Sister Shelby Peterson: Week 4: A week of Craziness and Miracles

This week has been CRAZY!! Crazy weather, crazy people, crazy everything!! The week started out SUPER SLOW!! Everyone was cancelling appointments, people wouldn't show up and our plans were just being thrown out the window! It was tough! When you're aren't busy as a missionary your thoughts tend to turn inward and you think more about yourself which makes missionary work 10 billion times harder!! As the week went on the work picked up, we saw and talked to lots of people and saw so many little miracles!! This was just a reminder to me of how we can plan as much as we want, but Heavenly Father always knows the main plan and gives us blessings right when we need them! So here we go with the week:

Snacks for our road trip!

First, P-day is the best!!! I got to go to Superstore! It's like a big thing here. You have to pay to use their shopping carts though!!! How crazy!?!? Then we went to Walmart...and I found myself a decent size Coca-Cola!! Every drink here in Canada is so small compared to the states! So I had to buy a whole liter of that sweet nectar I call Coca-Cola...Oh well! P-days are fun because you actually get to see your area!! You're not looking for a house number or street sign so you can actually enjoy the scenery!! If you haven't look up some pics of Campbell River...its BEAutiful! Later in the week we got to drive to Courtenay for district meeting! Road trip!! It was pouring rain so I didn't get to see much scenery, but it was still fun! Even though its only a 40 min car ride I made sure we had car snacks! haha can't take a road trip without snacks! We are the only missionaries in our area so going to district meeting and seeing other missionaries just makes your day!!! WE ARE NOT ALONE! haha

Oh no! Not you again.

At district meeting they talked about the importance of talking to everyone and relying on the spirit when we are finding (going door to door and talking). When we came back into town we decided to find in an area we hadn't been to before. We took the counsel from the meeting and prayed that we would be able to find someone! NO ONE WAS HOME! We were like what the cheeseballs!?!? It was pouring rain, we were soaked, but we kept going! We ended up knocking on the door of a lady who was interested! We left her a restoration pamphlet and she seemed super stoked!! Hopefully, we can teach her and get to know her better!!! At the end of the road, we met this nice couple that insisted they weren't interested and wanted to close the door so fast!! Then I felt like I should give her a mormon.org pass-along card in case she had any questions. When she saw MORMON she got super excited and started talking to us about how she LOVES...LIKE MORE THAN A MORMON...LOVES MOTAB!!! We told her about General Conference next weekend and that MoTab would be singing (hopefully they tune into some talks too ;)) She said she would look it up! SWEET!!! Prayer is amazing and when we just keep going and put our trust in the Lord we can do anything! Later in the week we had a referral which was interesting because she didn't really want to meet with us. She was going through a really hard time and didn't even know us. We tried all day to meet up with her and finally at 8pm we got to meet up and we taught her...in our car!! haha it was the most interesting lesson I've taught yet. She had no belief in God or Jesus Christ...it was like she had never heard about them before. By the middle of the failing lesson...I felt like she just needed a friend and to know that someone cared. It was so amazing!!! I realized that there are more people out there that

The Woods

don't know about God or Jesus Christ and that's why it's important for me to be on a mission to spread the Good news!! We ended up giving her a restoration pamphlet which she may never read but I just kept thinking all night that she has truth in her pocket!!!!!! How great is that! Another cool thing that happened this week is we got to walk through the woods to go to an appointment!!! I know I've said this a ton but this place is so beautiful! For those of you who watch Once upon a time...it's like that but better (They actually filmed in Vancouver!) Anywho...the woods were AWESOME!! We've been told there are bears and cougars and I swear we were being stalked by something but we made it out okay haha My dad says I should get Bear Spray but the wildlife probably think I'm too loud and crazy so they stay away! As the week went on we met people who were the definition of being prepared to hear the gospel! It was so cool!!

Sydni and Mom: we met this one gal who is a dental hygienist and was just in Las Vegas for the dental convention and we had a cool convo!! She works in an office here that's right on the ocean...Finding Nemo status!! She's so cool and we're teaching her next week!

Idaho!

Nevada!

I am SO Grateful I am from VEGAS! We have had so many conversations because people start talking about how they went to Vegas and blah blah blah...it's like my little missionary trap! Sorry my emails are so all over the place...if you love me you should keep reading!! haha The Relief Society Broadcast was AMAZING!!!! Our little ward had a Visiting Teaching Conference that was so cute, dinner, and then we all watched the Broadcast and one of our investigators came!! We were so stoked!!!!! I loved all the talks and the reminder that we are all children of God and that we are important!! My favorite talk was Uchtdorf's...big surprise there! haha He always speaks to my soul with his stories!

We've seen so many miracles this week but this was the coolest!!!Every week we have to get 140 Quality Gospel Conversations (QGC's). So we have to meet people and talk about the gospel and religion. Yesterday we were still shy of our goal

Supermoon

and because we had church and some appointments we didn't spend that much time walking around outside. We had about 1 hour until we had to be in for the night and we saw all these cars parked on Ocean Hwy! We decided to stop and walk around. Apparently there was going to be an eclipse/super moon/ Blood moon that night!! Seriously the whole town came out to see it! There were people in their cars, bonfires on the beach...perfect timing Heavenly Father!! We ended up getting all the QGC's we needed in an hour!!!!!! MIRACLE!! As we were leaving we even got to see some of the moon! It was so cool!! If we have faith anything is possible! You can accomplish anything when you trust in the Lord and serve him with all you've got!!

Here are some of the funny/crazy moments of this week...brace yourselves...jk

We met with some members of our ward and I said I was from Las Vegas. they started talking about their trip and how they went to Lake Las Vegas and Lake Mead and were surprised at how many carp there were! I thought it was so funny how they remembered that!! Then they told a funny story...Their friend was in Israel and apparently they have tons of carp there too...people were feeding them popcorn and it was like the water was boiling with fish!! Then their friend had an idea...Jesus probably had a bag of popcorn and was walking on the carp!!! It was so silly!!! hahah We all know that Jesus really walked on water though :)
Canadians have no clue what Capri suns are...just trying to explain it was painful.
We got the ward calendar and it had Thanksgiving on Oct. 12th I was like hold up that's wrong...then I realized Canada celebrates Thanksgiving on a different day...I then had a dumb moment and wondered if they celebrated Halloween....I'm exhausted hahaha
I gave an investigator a hug and she thought my shampoo smelled like coconuts..."Is that your shampoo??? We just have to add some Chocolate and we could make you into a Nanaimo Bar...only in Canada!