August 19, 2013

oh hey family :)

thank you for the email. i definitely enjoyed this weeks update :) i am happy to hear erin will probs pop sooner than september 25. just make it august 30th to let me know you still love me, even though you are having a baby long before i come home! august 30th sounds perfect :)

so in the little town of penacook, which is where i live, there is a wonderful man with some tattoos on one arm, a nice round mid section, evenly tapered hair, and a small black chihuahua that sits on his shoulder. i see him occasionally as we drive by, but i hadnt been lucky enough to see him while walking by. he is great.

on tuesday we went to contact a less active member of the ward who we had never met before. his name is jeffrey bowe. as we are walking to his house, a small black chihuahua comes out to bark at us and show us how tough he was. then a man came out who said hi to us. he introduced himself as brother bowe. hey thats a great sign! he then picked up the little dog and put him on his shoulder. oh HEY!! its you!! you are that guy we see from time to time! hows it going?! hahaha! it was such a delight to finally get to meet this man. he is so cool. he told us that he used to be into some pretty heavy drugs and he was even a drug dealer in l.a., but then he found missionaries, who taught him the gospel. he gave up his lifestyle and got baptized. this was just four years ago! as we talked more with him, he obviously had a strong testimony and a desire to be better, as he has not been active as of recent. he told us of some of his troubles and told us how difficult things are for him without making it a pity party. i told him i had just watched a video on mormon.org that said "we should not demand something unreasonable from ourselves, but we should demand progress from ourselves." (or something to that effect) he gave me a high-five and told me that made his day. we talked for just a few minutes with him, shared a scripture, had a prayer and left. i saw a little tear making its way down his cheek. its amazing how 4 people can come in contact with each other for just 5-10 minutes, and during that time feel the spirit, love each other and have more motivation afterwards. man! i love it!

did i ever tell you about the morning we went for a run and a woman put her head out her window and yelled to us that there was a bear in the hood? man oh man. i love that woman. i want to BE her some day. she has a beautiful home with lots of hand made decorations. she has 10 projects of different mediums going on all the time. she wears a bandana on her head. she tames wild cats. she is so gentle and kind and she loved her savior so much. she has a heart of gold!! i love her!! but anyway. this week we finally had an actual lesson with her. we taught her about the plan of salvation. she was so sweet and receptive. i love teaching the atonement! i mostly just wanted to tell you about how amazing she is. :)

ok. get ready for this. a miracle is about to be told. we were on our way to a lesson with a member from the ward who's name is brother shepard. he is an amazing man who has had a crazy crazy past but converted at 25, got married, has a beautiful family, and his wife passed away a couple years ago. he is just 51 now. he is top notch. so anyway, we were walking with him when suddenly we hear someone yell "hello" to us followed by a "where are you going?" we look around to find a man on a ladder painting a house. we walk over and talk to him. his name was craig. he was friendly but then told us he didnt want to talk too much about religion because we have such different theology. he then explains that he believes christ is the savior and that he is god. yes, we do to :) he was a little confused as he saw that our view of christ was the same  "latter day saints are jehova's witnesses, right?" doh! hahaha another person confusing us for jws. hahahaha i told him we get confused with them all the time. he said "yeah, me too!" hahahahaha! meaning they confuse him!

hahah  that little exchange cracked me and my comps up. oh it was funny :) but anyway,  we talked for a couple minutes longer, but he still didnt want to agree to a return appointment. so we went on our way and about 45 minutes later, we were making our way back the same way. he called us over again and asked to it with him during his lunch break the next day. happily we agreed, and met him the next day. he is a wonderful man who basically is part of a bible study group, so he loves the bible. he still thought we had drastically different views, so a lot of the meeting was him explaining how we are different and us explaining that we have the same beliefs as him. i think he was pleasantly surprised to know of our similarities. he ended up showing us a bible verse asking us to pray to know the truth. he basically pulled a moroni's promise on us! hahahaha! so s herrick layed down some sweet, sweet testimony about how she will continue to seek truth by praying and she invited him to do the same. we then showed him moroni's promise in moroni 10:3-5. after we read it he said "well that sounds familiar! hhahaha!" it was great :) i think we are making progress with him, but we still need to really teach him a pmg lesson. i believe that will help big time.

i think you must be praying for me a lot, because i have been so blessed for my whole mission. we are always so busy. we always have people to see, places to go. thank you so much for your prayers and support. i am the happiest and most blessed missionary in the field. 

ok. do you want proof? get a load of this miracle- we were going to contact another less active. we usually park in her dooa yahd (driveway). but hey, a little something very softly told me to park over by the beach of the lake. so i did. on our way over to the house, a sweet middle aged couple was loading their canoe into their vehicle. they called us  over- "hey what are the name tags for? what message are you trying to get out?" wow! a request to state our purpose? i will take it! so we go over and we didnt even say 2 sentences before the woman interrupted us by saying "do you have any literature you could give me?" to which sister mayle gladly gave her a book of mormon. she was so happy to receive it. i asked her why she wanted it. she told me "i have been doing some soul searching. i need something" wow!!! we talked for a few minutes and she told us about some reasons she is searching and some trials she is facing. much of it was about relatives passing. i shared 2 nephi 9 :3,4 with her and marked alma 40 for her. she was so thankful and so sweet to us. she gave us her number and we went on our way.

family. its a mission of miracles! it is a gospel that gives hope! it is a knowledge that brings us back to life! i love this gospel so much! i love it! thank you for everything! keep being wonderful and happy!

 i love you so much! have a wonderful week and be sure to give birth on august 30th!

love, sister wanay buxton who will share the birthday of her first niece!

August 12, 2013

bob! and family!!

wow wow wow! thank you so much! i got two, count em, TWO boxes from you this week! thank you so much! i loved every bit of it! my companions do too, but not like i do. the half way box cracked me up so much! it took me about... 15 seconds after opening up the box and seeing all the half things to figure it out. thank you for remembering :) i havent really done anything for my marks of being out. but i will tell you how a sister missionary can know if the first half of her mission has been a success: if she can find (ON her nine month mark) a very pregnant woman who will take a picture with her. this happened to me! i was so happy! she even let me poke out my belly for the picture. it was such a good time. so that is how i celebrated :) and of course with the box you sent. i am so thankful for the letters that everyone sent. thank you so much! the whole thing is so cute and fun. and i am so thankful to have the copies of the book of mormon with the testimonies. those are so great!!

ah! so this week has been a week..... of....       

MIRACLES!

wowie!!!!

i will start with monday.

the time was 8:45 pm. the air was humid. the feet were walking. a small girl in a sequin dress ran up to us and started asking us questions. her mom was not far from her. thanks to the little girl, who's name was abigale, we had the opportunity to explain our purpose, which every missionary wants to do. while we tried to put it into little girl lingo, her mom gave some clarification "they talk for god, honey."  abigale- "do you know about jesus?" "yes, we do" "teach me about him!" she insisted, as she sat down in the street and fixed her happy eyes on us. wow! it was great. we went back the next day and had a lesson, as well as an adventure through the forest. throughout the lesson, her mom, who is named angela, kept saying things like "ask them when their service is....   ...remember when we talked about where spirits go? ...   they are busy working for the lord, they cant stay too long..." all in such a gentle and kind way. wow angela is prepared for us and she has been preparing her little girl for us. it is so amazing!

wednesday: allow me to preface this with an explanation of one of our investigators. his name is anthony. he has 5 kids under the age of 18. he has been raised baptist and he is ver, ver close to his mom who might as well be a black woman from the south, she is so baptist. so he tells his mom he is looking into the church, to which she is hesitant about. but he defended us and the book of mormon and even convinced her to let us meet her. ok. back to wednesday!!!!

so we go visit anthony's mom, sharlene. we talk for about 25 minutes. in that time we were able to talk about the book of mormon and the contents of it, some of our basic beliefs and her family. about 15 minutes into our meeting, she stopped and said "ok i have one question.... .....   why dont more people use this book? i mean, why doesnt my religion study it along side the bible? i mean, it is so good and it goes along with it, why isnt it used by everyone?!" WOW!! oh man we were so surprised and so happy! it was an amazing time with her. she wants to see us again and you had better believe we feel the same way.

thursday: so the preface to this one- ray. he is the one we found on the street during me and s herrick's first week. he has come to church since then and we have also found out that he has a cousin that he has never met that lives in our ward. he is the sweetest old man. he also has some learning disabilities, so we usually take our time getting though the  lessons with him. we were worried that he might not be grasping anything. he is kind and wants to learn, but it didnt seem like anything was quite getting though. so on thursday..... we show up to his little apartment where him and his cat, bebe live. after a couple minutes, we ask him if he remembers who joseph smith is. he explained who he was!! and we didnt even help him! wow it was so amazing. also, he said the opening prayer!! the only other time he has said a prayer is when we helped him think of what to say, wrote his words down for him, then asked him to read it. so this was huge that he said a prayer, on his own, on the spot!! ah!!! we were so happy! we probs could have sung loud enough for you to hear us!

after that, we went on over to anthony! we talked about the visit we had with his mom. he was so happy to hear about it. then we read 2 nephi 29 with him and helped him understand it. he asked so many great questions, we even ended up explaining the 12 tribes and all that. he was so stoked after we read that chapter. he just thought it was the most amazing thing. "i need to find like... an hour every single day to just study this thing!... ... i mean, i have learned more in the 15 minutes you ladies have been here than in the hour long service i used to go to." oh man. that guy is so great. he has a new found love for the book of mormon. is it so exciting! i helped him see the comparison of lehi and his family starting out their journey to him and his family. when he brought up their "adopted daughter" i responded with "hey thats perfect! they adopt someone named zoram!" hahaha he thought that was great. at the end of the lesson, he said a totally inspired prayer. he was asking heavenly father to help him and his family and asking for help with getting his family interested in the gospel. oh it was lovely. this next week, we are planning on teaching his whole family (with his help! how fun!) the restoration. wow! i am stoked!

saturday- so we are not allowed to write other missionaries within the mission boundaries- not even sister to sister or elder to elder. but grandpa (thankfully) sent a letter to my old address, which s cloward got, forwarded to me, but first.... she wrote on the envelope "i love you sisters buxton, herrick and mayle! ken is getting baptized on the 11! (he is going to the temple on the 17!) love, sister cloward. family!!! did you read that!?!! do you know who that is????? ken!! ken is the man that s cloward and i found in his garage, told him about the book of mormon and he read it in less than a week!!! and now he has been baptized and he has recieved the gift of the holy ghost! wow!!! ah!! i am just so happy!!!! 

ok i have a couple minutes to tell you a great story! bonnie and lexi! bonnie is the mom, lexi is the 13 year old daughter. we went to visit them saturday. during our visit, bonnie recounted something that happened to her the other day. the jw's had come by her house! they were telling her about the end of the world and all that. she said she turned to lexi and said "i dont think they are with the sisters.." so she looked back at them and said "one minute" she ran and got her book of mormon and came back and showed it to them and  said "this is what we do here!" and they turned around and left her alone. hahahah she totally defended us and the book of mormon! it was great! hahhaha

sorry i have to go! i love you family! thank you for all the love and funny stories and all that. thank you thank you thank you!!! i love you all!

love, your missionary daughter/sister/aunt wanay/ sister buxton :)

p.s. keep being righteous!!!

August 5, 2013

dear bob and family and stuff,

hey! thanks for the email and the letters and all that. i still havent gotten the box yet, but i am going to bedford tomorrow, so if they still have it, i can get it from them then. thank you for remembering me. s herrick told me that her parents told her they werent going to write her letters and they have stuck to their word, even though she is in the states. they still email and send pictures and all that, but no letters for her. but she is cool. she deals with things pretty well. i feel the same way you do about the cookbook. whatever you can come up with will be great, i am sure :) my poor bum. i hope things are getting better. i want pictures! are there pictures of the cheeks? if you dont mind, i want to see pictures :)and yes i am glad you are picking up on the new england vocab. 'wicked amazing' is correct :) hahaha

i am happy that my nephew remembers me :) i love that kid.

this week has been a good one :)

do you remember me talking about kelly walter? she was one of my investigators from bedford 2. well she just moved to concord!! this week i was able to give her a visit! it was so good to see her. she introduced herself to my companions as "the investigator that has been trying to be baptized for 2 years, but cant stop smoking and drinking wine" hahaha is was rich. i love that woman. we had an awesome talk about what she wants to do and where she wants to be. she is still onboard to live the word of wisdom, and she thinks that this new place and basically her new life is going to be very key. she was just under a lot of stress and in a bad situation, so i am glad she is out of there. the bad news is that she isnt actually in my area. she is in the elders area in the concord ward. (i am in the canterbury ward, which meets in the same building as the concord ward.) i was afraid she might not want elders because i know in the past she has requested sisters. (in bedford she wasnt in my area but we still taught her) but good news!!! she does want to be taught by the elders!! so elder crockett and elder porter are going to be teaching her. let me tell you about those two elders- elder crockett is from arizona. he was in the mtc at the same time as me, but not in the same district. we met when we came out to new hammy together. (well- along with like 9 other missionaries) i was the travel whoever whatever, so i was "responsible" for him. our seats were next to each other. it was great. now, he is my district leader. he is great! he is very good at keeping everything spiritual and making sure everyone is happy and feels welcome. alright. elder porter. do you remember my friend named lisa from jr. high? she loved spider man and you searched the world twice to find a spider man costume for her for halloween. remember? well elder porter is her little brother! luke porter that is. i think he knew sam just a little bit. so yeah, that is pretty cool :) so those two will teach kelly.

oh man :) so bishop has been asking us to visit certain people in the ward. (which is great!) he asked us to visit a woman named debbie adams. turns out she is not the debra adams we thought we had on the records. her name is the same and her address is accurate. but date of birth is not the same, nor is location of birth. but for several years she has been receiving visiting teaching letters in the mail! haha :) when we went to see her this week, she invited us right in, gave us a surprise lunch, let us pull her weeds and share a message. man it was great :) the lord surely does work in mysterious ways. he sure is clever too! i just hope the other debra adams is still in full faith and all that. hopefully she hasnt gotten lost in all this.

another member that bishop asked us to visit was named sharon mcgehee. we have tried for a couple weeks and finally this week- SUCCESS! we were a pleasant surprise for her. she invited us right in and we had a lovely chat with her and her cat. she is a wonderful woman from arizona who moved out here all alone last september. she is solid! her testimony and desire is definitely there. it was so great to see. she came to church this sunday! after sacrament, i asked her if she was planning on staying longer. she told me she would stay for second hour, but first! she wanted to meet the bishop! well yes ma'am! i am sure he would love that :) it is just to cool to see someone with so much confidence. i am happy we were able to meet her.

oh man. another sister the bishop asked us to visit (when we first got here) is named sister cathy creed. she is a HOOT! oh i just love her. for the last month she has had us over every sunday for dinner and a lesson. her daughter, cynthia, has scooted by a couple times, but doesnt seem too interested in hanging out or sticking around. she is 24 and reminds me a little of pre mission me. well recently, she has slowly started coming around more often and for longer periods of time. this week we stopped by their place to go to an appointment with sister creed. she forgot, wasnt there, and the investigator cancelled. but cynthia was there and she invited us in! so we talked for a little while. you know, the usual- spongebob, cats, etc.. she opened up a little bit about her personal life and we were able to listen. before we left we shared a scripture, which she really enjoyed. i asked her what kind of message she would like us to share with them on sunday (assuming she would stick around for the lesson :)) she thought for a minute and then asked for a message about taking time to relax take care of yourself. they all work so much and cynthia really worries about her mom not taking any time for herself. well sunday came around. sister creek came to sacrament meeting :):):):):):):):) and after church, we went there for dinner. cynthia was rushing out the door and couldnt stay. that was a little sad, but it was ok. sister creed explained after cynthia left that she asked her to take notes during the lesson because she was sad to miss it!! half way though dinner, cynthia rushed home, ate with us and enjoyed the lesson :) they were so cute! they chose to read out of the same book instead of two. they complimented each other and expressed gratitude and a desire to help each other more. oh it was the sweetest thing!!! ah! i just love missionary work!!

thank you for so much love and support and love. i really do appreciate all of you :) thank you for helping me to prepare to be a missionary!

i love you! keep the stories coming!

love, sister lani buxton

July 29, 2013

oh hello family!

thank you for the letters and such. i love being loved, so thank you for allowing me to feel loved. i can still hear milo and logan's voices in my head. i wonder how different they sound now. they sure seem cute in the letters and in my head :) i hope they dont forget me!

yes i can buy mexican food, there is just not as many options, which i am ok with anyway. i dont cook a whole lot. i just do simple fast meals. oh. speaking of such things. i told my mission president about you, bob. he asked me to ask you if there was any way you could help out with easy recipes for missionaries. i was in a missionary leadership meeting the other day and the elders voiced that they have a really hard time knowing what to buy and how to cook and all that stuff. they just need simple quick stuff. if there is any way you can help out, i am positive they would appreciate it.

 
bum, i thought about you all week. i am so sad for you. it just sounds so scary and owie. how can you lay down and heal when you are hurting on more than one side?? but i am glad you are doing better.

oh yeah! transfer calls- didnt get one. we are all 3 staying for another transfer! well at least for now. i dont know when s herrick gets her visa, but i hope it comes soon. i worry about her. i dont know how much longer she can keep up this whole patiently waiting thing. but she sure is a wonderful contribution to the companionship. i love her. s mayle is... possibly happy about the news of no news. she didnt really let us know if she was relieved or disappointed. but. we are happy :) she is coming out of her shell a little now; she is silly and fun and even giggly at times! it is great! thank you for the prayers. i know they reached us. things are going a lot better for us and we have a lot more unity. we still need to work on it, but there has been a lot of improvement.

are you ready to hear about our wicked sweet week?? it sure was a good one! we got to do some service on a small farm this week. this sweet brazilian family allows us to come over and help and take home milk and eggs and stuff :) this week when we got there, they told us the wonderful news that their can had just given birth an hour earlier!! oh it was cute. we got to go see the little calf and the mom. the calf was still a little wet, and sooo cute!! we were able to see the calf stand up and try to play a little, nurse and cuddle. oh it was such a joyous time. you would have loved it, bob. the mom is great. i guess she has investigated before and she almost got baptized, but i think she is not wanting to give up coffee.. so she was pretty hesitant of us at first (4 or 5 weeks ago) but now she is so happy to see us! when we went over this last week, she wanted to sit down right away and talk about what she read in the book of mormon! she has been sharing what she reads with her family and she told us that she wants them to start sitting in on the lessons! wowie!!!!! she keeps telling us that she is not giong to join and all that, but my goodness! her heart is changing already! she is coming up with her own ideas for commitments. she is just a joy.

ron is doing well. we had another lesson with him this week. i have missed him a couple times due to exchanges and what not, so this was the first time i was able to talk to him in person while he was sober. wow! the light in his eyes was amazing. there was also a lot of sadness in his eyes, but now there is also hope. he used to be so hopeless, it was heart breaking. at the end of the lesson, i shared 3 nephi 9:14 with him. with tears in his eyes and a smile on his face he said "thats beautiful. that makes me feel so happy!" then s herrick and i invited him to be baptized, to which he happily said yes :) we are planning for october 12 :) we went away from the lesson practically off the ground! we were all just so happy :) later this week, we had a lesson with a man named anthony. he was pretty happy to see us and was all excited about mormon.org and the book of mormon. he is also planning on being baptized on october 12 :)

after we talked with anthony, we were walking to our car when we saw a woman standing outside her car. we waved and said hi, and she was just so... perplexed by us. she kept asking us "where did you just come from?... you are so cute! where were you?" hahaha it was so funny. it seemed like she just wanted so badly to talk to us, but had nothing to say, so she just kept asking the same questions. it was great! but we did talk to her, all 4 of us were laughing and just having so much fun. she gave us her number and we gave her ours. we are so excited to see her again! i hope i didnt make her sound crazy. she actually seems totally sane- she was just hilarious!

then, 15 minutes later, we were walking down the road when a man waved us down and ran across the street to say hi to us. he told us that he used to be a member and that he wants to come back! hahaha wow! how often does that happen? so good. he had some mental disabilities, so i dont know if he really is a member or anything like that, but hey, who knows what will happen next!

on saturday, we got to help out with a... WEDDING!! a member of our ward along with a recent convert of the ward got married :) they asked us to help out with stuff. bob, i got to help cater the wedding! just like you!! it wasnt anything fancy; they had us make over 200 tuna and egg salad sandwiches and we helped decorate the cultural hall and that sort of stuff. it was great though. that couple is amazing. they pretty much did all of it! they got all the decorations ready to go, she had her friend do her hair, she was in the kitchen with us getting food and all that ready to go, they had 3 cameras they assigned to me, an elder and someone else to take pictures the whole time. it was amazing! and so cute!

i know my emails are very jumbled and all that. i hope you can still understand them. and i know i make plenty of spelling errors and all that, i just dont have time to fix them or anything.

but as you can see, this week has been wonderful. and next year, i will tell you the rest of my mission, because there is just not enough time on a pday or emotion in a keyboard for me to tell you how much i am being blessed, the miracles i am seeing, the love i have for my mission, the desire i have for these people, the happiness the gospel brings to me and the reality of heavenly father and jesus christ. i love all of it so much! even the trials! i know they are difficult, but this is what i chose. every time something challenging comes up i just tell myself- this is what i chose. i chose to serve a mission. i chose everything that comes with it. as i think about that and as i study the plan of salvation, i realize that i will be able to tell myself the same thing for the rest of my life, because i used to live with god! i knew about his plan and i knew that earth life was going to be challenging and i knew i was going to have to walk by faith. i chose to follow christ and i chose to go with the lord's plan. i chose earth life. all that it brings, i chose it.

well to finish off this email, you can see that i have been having a great time and that i love you all very much! keep being a wonderful family! i love you all lots and lots!! i am excited to get that box in the mail! thank you so much!!! i love you!

love, sister wanay buxton :)

July 22, 2013

family,

first off, thank you, bum for not dying. i think it will be a while before i can joke about the accident. but i am so thankful that everything is ok and that heavenly father is blessing our family.

i feel like i am kinda at a loss for words right now. i know there was a lot to say, so i will just keep typing.

this last tuesday i had the blessing of teaching other missionaries. it was scary. and i was looking forward to learning from it, but definitely scared to actually learn. it was for zone interviews. i taught for about an hour total, to my zone. but really it was more of a discussion. i know that i learn much better with a discussion setting and where i feel comfortable giving input, so i did that the best i could. we learned about the holy ghost in missionary work. it sure was great. i felt really happy after.

 i also went on two exchanges this week, which were great. remember carolina and oscany? i got to see them!! it was so good to see them. we were all happy and hugging and all that good stuff. we taught oscany about the atonement and earth life. at the end, she said the most wonderful prayer. you know how in the scriptures they talk about talking to god as if they are talking to a friend? that is how she prayed. it was like she was talking to a good friend. she expressed in her prayer that she felt the spirit during our visit. she was so sweet. man i just love that family. unfortunately, carolina isnt investigating anymore. i am not sure what scared her away or distracted her, but she is not interested. it is sad because it makes it that much harder for oscany.

i really love my companions and the sisters i am responsible for. being in a trio definitely has its pros and cons. its really fun. its also a challenge for me. please keep praying for me and my companions.

one of our investigators... she is a struggle for us. the elders were teaching her for a while before we got here. she wanted to be baptized in june. after asking some comprehension questions, we quickly realized that things werent clicking for her. but hey, maybe thinking that the apostles are reincarnated peter, james, john, etc... isnt so bad. sadly she is an alcoholic who refuses to keep any commitments and as of recently, she has been quite intoxicated every time we see her. i am pretty worried about her. i am afraid she is going to get herself into trouble. i hope nothing too bad happens.

remember ron? the recovering alcoholic? in the last 12 days he has only drank once!!! i am so proud of him. he really wants to change his life. he really wants to be acceptable to the lord. he is so wonderful.

we met with sister lexi and bonnie this week! they are so great. they are such a cute family. sister lexi painted our nails for us. she sure is great. we get to see them again tonight, which all of us are happy about of course. they are planning on coming to church this week, and we are hoping they (along with all of our other investigators) come to a baptism that is going on this weekend. the elders in the neighboring ward are baptizing a couple! isnt that cute?! man i just think that is the coolest thing.

did i tell you that i got to meet 4 generations of LAMANITES? well i did! it was so cool! that was a couple weeks ago. this last week we went back to see them. we got to meet the husband of one of the women. it was so cool! he was all about respecting women and making sure they can voice their thoughts and beliefs.  he was so interested to know how the gospel has affected us individually. he seemed pretty happy about everything we talked about and he was also looking forward to reading the bom on his own. we are STOKED to go back to see him. what a cool man! i love it when the lord guides me.

thank you for the letter bob. i really enjoyed it. thank you for everything, family :) i love you all.

bum, careful with those cheeks!

love, sister buxton :)

July 15, 2013

bob,

man oh man are you funny!! your email today was crackin me up so bad! i love telling people about you. my comps always say things like "your mom sounds cool" and "your mom sounds funny" well she is! haha! thank you for always telling me funny stories. i am sure a missionary's sense of humor gets more and more sensitive as time goes on, but lets be honest, in never took too much to get me going anyway. the other day we were talking to an investigator outside when SOMEONE let out a huge FART! all of us heard it besides the investigator, so i felt really bad as i was basically crying because i was unsuccessfully holding back laughter. gosh it was hilarious. i was still laughing about it hours later. it was just so funny!!

ok. big big news that i am pretty sure i forgot to tell you! man its embarrassing that i forgot. ok. ok. so as of this last transfer (yes a month ago) sister cloward and sister berg are COMPANIONS! can you believe that? and sister caffall is their sister training leader! man it is so cool. i just love it. i hope they all have funny stories about me that they can entertain each other with. hopefully nothing too embarrassing. and i hope they all love me! but gosh its just so good that they are companions. so funny!

so ron- we had another lesson with him and he was so so sad that he relapsed. he was so ice to us and we brought a member with us that was able to help him out so much and relate to him big time. at one point, the member was talking and ron just cut him off and asked "will you take me to church on sunday?" oh it was great :) he really wants to come! he didnt end up coming this week though because he quit drinking again! he told us that after we left he didnt drink and he is going for it! so my main point is that he didnt come to church because he will be going through the withdrawals again and also he will be on medication for that business. but we are so proud of him and he so sincerely wants to stop. s mayle committed him to pray and he told us that he has been and that he feels lots and lots better. oh it just warms my heart. he is a great man, soon to be even better.

so rilla ron- not really any news, just that his friends are really happy to have the memorial service. they still need to pick a day and all that, but they are really happy about it.

yes i am still in a trio. poor s herrick is still in the dark with her visa. i hope she gets it soon. she has been very patient, but i dont know how much longer she will be patient. but it is good. this week we got to milk a cow! the woman that owns the cow and the farm is from brazil, so they got to talk a little bit in portuguese, so i think that made s herrick happy.

with music, p wilkey's music policy was that we could only listen to music that was by lds artists and also it had to be predominantly hymns. i only had like one or two albums on my ipod that fit that. but its ok, i sent it to dave a while back because i know he has a pretty nice library that fits under that category. so i have not been musicless. but i think the new president is going to change the policy to be just what the white handbook says and no other restrictions.

oh there is a couple in my ward and they wanted me to tell you "thank you" from them. their names are the tinkers.

oh man one more story. we got two new investigators this week. lexi, who is 13 and her mom bonnie. they are so cute and sweet. they are very spiritually aware and kind. we taught them this week about being daughters of god and what god is like. we shared experiences with how the gospel blesses families. they are so cute! at the end of the lesson, we were asking lexi what she likes to go by. she was pretty whatever about it. then we offered to call her sister lexi. oh she lit up and nodded her head! we are so happy to have sister lexi and bonnie in our lives!

thank you again for all the love! i have one random request. can you send me a small dictionary? i just want one is all. also. i really want more rhuberry jam. i had to leave the other one in augusta. :) please and thank you. these things can just be early birthday presents. i love you family!

hey when is erin going to have her baby anyway?

have a lovely week :)

love, sister lani buxton

July 8, 2013

well hello!

thank you of course for the email, it put a smile on my face for the whole duration of my reading. i love the stories and i can just picture lunk growling on your lap while you take pictures of the racoons. MAN i want to see them! do you remember that they are one of my favorite animals? ah! so great! i wish you could tame them and then all could be happy and friendly. how do the outside kitties like them? i hope they keep their distance.

i am so happy that my bum went to efy. i hope he had a lovely time. efy  is always good :) 

and bob i cant tell you how happy it made me to read about you being a regular on good things utah!! mom!!!!!! this (not specifically) has been something i have been praying for. isnt it amazing the way the lord answers prayers? i am just so happy for you! ah!! is that the same place i went with you before my mission and we saw franie muniz? dont know if thats how he spells his name..

so yes, s herrick is still my companion. did i tell you she was in a trio last transfer also? (her first transfer as a missionary) so she was already used to it. but it has been good. you wouldnt believe how amazing s mayle is. i have never known anyone who understands the atonement so well, or someone who has applied it so well. she has opportunities quite often to empathize with people because of the loss of their loved ones. she doesnt keep it back. she always uses her story as a way to connect with people when it is necessary. and you know what? she also never cries!! i dont get it. she just talks about it! it is rather inspiring, really. she is so great. she invited someone to be baptized on her first day (while i was in the  meeting hahaha) and she participated in a lesson that evening with me and i didnt even have to push her and poke her. i didnt even have to threaten her with sleeping outside! it was great. but anyway, s herrick still doesnt know when she will be leaving or anything like that. although, a few weeks ago she wrote on her calendar that she would get her visa today, so we will have to check the mail when we go home after emailing. :) i hope she gets it, but i also really enjoy being her companion. she is a wonderful sister. it is wonderful to see how dedicated she is even though she could be leaving at any point.

this week was fun though. we got to meet up with s mayle on tuesday evening. she was cute and happy and she told parker christensen hi for me :) what a blast. before we met her i would always say to s herrick- "i want to see s mayle. i wonder what she looks like." and her response was always "yellow". well guess who was wearing yellow on tuesday!!!! hahaha it must have been revelation or something because s mayle was indeed wearing it. haha :)

side note- the only cd we had before s mayle got here was book of mormon scripture mastery, and she brought some cds so it has been fun to listen to her cds. BUT. while i was at the meeting on tuesday our new mission president (who reminds me quite a bit of uncle brent) basically told us that the new music policy will soon be simply what is stated in the white handbook which is much more free than what i have had for the last little while. so that will be cool :) i hope he implies that soon. 

there hav been some pretty sad events with some of our other investigators. ray is in the hospital. they dont know what is wrong with him. we found him by a miracle and he was rather surprised to see us walk in to his room. he sure is a sweetie- he let us read to him while he sat in his cute little hospital gown. 

i have told you about terrence wigglesworth right? well he rocks. there is a sweet view of big fireworks from the church property, so we invited him to go to it. when we met up, he had brought his friend "rilla ron" the rapper. we had met him a time or two. they brought their music and terrence had his superman cape. it was so good to see them and to talk with them while on church property. a member of the ward we have been teaching was there, too. his name is george sartorelli. he has to be one of the coolest old men out there. turns out he is friends with terrence and rilla ron!! it was so much fun! all six of us went on a short church tour and had a good time with it, too. i even got to play a little basketball with them in the cultural hall. they had fun and so did we :) bro sartorelli agreed to take them both to church on sunday, too! sunday came and bro sartorelli was there, but not terrence or rilla ron. it was a little disappointing. later that day we walked over to their house. terrence and his friends were outside an they politely came up to us and shook our hands, but something was wrong. everything was different. i asked him what was wrong. he told us that rilla ron had gone the way of all the earth. he drowned in the river that weekend. it was so heartbreaking. we tried to comfort them a little bit. i think the best thing we can to at this point is to not forget about them and also we are going to try to organize a service for them. his family lives in ny, so they will probs have the funeral there, but we want to have a little service for the friends that live here. i have ever done that before, but it will be good. sure is sad though.

bittersweet news- we have an investigator named ron, who i hope i told you about last week because he is amazing. s herrick found him while street contacting. he wants to change his life and be a better person. he said he feels like god is calling him back. he wants to quit drinking and smoking. ok so the news is that he cancelled our appointment this week. the sweet part of it is that he cancelled because he was on day 3 of being sober, which is the worst with withdrawals. wow!! i am just so proud of him!! gosh :)

thank you again for everything. sorry this email was a little heavy, but i hope you know i am still happy and everything is good over here! i love you!!

love, sister wanay buxton

July 1, 2013

hey family!!!

sure is a fun time for all eh? eh eh??

sure is :)

thank you for the email, sure is nice to hear from you.

it really is a small world with the whole sister mayle and parker and all that. its fun. sister mayle got to nh at about 3:30 today but i wont get to see her until tomorrow morning when i will go to a meeting and she will get to spend the day in beford (my baby!!!!!) with sister herrick, the bedford sisters and another sister. yea. have you ever heard of 5 sisters being in a companionship for the day? i sure havent!! hahaha

sure is a blast. you say i have been prepared for her... oh i sure hope so. i truly truly hope so. i hope i am not just another trial for her in this trying time for her.

this week has been another great one. we are finding people to teach! we went on an exchange on tuesday. it was sister herrick's first time being senior companion. she was worried sick! but i knew it would be fine. while i was away, she found an amazing man who has been looking for religion and he wants to change his life! he doesnt want to just confess sins and then go do it again. he wants to change and he wants it to mean something. he told us that he feels the lord is calling him back. when we went back to teach him we taught the restoration together for the first time. it was amazing! sister herrick recited the first vision for the first time to a real person! oh she was amazing. and i was so quickened by the spirit! it was so wonderful to teach a preach my gospel lesson again. i havent taught the restoration since i was in bedford. so that was a truly delightful hour for me. at the end of the lesson, we asked him to pray about the bom to see if it is true. he explained that he felt he didnt need to because he believes it! wow it was great!!  after we taught him we met a boy on the street. his name is terrence wigglesworth. he sure is great. he seems to be a guy of his word. he happily accepted a bom and he said he is going to meditate about it.

the ward here is also fantastic! the bishop is such a sweet, humble, amazing man. i cant tell you how relieved and thankful i am to be serving to close to him and also our ward mission leader. this ward knocks me off my feet with their generosity and kindness. the lord is definitely answering our prayers though them. they have no idea how influential they are to us and also to the work

.

this week, on another exchange, i was humbled by one of the sister missionaries. she has found out since coming on her mission that she has a.d.d., anxiety and depression. i think it might be rooted in her childhood. the way her parents treated her sure made me thankful for you, mom and dad. thank you for bringing me up right and building my confidence. i sure love you and am thankful for you. it seems like there are a lot of sisters who have health problems-mental and physical. why does that happen? i just dont get it.

thank you very much for the prayers. they are definitely reaching me and i am sure they are reaching sister mayle. please keep praying for her. i am sure she will need the strength that comes from others prayers.

i love you all very much. keep telling me about home :) i always love hearing it!

with lots of love, sister lani buxton!

June 24, 2013

oh bob!

when i didnt have an email from you last week, my first, final and only thought was "poor mom, she is going to think i think he forgot me. but really i know she will probs send the email bout when i get off. she wouldnt neglect me, even over the internet!"

i love the stories. i cant believe my nephews are now 9 months (right?) 2 years and 3 years. i really hope they still remember me! at least a little bit!

those nephews sure sound cute! i love them!!

this week has been rather eventful for me. so i told you i was being transferred to be in a regular, non training companionship with a sister who has already been in the area that i was going to. right? yeah. thats what i was told. so off s cloward and i go to the transfer meeting. when they get around to announcing where everyone is going and who is training who, they always announce all the trainers and trainees first. the chapel was packed! half way through the announcement of trainers and such, president calls my name, asks me to come up. i was confused. i was not training... they didnt tell me i was training.. they didnt ask me to go to the trainers meeting.. they didnt give me a training packet.. so i say "do you want me to come up there?" he says "yes". then his assistants pull on his sleeve and start whispering to him and pointing to papers and all that. everyone was looking around and i was confused and nervous. then after some heart pounding moments, he tells me "oh ok sister buxton you will be sister herricks companion." then tells me i am opening a new area- canterbury 2. on my. this was definitely news for me. so turns out i am opening a new area and finishing the second half of training for sister herrick, who is a visa waiter for brazil. so i am training! upon further investigation and talking to the elders who are splitting the area with us, it is more like we are shotgunning an area. so.. call it what you will. also. during lunch at transfer meeting, president wilkey whisks me and s herrick into a room and sits us down. he then proceeds to tell me that on july 1st we will be receiving another sister into the mission. her name is sister mayle. i will be training her, also.

side note- i dont know if you have heard about a boy who was hiking and fell off a cliff. i think it happened in provo canyon and this was like.. a couple weeks ago. he was missing for a few days and then they found his body. pretty heart breaking. well. sister mayle is his sister. she is coming out late because they found his body the day she went in to the mtc, so the poor girl went home for the funeral and all that kind of stuff. so. this poor sister is going to have to be trained by me. and be in a trio.

oh. also i am a sister training leader again. this time over 3 companionships. this means i will need to plan and go on 6 exchanges this transfer. needless to say, i have been relying heavily on the lord this week. it has been scary, but fun. it is definitely helping me build my faith. and hey, i have had a pretty easy life, so i spose its bout time heavenly father asks me to do something that i cant figure out how to do logically figure out. dear impossible, here i come!!

also this week i was granted my third brand-spankin new car! wow! this one also had less than 50 miles on it. 

this week has been such a treat. this ward is so happy to have us and we are happy to be here. sister herrick is an awesome sister and it is inspiring to see how much her heart is in the work, even though she could be leaving at any point to go to brazil. oh, before i forget, so that you can face book stalk them, their names are whitney herrick and haley mayle. or haily. i dont know. i havent met her yet.

also my address is

21 park street

boscawin, nh
03303

on our first day in our lovely area (it truly is beautiful!) we met a man named jaimy. he rocks! we talked to him a couple days later. that night he was working on his motorcycle with his super old, tattooed, long haired, sleeveless friend named snake. he was SO cool :) we had a wonderful chat, prayer and snake committed to read out of the bom. also jaimy invited us to his daughters wedding. we went and boy was it wonderful! . it was outside. the colors were white and yellow. sunflowers were everywhere and after the bride's maids and all them walked down the flower-petalled walk way, we all heard an engine start up and rev. then down the walk way came jaimy with his lovely daughter on the very motorcycle he was working on when we talked to him a couple days prior. oh it was co grand. everything was so cute and fun and happy. me, s herrick and jaimy all cried during it. what fun :)

well i have to get off soon, but i will have you know that this area is wonderful, i have had so many wonderful experiences in this short week, and the lord has been here for me the whole time. i love you and i thank you so much for your love and support and kindness. thank you so much family! i love you all! oh! please please please pray for sister mayle. i cant tell you much about her, but i love her so much and i am worried about her. 

i love you!

love, sister WANAY!! (buxton)

June 17, 2013

well hello family! how is everyone doing?

i sure am thankful for all that you do for me and all the love and support that i feel every day. thank you for that.

this week was, of course, grand. i got two wonderful hats from a sweet old woman in the ward i am serving. i am sending one home this week so that i dont have to cart it around. i want to send the other one home soon, too but i dont know how to yet. it is a sun hat so i need to figure out how to send it home. thank you so much bob for the envelope of pictures and the letter. it always makes me happy to hear from you. thank you so much. i love the pictures. they bring back some good memories for sure. and s cloward really likes them. i dont know why, she just thought it was the craziest thing when she found out i used to wear bandanas alla time. now that i am in missionary attire every day i feel like i look very... normal i spose you could say. so perhaps that is why. every morning i put on my "a skylit drive" t shirt for our work out time. it is black and it has some skulls on it. she always tells me how scary it is and what was i thinking bringing it on a mission. hahaha :) she is a treat.

we went to the doc again this week. again they found nothing, but they want her to come back this week for another proceedure. that poor sister. i am ready for her to not be sick any more. a few days ago sister wilkey texted us and told me some things i need to do when we go see the doctor for s cloward this week. we smiled and figured that meant we were staying together for the next transfer :)

due to circumstances, i went on two exchanges this week. it was rather fun, if i say so myself. it is so amazing to see these sisters grow so much and be so faithful and strong. i have loved being an stl. the one sister i went on exchange with, named sister sowards, has been out for 6 weeks now and she will be training as of tomorrow! wow! i am so proud of her. i have no doubt she will be a splendid trainer and she will love and be loved by her trainee. the senior companion from the other companionship i am over is named sister deters. she was in the mtc with me. we were in the same room and the same district. she is so amazing. i found out last night that she will be transferred (for the first time!!) and she will also be an stl, AND she will be training!! ahhh! crazy crazy! i am so proud of her. and get this get this. sister deters and sister sowards companions from this last transfer are going to be companions! ah! does this make sense? oh it is just great. while i was on the second exchange, i got a call from sister wilkey. she was asking me all these questions about the sisters i am over and transfers and all this stuff. man. i didnt even know they asked so many questions to the leadership within the mission. it was a surprise! also she let me know that we are also welcoming in 2 visa waiters from the mtc. that means this transfer, we are recieving 20 new sisters!!!! aaaaaaahhhh!!! and only 7 elders! hahahaha isnt that just a hoot? i love it.

ok ok i will tell you about how transfers effects me this time :) thankfully, it is not nearly as dramatic as last time. so i am getting tranferred out of this area into a new area to meet my companion. they told me that i will be senior, but not traning. also i am staying as an stl. whew. i was so relieved. with 20 new sisters and they are opening 8 new areas, i thought for sure i was doomed. but me and s cloward are sad to be leaving each other. and i am also quite sad that i will be leaving big guy. its a sad day, but a good day. i thought for sure no one would mind that i was leaving since i just got here. a lot of times people just view missionaries as missionaries, not as individuals. and from my point of view, that is ok and i dont expect too much outside of that from ward members. but oh my goodness. i couldnt believe the tears and the hugs and the kind words that were directed at me. it was very touching. i definitely have a different view on members where i serve now. they even announced it in sacrament meeting. i was just very surprised i spose

 we have been working with a less acitive woman named shelby johnson. she got baptized a couple years ago. her husband left her when she made the choice to be baptized. since the first time i met her i have just felt so much love and admiration for her. her 9 year old daughter mo quickly became an investigator and i have loved her just as much as i love her mother. they both came to church yesterday. they stayed for the first two hours (rs, primary and sunday school) and then sweetly sat down in sacrament meeting. when they made the announcement about me leaving, mo told her mom that she was sick and her mom said she also needed to leave. we visited them later that day. they cried on my shoulder and told me how sad they were to see me leave. they asked me to write in their scriptures and mark some of my favorite verses. it was such a touching and humbling experience. i love those two so much and i am so thankful i was able to be a small part of their beautiful lives.

well family this is all for this week, but we will talk again soon! thank you so much again! i love you! i really do!!

love, your big stinky sister buxton!!