The Yellow Canary

Hello little pumpkins!

And HAPPY BIRTHDAY, JACLYN! Holy smokes! I'm so grateful that you are my sister. I hope that one day I can be just as funny, smart, and amazing as you are. Plus I think your one cute mama! Thanks for your love and for just being incredible. I love you!

Today is one lovely fall day. Incredible. I walked outside and just had this giddy feeling. It's fall. I'm in Canada. I'm a missionary. And I'm serving with my best buddy right now. The Elders took us to the most beautiful farmer's market in the world and we got a whole bag full of beautiful fruits, veggies, and raw honey.  Life could not be sweeter. 

This was a very silly week. We had a dinner appointment this Tuesday with the Athanassi Family. It's two sisters and a brother who all live together from Lebanon. It should also be noted that they are in their 60-70's. The dinner was very formal. We had a big fancy place setting, 3 courses, fancy elevator music while we ate. The works. It was a very normal, very fancy, very quiet D.A. We were getting ready to leave after we finished our spiritual thought when brother Athanassi asked in his beautiful Lebanese English "Do you want to get to know the house?" So we said sure and went on a tour of every single knook and cranny of their home. We saw all three bedrooms, the bathrooms, the living room, the food storage room, the water storage room, the office, the sewing room, and then the D.J/Dance room. Yeah. D.J. room. complete with lights and loud speakers. So brother Athanassi puts on some ballroom music and turns off the normal lights and puts on his sweet Christmas lights. Then he says, "Do you want to hear some Quebecois music?" And do you know what he turned on? Club music. And he started dancing like a crazy. Then he turned on some Lebanese music and more Quebecois  club music. The whole time Sister C and I were on the verge of dying from laughter. It was the funniest thing to see. When we left our stomachs hurt so bad. And that is how the most normal D.A. became the best D.A. 

So, apparently there was an earthquake this week. Guess who slept right through it? Yep. Me and the Honeyhead. We got a phone call the next day from a member asking us if we were scared and we were both like "um...no?" And then we heard from like a hundred people that there was an earthquake in the middle of the night. Good thing we were like zombies and didn't even notice. I'm pretty sure if we had, we both would've been like scaredy little chickens.

Let's see...So mother you were right. I was sick this week. Nothing fatal, but on Saturday at about 6 I turned in the towel. Once I got home I crashed and Honeyhead went to cleaning our disgusting bathroom that probably hasn't really been cleaned since 1924. So, I'm dead to the world for about an hour and then I woke up and found our living room covered in bags of trash. So, we load up with trash and go out the back door of our apartment. Our apartment is about 500 square feet and it has two doors. One in the front and one that goes out a back way to the trash. Well, I accidentally let that door shut and it locks automatically. And then we realized....no keys. So we walk to our concierge's house. Let me paint the picture for you: I look like death no make-up, sweats and Honeyhead has a Tyson Chicken shirt on it that says Power full and yoga pants and big pink fluffy socks. Pretty sweet combo. So we knock on our concierge's door, who is the nicest person by the way, and he kindly gives us keys and so we walk over to our apartment only to realize that this key doesn't unlock the back door to our house. So we try the front door and Viola! However, we locked ALL THREE locks on our door. Including the little chain one that keeps the door from opening all of the way. So after about 15 minutes of me sticking all of my appendages into the house trying to get the chain unlocked, we decide to go back to the concierge and ask for a screwdriver. He looks at us like we're absolutely as bonkers as we look as says, "Why? I gave you the keys." And we say, "Well, the problem is the little chain at the top." And he says, "That's impossible unless you went out the emergency back door." Oops. Big no no. So, he kindly gave us a screwdriver to  take off the chain lock and off we go. The only other problem is that we have to buzz to get back into our building because our concierge lives in another building. I'm a missionary so I'm pretty much a professional at getting into buildings so I buzz about a million of them and in we go. Bad idea. So, two of our neighbors come out while Honeyhead is unscrewing our lock and they look at us like we're delinquent robbers so in my delusional French I explain that we're locked out. Yeah. They were not happy. Finally we got in and that is how a five minute run to the dumpster took a half an hour. Gotta love the "within sight and sound rule". 

Yesterday we had one of those experiences that really struck me hard. We were visiting this family and we decided to teach the Plan of Salvation. We started out talking about how we are all children of God. And they argued that it's not true, this family was certain that only Christians were children of God. My heart was so struck by it. I tried explaining that we were all created by this same God who gave us all life therefore we are all His children. But they argued that it couldn't be true. It made me so sad and the words "the worth of every soul is great in the eyes of God" kept ringing in my head. I know that we are children of God. Every single one of us. He loves us no matter how good or bad, how "christian" or agnostic, He loves us all the same. I know that's not really groundbreaking, but for me it was. I'm a daughter of God. I'm His little girl. The apple of His eye. And there isn't anything or anyone who can make me believe otherwise. 

I hope you enjoy this beautiful fall season! I hope you are healthy! I hope you are wise! I hope if your name is Jaclyn Sue you eat a lot of cake and ice cream today:) 

Je vous aime beaucoup!

Bisous Bisous!

Soeur Perkins