Namaste

And it came to pass that the sister missionaries in Ashford where
blessed with sunny weather all the days of the week ace one, and great
was the joy of those missionaries.

And it came to pass that Wednesday we had interviews with President
Stevens, and it was fantastic. We did have joy in listening to
President and Sister Stevens give great trainings and getting to know
them better. They are so nice and loving! Sister Stevens was telling
us stories about speaking in general conference. She was saying :"Oh
elders and sisters I just love you!" When the Siri on her phone said
"I did not understand what you said" and the whole zone just started
laughing. After the interviews, we were waiting for the elders (our
ride home) while they talked with president because they are the zone
leaders. Sister Hernes and I were in the bathroom and started singing
the circle of life quite loudly,  unaware that they were right next
door and could hear us singing the whole time. Haha!

And Thursday was Sister Hernes birthday! She really wanted to find a
golden investigator for her birthday. We didn't find them, but we
talked to many interesting people. One of them said that in 60 years
when he was dead he would send us a text to tell us if we were right
or wrong about life after death... So we will see how that works out.
Monday when we were doing our shopping, I was really sneaky and
bought Sister Hernes a scarf for her birthday without her noticing.
(Fist pump) she liked it! We also made pancakes for dinner.
So we have decided to start an English class here! The first class
will be Wednesday. We made flyers for the class and went to town
centre and gave them to every Napolise person we saw. There are so
many people her from Nepal! We have started calling them Namastes,
which means hello in napolise.  So we will see how the class goes!
That night we had a dinner appointment with a family in the ward where
we ate pancakes. 

Saturday morning we had a pancake breakfast with the bishop and his
family. So yeah, we had a lot of pancakes this week. :) After a very
filling breakfast we went and played football (soccer) with some of
the men from the ward. Sister Hernes and I were the only girls there.
I am terrible at football so it was a bit embarrassing.  But I tried!
I basically ran up and down left field and went for the ball if it
came my way. Haha

Well my friends, it has been a great week! I love you all!

Love Sister McFarland

So Much Rain, Again!

This week was really good! But it was quite rainy. I have a daily
struggle between being pretty or practical. Lately practical has won
because it's been so wet.  Sometimes at lunch we come home and change
clothes before going out again. I am really grateful for these
experiences that make life more exciting and creates fun memories.
This week we were visiting a sister in the ward when I felt my foot
suddenly get warm... I looked down and her cat had peed on me! It was
gross. We had a good laugh about it. she felt so bad and apologized so
much. But I no longer trust that cat. Whenever it comes near me I just
"gently" push it away.
When I got my mission call to England, I thought I wouldn't have to
deal with large spiders. But I have seen bigger and more spiders here
than in Utah. But the other day during call-ins with our district
leader sister Hernes suddenly lets out this huge scream! There was a
giant spider in our flat. I felt like Samwise Gamgee facing the giant
spider in Lord of the Rings. Sister Hernes bravely took care of it
while I assured our district leader that we weren't dying, it was just
a spider.:)
I feel like I am actually getting to know Ashford really well! I've
had to use my "mind palace" (Lindsey will get this) to remember where
everything is. But God has helped me remember so much! And I have even
found some new shortcuts to places. I am a lot better now at reading a
map because I can no longer rely on Siri.
On Saturday we had a ward service project in Lyd where we cleaned up
the beach. It was such a nice day! It was really warm and it was so
lovely to walk along the beach to picking up rubbish. :) We collected
a lot of sea shells. Afterwards we had a ward BBQ.

Sister Hernes and I are really trying to get to know the young women
here better. We taught the lesson in miamaids yesterday. It went
really well! The young women's group here is small but they are all such great girls.

Love,
Sister McFarland

Here are some cheesy sister missionary photos. :) The jumping picture
was hard because every-time I jumped my shoes would fly off.

Sister McFarland and Mission Milkshake

Two months...what?

I cant believe it has already been two months! 

This week was pretty good. We have had pretty nice weather, but every once in a while it just rains so hard. Like this morning it just poured while we were biking to the church. We got soaked! I don't think I have ever seen so much rain in my life. I think that when the earth flooded for Noah's ark, that must have been what the rain looked like, but we made the most of it by singing and dancing in the rain.

We have a lot of character building experiences on the bikes. :) Last Monday we were biking to town centre and I looked down to see a HUGE spider bungee jumping off of my handlebars, hanging right above my lap! As most of you know how well spiders and I get along, you can imagine my reaction. Let's just say it's a miracle that I didn't crash my bike. I just really quickly grabbed the web and threw the spider into the traffic. 

This week we had exchanges with the sisters in London North. I stayed here in Ashford and Sister Hernes went to London for the day. I was here with Sister Epicoco from Italy. She is really great! When we got back to the flat we realized we had two problems: 1. I didn't know how to adjust the bike seat, because sister Epicoco is shorter than I am. So I tryed to ride sister Hernes bike so sister Epicoco could ride mine. But then I realized how short I am and couldn't reach the pedals. 2. Then we realized our second problem which was that sister Epicoco had not ridden a bike since she was very small. So we just worked closer to the flat that day because we were walking. 

We had a district meeting in Deal the other day, and on the way back we got stuck in terrible traffic, thanks to Operation Stack. So we were driving around Dover for an hour or so just trying to find a way out but the traffic was so bad! On the bright side we got a nice view of the city. 

Thank you all for your love and support! I love you all! Have a great week! Stay classy. 

-Sister McFarland 

So the pictures:

The first one is of sister Hernes and I after being caught in the rain storm. The second one is of Sister Epicoco and I during exchange, and the last one is of our district after district meeting. 

Kabaptized

So for some reason here in the mission it is a tradition to be
kabaptized, which means you eat your first kebab. Now if you asked me
what it was or what country it comes from I couldn't tell you. But it
was oily goodness. I think I gained about 12 pounds from that. So I
can now say I have been kabaptized. That was also where we saw the
castle ( see picture) after our zone meeting.

Zone meeting was really good. We were deciding what we should set as
our goal for baptisms in September. We decided to say a prayer and we
all knelt down and prayed to know. The spirit was so strong and we all
felt like we should set 4 as a goal. It was a cool experience.

So I have a new companion: Sister Henes from Norway! She is really a
great and diligent missionary. I have a lot to learn from her.
Transfers were fun because everyone just meets in St Pancras train
station to exchange. We get a lot of weird looks because there are so
many missionaries and luggage in the middle of this train station.
Yesterday we had a great mission wide conference in London. It was
very good! Brother and sister Christensen came and spoke to us about
members missionary work. I loved it and felt so inspired! It took most
of our day. I know I have already written about the underground but I
don't think I've ever been more claustrophobic in my life than being
squished into a train underground with a lot of tall people and no
elbow room.

We have been meeting with a ton of people, but none of our
investigators are really progressing.

We meet some of the best and weirdest people on a mission. The other
day so many people had turned us down. But one of the last people we
talked to was this woman who was such a hippie but so nice! We talked
on the sidewalk for about 30 min about how the world needs more love
and that we should follow our hearts. She said she felt the spirit and
will read and pray about the Book of Mormon. She doesn't live in
Ashford but she will get in contact with other missionaries.

I am learning loads everyday. I used to hate studying, but I love
studying my scriptures in the morning! I wish we had more time to
study. :)

Well I love you all! Thanks for the prayers and support. Have a great week!

So Much Rain!

Yep. So much rain. Some days I just accept that I am not going to be
cute and go into "marathon mode".  In Utah when it rains there are a
bunch of worms on the sidewalks. But in England they have gross slugs
and snails. Luckily, I have avoided stepping on them too much. But
everything is going well! At the beginning of my mission time was
going super slow, but now it is really fast! Man what even happened this week?
Last p-day we went bowling with the zone. It was fun!

Sister Top fell on her bike yesterday. It was one of the rare times I
was in the lead when I looked back and Sister Top was on the ground!
She is tough though and is okay. While we were walking our bikes back
to our flat we found a new investigator! We probably wouldn't have
stopped her if we were on the bikes. Everything happens for a reason.

Well last night we found out that Sister Top is being transferred to
Bedford! I'm really sad to see her go. I'm going to miss her. I don't
feel like I know Ashford very well so I'm really nervous. But I know
everything will be okay.

Nathan was confirmed last Sunday! It was really great. He was going
to come teaching with us but the appointment cancelled.

Well I love you all! Have a great week!