May 31, 2010

Hello! This past week has been pretty busy. I found out I will be in Cookeville for yet another transfer! Only they took a set of missionaries out of our ward so we will be covering all of Cookeville now! I will be with Sister Green still. It is nice because I don't have to pack my bags, haha. So our teaching pool just increased by quite a few numbers. We now have 7 set dates for this month! This will probably be a very busy, but very good month. It has been confirmed that the meeting with Elder Ballard will be combined with the Knoxville Mission! Haha, so I will get to shake Cody's hand! I am not sure what the Lord is trying to do here, but I am going to take it as a huge blessing! Not everyone gets to experience something like that, haha! Don't worry, President Hutchings already knows and so does Cody's mission president! :) I am not sure if I will laugh or cry when I see him, but I am excited either way!


Life as a missionary is really random I've decided. We find ourselves in some of the most awkward situations. We were over at a lady's house and Sister Green told her she has diabetes and the lady was like, oh I know just what to do! So she grabbed Sister Green and put her hands on her head and started to pray that she would be healed of her diabetes... That would probably only happen here in Tennessee! Unfortunately the blessing didn't quite work.. We were both taken a little off guard! Today we wound up with 2 dinner appointments, almost 3! All of the sudden people want us over for dinner, which is fine with me! Somehow we made it through the month on our miles even though we used 200 to get to zone conference, which is pretty amazing.

The mosquitos out here are everywhere. I am getting eaten alive by them! I guess beauty comes with its flaws, haha. We talked to Jana's husband the other day and he is wanting to change his life around so he can be baptized! I really hope everything there works out because he is a really nice guy and they would make a really cute couple in the church. We had alot of people at church yesterday, and then realized it was probably because we were getting a new bishopric in the ward! It was good to see so many people there. They even had the gym 1/2 way full! I don't know why but I feel like everytime I go to e-mail my mind goes blank and I can't remember what happened over the week. Time blurs together so much out here!

The other day we met a lady who had just moved in from Sevierville (Cody's old area) and she said she knew him! It is really cool some of the connections we have through different people. It makes me feel like he isn't all that far away. Well, I guess he isn't but it feels like he is half way around the world. So I thought that was pretty cool! We went over to one of our investigator's houses on tuesday night and ended up talking to her daughter who had a load of questions about repentance and the atonement, so that was a really neat experience. Only they are leaving for vacation for 2 weeks, so we won't ge to talk to them for awhile. Yesterday we met a few people the elder's were teaching, and they have some pretty neat people too. I think it will be a good transfer. It will be different without the elders being so close though, which is kind of sad. They were good missionaries, but thats the way it goes I guess!

Well if I think of anything else to tell you, you may get another e-mail. But I will send this one off so you can reply if you are on!

I love you all so much!

Love

Sister Turner

Moday after e-mailing, we walked outside the church and saw this cloud that the sun was behind and the rays were beautiful! The sky out here is so pretty!
 

The big white flowers are magnolias! Grown on trees apparently! Gorgeous!

We came home one night and the moon looked so cool. This picture, as cool and blurry as it is, just didn't do it justice.

Our last District Meeting with the Elders! They were so awesome! Top to bottom L to R: Elder Gilbert (he is staying and he is the new DL), Elder Pearson (our old district leader!), Elder Reimchissel, Sister Green, ME, and Elder Syme!

We had a lot of fun as a district! Syme, Pearson, GIlbert, Green, Turner, and Reimchissel!

May 24, 2010

Hello! It has been a "wild and ferocious" week, as President Hutchings would call it. It was up and down and all over the place, but it was good. Monday we went to go help a less active member do some stuff at her house and she took us to dinner, which was really nice! Tuesday I did my second training at our district meeting and it was about overcoming our fears and sharing the gospel, which is something I continue to struggle with! Then on Wednesday we had interviews with President Hutchings. It is funny because Sister Green told me she never cried in interviews until her 3rd month in the field... well I think it is a trend because I thought I was doing just fine until he flat out asked me how I was feeling. So I just decided to let it go and tell him what was on my mind, haha. I told him our ward is struggling to help us with rides and it is really frustrating, and always feeling like I could be doing so much more even though we do our best everyday it felt like I just wasn't doing enough... a typical me thing to do! But I am glad I let it all out because he told me a lot of things I needed to hear. He told me that he knew I was already a "queen tut" in the field and that he knows that the Lord is pleased with all the effort I have put forth, which made me feel a million times better! Then he gave me a priesthood assignment to write down 15 positive statements about myself, as a future missionary what I want to be and then to read them every morning right after I do the "hulk." He is really a great mission president! So that same day we went and reset a date with Wanda! She actually picked her own day to be baptized too! We also let her know we are willing to do whatever we can to help her. We had some members of the ward do a little church meeting for her at her house, kind of a condensed version of the meeting we had at church. She called us last night and told us she absolutely loved the meeting and said it inspired her to do more to make it to church and said it felt like an answer to her prayers about being worried about coming to church so she can get baptized. We were really excited to hear that! We also gave a blessing to a lady we have been teaching a blessing and as we talked to her, she said she had been reading the book of mormon and said she understands how we believe in a prophet today, just like in the bible and then she said, "I think I believe that too! I think I might be a mormon someday." That was a pretty big breakthrough with her! She is like a white version of Jana, haha. She loves "rowdy churches." She is a sweet lady. There are really a lot of good people out here.


We also did alot of service this week which I love doing. I could just do service for the rest of my mission and be happy! We helped a boy in the ward paint a playground at the local elementary for his eagle scout, and had a blast doing it. It was so funny, Elder pearson was up on the ladder and he yelled out, "Did anyone else see that!?" And right as he said it, his ladder started falling and he fell into a saummersalt (spelling?) roll. Yesterday we went over to Jana's house to visit her and she had taken some medication, and so she told us to come upstairs and she was laying in the dark in her room and kept talking to us and falling asleep mid sentence. It was really funny, we wind up is some awkward situations sometimes. But then she'd wake up from the noise of her own snoring and then finish her sentence. It has been a good week!

We were also told that M Russell Ballard is coming out here June 12 to speak to us! He is supposed to be in the Nashville and Knoxville Mission. Then Cody wrote me and told me that he'd be able to shake my hand on June 12th! I am not for sure if it is a combined meeting or not, but now I want to find out! It also got me thinking about how his mission president is going home in July.. and there have been rumors of combining our missions! I guess for now it is all rumor, but it sure has my brain going. That would be really cool though! He has changed a lot since he has been out, and it is really cool. He was cool before, but it is amazing to see the change in him. He is making a really good missionary!

We only have one week left before transfers, so anything you need to send can be sent to the mission address rather than where I live. I don't know if you are even using that address or not, but just in case!

The end of the month is really hard, being out of money and out of miles, and almost out of food. So, just for future knowledge if you could check my account at the end of the month and make sure there is money in there in case we need milk or something, that would be great. Thank you for everything you guys are doing for me! All of your prayers and letters are greatly appreciated!

I love you all!

Love

Sister Turner

The first picture is just a pretty sunset I saw. The sky is beautiful out here!

We were out driving in the country and saw this house that was abandoned, I think it may have something to do with a tree branch that fell on it?

We had a lot of fun painting. It was hot, and sticky, and paint everywhere!

Sunday for dinner we ate in our car due to a lack of miles to go home, and took pictures of an old rail road track! Right in the middle of town!

Sister Green and I are pretty cool.

Thats all the pictures I have for this week! I will probably be sending some my memory card home soon. I never got the pictures in you e-mail either.. :(

I love you though!

I'll e-mail you again next week!

Love,

Sisiter Turner

May 17, 2010, pictures

It has been a pretty good week out here in Tennessee. We had to drive ourselves to Zone Conference clear in Nashville, well Franklin, but it used up 200 of our miles this month because we couldn't find any rides from the members. We may just have to use our bikes by the end of the month! We were a little frustrated but zone conference went really well and we enjoyed it. It always gives us another boost!


We have done a lot of service this week at member's houses and I am making myself an oath that I will never become a pack rat. People out here have the randomest junk and they keep it all. It is really fun to clean up other people's houses though and see what a relief it is for them. There is a family, the Nortons who were baptized just over a year ago and have been struggling in just about every way possible in life, and we went over to help them clean and I didn't know where to even start. There was stuff literally everywhere! They are a really nice family, the mother is from London and she has a really cool accent so it is fun to hear her talk. I have learned alot out here about what I do not want to do! :)

We decided to go over to some former investigator's houses to see how they are all doing and we were able to visit with a few of them. We ran into Mitchell who Sister Winder and I tracted into the beginning of last transfer and never could get in touch with him again and so we decided to try again this last week and he was home! So we got to teach him a first lesson and he was pretty receptive and felt the spirit alot as we taught, and wants us to come back this week. He is an extremely humble guy and he has a really great love for his family. Him and his wife said they've been married for 26 years, which is an amazingly long time out here. I swear everyone in tennessee has been married, divorced, remarried, etc several times. Its pretty sad how much divorce there is out here, and single mothers. But the work is still going. We have a goal as a mission to increase our baptisms each month. This month it is 35, next month is 50, July is 75, and August is 100!

This transfer is going by pretty fast. All we have left is this week and next and then it is time for transfers again! Time is really weird out on a mission. Sometimes it feels like I have been here forever and other times it feels like it has gone by so fast. It is really weird! I don't really know how to explain it. My companion told me to just not even think about time and just focus on the day, haha. Today is actually my 3 month mark though! The time that Sister missionaries are out is weird too. It is actually either just 17 months or 19 months because if we left exactly at the 18 month mark it would be in the middle of a transfer. So I probably wont get to come home until the first week of September unless they send me home a tansfer early and it would be the end of July. I think it is really weird. Not that I am thinking too much about the end already, it is just weird haha!

Well I have rambled on and I need to write to President Hutchings. I love you all! Thank you for your prayers and your letters, I really appreciate them. I like your hair btw mom!

It isn't a huge rush for the GPS, but I do really want the superman bear. :) Thank you!

The first picture is the sisters in the McMinnville Zone and the Franklin zone at zone conference. They are a really fun group of girls!

The picture of the old rusty trucks and condemned house is an address we had of a less active member on our ward list we tried to visit... I sure hope nobody lived there! We didn't even dare go knock on the door! It was really creepy... so we took a picture of it instead.

We were driving down this road and all of the sudden saw a row of beautiful wild flowers, so we stopped and took pictures! They even had poppies!! My favorite flower! They had red an pink ones. The flowers out here are so pretty, I have never seen so much plant life before. All kinda of trees and flowers just about everywhere!

Love,
Sister Turner

May 10, 2010, pictures

Hello! I don't really have a ton to say today since we talked just yesterday, but I am doing good! One thing I didn't get a chance to tell you last night is that we went over to this lady's house who we have been trying to teach and she was there.. with her girlfriend.. so that was interesting. But she was babysitting some kids and we got talking to them and the little kids just loved the Book of Mormon and they wanted to take a whole bunch back home with them to their family! The girl was about 6 years old and the boy was about 10. It was really cool, we were a little bit nervous about how their parents would react when they pulled in but they were really nice and didn't mind that we had given their kids a lesson. Then her neighbor came out and talked to us, and she is really nice so we will probably start teaching her! So, all in one night we met all these new people, it was really cool and we really needed it.


This transfer has felt harder than last, but it has also gone by really fast too. We are already half way through, and the last half seems to go by really fast.

Well, I guess that is all for now. Hopefully I'll have some more to tell you next week.

I love you all!
Love
Sister Turner

The first picture is Gregory. I think he is a prarie dog or a beaver? He lives by our apartment and he always runs away when we try to talk to him.

The next picture is a sign we found on the side of the road. Don't drown!

Some pretty flowers from Brother Taylor's yard. I don't know what kind they are?

So there ya go, there's some random pictures!

May 3, 2010

Yep, Nashville has been flooding. We haven't had bad floods but it rained really really hard last night. It was really cool! Saturday night at about 4:30 we were called and told to get indoors until further notice. So we went home and stayed there the rest of the night! It was kind of an odd week last week. Nothing all that exciting happened, haha.


Jana had planned a dinner and "bible study" and she wanted to invite her daughter, her boyfriend, and some of her neighbors so we were really excited about that, and then only one of them was able to come. It was really good though and he told us he wants to learn more, so hopefully something more will come from it.

We were told this morning that the Gladys Knight Fireside has been cancelled due to the flooding in Nashville.. so we are a bit sad about that! We had quite a few people who wanted to come and it would have been a really good missionary experience. Hopefully they will be able to reschedule or something.

I haven't gotten any christmas cards yet, haha. Maybe I will get them today? We were at Wal-Mart last week looking at chewable vitamins because I just can't swallow pills and I found this woman's one a day drink mix! And it tastes really good, I was surpised. I know, that is really random but I was really excited about it.

Oh, one thing that would be kind of nice to have eventually is if you want to look on the internet and see if you can find a good decently priced GPS, that would be nice! Its not an emercency but be on the lookout for one. Also, I don't know if it is sitting out or if I packed it away, I can't remember. But if it is out, I would love it if you could send the superman bear! If its not, you don't need to because I have no idea where I would have put it.

We have been doing a lot more member visits this week to get to know them better to see if we can get some more referrals and more member help. This week we are going to focus on service, which I am really excited about. We are going to do simple service for every single house we go to whether they are investigators, members, or whoever. Even if it is as simple as taking out the trash or something. We feel that if we focus on serving others that they will be more willing to listen.

As far as Mother's Day goes, I think it will probably be more like eveningish when I call but I am not totally sure. Maybe if I call at about 6 our time, it would be like 4 your time I think? It kinda depends on which member is going to have us over. Is there a time that works better? Let me know if there is. Or you could send me your cell phone number and I can call that first to see where you are? I don't remember what that number is though.

Well, I am looking forward to talking to you all!

I love you, and thank you for all that you do for me!

Love,

Sister Turner

Pictures!

Here are some more pictures! Some from burgess falls!

Jana's baptism,










the elders watching me get my blood taken. Only two of us did it, everyone else was too squemish. Me and Elder Schwendemen!







Sister Green caught a fish with a stick! Well sort of.. it was dead.

But the green trees are beautiful! One morning I woke up and it was all foggy, it was really cool.

I hope that was a fairly good description of all the pictures. I think this is the most pictures I have sent so far, haha!

April 26, 2010

This last week has been really interesting. My new companion is really cool! She is really funny and outgoing which is good! Because I still don't know the area all that well, we are both learning it together which is actually kind of nice because we are getting to know more of the ward members rather than the same ones over and over again.


Jana got baptized! It was a really neat baptism. She felt the spirit so strong and couldn't stop crying. She sang one of her songs called "My soul is anchored in the Lord" and it actually turned out really nicely! She also sang to our mission president yesterday at church, haha. We are really glad she finally made it! She has plans to plan my wedding.. hahaha, oh dear!

Wanda gave us a letter yesterday before church... explaining that she doesn't feel ready to be baptized. She has a strong testimony and continues to read her BoM but she says she doesn't feel like she can do all that is asked to be an active member of the church. So that was a crappy start to sunday! But the Bishop says he is going to try to talk to her and explain they want to help her and ease her burdens rather than add to them. So hopefully it will all work out still.

There was some kinda crazy weather on saturday, and we were on a tornado watch but it was mostly in other areas. Cookeville is farther east where there are more hills and stuff so they don't get as many tornados here. The clouds were moving super fast though and it was exciting! I am actually looking forward to the summer thunderstorms here! We had a day of service on saturday and I gave blood to the red cross for the first time! I was a bit nervous but I did it! I was fine right up until the end when everytime I squeezed the ball I felt weaker and it hurt cuz I could feel the needle in my arm.. that was the closest I got to passing out but I made it. I don't really want to do it again though.

President Hutchings told our ward that they were about ready to open missions in China! That is exciting! Has Tyson heard anything yet about his mission call? Thank you for all of your letters you send during the week. It is really nice to get mail! I tell myself every P-day that I am going to write letters to you all, but the day seems to go by way too fast. Last week we went to Burgess Falls and it was beautiful! I have a couple pictures on here of them. It is so green, it is awesome! So anyway, if it takes me awhile to respond back individually just know I am thinking about you all everyday! I am glad Matt gets to fly to germany finally! Thats exciting! There was an elder at transfer meeting who looked just like him i swear, and for a second I wondered if they had him come out here temporarily or something. Wasn't him though, haha!

Oh, one crazy story that happened.. One of the elder's investigators called the other day to say thank you for commenting on his hair. He had cut his hair for his baptism. It used to be really long and so I just mentioned that it looked good all clean cut. Well he said I was the only one who recognized him, and he really appreciated it. Well thats fine, but he also wanted me to call him after my mission. So I told him I already had someone, and then he told me he loved me... That was a little awkward. I talked to the elders about it and they said they didn't know he was going to pull that card, so they said they'd talk to him about it all. He is real nice, but it was a bit awkward!

I am doing well though! Tired, stressed, a bit forgetful, but happy and glad to be here on a mission! my companion said she thought I had been out for atleast a couple more months than I have been because she thinks I am doing so well. I guess thats good!

Well I need to write my weekly report to President Hutchings, so I better go! I love you all! Thank you for all you do!

Love Sister Turner