she had those symptoms to go back to urgent care. So we did and they gave her some more medicine ran more tests and then sent us back home with basically the same info as the last visit. Super unhelpful. The next day sister Gregerson seemed to be doing tons better and I thought we would be able to go to church the next day. but then at 10:30 Pm she was doubling over because of this extreme pain in her lower abdomen. She said the pain was unbearable and we ran to the er. The put an IV in her took some blood, urine, and other samples. Then did a cat scan. They gave her some heavy duty pain meds and she was doing ok. But then around one in the morning her pain meds wore off and all heck broke loose. She was in excruciating pain and it took the doctors 30 minutes to give her more pain meds!!!! When they finally did she was ok for like 10 minutes and then she had another pain in her upper abdomen that was ten times worse than before. Yet again it took the doctors 30 minutes to get her a shot and more medicine. I was loosing it. Watching her writhe in pain and crying and basically look like she was dying I freaked out. I kept pushing the nursing call button but there were a bunch of ambulances coming with people dying so they took FOREVER to come and save her. She asked me to say a prayer and I begged heavenly father to make everything ok. The doctors came and settled everything down. they said she had a really bad muscle spasm and that all of her test came back clear and they said that her virus or bug was in her cologne and was causing inflammation. They gave her some MORE drugs and sent us home at 3 in the morning. That was probably one of the most awful nights I have ever experienced. Sister Gregerson was so high on drugs I couldn't understand anything she said to me and she could barely walk in a straight line. I directed her to her bed and she basically slept the entire next day.

We went to a specialist doctor today and they gave her some antibiotics and said it should be all over in a couple of days. I feel so bad that she has had to start off her mission this way. but I already feel super close to her. She is such a trooper and I admire her determination and faith soooo much. I hope and pray all of the craziness is over. It. was.scary!! The mission president's wife told me that I have now been called as the Mission's nurse haha. I really hope not. I don't know how to handle all of this craziness. I will definitely keep you posted on everything next week. But I have to go. Keep sister gregerson in your prayers and thanks so much for all of your support. Love you all

 

Sister Jones

 

Picture of poor sister gregerson in the ER.

Aug. 12th letter. Emergency room, baptism, transfers, 27 lessons and my blog actually gets read!

Yes, This probably has been the craziest week of my mission.

It started off pretty normal, but when wednesday came, for lack of a better term, all heck broke loose!

So on a normal busy day we have about 5 to 6 lessons and we feel like those days were super awesome. This Wednesday we had 10, that's right 10 lessons!! We started off the day by going on splits because we over booked ourselves. Sister Ence went with sister robinson and Sister Ratzlaugh went with me. It was so awesome! We were literally running from appointment to appointment the entire day. We had dinner with a family we love and rushed to a couple last appointments. Little did we know that sister robinson drank some crystal light during dinner. Which has artificial sweetners in it, which she is allergic too....yup.

When we were all finished with our day (or so we thought) I noticed that sister robinson was acting a little strange. I asked her if she was ok and she replied. no....She had a sevear headache and her throat felt like it was closing up, her back was hurting her and she started shaking...Freaked me out! So I called the elders and had them come over to give her a blessing. It didn't seem to do anything so the 1st ward elders called their bishop (who is a doctor) and asked him what they should do?? He said to give her some extra strength tylonel and if that didn't help within 45 mins to an hour that we should take her to the hospital. I called our mission president and his wife like crazy and neither on of them would anwser. (Cause it was midnight and they were sound asleep) After we waited an hour, sister robinson was still doing bad. I knelt down in the living room and prayed to heavenly father that someone would anwser thier phone (cause we need to get permission before we go to the hospital). Finally one of the assistants to the president anwsered their phone the first phone call I made after I said my prayer. They said it was up to me on judging whether or not we go. I was basically already at the hospital when they said that so I was like oookay. We  got in there and the doctors told her that it was a bad allergic reaction and from the stress of the day it made it even worse. They gave her some medicine and a shot and at 3 in the morning the sent us home. It was an extremely exhausting day. Luckily we got ahold of the mission president's wife and she said for us to take it extremely easy the next day so sister robinson could recouperate. She is doing much better now. Man, it was craziness!!!

Another Crazy thing i forgot to tell you last week is that we got a baptism this week!!! My first one!! But not technically haha. That's another funny story. Basically the elders were teaching this little 13 year old girl who is a friend of one of the members in their ward. They didn't know until two weeks ago that she actually lived in our area. So we inherited her. Which was so awesome because she is the sweetest nicest girl ever and you can just see the light of christ glowing within her. She was baptized on saturday at 10 am. It was so wonderful and everything ran so smoothly. There was a GREAT turn out and even one of our investigators came! We are excited to have her in our ward now. :) The craziest thing though is that my district leader gave sister robinson and I blessings about a month ago and he promised us that we would have a baptism. At the time I was shocked because our investigators were getting close to baptism, but I didn't think any of them would be ready by the end of the transfer. So it was so cool to see that promise come true!!!

We had such a spectacular week!! we got 27 lessons!!! So awesome, cause the most we have got is 20. The Lord has blessed us SO MUCH!!!!!

Now I probably should get to the nitty gritty about the news on transfers...........Sister robinson and I are both training.....I am being transfered :(..... I am so sad. It doesn't seem real. I have been saying bye to people but it still hasn't hit me yet. The worst part about it is I have no idea where I am going. I find out tomorrow. Ugh. My mission president is such a tease. On friday night he asked me if I want to know where I am going and I was like "YES!" he said "Well you will find out tuesday" That stinker. The assistants also were giving me a hard time too on saturday night. They told me that I am going to love my new area and that I am going to the best ward in the mission. ( So they are splitting craig 2nd ward right??) they also asked me the other day if I am a dog person? I said yes but they wouldn't tell me why they asked me until saturday. they said it has to do with were I am going. The anticipation is killing me!! But I will find out in less than 24 hours. It is also weird to think that I am leaving sister robinson and that she is training a new little greenie. I know she will do great. Hopefully I trained her well haha.

Oh the last part I wanted to tell you about is about my blog haha. So today I was saying good bye to a recent convert that I love and she was giving me her email and stuff and told me to look her up on facebook when I get home. I told her that she could read my blog so she could read these emails that i sent to you guys. She was asking me what the name of my blog was and when I told her it use to be "Confessions of a poor college student" she was like. "Hey I think I have read that blog before." haha She totally did. Isn't that crazy!! She read the posts before I even left on my mission. I almost fell out of my chair cause I seriously only thought that you lovely people that my mother sends these emails to read my blog. I never thought anybody else but family and friends would really come across it haha. That was so awesome. Made my day! Well besides dying of anticpation. I am doing super super good. Sad to leave but also excited to get to my new area and meet my new companion and find those amazing people the lord is preparing me to teach. I love you all!! Thanks for all of your support. Have a wonderful week!!!

 

 

Love you

Love sister Jones

 

Picture: Savannah Duran's baptism and all of her friends who are supporting her :)

July 29th post. Whew. Exchanges!

I had a really good week this week. We went on exchanges. I went to steamboat springs with Hermana bennett. She is a spanish speaking sister and she has been on her mission for 13 months. She made me sing I am a child of God in spanish to some random strangers haha. It went ok....I think haha. She is Sooooooo awesome! I loved every minute of being with her. She is so loving and kind and super funny. she is 25 and is from Canada. We taught 5 people when I was with her and the spirit was so amazingly strong. She taught me alot while I was with her for that short amount of time. I've been working really hard on teaching just by the spirit and teaching with her helped me alot with that.

Sister Robinson and Sister Remington (hermana bennett's companion) stayed here in craig and they did a great job. I am not worried at all about leaving sister robinson this next transfer. She did a great job. We find out if we are leaving in 2 weeks. I have a feeling that I will be transfered, but I feel like I will be staying close by. I really think that Sister Robinson will be training this next transfer. We need 60 trainers for this next transfer and they are opening up 40 new areas. Super crazy. (I can't remember if i already told you that before)

I am really really enjoying my time here. I finally feel like I am getting the hang of things. I feel the spirit alot more in the lessons we teach and I really feel like we are being guided by the lord's hand in this area.

Last night for example, we taught this couple who has been less active for a really long time. ( I think about ten years.) The husband told us that he became bitter because he works for the city and is in charge of the roads and the garbage and every time he came to church 3 or 4 members would come up to him and complain about how he was running the streets and garbage. He said it happened every.single.time. he went to church. Then when someone in the stake presidency did it to him, he was super fed up and never went back. The wife has been off and on active. But she has a hard time going because her husband doesn't go. We felt prompted to be bold and ask them why they go to church and the husband was honest and said he goes to please his wife and the wife said it was to feel the spirit and cause she knows it's where she is supose to be. We then had an incredible lesson about the savior and how he sacrificed for us so that we could be with our families forever. They both got emotional when we talked about the savior and you could tell they truely had a testimony of Him. We told them that by reading our scriptures, praying, and going to church and keeping the commandments is how we show the savior that we love him and we are willing to follow him. The spirit was so strong it was incredible!! When we left there, I just really truely felt like we helped someone that day. It was the best feeling every.

Well I have to go, but thank you guys so much for your support and your love. I love you guys so much!

 

Love Sister Jones

July 15th post. Are you the missionary your Mother thinks you are?

Dear Everybody,

How was your week? I had a wonderful week. We finally got to meet our new mission president and his wife. President and Sister Murdock. From Bountiful, UT. He owns the Murdock Cheverolet and Murdock Hyundai (I think that's how you spell those two names) They have Ten children! Yup TEN! 7 girls and 3 boys. All of them are married except for 3 of their kids. Their son is on a mission and they have a daughter who just graduated high school, who is going to college this fall and they have another daughter who had a brain injury when she was a baby. So she will be staying with them while they are on thier mission. They seem to be really nice and super pumped to be here. They are really really different than President and Sister Maynes. But I know they will be awesome. 
We had a little devotional and they introduced themselves and gave a little training  then one by one each of us missionaries got interviewed by them. While they were interviewing us the Sister Trainer Leaders and the Assistants to the President trained us some more. So that means I got to see Sister Hatch again!!! Yup she is a sister trainer leader, no suprise there. She told me that she saw sister southern right before the mission split and you will never guess the calling that sister southern got......She is a sister trainer leader too!!! Holy moly that made me almost pee my pants. I never thought in a million years they would call a sister to be in that position so soon. I thought I had months and months before I needed to start worrying about receiving that calling. But now there is a possiblility of me being called to that position next transfer! AHH it makes me super nerous. Also what makes me more nervous is that when I met President Murdock for the first time he told me that he has heard, so many wonderful things about me and that he is so excited that I am here for quite awhile longer. Gulp! I have no idea who is telling him these things because the only sisters and elders i know, except for the ones here, all got transfered to the new mission. I really hope and pray that if i were to ever get called to that position it will be at the end of my mission. If you guys could pray for that too, I would really appreciate it haha.

After the meeting with president Sister Robinson got a priesthood blessing because her arm has been hurting her a lot this week. (she doesn't know what happened to it) She thinks it might be a huge knot in her shoulder that won't go away. Our district leader gave her the blessing and wow it was incredible. She was told that the lord was pleased with her and her companion's work and that we soon will be blessed to see the fruits of our labors. He also told her that if she has more faith in the Lord her arm, will not hinder the work.

During her blessing I really felt prompted to ask my district leader if he would give me a blessing too. Not one of healing, but a comfort blessing. Wow, my blessing was incredible too. Things that I have never discussed with my district leader that I have been worrying about he addressed. The Lord also told me that he was pleased with our efforts and that if we continued faithful we would see the results of our labors. He also told me that there have been many lives that I have touched with out even knowing it. Which really ment alot to me to hear. Later in the week we met with one of our investigators that has been slowly progressing and we weren't sure which lesson to teach him next. But this time he told us that he has been feeling the spirit influence his life so much more. We even put him on date!!! Aw it was so awesome. I have already started seeing my blessing come true. It makes me really appreciate the priesthood and the awareness the lord has on us. I had such a good week, I've told everyone this, but I seriously don't know how they are going to ever make me leave this place. I really feel like I am here with family. I love these people so much. They are starting to actually become a part of me. I really feel like a piece of me will be missing when the time comes for me to leave. I just hope and pray that I can serve as faithfully and work as hard as possible for the time that I have left. I love this work, I love being a missionary and I love the Lord. When Sister Murdock gave a training on how to become a better missionary, she asked us the question, "Are we the missionaries your mother thinks you are?" It was a really good question to think about because I know what my parent's expect out of me and I know who they want me to become. It's a question I need to ask myself daily. Not only ask myself if I am I the missionary my mother thinks I am, but also am I the missionary the Lord wants me to be. I will strive daily to make them proud. To make all of you proud. and to make myself proud. It's tough work, but I know it will be so worth it to step off the plane when I get home and know, that I made everyone proud. Keep being amazing. Keep doing your best. And know that I love all of you!!!

 

Love Sister Jones

July 22nd post. Don't take my sunshine away.

Dearest everyone,

 

Life in the Craig/Baggs area couldn't get any better. Yesterday we went to a return missionaries' homecoming open house. We were invited by his mother and we thought we would tell him congrats, ask for some advice, and then head back to work. When we walked in every person we passed by said "Hey sisters!" We walked into the room where the return missionary was telling stories and talking to people. I glanced around and recongized basically everyone who was there. We shook the rm's hand, told him congrats, and he told us some advice. When he got talking to a lady that had just walked in we went and mixed and mingled with a few other people. On our way out we were stopped by 5 or 6 more people who told us some people we could go visit and asked us how the work was going. When I walked out of that open house it hit me...I feel like I am home. Every single person in that open house felt like family. I don't want to leave. I don't want to have a return missionary open house. I really feel like being a missionary is all I ever want to be. Right now I honestly can't imagine not being a missionary. It feels so great to feel this way. I'll be honest, the very begining of my mission it was hard to put the things of the past or what the future holds behind me and out of my thoughts. But yesterday I realized how much I don't think about those things anymore. All I think about, dream about, or talk about is missionary work. It's the best! It keeps me modivated, It keeps me on task and it helps me try to be the very best I can be. We are being so blessed right now. The investigators we are teaching are progressing so well, new people to teach are popping up all over the place, the members are more anxiously engaged in our work, and I am just so happy. This last week has been so wonderful and I can't wait to see how this coming week is going to be. I love you all. Sorry this email is short, but I've got to run. Keep being awesome! Love you

 

Love Sister Jones

 

Pictures: Sister Robinson and I were waiting for an investigator to show up for a lesson at the park, so we took some pretty hilarious pictures with these widdle of the wood statues haha. Enjoy.

My challenge to you! ;)

I have another awesome story that happened this week. We had a great week. A miracle happened this week.

So two weeks ago we were knocking on doors and we weren't having any luck. We knocked on a ton of doors. We came up to this one guy's door and asked if we could leave a blessing of peace and comfort on his home and family and you will never guess what he said.....yup, he said no thanks. haha We didn't really think much of it because that's what everyone had said on that street. But then! On tuesday this week we were walking to an appointment and the same guy was walking down the road towards us and he says, "Hey I could use a blessing or a message or what ever your giving away." haha and we said, "We would love to give you both!" So we walked over to his house and he told us a little about himself. He said that he is looking for peace and happiness in his life because he has made some really bad decisions in his life and he feels like something is missing. Man, I almost fell out of my seat I was so excited to hear those words. We taught him the restoration and gave him a book of mormon and invited him to church. He said he would read and that he would come to church. Which he did both and now we are teaching him. Walking away from that lesson it felt like Heavenly Father just dropped a golden investigator from the skies right into our path. Wow so amazing! We had a really great week and i'm excited to see the miracles Heavenly Father has in store for us this week.

I hope everyone is enjoying their summer and doing their missionary work ;) Before I have to go I wanted to tell you about one of the most amazing missionaires I have meet on my mission. His name is president Lee and he is 73 years old. Yup he is our Branch president up in Baggs, WY. Every single person we talk to in baggs or the surrounding towns says, "Oh yeah, you ladies are with the church that Howard Lee (president lee) is over. He already gave me a book of mormon and preached to me about it." haha every.single.person says this. and I have no idea when he has time to reach all of these people because he still runs a ranch full time and a construction company. He is constantly opening his mouth and teaching every single person he comes in contact with. I love it. I look up to him so much. He is an incredible person. The craziest part about it is that President Lee was in-active for basically 40 years of his life. He grew up in the church but never really was converted. I'm not sure what changed, but man he doesn't waste one single opportunity to share the gospel. He also studies every day. He has so many scriptures memorized it astounds me. I took a picture of his scriptures and wanted to share them with all of you. I wanted to let all of you know that if a 73 year old rancher, who is busy from sun up to sun down can find time to be a missionary, so can you!!! I know you can and so does the Lord! I want to challenge everyone who reads this email to talk to one, just one, person this week about the gospel. I know the lord will bless you for this effort. I love you all and I hope you have an amazing week. If you have a missionary experiance this week I would absolutely love to hear about it! Feel free to email me about it. Love you!!!! God speed!!!

 

 

LOve Sister Jones

 

P.s. These scriptures are his 3rd set that he has gone through.

July 1st 2013 post.

WE ARE STAYING IN CRAIG!!!!!! Yes I am so happy about that! I really hope we stay for awhile. We are just loving it here so much.

I don't have much time to write cause we are getting our hair cut/trimmed today, but I wanted to tell all of you the best story ever that happened this week.

So we have this less active who hasn't been to church since he was baptized. (which was in the 80s or sometime around then.) His name is Bob. He is super hilarious and we love visiting him. He owns a Landscaping/plant buisness. So in the summer time it is really hard to catch him at a good time cause he is super super busy. He agreed to meet with us for 6 weeks though for at least 20 minutes. So sometimes sister Robinson and i will drive to his office and give him a brief lesson. This last week we called him and he couldn't meet with us, so he asked us to come see him the next day. We called him the next day and he tells us to come over to Barclay street. When we get there and jump out of the car we see bob and one of his workers laying sod on this ladies front lawn. He said, "Girls (in a really loud voice) I made you come over here today to show you This (gestering towards the sod) is why i can't meet with you. I am always busy." We were like ok bob, we will call you tomorrow...Disappointed that we couldn't teach him we started driving home for our lunch break. But as we were driving an idea popped into my head. We called bob when we got home and told him that we had a proposition for him. We asked him if we came and helped him lay the sod down would he come to church this sunday. Before i could even get the words all the way out of my mouth bob was saying, "Well, get your little hineys down here!" So we changed as fast as we could and booked it over there. When we got there Bob turns to his work crew and says, "THese ladies are my mormon sister friends and they are going to help us lay sod today with the mindset that they are getting me to come to church on sunday." haha his crew laughed and we got to work. Bob gave us such a hard time the entire time we were there. Saying stuff like, "ok girls now we need to lay this green side up and cover all of the brown stuff." haha he is such a hoot. So we got to work and we finished within 45 minutes. It was awesome.

So saturday afternoon bob called and double check what time church was and said he was planning on being there. WE were SOOO excited. We wanted to suprise our ward mission leader, cause he had no idea what we did haha......... But the unexpected happened......

Saturday night we had a HUGE wind storm and Bob's neighbor had a tree fall onto her house. Bob called our ward mission leader and told him that he couldn't make it to church, because he also is in the tree removal business and he was planning on taking care of this tree for his neighbor. We were so devistated. I really almost cried I was so dissappointed. We prayed really hard that night that there would be some way for bob to still make it to church.

We walked into sacrament meeting and luckily we had a couple other unexpected investigators show up so we were happy. We went into the lobby to talk to an interpretor for one of our deaf less actives and when we came back into the chapel, you will never guess who's bright and wonderful face was in there smiling at us?! Yup you guessed it! It was bob's!!! Oh man I was so happy. We ran up to shake his hand and he said that his competitor out bid him for the tree removal job on his neighbor's house hahahha! We told him that we prayed super hard he would come and he said he would be sending us the bill that we owed him now for not getting the job. We assured him that the Lord was going to pay him back. Aw man it was so wonderful. I love when things like that happen. Well I better get going, but know that I love you guys and Keep being amazing. Live close to the lord and never stop trusting Him!

 

 

Love Sister Jones

P.s Picture #1 My adorable cup that my mom made with orange juice in it :)

Picture #2 a really pretty sunset day