Last Monday seemed to be months ago.  We planned on having a bonfire by the Knik River again.  We made s'mores with Reese's and roasted starbursts.  It was cold outside so we were huddled around the fire for way too long.  My hair took a couple of washes to finally get the smell of campfire out of it.

Our temple trip was happening on Wednesday and we needed President LaVoie, our vehicle coordinator, to check out one of our tires while we were in Anchorage. Because he was to do that we couldn't let him see how filthy our car was.  This car, which we named Filthy Animal, has not been washed the entire time I have been in Palmer, so we had to wash it, but the bad part was that we realized this is the Tuesday before.  I know this is breaking rules, but we went to a car wash that day. We had about 20 minutes before our next lesson - plenty of time to get the car washed. Everything was going fine but then all of a sudden the water was just going back and forth behind the car stalled in one position.  Naturally we would call the phone number to get them to fix it but the number on the side of the wall was faded off.  We were contemplating on calling anyone in our district but then we would have to explain why we were getting our car washed on a non P-Day.  It took about 5 to 10 minutes for a worker to come shut it off.  He had us go to the next lane to start over which he paid for.  We were a little late to our appointment and couldn't stay too long because we had our quarterly interviews with our Mission President, which went well.

Wednesday we went to the temple and normally because Satan knows you are going to the temple there is a lot of opposition leading up to that moment but that day everything seemed to be going well.  It was a good session and I spent some time just reading the scriptures in the Celestial room.

Thursday we had exchanges with the STL and her trainee.  Sister Richards came with me and Sister Gardner in Lazy Mountain and Sister Christian went with Sister Grieve in Beach Lake.  It was a good exchange but it happened all too quickly.  Before I knew it we were exchanging back.

Friday night we were teaching Chrisian, an autistic child in our ward, about the apostasy.  In order to help him stay focused on the lesson we do a lot of object lessons.  This time we took 6 cups and stacked them to make a pyramid.  We said this represents Christ's Church He established while ministering on Earth.  We taught about the Priesthood and how it was taken away once Christ and all of the apostles were no longer alive on earth.  This meant that no one was able to be in charge to run the church "we knock the pyramid down".  Each one of us took a cup and said what piece of truth we had.  For example, Sister Gardner took the piece of baptism, Sister Christian took the piece of salvation, and I took the piece of repentance.  Christian had the piece of faith and his brother Kellen had the piece representing Jesus. We all had pieces of truth established by Christ but none of us had the whole puzzle.  This is the period we call the Great Apostasy.  Then we taught about the need for a restoration of truth. This was done through a new prophet named Joseph Smith who restored the Church back to how Christ first established it "we put the pyramid back together."  This allowed him to see that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is the same church that Jesus Christ built while He was on Earth.  Christian was able to stay focused for the majority of the lesson and we think he was able to retain the information better.

Yesterday Nick and Kia, his daughter, came to church and stayed the entire three hours.  Our lesson in Gospel Principles taught about how the Book of Mormon is a sign of the Second Coming preached about in Ezekiel.  Relief Society went well, too, and even Kia was participating.  We finally saw Timothy who had lost his phone in Anchorage.  He is going through a hard time keeping the Word of Wisdom which is heart breaking.  Pray for him that he is able to quit.  I know that Christ's gospel is able to help us overcome any mistakes we have made and have yet to make.  His grace is sufficient for all of us no matter how many times we mess up.

Sometimes that's all you can do !!

Someone said that God's love is 100%.  He will not love us more if we do things right nor will He love us less if we fall short. His love is unconditional and infinite. 

Aren't Alaska Husky's precious ???

Sent from  ALASKA !!!

Sister Shelley Willden