Motivated To Work Hard To The End

Good Morning Everyone,

We had a great week.  On Monday I had to select classes for the next semester.  I can't believe it is coming up so soon.  Motivation to work even harder until the end.  I can't believe this is my last transfer.

We had a giant spider in our car one night.  It was fast and we couldn't catch it.  We had to go to pick up a member for an appointment so we were paranoid as we were driving.  We found it after the lesson and the member we were with smashed it with her hand.  It was disgusting.

Being in a trio is a lot of fun and effective.  Now that there are three of us we can do splits easily.  Sister Worthington is a great missionary.  We all get along well and we are working hard.  This is going to be a great, busy transfer.

We had a few events this week.  Saturday we had a branch welcome home party for Sister Joseph.  Everyone had fun.  There were games, food, and karaoke.  On Sunday it was a Creole holiday so everyone was partying.  They only speak Creole and they eat Creole food.  I got to try fish cakes.

Miracle of the Week:  We are working with an investigator named Valerie.  She has a daughter and she has come to church twice and she even came to the party.  she is the granddaughter of a member.  she told us she wants her daughter to grow up in the church.  She is cool.

Thanks for all you do for me and all the support.  I enjoy the letters I receive.

Love,

Sister Shirts

Viex Fort cemetary

Beautiful "view" of Vieux Fort

Final Transfer

Good Morning Everyone,

Transfer week!!!  Sister Hodge and I will be staying together and we will be joined by Sister Worthington.  We will be in a trio.  In addition I will be serving as the Sister Training Leader over St. Lucia and Barbados.  I am super excited for this transfer.  This last transfer will be amazing.

Funny Story:  On Thursdays we have our weekly planning.  We had a great planning session and were ready to get to work.  We went out to teach and had a good afternoon.  After a few hours we went home for a bathroom break and we couldn't get into our apartment.  The door was unlocked but the latch inside closed when we shut the door so we were still locked out.  We had to go to the Elders to get a wire hanger so we could bend it into a hook and lift the latch up.  We got in but it was an adventure.

We had a lot of cool experiences this week.  We went out to a new area to see if we wanted it to be one of our focuses this transfer.  In less than an hour we placed five copies of the Book of Mormon.  We went out again on Saturday and placed seven more.  We are definitely going to focus there next transfer.  The problem is it is pretty far from the church but a lot of people have cars.

We also had a great lesson with Marla about faith.  We read Alma 32 and talked about how to start our faith growing and how to keep it growing.  She has been getting letters from previous sister missionaries and she said it has been helping her recognize answers to her prayers and questions.  Thanks everyone who has been sending letters.  It really does make a difference.  It just shows how important it is to stay in touch with those you teach.

Miracle of the Week:  We went out to Choisel (the new area) to meet with a great family in the branch.  It turns out they have some less active cousins who are ready to change their lives and come back to church.  They are great young men and they want to serve missions.  We had a great lesson with them and they even came to church on Sunday.  It was great.

Thanks for everything.

Love,

Sister Shirts

P-day at the beach

Peanut

A Hot Week

Good Afternoon,

Sorry this one is short.  We don't have a lot of time today and the internet is slow.

Great news.  Nadiyah and Jason got baptized!  Also another investigator we were working with Izaiah!  Chaguanas has some great youth in the branch.  I am glad I had the opportunity to work with them and I am happy for them.  I bet Brother Deonarinesingh is happy.

This week was extremely hot and dry but it was great.  We were sweating buckets all day every day which made fasting fun but we were able to see great blessings as we fasted.  It was our first week without the Gublers and the branch did a great job.  This is a good opportunity for them to grow and learn about how the church runs.

We are working with a lot of awesome people.  Kenneth is still doing well.  He is almost ready for baptism.  Just a few more things to work out.  The Byron family is still doing great too.  Their brother/uncle is in England on a mission and they all want to be baptized.

Miracle of the Week:  Fast Sunday was great.  The testimonies were wonderful and everyone was smiling.  There were a lot of primary kids who shared their testimonies.  My favorite was little Aiden.  He is two.  His testimony was:  Jesus gave me a bike and it broke.  Amen.  I love serving in St. Lucia!

Thanks for everything.

Sister Shirts

Funny Caterpillar

The island across the ocean is St. Vincent

Thanksgiving in St. Lucia

Happy Thanksgiving!!!  At least it is here.  Today is a holiday so everything is closed.  Everyone goes to the beach on holidays.

I had a great ending to my birthday on Monday.  We went to Kisha's house and they had presents for us.  They gave us each some perfume which was nice.  They have a friend who is a fisherman and he gave them a free giant lobster and they gave us some.  It was delicious.  Free lobster.  Don't get that very often back home.

Elder Vaughn got stung/bit or whatever by a caterpillar thing and his arm got all swollen.  It was oozing fluid and he had to go to the doctor here.  They called us after we got in for the night and they had to borrow the car so they could go.  Fun stuff.

A lot of people gave us fruit and food this week.  Like I always say, West Indians are so kind.  We got lobster from Kisha, pumpkin from a random guy we met, avocado from Kenneth, mangoes, honeydew melon, and pigtail soup from Marla.  The soup was great.

How was conference?  I loved it.  We watched it on a TV at the church.  It was funny because it was on top of the pulpit so it looked like the speakers were here.

I loved how they focused on the changes we need to make to be more Christlike and how we should rethink our priorities.  It was amazing.  I know President Monson is a prophet of God and I am grateful we have twelve apostles that are also here to guide us.  The church is true.

Miracle of the Week:  Kenneth as usual.  He came to Saturday evening conference and both on Sunday.  We called him on Sunday to see if he was coming and he said he was.  We waited and he didn't show up.  He came just in time for President Monson's talk at the end of Sunday Morning.  He had a hard time getting a bus so he was waiting for a long time.  It was a miracle he made it in time to hear the prophet speak.

I love serving here.  Things are going great.  Thanks for all you do.

Love,

Sister Shirts

Eating lobster eggs