Trust in Him!! (10/19/15 email)

This one woman, B, is a cute older woman who's a baptized member but
hasn't been to church in years. We decided to stop by her house a few
weeks ago and we shared a message and invited her to church. (I don't
remember if I already told you about her or nah, so I might be
repeating myself with the background story.) Anyways, she started
crying and said, "I haven't been to church in years because my old
Bishop said something that I got offended by and I know I just need to
get over it. Thank you for stopping by. I'm coming to church
tomorrow." Sooo cute! So she's been to church these past few Sundays
and this last time we stopped by she said, "I got a copy of the Sunday
School manual and read it all when I was camping with my husband last
weekend. And I started the Book of Mormon up there too." She is so
cute! She has such a desire to learn now because she feels like she
deprived herself of it for so long. Every time we come by she talks
about how much happier she is now with His church back in her life.
Melts my heart! <3

S and R, the couple that are getting married then he's getting baptized,
are such a highlight of my mission so far. They have come sooo far and
it's such a blessing being able to see the difference the Gospel has
made in their lives! R, the fiancé that isn't a member, actually grew
up Jewish then Catholic and has always known a lot of facts from the
Bible but hasn't felt "anything like I do at church now." He has such
a strong testimony and they've been through so much. It's just so
great being able to see how much strength we can receive from deciding
to live like He wants us to.

This family in our ward has four cuuuuuuuute girls and they each just

have their own very unique personalities. They each wanted a turn with

our name tags on so they could look like us.

Goals:

Well I love God and it's amazing to know that we can always rely on Him. Remember Proverbs 3:5-6 whenever you're going through...anything really. It's easier said than done, but trusting in Him always pays off! The blessings are so real! I love you all <3

Sister Reeves fell off a porch LOLOLOL (10/12/15 email)

Not gonna lie, this week has been the longest thus far. The first few
days of the week were pretty discouraging; half of our appointments
fell through and someone said we should fear the fires of Hell or
something like that. Buuuuut don't you worry because the week took a
complete 180-degree turn! The event that started this turn happened to
be all the love my angel mother kept sending me. I just kept getting
surprises in the mail every time I checked! Shout out to my mom who
somehow always knows when I need help most even if we're hundreds of
miles away.

The next day we were walking out of our first appointment with this
one investigator and Sister Reeves was turned around saying bye as she
COLLAPSED to the ground on her porch hahaha omg we were dying
laughing. She didn't see that there were two steps and she really hit
the ground hard. Thankfully there was no scrapes or bruises or
anything (which you would not believe if you saw her eat it haha). I
honestly think God meant for that to happen so we could just stop and
crack up at ourselves.

Theeeeeeeen, we had our second lesson with this adorable 11-year-old!
I don't remember if I told you about her already, so just in case
here's some background: we ran into her and her aunt and introduced
ourselves. The aunt, T, said she has a faith and isn't interested in
learning more but she said her niece, K, could decide if she wanted to
meet with us or not. Well K was all about learning about Jesus! We had
our first lesson with her and she had never prayed before, but we were
able to hear her first prayer <3 omg I almost cried but I didn't want
to freak her out. It was just so simple and sincere. Anyways, we
testified about the power of prayer to her and talked about how it's
helped us in various ways - one of those ways being keeping us from
having bad dreams. Well, when we saw her yesterday, she was so excited
to tell us about how she's prayed every night since we saw her last
and she hasn't had a single bad dream. She is so cute <3 and her
maturity just amazes me! She's only 11 and she's really pondering
everything we say. K is just so great!

Also, this random 82-year-old man we talked to said he wants to learn
more but he's afraid to become a member of the Church because he
doesn't want to have to go out knocking on doors haha. He thought all
members were forced to serve missions.

We went on a zone hike last week - so pretty!

Another zone hike pic

Ignore how awk my face looks haha I was mid-rawr... Anyways, this is when I was on exchanges with Sister De Leon (who happens to know Camille McAlmont - small world) and this cuuuuuuuute boy, K, wanted to show us part of his Halloween costume. Apparently it's a Lego monster? Didn't know they had such a thing

Classic me.

I will always have a love for onesies. Always.

WE SAW THE PROPHET [on tv] (10/5/15 email)

Conference was AMAZING! Oh my gosh.

Anyways, I have a short miracle story: Sister Reeves and I were
praying to know who we should visit and then we both felt like we
should just walk down the street we were next to. (Also, Sister Reeves
happened to have a Russian Book of Mormon in her bag of all things.)
The first person that answered was Russian and said she was looking
into different religions and trying to know which church is God's
church...ANSWER TO PRAYERS! We gave her the Russian Book of Mormon
that Sister Reeves had in her bag and we have a follow up appointment
with her tomorrow. Two doors later this guy answered and asked why
we're serving missions. We said we love being able to see how the
Gospel changes people's lives. He said, "Maybe it'll change mine," and
took a Book of Mormon and asked us to come back tomorrow. He said he
grew up Christian so he already has a faith in Christ but he wants to
learn more of Him. This just solidifies my testimony of prayer. God
answers all of our prayers whether we recognize it or not.

Well here's my favorite quote from conference: "Small efforts
sustained over time can produce significant results." THAT IS SO
TRUE!! It's the small, day to day things that change our lives.

Thanks for all your amazing influences in my life! Seriously I have
learned so much from each of you and I am so grateful! YOU DA BEST

More selfies with my twinnn

I love Nehalem!! (9/28/15 email)

I have grown to just completely love the people here. It's crazy that
I've only been here for a couple months. I have some exciting news!

So this week we met with our investigator, R (just doing first
initials so I'm legally safe), and his girlfriend, S. They have been
praying about marriage and decided on December 4! And his baptism will
be the Saturday a week after that. The whole ward is so eager to help
in every way. We have a cake decorator, two floral designers, a master
seamstress, and so many cooks - all looking for any way they can help
this young couple that can barely afford rent! It is so sweet to see
the charity these ward members have.

Another event this week: we ran into this girl, K (about 10-12 years
old - bad family situation), and introduced ourselves. Her maturity
amazes me! We asked her if she'd be interested in learning more about
Christ and she said, "I think I really need that. I'm going through a
lot and I want to see if religion will help." We met with her a few
days later and we invited her to say her first prayer. She was really
nervous and hesitant, almost even started to tear up, but once she
started to pray everything changed. We all felt so comforted and loved
and her prayer was just this cute, very simple and genuine thing.

I don't remember if I've said anything about the member, Penny, that's
housing us now, but she is just amazing! She is such a great example
to us and she seriously makes us feel so comfortable! Being on a
mission, away from everyone you're close to, is weird at first because
you just want to be yourself and she was the first person I could feel
completely comfortable enough to be myself with. Penny is a dream!

Post-candy selfie. Thanks, Shari!

Me & my twin

Mish Life (9/21/15 email)

So before I get into how great this week has been, here's two pictures of my last zone:

Also, this is how you feel when you wake up sick on your mission...

Now, onto transfers! So Sister Floyd and I drove to the transfer meeting together not knowing who our two new trainees we're going to be (we both got letters saying we'd be trainers). We got to the meeting and President Taylor called up the new missionaries one by one and matched them with their trainers. Tangent: it is soooo much fun. The excitement is real when you get to see the two companions run up and give each other their first hug. Anyways, when the seventh new sister stood up (of about ten I think), I immediately knew we'd be best friends so I said a quick prayer, "Heavenly Father please give her to me." And then, no sooner than I said, "Amen," did President Taylor say, "...you'll be trained by Sister Carter!" Fastest answer to a prayer ever. I know that President Taylor is matching us up through divine inspiration because that was meant to be. Also, everyone we meet says we are twins (look similar, sound similar, dress similar, and even say the same things at the same time). I am so grateful for my new companion, Sister Reeves.

Here's a picture of Sister Hansen's posterity. She trained Sister Floyd (who trained me), making her my grandmother. So she's on the far left, then Sister Floyd (my mom), then Sister ? (my little sis), then me, then Sister Reeves (my daughter). Not the best quality picture haha sorry.

Our first selfie together. We struggle.

I would just like everyone to know I have the best mom anyone could ever imagine. She found me emoji stickers that I can use in my letters. SHOUTOUT TO MINDY 😘

Well this week has been great, and I wish I could tell you every detail about it. My spiritual thought is very similar to last week's, but it's just so well worded that I can't not share it. In President Dieter F. Uchtdorf's talk "The Gift of Grace," he said, "Grace is a gift of God, and our desire to be obedient to each of God’s commandments is the reaching out of our mortal hand to receive this sacred gift from our Heavenly Father." He has blessed us with His grace, giving us the opportunity to be forgiven of every mistake we make, and all we need to do is obey Him in order to accept that precious gift. God is great, ladies and gentlemen, and I love the opportunity I've been given to help others to feel His love and grow closer to Him.

Transfer letters (9/14/15 email)

Hello! We got our transfer letters this week...surprise. My 12 weeks
of training is being cut in half and I'll actually be training a new
missionary. I get to meet her on Wednesday at the transfer meeting and
drive her back to the Nehalem ward! I am so excited! I will let you
know all about how everything goes in my email next week!

Last week we saw this woman, Laura, carrying things from her garage to
her car so we introduced ourselves and asked if we could help. When we
said we could come back in jeans to help her with anything, she froze
and said, "...like for free?" Haha she was so shocked that we honestly
just want to help! We scheduled a time to go back and we helped her
reorganize her garage. She was so cute and grateful the whole time! We
love Laura.

We had interviews with our mission president this week! I was honestly
kind of nervous and I don't know why. It's weird because President
Taylor intimidates me, but I know he genuinely loves me and wants the
best for me. When I see him, though, it's like seeing the President of
the United States. It's a big deal! All the missionaries got to hang
out in a room with Sister Taylor to wait their turn to talk with
President, and even that is such a privilege! I can't even really
explain what exactly makes them so wonderful haha except for the fact
that they make you automatically feel so extremely loved and cared for
even though we don't know them very well.

We met with our investigator last night who had that amazing answer to
his prayer last week. We addressed living the Law of Chastity, which
was expected to be tense because he's living with his girlfriend who
is a member of the Church. It went so well! They already knew of the
Law of Chastity and had been praying about it and said that our
discussion about it was just what they needed to hear. They're
planning on getting married now and are praying and thinking about a
date for that to happen, AND they are so excited to eventually be able
to be sealed in the temple for eternity! They are so cute and it's
crazy how much I love them and I barely know them. I am so happy for
them and the decisions they're making.

There's this place called Burgerville by us and I've heard amazing
things about their shakes. I finally went and tried their black berry
one and almost died. Oh my gosh that was glorious!

I'm Shari's favorite sister missionary. Nbd (shoutout for the great package I got from her - so many calories, the best way to my heart)

Thought provoking quote for the week: "Life is God's greatest gift to man, and what we do with our lives is our gift to Him." Are you showing gratitude for your gift of life? Deep stuff!

I love you all! Thank you for the love and support you've shown me. I seriously wouldn't be where or who I am if it weren't for you!

MIRACLE WEEK (9/7/15 email)

Hey, loved ones! How has everyone been?

Well I've been loving the mission still. At our last zone meeting, our
zone leaders had us each set a goal to have three of our investigators
on date for baptism by September 6. Well a long time went by and
Sister Floyd and I have been praying about which people we should ask
about a specific date and what those specific dates should be. We
never felt like we received a for sure answer...until last week that
is! We were fasting and then we decided that four of our investigators
that week are ready. We asked this one adorable woman, Doris, on
Wednesday at 2 and she said she would prepare to be baptized on that
date! Then, at 3, we asked another adorable woman, Karen, and she said
the same thing! Then, we were planning on asking Rajan the next day,
but he had to reschedule the appointment so maybe that means he's not
actually ready...haha we'll keep praying and I guess we'll see. Then,
just last night, we met with this guy, Ross, and before we could even
open the lesson with a prayer he had an experience he was dying to
share! This was only our second lesson with him and the first time we
asked him to pray to know the things we're saying are true, and he
said he would be baptized if [when] he received an answer that they
are true. Well last Friday he received that answer and he was so ready
to accept our baptismal invitation. The Lord was definitely working
miracles to help us reach that goal!

I know that God is just waiting to "open you the windows of heaven,
and pour you out a blessing that there shall not be room enough to
receive it." I have found that to be very apparently true in this past
week!

Also, one more scripture. This is what we let with Ross after our
first visit: "And when ye shall receive these things, I would exhort
you that ye would ask God, the Eternal Father, in the name of Christ,
if these things are not true; and if ye shall ask with a sincere
heart, with real intent, having faith in Christ, he will manifest the
truth of it unto you, by the power of the Holy Ghost. And by the power
of the Holy Ghost ye may know the truth of all things." That's a
huuuge promise were given, but Ross and I both know it to be true.
It's crazy to think about just how much God knows, but it's even
crazier to think about how we can also know the truth of all things
through Him. God is great!

We randomly found this thing to test your vertical in a neighborhood, so we had to try it out.

Happy birthday shoutout to my dad!! I love you! We were in a lesson and the woman we were talking with had to go answer her door, so I took that opportunity to snap this picture.

A member of our ward gave us brownies and wrote notes on them so we can feel like our moms are still with us <3

After our first lesson with this guy who's had a very hard life, he sent this to us :)

Friends and fam! Hey! (8/31/15 email)

3 Nephi 13:31-33 "Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed? For your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things. But seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you." Don't worry about anything, guys! As long as you are following Christ's example and you put your faith in Him, you literally have NOTHING to worry about! Isn't that amazing? Heavenly Father knows what we need and exactly when we need it.

Well I finally took a picture with the Nehalem sign this week. I can't tell you how much I love serving in the Nehalem ward/area. The people are just amazing!

Here's me making my way up there haha it was pretty treacherous. I had no clue that's how you spell treacherous until spell check helped me out, by the way.

My comp and I moved to another member's home, and we just love her! She is seriously so much fun and I want you all to meet her. I'll take a pic so you can see her next week. She works at Costco and buys too much food for herself, so we help her out with that. Here's a picture of us moving all of our belongings in one little Ford Fusion car ride.

We went on exchanges last week with our Sister Training Leaders, which was so much fun! I LOOOVE the people I was able to meet with in their area, too. Here a pic of us after our exchanges. My companion was Sister Singleton (from Georgia) and Sister Floyd's companion was Sister De Leon (from Texas).

The sister we're living with got us an amazing mint chip gelato so we took selfies with it. Here's what I look like when I'm not sure if the selfie timer is on or not.

Last week we had a ward activity that was a Tongan version of a Luau (Kai-something, meaning "feast"). A few of our investigators came to that and it was a blast! This is a family were teaching and we just love them. We can't share any personal information, but I really wish I could tell you all about them because they're great!

Well I can't tell you how happy I am here! Of course I definitely miss everyone and I can't wait to see you all again, but this is such a great opportunity. The knowledge of the gospel has blessed me so much, and I love that I can be out sharing that blessing with anyone willing to listen!

One month??? (8/24/15 email)

I've already been out for a month? It honestly feels like it's been a few days maybe. This is such a weird feeling.

Well this week I learned that some churches have lessons that specifically teach about the LDS religion. What confuses me is the fact that people attend other churches to learn about the LDS church. When I have wanted to learn more about other people's beliefs, I have gone to their mass or temple. But this woman on the street the other day told us that she already knows that Mormons are members of a cult because she learned about us at her church. We invited her to look at Mormon.org to settle any confusion there might be, so hopefully she checks that out!

A quote I really liked from this week from a member of my Mission Presidency: "God has the power to deliver us IN difficulty, not just OUT OF difficulty." Why do you think God didn't just take Daniel out of the lions den? He obviously has the power to do so. It means so much more to us and helps us to grow so much more when we make it through the hard times because of Him, rather than having Him just take away those hard times. Sometimes we may be praying for deliverance out of difficulty, when we should be ready to rely on our faith and have him give us the help we need from day to day - or even from hour to hour.

We have a few new investigators from this week (keep them in your prayers), but here's a story of the most random one: We were introduced to a young family a few hours after they baptized their baby at their church. After we shared a brief spiritual thought, they invited us to come back and they're interested in learning more about the Restoration of the Gospel. We honestly were thrown off when we heard they just got back from baptizing their baby and we didn't want to intrude or anything, so the fact that she invited us back to learn more was a very pleasant surprise!

This weekend was stake conference for our zone and at the Saturday night session we had not only our Mission President and his wife there but also Elder Call, a member of the Seventy. Near the end, Elder Call randomly turned to President Taylor and said, "Give me your finest." Well...Sister Floyd and I were called up to the stand! We were pretty dang nervous bc we had no clue what to expect, and we're both such new missionaries! But when we got up there, we were asked to share a brief lesson and testimony of the First Vision. I honestly don't think we did very well in speaking at all haha but we invited the Spirit and that's all that matters. So many people came up to us afterwards and introduced themselves and thanked us for sharing the message we did. This one woman even asked us for our number and said she had six friends she wanted to introduce us to and invite them to take the missionary discussions. Holy cow we are more than grateful for that experience!

My companion made someone for us to practice teaching together. We both like to talk A LOT so we really struggle on giving each other any time to share any other thoughts. We are getting better about asking more questions to the investigators and getting to know them, though! Just gotta keep practicing on this balloon.

Here's where the balloon came from. We surprised Brother Privett for his birthday and the first thing he said when he woke up and saw it was, "You dropped a sock." Apparently Sister Floyd left a sock on the floor. Haha thanks for appreciating our hard work and love! Once he really woke up, though, he was so grateful for the surprise. Haha we love the couple we live with!

We're actually moving houses tomorrow, though. We'll be living with another member. So if you would like to write to me (which I would greatly appreciate), my new address is:
10803 NE 103rd St.
Vancouver, Washington 98662

Shortest week ever (8/17/15 email)

Hello again, friends and fam! I have got some stories for you.

I'll start with the weirdest story. My companion and I were walking down the street and we saw this old woman in her driveway cleaning out a motor home so we stopped and asked if we can help with anything. Her husband came out from behind the motor home and we got talking and had a very long and amusing conversation. Also, he didn't have a shirt on at this time and he had a decent sized, hairy beer belly and was missing most of his teeth. Ok now that you have the picture in your head, I'll continue. After we introduced ourselves as missionaries of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, he said, "I'm above all of you. I know more about the Bible than anyone else. I'm #1 at everything I do. I'm the #1 bass fisherman in the world." If that is true, then I'm proud that I was able to talk to him, but I'm feeling a little skeptical. He just continued to tell us how he knows more than anyone else in the world and is the best at everything. Also, he was born and raised in Wisconsin and the schools in Wisconsin are #1 in the world and other states are dumb. Everyone in the mission talks about the interesting Portland people and apparently there's a saying "Keep Portland weird," which made me a little jealous that my area is in Vancouver for now, so I'm glad I got to meet a Portland-type of person here in Vancouver. Oh also, he said that God just wants us to be more relaxed about religion and God doesn't want us serving missions; He wants us two girls to open up a can of Blue Ribbon beer and go the fair to "chase boys around." Then, after we tried to slip in a spiritual message one last time before leaving, he invited us to come back another time.

There is something weird about how time is altered on your mission. The weeks feel like days but the days feel like weeks. At the end of the day, I look back on the morning and can't believe how recent that was, but then I look back on what happened a week ago and it feels like it was yesterday. I've had such a hard time sorting through the order of events in my brain haha so bar with me.

My companion and I didn't bring any CDs to listen to in the car so her family mailed us about 8 CDs and my favorite by far is the 2015 efy CD. There's the main song, Here Am I, and I can't help but feel like a million bucks after listening to it. Go listen and sing along to it and try not to feel empowered. It's impossible.

Something a little creepy but so true that my companion quoted is, "Satan knows your name, but calls you by your sins. God knows your sins, but calls you by your name." Satan knows us better than we know ourselves, which is creepy to think about, but God does too and He is way more powerful than Satan. It's our decision who we want to give ourselves to.

The power of prayer is so real! I've been trying to pray more specifically now and my prayers have totally been answered! We always pray before we plan our week out and we ask to know what message we can share and how we can help people to the best of our abilities. Then, for the times that we don't have appointments, we pray and ask where we should knock on doors. Well boy does God help us out! One week the bishop told us he had been praying and felt like we should go down this one street. We prayed about it and asked, "Please have the people were supposed to talk to be outside at this time." Boom. The third house we walked by had this lady sitting outside who apparently had met with the missionaries that were in this area before us and she said she was trying to find us. Her phone broke so she didn't have our number anymore so she had been praying that we would come by her street again. We were the answers to each others prayers! Also, another night, we prayed and asked where we should be. We went by this one guy's house that we talked to earlier that week and gave a Book of Mormon to. He answered the door and said he's been having a hard time since his mother in law just had a bad fall and broke her leg (she's 104 I think). He was so happy we came by and invited us to come back this Tuesday to have our first official lesson with him. So, everyone, God is always listening and just waiting for us to ask for His help. Sometimes He won't answer our prayers right away or in the exact way we expect, but He knows exactly what'll help us most so trust Him.

So I'm loving this mission so far. The couple we live with is amazing and it's the husbands birthday tomorrow so we're surprising him with a balloon that says, "So many candles so little cake," and we're gonna try to make white chocolate covered popcorn. Also, the humidity here is perfect for my skin. And the people are amazing. I LOVE VANCOUVER!

I'M IN VANCOUVER (8/10/15 email)

I just love this place. I'm serving in the Nehalem Ward right now and
everyone I've met is amazing. We're living in members' homes and we
are fed by different families from church every night. They all just
love and adore their missionaries and we are treated so well.

Time to rewind actually: We had to meet at the bus in the MTC with our
bags packed at 3:35am last Tuesday morning. I was dead tired. We flew
to Portland, and our mission president and his wife and assistants
picked all 31 of us up and drove us to Vancouver to eat lunch and
learn things and meet people then eat dinner then sleep there. When we
were in the mission home, one of the Assistants to the President
(Elder Clarke) said, "Sister Carter!" So I turned around and he was
like, "The Lymans want me to tell you hi for them." That just made my
day! I was feeling a little awkward and out of place but then when he
said that, I felt so comfortable just knowing we had the mutual friends
of the Lymans. I sure hope I get to see them sometime soon!

Time to rewind even further: Back in the MTC, my roommate really
wanted to play four-square instead of going to the weight room one day
during our gym time, so we reluctantly joined her. It was such a
wonderful throwback to the Blue Oak Elementary School days! I killed
it and was getting so many random compliments from strangers
throughout the week after that...apparently four square is pretty big
at the MTC. If only I knew that earlier, I could've made so many more
friends.

Just an FYI for everyone, my mom will be posting all of my emails and
pictures to cassiesmission.blogspot.com (hopefully that's the right
link) which also has my mission home address and some info about my
mission on the right side of the page if you're interested in that.
Also, there's supposedly a Washington Vancouver Mission FB page where
they post pictures and other various things about us.

Ok now to the spiritual side again: I just love God and I love that
I'm getting to know Him so much more every day. I know that He sees us
so differently than we see ourselves. He sees our divine potential and
is just waiting for us to reach what He knows we can become. He's
always there for us, just waiting for us to pray to Him and ask Him
for help to get through our trials. Even when we haven't prayed to Him
and asked Him specifically for any help, His hand is always in our
lives and it's just up to us whether we want to recognize it or not.
Look up and read Alma 30:44 (preferably the entire Chapter 30 but
mainly verse 44) and think about all the little tender mercies we take
for granted. God loves us each so much and wants the best for us each
individually.

I love you all, and thank you for all your love and support! You da
best.

The couple we're living with made us a completely green dinner because we're greenies, including green potatoes, chicken, water, grapes, broccoli, and a purely green salad.

MY FIRST P-DAY (7/29/15 email)

Well, everyone, I have so much to say so brace yourselves! This week has been so hard, but honestly the best growing experience of my life! There is no growth in the comfort zone and little comfort with growth, though. I have never had such sincere prayers and been able to recognize God's hand in my life as much as I do now. I just feel like a whole new person!

We'll start with the basics, though. I love the workout classes here! Every morning we're supposed to wake up at 6:30, but us sisters have the option of going to a 6:00-6:45 girls-only workout class in addition to our gym time later in the day. One day the class was a cardio kick boxing routine and honestly I think it's been my favorite so far. Also, my companion is so sweet and supportive. She's always willing to come to the classes/gym with me and says she promises she doesn't feel pressured to, but I'm sure she wouldn't want to go if she honestly didn't know if I wanted to or not.

Onto my companion, Sister Jacobs: we are honestly like night and day in our personalities and interests, but I just love her to death! We work so well together and I think it's honestly because we're so different. Our strengths and weaknesses kind of fit together almost like a perfect puzzle piece. I know that God put her in my life specifically because she has helped me to grow so much and has made this an even better experience for me.

Thank you so much for the packages!!! I was struggling at first because I missed having familiar people in my life and I was getting used to everything, but then I was just flooded with love and I feel like I'm on top of the world now! All of my packages came on the same day, Monday, and I'm still living off of the high. My mommy/grandparents sent me Krispy Kremes with hats (which my district LOVEEEDDDDD). Good ole Shari got me this cute package with various things I was honestly just saying I needed right before I got the package - ask my companion. Collin sent me 4.05 pounds of fudge brownies, which my roommates and everyone who passes by our room is so grateful for. We're still not even half-way done with them and we've had a lot of visitors come in for some! Also, my feet have had a hard time adjusting to wearing flats all the time and one day I came back to class and was told that Davi stopped by and dropped off a present for me! It was super comfy/thick no-show socks and a journal! I am so sad I missed seeing Davi and I hope I can see her again before I leave, but I am sooo grateful for those dang wonderful socks!

At the gym the other day, I saw some people signing to eachother and so I asked them in ASL if they were Deaf. They told me they're not, but they're being trained to serve ASL missions. Anyways, we just kept signing and signing (for so long that I used up like half of my gym time just with that) and more and more of their ASL friends would come up and join the convo. They ended up inviting my companion and I to sit at "the cool table" with their ASL friends (my companion took a semester of ASL at BYU and loved it btw) at meals, but I went to the table they told me about and it was full. :( Today, however, I saw them again and told them the table was full and they said to try again for dinner tonight and they'll try to save two seats. I just love ASL and I want to sign everywhere I go so wish me luck in sitting with them tonight.

Now for my roommates: I live in a dorm with three other girls - my companion who's going to Vancouver with me and another companionship of sisters going to North Dakota. I honestly couldn't love them more. They are such a crack up and it is so hard to go to bed on time because we all just want to talk and laugh and catch up on our lives when we're in the room together every night. Sister Shutt is just like me it's weird. We're like the same person and we've had such similar experiences in life. Sister Robinson is just like Collin in almost every way (weird haha ik) and we always joke around that she was called to be in the same room as me bc God knew I would still need Collin here, but just a white girl version of him. All four of us get along so well and I couldn't be more grateful for our conversations.

Ok, time for me to get deep and all spiritual: Here are some various thoughts and experiences I've had.

I came across Moroni 7:45 the other day and I just love it. I was focusing on the "envieth not" part and you can apply that in so many different ways. I shouldn't be envious of ASL missionaries because I know this mission is perfect for me and God has prepared me specifically for my life experiences, not anyone else's. There was a lot of other thoughts I had on that, but I need to speed this up because it's almost time for me to do laundry.

We listened to a talk from Elder Steve Allen on Sunday and he said, "When your heart aches it stretches to make room for somethings more." That is real. I spent the first couple of days missing everyone, but I also spent the first couple of days growing more than I ever have before. Later that night I read Alma 32:28 and it just reaffirmed that thought. We can't grow without pain, and I am so thankful for the opportunities we have to grow even with the pain it can bring.

Another time during our personal study time, I was reading about Christ's love for us and I just know that God know us each individually. I know He wants the best for us so He is always there weeping for us when we suffer and rejoicing for us when we make the right decisions and find a greater happiness. While there's nobody else on Earth that knows exactly what we've been though/what we will go through, God knows every pain of ours and we can go to Him to find answer to questions or solutions to problems for SERIOUSLY ANYTHING!!

Ok I need to go, but send me letters everyone! I have limited time on my email, so emails aren't the best but letters/packages are the greatest. I love you all and I love this experience and I love God and I know He loves us all on an individual level. Now I'm rambling, but I'm just so full of love! Sorry if my emotions are overwhelming. I don't even know what to do with all of them sometimes.

Also, I'll be sending lots of pics after this. Byeee, love you all!