"Being baptized means you're trying to be a part of the solution" - Aria Love Harknes - Lilburn, Georgia

Dang Aria really is a poet huh.

Hello my lovely friends and family! This week has been filled with many emotions including sad goodbyes and incredible miracles. I'm so grateful for the opportunity I had to serve in Lilburn for six months! I grew to love people deeper than I ever thought possible. Lifelong friendships and memories were made!!! I know that the Lord has great things in store for me as I move onto this next chapter of my mission! Now for transfer news 

I'M LEAVING MY BABY AREA!! I thought pres was gonna prank me and have me stay here for a fifth lowkey. I'm headed to Etowah Valley with Sister Mortensen who is in her third transfer! I'll be honest, I'm a little nervous because I'll be greenie breaking but I'm confident I'm being put where I need to be. I'm also excited for change!!! Transfer 5 here I come

Here's how my long week went!

Monday we did a ninja warrior course and played sand volleyball for ages. Best day everrr! We had dinner with the Duffields and their house reminded me so much of my aunt Laurel and uncle James's house. It was so cozy. 

Tuesday I passed out in the gym probably from dehydration lol. We had a scare with Keyon because he ghosted us so we stopped by his house and his mom said she didn't know where he was either. Bruhhhh! We had dinner with Andrew Dearhart at Agavero (THE MOST BESTEST MEXICAN FOOD EVER) and he refused to let us leave without dessert so we got a giant brownie with ice cream on it and churros. I think I'll never be able to eat a churro from anywhere else ever again. 

Wednesday we exchanged with the Lawrenceville sisters for a third time! Sister Marble came with me to Lilburn! She reminds me a lot of when I was a new missionary so it was cool to be able to empathise with her about the things she's struggling with. We overcame some fears together! We had a new member lesson with Gimena Tzoy and I held her parakeet :) We had dinner with the Barons and the spirit was so strong. I love their family so much! 

Thursday I hit SIX MONTHS AS A MISSIONARY WOOOO! The entire day was a day of absolute miracles! At the gym, a bird came and SLAMMED into the garage door so we opened it and saved him because he was upside down and freaking out. We had our last district council of the transfer and ate lunch at the cutest restaurant called Old Hickory. We found a couple people in the Kroger parking lot including the most darling new mom with a one-month old baby. Not being able to hold kids here is HARD. We had an incredible lesson with our new friend Jarrett and put him on date! Woot woot! We had an all-over-the-place lesson with our friend Kelly who thought we literally wanted to put her in a pit of fire to baptize her again. NAUR KELLY! There was in fact a bit of a language barrier so makes sense. Our member that was with us told us someone came in and stole a gun from her store that day. We were on high alert the rest of the week. The Cardons (senior missionary couple in our complex) brought us dinner because we weren't feeling the best. What ANGELS. So tender. 

Friday Keyon finally rose from the dead and told us his phone was off since Sunday. Phew! He lives. My skin is not liking the colder weather. Yikes. We had a 40 min lesson that was supposed to be lighthearted but was lowk a bash the entire time. He brought up some of the hardest points to combat. Guhhh. Our member was clutch though. We heart attacked one of our members who is preparing for brain surgery on november 4th. Pray for Jackie! The Cardons took us out to dinner this time at Metro Cafe. So good wow. Then we called our best friend Aria. I love her sweet soul and BEAUTIFUL prayers. I write down quotes from her all the time because she speaks so beautifully. Hence the title of this email. Love you Aria :)

Saturday was just WOW WOW WOW! I LOVE JESUS A LOT. Okay so we got an online referral for this woman named Taniesha in the morning, so we call her and set up a church tour for 2pm that day. She shows up and just starts crying because she said she could feel the spirit so strong and she finally felt at home. We hadn't even started yet. We gave her a tour of the building and as we were explaining everything, she kept saying "I like thattt!" and "Oh I didn't know that! That's so cool!" We ended up in the baptismal font room and she started to cry again because she KNEW God had guided her to us. We put her on date!!! She came to the fall festival in the evening with her two daughters and she made some great friends in the ward. We were honestly baffled at how well she connected with everyone. God is so good. Also Sister Empey chased me with a giant cockroach in hand.

Sunday Taniesha, her daughter, and Jarrett came to church! The primary program was DARLING and I realized that I could name every kid up there and what they're obsessed with. We had a really great lesson after church with all three of our friends and the Cardons about the Plan of Salvation! It went really well! They had some good questions and were so excited to hear about everything that they'll be able to do after this life! We stopped by some inactive members and convinced one to come back to church (sealed with a pinky promise). We had dinner with the Bluncks and played with their giant cat Max and their teeny tiny kitty Bear. THE GANM HIT OUR BAPTISMAL GOAL! Surpassed it actually. We had a goal of 37 this month and got 43! More than any month in the last two years. 

Monday we had a great lesson with Ashley to refresh her memory about what she'll be doing in the temple soon! She was sad that I was leaving and asked to take a picture lol. She is so excited to get baptized for her grandma though! We found a few cool people and none had english as their first language. Atlanta really is a melting pot. We had dinner with the Dahnekes and it was so amazing as always. Milo Dahneke was showing us his Tonie which is a toy that's like a cube that you can put different toys on and it'll play different songs depending on what's on there. So cute. We dropped in on one of our inactive members, Erin, and she is in a pretty rough spot and she's in a place where praying makes her feel guilty because it's been so long. Both Sister Empey and I have been there, so we were able to help her pray again. She also said "Will I see yall at church on Sunday?" and we were like YES MA'AM you will. That was huge that she's taking the initiative to come herself.

Tuesday we went to the co-op and organized all of the dresses and jammies :) All of the old ladies gave me a great sendoff because I told them I probably wouldn't be back. We had a church tour with our friend Aleana that I found with Sister Marble on Wednesday. The Lord has been working HARD with her. She quit literally everything bad (WoW wise) three weeks ago and said she can't ever go back. She wants to be baptized! Just like Taniesha, as soon as we walked in the chapel she said "Yep. I can tell this is right where I need to be." I think it's so cool that when we pray for miracles, they come. If you're feeling a lack of miracles in your life, go ahead and pray for some. They'll come in His timing. We had a zoom lesson with Taniesha about prophets and it went awesome! We had a lesson at the park with Jarrett and taught more about the atonement and he wishes so badly that he could ask forgiveness in behalf of some of his friends who have made bad choices. I got to sign with a deaf BADDIE in McDonald's so that was fun :) We had dinner with sister Burke and said a sad goodbye :( She stood on her balcony waving and blowing kisses as we drove away. When we came home, the Cardons gave us cookies and the SWEETEST note of all time. Then I cut bangs. What is life if not with bangs. (This pic is from sunday but this is our bestie sister burke)

Sorry for the yap it was a long week

HAPPY ALMOST HALLOWEEN!

I love yall, the Lord loves yall!

xoxo, Sister Anderson

Andrew Dearhart at Agavero 

The Barons

The Cardons with dinner to help us feel better

Taniesha and her daughter

Church with Taniesha, her daughter, and Jarrett

Ashley

Sister Burke

Ashley's a MEMBER and Whimsy Galore 😻💕🌈🪩🍒🧚‍♀️🐟-Lilburn, Georgia

Hello my very special peopleee! I just love yall so much and am so grateful to have each and every one of you in my life!! If you're on this email list, I have personally seen the light of Christ in you! You are all beloved sons and daughters of a loving Heavenly Father. Don't you ever forget your divine identity!!

Here's how my week went!

Monday we played volleyball TWICE which iykyk I was thrilled to do so. We also thrifted as a district so that was fun! We had dinner with the Ellisons and they made us the yummiest sweet potato apple candied pecan fall salad thing and holy I need that recipe STAT! I didn't take any pics on Monday so here's me and a cat I named Pumpkin

Tuesday morning we had the brilliant idea to go finding at the park in the morning but surely after three hours of being there not a SOUL was interested. We had a church tour fall through so of course we still had the member there while we called some people who were interested in the past and found one. Live laugh love Peter Baron. We cooked up Ashley's baptismal program and heart attacked her door. We received the cutest most sweetest text from her and her husband Yi Ming afterward thanking us for everything. We had an amazing lesson with Keyon about the restoration and we invited him to pray to know if it was true and he just goes "I already know it's all true but the whole concept is just crazzyyy hahahaha" My gem. I love him. We went to the Fosters for dinner and had a spooky themed dinner of course. Everything was either dyed orange, purple, red, or green. We heart attacked Aria and found a baby gecko! 

Wednesday we tried park finding again and found someone this time! Yippee! I took a nap during lunch face down on my pile of laundry just like old times. ;) We went knocking with one of the youth in the Tucker ward for her first time so she was pretty nervous but her testimony is so strong! We had dinner with the Palmers! We exchanged with the Lawrenceville Sisters after their Book of Mormon study! 

Thursday I had a great exchange with Sister Marble who is in her first transfer! We went to her DC and DC lunch yay! We washed their car because zone conference was the next day! We had a lesson with their friends Caylin and Steve and talked about service! They showed us their new and improved fish tank setup and fed us cookies. Caylin's story is so interesting. She's had a pretty hard life. Her fiancé died in february of this year and now she's engaged to his dad's best friend. I skipped a lot but that's the short of it. We had a lesson with a fella named John that Sister Empey and I had met in a Wendy's and needed to pass him off because he didn't live in our area. After talking with him for a while I went to shake his hand and he kissed my hand instead. Oh! We went to stop by a referral but as soon as we pull into the driveway (it was on a busy street) we get blocked in by two massive trucks coming to cut down a tree for the fella that lived there. Once we talked to the guy and the men in the truck saw that we needed to leave, they kindly moved their trucks and backed us all the way out into the busy street and held up traffic for us. So kind. We had dinner with a cute family whose mom was baptized a year after they were married and the husband finally caved 18 years later. He had callings in the ward before his baptism. Then we found two frogs :)

Friday we had zone conference! Pres went really in depth with the sacrament and the STLTs and spanish APs went in depth with weekly and daily planning. It was really a banger zone conference. I learned a lot. We basically prepped for the baptism the rest of the day Friday. We cleaned the font (killed so many bugs that I didn't even know existed on earth), printed programs, hyped up Ashley, etc. My gem of a sister Leah mailed me a light that makes it look like the northern lights are on my ceiling and I found myself staring at them for a WHILE. I even brushed my teeth laying down so I could watch them longer. So freaking baller thanks breadstick. I sewed Ashley's jumpsuit with my sewing kit because it had a giant rip in the back. Grandma Susie ratatouille style helped me sew it. :) 

Saturday was Ashley's big day!!!! She got to the church at 10:15 and her baptism wasn't until 11. She said she could barely sleep because she was so excited! The ward clutched UP and made her feel so incredibly loved. (Imagine the following in a Vietnamese accent) She kept saying things like "I'm feel so warm!" and "I'm feel so special!" YES ASHLEY YOU ARE SPECIAL! Gosh I just love her so much. She had the best day. She was glowing. After the baptism, while we were stopping by all of our friends to remind them about church, we accidentally knocked into an inactive member who was baptized forever ago and one of the spanish sisters' friends Shiela who they stopped teaching for a few reasons. When Shiela saw us she said "Are you from Jesus Christ?" When we said "Yes!!! Are you Shiela??" She started bawling and ran to hug us. We gave her a pep talk about the INFINITE atonement of Jesus Christ and she was so grateful that she gave us a bag of apples. She is wrought with guilt and wants to come back to church so bad. She is in a really tough spot and needs some prayers! So pray for Shiela! Little did she know I was STARVING and needed those apples. Thanks God HOW CUTE IS ASHLEY

Sunday we sustained Ashley a member of the church (I was cheesing so hard) and had an awesome lesson with our new friend Adrianna! During our personal studies, the same John that we passed off to the sisters on Thursday called to thank ME for shaking his hand and said he missed us at church today! He explained that he kissed my hand out of pure gratitude because he hadn't been that respected by someone since his wife died????? He asked to be on our email lists so he could remember the people who turned his life around and put him on the right path. MY HEART . We had an awesome lesson with our friend Emmanuel!!!! We met a French fella named Presnel, and he promised to come to church. Idk if he's coming but we can pray. We finally weekly planned . I LOVE MY COMPY! 

I hope yall have just the best week ever!! Remember, no effort is wasted and you are SEEN and LOVED by God!

I love yall, the Lord loves yall!

xoxo, Sister Anderson

Ashley's baptism - Brother Barron, Ashley,
Sister Anderson, Sister Empey

Giant mushroom!

Sister Marble

Cleaning the baptismal font

Baby Dent, Hurricane Isaias, and Sick as Freak AGAIN Inbox - Lilburn, Georgia

Welcome back to the weekly. Guess what! Your girl has a parasite. Don't you fret tho I just have to treat it and stop picking up stray cats. WHAT A WEEK. It's probably going to be boring as freak for yall to read but I'll tell you all about it anyway.

Tuesday we got to go to the Atlanta temple! Oh how I love that temple. It holds a special place in my heart. I've done every ordinance in it and it's so fun to see the workers light up when they see missionaries walk in. Before the temple, of course we went to waffle house. After the temple, of course we went to Talpa. After P-day hours, we went to wendy's to attempt to study but we ended up talking to Chris and Jarvis outside for an hour instead. Chris was genuinely interested (in us? in the gospel? don't know) and Jarvis was straight up bashing us the whole time. We had a lesson with one of our friends Gabriel in the evening and rest in peeeeeeace he told us he's getting baptized into another church in a week. boooo! (Us lore dropping in the car iykyk)

Wednesday we both woke up nauseated as freak but we tried to go about our day as normal. We ended up calling the mission nurse about a spot on my arm that I was worried about because I thought it was a bugbite but apparently it's not just a bugbite. She told us to drop everything and go get smoothies and medicine. So we did just that.

Thursday: We woke up even more nauseated but we still went to district council and district lunch. Sister Freeman ordered us to go home and take a nap with cold towels on our heads so we did. We had to cut our naps short because we had a church tour to give to our friend Nathaniel. He is so cool and I'm so mad because apparently he doesn't even live in our area! Have fun Marietta missionaries :( We went to the store for some nausea remedies like ginger chews, peppermint tea, etc. We had a stake meeting in the evening and we were getting glazed the whole time cause our mission is goated as freak. Our numbers all doubled over a month. GANM ON TOP! (below Jesus trust)

Friday we only left the house for a total of 10 minutes and that was to take a nurse-ordered fresh air walk outside. Sister Freeman warned us about Hurricane Isaias that was headed right by us. Oh! We freaked out for a sec then realized it was going to be 150 miles away. We did a bunch of grey dot calls and this one guy called us saying he got our number off of a passalong card we handed him at wendy's? We don't remember him at ALL but we were like yes ahhhh we're the missionaries and YALL he lore dropped for 45 minutes wow. His name is James but he likes to be called John. He also had some crazy questions. "Do Mormons really have to serve mission trips for 7 years??" No John. "Are the elders females??" No John. "I prefer one wife over six or seven" Us too, John. His wife died in July from her fourth relapse of cancer, his wife's mother and mother's sisters were all slaves in the holocaust, they had to do some pretty sad things that I won't get into. John was a UPS driver and remembers meeting LDS people on his route and remembers them being kind people so ultimately he called to find out how to be that happy. He told us all about his IBS too... anyway apparently he doesn't even live in our area so we sent him over to some other sisters. Wish them luck.

Saturday was an awesome day despite us feeling sick. The weather was CRAZY because of the hurricaine, but we found three awesome people and ASHLEY PASSED HER BAPTISMAL INTERVIEW! She gets baptized this Saturday at 11am! Yall don't even know how excited she is and how proud I am. She has come a long way. I've been teaching her my whole mission. Almost 6 months I've known Ashley! She is a GEM and her testimony is so bright. Her husband is already a member and so excited for her. Bishop Duffield officiated their wedding in april and is going to baptize her! How special! Her interview was pretty unusual as there were 7 of us in there for moral support/translation purposes. She passed with flying colors and us four missionaries got a little teary-eyed at her sweet testimony. Now all we gotta do is help her feel the spirit every day so the adversary can't touch her! Pray for Ashley!!!!!!!!

Sunday was awesome because Ashley came to church but our friend Keyon accidentally slept through his alarm and didn't make it. We got blessings from the elders because we're literally still sick so that was nice. We had a great lesson with our new friend Darryl that we found on Saturday and he is so coooool. He's a retired police officer with one eyeball. We whiteboarded at the park with the elders for a couple hours and found a couple of really cool people. 

We got the most baller online referral who has literally already read the book of mormon and wants to come to church on sunday. We ended the night with the most tender MLC call. LOOK AT THIS PICTURE OF BABY AND GRANDMA AND GRANDPA DENTTTT

I love yall, the Lord loves yall!

xoxo, Sister Anderson

New Baby Dent

With Sisters Empey, Wilkinson, and Reitz

Whiteboarding at the park with Elders Hildreth and Winn

With Sisters Empey, Wilkinson and Reitz

Nausea arsenal

Triple Exchanges and Finding Whimsy - Lilburn, Georgia

My fellaasssssssssss I missed ya! Happy Tuesday everyone! Today I'll be at the temple and will be enjoying every minute of it. I also have President-Dent-mandated-nap time today. Here's how the last week of my life was :

Monday: I basically cried all day because my brain won't let me rest from missionary work. Even on P-day, I'm convinced I should be out proselytizing. We did go to the Hindu Temple though that was awesome! We also made a trip to the chiropractor so Sister Empey could get feeling better. 

Tuesday: Exchanges with Hermana Richins! My back hurt so bad by the end of the day but I had a lot of fun lol. Hna Richins is a spanish social media Sister and her companionship has survived two ETs in four days. She came to Lilburn with me while Sister Empey went to her area and did spanish work all day. I learned how to edit videos and gained a lot of empathy for social media work! I got one video done in the time she did four. We had dinner with a new family in the ward whose kids are deaf so I got to sign with them!! It was so fun! 

Wednesday: We had interviews with President Dent in the morning at the mission home and that was my first time being there since my first day in the field so it felt weird/comforting to be back :) I ate probs 30 billion grapes there. The crunchiest ones of all time btw. I told pres about my non-restful p-days and he made me pinky swear that I'd take a nap this coming p-day. Sir yes SIR . We had an awesome lesson with Keyon about the pre-mortal life and it was a completely new concept for him but he really liked the idea of a divine identity. 

Thursday: WAKE UP Exchanges with Sister Posvar! I opened an email on the treadmill from one of my bestie cousins telling me she was PREGNANT. I shed a tear on that treadmill. Ily cuh. We had district council and I gave a training on accountability which went so well tbh. We went to chick fil a (who could have guessed) for lunch. Sister Posvar was convinced she contracted rabies from a dog the day before so we had a little pause for about an hour while we tried to figure that out. We tried stopping by a referral but turns out his addy was at a kroger... but we were like "surely the Lord led us here for a reason" so we talked to everyone in the parking lot until we met Michelle. She was very closed off at first but she started to open up as we asked her more questions. She ended up being very open to baptism AND coming to church. Booyah. 

Friday: We started the day with MLC (Mission Leadership Council) and we were joined by a missionary wizard Brother Gonzales! He gave us some AMAZING pointers and basically diagnosed our mission with not-using-pmg-chapter-11 disease. Surely we'd have triple the baptisms if we did. After MLC we got bashed twice in the same wendys. But THEN we prayed and asked God where we needed to be and he told us to go to Arby's so surely we went there. We met Nathaniel there! He is so so amazing and committed to watching general conference! Then we got bashed again before dinner. We met a guy named Adam at Firehouse Subs and he also committed to watching general conference. Our members walked in as we were talking with him so he already has a familiar face for church on Sunday. YAYAYAY! 

Saturday: "On October third, he asked me what day it was. It's October third" GENERAL CONFERENCE!!!!!! I LOVED the focus on missionary work in conference!! Like wow I felt so seen and loved. Of coursely we started the first session with crepes. The second session we watched at the Tucker building with our district's elders! On our way home we stopped to put air in our tire and a good Samaritan stopped to help us cause we couldn't figure out what PSI our tire was supposed to be at... but after he helped us we gave him a card and explained who we were and he was like oh ok! Then he texted us a bunch of ANTI while we were still standing there. What the BUNS what happened to you being kind four seconds ago. During accountability calls with the sisters in our zone, my mom dropped some DIABOLICAL news and I screamed mid-call. Sorry Riverside sisters. Us singing called to serve during the first session:

Sunday: CONFERENCE DAY 2! We woke up to Georgia being enveloped in FOG! We had lunch with the Yancey's who apparently also invited the entire neighborhood over and it was so fun! We got to see some of our favorite wardies! Anyone know what a "Donde pizza" is? Lmk. We watched the first session at the church in the clerk's office while I did my needlepoint from my sweet friend Anthony John Ruetz. Miss ya pal. We went to Lilburn City Park and ran into our elderitos! We yapped for a sec then locked back in trust. We watched the last session with the Spanish district on couches they had brought into the relief society room. We had a great MLC call that night and president was smiling so big because the GANM is on the ups!!!!!! We got so many new people to watch general conference as a mission. Amazing!!! All of the people we committed to watching it did. And they all loved it and now want to learn more. What the miracles!!! 

Monday: EXCHANGES WITH SISTER REITZ! What a sweetie pie amazing goat missionary. Love her. We worked at the co-op in the food pantry and I basically threw away mushy pears for two hours. It was actually so fun. We stopped by our referrals and neither of them answered, but we talked to some really cool people that lived by them! One said she was willing to get re-baptized because we explained the priesthood and how it needs to be done a certain way. Man I love the spirit. Oh my I gotta tell yall about Maxwell and Zain. Maxwell put in a referral during a meeting we were in so we called him after and yall... he used to attend our church in ghana and moved to the US 30 days ago and wants to go here. Okay pal get in the water alreadyyyy! Zain was found by some other missionaries a while back so we decided to stop by and see if he was interested now. Before we could even ask to share a scripture he 1. Asked if he could tour our church building sometime this week, 2. Asked when/where church was, and 3. Asked if he could bring a friend. GUH yall that is every missionary's dream first contact. I saw this whimsy pot at someone's door and took a pic for my best pal Anna Banana Jenkins who told me to look for the whimsy this week yw cuh.

That's my week!!!! I'll be at the temple today so sorry if I respond later than usual or not at all

I love yall, the Lord loves yall!

xoxo, Sister Anderson

District with the Hindu Temple

Exchange with Sister Posvar

Keyon

Exchange with Hermana Richins

Exchange with Sister Reitz

Sister Empey

I saw this whimsy pot at someone's door and took a
pic for my best pal Anna Banana Jenkins who
told me to look for the whimsy this week