June 1, 2015-Missionary Quest and loads of fun!

Her group email this week! I just love this girl:)

"Hello all from humid-Virginia!!

First of all I would like to express how grateful I am for Elder L Tom Perry, one  of our beloved twelve apostles and faithful servant of the Lord. I was so sad to see him go, but I know he is in a better place and is doing such great work on the other side!!

So I know I have said this like the past 2 weeks, but this week really was CRAZY. So let me just tell you, This past week we got tiwis installed in all our cars, which are these little black and white boxes that determine how fast you are going, how fast you go around turns, over dips, if you brake too hard, if everyone in the car is wearing their seat belt when the car is moving, what time you get home, etc... and it all goes on your driving record!!! (you have to login and logout by tapping on the box with this card that has your info in it..) I have only been yelled at twice for speed to that's pretty good!! If you don't slow down fast enough though it is a mark against you and if you get three then you lose your driving privileges for the rest of your mission... so that's been a great fun experience.. BUT the day before they got installed our fan belt broke in our car so we had to park it at this 7-11 that was super far away from where we live and try and find a ride back to our apartment.. ha!! The company that was coming to tow it to fix it came and we thought we wouldn't have to get the tiwi installed the next day but it still happened.. darn. 

But yeah so then also while the tiwis were being installed we had a super awesome conference with our mission president, President Riggs, and wow, he is just such an inspired man.. and just super real with you too!--Don't be surprised if you see him speaking in the next general conference in October like I am not joking. One of the main things we talked about that really stuck out to me was talking about our quest. Our quest as missionaries and our quest as members of this restored church. Sharing the gospel and living its teachings should be the main quest in our hearts. We talked about the story of Nephi in the Book of Mormon, about the prophet Nephi and his quest to go and retrieve the gold plates from the hands of Laban, the wicked king. The Lord asked him to go and retrieve the gold plates, and even though Nephi was a faithful man and accepted (as we know in 1 Nephi 3:7) to GO and DO the things the Lord commanded, we don't know if it was quite HIS quest in his own heart to do what the Lord had commanded him yet. Sometimes we may follow the teachings of the gospel or obey the Lord's commandments solely because we know the Lord has asked us to do it. But I know that AS WE STRIVE to do this the knowledge will come and we will come to understand the reasons behind doing the things the Lord has commanded us. It all starts with an act of faith at first. We have to do what the Lord would have us do BEFORE we know the outcome/are able to receive the blessing of what he has commanded us. Which is what Nephi did and was eventually able to see the full prospective of things, making the Lord's commandments his "quest" and aligning his will with the Lord's. And now we have those records and the Book of Mormon in our day because of this event in history!! How blessed are we?!!

Well, I don't have much time and sorry that probably didn't make a ton of sense but I invite you to study it out!! Read the story of Nephi and think about how it can apply to YOU personally with something that is happening in your life at this very instant! I know that as we do this with the scriptures, we will find answers to questions we could not have found in any other way, and our testimonies of this gospel and the knowledge our Father in Heaven would have us achieve will increase!! Trust me, I have done it!! :)

I love you all so much and wish you a FANTASTIC week!! 

With all my love, 

Hermana Mariah Riddle :)

I'm so glad that Mariah loves her Mission President. She told me that he will be leaving after the next transfer which is on the 25th of June.  She said she will miss him so much but is also excited to meet her new President David Huntsman.  She is hoping that she gets to stay with her current companion though.  She told me that she and Hermana Peabody have experiences every single day that make them laugh. (Who wouldn't laugh if they had Mariah as a companion)?  She is such a funny girl:) They are having a great time together.

We got a lot of pics on the cloud this week. YAY!! :) She explained a few of them to me but some of them I have no idea what they were about but I love them anyway.

Hermana Riddle and Peabody went and "Heart Attacked" a women's door who lives in their ward.  See pics below. They just wanted to thank her for everything she has done for them.  Apparently they visit her often and she is always so willing to help them out which they feel is such a blessing. The pic in the middle is a direct translation to English of what her missionary tags says.

Next set of pictures are of a "photo shoot" that Mariah and her comp decided to do haha.  Mariah said that on their P-day they found these shirts that said "Stand for Something" and the highlighted letters spelled "STRONG". She said they just HAD to get the shirts because they were only $5! So then, they decided to do a photo shoot in front of the American flag that is hanging on the wall in their apartment.  I don't know Hermana Peabody that well yet but I do know Mariah and this is just a typical Mariah thing to do.  Haha..silly girls:)

Next set of pics are just some random pics that came through. The one of her comp holding a chicken she says that they were looking for an address on their GPS and saw some chickens walking around so they got out to take a picture of them. What!!??  These two girls:)  She recorded a video of her companion picking up the chicken which I am looking forward to getting.  If any of you know Mariah really well you know that she is a hard worker but loves to have fun in everything that she is doing. She makes me smile:)