the Adventures of Sister Russell: Aug 4, 2014

that's all my mind can think right now... a scream.... hahaha

weeeeeellllllllllllllll..... i dunno what to say.........

iiiii......

aammmmmmm.......

IN DENIAL.

okay ANYWAY!

this week. WHAT EVEN HAPPENED!!! okay listen these last two weeks were weird! they flew by... but.... and we were really busy. but with STUPID THINGS! like the dentist and doctor and a bunch of stuff. we still had success though! and miracles!!!

this is cool! so we had some awesome investigators a while back that we had to drop cause they couldnt ever come to church and they just weren't progressing, well this week we were walking down their street and saw them and THEY SAID THEY WERE GONNA CALL US because he got work off and can come to church now!!! WOOO!!!!! and we wanted to set an appointment for this week but he said no i have to come to church first cause i need to make sure that i am committed and then we can start the lessons again. he is SERIOUS!! WOO! they had a baptismal date and everything :) man i'm excited for them.

this week we played a (so we thought originally) funny prank on hermana sanchez... she didn't think it was veeeery funny.... we then promptly wrote her a rap of apology and love and i rapped it to her while hermana perez beat boxed in a twinkie costume. and now everything is good :) hahaha nothing was bad in the first place, but it was just really funny. i wish i had a picture of us.

hmmm lets see... SO THERE IS THIS family. really adorable, really awesome, from puerto rico! we found them in the roster and went to visit, they came to church the next day!!! when they came here they had been trying and trying to find the church, cuoldn't! put in a request for missionaries months ago and no one ever came, WELL GUESS WHAT! i'm pretty sure we got that referral but didn't think it was in our area and we sent it back to the office!!! (PALM TO FOREHEAD!!!!!) turns out they live in our area!!! hahaha anyway, they forgot a lot about the church BUT! want to come back :)

so we went to see this one less active and her house was HUGE!!!! she was a do not contact but we went anyway... hahaha we felt like giving all the do not contacts another chance!!! well she was really nice but not interested... BUT! her house was amazing, and she had big fountains and lions roaring and all kinds of cool stuff!!!

man these are boring stories..... i just can't think of anything right now!!!!!!

okay but it WAS funny later that day when the glass pan exploded, almost killed me, then sister perez burnt her hand with her pasta and then stepped on a little shard of glass, when i say little i mean TINY!!! and then blood started GUSHING out of her foot!!! and then i saved her :) hahaha i'll send pictures........... (okay and i know none of that sounds funny but just the choas in the moment and so many crazy things happening at once it made us all laugh really hard. haha!)

hmmmm... HMMMMMM........ we went on exchanges!! it was great!!! their apartment was INFESTED WITH COCKROACHES!!!! i was so scared to sleep cause the other sister had woken up with a cockroach on her face.... so i prayed really hard that they wouldn't crawl on me and..... did any? well i don't know! but i didn't wake up so i'll say no. haha

anyway. hey everyone. life is good.the gospel is good. God is good. Sometimes we don't see the good, and we see the bad. there is a lot of bad! so it's easy! but we aren't meant to focus on the bad, I want to just tell each of you to stop seeing the bad! stop dwelling on it, stop complaining about it, it'll make ya old and miserable in no time! cause though there is bad there is SO MUCH MORE GOOD! and it may be easier to talk about the horrible things, to complain about trials, to talk about the world falling apart, but BY GOLLY we have the restored gospel! we have eachother! we have SCRIPTURES and prayer and a nature and mountains and clouds and rain and FOOD!!! we have someone who loved us so much he died for us, and he felt every horrible thing we felt JUST SO THAT HE COULD RELATE!!! and know how to help us!! now let me ask you, when you are comforting a friend who lost a loved one, or someone who found out news that changes their life for the worst, or someone who is lost and heartbroken or discouraged, i don't think any of us in that moment want to feel exactly what they are feeling and experience that pain willingly, but he did, for everyone, so that he could be the one to get us through it, so he could know exactly what we need to stand strong and conquer the trials.

just know, that he knows. just know that we have a lot to be grateful for, and not even just things and blessings but just in general! like my favorite talk from last conference, we need a general attitude of gratitude! we see the big picture, we know that after this life there is so much more, so when you start getting consumed in the day to day trials or the big trials or ANY KIND OF HARDSHIP! just remember the big picture, and remember why you are here. do not forget your identity, or your purpose.

i love you all :)

the cool house with lions!!!!

this is just to make it more dramatic.

I LITRALLY COULD'VE DIED!!!!!!! hahaha i was standing RIGHT NEXT TO IT WHEN IT EXPLODED!!! facing the other way thankfully, but i suddenly hear this GIANT CRASH and i thought hna perez had gona crazy and thrown it on the table! turns out..... if you turn on the wrong stove thing, and glass is on top of it, it will explode. hahahahah it wasn't even me!!!!! there was glass everywhere!!