New Ward, New Companion -- November 12, 2013

This week has been pretty great! And you need to stop finding things out before I tell you! Hahaha. Yep, I'm in the Grand Junction 5th ward, with Sister Keihle. Funny thing about that, Sister Keihle is my grandma! She trained my mom, Sister Jensen :) And yes, we do live just a few apartments away from the single's ward sisters. And we see them pretty often... haha. I mean, we HAD to the first few days, because we didn't have a phone. Okay wait background on why that's important: Sister Keihle and I are opening 5th ward for sisters. There's already a set of elders here (Elder Hale and Elder Pulsipher - they're super funny! Anyways), but they've never had sisters and now, like GJ 1st ward, they get sisters and elders! So Sister Keihle and I are laying the foundation/groundwork for all the future sisters who come into the area. WELL we finish up transfer meeting and we go out to get all our stuff when we realize we don't have a phone. Yeah, the APs left it in Denver. It's a little hard to start up an area, introduce yourself to people, and make the necessary phone calls when you lack the phone. Thankfully on Friday our zone leaders brought it by our apartment.

So this last week Sister Keihle and I have been super busy but we haven't actually managed to find any investigators yet! We got a list of less actives and part member families to try, as well as potential investigators. Even with little "success", I'm personally not that stressed out by it. I know that since we're working SUPER hard, eventually we'll see the blessings. Besides, we've already seen some miraculous things! For instance: Back at the beginning of October, Sister Masima and I were on exchanges with Sister Bennett, and we talked with/sang to this guy, Pete. Pete LOVED us and said we could come by his home and teach him/pray with him. But he lived WAY far away. Totally not in 1st ward. So I gave the referral to the mission office and told them he'd prefer sisters (he told us this). WELL, first night in 5th ward and who should the elders tell us to go see but PETE! Yep, that way far away place is in 5th ward boundaries. We stopped by his house and he remembered me! We're pretty excited to start teaching him. Also this week, we met an angel! We decided he was one of the 3 Nephites. Hahaha. He's totally not but we still like to joke about it. Backstory: Sister Keihle and I randomly decide to try this less active family who are apparently friends with one of our potential investigators. No answer, and since we have no investigators, we decide to tract around the neighborhood. I see this guy on a bench and I'm like "Sister Keihle, we have to talk to him!" As we walk over he looks up and we say hi, how are you, etc. Then he goes "I just saw some elders up here yesterday. Are you sharing the area or is this the boundary?" or something like that. Whatever he said, he knew too much. I asked him "Are you a member?" and he says "Yeah." and Sister Keihle and myself are like "Dangit!" Hahaha. Anyways, we get to talking and find out that he's working for Vivint and going to BYU. He had to come up to GJ for half of the week because he needed to earn rent money. He went on his mission to Brazil and was asking us about the work in America/what our work specifically was like. We told him about the prayer approach and he asked if we could pray with him and then as we were talking he goes "Can I say the prayer?". He prayed for us, which was incredible, and then he took us on a little tour of the neighborhood and gave us a couple of homes he thought would be receptive to our message. You know how in D&C, it says that the Lord sends His angels before you to prepare his people? Well, Tommy was certainly that angel. It's just amazing what the Lord can do, and how he answers prayers through other people!

The members in 5th ward are awesome. They're all so excited to have sisters in the ward! We've felt very welcomed and we're excited to see what we can do here :) This should be a fun transfer! :)

Oh, my new address is 246 Belford Ave #7, Grand Junction, CO 81501

LOVE YOU GUYS!!!!!!!!!!

Transfer Ahead! November 4, 2013

This week was pretty exciting! We found a couple of new investigators and had some fun! On Tuesday we taught Angie, and Brother Becker came with us. That was the first time he'd ever come out with the sister missionaries! Go us! On Wednesday we spent over 2 hours just walking around in this one neighborhood and talking to a TON of people. It was ridiculous but I loved it. We also taught a new investigator that day. Her name is Penelope and while we were there her friend Ernesto walked in. Ernesto speaks really fast and was really excited to see us. "Oh, you missionaries? You share the word of God? I need the word of God today man, I'm so stressed out." He helped us move Penelope's couch out to the curb and then started asking if we knew what scripture he had been looking for. He started to describe it and I went "Wait, I read that this morning!" It was Luke 11:13 - "If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?". Ernesto was blown away. He asked me to read it again and again, and he asked if he could bow down as I prayed. We were like, "Uh, no, how about we all kneel and pray together." It was a little weird, but super amazing because that really opened the door for him to want to meet with missionaries too! He lives in another ward, so we passed him on to those missionaries.

On Halloween, we did service at the food bank because they called in desperate need of help! So we did that, then we taught Angie again, but this time we gave her roommate a Book of Mormon. Melanie (roommate) always sits in and listens to our lessons, so we figured she was ready. Then we went to a member's home for Halloween dinner! We were there for SO LONG, but it was okay because we weren't supposed to be out unless we had set appointments anyways (which we didn't). We helped the teenage son decorate/dress up his car to look like a pinata, we made pizza and "monster finger" breadsticks... fun all around.

On Friday, we got some very sad news... Sister Noakes is leaving the Grand Junction 1st ward :( Yep, I'm outta here! Sister Masima will be follow up training someone she came out with (they'll be training each other). I'm not training this transfer, and I have NO IDEA where I'm going. Ahh, mission life. Anyways, I'm pretty bummed about it but I know that the Lord needs me elsewhere (If only because somewhere around 20 different people have told me so. Hahaha.) So then on Saturday, we had to go to a training on training for Sister Masima, run by President and Sister Murdock. I showed Sister Murdock our newspaper article and she was so excited! We taught a couple of people that day as well. We had fast and testimony meeting on Sunday, and all the missionaries in our mission were doing a mission fast, which was really cool. And, Angie came to church!! We were so excited, since she promised last week and didn't come. She stayed for all 3 hours and really liked it. All four of us missionaries bore our testimonies, and the ward always appreciates that. Oh, and in elder transfer news - Elder Austin is staying and training a new missionary, and Elder Jacobson is leaving and becoming a zone leader somewhere out west.

So that was our week! Eventful if a little sad.

Love you all SO MUCH!

Sister Noakes

I asked Sister Noakes about the singles ward sister that she often does service with; Sisters Cope and Joslin are staying in the single's ward. They're pretty bummed because they'll be there over Thanksgiving. Hahaha. (They don't get fed terribly often in the single's ward, ya know.) Some other sisters are moving around but I don't think I've really mentioned any of them to you. If I end up in GJ 5th ward, I'll live like 3 doors down from the single's ward sisters though. Hahahaha. Who knows!!

Asked her if she wanted me to dig out her Christmas stocking (which I made years ago, it's a counted cross-stitch stocking based on The Nutcracker, which we love. I would love to have my stocking!! I'll mail it back to you post-Christmas :)

OH! So yesterday I bore my testimony, right? I started it off by saying "I'm Sister Noakes..." etc. ANYWAYS, after sacrament this lady I don't recognize comes up to me and asks me if I'm from Washington. I say yes and I'm trying to remember if I said that in my testimony or what. Hahaha. The next thing she asks is "Do you know Jen Throolin?" Immediately I go "YES! I love Sister Throolin!" This lady introduces herself as Lori Jacobson, and she just moved into 1st ward from 2nd ward, where the Throolins used to live. Apparently Sister Throolin told her to keep an eye out for a sister missionary named Sister Noakes from Kennewick. We talked for a couple of minutes and I am just amazed at our small Mormon world. The craziest part to me is that if they had started coming to this ward one Sunday later, they never would have met me or seen me! Timing is everything!

Love you!!!

These pictures are me and Kaleigh. Kaleigh is in 1st ward and is leaving for the Russia Vladivostok mission on January 1st! She's pretty awesome and has been coming out with us to lessons. (Kaleigh was also mentioned in the newspaper article in the Grand Junction Sentinel a couple of weeks ago.)

So, one of these is me and Angie and her roommate Melanie. (Angie has the long grey hair and Melanie has the long brown hair.)

Another is me and the Greens! They're the best. Brother Green is in the bishopric and we had dinner with them last night.

And the other is me and the Stacys. Brother Stacy is the EQ president and we've been teaching his family for practice like we were doing with the Beckers. Their kids are TOO CUTE. Parker, the one in glasses, just started passing the sacrament a couple of weeks ago and we love watching him do it in his little suit. Hahaha. Too cute.

A couple of pictures of me and the Beckers! Gotta love that family. Too adorable and sweet.

And me and Sister Larson!

(Sister Larson has taken the sister missionaries under her wing. I really appreciate her being a second mom to my sweet Sarah!) I'll miss Sister Larson too! But she'll always know what I'm up to since she's friends with you! She gave me some advice last night: 1) Look down when I walk (so I don't trip/fall) 2) Be careful on ice and 3) Marry the right person. Hahahaha. I just love the combination of advices.

Sarah and her companion, Sister Masima.