Greetings from Banning, California!!! Now let's talk Book of Mormon.......

Okay let's talk Book of Mormon.

You punks need to be reading that every day!!!!! So I'm starting my weekly email with a challenge- Read at least two verses every night before family prayer and discuss it! Reading the Book of Mormon everyday has seriously blessed me so much. I feel so much more at peace. And believe it or not it's actually way cool. Taylor- you need to read the Book of Mormon for 30 minutes every day. I never realized this (I'm so daft) but it's all about missionary work. Ammon is basically the coolest human that ever lived. But I seriously think reading it and reading it and reading it again will prepare you to be a great missionary.

Also, I would like to start a small segment called "I never thought I would (verb) on my mission." Guess what is in Cabazon, California. A dinosaur park. Guess what dinosaurs are in that park? The two giant ones from Peewee's big adventure that Peewee and ohhhh...what's her name... the girl that wants to go to Paris. And then her boyfriend tries to kill Peewee. Yup. So this week, I never thought I would see the dinosaurs from Peewee's Big Adventure on my mission.

We did some awesome service this week! So every Friday we volunteer at the Table of Plenty. We help prepare meals for homeless people. It's really awesome and the people that work there are really cool! We always have religious discussions with them. After that we go to the fire museum. I think I have sent a picture of it before. I need to get a picture with all the retired firemen that work there because they are awesome! It's all these old guys- Bob, Doug, all their names are like one syllable hahaha. Every other Saturday we go to the Wagon Museum. You should look it up, Dad. It's a historic site and it's way cool! Its called the Gilman Ranch and it's in Banning. They have a lot of field trips and we help prep for them. This week we made rag dolls. I'll send pictures! I sent you a post card today :)

We went with the Elders in our zone to make rag dolls at the wagon museum- yay for service!

We have been trying to get two of our investigators to church for three weeks. They still haven't gone. It's so frustrating because we know how prepared they are. Every time we meet with them, they pray the most sincere prayers I have ever heard. They know it's true. On Friday we took them on a tour of the church and talked about the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I talked to her about baptism. When I was explaining it, the spirit was so strong it was amazing! We didn't commit her to baptism though :( Satan is seriously working soooo hard against them. Please pray for them!

The miraculous investigator that appeared at District meeting is moving out of our mission it turns out. But it's okay because we passed her onto the Elder's that live in her area. Even though we don't get to teach her towards baptism, we still got to teach her a little bit. And I still think it's amazing that I prayed for a miracle and she just showed up to district meeting.

Our little nine year old investigator is doing good! She is so awesome. She definitely has a testimony of Jesus Christ. Even though she is 9 she still says things that amaze me. "From the mouth of babes"- am I right? We found out later in the week that her dad woke up extra early to go to Wal-Mart so he could buy a white shirt for church. How cute is that? They weren't able to make it to church this week because they got stuck at their grandmas. Pray for them too please!

Well the people here in Banning are awesome. In our mission, we don't tract, so we have to work really closely with the members. I absolutely love the Banning ward. They are taking such good care of me, Mom. There are so many members that are missionary minded- it's fantastic! We get a lot of referrals from members. We are super busy because our area is so big so there's that. But we are still trying to find more people to teach and struggling a little bit. We work A TON with less actives. If all of the less actives in our ward came to church, our ward would split twice.  Anyway, if you could pray that we can find some prepared souls to teach that would be awesome!

Thanks so much for all of your prayers. I can really feel them. I am honestly really happy right now. I'm still adjusting to missionary life. I'm trying hard and working hard. I miss regular life a lot sometimes. But somehow I'm still super happy. It's kind of weird.

Don't forget to read the Book of Mormon everyday! I'm serious about that and I will be following up!

Love, 

Ashlee

Some cool shots of Cabazon, aka the middle of nowhere.

This is the Banning Bench. It's soooo beautiful. Look how nice the houses are!

Sister Magleby decorated my desk for my montheversary.

The life of a missionary!!!