11.25.3013

Hello family!
 

So, first things first... I'm not being transferred?!  I was pretty surprised as well. Elder Sedgwick is not moving either. So we get to continue to work Lowville! The weird thing is the realization I had that my next area will probably be my last. :(    I am excited that I get to stay here in Lowville for Thanksgiving and Christmas! We are going to continue to make progress and I'm sure we'll see some cool stuff happen. And I was called as District Leader, which means I'll go on exchanges with other missionaries and give the trainings at District Meeting. That will mix things up enough to keep it exciting! It'll be good.

I didn't ever tell you about Rich passing away? It was pretty sad. Elder Bybee called me to let me know about it. He had a heart attack, then was taken to a hospital in Vermont where he had triple-bypass surgery. That all went pretty well, but then he had a piece of tissue go into one of the heart valves and he had a stroke. They were able to stabilize him, but he was completely on life support. Rich doesn't have any living family (only child, no recent spouse or anything) and had Elder Bybee as the point of contact, so it was Elder Bybee's decision to keep him on life support or let him go. He prayed and fasted about it, and felt that Rich wouldn't want to be left like he was, and they let him go. I had a really good talk with Elder Bybee about it all.  I was pretty sad, but I feel like the experience with Brother Laconti passing was a form of preparation for this experience for me. It kept me from having any form of shock when I found out. It was just a simple understanding that Rich wasn't gone forever and that I'd get to see him again. Apparently the missionaries that were in Massena found a box full of family history stuff in Rich's apartment. They gave it to the mission office.

So Mary's baptism was a good experience! She is such a sweet lady! Here story is pretty simple actually...

She moved to Lowville about 6 months ago. She had met Becky, our recent convert, and Becky invited her to come to Church. She came, really liked it, and has come every week since! She went to a different church when she was a little girl but wanted to find a church that she wanted to attend. She has done pretty good about reading the Book of Mormon and got an answer that it was true, accepted everything we taught, committed to obey all of the commandments, and just got baptized! She said a prayer at church yesterday and it was so great! She was thanking Heavenly Father for helping her find the Church and for everyone that was a member and for us missionaries. It was really cool. The baptism went well, although that crazy snow storm I mentioned earlier almost caused us to cancel it. There were some places of Lewis County that got 7 inches of snow in about 2 hours!  Here in Lowville, we only got 3 inches. It was wild though! And we had to get out the heavy winter gear. This winter could be a wild ride!

Anyway, I know that this work is true! God has prepared people for the Gospel and it's just up for us all to find them. Mary is a good example of somebody that was ready and will be a great member of the Church. I'm so grateful I got to be here when we found her, taught her, and saw her enter the waters of baptism. It truly is a great privilege we all have to be members of the Church.

Love you all!

-Elder Hussey

11.18.2013

Hey Family!

 

The weather in Lowville keeps swinging back and forth.. Last week, right after I emailed saying that it was really nice weather, we walked out and it was really stormy. Then that night, it snowed and we woke up to about 2 inches of snow on the ground. Then two days later, the snow was all gone and it was about 50 degrees. Then today, it is raining, cold, and windy. When it's a consistent temperature, I can adjust pretty well. But, the weather has seemed to be getting pretty temperamental all over the world the past few years, so the days of consistent weather might be a thing of the past. I guess that's part of why God created us so that we could adapt!

 

That sounds like it was fun having the sisters missionaries come over for dinner. Did we ever had the missionaries over to eat when I was growing up? I can't ever really remember any interaction with missionaries. That's one thing I really like about wards outside of Utah. Everyone here knows the missionaries pretty well! Hopefully I'll be able to have interaction with missionaries later in my life! I didn't realize how great the calling I had at college (Ward Mission Leader) was until now.. It'd be way cool to be involved back home!

 

I don't know when we'll be able to have iPads. It's weird, we've heard tons of different rumors about how the iPads work and everything.. I'm used the the work as it is, so that doesn't bug me, but not knowing the details kinda drives me crazy! We'll get them while I'm still out though. President Wirthlin has said it will happen in the first quarter of 2014. I guess we'll see! And yes, the NYUM missionaries get to go on a Palmyra trip about 2 weeks before they go home.

 

That's really funny you already saw those pictures on facebook from District Meeting! I wonder how they got up there so quick.. Did the Hammari's post them? And it was pretty funny... I was wearing a yellow tie all through district meeting, then before we took pictures, I ran in and put on the cheese tie as a joke. It took a long time before anyone noticed, and even then, I think only a few of the Elders noticed it. Fun stuff. The camera doing the video wasn't me, but all of the cameras were lined up on the Piano. So it probably got me as I went up to get mine. I wonder who's camera that was... Taking district pictures is always pretty fun though. Gives us a chance to be goofy. I didn't know the outside world would see us acting goofy so quick though.. There's a lesson to be learned there.. :)

So transfer calls is this Saturday! I'm super anxious to find out what is happening... I feel like it would probably be me leaving. However, there is a chance that we'll both be staying. But I kind of have the dreadful feeling that I'll be leaving. It's amazing to see how many good friends I've made in Lowville. I have a lot of people that I'm going to miss a ton if I get transferred. But, if I do, there'll be plenty of new people in my next area that I'll go to. I'm not sure what is happening though. I guess only time will tell! Being transferred the day before Thanksgiving would be kinda a bummer. We'll see!

Things are going really good in Lowville. This past week was great! We taught 15 lessons, which was really great. We still struggle to find new investigators, but the ones that we have are doing good. We have one investigator that had her baptismal interview and is ready for Baptism this Saturday, Nov 23rd, at 4 PM. We're pretty excited for her! She's one of the first that I've been there fully from start to finish with. She's a great lady though, and she asked me to baptize her. It'll be a really good experience! The Lowville Branch continues to grow (slowly) and the work is progressing all over the world. We're lucky to be a part of it! No matter where or how we're involved, it's the same great redeeming work. I know that the Church is true, the Gospel blesses families, and that Christ is our Savior. That's such amazing knowledge to have and I definitely feel the need to share it with everyone I can while I'm out here. I love all of you guys and am so grateful for all that you do.

-Elder Hussey

11.4.2013

Hello Family!

It's crazy to think that it's already daylight saving time... I'm not a huge fan of it though. I must admit, sleeping for one extra hour was probably one of the best gifts I could be given. I feel SO good, just from that one night of getting enough sleep. However, it is now pitch-black by about 5:15 PM, and it gets light at about 6 AM. Ironically, I'd prefer that it stay dark in the morning and then stay light until about 7 or 8, but I guess we'll just have to adjust. It's kinda creepy when 2 guys dressed in black knock on your door when it's dark outside, but it makes it really easy for us to tell who is home and who isn't. So I guess there's pros and cons to every situation.

 

It's almost winter! It looks really nice outside right now, but it's probably somewhere around 35 degrees. And it doesn't really get above that. We've seen snow a few times falling, but it has yet to stick on the ground yet. I guess we'll see! I have my winter coat, boots, and gloves ready to go for when it does hit!

 

Halloween was pretty uneventful for us out here. We had a few lessons early in the day, then when Trick-or-Treaters were on the streets we went to a members house for dinner and watched the church movie, "The Testaments". We put Mormon.org cards with a note that said "Happy Halloween! :D " on the stuff they were giving out, but they probably only had 6 people total come to their house. That was odd, considering they live in Main Street... But it was really cold and rainy on Halloween, so that probably discouraged most parents from going out.

 

So I'm sure I've mentioned it before, but one of the highlights of Lowville has been the CHEESE. It's delicious. We go and get fresh cheese curd every couple of weeks, which I have really grown to love. Yum. But this past week, we decided to finally get a picture with "Lady LeWinDa Milkzalot", the biggest Dairy Cow in New York. Oh yeah!

Pretty wild, huh? Then, I couldn't help it... I bought a new tie. Just to warn you though, it's pretty "cheesy". Ha. Haha. :)

It's a foam cheese tie! It is pretty sweet. It smells like cheese even! (Disclaimer- I'm not sure if that is intentional, or if it's just because it was sitting in a cheese store so long..) But it's pretty cool! I've wanted to have some sort of souvenir from each area that I've served in. I have some rock called "slag" from Owego, pictures in the ghetto by the graffiti from Syracuse, some really old sweet ties from a catholic thrift shop in Massena, and now a cheese tie for Lowville. I don't know what I'll ever do with it besides look at it with nostalgia, but it was too cool to resist. :)

I love fast and testimony meeting. It's sometimes scary when you don't know what people are going to say, but it always ends up going well. We had one of our investigators get up in sacrament yesterday to bear her testimony, and it was great! We could tell she was scared, but she was so sincere and sweet as she did it. It was a good moment to remember. We also had another investigator come to church for the first time yesterday named Jerry. He's a good guy! We've been meeting with him for a while, so it's great he finally came. He seemed to enjoy it a lot and we're actually going to play pool at his house later this afternoon! That'll be sweet.

Things are continuing to go well here in Lowville. We now have about 10 investigators, which is a huge relief. Things were kinda stressful when we only had one. We're just continuing to work hard and be diligent and obedient, and we're seeing blessings come as we do so. We taught 13 lessons this past week, which was the most I've taught in quite a while, and it looks like we're going to have another good week.

We have an awesome potential that is dating a less-active member of another congregation named Jay. He's the guy that we've helped plant trees for. Anyway, he makes super good food for us when we come over, and he invited us over for Thanksgiving. We were super excited for that, until we realized something... Transfers is the day before Thanksgiving. :( Dang! Now I'm super worried about what is going to happen at transfers, even though it's still about a month away! It's crazy to think about how fast time goes by.. But, nothing I can do about that! "Trust in the Lord with all thy heart, and lean not unto think own understanding. In all thy ways, acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths." Proverbs 3:5-6  Or, in other words, "Do your best and let God do the rest". :)

Things are good for us out here! I continue to learn about how simple the Gospel is, but what a profound impact it can have on our lives. I'm recognizing more and more things that I can work on and change to be more like the Savior, but luckily, I'm being blessed with patience to keep working with myself and not get fed up. Repentance is sweet!

Love you all,
-Elder Hussey