7.3.17 Happy 4th of July!

Hey everyone! Happy 4th of July! Our ward covers the Fort Belvoir military base as part of our sacrament meeting yesterday, we all stood and sang the National Anthem. It was powerful! What a blessing it is to live in such an amazing country. I am so grateful to get this opportunity to serve along side such amazing men and woman who have so bravely fought for our freedom. It's such an amazing place to serve. I am still learning a lot about the area and the people here but things are going pretty well. I think a favorite part is how we get to spend a lot of time with the other sisters. I love getting to see Sister Von Savoye. She is doing incredible! I am so proud of her. We went on a mini-exchange and had a lesson with Tony. I was so excited to see him. He has been working on getting to the temple and hints were kind of slowing down so I got to go visit him and see how I could help. Everything turned out really well and on Saturday we all went and celebrated his big day at the temple! The only time there was bad weather that day was when we were in the temple which was a huge blessing because it was the day of our car fast. Heavenly Father truly has a perfect timing with everything. If we would have gone to the temple any earlier, we would have been driving in a heavy rain storm. I also got to spend time this week with Hermana Abad. She is from Herman,Utah and she knows some of my friends. She is in the Spanish program so she taught me a couple of phrases. On exchanges, I am pretty sure I learn so much more from each of our amazing sisters then they learn from me. Hermana Abad is so great at listening to what people say. We were only companions for 24 hours but every time I didn't know what to say she would jump right in. She is incredible! Another sister I had the privilege of learning from is Sister Cottam. She is currently training a sister in a singles ward. As we began driving for our short exchange, the car started making a weird nose. We pulled into a neighborhood and immediately felt like maybe we weren't there to fix our car but to find someone ready for the gospel. Sure enough, as we pulled over, we saw this house and felt like we should talk to the people there. Now missionary work tends to be really awkward 99% of the time, so we were trying to figure our approach. Just as we were going to walk up to the door, a man walked out and asked us if we needed help with our car. We were able to talk with him and let him know that missionaries could talk with him more where he was moving. I think so many times I have to come to realize that just because someone might have been placed in our paths and is ready for at least a little portion of the gospel doesn't mean we will be the missionaries teaching them. We were able to plant the seed and let our little plant grow. In reality, none of these people are our investigators. They are the Lord's. He watches over them and knows exactly what they need. I am so grateful for these amazing learning experiences I have had this week. I know that this gospel is true and I am so grateful for it. I am so grateful for the temple. I know that it truly is the house of God where we can go to make further promises with Him. I hope you all have a great week! Love, Sister Goudy 1. Wash. D.C. Temple 2. JR. is in the front and Tony is next to me 3. Sister Cottam and I made a new friend 4. The amazing Hermana Abad

6-26-17 Sister Shelby Goudy's DC Mission

Sister Goudy did not get a letter out this week.  She is fine, just busy.  Mary Jean and Jeannette put together a picture show of Shelby's mission to the music, "Daughters of the Promise," .as performed by Nashville Tribute.  The link is listed below:

https://animoto.com/play/C73oBScuFQSxm46iY21gqg#

6.19.17 Small and Simple Things in Fort Belvoir

Well, Hey there everyone! 

I've got a good update for you on this new week, transfer, area and companion. Lots of new things happened this week. I am now serving in the Fort Belvoir ward. It's in Alexandria and Lorton Virginia right off the Potomac. There is such a great variety of cultures here in the area. My companion, Sister Millward told me people like to feed us food from all over the world here so get your maps ready.  This is Sister Millward’s last transfer. It's kind of cool actually, we have served in the same zone our entire missions and now we get to be companions. She is from Idaho and I hear she is an amazing dancer. She is the youngest in her family. I think the greatest thing I have learned from her, so far, is how great she is at literally making friends with everyone. I have to ask her sometimes if she already knows the people we are talking to because she seems like they are best buds. Ha-ha she is great. 

We are so excited to be sister training leaders together. We came up with a fun idea to kick off our Christ like attribute for this transfer, it's happiness and joy. One night after we got home we were joking around and one things snow balled into another and now we will be sending out a small and simple goal each day for the sisters. Last year President Huntsman would send out a small and simple video and would challenge us to do something that day to bring about our goal of 300 baptisms last year. I know it was by those small and simple things that brought about greatness then. It will definitely help each of the sisters and us have fun and bring about great things now. We are so excited! 

I love you all so much. I absolutely know that this gospel is true. I know that God is our loving Heavenly Father. He reaches out with open arms to each of us.  I hope you each will see His hand in your life this week! 

Love, Sister Shelby Goudy 

 

My first day in the new area and they already had a baptism!

Our small and simple kick off video

End of McLean Service pics only NEED TO ADD TEXT!

We Found this pass-a-long card in the grass!

6.5.17 Trunky Papers

Just Received My Trunky Papers

This is Jeannette Goudy- Sister Goudy Mom 

We got this note from her yesterday:

"I got this letter from the mission office. Guess what it is?

Yep! It is to confirm where I will be flying in and who will be
getting my agenda. So weird! They call them your trunkies."

She's officially home in three months- September 6th

She'll be speaking September 10th at 9am- mark your calendars, I know I will.

I'm so excited!!!!! 

Thanks for all your love and support throughout her mission. She wants to end on a good note, so words of encouragement are always welcome.

We're almost there!!!!

6.5.17 Exchanges With Spanish Suster Trainers

Hey everyone!

I hope you all had a great week. This week we got to go on exchanges with our sister Training leaders. It was a ton of fun because they are in the Spanish program so everyone we met for the most part could only communicate with one of us. At the beginning, Hermana Garcia and I made a bucket list of all the things we wanted to accomplish that day. One of them was to have me learn Spanish at dinner, another one was to make a U-turn to go back and talk with someone and another was to find 3 golden prepared souls. I'll attach the picture so you can see the rest of our list. I came to realize through this experience that anything in life is as fun as you make it. We could have looked at the day as knocking doors to just be rejected or having all of our plans get switched around but we decided to look at it as a challenge of how many fun things we could do. 

We started the day by doing our studies on the top level of their 25 floor apartment. When Herman Garcia started talking to and teaching, the lady that worked there, it was such a great way to start the day. A little later we went to have lunch where one of the members worked. As we were driving by I saw these two construction workers and I really felt we needed to talk with them. We flipped  a U-turn and rolled down our window and had a mini-lesson from the car. One of the workers said that the Book of Mormon was just what he need to talk with his friend about the connections in the Bible! It was such a miracle! They even said they would be willing to meet with the missionaries in their area. 

On our bucket list, was to teach our waiter so sure enough we started talking to him about the gospel. Turns out he had met the missionaries before. It was so fun, every time he would walk away, we would think about what we could say next to teach him in the short amount of time we had. He agreed to meet with them again on his day off. I think it helped us to have a purpose. We weren't there to just have lunch, we were there to see who the Lord had prepared for us. As we were about to leave we found out the manager had payed for our meal! 

One of the coolest things that happened though, came after dinner. I learned how to say I know God loves you in Spanish and I wanted to test it out. So Hermana Garcia went up to a family and said I was trying to learn Spanish and I wanted to practice. They absolutely loved it and I am confident they felt the spirit. They said they would love to have the sister come back and talk with them more. 

I think above all, what I really learned from this experience is that Heavenly Father sees our willingness. When we have a willing heart, and  he sees we will act on the joyful things that He places in our path. I love how President Monson puts it. He says," I want the Lord to know that Tom Monson is his man!" I want Heavenly Father to know that I will labor diligently no matter what. I know that as we do what the Lord needs us to do, he will bless us. I hope you all have a blessed week! 

Love, Sister Goudy