june 17....a week of miracles!

So this week has been truly incredible. But to start out on a fun note PDay was super fun this week. We decided that it would be fun to help me get over my fear of cows and so the Elders took us to a cow farm. I was so scared to even get close to one but I decided I was going to touch one. So yes I TOUCHED A COW! I was so scared! We also had a big water fight as a zone (cleared by the APs) and the park we did it at had the sprinklers on so we played football and kick ball in the sprinklers. This past week has been so hot!

We had some great lessons including two with our new investigators. We met them on Thursday and I could already tell that the are so ready for baptism! They are really good at asking questions because they really want to understand what they are getting themselves into. The day of our second lesson with them we got there a little early so our fellowshippers were not there yet but we went in and talked to them. Their roommate who is not a member either, started asking us questions about our missions. He asked us if we knew who we were going to marry and then jokingly told us that he wants to become mormon just so he could marry us! That's right I got proposed to on my mission. That is something I will never forget! 

On Saturday I got a call from my old companion and she said that she had someone for me to talk to. I was able to talk to George and Wendy(my investigators in Roosevelt) and they had just gotten married and George is getting baptized on July 6th! I am so happy for them. George told me that he wished I could be there for all this which just broke my heart. But I am so happy to be serving where I am now! Me and Sister Soper had a really cool experience on Sunday morning. We woke up and I was telling her about the dreams I just had and she told me that she had almost the exact same ones! That is companionship unity right there!! I was assigned to speak in one of the wards this week and I am so surprised at how well it went. I feel like I am becoming pro at public speaking! We had a house inspection this week and we got a perfect score! There has been a lot going on and I am starting to see more and more miracles occur. I love this work and I love that I have the spirit with me everyday to help lead and guide me in what I need to do for the people of the YSA 19th Stake! I was also surprised this week with 2 wonderful packages and a letter! I love getting letters because email time seems to be getting shorter! I love you all and I hope you know that this is seriously the best decision I have ever made!

june 10 ...mini missionary

I seriously can not believe that it is June 10th already! It seriously feels like I just left home! I guess time flies when you are having fun. I have been having a lot of fun this week with missionary work. We were able to do a lot of contacting this week because we have huge lists the wards have given us that they either don't know the people or they know them and know that they would benefit from hearing our message.  I have had some pretty amazing experiences this week with promptings from the spirit. A few weeks ago we found this girl who you could tell really needed the gospel in her life and she was very open to talking with us. But when we went to go visit her again she wasn't there and we remembered her saying something about moving. But we were hoping we could find someone at her old house who would be able to tell us. After a few times this week of no success I had this feeling that we should go talk to her neighbor. We explained to him our interaction in K***(his neighbor) and he told us she had just moved around the corner to her grandparent's house. So we drove over there and WE FOUND HER! I am seriously so glad I followed that prompting. We asked her if there was anything we could do for her and she actually gave us a service opportunity that we will be working on for the next week or so. I am so happy that we are going to be able to help her come closer to her Savior. I also went on exchanges this week and I was with the spanish missionaries. It was really nerve racking since I don't know any spanish. But I really prayed that I would be able to understand a least a little bit of what people were saying to me. I was very surprised when one of the investigators started bearing her testimony about prayer I was actually able to pick up on most of the story! I love this gospel so much. Not even just the big miracles but the little things make it all worth it. We had a mini missionary come out with us for 3 days and it was super fun to be an example to her and to watch her own testimony be strengthened because of missionary work. I am so grateful for the blessings I am able to see daily and I am grateful for my Savior who is there to help me when I need direction in the work. I love you all and love hearing from everyone!

~ Sister Harrison #2 (aka Kaylynn)

June 2, 2013 Missionary technology

So this week was a long but good one. It started off with a wonderful Memorial Day. My district decided to do a little bit of hiking and had a picnic. On the way back home Sis. Soper told us she had never changed a tire and so of course the Elders pulled over and decided to teach her. Monday night we had a small FHE as a district. One of the Elders kept complaining all day about wanting his hair cut so I told him I would do it. I was super nervous because I really didn't want to mess up. But I did a great job and he said he wants me to cut it for the rest of his mission. So I guess maybe I am a bit of a natural. The Elders also told us that we are some of the most awesome sisters in the mission. I was happy to hear that because I would never want to be a burden on the Elders. Tuesday was a pretty great day. We started out with a District meeting and we bore our testimonies and told why we decided to come on a mission. After DTM we went to lunch and right when we were finishing up a huge storm rolled in. By the time we got home it was pouring rain and hailing. Sister Soper had a doctors appointment on Tuesday because she thought she may have fractured her wrist. The appointment took 4 hours! It was a bit ridiculous. And her wrist isn't broken or fractured. So we get to go see a hand specialist this week. For dinner on Tuesday we got to eat with 6 or 7 YSA. And mom to answer your question, I still get fed every night. Wednesday we went down to Spanish Fork to help the Elders with a service project. So we followed them and they pulled up to a dairy farm. Yes the service project was to feed the cows! I helped scoop the grain into the truck but I would not go anywhere near the cows. I don't know why I can' t get over that fear. Then we had Zone Conference and we had an exciting announcement. Sis. Soper and I are now testing out the IPADS! President decided to tell us this news at the beginning of the conference so it was really hard paying attention to the training. But I did learn some really great stuff on how to be a better missionary. Thursday we went out contacting with one of the ward mission leaders and we had only a few people answer their doors. One of them told us that if we ever tried to come again they would turn us in for harassment. So that was a pretty interesting experience. Friday we had our IPAD training. We each have an IPAD mini and we share an Iphone. We found out that we are allowed to have a facebook account to stay connected with our investigators and we are supposed to teach lessons on them for a least an hour a day. SUPER CRAZY. I really like the convenience of the IPAD. It allows us to show Mormon messages, pull up general conference talks, and a lot more. Saturday we went out contacting with an Elders Quorum President. We could not find one of the apartments we were looking for and I had this feeling that we needed to go behind all the apartment buildings, and we found the one we were looking for. We were able to talk to this girl who is less-active and she said it was really nice hearing from us and knowing that someone cares. I love constantly having the holy ghost with me. Sunday was just a lot of meetings but it helped the fasting go by a lot faster. I am having such a great time and I can' t wait until the lessons start coming in and we are booked back to back. I know that the area has this potential. I hope every one is going to enjoy their summer and enjoy the company of one another. Maybe use the warm weather to reach out to those around you and be wonderful member missionaries. This is not a secret gospel, it is one that needs to be shared around the world. And sometimes all people need is an invite. Good luck with this challenge and I love you all!

may 27th...its been a great week!

May 27, 2013

 

Alright its been a great week! So we got to hang out with our new district on Monday and get to know them a little bit more. We finally have had some appointments but this stake is going to be a lot of reactivation which I am good with as long as our mission President is okay with it also. Tuesday Sister Soper and I had a super fun adventure. We decided to walk to one of our appointments because we had some free time. Sis. Soper told us we should try taking a different way to see if it was shorter. I was pretty sure that it was not going to be, but I went with it. So instead of a 2 mile walk to our appointment it turned into a 5 mile walk. It was okay because it was totally beautiful outside! Sis. Soper said that even though she was senior companion that we should probably follow my directions from now on. Super fun! Wednesday we decided to take matters into our own hands a little instead of depending so much on the ward mission leaders and we did some door to door contacting. We knock on the door of this girl and when we told her who we were she invited us in. As we were getting to know her she told us a lot about how she got into some bad stuff during her senior year of high school and after getting out of rehab she has been trying to turn her life around. She was so happy to have some one to talk to and to have a little spiritual uplifting. At institute that night we met some one else with a very similar background and he is wanting to start coming back to church too! Its so cool to see how the Lord is preparing people for us. Thursday was a pretty good day. We tried to do some more contacting but no one was home. Then we went and met this girl who is working on her mission papers. After that we came home and did a little more studying and I read the 14 day envelopes of the YW values. There was some incredible stories in there. Our dinner appointment on Thursday was super fun! The dad of the family grew up in Richland and graduated a Bomber. We got talking about people they might know and they knew the Ostler's and the Eppic's. They are actually the Eppic's cousins. After dinner we had a wonderful lesson with some one else who is trying to come back after getting into drugs. Its amazing how they can tell the difference between when God is in their life and not. Friday we attended the temple. It was funny because everyone kept asking us where we are going on our mission because there was quite a few groups from the MTC there. It was funny when we told them that we were already on our mission. When we were outside waiting for our district, Sis. Balero and Sis. Reynolds came walking out. The said they had just met two Elders going to the Salt Lake City West mission so we told them to keep their eyes open for our Elders from the Candy Mountain ward. For lunch we ate at a little restaurant called the Awful Waffle. I had an amazing crepe that was full of eggs, spinach, tomatoes, hash browns and other yummy stuff. It was the cutest little restaurant. Friday we were blessed with two lessons and they both went well. Friday night and all of Saturday I did not feel good. But I pushed through it because I knew that the Lord was on my side. Luckily I did because we were able to have two lessons and our dinner appointment was with a ward mission leader and his family. His family loved us and since we didn't have any appointments to run off to we were able to play some basketball with them. In our skirts but still fun. Sunday felt like one of the longest days ever. We headed to the stake center around 8:30 and attended 3 sacraments, and 2 meetings. So we were at the same building from 8:30 AM- 6:00 PM. talk about church attendance. But everything is going GREAT! We were struggling for awhile finding work but then the past few days we have gotten so many names we don't know what to do with them! So the Lord is truly blessing us and knows what we can handle. One of our favorite ward mission leaders was just released as an institute teacher so he is now all about missionary work. We are finding a lot of people willing to go on splits with us which is nice. I feel like a celebrity every where I go now, and it feels a little weird. But I love being in the Valley and I love working with the YSA! The couple we are living with has a son who works for the MTC and is over the IPAD experiment so he has talked to the board about getting us one soon! I hope it actually happens. Love you all and hope you have a fun summer!

week 9...mom thinks I'm spoiled.

Okay so I am officially the happiest missionary alive. I now am serving in the Provo UT YSA 19th stake. Yes I get to cover 9 wards of just Young Single Adults! We cover 3 cities so our area is pretty big. We cover Mapleton, Springville, and South Provo. The cool thing about opening this area is it is an experiment that President is trying out. We have to rely so much on the Ward Mission Leaders because since we are just covering YSA we can't really go tracting. Which I am totally thrilled about. We have been able to go to the activities the stake puts on, like institute, sports night, and some BBQ's. In fact we are encouraged because lots of the people bring their non-Member and Less-active friends to them.

Wednesday I met Sister Soper and we get along very well! She reminds me a lot of Jessalyn actually. She has such a cool story. She is from Texas and she has only been a member for 2 years. Her dad is a priest for another religion so he had a hard time with her decision but she stayed strong. She was in the ROTC program down at Texas A&M. She is 25 so she really wants to be here. She said since her first discussion with the missionaries she knew she needed to go on a mission. The house we live in is amazing! We live with the Radfords. Brother Radford is the high councilor over the missionaries in the stake we cover, and they had their dream house built and had living quarters for missionaries put in. We still share a kitchen but its kind of nice because they told us not to worry about buying our own food. We have 2 bathrooms which makes getting ready nice.

As far as work in the area so far we are still working on it... There is a ward mission leader who has helped us out quite a bit already. He is a teacher at the MTC so he knows all about how missionary work needs to work now a days. The funny thing is, his name is Jefferson and he acts and dresses just like the Ostler boys. So if you can imagine working with someone like that, yeah its fun! I don't really know what else to tell you because I am still trying to figure everything out. Just to inform you I did not get an IPAD yet. Right now the district just south of us is testing them but president said hopefully by the end of the summer all the missionaries will have one. Love you all and I hope you are having fun with all of your adventures!

LOVE<3 Sister Kaylynn Harrison

                                          Guess who Kaylynn saw at transfers this week!

week #8 Mothers day and transfer time

This is the missionary mom. So this weeks notes were super short on account of getting to talk on mothers day. The best part of our missionaries call was the surprise that came to Jessalyn as Kaylynn explained how many wards, how much work, how many lessons, how many baptisms and how many new sister missionaries there are in the Provo Utah mission. For instance Kaylynn says they got 12 new sisters when she started and are getting 19 more this week. Jessalyn's whole mission has 11 sisters. I guess for some of us its hard to believe there is so much missionary work to be done in Provo. They are both growing so much and are both learning to rely on the Lord in all the things that they do and both learning how to be great missionaries. Under different circumstances but also under the same plan of happiness. And both are having experiences with people feeling the spirit and learning to pray and learning about Heavenly Fathers love for us and Jesus Christ's great example. So here is her note:

 

So I don't have to much to say this week but I will fill you in on some stuff. I got my transfer call to Spanish Fork and I will be covering the YSA Stake. I am praying that it is a walking area so I can be out in the wonderful sun! It is crazy how attached I got to the people here in Roosevelt. I know that I will find amazing people where ever I go but its just weird. I seriously feel like I just came out of the MTC! Yesterday was the Memorial service for the Elder that passed away and it was very touching.  From what was said it sounds like he constantly was trying with all his heart, might, mind ,and strength to be Christ like and hearing about it made me want to try to be better. I am so excited for Wednesday to see Camry and hopefully we will be in the same area! I sent a lot of pictures this time because pictures are worth a thousand words. Love you and hope you all are doing well and being happy! I will have more to say next week since its going to be a whole new experience.

 

                                         Roosevelt sister missionaries with the District leader

                                      a family that likes to take care of sister missionaries

week #7 day by day...

I can not believe how fast weeks go out here. Its like just yesterday was monday and now its monday again. But this week has been a hard one but I have also seen many blessings. Last week for PDAY we went to Vernal and did some shopping and then we got together as a Zone. We had a BBQ and played lots of different sports. Like Rugby, Football, and Volleyball. We got to go to one of the bishops house for dinner and then headed over to a members home for FHE. I love that family so much, they want us to feel at home when we are at their house which is exactly what I needed this week.
On Tuesday we did some tracting and it was so windy and there was dirt flying everywhere and it was super painful but we got to about 10 houses. At 4:00 we went and visited an investigator family and we invited them to be baptized but found out the mom is already a member just not active. The most horrible thing about this week is 7 appointments were cancelled so we had a lot of free time which I hate! But that night we got to teach Brad which always makes my day a little better. We got the whole family in on the lesson and they asked a lot of amazing questions.
Wednesday was pretty great. I got to start my day out with a great run, we had quite a few appointments and we did exchanges. It was really cool in our lesson with George he really noticed how much he has in common with Nephi and how he wants to use the Book of Mormon to help him get through his trials. Our lesson with Tyra was good, she still has not picked a baptism date but her grandma said that Trya has been telling her friends May 25 so hopefully she will tell us soon. We ate dinner at a members home and the 14 year old daughter and her dad could sing and play the guitar so they showed off and I am so glad they did. They were amazing! We then went to an auction a ward was having for a fundraiser for the youth. It was so cool to see a ward come together like that to support such a righteous cause. That night we stopped by the local grocery store and bought a cupcake because it was our land lady's birthday. she turned 87! She was so happy when we gave it to her because I guess no one else had gotten her cake for her birthday.
Thursday we had District Traning Meeting (DTM) and me and Sister Smith got to teach. We taught about the importance of getting to know your investigator so they can trust you and know why you are there. We also had interveiws with the Zone leaders and I talked to them a lot about how to keep progressing in our area. That afternoon we got to go to the family history center and do some research. I found out that one of our family tree lines goes all the way back to 150 BC. Thats like Book of Mormon times! I also found out I am very very distantly related to two of the Elders in our district! That night we had 3 amazing lessons and one of them is a new investigator. I love days like that!
Friday was our planning day and then we had a lesson with a recent convert. Dinner was fun because it was really warm out side and so we had a little picnic out in the back yard. We tried knocking on doors of less actives but we were not very successful.
Saturday was a fun day. We got up early and went and did service for one of our investigators. Their "yard" (hardly anyone has grass on anything out here) was full of garbage so we cleaned it up. We took 3 trailers full of junk to the junk yard. Then we went to breakfast as a district to a members house. When it was finally time to get back to work we taught the Plan of Salvation to Pam and it was so cool because she already knew so much! She recommitted to baptism. That night we met two of the most interesting women. The first one just moved here from Texas and she is such a hoot. The second one welcomed us in and then told us she was an ex-mormon and didn't really want anything to do with the church but we could come over when ever we wanted. We also went to one of the Bishops houses to discuss with him how to move the work forward in his ward. I can't believe we didn't think of meeting with the bishops earlier because it was super helpful!
Yesterday(Sunday) we got to attend 3 sacrament meetings and we got to hear some pretty amazing testimonies. After dinner we got to meet with this girl who is 14 and when we met her she told me, "I love the gospel, I know its what I need to do, I want to be baptized" I was shocked! But after our lesson I could tell she was definately ready. Its been a pretty good week, lots of trials to strengthen me and lots of blessings of being surrounded by great people. I love you and hope you are having fun!