February | 2018 | Sister Ashly Weight

Kia Ora Kia Ora Kia Ora!

Have you ever been so happy and so blessed and so amazed at all that you have been given, and you just don’t know how you got so lucky. Yeah, that’s pretty much me.

This is my last email from my beautiful New Zealand! This time next week I will be on a plane riding to the mission home, and then shortly after, I will be coming back home to the USA. I am having a hard time finding the words to articulate how grateful I am for the past 18 1/2 months I have gotten to spend here in Aotearoa. I have loved the people, my experiences, the food, the culture, the weather and most of all being a missionary. I am not the same person that I was when I left, but I am so grateful for all that I am becoming.

Enough with all the sappiness, This week was AMAZING! Tuesday was Waitangi day! (My new fave holiday…) We got welcomed onto a Marae, got to help our branch members make a hangi, I had to hongi a few people…..( Look it up….) and it was like FULL ON NEW ZEALAND CULTURE AWESOMENESS! I love this place. They had a huge Kai fest at founders park, and we got to walk around and talk to people and try all the yummy foods. (Perks of the badge, everyone knows missionaries and people kept buying us food, or just giving it to us for free <3)

Our Zone had a goal for this transfer to find 30 new investigators and we reached our goal this week! Sister Bishop and I definitely had a small dance party on the side of the road when we found out! YAY! We now raised our goal to 40 because we have another week left… I have faith that we can do it!

Our car was in the shop a few days this week so we were biking it all over those dang hills…. I think my legs are pretty buff now:) Hahahaha

I got a new companion this week! Sister Gibbons! I met her a few months ago when I was in Feilding! She is from Rugby, England. Sister Bishop is still here, we are just in a trio for the next week. It has been quite an adventure so far!

We got to go to a members house this morning and carve some blackstone necklaces! That was super fun! Black stone is pretty common here in Nelson, but it really only comes from Nelson for all of New Zealand so that was pretty cool!

That was probably way too much information, but I LOVE YOU ALL AND HOPEFULLY WILL SEE YOU SOON!

Kakite ano!

Spiritual thought: Romans 8:16-17 One of the coolest things that I have come to realise out here is that we are all sons and daughters of God. He loves us ALL. He knows us ALL. He is our loving Father in Heaven. We are joint heirs with Christ, and are capable of earning all the blessings that He can, if we choose to follow him. I love this gospel SO much.

I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY!

-Sister Weight

KIA ORA KIA ORA KIA ORA!!!!

This week was interesting!

We had a cool as service with a nonmember from Belgium! He owns an all organic vegetable farm, and we got to help him sort through buckets of Tomatoes and we also bottled some fermented cabbage! He said it is really good for you…. but we were too scared to try it because of the smell… hahaha I LOVE SERVICE!

It was quite hot this week! But we had a pretty horrible tropical storm that hit Nelson this week, so that cooled everything down a bit. (We are back to the heat today though.) Luckily we aren’t that close to the ocean, the houses nearest to the beach are completely destroyed. It was kinda scary, but I am grateful that we didn’t get hit too bad.

We have had SO many miracles this week with finding new people to teach! Taynz (one of the twins I found with Sister Pega) Is now progressing!!! I almost cried! She is finally praying, and reading, and you can see her heart melting! The Kiribati family is doing well! We also found a Tongan family this week and some other potentials! It has been amazing! Sister Bishop and I are ON FIRE! I love how much the spirit guides us. It’s the best feeling.

Spiritual thought: Moroni 7:37. This scripture teaches us that miracles come on condition of our faith! I am so grateful for the miracles that I see on a DAILY basis! I can promise you that if you are not seeing daily miracles, you are not looking hard enough! They are there, and the more you recognize them, the more Heavenly Father will bless you with them!

Have a good week! Thanks so much for being the shining miracles you all are to me! LOVE YOU HEAPS!

Kia Kaha, Kia Toa, Kia Manawanui.