Monday, May 31, 2010

ThReE's A cHaRm*‏

Happy Memorial Day! Golly can you believe May is over!? So whack! I can’t believe it is june and that I have been on my mission a year this week! It is so weird to me that I just get all grossed out when it is brought up and change the subject. LOL. Time is just weird. Well we are at an internet cafĂ© so I don’t have a lot of time but I will type as fast yet readable as I can. Tuesday we went to transfer meeting and picked up Sister Bartschi J I am loving being in a trio. It’s like hanging out yet doing work with my best friends. Smith has been the best companion yet and Bartschi right after so it has just been soooo much fun. I love love love it. They both have been in trio’s before. Right after I left Bart went in a trio. They both said they loved being in one. So it’s gonna be a way fun transfer together. Bart has a matrice (I can’t figure out how to spell that word.) that she sleeps on on the floor and then in the morning slides it underneath mine J I got a new one so I am bed bug free!!!! Yeah!!!! And it is the best bed I have had yet! Thursday we were able to go to the ground breaking for our chapel! We are all so excited! It was so neat to see the Spanish and English wards there, in a thunder storm, the choir singing, as we discuss this big and beautiful chapel that we will be getting. They are so excited. It is going to take a 18 months! So I will have to come back J It is going to be 6 stories high! The one we are in now is a floor above the food court lol just one floor. We are so blessed, it was just so exciting. Yesterday Anne and Niva were confirmed members of the church and received the Holy Ghost. It was so awesome. I am so excited to see them in the temple. They are so happy. It's been really warm here but it doesn't bother me at all. I love it. I love the heat :) Well that is all for this week. The Spanish sisters ward is having a BBQ that we got invited to so we are gonna go play some volley ball and eat! I hope everyone has a blessed and SAFE holiday. Love you all~



Sister Phillips

Monday, May 24, 2010

rAiNbOwS~‏

Dearest Family~

I can’t agree more with brother brad! This week was most definitely an incredible one! So so much to tell!

As you know Nirva’s was finishing up lessons this week for her baptism on Sunday. So we taught her some awesome object lessons that she and Anne just LOVED! I love it bc when they love it they make it known. “Oh my that is so beautiful!” As they pat their heart J Tuesday Nirva wasn’t able to come so we just taught Anne. I again agree with Brad. I love the spirit. That morning in comp. study we decided that to keep them both on the same page we would share a BOM story with her. So we sat for a bit and I’m flipping through my pages and close them to just listen. Mosiah 24 came to my mind. Ok sounds good. (Anne’s son had just gotten in a car accident and she was going through insurance stuff which is always a pain so I thought this would be comforting to her.) Well we get to the church and Anne tells us about her day. She has a “friend” who is jealous of her. (jealous of her happiness and what she has.) Anne works with 5 special needs kids and really enjoys it. Well her “friend” went and told the boss that for some reason they needed to switch. So her boss came to her and told her she needed to switch. So the person that Anne is she took on the responsibility. She now takes care of 22 kids, one who is fully handicapped. As she goes on she explains that she will take the change and see the positive of it and that she will grow from the experience and not be negative. Her friend came up to her and in a kinda not nice way asked, “So how was your day.” Her friend was a bit taken back when Anne replied in a happy tone, “Great!” Anne was definitely teaching me and smith a lesson. We go and start reading what we had prepared and Anne was AMAZED. She kept looking up amazed and putting her head down. She explained that she couldn’t believe that this story was just for her. That it was exactly what she needed, it was ABOUT her. She hung her head for a minute or so, trying not to cry. This story touched her so much. She expressed gratitude towards God for sending us to her and how much happier she has been since she has been coming to the church. It was so so neat.

Thursday Elder Ringwood came for our zone conference and it was soooo good. (He was mission pres in Seoul Korea till 2007. haha. Kev entered right as he left but he knew Andy Thomas. He said that is the real reason that Preston is famous lol.) The spirit was great. Then Friday we met Nirva early since she missed a lesson and things got crazy. Trying to rush and get to Woodside for the Devotional on time. (there was a devotional for everyone and Elder Ringwood was speaking.) Well we were able to get their on time with a great seat. I saw a few ppl from the Park Slope ward so that was nice as well. The Chinese elders sang a beautiful arrangement of “How Great Thou Art.” It was so neat bc Nirva’s mom, Yolande was humming along and Anne was closing her eyes, lovin it. They loved it. So much that after one of our memebers spoke (he was the first speaker) that they started clapping their hands. Hahahha. Oops. I had to lean over and explain why we don’t clap. LOL. Right after that Nirva went to get her interview and we found out that they all thought that Anne was getting baptized as well. So when Nirva found out she wasn’t she was like, “I am alone!?” Oh man….the first prob is that we haven’t even counted Anne as an investigator bc she doesn’t live in our area but a whole nother church. So we were just counting the lessons. So while there we were tying to figure out what we had to do and what we were gonna do! Then Nirva comes out straight faced with Elder Pickering the same, right behind her. I see her mouth, “No.” I go over and ask her why and what happened. She just says she didn’t pass. I go ask Elder Pickering and he says to ask her. I turn around flustered when Nirva squats bringing up her leg and starts punching the air with a huge grin. Yup, they were playing a nasty trick on us! I would’ve never though that’d come from Nirva! The stress was so high that I almost lost it and started crying everywhere! LOL. Just before that I had also been told that a sister was coming here, meaning that either Smithy or I was leaving. Well we finally get home all sad bc we want to stay together and wondering what in the world we are gonna do with Anne. So Saturday morning we spend trying to figure out what are the boundaries of the ward where Anne lives and what church is closer to her. We then find out that she is planning on moving to Richmond Hill or even better, Jamaica. So this gives us a better chance of being able to go through with Sunday. So we call pres and update him and he has to get an ok from the stake pres and bishop since she isn’t even in the stake. So while waiting for that I am in the car with Mike and Reshma on our way to the temple for baptisms for the dead. (Nerves of the temple and then NY driving aren’t a good mixture. I could’ve thrown up.) Pres calls and says that he got the ok and so we have to hurry and set up an appt. I’m tryint to call everyone and no one answers. Everyone is waiting for me so we can get in to temple. So I leave messages with my DL hoping that it all works out.

The temple was so nice. It was so nice to go and do baptisms. I haven’t done that in so long! It was so nice to see Mike and Reshma in the Lord’s house. They loved it and thought it was so beautiful. The guy who confirmed me also baptized me. When I got in the water he cheerfully said so J and hugged me. After wards as I’m trying to keep water from getting in my eyes he gives me a big squeeze. It felt so nice like I was getting a big hug from my Heavenly Father. I figured out why. Oh…I haven’t had a hug from no man since before I left! Oops! It was very comforting and I can’t wait for that again! I wondered tho why he was so sweet to me…? J When we got out S. Smith said that one of the guys was from Preston. As we left they were eating outside at a restaurant. His name was Brother Sweeley. I recognized the name and we knew the same ppl J some that I grew up with in my home ward. ( mom he is related to craig and Dorothy Thomas.) So that was fun. I think the nice guy from the temple was his son or son-in-law maybe. It was really funny to hear them trying to get Mike and Reshma’s last name right in the confirmation room. Hahahahaha. Nazim pronounced just how it looks but with their big Guyanese accent hard to understand. lol

Once we got out of the temple we had a message that Anne was ready for an interview that night at 7. Well the good news is that they (pickering and brother jean-louis of the bishopric) loved her testimony. She was all set! Then that night we got transfer calls. Me and smith are staying together but have to still go to transfer mtg. Ya we guessed it (rumors) Sister Bartschi, the sister I trained, was coming with us! We are in a trio! We go tomorrow and will be trying to fit another sister in the pad! I am very curious as to how a trio will go.

Well Sunday President came to church as well as Anne’s whole family! Her 19 yr old son, Omslee, is catholic and had no interest really before. Well he wanted to know what the church was all about and how it was different. So by command from President we taught him during Relief Society. He said he was def gonna look into it and read the BOM. We can pray that we can get the family baptized. Anne also has a 14 yr old girl and a 6 or 7 yr old boy who is sooo cute!

The baptism went really quite well! After Nirva was baptized, her mother, Anne and her family all started clapping. Haha. Man, President and Sister Nelson’s faces were so funny. After the baptism I played “The Spirit of God” arrangement that I did before I left. Haha. Man, I think that I am not a performer, and I will not perform again. Hahahaha. Enough said.

Well, I think that that is everything! Whoo-ee! I hope no one falls asleep while they read this. Maybe I should’ve put chapters…? Anwyas, so we ended the transfer with 2 baptisms the last Sunday with a total of 3 the whole transfer. Wow, so incredible. What a beautiful experience. I love it. I loved seeing how happy Nirva and Anne were and excited they were to finally be baptized. They were done waiting. After the baptism, Yolande, (Nirva’s mom) came and acted like she was crying. I asked Nirva to interpret and she said that she wanted to be baptized. Luckily we have an elder who is coming that can speak French who can teach her and get her ready! J sorry, I took a lot of time! That is all! I love you all so much and hope you are all doing well! And congrats mick! Mom prob told you but all week I kept getting this feeling that you had the baby. (I couldn’t remember rthe due date) but sure enough you had! I bet that she is beautiful! I love her name. cute cute! Love you all!



Sister Phillips

So crazy week,

So this week i have had many strong testimony building experiences and found out some amazing news, the news is that Elder David A. Bednar is coming to the mission next week to speak to us and we will be able to meet him, i am so excited. That will be on June 5 at chapel Hill where i found out his son actually lives there so that is a big reason for him to come this way.
So i would say we had a very successful week we actually got contacted by people twice, the first on was so i just have to tell the story. So a few weeks ago we saw this guy carrying a whole lot of wedding gifts up to an apartment on the second floor in our same building so we offered to help and so we did, well later that week or so when they got of of there honey moon they came and said thanks and introduced them selves. There names are Kelly and Amanda, so we have been friends with them ever since and we talk to them quite a bit, well this past week as we were getting to leave after dinner we hear a knock at our door and it is kelly and Amanda, so we talk to them and they ask us how we work and all of this stuff, then they asked us to come meet with them today so that was pretty cool. The second one was, we were at a dinner for lunch called Andy's and one of the waitresses got off while we were in there and we noticed she kept coming back in every once in a while, any way as we finished up and got back to our bikes she walked up to us and asked you are Mormons right? we are like ya and all well it turned out we had like a 45 minute discussion with her and she was very displeased with her church and is church searching. the real hold up is her dad hates Mormons and threw away her Book of Mormon so we gave her a new one and we are meeting with her this week.
We just got a lot of neat experiences this week. So in the Holly Springs ward there is this family that one of there friends has been coming to church for the past month and the have told us to be patient because she is afraid of missionaries and stuff like that, so we have been patient and last Sunday she came up to us and asked to have dinner and meet with us, she actually got on the Distribution centers web sit and bought her a nice quad! so that was amazing! The whole family is going to take the lessons and wants to be baptized.
But the really cool thing happened yesterday, and the crazier thing is the spirit. So Saturday i felt impressed to look over the blessings again so i did briefly, but the only actual blessing i have done is the one i did for dad. Then comes Saturday and our Recent Convert Matt came and asked me if i would confer the Aaronic Priesthood on him and ordain him a priest, i was so nervous but is was so cool, just to feel that spirit and feel impressed to say things is so amazing, i am so thankful for the priesthood.
So that was my week pretty cool huh? so how is every thing else going? But it has been raining a lot here i have been soaked four times this week and let me tell you that is fun.
Well hope all is well, i love you all.
love
Elder Phillips

Monday, May 17, 2010

*aNoThEr SeTtiNg SuN*‏

Hello Family :D It feels good to be here and writing…well typing :D This week I was down sick a day or two. An awful cold is going around and then Sunday I had an awful migraine that wouldn’t even let me stand straight. But we were able to start the week off with committing Nirva for May 23rd :D Her mom (in creole) told her that she wants to get baptized to and was asking when she could. So we are having someone there for every appt that can translate for us. Nirva is so excited that she doesn’t even want to wait for her mom lol. The language can definitely be a barrier, we have to be sure to be as thorough and simple as we can and sometimes even just leave it to the very, very basics. But we feel that she loves it so much and that baptism is the best thing for her. So we are going to finish the lessons up this week and then when we re-teach them we will do so very thoroughly. I am so excited! This will be the last Sunday of the transfer. President came for interviews for the other district in the zone and afterwards we had a zone pizza party that he stayed for. He called me over and took me into the library and asked me if staying with sister smith is something that I wanted. I told him that whatever the Lord wanted was good. Later on Sister Smith and I were talking about it and she said the EXACT same thing haha. Poor president has to deal with 2 indecisive women. LOL. So we’ll see what is happening this Thursday. I’ve been a bit stressed lately with my whole departure date stuff. Its been so hard to make a decision and I’ve really been praying. I wish that I didn’t even need to worry about it. But I am going to go with Nov. 9th and have faith that it is the right choice and if not, that he will make that known to me. Its so hard, especially when Nov. 9th is only 4 transfers away…that will come so fast and I’m not sure what my feelings will be then. I guess if I want to extend I can always beg??? LOL. I just want to hurry up and make the decision so I can stop worrying about it and be completely focused. It has just been a complete distracting mess. But, I certainly hope that I can stay in Jamaica. Wednesday is our deep clean day which I am so excited for. You never have enough time and it is so nice to have almost all day to clean the entire appt. Then Thursday is our zone conference. Elder Ringwood of the 70 will be speaking to us. Friday is a fireside for everyone, will I think everyone in the stake or surrounding stakes. Saturday we are taking Mike and Reshma to the temple. Then Sunday is Nirva’s baptism! It’s going to be a crazy busy week and it is going to go so fast! The last week of the transfer! I have had the best 2 transfers yet. I have had way too much fun with sister smith. We have had so many laughs and good times. We for sure will be life long friends. I wish we could’ve roomed together up at college. We just have sooo much fun together. I will certainly miss these times. It seems like it was just yesterday that I was at the MTC. It is fun to look back and see the change and growth that has taken place since then. At times you wonder if you have changed or grown at all and even wonder what you have done. But I feel so blessed to be living a prayer I’ve had since I was young. It goes so fast, life does. I’m grateful to have this experience to learn how to make the best of life and make life the best for others. This church is most certainly God’s church on the earth today. We are so blessed to have day after day to try again and again. Life brings failure, it happens to all of us. But what counts is how we use the days after our failures. Will we get back up and try again? I love this gospel and the hope that it brings us. I love seeing the hope that it brings into peoples lives and their expressions change as they learn how important family is and that theirs can last forever. I know we have a father in heaven who loves us dearly and I can’t wait to see him again. I love you family and feel blessed to have the best! Have a blessed week.

Love,

Sister Phillips

Hey‏

Hey fam

hows everything going this week? My week has been intense a lot more teaching then past weeks and a lot more biking! We really only had maybe 3 or 4 full days of biking but we biked over 100 miles in those days it was exhausting, on Saturday alone we biked 40 miles i was wasted after that and because that day we didn't teach at all, and to make it better it was 92 degrees all day and humidity didn't help, but wait that isn't all either we laid sod for two hours that morning. Other than that it has been a good week. The teaching has been really good we have three that are really close one of them is a Muslim and that only hold back is that he couldn't go back to his country again or see his family he is from Iran, the other two, one is Alice she just has to find a different work schedule and her friend Jose actually asked what he needs to do to be baptized. So really close!
So i will tell you something crazy that i would never expect and never expect to do, one is we are biking down the side of the highway on our way to lunch and a lady stops us and asks us to meet her at the stake center for a blessing so we did, then later that night we get a call from sister smith asking us to come give her husband a blessing because he is really sick and has no strength, he has already had four heart attacks. Well guess what Brother Smith is a Seventy, he was ordained a high priest by Spencer W. Kimble and ordained a Seventy by President Ezra Taft Benson, so we placed our hands where they have placed there hands and now he is starting to get a little better. The Priesthood is an amazing power and we don't take advantage of it like we should. Also we got to hear from another area seventy in church Elder Giddons i loved how he said the Hollowing brings the Hallowing, You have to go in empty to come out full.
It has been a very exciting week, i love doing the work especially because there is so much work to do. the church is true and this is the best thing we could be doing with our time, and time is flying it will be over before you know it.
Love Elder Phillips

Monday, May 10, 2010

*wArM fUzZiEs*‏

I hope all you mothers had a great and blessed mothers day and that everyone got to talk to their mommy’s, that is def the best…actually hugging them is the best, but I can def settle for now with a phone call :D I’m gonna start putting a big smiley face so that there is no “J”s hahahaha. It was nice to hear from the family, it seems like we just talked, course it has only been 4 months. It was REALLY nice to talk to Brad speaker phone to speaker phone. He sounded so good and mature :D Miss the kid…. Well not a lot has happened, my comp was a little sicky this week so it was a rather slow one. But I do have the best news one can ever get :D Last week we taught Nirva, a Haitian who had come to church that Sunday. She is such a sweetheart. She brought her mother who speaks only creole/French. It went really well and when I called her during the week she said she had read the intro of the BOM and kept reading bc she felt so good. Yesterday she and her mother came as well as Anne, who is an investigating friend that brought her. (We are teaching Anne tomorrow :D)This time Nirva brought her 2 kids. She has a 14 month old girl and I think maybe 5 yr old boy. During sacrament her daughter started fussing and you could see she was struggling with the stroller and all. I went out and was talking to her and she was telling me that she wasn’t gonna bring her next week bec she can’t listen this way. Well I told her to get back in there and let me take care of her. As soon as I went up to her daughter I bent down and she hugged me. Ohhhh, she is the sweetest little thing. Before we got back in Nirva asked me when she could get baptized and what she needed to do. Oh my goodness, I hugged her I was so happy. She told me that she just felt so good; they hymns, prayers, friends, it all made her so happy. Looks like our last Sunday of the transfer we’ll be bringing her into the fold. Oh my goodness I am just so happy. I love her. Her little son, so cute, he came out the door from primary and looked around and when he saw me he waved profusely and ran to hug me at the knees. I love this family. I love this work. It is so hard and rough but so beautiful and rewarding. Her mother was able to attend the creole class (almost our entire ward is Haitian) and she came out smiling. Tonight we are going to show the Restoration DVD in French, I am excited. President called me and told me that I have to choose between Nov 9th and Dec 22nd for departure. Sheesh louish I’ve been stressed over it. He said I needed to let him know within a couple weeks bc they get all that stuff together way in advance. It’s fishy that my card is the only card that said Dec 3rd, right in middle of a transfer. I just don’t know what to do. I’m prayin like crazy and I’d love prayers for me to receive an answer of what I am supposed to do. This Saturday looks like we’re gonna be able to go to the temple with an rcla to do baptisms. So that is exciting. The next week we are planning on taking our recent convert family well, Mike and Reshma. They are on vacation or we’d be going with the ward this week. So that will be incredible. I’m grateful for the opportunity I have to be a tool in Heavenly Fathers hands, to help bring back our family. Its been so eye opening and humbling and I feel so blessed to have his trust in me to do so. I know that he lives and loves each and every one of us, his children and wants more than anything for all of us to return. How blessed we are to have this incredible gift in our lives, to have grown up in it! How great is this work and how great is our calling to share it. I love and pray for you all and wish you the best and most blessed week!



Love,

Sister Phillips








The shoes show the pollen he is in! He comes home for meals and cleans them. The guy with the leaf blower is also the pollen.

Monday, May 3, 2010

tHoUsAnD LeGGeD dUsTbAllS‏

This week was yet another great week. Yesterday was another baptism which is always INCREDIBLE! We are being so blessed. We had a street sweep on Saturday (where our whole zone goes out on a certain street and teaches) with a booth set up, and it seemed we picked a day where every other church decided to come out too. It was fun to talk to the Omish/Mennonites, who actually only come once a year, and we happened to be doing the street sweep the same time lol. It was fun tho. I had one of the best birthdays ever! I have such incredible friends and family! I was treated so well by our recent convert family Mike, Reshma, and Ashley. They took me out to T.G.I Fridays and we had lots of fun. I loved getting cards from everyone too! I am so so blessed to have such great friends and family! Wednesday we said good bye to our most recent member, Efrain and his family, that was a very sad event. But of course we will always keep in touch. It was incredible to watch that family change and come together. I miss them already. We have a temple trip coming up which is super exciting! We have some ppl that we are getting ready to go. Sadly, Mike and Reshma are going on a trip, but we planned a temple trip the last Saturday of the transfer! What a beautiful way to end the transfer! J Funny story. We were at a dinner appt at a members on Wednesday. We all got up to go to the kitchen (luckily I was the second to last with an elder following behind me) when all a sudden this big dust ball with a thousand legs ran right in front of my feet, almost stepping on it! I jumped and screamed, slapping the poor elder on the arm lol and ran to the door on the other side of the living room. The members of course had no clue what was wrong and the elder was telling me to hush and motioning me to come. I was so scared! I tip toed/ran into the kitchen. I sat the entire dinner with my feet propped up underneath me, watching the little dustball with a thousand legs attempting to come in and of course my companion across from me choking on her food as she watches me pale face. Well I lost track of it when all a sudden the other elder screamed! Haha. I turned around and there it was! Coming out from under my chair!!!! The wife came over and SPLAT! Oh for scary! So that was pretty funny. But all in all it was a great week with members, less actives and new members J Sunday we had 6 non members show up to church. All member referrals and those referrals bringing friends. Incredible! We got 2 new investigators out of it. The first question they asked me was what they had to do to get baptized…..wow. J Blessings blessings! I love this area and hope to stay for another while! I hope everyone is doing well. And has a WONDERFUL mothers day! I am so excited to talk to my marmmy!!!! J LOVE YOU!!!!



Sister Phillips

Sorry to short‏

Hey everyone,
We are starting transfer 2. That last transfer flew by i can't even believe how fast it went. I am staying in Apex and Holly Springs but i am getting a new companion i can't wait to meet him, i though i would be with Elder Henley tell he dies being he only has two transfers left. it is crazy though i will be taking over the area! I hope i am ready. Summer is starting to take off here i don't think i have sweated this much in my life 90 degrees with like a 100 percent humidity is crazy even when you have the car you still get soaked as soon as you step out side. So Elder Henley pulled his hip flexor so we couldn't ride bikes this week, so we drove all week. He felt it when we were doing service then on Monday we were playing basketball and it really hurt him. Then the next day we were in Apex and it was killing him so bad we couldn't ride home so we walked back, it was about four miles so that was fun. Although with driving around you don't get to many interesting experiences like you do riding a bike. IT was pretty cool though we were tracting this area in Holly Springs and we start to talk with actually 2 different people and they both weren't interested at first but when we started to testify they both just stopped and they realized that this could be true but they didn't want us to come back, it was just cool to see there perspective change. there just hasn't been much going on this week.