just a little flashlight

You guys.. it can't already be PDAY AGAIN!? What on earth. Time is flying. Where do I even start. So much happens every week and there is NO way I can put it all in here. But.. My week was PERFect.  Last P day one of the members took us to get a manicure and SHELLAC done and I was filled with happiness. YES. (Shellac should be my middle name) ahahah. My ward is amazing! We went to this relief society dinner on Saturday night and it was BEAUTIFUL. It was at one of my favorite member's home. She lives in a fabulous white house with a beautiful view of the ocean behind her. It was one of those nights where I felt like I was dreaming. It was perfect. Pinterest perfect. (I have a lot of those nights where I feel like I'm dreaming.) I will try to send a picture but it won't do it justice :)

I am OBSESSED with Connecticut. And New York. I will live here one day. I sound dramatic but I literally can't breath when we drive passed certain houses and sights. It is absolutely beautiful. I CANT EVEN explain. My favorite place here is Greenwich Connecticut. I just die. It's. Amazing. I think I will call it home one day. (Okay let's be honest, if I ever have the money... Hahah) but I won't let money stop me. It's my dream to come back here and do hair and be a fashion designer and be on broadway and be a mom and be mormon and be an east coaster. dreams can come true right? Ha

I have found that I have this crazy love for Koreans. We got to go eat dinner at this cute Korean family's house and I was in Heaven. I love Korean food and I love Korean people. Maybe one day I will move to Korea too..

I love being a missionary.

We found this lovely woman named Tia who has one of the hardest lives I think I've ever heard of. Basically she is really poor and has two kids that are little rebels. I won't list everything. But Anyways she is coming to church on Sunday and she started reading the Book of Mormon! I have been so excited about her. She is special. I love her. Hooray for new investigators!!

We have a pretty good teaching pool right now. I wish I could tell
about everyone but no time. I will mention Lynn tho. Lynn is 67 years old and has been a member since she was 40. Although not an active member. Within the last two months she has been coming to church every week and reading her scriptures and being the best person eva. I LOVE LYNN. She has Sooooooo many health problems its insane. But she is still going strong. Her faith is unreal. Last week she got her patriarchal blessing and Sister Amorim and I got to listen. She has no family so she invited us! It was the most amazing blessing I have ever heard. Lynn is awesome and such a special woman.

I have a funny story. Well kinda...

So my companion and I STILL don't have our car. Hahahaha. (At this
point it's just plain funny.) well not funny because apparently the
car was damaged way bad. Which is a way big bummer. And I can't wait
to get to better explore our area with our car.. Well anyways. We
needed to get to the New Canaan chapel. And we were at our apartment. So we started to walk. And this is NOT just a short walk. Quite long actually. But we had to get there. There were no sidewalks so we were just carefully walking on the side of the road. On our walk we decided to practice what we should say as we tract. We were practicing and role playing and we felt really good. And then we both stopped in front of this beautiful old white house and we looked at each other and said let's tract this one. Well. We go knock on the door and this smiling happy blonde woman opens the door. I was smiling at her and I was just about to open my mouth and put to use what we had just practiced but before I could even say "Hi we are the missionaries, --", she started shewing us away like we were insects!!! She was like no bye!!! Bye bye girls!! BYE. ...... HA. As we walked away I just looked at sister Amorim and started laughing so hard because it was hilarious how we felt like we should knock on that door specifically yet the woman inside was so scary and mean. I was like okay Heavenly Father that was kinda funny. Hahah. We decided to knock some more doors. NOT ONE person let us talk to them for more than 7 seconds. I felt so sad. I was like UGH COME ON. Seriously!? After all our practice not one person will even let us talk!?! We were feeling so not motivated at all. It was getting really dark outside. So visualize this. it's really dark, no sidewalk, shivering cold, hungry, and not one person will talk to us. I remembered I had a tiny tiny flashlight in my bag that my grandma had given me for my mission.. It was perfect. Just what we needed to see the road ahead of us. Well we continued on the dark road. We came up to this house and we decided to knock on the door but there was a little gate that we had to go through first before we could get to the front door. We were trying to open it but it would NOT open. So I was like hmmmm maybe it's a sign that we shouldn't go to this house..? Sister Amorim said hmmm or it could be satan not wanting us to share our message with these people. Ha I was like well yeah okay. Well we couldn't get the darn gate open
so we looked around for another way to get in. There was an opening by the side of the house so we got in right there. We walked through the gate and all of the sudden there was this insanely scary wild stray dog barking and growling at us. It looked like one of the Hyena's from the lion king. Just way ugly and way scary. We (of course) screamed way loud. Ha! I shined my flashlight in it's eyes and it took a few steps back. It was literally about ready to pounce on me. Haha we were terrified. The dog was a beast. We were SO scared. So we somehow escaped from the front yard and ran as fast as we could away from that beast. We were so tired. We were thinking about turning around and heading home because we were just having no success and it was dark cold and scary. But then we for some random reason decided to keep walking till we got to the church. To shorten this long story we eventually made it to the church and lucky us the young women were there for mutual. AND. There were two non members there!!! And we set up an appointment with them!!! Magical huh!?!
Here's a little scripture that I related to that night :)
Alma 26:27
Now when our hearts were depressed, and we were about to turn back,
behold, the Lord comforted us, and said: Go amongst thy brethren, the Lamanites, and bear with patience thine afflictions, and I will give unto you success.

We sure felt like we succeeded when we got there :) I LOVE that scripture.

I LOVE YOU ALL.
I LOOOVE this gospel. It's true. We just have to soften our hearts and read gods words and listen to the prophet and pray, and go to church, etc. to know that it is true. I know that it is. That's why I am out here tellin people about it. This is the most important work ever. It's good. And hard. And good. I'm a growing weed.
Love you love you. CTR

Love,
Abbbbbbbba
Ps I apologize for any spelling errors or grammar issues ;) no time to check

FALL IS COMING

HI GUYS

It's getting a little chilly here..

FALL IS COMING
I can't explain my excitement. Fall in upstate New York and
Connecticut is going to be BEAUTIFUL. I am such a fall lover and I am so happy. Today I made our family favorite PUMPKIN cake :) MMM. P-day treats. You know? ;)

Great week. We worked hard. Found a new investigator from tracting! Lena. And Rick and Maria are straight up PROGRESSING. I am learning SO much from going on two splits a week. I went on a split with Sister Vicino and Sister Fletcher! Sister Vicino is a Spanish speaking missionary. HAHA it was hilarious. I learned so much Spanish. It was so funny being in homes where I had no clue what was being said. I sat there in confusion like the whole day. But I'll tell you what... The spirit was SO easy to discern. :) although I couldn't tell what was being said, I could tell when the spirit was there. And that was so cool.



I got some good random stuff to share!! So I'll get right to it.

Funniest little story- So. Before I tell the story, keep this thought in the back of your head.. Sister Amorim and I were doing this "no sugar" diet thing last week and we weren't allowed to eat deserts or treats and stuff like that. (Ps that didn't last long because missionaries basically get force fed here in my ward) Anyways back to the story... We were tracting and we knocked on this little 91 year old lady's door. Her name was Rose. (SO CUTE) She opened up and we told her who we were and she suddenly became kinda cold and told us she could not help us because she was catholic. Well we smiled and we were just way nice to her and asked how her day was going and then she magically warmed up to us and asked if we needed a drink of water! I was like YES (thinking oh good we can slowly start bringing up the gospel of Jesus Christ without her even knowing it!!) hahaha. Well she goes to get us a glass of water and comes out with a big bowl FULL of Oreos. HA. (Remember how I told you my companion and I were doing a no sugar diet??) well. In my head I'm like heck no I'm not breaking my no
sugar diet for these!!! But at the same time I'm thinking awh man she brought these out in a cute bowl just for us and we can't tell he we won't eat them!!! Well I tried to just ignore the fact that they were sitting there and then she goes "come on eat the cookies!!!" Hahah. Me and my companion just hesitated and then we both picked one up. I still was like NO I'm not eating this. So I took a drink of water and started to chew ice making it look like I was chewing on the Oreo. Psh. Haha I then quickly and so secretly shoved the Oreo in my bag. HAHA I sat there trying SO hard not to laugh. My companion thought I was eating the Oreos and so she grabbed some more to keep eating. I was like Oh no!!! I have to save her so she doesn't continue to eat the sugar!!! So there I was so secretly grabbing HANDFULLs of Oreos and shoving them in my bag. HAHA I was dying. I kept grabbing them until they were gone. And then we finished talking to rose and ended up showing her the "Because of Him" Mormon message and she was all cute and happy. Anyways I couldn't stop laughing as we walked away and I explained to Sister Amorim that I had all the freaking Oreos in my bag. HAHA awh man just picture me secretly shoving Oreos in my bag. Hahaha

Something I've been thinking about lately-
It's so easy to doubt our testimonies. Sooo easy. We see it in
Scripture stories, We see it in people today. Satan is constantly
working on us. He is using everything he can to make us doubt God. He does not want us to have the truth. I feel that now, more than ever, satan can get to us easier with all our handy dandy techy tools. He makes us think that we are smart enough or wise enough to make it through life without thinking about or even believing in God. People become ignorant to God and search in the WRONG places to find truth, they turn away from god because they feel as though their own personal WISDOM can get them by. 

Ruude satan. I don't like him.

2 Nephi 9:28

"O that cunning plan of the evil one! O the vainness, and the
frailties, and the foolishness of men! When they are learned they
think they are wise, and they hearken not unto the counsel of God, for they set it aside, supposing they know of themselves, wherefore, their wisdom is foolishness and it profiteth them not. And they shall perish."

2 Nephi 9:29

"But to be learned is good if they hearken unto the counsels of God."  It can be hard in today's world to have complete confidence in our testimonies. Especially with all the distractions right in our laps. A lot of times people have small doubts. It's okay to have questions. It's okay to seek for truth! In fact that's awesome. We do need to ask questions and we do need to seek for truth when we have doubts. But you know what's important? In John 1:5 it says when we are lacking wisdom, we need to ask GOD. It's SO important that we ask God. It's important to not turn to false random garbage. We shouldn't rely on the world to help our testimonies grow. We can't go to the internet and roam through garbage to find truth. We cannot let our small doubts take over our faith. When we have the small doubts, that's when we should pray to god. And open the scriptures. DO NOT rely on the world.

Because we will only have more doubts and more confusion. So its good to be "learned if we hearken to god." With god we will never fail. He is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow. We must CONTINUALLY feast on his words. We must cry unto him in prayer. We MUST build our foundations on the rock. Christ is our rock. We can't be foolish, thinking we know best, and build our foundation on the worldly sand. Being a missionary, It's easy for me to see the fruits of living without distractions. I don't have the internet, I don't have the TV, I don't have the loud music in my ear. I don't have the world pulling at me putting doubts in my head. And it's now more than EVER that I KNOW how true this gospel is. and I know how important it is that we block out the world and build our foundation on our savior, our rock, our redeemer, Jesus Christ. I feel Gods love everyday. I know the truth of this gospel. IT IS SO RIGHT. I know that reading my scriptures and praying every day without distractions is the cause of this. We CAN be in this world and not get distracted, it IS possible.
Because God gave us things to guide us. It's the primary answers. it's reading our scriptures, praying to God, and going to church, listening to the prophet, keeping the commandments, etc. ....
So next time you have a small doubt, remember who to turn to :)
Heavenly Father. He is the best and knows best. Not us, the world, or the people in it ;)

No sugar right guys...?? ;) haha

SO YES there's my missionary thoughts.

I LOVE YOU GUYS. Thank you for all the prayers, love and support.

CTR

Xoxo

Love,
Abbs!
Sister Dunford

hi hi sis mish here

HI EVERYONE

I hope everyone had a great 1st week of September!! And that you all
wished my beautiful sister Kylee Rae a happy birthday on the 8th :) (I don't know about you, but I'm feelin 22!!!!) t swift. 

First of all it's SO totally Fashion Week here in NYC and you know I'm all up in that. So don't be shocked if you see a picture of me modeling on the RUNWAY at the Lincoln Center ;) WATCH OUT! No I'm teasin. #modelsistermissionary HAHa ohhhhh the Instagram days were good. I had a super awesome week. Still no car yet, but we are now pro at sharing cars with other missionaries and begging for rides. It's BIEN.
Good.

A cool experience I had this week- My companion and I were outside
talkin and walkin and doin our missionary thang... We were just
talking to everyone we saw and using our iPads to show the Mormon
message "Because of Him" I just have to say... That. Mormon. Message. Is. AMAZING. I saw it before my mission and loved it. (Everyone go watch that right after you finish reading my email) (DO IT) ;) anyways... There was one lady we stopped and talked to and she just started talking about how life is hard and we talked about how we all have trials and challenges and how the gospel of Jesus Christ can help EVERYONE no matter what. Well we then showed her the video and my gosh I can't explain the feeling that came over me. As we were standing there in New Canaan, Connecticut. It's like time stopped. and my eyes filled with water and I had chills everywhere. The love I felt for this lady was unreal. The love I felt from Christ was unreal. And the love I felt from god was unexplainable. The spirit was there. I was just thinking wow. How cool is this gospel. How awesome is it that I am out here bringing others closer to Christ. Never in my life have I felt SO good. (I am not a cryer and so this was so unusual for me!!!) after the video the lady was smiling so big and then my eyes were even more teary!!! I was like WHO AM I!?!? Hahaha.  The lady stopped and said "I feel SO good right now" I wanted to scream YES YES YES that's the spirit!!!! But I didn't. I didn't scream. Anyways we will be talking to her some more FOR sure.

So I get to go on two splits a week now. Which is A LOT of splits.
Normally you only go on one split each cycle. To clarify "splits" for my family- splits are when you and your companion split up with
another companionship and trade companions for a day! The purpose for splits are to learn from other sisters and so that the Sister training leader can make sure everyone is doing okay with the work and everything. So since my companion was assigned to be Solo sister
training leader (because I'm not done with my 12 week training) (hence solo)  normally it's a companionship of sister training leaders. But there were so many new missionaries that president needed another STL so he asked Sister Amorim! Sister Amorim has to do double the work that a normal companionship of STL's would do. It's funny all the missionaries here call me ASTL (Assistant to the Sister Training Leader) hahaha. I get the benefits of being an STL without doing the work that the STLs do. Haha!! It's perf.
I went on a split with Sister Kim Sunday night and Monday all day. I LOVE sister Kim. She's from South Korea and we are THE SAME person only she's Korean and I am American. Let me list some of our similarities: 

-We are both short. 5"2. 
-We both have TINY hands. 
-We are both obsessed with taking care of our skin at night!!! Haha we use the SAME EXACT skincare. Khiels!! Ha!! (Like nobody else understands me when I talk about my face care every night except for Sister Kim.) 
-We both are very social and can be oh so sassy when we want to be. Haha. 
-We both LOVE food. And ice cream in particular. 
-She comes from a family of ALL girls JUST like me. 
-We both eat lots of fiber..... Hahaha!! 
-We both love the latest celebrity gossip! 
-We are both allergic to cats! 
-And we just LOVE being missionaries!!! 

Sister Kim is so funny. She has this cute Korean accent and she has the strongest testimony. Maybe one day she will get to be my companion :)

Sister Kim and I

The spirit is the realest thing EVA!!!! So my companion and I have
been teaching a couple named Rick and Maria. I think I've talked about them a little bit. But anyways. (A little background on them) - They are in their late 40's early 50's. They are super duper smart. And they completely have their lives together. Like they're rich. Rick is a musician. He is super cool. Rick is catholic! Which is great! Right? But not as great as having the FULLNESS of the gospel of Jesus Christ and being MORMON :) Maria is so so sweet. She teaches English at a smart school here in Connecticut. They both are happy. And they have two kids. Their kids were baptized in high school and have been active ever since! (Hence the reason they are meeting with Mormon missionaries) So first of all anybody that knows me knows that I am NO gospel wizard. I have never been the one to bare my testimony in church or the one to answer all the sunday school questions, etc. Well. That being said, here I am, 19 years old, blonde, from UT and I'm teaching Rick and Maria and they are like bible wizards. You could say the word INTIMIDATING. Haha. You can imagine just how inadequate I feel teaching this couple. So every time we teach this couple I am like on my toes, edge of my seat, trying to be FULLY attentive so I know how I, (Sister Dunford) can help guide them. I'm always WIDE awake in lessons with them. Well Saturday night Sister Amorim and I taught them. And ACTUALLY no, let me change my words. .. Saturday night ..THE SPIRIT.. taught them. And I witnessed that. I have the strongest testimony of the spirit. There is NO way that Sister Amorim and I alone could make them believe in our message. But the spirit testified through the both of us. Before that lesson I was stressed about what we were going to say and what questions they were going to ask, etc. So I had been studying with them in my mind in hopes that I might be able to teach something they needed to hear. I prayed so many times in my head that I would be able to teach with the spirit because I know I am not smart enough to do it on my own. I had faith that God would put the words in my mind that I needed to say but that didn't keep me from stressing!! Well I will tell you what. During that lesson, I don't know how I even said what I said. We left the lesson and I was like woah. How did I just teach them!!! How did I just get those words out. And then I was like duh. It came from the spirit that's how ;) I KNOW for sure that missionaries don't teach people. THE SPIRIT teaches people. We as missionaries just have to be able to be instruments in gods hands.

Well. To end this email... (I will say it again) 

THIS CHURCH IS TRUE. 

I know that for sure. I hope everyone has a spectacular week. Don't forget to watch the Mormon Message "Because of Him" I watch it like everyday. I LOVE it.
LOVE YOU

Sista Abbs

First cycle say whaaaaat!!

Is it really September? Stop!! WOAH
How was Labor Day? I didn't even know it was Labor Day until Tuesday... The day after Labor Day. HA. I am in my own missionary world. How's everyone doing?? Utah? School? Life? Somebody/anybody feel free to send me a picture of the mountains in Utah. Those are truly lovely and missed by me Sister Dunford. Although I do LOVE the trees here. And the skyscraper buildings are legit too :) and the beaches are cool too.

Annnyways I made it through my FIRST cycle. Hahaha. 1 cycle down!! More to come. :) My first cycle has been amazing. And thank the heavens that my companion and I aren't getting transferred!! I LOVE this area. Sister Amorim and I have grown SO close. We are like best friends. I love her. We have had so much fun together and we've been working hard. She has just been assigned to be "solo" sister training leader!! Which is awesome!! We will go on lots of splits now! Lots! Like every week. Which will be so good for me. I will get to learn from lots of different sisters out here. I'm so excited for this new cycle.

Good week good week!! It was. Good week with hard days.
It was a HUMID HOT week here in Connecticut and New York. Not even worth trying to look somewhat decent hahaha. I would walk outside and just start to melt away. I can't even remember everything that we did!! The weeks sometimes blurr together!! Haha although I do remember one of the nights our fire alarm went off and there was a fire in our apartment building!! HAHa I was completely in my pajamas and ready for bed and next thing I know we are like AHH GET OUT!!! We had to wait outside for awhile and there were firemen inside doin stuff. So that was the funnest. I met a fireman that lived in UTAH and knows lots of Mormons. Mormons are so COOL. I love being a Mormon. Because I'm just the happiest.

I LOVE the Book of Mormon. It is amazing. I can't tell you how many
times I have read 1st Nephi and just thought "cool Nephi is legit and he is strong!!" but now that I am feasting and applying it to my life, it's like a whole new book!!  While I was reading these chapters I was thinking real hard and comparing myself to Nephi (don't compare yourself to others I know...) haha but I was like man... I would love to say that I am JUST like Nephi, but I tend to lean more towards the Laman and Lemuel side of things. Say WHAaaa!! Laman and Lemuel!?!? (I've always thought they were SO bad!! How could I SISTER DUNFORD be like Laman and Lemuel??)  Yeah. How would YOU act if your dad said "alright kids we are leaving and you cannot bring ANY of your possessions. I have been commanded by The Lord and so here we go!!" (Like sorry but I think I might complain a little bit..)  sue me. .. So I thought HOW can I be more like Nephi!?! How can I be so quick to do whatever The Lord asks of me?? Without hesitating or without complaining? Nephi went through So many challenges. Challenges that I have never had to go through and here I am complaining because we don't have a car to get around!!!! When Nephi didn't have a bow or an arrow to get food, he didn't just sit and murmur to god. He made one out of wood and a stick!!! (1st Nephi 16:  ) he made the best of what he had!! To be more like Nephi I need to be completely optimistic and make the most out of what I have. I need to humble myself and KNOW without a doubt in my mind that god knows best and that he won't command me to do anything unless he has prepared a way for me to do it. It is SO important that we are OBEDIENT to gods commandments because god KNOWS best. God is like the "ultimate" parent. He knows what's up. For realz. It's like when our parents "parent" us and they say "don't do this, don't do that, do this, do that!" It's because they love us. They REALLY do love us.  Our parents are trying to make sure we are safe and they only want the best for us. I love my parents so much!!!! And I will straight up tell you that they are the best parents in this world. But even better than my parents.. God. Our very own Heavenly Father is the BEST parent EVER. So LISTEN to him and OBEY
him. And talk to him. And worship him. He is amazing. He loves you. I love him so much!! (Pet peeve of mine when people are like waaahh
waaahh why do I have to keep the word of wisdom or why do I have to go to church on Sundays or why do I have to keep the law of chastity, etc.? I'm like duh. God is our father and he KNOWS so much more than us. Common sense. So be quiet and obey him. HAHA no teasin I'm not that sassy. But really just trust god. Don't be difficult. Don't think that you are the exception to the rule. Obey for crying out loud. ;)

I am SO happy to be out here on my mission. It is hard. Straight up.
not just a walk In the park. But I love the person I am becoming. I
have grown so much in just ONE cycle I can't imagine the growth that
will come from serving 18 months. This church is TRUE. It's so awesome. I wish that everyone could just have the knowledge of this gospel and the faith in god. And that is why I am out here. I want others to come to Christ so that they can feel as happy as I do. I know it is the gospel that makes all the difference. It's real. Everyone NEEDS it. The whole world needs the truth. It's so great. 

CTR.

Have an amazing week. Xoxo

Love,
SISTA DUNFORD