The Boonies Are Boonieing - Etowah Valley, Cartersville, Georgia

Yallllllll ain't nobody told me the boonies would be this fun tell me why I played some random guy's violin in a walmart parking lot and personal studied on top of a mountain... I love my life what even is it

Anywho how are we!! Let me know! If I don't respond to your email today know I still absolutely adore you, I'm just a busy woman. If you need prayers for ANYTHING or ANYONE please let me know!!! I'd love to put names on the Atlanta temple prayer roll in person next week!

Here's about how my week went:

Monday we woke up before the crack of dawn to hike a mountain and watch the sunrise. We personal studied up there and it was magical. We went to the motherland (Buc-ees) (I thought of you Madison and Zachary Berrett). We got poisoned at Subway and felt sick the rest of the day but that's okay. I won secret Hitler at the church (I was hitler) Then Morty and I laughed our faces off for some reason while studying at Chick Fil A.

Tuesday was so cooked but blessed at the same time. We had an amazing lesson with our friend Michelle and she is literally my favorite lol. She's slowly quitting smoking but she's getting there! We had interviews with president and man I just love that guy. We helped Mama Tanya pack up her apartment some before heading to dinner with the Burges and Hudsons. We had the most yummiest chili ever with homemade bread and pumpkin cookies. Holy yeah. One of our friends that was on date and 100% taught AND interviewed dropped us out of the blue. Rest in peace Scott. Pray for her please. Also one of our new members got ANTIED dw there's an update about that later

Wednesday it dumped rain all day and was FREEZING so naturally we played pickleball outside in the morning (??) The nicest worker at chick fil a gave us lemon water and called us baby. Oh how I love the south. We went to a ladies lunch brunch at the church and did crafts after eating with the relief society. A guy came up to us at mcdonalds asking if we were Mormon and we were like heck yeah and then we realized he didn't speak english so I spoke the most broken spanish ever to him and he pulled up to church on sundayyyy (shoutout to el don de lenguas) We visited our friend Pam and apparently her son stole her phone and she's now using her mom's? Idk. While we were knocking we had acorns dive bombing us left and right and we kept getting hit in the head so we lowk had to leave. We had FHE with our cutie lil group and de-antied the new member I mentioned before. All is well. 

Thursday we had DC and ate spaghetti for lunch. We were joined by special guests Elder Beaird and Williams. (The BYU football player Williams if anyone watches byu ball) He's a chiller. We had two lessons cancel so we decided to stopby this house of an inactive member and guys I am so confused and intrigued by her house. The outside looks like an old rundown falling apart shack but when we got past the storm door and into the enclosed porch, we looked through the windows and it was like a nice remodeled house with new floors and minky couture blankets and such. Wealth in disguise?? Anyway we had dinner with the Nederhands and they are quite the pair. She has a plant collection and he deals with it. She was so impressed that I could name her amaryllis (amarillis? amyrillis? I cannot spell that thing) but I owe it all to my pal Lukey Jocom and his grandma (and one of my best friends) Carol Farrell. We ran into an inactive member at mcdonalds and he showed up to church on sunday for the first time in ages yippee!

Friday we weekly planned and basically cooked our entire day helping Mama Tanya move but it was chill because she called all of our friends and read scriptures with them while we were there so we had an excuse to stay lol. She's literally the goat and one of my best friends now. She calls us her church daughters and church sons. We convinced her son Desmond to come to church and she literally started crying and praying out loud because she's been trying to do that for 20 years and then she tried to give us all money but no way Jose we do it for JESUS! 

Saturday was SO WEIRD LOL everything was baby themed??? Okay so 1. We went to a baby shower and I won a game and such 2. We found a family of cats with baby kittens in a bush and of coursely I gave them cat treats that I keep on me always thanks to my goat Hermana Clegg 3. I played the violin of a guy we talked to in the Walmart parking lot and he told me it was a copy of a strad... okay dope and he also gave us a bunch of info for an anti-abortion organization? (baby themed organization) 4. We had a lesson with our new member Taylor and what does she gift me? a BABY DOLL? OH AND IN MY DREAM I HAD A BABY. Who is pregnant be honest. This is going to eat me alive. 

Sunday I realized what a goat of a bishop we have. Bishop Baety is the most locked bishop of all time and he is so flipping cool. Sister Mortensen and I spoke in sacrament meeting and I literally wasn't nervous at all which was a first... guys is this growth? Idk. I also didn't write hardly anything down so that was also new. Someone was visiting from the Macedonia ward and asked if I knew CAROL DOYLE!?!?? Emp I GASPED. My shayla. We taught the 2nd hour gospel doctrines class and taught the word of wisdom. Some interesting thoughts were shared... We sat in with Taylor during her temple recommend interview because she was so nervous and she passed with flying colors so hopefully we can go to the temple with her here soon! All of our lessons fell through so we went to this beautiful park and talked to everyone, half of which had their headphones in and couldn't hear us at all so that was buns but it's okay. We went to a women's meeting at the church and it was so special! We all laughed and cried together. 

I truly love being a missionary! I do! I have the great privilege of using my testimony of Christ to bring others closer to Him! If you haven't prayed lately, go talk to Him. He's waiting to hear from you, and you are NEVER too far gone to reach out. He will always hear you out. Let me know how you're doing and what I can pray for!

I love yall, the Lord loves yall!

xoxo, Sister Anderson

Helping Mama Tanya move

Violinist in the Walmart Parking Lot

Nearer My God To Thee

Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing

Our park where we talked to everyone we saw

Top of a mountain for pday study

HI FROM THE WAH! - Etowah Valley, Cartersville, Georgia

Hello everyone!!! Okay... Cartersville is BEAUTIFUL like guys I'm in the mountains. (Like literally, I'm sending this from the top of one) I cried when I saw them. Bob Ross is up in heaven painting these fall leaves I KNOW IT. It's incredible. God knew I missed the mountains and gave me what I didn't know I needed! I'll have better photos of them next week trust. This was a super short and crazy week. Let me tell you all about it! 

Wednesday was p-day because of transfer week, and basically the whole day consisted of me being on the phone with my sister giving me a tour of her massive cruise ship in the bahamas while I packed my stuff up. Sister Empey was going to be joined by two other sisters in our little apartment so we had to build some things and shift other things around. We had dinner with Sister Brackett and of coursely I cried because I cry every time I see her sweet little 93 year old self and also it was the last time I'd see her. We went to bed late because we were building more furniture for the new sisters! Then Emp and I had one last sleepover (imy goat) (baaa) 

Thursday was TRANSFERS! I got to see some of my best pals at the mission office and had so much fun talking with them! My MTC comp Sister Lord is joining Sister Empey in Lilburn and they're STL trio training! My comps are comps and are having a BABY! So tender. I met my new comp Sister Mortensen! She is a doll and I love her already. Her hair is magic and she loves to laugh so we have a good time. Arriving in my new area was just WOW. Like I said in the beginning, I cried when I saw the mountains. It's also full of fields and farms and probably every restaurant you can think of. OH AND ANNA IT HAS A TARGET . I haven't seen one of those in 6 months, so I was pretty excited. We had a great new member lesson with Harvey who I clicked with right away and he made a pinky promise to give up his facebook AI dramas on sundays to keep the sabbath more holy lol. I was also amazed seeing the apartment because 1. I have my own closet and 2. I have my own bathroom?? Hello! 

Friday I woke up and counted my blessings cause I cannot get over the beauty of Cartersville. We weekly planned and somehow successfully kept it to two hours even though I knew none of the friends and none of the members. We found three cool people who unfortunately all ended up canceling their return appointments but hey they responded to us! (Getting someone to text you back after they've been found is one of the biggest challenges as a missionary if you didn't know) We had dinner with the Leachmans at a super yum mexican restaurant. The mom is from venezuela and the dad is from Georgia. They're a cute pair. Their 4yo son Jacob was climbing all over the place during dinner and he eventually got banished to his high chair. One of our new members, Taylor is on the spectrum and has been pretty overwhelmed with all of the attention since her baptism and called us a few times and eventually decided to take a break from church. Pray that she comes back and that we'll figure out how to help her! 

Saturday was HALLOWEEN! If you know me, I've had a countdown on my phone for this day since the beginning of my mission lol. I love halloween. I did have some major fomo because we had to be inside by 6, but I had fun in spirit. I did a word search and cleaned my apartment instead . I felt like a pile all day but it wasn't because we weren't working hard, it was because not a SOUL was answering their phone or opening their door before 6pm. Holidays on the mission always feel like this though so I was half expecting it but still. Guh. We stopped by all of our friends to make sure they were coming to church and put our friend Pam on date for baptism! She's a cutie. We taught our friend Michelle the word of wisdom and she brought up the fact that she needed to quit smoking before we did so that's rad. We comp studied at Dunkin and of coursely bought blueberry munchkins.

Sunday was so good! I got to meet a lot of members in the Etowah Ward but I also forgot basically all of their names but that is okay. We had a really good meeting with Bishop Baety after church and this guy is LOCKED on missionary work. Our huddle is amazing and Bishop is going to have us over every Sunday night for a meeting of how he can help the missionary work even though he's a busy fella. He's so cool. We found six amazing people during the day and fed two hungry cats. 

What a day. We had zone focus at night and learned some good things I'm excited to implement this transfer!!!

I love my compy so much look at her she's literally moana

I LOVE YOU ALL TO THE BEAUTIFUL MOON AND BACK!

Shoot me an email and we can be pals forever (please my inbox is dryer than the sahara )

I love yall, the Lord loves yall!

xoxo, Sister Anderson

This is what a lot of the boonies houses look like if you were wondering

Sister Mortensen a.k.a. Moana :-)

My favorite cat that I found

With Friend Pam

Someone had a hot dog on their porch

Transfers at the church

This is my fav thing ever btw: (my signed
trophy from none other than @Andy Dearhart )