A week of miracles and blessings

Hi Mom! Transfers were this week and both me and Sister Jeffery are staying! 
Woot Woot! <--- im not sure if thats actually a proper exclamation of joy, but 
were stoked! We had so many "if we stay together we can..." things. So now we
can do all those and not start entirely over with new people. 
 
Plus also, we have super similar voices so we have fun singing together. We 

sang the Rob Garner version of Savior, Redeemer of My Soul in sacrament 

meeting this week and it was super fun! Even though I did that same song with Sister Frischknecht like a few months ago, we changed it up to fit our alto

range. It was such a great opportunity to invite people to church, so we used it A LOT. We invited everyone and we had a long list of people who told us they 

would be there. But, no one actually came. So that was lame.  But we met this one guy, Phil, the day before and he said he would come (but clearly did not), 

and we happened to be in his area yesterday so we dropped by and he said he 

just couldn't bring himself to go to a church again after all his years of not. So 

we sang him the song and had a lesson and it was all while we were sitting 

around a campfire, and the spirit was super strong and it turned out to be 

really, really great! 
 
We actually met a ton of new and interested people this week which was great! We met this guy named Robert James White who is half Arabic and half Italian 

and he is also the wisest person I have ever met / my new life guru. Though he doesn't know the fullness of the gospel yet, what he does know, he understands deeply. Like more deeply than most members of the church! And he lives it and loves it. Also he gave he a ton of advice for life. Here's some: 
 
"a setback is an opportunity for a comeback." 
"love is an action word." 
talk to yourself to learn things- "nobody's gonna deliver your message like you" 
marriage advice: "compromise" 
"when you start acting like all of your friends, you rob them of who you are" 
 
The guy is just super cool! I'm excited to teach him! 
  

I love all those pictures! The color festival ones are so cute! And I love the 
cemetery ones! Hope you have a quality week, and that it stops raining so you 

can mow the lawn! 
 
LOVE, Sister Orr 
 
 
Dad! 
 
Some super cool things happened this week! It has indeed been a week of 
miracles. 
 
So since its toward the end of the month, we are like OUT of money, and we 

have eaten all our fresh produce, and our dinner appointment forgot about us 

one night. So we decided to run to the store and see what we could buy with 

the $5 left on my card, so we picked up some bananas and apples and tomatoes and spinach. It was all probably going to be more than $5 but as we walked up to the register a member from the stake (who we didn't even know) walked up and said "ready to check out sisters?" and he totally bought our food!  It wasn't a crazy huge miracle but I realized that last Sunday I finally paid my fast 

offering for the past few months and Heavenly Father was totally letting me 

know that He loves me and that He is aware of me and that he will bless us as we keep his commandments! Also the guy that paid for our food is in the same ward and is friends with Ted Olsen, the 75 year old man that I taught that got 

baptized! So I got Ted's address from him and I had been wanting that thing! 
 
Also last week I found out about beta.mormon.org which is the coolest thing 

ever that you should check out and show to everybody cause that's what I've 

been doing! It has like a 60 second video to go with each of our core principles 

as latter day saints! 
 
Also we tracted into a guy this week and it just made me happy even though 

he's not interested. He pretty much dosen't believe in anything that he can't see and we asked him what he thought his purpose in being here was and he said 

"to make cookies! want one?" and he brought out these huge chocolate chip

gourmet delicious cookies! They were so good! Also when we were walking away I was like "wait what's your name?" and he was all "the ladies call me 

gorgeous, but my wife calls me Tony" haha I love nice people! 
 
Welp I have to get off le email  but I hope this week is super good and that you 
enjoyed some Chicago popcorn and sent me some! 
 
LOVE, Sister Orr! 

6 Months!! = 1/3 = :) AND pictures!!

Erin is celebrating 6 months on her mission by sending pictures...

from the MTC! :)

MTC District and teachers - last time together

Hallway pic - always precious

MTC Companion - Sister Parsons

Mustaches

Elders Ostler and Stanley - posing in the classroom 

while I figured out how to use my camera

Sisters McLehaney and Dicent - MTC Roomates

Hey Mamma!

That was an awesome letter. So much fun stuff! Definitely go see Erica's farewell! That will be so fun! And take pictures! ... not that i am one to speak about that, but you will be getting some today! :)

I am so excited the girls get to go to Texas! They will have so much fun except probably they are not going to be excited to come back. 

I am so happy to hear that Addey is still the coolest ever. (Erin's talking about Addey going to the Payson temple dedication) I love that girl. It makes me so happy to see her so in-tune with the spirit. That's the actual goal in life. "Men are that they might have joy." and the spirit is the key!

We found a FAMILY! We started teaching a family this week. Well mostly -- the mom, Sarah, and the 16 year old daughter, Jessie.  The dad, Chad is pretty skeptical of mormons. He said he has grown up with them and knows about all the weird stuff. He asked about a few of those in our first lesson, but i think we did a really good job of explaining as simply as possible.  We were worried that all his questions might distract Sarah but she was so chill!  She was all "yeah honey! we're only married till i die!" when we were talking about eternal marriage and such. So that was quite cool. She is excited to have us back. 

We taught the 16 year old separately since they have really different schedules and she soaked it up too and is just SO eager to do what God wants her to do. I love them.  They also have a little son, but he is two so he cant really be an investigator, but he likes us a lot!

We have been hunting down less active YSA's this week and we found a guy named Aaron who invited us back. We planned to only meet with him but when we sat down, his dad and brother showed up to listen too! His dad is not a member. so that was cool, except his dad kept talking about the rules of dating and attraction and stuff on our missions and he kept telling his son not to let us go, and that we were a lot better looking than the elders. Aaron was sufficiently embarrassed but it was still a really spiritual lesson!

Have a great week! And I'm pretty sure chum is dead fish. Sooo.. that's awkward.

LOOVE YOU!

Sister Orr



Olo Dad!

i was just thinking today about when you picked me up at school and we went to Big Judds and Brian Regan. That was so fun. There needs to be a daddy-daughter date program initiated for missionaries.

I mentioned to el companion this week about how you and mom dated for like 5 weeks before getting engaged and she asked how y'all knew and I realized I don't know that answer. So this is me asking how you knew you wanted to be with mom for-actual-ever.

I told mom that I would send pictures and pictures are worth 1000 words that I dont have to type, so I'm going to go do that. 

Have fun on your business trip! I don't remember where you are but have a delightsome time wherever you are!

LOOOVE

Sister Orr

Mother's Day and More

Here's the computer pic from our glorious Mother's Day skype session with Erin.  She looks terrific -- her hair is so blonde!!  She is happy and wise and focused and joyful.  It was a treasure to hear her voice and to feel her spirit.

Mom,

I loved talking with yall yesterday. I called Jared and Em for like 2 minutes before we had to get going, so that was short and I felt bad but rules is rules. 

After we left, our plans fell through so we went to see if a girl we met named Jessie was home and I prayed before we got out of the car specifically that whoever we ended up talking to would be able to see and feel the spirit in our countenance. Well, we ended up talking to Jessie's mom who was kind of scared and scarred by the church that she was born into, but by the end of our conversation she was willing to learn about the restored gospel. And she said "I love when yall drop by, it kind of makes my day". Walking away Sister Jefferey was like " its because she feels the spirit" and thats when I remembered that I had prayed for that. So that was super cool. I just wished I had thought to tell her that! Next time though!

This ones going to be short cause I talked to you yesterday. 7 months till we get to do it again!

Also I realized that I forgot to say happy mothers day!

I love you!

Sister Orr


**In Erin's letter to Garret, she starts off by responding to some council he gave to her in his letter.  Since her reply doesn't make sense without his counsel, I'll add it here.

From Garret to Erin:

I'll keep it short this time since we just spoke yesterday. But I'll leave with this thought: 

Set the tone right now for how you want your life to be! In 1st Nephi 6:6, Nephi set the tone early on as he commanded his posterity and future writers of the Book of Mormon to "not occupy these plates with things which are not of worth unto the children of men". 

How grateful I am for such wisdom and insight from this great prophet. We can do the same thing right now and for the rest of our lives as we carefully choose what enters into our minds and bodies. 

Love you!
Dad

From Erin to Garret:

I love that! Sister Jeffery and I were talking about what vanity really is and how the world today sees it as caring about what you look like all the time, but really its anything worthless or empty. And that vanity is actually the perfect definition of what to steer away from in life. 

There are alot of different parts to wellness and they all effect each other. Like I fully believe that your physical health and your spiritual health rely on each other and that intellectual health will increase or decrease along with social health. It's all intertwined. That's why the theme for life is "balance, variety, and moderation." If we apply this to every aspect of our lives and prioritize the good better and best things, our all over wellness will just be dandy.

I realize my thoughts written out are a little jumbly, so maybe if you focus on each sentence individually instead of as a whole, it will make more sense:)

Love You!

Sister Orr 

Goodness...

Hey Mamma!

I get to see you in a week! Your actual face!  To be honest I'm not 100% sure how its all going to work out. I'm pretty positive it will be after church which is 1- 4 my time. I guess I'll just have people call you when I learn more. Sorry!

I LOVE this area and the people and the weather and service and being a missionary in general. It's such a good thing. I got to pull weeds in the rain for a few hours for an 80 year old lady named Betty Jane Johnson. She was SO cute and had us come inside halfway through for some herbal tea and then gave us like 90 teabags. Does this happen to every missionary? Because i feel like every old lady just gives me tons of stuff. Specifically tons of herbal tea.

That was the only day it rained this week. The rest have been high 60s and beautiful! In maple valley I have such a good view of the mountain all the time. It's so. dang. gorgeous!  I think when I grow up I will live in Texas and have a summer home on a lake in Washington. 

Also this week, I don't remember if I told you about Lexi and Shayla, but they are these two sisters. They are 11 and 13, and have gotten involved in the YW program and we are teaching them and I LOVE them. They wanted to see the baptismal font but we don't have the key so we told them they could see it IF they came to an 8 year olds baptism on Saturday. And they DID. And they were so excited about it and they really felt the spirit. It was so awesome. Those girls are going to make it! Also they are going to girls camp this summer!

Then on Saturday we had dinner with my favorite member couple, the Wilsons. They are so sweet and cool. She cooked like all day for us and the food was so good. SOOO GOOOD! Except she made halibut, which I found out I HATE but they were really excited about it so I ate it and I'm pretty sure that I didn't look like I hated it so that was a miracle!

Then yesterday in church they did this thing in young women's where they had a panel of ladies that consisted of a stay at home mom, a career lady, college girls, and missionaries sit up in front and the girls asked questions. Me and Sister Jeffery were the missionaries and the college girls so that was fun!  The girls had written down questions at the Wednesday night activity before. It was so fun to be in young women's again. That's definitely still where I feel like I belong!

Welp I LOOOVE you!!


6 days!

LOVE sister Orr:)



Happy Monday Dad!

Guess what? I shot a basket the other day! We talked to a few black guys on the street playing basketball and they weren't interested in the gospel but they let me shoot a basket:)

This week we did more contacting and the coolest thing ever happened. We talked to this lady on the street and she was like "I found one of your books today" and she pulled out an old, very torn up Book of Mormon. And she had been reading it AND she loved it! It was awesome. She had been praying for guidance and she was having a really hard time and she totally recognized that us talking to her was an answer to her prayer. She was meeting her boyfriend at the casino up the road so we walked with her there which involved walking on the side of the high way which was super loud but we taught the whole plan of salvation and she ate it up so it all worked out.  She doesn't have a phone or a house so we set up a time to meet with her at the church next week. Hope she comes! Her name is Latisha. And she is white.

Also we had an awesome lesson with Michelle this week about the need for a savior and afterwards she had us walk up a trail to the back of her property and breathe in nature while she read us a poem. She's kind of a hippy but it was nice:)

Also Wayne and Lisa are progressing INSANELY slowly. They are progressing though, but they could for sure use some prayers for their faith.

LOVE YOU! SEE you in a week!

Lurve, Sister Orr

Birthday Fun, Taking the Baton from Jared, Kanye References, Baptisms :) and More!

Mom!  That was literally the best birthday package you could have sent! So dang CUTE! Also I LOVE the necklace. Also the pizza ;) My companion has only seen me eat really healthy so she was kind of taken back when y'all sent all my favorite foods and one of them happened to be peach rings. Whatever. I ate them all in like a day. We were actually on exchanges at the beginning of my birthday so me and Sister Kirschner celebrated by doing lunch at Starbucks. So I got my vanilla bean frappucino with caramel, which tasted like real life so that was fun! Then that night after we exchanged back, Sister Jeffrey made up a chocolate chip cookie recipe for me and it was SO good! Quality birthday I would say.

President Eaton sent out a blast this week saying that we had to contact (or find new people to teach) for at least an hour everyday this week and since its been pretty rainy this week we couldn't just talk to people on the street, cause there wasn't any. So we tried tracting. It was pretty good. We had a LOT more success in the small towns right outside of Maple Valley than in Maple Valley. I think it's cause those small towns and people are a lot more humble and are willing to let change into their lives. We found some cool people and set up some appointments! So, I'm excited for those! We had a quite a few door slams though so that was fun. :)

We are teaching a guy named Wayne who is so sweet. He has had a really hard life, so he is really skeptical and moving slowly in the gospel. He is coming along though. He has just recently started believing that there is a God, and he totally feels the spirit in our lessons. His whole family joins us for the lessons which consists of his girlfriend Lisa and her two daughters Gabby and Dana and Gabby's son James. In our last lesson, the spirit was so strong and James, who is six, started talking about how he feels God in his heart. We asked him what it feels like and he said "it feels like God is being nice to me". It was so cute. And in Lisa's prayer she said "if only we could all feel how James feels". So we got to testify to her that she totally can! And that James feels the spirit so strong because he is such a humble kid. It was an awesome lesson.

Also there is a family who I LOVE their last name is Blue and we stopped in one day just to see if they were home or we could set up an appointment to teach them (they are less active) and we got there and they were in frantic cleaning mode cause her parents were going to be there in a few hours and the house was crazy messy. So since our next appointment had canceled we got to do some super fast paced and intense cleaning. It was pretty fun! 

Thank you again so much for the fun birthday! Good news all of my companions thus far have eyebrow masters. So they just do mine for me, so I can spend all the money on clothes and make up, and such!

I love you more than Kanye loves Kanye!

LOVE Sister Orr


Hey dad!

Things sound so good at home! I'm so happy! Also I'm so glad the girls get some Tejas time this summer! So fun. I'm definitely gonna need some too when I get back!

So Gabby, this girl we are teaching, who I told mom about. We are teaching her whole family but her too, on her own. And she committed to be baptized!!!! So excited cause I really think she will make it there. She just needs a new job so she can come to church on Sunday! So that is the goal with her right now. She is so awesome. She already prays every night and reads the pamphlets we give her. She's so cool.

Also we contacted her next-door neighbor and he wants to learn about the gospel so we are teaching him tomorrow. I think if we can just get all of our investigators on one street that would be great cause for our miles quota. I'm pretty sure we are at like 1300 miles for the month already. Oops.

I guess me backing into that guy on Virginia was mostly a blessing cause we got a good realtor out of it and we were gonna need a new back bumper anyway so, I guess your welcome ;)

On exchanges this week, my Sister Training Leader that I was with apparently has a thing for pillow talk and we were up so late because she would NOT stop talking. So I have been catching up on sleep ever since. I'm super excited for a nap today!

Also another miracle happened and that involved a referral i got from JARED. He taught a girl in Auburn who got baptized and fell away really fast. So since I'm in the YSA ward, she is totally in my area and we had an awesome lesson with her. It was rad.

Welp. I have to get off but have a GREAT week and thanks for the birthday stuff!

love!, Sister Orr

Pictures of the Lake Sawyer Area

Erin and the Rojas family

Erin and Joan

 

Erin, Sister Frischnecht and the Ridley family

 

View of Lake Sawyer from her cottage

 

Hitting the BIG 20, a New Area, and the 5 Month Mark

Good morning my mom!

Thanks for the birthday shout out on Facebook, I got quite a few emails, which was sweet. I can't believe I'm almost 20. I'm gonna have to warn my companion that I need to get all my immaturity out by Friday cause that's when adulthood starts for real. So that is going to be a task.

I LOVE my new area. Maple Valley is so pretty and friendly. It reminds me of McKinney actually. These are some solid people. Also my bishop looks like Greg Kinnear. 

My companion is Sister Jeffrey and she is so cute and has SUCH a strong testimony and is pretty much a gourmet chef. I'm so excited to be her companion. And she is from Oklahoma. Also SHE RUNS WITH ME! Everyday! I love it! 

On Saturday we did service ALL day. It was awesome. All pulling weeds. I am rocking a sweet farmers tan. Actually its not a tan yet, my arms are just VERY red. We pulled weeds till lunch and then for lunch we just slept on the grass at the stake center for an hour because its so warm outside and felt so good! But the relief society president's husband rode by on his bike and saw us and apparently he has been telling people because quite a few people mentioned it to me at church. 

Welp. I'm super excited Em likes her ONE roommate! She will love Hillcrest! One of my best friends lived there and loved it! Also like 45 of my YSAs are about to head up to BYUI so i feel like Jared and Emily are just going to be walking past people I know, all the time.

Love you a lot!

Sister Orr


Good morning dad!

So my first Sunday in this area was so crazy. Since we are over two wards and they are both at the exact same time in different places, we go on splits. So I went BY MYSELF, which I had never done before, to a new ward. It actually wasn't bad at all. I just stuck with the ward mission leader's family. Then I went home with our dinner appointment and Sister Jeffery met me there and we took off to our mission devotional in Puyallup and were there for the rest of the night. It was fun!

This week I met a bunch of investigators. The work in this area is on fire!  Mick is one - I think he is like 60. He is so close to God. He loves the scriptures and loves to pray. He came to church yesterday. So I'm excited to see how that was for him.

Also one investigator, Michelle, she is so awesome, I asked if she really wanted to know if the church is true, and she said probably not. And I was so taken back because she LOVES religion and has studied it her whole life and I would have thought of course she would want to know which church really is God's church. But she said it would make her sad to know that so many people like Ghandi and Muhammad were just wrong, and lived their lives in vain and she started crying and it made me realize how much empathy she has for like, the entire world, and how she just wants everyone to be right and to be included. So we talked to her for a while about how these people weren't wrong. They taught things that Christ taught and led people closer to him everyday, which is what we should be doing. They just didn't have all the information.

Guess what else. My district leader was trained by Jared. Elder Basillius. And he is very excited that I am in his district and talks about Jared a lot. To everyone.

Also more good news. We were helping a lady vacuum seal a bunch of racks of ribs earlier this week and she gave us one! So I'm about to go make ribs!

LOVE you!

Sister Orr