Sister Stephani Rodriguez: "Stumble Forward"

In Branch Council yesterday, our Branch President said something about how we all have to "Stumble Forward" sometimes. I really liked that because I feel like that perfectly describes my week! We did a lot of stumbling this week but as long as it's forward then we're okay!

So on Monday we were able to go to Wal Mart! Nikki and Keith took us which was really nice of them! It was a little scary cause the roads were super bad because of the snow. It was also a little scary because we had to drop off Alex's boyfriend to spend an hour with his parole officer!

Tuesday was also a struggle because of the snow! We were at the farm (the first half of the gang) for dinner and we were having a lesson afterwards with April, a recent convert because we're helping her prepare to go to the temple! Halfway through our lesson, Vonnie comes upstairs and told us we should probably head home because the roads were getting pretty bad. (They live on a hill that gets CRAZY snow!) so we ended up having to leave and get home early cause the roads were SO. BAD.

Wednesday was a little better! We had a white elephant gift exchange at district meeting and then went out to a luncheon provided for all the volunteers at the food pantry! (and they gave us ALLLLLLL the left overs!!!!

) Then we were able to go out to Madison and spend some tracting and trying potentials! We also were able to place three copies of the Book of Mormon, I'm excited to go back to their homes and see if they've read any of it!

Thursday morning the snow was a booger again. Sue, a lady from the food pantry called us and said we should stay put and not come out to Morrisville that day because the roads were too bad. So we stayed home and weekly planned and had dinner and we got on Facebook to try to contact some people! Kinda lame.

Friday and Saturday were reaaaaaaly awful. We spent both days inside all. day. long. Sister Maughan has been feeling terrible lately. She's so sick and exhausted all the time that both days she couldn't do anything. Like at all! So we stayed home and took it easy so she could get feeling better. I'm glad she did because yesterday and today she seemed to be doing a lot better!

I remember when i first got out here Sister Loveland and I would always joke and say "I want you to get sick so we have to stay inside and rest all day!" Well now that that actually happened.. I regret ever wishing for that! It sucks so bad. I just want to be out and about preaching and teaching!! But I know it's important to take care of yourself so we stayed in and got her feeling better! Also I was able to finish the November Ensign with all of the conference talks and the book "Our Search for Happiness" by M. Russel Ballard and do lots of reading from the Book of Mormon! So lots of good came from it. :)

A cool experience happened yesterday. So on Saturday, our temple trip with Lacey and the rest of the youth got cancelled because the snow was too bad to go anywhere! We were sooo bummed. We've been planning this for so long and it got cancelled in the blink of an eye. It was really frustrating. But yesterday, President Nelson shared with us that even though the temple trip didn't happen, something good came from all that planning and preparation. He was able to meet with Nick and Jordan (youth from the gang) to get them their temple recommends. While he was meeting with Jordan they figured out that her cell phone number was the wrong number in the system! So they were able to correct it! Now that may not seem like a miracle, but let me tell you the background. Jordan decided to move back down to Florida with her mom. (she left today

) and down there, she's not gonna have tons of support telling her to go to church. So we're happy that when her records get transferred, they will have the right cell phone number to be able to contact her and hopefully be the support she needs!

It was awesome to be able to see that something good did come out of our cancelled trip! Small miracles like that are so comforting.

Yesterday was just a really good day. We got out to see the gang and had some lessons there and had a lesson with Catherine as well!

The snow is killing me. It's freezing and it interferes with missionary work so much! There are so many hills that we have to travel over to get like basically ANYWHERE so anytime we have an appointment and it's snowing, they call and tell us not to come because the roads are too bad. We're slowing learning how to do missionary work with the stinkin snow. It's been a struggle but we're "stumbling forward"

Hope you all have a Merry Christmas!! Love you all :)

xoxo

gospel girl

Funny Stories:

*In the car with Keith driving in the snow*

Sister Maughan: "this is the day I die."

*boy with down syndrome at the food pantry luncheon puts his arm around me*

"this is my girlfriend!!!"

Trevor: "mom can I have some money?"

Keith: "what happened to the money we gave you?"

Trevor: "I spent it on ice cream!!!"

Me: "My name is spelled correctly in tagalong"

Sister Maughan: ".....you mean Tagalog?"