WEEK 7- LAST OF THE FIRST

So yesterday I finished up the last day of my first transfer!  Talk about CRAZY!  I can't believe how fast time is going by.  It makes me a little sad.  I don't want my mission to go by this fast!  Although some days are longer and harder than others, these past six weeks have been so beyond incredible.  I am happy to report that my companion and I are staying in Orleans!  I would have been pretty sad if I got transferred out right as we are finally getting things rolling in this new area.  I am really looking forward to the next six weeks!  Here is the breakdown of this past week.  First off the weather has been fabulous!  So much cooler and less humid than weeks past.  Monday night we went on exchange again.  This time I got Sister Cowley for my companion.  We worked together all day Tuesday.  I just have to say right now that Tuesday was INCREDIBLE!  We had so many neat experiences. Haley, a girl from the branch came teaching with us all afternoon.  We taught one of our investigators Kenneth and the lesson went extremely well.  We had taught him once before and didn't know if he was grasping everything we were teaching.  This time around he completely opened up and seemed to understand much better.  The Spirit was really strong and Haley did an incredible job bearing her testimony.  It is always nice to have members be involved in missionary work.  Sadly our appointments with Danielle and Torre both fell through.  That night we had dinner with Haley's family; it was wonderful!  Her whole family is solid.  We played Restoration Jeopardy and it was such a neat experience.  Who would've thought that a game could bring the Spirit so powerfully?  When we got home we went to visit Ray, a less active that lives down the street.  He was outside on a walk so he just walked with us back to his porch where we do all our visits.  We watched Finding Faith in Christ and had a really great and spiritual discussion.  I was just blown away with all the great experiences we had in one short day.  Wednesday we had our last district meeting before transfer calls.  We had district eat out and went to a Chinese buffet....Dad it wasn't nearly as good as the one you took us to. ;)  We started up our Book of Mormon class.  Two of the Cubit's came which was really nice.  We were hoping so badly that Ray would come because he seemed so determined and set on being there, but sadly he didn't show.  Thursday just about everything was falling through.  We decided to head to Island Pond a little early because we had a dinner appointment with a member scheduled.  We thought we'd stop by and see Tammy.  She is the one we helped move in a few weeks ago.  Boy was she happy to see us.  She is so incredible!  I know without a doubt that we were supposed to stop by her house that night.  We ended up staying way longer than we expected but it was such a great visit.  She has been having quite the struggle in this new home so we're hoping that we can help her as much as we can.  She is super open to discussing religion and says she wants to come to church, so we are way excited.  We got to do some service on Saturday.  We helped Chris, a member of the branch, in her garden.  She gave us some zucchinis so I'm excited to fry em up! We then went to the Stevens and were able to have a great time there with their family.  I still can't believe how strong they are through all that they have been through these past few weeks.  We had to be in a little early Saturday night for transfer calls.  Talk about torture.  Luckily I'm staying right where I am!  The only person in our district being transferred is Sister Cowley. 
Sunday was pretty exciting!  Our new branch presidency was called.  President Pingree is our new branch president which is AWESOME!  He was the one that we had dinner with this past week.  I really feel that we can get missionary work rolling in the branch now.  I hope that this change can bring a little more stability to the branch.  Oh and probably the greatest news of all, our investigator Danielle came to church!!!!  Talk about Christmas in July!  It was the most exciting thing to see her there!  I can't wait to meet with her again this week.  I'm really looking forward to another great transfer in the Green Mountain State of Vermont!  Best wishes to all you fishes!  Here are some words of wisdom from my recent readings in the Book of Mormon.  1 Nephi 15:24-25   
24...whoso would hearken unto the word of God, and would hold fast unto it, they would never perish; neither could the temptations and the fiery darts of the adversary overpower them unto blindness, to lead them away to destruction.

25....give heed to the word of God and remember to keep his commandments in all things.

HOLD TO THE ROD!  I love you all and wish you the very very best! 

Sister Dixon

WEEK 5- OH HOW LOVELY WAS THE MORNING

 Quite the week in Vermont!  Monday was a sad day, Rosanna Stevens passed away.  She has been fighting cancer for the past 9 years.  My companion and I had the privilege of meeting her a few times before she passed away.  She is absolutely incredible, and she has raised 8 phenomenal children.  The entire family just blows my mind.  I have never seen a family that is so strong and positive during such times of trial.  Tuesday we had some good learning experiences.  We had two lessons with investigators and the lessons were a little scattered.  Looking back on it now, it was pretty funny, but in the moment I was just thinking "these people are never going to want to meet with us again!" ha ha ha basically because I felt like we were overloading them with information.  But thankfully the Holy Ghost compensates where we fall short.  So we get to try again this week!  Wednesday was great.  We got 2 new investigators!!!! Like within half an hour.  It was crazy.  So we were visiting one of the less active members on our road and the sons girlfriend was there and so we taught them a lesson and she wants to learn more.  After that we were walking to another less active members home down the street the other way and we saw a man sitting with his dog (everyone here has a dog) a little ways off, but we kept walking.  I knew we should turn around, because we need to talk to everyone!  So we turned around and went and talked to him, and BAM we have a new investigator.  We are meeting with him tonight! Thursday we had some good lessons.  One with another investigator, Betty.  She is an older woman and loves to read and learn.  Before we sisters were in the area, the elders were teaching her, so that was our first lesson with her.  We had a good dinner and lesson with Chris and Phil.  Chris is an active member in the church and is a Relief Society teacher, and Phil has been less active for some time.  We had a pretty good lesson with him, but he still gets a little worked up and uneasy when talking about religion, but I have faith!  So hopefully we'll see some changes happen in his life to get him back to church.......Drum roll please....FRIDAY!  We got to go to the Joseph Smith Memorial. 

The girls in the branch had a stake girls camp at Camp Joseph that is on the property where the JSM is in Sharon VT.  We rode down with President Chamberlain, Brother Stevens (Rosanna's husband), his daughter Julia, and one of the great girls we meet with weekly, Mariah.  It was so fun to see all the girls and to spend time with them at their camp.  When they had a little devotional before the testimony meeting, Mariah, my companion and I got to go over to the Memorial.  It was incredible.  Although it was past closing time one of the missionaries that lives there gave us a tour and everything!  It is absolutely beautiful and the spirit there is quite strong.  Such a neat experience, to say the least.  On Saturday we spent the day in the kitchen.  We made a lot of food for the funeral and did what we could to help.  

The funeral was incredible and there was a really good turnout. They had a true potluck dinner after the service that everyone was invited to.  No assignments were given or anything, but there ended up being plenty of food, and plenty of variety.  It was a lot of fun being able to work in the kitchen with the ladies in the branch!  Sunday after church we were able to help a lady move in.  She came from NY so the elders that had met with her there called us and told us she was coming.  She is pretty awesome and we look forward to meeting with her again!  This week is packed with tons of goodness and I am really looking forward to whats ahead I love you all!

Sister Dixon     

WEEK 4- 88 DEGREES

Interesting week in Vermont!  This week was not the typical week for us.  On Monday we headed down to a town called Lemoile.  Sister Deters had a training meeting on Tuesday in Manchester so I got to go on exchange with Sister Kotter who was one of my MTC companions!  It was so great to be back with her for the night and the next day.  Wednesday we had an appointment scheduled with our Girl Scout friend, and she wanted to meet us at the library.  So we sat there for a good half hour and then she called the library and said she felt bad for making us wait all the time, but that she didn't have time to meet with us.  So we're really hoping that we'll be able to get the chance to talk to her again.  Our other investigator wasn't home, so we were a little bummed!  But we had a great lesson with Sally who lives down the road from us.  She has had quite a few missionaries through the years, but we are the first Sisters, so I think we've got this in the bag.... ;)  She is great though and she has a very strong belief in God.  The fourth of July was HOT!  We spent a lot of the day at Bella and Sara's home helping them and doing service, and we got to watch the parade in Derby.  We stopped by the Stevens home later that night to see how they were doing.  They had all the family over and were singing and playing on their guitars so it was a lot of fun to be with them.  This family is absolutely incredible.  The mom has been fighting cancer for the last 9 years I think, and the past two weeks her condition deteriorated rapidly.  It has been really hard seeing her suffer and seeing how hard it is on her children.  I have never seen such a strong and loving family though.  On Friday we had a really neat experience with a less active member in the ward.  We stopped by their home and were able to have a really great discussion with him.  He has had a hard time feeling his purpose in life, but we bore strong testimony of how the gospel gives us purpose and how the Book of Mormon can help him overcome his challenges.  His wife (who is active in the church) was a great help in the lesson because she is very straight to the point with him.  We are having dinner with them this week and he is allowing us to teach him the lessons!  I am sure excited about that!  Saturday we went to Hanover for our meet and greet.  We got to meet the new mission president, President Stoker!  It was great!  He and his wife are incredible and I am very excited to have them leading this mission.  He basically said that we are getting rid of tracting, which is WONDERFUL!!!!  Knocking doors.....rarely successful.  We aren't getting rid of it completely, but he wants it to be an absolute last resort, which is great with me.  He is hoping with all the new technology advances in missionary work that we will be able to find people to teach much more effectively that way.  It will be exciting to see how missionary work changes!  We had a great lesson with Dale and Mariah and they came to church on Sunday so it was great.  They are so fun to be around and we love teaching them.  If they keep going the way they're going they will definitely make it to their goal of a temple sealing, which is AWESOME!  We've got a good week lined up here in the beautiful state of Vermont!  I hope all is well at home!  I love you all and I hope "You're all set" ...a common Vermont term....you'll be getting a lot of these, I'm catching on real well.    Oh um last thing!  I can't believe I forgot.  I"M GOING TO THE JOSEPH SMITH MEMORIAL!  So girls camp is this week and we got permission from the mission president to go for the last night, which is the testimony/devotional night.  Our Branch President is driving us down on Friday.  I AM SO EXCITED!  ...anywho that is what I have to look forward to this week!  oh I guess I forgot one other thing... ha ha ha the purpose behind the subject line.  So it's pretty humid out here and despite the rain it is still pretty hot.  We don't have AC in our apartment which is loads of fun.  My nifty alarm clock has a temperature thing on it and we were sitting and doing our nightly planning and we were both just sweating like crazy so I went and checked the clock and it said it was 88 degrees in our apartment!  WOHOO. 

I count my sweat as my showers and take Whitney's advice and just towel off ha ha ha...but seriously.  I think I'll buy a fan today :) 

I'm sharing the advice from the mission and encouraging you all to write down a miracle you see everyday!  I promise you it is great, and you see them a lot more frequently when you do!

I love you all!

Sister Dixon

WEEK 3- ON MY HONOR I WILL TRY...

This week has been great!  So many wonderful miracles!  We'll start at the beginning.  So Monday night we ended our Pday early so we could go and see the Dicksons.  They are from St. George, but come out to VT every summer.  They wanted us to come and have dinner with them at their 'camp' on Lake Willoughby.  Her sister was coming that day, so she really wanted us to come out and have dinner with them because she is inactive.  We could tell that her sister wasn't too thrilled that we were there, but she was really nice and made a delicious dinner.  We had a lesson planned out, but time ran out really quickly and we only had about ten minutes until we had to go to our next appointment.  So we quickly changed our lesson plans and Sister Deters did a quick object lesson.  We then each shared a scripture and the spirit was really working on 'Aunt Blythe' .  You could see in her eyes how the spirit was touching her heart.  The atmosphere completely changed.  It was pretty neat to experience.  We then headed to Bella and Sara's home. Bella is less-active and Sara (who is 13) was baptized a year and a half ago.  We didn't know, but they were planning on eating with us too, so they had pizza for us!  Hooray for two dinners!!!  We talked to them for quite a while and just got to know them.  They are both so incredible and I love being around them.  They have been through a lot and are just trying to stay strong.  Again, we had a great spiritual experience.  We shared different insights and scriptures and the spirit was definitely present. 

Our district meeting this week was on the First Vision.  I have really come to love the account of the first vision.  Nothing brings the spirit as quickly and powerfully as quoting it directly in the words of Joseph Smith.  So later that day we were going to one of our teaching appointments and she was outside pushing her daughter in her stroller.  We started talking to her outside because she said her house was way too hot.  We got on the subject of Joseph Smith and of course that is the perfect transition to the first vision.  But because Satan knows the power of that account, he was doing everything he could to distract from us getting to share it.  Right before I was going to share the account a man pulled up in a truck and asked if she had any pliers....random.  So then he got back in his truck and drove away.  We got back on track and the moment I started to share the first vision, the entire atmosphere changed...like completely!  It was incredible.  Everything outside was silent and it was as if time stood still while I spoke.  I felt so strongly that the Lord was working through me.  I bore testimony of Joseph Smith and that he did see God the Father and Jesus Christ, and man it felt so good!  After she said 'so I just need to read the book' (referring to the Book of Mormon) and we were so excited we were like YES!  Everything is in this book!  We are meeting with her again this week!

A super nice lady from the ward had us over for dinner.  She has been widowed for a few years and she is just incredible, and has quite the conversion story.  She went all out with setting the table....like Grand America status, but so much better!  We talked and visited for hours.  She is a little lonely so I think it was good for her to be able to talk for a while.

One more fun miracle for the week.  We had spent ALL DAY doing weekly planning again, in efforts to try and get this area figured out.  So it was about 745 and we had not even been able to leave the apartment all day so we decided to go around town, which isn't very big, and do some tracting.  We weren't having much success.  It was almost time for us to be back in our apartment so we were making our way back and there was a lady standing on the corner with her dog.  It was kind of odd that she was just standing there.  We started to walk across the street to where she was standing....this is usually when people run away, but she stood there and waited.  It was pretty funny, the first thing she said to us was 'So are you Girl Scouts?'(the reason behind my subject line...Whitney will understand)  We thought that was pretty funny, then she confused us with the Jehovah's Witnesses, who are in full force here.  We got her all straightened out.  She had SO MANY great questions and was really curious and interested in what we had to say.  We also are meeting with her again this week!

The new mission president has arrived!  We have a lot to look forward to with how much the work is hastening.  I LOVE THIS WORK!  It truly is the Lord's work and He is the reason for our success here. 

Much love,
Sister Dixon

WEEK 2- ZOMBIE WEEK

Welcome to.........VERMONT!  Ya it's pretty great out here.  I live in Orleans, which is a little tiny itty bitty town...there isn't even a WalMart.  We are right by the Canadian border.  We got to NH on Monday later in the evening.  One of my suitcases...along with twelve other missionaries didn't quite make the second flight so we had to wait a little bit to get it figured out for them to send them to the mission home.  We went to the mission home for dinner and some orientation things.  I don't really remember anything that was said because I was SO TIRED.  But President and Sister Wilkey are so great!  I was able to meet with Pres. Wilkey for an interview and it was such an incredible experience. 

Oh and kinda cool story from the second plane ride.  So the first flight all these missionaries were just going to work talking to the people around them about the gospel and I was thinking to myself 'man why can't I do that?'  So I decided to push myself to do it on the second flight.  Our second plane was a lot smaller than the first one.  There were only two per row and one isle way thing, and more than half the plane was missionaries.  But...my seat wasn't next to another missionary, it was next to a man named Thomas.  He had his headphones in when I sat down so I was just thinkin that I was out of luck.  I prayed that I would just be able to talk to him.  A minute or two later he took out his headphones, and BAM the rest is history.  We were able to talk for a good half hour.  It was pretty neat.  He is a great guy and loves his family, so it was really easy to talk to him about the gospel and he was really open to listening.  I even gave him a Book of Mormon!  Ya the Lord definitely works in mysterious ways.  Who knows if he'll ever read it, but at least he has it.  Back to NH ha ha so after our orientation most of the missionaries stayed at the mission home but me and another sister went and stayed with missionaries in the Bedford area.  The next day was the transfer meeting.  I was beyond nervous and anxious to find out who my companion would be and where I would be serving.  I was assigned to serve with Sister Deters.  She is from Malta Idaho and has been out a little over 7 months.   We are opening the area of Newport.  There haven't been sisters in this area for MANY years, so we are pretty excited about that!  This week has been pretty crazy with organizing and getting everything put together for the area.  We are still just trying to figure out who everyone is.  I do have to say that our branch is AMAZING!!! I love all the members so much already.  They are very humble people and are just wonderful.  The members and the Elders who are also serving in this area got an apartment situated and furnished for us in the upstairs of a cute old home.  We haven't been able to do a lot of teaching yet since we are organizing and mapping out where everyone is.  We were able to meet with a less active member who lives down the road from us, her name is Illene.  She is a sweet old lady, but just doesn't have the ability to get out much so we had a nice little lesson with her.  She loves the missionaries.  On Thursday we left the apartment around 5pm to head to Manchester for our new missionary training.  We picked up sisters in Lyndon and dropped them off at another sisters apartment and then we drove to manchester.  We got in around 1030pm so it was a lot of driving.  The next morning we went to the training and it was awesome!  I'm really going to miss the Wilkeys but I am super excited to meet the Stockers.  That night we drove back to VT and stopped at McDonalds.  We went inside and one of the employees was on break and sitting at a table eating.  She asked if we were missionaries, and she told us she joined the church a year ago and just moved here and was wondering where a church building was that she could go to.  We got her number so we could let her know the closest church building in her area.  It's pretty cool how the Lord puts people in your path.  On Saturday we had our weekly planning which took ALL DAY! Finally I suggested we take a break and go and visit someone.  We saw on the branch directory that there was a member in a nursing home so we went and visited with her for a little while.  She was happy to see us.  Sunday was WONDERFUL.  We had church at ten and me, my companion, and the new elder in this area were asked to bear our testimony in Sacrament meeting.  This branch absolutely loves the missionaries and are so excited to have sisters serving here now.  The missionary broadcast was so great.  I am so motivated and excited to be a missionary.  This is definitely the hardest work I have done even though it's only been a week.  The Lord is in this work and is preparing people to hear the gospel.  I can't wait to get going on teaching!  There are so many people that are ready to accept the gospel, we just have to find them, and the members are the best way to do it.  We have 3 dinners set up this week so that will be great, and 3 lessons planned for today!  I hope all of them go through!  Many people have referred to the first week out here as zombie week, so hopefully I will be able to understand a little better what in the world I am doing ha ha ha.  I am so happy where I am and I know that Heavenly Father is watching over us!  I love you all!

ALL MY LOVE
Sister Dixon