July 15th, 2013

Hello Everyone!

So, we had transfers this week. Sister Farnsworth and I got the call that we are both staying, but then last Monday night we got a call saying we were going to be put into another trio. So we now have Sister Ryser with us as well. Its weird being in a trio again, but its fun! Sister Ryser came out the transfer after me and she is great!

For my birthday we had cake and a lesson with Robin, that was great! :] then we taught lessons and had an awesome steak dinner with the Griffith's. She bought me an ice cream cake because she didn't know I went off of ice cream, so I felt really bad because it was an expensive dairy queen one. So we had some ice cream cake, I am still going to stay off of ice cream, but I guess my birthday was an exception. Its not as great as I remember, so that was kind of nice. I thought I would crave it all the time if I had a little bit, but I don't. Then we just had more lessons. I got lots of mail and I am so thankful to all of you that sent me things! You are so awesome! THANK YOU! I apologize if I cant get a handwritten thank you to all of you, please understand I don't have tons of time :] but I am grateful! Oh, and I did get my free Slurpee, don't worry!

As for the rest of the week, it was awesome! We had 3 baptisms this week! Bryan got baptized, he is 20 and just super awesome! His friend in the ward got married this week and she was in town for two days this weekend before she went back to live in Utah with the new hubby, so he wanted to get baptized while she was in town! Luckily, he was so well prepared that we were able to make that possible for him. It was an awesome day, then we got permission to go to the reception that night and we got to see President and Sister Weaver so I will pull some pictures off of the mission blog and send them with this. :]

Then on Sunday we had our other 2 baptisms. We had Jacob and Bella's baptism. They are the cutest little things! Jacob is 10 and Bella is 8. Sarah, their mom was baptized a year ago and hasn't been very active since. But she is fully active now and the kids are so happy!

Overall a pretty awesome week for me! The work in this ward is growing so rapidly and we are so excited and happy to be able to be working hard and teaching every day! :]

Love you all!

Love, Sister Falkner

Picture 1- Bryan

Picture 2- Us and President Weaver!

July 8th 2013

Hello!! :]

So this week was just fabulous!!

Jacob and Bella are being baptized on Sunday the 14^th and I cant wait for that, they are so adorable!!

Brian is wanting to be baptized and is praying about the 20^th. He also wants to be baptized while his friend is still in town and so it might be pushed up to this week, so that would be great!! He is so solid and has been prepared by the Lord! It makes me so happy! This ward hasn't seen a baptism in over a year and they are so excited that they are getting some now!! We have been working hard and trying everything to find the people ready to hear our message and we are being so blessed and are finding them all over! We got 5 referrals this week, so that will be awesome! :]

For the 4^th of July we went tracting in the morning and then had to weekly plan. We went to a missionary BBQ with the senior couple in the area and played some football, that was a blast and super yummy food. Then we went over to a ward neighborhood party and played volleyball with some ward people. It was a blast! We had a lot of fun and really enjoyed our day! One of our sweet ward members, Brother McDonald left flowers and a nice note with flags on our porch that night, he is a convert and is so appreciative of the work we do, its really nice!

Well, as most of you should know, its my birthday this week!! YAY! I'll be out of my teen years! So, don't forget to go to 7-11 on Thursday and get yourself a free Slurpee in my honor! President gave me permission to go get a free Slurpee so don't worry, I get to celebrate a little bit too! :]

If you want to do anything for me for my birthday... I would just love to hear from you so just write me! And if you wanna go the extra mile, you can send me your favorite conference talk, because I love reading those!! :] for my birthday we will be having a lesson with all of our investigators :] and then we have a dinner with my favorite member, Sister Griffith's. She is so sweet and I'm really excited! I bought key lime pie to take to district meeting on Wednesday because I really wanted some key lime pie for my birthday, so I got myself some! It will be great!

We are getting a lot of new potential this week and it is really exciting!! I love this area sooooo much and am so happy to be here! There is a lot of work to be done!! Ohh and we got transfer calls this week, my companion and I are both staying :] yay! Love you all! Thanks for everything!

Have a great week!!!

Love, Sister Falkner!

July 1st 2013

So last week I gave you the gist on the people I am teaching and its changed already! So here is the update!

Laurie dropped us :( but she still wants to visit once in a while, she is looking into a different church and said if she doesn't really like it she will call us back, so we are waiting! ;]

Mike is doing awesome!!! He gave up coffee this week, so we gave up sugar to support him. He got a blessing for it and is doing really well. President Weaver came to one of our lessons with Mike and it went so well! President was able to answers some of Mike's questions that he has had for a while and he was at church in our ward for the first time Sunday (he had been going to a different ward before) we shared the article on personal prayer in the June ensign with him and he really liked it! When he started the lessons he didn't even believe in prayer, he is doing soo great!!! I love teaching him!!

Robin is a non member that feeds us every week and has a son out on a mission. She doesn't really have an interest in joining the church but that's because she doesn't know enough yet! She has some brain issues due to an aneurism she had last year, she loves learning though so we will keep teaching her! She is having us over for lunch on my birthday and asked me what kind of cake I wanted, I told her I was good with anything that included cream cheese frosting, so she suggested she buy me a cheesecake!!!! :] Mmm so that's what I will be getting for lunch for my birthday! She is so sweet!!

Jacob is doing great. We started teaching his sister as well and they are now both on date for July 13^th We had to push is back a week because Bella (the little sister) wanted to be baptized with him and they needed a little more time to go through the lessons because they went out of town this last weekend. But they are awesome and Sarah (the mom) is active again and loves it!!

We got a new investigator this week! His name is Brian and he has been at church the last two weeks, he is 20 and home for the summer from college, he is really good friends with an awesome family in the ward (the Olsen's) he has read the first 15 chapters of the Book of Mormon and says it has the same feeling as the Bible. He agrees with everything we are teaching him and really likes it! He is super solid! :]

Ashley is still doing great, she took us out for lunch and she brings her own fellowship to the lessons now! Haha its so easy for us! I hope her parents soften up soon and let her be baptized! That's about it. For the people we are teaching! This ward is so great, they help us out a ton and feed us well!

My companion and I have been sick this week, its really hard. She was sick earlier on in the week and right when she was getting over it, I got it. So I am sick.. its no fun! But we went to Sister Griffith's yesterday morning and she gave us all the goods to get us better. She is my favorite, she is so good to the missionaries! She was in Utah this last week and we missed her homemade bread in sacrament meeting, and her! But she is back now!! :] Last night my companion gave me a pedicure, she went to cosmetology school and said that pedicures are her favorite, so I couldn't reject when she offered to give me one! It was so nice!! :]

That's about all! I love you tons! Have a fabulous 4^th of July!!! :]

Love, Sister Falkner

June 24th 2013

Good Morning! :]

This week was pretty great with the missionary broadcast and what not! Pretty crazy that they will be giving us all that technology, I'm excited to see how it is going to work out!

We also had mission tour this week. Elder Pieper from the 70 came and taught us how we can be better and well, he just helped bring a little bit more spirit into the mission, so that was great and really helpful! I loved it! Turns out his daughter went to high school with me and we graduated the same year too! Hah, the funny things you find out later on in life! I'm not really sure who she is, but ill check the yearbook when I get home!

The members in this ward are really great, they are starting to help with missionary efforts already and I can tell that the broadcast will do a lot of good in this ward!

So a little bit about the people I am teaching, because hopefully I will stick around long enough to keep you guys updated on people without confusing you.

Mike Murray has been investigating the church for 8 months, he was introduced to the church by the example of a group of 3^rd graders in his sons class, he saw that they were outstanding kids and he continued helping out at school activities, when his son got into 6^th grade he finally asked one of these “outstanding kids” what church he belonged to and well, now he is learning about it! Mike is making a lot of progress lately and he attended his first baptism last night, so I know he is thinking about it more seriously now! Yay! He has read the Book of Mormon and is currently working on Doctrine and Covenants. He is a way cool single dad that almost went pro in football, he is HUGE!!! I told him we don't know who is going to baptize him because no one in the ward is taller than him! But it will all work out!

Laurie Bennet is a nice older lady that LOVES God. She just drinks up everything we say and is currently wrapping her head around the Book of Mormon. She is in 2 Nephi and loves it, she loves meeting with us and she is currently quitting smoking! She is funny though because she has a crazy schedule full of volunteer work so she is being taught by us (3^rd ward) goes to 2^nd ward church, and lives in 6^th ward boundaries. Thank goodness the church is true everywhere!

Ashley is an 18 yr old girl that lives with her parents and as long as she lives there she cannot be baptized :( she is solid though and wants it so bad! She attended seminary and goes to church when her parents allow, we meet with her all the time and she is so awesome! She wants to go to the temple so badly! I really hope she will be baptized soon, but we know this one could take a while. We introduced her to personal progress on Saturday and my companion and I are going to do it again with her to help her continue progression!

Jacob is on date for July 6^th, he is 10 years old and is the daughter of Sarah Chamberlin ( the less active we got to church last week) she is awesome! And she wants both of her kids to be baptized and we haven't met with the daughter (Bella) yet but Jacob wants to be baptized. She is really hoping that his learning about the church will pull him away from his video games because he used to live with his dad and during that time he got addicted to “not 10 yr old boy video games” hah so yeah, he is great!

Those are the ones that we meet with most and are progressing most, so there ya go! I love you all!!

Help the missionaries, not just by feeding them, but by going to teach with them and giving them people to teach! You will be richly blessed for it!

Love, Sister Falkner!

June 17th 2013

Hello everyone!!! :]

Happy belated Fathers Day to all of those Dads that read this!

I had a pretty good Fathers Day. I was thinking a lot of people were probably having a steak and potato dinner and then we went to our dinner appointment, and WaBam!!! steak and potatoes! :] Mmmm it was so yummy!!! and then we got cheesecake for dessert! Super yummy! This ward feeds us soooo much!!! my companion and I are gaining weight by the day! So we decided that for every letter we got via snail mail, we will run a mile! So if you love me and want me to stay skinny?! Snail Mail!!! ;] we had dinner at the Griffith's, they are an awesome family! Both return missionaries and so generous!! Sis Griffith's makes homemade bread every week for the sacrament! How cool is that? And she gave us 4 loaves! It is so yummy!!! we are enjoying it! She also made us T-shirts! That was super cool! This ward just loves and treats the missionaries well! Its really great! We are working really hard at getting to know them better so that we can build up trust and begin teaching their friends! I hope it works! So far, so good!

So, we have the big missionary broadcast this Sunday! Its going to be a historical moment, I know it! My predictions are as follows! :]

1.      CHINA opened up to missionaries ( Jason, they are coming for you!!!!! ;] )

2.      Sisters can extend to 2 years.

3.      And members will be on a higher obligation to help the missionaries. Maybe more missionary related callings?

Who knows! But those are my thoughts and I am sooo excited to hear what President Monson has to say!!! :]

Something super cool that happened this week... We got a less active to church. Yay.... haha.. less active work is not my favorite because that is the job of the members, butttt this one paid of! And I knew it would, so I was willing to do that! We visited Sara Chamberlin before church, we had tried to meet up with her like 10 times and she was never home but we finally caught her at home and we talked for a while, she said she couldn't go to the temple because she had an issue with tithing, and then she just starting crying and saying how much she wants her kids to be taught and baptized, they are 8 and 10! she said Sundays are her only day to clean and that was why she hadnt been to church in a while so we told her we would do all her dishes and clean her kitchen while she got ready for church! She followed us to church and it was so great! I felt like it was just meant for her! She was so happy and felt so good! Then we went to relief society and the lesson was on tithing!!!! what??? I was kind of nervous at first but the lesson was REALLY good and a lot of the sisters bore testimony of the blessings of tithing, at the end of the lesson she leaned over to us and said “where can I find the tithing slips?” it was so awesome, the ward now has a lot more respect for us because we actually got someone to church and now we can start teaching her children! It was just great!

That's all for now! Love you tons!!!! :]

Love Sister Falkner!!

June 10th 2013

Hello Everyone!

This week has been an interesting one! On Wednesday we went over to an investigator’s house for lunch and a lesson. We were all eating lunch out on her back patio and we went in to get dessert and I had TONS of little tiny baby spiders crawling all over me!!! AHHHH it was so GROSS!!! So my companion is picking all of these nasties off of me and then we went back out to eat our strawberries and I saw this huge web of thousands of little spiders on my chair right about where my shoulder was! Ehhh, so my wonderful companion sister Farnsworth said that she liked to eat her dessert standing up, haha Robin (the investigator) looked at us like we were crazy, but it saved me from getting 1286 more spiders all over me. I was super itchy all day, so that was no fun! But... gotta roll with the punches. My baby, Sister Stevens was freaking out she absolutely hates spiders! So that made it kind of entertaining! :]

Speaking of Sister Stevens, she is gone, she got transferred to Tacoma! So it is just Sister Farnsworth and I, as of Thursday. We are having a blast though! We had zone conference this week, those are always pretty awesome! And then we drove Sister Stevens to Tacoma and met with President Weaver and discussed our responsibilities as an STL, we will basically be going on lots of exchanges! An awesome perk to having this assignment is that next week we are having our mission tour and Paul B. Pieper from the 70 is coming, he has asked us to read the talk “Seek Learning by Faith” by David A. Bednar and find ways we can apply it to our missionary work and help our investigators learn by faith. When he comes to the mission he will be talking with the ZL's DL's and STL's about how we applied it and then he will take what we say, and combine it with his own thoughts and talk to the whole mission about it! So we get to meet with him before and it will be awesome!

The 3 things I am pulling from that talk that will make me a better missionary are

1.    Don’t attract attention to myself (focus on teaching people the gospel, not telling them how cool Sister Falkner is in the normal, not missionary world)

2.    Be a fiber optic cable (Thin strands of glass are used to create the fiber-optic cables through which light signals are transmitted over long distances. Just as the glass in these cables must be pure to conduct the light efficiently and effectively, so we should become and remain worthy conduits through whom the Spirit of the Lord can operate.)

3.    Teach them how to fish! (Help them become spiritually self-reliant, so that they can progress in the gospel all the time, not just when we go to teach them.)

This area has been a little bit more difficult because it is a pretty wealthy area compared to what I have been in before and finding people to teach by way of knocking doors is not very effective… but we are working hard and trying to build up a lot of trust with the ward so that we can get referrals from them!! :]

That which is to give light must endure burning! :]

So that is pretty much my week! I will attach some pictures from last week and this week because I can on this computer! Yay! :]

Love you all!! Have a great week!

Love, Sister Falkner

Pictures 

1 Us after shopping!! 

2 Us going to Zone conference

3 funny street sign.... hah

 



June 3rd 2013

Hello everyone

This week has been awesome!!! I am in Silverdale 3^rd ward and I love it here!!! I love my companions, I am in a trio with Sister Farnsworth, and our baby (trainee) Sister Stevens. We work hard, and we have fun! I really love it! We are kept so busy that I haven't even really had time to unpack yet but it's all good because we are doing the Lords work and we keep it pretty clean anyways. It's just sitting in suitcases still. Haha

This ward is so great, we have a lady that makes us lunches every Sunday, Sister Dodge, she puts them in the fridge for us. Also we had a lady supply us with blankets and towels because we didn't have any, and then our ward mission leader and bishop are just super helpful and give us lots of part member families! It is so helpful! :] when we got here we had one investigator and now we have six! I hope they all stay solid! They are awesome though, so I am not worried. The one we had before was Ashley, she is 18 and basically a member minus the water, her parents will not allow her to be baptized because they have read some anti, so that could be a long time coming but she will get there one day! The rest are super awesome. One was a referral from a ward member, she is reading the Book Of Mormon and is already in 2 Nephi so she is doing great and then we are also teaching someone who has a son on a mission, so that is way awesome too!! Lots of good things happening here in Silverdale.

This is a town!! There is an Old Navy across the street from our apartment, if you know me.. you know how dangerous that is. And there is a mall right down the street. So hopefully I don't spend too much money! But it's nice to be in a normal town! Haha

I love my companions, they make me laugh so much! I am really just so happy and I am so grateful for all the support I have, I love you guys! Thank you for everything!

Have an awesome week! I love you!

Love, Sister Falkner