Sister Manwaring: Serving in North Carolina

  Dinner with Hermanas and Carlos February 27, 2022   Dear family and friends,   Our ESL class is growing   Usually the hermanas teach the advanced group and I take the beginners.  In the past, we've had only one or two beginners.  But on Monday we had six beginners and on Friday, eleven!  We were learning to express what we like or don’t like.  I told them it reminded me of the song, “Esto No Me Gusta” (I don’t like this) by Enrique Iglesias.  (Yes I listen to Spanish radio.  It’s great language practice and I encourage my students to do the same.)  Anyway, they all understood the musical reference.    And speaking of things I like,  I was able to enjoy a delicious meal with the hermanas and a new member named Carlos.    It was the best meal I’d had in a long time    (It was a Mexican restaurant, but Carlos said that the food the hermanas & I ordered--chile r...

  Hermanas Y Yo at YSL February 14, 2022     Dear Family and Friends,   Probably the hardest thing I do all week is write this letter   It’s the same thing every week.  Basically, I’m just trying to be helpful to people.   Wednesday afternoon when I was at the park a woman lost her child, so several of us jumped to her assistance.  She found him pretty quickly and was very relieved.  She said she felt like a bad mom to have allowed this to happen, but other moms told her they’d had similar experiences.  I piped up that even Mary & Joseph lost Jesus. I don’t know if this helped.     On Friday my companion and I visited Linda & Coleen.  They’ve given up on the battle against smoking.  It’s pretty hard to quit, especially because Linda’s husband smokes.  They seemed to be feeling kinda down due to health problems and other stuff. Then I made the mistake of asking ...

  Dear Family & Friends,   Happy Valentine’s Day I have been blessed with many opportunities to serve this last week.  Some of these included serving in the temple, in the family history center, teaching ESL, and various teaching opportunities.   Last Thursday I learned  why  I like serving people so much. The Knightdale Relief Society had a Valentine’s party.  It was very enjoyable.  It was pot-luck.  I made soup and salad. And I made some new friends whom I hope to be able to serve.  Then we had a short presentation about how serving others produces chemicals (like oxytocin, serotonin, and dopamine) in the brain that make us feel good! Who knew?  Kindness is crack   (If you don’t believe me, google it!)     On Friday, the weather was warm (70˚) and beautiful, so I went to the park. I think my Spanish is improving because I was able to teach a woman in Spanish.  I...

  Dear Family and Friends,   I don’t really have anything new to report.  I continue to help and teach people whenever and wherever I can.    Probably my favorite day was Thursday when we took our friend Sheri to the temple.  Sheri lives about 30 minutes east of us and the temple is about 45 minutes west of us (depending on traffic.)  Needless to say, our trip involved a lot of driving.  But it was SO worth it!  It’s interesting that in our Sunday school lesson this week we were studying about Noah.  The Bible’s description of Noah’s world as “corrupt” and “filled with violence” sounded sadly familiar to our own.  But as I sat in the temple, surrounded by peace and beauty, I felt that perhaps the temple is our ark today.  I encourage you all to go there as often as you can.   We also had a very inspiring Zone conference last week.  What a privilege it is to associate with these ...