More Photos from the Cincinnati Reds Game Missionary Night :) Sept 8th

Hola!

Just got the transfer call, and I am going to be staying in the promised land! Woooooooooo!!! I seriously love love love this area, this ward, all the people, and my companion! Life is great! My companion is going to be staying here as well. She thought she was going to be leaving, so she tried to get a head start on packing.. but that backfired because now she has to unpack.. haha. Well this is going to be the first transfer meeting since I have been out on a mission that I will not be going to. Thats so weird. Weither I was leaving the area or just getting a new companion every 6 weeks there was something different to switch things up. But I am so excited to be staying in Kentucky, I need a little bit longer here to pick up my Kentucky accent! ;D Haha.. but seriously.

Well as you know this past Monday we went to the Reds Game!!!! It was so much fun! I think the best part of it all was seeing everybody I know. I could care less about the game itself, but it was the people around me that made it so great! Honestly I think how I felt there is how it is going to feel in heaven when we see everyone we love again. Also the moment you get to see your family again in the airport after the mission will feel just like heaven. I am just so excited for heaven(: But I will post some red game pictures for y'all!

So we went to that gross house to do more service this week, and it was actually really fun this time. Minus all the bugs that try to climb on you, and the constant runny nose because of the stench.. but it was fun because brother Bell decided that the sisters needed to do something fun. Because the Elders have gotten to do all the big fun projects on the house thus far. So he let us tear down some walls for him with a sledge hammer!!! It was so fun! He told the Elders that they would be doing the cleaning while we ripped things apart..Tehehehe(: However I think some of the elders missed the memo, because we started to tear it down, and they took it over.. lol. Boys will be boys i guess. They ended up getting in trouble with Brother Bell for it though, it was pretty funny if I say so myself.

Last night we ate dinner at the Wardrops home. I seriously just love this family so much, they're great! So their son, Johnny, made us some butterbeer for dessert like from Harry Potter! So we decided to come up with a Harry Potter themed lesson. We used the scripture Mormon 9:22-24 and related what it said to harry potter. Afterwards they asked if they could call our mission president to ask if we would be able to stay here longer. Haha. We are staying anyways, so I guess it all worked out.

Oh Sunday this guy pulls us out of Relief Society and pulls the elders out of Priesthood meeting and tells us to follow him. So we do. We get to the library and he offers us all this old missionary teaching material, none of us wanted it though.. they said they were just trying to get rid of all the old stuff. So I ask, "Are all the books going too?"  She says, "yes." So it obviously became chaotic with a roomful of missionaries that are spiritually hungry for any extra knowledge we can obtain. So needless to say we all left the library with as many books as we could carry. they gave us boxes to carry them in because there were so many! That was missionary Christmas/heaven right there! Lol. So I will be sending a box of books home within this month sometime(: Lol. Feel free to look through them and read some if you want.

Well have a great week everyone! Love ya bunches!

Love always,

Sister Steffani Stokes

Missionaries at the Cincinnati Reds Game Monday September 8th

 sister holm 20th birthday

 Kentucky sunset

 trying to hold Teancum the hawk!

 us in the rain!

Yippy Kiayyyyyyyy!

Baseball game tonight!! WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! I am sooo stoked! We will be in our proselyting clothes still, so you will probably still be able to pin point where we are in the crowd if you watch it! Its our whole mission, so you can't miss us. So turn on the sports tonight! :D

So this week we were totally able to patched up a heart who was turned away from the sister missionaries! I guess there were sisters in the past that hurt Sister Rich(Feeling wise). But we were able to mend it up! This happened about a year ago too, so we were real excited! She is just the cutest old lady(:

Oh and we were cleaning the Bells house they will be moving into soon for some service. They leant their house to their daughters family and they destroyed it! Man oh man was that house disgusting! Luckily we are making some progress.. but here is just a little bit of what we were working with: Smudged poop on the ground(human), spiders off the wazoo(I almost cried about 100 times), dead pieces of bug attached to the clothes and whatever else was in that house, spider webbs you walked into every couple of seconds, everything smelt like cat pee, oh and can't forget the bake'n'shake meth we found in the basement. So ya, as you can imagine that was definitely the highlight of my week(: Lol. Man! I have decided from this point on that I am going to have a clean house. That is all.

We met our progressing investigators(Barb) husband this week! She wants to be baptized but wants the consent of her husband first, and so far he doesn't like the idea. However, we ate lunch with them at this mexican food place, and really worked on our relationship with him! We are really close with him, and I think his heart is starting to soften! I am super excited! However we still havent brought up baptism to him yet, because barb told us not to.. sensitive topic still. But wish us luck!

Well hope y'all have a great week this week!

Love always,

Sister Stokes

Hey everyone!

 

This past week has just been phenomenal! Today is actually a weird day, I promise I am not just being disobedient writing on a Tuesday. We switched our p-day to Tuesday this week because it was Labor day. Which means lots of families would be together(: So as districts throughout our mission we all had  a sidewalk chalk day! It was sooo much fun! We drew the plan of salvation out on busy streets and would literally walk them from start to finish through their life! Lol. It was a really successful day! We, as a mission, got 276 new gators in one day! And now we already have 45 people on date to get baptized this month! The work is definitely moving forward!

 

So the miracle person we had found this week would definitely be Daphne. She is 14 years old, freshy in high school, andis just the cutest thing ever! So we were walking back to our car from being out a few hours in the hot humid air. So we were definitely trying to get in the ac car as soon as possible, but daphne comes walking along and we met at the exact same time on the street of this corner about to each head in completely diff directions. Well of course we talk with her, and she totally wanted to hear more, so she walks us to her house where we can sit and talk for a while. We taught her Resto and she felt the spirit really strong. I asked her if she would follow Jesus Christs example and be baptized by someone holding the priesthood authority of God and she said yes! She had been looking for a church to join and be baptized in. Plus she said her family is going through a really hard time and needs this in their lives too, so she set up a return apt for us to go and teach her whole family! Woooo! I am just so excited about this family. I love her like a little sister(:

 

On the other hand, there was an investigator we were trying to go and see for an appt. Their names are Kim and Joyce. Well Joyce comes outside before we can get even to her yard and basically breaks up with us.. She said that we were basically tearing them apart and that she knows that this isn't the true church. She had been grown up as a Baptist and plans to stick with that. However Kim would literally hang on every word we told him. He loved learning about our church and I know that if we could keep teaching him he would be baptized. Even in lessons Kim would tell Joyce to just have an open mind about this, because he thinks it is true. Joyce would always say, "How do you know its true, we could be going down the wrong path by listening to these ladies.." One lesson she just got up and walked out.. I tried everything to reach out to her. She was a really sweet lady, but closed off to any other religious belief. It just breaks my heard to stop teaching Kim. I just love him. :( It just re-illustrated to me just how important it is to marry someone from the beginning who believes in the same things I do. It would be so hard to not. Kudos to those who can, you are definitely strong(:

 

Oh and of course I need to add in an awkward moment. Last night we took a district photo and the elders were standing next to me. So my natural reaction was to put my arm around the elder next to me for the picture... ya... super awk! Hahaha. He totally moved to the opposite side for the picture.. :( Lol. But we all laughed about it(:

 

Well make the most of this week everyone! :D

 

Love always,

 

Sister Steffani Stokes<3

Hey everyone!

This week has been great! We went out contacting and met this one guy in front of his house. We taught him the restoration. He said that he wasn't really the religious kind of person, but we taught him anyway(: So before I shared the first vision with him I told him that the spirit would be here and that he would be able to feel it. So I shared it and asked him if he had felt those peaceful feelings the spirit brings, and he said, "Strangely enough, yes!" I was so excited, I felt like shouting Hallelujah! Haha. I just love teaching the restoration! Well the only thing about Dillon is that we tried to stop by to see him again, but the first time we tried back he drove out of his driveway right in front of us.. literally i could touch his car without moving, so that was a little awko. Then we try by a second time and he is just walking out of his house with his little girl to go pick up someone at a bus stop, so he says try back later. We go back for then 3rd try, and he is out front just chillin on the front steps of his house. So sis Holm and I were super excited! He sees us and quickly goes inside.. So we knock on the door, his sister answers and says that he isn't home.. then we go back to the car all confused. we get in car, he comes back outside in his front yard, looks at us, sees sis Holm reaching for the door handle to go back out to talk to him, and he quickly runs inside again.. Man! I just don't understand some people. I know that he had felt the spirit in that lesson we first had with him. It was a super spiritual lesson! However he is purposely trying to avoid us. And what stinks even more is that I found such a love in this guy, brother love, and he seemed so promising. Missionary work can be ruff sometimes, but it really is the best thing in the world! I just hope someday, when he is ready, other missionaries will teach him and give him the best thing that is in all of our lives: The gospel.

Guess what?!?

I am going to a Reds baseball game in Cinci with my whole mission!!!!!!! WOOOOOOOOOOO!!! I am so pumped! President Porter just announced this at the beginning of this past week! We get to invite gators, less-actives, and one member. We already claimed our bishop! We love him(: He called us his daughters on Sunday(: Lol. So we call him Papa Park! Haha. The game is going to be on September 8th at 7pm. I am seriously so Stoked! Ha! Get it? I am a Stokes and I am Stoked! Man, every time I get into a new ward everyone sees my name and goes, "Well Sister Stokes, we are so Stoked to have you in our ward!" The funny thing is that they all think that they are being original with the joke, so I laugh and pretend I have never heard that one in my life.. Lol. Oh but something cool I came up with last night..

I am so STOKED to go see some HOLM-runs at the Reds game! Hahaha.

Something else I was thinking about recently.. I have been in 3 different areas with 4 different companions in just 4 months! Isn't that insane? I really like this area in Kentucky though, so I hope I stay here awhile. 

Well I hope everyone has a great week! I love all of you!

-Sister Steffani Stokes<3