Truly Inspired By Our Missionaries and One Courageous Woman

All of the senior missionaries in our mission are asked to do apartment checks with the young missionaries. We met four of the young elders this week as we visited them in their apartments. I took the chance to leave them with a super short doctrinal message as well. They said it was strange being on the other side of the teaching. I loved getting to know these four elders a bit. Check out this bathroom in one of their apartments! Oh my!

God's hand is moving over the Canada Montreal Mission. The number of people that our young missionaries have been finding in the past few months is astronomical! Check out the numbers in this graphic. The number on the left is how many new friends were found, followed by the goal for that week.

Our exploring this weekend took us to the Old Port. It's where the community of Montreal began back in 1642. We were fascinated by the Notre-Dame-de-Bon-Secours Chapel. It was started by a woman named Marguerite Bourgeoys. She focused on educating girls and women. She made a conscious decision to not become a nun because she wanted to do God’s work among His children, not be isolated from them. She pointed out that the Virgin Mary was not “cloistered” and so she followed that path as well. What a hard worker! What determination she had! I was so inspired after learning about her life.

Here are some photos from the chapel:

Missionary moments:

• A young woman who worked at the chapel was passionate about the historical stories she was telling us. When I found out she was just as excited about her own family history, I sent her to FamilySearch.org.
• A young man who gave us a tour of the foundation of the church that burned down said he knew of our church. When I asked how, he said he's just curious about a lot of things so he's looked it up online. I said if he was really curious, he was invited to come to church with us and see what it is like. He declined.

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Senior Missionaries...WHAT rules?

Our supervisor came to visit from Pittsburgh last week and informed us that in a few weeks all four of us missionaries will be moving into the same room. The first 2 weeks of my mission, there were 5 work stations and 6 missionaries. Since I was the last one who arrived, I was just doing supporting work and getting good advice from the veterans. Then one of the couples went home and I have a spot now. I work in a room by myself on the third floor which I call "the cave". The other 3 missionaries are on the 5th floor.  I'm looking forward to being in a room together.

You can see my work station in "the cave" on the left.

It was 94° last Wednesday! Wow! That was a new record high for the 1st of June in Montreal. What happened to all of those cautions of "You're going to freeze" when people found out where I'd be serving?!?

This cute missionary is going home this week. So last week she wanted to go to the top of the Ferris wheel and watch the lights change on the Jacque Cartier Bridge at 10 pm. Two other sister missionaries went with us but only Sister C and I went on the Ferris wheel. It was so fun! And we had a brilliant view!

I also learned that Cirque du Soleil was started in Montreal. Gotta go catch a show one of these days! There are SO many fun things to see and do in this city!

Senior missionaries arriving home at 11:00 pm! Whatcha gonna do?

Last week the young missionaries in our mission found FOUR HUNDRED AND FIFTY new people to teach! Astounding! I was so inspired by them that I decided I wanted to find just one person for them to teach. I've been getting to know the security guards at the archives building where we serve every day. Last Friday I invited one of them to come to a stake activity with us on Saturday night. It gave us the chance to talk to him about his religious beliefs and show him around the chapel where the activity was held. We've been asked by those in charge at the archives to not talk about religion while we're inside the archives building. It was fun to be with this man in another setting so we could discuss religion with him. It seems that he might be open to talking with the missionaries. Stay tuned!

Running total of captures: no idea, I forgot to send in my report on Friday...Yikes! It will give you something to look forward to next week.

Captures, Waterfalls, and Ice Cream

I'm learning more every day about how to do a better job of the assignment I've been given to accomplish on this mission. 

Ever since the day I opened my mission call, I've been dreading sitting in front of a machine taking picture, after picture, after picture of historical documents that I couldn't even read because they're in French. The reality has been MUCH better than I expected. I count it a tender mercy that I have not felt bored while doing camera captures. A missionary couple who was only here for 2 weeks after I arrived taught me to make a game of it, to set goals and try to best myself from the day before. The husband captured 3025 images in a single day during the last week of his mission! ASTOUNDING! I hit just over 1400 for a high this week. I've got a long way to go.

Another missionary challenged me to find out WHY this work is so important. He said the WHAT would become easier if I had a deep understanding of the WHY.

Here's an example of gorgeous handwriting on one document.

You may not find anything fascinating about this stamp, but any variation in the documents makes life just a little bit more interesting.

And how about these cute little red seals on this document?

A seal AND a stamp! This one is over-the-top! 

I also go to the temple every Thursday to break up the week. The Montreal Temple is about a 25 minute drive from my apartment. I love that a bit of the local culture is apparent in the design of the temple. There are fleur de lys impressions in the carpet and on the altars. And there are maple leaves on the outside. I feel very blessed to be assigned to a place where I am close to a temple. I love going to the temple every week. It is a place of solace and realignment for me.

    

Our weekends are spectacular! Sister C, another single sister, and I like to go exploring on the weekends. Work hard, play hard! The archives were closed on May 22 for Victoria Day so we headed off to see Quebec City for the three day weekend. Quebec City is about 3 hours away from Montreal.

There's a spectacular waterfall nearby called Montmorency Falls. It is 30 meters taller than Niagara Falls. When you are near it, you are stunned by the power and the volume of the falling water!

Old Town Quebec City is gorgeous and has a European flavor.

Our favorite place by far on our weekend getaway was Orleans Island. Sadly, I don't have many pictures of it because as we drove around the entire island, I was behind the wheel. We are determined to go back and spend more time on the island.

We did manage to snap a few photos at the ice cream shop where we stopped. Look how thick that shell of chocolate is!!

I'm grateful to be serving in Montreal. I'm grateful for the opportunity to serve Heavenly Father's children who are on the other side of the veil. I want them to have the chance to receive ordinances. I think of myself as a missing link to facilitate someone finding their family through historical documents. There are many blessings that come from serving the Lord! Have any of you been thinking about serving a mission?? I invite you to pray about it and ask Father what He thinks you should do.

Missionary moments:

• We talked to a young man from India on the metro. He says he hopes to go to the US someday because he has family and friends there. "Which state?" I asked. UTAH! No way! "Which city?" SALT LAKE! I told him that his family and friends have surely heard of our church. And now he has as well.
• During a lesson about patriarchal blessings a few weeks ago, a young woman who was sitting two chairs away from me scooted over and asked how she could get a patriarchal blessing. I explained a little bit and later discovered that it was her first time to church and she was not a member of the church! Surprise! Last Sunday I learned that she had been baptized.

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My Assignment and Exploring

 

I am so blessed to serve with these wonderful missionaries. One couple left yesterday and I'm going to miss them terribly. They have taught me so much in the past 2 weeks and have tenderly mentored me.

These are the kinds of documents we are capturing. I love this line from the wills I have seen..."I recommend my soul to my God." I think I should put that in my living trust.

We work in the coolest building. It's the national archives of Quebec located in Montreal. I love the ying yang tables. Students from nearby universities often come here to study because it's a very quiet place. However, the library and archives employees have been on strike since last Thursday so the building has been locked. We are some of the very few people in the building.

The building was originally a college.

Hogwarts is right across the street from the archives.

This is the night view from my balcony. I love the cross that is lit up. It makes me feel like God is watching over this city. And also it feels like an invitation to look up to God. Elder F calls the cell tower on the left "the devil's fork." Haha!

The people of Montreal call this a mountain, Mount Royal. But those of us who live in the shadows of the Rocky Mountains would call it a large hill.

"Erected in 1924, the cross atop Mount Royal commemorates January 6, 1643, when Maisonneuve, Montréal's founder, kept his promise to carry a wooden cross to the summit of Mount Royal if the young colony survived flooding.

Source:  https://www.mtl.org/en/what-to-do/heritage-and-architecture/cross-atop-mount-royal#:~:text=Erected%20in%201924%2C%20the%20cross,the%20young%20colony%20survived%20flooding. 

Sister C and I have decided that we're going to go exploring every Saturday. We visited St. Helen's Island and Notre Dame Island. There were lovely gardens.

We also visited Notre Dame basilica. It was beautiful.

 I love this artist's nod to Canada by placing a maple leaf in Mary's hand.

I  met our mission leaders for the first time today as they were visiting the ward that I spoke in.

Setting Foot in a New Land

Well, between traveling across the country, getting internet set up, and dropping my phone with a deadly result, I'm a week behind on my blog post.

I spent a week driving across the country with these two: my sister, Kathy, and my African son, Jared.

The view from the back seat which was dubbed "the cave."

No pictures from here on out because of said dropped phone. After I dropped the phone the screen went black but the phone still works. It's a $250 repair so it's a goner. 

We dropped Jared off in Washington DC so he could get a replacement passport. Then Kathy and I headed to the Canadian border.

I was warned that Canadian border crossings for missionaries can be difficult and potentially take hours. We spent a total of 15 minutes at the border. And that was even after discovering that I had no car registration documentation in my car! I'd call that a tender mercy.

The other senior missionaries have taken such good care of us (Kathy stayed in Montreal for 4 days)!! They've shown us around, fed us dinner twice, helped us get set up with groceries and internet, given us free tickets to attend the symphony next week, and EVEN loaned me a phone for a week until I get my own replaced! I could hardly believe that one!

I've attended 2 wards and 1 branch the past two weeks. It has been a true missionary initiation. I've played the piano for sacrament meeting twice, shared a testimony at the request of one bishop, and I'll be speaking in church next week. And all of this before even being assigned a ward to attend  because I have yet to meet the mission president!

I've been learning more about my assignment to do digital captures of historical documents. And a  missionary couple who is leaving next week has given me some good tips on how to pass the time while doing this mundane, yet crucial work of document capture.

I'm starting to settle into my mission and become acclimated. 

Document Captures

 

This is the setup that greeted us the second week at the MTC. We kept wanting to say, "Lights! Camera! Action!"

Here are the four of us that were trained on document capture this week at the MTC. Trainers from Salt Lake came down from Family Search to help us learn the skills we'll need for our assignment. 

This is the most important thing that I learned at the MTC, that my first assignment as a missionary is to bring others to Christ. Oh, and by the way, I'll be capturing a few historical documents as well.

I made a harrowing 33 hour journey to the Montreal airport and straight back without any sleep. The intention was to fly there, get an important travel document, stay overnight in a hotel, and then fly back the next day. 

But because of delay, after delay, after delay due to bad weather, by the time I dropped another missionary at the curb, it was time to go back in the airport and begin my check-in process. I was haggard by the time I reached home.

I sure am going to miss this girl. 💕🐕💕

First Week at the MTC...Check!

What a week it has been!

Here it is, the classic photo by the map pointing to my mission.

These are the Davieses. They're the ones who took my picture in the front of the map, the very first missionaries I met at the MTC. It turns out that I was with Elder Davies' cousin in the MTC 39 years ago! Uncanny? Or is it the hand of God making me feel comfortable here on my very first day?

I love these two people, Elder and Sister Larson. We spent quite a bit of time "teaching" each other this week. We are convinced that it was no mistake we were paired together, especially when we discovered that I know Sister Larson's uncle! Uncanny? Nope. God's hand at work in our lives.

These sandbags were diverting water away from my house which is 3 doors from the corner. I went home on Saturday (preparation day) to get some medication I had forgotten. I knew there had been flooding on my street last week, but it was another thing to see the aftermath. People were texting to ask if my home was OK. It was almost 24 hours before I heard that I had dodged a bullet, but I wasn't worried because before I left for my mission I received a blessing that my home and possessions would be protected. I was at peace the whole time and knew everything would be fine.

The BIGGEST blessing for me this week, however, is the new understanding of my assignment which I have received. Every single day at the Missionary Training Center, God taught me that my mission is not to capture digital copies of historical documents, my mission is to bring others to Christ. I have struggled ever since I received my mission call thinking that I would be in front of a machine for two years. It sounded monotonous. But now I understand that I need to be working with people to bring them to Christ...and by the way, I'll be copying a few historical documents as well.