Fwd: Pictures from chistmas!

Yes that is a book with liam hemsworth on it. the sitcky note says "not to look at till after the mission" and then it is tapped shut. hahaha oh the dollar store! 

Christmas on a Mission

Well hello everyone! So good news I survived my 1st Christmas as a missionary! Actually I did more than survive, it was a really good day! So lets start with christmas eve...

-We got to go down to San jose and the whole mission met together for breakfast and a devotional. all 280 of us. crazy! but it was good too see other missionaries who I have served with like Sis. Goodman and Sister Ellis! We had Steak and eggs and pancakes. HUGE STEAKS. It was great. and then we did a white elephant gift exchange with our zone. Then we had our devotional. it was amazing. President Watkins talked and he started crying and it was just neat to see him on a more human level. He is so wonderful. 

-So the rest of the day was spent visiting members, we saw one family and taught their little girls about the true meaning of christmas and then we helped another mom in our ward wrap presents. it was great I told all the kids I knew what they were getting. hehehe Then we went to dinner at the daytons who are a wonderful family in our ward. they have a son and daughter out on a mission right now so it was a lot of fun. dinner was great and then we even had some musical entertaniment provided my my comp who plays the cello. (she is amazing!) I stumbled through a piano song. Looks like I need to start practicing again. :(

-Then after that we went Caroling. and then all of the sisters in our zone (so 8 of us total) came to my apartment and we had a sleepover! with our mission presidents permission of course. We all drew names last week and then exchanged gifts. Then of to bed.

- Christmas morning was great, I openened my packages, thanks everyone! and then we did our studies and headed off to another members house! Where we ate breakfast and watched joy to the world. then to another members house where we ate lunch and shared a message and then to dinner. all within a 5 hour period. so. much. food. anywho dinner was great and I loved skyping! it was so good to see everyone and I cant believe that carson is coming home this week! fun to skype together as missionaries though! then after dinner we went caroling again and then to the bishops house for one last appointment. Overall my christmas was great. I realized that being out and seing people and reminding them of the true meaning of christmas was much more fun than opening presents. (though I am grateful for them) It was nice to have a christmas to realize the important things in life like the savoir and our familys.

So the rest of the week was slightly uneventful. did some service, did a church tour with a nonmember who I have to unfortunatly pass over to the ysa sisters... hahaha 

Well I better go, but happy new years to you all and I hope you all had a wonderful christmas! 

Stay safe!

Annlie

Merry Christmas!!!

Well Merry Christmas everyone! I hope you are all getting excited for the big day. I still feel like its september here in our 68 degree weather. Have any of you heard the song by greenday thats called "wake me up when september ends" ? Yep thats pretty much how I feel. haha

So this was a good week! Still a little rough since a lot of people are out shopping but still good. We got to go caroling as a zone with the stake president and that was a lot of fun! One of our less actives came out with his nonmember girlfriend and she was crying. I guess no one has ever come caroling to them before! 

We also contacted an atheist at the bart. that was fun. Well I wouldn't call him a hardcore atheist but its all good. He knew a lot about the church and we just had a good conversation about what we believe and what he believes. you know you can get excited about something when you see a person and the first thing they say is " do you really believe that christ appeared to the indians?" YEP!

Also we tried this elderly lady in our ward. she has never answered and so on saturday we tried again and then we were walking away and then there was this loud scratch all the way down the door and a thud at the bottom. then we heard knocking from the inside. so at this point we are thinking that we killed this lady. so we knocked again and nothing happened. So then we went back on sunday and knocked and no one answered but as we were leaving we saw a lady look out the curtains. so good new I didnt kill anyone. hahaha

We had some pretty good lessons and some service, we got to help Sister bond clean her house and get ready for bro bonds 82nd (I believe) Birthday. That was fun. I have missed vacumming! Though mostly I just miss the carpet part. haha 

Well I am out of time but I love you all and wish you a very merry christmas!

Annlie

ps. Dont forget the Christ is Christmas!

6 Months!

Can anyone believe that I have been out 6 months? Crazy right? and To celebrate I shall send you all a short lame email. sorry. haha 

So an update on the sisters that left :sister Ellis went to holister and sister goodman went to santa cruz. rough life. haha 

My new comp is Sister DeLaMare. She is actually from kaysville. crazy right? but her family just moved to orlando so theres that. we have both been out 6 months and she has been in livermore so I actually have met her a few times. she is really cool! I also made a paper tie and we burned it for our 6 months. I wwanted to take one from the church but I felt to guitly. haha

We also had dinner with our nonmenber neighbor jack. it was his 82nd birthday. which also meant we had dinenr with his entire family. awesome! 

overall it was a rough week. no one was home. this whole holiday thing is really killing me. we did have 13 hours of service. the max is 14. haha so we did good on that! Im not going to lie this will be a bad email but Its a little crazy figuring out skyping next week with the family so I love you all and I hope you all have a good week whether you have finals, last week of school, work, christmas parties or whatever!

Love you all and thanks for the support!

Annlie

Winter in Dublin and SELMA'S BAPTISM!

So its freezing. Yes I know all of you in Utah and Poland (anna) are thinking, umm you aren't living in snow. but lets be honest here. I signed up for Cali. Not 30 degree cali. Oh well Its supposed to be back in the 60s this week so I will survive. :)

-As for the big news of the week! 

I am not being transfered. so looks Like I will be in Dub-town for at least 7.5 months of my mission. This week I hit 6 months! So crazy!  My companion Sis G will be transfered as well as my roomate Sister Ellis. I am Sad to see her go, we have been together from Day 1. as in the MTC. so after 6 months we wont be together. Its going to be weird. But I will survive somehow! ;) Plus we have plans to be together in Monterey at the end of our mission so its cool.

-Now to the other big news of the week, Selma got baptized! It was great. she was so happy! and so cute! and after she was confirmed on sunday? oh man She was loving life. I cant wait to see her progress in the gospel, she wants to serve a mission and she will be a wonderful missionary! She already tells me how to be better. 

-Sister Johnson ( my mission grandmother who finished her mission after my 1st transfer) came back for Selmas baptism. It was so good to see her and selma was so happy!

-Also Elder Pak our zone leader is going home and his parents came up to go to church with him and then to his outgoing fireside. his dad isnt a member but I guess when elder pak offered him a book of mormon he accepted it! and His parents are sooo cute! It was adorable to see how happy they were. and they brought us Korean BBQ for today. so more on that next week.

-The bummer of the week was that we had elder irvine and sister bliss sing in our sacrament and then we invited all of our less actives and non members. and non of them came. sad day. Oh well next week!

-The ward is really sad to see Sister Goodman go, as am I, Nichelle as in tears last night. Oh man I am dreading 6 weeks from now when I will most likely leave. 

-OH I felt a 3.7 earthquake. it woke me up. crazy!

-Oh so there is this special needs guy named collin that works at target and gets so excited to see us everyweek. So we went in today to have sis G and sis ellis tell him bye and he basically cried. and then gave them very long hugs. umm we arent supposed to hug at all. It was hilarious how awkward it was. Oh the life of a missionary!

Well I better go, I hope you all have a good week and stay warm!

Love ya!

Annlie

December?

Well here we are in December? When did it become december? Holy smokes! Also sorry but this email will be boring.. Hey I warned you all!

Well it was a good week but not a very busy one. Lots of people were either not home or out of town. Its quite funny because our little white handbook (the book of rules) Says that holidays are the best to visit people because everyone is home. Thats a lie. at least in california! haha We saw a bunch of the elderly couples in our ward. They are so cute! I just love them all. I will be sad when I dont get to see them anymore! We also had thanksgiving with the Lamberts on wednesday night. It was so good. potatoes. potatoes. and more potatoes. and green bean casserole. I could die happy. So then on thanksgiving we went over to St Raymonds catholic church and helped with a homeless dinner thing. It was a lot of fun! there was multiple churches from all around the area that came to help! Then that night we had dinner with sister Hernandez and her family. It was really good but had a spanish flare to the meal rather than a traditional thanksgiving. And then some how the family got some of the elders to sing, sister bliss to sing, and sister g and I did an interpretive dance.No none of you will ever see that. So Sister Ellis was the only one that hadnt done anything so we made her pray in hawaiian. It was awesome. Overall thanksgiving was good and I hope you all enjoyed your thanksgiving! Though I really did miss moms pie crust.. ah man. 

-Saturday we saw Daniel! He is our inactive neighbor who is now 30+days sober! wahoo! We just need to get him to church now. haha

-church yesterday was good. We taught sharing time. I fail at sharing time. Majorly. haha oh well. and then we had dinner and guess what it was? Thanksgiving. I love this time of year. haha

Well sorry for the uneventful week, I hope you all had a good week and thank you all for your support! 

Annlie

ps. Transfers are next week so if you try to send me anything make sure it will get here before tuesday!