Week 32

Greetings!

It's been a great week! We did some service for our landlady, Sister Jensen, she's 83. She has 1/2 an acre in the backyard with some fruit bearing trees. Someone came to prune them, but I guess the service didn't include branch removal! We had fun helping her. She was also in the hospital this past week so we held down the fort at home.

We also did some service for the Young Women's in the 3rd ward. They're having their New Beginnings this week and the theme is "The adventure awaits" so Sister Swain and I painted the little playhouse, pictured below. Isn't it cute?! I think so :)

The Lord has blessed us with two new investigators. They are pretty great people and are searching for the truth. We have appointments set up with them this week to teach them more. I know that when we are diligent and have faith, the Lord will provide miracles. We'll continue to make more contacts this week.

We also went on exchanges on Friday. I went to West Jordan and was companions with Sister Lopez. She's from Texas and is a great missionary, see photo below. We got to ride bikes! I have a bike, but haven't used it much during proselyting. But Sister Lopez and her companion bike in their area, it's pretty flat. So I got to use Sister McLean's bike and we definitely got to places a lot faster than walking. However, I didn't dress warm enough so I was pretty cold when the evening rolled around.
Hmm what else? We taught the 8th Relief Society lesson. It was based on Elder Hales' conference talk. He spoke about how we should take what we hear, learn and feel from General Conference and apply it into our lives.

That's it for now. Love you lots!

Sister Olszowka

Week 31

AHHH!!!

I was transferred!! Totally unexpected, but guess who's my companion?! It's SISTER SWAIN!!! :) :) The two Hawaiian sistahs are together and in action! I'm still in South Jordan but now in the Country Crossing Stake. We cover 11 wards and 1 branch. There are A LOT of apartments. We're trying to build our teaching pool so we're knocking on doors and looking into former investigators. We picked up a new investigator this week; her name is Dakota and is from a part member family. We're hoping to teach another new investigator, her name is Robyn and is from Montana. We also hold leadership positions in the mission now. We're the Sister Training Leaders. We cover 5 other companionships and basically we encourage, support and help the Sisters. We have 24 hour exchanges with them. We swap companions for 24hrs and help them find and teach.

We went to the Oquirrh Mountain Temple today as well. It was awesome. I've been to all three temples in the valley now.

The picture below is of my former landlords, Brother and Sister Jolley. She's from South Africa. I'll definitely miss them.

Alrighty, that's all the time I have today, until next week. Love you lots!

Sister Olszowka

Week 30

We had TWO miracles happen this week!!!

We've been trying to contact this one house. We've met the woman twice, we gave her a Book of Mormon and said we'd come back to follow up on her reading. Well the third time we stopped by her son said she wasn't home so come back on Monday. Well after dinner, I had a strong feeling from the Spirit to go that house NOW! So we did and when we got there her other son was walking out the door, he said his mom wasn't mom but we started to talk to him. His name is Angel, he's 20 and he said he had lots of Member friends and after teaching some restored truths on his doorstep we invited him to be baptized and he said yeah! Talk about a miracle. We set up an appointment for tonight and invited him to church on Saturday and said he'd come but he didn't. Small set back but we continue to work with him and potentially his whole family.

Wednesday we went to a social at the church building and one Sister approached us and said her son just turned 9 and he was planning to be baptized at the end of the month. However if you're older than 8 you need to be taught by the missionaries. So we had a lesson this past week and he will be baptized on March 29th. He's such an awesome kid. He's the grandson of one of the Bishop's in the area.

Miracles left and right I tell you. I'm so thankful to be a part of this great work. Heavenly Father will bless us for our diligent in bringing others unto Christ.

We had exchanges as well this week, and guess who came to my area?! SISTER SWAIN! Man, we had a lot of fun together. I hope we're companions at some point in the mission. We worked hard that day and night but it was soooo nice to be with another local girl!

There's a care facility in our area and apparently an elderly gentleman who has Alzheimer’s went missing on Saturday. Yes, they called and visited every home in the neighborhood and asked people to check their sheds and places where he could have gone to find shelter. They were still looking for him Sunday morning. Thankfully he was found in Sandy. They don't know if he walked or what but thank goodness he's alive.

Alright family, I love you lots!!! Until next week.

Sister Olszowka

Week 29

HAPPY MARCH!

Can you believe it already? There's only 10 months left in the year!

Well my 24th birthday came and went and it was pretty low key. We knocked on doors most of the day, no one was home. Our dinner appointment bought a cake and sang Happy Birthday. The District Leader, Elder Carlyle and Elder Denny called and sang Happy Birthday which was funny! President and Sister Chambers texted me that morning as well with a birthday text.  Mom and dad, I got the goody box will all my favorite snacks. Thanks for the beautiful earrings! I love them! Sister Dean baked the strawberry cake and put real strawberries on it. I can't believe I'm 24! Where have the years gone?! I thank my Heavenly Father for another year of life, the journey continues to get better and better. :)

The work has been slow, but continues to move forward. We had two lessons with investigators this week. Dani who's from a part member family and then one with Patrick. They both committed to baptismal dates in April. They didn't make it to church, but we'll be stopping by this week for another lesson.

Yesterday, I bore my testimony about missionary work and I mentioned Brother Birch's (88 year old who was baptized in November) in my testimony about how that was a miracle and it's never to late to follow our Savior's example and be baptized. Well a woman got up after me and bore her testimony and said that Brother Birch was her uncle! and that she didn't know he was baptized! She's been praying for him and she was so happy to hear the news.

I also met distance relatives in church as well! I've met so many people with connects to Hawai'i, La'ie, and family. These elderly people are related to the Day's...I met David's cousins. I think. I can't remember now. Dad I met someone who's brother did scouts with you back in the day in Oakland. haha.

Funny story. Well doing so service, we were picking up trash along the road, we found a phone number. Sister Dean insisted that we text the number, it was a Washington number, so we did. Said we found this number on the side of the road and asked if they wanted to meet with LDS missionaries. Well the person texted back and wrote "stop." I think they thought we were an automated service. haha! It was worth a shot right?! LOL!

Lastly, we met one of the former General Relief Society President, Sister Barbara Winder. Her husband was the first Temple President in Nauvoo Temple. Super nice people! They live in our neighborhood. Their daughter wrote "Daughters in My Kingdom" book too!

Take it easy and continue to do what is right. Love you all!

Sister Olszowka