Month: August 2024

On Tuesday, we had a lesson with our friend Andy and finished up the lessons he needed before baptism. We had a lesson with our friend Jackie, who's a funny lady! Then we went on exchanges! Sister Budge came with me to Winston and Sister Chatwin went with Sister Blake to Sutherlin. 

Wednesday was fun! Sister Budge is so sweet and genuine. We had some lessons with some members and visited people. Then we invited a ton of people to Andy's baptism on Saturday! We went to Young Womans and played a game with some chairs in a circle. My shoes have no grip and a kid ran into me as I was about to sit down. This dad did a total dad move and grabbed my chair and my arm so I didn't fall over. Everyone was laughing so hard! 

Thursday was fantastic! I got to be back with Sister Chatwin!! I honestly don't know how I'll every be able to have another companion. We got up and went to interviews. My interview with President was really chill. Then Sister Chatwin and I got some BBQ for lunch. We headed back to Winston and went on visits with a member. We had a lesson with Andy to introduce him to the bishop. Then we went to a relief society potluck. 

Friday was pretty good too! We went and helped a member pack up. We went to a less engaged members house and had a good little lesson. We also went to a friends house. It poured rain all day too and it was so nice! 

 On Saturday, we went and visited people. Then we went to the stake center for Andy's baptism!! His baptism went smoothly. He looked so happy when he came out of the water and the Spirit was so strong. He texted us afterwards and told us that he was so happy that he was baptized! 

Sunday was awesome too! Andy got confirmed at church. It was so sweet! We did some weekly planning and had dinner with some members. It was fun! 

It was so cool to see the Lord helping us this week! Every roadblock and thing that could go wrong in preparation for Andy's baptism seemed to go wrong! It was in my moments of frustration that I turned to the Lord in lots of prayer. We were able to get everything figured out and he was baptized! The Lord will make things happen when you put in your every effort!

Love,

Sister O'Barr

On Tuesday, we started off by making cookies for a bunch of our friends. Then, we went to a members house and had a good lesson. We had dinner with this sweet lady. She made tuna melts and put extra cheese on it. Sister Chatwin doesn't like cheese so while our member was in the kitchen doing something, she pulled the cheese off and me, being the kind companion that I am, stuck it on my sandwich and ate it. We were laughing so hard! It was hilarious! We then had a good lesson with our friend Jackie. She is so funny!

Wednesday was a party! We had Sister Lyons with us. She is a service a missionary in Sutherlin but she really likes us and wanted to come spend the day with us. We went to drop off the cookies we made. We visited with one less-engaged member who has a bunch of puppies. We had a good time playing with the puppies. We had a few good interactions and little lessons. We had a lesson with our friend Andy. We are meeting with him 3 times this week because he's getting baptized next week and we needed to cover a few things. The lesson went really well! We dropped Sister Lyons off and headed home!

Thursday was a blast! We got to go to the temple in Medford! I love the temple! I love how much joy and peace I feel while I'm there and afterwards! Medford has quite a bit more shopping there as well so all of us sisters went to REI, Trader Joes, Bath and Body Works and Target! It was so much fun! We also went to Chickfila! The whole day was a party. We drove back to Winston and had a lesson with Andy. He is so ready to be baptized, its awesome!

On Friday, we got to visit with a ton of members since a lot of our lessons canceled. One member had chickens and gave us eggs. They even let Sister Chatwin hold a chicken! It was so funny to watch! Its funny how it seems like there is always some member in every ward I've served in that has chickens and gives us eggs. We were feeling a little discouraged since so many lessons with our friend had fallen through but on the last house we visited, we were finally able to catch these less engaged members at home and had an awesome little lesson with them! 

It rained all day on Saturday!! We needed the rain so bad. There have been so many fires and its been so hot. The rain cooled everything off. We went and helped a member pack up her house. One of our favorite members has been sick for the past month so we really haven't been able to see her. But we finally were able to go over! She is doing so much better! They invited us over for dinner and we were there for way too long but we were laughing so much and having a good time. They gave us blackberry pie and it was so good! We had another lesson with Andy and finished planning a few things for his baptism. 

Sunday was good! We went to church, then did some planning and such. We had dinner with a fun member family! We were there for way too long but its so hard to leave when you are having a good time! 

Something that stuck out from my personal study was in 2 Nephi 5:27

“And it came to pass that we lived after the manner of happiness.”

The Nephites were happy because they followed the commandments and loved God! We can be happy too when we keep our covenants and continue to follow the Savior! I hope you all have a great week and are able to find happiness!

Love,

Sister O'Barr 

On Tuesday we had zone conference in Medford. We carpooled with Sister Maile and Sister Bills. The drive was fun. The sisters slept in the back and Sister Chatwin and I just had a blast talking. Zone conference was really good! We had some good instruction. We ran to Chickfila and got frosted lemonade! Then we drove home and went to a lesson. It was a super fun day!

On Wednesday, we were busy. We went and visited with a couple of our friends. We had a lesson with some old ladies from the ward that can talk for hours. I was trying so hard to stay awake. We had dinner with the sweetest old lady. She's a widow and lives by herself. She made so much food! She said it was a salad type of day so she made macaroni salad, regular salad, and coleslaw with marshmallows in it. It was a fun time! We went over to Young Womans and a member in the ward who's a doctor told us all about first aid. We met up with Sister Bills and Sister Maile for exchanges. I went with Sister Maile to Garden Valley, which is right in Roseburg. 

Thursday was wild. Garden Valley is a spanish area so the sisters have been working on their spanish and trying to find spanish speakers to teach. We spent our morning doing language study, then we went to a bunch of different grocery stores to put up flyers for an English class they do. We stopped at Chipotle for lunch, then went and visited some members. We had dinner with some of their members. We went to the english class and no one showed up but this one guy. He only spoke Spanish so him and Sister Maile had a whole lesson in Spanish and I just sat there. We exchanged back that night!

Friday was good! We had a couple lessons fall through but we were able to meet with one of our new members and one of our friends.We visited a bunch of records we had. We had dinner with some members and they made what they call Big Mac tacos. I've had so many random foods on my mission. Its so fun!

Saturday was pretty good too. We went and visited a bunch of less-engaged members and had a couple little lessons. We had a super early dinner with some members, then we went to this less engaged members house. She is the sweetest lady ever!! She was telling us all about these duplexes she had built, hoping that missionaries would be able to live in them, but they were too big. She was so kind and we had such a good conversation with her. 

Sunday was pretty chill. We had church, then did our personal studies and planned the week. Then we went to Roseburg and met with Sister Maile and Sister Bills to do an NMT split. We had a meeting with the stake president, then back home for dinner. We met with our relief society president too.

Today is interesting. We had to do missionary work all morning, then at 1, we were able to do pday stuff. We are going to the temple on Thursday, so that'll be fun! We are going to hit up Chick-fil-a again and Trader Joe's. I'm so excited!! 

In my studies this week, this quote stood out to me from President Ezra Taft Benson:

“Daily, constantly, we choose by our desires, our thoughts, and our actions whether we want to be blessed or cursed, happy or miserable”

Heavenly Father's plan of happiness gives us the choice to choose! Happiness is our choice! How can you choose more happiness this week?

I hope you all have a great week! Love you all!

Love,

Sister O'Barr 

Tuesday was Sister Chatwins birthday!! We went and visited with one of our favorite couples, the Wilburs. They are so cool and so sweet! We had dinner with the bishop and his family. His wife made a strawberry shortcake and it was so good! We had another little lesson with a super sweet lady who we've been trying to get baptized for so long! She's adorable though. 

Wednesday was crazy! We had MLC in Eugene. One of our sets of sisters needed a new car so we went and exchanged cars in a parking lot so we could drive their car up to Eugune and trade it in for a new one. We also met with some STLs coming up from Grants Pass and they hopped in our car to carpool up. MLC was good! We drove back to Roseburg but stopped in Sutherlin to go on exchanges with those sisters. So we dropped Sister Chatwin off and picked up one of the sisters, Sister Blake. We dropped the Grants Pass sisters off at their car, then ran to Winston for a quick lesson, then back to Roseburg to exchange cars back with the other set of sisters. I got to drive our truck and it was so fun! I really liked it. We came home and ate dinner, then met with the elders quorum president to talk about the less engaged members we are working with.

Thursday was good. I was on exchanges with Sister Blake in my area. She is brand new to the mission. We went and visited some members and had some little lessons. We exchanged back, then Sister Chatwin and I went to dinner with the coolest lady. She was a member, her husband wasn't. He wouldn't let her go to church for 30 years. But he died a couple years ago and she said she tries to never miss a Sunday now. She told us all about how she kept growing her faith and trusting the Lord. It was so cool to hear her story! She took us to feed her sheep and cows afterwards and it was a party! We then had a lesson with our friend. 

Friday was crazy! Everything we had planned fell through. Our 2 hour service and every lesson canceled except for dinner. We had to completely replan our day. We went over to a less engaged members house because she is amazing! She is working on coming back to church and she was telling us that she just ordered a new temple dress and using it as motivation to overcome some addictions. She also just got two adorable puppies! We sat and played with them for a bit and it was so fun. We had a lesson with one of our new members. She is so fun! We were visiting people in this gated community and this car rolls up next to us and we both thought we were able to be kicked out. Turns out it was a members husband and he said his wife would love a visit from us, so we went to their house and had a fun little visit with her! 

Saturday wasn't the best. We both kinda lacked motivation and the smoke was so bad. It was also so muggy out. Everything we tried to do and everyone we tried to visit didn't go through. We were able to visit a member who's 80th birthday it happened to be! That was awesome! We also visited with a super sweet less engaged member who lived in Alaska for 10 years. She has a bear skin in her house and it was awesome! We had a good little lesson with her. We went to dinner at this cute diner and got some good burgers. 

Sunday was decent. We went to church and met with our relief society president. We then visited with the basher guy. We probably aren't going to continue to teach him. We had dinner with a wild family with a ton of kids! Then we planned the week and hada couple calls.

Even though part of this week was a little rough, I've still been able to find so much joy and am growing from all these experiences! I've been reading in 2 Nephi 2:2 and this verse stuck out to me: 

“Nevertheless, Jacob, my firstborn in the wilderness, thou knowest the greatness of God; and he shall consecrate thine afflictions for thy gain.”

Everything works out in the end and will help us grow! I hope you all have a fantastic week! 

Love,

Sister O'Barr