April 7, 2013 {Kaitlyn}

HAPPY 43 AND 44TH birthday MOM AND DAD!

Happy happy birthday shout out to Mom and Dad. Well technically moms shout out will be next week... but they go hand in hand. Also shout out to Lindschris because I failed to give the shout out to her last week! HAPPY APRIL BIRTHDAY´s :) Have the best week ever!! 

WOW, wasn´t general conference the best?! Every conference I don´t think that anything can beat it until the next conference comes around. UNREAL. Wow, I learned sooo many things that I´m super excited to apply en la obra misional. :) Hope you all will do the same.  I thought of you guys in one of the talks that talked about sharing with your family the spiritual experiences you are having. Look at us, all on top of things. Now you really can´t bail on the spiritual thoughts of the week. I don´t remember who talked about this, but he explained it perfectly, because I really do learn so much when you send them to me. 

As for this week, we had quite a crazy week. It started off with the longest day ever on Tuesday. We had district meeting which takes about 2 and a half hours to travel to. We were waiting to return and to make a long story short we ended up getting home at 6:30 at night because the train got canceled and then... ya long story. I was DYING. We even had appointments this day and ended up missing the majority of them. Ayy ayy ayy... after a long day of a test of patience we recognized the reason for it all. We met a man named Marcello and talked to him the whole way home. About everything. He´s going to Austria in 2 weeks, but we went to visit him and ended up meeting his family as well. They are gold. He has the cutest little nephew ever. We haven´t talked with his Sister yet, but I´m thinking that the family of his sister has lots of potential. I´ll keep you posted, we´re going backtomorrow. :) 

The rest of the week went pretty well. We were gone for the weekend because we had to stay in Monte Grande for Conference. We stayed with Hermana Hansen. We had peanut butter! :)  Hehe We had one lesson on Saturday night that was excellent. The lady just started crying towards the end and all during the prayer. She told me that she was certain that I was an angel sent to her. Haha apparently I change my voice or something when I teach because the comp that I was with said I have a special voice or something. My comp on the other hand the other week told me that I speak too kind and people are going to fall asleep. Hahaha she´s so funny, she´s super sparky so you can imagine she has a bit of a louder voice. Hahaha :)  

I´m having a rough time remembering all that happened this week, because we were only here for basically 3 days. It was a bit crazy, but I wouldn´t trade anything for the conference. It was amazing. I´ve already forgotten a ton of it, so I need to review the talks again. I loved the talk from Elder Ballard I think? The one that talked about the importance of simple doctrine and the strength of our testimonies. My new goal is to make sure that people can feel of my desire to share this gospel. I read a talk that talked about recognizing our purpose as missionaries and it is absolutely incredible. I´ll have to share it with you but I don´t remember what it is called. I´ll let you know next week. :) 

Love you all so much, hope all is going well. Have an amazing week! 

Con amor, Hermana Wright 

PS Sorry this is a lame letter. I had a bunch of funny stories to share but for some reason I can´t remember ANY of them. Hahaha besides the one that I took a bug out of my companions eye but I was having a laugh attack... so you can imagine how that went. Haha FAILURE. 

PSS Dad mentioned how the weather is cooling down... Ha I´m pathetic I die of cold already sometimes and it´s APRIL. Uhh, I´m going to die in the winter.  I don´t know what happened to me... I used to never be cold! Haha squirrell.. Oh and mom we had a crepe in one of the houses for dessert. I was thinking of you every bite of it. :) 

April 7, 2013 {Kim}

Hola! How are you!? General conference was the best!!! i hope you all watched it! If not you better get on that!! So good. Welllllll I have a new companion! I had a really hard time the first day but now its alll good! I LOVE her. Hermana Solomon from Salt Lake! Weird story. At leadership training last week i met her for the first time and we got put in a group to do a role play together and it was one of the best role plays ever! And for some reason i just knew that we were going to be companions and that we ended up in the same group for a reason! And its way weird cuz she had that same feeling as well! sweet eh? Welllll....shes great! Haha its funny we have everythinggggg in common. She plays soccer, skiis, loves camping and being outdoors, and  her favorite ice cream is mint chocolate chip, shes stubborn, and we have the same favorite number, She loves little black children and wants to adopt. haha literally everything. We were laughing about it saying like there is noooo way that we literally like the same everything.... so she says your favorite color is green huh? and i was like yessss hahaha no way! and then later we were at a members house and the sons name is matthew and she goes hey my brother has the same name as you! haha so weird. But seriously she is great! I've already learned so much from her! and she pushes me a lot. we've had some awessssome lessons. I love teaching with her. Haha she willl nottttt help me with spanish though if im struggling for words in lessons. its way good. but i hate it. haha. We've been going running in the mornings and its way good!!! Scaryyyyy story though..... We were in a lesson with a member on Friday and during the middle of the lesson all of a sudden Sister solomon got super confused and didnt know where we were and couldnt understand anything and just like lost all her strength! And we are in the house of a member that speaks absolutely no english...well ya sister solomon had a seizure! ha it was sooo scary. i was so worried for her. She couldnt walk or anything or talk or understand and she got super hot. So im on the phone with the mission nurse while trying to speak non gospel related spanish. haha. But she is fine now. It was scary all night. Thought she was gonna die on me. ahhhh ha. but its weird because we dont know why it randomly happened. But anyways we have had some awesomeeee lessons this week. and we have found 5 new investigators!! whoo whoo. and when we were contacting we found a polish woman and she let us in. she barely spoke any english but we brought her a polish book of mormon and just had her read the introduction. she was so cute. soooo happy for the book and just kept thanking us for making her feel happy. if only we could speak polish. ha we are going to have the english sisters try to keep teaching her cuz shes way cool. well this week has been way good. I love my twinnnna sister solomon we are already homies and it hasnt even been a week. and im starting to do so much better. thanks for all the support. Love you all! Have a fantastic week! Hope all is wellll Loveeeee you!

 

Love, Hermana Josse

March 31, 2014 {Kaitlyn}

Buenas Tardes! Well I have no completed my first week in my new area. Things are going well, but I do miss the good old Alejandro Korn. :) I´ve decided that the Lord wants me to learn how to better adapt to change and for this reason I am transferred every 2 transfers. Haha every area it is right before a baptism as well. I sure am being blessed with the abilitly to adjust to things pretty easily. I have had a week FULL of learning :) 

We are in an area that is completely country. It´s really neat though because it´s a tourist place because it has a Laguna. We go running(if you want to call it running hehe) at the Laguna everyday... BEAUTiful. It makes me want to jump right in. :) I added pictures in dropbox so you can get a little glimpse of it. It gives me a little taste of home because I always think of boating and Lake Powell with the fam! :) 

The people here are super nice. I am already feeling like I´ve known some of them for quite the time. My companion and I both gave talks in Sacrament Meeting yesterday, and all went well. I´m getting a little bit more confident with my Spanish, considering that all I had was an outline. Believe it or not I actually enjoy giving talks... because I always learn a lot more in my studies while I am preparing for it. It´s excellent! I spoke about prophets... ohhh  I LOVE this subject, because I have gained the strongest testimony about a living day prophet. I tied this in with the importance of prayer, because as I was studying I recognized that President Monson always touches on this topic. He has the most incredible testimony of prayer... It was perfect for me to study because it is something that I am trying to improve on. I love conference talks. I CAN´T WAIT FOR CONFERENCE!

This week we shared the story of Naaman and I recognized something that I hadn´t thought much about. As we know in the story of Naman he had to bathe 7 times to be cleaned. We were teaching a menos activo who knows all the principles of the gospel but just will not commit to going to church. As we were teaching it came to my mind the symbolism of 7. If Naman had only bathed 6 times the disease wouldn´t have been cured. It is the same thing with ourselves. We can be perfect in our studies of the scriptures, prayer, but if we do not bathe ourselves on that 7th day we are never going to be completely clean. The sacrament is critical... we MUST partake of it each and every Sunday. As we complete with this ordinance we will start off each and every week clean and energized to make it through the next week. It was quite neat, because with every person we shared this story with... another symbolism came into mind. The scriptures are FILLED with symbols. 

Hahaha so funny story. Last night my tire popped on my bike so we ended up just doing ALB (open the mouth) for the last half hour of the night. This is not my strength in the mission. Haha I am so awkward when I do them... but last night I realized that the experience is what you make it. Haha we had a very interesting story. We started talking with a couple and before we knew it we found out that they had actually just met. In the end of the conversation she said that she doesn´t know this guy, but they should know a bit more in the morning. Ayy ayy ayy you know me. Hahaha I WAS DYING. Just about started laughing right then and there. Haha oh the things we hear on the mission. Haha :)  

Quick story about the food. We went to a members house and we had a steakhouse right then and there. I was thinking of how much Brandon needed to be here in this moment as I ate all this food. First we had a huge chunk of Sausage, then he puts both the chicken thy and wing on my plate... drum roll please... then he slaps down a huge chunk of steak. Lets just say I have no idea how I put down all that CARNE. Haha He´s the cutest little member though. He has an AMAZING conversion story. He used to smoke and drink alll the time... but he left it all for the church and is now enjoying every bit of his experience in the church. 

My companion is good. She has 3 months in the mission, but she is a great teacher. I learned something really important these last few days and that is that there is something good to find in each and every companion. It is so important that we do not compare one companion to the other because they all have their own strengths. I was missing the good bond that Hna. Diaz and I had developed and then once I put this into play everything got better. Things we always good with my new comp but now things are even better. I´m learning plenty of great things in this area. :) 

I was going to share a few other things but the letter is getting a bit long so I am going to close for now. We set somebody on date for the 26th of April. She didn´t come to church, but I have high hopes for her so I´ll keep you posted. I hope all is going excellent for you all. Remember the importance of family scripture study. It is VITAL. Not just personal, but with your spouses as well. As well as family prayer. And FHE! :) Love you all. Have an excellent week! 

March 31, 2014 {Kim}

Hola! Well i dont have much time right now. But this last week has been good. Crazy but good. We've kind of been preparing for transfers. Sister Garn will be leaving tomorrow and i will be running the area and getting a new companion. Not excited. I love Sister Garn and i dont think im ready to lead the area. ahhhhh. well other news for this week. This sister officially has ADD says the doctor. haha.

I gave my 2nd talk in sacrament meeting yesterday. Everyone said my spanish has improved a TON so that was good to hear. well i gotta go.. sorry i dont have much time. but ahhhh transfers. bummed. scared. Love you all so much! Have a fantastic week!

 

Love, Hermana Josse

March 24, 2014 {Kaitlyn}

BIRTHDAY SHOUT OUT TO THE NEW DADDY!!! :) Happy Birthday Brandon!!! Have the best week EVER! I´m sorry to say that I didn´t even ever get a letter off. Yes I did write a quick letter and I was even going to send a package, and then I didn´t get around to either. I was going to send the letter today at transfer meeting, but it ended up being CRAZY! But HAPPY HAPPY BIRTHDAY! HOPE YOU HAVE AN AMAZING DAY :) PS... are you 30?! WOAHHHHH. 

Wow, this week was full of surprises. First things first I got transferred. I am now in an area called Monte de San Miguel. Wherever that is? It´s in the middle of NOWHERE. It took us 3 hours to get here. My new companion is Hermana Martinez from Columbia and has 3 months in the mission. She seems super nice, and seems to have a ton of energy! Transfers were a bit crazy because I wasn´t expecting to leave... or maybe more than anything I was hoping that I wouldn´t leave. Everything was going so well in Alejandro Korn. I´m going to miss the people so much. They were my family hear in my home away from home, but even I know that the Lord needs me in this new place. It really is amazing what the Lord can do, because you know me, I HATE change but through all the changes I have had I have really been pretty calm. I´m going to miss Hermana Diaz but it´ll be excellent to learn from a new companion.

We had a baptism 2 hours after I arrived. Haha kinda neat eh? :) I gave a talk on the Holy Ghost :) Bienvenidos! We are in a branch that has about 15 active members so it´ll be SUPER different. I´m super excited because I´ll be able to strengthen some of my weaknesses... because we´ll be doing the majority of things here. They LOVE the Hermana that was here before me and she was here for 6 months so I have some BIG shoes to fill. :) Sorry don´t know to much still... but I´ll give you a better update next week.

Hermana Diaz in the end isn´t going to Venezuela. THey took out all foreigners. They gave her a decision of whether she wanted to be reassigned or if she wanted to stay here. Pretty crazy eh? She ended up deciding to stay. She´s seriously so amazing. Along with her family. He dad seriously is going to be some grand leader. He receives revelation of all things. He had basically warned her that this was going to happen by the words that he shared with her on monday. Wow, I learned so much from her... and her family! 

I had a ton of things to share for this week, but for some reason I have forgotten everything. We had an excellent last week. We picked it up a ton, because for some reason we both kinda had a dragging week the week before. I went on exchanges with Hermana Wyeth (friend of McCall the neighbor of SHellie). Oh she is incredible! We had this lesson that was seriously INCREDIBLE. I surely knew this man in the preexistence. He usually doesn´t sit in on the lessons, but this time he did and even more, he participated. We talked about eternal families, and WOW I haven´t had so much desire for a family to be sealed in the temple in quite some time. The spirit was SO STRONG. He´s going to start taking the discussions, I know it. :) We also went out of our little shell and made the goal to do our ALB (Open the Mouth). We met some amazing people :) Aww the miracles that pass in the mission. 

Haha Jose wanted me to take his piano so that I could practice in my mission. Haha and make my mother happy because one day I was telling him how my mom always told me that I would regret this. Haha yep she was right! Haha WHAT WAS I THINKING?! I regret it more than anything else in this world. Haha maybe I´m exaggerating... but I do regret it quite a bit.

Anyway, I can´t believe I´m forgetting everything that went on this week... but I had an excellent week. The transfers are a little bitter sweet. I´m already missing Hna. Diaz. She became like a sister to me really... but that´s ok, I´ll do the same with Hna Martinez. She´s excellent! :) Lopve you all so much! Happy Birthday to all because I know that it is also Uncle John´s and Austin´s birthday or something. HAPPY BIRTHDAY WEEK :) 

PS Hope you are all looking forward to conference like I am. YIPEE! Christmas is on it´s way!!! LOVE YOU ALL! Have an excellent week!!   

March 18, 2014 {Kim}

Hi. Welllllll.....This week was good! Haha we have contacted some more crazy people this week. I almost burst out laughing in one of our contacts when the guy we were talking to just started going off about Genies, Demons, and angels and how Mary wasnt a virgin. He was so crazy. haha i was dying i had to keep acting like i was coughing cuz i was trying not to laugh. Wow i sound like a terrible person now. So yes...something i am working on is keeping a straight face. Ha. So yes...we have been doing a lot of contacting again this week. We only have one legit investigator still (China - She has a date for the 27th of April which is happening forrrr sure. I love her.) ....Its so hard to find spanish people in our area! I mean there are soooo many hispanics in Jersey but we have the cities that border all the hispanic areas. Ha. Out of 48 people we contacted yesterday 2 were hispanic and they both lived in the city that the elders cover which is mostly all  hispanic. Its super frustrating. We get a lot of referrals for the english sisters that cover our area though. We did actually find a cool dominican guy the other day and he works in a barber shop. So he had us come to his work to teach him. Ha it was so awkward. We just stood in the middle of the shop while he was cutting someones hair. but it was good and hes way cool. We have another appointment with him tomorrow!

We had leadership training this week. its where all the new missionaries get together and have trainings and practice teaching aka role plays after role plays after role plays. (I HATE ROLE PLAYS i feel so dumb in them when i dont know what to say. I was dreadddding Leadership training for weeks. And i freaked the night before because the assistants called me and asked me to give the monthly scripture...which means standing in front of like 60 missionaries and all the senior couples and president and sister jeppson and talking. what. I was so scared. But it was finnnne. and guess what..... I LOVED leadership training! I learned so much. Main thing i learned is confidence and trust are KEY. I already knew that confidence makes a huge difference...but during some of the role plays there were some missionaries that i was teaching with that were so scared and you could just tell they were not confident at all. (Something i realized about myself is that when im put in a position where i have to lead. I can lead) So i stepped up in these role plays and just did it and trusted i would know what to say. and they were so good. I usually sit there while my companion is talking and try to think about what im going to say when she is done talking but i tried my best not to do that and just let the spirit work and it was awesomee! I was more myself and i was super bold. I dont know what happened. Haha. and of course President Jeppson decided to come join one of my role plays and mediate for us. I was like you are kidddding. He is the most intimidating man in the world. But the greatest. I was so nervous but it was a goooood role play because i decided to trust that i would have stuff to say. And i did. wow. I loved Leadership training. We also had to teach the youth class yesterday at church and they are PUNKS. Just the biggest punks. They just have no care in the world and think they are the coolest teenagers. We had a really good lesson though and we got a few of them to really pay attention. I hope we actually have the opportunity to teach them again because my goal is to help all the youth gain testimonies and not be punks haha.

I have to give another talk in sacrament next week...haha scared. talks in english are hard...so yes....talks in spanish are HARD.  At least i got more of a heads up this time. Not like i have much time to prepare anyways though. haha. Well guess what...this is the last week of the transfer. I am panicking. I loveeee sister Garn and she is leaving for sure. She has become one of my best friends. Everything is so fun with her and i am completely myself. geeez i love her. shes such a great person. Im gonna have a hard time with this change. But Itll all beeee good. Im also scared because i will be leading the area. ahhh. But mostly I just dont want my best friend to leave. haha. Well i gottttta go. but i love you all so much! Have a fantastic week!

 

Love, Hermana Josse

March 17, 2014 {Kaitlyn}

Buenas Tardes!!! Sorry, this one is going to be super short. Pday ends in about 25 minutes. Haha but wow, it was so good to hear from all of you! Shout out to Brandon and Whitney because I got novels from both of them :) I almost started crying I was so happy! ;) Wink, but not really. Haha... so now that I have heard that Zeus is doing well I have to tell you. The week that he had this scare I had had a dream that something happened to him. Only in my dream it was worse, I returned from the mission and asked about him and Brandon started tearing  up and ya you get the rest of the story. I never have Lamanite dreams so I wasn´t thinking anything had happened to him, but I guess this time it really did have to do with real life. Scary scary, but glad to hear that all is well. I LOVED the photos that Brandon sent. Ry guy (RZ) is such a little stud. 

Well, as far as this week goes nothing much went on. We had a good start to the week, but struggled towards the end of the week a little bit. We have been keeping up on our goals really well except for this past week, but we´ll pick it back up this week. We did set Daniela on date for the 12 of April. She´ll be confirmed on Dad´s birthday :) She seriously has changed so much already. It is absolutely incredible to see the effect that it is having on both her own life and the life of her family. She is the HAPPIEST girl now. She´s already starting seminary, and excited about it... and she even told the bishop that she´s GOING to be baptized. Last sunday was a huge breakthrough for her. THESE ARE THE BEST STORIES. :)

I laughed when I saw the beginning of mom´s letter. Haha I had completely forgotten. I pinched the Elders and it took them a second but then they just started laughing. Haha I didn´t have time to read all the letters yet because we were doing a deep clean in the house today. I did read the good old traditional St. Patty´s day dinner. Boy am I jealous! :) Eat double for me.  HAPPY ST. PATRICK¨S DAY! 

Heads up, next week is transfers... I don´t think that we´ll be moving... but it is possible so if I don´t email for some reason don´t be worrying. It shouldn´t change anything, but just to be sure.

Haha I laughed at Sara´s humble comment because that´s exactly my problem. I want the forwarded response of Brett.  I´m still working on humbling myself... but it´s a hard attribute to correct. Being too negative affects it but so does being too positive. Wow, Sara seems to be doing absolutely AMAZING. She seems to be a completely different person. I look forward to meeting my new friends when I get home. :) 

Well, I hope all is going well. Sorry that I don´t have much to share this week. It was a bit slow with the work. We had many things fall through, but we´re keeping our heads up high and ready to have a miraculous week this week! Have an amazing week!!!

COn mucho amor,

Hermana Wright