Week 46 - Merry CHRISTmas! :)

                                                                                                                                     December 21, 2015

Hello Family! :) I love you all! I hope you are having a great and happy holidays! 

This week has been good. We finally got some snow! Sister Meleisea and I had walked to the church to send out those skype emails and do a few other things on Friday. The weather was great as we walked to the church. A little cold, but nothing out of the ordinary! By the time we came out, about an hour later, the ground was covered in a couple inches of snow! Needless to say, we were pretty surprised! After doing a few silly things with the snow, we began the 20 min walk home in the snow! Brrrr. We had to rethink the rest of our evening. We have many members telling us to stay inside, not to go on the roads, and so forth. It was a lot of fun! :) It seems like it snowed continuously for about 24 hours. Let's just say we did a LOT of shoveling for ourselves and our neighbors, and for others in the ward and so forth. We are both still sore :) 

So, I had to drive in the snow. ... I don't like it! haha But that's okay. I just go super super slow and make wide turns and stop pretty early and call it good! Luckily, the weather is getting warmer, and we are getting a good amount of rain (it started this morning...) throughout the week! So, all the snow will melt, and there will be no more driving in the snow! But, no snow for Christmas... You win some, you loose some. What can I say? 

This week, I learned the parable of the talents. Now, of course I knew the parable of the talents. But, I actually learned how it applies to me in my life! ... :) I don't like singing for other people. I myself am not confident in my singing capabilities, so often times I avoid it where ever possible. But, one things Sister Meleisea loves to do is sing! And, sing for people! So, what have I been doing a lot of this transfer? Singing for others! As I have sung more and more, I have become more and more comfortable singing! I don't know if my singing abilities are getting any better, but I am becoming more and more open to the idea! I feel like my talent is growing! And so where does this lead us? Sister Meleisea and I sand a Christmas Carol Duet in Sacrament Meeting yesterday. And, we sang it without any accompaniment. Scary. Super scary. But, it was good! Heavenly Father has blessed us with talents! If we never try to develop them, and just bury them in the ground, that's not going to take us anywhere! Use your talents- even if they aren't the best... but, they will get better, and you will be happy! :) 

One of the highlights of the week for us had to be Thursday. We had received a media referral about a week ago from the Christmas Discover Why Website! It took us a bit to contact them because of the distance... 88 kilometers away! We had tried calling a few different times, but always got the machine, and never got a call back. So, we got a member to give us a ride, and planned to head out there this past Thursday. We were happy to find the referral- Bonnie- home! She doesn't really know how she came across the website- said it just kinda popped up- and she liked what she saw! She was even happier when she saw that we were giving out free Bibles! She had somehow lost hers and was longing to read from it again. We started asking her about her background and so forth and found out something really cool! In the past week, during the nights, her deceased father has been popping into her dreams. She told us he is a very religious man and she feels like he has been trying to tell her something. As the conversation continued, and after we all got to know each other a little better, we started talking about the Book of Mormon. Bonnie has researched the Mormon church a little at one time in her life, but besides that, doesn't know too much about it. But, she accepted The Book Of Mormon with open arms! She remarked that she was excited to read from it. We left her with Alma 7- connecting it all back to Christmas and how we can learn about the birth of Christ in the Book of Mormon and so on. Then, we testified and taught a little about the Plan of Salvation. We testified that this is what her father is trying to say to her. The spirit was so strong and just engulfed us all. We asked her how she felt and all she could say is "Wonderful." Unfortunately we were not able to stay for too much longer, but, we set up a time to come back and to teach her more about the Plan of Salvation and the Book of Mormon. 

The neat thing is that we probably would have never found Bonnie any other way. We probably would have never ventured out into that area, and if we had, we probably still would have never found her since she lives on a back road about 8 k's out of town. But, our Heavenly Father was able to lead Bonnie to us, and it was all through the Christmas Initiative. I have learned for myself that we can and will find the elect through the Christmas Initiative! I love it! :) 

 Sister Meleisea's headaches have calmed down a lot. A lot of her back pain is starting to come back. We have been shoveling a lot of snow lately and I think that might be a cause for it. Hopefully, since it will be raining a lot this week here, and melting all of the snow, her pain will come down. But she is great. She is a great and powerful missionary! Strong testimony. The ward loves her and is really hoping she will be around for another transfer so that she can perform a Samoan dance in the Ward Talent show, and so they can potentially put on a Luau! Sister Meleisea keeps me going, and definitely keeps me on my toes! haha we have fun together! :)

I am doing well! Sore from all the snow shoveling service, and a little nervous when it comes to driving in the snow... but great beyond all of that! I love being a missionary. I was actually happy to hear that we would be extended by a week! One more week to go out and do the Lord's work. It's a great thing. So, that means that my last transfer will be on August 16th as opposed to the 9th, so I imagine I will be home on the 17thas opposed to the 10th. Don't quote me on that. But I think that is how it will go! 

Well, I love you! I will talk to you soon! Have a great and merry CHRISTmas! and stay warm and safe!!! :) Loves! 

Sister Robison