Fwd: Stop eating animals, Obama!

From: Hannah Fouts
Date: Mon, Nov 30, 2015 at 5:44 PM
Subject: Re: Stop eating animals, Obama!

Well this week was swell!
My new companion, Sister Landaverry, is just my all time favorite.
She's an Aggie too, and we discovered we actually were at lots of the
same places in Logan, and so chances of us having seen each other
before are about 200%. It's really fun!

Highlights of the week:
Thanksgiving! Turkey bowl! I got two touchdowns and tripped lots so
people thought I was being good and two hand touching people but I was
actually just clumsy. Go team!

We ate 3 Thanksgiving dinners, 2 American and 1 Haitian. The Haitian
food was delicious, but when the chicken legs and head came out my
heart dropped. Fortunately I didn't have to eat those, but there were
in fact lots of bones from various parts of animal skeletons in my
mouth at multiple points during that meal. The American food was also
delicious, and it was a relief to have boneless mashed potatoes!
Also there was a Thanksgiving dinner on Wednesday night. I've never
eaten so much in my whole life and I think I gained all the weight.
Woot woot!

Some miracles of the week: G has officially claimed this religion
as hers. She still hasn't been baptized, or accepted a date, but
hopefully we'll change that soon.
D, the one with the cell phone, finally came to church! I almost
cried tears of joy when that happened.
M.G. said that she isn't ready for the Savior to come again, and
she knows she needs to come to church and be baptized in order to
prepare for Him. But she still doesn't want to come for some reason.
We'll figure it out eventually, but definitely keep her in your
prayers.

The subject line is from the most creative stop sign graffiti I've seen so far.
The squirrels are getting scarier because they're getting fat for the
winter. I think they might eat small children in order to fatten up.

The spiritual thought of the week is CHRISTMAS!!!! Christmas is coming
and I'm so excited!!! Long story short, remember the true meaning of
the season and look for happiness in Christ, not in the latest gadget
or whatever else you crazy kids buy these days.

I love you all so much! Have the best week and keep on keeping on.
Sorry that was lame.
Love you!
Sister Hannah Fouts

THIS IS SISTER LANDAVERRY AND SHE IS MY FAVORITE

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Fwd: Wake up, eat, sleep, repeat.

From: Hannah Fouts
Date: Mon, Nov 23, 2015 at 4:38 PM
Subject: Wake up, eat, sleep, repeat.

That subject line pretty much sums up my week.
Nah, I did more than that, but there was a heck of a lot of sleeping.
A few interesting things:
We looked up a potential investigator that turned out to be a
different family in the elders pool of investigators. They are crazy.
They've been investigating for over 14 years and once painted their
elders nails and did their make up. It was the first time they let
"female Mormons" in the house, and it was actually really funny. They
gave us a cactus fruit and nicknames before we left, and now I'm
having an identity crisis because I don't know if I'm Merida like the
primary kids call me or if I'm Anna like the crazy family calls me.
It's a rough life being a Disney princess look alike.

We invited another potential to culture night, AND SHE CAME. THEN SHE
CAME TO CHURCH THE NEXT DAY. And she wanted a Book of Mormon in French
and she s going to call us or we can come visit her and teach her and
she is Haitian and it is literally my best day.

G and P update: they are my favorite people ever, we are
going there for Thanksgiving, and Patricia knows she wants to be
baptized. G's still a little worried about it, but she thinks after
the holidays she'll be ready. I'm not too worried about it, because
they are so ready!! They want to do it together, so P's going
to wait for G. They're keeping the word of wisdom and coming to
church and doing all the things!!! Except daily scripture study. Which
is key. So we're going to work on that and hopefully that will help
G.

culture night!! I am officially not picky anymore. Nobody can say that
about me ever again. I ate lots of things that I'm not even sure what
they are. A picture will follow. Also I ate jerk chicken which
literally burned my mouth off. And soup tèt cabrit (goat head soup)
which is actually super duper delicious. I was lucky and didn't get
any bones in my bowl. Also goat meat isn't bad.

Transfer calls came! Sister Wheeler is leaving, I am staying....and
TRAINING. AH SO EXCITING!!!! My new companion is a Creole sister as
well, so the count is back to 3 tomorrow!!

The thought of the day is salvation cake. We see this beautiful
delicious cake of salvation, and we want the recipe. We want to be
able to achieve that. We're given the recipe and told if we follow it,
we'll get the same result. Well we get a little sloppy with the flour
and we don't actually have 3 eggs so we'll just use 2 and oh awkward
we let Sister Fouts* put in the vanilla, which is bad because I always
poor in too much on accident, and we're trying to accommodate my dairy
free dad* so we use margarine and coconut milk instead of the cow
kind, and Hailey* really likes sugar so we add a little extra of that,
and then when the cake comes out its not the same and we're bummed and
a little annoyed. That recipe was guaranteed! What happened? Um we
didn't actually follow the recipe. When we don't follow the
commandments and the council of the prophets, we won't get the
promised results. When we don't heed their warnings, and pay attention
to the little stuff that doesn't seem too important, our salvation
cake won't turn out the way we want. D&C 82:10 says, "I, the Lord, am
bound when ye do what I say; but when he do not what I say, ye have no
promise." And that is that. Amen.

Haha I love you all so much! I'm not dying, and it's in the Lords
hands when I'm good enough to work all day without sleeping. I hope
you have literally the happiest of happy thanksgivings, and that you
eat all the feasts!!

Love
Sister Fouts

*this is a fictional story created to illustrate a gospel principle.
Any reference or similarities to actual persons living or deceased is
purely coincidental.

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Fwd: Wake up, eat, sleep, repeat.

From: Hannah Fouts
Date: Mon, Nov 23, 2015 at 4:42 PM
Subject: Re: Wake up, eat, sleep, repeat.


Sometimes after culture night you eat passion fruit. It's actually
really sour and slurpy and pretty fun to eat.

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Fwd: MIRACLES LITERALLY EVERYWHERE

From: Hannah Fouts
Date: Mon, Nov 16, 2015 at 5:25 PM
Subject: MIRACLES LITERALLY EVERYWHERE

Hello people who I love!

This week was one for the books. Is that an expression? What air. 

[Note: pronounced: "whate'er". It's in the same family of words as "' 'Murica!"]

I drove in Queens, no big deal. And got lost and did u turns and other
fancy maneuvers to avoid death on the crazy New York roads. A yellow
taxi even cut me off and there was much yelling.
We sent our car in for repairs and so we walked all over the place and
it was ridiculous. But we looked up a former investigator because why
not? She let us in and we were able to answer lots of her questions!!
She used to come to church with her older sister who's at BYU and was
baptized 2 years ago. So fun!

We talked to C, who's from Haiti. We'd talked to him once before
and taught him the restoration, but I guess we didn't know he was
Haitian until this time because he was so shocked we spoke Creole he
told us he couldn't not come to church now. Benefits of being a white
girl speaking Creole. What what!

We got our car back on Thursday and got to go to Flushing, the Asian
part of Queens. Funnily enough the autobody shop was called
"Hallelujah Praise the Lord Autobody." It was the only sign in English
in town and so funny!!

Friday night was the biggest miracle. I had a weird thing happen to my
body/brain and couldn't control or feel my body for about an hour. Can
I just say scariest thing to happen ever? My awesome companions got me
to the emergency room and kept me awake, and Heavenly Father literally
gave us so many blessings it's ridiculous. I got a CT scan which was
cool. My results say my whole brain is unremarkable, which would be
offensive under different circumstances, but is a huge miracle. The
only thing keeping me calm was my Father in Heaven. I was able to feel
peace in the worst of it. I knew I'd be okay, and I could feel the
spirit so strongly. By the time we got to the hospital (yes, it took
an hour. New York is ridiculous.) I was able to walk and talk and
smile, and one of the nurses ended up talking to us about religion and
is going to try to come to church soon. The Elders gave me a
priesthood blessing, and I'm just so thankful for that!! It's
seriously the coolest that the priesthood has been restored! I love it
so much!! Someday when I have more time I'll go into more detail with
this story, because literally every detail had God's hand in it. The
power of prayer is so real, my friends.

Saturday and Sunday I played sleeping lions and just napped lots. We
had one really awesome lesson with a lady on Saturday night and she
was so impressed that we were so sure with our answers to her
questions. She said she wanted that conviction for her and her family,
and that when she knows this is what God wants for her she'll be
baptized.

I know that Heavenly Father has a plan for each of us, and it's so
full of happiness and peace we can't even comprehend it. I'm so
thankful to be here and I'm so thankful that I don't know everything
God does. If we could see the end from the beginning, there would be
no adventure! Not to mention no faith, and faith is just so good.

Also Sister Wheeler is getting her hairs cut for reals this time so
that's really exciting!
Have the best week. Count all your blessings and jump in crunchy leaf piles.

Avek tout lanmou m,
Sè Hannah Fouts

[Note: Hannah was diagnosed with a "Complex Migraine". We are working closely

with the Mission nurse to make sure she is taken care of. She's fine, it's just really inconvenient.]

ᐧ

Fwd: The beach, gyros, and probs other stuff

From: Hannah Fouts
Date: Tue, Nov 10, 2015 at 2:48 PM
Subject: The beach, gyros, and probs other stuff

Good day, my people!!
First order of business: Happy Birthday, Hailey Grace! I love you! 13
is so old!! WOW!

I'm emailing on Tuesday because Sister Wheeler is going to the temple
today and so our preparation day got changed. I know you all thought I
died, but you can rest easy.

This week was full of miracles and it's just so fun!
We visited S, my favorite. She's 72 and Haitian and we met her
because we helped her push her grocery cart home. I think I've told
you about her. But we weren't sure how much she was understanding,
whether that's because we don't speak great Creole or because she's
older. We prayed to know if we should keep meeting with her, and asked
for guidance to know if she was getting any of it. Well we got our
answer! We asked if she'd prayed about baptism, and she started
talking about how hard it would be for her to change religions. She
told us all her fears, and finished by saying "Se difisil pou mwen,
men Se pa difisil pou Bondye." For those of you without google
translate, that's "it would be hard for me, but it's not hard for
God." Then she told us if God tells her, she'll change, but she needs
an answer first. Um yes I think she understands why we visit her. It
was an incredible answer to our prayers!! Also the last time we
visited she was really sick. We prayed with her and left, and she said
as soon as we left she felt better. WOAH. MIRACLE. SO COOL. And it was
her birthday, so she taught us how to sing happy birthday in Creole
and the three of us sang happy birthday together. It was probably the
happiest I've been ever.

Then. Came. The. Best. Day. Ever!!!! We got to service....ON THE
BEACH. We were planting grass because I guess that helps when
hurricanes happen. So we got to spend a few hours on the beach and it
was beautiful and made my soul so happy.

Sunday was great! G and P came, and brought their
cousin/niece. I just love them so much! I'm so thankful Heavenly
Father is letting us help them! They're still rocking it with the word
of wisdom, and G told us if we ever needed a place to stay or food
or anything, to come to her. She wants to be our mom away from mom and
it's the cutest.

On to the spiritual thought(s)!!!
We visited a less active member who stopped coming to church because
of questions she had. We walked in and she was very upset about a
statement the Prophet made, and I hadn't heard anything about it until
she told us. At first I was shaken and had to let my companion talk
while I went back to what I know to be true. After a minute I was able
to join my companion in testifying of President Thomas S Monson,
Joseph Smith, and, most importantly, our Savior Jesus Christ and our
Heavenly Father. The church will not stray from the commandments of
God. The gap between what is socially acceptable and what is right is
getting bigger and bigger. Don't ever leave your testimony because of
what the world is doing. There will be times you have nothing else to
turn to, and those times will be hard. But when you have an
understanding and a testimony of the basic truths of Christ's gospel,
you will be okay. Things will work out. Life will go on, and you will
be safe.

That leads me into my next schpeel. When you see the grass we planted
on the beach, you'll be like, what the heck will that do in a
hurricane?! It's thin and doesn't have lots of roots. But when planted
in straight rows, an even distance away, it gives the sand a lot of
strength. When the wind comes, when the waves hit the sand, the grass,
planted deeply and often, will fortify the beach and help to slow the
floods. When we do the basics - reading our scriptures, praying,
showing love to each other, going to church and partaking of the
sacrament - on a daily and weekly basis, we will have the strength we
need in the hurricane.
Yes, that was tacky. No, I'm not apologizing.

Have a spectacular week, everyone!! I love you all!

Love
Sè Hannah Fouts

ᐧ

Fwd: The beach, gyros, and probs other stuff

From: Hannah Fouts
Date: Tue, Nov 10, 2015 at 2:53 PM
Subject: Re: The beach, gyros, and probs other stuff


Plantin grass, savin beaches. Also shark shirt because ocean. And
that's not a pogo stick, that's a poker for the sand. You put the
grass in the hole made by the poker and done! Beach saved!

We made cool Haitian shirts.

This is my companion for the day! Sister Bujingo! This was taken moments before we got gyros from the most delicious halal food truck evah.

ᐧ

Fwd: Peace and love

From: Hannah Fouts
Date: Mon, Nov 2, 2015 at 6:00 PM
Subject: Re: Peace and love

Hey friends and family...jokes on you! Or me. Or someone. But I didn't
actually cut my hair. Here is a more accurate picture of our hair
length, just normal. Sorry not sorry. Wow we think we are so funny!!
But thanks for the support if I did cut it. You all rock.

ᐧ

Fwd: Peace and love

From: Hannah Fouts
Date: Mon, Nov 2, 2015 at 1:06 PM
Subject: Peace and love

Hello friends and family! Loved ones! How is life? That is so good!
This week was seriously so much fun. All the fun!

One day we were looking up some investigators we hadn't seen in a
while and found J-B V. He was way excited to talk with
us, and wants us to teach his son S about God. S wasn't too
excited to talk about God, because he's 7 years old and the word his
dad uses to describe him most is "dezod." I haven't checked the
dictionary yet, but from meeting S it basically means running
around nonstop and making lots of messes. But he's cool and we finally
got to teach him a little bit!

We also talked with the mom of a less active member who apparently
moved a while ago. Her name is C and she loves reggae gospel
music and she got so excited talking to us that she ran at me  and
hugged me. (I thought I was going to die even though she's about a
foot shorter than me. It was a like a Hailey hug at full speed.) As we
were leaving she gave us the peace sign and yelled "peace and love!"
Thanks, C! Peace and love to you too!

We knocked a door and the lady who answered was Haitian. At first she
wasn't interested and had no time to talk. We started talking to her
in Creole and she started answering before she realized we'd just
spoken her native language. She had the cutest reaction I've ever
seen! She gasped and all of a sudden had 5 minutes to hear about the
restoration of the gospel! She told us we speak better creole than
her. I highly doubt that, but it's a better reaction than those people
that we heard bust up laughing at our Creole as we were walking away.
Over it!

We met with A again, and she's changed her mind about baptism.
Noooooo!!!! But we talked it out and she decided to keep learning more
and she'd keep thinking about baptism, but the date is off for now. It
was a miracle that she didn't shut us out completely, and I'm so
thankful for that!

Okay now for the best part of the week: TRUNK OR TREAT. Seriously so
fun! We were in charge of a room and decorated it with the only thing
we had lots of...really cheap toilet paper!! Woot woot! Sister Wheeler
even made a fake mummy and it was legit. "But Sister Fouts, that's a
lot of toilet paper gone to waste!" Never fear. We are reusing it. Go
team! Also Jan-Batis and Samuel came so it was so good!!

Fun New York thing: I've learned what's truly important - Dominican
hair salons and collision car repair places. I know they're the most
important because there is at least one of both on almost every block.
Also sleepy's mattresses. Lots of those.

Miracles: our mission is counting baptismal invitations on the first
or second lesson as a key indicator, or the numbers that go on our
weekly reports. So we invited this lady to baptism on the second
lesson and SHE SAID YES. I actually didn't hear her, so I didn't
extend a date just in case she'd said no, but I thought she said yes
so I just testified anyways. Afterwards sister wheeler confirmed that
she'd said yes so that's an awkward encounter avoided. Whew.

Also haircuts. Picture to follow.

Also we had to be in at 6 on Halloween and a member gave us an already
gutted pumpkin so you know I carved that thang! Also we ate candy and
donuts and lots of soup and played games. SO FUN.

Creole mistakes: we accidentally asked J-B if his husband (we
meant to say wife. Awkward.) was going to be home because we couldn't
meet with him unless there was another woman in the house. He was
pretty confused. Also I answered in the affirmative when he asked if
we were Jehovah's Witnesses because I didn't actually understand him
and I just usually say yeah and smile and nod if I don't understand.
Fortunately Sister Wheeler saved me on that one.

Spiritual thought: Luke 7:36-50. Wow this is such a good story! I love
it sooooo much! Especially verse 42. Basically we are ALL indebted to
the Lord. We all owe something, even the most righteous of us. Even if
we owe 1 pence, that is still 1 pence short of the glory of God and we
cannot enter His presence. The sad part about that is not all of us
are the same amount of grateful when that debt is forgiven. For some
reason, the more we are forgiven the more we love Christ. That sounds
good, but when we're forgiven for something little we tend to forget
it faster. HELLO. It doesn't matter how big or little it is, when we
sin we cannot live with God again. But when we turn to Christ, He will
"frankly forgive" us. Sorry this is jumbled, but essentially always
repent and always ALWAYS recognize and be grateful for the forgiveness
and blessings you will receive as a result of that repentance. Also,
let others repent. We don't know their debt, or their heart. Don't
hold grudges and just love everyone! Obviously I'm not perfect at any
of these things and don't expect you to be either. But we can all try
a little harder to be more grateful for the Atoning sacrifice our Lord
and Savior Jesus Christ made for us.

I love you all so much! Thanks for all your love and support! You rock
my socks! Let me know if there's anything I can do to help. I have
some pretty cute notecards if you want one of those.

Avek tout lanmou m,
Sè Fouts

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