Six Superior Sisters!

Just when you think that a mission couldn't get much better you have 6 spectacular sisters over for dinner and discover even more about how wonderful this chosen generation is. They were SO much fun! And they had such a fun time together. They are all serving in the Baton Rouge Stake boundaries but not in the district where we live, so we don't get to invite them to dinner. But today was Stake Conference and they were all in town for our meetings, so they came over before heading home.

Can you guess where Sister Stennet is from? Yup! Hawaii--Kauai specifically. She lives in Lihue which is where the airport and dock for cruise ships just happens to be. Well now, that's convenient! She attended college somewhere in Hawaii before her mission and said she thought she wanted to go to BYU and get away from home when she's released (I think in the August exodus.) But now that she's served a mission and been away from home she's considering BYU Hawaii. She's ready to be back in Hawaii. And what a violinist she is. I'm trying to figure out how to get a short video of her playing her violine onto this blog but I can't seem to get from point A to point B.

Sister Hill and Sister Steele are our birthday girls. Sister H's bday is tomorrow and Sister S's was yesterday. We had candles on the cake but never found matches. Elder L tried to light a skewer on fire from the electric stove but it just resulted in a charred skewer.
Sister Baird (in the short sleeve white blouse) and Sister Steele (the birthday girl in blue) are companions in Prairieville. They're both from Arizona. Prior to Sister Steele's transfer 3 weeks ago, she'd been in Vidalia, which is near Natchez MS, for 9 months. She's from Utah and was a music therapy student before her mission. Now she's not sure if that's the path she wants to pursue, but she has several more months before she needs to worry about it. Also, she's extremely allergic to bananas to the point where she carries an epipen. It took her years to convince her mom that she really was allergic!

Sister Baird, as I've mentioned before, was a student at SUU but would like to go to BYU at some point in time. For now she'll continue being a great missionary and not worry about too far into the future. She doesn't go home until August 2016.

Sister Weidmann, our Temple Square sister from Switzerland, loves it here. She'd be completely happy to finish her mission here. As much as we'd love that it sadly won't happen. Her parents will be entering the MTC with President and Sister Hansen in about a week. Her dad will be the Mission President in Albania. She's trying to figure out how to visit them when she gets home, but before she's released as a missionary, because she wants to see them as a missionary. One of her questions today was, "Can your Stake President release you on Skype?" She and Sister Hill gave us an account of the little tornado that I mentioned previously. They were hilarious! Sister W was so excited and wanted to video it, and Sister Hill just wanted to get them somewhere safe--just in case.

Sister Lindstrom told about a time that her family was somewhere bridge jumping. I didn't know what that was, but I guess you just jump off the bridge into the water below.  Mom and Dad weren't sure it was safe so they told her to jump and see if it was safe for her younger sister, Brita. Well, the water was too shallow where she landed, and she felt her foot turn where it shouldn't have turned. So off to the ER they went. One of the doctor's first questions was, "Didn't your parents ever tell you not to jump off bridges?" Oops!

She also shared a thought provoking quote from Rene Daumal then tied it into scripture which led to a spiritual discussion with these sweet sisters that reinforced why they're "Saturday's Warriors." Here's the quote:

"You cannot stay on the summit forever; you have to come down again. So why bother in the first place? Just this: What is above knows what is below, but what is below does not know what is above. One climbs, one sees. One descends, one sees no longer, but one has seen. There is an art of conducting oneself in the lower regions by the memory of what one saw higher up. When one can no longer see, one can at least still know."