Sheesh! One thing after another!

Hey everybody! This week Sister Nichols and I got sick with sore throats and gunk in our heads. We got blessings, and I got better, but Sister Nichols got worse. She was afraid that it was pneumonia or bronchitus (sp?). She has had a fever for a few days, and just can't seem to break it. We are waiting for permission to go to the doctor. Anyway!

What have you all been up to this week? I know dad, you asked what was up with me leaving El Paso, I don't know. But apparently I am supposed to be here in ABQ. BUT El Paso can use all the prayers it can get. Sister Bode is still down there, and I'm sure she is still struggling.

So my district is so fun! There is E. Fraughton (DL) and his comp E. Chiu, and then E. Cantey and his comp E. Castano. E. Castano reminds me of me before I left. He's really bubbly and excited all the time. I'm sorry to say that I'm not bubbly nor do I get excited easily anymore. :( I'm actually sad about that, but I've been through quit a bit that has made me more serious. I don't know, maybe when I get home I will be bubbly again. But I kind of doubt it. Oh well. Anyway! I'm just really glad that I have a good district. :)

Next week we are going to the temple! I am so excited! We have to take our concerns and stuff with us for Heavenly Father to help us. So I've been thinking about a  few things to take with me. Also another cool thing is that an apostle is coming to our mission in April!!!!! We don't know who it is yet, but we have to prepare also for his coming. I'm really excited because I have so many opportunities to prepare for his coming. :)

Well, I don't know what else there is to say, this week has been kind of slow. So I hope you all are doing great! 

 

Love Sister Stolp

Write Letters

Hey everybody! Everything is going good so far out here. I got a blessing last Monday and almost right after my lungs stopped hurting and I was able to breath. I'm not kidding when I say it was a miracle. We still had a little carbon monoxide after that in our apartment, but we were able to air it out. We had to get our water heater replaced, so that was good that they found the problem.

Sounds like everyone is doing good back home. Congrats Val! I hope that I can see you in action next year! Boys what are you up too? Any of you found jobs yet? Annie you should send me pictures of your pregnant belly. :) Hey, has Chelsea had her baby yet? How was Allens b-day party?

Things are going good. I was over 2 wards (Ladera and Volcano Cliffs) and 2 Navajo branches (Tohajiilee and Laguna Acoma), but then Volcano Cliffs split and Ladera gained some of VCliffs. VCliffs is going to a different building now, so we had to turn VCliffs over to another set of sisters that meet in that building. So it's all crazy! So now we just cover Ladera, which just got a new bishop and the ward mission leader has been out of town, so we haven't been able to utilize the ward as much as I would like too. But so far it's going, slowly but surely. There is so much work to do here in Ladera. There are 435 members, and 220 households, and 149 households without a Melchizedek Priesthood holder (!!!!!!!!!!!), and 114 single adults/ysa (only 4 come to church...)......There is so much to do. I was so shocked to see the numbers. I am hoping to get this ward more missionary minded and pumped to do the work. So far we have seen a lot of missionary minded people here, and the bishop is a convert, so I think he will help us out a TON! I'm really excited actually, but I feel like time is running out for me. I need to hurry this work along. But the ward is trying to get back on their feet from the split. So we are trying hard. We actually saw that a neighbor of ours was a member, so we decided to knock on their door to see who they were etc. So we found out that they had moved, BUT a lady lives there now and invited us in and talked to us about her family and stuff. It was reallly neat! We invited her to a RS activity tomorrow. So hopefully she will come! :) I love missionary work. I love finding new people to teach! I miss some of the other people I used to teach in my other areas. :( I actually got an email today from Angie in El Paso! I was so excited! She did start going to the spanish branch, which is much better for her, so I'm really excited that she enjoyed it. She has made a few friends. :) I LOVE Angie! I miss her a lot.

Anyway! What is this about the tsunami in Japan? Sister Nichols' mom wrote her about it. And I also heard that the middle east is in turmoil.  Anyway! Just keep writing me! And thanks for the money dad and Brenda, I really appreciate it! I got the money for Valentines' day ($15) but I'm not sure if you sent me any more. I won't need any for a little bit, maybe in April I'll let you know if I need any more. Thanks a ton! Love you all!

 

Love

Sister Stolp

Carbon Monoxide is BAD!

Hey everyone...So I got transferred to ABQ, I"m back in the ABQ West stake, so I've seen a few people that I knew when I was here last. It's been a really weird week (the story of my life), we cleaned the apartment for 2 days (elders used to live there), and tried meeting our investigators. So we have been busy and sore for a few days. Um...I am going to tell you a story, but don't freak out, we are fine...sort of. So, ok, Saturday night we were getting ready for bed, and Sister Nichols was out for the most part and I was saying my prayers. After I said my prayers I felt something wrong. So I checked the doors and the windows to make sure they were locked. They were. But the feeling wouldn't go away. There was something wrong. So I thought it was just the neighbors bringing a bad spirit into the complex. So I tried not to let the feeling get to me. So I went to sleep. At about 4am the carbon monoxide detector went off about 4 times before we actually woke up. So I got up and looked at it. It said 000. I thought it must have been the batteries, so I replaced them and reset it.  The dial showed up at 211. I didn't think to to much of it, because sometimes the detectors are broken. And honestly I didn't feel super bad. I felt woosy, and Sister Nichols felt sick. Which I never wake up woosy but she feels sick in the mornings all the time. So I kind of brushed it off. But I still thought it was weird that the alarm went off. And I remembered the feeling I had the night before. So we decided to leave the apartment and call 911. Which we did. The fire dept. came and checked it out, but their reader and our reader didn't pick up any monoxide. But we still felt kind of weird. So we called president and told him what had happened, and he said that we should be fine since none of the readers picked anything up. But he said that if we felt like we needed to go get tested then we should. So the fire dept. left and we decided to go to the hospital. We had been in fresh air for 2 hours now, so when they took our blood it was quit a while since we had been in the apartment. The test came back with 2.6% poison in our blood. Which is really high since it should only be 0%. It's the equivalency of smoking 1-2 packs of cigarettes a day. So we thought that when we woke up to the alarm, the poison was a lot higher, most likely in the 10%+ range where it effects the neurological area. Sister Nichols was slurring her speech once we thought about it. If we had stayed in the apartment for much longer we would have slipped into a coma and never woken up. I'm telling you, we had 2 1/2 hours left of sleep time, we would have died. I'm not kidding. But Heavenly Father gave me the warning the night before (if I hadn't gotten that warning, I probably would have said we were ok to stay there and that we didn't need to go to the hospital). And he warned Sister Nichols through the spirit that we needed to go get tested. And the alarm, come to find out, was broken. It does not read correctly. So it went off to warn us of the danger. And for some reason the fire fighters reader didn't work in there either. So we believe it was a test of faith, are we going to listen to man or the spirit? We were talking to one of the bishops out here and he said that an angel came down and pressed that button to warn us. It was probably mommy. :) She is always watching out for me. After we left the hospital we went out to the Navajo branches, wow it was awesome! I loved every minute of it! But wow, we were woosy and felt drugged (duh, we were just poisoned). So around 2ish I was getting blurred vision and we were both feeling sick. So the bishop from the other ward came and got us so that we could lay down at his house. We were not going back to our apartment to rest, that's for sure! So dad...come to find out. The bishop that we stayed with lived in Phoenix in the 80's and worked for GTE Laboratories, then it was called AG Communications Systems, but now it's closed. He said the name Stolp is not entirely unfamiliar to him. He kept thinking of you, and said that he remembers you now. His name is Marvin Distel. Then he moved to Florida after Phoenix and worked for Siemens. He was in the Boca Raton Stake and lived in Del Ray. He says he remembers you. It was kind of weird. But cool at the same time! He was so nice to us and took care of us so well. We are so grateful to him. He just got released from bishop yesterday, so that was sad. :(

Sister Nichols and I are feeling ok today. My lungs hurt, and they feel heavy, and it's hard for me to breath and get enough air. They said that fresh air and a lot of water will help get the poison out. So I'm hoping it will be soon! I hate feeling this way! My brain is not at full function either. I still feel woosy and I still feel kind of sick. Anyway! We are doing ok, and don't get freaked out. Heavenly Father is protecting us.

Well, that's all for this week! I love you all! And thanks for sending me the letters and the money! They are greatly apprectiated!

 

Love

Sister Stolp