Urban Farmer & the rapper 11/16 2010

Today I woke up and actually thought "I wish I could just sleep all day and not go out" It started out slow and we needed to go to district meeting and pick up the sis. missionaries on the way. Elder Wall got a call from his sick friend Brook just as it was time to leave and he really needed to talk so I ran and got the sisters picked up then came back and got Elder Wall, then we drove quickly(over the speed limit) to district meeting and arrived at 10:10 just 10 min late. No one was there , we called the Elders and the meeting was delayed till 10:30 . So we waited. After we usually all go to lunch but we needed to check out a restaurant for Wed. night . (We had called a YSA who is not coming and invited him to dinner Wed. night and he said great then we said after we can all go to institute together. We're so mean). We had left in such a hurry we forgot our binder with all the addresses and names of the people we visit so we had to go back to our apartment to get the binder and I thought it would be so nice to just stay home and nap. Low motivation today, but we went and our last visit was a young man named Chris. I've blogged about him before , he lives in a tough part of town, has a great smile and the first time I met him I was instantly drawn to him. ( One of my ghetto boys) He was home today and we took our cookies to give to him and he wanted to talk to us about whey we make cookies for him. Well wow!! We had such a great talk with him, he has a really great spirit and said he has felt like he needed to make some changes in his life. He is a very spiritual person and has a heart that wants to help others. He kept saying he wanted to live in a Zion society, work the earth and live happy. He loves to work in the earth and is trying to start a nursery type business. He has planted blueberries, raspberries, cherry tomatoes , grapes, in his Grandmothers yard and wants to get some land to make a big garden and grow vegetables and berries. We talked and I said something about the feeling of having an "enlightened mind" and he picked up on that right away and said he has that feeling when he reads from the scriptures, and when he works in the dirt. He said he feels that he is connected somehow during those times. He might come to institute Wed. night, I told him I would be waiting at the door looking for him.(no pressure) Look what I would have missed if I had followed my lazy day feelings I had that morning. We got a call from Tony (rapped testimony) and he needs us to take him to the library and help him apply for a job at Target online. He does not know how to do it and he really needs a job, I feel that if we don't get him on the road to a better life we will loose him back to the "hood". He has an electric personality and will be a great salesperson. Wow you know what? I'm beginning to really love these young people!! My urban farmer and my rapper may God bless them.

YSA SERVICE PROJECT

Today the YSA in the Little Rock Stake had a service project where we cooked and served a turkey dinner to a shelter. There is a young man in our group who for 3 months lived in this shelter a few years ago. He wanted to do our service at this particular place to say thanks. It is a working shelter where the residents must have a job or they can't stay. 70% of their salary must be given to the shelter each pay day. The shelter puts it into a savings account and then at the end of three months they leave the shelter and get their savings to pay rent and stuff. I think that is a great idea to get people back on their feet. The YSA Pres. called Fri. night and said that he bought 5 turkey breasts and how should he cook them, this is 7:00 pm and I asked him if the turkeys were frozen. He thought he could cook them that night, so I told him to put them all in his bathtub and fill it with warm water. We went to the store and bought turkey roasting bags and aluminum pans and headed to his home. We gave them directions on how to cook the turkeys in the morning and we took two of them to cook at our apartment. Anyway they did great and all the food was wonderful, we fed about 60 people. We are really learning to love these young people.

Another Great Day

It started out questionable when I couldn't walk my back was pinching a nerve in my left leg. I had to lay on the floor and try and crack it then iced it. Elder Wall was working on business problems, we had two brick walls fall down at one of his apartment complexes and he needed to get insurance claims adjusters and contractors hooked up to fix it . Paula our wonderful assistant is a life saver for us, she is so capable Elder Wall should give her a raise she already had my life long thanks. Anyway we didn't get away until around 2 pm and feeling like we wasted our day. While lying on the floor for my back I made up invitations for the pot luck dinner and broadcast talk by Elder Ballard on Sun. for the young adults. Here is a sample.

DINNER AND A BROADCAST TALK

THIS SUNDAY NOV. 7TH.

OTTER CREEK STAKE BLD.

(Otter Creek Pkwy. , 1st. left after gates, then 2nd church)

ELDER M. RUSSELL BALLARD

HAVE YOU EVER WONDERED WHAT DIVINE PARENTAL ADVICE HEAVENLY FATHER WOULD GIVE YOU, A YOUNG ADULT , TRYING TO LIVE A RIGHTEOUS LIFE IN THE WORLD TODAY? ONE OF JESUS CHRIST’S 12 APOSTLES LIVING ON THE EARTH TODAY WILL SPEAK SUNDAY NIGHT, SPECIFICALLY TO THE YOUNG ADULTS. COME WITH A PRAYER IN YOUR HEART

AND YOU WILL RECEIVE .

POT LUCK DINNER 6:00 pm BROADCAST 7:00 pm

( Come even if your pot has no luck , there will be plenty)

I am making my famous chicken wings and Piggy Sue's pineapple angle food cake.

Anyway we went out to deliver some to our young adults and first we visited our two track boys one who came to institute Wed. and he was not home but the other roommate was and we got to talk to him, he is from Australia and runs cross country, so we were stoked to have caught him home, then we went to the hood to leave one for Tony who was baptized and rapped his testimony, he is doing great. , Then to my first boy from the hood and he was home and has the cutest smile we visited with him and I hope he tries to make it, I promised him I'd save a chicken wing for him. With four visits catching him home was a real treat. Then off to my other gangsta boy and he wasn't home but we met his older brother and he was very nice to us, he drove up when we were at the door , so a suit , white shirt and name tag really comes in handy, we were immediately identified as non threatening , then for the cherry on top. For our 5 visit way down south to the Returned Missionary who is inactive, with the "attack goose" We have met his Mother, his Father but have never caught him home, I saw a car in the driveway last week and thought that must be his and he was home but no one answered the door, so I left muffins on the door handle for him. Well while driving down there I called his Mom's phone and left a message that we were coming again and had an invitation for her son. When we got there the car was in the drive again, that I thought must be his, and when we knocked we heard a male voice say just hold on a minute . Then the door opened and there was our RM he was sicker than a dog and got out of bed to meet us, he knew we were coming because of my message on the machine, and wanted to see who had been leaving him cookies and muffins and notes about making good choices in life. That was us! We said we would return another time and left him the invitation and said we would love to see him at it if he felt better, and if not I would bring chicken wings , ok so its not chicken soup , but they make me feel better when I eat them. Then there is this one young man who we haven't contacted because we have no address but know he works at this restaurant so it was dinner time and we went to dinner there and took an invitation in with us and guess what! Aw you guessed it. He stopped by out table and talked for a few minutes and we hope he will come to the pot luck, it would be his first YSA(young single adults) contact in possibly 2-3 years. We had another great day. The baptism Sat. for a wonderful young mother from South Africa has been postponed, she is great and just needs a little more time. Love to Yall

The Works first fruits

Last night was institute. We have be knocking doors for over a month and leaving cookies, muffins, and invitations for the young people to attend institute. We find some of them at home but mostly just leave them on door steps. We are following Sis. Burns from the MTC lead and expect to do this 8 times before we see results. But.... last night we had one of the students at the university who we have visited once and left cookies 2 more times, come out to institute.

He brought a friend, and another member brought a friend, and the sister missionaries brought a inactive young adult that we both have been working with, we leave cookies they teach, we also had two semi active young ladies who we left muffins , attend. If you feed them they will come! First the muffins then the spirit. So we had 8 new attendees last night. Wow do you know how great that is! I was substitute teaching last night also, I studied and worked really hard on the lesson for weeks, literally. I was so nervous and it was not going too well I would lose my place in my notes, and repeat myself, I finally took a deep breath, put the notes away and taught without reading the notes. It went a lot better, I really felt better just talking to them about the topic which was Prophets , moving the cause of Zion , law of common consent. I hope I don't have to sub too much more but I did learn that teaching youth is not like teaching Relief Society . We are teaching a teacher inservice lesson Sat. for the seminary teachers and I expect that will go easier for us. Well I need to go and make some muffins for todays doors, then we will go to the church to check out if the dvd and tv work for the lesson on Saturday, we have a short dvd to show and I hate it when they don't know how to work the equipment during the lesson, so we are going to practice because we are not known for our techno skills, computer hacking skills, num cuk skills, ha ha. Love to all