This week was exciting because
we had a meal every single night!!!
Also, I was going to bring my
happiness journal and remember my week through that, but I failed so here it
goes from my very terrible memory.
Biggest news is that Jake
wants to be baptized. His mom is a member, dad is not, and he turned 9 a few
weeks ago. He is the cutest kid. And we talked to them a few weeks ago about
him getting baptized so we were finally able to get in there and talk to him
about coming to church and getting ready for it. He is so excited. We don't
have a date set yet because we have to make sure he's coming to church
consistently first, but the whole Ward is very excited for their family.
A 16 year old has brought his
friend Hunter to church the past 3 weeks and he texted us last night asking if
he could be baptized February 6th!!!!!
Unfortunately The Elders are the
ones teaching him, but he still loves us more and he is a special and awesome
kid.
There was a baptism for the
1st Ward that we got to go to and it got all of us missionaries pumped to make
that a weekly thing to happen :)
New Years Eve we went to a
party at the church for adults only, then went to the family party at somebody
else's house. That was the first time I've ever wanted to stay up late at
all. They had this really fun game called "What's yours like?" My
siblings, Nate, Jon and Shelby, Josh, Noelle and Rachel: YOU WILL LOVE IT!
It's sad that the Holidays are
over but it's also nice because people are back in town and back to a regular
schedule and are willing to talk to us again.......well, as much as they've
ever been willing to talk to us :)
So, let's talk about something
for a bit. Being a missionary is like, really REALLY hard. And no one really
tells you that. All you hear is how wonderful it is and it's the best years of
your life because you're completely focused on other people.
News flash. That's
hard.
You're pretty much told what to do in every aspect of your life, you're
NEVER ALONE, people expect you to act a very specific way, and all you want to
do is curl in a ball and watch Disney movies just once to relax your mind so
you don't kill anyone.
Missionary angst. It's the worst.
You can't go running
to de-stress, there's no blasting fun music and dancing to get a change of
pace, there's no zoning out for an hour to empty your mind and re-fresh. The
solution for everything is, "Go to work."
But, sometimes you just
really don't want to. And then your feel bad for not wanting to and then you're
even more stressed and angry at yourself for being a lame missionary. And it's
a continuous and vicious cycle. Like anything, you can stifle it for a day or
so, but it always comes back and gets ya.
So you have to do ridiculous things
late at night to make you laugh and feel a bit better (don't tell Sister Maddox
I sent these.......she will kill me).
Maybe it really is just me.
Because no one else seems to say stuff like that. All you hear is, "I'll
never listen to anything other than Hymns again!" Or, "I'll only
watch Church movies for the rest of my life." And last (my personal
favorite), "I don't want to go home! I want to be a missionary
forever!" Either I'm just way off the worthiness and righteous spectrum,
or they're lying.
I love being a missionary. And I love being on a mission. But
I am glad this experience will be over one day. And that's all I have
to say about that.
We were walking down the road
when I saw a name plaque in the front yard of a beautiful home. We had already
talked to a man outside who was visiting his parents from North Carolina. I
stopped and said, "Sister Maddox what does that sign say?!?!"
"What sign?"
"That sign!"
"I DON'T SEE A SIGN! Oh I
see it. WHOA!"
So we ran to the door and
knocked and met the wife of Mark Packard from North Carolina. She never said
her name but we took a picture together.
We're all descendants of Samuel and
Mary who came in the 1600's. She was excited. I'm excited to go back. I'm ready
to meet some family! I don't know why I'm so surprised. I know this is where we
started out.....It was just cool.
-Sister Packard
Best:
1. Saturday morning nerf gun
wars with the Givens family.
2. Baptisms!
3. Nothing brings more peace and
joy in my life than reading from the Book of Mormon daily. I encourage all to
try it.
4. I didn't get scared to
death from noise for New Years. I slept right through it.
Worst:
1. A spider. I threw the phone
and ran, smashing my elbow. Our District Leader just laughed and laughed.
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