2016 10/26 "Holy smokes. Church is so good and everyone should go to church"

Dear Mom and Dad,
CAN YOU BELIEVE YOU'RE GOING TO HAVE ANOTHER SON??? MAKAIL IS GETTING MARRIED WOOT WOOT YAY HOORAY I'M SO HAPPY AND EXCITED AND FILLED TO THE TOP WITH INCOMPREHENSIBLE JOY WOW OH WOW.
(Is "incomprehensible" a word? I read it in the Book of Mormon today so I'm guessing it's a real word but you never know....) Anyway. I'm stoked to have a brother-in-law in case you couldn't tell #BainTrainForever

I am so happy that Grant got to go to the Goldfish store. My heart was so happy to see his huge smile haha!! I LOVE THAT!! I hope you all had fun in Logan!

You'll have to tell me how all the band concerts go tonight!! Tell the boys "good luck!!" for me!! I'm so excited for them!!

There's am article in the most recent Ensign called "Tutored by the Lord". You should check it out-- it was written by the new Yorktown stake Relief Society president!! (I'm serving in the Yorktown Stake right now and I met her and she hugged me so I'm bascially famous).

We had Stake Conference on Sunday which was sooooooooooo awesome. Holy smokes. Church is so good and everyone should go to church. We talked about the blessings that come from the temple. I KNOW TEMPLE BLESSINGS ARE REAL!! The Hartford Temple open house was so successful! There were more than 50,000 people that went through. HOW COOL. Go to the temple as often as you can!! Utah is so blessed with so many!! :-)

This week has been so good! Miracles are fun. Yesterday I went on a split with Hermana Derzon. She is such an incredible missionary and really just an all around wonderful human being. I love her so much. So! Yesterday morning, we had an appointment with a less-active and we had gotten there a little late because we got lost  (oops. Dumb GPS....) We had met with this less-active before (please don't ask me how I got lost even though I had been there before) and we knew that she talks FOREVER. I was a little worried because we had another appointment with a member at 11:30. Ahhhhhhhhhh time crunch! But we met with Sister Macia and had a wonderful lesson about the Book of Mormon  (are you reading every day???) I looked at my watch and it was almost noon!! (I'm really not a horrible missionary okay I promise we repented) so we called our next appointment, Sister Velmani, to tell her we were running late (obviously.) But! She didn't answer so we were kinda freaking out. We decided to pray and Hermana Derzon said "Please help us feel and know if we should go to Sister Velmani's house anyway." And as soon as she said that, the thought "Sister Bain, go now!" came to my head. It surprised me a little because it was so sudden and direct but I looked at Hermana Derzon and she said "we gotta go now!" We got to Sister Velmani's and we knocked 4 times and she didn't answer. So we called her again and she finally answered! We told her we were outside her front door to visit her and we could hear her running to meet us. She opened the door and was so excited that we were there and she just burst into tears. She said that she had been crying all morning because Satan had been making her feel guilty for different things (Satan. What a hater.) and she had prayed asking Heavenly Father to send someone to make her feel better. She said "instead of sending one angel, He sent two!!" We sang I Am a Child of God with her and the whole time she was just crying saying how grateful she was for the gospel and for us being there. It was so so cool to be able to be the answer to her prayers. She also made us Indian food so that was cool too. (She's from India so it was real and authentic YAY)

There are so many wonderful miracles that happen every day! I wish you all could be here with me-- but you have wedding plans to attend to!! GOOD LUCK!!!

I LOVE YOU!!!
Trust in the Lord.
The gospel is true!

---
Sister Keauna Bain ♡
New York New York North Mission

FALL

Jean from Waveny. She calls me "Sister Brain" and "Sister Sassy Pants" Hahaha

This is Max. He's my bud from the Darien Ward.
He reminds me so much of Bryson (that's probably why I like him so much!!) 

Sister Velmani teaching Hermana Derzon and I how to make Indian food YUM

Hey y'all!
I hope it was a good week for everyone! It was a good week for me!🤓 THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR THE FALL/HALLOWEEN PACKAGE!! (Dad, I'll still be hating Halloween with you all the way from CT😂) The notes from Jacob, Grant, and Bryson made me cry. I MISS ALL OF YOU!!❤
I'm glad Sister Miles always sends you pictures!! We (us and the elders) were able to get so many less-active families to go to the ward Trunk-or-Treat! Yay! We decorated our car for Christmas instead of Halloween because Christmas is obviously more fun🎄

We got to go to a "new missionary meeting" on Friday in Scarsdale for Sister Larsen! Driving in New York is a piece of cake!😉 (NOT. I've actually never been so stressed in my entire life.) But! Fall on the East Coast is a dream!! Elder Perkins from the 70 was there and I learned so much!! Something that I took away from the meeting was that my new companion is my #1 investigator (I also learned that from Sister Sam) and my job is to love her and help her faith grow.

Does anyone know about a "clown situation"? Every time we're out when it's getting dark, people tell us to be careful of the clowns and I don't even know what that means.

On Sister Larsen's first day, I took her tracting on Bailey Avenue in Darien. We met a guy named Rob and he's way cool. We went back a couple of nights ago to see if he had read anything from the Book of Mormon we gave him and guess what. HE READ IT!! WITH HIS WIFE!! Miracles all around, people. We talked to him for a long time and got to know him and his wife better. We asked if we could come and teach his family about Jesus Christ and he said "sure" AND Rob and Liz invited us over for Thanksgiving!!😂

We tracted into Martha a couple of nights ago. She said she had just baptized her kids into the Catholic Church but that she and her husband weren't really sure if the Catholic Church was for them. She was thinking about going to the Lutheran Church and then we showed up on her doorstep! She said "this must be a sign from God!" Cool cool.

I know the Lord directs this work. This is HIS work! And what a special opportunity I have to dedicate 18 months of my life to Him! #Blessed

I hope y'all are studying your scriptures every day! As a mission, we're reading the Book of Mormon together and we're in Alma now! I LOVE ALMA. HOLY SMOKES. He is one cool guy. Yesterday I read about Alma going to the land of Ammonihah and meeting Amulek. They are companion goals!! But before Alma and Amulek are companions, Alma went to Ammonihah and was spit upon and cast out (whenever I have a bad day I think of Book of Mormon missionaries and then decide that it could be worse!) But an angel appears to Alma as he's leaving the city and tells him to REJOICE! The angel basically said "Alma, pal, you have great cause to rejoice! Lift up your head, man! You got this!" Oh, how great reason WE have to rejoice! So Alma "returns speedily" to the people that spit upon him and cast him out and meets his companion Amulek. They teach the people repentance and work miracles!!

If you're not reading the Book of Mormon every day, you better start!❤ It will bless your life in more ways than you could ever count.
Have a good week!
I love you!
#BainTrainForever

Love always,
Sister Keauna Bain ♡
New York New York North mission


President Dieter F. Uchtdorf: "The Lord sees in you what He saw in Amulek—the potential of a valiant servant with an important work to do and with a testimony to share."
("Learn from Alma and Amulek" October 2016 General Conference)

Trunk or Treat

Autumn Leaves

Walk on the Beach

Pumpkin hunting in the Pumpkin Patch 

Look who we tracked into. Barney!

Sister Bain was here.

2016 10/12 "Don't just read the scriptures, STUDY THE SCRIPTURES"

Hello from CT ♡
Connecticut is oh so wonderful and I love being here!
Here's some random thoughts brought to you by Sister Bain:

- GENERAL CONFERENCE 2016 IS ON GOSPEL LIBRARY!! #Blessed

- I'm so happy and excited for Garrett!! I hope he had an amazing temple experience! It's almost time for him to be in the mission field!! Those lucky, luck people- Elder Sirrine x2 blessing the people of Washington! HOW COOL. Dallin better come to the east coast haha

- HOW IN THE WORLD IS IT ALREADY TIME FOR ELDER PRYOR TO COME HOME??? It's been 2 seconds, not 2 years! (I'm sure Bryan and Shirley might disagree with me on that one...ha!)

- I didn't even know there was a hurricane happening. It's rained a ton the last week, but that's normal CT weather! :-)

- Don't just read the scriptures, STUDY THE SCRIPTURES.

It's been a long week! We uh got yelled at a ton this past week....so.....happy 1 week to my new companion, Sister Larsen hahaha she legit thinks that all we do as missionaries is get yelled at. But we've had some cool miracles this week. We had all our investigators drop us at the same time (not a cool miracle) but every day this past week we've been able to testify of the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon and give 1 copy to someone each day! #ScripturePower Heavenly Father has been so good to us this past week. It would have been so easy for us to get discouraged, but we've worked real hard! I know God's plan is real and that everyone has a "time and a season." Not everyone is ready right now. And that's okay. But we still need to continue to work hard and be obedient despite the bumps in the road along the way. I know Heavenly Father blesses the diligent and faithful. ♡

In Relief Society on Sunday, Sister Wright gave a really good lesson about being fully committed to God. She touched on the story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. I started thinking about the Veggie Tales version of that story. (That movie is 10/10 I would definitely recommend) Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego were being pressured to eat the big chocolate bunny that that king said everyone should worship. But Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego had already made the commitment to follow God, not the chocolate bunny. But they saw everyone else who were going around eating all the chocolate they wanted and getting sick.

There are a lot of things I learned from this story:

- Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego were quietly obedient.
  They weren't obedient to get attention. They knew what was right.

- We need to have simple and pure faith in our Heavenly Father.

- Make the commitment TODAY to be 100% committed to following God's commandments.

- Our Heavenly Father and Savior Jesus Christ are fully committed to US so why wouldn't we choose   to be fully committed to them??

- Put your Savior first.

- PUT YOUR BELIEFS TO ACTION!

- When we don't do what we know we should be doing we get spiritually sick- just like the people did when they ate all the chocolate.

So, what are YOU going to do this week to show your Heavenly Father that you are fully committed to following Him and His son, Jesus Christ?

Genesis 31:16 "...whatsoever God hath said unto thee, do." ♡♡♡♡

I hope you're all having a good week!!
I love you!! #BainTrainForever

President Russell M. Nelson: The prophet Lehi taught a principle for spiritual survival. First, consider his circumstances: He had been persecuted for preaching truth in Jerusalem and had been commanded by the Lord to leave his possessions and flee with his family into the wilderness. He had lived in a tent and survived on what food could be found on the way to an unknown destination, and he had watched two of his sons, Laman and Lemuel, rebel against the teachings of the Lord and attack their brothers Nephi and Sam. Clearly, Lehi knew opposition, anxiety, heartache, pain, disappointment, and sorrow. Yet he declared boldly and without reservation a principle as revealed by the Lord: “Men are, that they might have joy.” Imagine! Of all the words he could have used to describe the nature and purpose of our lives here in mortality, he chose the word joy! Life is filled with detours and dead ends, trials and challenges of every kind. Each of us has likely had times when distress, anguish, and despair almost consumed us. Yet we are here to have joy? Yes! The answer is a resounding yes! The joy we feel has little to do with the circumstances of our lives and everything to do with the focus of our lives.


Sister Keauna Bain ♡
New York New York North Mission 

Autumn Leaves

Waterfront

2016 10/05 "I LOVED THIS CONFERENCE!!"

Hi family ❤
RAISE YOUR HAND IF YOU LOVED CONFERENCE AND THAT YOU ARE SAD IT'S OVER!!! (I'm raising both my hands...) I LOVED THIS CONFERENCE!! I loved Elder Rasband's talk about remembering spiritual experiences. Those times that we have with the spirit where we are taught from on high should be cherished! (Elder Rasband was also the mission President for the NYNYN Mission) It was a good reminder for me that I can't just forget about those experiences I have with the spirit! SO. GOOD. WOW.

What else happened this week? I don't even know. On Thursday I went to the city for a meeting. That was cool. I rode the train to Grand Central Station and then the subway to the church. Subways are so fun haha there are some CRAZY people in NYC. I love it.

I got some super sweet letters from the young women in the ward! I was sitting at the kitchen  table bawling my eyes out because of all the sweet notes of encouragement and hand drawn pictures of Hawaii  (they know me so well!!) I'm seriously so so lucky to have the Crescent 5th Ward young women cheering me on. Those girls are stellar.

Sister Sam got transferred to the Upper East side and I picked up my new companion, Sister Larsen. She's straight from the MTC! She's from Jackson Hole, Wyoming so we've had a good time talking about the Grand Tetons and Yellowstone (that's basically all I know about Wyoming.....)

We have some awesome goals set as a district to have 2 baptisms this cycle! One, we hope, is our investigators Jacqulove. We love her. We have a lesson with her tonight and we want to set a bap date with her! PRAYERS FOR HER ARE MUCH APPRECIATED!! :)

Nothing else really happened this week...just helping the Lord move His work along!
I hope you all had a good week!!

I love you!!

Sister Keauna Bain ♡
New York New York North Mission 

Trainers Conference

Main and Grant Ave. (Grant you're famous!)

Saying Goodbye

Life is Beautiful