1b960d37-640e-4a43-819b-668a39ec1fa3 Sster Talia Hansen Back to Missionary Letters Sushi N steak 👌 What's up folks? Hope all is well and that you had a happy valentine's day! Here's the run down on my week. We got to go to the temple as a district this week which was really fun! I may or may not have also eaten 3+ rolls of sushi by myself. We also got steak 3 times this week which if you know me you know that steak is my favorite, so it was a pretty dang good week that way haha! Lessons CARLOS He was a little sick, but cute as ever! We got to tell him a story about the gospel of Jesus Christ and he really ate it up! He is such a funny kid and we love teaching him. TANA She started right away by asking us questions about what she read in the book of Mormon!! She has been reading like crazy. She was also excited because she finally got her large print bible haha CHRISTINE Holy cow Christine it's amazing she hasn't smoked in a whole week! She says she's ready for the next step and asked us if she's ready for baptism! We are stoked! She is doing so well. She said she had 1 cigarette the whole week and it was nasty nasty so she doesn't even know why she did it. She really has such a strong connection with her faith in heavenly Father and it's amazing to see how much she relies on him in her everyday life. MASTERS The boys were as rowdy as ever, but they brought a long a friend this time. Her name is cat and she wants to take the lessons and be baptized! So we said yes of course! We like her a lot she keeps the boys in check. NATE We were able to talk about temples and why they are important! We set up a day to go up to the Idaho Falls temple and he was super excited and so are we! BRIDGER We talked about the word of wisdom with Bridger and found out how much he dislikes broccoli 😂😂 Been a pretty good week! But like a man outside the hospital once said "bad days are for Californians and New Yorkers!" Love yall -Sister Hansen 💕 Previous Letter Next Letter

e8475029-129a-46ed-82dd-19a704b468e4 Elder Stetson Ludvigson Back to Missionary Letters So this week was pretty insane! A lot of stuff happened, so we had transfers this week which is always a party, me and Elder Miles are staying together in Garland which I am pumped about because there is a lot of people here searching for the gospel! So after Tranfers we went and had a few lessons, one with Debra and Richard who are just the best, they are on date for November, and Debra has such a strong testimony it astounds me because she has had a tough life! But after our lessons it was towards the end of the night and we get a call from one of the Elders in our district, and we answer and see that he is in a hospital gound and at the hospital, So Elder Coons said that he has choked on some pulled pork so his companion had to do the heimlich, and after he got it all out he said he would still feel something in his throat, he went to the ER where they did an X-Ray and saw a big piece of bone stuck in his throat, so they had to ship him to a hospital in plano to have surgery on his throat. We had to go and pick up his companion while he went to plano in an ambulance! So that was pretty wild! But everything was fine and we got everything settled that next morning. We also went and visited Claudia and her family who are just the best! We are always leaving there laughing! She is an inspiration, she has beat cancer twice and has a son who I'd disabled and has around 10 seizures a day, and has completely changed her life around when she found the restored gosepl of Jesus Christ! So this Saturday come rolling around and we are heading to a lesson and as we were walking through the complex we saw Nelson, who is a recent convert that we haven't been able to get in contact with, and so we stop and talk with him for a little and share a spiritual message and got him another Book of Mormon, then we just headed to our lesson just a few apartments down from his. As we were teaching this lady, Shannon, the restoration a bunch of cops just start rolling up. And we are trying to figure out what was going on, and we see all these cops start running straight to Nelson's apartment, and so we kinda pause from our lesson to see what is going on. And we look over and see Nelson the recent convert guy we just taught getting pulled out of his apartment by the cops, and then taken to jail so that was pretty wild, haha. I guess that's what happens when you aren't following the commandments! But anyway our lesson with Shannon went amazing! She is the greatest and we are super pumped for her! On Sunday night we had a lesson with Keith, who has had a hard life and has really struggled lately to feel Gods love, but we had a super good visit and towards the end of our visit we asked keith if we could give him a priesthood blessing! And he said you can but to it according to your faith because I dont know if I have any anymore. And all through the lesson I had to use the restroom super badly but figured I would just hold it, specially since he lives in a trailer. But as we stand up to give him a blessing I knew I had to go before the blessing or else it would distract from the spirit haha so in Elder Miles words "it looked like you were about to say something so inspired it was gonna blow his socks off." But I stand up and say "keith... can I use your restroom man." Haha it was pretty funny, but after we gave him a blessing and the spirit was insanely strong it was pretty epic! I definitely knew at that moment that God loved Keith no matter what he had been trhough. Later on in the week we had MLC which is always a great time to see the other missionaries and to receive revelation, one thing that was really amazing that we talked about was a scripture, 3 Nephi 27: 2, and in this scripture Christ says "What will ye that I shall give unto you?" we talked about what you would say in response to this question, what would you ask for from Christ? Maybe perhaps a better family life or more faith whatever it is. Then our President shared James 1:5-6 "If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. 6 But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering." And so whatever you would ask Christ if you were there while he asked the Nephites this question, go and ask him! And I loved that thought, so that's my challenge for y'all! Sampai Jumpa, cinta kalian semua Previous Letter Next Letter

f7bbc5f1-adb9-45f3-ab82-597d1561523f Elder Isaac Iverson Back to Missionary Letters Snowvid, Snowmageddon, Transfer News Well it's been busy, but good. The snow storm in Texas got pretty bad and tons of people went without power, heating, and water. We had a pipe explode in our ceiling and were out of water from Mon-Fri 2 weeks ago. We were in pretty good condition compared to a ton of other people. On the bright side of it all, we got a TON of service opportunities! Transfer News: I'm staying in Scenic Oaks and getting a new companion named Elder Taylor. Super excited about that! The work still moves on. We have a few friends who are right about ready for a baptismal date! Franco is SO close! He is just really trying to get his answer, but he really loves what we teach. Marty got into Family History and has been connecting to ward members that way!. We starting teaching someone who is really ready to receive the Gospel. His name is Luis, and unfortunately I was on exchanges for the first lesson, but my companion Elder Ackerson did great in teaching him the Restoration! We've been super busy and I've been loving my mission! Here is my favorite scripture in the Book of Mormon: Enos 1:27 And I soon go to the place of my rest, which is with my Redeemer ; for I know that in him I shall rest. And I rejoice in the day when my mortal shall put on immortality, and shall stand before him; then shall I see his face with pleasure , and he will say unto me: Come unto me, ye blessed, there is a place prepared for you in the mansions of my Father. Amen. If we live faithfully like Enos, we will see our Redeemer's face with pleasure. He will welcome us and His love for us will radiate so powerfully! Previous Letter Next Letter

2cae9283-a4e9-4dc4-aa33-0706d491e49d Elder Braxton Poole Back to Missionary Letters Training is over whats next? (Week 15) WOW, feels like yesterday that our first transfer ended! It's been kinda weird building up to transfers. We went on two exchanges that both were a party! My first was with Elder Davis, as always we had a good time with Spanish. The other was with Elder Dye, he is from Island Park, Idaho! It was so much fun and the area we were in was kinda the boonies compared to Wesley Chapel so it reminded me of home a little. The reason I brought it up was because we met so many just different people there it kinda scared me! We had a lot of good lessons over the week and met a few new friends. I guess we didn't have anything drastic happen. It's been pretty average I guess, but I won't be keeping track of Wesley Chapel anymore! I'm going to Ocala! Ocala is the most northern zone in our mission and I get to be right in the city! My new companion only has one transfer left so that is crazy! Can't wait for the new adventures. Really sad to leave all of the other Elders in Tampa zone but it will be so worth it! I'll try and do better next week with my email! Elder Poole Previous Letter Next Letter

dab03780-35b2-4914-9c45-f9b461560bb9 Elder Emmanuel Navarro-Gonzalez Back to Missionary Letters Week 8 Hola y'all! This week I've definitely been practicing my southern accent this week! It's hard not to practice cause some of the mission leaders have really thick accents. It's pretty fun to take some of their best quotes and say it the way they say it. The best one this week was our vehicle coordinator this week telling us that he's busy mowing his lawn on his riding mower and that he "couldn't talk" but then proceeded to talk to us about his mission and that he killed it back when he served. Once twenty minutes of stories passed I let him get back to his mowing. On Thursday we had a zoom call Zone Conference! It was with Elder Martino so that was awesome hearing from him. My biggest take away was that we as missionaries should find someone that is in the same situation as the investigator. That will help the member to "astonish" the investigator with their testimonies. As Amulek did for the people of Ammonihah with his powerful testimony in Alma 10:12. But we sat there for 5 hours which was sooooo long! Afterwards we went to one of the best barbecues in the whole mission. It was called Mission Barbecue and it was honestly the best stuff I've ate since being here! So our Spanish page needed a talent portion for the weekly live so I decided to do frisbee golf. So my companion takes us to this random park and he bring some tortillas?? So then he gives me the phone and says start recording. So I record this kid start feeding ducks as his spiritual talent and I honestly lost it. We stayed there for like half an hour and just enjoyed the ducks. It was fun but I couldn't believe he took us there randomly. Go check it out on the page if you want to see this Elder feed some ducks! This Saturday was especially awesome because we ordered some Bolis! If anyone doesn't know Bolis are like Mexican ice pops. So there's this guy from Mexico that makes them in Nashville and drives around Tennessee delivering them to people! So we ordered some and he brought it to our apartment complex! I got some jamaica, coco, chocolate and fresh! They honestly hit the spot when you get done with work for the day. I would definitely recommend going on Facebook and liking Bolis Babys! I had my first dinner on the mission on Tuesday! We went to shoot a kitchen segment for the live and an Hermana taught us how to make huaraches! They were so fun to make and she let us eat them after! It was so fun to have in hour dinners! I can't wait for things to open up again because it was awesome! I hope y'all have an awesome week! Thanks so much for all the replies! It makes my week so much better. I appreciate all the love and support! If you guys want any awesome reads for this week I'd go to 2 Nephi! Its grown to be one of my favorite chapters in the Book of Mormon! Love you guys! Elder Navarro-Gonzalez My mailing address for the next week maybe: 952C Reach Lane, Murfreesboro TN 37120 Previous Letter Next Letter

8cbde4ef-f362-40f8-b856-ee8961f3ac91 Elder Daxon Toone Back to Missionary Letters I am thankful for Prophets. Teachings from old and modern day Prophets bring us closer to God and help us overcome challenges we face in life. Amos 3:7 Surely the Lord God will do nothing, but he revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets Previous Letter Next Letter

4f7e88ea-d096-4786-9c45-1d916b766123 Elder Aden Woods Back to Missionary Letters It's been a while.. 🦸♂️ Hello all! It has been a long while since I've sent an email so here iam! Life is good and everything is going well here! Still here in Roseburg oregon! Transfers are coming up in about a week so we will see what happens! The mission life is awesome! My companion is great and we have seen some cool miracles here in Roseburg! We've had a really busy past few weeks with all our meetings! Time is flying by! Hope you all are doing well! Have a great week! ❤ Previous Letter Next Letter

2cffe2d8-c501-48b1-8af1-e506971f1de5 Elder Tauaimalo Fiso Back to Missionary Letters BisNarck Talofa everyone! Sorry it's been a WHILE. I'm still alive in North Dakota and I'm loving it! I'll give yall a rundown of what's been going on the last few months: I got transferred out of Grand Forks, ND and I am now in Bismarck, ND! I miss Grand Forks and the members a whole lot, definitely one of my favorite areas in my mission so far. Being in Bismarck is a lot of fun and I am literally two minutes from the temple so that's super nice. Our friend Rose in Grand Forks got baptized about a month ago! She was so ready for it and has such great love for the gospel. Two weeks after her baptism, she gave birth to her baby Sebashtien. We went and saw him and that was a lot of fun. My last companion Elder Petersen is supposed to go to Samoa as well so we had a good time learning the language together. We had so much fun together and saw so many miracles in the work. My companions now are Elder Pryor and Ashcraft. We're staying in a tiny apartment with 3 other Elders, so 6 missionaries total. It's crazy but its tons of fun. The other set of Elders are the Content team meaning they make all the content for the Facebook pages in the mission and DANG they are talented. One of the Elders plays the piano so well, we just ask him to play a song and he literally plays it right away. He performed a special musical number in sacrament meeting and it was phenomenal. He played The Spirit of God and arranged it on the spot when he was up on the stage. So much talent. This weekend, Elder Gary E. Stevenson is coming to Bismarck for a Priesthood Leadership training and is also having a devotional with all the missionaries in the mission in person. Its gonna be way sick seeing past companions and missionaries I served around, especially an Apostle of the Lord in person. It's crazy tho because there are missionaries that live about 8-9 hours from the mission home so they got a trek here and back. I've been studying a lot about charity lately. I love the phrase from the scriptures, "Charity never faileth". Its so true! The love of Jesus Christ never fails!! If we pray will all our heart to have that kind of love, God will give it to us. Love conquers over everything! I love you all. Elder Fiso Previous Letter Next Letter

0e1865a6-6a82-4c1a-a7ce-4b1968400396 Elder Maverick Ludvigson Back to Missionary Letters THE AMAZON🐒 What up everyone im still alive in the jungle and wow its lit. My area is like the fields of the jungle so it super entertaining just to be here! Spiritual Thought Its pretty simple but super powerful THE SCRIPTURES! READ THEM! I can say without a doubt that if you read the scriptures everyday you will make better choices! Ma I got the package and it had a little nerf football and all of the latinos in my district are obsessed with it 😁. Everytime we go out of the house my comp always has it and we play catch in the street everywhere we go. The work in the jungle in super fun. Our area is huge! So im still leaning everything about it but the people out here are way willing to listen to us! We had a 2 baptisms programed for last sunday and we got permission to baptize them in a little area under a waterfall! But it sadly fell through 😅. Hopefully we can get everything situated for next week! We also had our leadership counsel in Quito so I had a lot of travels at the beginning of the week. We weren't going to make it back to Puyo(my area/jungle) on time so presidente booked us rooms in Baños (the prettiest place I have seen) waking up surrounded by mountains and waterfalls was peak! I love it our here and me and my comp get along great! We are always laughing and joking around. Anyways pretty tranquilo week feel free to send me an email! Until next week (hopefully 😂) Con amor Elder Lud 🤙🏿 Previous Letter Next Letter

8c8181a7-7c38-402f-a242-2d74d2075874 Sister Danrzel Park Back to Missionary Letters Headed To Provo MTC Hey guys! I hope everything is going well for everyone. I am on my way to the Provo MTC today and I am so excited to meet my district! The rest of last week was rough online but it was awesome to spend time with my family. I was able to go to the temple yesterday and I am so grateful for that opportunity! As for milestone this week me and Hermana Farnsworth taught our first two appointments!! I am so grateful for my companion she has such a strong testimony and amazing knowledge. Bullet points to describe this week • We were told NO RUBIKS CUBES!! My district was pretty upset… • The Holy Ghost really can bring things to our remembrance! • Family is your biggest support system, saying goodbye is really hard. • If you have a question just ask. • I have learned if you tell your parents every time you eat something “this is my last time eating this” they get annoyed with you and start to say that every time you do anything! I know that with the Savior we can do anything! Have patience and know that He loves and supports you. Look for Him and little miracles in your life and you will find Him in the details. Love you guys! Have a great week! Previous Letter Next Letter

dd34c7c8-9ebf-4ae8-842b-f1edc1c73e4f Sister Alley Shaner Back to Missionary Letters I'm Alive!! Hello everyone! I’m so sorry it took me so long to send out another email. Turns out adjusting to being home is a lot harder than I expected it to be! My experiences as a Service Missionary have been great though and I promise to send consistent emails once again! First, I want to share with everyone where I’ve been serving! Getting a schedule organized for me was really iffy at first and I was driving up to St. George almost every day because there are no other service missionaries in Mesquite and so nothing was really set up down here. The time difference also sucked because if I had an assignment at 8 Utah Time then that’s actually 7 my time, which means I need to leave at 6. I’m not a morning person lol. But, we’ve slowly been figuring things out and now most of my assignments are down in Mesquite! We’re still figuring out the kinks but let me just go over my schedule quickly! Monday I have a morning devotional in St. George with my district and then afterwards I stay at the institute to work on a really neat service project. We’re basically making homemade beds out of grocery bags and then we ship them off to refugees and countries who need it, like Ukraine! Then I come home and I help at the food bank we have here in Mesquite. Tuesday we’re still kind of figuring out, but I think I’ll be helping with the FamilySearch Center or the animal shelter which I am really excited about. Wednesdays are my temple days! I’m so excited to work in the St. George temple, it is absolutely gorgeous! I’ve missed it a lot! Thursdays are really exciting because I’m helping my old 4th grade teacher with her class! I’ve only done it once so far, but I loved it and the kids are amazing! Almost has me really considering becoming a teacher! Finally, Fridays I’m helping at the Salvation Army in Mesquite! Saturdays I don’t really have anything scheduled and Sundays are really a family day, which is nice! It’s been over a month now but I’m just barely starting to adjust. It’s been a little difficult keeping the habits I formed on my mission, which has been really frustrating for me but it’s to be expected. I’ll start shaping back up soon enough lol! I want to share with everyone a thought I’ve been having the past week. Last Saturday I had the privilege to hear from Bradley Wilcox who is in the Young Men General presidency! It was an amazing conversation and he said something that really made me think, that I’d like to share. Being on the covenant path can be really difficult, I think the most difficult part for me is feeling like I’m not making any progress because I keep messing up. I think it can sometimes take really long to take a step forward and we all focus on how fast we mess up. Think of it this way, each of us is walking our own path. It takes everyone a week to take one step forward, it’s a hard long journey but after 7 weeks we’re 7 steps ahead of where we were. Then all of a sudden something disrupts our journey, whether it be ourselves or an outside force and we end up falling back 6 steps in one day. How frustrating is that! We made so much progress and it took so long only for it to be ruined in a matter of seconds. I think we all can sometimes get caught up in the fact how much we backtracked and end up not realizing that we’re still one step ahead from where we started. That’s how our paths work. It sucks, it’s frustrating, and it’s not fair but it is worth it because eventually if we keep going we will all make it to where we need to be. President Wilcox said this in different terms, but his message was clear and that was that the only way we could possibly fail this journey is if we stopped trying. We let the mistakes get to us and we stopped trying to move forward. I hope everyone can think about that for a moment. Mistakes and bad circumstances suck but that’s no reason for anyone to get off the path that we’re able to be on through Christ. If we did stop trying we would just be playing right into the hands of the person who caused our misery! Anyway, I hope everyone has a fantastic Thanksgiving and recognizes the things in our lives to be grateful for! Adios! Previous Letter Next Letter

8dd7706c-1ae9-4c58-a380-a727ca173b7b Sister Tyra Ludvigson Back to Missionary Letters Cesar 🌊 CHOOSE JOY!!! Holaaa buenaaaas!! Holy smokes, this was probably one of my most favoritest weeks of my whole mission!!! Coolest things: - CESAR GOT BAPTIZED!!!! Such a sweet sweet baptismal service! Cesar can't see, so instead of having him look behind and see all the people there, we had everyone shout "Felicidades Cesar!" Ahhh so so cool!! A lot of his family came, you could tell they really felt the spirit - there was a lot of wet eyes 🥹 (If I had a nickle for every Cesar I helped get baptized after them receiving the missionary lessons for more than 2 years, I'd have 2 nickels - which isnt a lot, but it's AMAZING that it happened twice!) - We had a lot of really awesome lessons this week! One of my favs was with this sweet gal Conce. She'd felt like she's distanced herself for God because of situations in her life. It was really cool to be able to help her feel that it's never too late to turn back into His loving arms! Had some good tears on that one too! - Zone trainings! This was my first time giving a training at Zone Council! It was a good experience - I feel like whenever I'm asked to talk/give a training, I always end up learning more than anyone else! This was no exception! Me and my companion trained on the "Gospel Continum" I'll explain more in my pensamiento espiritual! - We had some young women come out with us! We were able to teach about the plan of salvation with them! I love hearing anyone and everyone's personal witness of Christ - so that was so special!! Pensamiento Espiritual! The basis of our training came from this amazing book called "Is God Disappointed in Me?" (Spoiler - He's not and cannot be!) In it, the author explains a pendulum-like Gospel Continum! We are swining side to side - one side represents the love/grace/acceptance of God and the other represents our behaviors/obedience/commandments. We need both to grow closer to God and we use each side to push ourselves to swing higher and higher (I'll try to attach a picture). It is so so cool!! I was able to share an experience I had towards the beginning of my mission which changed the way I viewed the work I was currently doing. During my 2nd transfer (basically beginning of my mission), I was struggling quite a bit - I was frustrated I couldnt speak nor understand spanish (as I'm sure Elder Ludvigson is currently feeling😆), I was starting to seriously question why I came out on a mission in the first place - when my parents told me that my sweet Grandma Cozy was probably going to pass within the week. I called Granny to say my goodbyes - and while I was holding back my wails - my sweet sweet grandma said to me "Now Tyra, If you come back from your mission to go to my funeral, I will be so upset with you." At that point, I was looking for any reason to throw in the towel and take a break for a second, but hearing my grandma's lowkey dying wish pushed me to say a fervent prayer that night. I asked God to help me with the desire to stay out, especially if granny was going. I had the impression to purify my heart, to purify my desire of staying out on my mission. My mission didn't magically get easier, but my actitudes changed and I started to truly find joy. Joy is a choice and I invite all of you guys to make that choice to accept and feel Christ's lasting joy! (Especially if you're currently on your mission!!) I love y'all!!! - Hermana Ludvigson Previous Letter Next Letter