Taking on Tacoma: Happyyy Week After Thanksgiving!

Hello everyone!

I hope ya'll had a greattt Thanksgiving week and ate as much as your stomachs could possibly hold!

We had a good week! Lot's of stuff happened. I don't remember Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday. Nothing too exciting must have happened. I just remember that it was cold. I add more and more layers every day.

Thursday was Thanksgiving! My Thanksgiving was good! We got to spend the day visiting members and we were able to come home at 8! So, I wasn't stressed out about being late to knocking or anything. Also it was beautiful outside all day...the sky was clear and the sun was shining, and there was frost everywhere! It was so pretty and happy outside. We drove around and gave thank you cards to members of the ward and then we did some weekly planning. We then visited a less active family and talked to them a bit and ate a snack. Then we went to the Popes house. We were only supposed to stay at members homes for 3 hours but... we ended up staying for 4... I just am not good at telling members that we have to go. That's something I have to work at. But it was really fun. Brother Pope is hilarious. He's the one that gave us the rebellious candy bar. He kept saying "What's your mom's phone number? I'll call her and tell her happy Thanksgiving." I wouldn't let him, but I told him that he could text her or send her a picture of us. He sent a picture of S. Philippi to her family and it said "Hello! We are having your daughter for Thanksgiving. She realized that in Washington we eat Oysters for Thanksgiving!" and she likes seafood so they texted back "I'm sure she's in heaven eating oysters!" (Sister Philippi is pretty gullible and it looks like she came from a gullible family!) Haha...it was funny. We didn't eat oysters. We had the normal Thanksgiving food. We also visited the Giffords, our adopted grandparents and they gave us some delicious hot chocolate. He said the trick is to double or triple the amount of chocolate it tells you to put in. Haha. Brother Gifford and I are kindred spirits.

We also decorated our apartment Thursday night because we had a whole extra hour at home! So we put up a tree that is kind of lopsided. It fell on top of Sister Philippi while we were putting it up... haha that was funny. It also came with a Barbie doll (Ken) inside the box. I don't know for sure why it was in there, but we assume it's meant to go on top... so that's where he is.

So that was our Thanksgiving. It was nice.

On Friday we went on exchanges. That was pretty fun. I got to leave the area. So I didn't have to make any decisions or think or worry or stress for a whole 24 hours! It was great. I went to Elma/Montesano with Sister Sasser and Sister Baxter. Nothing too exciting happened. It was kind of like going on vacation. I just felt SO relaxed. Haha.

On Saturday we had some great lessons. We finally saw Renee again and she wanted a blessing. She finished the Book of Mormon and KNOWS that she needs to start coming to church and preparing to be baptized, but it's still a scary change for her.

We also had a lesson with the Bradshaw family. We spent a whole lot longer there than we planned to but the whole time we were there we were just answering their questions. Sadly we ended up staying there through dinner time... so we just had to go straight to knocking and it was really cold and we were really hungry.

So we went knocking and then visited our ward mission leader afterwards. We asked him for food, and thank goodness they had just made dinner because we were reallyy hungry.

On Sunday we went to church. It was 20 degrees outside when we left... Very frosty and very cold. The Bradshaws came to church! And they LOVED it! Brooklyn, the 7 year old, is so sweet. She carried a Book of Mormon around and tried to read it during Sacrament, she also loved finding the hymn every time we sang. She followed along and by the last verse was able to chime in and sing with us. At the end of sacrament she looked at me and said "Your church is so fun!" So cute!

We ended up eating 2 member meals on Sunday... that accidentally happens occasionally and we'll normally try not to let people know, but they found out... sigh. We had a "lunch" at 2 and then dinner at 4. So I was pretty full when we started knocking.

Anddd that was our week.

My spiritual thought is just going to be to go watch the new Christmas video, "A Savior is Born"

https://www.mormon.org/christmas

It's really great and the little African kid is super cute and it reminds us to think of our Savior.

We've been sharing this video with everyone we can, and it just reminds me that we need to think about the Savior, who is the real reason for the season. :) I'm going to try to study the Savior in my studies this month. And you should too. Because He is Awesome, Wonderful, our Friend, Advocate, Redeemer, etc. And Christmas will mean a lot more as you ponder Him. :)

Well, I hope you all have a great week! Stay warm! Remember who you are and what you stand for!

Lot's of love,

Sister Warburton