July 20, 2018

Hello! Nauvoo is crazy around pageant time. let me give you an example of what our days are like here! I will use yesterday as an example....

I woke up at 7am, said a sleepy prayer. 

I got ready for the day, ate breakfast and listened to a conference talk before we went to a zone meeting at 745 at the chapel. Then we zoomed over to john Taylor's home, cleaned the site and almost died while killing a huge spider! There wasn't a senior sister with us, so after reading a verse or two in the book of mormon, sister Moss and I started giving tours. (930am) we continued to give tours to larger and larger groups of people, and it almost never stopped. There were always crowds waiting outside the door to learn about john taylor and see his home. We had just a few minutes to scarf down our lunch around 1 and then answer the door again. We kept up a good pace until 530 when we closed the site. I probably sat down twice. My feet hurt, I was surrounded by flies, my voice was almost gone from talking so much, I hadn't seen my companion most of the day, I had to deal with rowdy kids, bored teenagers, and large groups. I didn't have time to drink as much water as I wanted so my body was dehydrated and I had a pressing headache. We count up the numbers (50 tours, a total of 480 people! One tour of 30 peoole i did by myself....) After closing up the site, we rushed home, found nothing in the mailroom, made a quick dinner, ate it and changed quickly just as we heard a tornado warning. So we waited to see what would happen and then headed over to pageant in our rain jackets and umbrellas to hand out newspapers and greet people as they showed up to pageant. I forgot bugspray.... We tried to not get stressed by the protesters and their anti-mormon newspapers as we welcomed families and youth groups. Then we went to a singing practice at the visitors center. Last of all my companion and i came home to write in our journals, read a couple scriptures and say a prayer of gratitude before falling into bed. (1130pm). 

After all this exhausting work, day after day and week after week - I am still smiling! And it isn't a fake smile plastered to my face because I'm a "tour guide". It is a real live actual genuine smile. One that you don't have to think about or force. One that starts comfortably in your chest and then springs to your face and is evident in your eyes. One that can only come from pure joy. That joy is fuelled when I feel the spirit testify to people through me. Or when I tell an inspiring story of the saints that changes someone's life, or a youth bears their testimony to me or I hear pageant music. 

So yes, I am exhausted haha. But there is an amazing energy that comes from living as Christ would. His atonement empowers me and His true doctrine lifts me up, filling my soul with a happiness that can only be found by living the gospel. I'm so grateful to be a missionary. Smiling has never been so easy! 

So if you feel exhausted, whether physically, spiritually or mentally (which I feel all three) my advice is the same. Rely on the Savior Jesus Christ. With Him you can be truly happy. This doesn't mean you won't face disappointments or challenges, but it does mean that you can find joy in any circumstance! I invite you to do something this week to focus on the joy of following Christ. I can promise that you will experience a deep and abiding happiness that will carry you through your hard days (: I can promise that not only because I have experienced it, but because I am a representative of Him. 

Keep pressing on! 

Yours truly, 

Sister Bush

Email to family:

on saturday we served at the log school and home with sister Judd. she is hilarious. one of her quotes is that she told us that on the mission, "boys are trees. youd look pretty dumb talking to one." hahaha idk why but that made me laugh. i love serving with the seniors and getting to know them. elderly people are my favorite and are becoming some of my greatest friends! 

also on saturday on pageant grounds we got to talk to a lady for a longer time than usual because her knees hurt and she was just watching her grandkids play. so we got to get more in depth than just like the normal conversations we have. she began to feel more comfortable with us and told us what she is struggling with. so we were able to testify of the savior and encourage her along her way. it was really cool. i dont know if ill ever see her again but i know that i was an instrument in the Lords hand in that moment! and thats all that matters to me.

so lately we havent been riding our bikes because we dont have time. cuz we close the sites at 530 and need to be leaving our house for pageant at 630ish and that gives us an hour to go home, make dinner, eat it, change and stuff. so riding our bikes would take away like 20 minutes of our hour so we usually just ride in the car with sis T and B. 

wearing only 2 outfits and not washing them is sometimes annoying but it is also easier because i dont have to worry about choosing what to wear in the morning. i only have to decide what to wear for pageant. and about the boot thing, im sure the ones you picked out mom will be perfect. they look good. i cant wait to get them! i always look forward and hope for mail haha if i get anything at all, it always makes my week. im grateful for anything you decide to send me haha

sister moss and i get along sooooooo good. i love her dearly. we are worried about transfers haha

on sunday, my companion and i taught sunday school. which has like all the missionaries so it was almost like doing a mission training haha with some guests there too. we taught about temples! i loved it because i love temples. we learned about solomans temple and read some of his dedicatory prayer and then applied it to us and read some of the nauvoo temple dedicatory prayer. then we got a discussion going and it was just super awesome. at the end we sang i love to see the temple. i was happy with how it went! 

okay so monday was wacko. there was a huge mixup on where we were serving. our schedule said wagon rides. and for wagon rides you dont have to be there until 945 instead of 845 so we were excited to have some extra study time. so i studied while sis moss showered and then we would switch and then go. well, at 840 as im wrapping up my study and sis moss is getting out of the shower we get a call that our schedule is changed and we need to be at the family living center in 5 minutes. so in a flurry of activity and we made it there on time. except that we didnt have time to make our lunches. and when we got to flc, the seniors had more than enough people for the stations. so they were confused. so we hung out there for an hour and then went and asked wagon what was going on and they said that they could use us. but because it wasnt busy in the morning they said to go make our lunches and come back before it got busy. so we got permission from a sister at family living to go make our lunches and then came back and the site coordinator was mad at us for leaving and long story short it was a crazy day. plus sister moss wacked her head on a poll haha. so it was just a wack day.

plus that night sis T broke out her sloth mask and was going crazy and everyone was doing weird stuff and trying to scare sis moss and I! it was just a weird day haha. hence the title of this email. 

so on tuesday, wednesday and thursday we have been serving at the John Taylor home. boy do i love their stories. him and his wife are so cool. the problem with serving there is how busy we are! haha on wednesday we had 63 tours- 450 people came through. on thursday we had 50 tours- 480 people came through. yesterday i led a tour of 30 people through the house on my own. cuz when it gets that busy, sis Moss and i have to split up and not do tours together. its sad but its just the way it is on the mission here! so yep life is crazy haha. if you knew how small the john taylor home was i think those numbers would be even more astounding to you!! pageant season is pretty hectic. but i just like to think about how many people the savior met and taught when we came to the americas. 2,500 souls right? and each one her ministered to personally so that they could feel his love. i dont have time in a tour to do that when others are waiting, but these past couple days ive really been putting in an effort to love every single visitor that comes through the doors. to love them, listen to them, and give them the best quality tour that i can in the time that i have, as if they were friends or family. speaking of friends and family i ran into samantha mitchell! which was so cool haha. i only got to talk to her for like 2 minutes on pageant grounds but it was so cool to see her. i also got to give a tour to the smiths from el paso. they were so shocked to see me haha

this week i got my first contact! i met a nonmember in John Taylors home, her name is Ashlee Ren. i will soon be friends with her on facebook. we had a good tour, a nice discussion after and then we met her at pageant that night and watched it with her. she left quickly so i didnt get to find out what she thought but hopefully we will stay in touch and she may take the discussions! that would be cool. 

pageant! pageant is going great. there are ups and downs to it haha. i get to see the work of the Lord being furthered but also the adversary. there are these people called hecklers, and they stand just off pageant grounds and they give out anti-mormon stuff and are not... nice. theres two types. theres the friendly ones that give out fake nauvoo pageant newspapers and talk nicely and then get the youth into conversations about Mormonism and stuff. then there are the crazy ones who have disgusting signs and yell terrible stuff. also they try to video the missioanries to get them to say something wrong and all sorts of stuff like that. its pretty stressful to be assigned to an entrance because you have to deal with that. but anyways. back to the good stuff! pageant is wonderful. i have recently downloaded the music and can listen to it all the time! the actors and actresses are amazingly talented and i just love what they do. testifying about the gospel through song and dancing is so powerful. plus the whole thing uses preach my gospel principles! it uses pmgs tips and tactics for teaching about the doctrines of the gospel. its the best. ive had the privilege of watching many times, singing in British pageant, talking to people and seeing hearts changed. lives influenced and decisions made. amazing. there is a line in nauvoo pageant where parley p pratt says "when youre here, were here." and i love it. because its true. we can really feel the saints here with us. and im lucky to not only be here but be a missionary here because that means i am working along side the saints. and i can feel them because we all have the same purpose here. it is here in nauvoo that the prophecy "millions shall know brother Joseph again" is coming true. because so many people each day are coming to actually know him and the type of person he is. 

"Are you exhausted?" BOY AM I! YOU BET YOUR BOTTOM DOLLAR! haha its insane how pageant season can drain you. but also energize you! ill be talking about it in my weekly(:   

soooooooo i love you. just in case you needed the reminder, it is always there. i think and pray for you guys every day. and i cant wait for you to come to nauvoo and see how amazing it is someday. 

I LOVE YOU SO MUCH 

SO MUCH

SO SO MUCH

yours truly,

Sister Bush