It Is Solved By Walking

St Augustine once said "It is solved by walking".  I'm not sure what 'it' is, but I decided to put that theory to the test this transfer as I have been doing 'walk and talk with Sister Hymas' during our interviews.  Of course I couldn't show up to interviews without bringing cookies: (these chocolate chip cookies are from The Magnolia Cookbook, and are SOOOOO good)

You don't know how often we laugh at the end of an interview when we give the recently interviewed companionship their cookies, only to have them say "YES!!! This is the best part of interviews".  I always laugh and say, "yes, you have to just suffer through talking to President and me, and then you get the good stuff".  

But, my walk and talks might be my favorite way to go about interview days.  It came about on the first day of interviews this transfer.  We were heading to Sacramento, and it is our largest zone with 22 missionaries.  My head was feeling kind of achy, like I was beginning to get a head cold. The church is always cold, and the room I am in while I talk to the missionaries is small, cinderblock and doesn't have a window.  It has been a pretty cold and rainy winter/spring and as we got out of the car, the sun was peeking through the clouds and it was relatively warm.  I could hardly stand the thought of our first warmish day, being in that little windowless room all day.  So, after Scott met with the Zone Leaders, I took Elder Cummings and said "How about we go on a walk while we talk?" And 'walk and talk with Sister Hymas' was born.  He thought it was good, I thought it was good, and so I continued with the rest of the zone.  It was so refreshing to be outside and to be moving instead of sitting for 5 hours. I just set my timer for half of our time and we would walk until the timer rang and then turn back.  There was only one time I forgot to set my timer and Elder Quinones and I walked a lot farther than I had planned.  President was waiting for us in the foyer when we got back.  Oops.  The only thing I didn't think through was how far I would be walking that day. Luckily I had on flat boots, but walking for 10 minutes with 22 missionaries is father than I had anticipated.  By about the 18th missionary my feet were starting to feel it, as were my hips, but the waiting missionaries would see us come back in from our walk and they all wanted to walk.  By the end of the day I was completely surprised to look at my step tracker and see how far I had gone. 

I've been able to walk with all but two zones because it was raining, and we have three to go in a week or so, but I think I have found my new interview activity.  I actually think it is more normal for the missionaries to open up to me when we are on a walk, and it has been a really fun thing to do.  I did go and buy some new walking shoes, and have logged about 35 miles this week (Sacramento is by far the biggest zone).  I love it.  There is something about being outside that is just good for the soul.  My daughter Stacie sent this quote that I wholeheartedly agree with.

I feel bad for Scott, after interviews I am all energized and he has had to sit in a church building all day long.  I told him he should start a 'walk and talk' as well.  We could just take different routes and meet up and exchange companions, like a relay.  We'll see if that one takes off.  

How could you not be happy with walking companions like these, (and all the others I didn't get pictures of), and a blue sky like this one.  The Elk Grove day was really windy, but a little wind wasn't going to keep us inside!

Other than walking, we've also had our New Leader Meeting with our newly called Zone and District Leaders and Sister Training Leaders

We had Family Home Evening and Dinner at our home with our Senior Missionaries. We were happy to welcome the Chenns and sad to say goodbye to the Marquardts as they finish their mission.  They have been living at the far end of the mission in a town called Copperopolis, working with the Murphys Ward.  When they first got their assignment they thought Copperopolis was a made up name.  It is really out in the middle of nowhere, but they have grown to love the people and the ward so much.  I don't know what we, or the Murphys ward is going to do without them.  We have loved serving with them. They are incredible, humble, consecrated, dedicated servants and we love and will miss them.

We had our Mission Leadership Council the Tuesday following transfers.  I always say how much I love MLC, but it really is a special and sacred meeting.  All of the leaders gather and we council together, then they take what they have learned and counseled on back to their zones.  My training this time was inspired by a lesson we attended that I wrote about in my last blog.  As we were with some sweet sisters teaching a man who had a very strong belief in the Bible, but literally no belief, and some very negative feelings about the Book of Mormon I had the impression that we need to know the Bible better than we do.  We need to carry a Bible with us as we are out and about.  We were trying to teach him through Book of Mormon scriptures but they meant nothing to him.  He needed the familiar voice of the Bible to help bridge the gap.  

I talked about how when Samuel was called by the Lord, at first he didn't understand who was calling him.  He went to Eli three times, thinking it was Eli who called.  It was Eli who bridged the gap between Samuel and the voice of the Lord and gave him the ability to hear the voice of the Lord. 

When Christ came to the Nephites, they heard and understood the voice of the Savior, but they couldn't understand the voice of the Father when he spoke to them.  It took them a while to recognize His voice.  The Bible is the familiar voice many people understand, and so we need to use that voice and help point them to a voice that they can't yet understand: The Book of Mormon.  We did a really fun activity.  In Preach My Gospel there is a list of questions of the soul that people need answers to.  We know them and we are good at using the Book of Mormon to answer questions of the soul.  I asked the missionaries to be prepared to come and answer the questions of the soul using the Bible.  The spirit was very strong as they answered these important questions using the Bible.  For some people, as we bridge the gap with the Bible, it might then help them understand that answers are found in the Bible (the familiar voice) and in the Book of Mormon. 

Scott led a lengthy discussion about phone call procedures and other things that needed to be decided upon, and he finished up with a great training on recognizing the things you can control, the things you can influence, and the things you have no control over, and shouldn't spend your time worrying about.  All you can control are the things you can control, for instance, your obedience.  Often we spend too much time worrying about the things we can't control, like someone's agency, or God's timing.  

For the past several months, when Elder and Sister Gunnell were alone in the office, some lovely ladies from my ward stepped in and provided the MLC lunch.  Now that Sister Doig is here to cover the office, and Elder and Sister Mair are here, Elder and Sister Gunnell and Sister Mair are back to doing MLC lunches.  They prepared a delicious brunch this time. It was good to have them back.

This was Sister Gilbert and Sister Searle's last MLC. ):

I love this picture from a baptism we attended last Saturday.  The man getting baptized had first reached out online and been connected with these cute sisters serving in New Zealand. They taught him a lot of the lessons and then passed them on to the missionaries here.  Thanks to the wonders of technology, we were able to skype them in to be able to witness his baptism.  This was a great example of what we always say "we are all in this together."

For the past many, many years, missionaries who are closest to going home have been invited to attend a p day at Coloma, which is rich in history, both California, and history of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.  I have posted numerous pictures of those fun days on this blog and it has been wonderful.  As the size of our mission tripled in size last summer we wondered what to do about that p day.  We have started at 8:30 a.m and it goes most of the day.  We now have missionaries that are close to 2 1/2 hours away from Coloma, as it is on the very far edge of our mission.  Now with them calling home on p days, that adds another dimension to the many things they need to get done on that one day they have to prepare, shop, write letters, call home, do laundry, etc. A 1 1/2 -2 1/2 hour drive, both ways didn't seem like the wisest thing to do.  After counseling with our assistants and other missionaries we determined we needed to make a change in order to accommodate all of our missionaries in all parts of the mission.  In our counsel, it was decided that many missionaries come to the Capitol of California and never even see the Capitol City or downtown if they don't serve in the zone that encompasses downtown. We decided we are going to do a "Discover Downtown Sacramento" day with them this year.  I think it will be fun, but it is also a lot more work to get it going.  Scott and I spent an entire day last week figuring out logistics, what to do and where to go.  Our first group at the end of March are going to be our guinea pigs.  I hope it works as well as we are hoping it will.  

There is an exhibit of statues all over downtown right now of angels, and angel wings.  I couldn't resist this picture.

At the first of our mission, before our transfer schedule changed, we used to go to Jimmy John's for lunch every Friday before transfers, with our assistants.  We had some time between interviews and more meetings yesterday and so we went to Jimmy John's for lunch.  It brought back a lot of really good memories and made us miss some really wonderful missionaries that we had some wonderful times with at that little eating spot. 

 Last night we were able to go to a lesson with Elder Fischetti and Elder Larsen.  We went to a woman who they met in the parking lot of her apartment building.  They call her their parking lot miracle.  She was indeed a miracle.  She has been being led to the church for years, with a lot of association with members and missionaries over the years.  It was so touching to see her gain an understanding of principles that in the past have held her up.  It was also a sacred experience to listen to her heartfelt prayer.  One of my favorite things here is listening to the earnest prayers of those who are humbly seeking answers.  It was a privilege to be there and be part of that amazing lesson. 

We had a sad and humbling experience this past week.  The mother of one of our dear sisters passed away.  She had been battling cancer for the past 7 months.  This is the second missionary who has had a parent pass away since we have been here and it completely breaks our hearts.  That is the sad and tragic part of it. The humbling part came when we went to talk to her, she had spoken to her sister a few hours earlier and knew her mom's death was imminent.  This sister and her sister at home are the only members of the church in her family, and they are actually the only family they have.  These two young girls, are basically doing this alone.  She finishes her mission at the end of this transfer and as we called the church they said it was completely fine to give her an honorable release, since it was only about 4 weeks earlier than she would have gone home.  As we talked with her, she was determined to come back and finish her mission.  She had it all planned out.  She went home for about 4 days and came back on Monday, ready to get back to work and finish strong.  We had interviews with her today and she is amazingly strong.  She brought us gifts, one of which was a tea towel her mom had embroidered.  I couldn't hold back the tears, and that tea towel is something I will treasure forever.  She is an example to all of us. 

We were also saddened to hear of the death of our friend Kevin Moon.  We have lived in the same ward with Kevin and Mary Ann for nearly 30 years.  We are heartbroken for Mary Ann and her sweet family.  

We had a few visitors that were fun to see.  Our former Hermana Peterson was in town with her sister for Spring Break and we were able to meet up with her for a few minutes. It was great to see her again. She was such an incredible missionary.

We were also able to have dinner with Isaac and Morgan Ford and their darling baby Max.  Isaac is like a second son to us. He and our son Ethan have been the best of friends for a very long time, and they were tennis doubles partners through high school.  Now they are going through the accounting program at BYU together. Morgan was a good friend of all of theirs in high school.  We love them so much. Morgan's aunt, Carrie Crockett,  just happens to be in our ward and is a good friend of mine.  It's such a small world.  Isaac and Morgan have been in Portland for an accounting internship and stopped by to visit Carrie and her family for a few days as they made their way back home.  We were invited to have dinner at the Crockett's home the Sunday that they were here.  I actually got to see them first at our Sacrament meeting.  As I hugged Isaac I almost started crying.  It was almost like having Ethan here.  We had such a fun time seeing them and getting to know little Max.