Christmas parties, haircuts and Cadillacs (I wish)

Hi Family -

The mission Christmas party was good.  We didn't open presents there; I'm saving them for Christmas.  But I did open my coat, thank you!  I got approval to visit Dave and Monica on Christmas day.  We're skyping at one of our ward mission leaders' houses in the morning around 10:30.  That's so crazy that Dave works at the South Davis hospital!  I'm seriously there all the time and he works with a lot of the same people I teach.

Uncle Dave's office at South Davis Hospital

So here's some things I've learned about Bountiful ... the members are so crazy nice, I don't think you understand.  Like SO nice.  We went to the Salt Lake temple today and we have to get a ride from a member in order to go ... in Layton, it was hard to get a ride to an 8:00 am session.  Here, people literally fight for it. I'd say 70% of the families here have at least 1 missionary out right now.  I don't know if that's why they're so nice to us or what, but it's awesome.  People fight over meals, too; they want to start sending around a lunch sign-up too (lovely, I need more food fed to me).  Something else I've learned; these mom's wedding rings have the biggest diamonds I've EVER seen.  They're all HUGEEE, almost as big as my arms and thighs are getting, haha.  A bunch of ex mission presidents are our ward mission leaders and it's kind of intimidating ... I feel like they're constantly making mental notes of what we're doing wrong ... oh well!

There's a girl in the stake here who reports to the Mesa mission next week!  Keep an eye out for her; she's Tongan or something ... her name's Sister Solipo.

The mission president's wife called me the other day and asked if I've been giving sisters haircuts ... I was like, uhh yes?  She said she's seen a lot of haircuts that aren't mission appropriate ... I panicked.  Thank goodness they weren't any of the ones I've done.  Phew!  Speaking of haircuts ... remember Amanda in Layton?  Apparently she's giving Sister H grief over there ... she said something like, "maybe if Sister Shields were still here, she could help me ...maybe I should drive down to Bountiful and have her do my hair."  See, I don't know if I should be flattered that she wants my spiritual missionary advice .. or if she just wants free hair services, ya know?  Oh well.

In Bountiful so far, we're teaching a lot of young, single moms, early 30's, late 20's ... it's SO fun.  that's my calling in life.  It's hard to work with them sometimes though because we've run into so many girls who've had abortions .... and that really complicates the baptism process.  The mission president has to conduct those interviews and it's really hard to explain to them why they get special treatment and it might take awhile for them to get baptized.  This one girl was like, "I've had an abortion but it's okay because I was married."  Okay ...?  You have a baby now and you're not married, so why did you have an abortion while you were married?  And either way, it's not okay ... anyways.  We're also teaching a lot of teenage girls in less-active homes where they were never baptized.  It's really cool.

Btw, I hate this Chevy Cruze, I'm requesting to president that we get Cadillacs. And do you know how terrible it is to get out of the car 50 times a day and have to step into a muddy snow bank of 2 feet high snow and ruin your Steve Madden boots?  The struggle.  I hate sitting on the passenger side.

Have a great week, Merry Christmas!

Heidi

My Christmas gift to you ...

Dear Family,

I couldn't think of anything to get you all for Christmas that was actually affordable and would mean something ... so I had an idea.  here's a 12-day countdown to Christmas with some experiences I've had and some of my favorite scriptures.  It's kind of stupid but maybe you'll enjoy it, kind of.

Instructions:  read one a day, each night before family scriptures study.  Each person takes a turn reading, then looking up the scripture.  Some days will have a challenge, too!  Hope you all have a wonderful Christmas!  Love you all,
Heidi

Day One:  FAITH - Alma 32:19, 21, 26-27, 43
So when I was teaching Amanda in Layton, she really wanted to be baptized and knew the church was true, but couldn't commit to baptism because of her boyfriend Bryce.  He lived with his parents but was paying for Amanda's apartment.  Bryce's parents were moving, so Bryce would be homeless unless Amanda let him move in with her.  This was a problem (obviously) because they aren't married and she can't be baptized while he's living with her.  My companion, Sister H, felt really strongly that we should PROMISE her that if she refused to let Bryce move in with her, Heavenly Father would bless her with a job so she could pay for her apartment.  I kept telling her, I seriously could not even imagine being in that situation, but I knew if she did the right thing everything would work out.  As time went one, me and Sister H knew that if she just took that leap of faith, somehow things would be okay.  In Alma 32:27 it says to "arouse your faculties" - faculties, meaning power and ability.  Acting on faith isn't easy, but worth it.  Amanda ended up letting Bryce move in with her and it broke my heart.  She was back at ground zero and pretty much lost the testimony she had.  Sister H and I were so sad because we still know it would have worked out if she had exercised her ability and made the harder choice.  In Alma 32:19 it answers the question of why we need faith and why answers and explanations aren't just handed to us.  Faith without works is dead!  Don't be an Amanda.

Day Two:  MISSIONARY WORK - Alma 8:14-16
it is so easy to get discouraged when doing missionary work.  In these scriptures, Alma tries to go preach to the city of Ammonihah and they were just too wicked and prideful to listen.  The angel tells Alma to rejoice because he tried to keep God's commandments.  When encouraging members to do missionary work, sometimes it's hard because they've been rejected before.  I like to share this with them because it's 100% true - by making that effort to invite, that's keeping God's commandment to share the gospel.  In "The Power of Everyday Missionaries" it says to count your success in "No's" instead of "Yes's."  I try to have that attitude every day.  10 "No's" is better than zero attempts.  Plus, that way when a "yes" does come along, it will be a pleasant surprise!  Plus, it's good to keep in mind that some people are really slow moving.  Butch (in Layton) had been going to church and working with missionaries for 2+ years before he was baptized.  I've learned that you never know who you planted a seed with, and where it will go years down the line.  Challenge:  make a list of all the friends you know who are less active or not members.  Put the list by your bed and pray for them, by name, to know what you should do to prepare them to hear the gospel.

Day Three:  TESTIMONY - 1 Nephi 2:16
The story behind this scripture:  My, Sister H and Sister P had been working with Nate and Marcela A.  Nate was a less-active trying to come back, and Marcela was not a member.  She was from Romania and was open to the church, but if she did anything like come to church, read the scriptures, etc. she only did it because she knew how much it meant to Nate.  We were getting frustrated with her because we'd taught all the lessons, plus like 5 additional lessons and she just wasn't progressing.  So one night we decided to try and get her into scripture reading by starting the Book of Mormon with her.  We went around the room, each taking a verse.  She read this verse, stopped, looked up and said, "So ... Lehi's testimony wasn't good enough for Nephi ... he wanted to know for himself."  I looked at Sister P and she goes, "Uhh ... yeah, that's why we're reading this!"  It was so not what we got out of 1 Nephi chapter one, but 100% what she needed.  It helped me realize how powerful the scriptures can be and how they can always relate to what we're going through.

Day Four:  VIRTUE - Proverbs 31:25-31
Story behind this scripture: So this is Lauren's favorite scripture.  She wants to get verse 25 tattooed on her ... Anyways, it's her favorite and now one of my favorites.  I don't know why; I just like it.  There was a lady named Nikki who was in her early 20's, single mom with a baby.  She was really strong Catholic and we worked really hard to get into her home.  When we finally got in, she let us share a scripture with her and I shared this one because it's in the Bible and she's familiar with the Bible.  She really really liked it, and said she felt like that summed up the Mormon mother role, and she really wants that some day.  And now it's one of my favorite scriptures!  I want it in my living room on the wall or something.

Day Five:  APPLY - James 1:22-25
"Be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only."  President Hansen always says in trainings and meetings that the things we learn are pointless if we don't apply them.  It's one thing to go to church, learn something cool, and then go home and forget it.  it really makes a difference when changes are made.  In the mission, people say, "if we do what we've always done then things will be the way they've always been."  Kinda common sense, but not, ya know?

Day Six:  PRAYER - D&C 112:10; BD Prayer (last 2 paragraphs)
"Prayer is not to change the will of God, but to secure for ourselves the blessings that God is already willing to grant."  Since being on my mission ... I've learned to be careful what I pray for because it comes true .. haha!  We have this joke with some of the other sisters that only stupid missionaries pray for patience or humility because then you get stuck with a terrible companion or in Rose Park (ghetto area) with food poisoning.  When Elder Bednar came and talked to us, he said, "the real question is, do you have the faith NOT to be healed?"  It kinda makes you think ... but I think that's what prayer does, it brings you closer to Heavenly Father so if your will isn't God's will, you'll get closer and closer to His will and be okay with it.

Day Seven:  OBEDIENCE - Alma 47:8-19
This is a kind of hard story to follow ... but when you get it, it's really cool.  So Amalickiah was trying to get Lehonti to come down off the mountain so he could overthrow his army, right?  Lehonti's not stupid though ... he doesn't fall for it.  Then Amalickiah tries two more times.  Lehonti's still not falling for it.  Then Amalikiah's like, okay, come down, but bring your guards with you .  Lehonti agrees, that should be safe, right?  Wrong.  Poisoned.  Boom, dead.  Anna, this story's for you.  So what can we learn from this? Satan works the same way Amalickiah does - a little bit at a time, trying different ways to bring us down.

Day Eight:  MISSIONARY WORK - 1 Nephi 8:10-12
My favorite Book of Mormon story is the tree of life.  I don't know why; I just love it and use it for everything.  Verses 8-12 talk about how wonderful the fruit was and how the first thing he did after he ate it was wanting to share it with his family, or the people he cared most about.  That's how sharing the gospel should be for us.  A couple of months ago I was having a really hard time enjoying the mission, and was counting down the time I had left instead.  I said something in an email to Jamison about that and in reply he said, "you have 18 months to be really led and guided by the spirit.  Most people don't have that opportunity.  You get to learn to love hundreds of people like Jesus does.  The only thing I worry about is not finding everyone I'm supposed to in time I have left."  It was like a reality check, haha, and since then I've been okay.

Day Nine:  REPENTANCE - Enos 1:2-10
This is the chapter we always use to teach prayer and repentance.  Enos is a great example of having "real intent."  I love the word choice used here, like, "soul hungered," "pour out my whole soul unto God," "faith unshaken in the Lord."  It's just a cool story.

Day Ten:  HOLY GHOST/LIAHONA - Alma 37:38-47
These scriptures are talking about the Liahona.  While reading this, try to replace "Liahona" with "words of Christ," "Christ," or "the Holy Ghost."  I like it when it talks about not being slothful or getting lazy.  I think we are given trials to make sure we don't get slothful and so we can be brought back closer to Heavenly Father again and be worthy of the spirit.  I might have told you this, but I'll tell you again.  When we were teaching Amanda, we were trying to get her to pray about multiple different things.  We challenged her to take her questions and pray about them during the sacrament at church that week.  She was really looking forward to it!  One thing she was having issues with was accepting and obeying the Word of Wisdom. She showed up to church that week and told me she's had a rough night out drinking and partying, but forced herself to come to church so she could get answers.  The talks and meeting was absolutely perfect for her.  She leaned over to me at the end and said, "I don't feel anything ... I guess that's why you keep the Word of Wisdom, isn't it?  The Holy Ghost can't talk to you otherwise."

Day Eleven:  CHRIST LIFTS OUR BURDENS - Alma 7:11-13; Mosiah 34:13-15
Christ suffered for our sins.  He also felt all our pains and afflictions.  When we teach people about the atonement, I like to compare it to car insurance.  If you get in a really bad car wreck and your car is totaled, are you going to pay for the repairs all by yourself, or take advantage of the insurance you have and let them pay for it?  The atonement's the same way .  We don't have to suffer the grief that comes from making wrong decisions.  We don't have to suffer worldly pains and temptations or sicknesses alone.  Christ has already felt those; let him take it.  I really like the Mosiah scripture because it explains that Heavenly Father eases the burdens we have through Christ.  he doesn't always take them away, but gives us the strength to get through hard things.  Just like sometimes car insurance won't pay for everything.  Maybe we still have to pay a little bit to learn to be a better driver or something.  When Elder Bednar was doing a question/answer session with our mission, someone asked what advice he would give missionaries.  He said to use the atonement for everything, every day.

Day Twelve:  CHRIST - Moroni 10:32-33
Merry Christmas!!  Here's one of my favorite scriptures about Christ.  Christ is a wonderful gift we have been given.  Through Him we can be perfected, sanctified, made holy; all those other good words it uses ... I've really learned the importance of the Savior, the atonement and Heavenly Father's love for us.  Hope you all have a great day and remember the true meaning of Christmas!  Love you all,
Heidi

Bountiful!

Family -
First of all ... I haven't asked permission yet to go to Dave and Monica's on Christmas, so they probably shouldn't count on it (the president usually grants permission for missionaries to visit family in their area on Christmas, but I have to ask).  My new comp's kind of difficult ... I don't think she's going to want to do that but I'll see.  I'm going to need Dave and Monica's address and what stake they're in.  We have a dinner appointment that night and they're super excited about it so I guess I'll have 2 dinners tha tnight plus 3 breakfasts ... that will be fun.

So ... I am now serving in the Bountiful Heights Stake.  It's right up by the temple and all the houses are on the mountain.  The area is SO different from Layton ... all the people here are very very wealthy.  Even if the house if old, it's still huge and really nice.  There's absolutely no apartment complexes or really even any rougher neighborhoods.  Jon Schmidt is in one of the wards I cover; he's the ward organist and his wife is so sweet.  Neil Anderson (son of the apostle) is also in that ward; his family's really nice too.  A lot of our ward mission leaders are old mission presidents so they really know what they're doing.  We cover 9 wards and a branch for the South Davis hospital.  There's a bunch of baptisms in that branch because most of the people in that hospital are victims of really bad accidents or dying of cancer or something ... they all end up going to church services because they have nothing better to do.  It's really cool; we met a couple of the people there who've been through terrible accidents (lost limbs; paralyzed, etc) and they said they see their accidents as a blessing because they never would have been humbled enough to accept the gospel otherwise.  We have a baptism in a couple of weeks for a lady named Lacey.  She got hit by a car while riding her horse about 10 years ago and flew 20 feet.  She was in a coma for a couple months and ended up losing half her brain or something?  I don't know, it's really sad ... but she really wants to be baptized and it's super cool.  All the baptisms they do in that branch are for people in wheelchairs so they have a special ramp that goes into a therapy pool in the hospital.  So basically, to baptize, they wheel the chair down the ramp, tip the chair over and bring them back up.  How crazy is that?  It should be cool to see, haha.  Oh, and there's a polygamist complex in the stake ... that's fun.

Me and my companion, Sister C, took over the stake from the elders and she hasn't served here before either, so we're both brand new, starting from scratch.  The term for this is "pink washing" (sisters taking over an elder area).  We moved into the basement the elders were living in and let's just say it was a nightmare when we first got there ... it was SO gross.  Like, I couldn't function or eat or do anything because it was so gross.  Cleaning the bathroom, I've never seen so much hair in my life.  It was so nasty .. I bet in the 3 years the elders have been living in that basement they never once cleaned the shower.  And they left a bunch of old stuff like razors and dirty socks ... blek, I almost puked.  The basement is really big but it's in an older home.  It makes me miss my town home back in Layton!  The good news is, the counters in the mini kitchen down there are bright 70's orange ... orange must be one of those colors that ruins your appetite because the last thing I think about while I'm home is food.  Plus the kitchen's really old and gross of full of elder's food ... so I haven't had a problem watching what I eat!  Hahah, also, I get to do my studies in the morning in a massage chair, that's nice, and there's a ton of weight machines in an exercise room down there.  The elders must have loved that ... so I guess I'll leave the area very ripped, haha.

It is SO cold.  The roads here are super slippery and everything's on a slope .. it's really scary.  I let Sister C drive because she's from Nebraska.  We do have a car!  Yay!  The other sisters in our zone don't; I feel so bad for them ... but seriously, it's so cold and we've got roughly 4 feet of snow in the last few days.  I feel like it's 50 times colder here than it was in Rexburg!  My companion is very nice ... but she's going to be a struggle for me.  She's really controlling and OCD; she doesn't trust me to do anything on my own.  If she tells me to save something in the phone, she doesn't believe that I did it right until she checks it.  It's really been hard because I like to be in charge of stuff.  We've been out the same amount of time, but she feels like it's her way or not at all.  It's really hard.  We haven't taught many lessons yet; so far we've just been meeting with all the bishops and mission leaders and auxiliary leaders trying to find out ore about the area and to find people to teach.  We taught the first lesson (the Restoration) to a 13-year-old girl the other day.  Sister C took lead of the lesson and butchered it.  She left out the priesthood and jumped right to Joseph Smith ... like, what?!  I've taught the first lesson so many times I could do it in my sleep.  Apparently her and her trainer did things a little differently?  It's just been a little difficult to love her but I'm going to keep trying.  Also ... she hates eating healthy; when we pick somewhere to go for lunch she says, "anything deep fried" ... lovely.  As you can imagine, we get along great, haha.

The members here are SO nice!  Even though everyone's rich, they're really humble.  We went to ta bunch of Christmas parties and moms would come up to us, hug us and just start crying.  "I have a daughter on a mission and you remind me so much of her!" ... great!  hahahah, literally it happens 5 times a day. Each ward here has an average of 15 missionaries out on missions, no joke!  So people here are always saying, "we're going to take care of you because someone's out there taking care of my missionary."  They're so loving; we've got at least 10 offers for Christmas day.  In Layton, we tried so hard to visit people on Thanksgiving night, but no one would let us!  all these cute little moms show me pictures of their daughters and get all emotional and block out their whole schedule on Mondays because that's the day they get to email ... it's funny.  It really makes me hope my mother's like that, hahah.  The only thing that gets me though ... these parents have kids on missions and pray for them and worry about them ... I just think, okay, I'm here right now.  your job is to find people for me to teach .  That's so sweet that you want to feed me and buy me stuff and hug me, but then I ask about your neighbors and you're like ... "oh, they're not ready to hear the gospel," "we're not very close with them," "I don't want to ruin our friendship," etc.  Well okay ... so your kid is probably struggling with member like you in their area too, ya know?  Hahah, it just drives me crazy.  There's couple good families who are member missionaries, but not enough.  Jon Schmidt's wife yesterday raised her hand in the gospel doctrine class we were teaching and sai, "when my son was on his mission, he said it's so hard to get members to do missionary work when he can't even get his own family to do it.  That year he asked for nothing for Christmas other than for us to find someone for the missionaries in our ward to teach.  So let's do it for our kids on missions, everyone!" and sat down.  I was amazed!  Hahah, it was awesome.  Like, we don't have time to try to get to know your neighbors, earn their trust, then try to let us teach them.  So you do the first 2 steps!  It's hard when there's literally only 8 nonmember houses or so in each ward.  We're going to get the area moving though!

What time would you like to skype on Christmas?  I can pretty much do anytime that day ... we're going to about 50 people's houses and all have offered to let us skype there, so pick a time.  I'll ask for approval to go to Dave & Monica's and we'll see how the comp reacts to that one ...

Thank you for the prayers; I really appreciate it!  Now everyone go out and find some of your neighbors for the missionaries to teach please!  Merry Christmas, xoxoxo

Heidi

Transfer!

First of all.... This week I've been so stressed that I would get transferred somewhere ghetto and terrible... There's 3 main ghetto zones in downtown Salt Lake area: Rose Park, Liberty Park and Cannon. Sister Pilling got transferred to Cannon and it is terrible.... Her apartment's heater blows straight dust so her asthma is super bad and she gets sick a lot. She's gotten food poisoning from members in their area like 3 or 4 times.... It's just really sketch. I couldn't handle that.... Like of course I could suck it up if I was sent there, but it would be hard. Usually everyone sees the transfer board Monday at emails but since Sister H's an STL with privileges, we got to go to the zone leader and AP meeting on Sunday and see the transfer board. I prepared myself 200% to go to the poor, dusty, freezing cold, nasty, ghetto area with a troubled companion. guess where I got instead? the rich area of bountiful in the stake with 2 general authorities. and my companion is Sister C who I was in the MTC with! I have never been so happy in my life... so that's where I'm going. yay!

So I got a family visit this week, as you are well aware.... I thought Sister H was going to kick me out or something because that is SO against the rules hahah, but she was okay with it because it didn't distract me or make me homesick or anything ... it was cool to see everyone I guess. Guess what else? I'm in the Farmington zone, which includes Centerville. President Hansen gives permission on holidays to see family if they're in your area which means I could go to Dave and Monica's to skype on Christmas day if they'd let me. So that's cool.

                                      (Heidi's grandparents and cousins heart-attacking her door)

Thanksgiving was good! We went to the Nielson's (the only people I'm really going to miss in this area). I had Spencer (the son) add Kayla on FB and she needs to get together with him if you guys come up to Utah soon. We had a zone activity that day and it was me, Sister H and literally 30 elders.... guess sisters think they're too good to show up to stuff like that. It was fun though. After that me and Sister H hiked Adam's Canyon.

The Nielson family

So this Saturday Butch got baptized! He's the 70 year old who has gone to church for 2 years and we were trying to get him to stop smoking. He finally got baptized and it was awesome. the whole ward was there and everyone was crying and calling us the miracle sisters because apparently his family's been working on him for 17 years. Funny story though.... the first time he got dunked, he was like, floating on top of the water..?  And the guy who was baptizing put his hand on his face and tried to shove him under! Butch is flailing and going crazy... it was SO SCARY! It legit looked like he was trying to drown him, hahaha the stake president almost jumped in there to save his life! We found out afterwards that Butch is really scared of water.... the 2nd dunk was okay but everyone was still in shock from the first dunk so it was definitely interesting.... the little kids went in front to watch and when they came and sat back down, sister P (she got to come back for the day) asked this little girl if she was excited to get baptized now... that poor girl, hahah her face was white as a ghost and I thought she was going to cry!  It was traumatizing, hahah - thank goodness we didn't bring Amanda to that baptism.......

Butch's baptism

Here's something all of you NEED to do: read the book The Power of Everyday Missionaries by Clayton M. Christensen. it is SO GOOD. PS I met a guy this week who's read Dad's book! We were talking about symbolism and he was shooting off all these facts and I finally asked how he learned all of that... he said he read Dad's book and he didn't believe me when I said my dad wrote it. He really liked it though, I told him to write a review online.
Anyways, hope you all have a good week! I miss Anna a lot.... isn't that weird? love you all!

 xoxoxox
Heidi

Woe is the life of a Utah missionary ...

This Week:

-Sister P got ET'd (emergency transferred) to Glendale (part of Salt Lake) ... It's REALLY ghetto there... like, the slums of Salt Lake. It's a lot of Tongans there, apparently. It was sad to see her go but she will do great there. That leaves me and Sister H and I love it. We get along great and she teaches me so much. Everyday we count our blessings that we weren't sent to the ghetto.... because to be honest, neither of us could handle it, hahah.

-Butch has a baptism set for this Saturday! He's the one who had the smoking problem but has gone to church every week for 2 years.

-Amanda (our golden investigator) has really been struggling lately. Her baby’s daddy's parents are moving next week and he will be left without a place to live. His parents pay for Amanda's apartment so she feels inclined to let him live there. The dilemma - if she lets him move in, she cannot get baptized unless they get married. He's a scum bag so we do not want to push them getting married.... She has a really big decision to make. Bryce (baby’s daddy) is inactive and feeds her lots of lies about the church. He kind of brainwashed her and now she's doubting the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith. She's struggling to accept and live the Word of Wisdom, especially coffee. All week we've been telling her the best place and time to pray about big decisions like the whole Bryce being homeless thing is during the sacrament on Sundays. Well.... Saturday night she went out and partied and got really wasted.... She still showed up for church at 9:00 with Naveah and her baby. The talks were absolutely PERFECT for her... they were all about receiving answers to prayers and one guy even shared his conversion story. It couldn't have been more perfectly planned for her. (confession....... On Saturday I called the speakers in advance and told them Amanda's specific needs and asked them to bear testimony at the end and look directly at her.... Basically I cheated and stole the Holy Ghost's role a little bit... But hey, gotta do what you gotta do sometimes). Anyways, at the end of this fabulous meeting, Amanda turns to me and goes, "I got no answer and I feel absolutely nothing."  LOVELY.... then she goes, "That's why the Word of Wisdom is so important, isn't it? It blocks the spirit."  Bingo! It clicked. Now we just have to hope and pray that she gets herself together this week, receives a strong answer to her prayers, doesn't let Bryce move in and gets blessed with a job so she can pay for her apartment so she can get baptized! Please pray for her.

-Dave and Monica left a basket on my porch last night! I was so excited, I seriously screamed! If you could ask them... what stake are they in and who are their missionaries?

Hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving this week! Sister H and I are going with our favorite family, the Nielson's, to their Thanksgiving dinner. I love them so much and I'm really excited. They have a cute son Kayla's age and he's always bugging me to hook him up... so if she gets a Facebook friend request from a Spencer Nielson.... that's what it is, hahah.

This week me and Sister H were talking about how most missionaries come home all humbled and Utah missionaries.... don't. Especially sisters. Especially US because we are kind of spoiled brats- mostly because Sister H is President's favorite and everyone loves her... so she gets whatever she wants. Therefore I get whatever I want. Lucky me, right? Hahah it's terrible, we're working on it... But here's what we came up with the other day:

Woe is the Life of a Utah Sister Missionary: (all based off of actual events)

-You sell makeup and you haven't given us any free samples yet?
-Linda's not coming home til January... no house cleaner? You mean we have to clean the bathroom?
-You cut hair and you only offered us a discount?
-No missionary discount at Taco Bell? Well, that one's out of the question.
-We get fed way too many sweets....
-Linda doesn't have a blender? How are we supposed to make smoothies?
-Another loaf of homemade bread? Ugh.
-There's so many baptisms on Saturday, our investigator can't use the font until 5.....
-There's no Fossil store in the City Creek mall?
-The apartment's too warm during the winter.... we sweat at night..
-We only get 1,000 miles on our car this month? Lets bake the AP's cookies and maybe they'll give us extra so we can drive to Tepanyaki...
-Wait... we have to wash our own car?
-Linda's out of brownie mix.
-How do you live next door to us, sell jewelry, and we didn't know about it?
-Enchiladas AGAIN?!
-You want to get baptized.... In January? No, the font's actually only available this month, sorry.
-We're only teaching 19 people right now... dang, we need to find new investigators this week.
-We're hungry and can't successfully plan our lessons for this week... District leader, will you bring us Taco Bell? (He did.)
-No one paid our bill at IHOP? Rough day.
-This ward only has a 47% attendance rate..... they're a lost cause.
-This cashier was new and didn't know we get a 20% off missionary discount.


As you can tell.... we're a little spoiled and need to work on humility.

Thank you, love you, have a great week!

Merry Christmas to ME - look at the cute new shoes I bought!

The last picture of our trio before Sister P got transferred out

Us with Amanda and her daughter, Nevaeh

Happy Thanksgiving!

Family -

How is everyone doing?  I really wish I was home so I could bake healthified pumpkin pie and cookies and fun stuff like that for Thanksgiving and Christmas.  For Thanksgiving, my companions and I are spending it with the Nielson family.  They are our favorite members that we've met so far - they love us.  We watched conference at their house and they cooked us SO MUCH food.  They always try to find people we can teach at their house so we can be over there more often.  They have a son Kayla's age ... just saying.  And a daughter Claire's age who dresses so cute (my comp thinks it's ugly but whatever).

People are telling me and Sister P that we are both going to be training new sisters next transfer ... which is the 3rd of December ... I don't think I will because President Hansen thinks I'm an emotional wreck ... I think people tell that to P and then have to include me too so I don't feel left out.  But we'll see.  I kind of hope I can train because I would love to boss someone around and do things my way (AKA work all the time and not sit around the house and take breaks all the time like we do with Sister H), but if I train, I'm afraid they might move me into another area - which would suck.  Half of the zones in this mission are poor and ghetto - the other half are filthy rich but have no work to do.  So we'll see.  Pray for me!

Thank you, love you all!
Heidi

It's seriously cold here ...

Hi family! How are we doing? That story about Bunny is so scary ... I'm so glad she's doing well. It's so weird to think that she could have died and I wouldn't have even known until I read this email. I'm so glad Didn and Scott were able to be there for her though. This was a fantastic week in Layton, are you ready to hear about it?

Well this week Elder Bednar came and spoke to our mission. It was without a doubt the coolest experience I've had in my life so far. Our mission president has been strongly encouraging us to spiritually prepare for this for the last 2 weeks and go into it with specific questions we want answered in our lives. He did a question/answer session with us but really it was us asking him questions, him answering with questions until we found the answer ourselves. It was so cool and a great model to how we should work with our investigators to help them learn by the spirit. He used to be the stake president in Arkansas for my trainer, Sister H, so he called her out in the middle of the meeting and asked her how her family is and what not. It was crazy! He left right after our 3 hour or so meeting so I didn't personally get the chance to meet him, but it was still so fantastic. I've never got so much out of a meeting in my life. I learned the importance of being spiritually prepared for church meetings and the difference that can make.

The temple square sisters put on a musical fireside earlier this week for missionaries to bring investigators to. My companions and I really wanted to go so we brought a couple we've been working with, Ken and Alex. Ken has been excommunicated for 15 years or so and Alex has been inactive since she graduated high school. Side note, he's like 45 and she's 28. But they're cute so it's okay, haha. Anyways they've decided to come back to the church and work towards being sealed in the temple so they can have kids under the covenant. They've made so much progress while we've worked with them but haven't been able to come to church more than once because of their jobs (they're the respitory therapists who took care of Sister Monson, I think I told you guys about that) and we thought this fireside could be a good experience for them because it was on a night they had off work. It was a wonderful fireside and I got to see Amanda May! My comps always make fun of the stuff I wear... I thought I've been toning it down a significant amount for the mission but I guess I still pattern mix a lot. Anyways I ran up to Amanda and hugged her, then after we left Sister H says to me, "Is that Amanda from high school? I could tell because she was wearing stripes and polka dots together just like you..." hahah. Anyways it was a cool experience. Ken should be able to get rebaptized soon hopefully.

We're continuing to work with Amanda and her daughter Nevaeh. I absolutely love them .... This week Amanda's been really stressed out because her boyfriend/baby daddy is continuing to be a loser ... In reality, we just need someone to be straight up with her and tell her the boyfriend's holding her back from eternal salvation so she just needs to dump him. We've tried to subtly say that ... But as missionaries, it's not really our place to tell her what we think she should do. She found out this week that since she's been trying to live the law of chastity, he's been cheating on her ... it was really rough. So we had a spa day for her and I gave her a facial and did her nails. Please pray that Amanda will have the strength to do whatever she needs to with this current situation. She's also in need of a job so praying for that would be good too. We took her daughter Nevaeh to a baptism this weekend that Neil A. Anderson showed up at randomly. So that was pretty cool, haha.

Ready for the awkward story of the week? I was on splits with the Relief Society presidency in one of our wards, just visiting a bunch of moms in the ward. One house we were at, the teenage son walks downstairs in basketball shorts with no shirt on and comes and sits down talking to us ... I was so uncomfortable I seriously was about to lose it and his mom didn't even realize it, she just kept talking and introduced us and was basically trying to set me up with him when I get home ... then the Relief Society president was like, "um I don't know if sister missionaries should be in homes with shirtless teenage boys..." and his mom freaked out and kicked him out and laughed for like 20 minutes while my face was bright red .... then on Sunday she comes up to me and goes, "did you recognize your boyfriend with his shirt on today?" in front of the bishop. Like, thank you .... anyways, it was awkward haha.

So Sister P sleep talks ... the other night we convinced her to say our bedtime prayer 5 times in a row. She would get in bed, we'd say, "oh, we need to pray .... P, your turn!" She'd grunt and get out of bed, say the slowest, funniest prayer you've ever heard (always ending in, "I love you so much, thank you for this bed") and then rolling back in bed ... then we'd repeat. Hahah, she seriously said 5 prayers in a row, it was so funny!

Transfers are December 3rd. I probably won't get another P-day until Thanksgiving day. There is a possibility I might be training a brand new missionary next transfer, we'll see! It's cold and snowy.... I'm miserable! Hope all is well, love you all!

Sister Shields

News from Layton, UT

Family,

Good to hear everything's going well! I'm glad Anna hasn't quit volleyball, she should stick with it. I just want to let you know that I do read the stuff you send me, I just don't always have the time or want to take the effort to reply to it all... sorry.

This week? Our golden investigator, Amanda, really is golden. We watched the Emma Smith movie with her this week and she loved it. We do this thing every Sunday where we get up really early and make rounds to all of our investigators to try to get them to church, especially our young black guys who are punks and don't want to get up for their 9:00 church. So we go bang on their doors at 8 am until they come open the door, start the shower for them, lay out their church clothes, make them breakfast, set it out for them all nicely on the counter (side note- when I make them breakfast my comps were teasing me that I cook too healthy... so now they make me fry everything in oil and add tons of butter like they do, it grosses me out. So yesterday I made pancakes with egg yolks, put tons of butter in the pan, made bacon and used the grease to cook hash browns and then smothered everything in syrup and then everyone was happy... I almost threw up) and then they usually come to church! So we do that for CJ and Claud, then we go to Marcella's (the one whose hair I did) and help her get her kids ready, etc... then we call Amanda and asks if she needs any help and she always says they woke up early and are ready to go! She really, legit, loves church. No one in the ward really talks to her because they think she's already a member. She has the gospel library on her nook and follows along with all the manuals and dresses like a Mormon (even though remember, she is the ex-stripper) and dresses her kids all nice... then when they pass around the meal list for people to feed us, she signs up even though she feeds us ALL the time. She really is golden!

Wanna hear something funny? So one of our bishop's wives is a total grumpy, grouchy, awesomely hilarious lady... example: I said, "Hi, Sister Boudreo, how was your week?" She replies, "it was hell, what do you think?" Hahah, she just says stuff like that and she's so mean to everyone, it's awesome. Well, yesterday at church I was with Amanda  and she went and sat down right next to the bishop's wife. I got a little bit concerned, but whatever. In Relief Society they were passing around this sign up sheet for people who wanted to substitute in Primary and Amanda turns to the bishop's wife and asks what it is... bishop's wife looks at her like she's stupid and goes, "trust me Hon, you don't want that," snatches it from her hands and passes it on. Amanda looked like she was about to cry, it was so funny! I love bratty people, ya know? Anyways, Amanda is marvelous. Please pray for her though, she has a loser boyfriend who's trying to bring her down. We can't put her on date for baptism yet because he still technically lives with her, even though she keeps the law of chastity! We taught her a dang good lesson, she's never gonna break that one, hahah!  Oh and the other day we were leaving her house to go to other appointments and she fist pumps the air and yells "CONVERT!" It was so funny, hahah - especially because a couple weeks ago she hated us and hated Mormons. So my companions say that I do really well with girls ages 14-30 (I mean I do....) and so they always make me talk to them. We are trying to get this single mom named Nikki to take the lessons from us so we go over there yesterday to help her make dinner... it was going to be tough because she's strong baptist and doesn't really like missionaries. As soon as we get there Sister H and Sister P go, "well, you got this, we're going out back to play with the kid" and they left me in the kitchen with her for the next hour! I was kinda mad but it's true, they screw stuff up when trying to get girls that age to trust us. They do better with old people... I do NOT. When we talk to old people I wanna lose my mind, I don't know why, haha.  But anyways, things went well with Nikki, she's almost there! Pray for her as well.

Things I've learned about people:
-most people don't cook healthy, the more bacon and butter and oil and cheese the better (blek)
-Sister missionaries are so snoopy and gossipy... like, just stop please
-12 weeks with the same 2 females is really too long
-I'm not "chill" with guys 25 years old, they think I'm a goody-two-shoes and call me Princess. They don't listen to a word I say, hahah

Every second Sunday of the month, there's a family in the stake that has a huge dinner for literally anyone who wants to come. Members in the neighborhood, non members, recent converts, anyone. They have us come and bring people, then share a scripture. It's a great missionary opportunity for the neighborhood and it's SO fun. She posts about it on her blog and there's always pictures if you want to check it out, amothersshadow.com

Thanks for being great, have a wonderful week!

Sister Heidi Shields

Halloween week

Halloween Week:

Well this week was interesting! We have an investigator named Claud who keeps letting us back in to "teach" him but all he really does is argue... so he asked us to share our own personal conversion stories. Me and my companions each shared really personal things after making him promise to respect them, Sister H even shared about when her mom died. After that he got really disrespectful and started doubting all of our stories. He said Sister P (the one who can squat 550 pounds) is strong on the outside but doesn't have a testimony, SIster H blocks out her feelings and that I'm just weak and emotionally unstable. It was terrible! So of course I started crying.... and Sister P major chewed him out. Then we said, "we can keep teaching you if you want, or we will just never come back and we won't be offended either way" (the drop talk). He apologized for being disrespectful and said he wanted to learn from us. Basically I've never seen a bigger turn around in my life. So now our whole district and stuff jokes that we're the power trio- H is the spiritual one, I'm the emotional one and P is the one who will put people in their place. It's kinda true though, hahah!

Amanda (the story I told you about last week) is doing really well! She came to church yesterday and agreed to be baptized eventually... we're working on setting a date for her soon. We taught her the law of chastity and let's just say it was really interesting. try teaching that lesson to an ex-stripper with 2 kids, living with her boyfriend. It went well though, I really like her a lot. She and I get along really well together. Chris was baptized on Friday, yay! Also we had a rebaptism (excommunicated) on Friday, that was a really cool experience.

For Halloween, we got to go to the Bountiful temple in the morning, then we shopped and went out to lunch with the elders in our district. Everyone at the mall thought 1) we were dressing up as missionaries for Halloween and 2) that we were on a double date. So after we had 3 or so people ask us that... we left, hahah. That night we stayed in and watched church movies and it was fun. We were totally ready for trick-or-treaters but not a single kid came by! We were so upset! Like, is this not a town home division in Utah?! I was shocked, haha. Also earlier this week.... I had the biggest emotional meltdown you've ever seen. It was so bad. I just got sick of weight gain, being overwhelmed with 16 more months of this. etc. Plus sister H got assigned to be a solo STL (sister training leader- like a zone leader) over 2 zones and she's really stressed because President doesn't let me and P help or go to any training meetings or anything because we're "too new". But there are girls who came out the same time we did who are STL's so we're like....? Kinda offended but not? Anyways it was just a hard day for all of us. I actually got approval to call Mom at home, that's how bad it was. I couldn't do anything, I was worthless. Instead Sister H asked for permission for us to take a couple hours off and go hike the mountain. I felt a lot better afterwards but it was seriously a rough week.....

So here's some advice I have for friends and family back home:

-be a good fellowshipper. You don't have to convert your neighbors necessarily, but if the missionaries bring investigators to church, please talk to them. Be supportive and nice please, it makes all the difference.
-don't feed missionaries enchiladas. We get them 3 times a week and it's really just getting out of control.

-Christmas gifts for missionaries: $$ (cash- checks are hard to cash) and teaching visuals to go along with the lessons in Preach my Gospel. I would LOVE some sort of visual aid to use with kids. Just an idea.

Thanks for your love and support, hope all is well!
xoxoo
Heidi

Chris' baptism!

Great stuff

THIS WEEK

Well, we were supposed to have a baptism on Saturday.... (Chris) but we ran into a little Word of Wisdom issue. There's a rule that says you can't be baptized if you haven't kept the Word of Wisdom for a full week and we met with him Thursday and he casually mentioned that he accidently drank coffee that morning... so basically we had to do the hardest thing in the world and tell this guy who has such a strong testimony and already told all his friends about this baptism that he was going to have to wait a week. It pretty much broke his heart... it was so hard! So hopefully he won't slip up again and we'll be able to follow through with his baptism this Friday. Since Halloween is this Thursday, our P-day has been moved to that day and we get to go to the Bountiful temple in the morning, then shop and what not, then we're supposed to be inside our apartments at 6 until the rest of the night. The mission president told us to "plan for the week" but..... like, it's Halloween hahah - we're baking sugar cookies and deep frying everything in the fridge, let's be real here.

Earlier this week, me and Sister H were pretty stomach sick.... like it was bad, so we stayed inside 2 days this week and watched every church movie Linda owns (Linda's the lady we live with. But not really because she's never there). So that was kind of nice to have some down time. Therefore we didn't get many lessons taught this week and it was rough to get back on track with things.

So I don't know if I've told you about one of the people we're teaching, Amanda. We've taught her all the lessons and she really believes and understands everything we've taught, but she doesn't understand the reason she needs to be baptized. She hasn't been fully "converted" yet and doesn't understand that this is the only true church, not just a good church, ya know? She's really nice and friendly and likes us a lot but she hardly ever texts us back and it's really hard to get a hold of her. Plus she has this boyfriend who's inactive and hates Mormons so we can only come over when he's not there. Anyways yesterday she texts us and asks if we could come over and we were shocked. Like, I thought it was the end of the world basically. We had a super packed schedule yesterday so we said we would try to make it. She texted again and said it had been a really rough day and she was just going to go to bed. We were supposed to meet up with our president but decided this was more important and hoped he would understand (which he did). So we go over to Amanda's and she basically apologizes she couldn't make it to church that morning.... she said she woke up her kids on time and they were all ready to go and pumped and then they got stuck at the railroad tracks for 40 minutes waiting for a train to pass so they were going to be really late. Amanda decided to go to a Catholic church instead because she was raised Catholic and whatever.... this is where we got scared, hahah. So she went to the Catholic church and she said it was terrible and didn't feel the way she remembered it feeling. She didn't learn anything or feel uplifted at all. She said she realized right then and there that she was "sold" to the Mormons, hahahah. Our jaws were seriously on the floor at this point. But it gets better.... she said she dumped the scummy boyfriend because she realized she wants to get closer to God with or without him. He's a total loser, like he's always drunk and high and being mean to her. We never thought she would break up with him though because she just had his baby and she can't afford to pay for the apartment without him because she can't work and whatever.... but she dumped him! Amanda loves the idea of having a strong family and she really just cares so much about her kids.... she said she's worried no good Mormon guy will want her because of her past and the fact that she has 2 kids with 2 different dads.. But seriously, she doesn't even understand how special she is and that Heavenly Father is watching out for her. By her making this change in her life, she's gonna be blessed like crazy. It was just the coolest experience, I didn't tell it as cool as it is, sorry. Oh and side note, as she was talking, she said she used to be a "dancer"... I said, "no way, how cool!" she looks totally shocked and goes, "well, that's not the reaction I was expecting from you!"  That's when I realized she meant a different kind of "dancer".... hahah, and I said something like, "no seriously, how cool! you'll have to teach us!" Lesson learned; I think I need to think before I speak from now on, hahahah, but it was funny.... so hopefully we'll be able to put her and her daughter Nevaeh on date for baptism soon!

Oh and I got to sit and talk to our mission president's wife alone for an hour or so last night while Sister H was in an interview.... She asked me if I could cut the sister's hair if they did a sister's conference. So that's cool, I get to do 60 missionaries hair! But she likes me now, so it's whatever.

Hope all is well, thank you for the prayers. Wish I had more time to reply to each of you. Love you all!

Heidi

Did you know I speak Spanish? JK

So guess what I did yesterday? I went on splits... with the Spanish sisters.... and sat in all of their lessons... In Spanish. As you are well aware, I speak not a word of Spanish, haha, so it was interesting to say the least. I learned a little bit though! Aren't you proud of me? Hmm what else... I talked in church yesterday and it was fantastic, of course. Butch has successfully stopped smoking and he is deciding on a baptismal date sometime this next week! We're so excited. Also one of our investigators, Chris, took himself off date this week because he wanted to "learn more"... then our next lesson halfway through he goes, "so I know I said I wasn't sure about getting baptized Saturday.. but I was thinking about it and people kept asking when I was going to get baptized and I just kept telling them the 26th and realized I didn't ask you guys first.... is that day still open?" We were like, uhhhhh we can baptize you in an hour if you really want, hahaha! But anyways, he's doing really well! We're excited.

Also this week... I got to do hair for one of my investigators, Marcella! She's so super sweet and always cooks us full blown meals and she's from Romania so they're always deep fried and delicious... but her and her husband are really tight on money so we feel really bad when they insist on feeding us and taking us places with them. It's her birthday this week and she was saying how she really wanted to go get her hair done but she didn't think they could afford it. So, me being fantastic and loving and skilled and such, offered to do her hair for free. I colored and cut it real nice, then styled it super cute. When she looked in the mirror after she started tearing up and kept saying I'm an angel... like, yes I know, I know. Hopefully she'll get baptized soon now! We'll see ;) Side note, transfers are tomorrow and I'm staying here and keeping the same companions! But they made me and Sister P assistant STL's (sister training leaders, like girl zone leaders) because I'm a beast. Actually it's probably because Sister H, our trainer, is seriously President Hansen's favorite. He loves her so much and gives her all these crazy assignments. She had to talk for all the general authorities' wives last transfer! Anyways I'm staying in Layton. But anyways, my district was talking about the first impressions we had when we first met everyone. one of the elders told me, "when I first met you I thought you were a princess who'd never lived away from home and never worked a day in your life" and I was like, kind of offended? Thank you? Anyways now everyone calls me princess and it really kind of offends me.... haha.

My district hiked Adam's Canyon again this morning and it was super fun. We got a free chiropractor and I'm quite excited about that... I sent mom a letter the other day so that should come soon. All is well, I'm happy. I hear all of these terror stories about sisters with terrible companions and people being miserable and not getting any people to teach and it's really scaring me because I've had such good luck so far..... It's worrying me. Also this week we helped one of our favorite member family's son answer a girl for a school dance... We took a video because it was so funny and awkward. I'll try to send it if I have time. I'm going to hook him up with Kayla, he's so cute and sweet.

Here's some awesome quotes I found this week:

"Only by aligning our wills with God's is full happiness to be found... As one's will is increasingly submissive to the will of God, he can receive inspiration and revelation so much needed to help meet the trials of life. The submission of one's will is really the only unique thing we have to place on God's altar. The many other things we "give" are actually the things he has already given or loaned to us." -Neal A. Maxwell

"Love is like the North star; in a changing world, it is always constant" -Gordon B. Hinkley

Lauren's favorite scripture that I've learned to really like: Proverbs 31:25-26

Have a good week!

Heidi

That darn Word of Wisdom .. haha!

Family,

I'm glad California was fun.  Disneyland is better, I think.  One of my companions, Sister H, worked at Disneyworld, isn't that cool?

Good for you Anna, for being brave; you're legit.  I lol'd at the Jennifer Garner sighting - HAHA!  I'm glad you called Lauren, she loves you guys and she's good with hair.

Well, this last week my district went and hiked Adam's Canyon ... is that where we hiked with Grandpa last summer?  I can't remember.  It was really fun; my district thinks I'm like the most athletic sports-y person ever ... which I'm really not but I'll just let them keep thinking that.  It was really fun though, I definitely needed it.  Except my pink Nikes got kind of muddy and I cried a little bit but it's okay.  We had a baptism this week!  Technically 2, but only one counts as a convert baptism because one of the boys was 8 ... oh, the other day we were teaching the boys tithing and I showed them how to fill out a slip ... I ripped the white copy from the yellow one and Ryan (the 8-yr-old) goes, "Sister Shields, you're magic!  Tithing's magic!"  Hahah, it was so cute!

We got the elders in our district to sing with us at the baptism and that was fun.  So one of our investigators with a baptismal date, CJ?  We brought him to conference with us.  Well, we were a little concerned about him really getting baptized because we hadn't gone over the Word of Wisdom at all with him ... and he obviously has some issues there.  So all day we were planning to teach him that lesson I was freaking out.  Like, he's gonna think we're crazy and he's not gonna want to give up his drinking and weekend partying and we're going to lose our golden investigator ... all that.  So we go into the lesson; he has a bunch of alcohol bottles on the top of his fridge and that's all I could focus on, no joke.  We read the Word of Wisdom pamphlet with him and then there's a long awkward pause after we finished ... then he goes, "I'm sorry girls, I eat meat every day .."  After reading all that, he was concerned about the single sentence "eat meat sparingly"  HAHA!  He said he only drinks socially and it would be no problem to give that up.  Prayers answered!  We had to postpone his baptism because he does have a problem with coffee ... but we're working on it!

It's a joke among my companions and I that I'm only on a mission because I had to stop myself from getting married ... whenever we eat dinner with a young married couple and they tell the story of how they met, 3/5 times I'll cry a little during their story.  I don't know why, I can't help it, I just do!  And when I have time in personal scripture study, I like to read about eternal marriage.  I just think it's interesting!  But every morning when we share what we learned that day, they always go, "so let me guess .. Sister Shields read about eternal marriage," hahah, it's funny, they think I'm crazy, I'm sorry.

Also this week, we taught the stop smoking program to one of our investigators, Butch.  It went really well and the next 7 days are his trial so please pray for him!  We kept praying he would have the strength to stay away from social situations where there would be smoking this week, and yesterday we found out he has gall stones and has to get his gall bladder removed so he's in the hospital ... well, prayer answered, haha!  Kind of sad, bu we'll take it.  There's no smoking in a hospital, right?  anyways, we were teaching him the program and our elders came with to help us (we've never taught it before and they have) and randomly in the middle of it, Elder Keenon takes a tithing slip out of his pocket, rips a corner off it and eats it.  Right there in the middle of a serious lesson!  I DIED!  It was so hilarious, you have to know him .. I'll send you pictures later of our hike; he's the one wearing a green wig.

Have a good week everyone!

Sister Shields

My district

Me with Ryan and Jaden at their baptism

Me and Sister P, with Ryan at his baptism

Hiking Adam's Canyon

General Conference weekend!

Hello family, how is everyone doing?

I got to go to 2 sessions of General Conference down at the Conference Center, I went to the Saturday afternoon and the Sunday Morning. The Saturday afternoon we were sitting literally 10 rows from the front so we could see all the general authorities and what not.... it was so amazing I cannot even describe to you how awesome it was. This week we put 2 people on date for baptism! They're both young black guys... haha, and honestly we're kind of worried because they both obviously love the party, drinking, girl lifestyle so we're dreading the day we have to get into that..... ekk. If you would like to pray for my investigators, the ones we have right now are CJ, Claud (ugliest name ever, I know), Chris, Amanda, Butch (specefically pray he can stop smoking) and Marcella. CJ, Butch and Chris are all on date, Claud's almost on date and the rest are hesitant. Wish I had more time to share about what's going on but I really don't.

I'm just going to tell you straight up that I am gaining so much weight. Like the members feed us so much; every night I go to dinner completely stuffed and not hungry but I still have to choke down whatever they feed me... at conference this weekend, a member fed us cinnamon rolls and eggs and pancakes for breakfast before the morning session and then steak and potatoes and ribs and strawberry shortcake for lunch. and then we had a dinner appointment 2 hours later. Like, I've never been so sick in my life. I don't know how to deal with it. I don't even know what to do..... all my companions and other sisters out on the mission are struggling with homesickness and stress and all this, but I've been totally fine with that ... I'm just worried about this food issue. Sister P is so supportive and willing to help me, I know she was supposed to be my companion just for that reason.

Wanna hear what I liked about conference?
-"look ahead and believe"
-"doubt your doubts before you doubt your faith" -Uchtdorf
-"if the bitter cup is not past, drink it" -Holland

I wish I had time to share more, but Conference was just so good... I've never gotten anything out of conference before the mission, it's crazy. I loved how they stressed so much the importance of the family and how everything should be centered around that. I loved all the talk about the priesthood and what a blessing that can be in our lives. Also, did you notice all the talks about the importance of women? :)

Love you all, have fun in California.

Heidi

It was Sister H's birthday this week! So we had a little party with cake and what not. Sorry I look stoned in a couple of these ...

Hello Arizona ...

So happy to hear Daddy finished radiation. Those pictures cracked me up, I just showed my companion and she laughed too. Oh funny story.. we were visiting an inactive sister whose last name was Glover. I accidently called her Erin one day (daddy had a client named Erin Glover) and she was like, ummm my name's not Erin... hahah whoops! I don't need a raincoat or boots anymore, we got a car so I should be fine. Thanks though. Oh, next package you send, can you include all the missionary resource books and my mini hymn book? Gracias.

Hmm this week...... Well since yesterday was the 5th Sunday and they do those combined lessons for the 3rd hour, we had 3 of our 6 wards ask to have us speak at the same time. So we had to split up and somehow I got stuck going to one ward alone and my other 2 comps went to one together... anyways I thought I just had to share like a quick 3 minute insight on how we need help from the members to set up teaching appointments but turns out they expected me to give a full on talk in front of the Relief Society, High Priests or whatever, and all the youth... basically like Sacrament Meeting. Thank goodness I give fantastic talks because I got up there and winged it for 15 minutes and I think it was pretty dang good. In the meantime, Sister P and H taught Relief Society in another ward. I was feeling pretty good about my lesson but then I heard about theirs... apparently they focused a lot on not judging and stuff... This was one of the family wards (a lot like our's) and there's been a lot of problems with gossip and ladies being like, "my kids can't play with your kids because your husband's a convert and doesn't come to church all the time," or "I don't want my kids over there because you do yard work in a tank top," or just stupid stuff like that. So these ladies get really offended and go inactive. So my companions basically went into Relief Society and said (in a nice way I hope), "Cut it out, you're making our job as missionaries nearly impossible, you're being ridiculous and it needs to stop." Apparently everyone in there was crying by the end and afterwards all the sisters went up and were giving them huge hugs and what not. Afterwards my companions told me it was a good thing I wasn't there because I would have made the roof fall in. They like to joke around and call me the "spiritual power house"... I guess in lessons with people I get really intense? I dunno, haha but I guess that's a good thing? I don't know. We still only have one person on date for baptism but I think we're making some progress. We get to go to General Conference if we find an investigator to bring so we're trying really hard to bring one of the black guys we've been teaching. He's young, tall, dark and handsome so I mean, that's a plus. He really likes going to church but it's super hard to get him to focus in lessons and progress towards baptism in any way.

Oh, here's some funny stories...  in district meeting this past week we were doing a role play in front of everyone and my companion was one of the elders (weird I know), and he's like weird and kinda awk. Well the sister we were role playing with was saying how kids are so fun and the elder who was my companion turned to me and said, "yeah we can't wait," and it got super quiet and weird and his face turned SO RED it was ridiculous!! Hahahah like, "WE can't wait"?!?! WHAT? Then afterwards everyone was like, dang, Sister Shields you gave him the biggest shut down look I've ever seen in my life! It was funny, you had to be there. Also, one of the Relief Society presidents gave us a list of inactive sisters to visit so we spent a whole day visiting them. We got to one and it was my turn to talk so I gave a message, whatever. And I was treating her like she was inactive but there was a picture of her temple wedding in Rexburg from last year and like her scriptures on the table and an Ensign and stuff.... so I was kind of confused but she was on the inactive list, so whatever, right? I said something like, so will we see you at church Sunday? we missed you last week. And she said, "um, yeah... I go every week... and I met you on Sunday..... and you stopped by yesterday for cookies." It was so awkward. Like SO BAD, hahahah!  I meet so many people and hear so many names, I can't keep any of them straight, it's terrible.

Hmm, I'm trying to think what else happened this week... Oh - cool story! We're teaching a couple where the husband's excommunicated and the wife's been inactive since she was like 15. This week they told us the reason they decided to come back to church, take the discussions and get him rebaptized. They are respiratory therapists at the LDS hospital and worked with Thomas S. Monson's wife right before she died... Alex (the inactive sister) said President Monson refused to leave the side of his wife's bed. He would just sit there and hold her hand while she slept like all day long. And one time Alex had to go take her blood or something, I dunno, and President Monson wouldn't move over so she had to drag his chair back so she could get through. And President Monson is a big guy, I guess! She said she's never seen anyone love their wife so much and the spirit they had together was so strong; she knew right there that he was a true prophet of God.  Cool, right?

Hope all is well, talk to you next week!
Sister Shields

We finally got a CAR!!

Layton!

Tell Dad and sisters sorry I can't reply to their emails today... NO TIME. I liked Centerville so much better than Layton but it's still really nice here. The members don't feed us as much here (thank goodness) and this past week we had 2 dinners back out on us so we just ate cereal at our house. There's a group of sisters in our zone with a car so they take us to the store but we have to go when they want, leave when they want etc.... so it's kind of annoying but okay. Tell Dad congrats on almost being done with radiation! Okay, here's the weekly update...

So our mission president picked 2 companionships per zone (so 4 people out of 20) to take on this challenge of getting at least one baptism and one person reactivated a week. He contacted us the other day and said our trio was chosen... no pressure, right? He promised that if we made an effort though, there would be miracles. This was going to be hard for us because we're the first sisters to be in this area... so we had to start from ground zero. We're doing really well though; the past week we taught 31 lessons, have 11 new investigators and have 1 person on date. Technically 2, but they're brothers and one of the boys is 8 so he doesn't count as a convert baptism... pretty much we're on a roll. There's one apartment complx in our area that has a big basketball court in the middle.... EVERY SINGLE PERSON we've met and talked to there has agreed to take the lessons. Without fail. Which is surprising because it's kind of a sketchy apartment complex, hahah. So me and my companions joke that we need to just build a baptismal font in the middle of the court and push people in. Like literally, it's insane. We've only been turned down by probably 3 people in general so far.... it's awesome. We're teaching a lot of excommunicated RM's who want to come back and that's really cool.... it's also hard because they already know more about the gospel than we do most of the time... we're just supposed to try to help them feel the spirit again. It's really interesting; during lessons they answer all the questions right and have all these good comments about church history and what not but then when they ask if they will say the closing prayer they almost always say no... like they're not ready for that yet or something. We also have been working with a lot of inactive sisters who have been offended and left the church... that's fun.... haha. The members are really nice here and always giving us rides places and inviting us over to do random things at their house... this one sister has us over like no joke, every other day. Then we figured out she only invited us over when her inactive teenage son was home.... and she dropped the hint that she wants us to work on him... there's a lot of people who want us to work on situations like that for them, it's kinda awkward... oh the funniest thing happened at church this week. Because there's 3 of us, we can have lessons with single guys and guys in the ward can drive us places without having their wives or whatever... it's really convenient!  So in Relief Society this week they were passing around a sign up for our meals and they said, "we all need to take advantage of having sisters to feed now so we can have early dinners without having our husbands home from work," and Sister P (one of my companions who can squat 550 pounds, btw. She's a BEAST) said, "also, because there's 3 of us, your husbands can just be the ones feeding us too!....or your sons....." and the whole Relief Society got really quiet and it was awkward.. and then the president said, "but let's try to avoid that and make sure there's a Sister present." AHHAHA Sister P was so embarrassed; it was hilarious. Thank you all for your prayers and emails, I would love letters sent to my apartment as well! Being able to serve a mission has been such a blessing in my life, missionary work is the best way to be happy. Love you all, xoxoxo

I'm in Layton, Utah! Yayy!

My first night out in the field I was in Centerville and I loved the area so much .... it was all cute little Mormon families, and I was with a fantastic companion; I was really sad to leave. My very first night we had ... get this: 2 dinner appointments and a dessert appointment. And people are correct when they say you can't turn that down. So we taught a lesson to an investigator, they offered us huge sugar cookies. Went to our dinner appointment, went to a YW activity where they fed us dinner and dessert, then went to a dessert appointment with an investigator. That's a total of 2 full dinners and 3 desserts in one night. And it is impossible to turn people down! Especially investigators... Then they moved me up to a trio of sisters in Layton and this is where I will be for the next 6 weeks for sure, probably 12+ weeks realistically though. This whole mission is a fully referral mission, no proselyting is allowed. so it's almost all reactivation, working with part member families, excommunicated families etc. I really like it so far! The YW here have like 5 active girls and 20 inactive; it's crazy.

We are living with a lady who works in California and is only home a couple days a month. She lives in a really nice town home so we are lucky we have it to ourselves most of the time! The first day we were cleaning the bathrooms because they were disgusting... I literally just dumped every cleaner I could find in the toilet and then realized I had mixed bleach with this cleanser that said all over the bottle, "DON'T MIX WITH BLEACH- TOXIC FUMES" and I started freaking out and the house reeked like a meth house or something... Seriously I've never prayed so hard in my life. But we lived, so it's okay!

We don't have a car in Layton like we did in Centerville... so we're walking. Oh mom, can you money from my savings into checking? I might need to buy a bike... ugh. Hopefully we should get a car next week. Oh, there's this apartment complex in our area that's full of all these troubled inactive teenagers with drug addict parents. So we spend a lot of time trying to talk to people there. The other day we were talking to this black kid and he's like, "I'll tell you what.... I'll let you teach me all your lessons and I'll go back to church if I can have your number," so my companion's like, okay, here's our number. And he's like, "no, I want HER number," and we just like looked at each other and it was awkward and then we just laughed and he was like, "don't you guys get taught 'flirt to convert?' I'm down for that!" It was funny... hahah! But we're actually making good progress with him; he said a really good prayer in the middle of the basketball courts saying he was grateful for his Nikes and Kanye West! We get a lot of rides from nice members so I barely do any walking. Also we got caught in the rain the other day... my shoes were soaking wet all day, I'm so scared my feet will mold like missionaries in the Phillippines. or I'll get athletes foot. That was 2 days ago and my shoes are still damp.... what do I do? It's sicking me out.

Sorry I couldn't reply to everyone; hope you're all doing well! Yay Daddy for almost being done with radiation, good job getting a date Kla, and for the nutcracker thing... thanks Rob for the card, and tell Claire and Anna I said good job in life!

If you want to send me stuff, it would probably be best just to send it straight to the town house I'm in... I'll let you know when I get transferred but it won't be for a long time. like probably December. I have a ton of ideas of stuff Dad could get me for Christmas, I'll let you know.

Here's my address (google map it, it's a cute house)

1054 W. 975 N
Layton, UT 84041

My first area!

Family -

Just got to the mission.  I had to take public transportation and it was decently traumatizing but somehow I made it out alive.  Hope you're all doing well, love you all!

Here's the trio I'm assigned to, Sister Hornberger Sister Pilling.

From President Stephen W. Hansen, Mission President:

Dear Family of Sister Shields,

It was a pleasure for Sister Hansen and me to welcome your daughter, Sister Heidi Shields, to the Utah Salt Lake City Mission.  Her first day with us included an oreintation at the Whittier Ward building, lunch, an interview with me, administrative paperwork, and a tour of Temple Square. The next day she participated in new missionary training and was assigned her new companion.  She and her new companion then went to their assigned area, beginning an evening of dinner and appointments.  Each new missionary committed to invite someone to be baptized by the end of their day.

After prayerful consideration Sister Sara Hornberger was assigned as her trainer and missionary companion.

I am impressed by your daughter's desire to serve.  She is in high spirits as she anticipated the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead.  Please be assured that Sister Hansen and I will be watching over her while she is here.

Thank you for raising such an outstanding daughter, worthy and willing to serve the Lord full time in our mission.  I know you will be blessed for the sacrifices which make her service possible.  May the Lord's choicest blessings be with you.

With love,

Stephen W. Hansen
President, Utah Salt Lake City Mission