More lamb heart
Some of the Gang
Brother Foott
Prawn Cocktail
New Jumper
Well, all good things can't last forever. I'm finally getting out of Baldivis ward. It was a sad farewell yesterday. It was almost like leaving my home ward. 10 months I've spent in this ward. I've absolutely loved it. I got a couple of photos with some of the youth and stuff after church, but tonight and tomorrow are going to be jammed pack with saying goodbye and getting pictures with everybody. I definitely want to be able to remember everybody in this ward. Having served in both areas in the ward, absolutely everybody in it has touched my heart in one way or another. Bishop asked me to bear my testimony yesterday in Sacrament Meeting and it felt like I was giving a farewell talk. I even nearly got emotional. No ward on my mission can every compare to how I've been treated in Baldivis Ward. I absolutely love it, and can't wait to reconnect with everybody on facebook after my mission haha. It's a very bittersweet transfer to say the least.
I'll find out where I'm going on Wednesday. No word from President Cahoon yet though on if I'm going to still be a Zone Leader, or if I'm going to be going to a country area or anything like that, sometimes he calls to let you know for special assignments. So I guess I just have to wait until Wednesday to learn of my fate for the last 5 months of my mission. Either way, I'm excited. Every area that I've served in on my mission has had an impact on my life and I've learned something different from each area and assignment, so I know that my next area and assignment are going to be no different. I'd like to think that I've been able to have an impact in the people in my areas (especially this ward) as well. The Lord's hand is in this work and it's evident all the time. The big news for this week was that we were able to set a baptismal date with one of our investigators named Ryan! He's dating a less active member (April Gilbert) and we've been teaching both of them (this was actually only the third lesson), and we felt very prompted to invite him to be baptised. He agreed and we were so excited for him! It was no longer than 20 minutes later that I found out I was getting transferred, so I was gutted. But like I said, I know the Lord's hand is in it. Whatever happens is for the best. He knows better than we do.
Never hath a man seen so much good stuff happening in his area right before he gets transferred. We got TWELVE new investigators this week. All thanks to member referrals and finding and teaching families. TWELVE! Our average for that this transfer has been about 3 or 4 a week, so when we ended the week with twelve it was amazing. It just goes to show you that everything that Elder Evans said was true. Finding through the members IS the best way to find. And on top of those 12 new investigators we also had 7 progressing investigators. To be progressing they need to have been taught two or more times and be keeping commitments to read and pray about the Book of Mormon, come to church, pray, etc. We had 0 of those for the first four weeks and then 3 last week and now 7 this week. I don't know what has changed, but all of a sudden, we have just seen this area explode. This area has become a gold mine! WA is very popular for their gold mining, and we're holding the entire industry of importation and exportation of "gold" right here in Baldivis Ward! Yet another reason to be absolutely gutted to be leaving. Elder Hodgkiss and his new companion will do a really good job though, that's for sure.
There's been a couple of good highlights to this week. I can't remember if I said this last week, but Geoff successfully completeted the stop smoking program and we had a little celebration for him on Monday. We had our May Specialised Training meeting this week with President and Sister Cahoon and Bunbury Zone came along as well. Elder Hodgkiss and I gave training on seeking people to teach from members, (we're trying to remove the word referral from our vocabulary), and it went really well especially considering our experiences these past couple of weeks with successfully finding through the members. We modeled (or role played) on how to ask for someone to teach and to get the members excited about it. Because anyone can ask for a referral at every lesson, but if you don't get the members excited about it, and if you're not excited about it yourself, you're not going to see near as much success. So that 45 minute training and modeling went really well. We taught Alicia again this week, and she kept her commitment to pray on her own, but she didn't come to our movie night on Friday or to church, and she hasn't been answering or returning our calls, so we're kind of going to ease up on her for a couple of days, sad because that means I probably won't get to teach her again, but hopefully everything goes well with her down the road.
Alright, funny story for the week. It actually comes from eating dinner with an 89 year old lady in our ward, Sister Wolven. Sister Wolven is potentially the coolest old lady I've met my entire mission. She invited us over for dinner on Thursday, and I've never been to her house for Tea, so we were pretty excited. When we got there she asked us if we had come on an empty stomach, and if not, we should have. Luckily, it was relatively empty. She told us that she had a 5 COURSE meal prepared for us. It was absolutely amazing. Every single course that she made was prepared and cooked to perfection. Amazing this was that she didn't do any cooking while we were there. Every course was cooked and ready just at the right time to eat it. I don't quite know how she could have planned it that well, but every course was delicious. The first one was a cream of chicken and corn soup. Course two was a prawn (shrimp) cocktail. Course 3, the main course, consisted of roast beef, mashed potatoes, baked potatoes, mixed veggies and broccoli and cheese. It was about half way through this course that we started to feel full. But we couldn't disappoint Sister Wolven so we just kept on plowing through it. The fourth course was an apple and pear crumble with ice cream and cream on top. Fair dinkum, these were no small portions either. We were choc-a-block full. But, we persisted and cleared our plate or bowl on every course. The fifth and final course consisted of these little chocolate cups filled with Nutella and cream. She placed a platter of them in front of us and we just kind of ignored it and carried on our conversation, hoping she would forget about them. But our hope was in vain. She asked us to take some and so one at a time, we downed them. 4 chocolate cups later, I felt like exploding. I wanted to stop at 1, but she would pick up the platter and say "just one more? Just to fill the corners? Please?", and she would just look at you with these loving grandmotherly eyes that you just couldn't deny. So after those four chocolate cups each, there's 3 more on the plate, and she asked us to eat one more. So Elder Hodgkiss and I pick up a chocolate cup each, look at it, then at each other, then back at it, then just erupt in laughter. This was the kind of laughter that cannot be controlled. Elder Hodgkiss was laughing himself to tears, and Sister Wolven joined in laughing with us. It really is contagious. We finally did manage to eat that last chocolate cup though. I think the laughing made room for it. It was absolutely hysterical though. It's good to laugh. I love it.
Well that's us for this week. I love you all. Hope you're all staying safe from the tornadoes. They made international news, so it sounds like a pretty big deal. I pray for you though!
Much love,
Elder Tanner
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