Week 24: Tracting in slippers and stepping on frogs

Hey Family and Friends!

This was a pretty crazy week and I am so excited to tell you about it! First off we have this new investigator! yay! We thought her name was Melissa, but then we asked her how to spell her name and she started to spell Miranda...err now we need to go change all the papers we wrote her name on...Anyways she is so nice and is actually married! Her and her husband, Dan, have a cute little daughter named Charlotte. It is hard for me to get out of the baby holding mind set...I haven't really dealt with any little ones since i have been on my mission so it was so weird when we were teaching her about the Restoration and about every 5 seconds I had the thought of asking to hold Charlotte and then I stopped myself...haha it was really strange. I did that the whole lesson :p They also have 2 Siamese cats and they are so sweet. One of the cats is blind and deaf, but he is the cutest ever and I just love to hold him through the whole lesson. He does pretty well getting around and stuff. He is a trooper! We love going over there though and teaching Miranda. Dan hasn't been home, but we told her he is welcome to sit in the lessons as well. She is very open to letting us teach her, but there are still a few things holding her back. She is Lutheran so she is still pretty set in her ways, but we are going to help her resolve her concerns :) We are going back over tonight to teach her about the Plan of Salvation (My favorite!) So please pray that it will go well!

We also went on exchanges this week and boy was it an adventure! I went with Sister Brandley and we were able to have a lot of success.That night Sister Brandley and I were saying out personal prayers. I had finished before her and so I just laid in my bed and waited for her to finish. Time went by and I just thought "Wow she has super prayers...she is praying for like everyone! All her investigators and family and even the members probably....--" Then I hear a big loud snore. I giggle to myself and realized she totally fell asleep in her prayer...and she continued to sleep for about 15 minutes more in a praying position. Ha too funny. I just couldn't stop laughing. The next day we went tracting! When we got to the street we were going to tract on, we parked and got out of the car. We started walking towards a house when I noticed that my feet didn't quite feel right...I looked down and gasped! Sister Brandley looked at me and asked what was wrong. I began to be embarrassed because this was the Sister training leader! ah! I didn't change out of my slippers into my shoes and now I would be tracting in them...They are my moccasin slippers so luckily they look a little more like actual shoes...maybe if i was on an Indian reservation lol...We didn't have much time so we went with it. No one commented on them so hopefully it wasn't a horrible thing. haha Now I tell Sister Olsen to never let me leave the house with my slippers on.

Later that night we had sloppy joes and I asked Sister Brandley to relate the sloppy joe to the gospel because she is really good at that. I thought what she said was so deep! "A Sloppy Joe is like Repentance. It's messy, but it is wroth cleaning up". Wow I was shocked. I couldn't top that.

Sister Olsen and I went to go help one of our investigators pack up because she is moving soon down to Florida. We had so much fun and we really hope she will want to continue to learn from the missionaries in Florida. We have built such a great friendship with Ellen and she really loves the Sister missionaries. We are going to get her address there and write her and also hopefully send her other cute sister missionaries! She needs the gospel in her life! While helping her pack she maybe sort of gave us a little bit of piles of clothes...I couldn't resist. But It took all of me to not take all of the clothes. Her daughter is just my size. She also gave me some boots and some really good snow boots. I am hoping maybe I can just use these instead of buying new ones. We will see. 

Sister Olsen totally stepped on a dead toad on Friday. That was gross, but I couldn't stop laughing. She is scarred for life and hates frogs and toads. I don't blame her though. 

Thank you mom and dad for the books you sent me! I look forward to sharing one of them with a member too. They got here safely but i had to pay extra for postage because the mission office had to forward it. I really appreciate packages but i ask you to either address them to where i am staying or to always use flat rate or priority boxes and envelopes when sending them to the mission office. They can forward those kind of boxes and envelopes free of charge. If you do plan on sending me a package please let me know so i can look for it. Also Since it is close to transfers and i may be transferred please send everything to the mission office for now. I will let you know if i get a new home address.

My mission President also sent this to all the missionaries: 

The Church has produced a 90 minute documentary film called “Meet the Mormons” and has asked that it be shown to all of the missionaries in our mission. You will see it as part of your Zone Training Meeting in October. The missionary department has provided the following instructions relative to the release of the movie, which will open in select markets (not in our mission yet) on October 10th.
• Meet the Mormons was created to help others find greater understanding of the Church and our members. It is not intended to be a proselyting tool.
• Missionaries should not see the film in theaters or proselyte near theaters. 
• Missionaries should invite or encourage members, less-active members, and investigators to see the film. They also may encourage members to take friends to see the film. 
• Missionaries should not use the film as a means to make initial contact with individuals during the theatrical run. 
• Following the theatrical run, the film will be shown in visitors' centers, missionary training centers, and on digital platforms such as Netflix, iTunes, and YouTube. 
• A special pass along card will be provided for sharing with investigators and less-active members. Missionaries may use these pass along cards to continue inviting new contacts and investigators to watch the film on Netflix, iTunes, and YouTube. 

President Cutler

I love you all and hope you have a wonderful week! please continue to keep the missionaries in your prayers.

Love Sister Emily Sarah Eaton

 "I love my camera!"

ooops, was I not supposed to share that one?

Week 23: Why do people live here?

Hey Family and Friends!

This week was pretty much awesome! Sister Olsen and I were able to tract in the rain! yay! We decided that we just needed to get it done this week even though we have been dreading it for a long time. Here in Wisconsin it is starting to get cold and we are so not ready for it! I put my tights on again and they aren't coming off! Probably until next May! I don't mind tights though because they are just another fashion accessory haha. But the cold can stay in Canada :/ People here are telling us all that this winter will be worse than last year and I really don't want to hear it! That makes me more frustrated, but I am so grateful I only am here for one winter! Sister Olsen and I ask the same question everyday..."Why do people live here!?" I don't think we will ever find the answer to that one. 

But overall I am doing pretty good. Sister Olsen's family sent me a package on Saturday and I was so surprised! Her mom is too sweet and she just likes to spoil us. 

It is now football season and the Packer fans are pretty much crazy. We have been asked not to go tracting when the games are going on because people get really mad if you interrupt their game. Especially here in Green Bay. 

I am so proud of myself as I have reached the end of Alma in the Book of Mormon! I am still loving it and I look forward to read it and know what will happen next everyday! There are a lot of things I didn't catch the first time I read it for Young Womens...Probably most of the whole book so I am really enjoying it now and usually don't want to put it down. Sister Olsen will catch me reading it when we come home for a bathroom break...heh heh I told her that I don't have my iPod or my phone so what else am I supposed to do? But really I love diving into it all. I started also reading "Jesus the Christ" this week and I cannot put it down! It is seriously like a Harry Potter size book, but I haven't gotten bored yet! I love all the deep doctrine stuff and things that I have over looked so much. 

This morning I got soap in my eye in the shower...that wasn't fun. I was worried I was going to go blind so I took my contacts out right away and have been wearing my glasses ever since. Its weird. 

So I heard the new Costco is ready and open! I am so stoked about that! it will be there when I get home :)

One more story. So when we tracted in the rain the other day we met this lady at her door. We started to tell her about family history and such and then she interrupted me (3rd time that day...I didn't think that was very nice) and was more worried about us being out in the cold. She told us she wasn't interested and that we needed to stay dry. I didn't really have a response for her..I thought to myself.."Well we can't..we are being obedient". That has been our motto ever since. I don't know why people like to interrupt me though...I promise I am giving the Reader's Digest version!  :p

Love you all! Have a good and safe week!

Love Sister Emily Sarah Eaton

Before and After the rain 

Week 22

Dear Family & Friends

Boy, this week was rough, but Sister Olsen and I are going to make this week better! 
We did have an awesome lesson with Jack :) He seems to be accepting everything we taught him about so far. I bore my testimony and it was soo cool! Sister Olsen looked blown away when I did. I was surprised myself! It was like the most amazing testimony ever. If that didn't convince him I don't know what will! Unfortunately, We have to give him to the second ward elders because he lives on their side... :/

We stopped by Debbie's house the other day and tracted around it..kind of peeking to see when she would get home. We needed to set another appointment with her because we totally failed last time at the church. We tracted for about an hour and had not much luck with that. Then we saw Debbie outside and we walked up to her and asked how she was and all that stuff. Then she sighed...I could tell it was coming...She apologized for not calling us back to make another appointment. She told us that she has "too much going on faith wise" and she feels she is comfortable where she is at. My heart literally broke and I just couldn't believe it. She was so golden and all we needed to do is get her husband on board and everything would be just grand. We smiled politely and told her if she ever needed us she could just call us then we walked back to our car. I turned to Sister Olsen and asked her what the heck we were doing wrong?! I was getting so fed up with this whole mission prayer about having a baptism in each area. Everyone was getting one EXCEPT us and it was driving me crazy. We sat in the car in silence. We didn't know what to do next. Tracting just wasn't effective and the appointments we have always get cancelled. We discussed that we know we definitely need to be better at being exactly obedient...ugh ya I am not a perfect missionary :/ and I know I need to do a lot better. Sister Olsen and I have struggled to wake up on time and exercise the full 30 minutes we have. These have always seemed like little things to me at the beginning, but now I am definitely seeing the difference and its pretty big. I feel so awful and I know that the Lord's work isn't something to just be thrown around and to be taken lightly! This is Salvation here and I need to wake up (literally) and realize that! We still have a chance to make the mission goal, but it is going to take a MIRACLE and Sister Olsen and I are going to have to work our butts off! Please pray your hardest for us! We are going to be busy busy busy! I love you all and I hope you have an excellent week!

Love Sister Emily Sarah Eaton

One year down for Elder Taylor! 

Week 21: God knows everything...especially when we will get our iPads...‏

Dear Family and Friends,

This week has gone by way fast and I love it! Everything lately has (for the most part) flown by like crazy and I am still amazed that Cody has been out a year (in 9 days) already! It is so wonderful how much we have both grown and will continue to grow as we keep moving along. I just think it is such a blessing to be going a long side with my best friend. The experience is total awesomeness!

This week, Sister Olsen and I were grateful that none of us got transferred. We know we have way too much work to do in Green Bay and they need us specifically. I was very happy that I stayed because I am not ready to leave..if I could stay here my whole mission that would be great too...but who knows what will happen haha. Usually President Cutler has sisters stay in each area for about 6 months at the most so who knows what will happen next transfer. But I really wouldn't mind having Sister Olsen and I stay too :)

Anyway, we were able to have the opportunity to give a church tour to one of our investigators, Debbie. That was the first time I had given one so we didn't exactly know how it was all going to go. The spirit was really strong there though and she really loved the architecture of the building. My favorite part was showing her the chapel and the baptistery because we didn't have to even talk much. The spirit totally did all the work! We were able to talk about the sacrament with her and how special and sacred it is.  We invited her to church and told her to "come and see". Unfortunately, Debbie didn't show up to church this week, but I know that sometimes things just take time. I am really learning how to be patient with people. I get to thinking that "oh we can just teach this lesson and then this one an then this one...then they can be baptized and it will be easy!" I forget that the whole Mormon religion is a whole different world for them. That some have to change their whole lifestyle for it and it will take time. I need to learn to just slow down and learn to be at the same pace as the investigator. I tend to get frustrated when they don't get things or won't keep their commitments. At times, I won't understand why things are so hard for them to do because I know the blessings that will come from it all. I know that I need to just be more patient and that everything is in God's time. It makes me sad that people would rather not partake of the blessings that our Heavenly Father offers to us, but in time their hearts will be softened. We failed to get a return appointment with Debbie so we will cal her this week. We do get to meet with a family this week (fingers crossed that they won't cancel) and I am excited because Sister Olsen still hasn't met them! They are such a sweet family and they love when we come over. 

This month the missionaries are all excited about the iPads because supposedly for my mission this is the month that the leaders will learn about them and hopefully will be passed out soon after their big meeting. It is supposed to be at the end of the month, but I am still excited. We don't know much information about it though so if any of you in the outside world find out any more news please let me know! haha There are a few missionaries that don't think they will be here until they all go home though so I don't know...I want to be excited, but I don't want to get my hopes up...We will see!

I hope you all have a wonderful week and stay safe please!

I love you and miss you all!

See you soon.

Love, Sister Emily Sarah Eaton