Happy Australia Day! (27/1 email)

Yesterday was the coldest Australia Day ever! I hope you all enjoyed the sunshine! Even though it was pouring rain, I had sunshine in my soul ;) At church I greeted everyone with a "Happy Australia Day!" They thought it was pretty funny, but I was for reals!

I can't believe how quick time is going! This week flew by! 

Our investigator Zane is progressing really well! He will be baptised next month :) We have this couple in our ward, the Meeses, and they are the BEST! Seriously! They are ward missionaries and they just 'get it'. We went round to their house during the week, and Bro Meese was asking us about all our investigators. And he wants to have them over for tea and make friends with them all and he had all these great ideas to fellowship them. This is exactly the kind of support we need! It is SO important for our investigators to make friends at church.

On Saturday, we went out into Holmes Chapel to visit the people we met last week. No-one was home. Just as we were walking down the country lane back into the town, It started to get very dark. We were freaking out! We started running cos a storm was coming. It bucketed down! We were saturated! Pelted with hail! We had to laugh, otherwise we probably would have cried, lol.

Lily Poulton was baptised that night. The chapel was so full! So many friends and family came and it was such a great night. We will follow up with Sister Poulton about what her friends thought and see if we can get some referrals.

I love serving with Sis Tolman, we get along really well, and she is so positive, I love it! We are seeing miracles here in Congleton! Slowly but surely, big things are happening! It all starts with building the members' trust, then getting them to work with us... united and equal. We are the teachers, they are the finders! Well that's how it's supposed to be! I hope that is how it is in the Paralowie Ward! I love you all so much!

xoxo Sister Riley

Sister Tolman and me

Our breakfast on Australia Day

British phonebox in Holmes Chapel

Miracles! (20/1 email)

Why hello there!

What a week it's been! Last P-day was so good... you know what the best thing is... when you get everything done super quick and you can have a nap!!! bliss!

We went to this milkshake place in town, and it's the best! You can pick any chocolate and they make a milkshake out of it :) I chose Cadbury Creme egg, oh yeah!

We were out one night knocking doors and all that jazz, and literally no-one was even remotely interested. I was getting very disouraged. I turned to Sis Tolman and told her how I was feeling. I didn't understand why we weren't able to find anyone when we were trying so hard. We said a prayer, and went back to knocking... and you know what... we didn;t find anyone, but I felt so much better! I learnt something so important that night! The antidote to discouragement is WORK! even if you don't find anyone, you will feel good because you are doing the Lord's work!

We did a lot of finding this week, and we were blessed to find a lady named Carol who was very nice and said we could come back, so I'm looking forward to that.

I went on exchange with Sister Wagner to Wrexham in Wales. Sister Wagner looks exactly like Elaine from Seinfeld! I found this highly amusing, and pleaded with her to push someone and say "get out!" but she wouldn't :(  Anyways, I had an amazing exchange! Wrexham is the best! so many people stopped and listened to us, and we had some amazing lessons :)

Now it's time for the miracles!
We got a text during the week from Sis Boswell asking if we could come round to teach Samuel's girlfriend Sasha! Of course we said yes... and nearly fell off our chairs! So we got to teach her and it was so good!! she said she would read the BOM and pray and I am soooo excited!

Saturday was 4hr finding, and we went out to Holmes chapel. We planned to go out to the farms to see if the man we found a few weeks ago was home, cos he was amazing! Unfortunately he wasn't home, so we knocked some doors in a newly established estate... and we found a new investigator! Her name is Jane, and she has 3 kids. She believes in God and was interested in hearing about how the Gospel blesses families :) So we will go back next week!

On Sunday we taught the lesson in Relief Society. It was lesson 2 from the manual, and it went really well. The Spirit was so strong as we testified of Christ and the Atonement, and there weren't many dry eyes in the room. After church there was another miracle. A lady who lives next to the church, just walked in and was asking us questions! She wants to learn more so we will teach her this week!

Sunday night we watched 'Joseph Smith Prophet of the Restoration' at the Mosses home. Zane and Paul came and we all felt the spirit. Zane wants to be baptised asap, but we still haven't been able to teach him! I know that he will be baptised! I am so excited for him!

So I am feeling so pumped for this week! The Lord has blessed us for our hard work, and I am so grateful :) Stay tuned for more miracles!

xoxo Sister Riley

No longer just following (13/1 email)

Hi everyone!

What a week! We did sooo much walking this week, my calves are huge! Congleton is very hilly so it's good exercise!

My new companion Sister Tolman is the best! She is from Logan Utah. She is one of the sweetest and loveliest people I've ever met, and I am so excited to work with her :)

We have been teaching Lily Poulton. She is almost 8 years old, and her parents wanted us to teach her the lessons before her baptism. I love teaching kids! It helps me to teach more simple and easy to understand lessons which is good practice for when we teach investigators. The Poulton family is great, they have 3 little girls who are crazy! I love them!

Friday night we held a sports night so we could invite our investigators. Paul and Zane came along, and Paul's friend Darryl. It was a good night :)

We finally got to teach Christian this week! When I was with Sister Nemec we could never get hold of him, but we saw him in town one day and turns out he wasn't dodging us, he just lost his phone... Anyways, Sister Tolman and I had a short lesson with him about the Sabbath Day. He agreed with everything we said and said he would come to church with us when he has a free sunday.

We got to teach Wendy this week too. She opened up to us about how she feels lost and alone. My heart hurt for her. We shared with her how those feelings can be taken away as she reads, prays and comes to church. She is still hesitant to come to church, even though she said she felt good coming to the activities at church. I think that perhaps the people she associates with at her pentacostal church are saying bad things about us 'mormons'. I felt prompted after our lesson to sing for her. We sung 'I am a child of God' and she loved it. She thanked us, and promised to pray to know if coming to our church is the right thing to do. I know she will get her answer... I have such high hopes for her!

I'm out of time, but this week has been so good for me. We didn't get high numbers, but I am finally feeling confident in my abilities as a missionary. Because I had to 'lead out' in the area, I had to step up and take responsibilities. I'm no longer just following my companion around, I finally feel equal to my companion, even though she has been out longer than me.

Thanks for your love and support

Love always, Sister Riley xoxo

Alma 26:22 - The secret to success in missionary work 

My district (before Sis Nemec and Elder Hatch were transferred)

It's so gross how much dog poo is on the streets!

The Poulton girls wearing their ice cream

Happy New Year! (6/1 email)

Hi everyone!

Transfers this week! Sister Nemec is leaving, I'm staying and my new companion is Sister Tolman from Utah :) I can't wait! She is the best!

Hope you all had a great New Years! We went round to the Boswell's to bring in the New Year. Sister Boswell fed us real good haha! so much So that Sister Nemec broke her chair! hahahah! It was actually the funniest thing ever. We played games with them (pictionary, charades, etc.) which was way fun :) The Boswell kids are really funny :) We got back to the flat about 10, and we were allowed to stay up til 12, but we were too tired lol. The fireworks woke us up though... its legal to set off your own fireworks here, so needless to say, everyone and his dog were setting them off and I didn't get much sleep!

I went on exchange this week with Sister Sun. She is one of the Sister Training leaders. She's originally from Taiwan, but moved to Utah... which means everyone I've been on exchange with so far has been from Utah!

I love exchanges cos miracles always happen on exchange! We found three new investigators!
I'll tell you about Zane.. We met him street contacting. We started talking to him, and he broke down crying as he told us his story. He is at rock bottom, and is now turning to God to help him. He's been attending another church, but he said he would come with us to our church next week :)

He came to a movie night we had last night. We watched Ephraim's Rescue again cos it's so good! It really touched Zane, and he said he will read the Book of Mormon and pray to know if it's true! We will teach him tonight! He is so prepared!

Well I don't have much time... I am so rubbish with taking photos! I don't have any to send for this week except for the beautiful sunrise we saw the other day!

Have a brilliant week
D&C 81:5

xoxo Sister Riley