week 41: we are the PINKWASHING sisters

In missionary lingo, "pinkwashing" means the elders left and we took their spot. So we know nobody and are starting over fresh in the area. Fun times! My new comp is Sis Hartley. She is from California and has been out 13 months. We are also STL comps, so we stay busyyyyy! We live with Hermanas Holt and Nicol from Springville which is sooo fun and Sister Jones(my exchange comp from vernal) is serving in Provo too! Lots of fun friends nearby which makes being out of Vernal slightly less sad. :/

Speaking of Vernal, we said our final goodbyes on Tuesday to all our friends there. Leyla is all ready for baptism this week and it was sad to leave knowing I probably won't be able to go back for it. She is so ready and will be a great addition to their YW! Menio was a sad goodbye because we just barely started teaching him again after he was gone for forever! We even met his mom when we said goodbye who made us homemade cheese and quesadillas. Sad we couldn't teach them both more, but I'm praying he gets baptized in the near future! Another reason leaving was harddddd!! 

We are teaching one kid here named Nathan...wait sorry WERE teaching, we'll see how that goes. We taught him and his family the restoration on Thursday and he was super involved in reading and both he and his mom answered all the questions we asked. The dad was a little off though and didn't say much, but whatever. We ended the lesson and Nathan was excited to read more of the Book of Mormon and the mom invited us back again Tuesday when they get back from Moab. We were excited until we met their bishop on Sunday. The first thing he asked is if we heard about Nathan. Apparently his mom had called the bishop to let us know the dad didn't want us to come back because he wasn't ready for his son to be taught. What the?! The bishop told us to still go over tomorrow even if it is just to talk and also invited us and them over for a BBQ this weekend, so we'll see where things go! Fingers crossed and prayers up for the dad's heart to be softened!

miracle: We were knocking doors on Friday and finished our list, but had time to hit one more. I looked at the map and felt drawn to one dot in specific for a kid named Johnny Tuttle. We knocked and his grandma opened the door excited to see us. She asked if we we had just chosen their door of ward members to knock and we told her we were looking for a Johnny. She told us to sit on the porch and then just unloaded all the tea on us. Long story short, J's mom had just passed away from a long-term illness and lots of other stuff came into play but she and her husband had been praying for a way to help the kids out and bring the gospel more into their lives. And not 24 hours later, we showed up. Talk about inspired revelation! Apparently the kid's hearts are a bit closed off now because of their mom's history with the church and her passing, but the mom had wanted all her kids baptized after she passed so we know it'll happen with time. We are planning to start slow with some family game nights and dinners and then start helping Johnny to learn more. The whole family situation is a bit cray cray, but I know that the gospel will truly bless their lives and I am excited to see that happen over the next few weeks! 

This week, one of my favorite people in Vernal passed away. Paul Justice was in a mountain biking accident last weekend and experienced serious injuries that led to him in the ICU in Salt Lake. He was there for a week before he passed away on Friday morning. That was a HARD call to get from multiple missionaries that evening spreading the news to everyone that had served around him. He was seriously awesome and I am so grateful for the last 6 weeks of his life that I was able to spend serving with him. I was kinda shaken up about it and talking with my comp about how he didn't deserve to go because he was just so awesome. He was doing such good missionary work and his ward and neighbors needed him! But as we talked it really hit me that Heavenly Father had a plan for each of his children. Bro Justice is needed in heaven to be a rockstar missionary in the spirit world and to help up there. As hard as it is to lose loved ones, I am just SO glad I get to study the plan of salvation and teach it to all our friends! I know that Heavenly Father has a plan for us and for our happiness. This mortal life is not the end and one day we will get to meet our Father in Heaven and Savior Jesus Christ someday! 

love y'all!! sister dougall :)

Laser Tag selfies with Rick

ELDER THOMAS YOU LEFT THIS UNDER THE BACK SEAT ON PURPOSE YOU DIRTY DOG! our ugly blue car smelled RANCID!!

Menio! <3

The cooler half of the district that pulled up for temple pics on P-day

Andysaurus...

Attacking Miller with hugs bc "I Wuv Her"

Good reminders

Temple pic with the district

Leyla!!

Goodbye to rainbow *cough* Chelina haha

OK but this temple sunrise made not running the Pioneer Day 5K slightly less sad

9 meses!  halfway what?!?

RIP to the 9pm porch meetings with Hatch and Cranston 

Cuddling up with Cosmo the Cougar

UPM is the best UM!

(Utah Provo Mission is the best Utah Mission)

week 40: somos las hermanas SIN ENERGIA

hola amigos !! 

A week of absolutely no energy since I can't keep anything I eat down. No bueno, but a funny story for y'all! On Wednesday, we were driving home from a lesson with all the windows down jamming to music. All of a sudden I yelled, "Oh no! It's coming!!!" as I threw up all over the side of the car and into the backseat. It was so unexpected and I was just laughing sooo hard trying not to cry. We called the elders to get a blessing and in the call they made a joke that one needed to work on his 6 days to sexy before going home. He asked for advice and the conversation went something like this:

E Cranston: "yeah sisters, I gave up on that. working out is basically the worst thing ever."

Me: "just use my technique and throw up absolutely anything and everything you eat!"

C: "okay well umm that sounds like an eating disorder." 

It was sooooo funny and you maybe just had to hear it in his voice, but it def made throwing up a lot funnier in the moment. Send sick memes though haha!!

Anywaysssss, before that whole endeavor, we finally taught our friend Menio ("carcarjear" guy) the restoration this week when he got back from his 3 week salt lake trip! We recited the first vision to him and he recognized it from reading the first bit of the Book of Mormon!!! He also basically taught himself the lesson because as Hermana Miller struggled with her Spanish, he corrected her along the way and said half the points out loud back to us. I told my comp she is pretty big brained for that and should use her learning to our advantage haha. Menio came to church and loved all our friends in the ward! Hopefully we can get him on date tomorrow in the next lesson. 

We also taught José, our friend that just showed up to church on his own last week. Right when we showed up, he started asking questions about the Book of Mormon. He flipped to mid alma so he was mega confused haha. We taught the whole backstory and then went through the gospel of Jesus Christ to answer more of his questions about baptism and the sacrament. He had lots to say, but told us he could feel burning in his heart and tears in his eyes. The spirit baby!!! When we told him that and that he could have that feeling always with the gift of the Holy Ghost with baptism, he told us it was something he really wanted. He wasn't ready to accept a baptismal date, but is going to pray this week and find an answer for himself. Sadly we won't be there to hear his answer in the next lesson, but he is so awesome and ready to learn all that he can!! 

Transfer news came Thursday and it is less awesome this time! Hermana Miller and I are both leaving Vernal! Mega sad!! I am being sent to an Provo (in English...tearssssss!!!) to be an STL for 3 weeks before I leave for England. I'm not super happy about that and miller isn't happy about leaving vernal for Roosevelt either. I know it will all be good, but yeah bummer summer. I do get to live with Hermanita Holt though which will be fun!! 

Milagro: We had exchanges this week and I got to be in my area with Sister Clement. We were knocking doors in a trailer park and saw a Spanish family walking inside with their groceries. I was hesitant to talk with them because a few days earlier the dad had been really weird and tried hiding behind a bush when we talked to them. I felt a push from the spirit to go talk to them and just told myself myself dad was probably at work. We talked with the kids and they invited us in to talk with their grandma. Sis Clement speaks Chinese, so I led the whole conversation as we shared a scripture and prayed for her. She had been visiting from México and teared up as we talked. The spirit was so strong and I was so glad we had followed the prompting! Awesome, but the story gets better!! We leave their house and get in the car to head to our next lesson with a guy who worked for a ward member and had asked for us to come over. We put the address in the GPS and it was the SAME HOUSE WE HAD JUST WALKED OUT OF!!! There are NO coincidences!!! Sadly, he was not there but I know it all happened for a reason and the Lord was sending us as an answer to his mother in law's prayer!! Love being an instrument in the Lord's hands! 

Pensamiento Espiritual: In our lesson with José, he told us something that really stood out to me. His best friend growing up, Ruben, was a member of the church in Mexico. José knew Ruben was a member, but not once was he invited to church or to read the Book of Mormon. When he moved to Utah and had friends invite him to meet with missionaries, he was overjoyed! He told us that he wished his friend had just once given him an opportunity to learn more. What a crazy thought!! We live our lives as examples to others. They know we are members(or maybe they don't) and we are an example always!! But do we ever think to invite our friends to the things we do without hesitation? I want everyone reading this to pray about one friend that they can invite to church, to read the Book of Mormon, to come to FHE or a church activity, it can be anything. And who cares if they say no?! You never know where it will go unless you INVITE!! Buena suerte and let me know if anyone has any awesome missionary experiences!! 

les amo muchísimos! cuídense, Hermana Dougall :)

Exchanges with Roosevelt sisters!!!

Christmas in July attempt...the Trump flag was the winning white elephant gift haha

Using my mask to nap in the doctor's office lol

The Aggie bull!!!

Our pass along cards for papusas worked!! (sadly I couldn't eat the papusas but I'm going back haha)

Goodbye to the Lambs (the boot family)

USU Uintah Basin (ignore the Utah shirt ewww)

Razor rides with Eduardo

All our friends in church :))

El guapo mott y fam!!

week 39: somos las hermanas VAQUERAS!!!

Hola a todos!!! 

For all my gringos, a "vaquera" is a COWGIRL!! The Vernal rodeo (5th hugest in the US!) was this weekend and we popped in for one night to talk to some country folk. We didn't have the best luck with the Hispanic community, but it was fun to see even a little bull riding, team roping, and mutton busting! It def made me want to come back here next summer to watch the whole thing!! On Saturday, we were telling a member we had gone to the rodeo and so he of course asked if we had stayed to swing dance after to which we laughed and said "we wish!!" His wife was a country girl back in the day and had a bunch of cowboy boots she doesn't wear and said we both needed new pairs for our next rodeo if we ever wanted to find ourselves cowboys haha. She sent us both home with a pair of cowboy boots on the spot (and mine are brand new!!)! Man, the people here are TOO KIND!!! 

Monday was a special all day zone p day bc of the 4th, so we went to Roosevelt and spent all afternoon with with zone playing sports! Ultimate frisbee, kickball, dodgeball, spikeball, kanjam...it was a blast and I love our zone! We also had MDC with them this week, so now the Uintah basin zone is tighttttt! Alsooo the elders have been hitting us w pranks, but we ATTACKED them good! I could leave a fat list of how we got them back, but that'll be for another day... but lmk if you need prank ideas bc I got mucho ;)

On Wednesday, we got to do baptisms in the vernal temple with our friend Steicy!! It was amazing!! The vernal temple is teeny, but so beautiful! Steicy told us she had been struggling recently with some mental health stuff, but being able to go to the temple helped her to feel the spirit and feel the Savior's love for her. I was so glad to be able to go with her and see her spirit lift in the house of the Lord. That is the best place to be during hard times in life and we were so happy to be able to be there with her!! 

Our Friday weekly planning session was speedy as we had to drop basically half our teaching pool. We can't seem to get in contact with our friends because of crazy work schedules, summer vacations, their own religious beliefs holding them back, multiple people moving, or their lack of commitment keeping. Super bummer summer, but we are praying that our freed up schedule leads to miracles finding like it did at the beginning of the transfer. We also had a big focus as a zone at MDC on how we can be more obedient, level 3, consecrated missionaries the day before and took that into our comp inventory. We made a list of ways we can be more all in and focus on giving our all to the Lord's work. We've got one week left of the transfer and praying for miracles to find the elect out here! 

MILAGRO: We have been on the struggle bus trying to get our friends to come to church with us this whole summer. We set a goal this week to focus on WHY they weren't coming and saw mega miracles. We had 4 friends at church!!! Yahir was excited to come see the friends he met at sports night in church the next day, Eduardo made us go to an hour of his evangelist Christian church but then happily came with us, Jose came with his friends Hector and Trino who are the bestttt lowkey fellowshippers, and we had a guy come with his GF who wants to be baptized. Crazy!!! All I can say is...MIRACLES!!!! 

AND speaking of miracles, Moroni 7:37! With faith, we will see miracles. But there are 2 parts to that. First, we need to have faith that miracles will happen. Trusting in God that he will bless us by placing his hand in the midst of our lives is key. And second, we need to have faith to see miracles as miracles. So many people mistake miracles for coincidences or luck, but in reality we are just always completely surrounded by miracles! God truly is among us!!! 

Bueno, Hermana dougall :)

Zone Sports

Uintah Basin Zone part 2

Elder Stone!! (just missing Elder Thomas)

Vernal Temple with Steicy!!

Rodeo Cowgirls

Elders thought they could prank us haha

Saturday sports with our franzzzz

8 months in the field

week 38: somos las hermanas BUSCANDO (LITERALMENTE on the hunt)

Bueno !

Happy 4th of July!! I've have God Bless the USA stuck in my head all weekend, so I hope everyone blew some stuff up and swam lots for me!! 

This is a story you're gonna want to read mis amigos! It all started out on our crazyyyy Thursday night!! We were knocking doors with our friend Chelina and got a call to go to a chapel where a Hispanic guy was waiting for someone to come help him. We went over there immediately, but he was gone. We gave the lady a call back and she said she had given him money to go buy food, so we said a prayer and then drove around town looking for a guy in all black named Trent. After an hour peeking in 7/11, the bar, the rec center, and the temple grounds, we decided we probably needed to get home. We went to the chapel one last time and, lo and behold, he was outside by the AC units eating dinner!! We got his story (basically traveled from Kansas to SLC to Vernal by bus/foot and was just looking for some guidance), called up the bishop to help out, and then taught him about the Book of Mormon. Also we don't always have English book of Mormons on usually, so #MILAGRO that we had one that night!!! All Trent could say about the entire evening was, "oh wow!" over and over again. We went back to the chapel the next morning to bring him some breakfast and teach him the restoration with the elders (sadly had to pass it to them bc Trent is NOT Hispanic, but from Micronesia!!!). He told us that he had slept poorly and woken up at 3am to read the Book of Mormon! He told us he felt so much comfort and peace and after reading to Lehi's dream, he could finally sleep again (haha kinda memes on the story I know). He loved everything we taught him and when we invited him to be baptized on July 24 if he found these things to be true, his response was, "Why would I not?" Right?! It was literally legendary!! His original plan was to spend a night here and head to Denver the next day, but after meeting us and getting some help, he is planning to stay and work here for our WML and live with another Micronesia family in the elder's stake. The Lord is working mighty miracles in this guy's life!!! Keep him in your prayers por favor y gracias!!!! 

We had exchanges with the STLs and I got to go work in the Uintah Stake (my old area in vernal!!). We planned to teach one of my friends, Derek, but sadly he wasn't home. Instead, we dropped in on a couple of my other friends to say hi and it led to some awesome miracles! We stopped by Hannah Rich (we used to knock doors with her) and she wasn't home, but called us after so excited that I was back in Spanish because she has been bunch of Spanish friends she has been waiting for good missionaries to visit!! We're going to go visit them this week with her yay!! We also visited the Breen twins and they were also gone (bummer!!), but talked with their parents and little brother. Bradley gets baptized next spring and invited me to come if I'm home (fingers crossed!!) and their dad is now working in vernal so he can hopefully start being taught by the sisters again! Let's go!!!  

4th of July weekend was a BLAST! We had morning district sports and right after I ran loops around the 5k finish until I hit the 5k and earned a sweet dino medal haha. We went to the parade and got to watch with our WML, then wandered the streets with our friend Eduardo introducing him to anyone that called out to us(He told us we knew everyone and I said it's just bc of the missionary tag, to which he replied, "I need one of those!" I said, "You gotta get baptized first!!" and he told us on the DL he is not about that oof). We spent most of the afternoon and evening at the park talking to people, having a BBQ with a ward member, got our nails done, and played some volleyball w a family of an RM that got home this week. At 9, we ran home to change and then went back to the park parking lot to watch the fireworks from on top of the car while on a video call with our STL. It was seriously such a fun holiday!! 

other funnies:

-people are setting me up left and right out here in vernal-I'm only going to England, not going home!!

-i got my hair stuck in the fan when I attempted to use it as a blow-dryer

-more luck at sports night and had 2 friends come this week...we do better at that than getting our friends to church oof

-helped clean the NASTIEST home I have ever seen this week and I almost threw up multiple times

Milagro: On Monday night, we had another lesson with our friend Angie. She said her week had been rough with so much going wrong with her marriage, her job, home life, and on top of that, her dryer just stopped working so none of her clothes were clean. After sharing a message and inviting the elders over to give her a blessing, we left and promised we would find her some help. We called our friend Brother Justice to tell him the situation and he goes, "you're kidding! my neighbor is giving away a dryer for free!" We were shocked!! And the next day we go help a family move and they're giving their dryer away too!!! So we had 2 dryers for Angie! When we called to tell her we were bringing one, she was speechless and told us she felt so blessed by the gospel! Facts!! It was awesome! 

President and Sister O'Riordan are officially down under back in Australia!! We had interviews with President and Sister Hendrickson this week and they are amazing. Sadly no aussie accents, but it will be great to serve with them for the next 6 weeks before I get my 3rd mission pres haha(also their fam is all huge runners so that's cool!!). Something I liked that President shared with us after kneeling to pray at the start of district council was that, "Dropping to our knees leads to miracles." It's facts! The first vision and restoration of the church is a mega miracle from kneeling in prayer! It may not always be that way, but I can promise you that Heavenly Father hears and answers our prayers when we pray sincerely. The Lord is waiting to bless us with miracles, we just have to ASK! So my challenge to all of you is to kneel in prayer this week and pray for miracles and then look for God's hand in your life. He WILL answer your prayers and you WILL see miracles if you look for them!

les amo mucho!! Hermana Dougall

District hike to Red Fleet

El sombrero for Hermana Miller's 6 months

 Ice bottles for dinner

The YSA here are bomb and made us cinnamon rolls for date night!

The elders have been acting fishyyy

4TH OF JULY!!!