Hats, hats, and more hats, along with some scarves and gloves!

With the icy cold weather setting in it was time to pull out my winter stuff, then I realized, I don't really have much winter stuff! So, I decided the cheapest way to fix that problem was to make my own hats, scarves and gloves! I have had so much fun creating new patterns and creations with cheap yarn! They have turned out so cute and I have gotten several complements from strangers on how cute they are, not to mention my friends and family that have seen them just love them! If I could afford more expensive yarn, they would be even cuter I am sure! Also, over the Thanksgiving break my step-mom taught me how to knit, which I have been wanting learn for a very long time! I am way excited to develop my knitting skills so I can make lots of cute sweaters! I love sweaters but they are so expensive, I can make them for a lot less and they will hopefully be a better quality!

Naomi McIntosh

Naomi was and still is one of the dearest and most amazing people I know! She is what missionaries would call "Golden." She was definitely prepared by the Lord for us to teach her! A little background to her story, she was very involved in the community and the Christian Appilation Project. The area she lived in was very poor and there were very few members there. The missionaries had been taken out of the area and the Church really struggled to have any sort of presence there. About 8 months before I got there the sister missionaries were finally put back into the area. The only people that attended church when the missionaries first got back into the area were the Branch President and the Missionaries. The missionaries did a lot of work reactivating the members there. One of the rules in that area was that missionaries were not allowed to go tracting (knocking on doors) because people were known to shoot unknown or unannounced visitors. One of the ways the missionaries found to find people and develop relationships with the community is through clogging. Clogging was a major community event/hobby. Naomi was not a clogger but she was always at the community clogging lessons and events. The first Sunday I was in the area we went to the Fire Station down the street from our little house we lived in where they were having a community clogging lesson. Naomi was there, the first time I saw her I knew that if she wasn't a member yet that she needed to be. I knew of all the past problems that area had had so I was a little cautious about who I approached and what I said as to not offend someone. When I asked my companion that night about Naomi she told me that the missionaries had asked her several times if she would be interested in hearing more about the Church and always declined. Feeling a little frustrated we went about our other missionary work and I kept praying that we would find a way to teach Naomi. The answer came in the most unexpected way!!! We taught a weekly class that was supposed to be for the community but always ended up being the same few less active members that came. One week we challenged the class to each invite someone to come to class the following week. We told them that we would invite someone as well. When the expected date came, we had 2 guests in our class, they were Naomi and her husband Virgil. After we taught what was our first discussion, I went up to talk to Naomi and see what she thought of our lesson. Her response was..."Why hasn't anyone ever told me about the Book of Mormon before?!!!!" I just smiled and said, "Well, we have told you now and here is your very own copy!" Over the next few weeks we continued to teach her and she just soaked it up like a sponge! She would take our lessons and condense them into one or two sentences and one day I remember after we taught her about the plan of salvation she said, "that is so simple, even a child could understand that!" We just smiled and told her that was exactly right! She was baptized and now she has been through the temple! She is currently the Relief Society President in the branch! I am so proud of her and grateful for her example to me! When I left the area we were up to about 25-30 people at church each week! I think they are down to about 20 now, but they have had a lot of people move and some branch boundary changes that have effected their numbers, along with some other issues, but despite all of the struggles this area has with keeping the Church strong, Naomi has been strong and hasn't let it shake her testimony!

Here is a recipe similar to what Naomi taught me. She didn't measure a single thing, so I had to look up a recipe to get an idea of what amounts she was actually using.

2 cups corn meal
1/4 cup butter (don't use margarine, it has too much water in it)
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
1 cup buttermilk

Grease an iron skillet and preheat in a 400 degree oven
Mix the dry ingredients and then add the wet. Mix well.
Pour the mixture into the hot skillet. Bake until golden brown. About 20 minutes.

Note: This isn't the sweet cornbread that most of us are use to but it is so good! It goes well with beans or anything else that you would eat cornbread with, it just doesn't have all the sweetness! I absolutely love it!

Michelle Wenrick

I have been thinking of a dear friend today so I thought I would write a little about her. This is a mission story, so if anyone is tired of hearing mission stories, you can surely pass this up, but if you want to learn about an amazing woman, feel free to continue reading! Michelle was to say the least, an interesting person when we met her. I was serving in London, KY with Sisters Dixon and Galliano, we were out delivering some media one day and drove past a road out in the middle of nowhere! Sister Dixon mentioned that she thought there was a member who lived on that road and so I spent the rest of the car ride to our appointment looking through the ward list to see if I could find someone who lived on that road. I finally found it and on the way home we decided to stop by and visit the member. We drove all the way to the end of the road and that was where we finally found the address we were looking for. We were a little hesitant if we should go down the long dark driveway, since we were out in the middle of nowhere Kentucky where people were known to shoot strangers on their property. We decided to proceed and when we got to the end of the driveway we found a lone trailer. When the car came to a stop we were surrounded by several large dogs. We slowly got out of the car and a man came out on the front steps of the trailer. He called to the dogs and then said, "Sisters, how nice to see you, come on in!" We were shocked, this man knew who we were even though we showed up unannounced and we had never met him before! We went into this humble home and there met Grizz and Judy and their guests, Tony and Michelle. They were all glad to see us and welcomed us warmly. They had been working on some quilts they were making for Christmas presents and they were having trouble with the sewing machines. They asked if any of us knew anything about sewing machines, I said I knew a little and I got to work on trying to fix one of the sewing machines. Sister Galliano and Sister Dixon talked to them and found out that Judy was a member, Grizz was not and didn't ever plan to be but supported the ideals of the church. Tony and Michelle lived up the street and were good friends with Judy and Grizz. They also had a 13 year old daughter Stephanie. They were worried about Stephanie and some of the friends she had and the direction she was going in life. Judy and Grizz had told them what a great youth program our church had and wanted them to get Stephanie involved. We set an appointment to go teach Stephanie, however Michelle and Tony would also be there. We left with high hopes of bringing this family to the gospel. When we got to their home for our appointment Michelle informed us that she had made us dinner because Judy had told her how little money missionaries had and she loved to cook for people. We started the evening teaching what we called the Timeline discussion. They all seemed slightly disinterested in the message that we were sharing, which getting any sort of focus from them was a challenge because there were so many dogs in their tiny trailer that you had to step over at least 2 just to get from the front door to the couch. Anyway, we taught the discussion and Michelle seemed to be the most interested in what we were sharing with them. At the end of the discussion one of my companions asked Michelle if she would commit to being baptized. Well, Michelle didn't take that too well and told us that we would have dinner and then we would never be allowed back into their home. We calmly asked her if she would pray about it and she agreed and we set another appointment to come back to teach them. We had dinner and ended the evening quite peacefully. We continued to teach the family but Stephanie was having a hard time grasping what we taught them and Tony just wasn't interested in what we had to say. He mostly sat quietly and listened but we could tell that he wasn't accepting what we were teaching. Michelle on the other had, had plenty of questions and we were able to answer all of them. She had gone to just about every type of church there was and had asked basically all of the same questions of all of them. When they got tired of trying to answer her questions she stopped going. She had been baptized 3-4 times in different churches and it took her a while before she understood why she needed to get baptized again. We had promised at our first appointment that we would never mention the "B" word in her home again and we pretty much kept to that promise. We worked with her to help her quit smoking, which her family had strong objections to because she had tried before and became a very unpleasant person to be around! Well, we never saw any issues with her attitude or behavior, in fact she seemed to go the other direction and became more pleasant. Just before Sister Galliano was to go back to Temple Square we attended a Relief Society Enrichment meeting. At the end of the lesson they asked who would like to volunteer to bring food for the next month's meeting, Michelle was the first to raise her hand. We knew at that point that she was ready to be baptized. Sister Dixon and I approached her and asked her if she would be baptized on Sunday, without hesitation she agreed. We quickly set the plans in motion and continued to prepare her for her baptism in a few days. That Sunday was a beautiful day! Michelle was so happy, which was somewhat of an unusual characteristic for her. When she came up out of the water she let out a "hoot" of joy. Afterward she walked around the church as if she was walking on clouds. She came up to me and said "Sister Richardson, I feel so perky! I am not a perky person! But I think I like it!" From that day on, whenever we saw Michelle she was generally a more happy person! When she had questions she would ask, and search out the answers. She was so wonderful! I could probably write an entire book about Michelle and all of the great experiences I had with her!
About a year after we started teaching Michelle and her family,and a couple of days after I cam home from my mission, Michelle was killed in a car accident. I miss her tons and I can't wait until the day I get to see her again and rejoice in our reunion!

Random Pictures

Here are some of my favorite pictures.

My first recipe...or post

Well, I noticed that a lot of my friends have blogs and I thought maybe I would make one too. I am not sure what it will really come out to be...but hopefully I will have fun with it! I decided I needed a new addiction besides facebook as well. It may take me a little while before I get things where I would like them to be but I am excited to start on this new little adventure. I hope you like my title. I love to bake and cook so I thought that this would be a fun way to connect my interests and my life. Anyway...more to come soon!