Damage after the dog bite!

                                          What a big calf!  (And dad added, which one? haha)

Dearest Family and Friends,

What a week full of exciting adventures and shenanigans!

I'll start with the most exciting event of the week. So it was just a normal day of proselyting, hitting the streets, knocking on doors, etc.  I wanted to go see Rebecca, an investigator who lives way out in the midst of the potato fields.  So we went, and Rebecca's got these 5 huge dogs.  A few look like some sort of big German Shepard mix, one is a Great Dane-St.Bernard mix.  So they're some big dogs.  We've gone to her house a few times to knock, she's not home very often, but the dogs are always running around outside. They always bark a lot and aren't particularly loving or friendly dogs, but they usually just bark, and they let us pet them. This time, we went up to the door as usual, knocked, nobody was home, so we turned to leave, walking calmly and carefully through the crowd of big, protective dogs.  A few of them started barking at each other and getting riled up, and one ran behind me as I was walking, and I felt a sharp pain on the back of my right leg.  It felt like the dog had kind of jumped up and clawed my leg with his paw, but I just kept walking to the car.  Once safely in the car, I realized that my leg really hurt.  I pulled my boot off and my tights up to see that I had been bitten.  Badly.  Seeing the hole and the blood begin to come made me panic more than the pain did.  But I stayed calm as I drove off, having to use every ounce of self control I had not to drive the car over the dog that had just bitten me. Luckily, home (the Nickell's house) wasn't too far, so we went there and Sister Nickell bandaged me all up while I called the mission doctor. He gave me instructions and I was to receive antibiotics, which Sister Nickell picked up for me while we went out proselyting again. I was limping the rest of that night, but luckily it healed pretty quickly and now I'm walking just fine again :) But I've got a battle scar now! haha. 

So Sister Leasi left the incident unscathed, but now she is the one afraid of every dog we come in contact with. She asks everyone "does it bite?" "will it bite me?" like there was this teenie cute little labrador puppy, and she was like "aahh does it bite?!?" I'm like, oh my gosh, I'm the one who got bitten, I should be the one afraid. But I'm just not. I've never been afraid of dogs. In fact, I really want to go back to that one house with the dog that bit me. For revenge, of course. A baseball bat would do the trick. SORRY,  that was really violent and un-Chrsit-like.  But Christ did say, "Love thy Neighbor". He never said anything about the neighbor's dog. lol.

The weather here has been so nice! Yesterday it was super windy. We saw a baby cow!

Yep, 6 month mark coming up soon. It's a tradition to burn an article of clothing at 6 months, 1 year, 18 months, etc. Don't ask me why. That's a waste, if you ask me. But nevertheless, I'll think about doing it. Maybe I'll burn a hair tie or something.

Some of the baptismal dates that we have with investigators are starting to look uncertain....but we will work as hard as we can to help them progress towards Christ!  The longer I'm here, the more I'm realizing the amazing power of God and also the startling power of the adversary.  Satan wants nothing more than to stop people from gaining a testimony and coming to Christ.  He does everything in his power to stop people from coming to church, praying, reading scriptures, all of those essential things.  But he only succeeds if we let him.  It's up to us!

I just finished the most delicious Wendy's bacon blue-cheese burger. I highly recommend it. 

Thank you for the letters, emails, treats, and love. I am so grateful for the wonderful people Heavenly Father has put in my life.  

Report: I haven't bitten my nails in THREE WEEKS. Be proud of me. Hardest thing of my life. 

God Bless,

Sister Moreland