7 months already!?!?!?

 Hello hello! This week was good! Super busy and good! Hope you are all doing amazing and seeing the Lord in your life! 

HIGHLIGHTS:

• AMELIA: This week was so exciting for Amelia! We were able to put her on date and we are starting to prepare for her baptism! We are so excited! She is so ready for baptism and we are so excited that we get to continue helping her prepare for this covenant! Keep her in your prayers! 
• DAVID: We had two amazing lessons with our new friend David! David is very open to the idea of religion and has really enjoyed learning and experimenting. We are continuing to meet with him and he is so willing to learn which is such a miracle in Washington! Pray for him!
• EMLC: We had EMLC this week and it was so fun! It is always really exciting for me to see all of my friends at big meetings! A lot of my friends are serving in the south end of the mission so I don't get to see them very often. I got to see a lot of them this day! It was a really good EMLC! This time they really focused on testimony building more than other things and I loved it! President and Sister Mann are just the best and I love any chance to hear from them. 
• 7 MONTHS: I hit 7 months this week! It's crazy! I genuinely still feel like a new missionary and like I just left the MTC. Time flies by so quickly as a missionary and I am so grateful for the time I have had to serve! I cannot wait to see what is in store! 
• EXCHANGES: This week I went on an exchange with Sister Craner! She is an amazing missionary, I learned so much from her! We met some really nice people and had a lot of fun. We also met a very mean guy, which I'll talk about next. 

LOWLIGHTS:

• MEAN PEOPLE: People here can be very mean to us missionaries. They are very closed off, like they don't even talk to their neighbors, and they're especially closed off about religion. So they really don't like us. This one house had a really funny soliciting sign. We thought about it for a minute and decided it was okay to go knock it anyways. And we were very wrong. This man was very angry that we knocked on his door. He made us read the sign and then yelled at us that we couldn't comprehend and we were disrespectful. Then he screamed at us to get off his property and used some colorful language. But it taught us a lot and was very much a learning experience. 

SPIRITUAL THOUGHT:

This week I have really been focusing on the power of prayer. Missionary work is hard and sometimes it feels like prayer is your only outlet. And this week I have really recognized that prayer is powerful! While studying this week, I read a talk from Alan T. Phillips. In the talk he says "whatever the need and wherever you are, pour out your heart to your Heavenly Father". I love this! Pray is an opportunity for us to truly pour out our whole heart to God. He wants to know what we are going through and wants to help us, all we have to do is talk to Him and ask! I invite you all to reflect this week and recognize ways that prayer has been powerful in your life. And I would love to hear what you learn! 

I love you all and I am thankful for your constant support! Have an amazing week! 

-Sister Stringham