❤️❤️❤️

Hello again! I feel like I just wrote you all..this week flew by!! I've officially been out for my first transfer. Don't worry though, I'm staying here in Maine with my lovely trainer Sister Crook :) I'm so glad I'm not leaving. I've grown to absolutely love this area and this ward and just everything about it so I'm not quite ready for that yet. 6 weeks goes by a LOT faster than I thought..next transfer, I'll officially be done with being trained!! (Hallelujah)

THE HUMIDITY IS SO REAL. This week has been especially hot and humid..there's nothing like walking miles and miles in the middle of the afternoon in Maine carrying a heavy bag and no clouds in sight..*screams* keep in mind that our apartment doesn't have air conditioning so it's even stuffier in our apartment. Hopefully it's really true that you lose weight when you sweat because that would be wonderful at this point. other than that, Maine is beautiful and I'm still not used to the amazing scenery that's literally everywhere.

Thanks to everyone who commented about my last week's email! It means a lot to hear that you liked it so much. I sometimes don't realize who's actually reading these so I just say what's on my mind and just go from there..enjoy I guess :)

I volunteered at a random soup kitchen this week supported by a different church which was fun! They were playing "take me to church" and I miss that song SO MUCH. I honestly forgot it even existed which is sad. It was nice to hear a song from the radio..I mean..no, it was very bad. Naughty missionary. Ha, hahaha, haha oops but anyway we were in charge of washing all the dishes and bringing the dinners to the people sitting at the tables. Sister crook has some weird obsession with washing dishes so she enjoyed doing that while I dried them all. (That was so useless but I'm too lazy to delete it so there ya go)

Oh, and apparently sister crook is allergic to cats because after visiting a less active who had two of them (which she petted both), she rubbed her eye and it swelled up and couldn't stop watering which meant I got to drive! I thought I was going to forget how since its been ages but don't worry..we made it home safely. I just realized I've barely been out for 2 months which isn't THAT long of a time but I promise..it feels like centuries since I've been home!

Update on Dotty..her ears are unplugged! :) we taught her a little more about the restoration because we felt like she wasn't completely understanding it before. It was such a success! She said she loves what she's hearing but she is scared to join our church because she lives alone and her family is all a part of another church and she doesn't want to be alone with religion. She also is going to consider attending church again since she decided not to last time due to her health. We're working on it! She's a tough one.

Here's an interesting story..while we were looking through some older records of former investigators, we found someone named Fred and decided to go visit him. It had been a few years since he's met with missionaries so we decided to give him a try. Apparently he's been in an accident so his voice and the tone of his words are weird which makes it hard for him to have a conversation. He told us it's better if he sings his words because then we can understand him better. Soooo we talked with a singing man who also serenaded sister crook and I with his guitar. Hahaha ohhh man, it made our whole day because we kept nudging each other and we didn't know what to do and it was just so funny. The people you meet on a mission.. 

Soooo I ended up asking for yet another blessing. Oops. Sister Crook and I were really struggling this week and we decided to ask the elders to give us a blessing one of those nights after a coordination meeting. Let me tell you..PRIESTHOOD BLESSINGS WORK. I'm so grateful for the men in this church and their willingness to exercise their priesthood power. I've done so much better and I couldn't have done it without the help of the Lord. 

I have a miracle to share! The other night we were outside doing weekly planning and someone was having a party a block or so away and they were blasting some of my favorite songs which was making it SO hard to focus. They reminded me so much of home but I didn't want to go outside because our apartment was so hot. I prayed to be able to ignore it and focus on planning and all of a sudden, it started POURING rain. The rain was so loud and it completely drowned out the music so that I was able to ignore it. If that's not cool, I'm not sure what is :)

I don't know if I've talked about the Youland's before..but they feed us every Friday afternoon. She's a member, but she's less active..she hasn't been to church in months. her husband isn't a member. A few weeks ago, we show up at their house for lunch and Sister Youland is storming out of her house in some fit of rage and tells us it's safe to go inside since Tony (the husband) is in there with Kristina (her step daughter). If you didn't know, we can't be in a home if it's just a man in there with no female. So she storms off and we go inside. Kristina gets a phone call and goes outside to talk on the phone so we told Tony that we had to step outside since we couldn't be there in the house alone with him. He then said "it's things like this and people like you that drive me away from joining the church." He doesn't like that rule that we have since the situation was so harmless, nothing was going to happen, etc. 

Sister Youland finally came back and told us to come inside and we carry on with our day. We continued to come every Friday but this last Friday was different..sister youland basically got angry with us for doing that to Tony. She doesn't understand why we obey that rule so strictly especially if it's the reason for Tony being pushed away from the church. She continued to argue with us but sister crook and I held our ground and said that we were sorry, but we've been given this rule so we are going to follow it. She kept arguing and being angry with us and blaming us for her husband's anger about this church. It was horrible. But we just stayed quiet and didn't budge with the rule. We were pretty upset on the drive home and the spirit definitely wasn't with us so when we got home, we took time out of our day to sing a hymn, pray, and read our favorite scriptures. We would pray for charity and love toward sister youland and tried to remain positive.

But a guess who we saw come to church for the first time in ages on Sunday? SISTER YOULAND! I've never felt so much joy from seeing somebody at church. I literally dropped my bag and gave her a hug because I know how much it took for her to get to church. All the hard feelings were gone immediately and she started crying and she asked the elders for a blessing. MIRACLES.

My dad will like this part..while at the youlands last Friday, Tony brought out his huge potato cannon/launcher thing that he made and I got to blast potatoes out of it. It was pretty cool I guess ;)

We have another baptism this Sunday!! The girl we are baptizing asked me if I'd give a talk at her baptism sooo that'll be fun! it's on the topic of baptism so if anyone has any cool insights or quotes or scriptures to help me out with that, FEEL FREE. (please)

Oh, and we finally gained the trust we've been hoping for with our bishop! We were scared that he thought we weren't trying hard enough or that we weren't serious about our work but he sent us a text yesterday that made our entire day. It read "I'm learning something about you two..you don't mess around!! :) great work pressing them forward." He was talking about the family of the girl being baptized at the last part of that message. Felt good to make him proud of us :)

Here's an embarrassing moment..we were talking to a lady we met the first week the other day and all of a sudden a car drives by and their windows were down and they were blasting "cheerleader" and I immediately started singing and jamming to it and the lady couldn't stop laughing at me..I couldn't even help it!! I didn't even think about what I was doing..it was so awful. It's probably a good thing that we don't listen to the music on the radio while serving a mission.

Can't wait to start this new transfer! I'm getting the hang of everything and I just love being a missionary. It's so hard, it's so demanding, and we never stop working but I LOVE IT. I'm on the Lord's errand with a new best friend and a new outlook on life. My testimony grows more every single day and I see myself in a completely different light. Serving a mission has been the best decision I've ever made and I will never regret it! Love you all, have an amazing week!!!!! 

Here's my district!! (Minus elder wheeler because he was transferred randomly to Mesa, Arizona. He emails me. We're tight.)

Me, Elder Crosby (on the right, he makes me banana bread at least twice a week because I love it, and he's being transferred tomorrow), Elder Mcmahan, and blurry Sister Crook.

Best text message I have ever received ❤️

We looooove tracting..

After her swollen eyes from her allergic reaction.

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Baptism, Blessings, Blisters, and Beauty

So many different things to talk about..wow. I suppose we can start with the FIVE skunks we had in our backyard the other night hahaha it was so disgusting! They were going through our garbages and we didn't know what to do so Sister Crook decided to start throwing things at them from our back door and eventually 4 of them ran off but there was one that wouldn't leave no matter what we did. Finally sister crook got a cup of water and threw it at the dumb skunk and it finally left.  I'm surprised she didn't get sprayed!!

Another funny story: we had dinner at the Alexander's this last week and they are the cutest old couple in the entire world. I just love them so much :) but anyway so we were eating spaghetti with them and I was sitting by brother Alexander who is practically deaf and pretty much blind..but I was just peacefully eating my food when all of a sudden he looks at me and yells, "ARE YOU STEALING MY MEATBALLS?!" And it caught me so off guard and I didn't know what to do and everyone started busting up laughing because of how terrified I looked and oh man..that story really doesn't sound very funny when I write it out but I promise it was absolutely hilarious!

I also found out that I like mangos..I really think I'm addicted to them. AND I LIKE GUACAMOLE. I know mom..calm down..but yes. I supposedly like guacamole. We went and visited a less active who's from Colombia and we helped her make guacamole and mango salsa for company she was having that night. While cooking, she made me try straight avocado (which was horrifying since I didn't have a choice) BUT I liked it. Hmm. And she ended up giving me an entire mango to take home because I loved it so much!

Oh man..so in the beginning of the week we walked four miles to a recent convert's home in the dumping rain. I didn't have an umbrella and I had a light cotton jacket which soaked through within seconds. I've never been so wet in the rain in my entire life! It was like I just jumped into a pool. But when we were walking home, a man pulled over and offered us a ride but since it was just him in the car, we had to tell him no thanks. As soon as I told him no, I immediately tripped and fell into a puddle... it was the most embarrassing thing ever! "Oh, no thanks!" *FALLS* whew it was just awesome. 

Oh yes! I had my first zone interview with my mission president! It was SOO good and it felt great to finally get one on one time with him for the first time since arriving here. He's such a sweet man and he was so willing to help me out in whatever way he could. I've particularly been struggling with homesickness and some other things that I didn't mention to him that's been bothering me so I decided to ask him for a Priesthood blessing. He was more than willing to do that and even though I only told him about the homesickness, he mentioned all the other things I've been struggling with and reassured me that everything was going to be okay, etc. Ever since then, I've been doing so much better! :)

I also had my first experience with exchanges this week...hmm. For those who don't know, that's when you and your companion get split up and you swap with another set of sisters in your area for 24 hours. We swapped with our sister training leaders and the sister I was with has been out for about 16 months. AND I stayed here in Bath while sister crook went to their area which meant I was in charge of the plans and leading out on lessons. Horrifying. 1) She was incredibly experienced. 2) She was my sister training leader. 3) I've only been here in the field for a month. needless to say, I was a wreck of nerves for these exchanges. I would pray and pray for the help to stay busy and to get to our appointments and to be calm and it worked! Time flew by, we stayed busier than I thought (even though one of our major service appointments fell through), and I learned that I can in fact be in charge without too much of a problem. #blessed 

My...feet...hurt. We walk everywhere since we are low on miles and geez, it's rough. We walked four miles again yesterday and my blisters that I got a few days earlier were all open and hurting so bad that eventually I had to take my shoes off altogether. I had to walk 4 miles barefoot to teach someone. If that's not real missionary work, I don't know what is! I ended up treating myself to the Dr. Pepper my mom sent me in the MTC that I was saving for when I deserved it most.

WE HAD OUR FIRST BAPTISM YESTERDAY! :) oh my goodness, it was amazing. It was for sweet 11 year old Caryssa. I hadn't been to a baptism in so long..I forgot how great it feels. I don't remember the last time I felt the spirit so strong. I literally started crying because it hit me so hard that THAT is why I came out here. It is my job 24 hours a day to bring people into the waters of baptism and see them in white with so much faith and so much joy in their faces. I am SO lucky!
Oh and shout out to my ward mission leader Brother Smith for dropping by 75 pieces of Lindt chocolates to sister crook and I the other night at like 10:15 :D I had just gotten out of the shower and he called us and asked if he could give us a surprise and there ya go! 75 pieces of the best chocolate in the world. 

I'm gonna get a little deep here for a second but I feel like I have to say this. Those who know me really well know how self conscious I am and how negative I am when it comes to my appearance. I compare myself to other people and I point out all the negatives in myself. Lately, it's been pretty bad and I've been struggling with it while I've been out here. But I decided to pray about it and ask Heavenly Father to help me love myself more and find more self worth so I can have more confidence when talking to people. Over this past week, I've been so blessed. My companion, the sister I went on exchanges with, and random people on the street would just compliment me. And they weren't always even about my physical appearance! They would tell me things like, "you are such an amazing missionary." "I never would think you're brand new." "You're very hardworking and a great leader." "You posses a lot of faith which is essential for missionary work." "You're so good at listening to the spirit and following your promptings." "You have such a strong testimony and you're so bold with it." 

Last night during our dinner our we watched an LDS face2face thing with Lindsey Stirling and guess what it talked all about? Self confidence and self worth. Hmm.

Then, we go to our recent converts house for a lesson last night and we had planned to answer her questions about the resurrection that she had the previous week. Wait - pause. We walked there and the entire time we walked, Sister Crook kept complimenting me on absolutely everything. She knew I struggled with self confidence so she decided to talk me through it and help me understand that beauty isn't just on the outside. Keep in mind, she had no idea that I've been really having a hard time or that I've been praying about it. She told me so many things that I didn't even notice about myself which was so awesome and I'm so grateful for her. 

Anyway, we finally get to Gena's house and somehow we ended up talking about self worth and the beauty from within (no clue how it came up) and how that matters so much more than our physical appearance. I suddenly for some reason started talking about my poor self esteem and the role its played in my life. It makes me so sad to think of all the times I'd beat myself up about it. Beauty is SO much more than our flaws or imperfections. I am so much more than my cleft lip or any imperfect part of my body. God created me like this because he thought it was perfect for ME specifically.
Moral of the story: LOVE YOURSELF. It makes you SO much happier once you realize there is more to you on the inside than anything on the outside. Oh, and missions change you. I feel like a completely different person than I was two months ago! I've learned SO much about myself that I wouldn't have learned at home.

I LOVE YOU ALL :) Enjoy the pictures!

HAVE AN AMAZING WEEK 

Here's a shirt my mom sent me. I LOVE IT. 

Me and Sister Blume, my Sister Training Leader :)

We had been planning for our next week for 4 hours soooo this happened :D

Here's a result of walking so much...MY FAVORITE SHOES.

The dumb skunk.

Right before our trek in the rain...we had no clue what was coming our way :D

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Week 5

It's already week 5...what. SO MANY GREAT THINGS HAVE HAPPENED AND I CANT WAIT TO SHARE THEM :)

Let's start with Melissa. It all started the other day when we were walking to our other investigator (Dotty's) house. It was POURING rain and we were drenched as we knocked on her door and rang her doorbell. She is practically deaf so her TV was blasting and we could hear it from outside her house. There was no way she was going to hear her doorbell so we decided to give up and start walking back home...in the dumping rain. On our way, I saw this adorable yellow house and had the feeling to knock on the door which was odd because their lights were off and there weren't any cars in the driveway. Even Sister Crook was pretty hesitant but we went and knocked anyway. Immediately, some lady came and opened the door and hurried us inside to get us out of the rain. We probably looked absolutely ridiculous now that I'm thinking about it! so we sat down and introduced ourselves and she was SO interested in everything we had to say. We taught her the restoration and gave her a Book of Mormon and she was so excited to learn more. HALLELUJAH! Moral of the story: follow the spirit, even in the middle of a huge rainstorm. It'll get ya a potential investigator.

Another story: remember when I told you about the random man that stopped on the side of the road and gave my companion and I flowers? Yeah, we saw him AGAIN. He works at Dominos. He's the best. Apparently a lot of people notice us as we walk around everywhere..people in the ward and people we don't even know (like 2 random Dominos employees) told us that they've seen us around. Our miles got cut so we've been having to walk a lot which has been awful especially since it's never been so hot and humid...we walked a whole 7 or 8 miles the other day actually. WHEW. Good thing my momma sent me more comfortable shoes.

DOTTY! Oh my gosh. So we decided to try her house again to see if maybe her TV wasn't blasting and she could possibly hear us. When we got to her door..it was even louder than the day before that. Ugh. So we knocked and knocked and even called her house phone and we weren't having any luck...until the very last ring of the doorbell, she FINALLY CAME. She said "I thought to go open the door for some reason, I don't even think I heard anything" (thank you spirit). She then told us that she fell down the stairs or something and her ears were all plugged up (she was already half deaf as it was) so she was basically completely deaf now. She couldn't hear a single word we said. I ended up sitting directly in front of her and I was yelling....she heard nothing. I ended up having to write questions down for her and point out passages for her to read. Sister Crook and I would have legit conversations about what was going on RIGHT in front of dotty because she had no idea. "what should we write now?" "We could say anything we want right now" "what pamphlet should we show her" "this is so weird I can't wait to tell my family/friends about this" hahaha but in the end, she learned a lot and tons of her confusion of our church was cleared up so that's great :)

I got to go to the beach! A sweet lady that looks like she's about 3 feet tall fed us lunch one day and we took a walk to the ocean...no big deal! it was great! She always needed constant reassurance of whatever she was saying was right but other than that, it was a wonderful afternoon. "Right?" "Ya know?" "Huh??" My comp and I would nudge each other every time..and she would do it after every single sentence she said hahah I love the mainers :)

So the day that we walked 7-8 miles...oh dear me. Such a struggle..but of course, I have a story to go with it. We were finally headed home and still had 2 miles to go when we walked past a nice looking lady. We greeted her and said "hi how are you?" But we both kept walking after that. My companion started feeling guilty that we didn't introduce ourselves and ask her if she was interested in learning so my first reaction was to turn around and catch up to her. This was her SALVATION we were talking about! Maybe we were supposed to walk past her! So we started speed walking towards her but she was pretty far away. Again, we were both SO sore and hot and tired but we kept back-tracking to talk to that lady. Eventually she started walking towards a gate so we started running. Where on earth did we find the strength to do that?! Two girls in dresses with sweaty faces and big bags running toward you..that's just horrifying. Sister crook finally yelled "HELLO!" But she didn't hear us so she yelled "MA'AM!" And she turned around! Sister crook said "we saw you before but we had a feeling to ask you if you wanted to learn about Jesus Christ and about our church." The lady said "no thanks I've already been saved."

oh..

Okay..

So we went back our merry way to our home. Without a potential investigator. Maybe one day she'll realize she needs what we have.

Okay, I think that's about it! Wait, Thought of the week..

The Lord's hand is in EVERY detail, you just have to look for it. I've noticed that so much on my mission! When I was at home, I definitely didn't notice (or take the time to notice) all the things He does or what He placed in my path. I just did whatever I did throughout the day and didn't stop to realize all the tiny miracles or the blessings I was given that day. He is SO aware of us and is so happy to bless us if we're doing what's right. Yes, IF we're doing what's right. I hope you all take the time to recognize His hand in all things throughout your week, because you'll absolutely find it!

I LOVE YOU ALL.

Love,
Sister Watson

The beach :)

This is the trail leading down to the water. SO pretty

My mom sent my companion and I coordinating nightgowns!!!!

Railroad track I saw while walking one day. Just a normal thing here in Maine..no big deal.

Another picture of us in our nightgowns because AHH they make life so much better. 

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New Mish Training & Nightgowns

ONE MONTH DOWN AM I RIGHT :D

I actually don't know how to feel about that..VERY bittersweet. Time is flying though and sometimes I just want it to slow down so I can enjoy everything but noooope. Sigh.

This week was the fastest by far! We had a New Missionary Training on Thursday which was SO GOOD. We drove about four hours on Wednesday night to Manchester, New Hampshire to stay the night in the beautiful mission home. It's literally in the woods and it's huge and I wish I took a picture of it DANG..but my comp and I got to sleep in the president's office...woah. We felt unworthy due to so much revelation and stuff that's happened in that room. Speaking of the Mission President, I LOVE THAT MAN. His wife is just as incredible! They're so so kind and it's impossible to not notice the spirit radiating from them. They've truly been called from God and they're just so loving and I could go on for hours about them❤️️ ahh

I learned a lot at the training. The assistants to the President talked about how we have this opportunity one time. We are called of God to serve in this specific area at this specific time at the age we are now ONCE. So basically, don't screw it up. But just thinking about that got me so excited and so much more motivated to get out there and work even harder knowing that there are people out there right now waiting for me. I LOVE IT.

Here are some stories:

The other day my companion and I were walking like 2 miles to someone's house and as we were walking, a car pulled over a little ways ahead of us and we started joking around by saying "what if he got out and put us in his trunk and kidnapped us?!" Because we're literally like four years old and quite immature..but anyway, some guy gets out and starts walking right towards us and we both got a little nervous and slowed down. Sure enough, he walks right up to us and holds up 2 flowers and told us to choose our favorite one, then told us to have a good day, then got back in his car and drove
off.......WHAT.   Heavenly Father works in the most interesting ways because I was having a very hard morning and I wasn't in a good mood and idk, it was just rough. But as soon as that happened, everything completely changed around and I was so happy. So grateful for that random hippie man :)

We were at church yesterday and this adorable old lady with a walker comes and talks to us about how she woke up, looked at the clock, thought it said 6:02 but it said 8:02 (church is at 9), so she "panicked and got out of bed, went poopoo, fed her cats, got dressed, and got ready in time for her ride to come" I LOVE MAINERS❤️️ she was so so so funny and I really just love old people. 

So yeah. I bore my testimony yesterday!!! Pure panic was taking over my life but I did it. And it was my first one in the new ward and everything..whew. I talked about the power of prayer and how my blessing when I was being set apart talked about how I'd be able to feel the power of the prayers given in my behalf at home when I'm struggling or going through something hard here. ITS HAPPENED SO OFTEN. I'm so thankful for all of my support and prayers given by those at home. As simple as it may be, it plays SUCH a huge part in my ability to move forward and work harder, so thank you :) 

There's a new convert we go visit quite often named Gena and she's a hoot. She's VERY knowledgeable in the gospel because she's always reading all sorts of literature that talks about anything and everything when it comes to our church. For some reason, she really enjoys writing down prayers for people and she gave my companion and I our own 'prayers'. At first, I thought it was going to be more generic or poetry or something..but it's a legit prayer that she personalized for us. I'll attach a picture of it, but holy cow..it was everything I needed! Every word pertained to the experiences I was having as a brand new missionary and it caught me so off guard that I cried while reading it.

Next: I GOT A NIGHTGOWN. it's a sister missionary thing I guess, but I'm in love and I'm actually wearing it as I type this, sprawled on the couch, at 2:15 in the afternoon. Regrets? Absolutely not.

I'm struggling to remember what else has happened this week..it was seriously such a blur! OH! We were walking to our investigators house yesterday and an older man stopped us in his driveway and yelled "HEY ARE YOU MORMONS?" And we were like ummm, yes! And I guess he was too but hasn't been active for about 20 years. Eventually we ended up committing him to church this Sunday because he said he was thinking about coming back but wasn't sure how to go about it. I hope he really does come! So many miracles as a missionary :) 

Well, I think that's about it for now. My inspiration for the week is to pray like Enos. I have found that Enos is one of my favorites in the scriptures, and his section is maaaaybe a page and a half :) but he prayed with his entire heart asking for repentance and even though it took him a whole day of prayer, God answered him and blessed him and forgave him. Pray just like him-with your WHOLE heart. Try not to use repetition and say the same things every time. You're literally talking to Heavenly Father, so act like it! I'm so guilty of doing that before my mission. Oops.

HAVE AN AMAZING WEEK, I LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH❤️️

Nightgown!

 Got to sleep in the mission office!!

Our four hour drive to Manchester

Car rides are our faaave

And of course my weekly selfie, you're all blessed.

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