Haleyville Roller Coaster Ride‏

What a wonderful Christmas it was to talk to family! What a blessing to have Christmas on your mission. I realized this was the only Christmas I'll ever have on my mission. ... Thursday was a little rough getting into the routine of things, but by Friday we were feeling great! Friday evening the Elders texted us and asked if they could borrow the car Saturday to visit all the single males on the Branch roster who live in Double Springs and Bear Creek. Sister Downs joked, "Watch. Tomorrow will be the coldest rainiest day in Haleyville." ... Jokes on us. It was! Saturday was such a fun day though! We tracted all day in the rain, up hill, both ways ;) until evening. Not much luck, but we did get to see Kelly, who's Paul's best friend. Kelly's dad died on Thanksgiving day this year. We finally found where he lives (by his southern directions) We met Kelly through Paul who hasn't been to church in a while, but Kelly is interested in the Book of Mormon. We talked about the Atonement and what that meant and shared the scripture about when Christ cried out, "Abba" meaning daddy. He really likes inspirational books and learning more about the Savior. He's in his late 20's and his son Peyton who is 6 is just the cutest thing. He kept showing us all his toys he got for Christmas. Other than seeing Kelly, we didn't get any return appointments, but we did talk to a baptist man who called Joseph Smith a quack and then tell us to take no offense to it ... It's like saying, bless your heart but I hate you. So that's when you take Sister Pates advice, to shake it off and read some scriptures. So we kept skipping and dancing along in the rain with frozen toes. By dinner time the Elders brought back the car, and we went out to see Angie and Oscar. We ended up teaching them all of the Commandments in ONE VISIT! We went through the baptismal interview questions, and committed Oscar to prepare to be baptized on January 11th. Then we went back Saturday to make sure they were coming to church, etc. ... Sunday morning we call them and they say they are coming. It's 9:00. They haven't showed up. It's now 9:30 ... they didn't show up. We have dubbed Sundays to be a roller coaster of emotions no matter what. Then later that day because we are oh so smart, we drive to Tonya's (she lived up past a dirt road). ... not thinking, it RAINED ALL DAY SATURDAY. So naturally we get the car stuck in the mud. Being prideful we wanted to try and get ourselves unstuck by shoveling the mud and pushing the car. Well we aint' pioneers, because the car was going nowhere. So we go to her neighbors to ask for help, and he says, "Y'all got stuck again?" We had gotten stuck at her house a few weeks ago. So we were actually happy we got stuck because it left us some comic relief after the Sunday morning we had had. And I'm pretty sure we went through a cycle of EVERY EMOTION this week since Christmas day. But always all in all, it was a great 'nother week in the life of a missionary! Oh the joys of being a Sister Missionary on a Haleyville Roller Coaster Ride!

Love y'all!

Sister Reyne