10 Months Away!

First of all,
Happy Father's Day yesterday to all of you fathers, especially my own, and to the newest fathers in our family, Jordan and Aaron. Hope you all had a wonderful day. (and Happy birthday Jonas!)

and today,
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, THOMAS!!

And because I know you were all pained from suspense, Cynthia got baptized!!! Last Saturday was a pretty stressful day of cancelled appointments and no one answering their door, and then forgetting things we needed and the woman of the moment showing up 45 minutes late!! Yeah, not so much fun. However, she got baptized, and it was beautiful and there were a lot of non-members there. And for some reason we sang "Un Angel del Senor" which is a terrible song to end a baptism. Go figure.

Cynthia was pretty funny this week. We stopped by to help her pack and she gave us a plastic head that she had used to practice cutting hair. His name is Zippy and we've greatly enjoyed placing him in interesting/surprising places around the apartment.  Then at her
Interview, she was super nervous at first and by the time we left, she hugged Elder Skousen accidentally. He was so embarrassed. It was hilarious!

Some less funny things:
Erique, our Chinese investigator would get baptized if he could only give up social drinking. Any ideas to help him?

Angel, a very interesting investigator who attends Rey Jesus dropped us. We weren't too broken- hearted.

We had two hours before interviews with President on Wednesday to harvest. So we wanted to get 5 to meet our Wednesday goal of 8. Unfortunately, it was deathly hot. As in, we talked to two people (had a mini-lesson with one!) and then had to go back to the car to get water and cool off before heading back out. It was ridiculous! Got to love Florida in the Summer!

Actually, one of the great things about it here in Florida are the Sunsets and Lightning Storms. We just sat and watched lightning for 45 minutes before bed the other night because it was so cool.

I don't think I mentioned that our recent convert Juan is now the  assistant Branch Mission Leader. He is doing so well! He is pretty much a more solid member than most of the Branch. He always brings us dinner (because he is 30 and has a good job), and he goes out to help the struggling recent converts and less actives all the time. He brought several people to the baptism and he performed the baptism himself!

Afterwards he asked us if we were going to call our fathers the next day. We told him no, because we can only call on Mother's Day. He was flabbergasted and said, "WHAT?! Does your mother hold the priesthood?!" It was so funny!

Well, that about sums up my week! Hope you all had a great week, too!

Love,
 Hermana Sheffield

Where does the time go?

Hello everyone, I hope you've had a nice week. Mine went by fairly quickly because I'm no longer sick!~ yay!

We had a mission goal to get 8 blessings with baptismal invites by Wednesday and we were able to bless 10 homes and invite at least 6 of them to be baptized! It was pretty awesome.

We met with some former investigators this week that are really cool and I think are ready to be baptized. Erique (pronounced like Eric) is from China and is super solid except he likes to social drink. But we'll fix that soon. He wants to talk to Alan, but I don't remember his number. But I think that would be pretty great!

The other was David. He had a pretty troubled past but he just showed up at institute this week, so we had a lesson on Saturday and set him with a baptismal date for the 23rd!  Yay for miracles.

Our most solid investigator, Cynthia is still doing great. She is getting baptized on Saturday at 7pm and is super excited to have a birthday/rebirthday party! It'll be fun. She flies out to Nicaragua on the 19th so she can go to a real doctor and fix her back problems. We're really going to miss her!

Anyone ever heard of the band "Twin Shadow"?

I got a phone call from Patricia, my former investigator from West Palm Beach and she said she's getting baptized!!!! Best. call. Ever.

We ate dinner at an investigator's house yesterday that is by the beach. As in, they have a dock to a canal that leads to the Bahamas. And they have a pool and George Bush Sr. hid in their upstairs room in the 60s. (They didn't live there at the time) but Cool cool stuff.

I actually feel more comfortable in trailer parks right now, but it was a neat experience.

I really have to go. But I love you all! 

Have  a wonderful week! Go read the Book of Mormon and share it with a friend!

Love, Sister Sheffield

So much to say, so little time

I have been sick all week. I had a sore throat that turned into head congestion which turned into absolutely no voice which turned into a terrible cough. Good times.

On Friday, I had such a bad headache I was sick to my stomach. We had to go home early so I could sleep and not throw up. Plus there was so much lightning we couldn't harvest anyway.

There was a lot of rain all week. In fact, last Tuesday, there were over 3 inches in the parking lot. It is the closest thing to swimming we get to do!

Combining a YSA area with an illness means we don't get much done. There were days this week that we only had 1 lesson and that was it. Luckily, those lessons are awesome. Por ejemplo, Fatima was the only person we saw on Thursday, but we taught her about the Gospel of Jesus Christ and set her with a baptismal date for the 23rd!

Yesterday, Cynthia couldn't come to church because she has terrible back pain. So we went up to her house (which is technically out of our area) and got the Miami Beach YSA Elders to come over and give her a blessing. She was so excited when we explained it to her, and then when they finished, she sat and cried for almost 5 minutes. The spirit was so strong. She is so amazing! She has to go to Nicaragua to get medical treatment but she refuses to go until after her baptism! I love her so much!

I love all of you as well, but I have to go now.

Congratulations to Emma and Jordan with their new baby!
Happy Birthday to everyone the past few days who had birthdays.

I love you all!
Love, Sister Sheffield

" Hymn to the Fallen", on repeat, in the rain

Monday, May 28, 2012
That is Memorial Day to me. And I got to do it here, too! For a minute at least!

 

Hello my wonderful family and friends,
I hope you are all doing well and are healthy and happy.

Well, this week was a bit different.
On Monday, we helped a girl in our ward with her wedding announcements.  She sent one to the Naylors! It was so strange to see their address!  The Mormon world is so small!) and then got to hold her roommate's Fenix Fox and hedgehog! So worth it!

On Tuesday we met with Cynthia in Wendy's because she technically lives outside of our area. She had a baptismal date already chosen before we got there! She has already felt the Spirit and knows this church is true without even knowing hardly any doctrine! She is an amazing blessing from God. [and the part I told President: "We were able to teach her several times this week and yesterday we were able to teach her the Restoration. I made a conscious effort to include the Book of Mormon in this lesson, especially since she had already started reading in it. During companionship study in the morning, we had looked up several scriptures we could include and practiced sharing them. In the actual lesson, we ended up using some of them but we were directed by the spirit to share others as well.  It was amazing to see the connections she made as we share verses from the Book of Mormon. She was touched by them in ways I wouldn't have thought of on my own."]

Tuesday also included meeting two other new investigators, going through all the Baptismal interview questions with Bryan, and seeing Eddie for the first time because he fractured his back and wanted a blessing. We taught him in the Riverside Chapel (which is where we have district meetings) which used to be a bank.

 

Wednesday, Sister Buckley had to go to the Eye Doctor because she has little floaties in her eyes and they dialated her pupils. She had to stay inside for 3 hours because she was so sensitive to the Florida Sunshine. But we still were able to teach Anabell, meet Kashara (who is very pro-"pot"), and have dinner with newly baptized Juan at a Peruvian Restaurant
.
Thursday we found out a recent convert started smoking again and went to institute and learn about the end of the world with a new investigator.

Friday we had Zone Conference about the Book of Mormon, Mormon.org "our fourth companion", and what to do in a hurricane. Good times.

Saturday we harvested a lot because all our appointments fell through except Cynthia. and we met a guy Named Dario with a Mario shirt on.

Sunday I gave a talk in Sacrament on Missionary work, Then I started feeling sick and had a really bad sore throat. I didn't get much sleep Sunday night and was barely functioning Monday Morning. Good thing I found some Ibuprofen because we got a call saying one of the other sisters, Sister Lavoie, was in the hospital. We brought her some food, went to district training taught one lesson, then stayed with her in the hospital all day.
I'm doing better now. She's okay too.

I love reading the Book of Mormon. Just this morning I read about Abinadi and noticed all of the Christlike attributes he had and taught. He astonished the priests by teaching them the truth and counseled them to live what they taught. This was very impactful to me because I had been reflecting on how I have learned so many things from my past companions that I haven't been applying lately. I've been allowing the other Sisters to lead because they were both here already, but I realized that I don't like who I'm turning into. I've become casual with a lot of things that I was very strict on before and that's not the missionary I want to be. But it has been  a challenge because they are older in the mission than I am and are set in their ways a bit. Hopefully I can figure out how to be an example without offending them.

 

Now I'm out of time
 Love, Sister Sheffield