🇮🇹❤☀️🤗- Lampugnanao, Milan, Italy

Ciao everyone!

Just a short email for today, with some attached photos and letting you all know that I love you and that Heavenly Father does too! I was gratefully reminded this week that God knows us each individually and helps us work though problems in the ways that he knows his best. All he asks of us is to, as Elder Holland put it, "keep loving. Keep trying. Keep trusting. Keep believing. Keep growing. [Because] heaven is cheering you on today, tomorrow, and forever." 

Heaven is cheering us on! Vi voglio un mondo di bene! 

Con amore, 

Sorella McConkie 

Photos... 

Lemonsicles during splits 

Leaving the church after a crazy Sunday with my greenie

Happy Wednesday!

Ciao tutti!

What a great week it has been. A little less crazy than last week but productive and happy nonetheless! 

On Thursday we met with our investigator Luigia for the second time and set a baptismal date for the 5th of May!! That feels so close and we still have so much to Do, but I'm grateful for the work and the business and for an investigator who truly wants to learn and grow. We are teaching the Plan of Salvation this week with a recently returned Italian missionary from our ward tomorrow and I'm really excited:) 

I've also been thinking a lot about elder Bednars talk from conference about meekness this week. Here's my favorite line: 

"Whereas humility generally denotes dependence upon God and the constant need for His guidance and support, a distinguishing characteristic of meekness is a particular spiritual receptivity to learning both from the Holy Ghost and from people who may seem less capable, experienced, or educated, who may not hold important positions, or who otherwise may not appear to have much to contribute." 

I've thought about this so much this week as I have gone about and done normal missionary work, about how I can learn better from other people. It's something I want to improve at. I'm learning a lot this transfer from my cutest greenie Sorella Pearson, our loving members and our incredible investigators. I feel so grateful for people around me who can help me to learn and grow everyday:) and I invite you all to try to do that this week! Notice the talented people around you and I promise you'll learn something valuable! 

Have a lovely day! 

Love, Sorella McConkie 

Photos... 

Gelato, pizza, and walking through the rain. 🇮🇹

The Trifecta - Lampugnano, Milan, Italy

Hello friends and fam!

I literally have no clue where to start with this week. IT HAS BEEN SO CRAZY. First off, we moved apartments on Thursday and I can quite literally say that it was one of the most frustrating things I've done on my mission, maybe in my life. To those of you familiar with my family's Czech mission saying of "carry your corner," that took on whole new meaning as we ported out corners of a mattress full of bedbugs down 3 flights of stairs and cleaned and cleaned this apartment for 3 straight days. We changed apartments with the Anziani in our district and they left us with an apartment full of mold, bedbugs, and a cockroach under our sink. "The trifecta" as Sorella Pearson and I have called it.

Amidst the chaos and grossness of all of this, Sorella Pearson and I saw so many miracles this week. On Thursday we taught the Restoration for two of our English students who agreed to meet with us. Such a cute Venezuelan couple. Not only had they started reading the Book of Mormon that we gave them, but they agreed to meet with us each week and receive all the lessons! We were so excited!!

Throughout the cleaning days, we got to breathe and go outside a couple times for some appointments that were all so lovely. Our less active woman Michela who we visit often had a birthday! So we made a banner and the three of us ate a cake together.

On Sunday we had a really cool potential named Chantel come to church and we are meeting with her again this week! And we also got to help a blind woman named Laura who I love get home ok on the metro and bus after church. Her husband just passed away and she's going through a really hard time.

On Monday we kicked things off with going to find a referral that got sent to us from Salt Lake for a 17 year old girl named Claudia. We only had an address and no phone number, and she lived more than an hour away, so we went all the way to her house and said a prayer outside her front gate that she would be home so that we could say hi. We rang her doorbell and we were greeted by the cutest Italian teenager who said six times how happy she was to see us and how surprised that we would take the time to come and visit her! We exchanged phone numbers and she said she would love it if we would come back and explain more about Mormonism to her family. She was such a sweetheart.

The biggest miracle out of all of these happened on Monday night, just as we sat down to do studies at about 7:30. The assistants called us and said, "how fast can you both be ready to come teach a lesson with us?" We ran through the rain to meet them and drove together to the house of a woman named Luigia. She had met the missionaries 3 years before and had stopped meeting with them. Since that time, she said that she has felt an absence of something in her life and that now she wants to study with us and be baptized in our church. She said that and all 4 of us kind of dropped our jaws on the floor. We continued to talk with her and confirm that yes, in fact, she wants to be baptized this month. Stuff like this doesn't happen in Italy. But she is amazing and so ready to learn more and we can't wait to teach her and get her ready for baptism so speedy fast!!!

I guess at the end of the day, our gross apartment full of bugs and mold seemed like a very small part of our week compared to the miracles that we were compensated with. I have come so strongly to believe in this principle throughout my life. Just as Peter and the apostles tossed their nets aside and decided to follow Christ and developed the faith and conviction necessary to become his disciples, we also can become greater through the knowledge that God will compensate for our losses. He knows us and what we can handle, and he also knows what will be hard. He knows how challenges will stretch us, but he also knows that throughout righteous pursuits, all our sacrifices will be for our good and we will continue to see only blessings pour out from difficult experiences. This week has been one of the most impactful of my mission. Even though my hard thing this week was cleaning up a dirty apartment, who cares about cockroaches when we get to interact with amazing people everyday?

Vi voglio bene!

Love,
Sorella Evie McConkie

Sorella Pearson chucking our bug infested bedding out of our window.

Celebrating Michela's birthday!

Walking Laura home.

Our celebratory macarons after finding Claudia! 

The Anziani making sure I didn't get wet in the rain

God Directs Our Paths - Lampugnano, Milan, Italy

Buongiorno!!!

Happy Wednesday from Milano! This week has been rainy but happy as we've approached transfer season once again. My greenie and I will be staying together for another transfer! Yay! We are so excited to keep working and growing together. We are also having 3 new elders come into the city making a total of 8 people in our district. Whoa.

We had a lot of experiences this week which helped me to see God's hand in our work. On Friday we had a lunch appointment with a member family, and for some reason my 3 months of directional reasoning and knowledge about this city flew out the window as I got Sorella Pearson and myself so lost again and again on public transport. I was momentarily frustrated as we finally got to the bus station we needed to be at and to see the bus roll away seconds before we ran up and had to wait 30 minutes for the next one. As we were looking at the bus schedule, a woman comes up and sees our tags and starts up a conversation. We talked to her while waiting for the bus and a little more on the bus ride, and ended up giving her a Book of Mormon and explaining a little bit about it. It was a simple experience but it helped me to realize how much God needs us to calm down sometimes and realize that he is putting us where we need to be. It helped me to feel less stressed about circumstances I can't control and more grateful that God is directing my paths so much at this stage in my life:) even if we were an hour and a half late for lunch.

I also adored conference so much. We haven't been able to watch all of it yet, but I wanted to echo the message given by president Nelson and just say how crucial it is to receive our own personal revelation in these latter days. We can't really survive spiritually without it. I loved his talk and also the talk by Elder Wilson, and how the topics of prayer and revelation perfectly coincided with each other.

I love you all and have the happiest week!

Con amore,
Sorella McConkie

Last week when Sorella Stolk came up for her visa

work and I got to have 3 of my comps in once place!! 

Sorella Pearsons Easter/conference cinnamon rolls. So tasty. 

Roller Coaster Adventure Called a Mission - Lampugnano, Milan, Italy

Friends! Fam! I miei cari! 

Happiest of Wednesday's to you all. I hope that everyone is having a lovely lovely day! This week has gone by pretty quickly and here are some highlights: 

1. I got to go back to Vicenza to finish up my visa work! It was so much fun to see people and walk around my old city. We got to the vicenza apartment late Wednesday night and our downstairs neighbor comes out of her door and sees me and says "SORELLA!!!" And I ran up and she gave me a big bear hug and a big fat kiss on the cheek. I got to go inside and talk with her for a minute and I felt so overjoyed that this woman who I thought hated me at the beginning of my mission was actually just going through a hard time and I got to love her and know her over my months of being there. She's the sweetest.  

2. The Anziani in our district had a baptism! We helped them get ready for it this week and we were so happy to welcome Milad into our ward. 

3. We visted again our little investigator boys Jacinto and Andy on Friday, and I've come to adore this family so much. We tried extending a baptismal date to them last transfer, and their mom said no. However, we decided that we are going to try again. So with a lot of a prayer and a lot of preparation, we are going to try again a week and a half from now to convince the mom that her son's are ready and amazing and that baptism is a wonderful thing:) 

I love you all so much! This mission has been so good to me and I am learning so much each day. I am grateful for my Father in Heaven for giving me the investigators I've taught, the companions I've had, the members I've worked with and the cities I've served in, and I'm oh so excited to see what else there is waiting for me on this roller coaster adventure called a mission. 

Have a gorgeous day!

Con amore, 

Sorella McConkie 

Favourite scripture from this week: Alma 5:26 

That They Might Come To Understanding - Lampugnano, Milan, Italy

Buongiorno!!!! 

Happy Wednesday from good old Milano. Things are going well and it's seems like just yesterday we had last week's pday!! Time is odd here. 

This week has been great!! I'm attaching some pictures of some English finding with our Anziani, a photo with some other sorelle and members at stake conference, and a package we made for a girl in our ward who goes into the MTC soon. Sorella Pearson and I have a mutual friend from back home in Utah who is serving a mission right now in Russia, who had always been so good at composing cute things like this, so we decided to "channel our inner Maddie" and make this little package for her to open and feel a tad less overwhelmed while in the Provo MTC where she won't know how go speak English and will feel a little further away from home. 

One of my favorite snapshot moments from this  week was with a member named Lara. She is a blind member who lives alone in a sketchy area and is depressed and has some financial problems but loves coming to church. Another problem that she has expressed is that it's hard because she wants to read the scriptures so badly, but the church hasn't done all the audio versions in Italian yet and that's the only way she can listen to them. We visited her on Monday after weeks of racking our brains as to how to help her, after having some technological attempts fall through, and decided that the best solution for now would be to go and just read the scriptures our loud to her once a week. We went to her house and asked her if that would be an ok plan and she instantly responded with a "yes! Yes! Of course! Immediately! Yes!" And also was so happy and excited that it was our own idea instead of the church telling us to do something for her. We read to her on Monday the first section of the D+C, because that is what she says she wants to learn more about, and this verse stood out to me as we were reading: 

24 Behold, I am God and have spoken it; these commandments are of me, and were given unto my servants in their weakness, after the manner of their language, that they might come to understanding.

That particularly touched my heart. I felt like a instrument in God's hands as we sat across from Lara, and God's prophecies coming into further light as we (the servants in weakness) were able to help someone come to further understanding in their own language. 

Other than that, I don't have too much to report on this week! We found a new investigator to teach, we met with a few struggling investigators and inactives, and have been enjoying the beautiful sunshine. 

Have a gorgeous week! 

Love, sorella McConkie 

I'm attaching some pictures of some English finding with our Anziani, a photo with some other sorelle and members at stake conference, and a package we made for a girl in our ward who goes into the MTC soon.

Week 2 as a mamma

Buongiorno tutti!! 

This week has been one for the books. My cutest greenie Sorella Pearson is doing so well!!! We had a lot of adventures happen this week and I'm learning so much from her and from the members here. 

We are currently on a train back from our pday right now, we went to visit this little town by a lake in our zone and it was beautiful! Pictures to be attached. 

One of my highlights from this week was doing exchanges with our sister training leaders in a different part of Milano. I got to walk around with another sorella and give out books of Mormon, visit a darling member couple, and visit a woman in the hospital. I didn't expect coming on my mission how many times I would go into little Italian hospitals or rest homes to visit people. Often, they are the loneliest and need the most love and support. The woman that we visited has been a member for many years, and we just sat and talked for 30 minutes and shared some of our favourite scriptures together. I shared this one in mosiah:

41 And moreover, I would desire that ye should consider on the blessed and happy state of those that keep the commandments of God. For behold, they are blessed in all things, both temporal and spiritual; and if they hold out faithful to the end they are received into heaven, that thereby they may dwell with God in a state of never-ending happiness. O remember, remember that these things are true; for the Lord God hath spoken it.

The first part of this scripture is my fav. In an email from my mission president this week, he mentioned how it is important to always remember "we cannot achieve perfection without learning to feel joy and to enjoy being happy,". I thought about this as we talked with this old Peruvian woman and more throughout my week, about how reflective it is of God's divine influence when we see people who are striving to be HAPPY. no matter the circumstance, I find that it is often an indicator of those who are trying to learn, listen to God, and love others:) 

LOVE to you all!!

Sorella McConkie