I felt like I was taken out of the world

Dearest family:

The internet isn’t working properly so I’m typing this in word.  I might even have to print it and send it to you. We even have to hand write our letter to President.  Great!  Well I’m not too happy right now, but oh well!

My time here is limited, and I have no idea what ya’ll wrote me in the email.  I did get the boys letters, which was fun.  It’s funny because they mostly tell me the same thing.  So I get the same stories, just from four different points of view.  It’s great!  And when you mentioned that you were short at the office, Dad, I told Sister Clark that she should come to work for you.  She’s a dental hygienist and loves working in ortho offices.  But I’m pretty sure she’s gonna stay in Utah and go back to school for foreign languages.

And that’s cool that you went to Hawaii to be with Saydi, Mom.  I bet that was so fun.  And I want a picture of 1) her car 2) David Oregon...her David Oregon.  That’s so funny that she has one!

So the work here is kinda slow.  Some of our investigators are kinda dropping us.  They won’t answer texts and what not.  One though, well her boyfriend is stopping her from seeing us...we think.  So whenever we’re in her area we drive by to see if his car is in the driveway.  Yeah, it’s a way sad situation.

Oh man, I really wish I could have seen what you had written!

Oh so there’s this one investigator, Todd Siebring.  He’s a big guy.  I think I already mentioned him.  But you can’t help but love him.  He’s just awesome!  When I came 2 weeks ago he was progressing, but slowly.  He still didn’t know much of what to think of us, and wasn’t praying a lot.  Well, now he’s praying almost everyday.  And we’ve taught him the Word of Wisdom.  He still won’t give us his cigarettes but he knows and wants the blessings from keeping the Word of Wisdom.

Last night we talked with him for about 10 minutes about giving us those cigarettes, but he wouldn’t do it.  Sister Clark even quoted the blessings from D&C.  He wants those blessings bad, just not bad enough to hand over that white and red box.

So remember the llama farm we went to?  Well last Thursday we went back and met Korey.  He’s gotta strong faith in Christ.  He feels like Job, he told us.  Well we were gonna teach faith in Christ, but then we realized, “Oh wait, he’s already got faith!”  So Sister Clark started with the Restoration, and so I followed.  It was a powerful lesson and we knew that he had felt the spirit when Sister Clark quoted the 1st vision.  You could see it in his eyes and in his body language.  But he wouldn’t take the Book of Mormon.  He was too scared.  So Sister Clark comes to the rescue again.  She pulls out the General Conference Ensign and we tell him to read President Monson’s talk on “The R’s of choice.”  He said he would, and Sister Clark noticed him kinda looking through the ensign when his grandma came to talk to us.  When we got in the car, Sister Clark was like, “That Ensign was for him.  I found it in my bag a couple days ago and was like, ‘I don’t remember putting this here.  Oh well!’  Then when I saw it in my bag while in the house, I had this feeling to give it to him.  I though ‘that’s really dumb.’  so I didn’t.  Then I did.”  Yeah, isn’t that cool?

And when we left, Sharon, the grandma, was like, “since we don’t know your first names you’re Britney, pointing to Sister Clark, and you’re Sara, pointing to me.”  We told them our names (Sharon thought it was cut that our names were “secret”) but when we got in the car Sister Clark was like, “you know that she only wanted to know our names so she could ask Korey, ‘Which one’s cuter, Britney or Sara?’”  (And you say it in a country accent).  So that’s our inside joke now.  And we even call each other that sometimes, especially when referring to the llama farm. . . then we just end up laughing.  It’s great fun!

Okay, gotta get to typing letter to President!  Have an awesome week!

Love, Sister Ostler

Dear Family. . . again.

We’re on our way to the temple so I thought I’d add a little more before I get too sick.

Sister Ostler & Sister Clark at Chicago Temple

Yeah, don’t really know what else to say.  Oh, Sister Cameron had us over one day and we frosted valentine day cookies for our investigators.  It was the kind of icing that’s smooth and shiny.  It was a lot of fun.  They have a 10 year old girl whose, well, 10.  She would take some of my simple cookies and add more frosting to them.  Yeah, a 10 year old girl.

Sister Clark is teaching me a lot about patience just by her example.  She doesn’t let a lot of things bother her.  And when they do bother her, they don’t bother me.  So we’re pretty perfect for each other.  She says I’m patient . . . well, I just try to not complain.  Like yesterday, Sister Clark woke up sick.  I just let her rest and studied while she slept.  She said I was awesome.  I was just thinking that if I were in her spot I would want her to do the same thing to me.  And I know that she would.

We have an investigator, Ulysses, he’s 14, who reminds me of Ben & Jefferson.  He’s awesome.  Oh, I said my first prayer in Spanish yesterday.  It wasn’t that good.  But I’m starting to participate more in Spanish lessons, which is good.  I learned a new word yesterday - pecados.  It means sins.  So I can kinda explain the Atonement in Spanish.

The other day we stopped by Rosa’s house and they offered us some soup.  We said to give us a little because we had a dinner appointment in 1 hour.  Well, they gave us a huge bowl of it and what was more, there was half a fish in it!  Tail and all!  We had to pick the meat off the bones.  It was gross to do, but good to taste - except it was super spicy!  And I had pork rinds.  Those were gross!  No me gusto che quilla.

Well, it’s Thursday morning!  Temple was great, but haven’t been feeling well physically.  I think I need to stop overeating.

We went to a middle school wrestling match this week.  Ulysses, one of our investigators.  Well, his family is investigating.  He's the perfect mix between Ben and Jefferson.  Well he wrestles and is in 8th grade.  He's been wanting us to come to one of his matches.  Well President Cameron's kid wrestles too, and just so happens that on Monday their schools were going against each other.  So we went to it to support both of them.  Although Sister Clark and I were voting for Rensselaer Central middle school, except when Ethan Cameron was wrestling.  And he pinned the guy on the last match!  But Sister Clark and I had never been to a wrestling match before.  The rules were easy enough to follow, and it was fun.  We both got into it.  But oh my gosh!  The parents were horrible!  They were yelling at the ref and just not being very good sportsmen, when we thought the ref did a great job!  And they were just yelling and mad because, oh man...so Sister Clark and I still get angry over this.  There was this one kid from the opposing team (the president’s school) who was a whimp.  He went up against this really good kid who was really serious about the game...it was kinda funny.  But the whimp would make his way outside of the circle every time the other kid would get him on the ground, just so he could start over.  How stupid is that?  Well at the last match the other kid finally pinned the whimp, and we were happy.  Sister Clark really wanted to yell out, "Kill him!"  But since she's a missionary she didn't.  We had to leave before we could watch Ulysses.  We were sad we didn't get to see him.  But we might go again when the other kid from our ward...his school competes agains Rensselaer Central.  But we found out that Ulysses tied with his opponent.  "At least I didn’t lose" he said.  Good, good kid.  Always looking at the bright side.

Yesterday we went to the temple.  That's what the pictures are of.  One of Sister Clarks less actives from her first area was going through.  And it was really cool.  Brother and Sister Boweman took us, and the Heborn elders, Elder Vicars and Miller (he's 7ft 2") tagged along with us.  And we met Elder Anderson and Miller (a different one) there too.  They are also in our zone. Elder Vicars and Sister Clark are like brother and sister.

For the car ride we made homemade trail mix since it's something Sister Clark can have, and since the stores don't have good ones here.  The car ride up I got sick, and I hadn't been feeling well anyways.  The temple was really good.  And the Celestial room was amazing too.  I sat down and I felt like I was taken out of the world.  That little room (and it is little, littler than the Columbia River Celestial room) was in heaven.  I didn't have to worry about the worldly crap out there, and felt that that was how the millennium was going to feel like...peaceful, and the spirit always there.  I really didn't want to leave.  But leave we had to.

Love you all!

Love, Sister Ostler