9 down 9 to go, but who's counting?

Well honestly nothing too exciting happened this week. We had interviews with President Williams on Friday so we got to drive to Wausau for that. It was nice to actually sit down with him to get to know him better. And the interview was great, I didn't feel rushed at all, so that was nice and much different from President Cutler. 

I also burned a skirt for my nine months mark. It was so funny when we went to burn it, Grandma Rekow told us to be careful because she didn't want us to start a huge fire because it is so dry outside. The funny thing is that it had rained that morning and it is NEVER too dry in Wisconsin. We have an Elder serving here from New Mexico and he said "In New Mexico we pray for rain. Here, they need to stop praying" I was laughing so hard, because it is so true. They don't even water their fields here, or their gardens, how nice would that be? I haven't seen any wheel lines or pivots since I have been here, but there are fields of corn 6 feet high everywhere you go. 

Sometimes we get to see this super sweet 93 year old lady. She was inactive for 60 years, but she has started to come back to church now. And she is the classiest lady I have ever met. Basically think of Audrey Hepburn when she is 93 and that is this lady. She always talks about her days of playing the violin and waltzing. She is always giving us tips on how to look young and what products to use, she is hilarious. This week she said in a very serious voice "girls, I have to ask you something, what does hashtag mean?" It wasn't that easy to explain it to a 93 year old. But I think she got the idea.

All of the people that we are teaching are doing well and are progressing, so that is great. We are just trying to find new people to teach now, so that we still have people to teach after these people are baptized. We have a recent convert working toward the temple so that is exciting. Hopefully I will be able to go with her. This nine month drought of temple attendance is going to kill me. We figured out another thing that CTR stands for, Current Temple Recommend. Even if the temple is too far away for you to go often, it is still important to have a recommend, and to be worthy to enter. I love the temple to much and I am so grateful for the peace that is there, and I am so grateful for the priesthood power to bind families together forever. I hope you all have a wonderful week! 

Love, Sister Koyle

Here's to nine months! #halfway #Doesn'tFeelLikeIt 

Don't worry Mom this was my companion's old skirt that had holes in it

I had my very first kids meal this week, so that was kinda fun.

I am on a Quest!!

So we had a stellar zone training this week, a real kick in the pants. I needed it so bad, and I bet everyone else did too. The Sister training leaders shared this poem with us and talked about how Obedience is our quest. How the world puts limitations on things and tells us that we can't reach our goals, but with God nothing shall be impossible. All we need to do is have the faith, because God works according to our faith.  

"To dream the impossible dream

To fight the unbeatable foe

To bear with unbearable sorrow

To run where the brave dare not go

To right the unrightable wrong

To love pure and chaste from afar

To try when your arms are too weary

To reach the unreachable star

This is my quest"

This week we were going to set a baptismal date with this 16 year old kids for sometime in October, but when we asked him when he wanted to get baptized he said before school starts, so he set his baptismal date for August 27th, so we need to teach him all of the lessons before then. But that was a total miracle! We were so excited. The 19 year old kid that we are teaching is really progressing as well and he had so much real intent and desire to be baptized, we are aiming for the 6th of August with him if we can teach him all of the lessons and get him interviewed by then. And the 16 year old girl that we are teaching wants to get baptized in September, we just need her Dad's permission and his heart has softened, he has let the missionaries in Fond Du Lac come over twice now. So thanks to the Lord miracles are happening, we don't have many people to teach but the ones that we do have are AWESOME. I hope you all have a wonderful week.

Love,

Sister Koyle

 Sorry this picture is awful, but this is the Shawano Ski Sharks. Sometimes we watch them on Monday's when we have nothing else to do. In this picture there is a tower of 6 of them on water skis, it's pretty cool.

Nature is a miracle.

​a member showed this to us, I thought it was pretty cool.

Wisconsin is a wonderful place . . . if you can withstand the mosquitos

Well honestly this week has not been very eventful, besides the fact that I counted 16 mosquito bites on my legs. I guess I am going to have to start wearing bug spray instead of perfume. All day yesterday we literally tried to contact every less active and former investigator that we could, and no one answered their door. So that was interesting. We did have a really cool miracle this week though.

Last week at church a member told us about this less active girl who has been going through a lot of hard things and she is ready to come back to church, but she doesn't really know any of the doctrine because she was just baptized at 8 years old and that was it. So we contacted her and her husband let us right in, they are thee sweetest couple. And they both really want to be taught and they both want to come back to church. And he isn't even a member yet, so hopefully we can get him baptized. 

Also there is a man who we have been teaching and he hasn't really progressed too much because his wife is anti, but this past Wednesday we got his wife to come to the church to do family history and they were able to find some good leads on her family history, so she is planning on coming back in a couple of weeks to do some more. Their son and daughter also came to the church and they both played capture the flag with the youth and we were able to give a Book of Mormon to the son. So that was pretty exciting. 

On Saturday we had a young woman come out with us because she wants to serve a mission and it was so funny. We were walking around the baseball park giving out cards and talking to people and she was just super freaked out, like she couldn't believe what we were doing. Then we tracted for a bit and when someone accepted an offer to pray with us she squealed, I think it freaked them out a little bit, but they still prayed with us :) We also helped a part member family with service and it was SO FUN! We basically just got to play in the dirt, and pull out weeds and vines and little stumps, I loved it so much. I hope you all have a super great week! 

Love,

Sister Koyle

This is what we eat for dinner every night . . . JK

They have nice sunsets here.

​​The Church oh Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is even on the welcome to Gresham sign.

So grateful for Religious Freedom and that I am serving in the states.

This week has flown by, so I guess that means that it has been a good week. It is weird to have P-day on Tuesday. I can't really remember what we did this past week. It was the end of the month so we were walking a lot. Friday we drove to Madison for three hours had a 2 hour meeting with President Williams and his wife and then ate dinner and drove home, so that took up the whole day. It was good to meet him though, he seems like a nice guy and like he will be good for our mission. Over the pulpit he said "do you think I'm nervous? ABSOLUTELY!! (with his hands in the air) But whom the Lord calls he qualifies." I took a lot of good notes from him, but I don't have them with me now. I remember that he said that a mission is a defining moment in life. That the decisions that I make here will affect the life that I will have after my mission. I thought that was really cool, and it really struck me. I need to "choose the harder right" as President Monson says. It is really cool because mission presidents spend like four days with the 12 apostles before they come out, so he was basically a spiritual power house because of that. He said that he and his wife really want to get out with the missionaries and actually do missionary work which is really cool. 

On Saturday Gresham had all of their festivities, so we street contacted before and after the parade (the only day of the year that you can street contact in Gresham) It was so nice to actually be able to have people to talk to about the gospel. We got to watch the fire works out of our bedroom window that night. Yesterday Bonduel had all of their festivities so we went to the Bonduel parade and the after party at the park and we contacted people. Again so nice to actually have people to talk to. We found a few kind of promising people. It is hard because almost everyone knows about the church already from unreliable sources. But that is why we are here, to try and straighten out some of those misconceptions, and to show people that we are nice people.

We had a super solid lesson with the 19 year old guy in Gresham. He is still praying about baptism on August 6th. We read 2 Nephi 31 with him and we related the gospel of Jesus Christ to golf, since he is a golfer and in verse 9 of that chapter it talks about the straitness of the path, and there is a Golf course that he goes to called The Whistling Straights. We have to have the faith to swing. Strait spelled that way means a narrow strip of land, so we have to follow that narrow strip of land until we make it to the hole, AKA endure to the end until we make it to the celestial kingdom. So it has been a good week. I know God answers prayers, the answer isn't always what we want to hear, but he does answer. I hope you all have a great week! 

Love,

Sister Koyle

P.S. 1 Nephi 13 17-19 totally talks about our independence from Britain, the Book of Mormon is amazing. What can I say more?

 We went fishing last Monday with a part member family and I caught this tiny Blue Gill, it is the first fish that I have ever caught with a fishing pole . . . but it was tiny so we had to throw it back. I also caught a tiny perch . . . that we also threw back.

But the people that we went fishing with gave us all of their fish, so we brought them home to grandma and she taught us her ways of butchering fish or whatever you call it. So I got to skin this bass. It was super fun, I would probably do it again.

Friday we drove three hours to Madison, to meet our new mission president. So we decided to stop by the capitol for a bit, because why not? I like Madison, it is a nice city, I wouldn't mind serving there in the future, just sayin.

AAAAND Happy Fourth of July!! Once again, my favorite holiday, good thing I am still in the states or else I might go insane.