Sister Layton In New York: I Love America

Hi Guys!

As the Fourth of July rolls around I am counting my blessings that I'm a STATESIDE MISSIONARY! Life is so pleasant here. Especially on Long Island! It's pretty cool to be a missionary in NY and meet people from a l l o v e r t h e w o r l d. I love hearing their stories. Often times when meeting foreigners I ask them why they came to America, and what it took for them to get here. For most, they worked, worked, and worked so they could finally come to America, and here they work even harder to STAY in America! What I think is absolutely CRAZY is the fact that families split, sometimes temporarily, sometimes forever to come to America! It is SO common for mothers to say "I have 5 kids, but three of them are still in my country. They haven't come over yet." Breaks my little heart!

America<3

So our week was swelllllll.

I got a little taste of my mom's life. She was always so motherly to drive me to doctors appointments and wait patiently with me, sometimes for hours for my doctors appointments! I drove to the city twice for Sister Hardman's appointments and both times the traffic was terrible hahaha. I just laughed. I'm over this NY traffic! It was super duper fun to wait in the sitting room for her appointments tho. She had 3 appointments which all lasted over an hour. So I decided to become pals with the elderly ladies in the waiting room. One lady spent about 30 minutes telling me why I should become a library scientist. No matter what I said she insisted I go into library science. Lol. Butttt then I managed to turn the conversation over to spiritual things, so we had a nice spiritual chat for about 45 minutes. Score. She actually met with missionaries when she was younger, so that's cool. Another elderly lady was vitally concerned about my future as well. I can't tell you how many times she told me to "get a degree, get a degree, get a degree, anddddd move away from Utah!" Lol.

I LOVE waiting room friends!

The good news from this week is..... We started teaching F! Did I tell you about her last week? Can't remember. We taught her Tuesday and she just accepted the restoration and committed to a baptismal date on the first lesson! Yessss. And it gets better.. J came with us! Miracles happen. It had been 8 weeks since she came with us :))) it's a BIG DEAL you guys. We went back yesterday and she's still excited, so keep her in your prayers... It seems like she might learn slow, so pray that she can understand the things we teach her!

The funniest thing happened after we saw F.. We went to look up someone named A. This A is an 89 year old lady... And she lives in this little, adorable, red shed. HAHA it was so funny, when we knocked on the door she was like "oh! Come in! I need help!" She was hilarious. I can't describe her, definitely unlike anyone I've ever met. We helped her put together a simple lamp fixture that she had been trying to put together since 2:00pm. It was 8:15pm lollllllll. She was just sobbing because it was "such a miracle that we came to help her with her lamp." Remind me to tell you what happened as I was praying with her when I get home. It won't sound as funny over email.

S is still doing good. Her date has been moved back a week... We felt like we were rushing her ha. We sidewalk chalked the plan of salvation with her for family night on Monday. No one else in the family showed up except her and her cousin hahah :( oh wellllll we do what we can! I'll send a pic of that.

OH remember the Haitian girl I said hello to last week? The one whose hat I complimented? Her name is L, and we visited her this week! Sister Hardman taught her. All I did was said "hello, how are you?" She doesn't know English :((( sigh. BUT it was the best lesson EVER. wanna know why? She brought her baby outside, and her baby was only 14 days old! So I had the pleasure of sitting there and staring at the baby :))) I will adopt a Haitian baby someday. I will.

Remember M? We skyped her on Saturday. I missed her so much! She's doing great in case you were wondering.

Our new mission president comes this week..... Which calls for a mission conference! YES! There is nothing better than being reunited with mission friends. On the 4th we have interviews with the new president aaaaand we got invited to two member BBQs. #cheeseburgers for days. It's gonna be a fabulous week, I can tell.

Okkkkaaayyyyyy I love you all!!!

Be good. Light sparklers. Drink diet coke. Eat watermelon. Read your scriptures.

Please Pray for me, Sister Hardman, F, T & B and co., St, S, aaaand our new President Reynolds and his wife. I can only imagine they will feel extremely overwhelmed this week. Thanks guys!

Xoxoxoxox

-Sister Layton IV

Pics:

1. Elder and Sister Bushmann. Oh my lands, I LOVE THEM. We go to their institute class every Saturday morning with J. In fact, since I've been in the area for so long they decided to give me institute credit hahaha. On Sunday during sacrament Bishop called me and J to the stand to get our institute certificates.