Winter is Here. Pray for Me. (Nov 3)

 We have two new investigators! Maombi and Jacob, the guys I talked about in my last email :) They both came to church along with our other investigator Enma! It's so crazy to go from having hardly any investigators just a few weeks a go to having about 5! The Lord is definitely blessing us. I feel so blessed to have met these people and be able to share this wonderful gospel with them.

    Winter is officially here! Got snow on November 1. Everyone please pray for me that I survive this Canadian winter! hahah

    This week we had our Zone Conference where our mission president gave us training. The one thing that I remember the most that was said was "If you're having a bad day, you know you are doing something right!" I love this so much because we ALL have bad days and it should be a compliment to us that Satan is working so hard on us because if we weren't strong and faithful, he wouldn't care to work hard on us at all! Just a good thought for you to all ponder on. :)

    On Saturday we were able to go to a women's devotional where Jean A. Stevens, the first counselor in the general relief society presidency came and spoke to us. Such a cool experience! They are all definitely inspired and called of God. During the devotional I got a text from another sister missionary who told me to come outside for a surprise. My surprise was Sister Martin!!!! Or should I say, Sarah Martin! She went home a few months ago and she was here in Canada for a few days. I absolutely love the friendships I have made on the mission. They're the best!!!

     I hope you all have a super fantastic week! Love ya!

Love,

Sister O'Dell

They're just too cute!

Sister O'Dell said, "This is Thang during one of our lessons. This picture shows him choosing God !!(The Book of Mormon he is holding) and not the cigarettes (which are what I am holding)."

"Making Halloween cookies with the Hawryluk family that we live with!"

"The adorable Katelyn Hawryluk!"

"Snow!! And I'm wearing a cow scarf that a less active just gave me :) haha" Everyone knows that Sister O'Dell loves her cows!!

She's too funny!

Mom and her baby!

Patience=Miracles! (Oct 27)

 Pretty slow week this week...and of course all the good stuff happened on Sunday!! Heavenly Father definitely taught me to be patient to receive blessings hahah So Sister Alvez and I got a call yesterday from a member in our ward letting us know that there was a woman at the church who was crying and needed help. The woman, Enman, told us that her husband just asked her for a divorce and she is feeling like she isn't good enough and is feeling weak and super sad. She mentioned that she has come to our church before and with all that she is going through right now she felt drawn to the church again. We talked to her about how much Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ love her and through them she can find that peace and happiness again. We even invited her to be baptized and said she had thought about that before and is going to pray about it and we are going to meet with her again on Tuesday night. We were supposed to have a lesson at 4 pm but they cancelled earlier and at the time that lesson was supposed to happen, that was when we got this phone call about Enman. Heavenly Father definitely knows what he is doing! haha

     Then at church we met Maombi. He is a non-member who came with a family from the ward who is searching to find the right church and is interested in ours. We are hopefully going to start teaching him this week. :) We also had this guy, Jacob, come up to us and ask us if we could teach him the lessons!! That's every missionary's dream! hahah His family are all recent converts but Jacob was still living in Africa so he never had the chance to be taught and what not. Super excited to start teaching him this week as well!!!

      I have to admit, being a missionary is not easy and this week was tough for me. But everything that happened on Sunday made my not so great week worth it. I am so grateful for this chance to meet so many amazing people and share my testimony of my Savior. I hope you all have a great week!

Love,

Sister O'Dell

Fall crafts Sister O'Dell and Sister Alvez made at the relief society activity!

They have too much fun together!

Huge head Sister O'Dell found while they were down town.

"The Field is White, Already to Harvest!" (Oct 21)

This week we got two new investigators!!! Their names are Helen (the mom) and Connor (the son who is 11). I just love them already! And I must admit I was a bit nervous teaching with my new baby but holy cow she is amazing! So lucky to have such a spiritual companion to serve with. The spirit was just so strong during the lesson and we extended the invitation to read and pray about the Book of Mormon which they accepted. Can't wait to meet with them again!

We do a lot of door to door contacting and most of the time it isn't too successful...but this week it was! We ended up getting three potential investigators! My favorite experience from this was when we knocked on this man's door who told us he was Hindu so he already belongs to a religion. But then I asked him the question if he wanted to be with his family forever, even after when we die (he said he had a wife and daughter) and he said yes and asked how that could happen. Then I got to just bear my testimony and give a short lesson about how we can be with our families forever right at his doorway. He invited us to come back. :)

On Sunday we got to go to the youth's fireside at our Bishops house. Man do I love the youth in our ward! Sister Alvez and I got to talk to them about how we personally prepared for missions and what it was like to be a missionary. It was a cool experience and the leaders told us that we were so powerful and relatable, but I just hope the youth thought so too and realize how amazing it is to be a missionary!

I hope all of you are bearing your testimonies wherever you go because you never know who will be ready to hear and accept Christ's gospel! Have a great week!

Love,

Sister O'Dell

Generations picture! Mom, Grandma, and baby:)

Another posterity picture!

Sister O'Dell and Sister Alvez:)

I'm a Mom!!! (Oct 14)

Transfers are this week! And guess what?!?! I'M TRAINING! I'm going to be a mom! hahah And Sister Olpin goes home on Friday so I am "killing" my grandma and "giving birth" all in the same day! hahahahh I am a bit nervous but excited for this new adventure and getting to show my new baby how amazing it is to serve the Lord! :)

Not a whole lot happened this week, but it was Thanksgiving here for these Canadians so I got to eat a few Thanksgiving dinners... :) Apparently by now the weather is supposed to be a lot colder than it is now and I am so grateful for that! hahah It makes tracting a lot more bearable :)

I had a super cool experience teaching a less-active this week. There is this woman, Tomoko, who doesn't come to church but her family does and we don't really know why. Well during the lesson we started talking to her about prophets since we just had General Conference and surprisingly she commented (she's pretty quite) and told us something she had read in the newspaper that had nothing to do with what we were talking about...but I related it to something gospel related and she started to talk and open up more and started to ask questions and what not. It was pretty awesome to see that! While we were talking I was prompted to ask her why she didn't come to church anymore and because she felt comfortable enough with us finally she opened up and told us why! I am seriously so grateful that we have the gift of the Holt Ghost. It seriously is impossible to teach without the Spirit. I love being able to help people gain/regain a testimony of this gospel!!!

I hope you all have a super fantastic week! Keep on smiling! Love ya :)

Love,

Sister O'Dell

Outside the Calgary temple.

Look what Sister O'Dell found!! O'Dell Electrician:)

Sister O'Dell's district