#bless September 19, 2016

Well this week has been a pretty good one. Lots of miracles and fun times were had.

Before I begin I forgot to tell you something that I found out last week that made my day. Allison got baptized! I don't know if you remember her but she was the one Sister Hudson and I found right before my car accident. I am a little sad they didn't invite me to her baptism but I am so excited for her. She is awesome!

Tuesday we did a mission wide car fast and so we were biking for most the day. We had a lot of fun, for the most part. Nothing too miraculous happened that day but I think we were blessed later for it. We talked to a lot of people and it was a nice day for biking. We even handed out a Book Of Mormon and ran into the cutest lady and her son who are now new investigators. So that is pretty cool. I will talk about them later though! But here was the not so fun part for me. I don't know if you know this about me but I don't really like being wet in the rain. Sometimes it's fun. But when you have to bike 30 mins home in pouring rain, not so fun. I am kicking myself though cause if we would have started heading home when I was prompted to, we would not have been so wet and cold and sore. But alas, we got soaked. And I actually felt pretty sick from that so that was not fun. But looking back on it I can laugh a little. We got to visit with Benji after that so that was good. He is doing so well and is so excited to be baptized this Saturday! He has a countdown. It's so cute. He is already a great member missionary too!

Not much happened on Wednesday except some service. Except I think I am allergic to horses cause my allergies go crazy when ever we go through. JK I know its the dust and stuff but I will blame the horses. Speaking of, I have tried like 5 different medications and nothing is helping my allergies. So now I just have this cronic stuffy nose that is driving me insane... 

Thursday we had a pretty bomb zone meeting. I learned a lot. And our zone leaders got us matching zone t-shirts so that is pretty fun. Also I found out that Sister Dennis is now in Parker. Sadly because of and ET but I am excited that she is closer to me. And I get to see her today because of zone pday! Woot woot! But we got to teach one of our less active members and she is such a sweetheart. I just feel so bad for her. Her family is super anti and don't know that she got baptized and she feels like she is living a double life. Its so sad. So we ended up talking a lot about the Atonement and boy am I grateful for that. When we can learn how to personally tap into the power of the Atonement, we are free. And it is so personal because everyone has their own personal relationship with God, and thank goodness for that. We also found a new investigator, Jackie. We actually tracted into her like two months ago but finally got to teach her. She actually has a lot of the same beliefs as us and so hopefully she makes time for the Gospel to learn more. 

Friday was a long day of contemplation and realization for me. And I realized that Satan is very sneaky and powerful, when we let him be. And I also learned that the little things are so important to do. Little acts of kindness and obedience go a long way. And there are a ton of scriptures to support that. 

Saturday was a pretty good day. I was having an off day and had the tendency to say really awkward things but that's OK. That was when we got to visit with Shea and Sabian, the two we ran into on Tuesday. They have the coolest story. Well, it's not that cool, but very inspiring to me. They came from Alabama and their adventure to get here is crazy. They have been through so many hard things just to get here but they still love God and know he is watching out for them. And Sabian is 10 and is just so adorable. But I love to hear the stories of those people that go through so much and basically have nothing but are as happy and content as they can be. They are truly humble. And it's a lesson I need to learn everyday. So they are awesome!

Sunday was a fun day. We had the primary program in one of our wards and Shea and Sabian came to Church. They were really overwhelmed so I don't think they had the best experience but hopefully that doesn't deter them from learning. We also talked all about marriage in both Relief Society meetings. Fun

stuff. We also had a great lesson with Benji at the Ogdens again. They are just the best. There are some really great people here. And I just love them!

Well this week is probably going to be a stressful one with getting ready for Benji's baptism but I am so excited for him. He has come so far!

Anyway keep being disciples of Christ and loving God. Love to you all!

Much love,

Sister Richards

Soaking wet after.....

Benji got us razors:) haha

Yes, time flies! September 12, 2016

Last Temple Day.  It was very windy...

You are totally right Mom, time does fly indeed. So I will tell you about the time we had this week!

I will start with Wednesday. We had an amazing Zone Conference. It was really fun too cause all the Sisters were in the same meeting because of the Temple open house help we have been doing. So I got to see all of my companions in one meeting. Sadly didn't take a picture but it was great. There were also some really great musical numbers too. Gotta love those harmonizing skills. But let me tell you some things that I learned. The biggest thing I learned is how important love is in doing the Lord's work. Love is the driving force. But it's not just love for the people we teach but also love for the Gospel and for Jesus Christ, and the difference between love, the noun, and love, the verb. Something else that was really prominent to me was being a disciple of Jesus Christ. I'm trying to be like Jesus. What would Jesus do? It was all just very good and eye opening. Our President's son was our guest speaker. That was awesome! He mainly talked about no regrets on the mission and working hard. Really great! I learned a butt ton! So that was a really good meeting. And everyone sang happy birthday to me so that's a plus! :)

Not much happened on Thursday. We got to meet with one of our investigators, Danielle. She even fed us dinner so that was awesome! She is so sweet! She is kind of hard to read right now but hopefully she reads the Book Of Mormon and prayers and just feels the Spirit so hard. That's basically the highlight of that day.

Friday was our last day at the Temple open house, which is where I sent those pictures to you! Did you get the one with me and my companion? Anyway that was super fun. On the way up to the Temple I was just thinking that it would be really cool if I could see someone from Henderson there and lo and behold God answers prayers. I got to see Sister Gilson! She is seriously my favorite. I just love her so much and I was so happy to have seen her. But we also got to go through the Temple one last time with President and Sister Mendenhall actually so that was awesome! We had an interestingly unpleasant experience though after dinner. We tried by a less active member's  house and no one answered so we went somewhere else but then I felt like we should go back to that same street and try the corner house. I didn't know what I was doing but nothing came of it. But as we were walking back to our car to go home, we saw the lights on in the house of the less active member we had tried previously. So we knocked on it again and you could hear lots and lots of screaming. It was hurting my soul. So they finally answered and we, of course, got yelled at. But I wish they would have just listened. We had a solution for them that no amount of screaming was going to take care of. So that was just an interesting experience for me and I learned something from it, even though she yelled at us and rejected us.

Sunday we had ward conference in one of our wards and it was amazing. I again learned a lot about love

Beautiful Sunset

and being a disciple of Christ. It was really good. And to look at the little miracles and tender mercies that happen every day! They are there, we just have to look for them and be grateful for them. Oh and there was a musical number that was to die for. I was blown away. We actually taught his daughter after church and just talked all about singing. I think he was in Vocal Point once. But he just didn't want to tell me. But he told me to keep singing, which of course I will do. Its the best! :)

Anyway that was our week. Not much happened but I learned a lot. And I will definitely pray for those people. Thanks for all the love and support! I hope you all have a great week. I will leave you with something to remember. Comparing yourself to a pencil, remember 1. that everywhere you go you leave a mark. 2. you can always correct your mistakes 3. the inside or core is the most important part and what matters 4. you have to go through painful sharpening but its to make you better and 5. you must allow yourself to be guided by the person that holds you. Think about that one!

Much love,

Sister Richards

Beautiful Sunset

My MTC district together at zone conference. Well at least the ones that came out with me.
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Parker Zone plus Elder Coberly

Last Temple Day--Sister Mendenhall

So I hurt myself this morning. My closet cut out a huge chunk of my finger today. But don't worry, superman made it all better. My hero! :)

 

Blessings of the Temple! September 6, 2016

Sadly this is the only picture from this week... I need more! I did the math one day and I found out that I needed to take 55 pictures every day to fill my card by the end of my mission... here comes random pictures

Well glad to hear you had a great time in Colorado, Mom. It's a good thing I had no idea!! Geez!

Well this week we didn't really have a lot of time to do much! We were up at the Fort Collins Temple helping with the open house Monday, Wednesday, and Friday! So that was really awesome! And I got to see lots of people from my past wards! And this one less active family recognized me before I even saw them so that made me happy! And yes, the temple is beautiful! I love being able to go there and help out. There really is such a Spirit there even though it hasn't been dedicated yet. It makes me happy. And whenever we are the last tour we get to go through the Temple and it is just so awesome! I love being in the Bride Room and the Celestial Room. They are really amazing! The Baptistery is really pretty, too. It's small but very detailed. And the crystals on the chandeliers are my favorite. I just love the Temple!!

Tuesday we had a pretty good District Meeting. Our new missionary gave his first training on being a consecrated missionary. It was pretty good. I did a role play with him and he was so nervous, poor guy. But I'm sure he will do great things. 

We did get to teach a less active girl on Wednesday and that was really cool. She is just so ready to start trying. She wants us to come over and to bring the Spirit to her home. You don't get that a lot here. She is super sweet! I think it's going to be a slow process for her but I think she will get there. 

Thursday was really our only day to do missionary work. And we got a new investigator from it. We were running back and forth between both Wards pretty much every hour. It was insane. But we talked with one of our investigators, Sharon, who likes to contradict herself sometimes. Very confusing. She believes in what we do, she just doesn't think she needs to be Mormon to believe it. Interesting. Then we taught a Hindu lady. Let me tell you, teaching Hindus is hard but she loves Jesus so that's cool. Except she dropped us so not so cool. That's the fastest investigator I think I have had. Found her Sunday and got dropped on Thursday. Dang... But our new investigator is Danielle. She is super sweet! It started with her telling us we could come back cause of her kids, but then her kids went to play dress up and she had all the questions. And we basically taught a principle from every lesson before we just asked to share the whole thing. So she said we could. Her ex-husband was a member so she is familiar but is interested in learning more. Her husband now is a quiet soul. Very interesting. I am hoping that he will find God again as we come over more and more. Then we taught Benji. He is progressing so well. He gets all emotional when we pray and he is so excited for his Baptism. It's going great with him. He just likes to talk a lot. But we have a great sass relationship. He says I give him the "mom look" which I don't know what he is talking about but whatever. He's awesome.

Saturday was a bit crazy. We found another investigator who is Muslim. But I don't think it's going to go very far with this one either but we will just have to wait and see what happens I guess. They have very similar beliefs as us so that's cool. 

Sunday was back and forth again. We had back to back appointments like every half hour. Crazy. But I love visiting with Brother Ogden and his daughter Sister Grieves. I don't know if I have ever talked about them before but they are just awesome. I always learn so much when I go over there. Their whole family is just going through so much right now it's ridiculous. But they also have so much faith. And I love to hear stories from Sister Grieves' mission. We just shared our favorite scriptures this last time and Brother Ogden shared Luke 9:62, which I just came across recently and it's just awesome. And it makes me think of Meet the Robinsons. (love that movie). But we cant go back to our old self. All we can do is move forward. It's like President Uchtdorf always says, start where you are. I just love that.   

Anyway I love you all and I love the work. This Gospel truly is amazing and I couldn't imagine my life without it. Thank you for all the support you give to me so that I could be here serving the people of Colorado! Love you all! And love Jesus!

Much love,

Sister Richards

Ok so we were going through a car wash and they had monkeys at the end and I flipped out. I don't know if you know but I hate monkeys. It was like they were going to come in the car and attack me... not cool!

That's all she wrote.....August 30, 2016

First off, sorry we didn't get to email yesterday because we were helping with the Fort Collins Temple open house all day. So that was fun!

But this week was pretty good. Things are finally picking up so it's going pretty good. 

Tuesday we got a new investigator! Her name is Sharon. She is the sweetest older lady ever. And what is even better, she believes in pretty much everything we do. She believes in the Book of Mormon and that there is a prophet. But she doesn't think she needs to be Mormon to believe that. Which is true but it's not all about the beliefs, its the Ordinances and the lifestyle. So we will see what happens with her. She is so sweet though!

Wednesday we went to help out at the Temple again. That was a good time. Except having to wake up at 4:30 in the morning. That was not fun. I don't like being up before the sun. So there is not much to talk about that day. Except I got to see a lot of my old friends. Missionaries and members from past wards! That makes me happy! But we had a really fun dinner with the Giles. They are so cute, especially their daughter. She has the cutest giggle and was telling us about how they put their dog in a princess dress. That was funny. Anyway we did find another investigator after dinner. We only got halfway through our lesson when he had to go but hopefully we will help him. He already bailed on us so that's lame but we will see.

Thursday we had District Meeting and we have a new missionary in our district! I love new missionaries. They are so fun! But our whole meeting was about helping people overcome addiction. That was very interesting. I want to try something in Preach My Gospel about giving up a bad habit, for example, eating too much, to see how hard it is. Let me tell you, I failed the very first day. Haha but I will try again... maybe. Anyway we had a pretty good lesson with some less active members. They are from Trinidad. They are so cool. Super sweet too.

Lunch with Benji

We also had a really good lesson with Benji. He is just progressing so nicely. We just talked about some commandments and he just loves it. He is so excited to learn and do what we ask, it's great. And then we had a pretty terrible lesson with another set of investigators, Jeff and Marianne. All I'm gonna say is that it turned into a mild bible bash and they don't really listen to us. Plus it didn't help that our member kept bringing some things up that didn't need to be brought up. And then Jeff got insulted twice. Sigh. It was very frustrating and of course I cried after cause I just can't handle when people want to bash. I have nothing against them but what I know. But that was very frustrating. 

Friday we got to see another investigator who actually dropped us. But it was going to happen anyway. But she still is the sweetest lady ever and will feed us whenever! We also had a ward pool party and that was kind of a bust. There were no non-members there so we didn't really stay long. But the food was good. 

I hate rain

Saturday was a really good day. We talked to a lot of people. We were tracting and asked if we could do service for a lady and she said no, so we moved on. But then when we were walking by again she came out and changed her mind. So we helped her with some small things around the house and said a prayer with her for her health. So she gave us lots of candy. But it was cool because you could see a difference in the husband as we were there. He was not as friendly when we first got there but as the time went on he seemed very grateful. Gotta love it. We also had a lesson with a less active member that we don't really know if he is a less active member. He said he was baptized but never really went after that. But his wife is not a member and she is a social worker so has a hard time believing in a God with all that she sees. I totally get it. But we talked a lot about the Book of Mormon and I really felt strongly that they would be blessed from reading it and I know that the Book of Mormon is truly an amazing book. It can help us in everything. So that was good. I hope they want to continue to learn. He has a lot of potential. 

Sunday was a great day! Church was great. All about marriage and Temples... But I will skip to what happened. We found a new investigator. But the story is so cool. We knocked on her door and knew that she was Hindu but before we even said anything she invited us into her home. I was dumbfounded. So we taught her the Restoration and she loved it. She is a Hindu that loves

Jesus and you can even see the testimony she has of him in her eyes. She was so excited to read the Book of Mormon too! It was just really cool. I don't know how this is going to work out but I have hope that it will. And with God, it will!

It was good to hear about the many adventures you are having. I hope you all continue to love God and have faith in Christ's Atonement! I love you all!!

Much love,

 

Sister Richards

Beautiful Sunset!!!

The winds of change in pictures August 22, 2016

Benji

I thought it was funny that a pile of dirt was sold...

We tried to be cute...

We were in the middle of a storm

Benji got us so many gobstoppers.... Its a problem

Our rock friend Chuck :)

This story is rather funny. I was running in socks, slipped and hit my ankle on the door frame. But I also had to do my exercises so I had to warm up my arm. That is the short version of the story

This grasshopper wouldn't come off our car even when we were driving so we named it...
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The winds of change! August 22, 2016

Well, it's transfers but it doesn't feel like transfers cause Sister Larson and I are staying together for another transfer in Parker. This is so unheard of for me. But it's gonna be good. But let me tell you about this very awesome week!

Monday we got to go to the Fort Collins Temple open house. They did a special tour for the missionaries in our mission to take their investigators up to the open house. It was so good. It took the whole day but it was totally worth it. We took Benji with us and he loved it. The temple is so pretty and the Spirit there was just amazing. I was getting excited with just being on the grounds. So good.

Tuesday we had a good day. We had a lesson with Maria. I don't know if I have told you about her. She is Catholic but is a very spiritual person and very sensitive to the Spirit. She actually texted us that day and basically dropped us but we decided to go teach her anyway. So we went and actually taught the Restoration and she said she needed to read more and pray about it before she dropped us. So that was a miracle. And a blessing. We also had the funniest dinner ever with the Crawford's. It was like being home. The two girls just reminded me of me and the Phat sisters doing what we do. Like that one time I was telling that story of when I got really sick while we were home for one of the funerals. Remember that? Anyway it was just super chill and we just laughed and laughed. It was great.

Wednesday was kind of not so eventful. We did lots of service and said lots of unnecessary goodbyes to Smores. Haha. But we did get to talk to a lot of people. We actually met a member that we had put down to go see but then decided not to. So I guess we needed to see them so God brought them to us. That was cool. We also had a lesson with a less active member and that was very interesting. It has been a long time since I have actually taught a less active member. But he is a very interesting one. He served a mission but then after he just stopped going to Church one day. He said he doesn't really know why but he always had questions that he was not getting answers to. So it was interesting. I think he just stopped doing the basics and let his doubts win. Stupid Satan. He is not interested in coming back anytime soon but he says that he is still Mormon cause that's how he grew up and it's a part of who he is. So that was confusing. Maybe one day.

Not much happened on Thursday. Just District Meeting. And that was good. Actually we did have kind of a cool experience. We met a less active member, finally, that just found out that he was getting a divorce, which is no bueno. But he told us that we were the second ones to show up that day from the Church. It's a sign bro, come back to Church. Anyway he was so nice and was even trying to give us referrals but just isn't ready to walk through the doors yet. I have hope for him someday. 

Friday was great! We got called to help out with the Temple open house. They needed more sisters to help so they called us to help. It was a little stressful because we got called after they did training but it was really great. We just got to talk to people and I saw a lot of members from my past areas so that was really awesome! That took all day :)

Saturday was the miracle day of the week. We did some service with horses again (why?!). But then we didn't really have a lot of time to do anything. But we did have time to have a lesson with Benji and put him on date for baptism!! Woot woot! It was really cool. We were just talking and asking about how things are going and then I just asked him to be baptized and he said yes. It was so simple. Why did it take so long? But he really has come a long way and is progressing well. So that is great! And now we are going to still be here to see him get baptized! We are so excited for him. September 24th here we come!

Well, that is our week. I feel things are changing for this next transfer and we are going to be on fire. I love you all and I love being able to see the difference the Gospel makes in people's lives. It truly does make a difference and this really is the truth!

Live long and prosper!

Much love,

Sister Richards