I love you so very much! I just think you're the best family in the entire world.
Look on the bright side Mum; at least you still have two weeks to work on your paper and not two days. It could be worse. And I'm so excited that you're starting to look at jobs. Just a few short months and you'll be a big kid! Well you already are, but I just equate graduating from college with growing up. That's really exciting and I'll be praying for things to work out. You've been working so hard the past few years and it's finally going to start paying off. Keep up the good work, I'm so proud of you!
And Cam, good job pinning your guy. It's taken you long enough in the season. Sorry that Tyler's been sick, I hope he's getting better. We've had about 10 out of every 10 people we talk to are sick here. Those germies are going around. So be sure to wash your hands! Kelley, you made it through your first high school basketball season. Woohoo! You are a superstar. Did you get my special surprise in the mail yet? Isn't it the best thing ever. I would have kept it for me, but every time I looked at it, that song would pop into my head. We're trying to keep Babylon out, and that was just inviting it in. But I hope you looooove it! I'm so excited that Natey is still reading Harry Potter. I got his email last week and then after we left the library I felt like a huge jerk because I forgot to respond. But I'm very excited that he read the "hole" book. Keep going! And tell him that when he's in the NFL he can buy me a car too. Yeah that would be really good.
I'm so excited that the elders are going to start teaching our neighbors! That is so good. I know you don't have a ton of time, and I know it's scary, but volunteer to go with them when you can! Our lessons are always so much stronger and so much more spiritual when we have members present. They will really appreciate that.
Thank you for finally responding about the mouse. It is gross! We haven't found him dead yet. But we haven't heard him either. Maybe he went to go and bother someone else. Speaking of rodents, the other night we saw a possum. I honestly don't know why Heavenly Father felt the need to put those creatures on the earth. They are horrid. Ick.
So, our week this week. Like every week, we had our ups and our downs. I think being a missionary might be equivalent to being diagnosed as bipolar. We experience just about every emotion on the spectrum just about every day.
I don't know if I've told you much about Wednesdays here in the DC South Mission, but we have this thing called Walk About Wednesday. And it's just that. We don't use our cars on Wednesday. At all. Sound fun? It's not. We dread Wednesday. But because we know there is some blessing to be had in being obedient, we do it. This week has been so cold. We got snow a couple of days and then we had the temperature drop into the low teens. One of those days just happened to be a Wednesday. And it was windy. So I had on tights, and leggings and wool socks and and under armor shirt and my warmest sweater and my coat and my warmest scarf and this fleecy headband thing. And we still froze. But we finally had our Walk about Wednesday Miracle. Two actually. First off, we didn't turn into popsicles. But the more important one was that we were looking at some old teaching records and we decided to check on an old investigator. We went to the house and there was a Muslim man living there. Not exactly what we were looking for. But then, a couple of houses down we saw this woman getting out of her car. She looked like she might speak Spanish, but by the time we made it to her house she had gone inside. We decided to knock her door. She answered, and without asking any questions she just said, "come in, it's cold." No questions, no funny looks, nothing. It was a miracle. I've never had anyone just let two American girls with name tags in their door like that before. It turns out that her dad had taken the lessons on was baptized 20 or 30 years ago in Bolivia and she had sat in on all of them and the assistants to the President went to the ward they went to and everything. She even has one of their name tags. She loved church and she loved the change she saw in her dad and how much he was focused on their family and how loving he became. She was never baptized so we gave her a Book of Mormon and we did a quick review with the Restoration pamphlet and it turned out so well. She is married, which is awesome, and has a two year old son. She would love to come to church and wants us to come back. When we left her home, she said, "thanks for knocking on my door." That's also something we never hear. There are blessings, miracles even, in being obedient.
We also had another miracle this week. We had a baptism last night. Here's the story. There's a woman in our ward who is just awesome, She decided to serve a mission when she was 28 because that's what the Lord told her to do, and she's just awesome. Well we went to her house to have lunch with her earlier in the transfer. While we were there we asked her to revelation question and she just pointed to the other guy that was there. His name is Edgar and he lives in her house and had been taking the lessons from the elders a few months back. He comes to church every Sunday and is just the nicest guy. So that was all good and well, we shared a nice spiritual thought with them and had intentions to come back and teach Edgar. The following Sunday he all of a sudden tells the elders that he wants to get baptized. What?! We were so excited, and a little jealous that he talked to the elders and not us and that the elders got to finish teaching him, but all is well. The important thing is that he got baptized. The service last night was so beautiful and the Spirit was so strong. This baptism has been a long time coming. It was so amazing, I wish I could put it into words, but they wouldn't be sufficient. Just such a sense of peace and happiness, joy really, and Edgar was so happy. I was also playing the piano and translating for the English elders who had brought an investigator, so it was a little stressful, but so so good. After the service we were talking to him and he said, when you asked the question at our house that day, that's what got me thinking about getting baptized. So thank you. The church is true. I love this gospel because it is truly the gospel of Jesus Christ. It's what gives us lasting joy and happiness. It makes it so our families can be together forever, and it's let's us know where we're going. I love being a missionary and I love having the privilege of representing Jesus Christ and being allowed to see miracles. I'm just so full of love for everything today. And I especially love you guys. You're so important to me and I miss you so much and I can't wait to see you again, but I know that this is where the Lord wants me and that we are all being blessed as a family because of it. I love you all so much.
xoxo,
Hermana Simpson
This is also funny, but every time Hermana Stewart emails home she uses a different celebrity name for me. So I've been Brittney Spears, Taylor Swift, and this week it's Mariah Carey. Cool?
Also, Kelley, I did not get a single letter from you this past week. It was a very sad mail week.
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