How to Park a Car

Hello! Another week has flown by! We had a miracle this week where all
clocks magically changed, and we got an extra hour of sleep. That was
a great day. The other side of that though is that it now gets dark
way early, which is weird. And cold. So cold. But I just pretend to be
Elsa and sing : " The cold never bothered me anyways."

The English class is going well! We have another student, a girl from
Nepal who can't say my name. So she calls me Sister Mac instead.

This week we had exchanges and I stayed here in ashford with sister
Grant from Finland while Sister Hernes went to London for the day.
While we were tracting, we were talking to this guy at his door. He
said he wasn't really interested and was telling us about his wife,
who was sick and has a physical disability. We asked if she would be
interested in our message. When he went to go ask her, we heard this
from the next room: " Honey, there are two girls here who are going to
heal you! " Ah! That's not what we said at all! So we had to explain
to her that we were not going to heal her, but just wanted to share a
message. It was quite sad cause she was really excited. But we will
see her next week to share our message.

Saturday we had a ward activity where we had a quiz night. I guess
those are popular here, and everyone in the ward talks so much about
them. They are basically where you are in teams and answer different
trivia questions about random things. It was really fun and we had a
good time getting to know the ward better!

We went to the white cliffs of Dover again today! We went with a
recent convert and a family from Sister Hernes last area. It was a
beautiful day!  Being next to the cliffs was scary, because heights
and I don't really agree with one another. But it was really pretty.

Well, I love you all! Have a wonderful week!

Love, sister Mac

P.s. Here is how to park a car in England... ;) it's okay, we still
could get our bikes out.

Autumn

Hello family! I hope you have all had a great week!

Autumn is here! It is getting really cold. Like, really.  Cold. The
other day I thought I might have been called to the North Pole. I
bought some nice wool tights so it should be better. I used to always
make fun of people who would bundle up when it wasn't that cold, but
now I am one of those people. Aw well. ;)
I am all caught up with general conference now. I have been reading
the talks during personal study. I loved the talk about "ponderizing"
and have made a goal to memorize a new scripture each week. This week
I am memorizing Malachi 3:10. It's about tithing.
We had a super cool miracle this week. We were biking and we stopped a
couple waiting at the bus stop. We were talking to them and found out
they know a less active sister who we work with! They told us that
they had been having a really hard year and have been praying for help
and were ready to give up. Just as we were about to share a scripture
with them, their bus came! We gave them a pass along card, but before
we knew it they were gone. Then a couple of hours later they texted
us! They had contacted the less active sister and gotten our phone
number from her. They had researched the church and wanted to meet
with us! They feel like like this is something that is an answer to
their prayers. They are so sweet!
Last night we went to have a birthday dinner with a sister in the
ward! We baked her a cake. I remembered seeing something on Pinterest
before I left about making a box cake better by using milk instead of
water and more eggs. So, because Pinterest is always right, I decided
to give it a go.  After we cooked it, I didn't test it before we went.
So I just hoped for the best. So when we started eating it, I was just
praying I didn't destroy this cake. But, Pinterest was right. It was
good! Phew!

The church is true!

Love,
Sister McFarland

Here is a picture from the ward service activity we did a couple of
weeks ago. :)

The Miracle Badge

Hello lovely family! Hope you have had a great week! This week was really good for us. It is definitely getting colder now! 

Transfers are this week, and sister Hernes and I will both be staying in Ashford! Yay! I really love this ward. 

My missionary badge is really quite a miracle badge. A couple of weeks ago I had lost it somewhere in Ashford. The next day while biking I looked down to see my badge in the gutter, black and shiny and beautiful. It was a miracle! Then this past week I lost it again... typical me. It fell off while biking. I didn't think I would have that miracle again but I did! A brother in the ward had found it while walking and kept it for me. He also put it on Facebook so the whole ward knew about it. :) haha So every member we saw said, "Sister McFarland, we saw you lost your badge!" Luckily I have two.

Today for P-day we went to the Canterbury Cathedral. Its the oldest cathedral in England. It was really beautiful! And it looked a lot like Hogwarts. I may or may not have pretended that I was in Hogwarts for a while. :) 

We had a really cool miracle with a lovely woman named Joan. She used to be taught by sisters a while ago. We were just stopping by when she pulled up in her car. She invited us in and we had a good lesson with her, and we are now meeting with her regularly. She says she now feels like she is ready for the gospel. :) We are so happy! 

So in our mission we do GAPS-greatness after preparation (also because in the underground in London- "mind the gap") which are principles in the Preach my Gospel lessons, such as God is our loving Heavenly Father, the Book of Mormon, etc. There are assigned gaps for each week and we role play 4 gaps to each other every day. They each have a scripture, and have to be 2 min long. It is really good practice teaching. 

 Anyways, I love you all! I hope you have a marvelous week filled with sunshine and happiness! 

Love,
Sister McFarland

 

Conference, Cliffs, and English Class

Conference was really good. We watched the first session at a member's home live, (5:00 England time)  and it was cool to think that you guys were home watching the exact same thing, singing the same songs, at the same time! The other sessions we watched at members homes later. We watched the Saturday afternoon session at 1:00 Sunday and the Sunday morning session at 5:00. They show them at the stake centre but we watched all of them at member's homes. I still haven't seen or read the Sunday afternoon session. I think I will study it for personal study tomorrow.

So today I am emailing late because for P day we went to the White Cliffs of Dover! It was so cool! It was really beautiful. It was a bit rainy but not too bad. I got a bit nervous standing on the edge of the cliff as I'm sure you can imagine. 

So the English class went really great! We didn't think anyone would come, but a Chinese couple did. They are so so nice! The class went well and afterwards we taught them about prayer. They want to come to church next week! They own a fish and chip shop nearby and give us 50% off. We have heard of more people who will be coming next week, so it is building!

Love,
Adriana