Damage Control...

Dear Friends and Family,
Oh the busy life of a missionary.  :)   It's great though.  I'll just get right started in on this week.
Monday started off the week nice and freezing cold!  It's actually been snowing on and off all week, but nothing that really sticks.  In the evening we went to the Lee's for Family Home Evening.  They are a cute family.  We were an half an hour late thought because the buses decided not to come!  Everyday is an adventure on buses, but Sister Strunk and I are just counting our blessings that we aren't on bikes  :-P 
Tuesday was District meeting.  The first district meeting of the new year! hooray!  Then after district meeting we saw Reon again.  He's doing well.  He's still excited for his baptism, and we're still excited too.  Then we went to visit Jason, and organize final preparations for his baptism.  Everyone was very excited.  Then we went and saw Kingsley with Rose, and again Rose saved the day, and resolved all of Kingsley's concerns with the Word of Wisdom, and he's living it now  :-D .  Then in the evening we went to the chapel with Milena in order to introduce her to mutual. They were cleaning the chapel for the activity, and everyone seemed to have fun doing it.  Sister Strunk and I ate dinner and studied a bit for our driving tests.  Then we found out that Jason's parents were meeting with the bishop, and that they had decided to postpone his baptism for a while.  It was kind of disappointing, and it's created a little bit of a stir, but everything is settling down, and moving foward again.  Jason took the news pretty well, and things are moving forward.
Wednesday was an interesting day, but in the evening we saw Cecelia.  She's doing very well, and she loves the Book of Mormon.  She asks good questions.  Also, before Cecelia we were tracting, I had decided the night before to try a different approach that Elder Stockton mentioned in District Meeting.  He said that instead of thinking what we are going to say before the door opens, to have a prayer in our hearts.  So I was thinking about that, and then I decided that what I wanted to do was use the moments before the door opened to pray, and then when the door opened just to bear testimony of whatever popped into my head.  So that's what I did.  I'm sure it might have seemed weird to some of the people who opened the door, because when the door opened I would just stare at them for a second, and then say something like, "I know for myself that God still speaks to us today...." or whatever I felt like saying, but I had decided that it doesn't matter if it seems awkward, as long as I bear my testimony.  Well, that night we tracted for about 2 and a half hours, and we found 8 new investigators!  That's normally the amount we find in a week.  It's pretty exciting, and it strengthened my testimony of the power of testimony, and how the Holy Ghost bears witness of the truth.  :) 
Thursday we saw Jason again, and talked to him about King Limhi and how he had to wait to be baptised.  He seemed to like the story.  Then we saw Toto.  We aren't sure if we'll be able to teach her much longer, because, although she likes us to come, she doesn't keep her commitments.  I'm sad because her children are so cute!  Jessica, the 5 year old, really wants to come to church.  We'll just have to see what happens in the coming week.
Friday in the morning we went to see Aneta and Artur.  Bruno is crawling now!  He's so adorable, but he's quite a handful!  Artur told us the story of how he found the church.  He said that one day he was at his Aunts house waiting for his cousin, and she had a Book of Mormon on the table.  He'd always been interested in religion, and reading about God, so when he say "Another Testament of Jesus Christ." He decided to read it.  As he was reading it he said he had this special feeling, and he really liked it, then his cousin came, so he put the book down and left.  Throughout the coming days the book kept coming back to his mind, and he wanted to read more, so eventually he went back to his Aunt's house, but he couldn't find the book anywhere.  So he forgot about it, and went on with his life.  But then sometime in the future he was in town walking with his friend, and there were some missionaries trying to contact people.  His friend said, "Oh, look at those mormons."  And Artur said it was like a bell going off in his head, "*ding ding ding* mormon.....Book of Mormon!"  So he went up to the missionaries and asked them how he could get a Book of Mormon.  They said they could get him one, and that they could tell him more about it.  They came and told him about Moroni's promise and how he should ask God if it was a true book..  Artur thought "Why not?"  And he said that when he read and prayed he knew that it was true, and he had no doubt.  When he went to church for the first time it was fast and testimony meeting, and he just had such a good feeling, so he went up to the stand and said, "It's only my first time here, but I know this church is true!"  Isn't that amazing?  Oh Artur.  Hehe, then we went to see Hayley and David (Jason's Parents).  It was good to see them.  We'll be seeing them a lot in the coming weeks to help get everything ready for Jason's baptism, but everything seems to be going well.  Then in the evening we saw Art, and both Sister Strunk and I are feeling much better about him.  We think he's gaining his testimony of the Book of Mormon, so we're going to work with him some more  :) 
Saturday was the coldest day ever!  Okay, maybe not, but it was pretty cold.  In the morning we saw Kingsley, and we taught him about living Prophets and watched part of "Special Witnesses"  Even though I've seen that clip of Special Witnesses several times before, I really felt the spirit this time, and I knew Kingsley had to be feeling it.  Afterwards Kingsley said that the film was very "moving."  :)   He asked if he could borrow it and watch the rest  :)   It was a good lesson.  Then we went to see Jason.  We're going to work with him and having read in 3 Nephi and then watch the Testaments with him afterwards.  I think it will be good.  He's such a cute kid.  When he prayed he said, "Please bless that this will be the best week ever."   :) 
Sunday was good.  Milena, Kingsley, Lillo, and Jason were all at church.  Agnes came as well.  The chapel seemed extra full, and what was even better, it seemed that there were more complete families there.  It was great!  Then after church we met with Kingsley, and had a really good lesson about the 10 commandments. He's leaving to go to Nigeria for 2 weeks this week, so we have to get everything ready for his baptism before he leaves, but I think he'll be okay.  He wants to go to church in Nigeria  :)   We like that idea.  Then we went to see Ohennaba (Prince) and Stacey.  I'm so excited about them!  Stacey joined in the lesson, and stayed with us the whole time!  And she didn't just listen in, she participated and asked questions.  It's pretty amazing.  I love how the gospel blesses families!  Then in the evening we saw Milena and then David & Hayley.  David demonstrated various British and American Accents for us, (actually the only American accent he can do is Forrest Gump)  so that was pretty funny.
So that was my week.  Pretty crazy, but so fantastic!  I love being a missionary!

Mom-  This week at church we gave Sister Donyina a thank-you card for cleaning out my ears among other things, and she said that she couldn't stop laughing.  It was pretty good.

Dad-  Illinois was on the news last night for the amount of snow it's been having in some places.  It was pretty cool, haha.

Elder Ison- I'm looking forward to your letter!  Congrats on making the papers!  :) 

Nathan-  I'm glad your rumbly tumbly is feeling better!

Grandma and Grandpa-  I'm sooo glad your surgery went well!  I love you!

I love you all!

Love,
Sister Ison