Toronto, eh?: First email of 2014....

Dear Family and Friends,

Happy Birthday to my sweet little Ashlyn! Well, I guess you aren't so little anymore. 12 years old!! Stop growing up...

Did everyone have a special New Years?! I sure did. On New Year's Eve, we read the Doctrine and Covenants for almost 9 hours. Then for 4 more hours on New Year's Day! I am happy to report that in 26 hours we finished all 4 Gospels, the D&C, and The Pearl of Great Price. So cool.

On New Year's Day, our mission president challenged each companionship to find a new investigator. Sister Woolf and I were very determined to find that day. However, none of our plans were working out. All of the people that we went to see either weren't home or weren't interested. Tracting was worthless because it was SO cold, no one wanted to open their doors. Finally, no one was outside. We felt like we needed to look at the former investigators that we had in our car. We found one by the same of Harpreet, who was pretty golden a few years back. We went to her home, got let right in, and we were able to teach her. It was incredible. She is the sweetest lady! Our sister training leaders wanted us to text in our miracle of the week, and they were going to forward it out to the rest of the sisters, so this is what we came up with -

"And it came to pass we were knocking on some doors and yielding little success, therefore we felt inspired to look at the records that had been kept by our ancestors. Insomuch that we found a Harpreet and as we went to her home, we found her prepared. Verily verily, we say unto you - she became a new investigator."

We thought it was pretty creative. :) Quite a miracle as well...

Also, another miracle.

We've been teaching Mary and Michael for awhile now. Michael is 11 and Mary is his mom. Mary was a former from several years ago. Well, last time we went over there, Michael had already read to Mosiah 26. He was practically begging his mom to take him back to our church. So they came again this week. Mary hasn't been too into it, until church yesterday. She stayed for RS and since then everything has changed. We called her last night and she told us that she is finally reading the Book of Mormon. So amazing!!!! A huge testimony to me that you do NOT give up on investigators. The Spirit changes people.

This week it reaches -20. With a windchill of -30 to -40. Can you believe that?? You all thought Utah was cold. NOPE. The worst still hasn't happened...A typical conversation between Sister Woolf and I -

Me - "Where am I??!"
Sister Woolf - "In Canada." As she is walking around with no hat or gloves. Then there is me with two layers of gloves, a huge hat, scarf, double socks, etc. It's pathetic actually!

George went to his cottage for the week, so we needed to move his baptismal date to January 19th, but he is doing well. He completely quit smoking!! We were able to see Jackie and Xavier Vieyra last night. They are doing well and have been taught everything. It is going to come down to getting permission for them to be baptized. Prayers...

Trevor has been coming to church for weeks now. :) We had a spaghetti dinner with him last week. It was so fun. :) He even comes to the family history center every week to do his family history work.

We went to Caledonia on Saturday. We were able to meet with a part-member family, the Clark's. They invited us to come for dinner, and it was so amazing. We taught them the plan of salvation and it was so powerful. I love sharing the experience of being sealed to Ashlyn and Brynn in the temple. We truly will be together forever, and when other people realize that - a new light comes into their lives.

All in all it was a very good week. I have never had so much fun on my mission than I have with Sister Woolf. We have snow fights and laugh 24/7. I've never been happier. I know that serving the children of God is the best thing that I could be doing right now.

Keep pondering about our family motto, only Mom and Jaclyn told me what they thought. :)

LOVE YOU ALL FOREVER!

Love,

Sister Hardcastle

"Have Faith, Have Hope, Live Like His Son, Help Others On Their Way"