Half way through the mission

 Sorry this will be short. I hit my nine month mark!!! I can't believe how time has flown. In the last nine months, I survived MTC, a world wide pandemic, and now wild fires. 

Oh yeah, so now we have wild fires. The smoke got so bad that the sun looked dim enough that I could look it in the eye. Even with masks, it smelled while we were in the middle of a camp fire. No falling ash yet at least. It has been kinda crazy, but it has made the sunsets simply spectacular. That are always blessings in everything. Always a silver lining. 

After all of that has happened, I have grown so much and learn things I never thought possible. I can hardly wait to see what the next 9 months hold in store for me!!! 

Serving in Spring Creek

 So sorry about last week. Everything was so crazy I completely forgot to send my weekly! So much to say, so little time. 

So, I am now in Spring Creek. I am currently serving here with Sister Burger and Sister Rosa, two WONDERFUL missionaries. Transfers are next week, so I might be moved again. We'll have to wait and see. I am now fully recovered. Last week we were able to go to Ouray, a small mountain town, and go on a beautiful hike up to the water falls. It was such a fun hike, and there were so many cute little stores in town that we got to look into. 

Earlier this week we made cookies to deliver to people, and we made little notes to go with them. Sister burger did the amazing chaligraphy on it, I painted it, and Sister Rosa wrote little loving notes on the back. Now THAT'S comp unity. 

Sorry, but this week is going to have to be brief. Last week was a ton of fun, and I've learned so much in such a short amount of time. 

Some news. You will never guess who they asked to be on the cover photo for the Church of Jesus Christ in Montrose page. My companionship!!! we took a couple photos a few days ago and are deciding which to use. It was so much fun. You can tell they were getting pretty desperate if they asked me to be a model, haha. Never thought my modeling career would begin while being on a mission. This will most likely be the end of that career as well, haha.

I'm sure there was other news I could tell, but that will have to wait until next week. I hope y'all are doing great and staying busy during this crazy time!!!

I

am so grateful that I chose to serve a mission at such a time as this

The Miracle of Healing

My week has been a little slow. The first part of my week I was still feeling pretty sick, but I am starting to recover. This week I discovered that the miracle of healing isn't always an easy process. I prayed to be healed, and while I was not completely healed, I was strengthened. While recovering and going back to missionary work, I had terrible headaches, I struggled to keep food down, and my entire body ached, but I tried everyday to do all that I could and I put my trust in the Lord for the rest. I'm still not completely healed, but I am getting stronger each day. The headaches are gone and I can stay awake all day without much problem and while my stomach always aches painfully in the morning, I can now eat. Healing isn't always an immediate thing, but God can strengthen us through our trials and give us what we need to continue on strong. I won't lie, it was really hard and painful the first few days, but now I feel strength beyond my own holding me up and supporting me when I feel to weak to strong. I know I am not alone in this, I know I am being watched over and provided, and I know that as we have faith in God and do all that we can, He will always provide the rest of maybe not what we want, but what we need. 

Well, I did it again. I planned my P Day poorly when considering when I should write my weekly. I honestly ended up spending about two hours of it talking to my mom, and three or four hours of it talking to my Dorkette (Miriam) but I can't regret spending time with my wonderful family. They help strengthen me when I struggle and keep my life in perspective. I am so grateful to them.

I am grateful everyday that I chose to serve a mission at such a time as this! 

Sickness strikes me down

 This week was pretty good for the most part. My companion found a beautiful park near our hotel with an awesome lake and wonderful view. We did contacting over there, dinner, and even had a fun little run. 

I really like the weather over here. Main reason, because it's weather. It's not just sun, heat, and burning everyday. We'll get little rainstorms, wind storms, and even lightning storms a few times. We went on a fun little walk during a storm and Sister Burgoyne's poor umbrella was no match. It kept flinging inside out every-time a strong gust would come by. Eventually she just walked backwards and would just no hand her umbrella thanks to the wind. 

So this week I got sick. It was a strange sickness, where I was just so exhausted all day. On Thursday I slept almost all day, just waking up long enough to get some food, drink water, allowing my companion to make a few phone call or send a few messages, then exhaustion would get the best of me and I would be passed out again. For the next few days it got a little better, where I could be up a little longer, but I wouldn't usually be all there. My mind felt like there were cotton balls in it slowing down my thoughts when I was awake. Then I was able to stay awake about an hour for lunch and dinner and I was awake awake, where I could hold a conversation. My body was still so heavy and dI would have to lay down and rest, but my mind was more active and I was able to have conversations and studies with  my companion. Today I am feeling much better. Only one nap today! 

The strange thing about it is that other then pure exhaustion and sleeping all day and all night, I felt fine. A little bit of a sore throat, very light headed, hot and cold flashes, but nothing too bad. It feels the same as the sickness that Sister Harvey and I had a few months ago, so if it is the same then I should be on the mends from here and only get stronger in the coming days. 

Through this, I have come to appreciate my companion more and more. She has been so patient with me and all the rest and scatter brained conversations we've had. On the first day when it was an effort to sit up she made me soup and took care of me. She would check in on me and see how I was doing. While I was resting, she was so diligent in her studies and prayers and keeping physically fit by exercising. She has taken my sickness as a wonderful opportunity to grow intellectually and spiritually. She has improved SO MUCH in speaking Spanish in the last few days, and every time I'm awake she's always studying scripture or praying or doing whatever the Lord inspires her to do. She is so upbeat and hard working and I am truly inspired by her. Every time I'm awake she tells me excitedly what she was able to do, what she had learned, and how she had grown in just those few hours. She sees this time as an opportunity to grow and to learn, and I am truly grateful to her. I am so excited to see what God has in store for the both of us!

I am so grateful that I was ready to serve a mission at such a time as this!

The Suite Life of Sister Dickson and Sister Burgoyne

 So, big changes. This Wednesday I was transferred to the Paonia area, which covers the towns of Paonia, Hotchkiss, Crawford, Somerset, Maher, Bowie, and Lazear. Our area is pretty big, especially considering we are staying at a hotel in Delta, which is forty five minutes away from Paonia. This means if we want to visit our area, it takes about an hour and a half of driving each day. Luckily, it's a pretty enough view. Delta is a small town where our hotel is, and once we leave town it's about twenty five minutes of desert and dunes with mountains in the distance, but then you hit the boarder of our area and it's green trees and farm land and pastures. These towns are in the middle of the mountains, so anywhere you turn a beautiful mountain will be towering above you. This is a beautiful area. It is the closest to Washington that I have felt in a long time. Green fields, trees, and mountains. All we need now is rain!

Sister Burgoyne is my new companion. She is fresh out of the online MTC. She was originally assigned to Argentina Santafe, but with everything that's been happening she is now here in Paonia, Colorado. She is energetic and so excited to be here. 

This are we are in is called Paonia two. Now that the number of missionaries has nearly doubled, many wards are now being served by two sets of missionaries. We are now serving the wonderful people of Paonia along side Elder Herrick and Elder Earl, two wonderful missionaries who have been faithfully serving this ward. Since we are technically opening this area, it's been a little slow trying to start to do work here, but we have already made so many wonderful friends here. It sounds like they haven't had Sister Missionaries here for over six years now, so everyone seems excited to hear that we are here to serve them as well! 

While exploring today, we discovered that Paonia is known as the creative town, and it is beautiful. On every street there is beautiful artwork on store walls. I included a few pictures of them in my weekly below;)

There have been a few hick-ups in this transfer, such as being forty-five minutes away from our area, packages being sent to wrong addresses, and losing signal so often while driving, but it is beautiful and exciting. New companion, new area, new possibilities, and I couldn't be happier to be here!

I am so grateful that I chose to serve a mission at this time!

Another transfer

 This has been a pretty fun week. Now that we share a car with Redlands, we have been doing more biking. Some days it can get up to about 100 degrees outside, so a LITTLE hotter then I'm used to. Luckily, it means I will hopefully be in shape and lose some mission weight. I just have to first survive the heat, haha. We did more service this week and had another fun picnic. One of the members from the Ward actually took us to an English Toffee Factory this week! She bought us ice cream, Toffee Lover flavor, and then she bought us a giant bar of Toffee, which is so rich and amazing. The members are so awesome. It will be sad to leave.

Yeah, we got transfer news this morning. In my last area I was there for six months. This area I've been in almost a month now, and it looks like I'll be leaving Monument area to go to the Payonia area. I will be leaving Thursday to drive an hour to our new area. My companion, Sister Makasini, will be staying here. I will be opening a new area in Payonia. This week we are getting 28 new missionaries, and one of these missionaries, Sister Borgoyne, will be joining me. I am in charge of showing her the ropes and helping her adjust, while trying to introduce ourselves to the ward. There are already Elders serving there, but with so many more missionaries coming in they will now have two companionships of missionaries serving. Sadly, the mission hasn't been able to find a lot of extra apartments for Missionaries to stay in, so we will be living in a hotel for the foreseeable future. It will be an exciting adventure to be sure. Before all of this happened, we had about 150 missionaries. Now, by the end of August, we should have 300 missionaries serving here. It is a crazy time to be serving, but it is so exciting and fulfilling. I have truly grown to love this ward and the friends I have made here. It will be so sad to leave, but I know this is where God needs me to be right now.

Hot Hot Hot!

 Wow, it is HOT here. Even as it started to rain a tiny bit, the sky was almost completely blue. Breezes aren't cold, they are like a hair dryer. Yet, God knew me enough to give me a swamp cooler and an air conditioned church building to work in. Haha, God will provide for our needs. 

I am doing really well. Oh, one exciting thing from this week is that we got four new Elders in our district, all reassigned from foreign mission, everywhere from Africa to Rio. Our mission has almost doubled in size. With the Monument ward, we are now sharing it with two Elders, meaning we take care of one half of the members and they take care of the other half. I've never served a ward with another companionship in it, so this is a VERY new experience, but it's a fun experience. We have almost no idea how to share a ward, none of us have had to do this in the past, but we are getting it figured out.

With the new Elders in the district, that means the Sisters over the Redlands ward had to give their car to them. Now Redlands and us carpool and share our car. Luckily, the Redlands Sisters are awesome and we don't mind sharing.

Oh, and this week we were able to do service and have picnics with members. We helped stain someone's fence, then we had dinner with them outside. On the 4th of July, we were invited to a small BBQ with a family from the ward. It was just them and two of their neighbors, so we were still within the rule of less then 10 people.  

Sorry, not much to report on this week. We are doing well, staying inside where it's cold. 

I am so grateful to be serving at such a time as this.

P.S. Today while shopping we found Herby the car😊