Squalls and Falls

This week was an odd one. I don't know why. It just felt odd!
We ate at a Korean Restaurant on Tuesday! It was pretty cool. SO so so much food though! It was legit!  We really enjoyed it!

Korean Restaurant

For P-day last week we had a Zombie nerf war... it is as dorkie as it sounds, but it was a lot of fun and something different for once! I had a lot of fun!

We also had Pioneer Day this Saturday which was so great! We got to spend time inside showing Church History videos and having discussions about them afterward. I liked that! Then for the last 30 minutes we went out and walked around the park with all the members. It was cool because I got to see a lot of the members from my 2 previous areas! It was super good!

We also biked a lot on Friday! It was great! We biked first thing in the morning to District meeting....

Back on Bikes :)

I totally bit the dirt though. We were biking on loose sand and my companion's bike wiggled a bit, so while I was watching her I buffed it and landed in a thorn bush.. that's right... you can laugh... it's fine. Laugh at my pain... go ahead! Haha... it was pretty funny. And I have some gnarly bruises to go with it!

One of our members brought a friend to church yesterday, and since they had a calling in nursery, asked us to meet her there and show her where the Gospel principles class was... which we happened to be teaching... so while we're talking I finally ask where she is from... "I'm from South Africa"... imagine how excited I was haha.  She was from Durban but had been in Denver for 2 years.

Durban beachfront

It was pretty cool!  Also someone who served their mission in South Africa said my accent sounded like what they remembered a SA accent sounded like... Happy days!! Haha! Made my day!!

We are teaching a 9 year old boy who's grandparents are members but his parents aren't. He is so smart it's crazy! I think they underestimate his understanding of the things he learns.
Yesterday when he closed the lesson with a prayer in his prayer he said "And please help my dad to learn the Gospel as well as me" My ever growing heart broke a little bit. It was the sweetest thing!

We also did a good bit of service this week!  Because of the storms, we spent one afternoon fixing up a garden and another repainting a recently flooded basement! It was fun!!

I feel bad for being so excited about these big storms!! But they're so beautiful!!!!

Flag in a Storm

Calm after the Storm

Yesterday's talks were on families... and someone mentioned "Intentional Parenting".

I'm just going to leave those two words... you can think about what that means to you!


The church is true. It always has been...


I love you!!!

Sister Botts.

Hard Work and Still Small Voices.

I have a peanut butter problem.  I don't know where I lost my hate of peanut butter but it has happened. I went through half a jar and an entire loaf of bread last week.   It's a real problem I have now!!

This week was good. I've started drawing again. So that's a thing I guess.

We spent Saturday doing service. We spent it in the Black Forest Regional Park. There was a really bad fire there a few years ago, and so to stop mudslides we were digging holes and embedding logs of trees.  It was fun. I love some good manual labour!! I got bitten by huge red ants while moving one of the logs.  Freaking hurts!!

Service in Black Forest Regional Park

Some fun along the way

Loving the manual labour

It was also 11th of July ... or, in America 7/11, which means FREE SLURPEE DAY!!! Haha happy days!! Just the right thing after some hard work!


We had a good teaching week. Next week can be better though!



There was a massive storm here on Thursday night.  I feel bad for loving storms so much because it ruined a lot of people's homes and gardens.

Some of the roadside along this road was washed away in the storms

No sign of the storms in this sky

I was once again confronted by my fear of public praying yesterday... for both Sacrament meetings I gave the opening prayer... Aaaagh!!!
But it was ok. Something that I realized while I was praying, and then was brought to my attention last night by someone else who had heard me pray in Sacrament.... I revert back to my natural accent when I pray. Proper South African sounding hahaha!   It's weird. It's like my habitual accent that I have when I'm talking to non-South Africans just goes away when I pray. It's funny!


It's been a good week though! We had Zone training on Thursday which was pretty great. Probably the best one I've gone to yet! I learned a lot!

We also had interviews with the Mission President on Friday.  Interviews always freak me out hahaha.

I've loved the week though. We taught a lot and got to know more of the members.   We happened to find the right people to teach who needed to hear from Heavenly Father, without ever knowing that they needed us. I love that we can do that. That Heavenly Father will direct us to the people we need to speak to, even if they are active members. Sometimes we don't know the struggles that people are going through, and we just have to listen to the Spirit when he tells us who to see.

Instruments in His hands

There have been hard days but it's still the best thing I've ever done!!!  I wish I had  time to type more but the time is far spent... wow... that was obnoxious!  Anyway... here's a fun fact! I'm learning Korean!! I can now say "Shut up", "I love you", "stop texting boys", "you're obnoxious" and "that's stupid" in Korean. Hahaha it has been a good week!!!!!!

We shall overcome!!!

And now I should go!

Sisters in Zion

Just remember this.... you may never need a  load of food storage. In an emergency, you will probably not be able to carry all the water you obediently stored in case of an emergency, but one thing you will have... is the fact that you have been obedient to the Prophets of the Lord in getting ready your food storage.  Maybe it's not about disaster. Maybe its about obedience.  Maybe you will meet someone who will be in need of food? Maybe you'll just be obedient and do it anyway?!


LOVE YOU ALL!!!

Be obedient!!!!

<3 Sister Botts

Onward and Upward

Goodbye Sis. Grow

Hello Sis. Park

So this week was very interesting!  New area. New car. Happy days!  Our home is beautiful. The members that we live with are great!!!  We have a boxing bag!! And a gym downstairs where we live. I've never worked out so much in my life!! It's awesome!!

She's always wanted a boxing bag!!!

Driving has been fun.  I forgot that Road Rage was a thing that I had. Hello my old friend!

It's been the 4th of July weekend so there were a lot of people either not around or busy celebrating so we didn't get to teach a lot, which makes me sad.... But... on Saturday we were in a parade... a whole bunch of missionaries. It was cool. I got so tanned. Happy days I'm not "Shark Bait" anymore!!! :)

Before the Parade

A lot of fireworks this week.

I feel weird about this week just because I don't know the area or the people and we only taught like 15 lessons... so I just feel like it flew by with out anything significant happening.   The people here are all really great!!



Something happened during the parade though. Maybe it was just heat stroke! haha

But I looked around. I saw these hundreds and hundreds of people around us and realized that we, as a small group, were responsible for bringing them the gospel. It was like I all of a sudden just had this mini panic attack, and my smiley face turned to a terrified face for a few seconds!

It made me think of something our Mission President said during Stake Conference. He said that our missionary experiences will not grow our testimonies, but our testimonies will grow our missionary experiences!   There are people all around us all the time! There is never a reason to say "I didn't have the opportunity"   I think really when we say that, what we mean is "I don't have the faith to try and share it" so the stronger our faith is, the more willing we are to share it with others.

 

Because I always had the excuse of... I don't have time, or I don't talk to many non members.  Translation..... " I don't have faith, I don't have faith"    That sounds blunt but that's how I'm seeing it these days.  There is always someone around us to share the gospel with.  

Just freaking do it!

And if you're not going to do it... come up with a better excuse to tell the Lord.



I love you all so much. Thank you for the support and emails! I really do appreciate it!


The gospel is true!!!!!!!


Have a great week!!

With Sis. Aukuso and Sis. Park

Love Sister Botts

Sis Botts and Sis Bentham

Happy!!!

End of the day

So... this week.

Well... by the end of last night we had only taught 21 lessons this week... and I was kinda feeling like... What the heck? Is that all??? But then I remembered the days where we would be happy to have a week with 15 lessons... I guess it's because the better you do, the more you expect of yourself. But this week was full of random other things that did not consist of teaching. Like Sister Grow had to go to "train the trainer" and I had to go and take my driving test... which I failed....

But then I passed it this morning! Happy days!

Driving test - Passed :)

I'm going to use the fact that it was my first time driving in over a year, and then it was also on the wrong side of the road on the wrong side of the car... as my excuse for failing the first time!!

I don’t have much time to do this since I took time to do my test this morning... but we had an amazing week! I'm excited for my new area and companion.

Last few days with Sis. Grow

This gospel makes me so happy!! 

I love the people I have met here in these 2 wards and I'm gonna miss them, But this time I feel like it's ok to leave.

Hope and Charlie Winkler

Griffin Winkler

The Berhman family

Bishop Ebersohl of the 6th Ward - 'coolest person ever'

 

I hope you all know that I love you!

I love this church and I love sharing the gospel with those around us!!  I am so happy!

I never thought I would ever be this happy! Ever! I was ready to carry over how miserable I was into a mission, and just hate life forever more... but I'm so happy here serving the Lord. I could never have imagined the joy I would have when I first filled in those papers.

I always felt like "the Gospel is true so suffer through" and for a large part I guess that's true! Living the Gospel can be hard... But it's worth it and it will, eventually, if not right away, bring you joy!!

I promise!

Well... This is it for now!

Sis Bentham is on her way home

With Sis Bristow and Sis Hall (back) at Manitou Springs

 

I LOVE YOU!!!!!

X

Sister Botts.

Sunset over the mountains

 

Good Times and Good Timing

First of all... I'm melting. Someone please open the fridge!

Sunshine

Storm clouds 

So this week has been great! We taught more lessons this week than we did last! It's been so good to be busy all the time.  Time is flying, which sucks, but busy is good! I hate days when I feel like I've achieved nothing!

This week on our way to get something after one of our lessons, we decided to stop by an older lady named Alice. She's not a member but she loves when we come around and share a message!   We talked for a while on her door step and then we sang "Families can be Together Forever" to her.

  She's really old and is out-living all of her friends! It's sad, but at the same time we always drive past her and she's doing crazy amounts of yard work... and when we offer help she turns it down.  Secrets to living long I guess! Haha 

But it was a pretty cool experience!

She is always so loving towards us!

 

We've had a week filled with good timing!

Friday we skipped lunch to get to an appointment, and then the one after that cancelled so we decided then was a good time to go for lunch! When we were about to leave the place we ate at, we saw a lady that the sisters previous to me arriving had been teaching . We got to talk with her a bit and see how she was doing and set up a time to see her.

Another evening we were leaving to go home and we saw a girl picking some stuff up out of her car... we stopped to help her, and it turned out to be one of the kids from a group of kids in that complex that we often stop and share a message with and have a chat. She introduced us to her mother who was so kind, and gave us her details and set up a time where we could come back and teach them! Booyah!

We taught the "Stop Smoking" program to 2 people in 2 days! It was pretty great! It's a great program too... all the steps make sense and I can see from teaching it to others how it could work as well as it does! We are excited to see how they progress!!  Schweet!

We watched the "Candy Bomber" clip from "Meet the Mormons" with a German lady who was actually there!! How cool is that?!  She showed us her little statue that she had that commemorated it!  It was pretty awesome!

Gail Halvorsen - the Candy Bomber

It's been such a good week!  I've started using my new scriptures so it's pushed me to look for all the scriptures that aren't marked in there and to mark them and get to know them!! I feel slightly smarter after this week... as far as finding scriptures anyway... I'm still rather dim in all other ways! Hahah

Helaman 5:12

En nou, my seuns, onthou, onthou dat dit op die rots van ons Verlosser is, wat Christus is, die Seun van God, dat julle jul  fondament moet bou; sodat wanneer die duiwel sy magtige winde sal uitstuur, ja, sy pyle in die warrelwind, ja, wanneer al sy hael en sy magtige  storm op julle sal neerslaan, sal dit geen mag oor julle hê om julle af te trek na die kloof van smart en eindelose ellende nie, vanweë die rots waarop julle gebou is, wat ‘n seker fondament is, ‘n fondament waarop, as mense daarop bou, hulle nie kan val nie.

TRUTH.

A lot of the times we think of Repentance as a punishment. We think of it kind of like Heavenly Father being like "naughty, naughty, go away and sit in the corner" when really... repentance is a blessing.

Isaiah 1:18

Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.

My favourite part of that is where it says "Come now, and let us reason together"

Heavenly Father doesn't expect us to sit in the naughty corner alone to repent. It's something He wants us to take to Him and to get through with Him.  He is a loving Heavenly Father and wants us to rely on Him because He knows what we need.

Repentance is a blessing

Hope you all have a great week..

Hope I survive the heat!

Cool watermelon for hot days!!

A whole cargo of sweeties from Aunty Doreen for the difficult days

Love you all!