End of Goal Week 3 of 2010

Goal: Be Neighborly and Introduce Ourselves
I should mention that I haven't done my Visiting Teaching yet. However, in my defense, I still have the rest of this week to do it for this month.

Well, we waited until just about the last minute, but Friday night we took a little bag of cookies to each of our three neighbors and introduced ourselves.
I think we might have freaked a couple of them out. : )
Things I learned:
First guy gets up REALLY early to go to work. I actually never saw him before, just his wife and daughter.
The people on the bottom floor, but on the other side of us are Hispanic and didn't seem to speak much English. We knocked on the door and they said to, "Come in", but when we poked open the door, they seemed surprised. Why do people do that? I could have been a serial killer for Pete sakes! They didn't say much to us and it was extremely awkward so we left them with the cookies and went on.
There are two girls who each have very young daughters in the apartment underneath ours. One is actually dating our landlord's son. Only one of the girl's and her daughter were at home when we stopped by (the one not dating the landlord's son). She was very nice and was really excited that we brought over cookies. : ) It was sorta funny because when we gave her the cookies she said laughingly, "You guys are good neighbors. I would have never done that." I thought, "It took a weekly goal for me to do it."

As soon as we were done, we scampered quickly off to our apartment. I was proud of us for going waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay outside of our comfort zone and making ourselves known to our neighbors. One of them (pre-cookies and introduction) actually took our garbage out for us this week. How nice!

"Won't you be my Neighbor?"

Goal for Week 3 of 2010: Neighbors

(As written in the book)
"Goal: Choose several of your neighbors and serve them. Make them feel special and let them know you care. If you have neighbors that are hard to love, make sure they are recipients of even greater service."

Source

So, I won't lie to you. This one is probably harder than remembering to say my prayers.
Haha. Isn't that sad!

Ty and I are big homebodies and like to keep to ourselves. We're not the type of people to start the conversation, especially if we don't know you. We're more "You-Come-To-Us" sorta people. This goal is definitely a step outside the comfort zone.

However, I'm looking at as not an every single day of the week thing. More like, if we can get it done in a week, we'll be good. I think we might freak our neighbors out if we were making a particularly special effort to see them EVERY DAY.

My plan of attack action is to make some delectable Robbins Cookies (No one can resist. They must succumb.) and take them to each of our neighbors in the four-plex we live in. We've lived here for just over two months and we still don't know anyone. I'm not sure what the protocol is for new neighbors, but shouldn't we be the ones receiving a pie or something? ; ) For this week we'll let it slide.I've decided that this is also a good opportunity to do better with my Visiting Teaching. For those who don't know or understand what Visiting Teaching is, it is a program within the LDS church where two women are paired together to visit two or more other sisters. (We call each other Brother or Sister because in the eternal scheme of things we really are.) The church provides a message that we are encouraged to share to the sisters we see. Most importantly, this calling serves as a way for each sister to be looked after. Visiting Teaching is asked to occur once a month with each sister, but is certainly not limited to just that. The Visiting Teachers have a sacred responsibility to make sure each sister is being taken care of. Let's say a sister has just had a baby or had major surgery, then, if they have been making continual contact, her Visiting Teachers will be able to let the Ward Relief Society (ladies 18 and older) know and assistance can be provided. Something the Relief Society is famous for is making dinners for those who are sick or otherwise in need of that help. Basically, what it comes down to, is Visiting Teaching was put in place to make sure that each sister knows and feels that she is truly loved and cared for.

Being a good neighbor, as well as being a better Visiting Teacher are my goals this week. Let's get to it!