Happy Mothers Day

I GOT TO TALK TO MY FAMILY!!                                             5/11/2015

I love the gospel because I know that families can be together forever! It lifted my spirit a lot to be able to talk with my family, hear their voice and see their faces! And people ask me all the time if it’s hard to be on a mission because you don’t get to see your family, and it really is, that is the hardest part. I miss them a lot, but that is also a good reminder to me of why I am here, because I am here to teach others how they can be together forever. My family means the world to me, and I am looking forward to Christmas!! (today kinda feels like the day after Christmas....all that anticipation and then it happens and then the next day it’s really sad because you know you have to wait a whole year till next Christmas) But it was so good to see how good everyone is doing! 

This week was fun! We had exchanges and it was a really great opportunity to learn from someone else and see how the taught. We got to volunteer at a race for Hospice; we were the ones who would mark their time when they came across the finish! We got to do all kinds of service this week! We helped out at a Part Members House....who also happens to be a little bit crazy. That was an adventure! But, then right after we got to go and help the sweetest old lady in her garden. 

I also finally met Dan! He lives on the other side of the tracks, in the really sketchy part of town, but he is amazing! He is kind of like our protector, he told us that if anyone ever gives us trouble we need to come get him and he will teach them a lesson :} He lives on a property that the owner has a 400bl pig named Penelope. And in front of their house is a huge sign that says "WE DONT RENT PIGS" its super funny! But Dan is amazing, he wants to get baptized but he is having trouble quitting smoking because every time he tries he gets really sick and ends up in the hospital. He quit drinking and everything else cold turkey and he is so happy about it! Now we just need to get him to church!

Scott and Dyan who are recent converts who are amazing, they are just struggling right now, took in an 18 year old boy named Jr, because his mom went to jail. But he is amazing, he is trying to live a good life unlike is family so he wanted out. We had a lesson with all three of them and he said he would be up to taking the lessons with Scott and Dyan. So on exchanges we had an amazing lesson, it was one of the most spiritual ones I have taught. We talked about the plan of salvation and i ended in tears! Jr and Scott came to church on Sunday too!! I am so excited for them! He is what we call a dry Mormon. He is living it, He just hasn't been baptized yet :)

I love the Gospel! I love the power of prayer! It is amazing and it is what gets me through!! 

I pray for you all daily!

Love,

Sister Loveless

#13 &14 Make the most of it! 5/4/2015

Hello World!

I have learned many valuable lessons this week! Every day I learn something new and it just blows me away!

On Tuesday we had Zone Conference, President and Sister Snow came down with the Ap's and MSTL's (Mission Sister Training Leaders) and gave some amazing training's to the zone. I was spiritually fed and received a lot of personal revelation. That’s the most amazing thing about the Gift of the Holy Ghost, we have the ability to feel and recognize promptings and receive answers to questions. I know Heavenly Father hears and answers our prayers. I finally got to meet everyone in my Zone too, we don’t often go to see all the missionaries when we are out of valley. But at the conference we talked a lot about the scriptures and how amazing they are. I have a personally testimony of receiving revelation through the scriptures. Heavenly Father will help us understand anything if we ask and then seek! 

Most of our week was spent in doors. My companion, Sister Onorato, got really sick for about 3 days so we stayed in. It was actually a really great experience for me because I was able to take some time to really pray and study and learn! I have learned so much! We also got to watch a few church movies, like the restoration, 17 Miracles and the John Tanner story. It really helped me put my life into perspective. The members of the church at that time gave up everything they had for the gospel. They laid down their very lives for their faith. They left their homes, families and all their belongings to walk hundreds of miles in conditions that we can’t even comprehend. And then I think about, if I was ever called to pass through a trial such as theirs and I wonder if I would be able to lay down my life for this gospel. And I would like to think I would. There was a talk given by Elder Bednar where he said "your Ancestors have proven their Faith time and time again. But what have you done lately?" those words have come back to my mind many times over this past week. I want to give my all, my everything. I may not be asked to die for my faith (or I might you never know) but I want to be able to live for my faith! Each day. Every day. I want to make the most of every day! This gospel is a pear of great price, and I don't care the cost. I will spend my life trying to live worthy of the price that my savior paid! 

After spending a few days inside we went back out and got back to work! We had a Zone Training Council on Saturday in Lake Havasu (where it was 100*) we learned together and talked about how we can further the work of salvation! We are trying to become more unified as a Zone...so now we call ourselves the "OHANA SQUAD" it makes me happy, I love it! We also made Zone T-shirts. We spray painted them. Our Zone goal this transfer is to focus on the "fundamentals" of the gospel and sharing that with everyone so that’s what our shirts were. It was super fun and super-hot outside while we made them!!

Sunday was an awesome day!!! We met with our investigators and recent convert (they all live together haha) Andy, Anna, their son Braden and Mark their roommate! Mark drives truck and we hardly ever get to see him so this was the first time that I have had a lesson with him. He is amazing; he is so ready for the gospel. We had a lesson about the word of wisdom with everyone, and when we asked him if he would live it he said "I already am. I want to take care of the body God gave me". The member who came with us said "Mark you just need to get baptized!" he replied "yea I know" so we set him with a date to work towards! The problem has been that he never knows when he will be in town, so he never wanted to agree to a day. But he knows he will be here the weekend of May 23rd!!!! So that’s the day!! I am so excited! We just have to teach him a few more lessons and he will be ready! Well actually he already is ready. Braden said that he will be baptized once His dad, Andy, gets the priesthood. Right now Andy is taking it slow because he has social anxiety and has just been feeling a little overwhelmed with everything. The whole family has social anxiety, but we are all working together to make it easy on them. Anna is still not sure about everything. I am praying that she will recognize the spirit and the blessing of the gospel for her family! They are such amazing people! 

I love my mission. I love teaching people about the gospel! I pray that we can all be converted and find the joy the gospel brings into our life and our family's life!

Speaking of family I get to talk to mine on Sunday!! MOTHERS DAY!! I CANT WAIT! 

Love,

Sister Loveless

Pictures are of Braden and T-shirt making

What a week !        Monday April 27th 2015

This has been quite the week! Every day has been an adventure! I am finally getting to know the area a little better and that is good! I have yet to get lost *knock on wood* but that is probably the only thing....i did lock the keys in the trunk today....in front of my whole district of Elders, they thought it was pretty funny...But then my poor companion and I had to sit outside forever waiting for a locksmith to come help us. So if your having a bad day just think, "hey at least i didn't lock my keys in the car in the middle of the dessert!" 

This week was full of fun stuff! We had exchanges, and Mini Missionaries and we spoke in church!

Exchanges was a great opportunity for me. Coming into this area has been an experience, we have a lot of things we want to do to improve our area as a companionship. And it was really nice to be able to have another sister come in for the day to help me really see these wards in a new light! Sister Smith taught me a lot about how to be bold and take charge. My mission has taught me a lot, and every missionary i meet teaches me something new, I love it! 

We found a few new investigators this week. One is named Carl. He is in his 70's but he is prepared! He had been going to another church and he doesn't agree with a lot of what they teach, and everything that he has had a concern about we have had an answer too!! I love it!

This weekend the youth in our stake over 16 had an opportunity to do something called a "mini mission". Friday night we met at the chapel with them and heard from a few converts and they shared their story. Then we were assigned our companions. Just like my first day out on the mission field, they announced their names and then said who their trainer would be! I had 3 girls, Vicky, Kara and Kate! We then broke off into rooms and showed them how to teach the first discussion, then they got to teach one of the investigators we brought with us! It was a mini MTC! The following morning on Saturday we met up at the Chapel and after having studies we headed out to go do missionary work! We had two rotations, so in the morning i had Vicky as my comp, and then we came back for lunch and i took out Kara and Kate for the second half of the day! When we returned we had dinner and then the mini missionaries got to share their testimonies of what happened over their mission! 

It was such an amazing experience! One of the girls i was with had told me at the beginning that she wanted to do this to see if she wanted to go on a mission, and by the end of Saturday she turned to me and said "I am going on a mission!!" seeing these young girls and showing them what it’s like to share the gospel really impacted me! We saw so many little miracles, it was stormy and raining but the girls never lost hope they wanted to find someone who was ready! We talked to every person we saw, they got to see what it was like to be rejected, to have a door slammed in their face and to see someone so thankful for missionaries and kind and loving! A mission is full of all sorts of emotions, and was excited to let the girls experience that! I wish I had time to go into detail about everything! Its been a great week! We have met a few insane people who have made for some great memories and laughter! 

Love,

Sister Loveless

Pictures 

-me and my comp Sister Onorato  @Temple 

-Me & Sister Smith on exchanges

-Me and my mini missionaries 

# 12 New area Kingman Arizona April 20th, 2015

TRANSFER WEEK!!!

   I am here in good 'ol Kingman Arizona, the heart of Rout 66! Like from the movie cars!!! It is the cutest old town! There is nothing around except for dirt & tumble weeds! ya gotta go look up this place on google, it is so fun! (I'll send pictures next week, I forgot my camera.) I needed a change of pace and i sure found it!

MY Companion is Sister Onorato! She is the sweetest person in the whole world! She has an ability to love people that amazes me! I am so blessed to be serving with her! We have had a crazy week trying to get to know the area and each other. The people here are amazing!! We live in an area that if you drive 15 min up the hill you are surrounded my mansion size homes, and then if you drive 15 min the other direction, you are in an area where people are living in little man made tin huts, because that’s all they could find. I have never seen this kind of poverty before! It is so humbling to think about everything we take for granted...for example a roof over our head, heat, water, a toilet, a bed, a room to put your bed! It just amazes me! They are some of the kindest people I have ever met, maybe, because they have no reason to be selfish or judgmental. But there are also some pretty scary “ghetto” areas that we tend to avoid in the evening times. Places like "slaughter canyon"....yea let’s just say we don’t go down that road! hahaha I love it here :) this is my kind of town!

   We had two baptisms this week!!! Kate is 20, she has an amazing testimony!! When she told her family she wanted to join the church they formally disowned her with legal papers in an Easter card! So she sent them an invitation to her Baptism and told us "Sisters I just know it’s true, I have to be baptized, I have never wanted something so much in my entire life!" She was baptized on Friday night!! It was an amazing experience to be there for that. Although I didn’t get to teach her, I am learning from her testimony! The other baptism was a little girl, she waited to be baptized until she knew the church was true, so we get to teach her!

   There are a lot of recent converts here that we have been teaching! Carlos, Della and Andy! They are AMAZING! They all have a fire within them, they love the gospel more than life!! Della is a sweet older Lady who we go over and have bible study with every week! And she invites everyone she sees to come and join us! Her Husband is atheist, and he is so nice. He sat in on our lesson this week, and Sister Onorato told me that he has never done that before! 

   Andy, oh I love that guy! He reminds me so much of my brothers! He got baptized recently and we are teaching his wife Anna, and son Braden. They soak it up!  Braden knows it's true and he wants to get baptized once his dad gets the priesthood so that he can baptize him! Anna has a little harder time, she loves the lessons, but we need something that will really help her feel the spirit! They have another Son, Thomas. The missionaries have never met him, he doesn't come out of his room, and he has serious social anxiety. They whole family has struggled with it. Andy hadn’t come out of his apartment for months, and then the day he did was the day the Sister missionaries met him outside and he took it as a sign. So it’s amazing to see how far they have come! I have started leaving notes for Thomas and hopefully one day something will change! 

   

We also had the blessing of being able to go to the Temple this week! Sister Onorato had a doctor appt. in the valley so we drove back to Las Vegas and got permission to go the temple while we were there! And then I had an appt. this morning so we got to make the 4 hour drive again! We have had some fun mini road trips! It’s been fun! also.....we live in the desert...so there are lots of bugs. We find roaches in our apartment all the time! It was super bad for a while so we would sleep with the light on ‘cuz they don’t like light. But we have been getting tips and tricks from people, on how to get rid of them that have been working so there are a lot less now!! But hey I have a toilet and runny water so I am not complaining one bit! 

We have another crazy week coming up. I’m excited to see what it brings!

A mission is the best and hardest thing I have ever done, and I am so thankful for the blessing of being able to struggle my way through it! The atonement is real, and that is the way I get through the hard things! I love this gospel with all my heart! 

I’m praying for you all!

Love,

Sister Loveless

# 11 Transfer Time! April 13, 2015

Well it's that time. Transfer time! Today I just finished my second transfer in the mission, I finished my 12 week training and I am no longer a "greeny" or new missionary! 

We found out about transfers on Saturday morning, we get a piece of paper that us missionaries like to call "Transfer Doctrine" because it tell you, your fate!

My District

Sister Harrison and I had a feeling we would be getting transferred. And low and behold we are BOTH leaving and Elders will be coming into replace us. It’s crazy!! We had just replaced Elders, and we are the only Sister Missionaries both of our wards have had in over 10 years! And now they are back to Elders! 

The Duanes

Sister Harrison will be a Sister Training Leader for her last transfer. And I will be going........OUT OF VALLEY! I'm headed to the very tip of the mission. I’m going to Kingman Arizona! We joke and like to say that they didn't like our companionship so they split us up by states!

The Truman Family

But everyone I have talked to says they LOVE serving out of valley! It's more of a country feel and everything is a little slower pace. And I am excited! I am sure that I am going to LOVE it! It will be a nice change. And it will be so different to not see the strip right across the freeway. I will be out in the middle of nowhere! 

This week has been great! We got to visit a lot of Less Active members in the wards. Most of our investigators canceled on us, but I think it worked out for the best, the Elders coming in will be able to start fresh with lots of appointments this coming week. We have spent the past 2 days preparing the area for the Elders to come in and make a smooth transition. 

Wendi

Wendi & Robert

Wendi found out we were leaving and couldn’t stop crying! We had the blessing of being able to go over to their house for dinner on Sunday and talk with her and Robert about the importance of the gospel, and how going back to church will truly bless their lives!! I love being able to invite people to come to Christ. It is the most rewarding thing I have ever done. 

I feel so blessed to be here, I have learned so much in such a short amount of time. My life has truly been changed! I have formed relationships with people that I will never forget! I will treasure these past 3 months the rest of my life, I have learned so much about myself, and the gospel! I have seen the Lord's hand work in people’s lives in ways that I could have never imagined! I am so blessed! I am so happy!! 

Bishop Whipple & Famly

I am excited to start the next chapter of my mission! 

Sorry it's short, I have to go pack and get ready to catch the Van out to Arizona Tomorrow morning, and meet my new companion!

Love,

Us with  Antionet

Sister Loveless

# 10 Thanks for the Love and support!

Just a quick note today                   3-30-2015

I am so thankful for everyone and everything you have been doing to support me.

I am SO EXCITED FOR CONFERENCE!!! It’s going to be amazing!! These past two weeks have been so crazy and so spiritually uplifting. I have been working more on recognizing the spirit and listening to promptings. Dad we are trying out your method of tracting, we call inspired biking :) We have been focusing on finding a lot, in both our wards. We have started getting referrals and we found people on the street. We ended up getting two new investigators, they are a young family with one kid and another one on the way this week! AND Jen went to her friend's niece’s baptism on Saturday and called us up right after and said we needed to come over. We stopped by and she said "I WANT TO GET BAPTIZED!"  I AM SO EXCITED! She is amazing! She came to church yesterday with her two kids, and even though it was so hard and stressful for her to be there with them, she decided she wants to come every week!!

As I have been studying these past few weeks I have been thinking about one thing a whole lot! And I just can’t shake it.

I want you to go and read "Are we prepared" it was the 1st presidency message last September, I believe. Read it as a family. I really feel that now it the time to get ready for the future, and put some more effort into emergency preparedness, and food storage. I know I can’t do much from here. But i want to make sure that I share that thought with my family and friends. Because you mean the world to me! We don’t know what’s ahead, but the Lord has sent us prophets and apostles to lead and guide us, and that is one of the directions he has given us!! So don’t take it lightly! Read it for family night tonight! Maybe make a plan or something to work toward. I just feel like i should share that with you!!

I love you sooooo much!!!! I hope you are all doing great!! 

I send all my love!! 

ENJOY CONFERENCE!!

# 9 It’s a great day to be alive!

                                                                   

 

3-23-2015

What a great week!!! I feel like I’m running a race with no finish line! And I love it! I have learned and grown so much in the short time I have been a missionary. I can’t even believe it! This week has been one of growth and learning, the Lord stretches us to make us more flexible during hard times :) 

It's funny to me how much the world has changed from when I was a child to right now, this is a time and age of change, if you think about it, no other generation has gone through so much change in such a short amount of time. I mean look at my parent’s generation (I love you mom and dad) when they were growing up they didn’t even have a TV, or cell phones, or any of this crazy stuff, everything was simple. And now in this era, in the space of just 20-30 years we have totally changed our way of life, and with that we have lost some of the most important things. Like the importance of family, and God, trust, independence. The world is a crazy place. And that’s why I am so thankful that my parents taught me to live in the world but not of the world. And to give of all we had to those who are less fortunate, do secret acts of kindness and love one another. I am so eternally grateful for all the amazing lessons I was taught to help me become who I am today and to be able to live in this world but not be effected by all of the horrible things going on. The world is going to get a lot worse before it gets better. So strengthen your faith, learn of the eternal things. Because we will only be able to take our experiences, our knowledge and our relationships with us after this life. The adversary has done an amazing job trying to convince that what "really matters" in life is; our job, our car, our money, our clothes. What's going to happen if someone takes all of that away? What will we have to show for ourselves? Those are material things. We need to focus on the eternal things in life! That is what is “Most Important”. 

Okay I will get off my soap box now. But I have such a testimony that there is so much more to life, if we are willing to put in the work to find it!

This week I had the "blessing" of speaking in church. (I’m kidding, yes it really was a blessing, and I learned so much) I spoke on Christ and His suffering. It was amazing to study that more. 

We helped 3 of our investigators move out this week! Talk about sad! Antionette moved to Texas, we helped her pack everything up and get it all moved out! Then we helped Kathy and her family move out of their house (they were new investigators that were friends of the Downer's in our ward). WE did tons of service this week, it was really fun. We met a guy on the street named Joe who was pulling weeds and we stopped and helped him for an hour, and he said he would love to come to church with us. He was so nice. That same day we went and helped Wendi clean, because of all her health she can’t really do much on her own. So we were able to make a good dent with that! 

We had a really cool experience on Tuesday night while we were headed to go visit a less active in our ward. We were walking down the sidewalk at about 8pm, so it was dark, and we saw this guy working on his can in his driveway. So we went up to him and introduced ourselves. His name is Joe (not to be confused with the other Joe we met pulling weeds) To be completely honest, I’m not sure what happened next, but the next thing I knew we were talking about trails and all the hard things he went through in life, and then we found out he had a friend and her daughter living in his house who are inactive members of the church. He took them in because they had nowhere else to go. The daughter has struggled with drugs, and he paid for her to go through rehab. He said he wants us to come by and visit lots, it would be really good for everyone, he's not a member of the church, but he really wants us to come and help the girls. And he said that he would love to listen and learn too. We talked with him and the daughter Brittaney, for a good hour or so. 

I got to go to the Temple on Saturday!!!! One of the cute old couples in our ward got sealed in the temple this weekend, and we got special permission to go! It was such a blessing! I love the temple to much!

Our ward put on a really cool even for Easter. It was called "the Last Supper Fireside" It was so cool!!!! It was all about the Jewish beliefs, and the symbolism of the last supper in the bible. They made the food and everything, it was a really amazing experience. And then they took it one step further, and explained how the book of Mormon fills in all the rest of what the Jewish faith didn’t have the answers to. It was a really spiritual experience! 

I love the gospel! I don’t know where I would be without it! Strengthen your faith, and trust in God! He knows what you need, let him be your strength and your guide! Remember...do you want to choose that path that is best for you, or the path that you think is best? 

I love you all! And I testify that the fullness of the gospel has been restored on earth once more, it is the same church that Christ established during his ministry!

I love you!

Love,    Sister Loveless

These pics are from our District Meeting last month.  "GOT LIGHT"

# 8

Hello all,

Another week in the warm Las Vegas!! In the Warm Springs stake.....and boy is it starting to get warm!

This week was full of firsts for me. I gave my first "training" in our stake missionary meeting. Sister Harrison and I led a discussion of how we can help our members see their role in missionary work. We had the coolest object lesson! Our amazing relief society president went out and bought flashlights for all of the missionaries in the stake for this lesson. We turned of all the lights and handed everyone a flashlight and then told them they could only turn it on if someone shared their light with them. So I started by reading a scripture about light, and that made my testimony "shine" so I turned on my light, then I shared it with my companion who then shared it with one of the missionaries sitting down, and then they shared their light with everyone else. So by the time we were done everyone's light was shining and the whole room was light! It was really cool! The spirit was very strong! 

We had a ton of amazing lessons with week!! We met with the Tenny's a family just coming back to activity, and we were planning on having a lesson about the plan of salvation....but her son in law was in town, he is a strong catholic...and very closed minded. So as we tried to give them a lesson he came in the room and started telling us all why we are wrong and what the "true" meaning of the scriptures are and how we have a fake bible and all this stuff. So after a while of that we decided it was time to excuse ourselves because nothing will be accomplished with the spirit of contention! He later told sister Tenny that he had "schooled us" we knew he thought he had "won" but it doesn't really matter, because I know the truth and I know what I believe and I know that Joseph Smith is a prophet. 

But then right after we had a lesson with my favorite investigator, EDVIN! His lesson was amazing!!! It was the most spiritual lesson I have ever been a part of! Edvin and Lucy are amazing!!! Their faith is so strong because of the things that they have been through! I can’t wait to see his be baptized, and their goal is to go to the temple a year from now, so hopefully I will be able to be there for that too!

The other first's that happened this week were dropping......We had to "drop" one of our golden investigators, David. We had another lesson with him with a young couple from our ward and it was a good lesson, but the whole time the spirit was whispering to me that he was not ready. He loves the spirit and the gospel but he doesn't accept the church as a whole, he isn’t changing at all. We all came out of the lesson feeling that way. I think one day he will be ready and he will remember everything we taught him and it will finally click, it’s just not the time now. So we will continue to invite him to things, but unless he asks to have us come over we won’t be meeting with him anymore :( because we are on the Lord's time and I know that there will be someone else who we need to focus our time on. We also go dropped by an investigator that same day....Bob told us he is happy for us but he doesn't want to take the lessons, he is fine where he is at. ( it feels like I dumped someone and got dumped all in the same day...ahahah)

Antoinette is moving!! Her husband needs surgery, so she is moving out to Texas to be with him. We are happy for her though, she still want to meet with the missionaries, so we will send the missionaries there her info, and hopefully she will keep taking lessons!

But Wendi!! She is doing amazing!! She told us her full story, the day before we came over she was getting ready to kill herself. She had given up, and she was tired of being in so much pain all the time! But she decided before she did that that she would try one last, thing. She went onto Lds.org to the chat section, and said "I need strong LDS friends" so a girl responded, they started talking, and then she sent in Wendi's information to have the missionaries come. And we showed up the next day. She has changed so much from that first day, she has a light about her and she is happy again! She started reading the Book of Mormon from the beginning 3 days ago, and she is already in Jacob!! That’s almost half way through! AND she told us that on Saturday when we met with her he husband (Robert, who fell away from the church right after getting baptized years ago) was listening in on our lesson and he asked if we could come over for dinner on night and stay after so he could talk with us!! I can’t help but smile! Wendi was about ready to cry! We are so excited!! 

And now it’s time for another week! I pray we will be able to find more people to teach to make up for all the people we lost this week!

With Love,

Sister Loveless

(I’ll send pictures next week....I left my camera at home..)