He is Risen!!

Hello! I'll keep this one short. I would like to focus on the Atonement and how important it is. I have meet so many people on my mission who know that Jesus Christ was resurrected, meaning that he came back from the dead but with a perfect body. I know that the same will happen to us, and we will all recieve a perfect body just like Jesus Christ. 

Love you!!!
Sister Toomey

Baton Rouge Temple

Meet Fred

Mom's Note:  She sent this on 11 April 2017.

Hello Everyone! I hope that everyone is having a wonderful day! These past few weeks have been interesting, not quite Louisiana interesting, but missionary interesting. I learned how to do the "missionary stretch" or as I call it the "Elder Stretch." Basically you just stretch up your arms and do some funny stretches. Sister S, who informed us on this, said that we can eat a solid 3-5 more bites of food this way! I'm not sure if it's the most healthy thing to do, but it kind of works lol.

We got a Bible referral, but they went uncontacted for a few weeks because they were sent to the wrong sisters, so we went down there and tracted her street. But this was no ordinary street! It was full of wonderful people who were really willing to hear the gospel! One sister was just released from the hospital that day after a bad car accident, so we went back the next day and helped her wash her hair. I didn't know that it took so many products to straighten hair "naturally." It was funny because long story short, my companion bleached my hair blond. I was really worried at first because it was so different, but it is growing on me and completely changed the chemistry of my hair (for very good reasons). 

Last P-day, we went to Bass Pro Shop, and we meet Fred, a ginormous Alligator Snapping Turtle. We also ran into another set of missionaries investigator who invited us to his church. Then we also ran into another 2 members of the church who had meet when i was serving in Amite. One of them was celebrating her last day of work before she started her mission. 

Love you all!!! 

Sister Toomey


P.S HAPPY EASTER!!!!

Bass Pro Shop. I tried to give a pass a long card to a manican.

Baton Rouge at night. This guys has good friends who didn't let him drive home himself. I still don't know how I feel about it, but it's hilarious.

The Cantelope Approach

Mom's Note:  She sent this email out on 27 March 2017.

Hello Everyone! This week we have been working on just getting investigators. This area is so different from both of my previous areas, we have been switching it up a lot! We have been trying to find the less-active members of the church, but most of them haven’t been answering their door, so we have been tracting around their street. We meet this guy, who was Catholic, like most people in this area, and after we knew that he was about to turn us away, I offered to help him with his family history. He said that his wife had done a lot of work and he invited us inside and he showed us picture of his family and of the country where their ancestors were from (it turned out to be a cute and tiny island near the Dominican Republic). So Sister Nelson gave him our number, so that he could give it to his wife and we left. 

We gave a church and temple grounds tour to T, our one investigator. I feel so blessed to be right next to the temple! Even though he didn't go to church the next day, it was still a neat experience. 

Apparently Sister Nelson had tried to see this one less-active family before, but they kept rescheduling, and usually that means that they aren't that they aren't ready yet, so we went to their door, uninvited with a cantaloupe, and they welcomed us right in! They seemed to have strong factual testimonies of our prophet, but they wouldn't come to church. So we tried to help them out and told them that they needed to act on their faith in order to receive an answer about whether or not they should come back to church. Then they gave us a case of water, which was a huge blessing, because we were about to run out! Our goal this week, is to watch General Conference with them! I am really excited for General Conference this weekend!! I know GREAT things are going to be said and the Spirit will testify of the truth of it all!! I know that the Prophet, President Monson, or one of his Apostles will answer your questions that you have about LITERALLY ANYTHING. I am really excited!  

https://www.lds.org/general-conference?lang=eng

I love y'all and hope you have a blessed week! 

Sister Toomey

pictures!

Hello everyone! 

I hope that y'all had a great week! My week has consisted of lots of door knocking, but that will hopefully change with some time and dedication. One thing that is unique about this area, is that we live in the Mission President's house boundaries and people remember previous missionaries who have knocked on their door. But nevertheless, we have gotten a few return appointments! This morning the song Lemonade by Alex Boye, which I havn't heard in a long time popped into my head. There is a beauiful story by President George Albert Smith about how he used lemonade to stop people from swearing in his neighborhood. I originally found it a few days ago when I was reading an old book. 

https://www.lds.org/friend/1991/10/pitcher-of-lemonade?lang=eng

Anyways, I love all of you!

Sister Toomey

P.S.  My District threw a suprise birthday party for me! They got me a 1 because it was also my year mark! Afterwards we went and fed turtles bread down the bayou. At first, there was only a few but as we fed them, the turtles came swimming down until there was about 60 of them. 

Sister Nelson and I on St. Patrick's day getting Shamrock Shakes at McDonald's

We got Mufalda's from a member. It's delicious and is basically a HUGE Italian sandwich!

My Surprise Party!

PRAIRIEVILLE!!!!

This last week, I packed up everything I own and moved to Prairieville, Louisiana. Guys! I have a ward!!! You have to fight to get a seat in church!! It's the best problem ever! It's like going to a crowded stake conference! I didn't know that this existed in Louisiana! And our building shares a parking lot with the Baton Rouge Temple! It's beautiful! I didn't think that I would ever go to church right next to the temple! My new Companion, Sister Nelson, is from New Hampshire! She looks kind of like Lorde, the singer and is only 1 transfer ahead of me! I will hit my year mark this week, and I am considered on of the older missionaries, and i'm not even 20 yet lol!

We only have 1 investigator, and I know that it is going to grow! My companion has been sick most of this week, so I have read a lot of scriptures, especially Isaiah, which I have been working on for a few months now, but I haven't really gotten to much of it until now. I have also been reading more of the Doctrine and Covenants, which I haven't really studied until my mission. I suggest reading D & C 88-89 for some deep doctrine. Section 89 is for how to be healthy, not only food wise, but lifestyle wise. I bought a box of ruffle shape pasta with marinara sauce to eat for lunch and dinner and it has lasted alot longer than it should had. It kind of reminded me of the loaves and fishes story in Matthew. 

For if you want to watch a short video about it:

https://www.lds.org/media-library/video/2014-01-023-the-feeding-of-the-5000?category=bible-videos-the-life-of-jesus-christ&lang=eng

Anyways,  I love you! have a safe St. Patricks day! 

Sister Toomey

Mardi Gras!!

I hope that y'all have a happy Mardi Gras tomorrow! I have seen a lot of out of staters driving around! We went to a family-friendly parade last week and it was da bomb.com! We were drentched with rain and had beads chucked at our faces! It is something I would definetly love to do again! I knew it was going to be good as soon as I saw the BR Temple Matron and President show up! It's a small world in Louisiana as a member of the church and I am pretty sure that he knows every member and their family history :)

My Mission President and his wife came up to our branch to speak. I told him about a 8 person family who committed to be baptized but didn't have a way to church, so he volunteered to go pick them up. Because everyone was running late, I went on exchanges with him, while Sister Hyer went with Sister Hansen. When we got to their house, one of the girls answered the door and she said that everyone was asleep, so I offered to take them in their pajamas and she declined. So went to the church and people had apparently thought that I was transferred, so we set that straight. Then I found out that I am not teaching Gospel Principle anymore. For several months, I had been teaching it more like a discussion and it was weird not completely leading it anymore. A newly assigned Senior office Elder was assigned to our branch and is now teaching the class.

Afterwards, we went tracting in a nice neighborhood and meet a Jehovah Witness. She accepted our pass-a-long card and we made an appointment with her. Down the street, we meet another guy, also a JW, and about 10 minutes later, he came up to us in his car, and he gave us one of his JW pamphlets. Idk, but it was just really funny how he was trying to convert us. Also, it was intesting how some people here just don't want to believe that there could be a modern prophet here on the earth. But, it didn't. I know with all my heart, that there is a modern prophet here on the earth today, and his name is President Thomas S. Monson. He is as qualified a Moses, or Adam. He teaches the same Doctrine as Jesus Christ and that this Church was started by Jesus Christ himself.

I hope that yall have an awesome week! 
Sister Toomey 

My companion and I after a mardi gras parade

T's Birthday party with Sister Hyer and W!

I found a street named Kent's Acres and thought that it might be funny to get a picture of the sign!

Tornado!

This has been a very interesting week. Our mission president personally called us about 3 or 4 times to keep us updated on a tornado with a 4% chance of hitting Amite and he told us that we had a .5% chance of getting hit at our apartment. So we got to hang out in the center of our house, the bathroom for a few hours with bicycle helmets on. Its was great! After wards, Prez told us not to go to any tornado sites for safety reason until the next day. So, the next day of course, we got some information from a neighbor that one of the tornadoes hit in Loranger, so of course we went there with the idea of "service tracting." The 2nd house that we knocked on was a member of the church who had moved there a few years ago, but didn't know that there was a church new by. So this time, we got all of his information so that his records could be pulled from Oklahoma. That night we had missionary coordination and now he is the newest member of the branch! 

Also, we had our tire lights pop up less than a week after having them filled, so we called Elder Smith, and he told us that it was probably a nail in our tire. So 3 stores later (they offered us kits to do it ourselves, but I am not that confident with cars), we went to this tire place and the guy fixed it for free! There actually was a nail in one of the tires.  I love being a missionary! 

We have found a lot of success finding on fun/movie names streets! Hopefully these few families will come to church soon :) We found a large family on one of the movie street names and it ended up being the family of the guy who jump started our car a few weeks ago! So he saw us driving down, and he came on over! It was amazing! 

Anyways, it was crazy week! I love y'all!

P.S. HAPPY VALENTINES DAY!!! The following article is about LOVE! Real Christ-Like Love! Also, the picture with all the yellow helping hands shirts is in the Hammond building, where we go all the time for meetings. That picture means a lot Too-mey 

https://www.lds.org/blog/hisday-is-for-love?cid=HP_WE_8-2-2017_dOCS_fBLOG_xLIDyL2-2_

Sister Toomey