September and Transfer Calls!!!

Dear Family,

Wow! It has been an amazing, crazy, super fun, one of a kind week! I
realize that I have sent some pathetically short emails the last few
weeks, so I will try to make up for it today. Story time!
Last Monday, we cut our PDay short because we were helping a single
mom with five kids set up her school room to get ready for the
homework to come piling in. We got pretty far, but we're going to go
help her finish tonight. It was super awesome! Then she took us out to
dinner at our Ward Mission Leader's new food truck! He is Mexican and
his life long dream has been to have a restaurant. Well, he is just
starting out now with a food truck, but if they do well enough, he
will expand. I think they will do well. The food is so good!
Tuesday we started off the morning with a new investigator! He had
been meeting with missionaries back in New Jersey, (just miles from
where I was in Medford!) but, he had unexpectedly needed to go to
Vietnam for six weeks for his mother in laws funeral. Well, he finally
got back to the U.S. and ended up moving here. Then, he got back in
touch with the Jersey Sisters and they called us. Whew! Long story
short, he is golden! He is so ready to hear the gospel and he is
amazing! We taught him the Restoration and he loved it! When we gave
him a Book of Mormon, he was so grateful! He picked it up so carefully
and held it like he was holding a baby. It was so neat!
Wednesday we went to see a less active man in our Ward. His home
teachers had invited us to come with them. When we got there, this
mans sister was there. We got talking to her and found out that her 15
year old daughter had passed away a year ago in a tragic car accident.
She was searching for answers and help. We were able to teach her the
plan of Salvation and tell her that she can be with her daughter for
eternity. It was so sweet! We are teaching her now too and we can't
wait to go back this week. Once again, I would like to point out, that
this wouldn't have happened without two dedicated and faithful home
teachers that took the time to care and followed the Spirit in
promoting them to bring the missionaries. People! Just do your HOME
AND VISITING TEACHING!!!!!! This is the reason why!!!!!!!
Thursday we met another new girl to teach! Her name is Mariah and she
is so sweet! The Spanish Elders actually knocked on her door, looking
for someone else. So, they referred her to us and she is awesome! We
are super excited to start teaching her too!
Friday seemed like it was the longest day of my life! We spent the
whole day, simply dreading the phone call that was coming..... Yes, we
got transfer calls! And Sister Schettler and I are BOTH STAYING in
Bayview!!!!! It's so crazy! I have never been in an area for this
long, or with the same companion for this long, but I LOVE IT!!!! I am
so excited to stay here in Bayview! This is my favorite place in the
world. I just feel like I'm home.
Not much else happened this week, but it was awesome! This morning we
went hiking with our investigator, Rachael. It was fun!
Anyway, I love you all! I wish you luck with School and everything!

Love,
Sister McGuire

Elder Morgan's Mom made yummy 'Minion'aries and sent them for a District Meeting treat! :)

Short and Sweet!

Dear Family,

I can't believe another week has gone by! I also can't believe another Summer has gone by! All the kids are back in school and Walmart put out their Halloween decorations today...... WEIRD!!!!!!
Well, I am just loving life and enjoying every second of it!
This week was Bill's baptism! He was baptized on Saturday afternoon, which was his Birthday. It was super special and it all went well! He had been really nervous about the baptism, because he doesnt swim, but the Elders did a great job practicing with him. He did everything perfect..... except...... he forgot to close his mouth! Hahaha! Oh dear! He went under the water just fine, and he came up alright too, but he was coughing and spluttering. Woops! Oh well. But, he was beaming and he was so happy! He was confirmed on Sunday by Bishop and he was practically glowing. I love the gospel! I love the joy you see in people once they've made covenants with God. That is truly when you see the light of Christ in their life.
Well, unfortunately, we are helping someone re-do their house tonight, so that cut our P-Day a little bit short. But I LOVE YOU ALL!!!!! I hope you have a fantastic Week!

Love,
Sister McGuire

Me, Bill, and Sister Schettler!! It was a great day!

Me, Bill, Sister Schettler, and Elder Morgan!!

So Sorry!!

Dear family,

Once again, I am absolutely out of time. But I love you all and I hope
you have a fantastic week! I promise more stories and pictures next
week.
The main highlights in Bayview right now.......
Bill! Bill is getting baptized this Saturday and we are so excited! He
is so ready for this and is so awesome! Please pray for him this week.
And many other things...... We are so busy that we spent three hours
of our day today in teaching appointments and meeting with the Relief
Society President, so that's why we didn't have time for anything. But
I love you all!

Love,
Sister McGuire

A Taste of Eternity

Dear Family,

Well, it's funny because once again I know we were so busy this week,
but I don't remember what happened at all! Haha. We had an amazing
trip to the temple today! That's the only thing I can think about
right now.
We woke up at 5:00 this morning to get ready to go. At 6:30 Brother
and Sister Todd picked us up and we headed out. On the drive there we
crossed the Susquehanna River. It is so neat to know that in that
river, the ordinance of baptism and the Aaronic Priesthood was
restored to the Earth.
Next we passed Bel Air. And yes, we all had the Fresh Prince theme
song stuck in our heads. Next we drove through Baltimore! What an
interesting place! I pulled out my camera to snap a few pictures
and......... It was completely dead! Figures.. The battery was totally
exhausted. While we were passing Fort McHenry, Sister Todd told us the
story of how Francis Scott Key was stuck on a British ship that
fateful night. We thought about the words to the Star-Spangled Banner.
It was so neat!
Then came my favorite part! We were driving along and we rounded a
corner of the Freeway and BAM, right in front of us was the temple! It
was all shimmering in the light of the morning sun! It was
breathtaking! Kim was so excited to see it!
We walked in the front doors and the Spirit was overwhelming. Kim
whispered to me, "this is heaven, isn't it?". It sure felt like it!
Kim loved the temple. She said that the beauty and the spirit there
made her want to be different. She said that she felt so close to
heaven. Sister Schettler and I had the honor of being baptized for
Kim's ancestors. When Sister Schettler was baptized for Kim's
grandmother, Kim was overcome. She said that she felt so great. It
always touches my heart to see families being brought together on both
sides of the veil.
We ended up waiting in the foyer for our turn in baptistery. People
were trickling in slowly. I glanced at the door and in walked.......
Sister Katherine Armstrong!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! She was an inactive
woman in Salisbury that we were teaching back in December! We had
worked with her so much and on my last Sunday in Salisbury she finally
came to church for the first time in months! I hadn't heard from her
since I left, so I didn't know what had happened to her. Well, the
sisters had kept working with her and now, here she was! Standing in
front of me in the temple! I ran up to her and we embraced. I couldn't
help but cry. It was such a tender mercy. She said to me, "Can you
believe it? Can you believe I made it?" As a missionary, we don't
always get to see the fruits of our labor. Whether we are the one who
plows the field, plants the seed, weeds the garden, waters the plants,
or truly harvests the fruit, each one of us has an important role to
play. It also reminded me of the scripture in D&C 18:15 "And if it so
be that you should labor all your days in crying repentance unto this
people, and bring, save it be one soul unto me, how great shall be
your joy with him in the kingdom of my Father" My joy was so great to
see Sister Armstrong standing there in white, being baptized for her
Mother. That was a huge miracle for me to see!
So, I have had a fantastic day! Always stay close to the temple!
I love you all! Have a great week!

Love,
Sister McGuire

The Susquehanna River!!

August?!?!

Dear Family,

It's August?!?! Wow! Where does the time go? We are so busy all the
time, but once again I am sitting here at the computer, thinking to
myself, "What did we do this week?" Hahaha! Well, here's what I
remember!
Story 1: Laura. Remember the funeral we went to back in May? Well, we
have been visiting that family off and on ever since and this week we
started teaching her daughter Laura! So, we were super excited for our
first lesson with her. We had planned to teach her the restoration and
then invite her to be baptized at the end. So, we go in and sit down.
We say the opening prayer. We look up and sister Schettler looks at
Laura and says, "have you ever thought about getting baptized?" Wow!!
Bold sauce! Honestly, I was kinda freaked out at that point. But Laura
says, "yeah! I want to get baptized! Soon! How do I do that?" Wow!
Hahaha! So, after my companion had to revive me off the floor, we
talked about the covenant of baptism and we explained about the
lessons and everything. She is awesome! She wants it so bad! So, we
are starting to teach her now and we can't wait!
Story 2: Water to Wine? There's the story in the Bible where the
Savior turns water into wine. Well, I've never heard of any miracles
like that before, but it happened to me this week! So, there's an
awesome lady in our Ward that we are working with. She is just coming
back into activity. She lives in a broken down little trailer and has
the biggest heart in the world! Well, she has been insisting that we
HAVE to come to dinner at her house, and we have been putting it off
for a while. So, this week she finally pinned us down for dinner. She
had been promising for weeks that she would make us Tilapia Fillets
and potatoes. I now know that fish is actually kind of good when it is
fresh and cooked right. However, I KNOW that the Tilapia that this
lady wanted to make was going to come out of a plastic bag that has
been sitting somewhere in the back of her freezer where it has been
slowly decaying for the last 6 years.... So, I'm more than a little
nervous for this dinner appointment. The fateful day arrived and we
were so busy that day, that we hadn't even had time to eat lunch. So
we are starving! And I am even more nervous, because I did NOT want to
dry heave on this lady's table. So, we say a very heartfelt plea
before we go inside to please protect us from food poisoning and from
embarrassing this sweet sister. Well, we go in and sit down to dinner.
She says, "Sisters, I pulled out the bag of Tilapia today and it turns
out that it was actually chicken! How weird is that? I was positive
that it was Tilapia! I'm sorry that you don't get fish tonight. I'll
have to make that next time. So, tonight it's chicken!" Yes!!!!!! We
were so happy! Haha! So, we cheerily choked down our freezer burned
chicken fillets and we were SO grateful with every bite that it wasn't
fish!
Story 3: Sabbath Day Miracles! The best part of the week is going to
church. And the best part of going to church is seeing all of the
people we are teaching come to church! This week we had 4 totally less
active people come to church this week! It was incredible!!!!!!! There
is nothing in the world better than seeing someone walk through those
doors on Sunday morning! It was awesome! So, that was just a sweet
cherry on top of everything!
Well, I'm out of time. But, I promise there will be more stories next week!
Also! We are going to the Washington D.C. Temple this Saturday (the 8)
to do baptisms for the dead with Kim!!!!!!!!!!!!! We are so excited!
So, that means that the 8th will become my P-Day and we will not have
P-Day on the 10th. So, if you want to email me, you have to do it on
Saturday! We are so excited!
I LOVE YOU ALL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Love,
Sister McGuire

In Our Lovely Desert!

Dear Family,

Well, this week was, once again, jam-packed with stuff! And
unfortunately, I don't have a lot of time, but here are the
highlights!
It starts off with a sad story. We have been working really hard with
our investigator named Keith. He lives with his grandma who is a
recent convert in our Ward. Well, out of nowhere, Keith's mom decided
that she was ready to have him come home. So, Keith moved back down to
Baltimore to live with his mom. Honestly, we were devastated. We are
so happy that he gets to be back with his mom, but we were so sad to
see him go! Before he left, we made sure that he had his Book of
Mormon and he promised that he would continue to read and pray about
it. We are trying to convince his mom to let the missionaries in
Baltimore come and visit with him, but we will have to see. She
doesn't seem too excited about the idea. We just really pray that he
will keep going strong!
On to happier things! We also had a mini Pioneer Day celebration at
district meeting this week. Sister Schettler and I made rolls and
honey butter to share with the district. We all told stories about
pioneers and I was able to share about how Grandma Lemon used to make
7 loaves of bread a day! Pretty impressive! It was fun!
We were also able to see the Blankley's again this week! They are
super solid and progressing so well! We set a date for all of them to
be baptized on August 22nd! It was super special because that day is
the Dad's Birthday! We can't wait! To top it off, they all came to
church this week too! We were super happy that they came!
Kim was confirmed this week! It was beautiful! Truly, "in the
ordinances thereof is the power of God manifest." I always feel the
Spirit so strong whenever I see an ordinance performed. And I know
that this has changed Kim's life! I love her so much and I'm so
excited for her to continue to progress! We also set up a day that we
can go do baptisms for the dead with Kim! I'm so excited to go to the
temple soon! I haven't been in over a year, and I miss the sweet
spirit that is found only in the temple. And I'm so excited for Kim to
experience it as well!
I love you all! Hope you have a great week!

Love,
Sister McGuire

P.S. Sister Schettler and I found our new favorite hymn! It is In Our
Lovely Deseret. You all need to go look it up, because it has been
stuck in my head ALL week!

An Incredible Week!!

Dear Family,

I had an incredible week! We saw so many miracles and blessings this week! I don't know where to begin!
Story 1: The Tickets. So, we were weekly planning at our apartment, but we had left something in the car. We ran out to go get it really quick. Well, in the parking lot, we met a super nice guy who wanted to chat for a bit. While we were talking he told us about his wife who passed away a few years ago and how it had been hard on him. We were able to testify to him about eternal families! It was so neat! After that, he said that he had two tickets for a baseball game in Aberdeen that night, and he wanted us to take them, because he wasn't going to be able to make it. We tried to turn him down because we had plans (Oh yeah, and it's SO AGAINST EVERY MISSION RULE IN THE WHITE HANDBOOK!) But, he insisted! So, we got the man's information and left.
On our way up the stairs to our apartment, we remembered a cute young couple that lived below us! They would love the tickets! So, we stopped and talked to the wife for about 30 MINUTES! She asked what church we were from, and we told her "the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints" She jumped and said, "NO WAY!!!!!! I used to go to the one in Missouri with my best friend!" Wow! She asked where our church was, and she totally wants to come next week! It was awesome! We were super excited! Hahaha! It turned out that two baseball tickets=two New Investigators!!!!! Super awesome!

Story 2: Rocking the Plan of Salvation! So, we had dinner with Brandi and Rocky this week! We were able to teach Rocky the Plan of Salvation and it was AMAZING!!!! Hands down, the best lesson I have ever had! He had a ton of questions and we were pullng out scriptures and explaining things like crazy! It was awesome! At the end, he told us that he had a huge question that he had asked every preacher/priest/bishop/pastor he had ever met, and none of them could answer it, and he wanted to ask us! (No pressure!) He had a super confusing scenario that I didn't really understand about how the Lord will judge people, but Sister Schettler was so in tune with the Spirit! She testified that no matter what our actions were, the Lord will judge us by what was in our heart. He was stunned and over-whelmed by the Spirit. It was awesome! He paused for a minute and said, "It's true. That's the answer I have searched for my whole life." AWESOME!!!!!!!!!

Story 3: New Horizons! So, I live in Maryland right? What is Maryland most famous for? Crab! Remember how much I HATE seafood??? Yeah, it's not a good combo. Luckily, I have been able to avoid my fishy foe thus far.... Until this week. We have an awesome couple in the ward that wanted to treat us to dinner. Not just any dinner, but they wanted to take us to the fanciest place in North East! Which is....... A Crab House! Oh dear..... I was so worried! But, I decided that I would pray extra and hope there was Chicken Alfredo on the menu! So, we go in and Brother Shepherd orders FOR us. He gets the Net Buster, which is the biggest array of every type of sea food they serve at the restaurant!!!!!!! Now, I'm practically sweating! They bring out the smelly net, full of food! I realize, that there's no getting out of it, because Sister Shepherd wants us to try some of everything! I crack open the Snow Crab Leg and resign myself to my fishy fate...... I prepare myself mentally to choke it down........ and in goes the meat and.......  Actually, the consistency is pretty good.... It tastes alright..... actually, it's not even chewy and slimy....... actually, this is incredible!!! Before I know it, I am chowing down on the crab and the crab cakes and the Lobster and Mahi Mahi like there's no tomorrow! That stuff was amazing! Except for the clams. Those are definitely still gross. But the rest of it was awesome! I never thought I'd say it, but I actually LOVE Sea Food! It just has to be done right. And don't dip it in cocktail sauce.

Story 4: The Miracle of the Week! The Crowning miracle of the week was Kimberly's baptism! It was a beautiful service! She was beaming! I can't believe the changes we have seen in her over the last 6 weeks. It's hard to believe that just 6 weeks ago she didnt want anything to do with us. It was an incredible experience. She asked me to play Amazing Grace and two little girls sang it. It turned out so beautiful and the Spirit was amazing. I felt the joy it talks about in Doctrine and Covenants 18:13. How great is His joy in the soul that repenteth! What an amazing thing it is to know that she came to know  her Heavenly Father and now she is on the covenant path towards meeting Him. Missionary work is the best!

Story 5: The Cherry on Top. To finish of this awesome list of tales, we got transfer calls this week! I Am STAYING!!!! So is Sister Schettler!!!!! We get to spend 6 more weeks here in Bayview together! We are so excited!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So, I LOVE YOU ALLL!!!!!! Have a fantastic week! And Don't EVER forget to appreciate the little miracles everyday!!!!!!

Love,
Sister McGuire

The Giplin's Covered Bridge in North East!!

The Plumpton Park Zoo! I think we fit in a little too well with the Monkeys! ;D 

A little Jungle fun!

Kim's Baptism!!