What a Week!

To be truthfully honest I am slightly glad it is a new week!

We had so many things going on last week its hard to keep all the days straight. To start off we had Elder Kopischke of the Seventy do a mission tour this week. We have been anticipating this visit for about a month. Last year when we had someone come it scared us all into submission. Really.... But as he walked into our zone conference Love just eminated from him. He asked to meet every missionary and did so! He is so warm and gentle. He loves to laugh too. He had us think of questions that we wanted to have answered and to write them down. He then told us to only write down the impressions we received from the spirit. Let me tell you with in minutes of him speaking I had almost every question with an answer. It was simply amazing. As we approached the half way point of our meeting I started to get nervous because my turn to get up and play was coming. Well they accidently skipped it! During lunch they told us they would do it first thing when we started again. Okay nerves=through the roof. Heart=pounding in my ears. I am NOT a pianist people! I am a violinst. So I started praying. I knew that if I was going to get through this I needed help. I asked for the calming peace I know comes from my Heavenly Father. I was still pretty nervous as I sat down to play but then the most remarkable thing happened. As the vocalist came in I felt the stage fright literally melt away. I felt peace and love start running through my viens. I totally calmed down. I was able to play the song with fervent love for my Savior. Both of our testimonies were borne as we preformed. I was able to play this song without noticable mistakes. Of course there were little ones, but only I was able to notice them. I sat down when it was over and just started crying as I realized the blessing in full that I was given. It was a remarkable experience and I am excited to continue accompanying missionaries for their muscial numbers. So that was just Thursday. Then Friday we had another early morning meeting with Elder Kopischke for the Leaders of our mission. We learned so much!!!!!! Lately a couple of us have been feeling as if we have become robots throughout our mission. He totally addressed all of our concerns! It was simply amazing. Something I learned that was just profound is that our exchanges need to be when the Sisters need them and not when it is convenient for us. For example: if they are struggling with the ward council our exchange needs to be over a sunday when we can be there to help. If they are struggling with weekly planning then our exchange needs to be over Thursday when we do our weekly planning. Simple, right? Totally mind blowing!!!!!!

Funny Stories: One night we were driving through a neighborhood. It was dark. I had never been through this neighborhood so I was relying on the GPS. Suddenly there were 6 horses and their riders crossing right in front of us at a stop sign! I couldn't believe it!!!!! I so badly wanted to take a picture but couldnt get my camera out fast enough. The only other place I have seen horses is in Chatsworth so it was a total surprise! We laughed about it forever.

Last night I had a startling experience. I had somewhat of a hard time falling asleep last night and just when I felt myself really sleeping I got a very scary wake up call. The fire alarm was blarring! I was so groggy I could barely think how to turn off the alarm. I grabbed a chair to stand on since the alarm is very high up on our wall. I didn't even think to see if there was a fire now that I am reviewing last night. hmmm..... ;) I thought it was just our alarm. The sisters from the other room finally emerged and asked what was going on. None of us could think striaght. We finally made our way out to the living room we realized that the alarm sound was also coming from outside. We put jackets on and stepped outside to find that many other people were coming out of their apartments with confused looks. The alarm finally turned off and we got the word that someone had a cooking accident and it had caught fire causing all the alarms in the complex to go off. Now this happened probably in about 5-10 minutes. It was the scariest thing. Super annoying too. hahaha but all is well and we all learned an important lesson that should a fire happen we need to be prepared to leave the apartment with clothes to cover our garments. ;) heeheehee

I learned how to eat with chopsticks this week!!!!! It was a success! I didn't spill once! I was so excited!

An update about Sugar: She has had some pretty hard days this week. But on a long drive down to San Diego she was praying and as she finished her prayer the sun broke through some pretty dark clouds. She found herself filled with hope. A hope for the future. She is so amazing. I know I say this every week but its true. She continues to grow stronger every day and her testimony that the Book of Mormon is true is deepening. She is truly GOLDEN!

Mostly this has just been a calm week. Not too much to report other than Elder Kopischke. His comments have filled my head all week.

I love you all so much. I hope you have a wonderful week!

Hurrah for Israel!

Love,

Sister Cottrell