"4th floor, Last door"

Hello everyone!!

Another week down! This week seemed longer than any other week on the mission! Time in the mission world is sooo crazy! 

Tuesday: not to exciting, we had district council and thats always fun!

Wednesday: ok skippin this day too hahahah

Thursday: we did service at the food pantry wooooo we packed all the bags full of food so that they were ready to go on the day of the actual food pantry!
After we taught vladimir! We read mosiah 4 with him and talked about how recieving a remission of our sins is so important and is essential to live with God again. He seems to get everything and believes it but isnt willing to act. (Frustrating)

Friday: we heart attacked Alma! Last week we went to visit her and we knocked and no one answered so we knocked one more time and then we started to leave and she opened the door and got so mad at us she said "YOU SCARED ME SO BAD!!! i was about to call the cops because you were banging on my door so loud!! You cant come back!!!" So we decided to heart attack her and kill her with kindness! Crossing our fingers it works!
We taught Edward!! Edwards grandma is a member and we teach her come follow me! Edward is 9 and really shy when it comes to talking about the church! We are hoping he will talk more next lesson but we are soooo excited to be teaching him! If you know me you know i loveee kids and teaching them is even more fun!!
We also taught hayley!! She likes things slow so we went over helped her get things cleaned and organized and answered a few of her questions! 

Saturday: we went on splits with the STL's i was with sister collins who was an STL in woodstock before she came to be an STL for all the new ganm missionaries hahaha she just got transfered on wednesday so it was good to get to know her!! We had a good time and she taught me how to do the Family and Temple door approach! It was so cool to see how many people open up when you ask them about their family first! We tracted all day in a really hard area and had no success, when i say all day it was 7 hours! 
Towards the end of the day sister trussell and i were on our way to dinner and decided to knock doors on the way. We were in this neighborhood where again not many people were listening.(there was the cutest house that i kept telling sister trussell i loved) I started to just walk and sister Trussell asked me where i was going and i told her "im trying to have the spirit guide me" Hahahahah she asked if it was working and i said "nope lets pray" soooo we did! After we prayed we knocked on one door and no one was home. We decided to knock one more door (member that really cute house? Ya we knocked that one) a lady named Gloria answered and we started to tell her about the Book of Mormon and explained to her that Jesus Christ also visited the people in the ancient americas! The light of christ filled her soul and she looked at us and said "That makes sooo much sense" with a big smile on her face!! Sister Trussell and i had the biggest smiles on our faces, with tears in our eyes and couldnt believe that she just said that. After all fay of rejection we finally found someone. She asked if we wanted a coke and we both said yes even tho we dont drink soda cuz we were so happy and loved this lady!! As she walked away to get the coke sister trusell and i both looked at each other with smiles from ear to ear. She came back and we told her a little bit more and gave her a copy of the Book of Mormon and she asked if we needed money for the book we told her no and how we both know that this book and gospel blesses peoples lives so we give them out for free. She was very happy and it seemed like she had been waiting for someone to tell her this for her whole life!! She said one thing that she loved is she felt that we were very pure and had a spirit about us that she was drawn to. I have never felt the spirit so strong on someones front porch but it was one of the best moments ive had on my mission!! This was the first "4th floor, last door" experience i've had and it was incredible!! Hard work brings blessings!

Sunday: church woooo!!! After church we had a lunch with the missionaries in just the cartersville stake (all the missionaries that moved missions) and it was really fun! We also had interviews so that was nice! President and Sister Marsh are amazing and I am soooo grateful for them! They are already both so aware of me and it means a lot :)

Missions are incredible and even though i never planned or wanted to go on a mission in a way i feel like im made for this. Hahaha its crazy! I know heavenly father knows whats best for us even if we dont see it. When i first was thinking about a mission i thought WHAT NO WHY! but i have come to realize his plan is best and at some point we will realize why. I am grateful for the opportunity to be a missionary and am grateful for the Lords trust in me to do his work.

Love you all and have a great week!!

Xoxo, Sister Barton 

The Lords hand & timing

You know what people say time flies when you're having fun ;) the mission is full of fun in many different ways! Let me just share with you my week

Tuesday: lets skip this day

Wednesday: vladimir called us and told us he doesnt want to meet with us anymore because it causes to much stress with him and his ex wife. BUT we talked him out of it and got a return appointment for the next day. Everyone pray for him!!!

We also went to Hayleys! We helped her paint one of the rooms in her appartment!! It was so fun and a great way to do service!! Quick shout out to my cutie mom for teaching me how to paint rooms :)

We went to the yw/ym activity & they made dinner and had all the ym & yw write down questions that they had for us about missionary work and everything! it was so fun and we got to know the youth so much better!! Thats one thing i LOVE about it here, the members are so missionary minded and we are basically family with them all!

Thursday: we taught Vladimir!! The lesson kinda went in circles but we decided to focus on his ex wife and see if we can serve her and maybe start teaching her so she can see for herself the blessings from the gospel.

Kyrees lesson went good this week! We taught him about the importance of going to church and i related it to how if we have a tree and we arent giving it water and the sun it wont grow any bigger and eventually die. The tree is like our spirits, if we arent giving it the things it needs like church, reading the scriptures, and praying our spirit wont grow and be able to shine as bright.

LISTENING TO THE SPIRIT!!! On the way to the church to call my brother jens for his b day we stopped at the gas station!! I got out of the car and thought nah i dont need a book of mormon this time we are just going in for a second. THEN thought wait no ill just grab one just in case! We went inside did our shopping and as we were checking out the cashier said he has seen us in here before and we told him we are missionaries and he told us he is budist and we could have some of his books and then he said he would be interested in learning more about our church. I GAVE HIM THAT BOOK OF MORMON it was amazing heavenly father told me to bring it in and it was specifically for him. Wow AND HE TEXTED US AFTER!! I was so happy that i followed that prompting.

I gave sister Trussell a haircut thursday night too so that was fun using my pre mission skills.

Friday: service at the food pantry woot woot!! Its always so fun to do service at the food pantry and the lady dona that runs it takes everyone to lunch after at this cute place called the first watch.

We taught Boakai!! We were running late to his house and got there about 20 minutes late whooopps but we knocked and his son answered and told us hes been at a meeting all day and doesnt know when he will be home ugh we were bummed cuz we texted and called him before to remind him and he didnt respond. Right as we were about to leave BOAKAI pulled into the driveway and we had such a great lesson with him!!! I was able to understand way more of what he was saying this lesson than the last (hes african with a THICK accent) but this miracle just shows that everything is on the Lords timing! 

We had a lesson with anthony where we gave anthony to the ksu elders so that he can start going to the ysa there. So hopefully he progresses with them!!

We had a girl named haley message us on thursday and told us that she just moved to the acworth area and wants to come to lessons with us so she came to all of our lesson on friday.... she drove us too and on our way home she got lost and we almost ended up going to Chattanooga ya thats in Tennessee. So basically we almost got kid napped until i said hey i dont think this is the way back to the church. HAHAHA Then the next day we talked to the presidents wife at the YSA and found out she is crazy and goes around and gets baptized into every YSA ahhhh shes been baptized like 4 times already and she told us shes 23 but really shes 34 ahhhhh oh one more the old mission president in the GAM told all the missionaries to stay away from her because shes a wild card but we had no idea tbh i thought she was really funny and i had a good time! But little did I know!!

Saturday: we met a 13 yr old kid named jason so hopefully him and his family will be interested!

Sunday: we had church! My fav!! Omg we had dinner with some members and they were so cute!! I felt i was at my grandma and grandpas it was so fun and the food was so yummy so right at my true grandma and grandpas house!! 

It is incredible to be apart of all these experiences and be able to recognize fully the Lords hand in my life and in missionary work. I hope all of you can notice one way the lords hand is in your life. LOVE YOU ALL!!

xoxo sister barton

WAHOO for missions

Im actually apart of the Georgia Atlanta North Mission now!!! It now feels like real life that ive changed missions and im actually not to sad! Heres me week for all yall 

Tuesday: nothing crazy happened just a day in the mission.

Wednesday: ZONE CONFERENCE!!!! tbh i think this was one of the best days on the mission for me! To start of the day I SAW TWO OF MY FRIENDS FROM HOME AHHHH first we got to zone conference and met lots of new missionaries which was great and then i saw Elder Alldredge omg it was so fun and made me so happy to see a high school friend in georgia and in the same mission CRAZY!! THEN i turn around and see Sister Wersland from cosmetology school!!! AHHH the excitement was real!! Theres nothing like a familiar face when you are far from home! Highlight of the week for me was seeing both of them for sure!!
Zone conference!! We started off by having lunch with the entire mission and then took a mission photo of the whole mission in front of the city hall!! Then we had zone conference and it was the best 4 hrs of my life. The north mission is on FIRE! President Marsh is so dedicated to the work and is here to get things done and not waste time. At zone conference they explained many of the things they do that might be different! One of the things was what they call Yellow Pad Prayer where you pray in a way where you recieve direct and real time revelation from God (President Nelson does it). A few of the missionaries shared their experiences from YPP and they were amazing. President Marsh told us to imagine it like Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ are right in the room with you and you are having a conversation with them. He began to share many amzing experiences with us and it really inspired me and motivated me to learn this YPP so i can recieve this kind of revelation for myself.
President Marsh also made what is called 174 unique and exclusive gifts of the gospel and they're a bunch of topics that talk about our beliefs with more info about them and what they can do for us. IT IS SO HELPFUL!! He also made something called the FAT discusion which stands for the Family and Temple discussion. We had a call saturday night about it and the missionaries told us just by using this baptisms went from 15-20 per month to 40-50 per month! PRESIDENT MARSH IS AMAZING!! As you can tell he is here to BE a mission president and help the work progress and I am so amazed by his dedication. They also told us some helpful tricks when teaching and i always need those!! So long story short zone conference was great!! 

Thursday: we taught Vladimir and pushed his baptism back to the 27th so pray for him!! 
We taught Anthony! Anthony told us he is very interested in religion and thought he should learn it from the source rather than random places. He told us that if he finds out it is true thats just a bonus. We taught him the restoration and it was a very good lesson! 
Kyree!!! We taught Kyree again and played a matching game with him and wooow his attention span was not there this time. We are trying to come up with lessons that will keep him engaged so let me know of ideas!!!

Friday: 4 week follow up!! This is like new missionary training in the GAM but in the GANM they call it 4 week follow up. It was awesome to meet the new missionaries so i could have some friends and people that relate to me! 
After we went to the temple with a recent convert that Sister Trussell taught! It was her first time so we got to go!! It was an amazing experience to be able to go to the temple with a recent convert going for her 1st time and another one was there going for her 2nd. The spirit was so strong and i felt as if what im doing here in georgia might eventually make a difference in someones life. After we went to olive garden so cant forget that!! Yum yum

Saturday: nothing to exciting.

Sunday: I LOVE SUNDAYS!!! Vladimir and Anthony came to church and so did kyree the recent convert!!! WOOOO
After church we were contacting and decided to try the FAT discussion. The first house we knocked on was a lady Alma. We started talking to her about families and how we believe we can be sealed with our families for all eternity. She let us into her home and told us she is struggling right now and has met with the missionaries in the past in California when she was looking for a religion but decided to join the Jehovah witnesses. We asked her why and she told us she had some concerns with the "mormon" church. We asked her what they were so we could clarify and we did!! We answered her concerns and explained them to her!!! She was a little hesitant with us at first but we got a return appointment!! 
As we were tracting after dinner in a different neighborhood we walked up to a house and a car pulled to the side of the road to get our attention. We walked over and he told us he has studied the bible a lot and believes there should be more somewhere! WHATTT?? GOLD RIGHT? we set up a return appointment with him! 

All these stories are just a few of the miracles of missionary work. I am so blessed that i was chosen to have these experiences and that jesus christ can trust me to teach his gospel and be a disciple of him. I wear his name on my chest everyday and i hope to be able to represent him better and better everyday i serve him. I challenge everyone reading this to be their own missionary. It might be by giving someone a book of mormon, not being shy about sharing your beliefs, or by being an example by the way you live the gospel. Everyone can be a missionary in their own unique way.

Its p-day already??!!

At this time in my mission I cant even keep the days straight. Everyday goes by so fast and to think it's already p day again is crazy!!

Tuesday: The coolest thing happened!!! We were on our way to pick up hermana Miller so she could come to a lesson with us and she told us she wasnt home yet and she lives right by mango tree!! We were already on our way there and I had this great thought (the spirit told me) to stop at Mango Tree first and see if Mar-Naye was working so we could talk to her again and set an appointment. We walked in and SHE WAS WORKING!! She was so happy to see us and we were even happier to see her!! We set up a lesson with her and got to talk to her more! It was awesome!

We had a lesson with Boakai. Boakai is from west Africa and the whole lesson I could not understand him HAHAHA so hermana Miller and sister Trussell taught a lot of it with my few inputs when I cought on hahahahah

Wednesday: we didnt have any lessons :( we contacted people and in the evening we went to a pre 4th of July celebration!! Oh my goodness it was soooo fun!! Sister Trussell and I got our hair done from one of the booths cuz you know got to support those cosmetologist :)

Thursday: 4TH OF JULY my favorite holiday!! We went to a breakfast 5K that was ran by the church! They had a dunk tank, bounce houses, and lots of food!! It was a good time!! We contacted a little! the members here are awesome they are so nice and ALWAYS feed us dinner! So we had a cute 4th of July dinner with some members!! 

Friday: we did service at the food pantry!! Friday we packed bags and set everything up for Saturday! It was fun and a great way to serve!

We taught mar-naye Friday evening!! She is so open minded and I loved teaching her! It was definitely my best lesson! 

Saturday: can't remember this day so we will skip it hahahah

Sunday: we went to church!! Ohhh how I love church!! President and Sister Marsh decided to come to our ward so they were there!! After sacrament we got to have mini interviews with them and it was awesome!! I ALREADY LOVE THEM SOOOO MUCH!! 

Monday: today we went shopping and I'm convinced that's my therapy!!! I LOVE SHOPPING!! 

This week my grandma emailed me about repentance and that is something I have thought about so much. I am striving to become more and more like christ everyday and repentance is the way I can do that. I have learned to repent for even little things so I can become more like christ. I challenge everyone reading this email to repent for big and little things and gain that desire to become more like christ. Have a great week and I love you all!

Another week wahoo

Another week in the mission!!! Almost 4 down in the field WHATTT I love the life of being a missionary and want this spirit to be with me my whole life!!! So here's my week :)

Wednesday: we did lots of missionary work and I loved it!! That's how it should be right!! We did lots of contacting and at the end of the day we went to institute we were hoping Vladimir would show up but unfortunately he didn't :( he has lots of at home trials that keep him from doing some of the things that are going to keep him progressing.

Thursday: I am convinced that as soon as I walked into the mtc I lost half my memory. I call it my missionary mind. HAHAHA serious tho I cant remember anything anymore!! So good thing I keep a journal! 
Thursday omg we had an awesome experience!! It was time for comp study, we drove to one place and it was a place we couldnt study at soooo... we saw a donut shop and thought ohhh let's study there, we drove there and it was closed!!! Ya i know so random it was closed in the middle of the day on a Thursday it was Gods plan tho! After that we just decided ok let's go to our regular spot at the lake so we did! At the lake we went into a cute smoothie shop and the lady working there was so cute! Her name is Mar- Nae and she was telling us how she has been looking to grow her faith this summer and that it was crazy that we just happened to walk in! It was awesome and I am so grateful to see miracles like this one. Also she gave us free smoothies!! so nice!!
We taught Kyree today too! Kyree if you remember is a recent convert and he is 11! Our first lesson with him he was CRAZY!! hahah he was so energetic and couldnt sit still! But this lesson we planned a game! We made a hop scotch with chalk and put principles in the squares and as he played he had to stop and explain the principle to us. He loved it and was sooo involved. So if anyone has anymore fun games let me know :)

Friday: District Council with everyone going from the GAM to the GANM!! It was so fun!! Two of the office elders from the north mission were there and they were very cool so I'm excited! After we went to a place called Jefferson's and got some wings! So yum!! 

Saturday: service at the thrift store hearts of faith!! The store is closing and we helped organize it before everything was officially closed. We shared with her more about the church and she said she might be interested because her son goes but lets hope she comes!!
We had a referral!! Hayley!! She was referred by some sisters in my "old" mission hahahah anyway she had twins and shes very busy!! We helped her clean her house and just got to know her for a while so that was nice. We are excited to help her come closer to Christ! 
Saturday night we went to a car show to find people with some elders! It was really fun!! 
Sunday: last day in the GAM!! Sister Trussell and I spoke in church!! Its not as scary for me here because I really don't know these people yet hahaha after church we had a picnic with Alexis!! Alexis us a member and Sunday was her one year mark of her baptism so we went to celebrate!! After we took her to be a missionary with us hahaha after about 3 houses she was EXHAUSTED from the mission life and the heat!! Sister Trussell and I were laughing so hard because it was like 5 minutes after being a missionary! So that shows you how hard it is hahaha we went to a members house to get alexis some water so that was good hahaha 

The mission life is fun, crazy, repetitive, and spiritual!! I hope you all can continue to grow your faith in Christ and realize we can do all things through him. Always remember my favorite quote! "I believe in christ like I believe in the sun not because I can see it but by it I can see everything else" I have seen that to come even more true while I have been on my mission because many things I never thought I would be able to do I've done so wooo!!!