Planting Grass and Old Lady Sass

Hi loves!

My highlight of this week was getting to plant grass and mulch for Holly this week! Love her, love mulch, love crazy little boston terriers!!!

We got to do more tracting this week and I didn't realize how much I would miss tracting, but I did! We met some cool people in a trailer park, I love trailer parks! They have so much potential!

On Wednesday we built a baby crib. This is the 3rd bed we've built, and by we I mean Sister Pankey, I just handed her the tools and held stuff :) That night at our lesson the person we were teaching cut a hole in the side of his house... yeah, he was trying to cut out a pipe and missed. Why he needed to cut a pipe right before a lesson, I don't know, but hey it was pretty funny!

Thursday we helped set up a yard sale and BUILT ANOTHER BED, cuz that's just what we do I guess. Later on in the day we felt like we needed to change our plans and so we visited some folks. We got into contact with Ashawnta again which was crazy because it's so hard to do that! It was meant to happen! Also, funny thing, Ashawnta's name is actually pronounced Ashawnt-e. This whole time we've been saying it wrong and nobody wanted to correct us because they didn't want us to feel bad! Well now I feel worse! Hahaha ha ha! We contacted Temyha and met her brother- he is funny! And we got to talk to this really sweet gal who has such a strong testimony of Christ. Seriously, she knows she is in good hands and that nothing is accomplished without the Lord's help. It was really cool! I was like, "can we just take you around town to talk to people?" she would be fire!

I know I'm skipping days, but on Saturday we went tracting again down this street by a park and we met the Boom Squad. Apparently the movie 'Drum-line' originates here. Anyway, we talked to the director of the group and he was very passionate about what he knows about our church (which was not entirely correct but we listened patiently) and I think we were on that street so we could meet him. We didn't get to say much, but he wants to hear us out and set up basically a return appointment. He's black, and many people are still hurting and holding onto when people of color could not hold the priesthood, including him. Even though he's not a member.

We don't know why they couldn't hold the priesthood, only God does. Honestly, I think it was just a huge trial of faith for us as a people to overcome. The 'Be One' broadcast that we had a few months ago was amazing and I seriously encourage you to watch it if you have been struggling with this whole priesthood thing as well, or if you just want to watch something beautiful because it gave me chills!

I got to hold some chickens on Saturday too because we went to visit some new members and they had all these Rhode Island reds and I held their rooster! I have issues. I miss my chickens!

Another funny thing (honestly there's lots but I can't remember many of them at the moment) was that sister Coomes, this wonderful great-grandma, smacked this ginormous wasp with a piece of paper all the while saying "shoo" "off you go!" This sucker was as long as my thumb and all kinds of scary warning colors and she slapped him around like a boss lady!

We visited another wonderful older lady who we have had the most difficult time tracking down, because she kept getting moved, but we finally got to meet her! Sh'es beautiful! She's 83 and looks like a goddess! And she was so sweet, her spirit was so strong it would just hit me! I teared up several times while she bore her testimony and told us about her experiences with the church. I told her how powerful her presence was, and she just smiled at me, what a delight! I wanna be like that when I'm that age! She gave us some advice about marriage too. She was like, "if they're too nice, look for something wrong!" and "some people get married for the looks. Don't look." and I don't know, for whatever reason that was super profound to me. But anyway, so blessed by the people we get to meet here in Evansville!

That's all I remember from this week! Y'all are amazing, wonderful, beautiful souls and you are beacons out in this dark world. Light will always prevail against darkness! You are POWERFUL and you are a force for good! Have a great week, love y'all!

With love,
Sister Wilcox

I Don't Really Know What to Put Here Cuz so Much Happened...

Hey y'all!

First off, I'm emailing at the church because my tablet crashed due to some kind of update from our parental-control missionary app- I am not happy! Oh well!

So Sister Pankey and I are staying together for another transfer! Seriously was not something I would have predicted, but here we are! We'll go all the way to October together, OCTOBER! Feels so far away and yet it's not! I'm glad we're still companions though because with all the madness that hit the fan this week I could not imagine bringing in a new missionary to this area just yet.

Umm, I can't remember anything before my birthday, so yeah. On my birthday I got bombarded by all these cute packages from my family and I felt so spoiled! Love them forever! We got taken out to lunch to Red Robin and McKenzee made me this amazing chocolate strawberry cake, love her and I'm so sad she has to go back to Utah! The summer sales team is wonderful and they have helped us missionaries out far too many times than I can count. They are gonna have major blessings!

We visited a referral we got from HQ and they were this cute older couple. The wife said she already had a church, but the husband kept asking all sorts of really good questions, so we got to teach a little restoration lesson right there and it was all a girl could want on her birthday!

Thursday before we had our little district council thing, sister Pankey and I did our rounds to the bathroom. Well, upon opening the door to the restroom, this smell hit us bad and I thought someone had left a diaper in the garbage. But then I thought, "man if somebody's pooped on the floor..." and then I looked around the corner and THERE WAS A TURD ON THE FLOOR! Who does that?!?!? And then my companion was like, "you know, as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, if you see something that needs to be taken care of, it's your responsibility to take care of it." and I just could not argue with that. I put on some latex gloves and cleaned up that poop y'all.

We helped Sadie, a member in our ward who does literally everything, with some baking one night cuz she sells baked goods at the farmers market. It's super cute! Anyways, she had these fake nails on that she got from being a part of a wedding (which sounded like being part of a nightmare) and when we were done baking she was like, "guys! I'm missing a nail!" and held up her fingers and sure enough one was gone! And that's how we spent part of our night trying to find a fake nail in multiple batches of cookies! Woo! Yeah, we didn't find it so she just turned all the cookies into cookie butter.

Saturday night we found out that Temyha, (cute gal who was stuck in Illinois for nearly the entire transfer) was finally home and we could go see her! We went out and bought her dinner to take to her and it was getting kinda late and it was also in this sketchy part of town so we were a little on edge... and the house looked totally quiet. Sister Pankey was not having that, but I was like, "let's go!" We went to knock on the door when we heard from behind us, "those are my church people!" and here comes Temyha on the back of her dad's scooter riding up the street! It was one of the greatest moments of my life, not gonna lie! We finally got to meet her in person and she wanted to go to church the next day! YAAAAY!

Sunday is where it gets crazy. Sister Anderson was down for picking up Temyha so they all came to church and that was great! Temyha looked a little sick though. Meanwhile, we were trying to coordinate a ride for our other people we're teaching, Alan and Amber, to go to the Newburg ward because they start at 11am and that's the only one they could make it to. I had to write a talk that morning (because I had forgotten all week) for sacrament meeting, so that was fun. Temyha threw up a little bit before the meeting started and sister Pankey and I were panicking a little, but she said she was fine. In the middle of sacrament meeting Temyha and sister Anderson leave and I was up in the stand like, "what?" afterwards sister Anderson returned to tell us she had taken Temyha to the hospital! She went and picked up her mom too!

The madness continues. Sister Anderson needed to go pick up Temyha but she only had the family car (oh by the way I cleaned up throw up outta the car too because I wasn't about to let sister Anderson do that) and her husband was there so he could take the kids home, but she needed a ride for Temyha! So all three of us booked it around church trying to find somebody who had a spare minute while also checking in on Amber and Alan (who were currently in sacrament meeting at this point) and it was just nuts! Finally this guy said he could do it and we all drove to the hospital and found out Temyha had a cyst! The poor girl had only been home for 24 hours! We got that all figured out though, and sister Anderson is Wonder Woman I've decided. Such an amazing woman that one is.

The member who was super generous with his Sunday (brother McMann) was telling sister Pankey and I that his wife had felt prompted to ride separately that morning. And, he just moved into the ward 2 weeks ago! Hope this wasn't a bad first impression! But seriously the Lord was watching out for us all! Blessings!

Then we hustled on to church again and made it to take Amber and Alan to gospel principles and Amber to relief society, Sunday was great!

It was also funny because in my talk I spoke about how sometimes we have to deal with the "ox in the mire" on Sundays and all the day long sister Anderson and sister Pankey were like, "does this count as the ox in the mire??" why yes, yes it does. Glad my talk left an impression! Actually, people kept complimenting me on my talk and I felt so bad that it was a 'flying by the seat of my pants' kind of talk! I guess I should be grateful.

That's all I remember folks, love y'all! I don't have pictures because first off, my tablet is M.I.A. and second, I don't actually think I took any pictures. Whoops!

Have a fabulous week!

With love,
Sister Wilcox

Welp

Hey,

So this week was interesting. We played soccer for our dstrict p-day and that was crazy cuz it was so hot! How are there athletes in the summertime?? It's death I tell you!

The beginning of the week was rough, but I finally feel like I am coming to understand things. That's all I want to say cuz I don't wanna to put negativity into this email! Okay maybe one negative thing but it's pretty hilarious now, it wasn't at the time though. So our elder trio got us milkshakes and it was the nicest thing they could have done, but sister Pankey wanted to take a picture of her milkshake and she DROPPED IT ON THE CARPET and it exploded! It was super sad, but now I just laugh! Also, anybody know what else I can do to get milkshake outta the carpet??😂😂

The end of the week was great though and we had a lot of fun times! Man are we a crazy companionship! Transfers are next week people and I can't say I know what's gonna happen, cuz anything could happen so I'm trying not to think about it...

We have built some crazy relations with our ward members, like one of the new members who never really talked to the sisters started texting us every now and again some random stuff. I think he likes us? Oh! So one time we texted him (his name is Bryan) and asked him if he made it to the other ward's sacrament meeting, the Newburgh ward, and he responded with, "I don't wait around for Newburgh. They got captured with a stove pipe... During the Civil War." And we just didn't know how to respond to that! We found out last night that that is a legit story about Newburgh which means Bryan probably has all these fire comments and jokes and they have been going over our heads because we are IGNORANT. 🤣🤣🤣

There's a member, Sue, who wants us to come over and bake some bread with her, and sister Holly called us up this morning asking us what color we want our hats to be because she's crocheting us hats!!! Oh and sister Jenks wants to bake me a cake for my birthday and sister Andrade wants to throw me a party the next day cuz we found out our birthdays are right next to each other! So it's just gonna be a lot of cake and craziness and I just love our members!

Also, random but, we have been visiting the church at night a lot and I'm sorry but it gets so creepy and dark in there so every night sister Pankey and I flat run out the side door through the parking lot! We're ridiculous I know, but if she runs, I run, you know? 🤗 Speaking of running, the other morning I ran during our workout time because I felt like I could do it? People, this does not happen for me so I don't know what's gotten into me!

Oh and I think I have chiggers... haha bye! It's from all the weeding probably, so yeah. Vicks is apparently supposed to help get rid of them so I bought some today, I just can't catch a break with the creepy crawlies! And all the weeding has seriously made my gloves smell like weed. No joke. It's bad!

I hope you know you are loved, you are appreciated, you are good, and that you are enough! Elder Lamereaoux of the elder trio says that to us all the time😊

I love and miss y'all so much! A girl couldn't be blessed with better friends and family! Have a wonderful week!

With love,
Sister Wilcox😘

Some of these are from 2 weeks ago, can't remember if I sent them or not? Oh well! District lunch and p-day and exchanges!

Plant People Find Other Plant People

Hi loves!

Another week, another month and oh my gosh y'all I'm turning 20! Ewwww!😲

Also, today is district p-day and we're playing soccer, so I might not get to everyone... again.

We have been swamped with work! It's been fabulous! There are so many people to work with here, and I didn't realize how much until well, yesterday. I did a ton of yard work and I'm in heaven! Sister Pankey admitted that she's been using me as an 'in' to get into members homes!😂 I'm okay with that! Just tell them you love washing dishes and pulling weeds and all the doors will open!

Our man Gabe, who we've been teaching for 2 weeks decided he was ready to set a baptismal date and he is already cracking down on the things he needs to do to get ready! He is just amazing and he has been so worried that all we wanted were the numbers, but we told him that it doesn't matter if he's baptized here, or in Utah, or a year from now or whatever and he totally relaxed and it was just such a Spirit led lesson! Like, that's the most confident I've ever felt teaching a lesson, because I wasn't trying to be the one teaching! It's all about channeling the Holy Ghost and it's taken me 7 months to sort of get it!!!😣😣😣

Oh and last week was the county fair and I was SO UPSET that we didn't know until after p-day!

Anyway, we had exchanges this week and guess what??? I got to go on exchange with sister Wilcox!!!! I was higher than a kite! I got to go to her baby area, Mt Vernon! I absolutely loved it and I loved the members I got to meet, and yeah. It had the same vibes that Woodhaven had and I flipping loved Woodhaven! It was a blessed land, not that Evansville isn't cool too... It's just different. I would totally love being shipped off there. So Sister Wilcox and I partied it up! Man I love her.😊

Umm, oh yeah! So Sister Pankey really wants to do more spirit tracting and we picked a couple roads and prayed about them. One I picked was called Spirit Trail and I just felt like we should go there. We got onto that road and it turned into a gravel drive enclosed with trees and sister Pankey was panicking cuz it looks kinda sketch. Then it opened up into this cute garden area with cute little lodges and we were both confused. It was an Arboretum! Sister Pankey was all "nope!" Meanwhile I was like "let's go try this house!" This cute old lady answered  and we talked, then she mentioned how they won't be getting a whole lot of volunteers with school starting and all, so we asked if we could come do service and she said yes! We're giving her a call today to figure out a schedule, but it was so cool and it's going to be such a great opportunity to serve her!!! Plant people everywhere I love it!🌿🥀🌱

And Ashawnta came to church with her family and her husband was the one who was like, "let's go to church!" It was the best, Sunday was awesome!

Well I love you all and I hope y'all have the greatest week ever!

With love,
Sister Wilcox❤💕❤💕❤