Good morning!

  It has been a good morning. I went to bed early last night, woke up at 6 this morning, had fun doing laundry with the Hermanas, and even went for a jog. This morning there have been a lot of beautiful big clouds across the sky. :) I like clouds. I hope they turn into rain clouds eventually. :) I loved your email this morning, Mom. Thanks for the update on the family and the events of last week. You had a bit of rain and thunder this morning? Sounds very pleasant. I've actually noticed a few trees that have leaves that have turned a bit orange and brown. Does California get a Fall? Or has it just been so hot that the leaves are feeling it? It has been very pretty to see them. Haha, we did hear about the BYU game. All of the missionaries in our stake had a meeting with the stake presidency yesterday morning and they couldn't resist bringing it up. The ward party sounded so fun. Congrats on your jacket Emma. Cool! Send me pictures. Personally, I would take choir tour over Costa Rica any day. ;) Do choir tour! It's the BEST! I wish I had had a chance to go to it more than just my senior year. Emma, you got asked to Homecoming! Ah!!! Tell me about it! That's so fun! When is it? You'll look so pretty, and have so much fun. Congrats Nathan! I'm been thinking about you. I'm so proud of you and excited for you. - Not about eating the worm though. :P  Please tell Katie and Jacob and Christian and Natalie that I say congratulations. Exciting stuff. I love babies. Here in the Moorpark 1st ward we have a baby blessing almost every other week!

  So...now to missionary work. This week was so great. Sister Evans and I worked so hard. We pushed through the heat and the sweat and focused on having a "Spirit of Diligence" at every moment. And we saw miracles! We were able to have many amazing lessons this week with different investigators and members of the ward, we found a few more people that are interested in learning more, we received a ton of referrals from the Hermanas and contacted 10 of them, we studied and grew, and we had a lot of fun doing it. You know that feeling you get when you've been walking around Disneyland all day and you slide into the Candy Cane Inn covers to go to bed and your feet ache, but it feels so good because you put in a good day? Yeah, I got that feeling a few times this week. I loved it. When we work hard to do the Lord's work you really do find peace, joy, and strength. Hooray for learning to have a "Spirit of Diligence."

  We had a lesson with J. on Saturday with a member from our ward and it went really well. We taught him about keeping the Sabbath Day Holy and testified and shared a lot of the blessings that we have seen in our lives from going to church each week and setting apart the Sabbath Day. Jo. came to church on Sunday! The ward members were all really friendly and welcomed him. He is sincerely investigating the church and wants to know if it's true. He said he would come back next week, and we will be having lessons with him this Wednesday and Saturday.

  Random facts and fun or funny moments of the week:

~During companion study on Tuesday we heard a THUNK and saw a small little bird fall down to our balcony after hitting the sliding glass door. It looked so helpless and we felt bad for it as it laid there looking stunned. But it didn't look like it had broken anything. It was stuck in the crack, so we put on some work gloves, carefully picked it up and put it in an Easter basket someone left in the closet. We watched it for a few minutes so that it could "re-coop." Then, it looked around at us, lifted it's wings and flew away. It was a really funny way to start off the day.

~We were walking through some apartments and we stopped to talk to a man who was standing by his garage. I saw a Prince of Persia poster on the wall, so we used that to start the conversation. Turns out he was Italian and had a very strong accent. He told us, in a very strong Italian accent, "How do two beautiful girls like you end up being missionaries?! You should be on TV and modeling." Awkward moments...Those seem to happen a lot in Moorpark. The accent made it so funny though!

~I made cheese enchiladas this week! Yay! I loved it. I enjoyed making them while listening to my CD, and then eating them while reading Mom's letter.

  So guess what? This week on Wednesday marks a year from the day I first went through the Temple. :) It's special to me. We're going to watch Mountain of the Lord during lunch to celebrate. That is also the day that I started writing in my journal. I'm excited to be able to look back at a year ago. General Conference is coming up! I'm already getting so excited. I love General Conference.

  Well, I hope you're all having a fantastic September and that work, school, family, friends, hobbies, goals, etc, are all going really well. Have a wonderful week.

I love you!

Love, Mel (Sister Hardman)

I made cheese enchiladas this week! :) I thoroughly enjoyed eating them while reading your letter, Mom. :) (And my "Cars Cup" - Thanks Lisa, I carry it around with me all over the apartment and fill it with water every five seconds.)