12/14 EMAIL COMEBACK

This week has been a week of adventures..or something.. Surely this
email is going to redeem last weeks by a long shot. If not, well then
I deeply apologize. It was definitely a week of awkward moments and
laughter so hopefully you are feeling the vibes of this email!

SO it's 8:30 at night, it is dark and of course our plans fall through
and we are headed to visit a member of the ward that we want to get to
know better. So we go and our lovely GPS, Michelle, Took us to what  I
am going to call "Hill of Doom" that has the idea to just completely
destroy the lovely Subaru. So we come to the hill to find out it is a
one way and that we are one the wrong side of it. GREAT! So thanks to
Sister Spiteris amazing backing up skills we overcome the "hill of
doom" and so does our lovely car, which the elders have named
"Waffle." The story continues, we head the alternative route just to
find ourselves in the middle of this neighborhood with all manner of
closed roads and we move ourselves about just right and get to what we
think is  the members house. We pray. Get out of the car. And then all
our car alarms start going off. It's cool. We get ourselves together,
and headed to the house and it was the people that we were looking
for! Thank goodness!

Next adventure. We found  this really awesome kid named Denny. He had
gone on Mormon.org and said that he wanted to be a missionary and
asked for missionaries to come by. OBVIOUSLY we go by! And out comes
this 18 year old! And we are like WOAH! And we teach him! And then he
tells us to come back the next day! SO we confirm with him. *Side note
here: Sometimes it is a struggle to be a sister missionary because
sometimes people seem a little too interested if you know what I
mean..so sometimes it is hard to decipher whether they like the
message...or if they like you.* There we are driving to his house when
we get this text: "Hi can we do the lesson in the car tonight"  and so
naturally in our minds we are like flip what the heck are we going to
do in this situation...We play it cool and tell him about the rules
and such and ask him why he would ask that...Then he said it was just
cause his dog barks... hmm interesting. We get there and we end up
doing the lesson on the porch of his house and it was awesome! And we
totally set a baptismal date with him! And we had another lesson with
him later in the week. And he is actually genuinely interested! So
that's fantastic! :)

I never want anyone to tell me that I cant speak Spanish ever again.
Listen to this: Okay so obviously I struggle at Spanish, even though I
tried REALLY hard for the 4 1/2 months that I was teaching Hispanics
up in Jasper. But I guess in that time I actually did learn something!
Imagine, a nice day, Sister Spiteri and I walking down the road when
we see a lady raking her leaves! *Another side note: Seasons are
messed up here so the weather is like early October right now* And we
start talking to her when oh snap, she doesn't speak English. SO I whip
out my limited Spanish skills and she said that missionaries could
come back and talk to her! HA. I'm so good. Thanks Heavenly Father for
making that one happen...cause in all reality..I cant speak Spanish.

That same day in our adventures of walking around in the fall weather
in December, please understand that I'm not kidding when I say
that..the other day it was 68.... We met these two little girls! And
they called us pretty, gave us hugs, and then gave us candy. Does this
fall under the category of taking candy from strangers?

Automatic window fail. Car automatic windows don't work when you want
them to..but at the most horrible times. We were having another late
night adventure in the dark trying to find an address. 80% of the
skills you learn as a missionary I think fall under the category of
finding addresses in the dark.  We come up to this round about and are
suck because this huge moving truck is completely blocking our way..
and so we just kinda sit there contemplating our lives..when this guy
comes up to our window. I roll it down like a champ, and then we are
talking and while he is telling us that he is the husband of the
person that we are looking for, I bump the button and it starts
rolling up my window in the middle of our conversation! Oops... turns
our the lady that we were looking for was moving the next day and so
we got to wear pants and go and help! :) It was awesome...plus she
gave us like all the food from her freezer that wouldn't last the 4
hour drive. #perks

Sometimes you have no motivation to cook..or you are just forever away
from your apartment come dinner time and need to figure out what to do
with yourselves. Taco-bell is always a good choice. So last week at
 Taco Bell I found a piece of paper in my burrito! What the heck 
Taco Bell..so we were fighting. But this time we were hungry and so we
were like..Tacobell is quick we will give it time to make a come back.
So we go...and order.. and wait....and then we were talking and some
man comes up to us, and he is like, "Man, I'm buzzed, you don't come to
tacobell and order $53 of food unless you're buzzed!"....needless to
say... 20 minutes later we got our food cause the 3 people that were
working were busy making the drunk man's food.  Thanks Spike for
making us late to our appointment. Yeah, his name was Spike.

Margret was this nice lady we met on the side of the road the other day
and she told us to come back and see her! WE go to her apartment
complex for the older people.. and cant get in any of the doors...it
was like a prison kind of...and then on top of that..no one was around
or making any sounds at all.. and we were just wandering the halls of
this place confused and there were so many doors we just had no idea
what we were doing. I guess sometimes you can tell that we are lost
because this old man wearing these awesome flip-flops came and guided
us to the right place. Thanks flip flop man!

It was a good week! Also.. transfer calls were on Saturday..Sister
Spiteri and I are both staying right here in Frankfort...That means
it's officially my last area...with my last companion...and the last 7
weeks. It's gonna be great!

Bring on Christmas! I hope that you all are having an awesome holiday
season and that thins are going so good for everyone! I love you and
miss you all! Have an amazing week and please remember our Savior
Jesus Christ and why he was born. He was born for each one of us to
overcome mistakes and sadness, he was born so we could again live!
And live in the presence of God. Life is good because He was born and
that is something to rejoice in! :)

SHOUT OUT TO EX-COMP HERMANA MAGALEI that girl is a champ and
completes her mission honorably this week and flies all the way back
to the promise island of Hawaii. LOVE YOU SIS!

SHOUT OUT TO MY AWESOME GRANDPARENTS! Thanks nana and papa for the
Christmas package <3

peace and love my friends,

-Sister Wagner

Gotta love the Capitol District. Elders Gaskin, Passmore, Salazar,
Burr, Bennett, Grossman, Jolly and then us sisters :)

Christmas time on the mission <3 our little tree

12/7 FLOP OF AN EMAIL

This weeks email will be a bit non-entertaining and not long at all!
Haha This week was an elder in our wards birthday! And so today has
been a series of cake and cookie making and shopping! So forgive me
for this!

This week the biggest miracle of all was Alison. She is straight up
one of the most amazing people that I have ever met and she is
completely inspiring. This week we were on exchange with the sister
training leaders, and I was able to be with Sister Taylor, my MTC
companion from back in the day! And so it was a good day! And we went
to try some less active members and when we got there..this woman
opened the door..and I knew it wasn't the people that I was looking
for... So we told her who we were and she started talking with us and
she has so many questions about religion and God and told her some of
her heart aches and trials. The gospel was her solution. We knew it
and the coolest part, was she did too :) This week we saw her 3 times
and the lessons were amazing and she was excited. She even came to
stake conference this week!

This week at stake conference, and Alison even came to that! It is
amazing to see the great peace that someone can find just by learning
about the gospel. And in one of our lessons with her, we invited her
to be baptized in January. She said that March sounds more do able to
her so we agreed, wishing that it wasn't quite so far away. But at
stake conference we felt impressed to have her talk to our mission
president who was there. IT was amazing because he asked her when she
was getting baptized and then told her that she needed to get baptized
sooner. It was soo cool! :) And she felt the spirit in such away that
she agreed and realized that she too wanted that experience sooner! I
love being a missionary and seeing the light that the gospel gives
people who don't have any sign of hope.

This holiday season, I mentioned last week, that the church put out a
video about the birth of our savior, #ASaviorIsBorn. That video is
amazing. This week we have had the chance to play it to others and
they have just lit up at the message of our savior that is being
presented to them. It is amazing to see what the Savior has done for
so many of us and how he has touched our lives individually.

SHOUT OUT  to Jordan! Thank you so much for your letter! I really
appreciate it!!

Have a great week y'all! I love and miss you! And hope that you are
feeling the special spirit of this holiday season! :)

-Sister Wagner

US with the STLs

 

 

YUP! It's a castle!

(All names of investigators have been changed)

11/30 TRUE KENTUCKY

Okay! Things in this area go in massive tidal waves of activity. So
last week was slow and the email was short, but this week things
happened! :)

Monday nights are ALWAYS interesting because then i am forced to wait
to tell you all! SO  we went to a lesson with a person we had met
once, Kate! flash back!! The Spanish Elders found her for them, and
we followed up and set the appointment pretty quickly and left! flash
forward! We go to the lesson. And Kate comes and we are talking to
her and asked if she had read the pamphlet we left her! and she said
yes and we got talking and then KATE walked in..WAIT WHAT..YEAH turns
out brilliant as we are, we had been teaching her sister who looks
SUPER similar...and she knew who we were and had read the pamphlet
because Kate had told her to..so we had been teaching Missy. Gosh,
our lives. That is what happens when you have a lot of kinfolk!
Sometimes as missionaries, if you aren't careful you will teach the
wrong person because they will look an awful lot alike. #weareidiots.
BUT! We ended up catching Kate up and setting a baptismal date with
her! That is how it is done people. #win

Also, remember how a couple weeks ago, I had this major revelation on
this person, K....., who i taught in Corbin, but sometimes she would
live here? WELL.. Update, the Elders found her! and they got ahold of
her! and will be seeing her this week! :) And then hopefully I will
see her soon! It is amazing how aware God is of his Children, he will
place them in your path again if they are there for you to help!  :)
God is Great.

We are teaching this man named Nathan. Nathan is one of the most
interesting people that I have ever met. He is quiet and goes through
a lot of  things that the average person wont understand. And so he
tends to be a little more..."dark" if you will. He believes very
strongly that he has been asked to defeat all evil. And so the
question that he asked us as we were teaching him... if it would be a
bad idea to look up things about cults and witchcraft? which of course
we said "...that might not be the best thing to do, let's fight
darkness, by bringing light into our lives" And so this week we have
been studying a lot about light, specifically the light of the gospel
and the light of Christ. And it has been really interesting. When we
have the light of Christ in our lives, the things that are possible
are endless and the peace that we feel nothing will be able to match it. Darkness will never overcome light, light will always penetrate. And in the
wise words of a friend of Sister Spiteri.. "don't look for Gods truths
in an environment where they can not be validated by the witness of
the spirit" #LIGHT.

This week MALLORY, my dear friend from the world of Jasper Indiana
came to visit us this week :) She spent the day going around with us
and we had a few very interesting encounters. We go to find this man
named Ryan, a less active member. And we come to this road in the
middle of no where... and we drive up this mud driveway that is a hill
and we get to the top, just to see this truck come up behind us and
this man with a killer beard as the driver. We say a prayer before we
get out of the car, which I said "Heavenly Father please bless that
this man doesn't have a gun, or that at least that he wont shoot us."
And then during the conversation he was telling us about his friend
and his friends hunting abilities, and then he tells us "I don't even
own a real gun, just a pellet gun" HEAVENLY FATHER HEARS PRAYERS :) I'm
so blessed! He was an extremely kind man too!! :) I love Kentucky!

Apparently, my stone heart is beginning to soften, which may or may
not be good. I have been driving my companion up the wall trying to
talk about feelings, thoughts and life. It's like I don't even know who
I am anymore. #heartless #maybenot #thereishope

We met this ADORABLE little old lady this week! The same day we met
the man without a gun! So we were out in the Kentucky sticks and we
had no service and we pull up to this what looks like abandoned house
that matched the address we were looking for! We look around and we
see this broken barn, and then we see a cat...and then another
cat...and then another, and another... And then we are starting to be
a little freaked out..and we see this bag...hanging from this
tree...and we are convinced at this point that we are gonna see a dead
woman in this house that has collapsed and been forgotten. BUT! We
knock and enter to find the cutest, frailest woman I have ever seen in
my life. She tells us about her life and how her grandparents crossed
the plains and how she is her with her children and they live around
and they need the gospel. And she was hilarious! Example: She goes:
"Here, let me buy you lunch take this" *hands sister spiteri 20 bucks*
"No it is really okay!" then she goes "It wont be okay, not until you
take this!" haha needless to say this lady forced us to take her
money. And then She kept telling us to "take a cat" cause she didn't
want them..She was the sweetest!!! But we couldn't take a cat..

Turkey day was a blast! We got some naps in, and some delicious home
cooked food! We got 2 dinners, there is nothing like it! and
therefore, we almost blew up..It was worth it! :) We were taken care
of!

SHOUT OUT:
THANK YOU NANA AND PAPA FOR THE CARD YOU SENT ME FOR THANKSGIVING!!
THANK YOU DAD AND BRENDA FOR THE EARLY CHRISTMAS PACKAGE!

That moment when...
..it still isn't that cold
..you have a heart to heart with your comp
..you rearrange and it's a total fail
..you survive two thanksgivings two years in a row!
..you learn how to take off wall paper

I hope that you all are doing amazing and had an awesome week and
holiday season! Check out christmas.mormon.org There is a new
Christmas video out to celebrate this new season that we have now
cracked into!

Love and miss you all!

-Sister Wagner

Gotta have the comp selfie; she puts up with a lot

Gotta love when one of your favorite sisters, Sister Resendez,
randomly stops at your place!

11/23 Jump up to Jasper

This week I had the amazing pleasure of heading back up to Jasper to
see Jane  be baptized!! It was amazing to be there and see the
excitement on her face as she entered into the waters of baptism.
Anne is now not the only person in her family to join Christ's
church!

This week has been a long blur. It happens I cant even handle myself!
We are just so busy working with the people in the area I'm loosing my
mind! I have been making goals to learn all the people in the area but
I cant seem to keep their names right in my head! haha They all get
jumbled up!

This week we had interviews with our mission president! He is amazing!
And so hilarious. He was able to teach us how to better introduce the
book of Mormon to those who we meet. It was inspiring. He practiced on
us and I left feeling like I wanted to read the book of Mormon over
and over again and tell everyone about it. I know that the Book of
Mormon is the word of God and can bless our lives and help us come
closer to God.

We were able to have a lesson with this woman named Tess. She hasn't
been to church and forever. We were able to listen to her as she
shared with us her experience of finding the church and going up and
down with  her relationship with God. She was truly inspiring. That is
the amazing thing about serving in this way. The people that you meet
will change your life because of their stories and the things that
they have gone through.

Sorry if this email this week is totally lame! it was just a really
slow week! :) I love and miss you all!

I love these people #baptism

Capital Building

 

11/16 FORT OF FRANK

This is it everyone! I am officially out of Jasper and in the capitol
city of Kentucky! Frankfort! Many of you might think it is Louisville
because for the longest time I did.. #fail Not going to lie though, my
heart longs for good ol' jasper. You truly don't know what you got
till it's gone.

Frankfort is amazing! We cover TONS of area...I'm talking the whole
ward boundaries. It is completely insane. There are 3 sets of
missionaries in the ward. Sisters, Bike English Elders, and the
Versailles Spanish Elders. Needless to say, there is a lot of work to
be done and a lot of people to be taught! We are just busting out
miracles up this way and making things happen #hollah But let us put a
spin on this WHOLE THING. This area was whitewashed essentially
because of safety. SO The sisters moved from Versailles, and came to
Frankfort, we switched places with the Versailles Spanish Elders
SO...we have no idea where anything is..or where to go..because part
of where we live is the bike elders so it has been a real journey..
CRAZY planning. But hey. What can you do about it right!? Just gotta
roll.. even when it feels like your head is going to be what rolls
off..

My companion is Sister Spiteri! (SPIT-TERRY) She is from Utah but has
lived all over! She is super creative and is majoring in Art! :) She
has been on her mission about 14 months! So we are right around each
other in field time! It makes things easier because she knows what she
is doing! SO that's good!

Oh.. I could go on for days about the car I drive in this area. mmmmm
mmm. MIKE be jealous right about now.. I have the pleasure of being
the driver of a 2015 SUBARU LEGACY. dark gray with dark interior. Oh
man this puppy looks so nice and drives even better. It kind of sets
up any car I will probably ever be able to afford for utter
failure...but I will live in luxury for now. I will take a picture of
it and send it next week as proof.

The area that we work a lot, Versailles, is horse country. It is
absolutely breath taking. We see these million dollar horses ALL the
time. And the pastures and barns are almost as beautiful as the
horses! this is why I love Kentucky. It is good to be back in this
area!
Not to mention a mall is 30 minutes away and there is some actually
shopping right  near by. HALLELUJAH!

This week..revelation was received. Back in Corbin, KY I was teaching
this woman named K....! She was super sweet! And she sometimes lived
there and sometimes lived in another town. And we would teach her
while she was there. I haven't thought about this woman for forever!
Until we got talking in a meeting about something...and then the
spirit just put in my mind... SHE SOMETIMES LIVED IN FRANKFORT! And
then I told the Elders about it, and then Elder Bennett, who has
already served in this area, had taught her too while she was this
way...and that same day she had come to his mind as well.. SO we are
now on the hunt for K.....! It is so amazing to know that God will
place thoughts and impressions into your mind so that you can help his
children.

I had the pleasure of watching someone be arrested this week. We were
in the library parking lot and it went a little like this: this cop
car is circling the parking lot. He parks near a big red car. He gets
out. He taps on the window. The lady in the car, "1 seconds" the cop
with her finger. ☝🏼. The cop waits. The lady rolls down her window.
Then we hear "i have your picture in my car if you need to see it."..
"You are about ready to be charged for possession" The cop tells her to
get out. She gets out. She is on the phone talking. She walks around
the car. the cop follows. She walks around multiple times. Then she
begins to run. the cop runs too. He says "you can't out run me" She
says "I'm on the phone with my daughter! She is crying!" As she
proceeds to try and get away from the cop. He says "You are about
ready to be charged for about 4 different things" and then she throws
a fit. Then he cuffs the lady. Then he brings her to his car. Talks to
her about who knows what. And then puts the old lady in the car. Oh,
yeah, the lady was old.

Missionary work is the hardest thing ever. Especially when things are
mixed all about. But I have found that prayer goes a long way.
Heavenly Father isn't going to leave us helpless. He will always
support us and lead us to where we need to go and what we need to do.
And he does that in real life too...not just missionary life. :)

I hope that you all are having a great week! I love you all! Feel free
to send mail if you want to..I sure wont complain :) Work hard, and
PRAY harder!!

New address:

Sister Wagner
749 Ridgeview Dr.
Frankfort, KY 40601

-Sister Wagner

The best water tower I have ever seen!

It's been 15 months since I have lived near a TJ Maxx. My life is complete, my wallet is not.

Companion!

#arrested #cops #fightingcrime

My greatest apologies!

To those who have been keeping up with Sister Wagners Blog,
this is her cousin Shannon here who has been running the blog while she has been away.
I'm sure you've all noticed there has been a lack of activity over the past month and I am very sorry for that! Sometimes in life there are times where your head isn't on the right way and sleep seems to be nothing more than a memory and that is what it has been like for me. I've been very wrapped up in many things going on recently and over the past several weeks and have let the blog slip and I apologize for that! But today I will be making it all up to date, and in practically no time at all, Sister Wagner will be home! 

Thanks for the understanding, 
Shannon

Adios Jasper

The time has finally come. After 8 1/2 months of laboring here in the
Jasper Area, the Lord sees it fit for me to do the work else where. My
heart is broken and torn in so many different directions. It kills me
to leave these people I have served and grown to love. The Members
here are my family. The strangers, my friends. The streets memorized and
 the smells familiar. The thought of being so far from my new found
home for so long, without knowing when I'll be back, makes my heart
truly ache. But I'm more than blessed to have had the opportunity to
get to know this area, and the people so well. So many missionaries
don't have that same chance in their areas.

I'm excited though! Excited to grow and learn in new ways with a new
companion! But for now, lets focus on 10 lessons that I have learned
from the one and only Jasper, Indiana :)

1. As gruesome and down trodden as things may seem, after some time, things pick back up.
2. People are not as bad as they seem...except for when they are.
3. I have seen and thus learned the corn cycle.
4.All the smells that come along with the corn cycle.
5. Indiana People and Kentucky people are on opposite ends of the spectrum
6. Indiana people rarely have accents.
7. Don't complain right away, if you just wait, you will have your ideas changed..and if you already
complained...then you just feel like an idiot.
8. after 8 months,  people consider you an official part of the ward.
9. Hispanics LOVE to  learn about God.
10. No matter where you are, people are wonderful,
and the gospel is the true.

This week in the life of Sister Wagner just a major tender mercy
miracle from God. So back in the day, my trainer, aka the missionary
that taught me to be a missionary, served her in Jasper. And so when I
got sent here, she gave me a task. "Find Jose R, he is great" Jose R
was a person that she taught and because of circumstances it didn't get
very far. So I totally forgot about this until this week.. This week
we were on exchanges and I was with Hermana Bown. We had an
appointment set with these two guys, Matt and Wayne. So we head to
their house. We get there, and it's dark. We knock, the door opens,
and 4 Hispanic men come onto the porch, one of them being Wayne. We
look past them and see multiple beers on the floor of the house. At
this point I thought I was going to die. And then they pulled up two
chairs and I REALLY thought I was going to die. This whole time they
are all just speaking Spanish and I have no idea. Then one of the men
I think saw that I was confused and started speaking English to me!
And he talks about how he knew a sister, and used to be taught, I asked
him his name...and he said "Jose R" WAIT WHAT?!?!?!!?!? nnoooo
wayyyyyy, IT WAS THE MAN THAT I WAS TOLD TO FIND! and the week before i
left.. I found him. It was a glorious day! And then we proceeded to
teach them all about the restoration of Christ's original church! :)

Hermana Magalei and I were asked to give a training this week, and we
had some time to prepare it. As we were preparing and seeking
revelation our minds were blocked! We spent more than half the time
trying to figure out what way to take the topic. and we had nothing.
So we said another prayer. Once we said another prayer the revelation
startedd flowing and we created this epic training on
R-E-A-L-ationships with the Help of the Lord. We just trained
missionaries on being real with people, keeping your personality while
being on the Lords errand. It was a fun topic! we had minimal time to
prepare because we were on exchanges, but with the help of the Lord,
we accomplished much and things went really smooth! R- relate E-
engage A- ask questions L- listen and laugh. That is how you be real
with people. And you can accomplish much with God!

I had the chance to give a talk in church about serving as Christ
would. It was a great chance to address the lovely Jasper ward.
Because of that I have really been pondering our Savior. Jesus Christ
is amazing! As I read from the scriptures I am just amazed by the
things that he does and the attitude in which he does them. No matter
the circumstance Christ serves whole
one he is serving. It is an unconditional love that he has for us, and
in turn he gives unconditional service. I just want to become a little
more like my elder brother  and with his help, I can do just that.

Thank you all for what you have done for me! And your support! You all
are fantastic. Next time you hear from me...who knows where I will
be!!!!!! Have a great week! I love and miss you all!

SHOUT OUT TO THE FUTURE MR and MRS JACK STOUT WHO ARE GETTING MARRIED
THIS WEEK! I LOVE YOU SYDNEY! Just my best friend and ex-companion...

-Sister Wagner

Lovely snake skin!

Adoptive Grandparents!

The Ferera Family

Jose and Hermana Bown

Mogle Family AKA my Adoptive family!

The Blands

heartedly thinking first of the