Ponderize this week on Divine Nature:
"...Be partakers of the divine nature... And beside this, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge; And to knowledge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness; And to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity. For if these things be in you, and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ." —2 Peter 1:4-8
It's been a good, sad, and long, but also short week, all at the same time. Ha. It's funny how things can happen like that at times! But I'll explain further.
Last MONDAY on P-day, Sister Pointer and I made a TEMPLE COUNTDOWN white paper chain — because, yes, we're 5-years-old, and also really excited to go to the Temple again in a few weeks! We also found out for us in the north our official Temple day is the 8th of December :) Party on! #Excitement #RoadTripToHamilton
TUESDAY this week resulted in ALL the walking. But hey – we talked to more people than we normally do in a day, so it was nice! We walked from back behind the chapel, over to Waitangi, made a few visits, and walked back. It really isn't all that long – just not something we always do. But – we've now done it a few times, and it's really quite nice. We also got to catch our dear James Puru at home for a minute to share a message with him – and set for SURE with him that we would be having a lesson with him the next day. (He said yes. Brilliant!) Another win for the day! AND I GOT KATRINA'S CHOCOLATE AFGHAN COOKIE RECIPE. #Excitement. I just hope I can make them as good as her one day. She's adorable. And then our dear Kresta. We missed her. (She's a Less Active in Paihia.) And fun fact Mum, you're now being followed by New Zealanders!! Haha. Kresta was telling us how she's OBSESSED with quotes – so I had her look you up on Instagram. Fun fact: I didn't think it would be filled with ME! Ha. You're hilarious. But we laughed, and she was excited to go on and read quotes. So you'll have to keep an eye out for her. Kresta Park. I'm not sure what her insta-name is...
And then came WEDNESDAY....
We'll come back :)
THURSDAY was a day of sickness for Sister Pointer, as was half of FRIDAY: (Sister Pointer wasn't feeling well.) But we still made the best of it and decorated for Christmas – because the $2 shop is our FRIEND. And we found a mini Christmas tree for $4. His name is Douglas. (Ha.)
SATURDAY we finally made it out to Matauri Bay for the week, and dropped in to see our dear Eddy Jones at his Nursery (as in a garden nursery). And he spoiled us – giving us Silver Beet, Kale, and Cauliflower. #HealthyThings #Excitement
Dropping into see Uncle Hohepa again was a treat as well — he generally always brings out some sort of food for us. #ClassicMaori This time he even included fancy "wine" – aka: Sparkling grape juice. Ha. He's a crack-up! With him this time we jumped into a discussion of Maori culture and Genesis. "I am the land and the land is me." "I am the earth and the earth is me." "I am the water and the water is me." ...I actually really truly enjoy learning about Maori culture. It's interesting. And it goes along with gospel principles (especially the Plan of Salvation) really quite nicely. We've just gotta find more ways of making them realize that ;)
Saturday we also dropped into see the Himiona's (as in President Himiona and Laura) – which ended up being a night they all needed an uplifting message for some things they are going through. We always love seeing our dear Himionas :)
But: Another big thing of the night: I'm OFFICIALLY becoming friends with Te Manakau! ("Hope" in Maori – I'm not entirely positive on the spelling of her name...) She's their little baby girl, and VERY partial to her parents – rather shy around the missionaries. But, we found a common ground. BIG HERO 6. *Fist-bump* "Ba-la-la-la-la!" THAT'S RIGHT. Disney, if only you knew how much you've truly done for me in my life! Haha... Good times :) I then spent the night playing with Hope and Bishop (youngest son – 3 years old) – having them show all their toys to me, reading books, and all that jazz :) #FUNNEST #MissedIt
SUNDAY, our dear Camilla Going gave a BEAUTIFUL talk on "Creating a Home of Conversion" – apparently based on a talk that's in the "New Zealand Local Section" of March's Ensign earlier this year. A talk by Rosemary M. Wixom. I'm gonna see if I can still find it! But it was brilliant. Placing the words creating, home, and conversion, all together just makes for a lovely visual for me :)
Anyhoo. BACK to WEDNESDAY. I don't want to make it sound like I'm all prideful of my birthday. Ha. But it was just a really fun day – I was spoiled in SO many ways. We woke up, opened presents – the theme this year was apparently "Stickers" Haha. #LoveIt Sister Pointer made me pancakes, we had personal study, and then the Elders came over for companion study – and at the end the other Sisters showed up with chocolate chip pancakes, strawberries, cupcakes, and juice! And a balloon! (Just one – because they were too sick to blow up anymore than that... ha. So sad.) #SPOILED. So we had a mini party all together.
We then ran on our way to BayCare for singing. We sang and Arthur, once again, cried at the end of "God Be With You" and shaking my hand. It breaks my heart, and makes me happy at the same time every week – just because I know he feels what we feel! Then, one of the careworkers had mentioned to us that Geoff wanted to come in to hear us, but was stuck in bed — so we jumped down the hall to give him his own song :) We sang "Be Still My Soul" — and I almost started crying when we were 10 seconds in. I just LOVE the people there so much. They're the CUTEST and most brilliant people, and it makes me so happy to go and sing to/with them :) It makes me wish I would have thought to sing at Grandma's care center!
Birthday Present Lesson: James Puru. Normally, with James, if he hasn't done his reading he just sends us away – but this day: He did not! He said "Ah — I haven't done my reading. What if we read it together?" So we did :) And had a great discussion. #BestBirthdayPresent
Our dear Sister Pam and Brother Aubry White then had us over for lunch, after which Camilla and the kids (Ezekiel, Sarai, Xavier, and Kayla) came over and put together an "ice-cream cake" for me! — Different from the type of ice-cream cake we have. Literally just ice-cream from the square container on a plate and decorated with Lollies and 100's & 1000's of sprinkles. :) CUTEST. Sarai also brought me A PRESENT. It was a muscle shell, and 2 little other ones that she gathered from the beach for me. Cutest? Cutest :)
Later that night we were able to spend time with Camilla and the kids again - as they had signed up to feed us/teach a lesson for the night. Great thing about this – Kayla, the little baby girl who's very similar to Hope Himiona and attached to her mum and shy with missionaries — became better friends with me! At one point in the night they were playing with hotwheels cars. I was giving Kayla her's back and pushed it across the floor to her with my foot. Ha – Children learn by example. And... the rest of the night she continued to push the car around with her foot! Hahaha... Camilla realized this at one point and said, "I wonder where she got that from?" And Sister Pointer and I started laughing and told her the story. But – Kayla and I became friends over a car, so that was happiness :)
We made a couple more visits, had a meeting with the Clements and Boss Going (our Branch Mission Leader) and had a lovely night. When we got to the flat, the Zone Leaders (Elder Chong-nee and Cunningham) had DECORATED OUR DOOR. #Spoiled With cake and cookies and balloons and all. #BestDistrictEver
Then, to top the insanely packed Sundae off with a cherry – President and Sister Balli called to say Happy Birthday! :) #Joys #LoveIt They're the best.
The BIRTHDAY MESSAGES. I cried. But tears of joy! That morning I asked Sister Pointer if we could play Cayden's songs in the car – 'cause I knew they were on the flashdrive, and she said yes. Unfortunately –there's only one that would actually play in the car. But they're good! Different from what I was expecting, but impressive! But then, because the flashdrive automatically jumps into "alphabetical order," it jumped to Acacia's message suddenly – and I was in shock. ALL THE SURPRISE!!! And then when Aleesha's voice came up next I started bawling. Lost it completely. But seriously tears of joy. I wasn't expecting the audio messages of all of your voices!!! So, Sister Pointer kindly let me listen to the flashdrive nearly all day. Whenever we were in the car. I had to skip a few (yours and dad's the first time it came up) because I didn't know if I would be able to drive and see through the tears. It's amazing how hearing voices touched every part of me. We also stopped by the Clement's that night so I could watch Brother Hilmo's flashmob!!!! He's IMPRESSIVE!
So. To sum it up: It was a BRILLIANT WEEK. The slow moments were obviously within the sickness, but there were many blessings that helped us to overcome that. We're excited for a week of.... hopefully no sickness now :) Haha.
MUCH joy, blessings and THANKS for ALL the birthday wishes and mail and all the things. :D LOVE YOU HEAPS!!! And I couldn't be more grateful to have a family worth missing! (This is something that Melissa pointed out to me this week... a way she got over homesickness.) Because – I definitely am lucky to have such a brilliantly wonderful family that I'm able to miss! :)
I miss your faces, and I hope all is well and that you have a most lovely week and Thanksgiving :D
Eat a little pumpkin pie for me – as most people here think it's weird.
LOVESSS 😘😘😘
Arohanui,
Sister Mckenzie Ann Ottley
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