Subject: Families can be together forever :D  (letter dated August 25th)

What a crazy week. But so good. I have prayed harder this last week than I have my whole mission, and the Lord has really blessed me (and us) so much!  I have the best trainee in the world. I am positive that she came pre-trained, and that she is actually here to help me, not the other way around! Her name is Sister Peterson, she is from Holladay Utah and also went to a year of college at BYUI (represent!) before her mission! We have a lot in common, and get along really well, but we also have so different strengths and weaknesses, and it has been awesome to see those come out in these past few days! We are still working out a few kinks in our teaching methods, but we have a lot of appointments this week, so we are going to have the restoration down pat by the next time I email home!

We met the coolest family this week. We were walking to contact a referral, and there was a family moving in across the street. So we asked if we could help them! (On a side note, we ask to help people all of the time, and they almost never let us serve them! So I didn't really expect them to say yes when we offered our services!) AND THEY SAID YES. We helped them move for about an hour, and got to know them as we worked. And I have come to realize even more than before that

there is nothing better than physically serving someone to help boost your spirits, and theirs as well! And then it opens so many doors! We are doing a family home evening with them on Saturday, and I am so excited! They are so prepared, and really interested! And when we said a prayer with them, I felt the Spirit so strongly, and the grandma even started to cry! I am so excited to help this family come closer to Christ and each other, and to help them get to the temple someday!

:D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D This is the only way that I can describe how I feel right now :)

Love you all!

Sister Sara Matthews :)