Family

Dear Mom and Dad!

25 years! Amazing!

We talked to a woman in the grocery store today. She has been married 55 years! I told her you had your anniversary yesterday and she said, “Oh the second 25 years are harder!” ha ha. So hang on! You’re not out of the water yet! But you are both amazing and I know you are in it for much longer than 50 years! I’m grateful for the gospel! And I’m especially grateful for temples where we can be sealed together as a family for eternity! I keep reflecting back to when little Damiance told us she didn’t want to go to heaven if her family isn’t there.

Our ward had their primary program yesterday and each young child bore their testimony of “eternal families.” I couldn’t believe how powerful the Spirit bore witness to the truth of those simple words they spoke! We have a Heavenly Father who sent us to earth to learn and grow and become like Him. He gave us families to help each other. The longer I’m out here the more I’m realizing how Satan is literally destroying the concept of “family.” Society is trying to make the ‘individual’ the “fundamental unit of society,” but in any healthy society the ‘family’ is truly that fundamental unit. And it’s because it’s an eternal principle!

We’re teaching a sweet woman named Mary! Oh I love her and her family so much! She lives with her son and 14 year old granddaughter and they are a neat little family! The other day we were driving to another neighborhood but the Spirit prompted us to stop at Mary’s. So we did. We found out it had been an extremely hard week for their family. Mary’s granddaughter is in a difficult circumstance with friends and drugs and it’s been hard on everyone. We had a beautiful lesson with Mary about the Holy Ghost and how that peace and comfort can be a reality in our lives.

I couldn’t get them out of my mind this week. I become more and more grateful everyday for the gospel in our family! We are so blessed!

Martin came to church yesterday! We were excited because we haven’t seen him for awhile with his work schedule. He was touched by the primary kids! Who wasn’t?! Actually all of our meetings were centered on the family and eternal marriage. So Satan is on the offense, but we’re still standing our ground!

I love this gospel. Really it is the way to find peace in this crazy world! Mom, I’m so proud of you for doing acts of service! See! It’s a wonderful feeling!

I sure love you all! And I love this work!

Sister Painter

Great People In My Mission. . .

Here is a picture of Cassie and I that we took last night. Cassie was just baptized earlier this year. (I love her!)

I got to play playdough with Adela, which is always a highlight of my week.


Julie labeled every single book in her scriptures! Isn’t that sweet! She told us she reads almost an hour and a half every night! If only we all did that!

I love this work!

Dear Family:

Well last week was hard, but now we have a new week ahead! What a blessing! I’ll tell you the highlights of last week:

Our lesson with Martin and Suzzy was amazing! Bishop and Brother Jungkunz came and helped Martin work through a lot of his concerns. The Spirit was strong! I love that! Sister Thacker and I walked away practically floating on air!

Our lesson with Julie and Vicky Weisenberger was fabulous! They have been working with the missionaries for awhile to get back to church. I love them! We gave them the Book of Mormon Challenge that President Hinckley gave the church a few years ago to read the whole Book of Mormon from the time of General Conference (October) to the end of the year. Julie is tearing it up! She’s amazing! (Picture included) She labeled every single book in her scriptures! Isn’t that sweet! She told us she reads almost an hour and a half every night! If only we all did that!

I got to play playdough with Adela, which is always a highlight of my week. (Picture included) Adela loves when we come over! Her mom is a less-active we're working with. It always seems that we get there and I end up playing with Adela for an hour while Sister Thacker talks to her mom. haha.

We had another cottage meeting at the Junkunz’s home last night. I sent a picture of Cassie and I that we took last night. Cassie was just baptized earlier this year. (I love her!) Sister Thacker and I gave the lesson on President Monson’s conference talk. We handed everyone a “warm fuzzy” and committed them to do an act of service for someone this week. The world would be such a better place if we just turned our hearts outward to help others more! And it doesn’t have to be a big thing.

This might sound silly, but another highlight this week was doing Coranetta’s dishes. She’s been feeling a little overwhelmed so before we left Sister Thacker and I rolled up our sleeves and did quickly cleaned her kitchen. What I loved was watching Coranetta getting motivated and feeling a little bit better. Sometimes all it takes is something small, but the Lord truly will work through us if we let him.

So anyone that is reading this, I’m committing you to do an act of service for someone this week, especially someone that you might not see or serve regularly. (So the kids don’t count Mom. ha ha) I know that when you do you’ll realize your own capabilities to be the Lord’s hands.

Even though the week was hard my little “miracle” journal still has many entries everyday. The Lord is in the details of our lives… even as missionaries.

I love you lots and lots.
…except for we seem to be in a mail drought. What’s up with that? :)

Sister Painter

Early Christmas Present. . .

Sister Thacker and I and our finished Pierogis!

Becky giving me my "Christmas" present. . .HaHa!

Terry and me with my "Christmas" present that Becky found me because I love hers!

Finding. . .

Sorry this is a few days late. We have been in Florida playing at Disney World for the last 9 days. We couldn't get this done until we got home tonight. So enjoy. . .all sound well in Sister Painter's world. LaDawn

Dear Family:

I’m following up to see if you read the Members doing Missionary Work article in this month’s Ensign. Did you do it? And don’t tell me, “We were out of town on vacation.” What a perfect opportunity! Did you even take pass along cards with you? Ha ha. I hope you are having fun in Florida! I bet it’s twice as hot and humid there than here! It’s been beautiful. Although a little cold for Sister Thacker. :)

We had a fabulous week! Can you believe I’ve been out for four months!

We found 5 new investigators this week! It sounds low for some missions, but for Sister Thacker and I right now they were such a blessing! We’ve been praying for new investigators! It was a tender mercy too, because we’ve been praying to find a family to teach: father, mother, kids. And we found one! They were a HQ referral for a bible. When we delivered it we had a wonderful conversation about the Book of Mormon! And they were open and excited to read it! Prayers are answered!

On Saturday, our friend Becky taught us how to make Pierogi with her mom. It’s a Polish dish made out of egg noodle dough with cottage cheese, onions, eggs, and all sorts of crazy stuff. But it was delicious. See Ohio is pretty cultural huh!

Our funny for the week was when we were out tracting and were invited in by a woman who was from Africa. She let us in but had no intention of listening to us. We were in there for 45 minutes being lectured about not being misled by false prophets. She read from the bible in 1 Kings 13 and said we were making a big mistake. All we could do was bear our testimony. When I did she said, “I love your sincere heart, but even the terrorist are sincere.”

Well I don’t know much, but I do know that we have a loving Heavenly Father! That He has a plan for us! Jesus Christ is central to that plan! And oh how I love both of them with all of my heart. I know that they are preparing us for great things to come and because of that God called Joseph to be a prophet and restore the gospel and the priesthood to the Earth.

…And I’m being sincere!

I love you lots!
Sister Painter

Conference Weekend!

Hi Family!

I’m so glad you got to go to a session of conference with the Tuckermans! It looked like fun! Wasn’t conference incredible! I can’t stop thinking about it! It was power-packed!

All of us (missionaries) can’t get over Elder Holland’s talk about the Book of Mormon! He nailed it! He boldly proclaimed his testimony to the world that the Book of Mormon is inspired of God! He taught me more by his example than anything! He taught powerfully by the Spirit. He taught the simple truths of eternity. And he shared with the world his witness that he had found out these things for himself and challenged everyone else to do the same.

I LOVE the Book of Mormon! I know that it is inspired of God. One of my favorite quotes from Elder Holland is that, “A wicked man couldn’t have written it and a good man wouldn’t have unless he was inspired by God to do it.” And it’s true. I’m continually blown away at the beauty of it. Eternal truths are intricately woven into a complex narrative of God’s chosen people, and yet even the simplest minds can read it and “grow closer to God” (Intro to the Book of Mormon). It truly is a literary masterpiece! And there is no way Joseph Smith could have written it on his own accord in the 82 days (ish) that it took him to translate it. What’s even more profound to me is that those promises recorded to ancient Book of Mormon prophets are for us today! They were writing to US! I remember last year when Elder Holland spoke at a CES Fireside and declared that, “Heavenly promises are always kept.” I’ve considered that statement time and time again as I read the Book of Mormon.

I’m so excited for our family to read it again! There is a power in the Book of Mormon to perfect us and protect us! Our family needs those blessings! The whole world needs those blessings! Just like President Monson told Sister Dibb: Those promises “are everything!”

I rededicated myself this weekend to not be afraid to boldly declare my testimony to the world!

Anyway, there I go again just rambling. So this week! We had a wonderful week! Zone Conference was on Wednesday. (How spoiled am I!) It was great! Sister Winters turned 81yrs old so we brought her balloons and watermelon (her favorite). We’ve had several new investigators. Martin and Suzzy are both progressing again. I told you how they both said they would get baptized, just not yet. ha ha. We’re working on it. I love them both dearly! We’re spoiled with a wonderful ward! They are more than willing to help us! We’re just trying to turn the tables. We are more than willing to help them. Missionary work is so much more effective when the members do the finding and the missionaries do the teachings.

Speaking of which there is a fabulous article in the Ensign this month about Members doing Missionary Work. I’m going to challenge you all to read it! And apply something you learn. Return and report to me next week! ha ha

I have to go but I love you lots!
Sister Painter