Week 44- 10 Months, Changes in Plan (again)

My health has been doing much better since I've slowed down a bit and do more of my work from home. However, that doesn't mean I don't get a lot done. This week included:

• Transferring a saber-tooth-tiger load of employees. I think the finance department must be running an audit or something, because the requests just keep pouring in.
• Organizing the hotel space (a cubicle for storage and visiting employees). This involved way too much wrestling with reams of paper and wondering "why do we even have this?"
• A Writers' Community of Practice Meeting for which I used my awesome administrative skills, orchestrating a last-minute location change on my laptop...while walking. That's right. You're welcome, team. 
• Attending a farewell. It seems to be that time of year...lots of people are ending their mission this month.
• Passing along a new batch of interpreter names. I seriously thought we were done with this, but apparently not!
• Handling more educational reimbursements. It must be that time of year too.
• Attempting to explain to someone that I don't know when they will get their data, I don't have anything to do with fixing the glitch, no I really don't know when you will get a better list.
• Assigning accesses and explaining that I do not have magic tunnel access granting power (the granting power being magical, not the tunnel). 
• Digging out all the short stories I own for Carter to use for an English assignment. I kind of went crazy-english-major on him. At some point during my rummage through the basement, I came to a couple of conclusions. 1. We need to clean out the basement again and 2. I am not a normal person. I own a LOT of books.
• Washing the dog (one of us smelled a great deal better after this adventure. It was not me).
• Volunteering at the food pantry with mom.

I also have some pretty important news for many of you. While I originally intended to serve a 18 month mission, I will be ending my mission at the end of June.

I have been praying, attending the temple, and fasting about my mission and where I need to be. I thought what I needed to be praying about was a transfer, but it seems that was not the case. A couple of weeks ago, I finally got an answer. Over and over I got the prompting that I should end my mission. Of course, I thought, "that's crazy!" why would you say that? I thought I was just tired and hysterical (a downside to revelation in the middle of the night). However, everything I prayed about and studied affirmed to me that this was the Spirit speaking and that for whatever reason, it was time for me to wrap up my mission. I was even directed to a lesson in the Hinckley manual which began with the instructions to listen to the whisperings of the spirit in the middle of the night. It was by then, 3:00 in the morning. I wish I could say I was gracious about it, but in reality I was bawling and snivelling, and finally said, out loud, "Fine! I'll end my mission early if that's what you want! Just let me go to sleep!" And that's exactly what happened.

Despite my less than positive attitude at the time, I am feeling good about this decision and have received multiple spiritual confirmations that I am on the path God wants me to follow. It took a while for my brain to adjust to this new change in course, but as time goes on I get more and more excited about returning to school, even though I am sad about leaving my mission at PSD. (Someone once said that if you want to make God laugh, just tell him your life plans. I must make him laugh a LOT). That being said, I've re-enrolled at BYU, signed up for classes, and found housing. I don't know what life will bring, but as Mom reminded me today, our whole lives are missions, I'm really just getting a transfer to a new, exciting area. Until then, I am trying to just enjoy my last couple of months on the mission.

I love you all and hope you have a fantastic week.

Love,

Sister Ward

Week 43- A Few Dances and A Complaint about the GSC

First of all, I found this video of one of my favorite songs--it always touches me, and this performance is fantastic. If you don't have time to watch it now, I was going to say save it for later, but actually, you should just watch it anyway. It's that lovely.

The last few week's activities included:

• Processing educational reimbursements
• Stuffing lots of papers in the confidential recycling bin
• Running an audit of job descriptions, because apparently if a tree fell in the forest and the GSC doesn't have documented, signed, and perfectly formatted and delivered proof, not only did it not make a sound, it never fell at all.
• Grumbling at the GSC because they kept on telling me that my e-mails were wrong and they couldn't process someone's back pay. They asked us to instead submit some document that never existed and when Andrew called, they said, "just send an e-mail." Ahhh!
• Organizing desks (apparently the director is a neat freak and is too polite to say anything about it driving him crazy).
• Terminating employees
• Writing a letter of recommendation with a few blanks for my supervisor to fill in, as if I were her. This was a little weird and a lot harder than I thought it would be. Usually I'm the one asking for a recommendation, not writing one.

This was also a very busy week. We hosted a prom dinner at our house. It looked and tasted amazing, but was way too much work for us to want to do it regularly. Mom and I were pretty proud of our decorations. You'll have to check out the family blog later to see the results. I mostly just arranged flowers. We were able to get everything we needed from the garden, even this early in the year, and it looked fantastic, if I do say so myself. 

We also went to the band fundraiser for FHE, a swing dance. I was more than a little worried about this. I'm supposed to look and act like a missionary all the time, but our family activity was dancing... I loved swing dancing before my mission, and that made it harder. I just danced with the family, so hopefully nobody got any crazy ideas about missionaries. I just felt odd. It was fun to see Mom and Dad dance together, and I got to see one of my good friends. Sally started out as my flute teacher when I was nine and in some ways was like a surrogate mother to me. I still try to keep in contact with her and her family now that I'm in the great big world of grown-ups, so it was a real pleasure to see her there.

That's all for this week.

-Sister Ward

P.S. I love you

Weeks 41 & 42- The Prince of Peace and Some of My Other Favorite Things

First of all, if you haven't seen the Church's newest easter video, this is your chance, because it is beautiful (and yes, Publishing Services created this):

You can see last year's video here:

However, my favorite is still the one from a couple of years ago. 

I am confused by many things in life. I don't always know where I'm going, and that's frustrating, and scary. But I do know some things. I know that Christ lives. I know He died for me and for you. He is our big brother, who would do anything for us, simply because He loves us. Because He atoned for us, He understands us perfectly. He knows what our lives are like and what makes us hurt and what makes us laugh. He knows how much we struggle. He suffered for our sins so that we could return to our home with Him and Heavenly Father. Because He broke the bands of death, we will all live again. I don't have the words or skill to express my faith in Him, but I know he hears the "song I cannot sing." I don't know many things, but this I do know: Jesus Christ is my Savior. 

Now, you may have noticed that I am not much of a picture taker. I generally don't have a camera with me, and even then my brain still seems to think I use film and have to be careful how many I take (someday my children are going to laugh at me when I try to explain film cameras). However, I've thrown that tradition out the window this week. Perhaps because I have been struggling to love my mission lately, I have taken a lot of photos of some of the parts of my mission that do bring me joy. I don't love the commute or the paperwork or copying and pasting data all day. But there are things that I do love. I love going to the temple. I love walking through temple square as the gardens come to life. And I love the spirit that I feel on Temple Square.

The Provo Temple: I know this is not the most glamorous of the temples, but it is MY temple. This is the temple I grew up seeing, where I was first baptized on behalf of the dead, and where I received my own temple blessings. I have been able to attend this temple since I was twelve. I have also been able to provide blessings for many of my own ancestors in this temple. This is where I have gone when I needed an extra measure of peace or answers to questions. So perhaps it is not the most gorgeous temple ever designed, but it is beautiful to me.

Temple Square Gardens: Some people say you shouldn't post too many pictures because people get bored. But you know what, I enjoy looking at my old pictures. You can scroll through them.

In front of the Conference Center:

In front of the Church Office Building, or COB. My office is actually just through those windows on the right.

My (not so quiet) hiding spot.

I couldn't get this picture to turn out, but I wanted to get my tag in it. I really love my missionary tag. There aren't very many people in the world who get to wear a name tag that says they are a missionary for Jesus Christ.

In front of the Beehive House

The front of the Lion House

The COB. It's not a gorgeous building, let's be honest, but it has a great view.

This one looks like a big frothy blanket.

Were these alcoves meant to house statues originally, or was it intended for future photo taking purposes? Who knows, but I'm just saying, I don't need a wedding dress to rock the picture pedestal.

It's like tulip mania out here. Some day I'm going to plant loads of tulips so I can have a beautiful garden and cut flowers whenever I want them. 

A lovely picture...except for the traffic cone. I guess they don't want us to forget we're in Utah.

The Assembly Hall. This is one of my favorite buildings on Temple Square (besides the temple, obviously). I can't believe I got to play my flute in here when I was in high school.

If the lighting's bad and you're not much of a photographer, no worries! Add a filter and it will look like you were just being artistic...