COVINGTON

Hi Everyone!

 

Greetings from Covington! Never heard of it? Neither had I! It's a small town an hour west of Atlanta. But Covington is where they film the TV show Vampire Diaries, and if you know what the Mystic Grill is, then I've driven past it like 5 times already AND met the owner tracting! But I get star struck easily, so that's why I mention that first.

 

My new companion is Sister Reading, and like Sister Tavenner, she is also from Idaho Falls. They just like sticking the Idaho girls together so that we work super duper hard. Idaho Dream Team! The ward is really sweet, and we live in a member's basement in the middle of the country. Our ward building is only for our ward and the chapel only has 6 rows of pews! It's a very small building!

 

I know I normally do a very spiritual, miracle filled email, but this one is going to be just goofy. I figured since I have a change of scenery that I'd shake things up a bit.

 

Well, on my first day in Covington, we loaded up all my bags and went straight to a service activity. We were helping a Catholic lady plant her garden. My job was to start digging a small drainage trench. My feet started to hurt, but I just thought I was getting blisters so I kept going. Next thing I know Phyllis is yelling at me, patting my legs down, and telling me to leave the garden and stomp out my feet. Yep, I had stepped in a fire ant hill. Luckily I only got about 3 bites on one foot and they don't itch too bad. It could have been a lot worse. What a warm welcome to Covington!

 

Then, a little later, a member picked us up at the church for our dinner appointment. Our ward boundaries are about an hour drive from one end to the other, so she drove us for about 30 minutes to her house. Her 18-month-old daughter was in the backseat with me, and she doesn't like strangers. So she screamed and cried giant crocodile tears yelling MOMMY the whole way home, so loud that we couldn't even talk to each other. It was pretty awkward. You would have thought I was torturing her with the way she was screaming! But it's all good. Once again, welcome to Covington.

 

But then, a few days later we were driving and I said "Sister Reading! There's a TRAILER PARK! Please tell me you have knocked in there!" Sis R: "Uhhhhhh nope." "WHAT? We have to knock there! Like tomorrow!" So we did, we knocked 5 houses and found 2 new investigators. Awesome awesome. :) One thing Sharpsburg taught me was the awesomeness of trailer parks. Glad I could bring that to Covington.

 

But today we got to go strawberry picking! We picked a grocery bag half full of huge, fresh strawberries which was so fun. Lots of fun pictures. I'm excited for the smoothies I'll be making with them! And then today we are building a chicken coop! I get to show off my saw and drill skillz from DeWALT days, and then we are going to paint it blue and purple! So fun!

 

Really, this ward is really great so far. I still really miss Sharpsburg, but I'm excited to make new friends here. The people are so loving and we are getting fed every night this MONTH. And there are some great Southern accents out here, so I can start working on mine. :)

 

Hopefully, next week we'll get back to some crazy miracle stories. But thanks for humoring me. It was awesome getting to talk to Mom & Dad yesterday. There's just nothing like Moms. But my surrogate, Southern mamas sure are wonderful. :)

 

Love y'all! Have a great week!

 

Sister Laser