8-1-2017 ..

God is Good, and sometimes confusing.

Blowing the jet stream and cool air South, to Utah

Sister Brock and I are trying to figure out what we are supposed to be learning from the experiences we have had in our area!! We are beginning to recognize a pattern with all of our "solid" investigators. We find them, we get pumped, we have really awesome spiritual experiences with them, and then they decide they are fine without learning about the restored Gospel of Christ, and they drop us.... The struggle was real this week, but we are fine!!
This week was full of tracting, tracting, and some more tracting... We had a few scheduled lessons, but they all fell through for some reason or another!! We are hoping that through member missionary work, that will begin to change and the area will start to grow!!!! We did meet a Menanite woman this week and gave her a German copy of the Book of Mormon!! She said she will read it and would like to meet with us, if her husband will let her!!!!! We really hope her husband has a soft heart!!

 It isn't until after the trial of your faith that you receive a witness (Ether 27:6); therefore, we will keep knocking on every door, until we have done all that we can!!! The work will go on, it might seem as though the efforts are in vain, but they never are!!
"That’s not how we do it! We don’t hold back to see what the minimum is we can get by with. The Lord requires the heart and a willing mind. Our whole heart! When we are baptized, we are fully immersed as a symbol of our promise to fully follow the Savior, not halfheartedly. When we are fully committed and “all in,” heaven shakes for our good. When we are lukewarm or only partially committed, we lose out on some of heaven’s choicest blessings." - Elder Gary B. Sabin of the Seventy
I think part of this is smiling, even when we don't want to!!!    I love the thought that even just a smile can change someone's day, so imagine what could happen with a sincere effort to brighten someone's day!!!! This doesn't just apply to missionaries, or to certain people!! This applies to EVERYONE!!! I highly recommend smiling at everyone!!! Even if it is awkward!!! ESPECIALLY if it is awkward😅!!! Smiling makes you happy!! It makes those who see you happy!! There is no downside to smiling!!!!

ALWAYS FIND YOURSELF SMILING IN EVERY SITUATION!!!!
On another note, I tried Donair this week!!!! (Like a Gyro)  10/10 would recommend!!!!!!! NAPAKABUTI !!!  (Filipino song of worship Father God is Good")And we saw Reindeer!!!!, in JULY!!!

July 25, 2017 - Jasper National Park - BEAUTIFUL!!

Last P-Day Sister Brock and I got to go to Jasper National Park!!! SO BEAUTIFUL!!!! This, like Jasper, are a testament of God and His love for His children!!!! Even with a ton of ash/snow in the air from the fires in BC, everything was absolutely awe inspiring!!!!! Every little bit of our trip to Jasper was amazing and was so fun!!!!! I will forever be grateful for the Valleyview sisters that invited Sister Brock and I along for the ride!!!!!!     Also, we saw a bear!!!!!!!!!
Other than Jasper, our week seemed slow and uneventful, until the Golden Day!!!! We hadn't been finding anyone, and we weren't teaching or having discussions for lack of investigators.  So we had the opportunity (which we have most of the time) to tract all day!!! Thursday was no different!!! We tracted from right after studies, until we went to bed!!!! But we found 6 potential investigators!!!!! One of them being super ready for the Gospel, and in need of it at this time too!!!   We haven't had a discussion about the Restored Gospel of Christ yet, but we have visited her a few times, and she is super excited to come to church on Sunday!!!!
I know that the Gospel will bless her and her family's lives, in every possible way!!!! Just as it does all of our lives!!!!! I know that the Restored Gospel of jesus Christ is our path to ultimate joy and happiness in this life and the life to come!!!!! I know that through the doctrine of Christ we can all be made whole and be prepared to meet God again!!!!!!    

I love all of you so very much and love hearing about what's going on in the world back home!!!!!!   You all mean the world to me and I feel your love in my life!!!! Thank you all for being so amazing!!!!!!!!!

<3/Sister  Ball

July 18, 2017 - Red Dot Day!!!

Once upon a time... I was set apart as a missionary over a month ago!!!!! Aaaaaahhhhh!!!!! I love my mission, and I already know that it has been the best decision I've made this far in my life!!!!! I have already learned so much that I wouldn't trade for anything!!!!

This week was LONG!!! Purely because we tracted all day everyday, except for the occasional supper appointment or 1st discussion lesson!!!! My area is so great, except for the fact that we have next to no one to teach... 

My amazing investigator that committed to be baptized had to be dropped because her husband didn't agree and didn't want us coming to talk to his family anymore!!!! It's so sad because he has no idea what he is keeping away from his family! I'm not worried too much though!!! I have faith that the opportunity to accept the gospel will present itself again when he is also ready, and then his whole family can be baptized and begin to grow even closer to Christ!! 

This week while tracting we found a 10 year old boy that LOVES learning about Jesus Christ, so we go and teach him for a bit about every other day!!! He is so excited to learn more about the restored gospel and what it means for us!!!! It also makes me even more excited to be a missionary!!!! 

One of the major things that stuck out to me this week was something I "relearned" while I was preparing a talk for sacrament meeting. Often times we get caught up in whether or thoughts, feelings, impressions, etc are of the holy spirit. That is not what is important!!! What is important is doing good, choosing the right. If it is good, do it. JUST DO IT. If it is good, it is of the spirit!!! 

I LOVE YOU ALL AND AM SO GRATEFUL FOR HOW YOU ALL HAVE BLESSED ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!

July 11, 2017 - I'M IN CANADA!!! I LOVE CANADA!!!

I'M IN CANADA!!! I LOVE CANADA!!! CANADA IS AMAZING!!! My trainer is Sister Brock from Texas!! She is so sweet and cute!! She's been here for 3 months... so we are both new!!!! We are serving in Whitecourt which is a cute little town, North of Edmonton, with a population of 1100 people!!! Our area is hugh though, if we were to drive from one end to the other it would take us about 2 hours!!! We are also washing the area, meaning we are both new to it!! And, we are opening the area, there haven't been missionaries in this area for 6-9 months!!! Because of that when we got here we had nothing!! We started from scratch by calling people in our contacts list from our phone to find who our branch president is!! With that information we were able to discover that our branch had a very high percentage of inactive members!!! But most of them are out of town right now, so there isn't much we can do for them, right now!!! Because we are opening this area with very little information, and there isn't a great place for us to go street contacting, we have been tracting a whole bunch!!!!

On Sunday we tracted into a lady named Jackie!!! It took her a long time to answer the door, so when she answered we were walking away!!! We talked to her for a bit and she told us she would love for us to come back and teach her family about Christ!!! We went back last night and had the 1st discussion with her!!!! SHE IS GETTING BAPTIZED ON AUGUST 12TH!!!!!!!! I am SO excited for her and her family!!!!!!! They are SO ready to receive the Gospel and they have such a strong desire to learn!!!!! 

I LOVE BEING HERE!!! This is so amazing!!! I am so grateful for the time that I have to share my greatest blessing with the people of Canada!!!!!! I LOVE YOU ALL!!!!!! 

                                    <3/Sister Ball

July 4, 2017 - I'M IN CANADA!!! First area - Whitecourt

I'M IN CANADA!!! I LOVE CANADA!!! CANADA IS AMAZING!!! 

My trainer is Sister Brock from Texas!! She is so sweet and cute!! She's been here for 3 months... so we are both new!!!! We are serving in Whitecourt which is a cute little town, North of Edmonton, with a population of 1100 people!!! Our area is hugh though, if we were to drive from one end to the other it would take us about 2 hours!!! We are also washing the area, meaning we are both new to it!! And, we are opening the area, there haven't been missionaries in this area for 6-9 months!!! Because of that when we got here we had nothing!! We started from scratch by calling people in our contacts list from our phone to find who our branch president is!! With that information we were able to discover that our branch had a very high percentage of inactive members!!! But most of them are out of town right now, so there isn't much we can do for them, right now!!! Because we are opening this area with very little information, and there isn't a great place for us to go street contacting, we have been tracting a whole bunch!!!!

On Sunday we tracted into a lady named Jackie!!! It took her a long time to answer the door, so when she answered we were walking away!!! We talked to her for a bit and she told us she would love for us to come back and teach her family about Christ!!! We went back last night and had the 1st discussion with her!!!! SHE IS GETTING BAPTIZED ON AUGUST 12TH!!!!!!!! I am SO excited for her and her family!!!!!!! They are SO ready to receive the Gospel and they have such a strong desire to learn!!!!! 

I LOVE BEING HERE!!!   This is so amazing!!!   I am so grateful for the time that I have to share my greatest blessing with the people of Canada!!!!!! 

I LOVE YOU ALL!!!!!! 

                                    <3/Sister Ball

July 1, 2017 - CANADA DAY!!!

Happy Canada Day!!!!!! Today we celebrate 150 years of Canadian Independence!!!! Congrats Canada!!!! Also, Happy 4th of July!!! To celebrate the 4th I will be leaving the country!!!!!! I am SOOOO excited to get to Canada!!!! I have LOVED the MTC, but I am ready to get out into the real world of missionary work and help real investigators come to Christ!! My district has been so good, they are definitely some of my best friends now, especially my AWESOME companion Sister Larsen!!!! She has been so good and inspiring to me!! She definitely helped me stay distracted with the work when homesickness would've taken over!!!! My MTC stay has been so good, I have learned so much and know what I need to work on when I get out in the field, and know how to strengthen those areas of my life because of my amazing teachers!!!! Brother Croft, Anderson and Chappell all helped me so much to get to a point where I can confidently leave the country and teach the people of north western Canada!!!! Sister Larsen and I had 3 investigators while we were here at the MTC, and we love all of them!!! We are going to be really sad on Monday when we say goodbye to them!!! All of them have committed to baptism!!! Whoot Whoot!!! That would be even more awesome if they hadnt already been baptised and weren't already super strong in the church!!!!! While we were talking about the comfort the spirit brings to people one of our investigators asked us how you feel that comfort from the spirit all of the time. When told her that it was through Faith in Jesus Christ and being Baptised she basically asked us if she could be baptised!!!!! It is experiences like that, that make me so excited to get out the real mission world and bring that comfort and happiness and everything else that this gospel offeres us, to everyone.
This past week was the Mission President Training Seminar, so quorum of the 12 on campus for a good majority of the time. Even with that though, Sister Larsen and I never Saw any of them walking around, although some elders in our district talked to Elder Stevenson for a bit, before they ever realized that he was a member of the 12. They thought he was security!! LOL!!!! On tuesday, because most of the 12 was here, we had a closing devotional for the Mission Presidents going out, and 10 of the 12 were there!!! Everyone, but Hales and Nelson was seated on the stand to  hear Elder Bednar and his wife, sister Bednar, speak!!!! It was such an amazing devotional about "the Word" and all that it means through out the scriptures, and how it applies to us. It was sooooooo good!!! And before the devotional started, the 2nd councilor of my branch presidency, brother Stucki, was walking to find his seat and he ran into Elder Oaks!!!Oaks was lost and didnt know how to get back to the stand, so brother Stucki helped him get back up there! LOL!!!!!
In other news... I am PRO at MTC 4 square now!!! Sister Larsen taught me, because I never played in elementary school, and now I dominate (sometimes) ;)  My district has taken over 4 square!!! We are unstoppable!!!! And we LOVE it!!!! I also am able to run a lot farther than i used to be, and I can shoot a basket!! All thanks to Sister Larsen!!!!!
The Pilot Program that I was a part of was so good!! I dont know exactly what was different from a normal MTC stay, but I LOVED what i learned, and how i learned it!!! All of our classes were "unstructured" in the sense that our teachers would come to class with an idea of what we would do, but rarely did we ever do that!! We would start class by them asking us what we wanted to learn or work on, basically we drove the class and all of our learning!!! Our teachers would help us find the answers ourselves in the scriptures and give us tools and practices and other guidance to strengthen the skills we would find we needed to work on the most!!! Because of that I feel decently ready to get out into my field of labor!!!!!
                                            I love you all!!!! Miss you bunches!!!!!    <3/ Sister Ball   <3<3<3

June 24, 2017 - Donny Osmond devotional

On Sat, Jun 24, 2017 at 4:36 PM, Kathleen Elizabeth Ball <kathleen.ball@myldsmail.net> wrote:

Donny Osmond spoke at our Sunday devotional!!! He sang just a little bit of Lets Get Down to Business because he was the voice of General Shang in Mulan!! Too Cool!!

Donny Osmond groupies

I have seriously LOVED the MTC!!! I Love this pilot program that I'm in (even though I don't really know how different it is from the norm) and I LOVE LOVE LOVE my companion and my district!!! We play Hardcore 4 Square for exercise time, and believe it or not, I am actually becoming kind of decent at it!!!! Also, HAPPY FATHERS DAY to all of the Fathers and future Fathers in my life that i love and care about!!!!! <3   

Earlier this week Sister Larsen and I recognized that we were having a hard time teaching to the needs of our investigator (which is key to converting them to Christ and not just the church or to people in it) and we were being told that one way to help do that is by asking questions!! One of our teachers, Brother Anderson (who played our first investigator Tanner before he was our teacher) sat down with us and worked through it with us. We still aren't perfect at it, but we are now to a point where we can teach with questions to help them see the importance of what we are teaching them and how to apply it to their lives, and why!!!  Because of that we committed one of our investigators to Baptism!!!!!!!!! We think she is already a member, just playing an investigator, but there is still a chance that she isn't and that she might get baptised!!!!!!!!! 

The investigators we teach here are called TRC investigators, which just means that they are just helping us practice teaching for when we get out into our fields of labor. With that though, 43 of those "fake" investigators aren't members of the church and are actually looking into the Gospel!! I LOVE all of my investigators, and I have felt Gods love for each and everyone of them, which makes it hard, because sometimes they don't recognize that and have a hard time having faith. 

I seriously LOVE what I am doing!!! 10/10 recommend missions to everyone!!!!!! 

Hole cut in ice for baptism... in Edmonton????

Something really cool I realized/was taught/ never had really thought about before is what does "the Gospel" even mean?? "The Gospel" of Jesus Christ is simply that we have a way to live with our Father in Heaven again with our families for time and all eternity, because of the power of the Atonement of Jesus Christ!!! I want to share that with everyone, and I am so grateful that I am on a mission right now, preparing to go to Canada, to do just that!! I want to share Gods love with the World and show them that there is a way to make it through anything, and that means ANYTHING!!!! 

I have only been here for a week and a half and I already feel my faith has grown SO MUCH!!!! 

I Love you all and miss you!!!!!!!    Keep the emails coming!!!!! <3 <3 <3 

                                                                <3/ Sister Katie Ball   

- Sister Ball and Sister Nauman -