6 months

Dear All,
Another week has flown by! I hit six months tomorrow! This week we have been meeting a lot with the Meenas. We finally found a member of the church who can translate Hindi so that Nirma (the wife) can be interviewed. Hey had their interview Saturday night and will be baptized on April 1st. They are so excited!! A family in our ward, the Olsens, invited the Meenas over for dinner on Friday night and the girls loved it. Everytime we see them they can't stop talking about their "best friends".
Sad news, right after the cherry blossoms arrived, so did the snow....on Tuesday there was so much snow and the roads were pretty bad and so we weren't allowed to drive. Sister Cleaver and I decided to take the bus to a member's house that was out in the middle of nowhere at the edge of our area (our area is really big). She ended up not being home and so we just tracted her neighborhood for a couple hours. It was dark, windy and snowy so we decided to start making our way back home. We got to the main road and realized we had gotten directions to the place we were at, but not home.....we waited for about 30 minutes out there and no bus came. We decided we would say a prayer because we needed to get home soon and it was late. So we said a prayer asking that we would find a bus to take us. We started walking again and 1 minute later a bus came! It was the wrong bus headed in the opposite direction but he stopped asking us where we were going and told us where to go. It was a really cool experience. I know Heavenly Father is aware of every circumstance and is always there to help us. On Thursday we had zone Conference. It was a different one than usual, but I learned a lot. It was all about humility and obedience. There was so much love in that meeting. Something I came across while I was studying this week is about our will and recognizing that all we have comes from Heavenly Father. It says "If you dedicate your gifts and talents, you only return to Him what He already has given to you. If you pay tithing you only return to Him a tenth of what he has already given to you. Everything that you have to give to the Lord, has its origin in Him, except one thing: your will. He does not have your heart, nor your mind, unless you give them to Him. It is the only gift you have to offer that He does not already have. And so when you give yourself, you truly give everything to Him".
We can become so much more when we are humble enough to put our trust in Heavenly Father and align our will with His will. It's definitely not always easy, but He can turn us into more than we can imagine! Have a great week!!
Love, Sister Haertling

top picture:  Roomates

middle picture:  The Meena family

bottom picture:  Georgetown cupcakes 

Hello

Dear everyone,This week we had the opportunity to be trained by brother Hodges andBrother Marc Lusvardi who is in charge of all of the visitor centersaround the world. It was great! We had a training for all the VCsisters on Friday and Saturday, and then for the rest of the week theyworked one on one with us and our companions. We did a lot of roleplaying and practicing how to be better missionaries in the visitorscenter. I learned a lot from it and brother Lusvardi is always so funto be around.We have been meeting with a guy named Sam who is about 28. He ismarried and we tracted in to him about a week ago. He said that he wasinterested in learning more, and so we met with him on Wednesday. Ithought he looked familiar but I didn't know where from. At the end ofthe lesson he was telling us about how he had gone through a roughtime in his life, but was in a support group/program that took himthrough steps to come closer to God and overcome addiction. I told himabout how a recent convert in our ward (Marty) who is about 60 yearsold is in a group like that and we are close friends. He knew exactlywho we were talking about, they were in the same exact group and thenit clicked where I knew Sam from! 4 and a half months ago I saw Samacross the room at one of the Meetings I went to with Marty and SisterFreeman at the meeting Sam was talking about. I never talked to him,but he stood out to me because he was the only person below 50 at themeeting besides us. Then he recognized me too and said he rememberedus coming to the meeting and wondering . It was really cool to see howthere are people all around and you never know who is looking for theexact thing that we have and know to be true.We got to have dinner at a woman's house in our ward, sister Lee. Sheis from Hungary and lives in an apartment on the 24th floor and so youcan see over all of the city even to downtown DC. She made traditionalHungarian food, which was actually really good. She joined the churchabout 2 years ago and is in her 70s.On Sunday the Meenas came to church again! All of the girls lovecoming to class and have made a lot of friends there which is great!They have their interview this week to be baptized and are reallyexcited. We were a little bit nervous about the last part of the 10commandments when we were teaching them is week because of tithing. Wetaught them about why we pay tithing and then asked them what theyunderstood. Lokesh answered and he said, "I contribute 10% of myincome and sacrifice and then God will bless me and my family". Theirfaith is amazing.On Saturday night we had a huge youth fireside at the visitors centerdown in the auditorium. Al Carraway came from Utah (she's the one withthe amazing conversion story and has a book I think it's called thetattoo'd Mormon) to speak and there was a huge turnout! Over 700 youthcame. We filled up every seat in the big auditorium and every otherroom with a screen in it upstairs to broadcast it. We got to meet herafterwards and talk about her life.It's been really cold this week and is supposed to snow a lottomorrow....I hope the weather forecast is wrong though! Have a greatweek!Love, Sister Haertling

Dear all,
It's amazing seeing spring begin to bloom here in DC! I can't wait for
all of the cherry blossoms. There are quite a few blooming, and then
the first week of April we get to all be in the Cherry Blossom parade
which will be really fun. On Tuesday we had specialized training for
the 6 new missionaries. It's a 6 hour meeting that only the new
missionaries and their trainers go to with President and sister
Johnson. It's always good to be able to meet with president and sister
Johnson. They are the best. On Thursday we found out that the Meena
family was in the hospital with their little girl Avni who has been
battling Leukemia. We called Lokesh (the dad) and spoke with him about
how they were doing and if they needed anything. He told us that he
would really like a blessing for Avni just so she could be comfortable
and have the strength to eat again. We got permission to go to
downtown DC with some members in our ward to the hospital. When we
walked in Avni was barely sitting up on the bed and every time she
tried leaning over on her hands, her arms would give out on her. It
was so sad to see. We brought her some flowers and snacks for their
family while they were in the hospital. She loves Lego friends and so
we played those with her for a while. The member in our ward gave her
a blessing and I could feel the spirit so strongly. I especially felt
that same overwhelming feeling of love that I felt the first time we
met with their family. It helps me understand (in the most basic way
possible) a small amount of what our Heavenly Father feels for us. I
am so grateful for the Meena family. They weren't able to come to
church on Sunday because they had just gotten home from the hospital
the night before. That night they told us that they were so thankful
for the blessing and that Avni was finally eating again. The text he
sent us said, "thank you again for coming last night. Avni is doing
much better and our prayers have been answered. We know that God is
watching over our family". I love being able to witness their faith
start to grow. On Friday morning we finally got to meet with a mother
named Miriam. We have been trying to contact her since I first got to
the mission and just now got ahold of her. She has three kids, and her
youngest son who is two years old has epilepsy. She has read parts of
the Book of Mormon before and just hasn't made time to learn more. We
taught her more about the plan of salvation and the steps that we need
to take in order to live with God and our families again forever. We
talked about the gospel of Jesus Christ mainly, and focused on faith
and baptism. She wants to be baptized especially with her kids and so
we set a date for the middle of April. We are so excited for her to
start coming to church and meeting more regularly with us. On Saturday
we had called our bishop to ask him a question and he mentioned a
ladies name that he thought might like a visit. So we went over that
morning and she was really excited to see some company. She lost her
husband 6 years ago and hasn't been to church hardly at all since
then. She said she has been praying for strength to come back. She has
2 kids and is one of the kindest and successful people I know. It was
a really nice visit and she told us about her friend down the street
who is looking for the right church to join and so we are going to
visit her this week. This week was really great, we have been doing a
lot of metro contacting. When I was in the first couple months of my
mission I really didn't like it, but I actually love metro contacting
now. We have our little metro cards that let us go on the metro
whenever we want, we sit at different parts of the metro and talk to
people about their day and get to share our testimony. Most of them
are usually pretty nice and open. s there's always the grumpy ones who
don't want anything to do with you once they see our tags, but I just
be overly friendly to them and it makes them even more mad haha!
Actually there was one time this week where we were just getting off
the metro and I went up to a guy around 20 years old and he looked
really mad. I asked him how his day was and introduced myself and
sister Cleaver. He just rolled his eyes and I stuck my hand out to
shake his and he gave me a look as if I just asked him to do some
incredibly difficult task. I thought it was pretty funny. Then I
invited him to come to the visitors center and he said some really not
so kind words haha. I just gave him a big smile and we walked away.
Usually that situation would've bothered me, but it doesn't so much
anymore. It helps remind me of the things the Savior did while he was
here on the earth. He faced so much rejection and MUCH more than we
will ever go through. I am so grateful for him and everything that he
has done for me. Missionary work is amazing, but can be difficult, but
that's because we are representatives of Jesus Christ and in being
such, requires us to walk a small SMALL path of that of the Savior. It
is the greatest blessing to know that we never have to walk alone and
He always is there to guide us in whatever we are going through!
Love, Sister Haertling

Top Picture:  Hiking on Pday
Bottom Picture:  Visiting the Meena's