It was birthday week, everybody!
Here were the birthday week happenings:
Monday: We had some sisters over to our apartment to
hang out on P-day. Sisters Adams, Remington, White, and Snyder came over.
Sister Snyder gave me a cute little notebook with a note in the front
that said I am the best sister in the mission and that I deserve a great
birthday week. She was already my favorite, but she is even more my
favorite now!
Tuesday: We had dinner at Smashburger with the YW
president and her daughter from the Thunder Mountain ward. She even
bought us shakes. It was one of many expeditions from the week that
ultimately will lead to #birthdayweekdiabetes
Wednesday (my real birthday): The elders greeted me at
the gym with a rendition of "Happy Birthday" to the tune of the
"La Cucaracha" song, complete with clapping. They went on to
sing it to me five times over the next three days. We had a grill out
with our district for lunch and that was fun as well. I got a package
from Michael that had some fun trinkets and some cards from our other friends.
A family in the ward made me a birthday cake that we had after our lesson
with their daughter (she is one of the youth that we teach). We had
dinner with the RS president in Thunder Mountain, she made us burgers and
bought Reese's ice cream (at this point about 50% of the members we are close
with know that I have an obsession/border line addiction with Reese's Eggs).
She also gave us a gift bag with fun toiletries. We had a lesson
with Harry Potter that night and played jeopardy with him. All in all it
was a wonderful day!
Thursday: We had a RS activity that Sister Gillespie
and I sang at. A lot of women came up and told me Happy Birthday (they
saw it on Facebook the day before). It was very nice of them.
Friday: We went to Chipotle with the Tony Hawke kids'
mom. I was so full later that day still that when my companion asked if I
wanted some popcorn I told her, "No, I'm still full of one pound of Mexican
diabetes." She had a good laugh and now we classify our foods by
what type of diabetes they are. Mexican, white, Asian, etc. I think
white diabetes is probably the worst variety, but I haven't consulted the FDA
yet. Before lunch our member asked what my favorite restaurant was so
that she could take us to lunch on Friday and I told her that my favorite
restaurant, Rubio's, is just outside of the mission. She said we should
just go to Chipotle then and someday in the future she will run to Gilbert and
pick up Rubio's for me and bring it back. She really is the sweetest
lady. I would be her friend in real life. She also said that if I
ever need anything from Old Navy she will run over and pick it up for me too.
I love the members here and how great they are to us!
Saturday and Sunday: Nothing too special happened in
regards to my birthday.
Outside of birthday happenings, we had a great week too!
On Monday we had a family home evening with Neville
Longbottom and his family. We played gospel jeopardy and the step dad,
Sirius Black was kicking butt. His wife kept getting mad at him for doing
so well and knowing everything because he won't be baptized. At the end
of the game Neville said, "So Sirius, where are you with the church right
now anyway?" It was hilarious. Sirius got all quiet and kind
of nervous and brushed off the question and said they would discuss it later. I
hope it led to a good, productive conversation and that he is able to reflect
on why he isn't a member yet!
On our way home from that FHE we ended up at the stop light
with the elders. They rolled down their window to tell us about the
baptismal date they had just set and we were telling them about our good FHE.
The light turned green so the elders sped up to be next to us and were
shouting at us from their car! We continued our conversation with them
for about another mile and it was hilarious! When we got back to our
apartment complex we gave them some cookies (people gave us so much food this
week for Easter and my birthday) and finished our conversation. They're
fun elders and they're pretty hard workers too. I really like them.
Earlier in the night we had a lesson with the Tony Hawke
family. The boys fart and burp in front of us now because they like us so
much and are comfortable with us. It's a compliment wrapped in poor
manners. At one point in time the youngest boy was doing something that I
couldn't see very well, though I saw him in the corner of my eye. I then heard
his mom say, "Hey! No more twerking!" I about died! He
was twerking in the kitchen. The oldest boy prepared the FHE lesson and
we had to list our favorite super hero with their strongest characteristics.
I picked George Washington. The boys thought it was really funny that I
picked a historical figure instead of someone like Iron Man. At this
point they know me pretty well though and they said they weren't surprised.
I woke up Tuesday morning and was just kind of antsy so I
scrubbed the kitchen with a toothbrush during companionship study. I told
my companion that I needed to scrub some things to get out some aggression so
she could write down our lesson plans while I went to town with my best friends,
Comet and a purple toothbrush I stole from the dentist in December.
On Thursday we stalked one of our less active members (Harry
Potter's fiancé actually) at her place of employment, Waffle House. She
has kind of been hiding from us lately so we stopped in and bought a waffle so
she would have to talk to us. I'm not above being creepy when people's
salvation is on the line #stalkingforsalvation
Do you want to know what obese chihuahua's look like?
Corgi's. When you tell their owners that though they get a little
sad. Oops...
We met a crazy man the other day who is a medium and communicates
with spirits. We talked to him for about half an hour and as we were
leaving he said that my ancestors had things to tell me. Naturally, it was me,
not my companion, because the crazies love me. He told me the following
things:
1. My
ancestors are really confused about me, but they want to
warn me about a
mistake I made
a few weeks ago.
2. There's
a lover in my life that is lying to me (Jesus is about the
closest thing I have
to a
relationship right now, so that is interesting).
3. There's
an impending pregnancy in my future
#hussysistermissionary?
4. A shy
young man adores me and I need to start being active with
other young men so this shy
admirer will make himself known to
me and invite me out for a coffee date. He is 1-2
years younger
than me, or he's known me for 1-2 years. He was a little
unsure
how the 1-2 was supposed to manifest itself.
Anyway, his name
starts with a T. So I give you
the go ahead random admirer, you
have my permission to reveal yourself. Maybe it's
my Twitter
stalker from 2012?
5. Something
about a Ford Galaxy and an Allis-Chalmers tractor.
I don't even know how I find these people.
We had a really productive meeting with the bishop in
Thunder Mountain. My companion's first companion always said that the missionary
work in that ward wasn't moving forward because the bishop wasn't on board, so
I said I wanted to meet with the bishop. Finally after I had my
passionate border line temper tantrum a few weeks ago (the one that ended with
My Milkshake) we had a meeting with the bishop set up. I left any
references to milkshakes at the door and we had a great conversation with the
bishop. We talked about the broken machinery for missionary work in the
ward and brainstormed a lot of wonderful ideas. After the meeting my
companion said she is a bad missionary because she has been here for 7.5 months
and never tried to meet with him and I've only been here 3 and demanded a
meeting that I got, that resulted in a standing meeting once a month with our
bishop, an invitation to BYC, and a missionary fireside on the date that I
decide in which we will discuss missionary work as a ward in a round table
meeting of sorts. I am so excited! I told her she isn't a bad
missionary she just trusted her trainer and believed the work was dead in this
ward. I told her that she needs to learn from this lesson that you
shouldn't live beneath your privileges. We are both missionaries called
by the same prophet to profess the Gospel of Jesus Christ! We are
entitled to a supportive bishop, ward council, and good members that are
willing to work for us and with us. I said that I got a meeting with the
bishop because I told our ward mission leader that I deserved one and that I
deserved more support than I was receiving. Further I pointed out that
the Lord deserves better members, especially when the people in this ward are
showered with economic blessings. It made me feel good that this went so
well. I'm not your stereotypical good sister missionary. I don't
walk on rainbows and fairy dust never accompanies my journeys. I will not
uplift people with my sweet spirit or tender voice, but I will motivate people
and I will get something done. I don't doubt I was sent to this area
because they needed a sister with a little fire inside of her instead of sugar.
Once I've straightened things out then they'll probably get a super nice
sister missionary in here to start converting the masses, but I will be the
sister to tighten the bolts and fix the broken machinery. I've spent a
lot of my life feeling guilty for being "bossy" when I don't need to.
I read a book before my mission that said if you were ever called bossy as a child it actually just means you're a natural born leader and you
shouldn't feel bad about that. So I'm not #sisterpoppeforworlddictator2015
I hope I get to stay in this area for a little bit longer so
I can help it along. I hope that I can actually help it too! I have a lot
of big ideas and hopes and dreams for this area. Hopefully hard work and
faith will help it out!
That about does it for this week!
Sister Poppe
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