SISTER SARAH JOHNSON - 05/08 - Hello again! :) It's been a really fantastic week! We did a lot of things....

Monday was our designated "no play, all cleaning" pday.... it was less than fun, and I literally spent 5 hours on the kitchen alone. But hey, at least it smells like lemons in there now, and the walls have probably never been so white. At least we got to go out for Mexican food with the Johnson's from Potlatch. They're super cool, and they just went to the temple this weekend to be sealed :}. We just love them. They invited us to come, but we weren't "their" missionaries (president said the policy is only the missionaries that were there for the teaching and baptizing can go :/). But we felt really cool to at least be invited :). 

Tuesday I went to MLC, and that was cool. We discussed a lot of different things, and were given some instruction for when Elder Holland would come. It's fun to go to Spokane for a bit, but I was really excited to get back home to chill with Sis Mitchell, because she's the best. 

Wednesday was whatever.... until we had dinner with the Gomez family, and they're the cutest :). We love them. And then we got to have a lesson with Dawn! And we actually had a lesson with her! We decided to cut the restoration lesson into all it's little pieces, because she usually talks for so long about her family and her life (which is all very interesting... but it's hard to fit the Gospel into it). So we just taught about what Heavenly Father is like and His love for us, and then left her Jacob 4 to read (about prophets) so we could talk about it when we came back. And IT WORKED! We went back last night to talk to her, and she had all these questions about it, and wanted us to go through it with her. And then we assigned her to read Joseph Smith's history, because she was a little confused about how he fit in, and where he was in the Book of Mormon... So we're getting there! Slowly but surely :). We just love that lady. 

Thursday we were able to go to a lesson with Ezra and we decided to just teach him about who God is and his relationship to us, but all through the scriptures. He really seemed to appreciate us citing our sources ;p. Haha but the lesson went so well! He really liked it, and he came to church yesterday and sat by us :) it was awesome! He's going away for the summer, though, to Vegas.... that leaves us with exactly 0 YSA investigators starting this coming Friday.... yaaaaaay.... 

Friday we worked on the horse farm. There's this one babyish horse that has absolutely no manners, and the lady who sent us to brush the horses told us to just push him away because he needs to learn not to just walk all over us. So this horse (which is like a year old, almost full grown) tries to eat my sweater, and I whacked him on the nose because I didn't appreciate it. And then he went straight for Sister Mitchell and tried to eat her. Haha she was mad at me for making him mad, but then we just went and hid in the barn from him so it all worked out. Also! Friday there was this crazy power outage all over Moscow.... for 4 hours. It's like everybody lost their minds. We stayed off the roads as much as we could. It was scary. Then we went to a dark luau on Cinco de Mayo. It was a fabulous way to mix weird cultural traditions. 

SATURDAY WE GOT TO SEE ELDER HOLLAND AHHHH! It was incredible. It changed my life. I wish I could tell you more, but I really don't know how to. He shook every one of our hands and said he "interviewed" us. And his handshake was perfect, like getting a hug, and his eyes were so intense it was great. And his talk to us was amazing, and included some serious pulpit pounding, and a threat to throttle us with his knee on our chest if we ever go less active on him. Haha it was so good you guys, so good. But my favorite part, was that at the very end of all of his inspirational chastisement, he blew us a kiss, and softly told us to "work hard", and then walked out. That man is an apostle for the Lord, and I felt it, and I'm a believer. 

Church was good.... Sunday was good, same old same old. :) 

Gotta go hiking now! I love you all!! 

Sister Johnson

 Pictures! 

I saw Sister McFaul at the Elder Holland Meeting :) she's so great. 

Sister Mitchell and I :) 

Us on Sunday with one of our YSA members (Audrey :) ) who's going to Ghana next semester. I'm so jealous. 

 Also the "Hippie Harry" sister Mitchell painted for me. He's fantastic. 

ELDER MATTHEW LEBARON - 5/1 - Another day in the work

This week really flew by! It's kind of hard to remember everything
that happened! But we are still plucking along and I'm doing my best
to try and learn the area, it's so big!

This week we went to L.A, Chino, and Burbank, its so crazy how much
driving we do.  It I think it's even crazier how hard it is to find
Filipino people to teach, surprisingly we still pick up quick a few
investigators a week, but some of those people we just pass off, which
can be frustrating sometimes, but it's a really cool opportunity to be
in the Filipino ward.

Things here are a lot different than English work! I think the food
has really gotten me the most, and the way people eat it. At ever meal
that I've been to we have rice, that's just a given, but a lot of sour
soup, which is essential pork with like this seaweed type of stuff
with beats... it's kind of weird and tastes well... a little sour, you
take that and put it on rice. I think one of the weirdest things to me
was watching some of our members eat with their hands, which I guess I
a very normal thing they do in the Philippines? If they don't eat with
their hands they eat with a fork and spoon. With the spoon in your
right hand you use the fork to put everything onto the spoon, it's
just weird. I've never eaten with both a fork and spoon before,  but
it beats using your hands for sure.

Something that I have tried to improve on this week is to be more bold
with our investigators and with people on the streets, it's been a
little intimidating, but I've seen that it doesn't freak people out as
much as I thought it would. When people tell us that they've already
been baptized to tell them that the church of Jesus Christ of Latter
Day Saints is the one and only church that has the authority to
baptize and preach the gospel. To tell people that they need to find
out for themselves if what we are saying is true because their
salvation depends on it. I've learned a lot from my comp E. Ela. And
it seems to work pretty well, there is a way to be bold without over
bearing and I'm starting to understand the difference. I know that
this church, is the only way that we can obtain our salvation, I know
that it is essential that we know that the the priesthood was restored
through Joseph smith and that there is no way we can obtain
forgiveness in this life or the life to come unless we take advantage
of the atonement which our savior Jesus Christ preformed. It's really
cool to be able to inform people about all of these things, I'm
grateful for the opportunity I get each day. Until next week,

Elder LeBaron

614 west foothill blvd, Arcadia, California, 91006

SISTER SARAH JOHNSON - 5/01 - Hey guys! Happy May First!

So this week has been good :) we had a couple of good highlights. 

We played "Quidditch" with the zone last pday and it was awesome! No brooms were involved, so it was like.... muggle Quidditch. But it rocked anyway! And we got really good exercise and a lot of laughs out of it :). 

We had a great lesson with Jim out in Potlatch this week :). We went back over the Word of Wisdom with him, because he had some really great questions about it. He said that he just felt like God was telling him to reread the Word of Wisdom pamphlet, and then when he did he just understood everything so much better when we re explained it all. Hopefully it helps convince him to quit the coffee.... we'll keep working on him :). 

We had dinner with the Gough's on Wednesday! They're the senior CES missionaries at the institute, and they're adorable. They fed us a beautiful pot roast dinner. Sister Gough's birthday is coming up.... we'll have to make them cookies or something. 

Also we were invited to a BBQ with some of the YSA people... and I realized how extraordinarily awkward of a partygoer I have become. We went to like.... get to know the members, with the intent to only stay half an hour and just talk to some people, have a few laughs, maybe get a referral, and move on. But instead we stayed like 5 minutes and awkwardly ate one hotdog between us.... and talked to 2 people..... like dangit I finally got invited to the cool cat party, and now I'm weird and awkward about it. Haha I have some work to do when I get home.... ;p 

John is still doing good! They got him a calling as the Usher :) and we got to be there to sustain him for the priesthood yesterday :). He's just moving along so nicely. We started his new member lessons this week, and they went really well. He remembers a lot, and it's been good to add to what he already knows. (New member lessons are all the missionary lessons again, in case I hadn't explained that before...) 

Thursday night we had a really awesome dinner with the Blazzards out in Potlatch :). They're the cutest elderly people ever, and Bro. Blazzard is obviously still so in love with Sis Blazzard and it was the best dinner ever. We shared the Easter video with them, and they really felt it. I've also been reading Jesus the Christ a lot this week, and I'd just read about Jesus being betrayed, and the unjust trial, and watching the Easter video after that was so powerful. We talked a little about how Jesus really had no armies, didn't gain power, didn't dictate over us, even though he could have. When he says to Peter in the garden before the mob takes him, "Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father, and he shall presently give me more than twelve legions of angels?" I realized that he could have lead armies. He could have taken spoils. He could have ruled over us. And instead, he saved us. Instead, he heals us. Instead he loves and leads us. I had this overwhelming feeling of gratitude during that message, it was incredible. I love Jesus so much, and I really felt closer to Him this week. 

Well.... I have to get off the computer pretty quick here, so I'll give a brief rundown of the weekend. We finally went on an exchange, so Sis Allen and I were companions for a day! It was super fun, I love her :). It was cool to hang out with someone from home, so we could talk about all these people and actually know who the other was talking about. District meeting was good too, we ate donuts. Church at the YSA ward was good, and we finally had a meeting with Tessa! We hadn't met with her since the first week in YSA.... and now she's going home for the summer.... bummer..... (that rhymed yo). But she rocks and she's going to meet with missionaries over the summer where she's from, and they'll probably get to baptize her, so that'll be sweet :). 

Anyways, this week we'll get to meet Elder Holland at a huge mission conference! I'm so excited! It'll be the coolest mission reunion ever.... and I think we're supposed to take a mission picture that I'm super pumped about. Stay tuned for the details on that :). 

I love you all! I hope all is well :). 

only one pic this week.... sorry guys.... We'll do better next week. At least Sis Allen and I were cute :) 

ELDER MATTHEW LEBARON - 4/24 - Cars, Tagalog, and food

This week has gone by pretty fast! I've really enjoyed this. New area
a ton. I love my companions, all my dreams are coming true. Glendale
is where all the party people are at, which is where I belong. It's so
cool being in the city and seeing a bunch of crazy stuff. There is so
much to see and do, and it feels like we can accomplish so much with a
car that I haven't been able to do with bikes. Our area is huge, we
have no bounds, nothing can stop me. It's literally the coolest to be
able to go anywhere in the mission, and out. We went to east L.A This
ward spoils us... holy cow. It seems more of a branch than a ward, but
we eat every night. Rice everyday all day. Filipino people are so
nice, the members seem to always be giving us stuff, and helping us
with rides if we are running low on mikes. The bishop gave me a pair
of Oakley sunglasses... they are so nice holy cow. So what I'm getting
at here is that white people are the worst, English work is not where
it's at. Filipino work is where the party is at.

I love my Filipino companion Elder Ela so much, he is such a funny
guy. He is about to finish his mission, but he is still working hard,
but he makes the work fun. He showed me how to catch bees without
getting stung. Apparently the skin on your palm is too thick to be
stung by a bee? Well I finally built up the courage and caught a
couple bees. I got a little too confident and I got stung on the
finger it, it hurt a lot more than I remember, What a dumb idea. Learn
from me, don't catch bees with your hands, unless you are a small
Filipino man, then go ahead you'll never get stung. I like being with
foreign missionaries when they are learning English, even though Ela
has been out for awhile he is still learning, the other day we were
trying to explain to him what a red neck or hick was, and now he is
calling everyone we see a redneck... its so funny. The other day when
we were knocking on a door, there was a big pit bull that started
barking at us through the gate, he walked straight up to the dog with
his finger pointed out it and yelled, "shut up dog I will eat you!"
You never know what that guy is about to do. He is so bold in lessons,
he just breaks people's legs. We were in a lesson and the guy had a
couple concerns and we pulled out the scripture and explained to him
what it meant, he then told us that he didn't believe that it was
true, then Ela said " you simply don't have enough faith to believe
this scripture" and later explained that he would not obtain salvation
if he continued to deny our teachings... oh man... haha.... all true
but bold. I love that guy. Elder cottle is super cool too, he is
pretty relaxed and likes to joke around, I am always messing with him,
it's pretty fun. We have a lot of fun in our companionship.

Cars are the best! I can't believe I have been riding a bike for so
long. When it was 90 degrees outside I was surprised at how much I
still complained about the heat even though we had a car... hahah. But
I really enjoy riding in the car as we go on the freeway. Even though
it's church music it's super nice to listen to something, and roll the
windows down when it's night time and see all those city lights. We
are pretty close to downtown L.A and see it as we come back home most
nights. Then we go to downtown Glendale. It's awesome. I love this new
area, it's just such a nice transition, now I understand why all the
missionaries want to go into Filipino work. What a blessing, super
pumped to learn more about the people we are working with and help the
kingdom grow in this area.

Elder LeBaron

614 West foothill Blvd Arcadia, California

SISTER SARAH JOHNSON - 4/24 - Hey Guys! :D

So... this week was pretty basic. It's rained every day.... but it's alright at least it's not snow! 

Here's the rundown of the more interesting things we did this week. 

Monday: Pday, played Marshmallow Dodge ball and miraculously didn't get hit in the face, then went to the FHE activity for the YSA ward - it was this super cool scavenger hunt all over Moscow, but we only had 30 minutes to do it. Our Relief society president and her boyfriend called us for their team, and we almost won, it was fantastic. Wish I had pictures to show you all.... 

Tuesday: Started cleaning up the YSA less-active member list, and pretty much did that all day unless we were eating.... 

Wednesday: Worked at the food bank! They had a whole bunch of avocados, so we got to take like 6 home. Chips and dip are coming this week, woot! Also saw Dawn, our favorite 82 year old. :)

Thursday: We were so busy! We saw Ezra at the campus library where he basically bashed with us for an hour about how the Word of Wisdom is stupid.... we're considering dropping him as an investigator, because every time we meet up with him it turns into an almost argument.... he's not really looking, he's just asking his friends for anti-Mormon questions to debate with us about. It was the worst. But it contrasted in a really cool way to Jim's lesson right afterwards, which was about the Word of Wisdom too! We were talking about the things God asks us not to put in our bodies, and when we got to coffee, Jim was all "I'm not giving up my coffee guys!" and the members we brought, Bro and Sis Vandehey, were on it and they encouraged him and explained why it's important, and it was so awesome. By the end of the lesson, Jim said "I'll give up coffee when I'm refreshed" (meaning when he's baptized). And when we told him he had to at least give it up 2 weeks before, he agreed. Even though he didn't totally understand why coffee was so bad, he was willing to try and give it up so that he could follow God's commandments. I loved having the stark contrast between someone who's really searching for the truth and repentance, and someone who is just using missionaries to debate word play. 

Friday: We had district meeting! Sister Mitchell gave a fantastic training about how to teach with your companion in unity. She is a powerhouse, and I learned a lot from her! I love one of the scriptures she used, Luke 22:32, and she talked about how our teaching isn't a power struggle, because we should be strengthening our companions no matter what. It was awesome to watch her teach, and it made me so grateful that I always trust that Sis Mitchell has my back in every situation. Ah! She's just the best. And then after district meeting, we worked on Orphan Acres again. Then we met with Isabeau and taught her the first part of the Plan of Salvation :) and she was really nice to us again! 

Saturday: we had our weekly planning for 3 hours. it's so hard to stay focused the whole time.... but it was good. We took a little break to read ancient Ensigns from the 90s, and I found this really cute story! It was by James E. Faust, I'll copy and paste it for you all....

Now, some of you older sisters may ask, “Haven’t I heard every Relief Society lesson? What point is there for me to go to Relief Society each week?” The answer to those questions may best be given by relating the story of a young piano student. His mother, wishing to encourage him, “bought tickets for a performance of the great Polish pianist, Paderewski. The night of the concert arrived and the mother and son found their seats near the front of the concert hall. While the mother visited with friends, the boy slipped quietly away.

“Suddenly, it was time for the performance to begin and a single spotlight cut through the darkness of the concert hall to illuminate the grand piano on stage. Only then did the audience notice the little boy on the bench, innocently picking out ‘Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.’

“His mother gasped, but before she could move, Paderewski appeared on stage and quickly moved to the keyboard. He whispered to the boy, ‘Don’t quit. Keep playing.’ And then, leaning over, the master reached down with his left hand and began filling in the bass part. Soon his right arm reached around the other side, encircling the child, to add a running obbligato. Together, the old master and the young novice held the crowd mesmerized.

“In our lives, unpolished though we may be, it is the Master who surrounds us and whispers in our ear, time and time again, ‘Don’t quit. Keep playing.’ And as we do, He augments and supplements until a work of amazing beauty is created. He is right there with all of us, telling us over and over, ‘Keep playing.’”

Isn't it so cute? I gave me a lot of hope and encouragement, and it was a good reminder that Jesus Christ will take whatever I have, and make it enough, as long as I keep playing :).

Sunday: We got to go to Potlatch finally! Every time we go to their branch, we remember why we love it so much. The Vandeheys had us over to a beautiful french toast brunch, and we got to see Jim and talk to him a bit :). He wants us to look for "manly" curtains for him.... haha so we'll probably look for something plaid. The rest of the evening we looked for more of the YSA less actives - it's a good way for Sis Mitchell to learn all the Moscow streets, driving back and forth all evening.
Aaaaaaaaand, that's about it folks. Until Next week! :))
I love you all!
Sister Johnson

Aaaaand turns out I have pictures to send too! Didn't think I took any... guess I did!
We made s'mores out of Easter goods, it's tradition!

 

 

 

 Also chips and dip. 

 

 

 

 Also Elder Brunt and Elder Klunker brought us the cookies I won out of Elder Brunt. They were pretty good! They said if there weren't enough chocolate chips, we could microwave more on top haha.

Here are the Orphan Acres pics! 

 

 

 

Also we saw a full rainbow on Sunday! Sis Mitchell had never seen one before, so we stopped and tried to get a picture of the whole thing.

 

 

 

 

She even ran far away to try to get it. But it was too big....

 

 

 

 Look at the sky though! It was awesome! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

SISTER SARAH JOHNSON - 4/17 - Hi guys! :D

Lots of good things happened this week :). 

On Monday we got to play Hockey as a zone for the last pday before everyone left for other zones. That was so much fun! Except Elder Rapier hit me in the knee with the puck (from the other side of the room) and then I was pretty much out of the game.... haha Elder Marinos drew an illustration of me, it'll be included later. 

Also this week, the tripan split up, and Sis Cheney is now 2nd training non other than Sister Allen, from good ole Mesa, Az! It's been fun having the new sister, especially because she's fantastic and I knew her from home. So she knows all the people involved in the stories I tell from home. Good times :D. 

Tuesday we had a lesson with Ezra, where we finally talked about something other than the Plan of Salvation. We talked about the Restoration of the Gospel and what that means... it was a rough lesson only because Ezra is looking more for a logical philosophical kind of view at the Gospel instead of seeking to feel and understand the truth. We have an elder in our district now who had taught Ezra back in Coeur d'Alene, and he gave us a new perspective on the situation, so we're excited to figure out how to help Ezra progress better. The work rolls forward! 

On Wednesday we got to eat dinner with the Tunnell family in Potlatch! They were super nice :) and made us really good Greek food. They also had a banjo!!! And they let us pick on it a little bit. Again, I will definitely be learning the banjo when I get home. I think my calling in life is to rock at the banjo. Get ready, world! 

Thursday.... Thursday we had a lesson with Jim. But he had a friend over and I'm pretty sure that the friend being over kept Jim from reigning in the comments and the curses like he usually does. Bummer. Also he missed church this week we're pretty sure (weren't in Potlatch for church, but we didn't hear from the members that he came, so we're assuming he didn't :( ) so we'll have to move his baptism back a couple of weeks. Sad. :( 

But Friday was fantastic! We had our district meeting, and the new district is cool :). Got a couple of new elders. Also, I played Elder Brunt at air hockey, and after he beat me the first game, I made a bet with him on the second game, that loser had to make cookies for the winner. Elders will do anything for a cookie bribe. And then I promptly destroyed him, he didn't even get one point. So we played a third game, "double or nothing", and I beat him at that too. Ha! It pays off to go to Peter Piper Pizza every week and play air hockey with Dad. Double chocolate chip cookies are coming our way! :D

Later on Friday we had a lesson with Isabeau where she was actually really nice and receptive to us! It made me really happy to see that she's ready to learn again. And we all left the meeting smiling, and there's a lot of hope for the future with her. :). After that we went to the YSA bishopric dinner, where they fed us all prime rib and baked potatos. Man alive, was it good! Haven't had a steak that good in 9 months.... We grabbed a couple of the extras and brought them over to the elders, because they also haven't had a steak that good in quite a while. 

Saturday we worked on the horse farm, Orphan Acres, again. But this time we shovelled out stalls. It was fun, except this huge sorority came the same day and it was awkward because they obviously didn't want to talk to us. Thank goodness we had the Pullman sisters to be on our team. Then we at least didn't feel lonely and awkward. Just awkward. 

And then on Saturday the Paradise Ridge elders had a baptism too! We got to take Isabeau to it; she likes coming to all the baptisms. It was fun to have her there. Right after the baptism we had Zone Kickoff, which rocked! Sister Mitchell and I gave a fun training on companionship unity, and how to make communication less scary and ideas for building a friendship. And the zone leaders gave an amazing training on how to build zone unity, and we made some fabulous goals! So every week we'll add a goal and build the zone up. This week we're praying every day for the members to have opportunities to be missionaries too :), the week after we'll start doing one act of random service for our companionships every day (but I mean, it's good to start that now too, so we kind of did), then we'll do district service once a week, and then we'll do a zone service project the 4th week. It's cool, I'm excited :). This zone is the best. 

Easter was great! Church was great! I really felt it this year. I feel  like I've taken Easter for granted my whole life. But watching John recieve the gift of the Holy Ghost, and to sing the Easter songs just did my soul some good. And we were invited to dinner with the Cox family in Quail Run! I ate with them on Christmas..... I've been here forever..... but it was amazing! They're so cute and kind to us, and we got to show them the #PrinceofPeace Easter video from the church. I love that video, everyone go watch it, ok? We also got to go looking for the YSA less active members.... and definitely crashed some Easter parties that way. Awkward. One lady let us into her house so she could package some cheesecake to go for us, which was really sweet of her! But her entire family stopped talking to stare at us in the entry way. Lets just say, the cheesecake was aaaaaalmost not worth the awkward vibes.... haha. 

Anyways.... that was pretty much it. I love you all! :) 

Sister Johnson 

Here's my injury illustration.

A picture of sister Mitchell moving a dead squirrel out of the road. 

Some pics of the horse farm adventure!