Transfer Week

You guessed it! It's been another 6 weeks..... My how the time flies!

This week Sister Ytac and I worked our tails off! AND we hit our Mission's "Standards of Excellence" again!  We found so many people to teach! Two of whom were former investigators who weren't taking our message seriously a couple of missionaries ago. But they come to church EVERY WEEK without fail and stay for all three hours and actively participate! Last week Sister Ytac and I went up to E and R and asked if they would like to start taking the missionary discussions from us again and really seriously consider our message this time. We were both standing there holding our breath because the man, E, is the one that everything hinges on. R was ready to get baptized MONTHS ago. He said yes and we set up a time to meet with them. On Sunday after church we had an amazingly inspired lesson with E and R and our Ward Mission Leader's family, the Kinders. (They are awesome for anyone who doesn't know that already). We were very frank with E and R. E has some habits he needs to stop before he can be baptized and sure enough he came out with "it's a lot easier said than done". As he is sitting there saying this I'm thinking, "Sister Voss, its now or never. He's either going to take the gospel seriously or he isn't. Here goes nothing." I looked him straight in the face and said "E, you are a stubborn old man. You know it, I know it, R  knows it. EVERYONE knows it. You can darn well do whatever you set your mind to because you are THAT stubborn. If you want to stop these habits, I know you will stop them because that's the kind of man you are!". He was very quiet and I was sitting there thinking, "oh boy, now you've done it Sister Voss. Go big or go home, I guess." He looks at me and laughs and says "Yeah, I know". So. Good news! E and R are getting married and then they're getting baptized on the 14th of November!!!!

Miracles happen every day and that, my friends, is most definitely one of the biggest miracles I have seen on the mission! It's going to be a rocky road, but I know the gospel has the power to change even the hardest of hearts. E proved that to me this week.

As per usual, with transfers this week, be sure to send stuff no later than tomorrow or send it to the mission home address 999 E Tufts Ave, Denver CO 80113. Sister Ytac and I are about 95% sure we are going to stay in Fruita (YAY) to finish up her training. The goal is to stay through Christmas. I don't want to leave this place!

I love you all and thank you all, AGAIN for the wonderful birthday wishes. Sister Ytac and I are just beside ourselves with the love you poured out to the both of us!

Love,

Sister Voss

It's my Birthday!

First of all, thank you all SO much for the wonderful birthday wishes, emails, cards, and packages! It's been a lot of fun checking the mail every day! And seeing my entire email inbox flooded with emails! Sister Ytac and I have enjoyed all of your love! I have been trying my best to reply to your emails and sending cards. It's gonna take some time and I will do my best to write you all back!

We worked so hard here in Fruita this last week and saw a lot of our hard work finally start to bear some fruit. We have several new people to teach and a couple of them are ready to come unto Christ and enter into the waters of baptism! How exciting! We are truly finding the elect out here! On top of that we have found some less active members out here who are so ready to come back to church and restore their relationship with the Savior. I love this work!

Secondly, what an amazing week of spiritual food and uplifting messages! I love General Conference, and I especially loved the Women's Broadcast last Saturday #CreepyCat. Hahaha. President Uchtdorf is so funny! And three new Apostles! It just goes to show that the work here on earth is hastening and God has a lot for us to hear that is still relevant to us today!

Also, can we just talk about President Nelson's talk on the glory of being a woman in the Latter-days!? If you missed it I encourage you to keep your eyes peeled on lds.org because it is good for EVERYONE to hear, not just those of the LDS community. We are all beautiful and divine daughters of God! Well, son's too!

The fall colors up (down?) here are absolutely beautiful. Today it has been rainy all day and really reminds me of Washington. Its oddly refreshing. The weather has been gradually cooling down which is a relief to me. Not so much for my Californian/Philippine companion! But she is acclimating well.

Last Sunday was Sister Ytac's birthday, she turned 20, and our Ward Mission Leader and his family threw us a "double your pleasure" birthday party on Wednesday. We had a blast!

I have to head out but stay tuned to my Facebook page! A couple here in our ward is doing the honors of throwing us (another) birthday party tonight and will be posting pics and videos!

I love you all! Keep seeing the daily miracles and the Lord's hand in your lives! He lives, and He is always there!

Love,

Sister Voss

 Sister Ytac and I with our Fruita 2nd RS President, Sister Behrman. We love her!

One of our Sister Training Leaders here on the Western Slope, Sister Eldredge and I honoring you all with our beautiful faces

The birthday party, part one on Wednesday!

 We're the Cat's Meow! These came in a birthday box from the Bessey's

Week 16

What a week!

Sister Ytac and I have been seeing some amazing miracles here in Fruita. I absolutely adore this place. On Saturday Sister Ytac and I got to go help set up for the Women's Broadcast at the Stake Center in Grand Junction. It was absolutely beautiful and so many beautiful sisters, too! What a joy it was to be there and to be so spiritually uplifted.

This next week we have some AMAZING plans for the area with our Ward Mission Leader, and we are so excited to be seeing our teaching pool grow every week! We are almost to the point where we need another set of sisters here to help us out!

Fun adventure of this week: A recent convert's son came over to spray our apartment because we have been having a pretty bad bug problem. Ugh. SO GROSS. So, he took some heavy duty spray for inside the apartment and some for outside the apartment. Oh man. We literally watched the bugs crawl away from the apartment. The next day, Sister Ytac and I walked out to our car to find a vast cockroach massacre on the port. Nothing like dead bug carcasses to make your skin crawl. But. Better outside and dead than inside and crawling around. Yuck. Fast forward a week later and we STILL have dead bugs showing up. I'm hoping this is a warning for all future bugs who decide they want to move in. WARNING: You will die.

Other than that, not a whole lot of new things going on. Just work, work, work! I love it!

The weather is still pretty toasty here in the afternoon but pretty chilly in the mornings. Not looking forward to the winter months, but the work must go on!

I love you all and hope you all enjoy General Conference this weekend! I'm looking forward to being spiritually uplifted and corrected!

Love,

Sister Voss

100 days!

Ladies and Gents! As of tomorrow I will have been in the mission field for 100 days! That's so weird to me! It feels like just last week I was in the MTC. The days go by slow but the weeks go by so fast!

Sister Ytac and I have been laboring hard here in the Fruita 2nd Ward! We almost hit our mission's Standards of Excellence this week which was amazing! We knocked on this one little street for about 3 hours the other day and talked with about 10 people, 4 of whom are now meeting with us and one is on date to baptized in October! Woohoo! Miracles are happening and the field is white for harvesting here in Fruita!

I am sorry I don't have much time to write today because I have an appointment to see a massage therapist today.... May be seeing a chiropractor as well if it persists. My back has been really messed up this last week and it has been keeping me from sleeping. Not sure what is up, but it isn't fun, that's for sure!

Today we are out with a sister who lives in Grand Junction and is getting ready to go on her mission in a month. She is spending P-day with us and going to come out with us during the week to teach and get to see missionary life in action.

I love you all and can't wait to email you more next week! Make sure to keep track of the miracles you see every day!

Love,

Sister Voss

Week 14

Holy cow the time flies so fast here! I can't believe I've been out in the mission for 14 weeks. Tomorrow will be my 3 month mark that I have been out in the field.

This week was pretty busy trying to get Sister Ytac situated and get everything she needs out here. We spent a lot of time with less-actives this week and 10 of them showed up to church! All of whom we have been teaching within the last couple of weeks! Woohoo!!

This week I have been SO tired. I'm not sure why. As a missionary, you're tired ALL the time because you are going LITERALLY from sun up to sun down.... and then some. 14 hours. But it is the best kind of tired. I lay down in bed at 10:15 and know that I have done absolutely everything I could that day that the Lord could put in our path.

The weather here is starting to cool down a little. But it still gets to be about 95 degrees in the afternoon on really sunny days. Yesterday was one of those days. Sister Ytac and I tracted for about an hour and a half. Lot's of people home on a beautiful Sunday afternoon and a lot of opportunities to talk to people. The Denver Broncos won yesterday so everyone was really excited about that.

This week Sister Ytac and I are working on getting her comfortable with OYM-ing. So pray for opportunities to see people on the streets and to give her courage!

We gotta go wash our car and get shopping done for the week. And nap.... an afternoon nap sounds really good. #Pday.for.the.win!

No picutres this week! :( Sorry! We were really stinkin' busy!

I love you all!

Love,

Sister Voss

Week 13

Sorry this is all so late everyone! I forgot that Monday was Labor Day.... In missionary land you don't really have holidays so you think, "why should the rest of the world?" Then on Saturday night we received a text from our Mission President to our whole mission stating that he wanted us to wait and have P-day on Wednesday. So here I am, emailing on Wednesday

GOOD NEWS! I'm still in Fruita! YAY!

OTHER.... Weird news.... I'M TRAINING!!!

So here is the news! I am here in Fruita still! Yay! My address is still the W Pabor Wy. :) Unfortunately, Sister Kenworthy is still sick, so she is on the Metro side where she has access to doctors, which means I have a new companion! Her name is Sister Ytack (ee-tack) and she is from California! She is an absolute doll and I'm so excited to have her here in Fruita with me! We are going to work hard and see some amazing miracles! I can feel it!

I was very sad to part with Sister Kenworthy! We have gotten so close. She isn't just a companion, she is a sister of my heart! We were so sure we were going to be together for another transfer. But that Lord had other plans, and that includes her getting back to good health. We hope to be able to serve together again, though.

This last week Sister Kenworthy and I gave service to a single mom here in Fruita and we got our district in on the action. We did yard work for about 4 hours on Thursday afternoon and we had a HYSTERICAL time! We worked hard and laughed even harder! I'll send pictures in the next couple of emails :)

What else???? Oh yes! Yesterday was my first day as a full-fledged missionary. I am no longer a greeny! (Greeny is a term we have in the mission for a missionary who is still in their first 12 weeks)

Saturday we got our transfer calls, but President Murdock was the one calling us. He usually doesn't call unless you are being called to leadership, whitewashing, or training. I knew for a fact I was not being called to be a Sister Training Leader and I didn't think Sis. Kenworthy would be because she has only been out for 6 months..... Surprise!!!! So, the stork visited me and brought me my first Daughter in the mission straight from the MTC :) her name is Sister Ytac (ee-tack)  and she is absolutely adorable!  She is very shy and timid but I have absolutely no doubt she will warm up quickly and be an amazing disciple of Christ. She is a choice soul!

I'm SO stinking surprised that I was asked to train. In my interview with President Murdock this last transfer he had told me that there were only two Sisters coming out in this transfer so I wasn't going to train, but that I probably would within the next couple of transfers. I'm sitting there thinking, "NO PROBLEM there! There is no way I'm ready to train someone else! I'm just finishing BEING trained!"..... SURPRISE! I'm training. What in the world?!?! I'm the first in our district from our MTC group that is training, and I feel like I am the LEAST qualified and prepared for this! SO.... now all of a sudden I'm a trainer, senior companion, and I've taken over an area that I really haven't worked in much!

But Heavenly Father doesn't make mistakes. He obviously told President I would be a good trainer for some reason.... I just have a hard time figuring out that reason! I need all of the prayers I can get this transfer, and I'm pretty sure I will be spending a TON of time on my knees praying and pleading for guidance! Monday afternoon rolled around and I had a full out panic-attack because I was so nervous. Keep praying for me, please!

I love you all and I'm so excited to start my third transfer out here on the mission!

Until next week!

Love,

Sister Voss

 1st Picture: We were given a Green River watermelon by our Ward Mission Leader. Sister Kenworthy and I LITERALLY ate out of it with spoons. No shame.

2nd picture: That would be our crazy district. Elder Kamrowski, Elder Rogers, Elder Green, Elder Lybbert, Elder Sorhus, Elder Power, Yours Truly and Sister Kenworthy

Pic 3: Elder Kamrowski's "funeral" (He is finished with his mission and is now on his way home)

Pic 4: This is from when we did the yard work last week. That bundle is nothing but WEEDS! We pulled them all up from her front yard and then realized we needed to take them to the back yard to burn them with the rest..... So we  decided to grab a rope, tie it up and roll it. Genius and hilarious!

Pic 5- Captain America. Need I say more?

Pic 6- Sister Ytac (ee-tack) and I on our first day together!

Week 12

Cabin Fever is the name of the game this week

So with Sister Kenworthy STILL not better we have been inside most of the week. Not sure what is going on but if she isn't better by Wednesday we will be calling our mission nurse again and try to figure things out. She's finished 2 Z-packs (Zithromiacin). And while most of her symptoms are gone her fatigue is not getting any better, it actually seems worse. So, we've been going crazy being stuck at home so much. But we have had some amazing spiritual conversations about life, scripture study, etc. Fun Story: We had a scripture chase to find the word sponge and marshmallow in the scriptures. They exist.

While she is resting, I've mostly been cleaning the heck out of our apartment. We have stuff from 6 missionaries ago. Not to mention it hasn't had a decent cleaning in quite a while. I'm pretty sure Sister Kenworthy and I have spent more of our MSF funds on fixing up our apartment than actually getting food, toiletries, etc. **Attention Future Missionaries reading this email- For the love of all other missionaries out there in the world: CLEAN YOUR APARTMENTS! Seriously. It's not always fun to clean. But it is necessary.** You can thank me later. 3 words "Be ye clean!"

This Saturday we will be getting transfer calls (I can't believe its already been 6 weeks!) I don't think either of us will be transferred which is fine by me. But President Murdock is the one that receives that inspiration. I absolutely love Fruita! I love the community, the ward, and my district! Sister Kenworthy and I haven't had a chance to really work the area, but I have grown to love this amazing daughter of God with all my heart. We have been able to experience some rather amazing and funny Companion "Comp" unity.

This morning we had an elder in our district with a birthday so we threw him a surprise birthday party! Sister Kenworthy and I made the cake. We all got to the church building and hid... which took a lot more creativity than you'd think without being blatantly disobedient. Sister Kenworthy and I hid behind come curtains (Sight and sound, always), Elder Lybbert and Sorhus hid behind the piano, and Elder Rogers and Kamrowski hid in an empty closet, which was hysterical to watch them fit into that tiny space. We were laughing so hard! Sometimes missionary work really is HARD work, but a lot of times that work is accompanied by a lot of fun and memorable moments.

With transfers just around the corner, keep in mind that if you're going to send packages or letters after Tuesday via USPS send it to the mission home office at:

Sister Leona Voss

Denver Colorado South Mission

999 E Tufts Ave

Cherry Hills Village CO 80113

They will forward it on to me, whether it be in Fruita or in another area, but only if its USPS. I will let you all know ASAP whether I will be transferred or whether I will be staying in Fruita!

I love you all and pray that you all see miracles every day! Thank you for keeping me in your prayers and I love reading your replies. It's always good to hear from you!

Love,

Sister Voss

PS- It was brought to my attention that the milk jug pic. did not attach so I will send that pic along with some pictures from Sisters Conference that we had on Tuesday of last week.

1) The ferocious milk jug

2)Sisters Conference! BACK ROW LtoR: Yours truly, Sister Kenworthy, Sister Davis, Sister Collins, Hermana Young, Hermana Eldredge, Sister Koenig, Sister Johnson. FRONT ROW LtoR: Sister Clarke, Sister Harshaw, Hermana Chavez, and Hermana Bendorf