Week 2 from Lansing Michigan

Hello From Michigan everyone!
So week 2 of the mission in Michigan has been really just awesome.I am assigned to work in the St. Joseph area... which covers a lot of little towns that I don't know the name of yet. It it right on the shore of the lake and everyone says it is the prettiest area in the mission. It is very green and most of the houses in St. Jo are gorgeous, they look like they were just cut out of a magazine. Our area also has Benton Harbor which apparently is one of the more dangerous places in the nation. It is really segregated here, the only white people I have seen in Benton Harbor are my companions, its kind of weird because people say that in the 60s it was really intergrated but over time things just started to separate which is usually opposite of what you would assume. Since it is very dangerous, the Elders do the door knocking in Benton, but we still teach lessons out there, and then we door knock in St. Jo. We do have one investigator who is actually from Brazil! We went to go visit her the other day and I got to speak a little portuguese with her. She said I was good at it, but mostly I think she was being nice ha. Anyways we didn't get to teach her a lesson because she didn't have a lot of time. And she is going to Brazil with her husband for a couple of weeks so I won't get a chance to teach her until october.. I am really excited for them to get back. Also I found out that there are a lot of Brazilians that live around here because its one of the Whirlpool headquarters, another one is Brazil I guess and so a lot of the people move out here to work there. I need to find them all so I can teach them and keep up on the lessons!!

I am learning a lot about how much I have to learn! This ward is so great because everyone wants to feed us all the time! We have yet to go a day without dinner plans which is good for Sister Greene and me because it has given us a good chance to get to know the families in the ward. What is hard is that we haven't gotten very many referrals from the members, which means door knocking... I actually really enjoy door knocking, we always meet the most interesting people and everyone here is kind but it would be much more effective if we were teaching people that had been referrals because we don't get very many return appointments from door knocking. So if I have any advice or favors to ask from you it is to give your missionaries referrals! Do everything you can, PRAY as hard as you can for names of people to give to them, it helps move the work along so quickly. We all know people who are needing the comfort that the gospel can provide we just have to stop being chicken and invite them to learn! Anyways... we spent the first part of the week doing as much finding as we possibly can. A lot of people come to the doors and say that they are busy but they are too afraid to turn us completely away so they will tell us to come back later or a different day. That always makes me smile because you can tell they don't think we will and are usually surprised when we do.This is a very Catholic area.  We finally got an updated ward list and we were able to go through with the Relief society president to find names of less active and part member families that we can go teach, I am so excited to focus on that this next week. I can't wait to watch as the fire in their hearts is rekindled and to be able to help them come back and find strength in the gospel.

We had our first zone training ever this week and it was the best experience of the week by far. We drove up to Kalamazoo for the meeting and I finally got to meet all the people in my zone and the sister training leaders, zone leaders, district leaders, all that goodness. We got a lot of great advice that really helped me find goals to focus on in these upcoming weeks and I am so excited to use some new door knocking approaches and see if anyone will listen to me. I wish I had time to write down all the things that I learned buuuuut I don't so I'll just put one thing that I loved.
Our zone leader talked a lot about having the faith in the Lord that He would lead us to find people to teach. We talked about the Armor of God (D&C 27:15-18 if you wanna read it, which you should, its great) and he told us how the shields that warriors use to carry when they went to battle weighed 60+ pounds. He made the analogy that our shield of faith will be like wise heavy. I loved that he said "Faith is heavy, it requires effort." It really made me think about how I need to be exercising my faith every single chance that I get so that when I go to put on my Armor of God, I will have the strength to lift it. Being faithful is not easy... especially when there are so many distractions around us in this world, but it is not supposed to be easy. It would not be as powerful and strong if it came with no effort.
After all of the training was done we set goals, as companionships for the number of people we would help bring to the gospel and help make and keep covenants before the end of the year. Our companion set a pretty high goal, if you were to compare it to the progress that has been made in the area but I know that if we are diligent and obedient it will be no problem. So here comes the coolest part.... We set our goals and then all headed out to drive back to our areas. After about 20 mins of driving we got a call from one of our investigators that we had almost dropped. We hadn't had contact with her in over a month and had tried calling and going over to visit her with no answer. When she called she asked if we could come see her, so of course we went right over as soon as we got to St Jo. She came out and we had a lesson and she was so excited about reading the Book of Mormon and so sincere in her desire to learn. We even were able to set a baptismal date for her and a return appointment. She was just so prepared that it was a huge testimony boost for me to see that if we put our faith in the Lord, he will guide our footsteps to where we need to be. Since friday, when we made our goals, we have been able to meet with 3 other people that we have had a hard time contacting or that have kept cancelling meetings. It is so exciting to see how quickly Heavenly Father rewards our efforts and I am so excited to continue meeting with them, and finding more and more people that are prepared and needing to accept the gospel into their lives! I hope all of your weeks are going well! Write me letters:)

Sister Seagraves
4419 Red Arrow Hwy Apt C2
Stevensville MI, 49127

Te amo! Ate mais

Sister Seagraves — in Lansing, MI.

Relocating to Lansing Michigan

Okay Err'body, 

The day has come! All my clothes are washed, bags are packed and my whole district has already left! Tomorrow I will be in Lansing Michigan, and I cannot wait. Last night I said goodbye to my companion and the rest of the district and it made me so stressed out for my departure tomorrow morning! What if I get up late? The travel office had given Sister Wilcox the wrong time to depart so we thought she was supposed to leave at 3:30, jokes on us, she was supposed to be there at 2:30..,. AM i might add. We had gotten up at 2:15 to see our Elders off and then gone back to our room and she was going to use that time to get ready. About 20 minutes later she gets a call from the front desk saying that the whole bus was waiting for her and that she was super late... SO its 2:50 and they tell her that the bus needs to be out of the parking lot at 3am and she needed to be there now. Sister Fehlman, Sister Sauer-Davis and I went crazy trying to get the rest of her things packed, dressing her, lugging her bags down the stairs and then sprinting to the bus with her bags while she went to the travel office to check out. We got her from the phone call, packed and dressed and  to the bus in four minutes flat... We should probably work on a runway or something, she is lucky we are pros. Anyways when we finally went back to sleep last night all I could dream about was missing my flight and them sending me home because I was a disgrace haha. No way I am gonna let that happen! I am waayy too excited about going to Michigan. 

This week, we finished with our last progressing investigators and then began practicing teaching in English one on one.. I did not like it! It was so much hard to teach the lessons in English, who'da thunk? Seriously there were times when I could think of what I wanted to say in Portuguese but then when I tried to make it work in English I couldn't. Also, in Portuguese it is okay to be extremely bold with your statements and in English some of the ways I would have said things would have come across really rude so I had to learn how to say things more nicely. I never would have guessed that it would be so difficult but I guess teaching in Portuguese is all I know.  ]

I am so excited to be going to teach in Michigan... I know I have less that 8 hours but I can hardly stand to wait!! Strange to think that this time tomorrow i will be finishing my first day as a real, in the field missionary! Today we spent most of the day getting everything together and I was weird because we literally have like no friends left here. Everyone left this morning and we just walk around and people say "hey aren't you supposed to be gone?" and that's rude lol. And our class is completely empty which is sad and lonely. 

Tonight we had devotional, as usual for Tuesdays, in the Marriott Center AND and APOSTLE spoke! Elder Neil L Andersen, so I guess you could say that we are pretty lucky for being the last ones here. They told us that 4167 missionaries were watching the broadcast live in there respective MTCs and that it was the largest MTC broadcast to date. When the devotional ended they had to hold the all of the missionaries in the building because it was storming so bad and after like 15 minutes we all had to make a run for it back to the MTC (which like a 5 minute walk or so ) and we all got SOAKED!! I guess its just a little taste of the mission life in Brazil, I really didn't mind the rain except that it was the first day in like 2 weeks that I wasn't wearing my crocs, go figure... and all of my clothes are packed and I was planning on wearing the clothes I had on the trip tomorrow but they are now drenched... Ahh well hope they dry fast, It was worth it. I'm not sure what else to write so I guess I will just say I love you all. Please pray for people to be prepared for me to teach... I hope the first week back to school and such went well. 

Eu amo voces!

Sister Seagraves

PS. I can't remember if I have answered everyone's letters or not but lets just call it a clean slate and I will answer new letters starting now ;) hah love ya