Welcome to the family Amelia!!! :)‏

Hi everyone!! I first and foremost want to congratulate Ash and Brian
on sweet Amelia Dawn!! She looks adorable and I cannot wait to meet
her :) she looks a ton like Lilly so I am really excited to see how
much they will look like each other. I hope you are feeling well Ash
and Amelia is doing well also!!! :)

We got transfer news this week that Sister Herpich and I are both
moving. I am going back to Oregon in Gresham and my new companion is a
sister I just love! This will be so much fun :) a ton of missionaries
I am close with are flying home tomorrow, it's crazy! And McKay is
flying in tomorrow morning. I am stoked to find out who his trainer is
:) and I will for sure see him on Wednesday. Cray cray :)

Here is a break down of my week :)

Monday: we ran all over the place during P-day, so that was fun. We
went out to dinner with our ward mission leader, his wife, and his
mother in law. It was so fun! We went to this nummy Italian restaurant
:) we taught Josh with an awesome member who we just adore! Josh is as
awesome as ever!

Tuesday: we had district meeting. I love my district! Actually, my
whole zone is way tight. We all get along so well and it is a blast!!
:) we met with a less active member and talked with her about family
history work. She is catching the bug. I am excited to do family
history work when I get home it seems so fun! :) especially because I
am endowed it makes me want to live up to my covenants more because I
want to go to the temple worthily for my ancestors. I want The Lord to
know he can depend on me to do the work for those who have passed on.
I can't wait to be searching and searching for a name, and finally
find them and help them along the path back to Heavenly Father. It's
the best hobby I can think of :) we taught our new friend who I just
adore! She introduced us to one of her friends and we all talked for a
long time. They both loved our discussion and want to meet with us
more :) sadly we are getting transferred :( we had dinner with an
amazing couple who have the coolest "how you met" story I have ever
heard! We walked around for a while contacting people and making
visits. We visited sweet Sister Johnson to wish her a happy birthday.
I sure do love her :)

Wednesday: this day was good, nothing super out of the ordinary though :)

Thursday: Sister Herpich made 15 bags of candy and wrote "sweet is the
peace the gospel brings" on them and we delivered them to members and
doorbell ditched them :) we helped clean one of our friends garages.
We had lunch with a member and a sweet woman we met on Easter Sunday.
We ate on this ladies patio and her yard is gorgeous!! It was so fun
:) the rest of the evening we had visits and meetings back to back so
it was a good day :)

Friday: I got a little sick that morning so we stayed in for an hour
or two then I felt pretty good :) we found out news about transfers
and we are both way sad because we love this ward a ton!! We do have
peace though so we know this is what The Lord needs to have happen at
this time. Again we had a bunch of visits and we were busy busy.

Saturday: I love Mama Hobbs!!! She took us to the temple!! :) oh my, I
absolutely love the temple! It was such an amazing morning! I will
never forget her :) we had appointments throughout the day and we had
dinner with another amazing couple! This ward is just chuck full of
amazing members :)

Sunday: Sister Herpich and I were both asked to bare our testimonies
during sacrament to bid our farewells. It was bitter sweet. I will
definitely come back and visit this ward, I love the members so, so
very much!! One of our friends decided he wants to be baptized! :) it
will either be this weekend or the next and we are very excited about
that! We spend some time with some amazing people and it was a
wonderful evening :)

The Lord has blessed me so very much on my mission! It is miraculous.
I am truly so grateful to him for these experiences and for the people
I have met. There is no other way I would have met all of these
wonderful people that have changed me than serving a mission. It has
been by far the best thing for my life :)

Love you alls!!

Sister Birch :)

Did You Know......

Hi family! :) I'll break down the week again:

Monday: it was my birthday. I am spoiled!! You all are so sweet to me
to send me gifts and packages and cards it is so kind! Thank you so
much :) the ward spoiled Sister Herpich and I. People were giving us
cards and texting us and spending time with us it was amazing!! We
went out to breakfast with a member and her cute kids. We did our
shopping and emailing then we went over to a members home to watch
"The Other Side of Heaven" and eat snacks and treats. Then we walked
around a little bit and tried contacting some people then some other
members gave us some fudge sickles to say happy birthday. It was an
awesome day and I am so grateful for everyone who made it that way! :)
I love y'all!

Tuesday: we had lunch with some members and we taught some lessons.
Our dinner cancelled because they were all sick so an AWESOME family had us come over 




















last minute. Their son came home from his mission about a year ago and
taught us this awesome way on how to work with members so we are way
excited to try it out :) our new investigator we met with read all of
1 Nephi and 5 chapters in 2 Nephi in a week! She said her prayers
changed and she is feeling so much joy and clarity in her life after
she started studying. She is truly a golden investigator. She already
believes in everything we share with her because she has believed it
for a long time but no one has discussed it with her. It's amazing!
Truly. We helped our bishops sons family move that night as well.
Bishops family is a wonderful group of saints! They are so kind and
hardworking and dedicated to the gospel I love spending time with them
:) it was really fun!

Ahhh!!! I am running out of time!!! K, I will tell you a few highlights k? :)

The new investigator who is golden told us on Thursday that she wants
to be baptized and she is already inviting people to her baptism and
she asked her friend to take the discussions with her and he said yes!
Miracle!! :)

We helped an amazing member of our ward wash her convertable. I will
send pictures :)

We cut through a members backyard and we didn't realize she doesn't
have a gate and she wasn't home so we jumped the gate. I hopped it in
a pencil skirt. That's legit. I'll add a picture too :) we did break a
chair of hers though.

We taught 33 lessons! That's a lot we are busy busy because this ward
is phenomenal! It's great :) the part I do not understand is that we
taught 33 lessons and still had time to do service. This week was way
fun! :)

I hope you all are doing great! Love you :)

IT'S MY BIRTHDAY :)!!!!!!!!!

Yahoo!!! Everyone ready to celebrate?! :D whoot whoot it's my
> birthday! 
> Oh my goodness this week has been an absolute blur because it has been
> so darn fun!! I will try to break it down :)
> 
> Monday: we had a mission birthday party because the Washington
> Vancouver Mission started July 1, 2013 so the whole mission celebrated
> together and had a BBQ. It was awesome and so fun to see everyone!
> 
> Tuesday: we had a ton of appointments with less active people. I love
> them all they are hilarious!! Haha at one ladies house I was laughing
> a ton! At another one we were talking about the word of wisdom and we
> got talking about eating meat. K, I haven't ever really enjoyed meat.
> A steak or cheap Chinese food every now and then is tasty but I never
> buy it on my own. That day I decided, "that's it! I am vegetarian." So
> I am :) yeah! The only time I eat meat now is if a member makes it for
> us. The only dairy I eat too is cheese and candy so I am practically
> vegan too. miracle story! K, so this lady
> talked to a member of the ward who moved 2 weeks ago right before she
> moved. The 2 ladies talked for over 3 hours about the church. The non
> member got really excited and referred herself online. We met her on
> Thusday night. She is awesome!! She is very very sick but she is
> really young so it's a sad deal but her attitude is stellar!
> 
> Wednesday: we taught some lessons and met some people. At night we
> nought 3 bouquets and 3 balloons and drove to 3 investigators homes
> who are having a hard time with sweet Mama Hobbs to drop them off. I
> sure do love that woman :)
> 
> Thursday: we drove with Sister Munden to St Helens to see sweet Jean
> get baptized! :) she is so sick we literally said an
opening prayer,
> she bore a brief testimony, she was baptized, confirmed her, closing
> prayer, and they took her back to the hospital. She is terribly ill,
> she can pass away any day. I am so grateful I was able to be apart of
> that experience with her. I love Jean! I will attach a picture :)

 for dinner we went to this awesome Thai restaurant and I ate my dinner out
> of a pineapple. Sick right? :) it was so good!

 Her email ended abruptly here, so I think she ran out of time. I know she got to go to lunch on Saturday with our neighbors Todd and Michelle who moved to Vancouver about 8 months ago. Sierra said they were so kind to her and Sister Herpich, and hope to see them again soon :)

Miracle Weekend!!! :)

It is amazing what happened this weekend!!
We helped out with a youth conference for all of the youth from the
Dalles, Vancouver and Longview so it was about 1400 kids 14-18. They
had a choir, orchestra and group of dancers. They were amazing! Anyone
could come and watch for free and they invited the missionaries
serving in the Vancouver stakes to come help out so we were there all
day Friday and Saturday. On Friday a woman from another stake asked
sister Herpich and I and our zone leaders to do a little Q&A session
with the youth in her ward. She asked us questions like how old we
are, how long we have been out, where we are from, etc. The last
question she asked us was what motivated us to come serve a mission. I
didn't sugar coat anything and was really blunt about how my life was
before and how I wasn't going to church and I spent all of my time
with a rougher crowd (right Hunter? Haha!) -( ok rougher crowd... I had to laugh , they weren't all that rough).
then we left and went about our business. On Saturday I had all of these Elders tell me a boy was
looking for me but I didn't find him. When we were leaving I heard an
elder yelling my name and running down the sidewalk with a guy named
Isaiah. Isaiah told me that when I shared my story he couldn't stop
thinking about it all day Friday and he couldn't sleep that night
either. He said he prayed for 4 hours straight and he knew he needed
to serve a mission. He never has wanted to but now he is! How exciting
is that?! :) the most amazing part of all of this is that the Lords
hand is clear in every step of this process. Me, who was not  very active prior to my mission, getting clear revelation I needed to serve. I graduate from SUU and get a job. Next I get more clear revelation that I need to serve. Then it was so quickly that I get my call and fly out to Washington. Then my mission is the hardest thing by
far I have ever done and I am oober close to coming home early when I
meet Isaiah. I have shared that story with easily dozens of people but
God does not do random. He used my story to touch Isaiah's heart in
the exact way he needed and now he is going to go change lives and
generations of people! The Lord is truly aware of all of us and knows
how to help us. We need to ensure we are aware of the tender mercies
he gives us to we can recognize his hand in our lives. This experience
is also exactly what I needed to show that I am needed as a
missionary. As I said earlier, I was very close to coming home because
I felt that I was making very little of an impact here and frankly I feel that any
one else could have been in my place and done better. Seeing that my
goofy story, that comes only from me, effected another person has
changed my heart and humbled me. I am SO grateful for the tender
mercies The Lord gives me, like meeting Isaiah. It is a miracle :)

This week was normal besides that weekend. Today we had the missions
first birthday party and that was oober fun!! :) I love my mission
friends! I know Sister Fitt, Johnson, Cluff, Thorson and I are going
to be tight for the eternities easily :)

I will try sending some pictures :)

Love ya'alls! :)

Love, Sister Birch