Week 15- Who would have thought...

All the seniors and sisters who worked the sites during Pageant 2019!

Transfers came and went and I'm still here full-time at the sites with Sister Hatfield! Yay!  We went from 100-0 this week. It's been REALLY slow besides a couple EFY groups. It's been nice to get a bit more time to study and recover from the last couple weeks haha. And I forgot how nice it is to take individual tours to really connect with people and get to share your testimony and really focus on them and what they need. 

Sister Hatfield and me at Church!

This week I finished memorizing the entire Living Christ! It has been such an amazing experience. My favorite parts are "He gave his life to atone for the sins of all mankind. His was a great vicarious gift in behalf of all who would ever live upon the earth." and "We bear testimony, as his duly ordained apostles, that Jesus is the living Christ, the immortal son of God. He is the Great King Immanuel, who stands today at the right hand of His Father. He is the light, the life, and the hope of the world. His way is the path that leads to happiness in this life and eternal life in the world to come. God be thanked for the matchless gift of his Divine Son." How beautiful are those phrases? It has strengthened my faith of the Savior and the reality of his existence and his matchless life. 

With one of our favorite senior couples, the Horsleys (from Malad, Idaho).

Now for the title, we were going home from the Whitmer Farm and we caught a ride from one of my favorite senior couples, the Horsley's. They are amazing and always have the most amazing and grateful attitude about the mission and it teaches me so much. We were driving and there was the most beautiful sunset and they said, "who would have thought that today, in 2019, we'd get to be driving home from the Whitmer Farm? How blessed are we?" and it really just hit me like WOW I get to be at these amazing historic sites that people get to visit MAYBE once in their lives, but I get to do it EVERY SINGLE DAY. Then we saw a quote that talked about an Elder in this mission who was having a hard time and prayed to know why he was sent here. That night he had a dream and Joseph appeared to him and told him that he hand-picks the missionaries that serve at his sites. Whether that's true or not I'm so grateful to be able to have this opportunity to be here and serve here. It's amazing to be able to learn so much and help others learn and my testimony of the restoration has grown a TON. I know without a doubt that Jesus Christ and Heavenly Father appeared to Joseph in a grove of trees that's 100 feet from where I am currently writing this email. That Joseph translated the Book of Mormon, and that through that book we have the fullness of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. We are SO BLESSED!

Whitmer Farm--the BEST!

The Whitmer farm chapel and Visitor's center!

Have a marvelous week! 
P.S.  My p-day will be on Wednesday next week.

Love, Sister Potts

Scroll on by if this makes you queasy!  I was finally able to borrow one of the senior couple's vacuums and get rid of the spiders and webs all around our house today.  I counted 40 spiders I vacuumed up!!  No joking!  You know how much I HATE them! and I've been having to kill my own out here--on a daily basis!  Everyone in our house will sleep much better tonight.

FUN FACTS:

1. Luther Howard, who was hired to help the Smith family move from Vermont, tried to steal the family's possessions 100 miles from Palmyra, Mother Smith had to enlist the support of bystanders to get back her things.

2. Sophronia, who was 13 at the time, payed a last family debt with her earrings she was wearing.

3. The Smith family traveled the last 100 miles with a family by the last name of Gates. 

4. On the final part of the journey, one of the Gates boys knocked Joseph out of the wagon and an unidentified stranger carried the 10 year old boy the rest of the way to Palmyra. 

5. The journey from Vermont was 300 miles in the WINTER and took 3-4 weeks--all without Father Smith. 

Week 14- Pageant accomplished!

BEFORE Pageant--ready to go!

Wow this week was CRAZY. 12+ hours a day, a lot of it in 95 degree weather with 100% humidity, talking to thousands of people. I feel like I've been hit by the front runner. I can't even formulate sentences at this point so sorry if this doesn't make sense! The hardest place to serve is at the Smith Farm because it's more physically demanding and yet somehow we were scheduled there 4 TIMES THIS WEEK. Usually it's 2. So sufficeth to say, I have some sweet tan lines, I was pretty close to a mental breakdown for the last couple days (still am 😂😂😂), and I was able to talk to thousands of amazing people. From the day before pageant to the day after I have estimated that I have talked to nearly 40,000 people--in only 2 weeks!  When else will I be able to have that experience? I was able to complete meeting people from all 50 states too, and probably 12 countries! It's been hard but good.

AFTER Pageant!  Still smiling (mostly).

Some funny/cool experiences: I had a lady come up to me and ask me if I was from outside the states because I had an accent she's never heard before, she was wondering if I was swedish? It was really funny I was like, uhhhh, no I'm from Utah--haha. I also met John Bytheway and started talking to his daughter and told her I kind of wanted to get a picture with her dad but then I chickened out and he walked away. Well an hour later I'm eating dinner and he comes downstairs looking for me because she told him I wanted a picture--I was SO embarrassed but thankful. 

John Bytheway :)

We also had quite a few crazy rainstorms and one day we were hunkering down in the barn with another 100 people singing restoration hymns which was awesome. There was also a lady who just came up to us and started telling us all the amazing circumstances surrounding her conversion which was awesome.

Another day it was about 8 pm and it had slowed down so I was doing some scriptures study on a bench on the Smith farm and this dad and daughter walked by and were like, wow what better place to to your scripture study and I had to take a moment and think, wow, really though!!

Scripture study at the Smith Farm.

Have a great week everyone, and remember that you are loved and that the Savior loves us more than we can imagine. 

Love, Sister Potts

P.S. I reached my 3-month mark on the 17th during Pageant.

Book of Mormon Publication Site!

FUN FACTS: 

1. In printing rooms they keep the type in cases and the upper-case held the Capital letters and the lower case held the small letters which is where they got the names uppercase and lowercase!!

2. The ink they used to print the book of Mormon is really thick like peanut butter.

3. The Smith family once won an award for making the most maple sugar in a season.

4. Back then they used to make their beehives from hollowed out logs covered in a board and secured by a rock.

5. The Smith family had about 10,000 trees on the 100 acres they bought, they cleared about 2/3 of it. 

Week 13 - 3 Sisters 'Dead on the Floor'

Pageant week one- ✔. 

Sister Hatfield and me at our post and ready to testify!

Sufficeth to say, on our 'chaos chart' this week 'three sisters dead on the floor' was put more than once.  At the Smith Farm alone on Friday I met about 10,000 people! The record for any day prior to this is 3,000 people!  Wow!  For all 3 days of pageant I got to testify to over 15,000 people about the restoration of the gospel--how amazing is that?!  Thankfully the weather was good or that would have been pretty miserable! 

This is a picture that someone posted from last year showing the sisters 'dead on the floor' haha!
Those 12-hour days and thousands of visitors are what we have been training for, but it's still exhausting!

We aren't allowed to see pageant which is kind of a bummer but it's fun meeting all the cast and everyone coming to see pageant! I've become obsessed with hearing where everyone is from and I have met people from 47 of the 50 states just since the 9th! Cool huh? Also people from Canada, China, Japan, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Honduras, Mexico, Venezuela, Ghana, and more! How incredible to see people from all over the world coming to unite in a common cause with a common faith and to see how the gospel has spread all over the world. 

One of my favorite views from the Smith Farm! When they built the Palmyra Temple, they cut a clearing out of the trees so it can be seen from here.  The Palmyra Temple is actually on part of the Smith's land.  I've been spending about half the week at the Smith Farm lately which includes the old log home (where Joseph read James 1:5 and Moroni appeared to him),  the frame home they built later on (where they were living when Joseph got the gold plates), and the Sacred Grove (as well as a few other barns and buildings).  Incredible spirit here!

One of the hardest parts has been because, you know, 12-hour days on your feet, but hopefully that won't be what I remember. Can't wait to see what this next week has in store! One more week of pageant!  Then next Monday or Tuesday is transfers and we'll see where I end up going from here (or staying).

A fun thing that happened this week was one little girl at the Smith Farm came up and gave me a hug and I was like awww and her Dad was like "sorry, we just came from Disneyland and so she's used to hugging all the princesses." AWWWWW I died haha. 

Love, Sister Potts

FUN FACTS:

1. It's likely that Father Smith first considered New York from a newspaper article advertising land.

2. When the Smith's traveled to NY they had 8 kids ranging in age from 17 to under 1.

3. Lucy had to make the 300 mile journey in the winter alone with her 8 kids.

4. Joseph Sr arranged for a man named Caleb Howard to make the trip with Mother Smith, but he was terrible, if you want to read more about it read Saints! ;)

5. Mr Howard even knocked 10 y.o. Joseph out of the wagon for several days while he was still recovering from his surgery.

More from Mom:  Bruce and I took Jacob out to see the pageant and sites this past weekend since this will most likely be our last chance to go see the pageant before it ends and Jacob attends a semester at BYU-I and then on to a mission. Bruce had also never seen the sites or the pageant.  It was such a beautiful place!  We were there on their busiest, record-breaking day!  Unfortunately, we weren't able to see Emily (at the mission president's request) and had to avoid going to where she was assigned each day, which is not for the faint of heart, I can assure you!  My momma heart was nearly breaking and overflowed several times, but I consoled myself by taking pictures of all the other sister missionaries (and giving them big momma hugs) so I could share pictures of them on the mission facebook page or by texting their moms.  Thankfully other kind souls texted us these sweet pictures of my missionary this past week:

Bruce's Uncle Terry (Duffin) made a surprise visit
to see Sister Potts while he was in the area last week!

Sent the day before we arrived:  "Thanks for letting your daughters serve :-). 
We are from Phoenix and ran into them yesterday and today at two of the sites we were visiting. 
Two of my children are missing from the picture, but I was able to get most of them. 
Your missionaries were some of their favorites!"  💖

Friday (our first day there):  "Your beautiful missionary is sharing her time with us today. 
Love the Maughan's from Colorado Springs, Colorado.  Our Sister Missionary is in Kirtland, OH." 
She gave her a mom's hug from me when she found out I was there but unable to see her.

"Look who we found at the Smith Farm! 
She said they broke the record of visitors at half way through the day. 
Busy, busy missionary!  The saints are here in hoards today!"

From Saturday:  "Greetings from Cumorah.  My wife and I got to meet your daughters at the Visitor Center yesterday.  They are happy & doing well.  We served in this mission 7 years ago.  We had a Sister Julia Potts, from Price serve with us.  We are from Layton.  Pageant was great!"

Sunday from a friend of Bruce's:  "Look who I see!! :)"

Monday:  "Sister Potts & Sister Hatfield - What sweet Missionaries!!"
Good to see them smiling even during pageant and even though we didn't get to see them in person!

Week 12 - Pain and Panic, reporting for duty!

Well people, it's about to get CRAZY here at the sites! Pageant is in t minus 3 days and it's going to be exciting. Hopefully the pain and panic will be more than made up for by getting to talk to tons of people and testifying to thousands! 

Sword from the original pageant around 80 years ago!

Fourth of July was fun, the temple and senior missionaries had a big breakfast, then the Seniors serving with us at the Smith Farm provided a TON of food which was great. But it was SO slow we were so restless and trying to think of ANYTHING to do which is nice once and a while because you get lots of studies in. The 12-hour days are honestly a daily miracle I don't know how we manage to do it every single day without DYING but somehow the days end and you do it again the next day! It's definitely one of the Lord's blessings for missionaries. 

4th of July celebrations!

There's this really nice guy in the Rochester YSA who's taking the lessons and he comes to the sites EVERY SINGLE DAY. He is golden! I guess he's on date to be baptized, and he comes and talks to the senior Elders and asks questions and gets clarification on things he's confused about and we get to help. I'm so excited for him! 

Playing dress-up at the log home

Also the Hill Cumorah Pageant cast is all showing up! There's nearly 800 cast plus crew so it's crazy! But we got to take a backstage tour which was really cool I had no idea how HUGE it is! My Lyceum conductor is here for the pageant so when I ran into him he showed up later with his cello and a violin and we played a couple duets. It was fun!

Hill Cumorah Pageant stage!

Well that's about it, we'll see if I'm still alive by next Monday--wish us all luck! :)

Love, Sister Potts

FUN FACTS:

1. In 1802, Mother Smith became really sick with Tuberculosis and nearly died, but made a remarkable recovery.

2. When the Smiths were first married they were actually well-off financially, but they got cheated out of their money and struggled for the rest of their lives.

3. Joseph Sr taught school in the Winters in Vermont to help provide for his family.

4. After Joseph's surgery he had to use crutches for 3 years.

5. The year 1816 was known as the "year without a summer" or "1800 and froze to death" Because a volcano eruption in Indonesia threw off the weather patterns. This caused several years of crop failure for the Smiths forcing them to move!

Bonus Picture/Story:

There was a guy who came into the Grandin and asked to cut through to the Pizza place. The Senior sister joked that he could if he brought us something, but came back with two pizzas and a soda! 

More Bonus Pictures Mom found on the new mission president's Instagram page :)

Week 11- Birthday Miracles

The Big 20!

and I finally took my 2-month picture (only 10 days late)

Hello all, this has been a great, crazy week! My birthday was on Thursday and I was a little worried not having my family there but it ended up being awesome. The other sisters in my house woke me up with breakfast (chocolate chip pancakes), I got to go on a run and doll myself up, and then I got to spend the day at the Smith Farm and Sacred Grove! One of the Senior couples brought cupcakes and ice cream, another got us fries and ice cream, our Site President and his wife brought two containers of cookies and ice cream sandwiches, and an office sister I share a b-day with brought a fancy fruit tart along with flowers and a package from my family! I have never eaten so many sweets or felt so loved, so it was great. 

A surprise bouquet and teddy bear from my momma!

Ignore my face--I was just really touched or something
but you can see some of my birthday spoil haha. 

One of the tours we gave that day was a non-member young adult who just saw a sign on the freeway and decided to come (WHAAAAT?). On the tour was also a young family with kids so we just taught super simply and basically taught the restoration. We made sure he didn't have any questions, then let him into the grove. We went to dinner, but apparently he came back into the welcome center and asked if the church had any literature!!!! Of course we do! The Seniors gave him a Book of Mormon and a copy of the Testimony of Joseph Smith and sent him on his way. It definitely made my day. 

Go Smith Farm!!

Another neat tour was at the Whitmer Farm Saturday, it was a family from Finland! First off, the language is super fascinating. They taught us how to count to three! They were really funny and then after the tour they just walked into the chapel, one guy walked up to the piano and started playing Be Still My Soul (the tune of Finlandia haha) then had us sing hymns with them it was super neat. 

I started making a list of the countries I've had people visit from and it just struck me so hard how amazing it is. I was serving where the church was organized which is literally in the middle of nowhere, and now the church has spread to all 4 corners of the earth. I know without a doubt that something that started in the middle of cornfields in New York could never have spread that far if it wasn't the true church of God. 

Me with my awesome companion, Sister Hatfield!

Have a great week and remember to read the Book of Mormon!

Love, Sister Potts

FUN FACTS:

1. Ancestors of both Smith parents fought in the Revolutionary War

2. Joseph Smith Sr was the third of 11 children!

3. Joseph Sr. was 6'2'' about 200 lbs, and was famed as a wrestler. 

4. Mother Lucy was the youngest of 8 children

5. Mother Smith had two siblings die within months of each other when Lucy was 19, and to console her, her brother took her to Vermont where she met Joseph Sr.