Always winter never Christmas....boo!

Sister Chadburn and I roasting in front of Parliment

Top Picture:The cool cowboys:Jeffrey and William

3rd Picture: Too short again! Elder Meza let me stand on his bag so I could see the view

Hello!

So this past week has been crazy weather wise. Last week it was in the upper 30's and today it is -2. I will never understand Canada. Boo! Last P-day we were roasting our brains out. No coats, no boots, no tights. It felt like summer. Now we're bundled up like snowmen again. Hopefully, conference and Easter bring us tidings of great warmth.

So we had transfer calls this weekend and I get to stay here in Dows Lake!!!!! Yay! I'm so excited, I get to see my lil' Jeffrey get baptized!!!! It's going to be incredible. Sister Chadburn and I literally screamed on the phone....the zone leaders weren't super jazzed. It's going to be another great transfer in the beautiful city of Ottawa. No complaints here:)

This week my comp and I did a lot of bus contacting and there was this cute little special needs couple. The boy was talking to his girlfriend and he kept calling her his "plump juicy little pear" I was nearly dying the whole time it was too funny. I wrote it in my planner like wildfire, because I didn't want to forget it. I'm going to use that one someday:) Got to love bus contacting:) Really the bus is like a sitcom waiting to happen.

Speaking of bus contacting we had somewhat of a miracle happen last week. Sister Chadburn and I decided to take a bus out to the Fallowfield area (about 45km away, Ahhh miles no km I'm becoming a Kanook!!!). We like distance buses because it gives us more time to have a solid conversation. Well, the first bus we got on was a total bust. There was a couple fighting and so the whole bus was silent as the grave. So we hopped off on a random spot and decided to take another bus. We hopped on that one and everyone on that bus was about as friendly as a cactus, so once again we hopped off. We were nearly dying of laughter at this point, because well we're in the middle of siberia and everyone is super grouchy. Well, we get on another random bus and again no one wants to talk to us. I kind of spaced out for a minute and then this kid walked up to me and I realized the entire bus is empty except for me, my comp, him, and the driver. "You're going to want to get off. This is the last stop." He looked at me like I had antlers on my head. So we scramble off that bus and while we're lingering at the bus stop waiting for the next random bus. I notice he's watching us so I tell my companion "Whatever bus he gets on,we're following." Creepy right? Well that's my job:) So, we follow him on to the next bus. Guess who I end up standing next to? Oh yeah. Only problem is I'm having a really hard time striking up conversation because a) I was just rejected a lot on the previous buses b) I just obviously followed him onto this bus and c) he would not stop staring at my tag. Then randomly he pulls out a notebook scribbles something on a paper and stuffs it into his pocket. Now who's creepy. So my comp and I get off on a random stop and he follows us off. "Sisters." Okay if anyone addresses you as "Sisters" you can assume a) they have been taught before or b) they are a member. He handed us a paper with his contact info and introduced himself. "I want you to teach me." That's the sweetest words to a missionaries ears.We decided that meeting Blair that day was nothing short of a miracle and we know that good things are in store:)

This week while studying the BOM I've realized how often we read about hearts. It's really quite often. We read about soft hearts, hard hearts, pure hearts, desires of our hearts, sobbings of our hearts, pierced hearts, the list goes on and on. It's made me think about king Benjamin's people who had no more desire to do evil but to do good continually. We coin that as a conversion. But what causes our conversion? I would suggest after this week it's the quality of our heart. The Lord knows if something is felt in our hearts it really doesn't matter what our heads say. I pray that this week as you hear from the prophet of the Lord you listen with your heart. Allow the spirit to soften, to pierce, to purify your heart so that you will have no disposition to do evil,but to do good continually and only then can we say we are truly converted.

I wish you the most beautiful, warm, inspiring week. Scatter sunshine all along your way:)

Love,

Sister Perkins

Wow! 6 Months Already!!

This picture is on the bus back from Montreal...and it pretty much sums up my companionship with Sister Chadburn.
This is why I pray every day that I won't weigh 2000 lbs when I get home. Sister Chadburn is the best cook evah!!!

So pretty much that is my week in pictures. Life here in the CMM is good. We have dinner appointments coming out of our ears, my companin is a nut who I love dearly, my investigators are angels. The weather is beautiful!! So yeah, no complaints.

One thing I would like to share is something I learned at mission conference. Elder Packer's son Alan Packer came to speak and he talked about how learning the language of the spirit is the same as learning Spanish or French. He talked about how we don't need to just learn the words the spirit uses but the culture the spirit operates in. He counseled us to pay close attention to the thoughts that come into our minds and use them to discern the will of our Father in Heaven. This reminds me of how in Jacob when Sherem tries to shake the faith of Jacob he cannot because Jacob tells him "I have heard and seen; and it also has been made manifest to me by the power of the Holy Ghost." We can't wait to feel the spirit we need to be seeking it, so when the Sherem's of the world come into our lives we can say as Jacob "I could not be shaken."

In case you remember this week marks 6 months of my mission. They have been the most beautiful 6 months of my life and I know that I owe every single blessing I've experienced to the Savior. This time on my mission has been like a dream and I feel like the Lord has given to me in abundance.

Don't forget we talk of Christ and we rejoice in Christ. I pray that you have a beautiful week.

Con mucho amor,

Sister Perkins

Hello!

Hello!!!

So this week has been gorgeous here in Ottawa. It's been around eleven degrees( I think the conversion is like 50 degrees) which feels like summer time for us polar bears up here in Canada. It's been beautiful! This week has been crazy crazy, but oh so good. I love mission life! There isn't much more I could ask for at this point, except maybe more investigators:) But life is good here in the CMM. Let me start with the most exciting story.

Sister Chadburn and I have been working on our contacting skillz, but for some reason everyone thinks we're super creepy and as soon as we start talking to them they run away. Sometimes literally.So this last week we tried our hand at bus contacting. As soon as we got on the first bus Sister Chadburn started talking to this cute little YSA aged Korean girl and I'm sitting there and this lady looks at me, "Sooo, what's new?" This caught me off guard because usually I'm the crazy lady who starts uncomfortable conversations. "Ummm, well we've been having really nice weather." Then she started telling me how she spent her whole morning looking for this art gallery and couldn't find it. I asked her if she was an artist and she told me that yes indeed she was. She was in fact a "whimsical artist". Apparently I looked interested/confused because she spent 5 minutes telling me about her painting of a giraffe that is in a space ship that has landed on planet Earth and now her job as the artist is to help him figure out why he's here. We'll my crazy radar started going off, but my companion was still having a pleasant conversation with ther little Korean friend. Well, then my friend tells me she's going home to watch a movie. "Oh yeah, what movie?" "Well, I actually love wrestling. So I'm going to go home and watch wrestling tapes. I'm working on a painting for the wrestlers in Ottawa." If the first painting wasn't insane this one certainly was. She told me she was working on a painting of the "persona of a wrestler" which apparently to her is a butterfly and a dragon? It was weird, at this point I realized my companion was done so I stood up and said, "Bye!!!" Don't worry she invited me to her art show this weekend. Too bad that we're going to be busy. I was getting worried about my book "People I meet on the Bus" because it's been a while since I met a crazy on the bus.

....we've been helping this lady clean her house. She's actually a hoarder. Her house is a disaster. We helped her clean it last week and then when we came back this week it was even worse. I almost died. I will spare you the juicy details of what we found, just know that I have never seen so many disgusting things in my life! It was terrible. So terrible that even the "professional" cleaning lady she hired left. She walked in and said "I'm sorry I can't deal with this." and walked right back out. The whole time I just kept thinking "What would Sandra do?" Te amo mamita:) It was quite the experience.

To answer some of your questions. A day in the life of Sister Perkins consists of waking up at 6:30, getting ready, doing studies from 8-11, lunch, teaching/going finding/hanging out with the crazies. Once a week we also get to volunteer at the local homeless shelter which is actually super nice. The people are very kind and it's a blast. Let's see...food. The food here is pretty normal. The most bizarre thing I've eaten so far would be poutine. And that is basically french fries covered in gravy and cheese. This weekend one of our Chinese members made us a dish called a hot pot. It's basically a soup but they don't eat the broth. They throw in all kinds of meat and veggies and then they dip it in a peanut and seasame sauce. That was really good:)

This week I was reading in Mark 7:54(I'm on track to finish the 4 gospels by Easter) It's a part of the Bible when the Savior and his disciples are sailing into Genesaret and the people come to the shore.What I loved about this verse was that it said 'Straightway they knew him." The Savior has just landed at this people immediately know it's him. They run through the whole city to get the sick and afflicted because they know him. This really hit me. How well do we know the Savior? Are we like these people or are we more like the Pharisees? Would we know the Savior immediately if he walked into a crowded room? I testify that the Savior knows us, He loves us. And more than anything he wants us to draw near unto Him. He really doesn't care what you've done or who you have been. He wants you to come to know Him. I testify that as you come to know Him, your burdens will be light. And you will literally feel the arms of the Savior around you. This feeling has only happened to me a couple times on my mission, but I can tell you that I know he was there. I love this gospel. I love the scriptures. I love my Savior and I know he loves me and you.

I hope you all have the most warm and delightful week! Don't forget that General Conference is just around the bend! It's time to start praying for answers to those questions. "Ask and ye shall receive." Eat your veggies! Brush your teeth!

Con muchisimo amor!!!!

Sister Perkins

This week we met with Jeffrey on Thursday and it was as alway amazing. Jeffrey told us that before he came to Canada he prayed that God would help him find a church. Well, we met him two weeks after and at first I wasn't sure that it was going to go anywhere, but he's made so much progress. I'm happy to say we comitted him to be baptized on April 6 which is a great day if you know your church history:) It's going to be incredible. I just hope I'm still here. Sadly April 6 is the week after transfers:( Pray for me.

Ma-ma-ma-march!

Well, dearlings this week we are using the wonderful computers at the Ottawa Library. We have exactly 15 minutes to write and then the computer kicks us off. It's pretty epic. We usually have computers at the church, but this week the internet is down. Oh the glamorous mission life:) Before I forget HAPPY BIRTHDAY ISRAEL!!!! And a late one to baby Nixon too! Iz I love you so much you are the best brother a girl could ever ask for. I'm pretty sure this is your year, it's going to be a golden one. Nixers, stop getting so big. I need you to stay a baby until I get back, por favor:)

First thing I would like to address: Mother I am not dying of cold. It's been a super mild winter. In fact once it's starts hovering around zero I get really toasty. Also, we have a car so really you can't complain too much. It's a fancy shmancy car which makes us even more spoiled rotten. And my companion and I make tea and panela(colombian hot drink) every day. It's a beautiful thing.The blessings of being on the Lord's errand:) Trust me I'm healthy, happy, and warm.

This week we spent the majority of our time dropping people:( That is probably the worst part of being on a mission. I hate having to drop, but at the same time I realized this week that I'm here on the Lord's errand and my job is to invite others to come unto Christ, if they don't want to accept then it's time to move on. Acutally, did I say I hate having to drop people? Well I did at first and then all of the sudden it was almost like I was overtaken with drop fever. Let's just say that the number of investigators we have left we can count on one hand:) Yeah. We could use your prayers:) The exciting thing about dropping is we have a lot of time to do knocking and finding:) Let me tell you we've met a lot of crazies. We knocked into this guy and his friend Andy. Andy didn't actually talk his friend(still don't know his name) did all of the talking. He would say stuff like "Well, Andy and I believe blah, blah, blah." I kept thinking why doesn't Andy tell us what he believes, chief? And then he went into this whole analogy that Christianity is like a cellar full of different types of jam and that is why there are so many different religions. I was literally biting my lip the entire time, because that was the Cah-raziest explanation of the apostasy I have ever heard. I'm going to write another book when I get home called, "People's Interpretations of the Bible: A foodie's journey." We've actually made knocking into a game, we try to guess where the drug smells are coming from:) Mom don't freak out. Canadians are harmless they don't even own guns:)

Can I just say how much I love our Chinese investigators/members? They are incredible! Everytime I feel blue one of those little guys pops in and just makes me so happy again. They are my little angels. Our little Ami Jeffery has been progressing a lot lately. I can't even explain other than it's that change of heart he literally has no more disposition to do evil, but to do good continually. It's really one of the most beautiful transformations a missionary could ever hope to witness. He texted us last night to tell us that he wants to help us teach other people about Jesus Christ, so we could call him to help us with our lessons. It was pretty incredible. They are just the sweetest little things and I wish I could just take them with me everywhere.

Last night my companion and I had the beautiful opportunity to attend a baptism for the Spanish group that our Riverside Elders help with (the infamous Elder Meza and his new comp Elder Shaver). The baptism was beautiful and entirely in Spanish. Oh mi corazon! I was sooooo happy to hear/talk to those little latinos. Such beautiful people! Mom I promise that by the time I get home I will speak Spanish and if I don't...I'm going to fake it really well:)

So this week before we dropped everyone and their mom, it should be known that Sister Perkins gets really bad anxiety when it comes to dropping people. I'm always worried that I didn't do the right thing. But then I realized that if we hold on to people who aren't progressing we aren't showing the Savior that we have faith he will provide those who can progress. Last night we watched the movie "Finding faith in Christ" with our sweet little Jeffery, Comet, William, and Shu-ling, and there was a part that really struck me. There is a leper that comes to the Savior and says, "If thou wilt thou canst make me clean." The phrase really stood out to me because of course the Savior could heal this man, but this man was humble enough to recognize that maybe healing wasn't the best thing for him. The Savior and the Father can do anything, but as the scriptures teach prayer isn't to change the will of the Father to but to teach us to align our will with His. So, what really hit me was that I don't need to be praying that the hearts of these investigators will be turned, but that whatever the Lord does is because He knows it will be for my best. So, really what we should pray for is to be humble enough to accept His answers when they come.

I love the gospel of Jesus Christ. I love that He has given me a shot at being a missionary. I'm not always amazing at it, but I can promise you where I lack He makes all of the difference. I have been blessed a lot. My companion is so sweet and makes me laugh all the time. My little itty bitty flock of investigators are incredible. My family and friends back home are the best. I really couldn't not ask for more. I love you all. May the Lord bless you.

Love,

Sister Perkins