Week 53

So happy to hear you had a great Thanksgiving! I thought of you a lot this week, but I really am so glad to be out here! Lots of miracles this week, the Spirit has really directed us in where to go and what to say. The holiday was fabulous, a woman in our ward named Sister Walsh takes good care of the missionaries and she had us over for dinner. It was really enjoyable and delicious. :) It was good to be with friends and to just focus on everything we're thankful for. I loved having a turkey dinner on Thanksgiving, too! The holiday was awesome. We baked like 80 pumpkin chocolate chip cookies and delivered them to pretty much everyone we know that was struggling for one reason or another. We uplifted spirits, got appointments, and strengthened relationships. We also caught a lot of people at home that are hard to reach :) We have had a focus on being Spirit-led this week, and we saw so much success in doing things the Lord's way.

Some small miracles of the week:

We found Chris, a former investigator who for some reason is not in our area book. He came to church on Sunday.

We had an amazing first lesson with Jack (the one who came to conference with us) and he is so prepared!

We felt that we should drive to Courtney's (a former investigator) on a whim and caught her at home. I don't know how many times I've tried her door and she's never home! We have an appointment for this week.

Scott is very seriously thinking about getting baptized :) 

Marriah is starting to open up and trust us

The Spirit is working on people's hearts! It's nothing we could do ourselves :)

I need to get moving, but I'm glad you got home safely. I've been praying for you all week!

Love you more and more,

Sister Schank

Week 52

I applied as an EFY counselor today so this email will be short. The three pictures attached pretty much summarize the big parts of my week: training at the Peter Whitmer Farm, Sister McManama's first time at Niagara Falls, and took Sandy and Dawson to Palmyra (or rather, they took us). Other big news is that Scott has made some huge progression this week and is looking into being baptized once he finishes the Book of Mormon (should be by New Years at a rate of 3 chapters/day). He brought his girlfriend to church and we've started teaching him the commandments. It's been rough with the Perry family recently but we are meeting with them tomorrow and hopefully it will go well. We are teaching a couple of restoration lessons this week that I'm excited for, and... Sam has a goal to be baptized December 8! I don't know if you remember Sam; she's a single mom who we haven't been able to teach in forever but we just dropped in last night and by the end of it she had a baptismal date. I love the Plan of Salvation :) and so does she! It's amazing how she can recognize truth instantly. She really is one of those with "believing blood." Love her.

I'm excited for Thanksgiving; we hare having it with a member named Penny Walsh. Her two daughters have moved out so she's on her own and is having all 6 missionaries over for Thanksgiving dinner. I am so excited! Haven't had turkey on Thanksgiving in years! :D

I love you all and hope you are enjoying yourselves! 

Lots of love,

Sister Schank

Week 51

It has been a week of miracles out here. We went from 3 to 6 progressing investigators, which is exciting. We've been able to meet with some people who have been hit-and-miss for a long time, and it's been a blessing.

Got to visit the Palmyra sites with Bill, which was REALLY awesome. He's really starting to understand the significance of the temple. We are excited to get him there to do baptisms and also to get him going on family history in the not-too-distant future.

Scott is making a lot of progress and is recognizing his growing faith and also answers to his prayers, through the Spirit and also through dreams. He's still not sure how he feels about being baptized, but he's making progress.

We are really excited to teach the Perry family tonight about the Plan of Salvation. We are talking about how baptism is an important goal, but focusing on preparing the family for the temple. We prayed a LOT in companionship study today and are excited to invite their whole family to prepare for a Christmas Day baptism! We are hoping Brother Perry will be able to baptize his boys on that day. I love their family. :)

Things are going well with my companion. We have had really different previous mission experiences so we are still working on figuring out how to mesh everything, but we love each other and are trying our best to be unified :) We had a great zone conference this week and will be visiting Palmyra again this week with a less-active and her son (Sandy and Dawson).

The Lord is there! He's aware of us and He loves us. Thanks for all your love and support. I'm convinced you're the greatest family ever! Love you bunches :)

Sister Schank

Week 50

Dearest family,

Thanks so much for your email updates and snail mail. Becky and Sarah win the prize for making Sister Schank's day this week when the mailbox gets checked. :) Some fun events of the week:

-We were told we had to cancel all our Tuesday appointments and stay in because of the hurricane and then the weather was nice enough to go out. Tried to set up other appointments, which all fell though. Tracted a street in the light rain, found a new investigator named Rodney! We are meeting with him for the first time tomorrow :) Also got in touch with the Perry family, who we are really excited about! They were member referrals until the members found out that the parents were actually baptized 10 years ago in Ireland! They moved pretty shortly after and lost touch with the church, but still have strong testimonies and want their two boys baptized :) We are meeting with them for the first time tonight.
-We switched p-day to Halloween this week and played sports with other missionaries at the church building. I am still a little sore lol.
-Stake conference this weekend! It was excellent, and the theme was on preparation. Specifically preparing youth to serve missions, temporal preparation in light of Hurricane Sandy, and preparation to attend the temple/spiritual preparation by attending the temple. The Second Coming is on the way! SOOOOO much recently about missionaries, temples/family history work, and temporal preparation.
-We got to go on our Relief Society temple trip this week. We happened to schedule an ASL session. Pretty much the coolest thing ever. I learned SO MUCH being able to watch the translators and read the closed captioning. I really love the temple. :) The Lord is trying to teach me recently just to trust Him. He has provided for others in the past, and He will guide me too—I just need to be patient and listen.
-Officially transferred Melissa and Patrick over to the Buffalo ward elders. We are sad not to teach them, but the elders will do a great job and I'm so excited for their family. We got to sit by them at stake conference. :)

Other than that, it was just a busy week! We have a few investigators we are just about ready to drop, and a few more that look like they are finally starting to progress :) And a handful of inbetweeners. We are also working with a bunch of less-actives right now... in particular, we get to meet Marriah for the first time this week. She's a 15-year-old in the Orchard Park ward and is just kind of in a delicate situation right now and is responding better to sisters. We're the only sisters in the stake, so we get to start teaching her! We are also planning on going to Palmyra with Bill this week! (Last week's trip was rescheduled because of the storm.) The weather is supposed to be nice this time... well, nice for November. I couldn't believe it, today and yesterday we walked out to our car and saw little snow flurries! I'm still a little bit in denial. Excited for the holiday season, though. We have some members that have plans to take good care of us and Thanksgiving, and I am super excited to proselyte throughout the Christmas season. :)

Health update: Doing pretty well, sniffles almost gone. I've been off stomach meds for probably a month now and have been sleeping on an incline, but still feeling chest pressure and at times general or sharp pains. Dr Boyle is doing his homework this week, including talking to a GI specialist at the hospital he works at. So we will see :)

Love you all to pieces!
Sister Schank