Final Week...

Hey everyone!

This is just going to be a short email this week as I'm going to be seeing and talking with you all in person in just a few days. It's kind of crazy coming to the end of my mission...I was expecting to be sad and want to stay longer or to be extremely excited to go home to the point where I couldn't focus on my mission, but neither of those things happened. Sister Palmer and I continued working like we normally had (except we took a little bit more time out of our schedule this week to update the area book) and I'm excited to come home, but not to the point where it's all I think about. I'm still worrying about our investigators and planning like I'll be here all next week. Then I'm sad to leave the friends that I've made, but not to the point of tears. I thought I'd cry at that last transfer call, but I was just SO EXCITED that Sister Leonard was coming here (she was my companion up in Quebec if you remember and she's one of my favorites...I was half praying that she would come! I'm SO excited for her and Sister Palmer!) that I wasn't sad at all. Haha, Elder Corbitt when he called told me that my new companion would be a man named Michael and I said "Oh, that's my dad!" and he said "Well that'll be interesting...your new companion has the same name as your dad...odd." It was funny :)

But this week was a good week overall. We had our sisters sleepover and training at the mission home and it was SO much fun! It was great to be able to see all the sister again and to meet some of the ones that I haven't served around yet. Everyone kept asking me what my plans are for when I come home and I couldn't think of anything to tell them...to be honest, I haven't thought much about going home at all. But it feels like it should be the next step, so it's good. So the sleepover was a lot of fun, and then the training was probably one of the best trainings that I've had so far in my mission. President gave a wonderful one about working with the priesthood and the things that they said applied not only to us as sister missionaries, but they're things that I can apply after I get home as well. Sister Cannon talked about unity and the importance of being united as sisters, and it was really neat. There is such a force for good when we all work together for a common goal. I love it :)

We taught several people this week, but nothing extremely interesting to note there. We taught Denis tithing and law of chastity and he accepted both fairly easily. He said as we were teaching tithing that everything just makes so much sense as we teach, there's no reason for him NOT to accept it. I loved that answer :) He's wonderful...he'll be baptized in 2 weeks and I'm SO excited for it! There's so much going on right now in this area...Sister Leonard and Sister Palmer will be great and I'm really excited for them.

It has been really neat to be able to reflect this last week on lessons that I've learned on my mission. One of the greatest lessons that I've learned is how much God knows and loves each one of His children. It's really easy for me to think that He loves me and my family and my friends, but it was harder to think about Him knowing the people that yelled at me in the street. But there was one day in particular that I looked around and started to really think about each one of the people that I saw and how they each had goals and hopes and worries and how God knows all of that and loves them and wants to help them. It marked a turning point in my mission where I started looking more at people as children of God instead of just as people in the street who I don't know. Another lesson I learned is just how importance obedience is. Really, each blessing is given based on our obedience to a law given by God. Our Father in Heaven really does WANT to bless us. He is even more willing to give miracles than we are to receive them. As soon as we obey even the smallest commandment, God blesses us as much as He is able, and that's something I've seen and experienced while here on my mission and I love it. I've learned a million other little lessons, but those are the two that have made the greatest impact on my mission. I'm so grateful for the chance that I have had to come here and serve the Lord for 18 months with my whole heart. I've seen so many miracles and really come to know my Savior personally and it has been wonderful to help others gain the knowledge that I have. I can't wait to go back home and continue serving the Lord with all my heart, just in a different capacity. Thank you for all of your love, support, and prayers. I love you all!

Love, Sister Nicole Lindsey

Sugar high.... :)

Hey everyone!

So this week was yet another WONDERFUL week! It`s March which means that spring is coming! SO exciting! :) It started raining the other day and we thought that winter was over and then it started snowing yesterday and turned into a horrible snowstorm for today, so maybe it`s not quite as over as we thought it was. But at least the snowstorm didn`t stop us from going to our cabane a sucre today! We went to one out in MOnt St. Gregoire and it was SO much fun...and SO sugary :) THey give you an all you can eat breakfast meal and you douse the whole thing in maple sugar. We went to one last year and it was really good...this one was slightly different, but it was the first time that everyone else in the zone (except one elder) had gone, so it was a great experience. And because of the storm there weren`t very many other people there, so we had a waitress there just waiting on us. It was a wonderful p-day :)

And the rest of the week was great as well. We taught our family that came to church last week again - twice. Their names our Josie and Sebastian and they are SO much fun! We went over on Tuesday evening and they didn`t have long, but we just sat and talked with them and they LOVED church. And they said that more importantly to them, their kids loved church. They asked the 10 year old afterwards what she thought and if she had had fun playing the games and she said ``I didn`t play; I LEARNED`` and they were thrilled about that. And they started asking us questions about how they could become members and we explained baptism and they wanted to plan it out all right then: who would baptize them, what clothes they would wear, who they would invite. It was great. And they asked about getting sealed in the temple and how that works and we explained it a little. We came back on Saturday and they had started reading the Book of MOrmon Stories (for kids) to their children each night and praying with them and they all loved it. We taught the Plan of Salvation, which they loved, and then set a date for baptism with them and they wanted to meet us at least 3 times a week until their baptisms. Unfortunately, we don`t have 3 evenings open each week, so we`re teaching them twice a week, but it`s still wonderful. I`m so excited to see them progress!

And we also taught Denis and it went so well. He`s progressing so well! We have 2 more lessons on commandments to teach him and then his baptism is in 3 weeks. He just needs to stop smoking. But he came to church AGAIN this Sunday (for the 7th Sunday in a row! He`s come every Sunday since we met him!) and again he loved it. He said he already knows it all, but each time he deapens his understanding, which is what he wants. It`s so great to see everyone learning and progressing...it`s the best part of missionary work :) And then we have Isabelle Poissant who is actually making progress! Her husband (a member) is in the hospital right now with a million different medical problems but he gave her an ultimatum and said if she hadn`t stopped smoking by the time he got out, he wasn`t going to come back to the house because he needed to think about his health. it just about killed both of them to think of that, but it gave Isabelle the motivation that she needed to really make an effort to stop and she`s sincerely trying. She promised to come to church this week and we`re really hopeful that her baptism will go through for the first week in April.

And also, JOSEPH called us! We haven`t seen him in over a month because he keeps cancelling our appointments at the last minute, but he called last MOnday and set up on for last Thursday. We waited there for 45 minutes and he never showed up, never texted or called us back, and we didn`t know what to do. So then yesterday I called and left a message saying that I was leaving and wanted to talk to him before I left and he called back early this morning and said that just about an hour before our lesson on Thursday (he was all set with a backpack filled with church things) he collapsed from exhaustion and some sickness and was in the hospital for 2 days and then sick in bed for 2 days and now both of his kids are sick. Crazy. So we set up another appointment for this Thursday..I pray that it actually works out.

But things are going really well in the area now. It`s amazing to see the progress and the blessings that have been poured out in this area and on the mission as a whole in the last month or so...there are miracles almost every day in each of the areas, both big miracles and little ones. It`s such a great time to be a missionary and such a wonderful mission to be a part of...I love it!

I hope all of you are well. Take care and have a great week! I love you!

Love, Sister Nicole Lindsey

What a beautiful day :)

Hey everyone!

This week was AMAZING!! :) We've been working hard and we're definitely seeing the blessings from it. We had a great lesson with Denis at the Groux's house and it went SO well! We taught the Word of Wisdom since we'd already kind of covered it in Sunday School class and Sister Groux testified so beautifully of it's importance. He accepted it without a problem and said that he'd been thinking for some time now that he needed to quite smoking and he wasn't sure if that was just him or something else telling him to stop, but he's going to try really hard to stop. it was great. And then he came to church on Sunday and we're pretty sure he loved it...he left right after Priesthood and Relief Society hadn't been let out yet, so we didn't get to talk with him right afterwards, but we're going to call him today and see how it went. he's wonderful though...I love to see the progress he's making!

Then also this week we taught a FAMILY!! It was a man, Sebastien, and his wife, Josee, and their 4 kids. During the lesson we actually only taught the husband, but he really liked it, said the prayer at the end without argument, and said that they wanted to come to church on Sunday. They have neighbors who are members of the Victoria (Spanish) ward, and they really like them. So then on Sunday morning we were sitting in the car before church and a number we didn't recognize called us and it was a woman from the Victoria ward who said that we were teaching her neighbor, Sebastien, and that he and his family had come over the night before and asked them a bunch of questions about church and so they had skipped their ward and were coming with Sebastien and his family to our ward. So the whole family showed up and they LOVED it! Everyone was so friendly and the kids just adored primary. Soeur Groux said they participated a lot in sharing time and she even asked one of them to say the prayer at the end because she had just been so involved in the whole class. It was so cute. We're teaching them again this Tuesday and the mom said that they were going to come back next Sunday. The dad had said that they wanted to find a church with good family values and teach their children more about Christ - perfect! I'm SO excited for them!

Then we also had our investigator Jean-Guy who we taught and he is an interesting guy. Very into meditation and very factual so when he read the Book of Mormon this week he looked up a timeline in the Guide des Ecritures at the back and decided that it was missing some things so he went through the Book of Mormon and filled it in the rest of the way and that was his study. Odd. But he said he'd been talking with his nephew about the church and then called us Sunday morning to say that both he and his nephew would be coming to church. So they both showed up and I think they liked it...the nephew said he did and he wanted to come back, so we'll see what happens. But Jean-Guy is definitely a character...we're going to commit him to baptism this week to see if he really is interested in progressing or not. We're not sure where he stands right now. But church yesterday was WONDERFUL...we had a really interesting Sacrament meeting and each of the investigators liked it and the members helped us so much. It was wonderful.

Also this week we did splits with Concordia and that was exciting! I went back to my greenie area with my first daughter, Sister Cottrell, and it was so fun to work with her and talk with her again. I just love her. And we got to see some of the people that I knew from before. And the best surprise of all: Elder and Sister Anderson showed up! they went home from their mission a couple of months ago, but they came back out for a wedding this last weekend and they stopped by the church at the same time that I was there! SO exciting! :) I just loved it. It really was such a great week.

And this next week is going to be wonderful as well. There is SO much going on in the next few weeks! I can't believe my mission is almost done and with everything that we have planned these next 3 weeks are just going to fly by. But it will be fun. I'm so excited for everything, and I just love seeing all the progress that our investigators are making! this really is the work of the Lord and it is definitely going forth. I just love it and I'm so glad that I get to be a part of it and share my testimony with people everyday! I'm so glad that Heavenly Father knew me well enough to send me on a mission to this area and to put me with this companion so that I could have these experiences. And I'm even more grateful that I listened and came out here. It's been the best experience of my life...I just love it :)

Hopefully you all have a wonderful week! I love you!

Love, Sister Nicole Lindsey

PS: I got the valentine's day package from Heather and Kaylee this week....thanks so much! I loved it! And I got the one from Nic and Janey the week before and I LOVED the pictures...and the fudge hearts :) I have the best Friends ever!!