Soggy Letters and The Ultimate Wireless Connection

 My letter blew into the pond.  Sister Salvesen let me fish it out with her crutch!

 Dessert with the Sherwood's at Cracker Barrel

 Me & Swampy!

District P-Day!  The Sherwood's made us breakfast and we played games.

 Elder Sherwood fixing our light!

 We couldn't believe he climbed up on a chair on a table!

 More Florida wildlife!

 Bea brought us roses and chocolate covered pretzels when we had a rough day!

 Love this sign! Prayer: The ultimate wireless connection

We stole Steve's cigarettes and put scriptures on all of them!

Cleaning Steve's wounds!

I can't even tell you how great it was to make him cry 

after how much heartache he caused me!

When we gave him his made-over cigarettes!

His face was priceless!

He still gave us roses!

Steve's pool that he stupidly/drunkenly jumped in after his accident.

I don't even know who took this, but I thought it was cute!

Temple tour with Michael!  :)

Rainbow!  :)

Saying goodbye to Steve and Eric!  :(

Saying goodbye to Grace!

Getting ice cream with the Bullock's, our ward mission leader.

They are just the cutest little family!

Saying goodbye to Ed!

Saying goodbye to Nick, Kelly & Luke!  :(  That was hard!

Sister Allred, one of my roommates and friends!

Saying goodbye to the Elders I served with in Cocoa Ward!  

They were so great!  Elders Lindstrom & Reneer

My trainee!!!  :)  Sister Rogers!

I am loving this quote on our fridge!

My cute companion :)

The view out our window!

School is in Full Swing! :)

 Hey all!

 Oh my gosh I have the most stunning/sharp family! Thank you so much Brenda for sending those pictures from the first day of school! I hope school has started off great for all of you, and for those who it hasn't started yet, best of luck! :) I can definitely say I am glad I'm not going! However, school here started today, and I feel like I might as well be going because of how much it affects us as missionaries! Families won't be home as much during the day now. And not to mention we bike by the high school and like 3 middle schools and elementary schools a day! It's gonna be hard going past that football field...makes me miss the glory days of CV football!! ;)

 My quote for the week:

"There is no man or woman in this church who is not on a mission. That mission will last as long as they live, and it is to do good, to promote righteousness, to teach the principles of truth, and to prevail upon themselves and everybody around them to live those principles that they may obtain eternal life." -my boy, Pres. Brigham Young ;)

It's so true. Even if you are just planting seeds, which is what we are doing a lot of right now! :)

So it was kind of a weird week. It seemed like we had a lot of meetings. And didn't do much proselyting. But that's okay! This week will actually be pretty similar since we have zone conference. Which should be great. We had trainer follow up meeting this week, which is where we basically just go and get encouragment for our training. So that was cool. I didn't really need it because my trainee is awesome. But it was fun seeing everyone.

 

 

 So our mail has been like lost for the past 3 weeks. We finally found out it has been going to the elders apartment! I was mad. But it's all figured out now :) We got to help an older couple with yardwork this week, which was so fun! No one ever lets us help with anything, as I've mentioned before, so were very happy! We have a couple more opportunities to serve this week, so that should be good :)

 

So Christy, the miracle fiance of a less active guy, we got to meet with twice this week. She loves the Book of Mormon already, and it super excited to learn and become a part of this church! They met with the bishop and set up a wedding date for August 31! :) They asked us to be their witnesses! We are SO stoked! :) That also means we get to buy new outfits! You can't go to a wedding in old clothes, right? And there is a huge shopping center here in Waterford Lakes, so it should be a fun P-day activity :) She is also planning on being baptized the day after, on September 1, so they can be sealed as close as possible to their anniversary! :) Super super cool. Hopefully we will find more people to teach this week :)

I usually write down things I want to tell you about from my journal, but I forgot/didn't have time, so that is all I really have to say this week! Stay cool ;) I love you all and keep you in my prayers!

 Love, Sister Lowry

Coming Right Along!

 

My favorite place by the river in Cocoa

 

Hey all! :)

I hope you all had/are having a great end of summer! I am sad school is starting because that means the kids won't be home during the day when we tract, and therefore we find less families :( But that's okay, most people don't answer anyways haha! ;) I think I scare them off because I always have sweat dripping down my face all day long. My companion thinks I'm gross. She doesn't sweat ha. :) I love her so much though. We are gonna be good friends for life I think!

This week was another rough, hot week of finding! :) But, we had an awesome stake meeting last night where our mission president talked more about how it's the members responsibility to find. It sounds like my dad had something similar to that? The church is true and perfect everywhere! :) I loved what was said about how you don't have to be good friends with people to share the gospel with them, you just have to have some kind of relationship! Another guy also said something I loved, it will be my quote for the week! :)

 

 "If you're still sharing mission experiences from your mission, you need to get some more mission experiences!"

 

Let's see, we got a brand new 2013 Toyota Corolla to share with the Elders. I was pretty excited about that. Not the sharing part. But i like biking too. My butt just hurts from my crappy seat! But a guy in the ward is getting us new seats :) We tracted this one street this week with no success. There were a couple really rude people who told us we knew nothing about Jesus Christ and that it was a no soliciting area. So that sucked. But Sister Rogers realized that night that the people right after those people were always the really nice ones who needed our prayers with them! (We ask if we can leave blessings on their homes and families when we knock on doors).  So that is like stupid satan always trying to get us down and discouraged, but if we continue to do the Lord's work he will always help us! :) That same day we totally wrecked into each other on our bikes, right in the middle of an intersection, and fell all tangled. That was a good time! :) Even though we had like no success tracting or visiting less actives this week, it was okay! I was reminded of the sons of Mosiah again who got cast out of everywhere they went, but they just kept right on truckin'! And they finally were able to see success....

Speaking of success! Coolest stories! :) There is a family, I might have mentioned them, the Holts. They moved in and a friend of theirs from Idaho emailed our bishop, so we went over there to visit them and invite their girls to Young Womens! Their friend who emailed bishop sent him another email, which he shared with us! I will copy and paste! :)

Dear Bishop Hillis,

I just wanted to pass along what I just read of facebook.

Two sweet young Sister Missionaries found their way to the Holt house today and the girls are excited to go to Mutual on Wednesday evening. Thanks be to the one who led them here Vickie Miller Grover you're a success!! 
This just made my day!  Thank you for helping to make this happen.  She said both sisters were from Utah and fairly fresh out of the MTC.  She said she'll watch over them for the next 15 months until they get to go back to their mommas.  
Thanks again!
Vickie Grover

How cool is that?! :)

Another story. So we were having a lesson with a couple recent converts, and we got a voicemail that we listened to after. It was from a less active named Alex who we left a note on his door the week before when we tried to visit but no one was home. (We do that alot). Anyway, he asked to call him back. When we did he mentioned that that him and his fiance had been discussing where to get married right about the time we left our note, so he decided to call us. He said he hadn't been to church in a long time, but he knows that marriage is only until death do us part, but in the temple is for eternity! So his wife agreed to be married in the mormon church, not catholic church, and also agreed to take the lessons and be baptized!!! :) So, we get to participate in a wedding, and when they go get sealed in a year we can both go!! :) Oh my gosh we were freaking out!! So we are going to meet them tonight!! :) Just goes to show that the Lord rewards us for our hard work, even if the results are not direct! :)

My sign in Cocoa!

I got a little heat exhaustion this week. Sister Salvesen, my last companion who got hit by a car, is getting sent home this week :( I am so so sad for her. But knowing her she will be back out quick! She is a great missionary and needs to get healed up, so she will! We found a new investigator for the Elders in our ward, so that was awesome! :) We also taught our maintenance guy about the restoration and the temple! So we are trying to find something else in the apartment that needs fixing so we can get him back to follow up on his Book of Mormon reading! :)

I love being a missionary. I love this gospel. It is truer than true. And I love all of you! :)

Love,
Sister Lowry

The Land of WET!!

Hellooo! :)

Wow. I just am so happy to be hearing all this good news from everyone!! First of all, are prayers answered or what?! I had been praying for rain for you guys, and look what happened!! I had been praying for Toni to find a place, and look what happened!! At least there are miracles happening over in Utah! I am still waiting on them over here haha! I guess we are both the lands of WET now! I am always wet. Sweat from about noon-4. Then rain during the late afternoon! Man it's so fun. My quote for the week is one that was on our fridge when we moved in to our new apartment, and it is helping me so much! :)

 "The challenges ahead of you are not nearly as great as the power behind you." -J. Reuben Clark

How comforting is that? It kinda goes along with my favorite scripture, D&C 84:88 :)

Ah! Where do I start?! Well, first off. Saying goodbye to everyone in Cocoa on Monday was like so sad. Almost as sad as leaving home haha! They were like my new family! And that is the first place we are going back to visit when we come back to Florida! I am sending some pictures on my flash drive today, but I said goodbye to Steve, Eric, Grace, Nick and Kelly, the Bishop and ward mission leaders’ families. Man, it was rough. But I just had done all I needed to there, and the Lord needed me in Waterford Lakes! :)

Which brings us to Tuesday! We had transfers in Orlando, and we got our trainees!! :) I absolutely LOVE Sister Rogers! Ok, we are like best friends. We have so many things in common! It's so weird but so great! She is such an example to me! She loves to work, and she stays so positive! What we have been doing (tracting and street contacting) is not what she expected missionary work to be like at all, but she doesn't get discouraged or negative ever! I am just so impressed with her. I don't even feel like I'm training; I just feel like she is another companion!

And the area! It is super nice here! Not even close to Cocoa/Titusville! That was like a little more ghetto, and this area (Waterford Lakes) is like all gated communities. Yeah. Ask me. So we have to like sneak in through the gate on our bikes or ask members for the codes to their neighborhoods! It's like very eastern Orlando, so actually not far from Cocoa. It's beautiful. Lots of trees and lakes and pretty houses. We have been on bikes all week because we share a car with the Elders who we split the area with. So we got to know the area pretty well. But my butt hurts soooo bad. BUT! I'm losing weight!! :) Yay! :) And, Sister Rogers did cross country, so we run every morning! :) The Elders just barely baptized all their investigators before we got here, so we are basically starting from scratch! Which means a lot of knocking on doors! Which has not been very successful, but we are just being obedient and doing all we can. We know the Lord will eventually compensate for our efforts if we keep working hard!

Oh, the apartment was gross when we got here. The Elders said it was clean. But obviously our definitions of "clean" are quite different. So we cleaned and unpacked and that was about it! Wednesday we got to meet some members of the ward and hang out with the young women after our coordination meeting with the ward mission leader. This ward is really great! But it's like all youth and kids! Complete opposite of Cocoa! So that is kinda cool! The Elders drive me a little insane... :) Well, mostly the district leader. He is just so uptight! I told him to loosen the freak up and stop stressing so much! He is getting there haha :)

Thursday and Friday and Saturday we basically biked our whole area, which was a lot of miles. I would say we have biked close to 80 miles in the past week. We met a cute little family who we prayed with on the doorstep. The little girl did gymnastics and I told her that I did too! Then I got to teach her how to pray, so that was a cool experience :) We are going over there tonight to teach them! :) We get bugs splattered all over our faces a lot. And we got caught in a rainstorm the other night. Basically everything in my backpack got wet. :(

Anyway, I'm just loving it! We got like no mail this week, but I got a ton of emails! So thank you all for that! I'm just gonna finish up so I can reply to some of you! :) Best of luck with school and work preparations! I miss and love you all so much! :) xoxo

Love,

Sister Lowry