Week 14 Pictures

The sisters

Sister Urie with her new Tassels.  The look so cute!

Friday night..945pm there is a knock at the door..We thought it was the elders bring back a dish we had let them borrow..but I opened the door and there was a pizza delivery man with a pizza and said is Becca here..I wasn't sure who he was talking about..and then I remembered..that's me. so I said that was me and he said this is a surprise for Becca. Crazy! So thank you I was very surprised. haha

It looks like 100+ with 50% humidity

Sister Urie found a Violin to play while she is in slidell.

week 14 -This is the Anniversary of Hurricane Katrina

Hello Friends and Family!

How are ya'll doing? I hope everything is going well!

Things are going great here in Slidell, LA! We have been having some slow weeks because we just baptized our teaching pool, but things are starting to look up! We are approaching a reaping season! I see now why they say missionary work is so hard. You are not always teaching lessons and baptizing people..there are a lot of seeds you need to plant and sow before anything like that can happen. We have found a lot of success from member referrals.

This week we had another sister with us, Sister McPheeters, from Picayune. Her companion is sick and so she came with us to Slidell for a week. It was been really fun..and adventure you could say. We Biked on Thursday. They weather wasn't too bad. The other two sisters were sweating and couldn't figure out why i wasn't drenched in sweat as well.. I told them.. " I do not sweat..I glisten"...but i really was sweating. It is very hot here! It was 104 deg. with 50% humidity on Friday. We about Died! ( I think I included the picture of the thermometer we saw)

So we actually had some lessons to teach this week. What a blessing!
Tuesday we went to see One of our Recent converts who hasn't been coming to church due to some work issues. We went over to visit her  and she said she had quit her job and she was free to come back to church and for us to come over! her phone kept going off during our visit with her. Wednesday comes and we get a text from her saying she and her sister can come to book of Mormon class. ( We have tried to teach her sister before. She said she was atheist and acted very disinterested and blew us off.) They both came to class and she enjoyed it but she said she had A LOT of questions for us. The lesson that night was on Prophets and she was really interested to know how there was a prophet on the earth today. We set up a time to go see her at our Recent converts house Friday. So to make a long story short.. The person that kept calling our recent converts phone was her sister (Her sister has 4 little kids.) Due to recent deaths in the family her sisters kids have been freaking out and asking her sister,we will call her jess, a bunch of questions. Now she wants to know for herself and for her kids. We had to start with the basics with her when we went over on Friday to teach her. At the end of the lesson we invited Jess to say the closing prayer. She asked if her kids could come in for the prayer..we said of course. and she called all her kids in and we all knelled on the ground. Jess offered the most heart felt, sweet prayer. It was so simple and the spirit was so strong. after the prayer Jess and her sister were both in tears and when we asked her how she felt she said great and she was going to do this every night with her kids. It was great.

Another Story!
 So.. A few weeks ago..( I believe it was last transfer.) we had to go get our oil changed.) I was a new missionary and just knew i needed to talk with everyone!..so I started talking at this lady at the dealership..She said she wasn't interested in the message but I gave her a mormon.org card any way and said to call if she need anything and to check out our website..
We got a call Tuesday night from her saying she went to the website and really wanted to meet with us. We set it up and went to visit her Wednesday after District meeting... Let me see if i can paint a good enough picture for you of this lady.. we will call her Helen. Helen is a little bit larger middle age woman who lives a lone. ( well she doesn't really live alone..she lives with her daughter) Her daughter is never really there and she thinks that she is off doing drugs. ( very sad) Helen lives in the hood of slidell. Very sketchy neighborhood. We get into her house and she tells us all about her life and such. ( a half hour passes) we finally get a chance to ask her about why she invited us over and she said she was lonely and wanted someone to talk with also she was a little interested in the book of Mormon. We tried to read it with her but she couldn't see it so we are going to take back a large print for her. After we had been there about an hour or so we said we needed to leave she shouted .."NO! you cant leave. there is a storm coming look!" so she turned on the news really loud and started showing us all about the hurricane that was coming and said we couldn't leave. She said her house was safe because there were a thousand prayers written and stapled inside the walls..also that she has AB- blood and that can be traced back to Jesus and that scientist have been doing tests on her...it was crazy..we finally got out of there. My story does not do it justice..I will give you the sequel to Helen when we go back to give her the large print book of Mormon. wish us luck!

Tracting Tips: $1.59
Southernism: "you loot we shoot" People had signs that said this in their front yards after hurricane Katrina
Scripture: Ether 3:5


Thank you for all your support and prayers. More stories to come next week!

Love Ya'll!
Sister  Urie

Week 13 Pictures

Thank You

Week 13 - Jesus is a Saints fan

Dear Friends and Family!

 

Hello Family and Friends, I love you all and miss you and hope all is going well. Things are going great here in Slidell, LA. Lots of Good people.

This was a great week. Not as slow as last week but still we are working very hard on finding new people to teach and working with the members to get referrals. It is so much easier to work with a member referral then to teach someone you met at the door. So please..invite your friends to church and to have dinner with you and the missionaries!

Here is the story.. Our whole mission is completely out of miles..so we are going to be biking here a lot in the next few weeks. (yes I will send pictures of the tassels on my bike.and no..I will not embarrass anyone and wear them around slidell.)

It is that time again. Football season. You know how it is when the game is on, you don't want to turn it off for anything..that is how everyone whose door we knock on is like. We never really know when the games are going to be on either. So it was a shock to us when we went to go visit one of our investigators and they were watching the saints game. they said come on in and get some food! so we sat in the room with them..not facing the TV and talked with them. Surprisingly enough they talked with us a lot instead of watching the game and then when it was time for us to go and share a spiritual thought he turned off the TV. We are working really hard to get him to come back to church. ( One of the pictures I sent you is of all the food they sent us home with..we are doing fine in the food department if you were worried.lol)

We have transfers today so I will report more on that next week. I am staying here this time and sister Hills is going to Picayune.

( update..no transfers..)

OK! So here is another story.. We have found that one of the biggest problems with investigators not coming to church is that they do not feel comfortable coming because they do not have anything other then jeans to wear. So I had the Idea to start the 'Clothe Our Investigators Please/Program "C.O.I P! :) The relief society president announced it in relief society, anyone that has larger skirts or shirts that are nice and modest for church that would be willing to give it to us. This all started because one of our investigators and her daughter don't really have anything to wear to church, so we went to goodwill and bought them some skirts. I would love to tell you that they came to church..but they did not. we are hoping and praying that nothing will come up next week so that they are able to go. We are also going to work on fellowshipping them this week.

There is a story I forgot to tell you from last week that I thought was really funny.. ( dad don't freak out) So it was 10:40ish pm one night. I was almost asleep and we hear this lady out side our window saying something about a lost kid. and then we hear a knock at the door..so we go and look through the peep hole and turn on the light inside..she bangs on the door again and yells.."it's your neighbor!" (yeah right like that gives her any credibility! lol) So we open the door and she tells us that our backyard is flooded that someones house is leaking. So we meet her around back and sure enough our whole backyard is almost flooded..she looks and says oh never mind..its not coming from your house and walks away..So we didn't think anything of it..until the morning when we went to look at our backyard. sure enough the leak was coming from our house and the whole backyard was even more flooded and so was the back parking lot. We called the maintenance people and the plumber guy that came said that a tree root broke the pipe line and caused the leak. There is still a big hole in our backyard today..also when he had to fix he leak it was raining..of course!

One last great thing.. The ward music lady in the ward had a violin and she is letting me use it until I leave Slidell! I am so excited, it is great to be able to play again. You don't realize how much you take creating and playing music for granted.

That is pretty much it on the week for me. I hope that all is going well for you at home and that you aren't dieing in the Arizona heat.

Thank you for your prayers and all you do!

Love, Sister Urie

 

P.s: anyone preparing for a mission.. read preach my gospel! and memorize the how to begin teaching points in the teaching skills chapter. ch 10...it will help a lot.. The more you have memorized the better off you are when you get in the field..then the spirit only bring things to your remembrance after you've learned it! I think i will make this a new section to my email..MP( mission prep! lol)..or not.. To be honest there were sections of PMG (preach my gospel) That i just didn't pay to much attention to because I wasn't a real missionary yet..this is false!! just read it all.lol

 

Southernism: "Jesus is a saints fan" " Real men love Jesus" ( saw these two sayings on bumper stickers this week..too funny)

Tracting Tips: add 14 cents to last week.. I keep forgetting to count. sorry..thanks mom!

scripture: 2nephi 31:20

Week 12 Pictures

Leadership Training

 Sister Harding and Sister Urie

 Temple Baptist church in Hattiesburg Mississippi

 More Missionaries

 Mini MTC reunion, Sister Harding, Sister Linton,
Me and Sister Tieki

On no, This umbrella has seen better days! Time for a new one!

Week 12

Hello Friends and Family!

I love you and Hope you are having a wonderful week!

Things are going great here in Slidell, La. Last week felt really short though..and yet again not too much to report.

We had leadership Training in Hattiesburg, MS Wednesday-Friday of last week. It was great. We went over the 8 fundamental lessons that we learned in the MTC. ( for those who have not had it yet) and at night we stayed with members(In Petal) and got to go on exchanges with ward members. It was a lot of fun.(yes missionary work can be fun!) I got to visit this one less active family one of the nights. She was sick and had been offended, her reasoning's for not attending sacrament meeting. As missionaries, we get to focus on helping member's remember their testimony and why they became members of the church. I got to ask her if she remembered how she felt when she was at sacrament meeting and when the last time it was she had been to the temple..another neat thing was she took us on the "grand tour" tour of her house. She played many different instruments and I asked her if she had a violin. She did! A full size. She told me her husband had bought it for her because she wanted to learn and she had never learned and it had never been played before. I was able to tune it up and play a couple hymns for them. I hope that they were able to feel of my testimony of the gospel through word and music. I hope they remembered..

Another thing I learned from training, that touched my heart was that..we do not have a temple in our mission and this has been a little hard on me. I love love the temple. It is the house of the Lord. One thing that President Tucker said during training, pertaining to revelation through church attendance ( one of the 8 fundamentals) is that our Sacrament meetings should be a mini endowment session. It should mean that much to us and we should come that prepared. I had the opportunity to do that this week and I have never felt the spirit so much during the sacrament. He also said that the first thing most people do after the sacrament prayer is said is they pop their head up and look around. How much more would it benefit us to after the prayer is said to keep your head bowed and ponder, reflecting on the words of the sacrament prayer and what it really means. putting your name in the prayer. This has really helped me in not being able to go to the temple. At least I have church! :)

Oh! I have to tell you.. One of the largest Baptist churches in the mission is in Hattiesburg, MS it is called 'Temple' baptist church.. It is huge..this picture ( from the car window) does not do it justice. It is so big that the high school that is up on the hill behind it looks very wimpy.. I will try to send a better picture of it soon.

The picture of the swamp was from during exchanges in Petal. The sisters in the pictures are Sister Linton, (new sister, 2 1/2 weeks out) Sister Tieki (from the Pacific Islands) Sister Harding ( my MTC companion) and ME! It was so great to see my district from the MTC again and sister Harding. Like a mini family reunion.

Stories from this week...

We have 2 new investigators!  A mother and daughter..when i was away at training the elders found them and gave them to us. The mom is great. Sister hills and the other sisters that came to slidell went to visit her Thursday and taught her the restoration..we went back Friday night and between that time she had already read to ch12 in the book of Nephi! She really wants to learn more. And shes already invited us over for her daughters birthday party. we set up an appointment and went to visit her Saturday and she was not home..hopefully she was just not home. We like to hope for the best. Hopefully we will be able to work really hard in helping them progress. Sister Hills and I were worried that we got over excited about finally having a new investigator and scared her away by giving her too many commitments at once...We'll see what happens..

On Tuesday we went over to a part member families house for dinner. The elders are working with the husband who is not a member. They taught about faith and gave him a challenge to do for one month. They had plant starters dirt things and seeds and had everyone take there own and plant it..and this was to remind the family about the challenge they left them to do for one month..to read the book of Mormon, pray..and come to church every week. It was a nice lesson. It was not received well though. Until We know who God is and our relationship with him, prayer is almost meaningless and pointless. we need to know who we are praying too..when we know who God is  we will want to pray and we will know why it is important. ( I hope this makes sense) The husband had a lot of concerns about if God is even really there..

last story, Sunday was a nice sunny day and then come mid afternoon during lunch rain came pouring down! It was crazy. It rained so hard that it felt like we were going through a car wash on the power and it was pretty hazy. We had Dinner at the senior missionaries house..we made it no problems..but going inside was the crazy part. the rain was coming down so hard and the wind was going crazy. my poor umbrella broke. flipped inside out and we were all soaking wet. It was soo funny I couldn't stop from laughing. It reminded me of the crazy rain we would get in Florida..but even harder rain! Good ol' SLidell :)

That is pretty much it for this last week. This week we are focusing on working with the member's. I will let you know how it goes! :)

Thank you again for your support and letters. It means the world to me!

Hope y'all have a great week!

Love, Sister Urie

Southernism: Momo - means grandma. instead of saying grandma they say Momo.

Scripture: Mosiah 1Nephi 2:12. When we know our relationship with God and who he is..we wont mummer! :)

Tracting Tips: $1.41 ( I counted it finally! )Almost enough to get cupcakes!!

Week 11 Pictures

Week 11-Fast and testimony meeting and..."Shouldn't this be on the news?!"‏

Dear Friends and Family!

Another Great week In Slidell, LA! Not too much to report this week. We are still working hard to find new people or a family to teach. Which, Success, we think we found a family!
We were out trying to visit a less active member, but they weren't home. When this happens we normally knock some doors around their house. (we call it '5-5-5'..more effective then just tracting) As we were walking there were two men in a drive way and it looked like one was washing his car. When we got closer you could see that He was gutting fish! Cat Fish! He showed us his fish and then we told him who we were and about the message we share. We asked if we could come over sometime and have a family night with him and his family. He said yes! We are going back Tomorrow to teach him, his wife and his 5 kids! Hopefully they will be receptive to the message.
Also on that street we tracted into a house, a man answered the door and said it wasn't really a good time because he was just eating dinner with his family. So we told him a little about the message of the restoration..he asked if there was something we could leave for him to read..yeah of course there is! So we "Loaned" him a copy of the book of Mormon and told him if he wasn't interested we could come and pick it up and give it to someone else. We are going to go visit with him again soon. It was great to see someone who was really interested in finding out if it was true or not before shutting the door. (He also has a big family!)

(Mom..dad.. Do you remember the man I told you about that we found tracting who was playing hotel California on his guitar?..well..
Sister hills and I tried to find him one day..went and knocked on his door.. not home. his car was there though. so we called and left him a message. later that day we get a text from him asking if it was the sisters. we said yes. he replied.."whatsss happenning!!??" we texted back.."not to much we just wanted to come talk with you about the book of Mormon some time." He replied again 3 hours later.. " maybe not tonight..I just finished a quiet dinner alone. were you wanting to go out for drinks and dancing?"
So we figured he was either drunk texting us or just crazy.. So sister hills was going to text the elders and ask if they would go over and meet our potential investigator because he was hitting on us.. but instead of sending that text to the elders she accidentally sent it to Brian!... we about died.. oops! one day we pray he will read and come to church..until then we have saved his number as a do not answer. lol)

Other things that happened this week...
So we were tracting..and we saw a thermometer by someones door..It was about 97 deg.s with 70% humidity. Arizona..You don't know how good you have it!

Two stories..
First...yesterday was fast and testimony meeting at church. Where people get up and bear their testimonies.
A little boy got up ..about 4 years old and gave his testimony..it went just like this..
" I love Jesus.. I love Jesus and Jesus loves me.
I love everyone... and everyone loves me!  Name of Jesus Christ Amen!"
It had to be the cutest testimony i have ever heard. Too funny. :)

Second. We went to visit one of our part member families last night. We are teaching two of the daughters. The younger daughters friend was there ( they're 19/20yrs old.) We were reading the first two chapters from the Book of Mormon with them and talked about how we have a living prophet on the earth today and about the Holy Ghost. The Girls friend was shocked! She said.." Wait..there is a prophet on the earth today..? Why isn't this on the news? Shouldn't people know about this?!" We were able to testify to her about the why we were there and how true the message really is. God loves us Just like he has in every dispensation, so he blessed us with a modern prophet! He's not just going to leave us in the dark. It was a great testimony builder to me about the reality of a modern, living prophet on the earth today who does talk with God and gains revelation for the whole world.

Well that is pretty much it for the week. Thank you for all the letters! I love the support..Thank you! Time sure is flying!
(I go to training this Wednesday to be a trainer. Cant wait to tell you how it goes!)
Hope all is going well at home,
Love You,
Sister Urie!

Southernism: A news broadcaster was interviewing a lady after hurricane Katrina and asked her how she felt about all the churches being destroyed. The lady told the News person.." Grrl, I dunt know bout you, but we gets our chicken from Popeye's" :)
Tracting tips: so..Still haven't counted. but we got two penny's this week. Sorry! Pretty sure were really close to getting happy hour cupcakes!
Scripture: Mosiah 2:16-19

So i Forgot to tell you!
I got to play a baby violin. We went to the boyacks for dinner ( a family in the ward) and their son has a little 1/2 size violin that i somehow got tunned up and played. It was so great to finally play again. Also I was finally able to talk with the Ward music director and told her I play the violin. She is going to get new strings for her full size violin and I am going to restring it for her. Prayers have been answered! :)
Thought you would find that interesting.
Love you both and i Hope you have a wonderful week!

Love Sister Urie!

Week 10 Pictures

 Me and Sister Goodin

 Sign on someones door?!

 Sister Goodin picking up shells

Mexican food from the Country Store

(Must be southern Mexican food)

Week 10: More Rain...No investigators..but He came to church!‏

Dear Friends and Family!

How are you doing? I hope all is going well!

I am sad to say that there is not much for me to report this week.
This week was really slow and kind of discouraging. (yet I am discouraged because discouragement weakens faith!) Many appointments feel through this week and no one would let us in or meet with us. Sister Hills and I worked really hard and didn't have much to show for the week. It was crazy..Sister Hills told me that She has not had this much success on her mission before..and she had also never had such a bad week before. One of our potentials told us that someone needs to stop "burning the black candle". It is crazy how many bad things have been happening to our potentials! One lady had her dad go into the hospital, her daughter had an inner ear infection and her little girl had strep. Satan is working overtime here in Slidell!
..Now when I say that nothing happened this week..I really mean nothing. We were only able to teach 4 lessons.. very sad. We did however have two things happen.

First..Now what happens "in the mini van" stays "in the mini van"..but I had to share this story with you. Once a week we have to wash and vacuum our car. We always take our van through the drive through..( to save time and it's really inexpensive) So we were in the drive through and I thought..oh wouldn't it be bad if the back vents were open.. ( thought this because I remember all the times Jessi asked you, mom, to close the back vents) So I turned around and looked in the back of the van and soap was coming through the back vents!! It was crazy..I turned to Sister Hills and said " Hurry Close the Vents!" What an adventure that was. I couldn't stop laughing. It reminded me of willy wonka and the chocolate factory when they're in that one car machine and the soap is coming in. ( except on a much smaller scale.) I promise the van is fine.. we cleaned it up and no soap got in the carpet so we were good. Just a crazy time..

Second thing that happened this week.. We had someone come to church today!..No not an investigator..(because we have none as of right this second..) it was David!! David came walking through the door in his jeans and snake skin boots. Best day ever! It was so great to see him. (He has not been able to get in touch with the Laurel elders yet, but he will when he goes back next week. He is in town for the week and we are going to meet with him today.) It was so great to see him. He is just the "Pick me up" that Sister Hills and I needed. What made it even better is that He paid his tithing! He really is a great example of what it means to be anxiously engaged in a good cause. He loves the church! It was so exciting to see him. He stayed for all of church.
 One more things I forgot about. We had one of our Senior Sisters Leave, that was working at the employment center. It was really sad to see her go..but it is good that she is able to go home and see her family. We will miss Sister Goodin! :)
Well that is it for the week for me..not too much happening..but just wait next week is going to be crazy!
I love you and hope all is going well in Good ol Arizona!
Love,
Sister Urie
Tracting Tips: I have kind of lost count.. i will recount for next week..we earned..2 pennies. Once again a slow week. So much rain!!
Southernism: Roll " We are going to go 'roll' his house" ..( now i know what you're thinking..because i thought this too when i heard it..why are you going to roll that poor mans house down the hill!..but rolling is what we would call "Toilet papering" or "T-Ping" Crazy huh? )
Scripture: Mosiah 18:8-10

Oh! P.S: I am now the designated driver!.. look out slidell..here I come with Stacey's Mom the Mini van! ( Her name Is Stacey's mom..)haha
.. this week we went to the bayou country store..the Mexican restaurant we went to for my two month had good salsa but the food was a let down.

We went with Sister Goodin, Sister foster and Sister Goodins daughter to this swamp boardwalk. When they had gone to the beach sister goodin got a bunch of sea shells and thought they were fine..turned out to be hermit crabs! The escaped all over her car. Pretty funny. so we went with them to set them free..
Sorry I don't have more exciting success missionary stories this week. We are in a "sowing season"

Week 9 - Pictures

 

 In picayune Mississippi on exchanges,

lots of Country roads

 The pictures of those signs in peoples yard were something I thought was funny

 Our district,  The Elders are serving in picayune and so are the other sisters. The other Elders that are serving in Slidell are zone leaders and only come to our district meeting every other week.

 The other Baptism for this week

Our other Baptism this week!

 We rode bikes this week!

Week 9 - 2 Baptisms and Biking

Dear Family and Friends,

This week was another great one!  As of yesterday I have officially been out two months and Ive been in Slidell a month and a half! It is so crazy how time fly's.
We went on exchanges this week. I went to Picayune, Mississippi and sister Hills stayed in Slidell. Picayune is more of what I thought my mission would be like. Long stretches of country road with a house every so often. It was really pretty, but almost more humid then Slidell! The people were great. While I was in picayune I was able to meet their ward mission leaders wife who comes on exchanges with the sisters once a week. She was such a sweet lady. Not a day goes by that we do not hear about the devastation that Katrina caused from one person or another.
Oh! I almost forgot the best part of Picayune..I got antied for the very first time! Sister Spencer and I went to try a member referral. When she opened the door and realized who we were she started telling us about what she believed and how we did not believe in Christ. ( this always amazes me.. because the name of Jesus Christ is in the name of the church. lol go figure) She prayed for us on her door step.. " Dear Lord, bless these girls,I pray the scales of darkness fall from your eyes!" It was great. I will say though i have never felt the spirit leave so quickly. There was so much evil and hatred in her... All is well now. ( see 2nephi 29..that is the south!)
 
We had two baptisms this Saturday!  These two men that got baptized made huge changes in their lives. This is has really helped my testimony to grow. The Atonement is real and people really can change if they have the desire and help from the Lord.
So funny story..Right after one of the men getting baptized and came out of the water ( after having been baptized but still in the water..)  I don't know what kind of a change he was expecting to feel. He really wanted to be baptized so that he could have a completely new clean slate.. So after he came of out the water he put of his hands up and did this little step back almost falling in the the side of the font looking up to the ceiling. It was so funny.
The other man that got baptized was just recently married to his wife who is a member. They are very excited because now they can be sealed in the temple a year from Saturday..on her birthday! She gave the talk on the holy ghost at the baptism. It was very sweet.

We rode our bikes yesterday! ( PS..my bike is still tassel-less..walmart does not sell them. so if you see any send them my way! lol) First you need to know that it has been raining like crazy here! Some one told us yesterday how there were tropical storms coming?..yeah no big deal. lol
So we had planned to bike... That morning we went tracting around our apartment and it sprinkled rain a little, but we knew it wouldn't rain because we had to ride our bikes! We prayed that it would not rain because we were trying to be obedient and ride our bikes. We rode our bikes and no rain!  The crazy part is that when we were visiting with someone whose house we rode to on our bikes they were shocked when we told them we had rode there. Apparently they had had so much rain that morning. The whole time we were at their house and all the way back to the car it was very sunny. See! God really does answer prayers!

(I got to eat Craw Fish Et touffe. It was really good! Craw fish is my new favorite. I will have to cook it for ya'll one day! :) )

I have also included a picture of our district. the elders are serving in picayune and so are the other sisters. The other elders that are serving in Slidell are zone leaders and only come to our district meeting every other week.oh.. this week I drove the mini van last Thursday. I am going to be driving this coming month! time really is going by very fast.

Southernism: for .. Instead of saying for example, " let's have dinner at 6 pm.." You would say " dinner for 6 pm" 
Tracting tips:...Times have been rough the water is washing away all our pennies.. we only made 3 cents this week.

Scripture: Jacob 4

Well that is all me for this week. Things are going great here.

I love you and hope you have another wonderful week!
Love, Sister Urie

New Story from week 8

"I forgot to tell you a funny story that happened on Wednesday so here it is."
We had some time before David's baptism interview.  (we promised we would be there before he went in.) So we decided to do a little tracting on a street we planned to try.  No one was interested.  We kept walking.  we saw a man playing the guitar on his front lawn.(this was perfect because we had just enough time to try on more house.)  I turned to sister Hills and told her I thought he was playing "Hotel California" we introduced ourselves and asked him what he had been playing.  I was right! (that's the part I thought you would appreciate that dad) we asked him a few simple questions about what role religion had played in his life and how his faith had grown as he trusted in god.  for these 2 short questions he stood there for 20 minutes and told us his life story. (It is amazing the things people will tell us)  some how we tied it back towards a gospel principle.  taught him about the restoration and loaned him a copy of the book of Mormon.  He told us to call him in about a week.  As we  were walking away he asked us if we did this all the time.  we told him we were full time missionaries.  Then we ran back to the car because we were late and he saw us peel out and speed past his house.  yep, we are missionaries!

Week 8 Pictures

 This is rain. we have been getting buckets and buckets of it!

 

 
 me, Sister Hills, David, and Sister Goodin. (one of the senior sisters)

Week 8 - The Great Pearl

Dear Friends and Family,

This week has gone by so fast and was so crazy!
It all started Sunday when we got a text from a former investigator. He said he was in town and wanted to meet with us. ( the background on this investigator: The sisters in Slidell have been teaching him for about 8 or 9 months. he was staying with his dad who lives in slidell but he actually lives in laurel. not in our boundaries.  David is about 38 years old) So we called David and he said he wanted to meet with us. Everything was cleared up and he wanted to talk to us about "getting him baptized". So we went over on Monday afternoon and talked with him. He was still smoking and drinking tea..but once we told him that if he wanted to get baptized he would have to stop today right now he said .."well sisters i've just smoked my last cigarette" and that he did.

President Tucker came down to interview him on Wednesday. And the baptismal service was on Saturday. In between that time we had the opportunity to visit with him everyday. He loves all the scriptures especially the book of Mormon.( He called the pearl of great price 'the great pearl.') he keeps trying to slip his dad and step mom a copy of the book of Mormon. They used to think we were a cult. David was able to get both of them to attend his baptism and they were very impressed. At Davids baptismal service sister Hills and I had to sing a musical number ( I am a child of God) David didn't know any of the hymns, when we were helping him pick out which songs he wanted sung at his baptism. ( He wanted everyone to sing "this little light of mine" and "amazing grace"..but we said no. He also wanted to sing " the four walls of raffer" but that was a joke.) So we sang some hymns for him. He thought we sounded so beautiful that he wanted us to sing at his baptism. We told him we would..I told him he better keep praying so we sound better. Only for him would we ever sing at a baptism.
On Sunday at church David really wanted to pay his tithing. He was so excited. (I have never seen anyone so excited about the gospel or paying tithing in my life!)  We showed him where to get the tithing slips, how to pay and who to give it to. He felt so bad that he could not pay more and said he was so embarrassed. "If all (Investigators/members) ever were and would be like unto (David)" This church would grow like never before. It was sad to see him have to go back home to Laurel. He will be a great addition to their branch.
This coming week we have two investigators scheduled for baptism. One was interviewed by President Tucker when he came down and the other is being interviewed on Friday.
It has been raining so much here! It is crazy. Everyone here thought they were in a drought because apparently it normally rains every afternoon. well it's back! Thank goodness for umbrellas!
The work is going great here in Slidell, LA. We just keep praying that we will find a family to teach.
The one less active family we have started working with did not come to church this Sunday. The girl that came last week was out of town. We stopped by to visit with the dad and he was in New Orleans with his wife. We were able to visit with the older daughter and invite her to church. They are pretty interested in our message..they are just unsure. We just keep praying. Hopefully this week they'll come to church. we are  hopefully meeting with the younger sister for a lesson this week. She really enjoyed church last week.

We were about to go back out to work after dinner Thursday evening when we saw a family a few doors down from us playing out side. So we turned around and parked by our house ( Saving miles! ) and walked over to them. The little boys were fishing out craw fish and baby frogs with nets from the canals in front of the house. We talked with the mom and 11 year old girl. She was very interested in our message and wanted to learn more. The mom was very hesitant at first and used the excuse of.."we just have so many little ones..we don't have time I'm sorry." To which i replied " Oh that's no problem.. could we set up a time and have a family night with you?" She loved it! We are going back this week to teach her and her family. She just has two girls( age 11 and 2) the two boys were her nephews.

so funny story.. I went to answer the phone the other day.. ( well this actually happened twice) and I said " Hi! This is Sister Hills with the missionaries." Sister Hills looks at me and says." You're sister Urie" and ... oh it was so funny. She must be doing a really great job training me. I answer the phone the way she does. our Investigator that is getting baptized on Saturday called and I did that same thing.. I said " Hi! This is sister Hills with the missionaries..oh no I lied sorry I'm sister Urie." He didn't notice though. It was pretty funny.

oh ..so one of the ladies in our ward works at chick-fil-a..Sister Hills and I have eaten there at least 4 or 5 times in the past week. She gave us free sandwich coupons. I never liked chick-fil-a before..but we love it now!

I am going to be going to picayune this evening for exchanges and one of the sisters from picayune will be coming to slidell. I will be there from Monday night until Wednesday afternoon and we will switch back after District meeting. I am very excited to see how the work is going down in picayune. This will be my first exchange! They wanted us to ride bikes during the exchange..but it has been raining a lot so i do not think that will happen. We are supposed to sacrifice a 10th of our miles and ride bikes. It has either been too hot or rainy to ride bikes lately.

This week...
Tracting tips: $1.23

Southernism: 'set'... People say sit..but it sounds like set.
Scripture: Alma 36 ( Alma's "conversion" story being told to his son Helaman. I love this because it shows that there is hope for all of God's children if we desire to repent and turn there lives around.)

I love you family and friends, hope all is going well! I am excited to be able to tell you all about this upcoming week and the adventures I will have. Thank you for all your prayers!

Love, Sister Urie

MJM Birth Announcement

This is Becca's MJM Birth Announcement.

The Southern Name comes from a street name

The Black Name comes from the craziest name of a 

Black person we meet.

Week 7 Pictures

 City Hall

 "Drury Lane"

' Drury Ln.' you know... the muffin man! He lives on Drury Ln.! Well we didn't find his house..but I know he lives on this street somewhere! :)

 There is a picture of a huge bug we saw on the ground. I think it's head is gone..which was fine by me.

  A place called lees hamburgers. ( I guess they sauted finely chopped up onions and then put them into the meat and make the patty..so bad for you but so wonderful!) 

This experience merited a picture.

 Yum!

In the picture of sister hills and I on the back wall there are pictures. Those are Mardi Gras pictures! Mardi Gras is a huge thing down here. Kids get a week off of school for it! It is crazy! Gause Rd is pretty much shut down and they have parades all the time.