2nd to Last Email 2/2

Oh gosh.

Hi (:

Is it annoying if I comment on how fast time is flying or how I feel like this week was one big blur again?

Probably.

Oh well.

Time is flying and this week is one big blur.

I legit am sooo out of time so I will just paste what I wrote for my "final paragraph" that will go in the book of missionaries at the mission home.

" Everyone says that time flies when you serve the Lord. It isn't until you live it do you realize how true that is. This past year and half has truly been a blessing, a refiners fire, a miracle, a challenge, and a privilege. I'm not sure how anyone puts their mission into words. It has been the hardest, most rewarding thing I've done so far. My mission has taught me about God's infinite wisdom. He knows me. He knows me so much better than I know myself. I have learned to trust in Him. He knew I needed to serve a mission eons before I ever did. He made it possible. He knew that I needed the people of Wisconsin. He knew that I could do it. I have come to know my Savior, Jesus Christ. I have come to better understand His Atoning sacrifice for me. I learned how to do hard things with His help. I learned what it means to have weaknesses become strengths, and how that is possible. I learned the importance of covenants. I have seen the power that comes from righteous living. I have been humbled. I have been broken. I have felt strength when I needed it. I have seen and witnessed the literal, tangible light that glows in peoples' eyes as they come closer to Christ. My mission has become sacred to me because it has taught so much that I didn't even know I didn't know! I have a long way to go and I many more things to do in my life, but my mission has taught me that I can have hope and confidence in my future. I have learned how to help others, but most importantly, I have learned how CHRIST is the only one who can heal and change hearts. I am thankful for the opportunity to serve the people in Appleton, Prairie du Chien, Janesville, Lake Mills, and Racine for Him. In turn, He has changed my heart. And I am eternally grateful. "

Rollercoaster'ing 1/26

Is today REALLY the 26th of January????? Oh my good golly gee whittickers, I just might just freak out.

So like, HI!

Time is ticking and it's stressing me out.

This week was so good.

And that stresses me out.

My good friend JayQ once said that at the end of your mission is when you FINALLY start to feel like you are getting the hang of things, and thats when they send you home.

JayQ is right.

Like, I am having so much fun. haha. And everytime I'm like, "WOW, this is so fun! I'm so glad I just got here!" I remember that I have ACTUALLY been a legit set-apart missionary for 18 months and 2 days now and I DIDNT just start. And then it becomes a sad day.

But at the same time, I am so tired.

Evidence:
 Pday last week consisted of a 3 hour nap by the fireplace. And that didnt even cut it.

But then I remember that I love this place and I love being a missionary and I love teaching people the gospel.

Evidence:

District Meeting the other week when we set our yearly goals for the mission. Oh wait, what do you mean I wont be here for 90% of 2015? Sister Cutler (the mission presidents wife) happened to be sitting next to me and I said, "Sister Cutler, I dont ever want to leave!" To which she very happily reminded me that I can sign up again in 6 months!

I started to get sick on Tuesday this week.

Which is hilarious.

Because I went on exchanges on Tuesday.

Translation: I am ALWAYS sick on exchanges. I'm pretty sure every exchange I go on, I look like the worst missionary in the world because I'm always just coming down with something. 

#ithappens

But the good news is that is was just a cold and I am feeling much better and it didnt prevent me from working.

We've done some super great things. We've been tracting a lot. And its been pretty hilarious.

Last night we went out with a goal to get four other lessons in a short amount of time. So we were just doing everything we could to get people to talk to us. At one door, a man answers and opens the screen door. I smile real big (but not cheesily) and reach out my hand and say, "Hi! My name is Sister Butler. What is your name?" ............ AND THERE IS SILENCE. Just this big dude staring at me. In silence. With my hand, nice and warm and toasty in my big pink mitten, just hanging there, juuuuuuuust chillin'. For like what was probably 5 minutes. When I realize that he was NOT going reciprocate my handshake, I awkwardly said, "ooookay, I wont shake your hand.... Well, Sir. We are missionaries...." And he says, "we're eating dinner" and closes the door. Then Escobar and I proceeded to laugh our faces off. 

We kinda laid down the law with Tessa. She is not progressing and she is lying to us about a bunch of things and its really awkward because we KNOW she is lying, but she refuses to tell the truth, even when we ask her about it and teach the principle and everything. So we have been praying really hard to know how to help her. We made the sweetest baptismal calendar eveeerrrr. We used sticky notes and wrote all the lessons we need to teach and scheduled lessons for them. This way she knows what we'll be teaching and that if she cancels or doesnt show up, its going to push her date back again. Its been suuuuuppppper helpful so far.


Oh. I should probably explain my picture and the comment about almost being shot...(: I like to joke and say that I almost got shot this week. But its kinda not funny cause it could have happened. We went to visit our friend Tessa this week. We pull up next to her house (I always feel awkward in her neighborhood and other parts of the "hood" cause we drive a new white 2013 Ford Fusion and we always wear skirts or dresses, and I'm just a total white girl and it just looks bad..haha) So. We pull up and there are like 20 shady looking characters pointing and yelling and pretended to shoot a gun toward her house. I'm like, "Sister Escobar, we are about to get shot!" (and she laughs cause she aint scared of nothing here {excuse my grammar...it's just what happens when you live in the hood} and thinks it would be fun to get shot. She's crazy and wants to be a cop or something.) But, we have an appointment and important things to talk about, so we get out of the car and walk through the crazy and knock on her front door. She opens it like an inch and tells us, "you dont wanna be here right now. LEAVE. People here gots guns. You two pretty white girls gotta leave. It aint safe for you. Dont stay in the part of town." So...we walk back and get in the car and laugh and drive away. The end.

Fred is still awesome. We asked him to sing for us this week when we were at his house with Sister Dalley and it was crazy good. Like.... he opened his mouth and we all like....jumped, it was so good.

OH! I gave a talk in spanish! It was the proudest day of my life. I have been working on it for a little bit now. I decided to write as much of it in spanish as I could and then have Hermana Calderwood help me edit it. I was soooo surprised at how little corrections she made. I spoke on, "sacrificios de uno por Cristo" (sacrifices we make for Christ, essentially). It was so fun. Everyone told me it was so good and that I can't get away with saying that I dont speak it anymore. So...now I guess I have to actually talk to people in spanish now. I also volunteered to translate for Bro Warner when he goes home teaching this week. So.....I'm terrified about that. I'm not THAT good.

This is what I just told my mission president about this week, "This week was good! We have been focusing on finding. We havent had a bunch of success yet, but we will! Its been fun to see how much I have grown in my ability to talk to people and to testify. Testifying makes me happy. It reminds me of what I know and why I came here. Its been a fun week to be a missionary."

oh! My homecoming talk will be of Feb 15th! Uhm, I dont know what time or where...but I'm sure you can ask my dad or you already know because you are in my ward anyway. But if not, ask el Padre gue see llama Shane. Hope to see you all there!

Jan 20, 2015 (where did January go?) 1/20

Hey!

This week was a really good week! This email wont be very long because we couldn't email yesterday since the libraries were closed for MKLJ day and we have to be at District Meeting in an few.

Monday was a fun Pday. The elders had a nerf war. It was pretty epic. We had a lesson with Cheryl Johnson and her family and that was legit. He husband recently returned to activity, and he was on fire. She is less active too and is struggling with a lot of t hings, and he ended up being a big help to her. It was cool because he like literally had JUST started coming back. Like..the past two weeks. But he knows its true and good and he knows how much living the gospel blesses him. 

We saw Fred twice this week. . He is SO cool. We taught him a bit of the Plan of Salvation, but he had questions about so many things that we didnt get very far. They were super good questions though and I'm glad we had time to help him. He struggles with things and keeping the faith, and so I asked him to read 2 Nephi 4 when he had time. He opened up to it and says, "Hey! That the page I'm on!" Which means in 1 week he had read 63 pages. Thats legit. This guy is so prepared. We taught the rest of the Plan of Salvation on Saturday and it went really well. Then he went to a get-together at a members house and apparently had a super fun time and even sang for everyone. We didnt know he sang. 

We werent able to go to said party because we went to a baptism in the spanish branch. That was really cool. Little Yudiria got baptized! Her father is really against the church and swore she would never be allowed to get baptized while she was under 18. She had been praying since she was 6 years old for her dads heart to softened so she could get baptized. Isnt that the tenderest thing ever? She was precious. She came to the church without any baptismal clothes and without any idea how the actual ordinance worked. I helped her pick a dress and braid her hair back and she asked me to stand by the steps in the font while the ordinance was performed. It was so precious. And of course, anything said or done in spanish is 100% prettier and more spiritual than in english. 

I also made a little friend named Chase who is 3 years old and only speaks spanish. We get along great because I can speak 3-year-old spanish pretty fluently, actually...its probably all I speak. 

We had interviews with President this week too. It was a little crazy that it was my last one before like the... "go home, stay active, and get married in the temple" interview I will have in three weeks. But it was good. I usually bawl my face off for who-knows-why, but I didnt! I've had a lot of experiences this week where I was able to see how much I have grown. Some of them are silly things and some of them are awesome spiritual things. 

One of said silly experiences was when we got TOTALLY stuck in some snow in a ditch. Sister Escobar tried to turn and we ended up in like 3 feet of snow. We were STUCK. BUT! This Arizona girl knew what to do. I got the floor mats from the back seats and got them under the wheels after digging out the front half of the car. We had to call the elders to help me push, because I am weak. But I totally didnt freak out. Usually, I would. But I was calm and collected and it was kinda funny, actually. 

This week is going to be awesome too. We will try to stay out of snow banks though (;

Miracles happen 1/12/2014

Hey friends!

This week has been REALLY cold but REALLY good. 

One of the highlights of this week happened on Saturday and Sunday and involves our new friend Fred and the Dalley family. 

Earlier in the week, we had set up an appointment with Fred for Saturday. We tried really hard to find a member to come with us since he is a single man and we can't visit him on our own. On Thursday, we thought we should call one sister, who was unable to come. So we asked another sister. Who never got back to us. On Friday we were feeling a little more desperate. We literally asked 4 more sisters. No one was free. Saturday morning we were stressing. Sister Dalley texted us about this coming thursday when we are going to the family history center with our friend Mackie. We had just seen Sister Dalley, but it was worth a shot - we asked her to come to our lesson with Fred later that day. She said she could!

We got to the lesson and it was perfect. I havent been the best at having members present at every lesson, but this week I gained a testimony of it. It was one of the best 1st lessons I've ever taught. Fred is super prepared. And Sister Dalley is an awesome member missionary. She could explain things in ways that we never could. SHE invited him to church.  And he came!

So the next day we are welcoming people into the building and up walk the Dalley family and Fred. literally, they looked like THE HAPPIEST people on earth. 

Did Fred love church? YES. Did he say he'd come back? YES. Was Sister Dalley the person God needed us to take with us to teach Fred? YES. Is that why everyone else and literally their mom was busy? YES. Is God totally in charge of His work? YES.

17 months down and I feel like I'm finally starting to get a hang of this. haha. Sometimes...

We got to meet with Tessa again finally too. She came to church too. The lesson was crazy spastic and all over the place because there were like 4387345 other random people and children at her house and she was trying to braid extensions into her girls' hair. Did she teach me? Yes. It was the greatest thing ever. All of the little kids were like, "You know howta braid?" And I said, "Uhm, yeah. Does it look like I know how to braid?" And they laughed and said, "Noooooo, youre a white girl!" Well, I showed them. White girls can braid too. 

Oh heavens. We also met with our friend Pat. We tracted into her a few weeks ago and we've seen her a few times. I love Pat. She is the nicest soul. This week, she dropped us. But I still love her. She sat down and told us that this would be our last meeting, that she thanked us for the things we taught her and helping her, but she cant see herself changing beliefs at this point in her life. Yet she said, "So what are you teaching me today?" and we had planned on reading the Book of Mormon with her, so we did. We read Moroni 7 which was PERFECT for the situation.

...

" 22 For behold, God knowing all things, being from everlasting to everlasting, behold, he sent angels to minister unto the children of men, to make manifest concerning the coming of Christ; and in Christ there should come every good thing.

 23 And God also declared unto prophets, by his own mouth, that Christ should come.

 24 And behold, there were divers ways that he did manifest things unto the children of men, which were good; and all things which are good cometh of Christ; otherwise men were fallen, and there could no good thing come unto them.

 25 Wherefore, by the ministering of angels, and by every word which proceeded forth out of the mouth of God, men began to exercise faith in Christ; and thus by faith, they did lay hold upon every good thing; and thus it was until the coming of Christ.

 26 And after that he came men also were saved by faith in his name; and by faith, they become the sons of God. And as surely as Christ liveth he spake these words unto our fathers, saying:Whatsoever thing ye shall ask the Father in my name, which is good, in faith believing that ye shall receive, behold, it shall be done unto you.

 27 Wherefore, my beloved brethren, have miracles ceased because Christ hath ascended into heaven, and hath sat down on the right hand of God, to claim of the Father his rights of mercy which he hath upon the children of men?

 28 For he hath answered the ends of the law, and he claimeth all those who have faith in him; and they who have faith in him willcleave unto every good thing; wherefore he advocateth the cause of the children of men; and he dwelleth eternally in the heavens.

 29 And because he hath done this, my beloved brethren, have miracles ceased? Behold I say unto you, Nay; neither have angelsceased to minister unto the children of men.

 30 For behold, they are subject unto him, to minister according to the word of his command, showing themselves unto them of strong faith and a firm mind in every form of godliness.

 31 And the office of their ministry is to call men unto repentance, and to fulfil and to do the work of the covenants of the Father, which he hath made unto the children of men, to prepare the way among the children of men, by declaring the word of Christ unto the chosen vessels of the Lord, that they may bear testimony of him.

 32 And by so doing, the Lord God prepareth the way that theresidue of men may have faith in Christ, that the Holy Ghost may have place in their hearts, according to the power thereof; and after this manner bringeth to pass the Father, the covenants which he hath made unto the children of men.

 33 And Christ hath said: If ye will have faith in me ye shall have power to do whatsoever thing is expedient in me.

 34 And he hath said: Repent all ye ends of the earth, and come unto me, and be baptized in my name, and have faith in me, that ye may be saved.

 35 And now, my beloved brethren, if this be the case that these things are true which I have spoken unto you, and God will show unto you, with power and great glory at the last day, that they are true, and if they are true has the day of miracles ceased?

 36 Or have angels ceased to appear unto the children of men? Or has he withheld the power of the Holy Ghost from them? Or will he, so long as time shall last, or the earth shall stand, or there shall be one man upon the face thereof to be saved?

 37 Behold I say unto you, Nay; for it is by faith that miracles are wrought; and it is by faith that angels appear and minister unto men; wherefore, if these things have ceased wo be unto the children of men, for it is because of unbelief, and all is vain.

 38 For no man can be saved, according to the words of Christ, save they shall have faith in his name; wherefore, if these things have ceased, then has faith ceased also; and awful is the state of man, for they are as though there had been no redemption made.

 39 But behold, my beloved brethren, I judge better things of you, for I judge that ye have faith in Christ because of your meekness; for if ye have not faith in him then ye are not fit to be numbered among the people of his church.

 40 And again, my beloved brethren, I would speak unto you concerning hope. How is it that ye can attain unto faith, save ye shall have hope?

 41 And what is it that ye shall hope for? Behold I say unto you that ye shall have hope through the atonement of Christ and the power of his resurrection, to be raised unto life eternal, and this because of your faith in him according to the promise.

 42 Wherefore, if a man have faith he must needs have hope; for without faith there cannot be any hope.

 43 And again, behold I say unto you that he cannot have faith and hope, save he shall be meek, and lowly of heart.

 44 If so, his faith and hope is vain, for none is acceptable before God, save the meek and lowly in heart; and if a man be meek and lowly in heart, and confesses by the power of the Holy Ghost that Jesus is the Christ, he must needs have charity; for if he have not charity he is nothing; wherefore he must needs have charity.

 45 And charity suffereth long, and is kind, and envieth not, and is not puffed up, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil, and rejoiceth not in iniquity but rejoiceth in the truth, beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.

 46 Wherefore, my beloved brethren, if ye have not charity, ye are nothing, for charity never faileth. Wherefore, cleave unto charity, which is the greatest of all, for all things must fail—

 47 But charity is the pure love of Christ, and it endureth forever; and whoso is found possessed of it at the last day, it shall be well with him.

 48 Wherefore, my beloved brethren, pray unto the Father with all the energy of heart, that ye may be filled with this love, which he hath bestowed upon all who are true followers of his Son, Jesus Christ; that ye may become the sons of God; that when he shall appear we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is; that we may have this hope; that we may be purified even as he is pure. Amen."

The spirit was so strong. She just kept looking at the page and we let there be silence for quite awhile. Sister Escobar asked her what her favorite story of Christ was, and she said it was the Sermon on the Mount. Even more perfect! I showed her where Christ teaches the Nephites the exact same things in 3rd Nephi. We read it together and it was so great. Pat still dropped us, but we got her to keep the Book of Mormon and to commit to read the rest of the chapters that cover the sermon on the mount in the America's. And it was awesome. 

I was just emailing my cousin and he asked me how much more time I have on my mission, when I realized that today is january 12th and I got home on Feb 12th. AHHHHHHHHHH. Stress. Sadness. I want to do this forever. 

missions are great.

go on one.

Love you all! Thanks for everything! I feel your prayers! 

1/5/2015

It was my birthday! I cant even believe I'm supposed to be 21 now. Thats crazy. 

My birthday was SO good. We emailed and then we went bowling with all of our missionary friends from Racine and Kenosha. Bowling party for 14 people? Why, yes please! It's become a tradition to go bowling on my birthday. I did it last year, and I did it this year. 

It was so much fun. I bowled the greatest game I've ever done. It was a birthday miracle, I tell ya! 

4 people left by the time we could take this pic...

​

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Okay, I forgot that myldsmail hate missionaries and I can only send inline pictures like once per email. 

The rest of the day on my birthday was so good. We had dinner with the Costabiles and I even got to blow out 21 candles on a birthday cake! And I did it in one breath! 

This week was so good. We've tracted a lot. It finally snowed and got cold. We were supposed to have a baptism, but that didnt work out. I guess that doesnt go under the "why the week was so good" category. But it was part of the week. Tessa has kinda fallen off the face of the planet. We're pretty sure she is keeping some secrets because she hasnt come to church or made any of our appointments and shes kinda avoiding us. Hopefully we can get in contact with her soon and try to figure out why she wasnt ready for her baptism. 

We partied really hard on New Years. We had dinner with the Furner family and had missionary correlation meeting and set some goals for the new year and were home by 9:30 and went to bed at 10:30. Living life on the edge. haha. But it was actually really fun. The Furners are a great family. I dont understand how they are still living on the earth right now...they are practically perfect. They should be taken straight up to heaven. haha. They really are just so good and do so much for us missionaries and our investigators and the ward and their family. They are truly an example to me. 

Its finally cold here. There's a wind chill advisory right now. We arent allowed to have any skin exposed for more than 15 minutes. So....our plans of building a snowman probably wont happen today. Its cold. I kinda love it. It feels like a Wisconsin winter FINALLY. I came into the worst winter in 20 years and this year has been super mild, so I've been pretty disappointed. But now its here and I'm kinda eating my words. haha. 

I am excited for this year. Its going to be so good. I made some goals to work on my personal prayers and to make them more earnest and sincere and meaningful. I feel like doing so will help me in all other aspects of my life, whether I'm a missionary or not. 

Love you all!

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year! ....oh! And Happy Birthday to me! 12/29/2014

Hi friends!

I'm tooting my own horn today and saying. "HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!" 

21! 

j

I kinda wish I was 22 so you could all sing T-Swift in your heads, but that will have to wait another couple hundred of days. 

Life has been so good. 

I apologize for my lame excuse of an email last week, but I really did get sick.  I caught the 24 hour flu and it had me real good. When I said that I was going to go hurl, it kinda really happened. Like all day. TMI? oh well.

The good news is that I was only sick for 24 hours. And that we live with members who can pretend to be your parents and get you medicine when you want to die. And that the elders can give blessings of healing. And that it was P-day and we really didn't have anything planned anyway. All tender mercies of the Lord.

So many things this week.

Christmas Eve was fun. 

We did service at Bethseda (a thrift store, for you non-Wisconsinites) and organized the shelves. Which was sooooo fun because I love organizing shelves. Especially shelves with Christmas things on Christmas Eve. 

We visited our friend Reagan and her kids and shared a message and got to know her and had a jolly good time. Those kids are hilarious. One is literally a miniature Will Smith. They are so witty. I was rolling on the floor the whole time. 

We did a lot of walking and tried to talk to everyone. The only problem was that no one was out. haha. So we went downtown and tried street contacting down there and we had a little bit more success. We also ran into really cool things along the way, so that was sweet. 

We had dinner with the Bishop and his family and other people from the ward. It was so cute. 

We had a really good Christmas dinner and talked about Bishop and his wife's missions in the Philippines and it reminded me of my dad. Then we played a game kinda like Catch Phrase, but it was Mormon-edition. And I TOTALLY ROCKED it. haha.We played missionaries vs members and it was super fun. I'm pretty sure we won, but bishop wouldnt tell us because missionaries arent allowed to keep score. haha. 

Then we went to the Linsley's. They are a senior couple in Kenosha. They had all the missionaries over in the area and we had chips and salsa and snacks and played some games. We almost got Elder Reynolds to beatbox and Elder Clark to rap, but to no avail. Then we had a precious little Christmas devotional and we read the Nativity story from Luke and all shared insights and it was super spiritual and one of my favorite moments. Probably one of my favorite Christmas memories in my 21 years of living. Just precious and spiritual. 

Christmas was fun too.

We had breakfast with the members we live with and chatted with them for a bit. Then we studied and got ready and then we weekly planned all day. haha. Then we called home from the Riley's house. That was great. Can't believe it was my last call home. 

And I got to play with a dog while my comp talked to her family, so I was happy. 

Then we had dinner with the Grover family. That was a blast and a half. They are a super fun family. 

The rest of the week we mostly just walked around Racine trying to find people to teach. Its hard when no one answers the door, but its also fun because you never know who will answer and what they will be like. And its not very cold, so thats good! 

We taught all the youth yesterday for Sunday school, and that was super fun. I love the youth in Wisconsin. They are super strong. They live their beliefs so fiercely every day.I also loved it because it showed me how much I've grown and learned and changed. We taught about the Atonement of Jesus Christ and missionary work and it was really cool to see how much more I knew and applied that I had even a year ago, let alone 8 years ago. 

I cant believe I have spent the WHOLE year of 2014 as a missionary. I mean, I totally can believe it cause it just happened... but... you get what I'm trying to say. 

Time flies. 

And I have learned SO much about the gospel and about myself and about life and about Christ and about my purpose on earth and so many good things. 

I know that living the gospel of Jesus Christ is the best and only way to truly be happy. I know it because I've lived it and because I have seen it in so many of my friends here in Wisconsin. 

I know that the Book of Mormon is the truest book on the earth. I know it is of ancient origin and that it teaches us SO much about Christ and how to live in a crazy, fallen, war-torn world. 

I know that Joseph Smith was a prophet called of God in 1820. I know that by the power of God, he translated the Book of Mormon.

I know that God still loves us and still has a very active role in our lives. He answers prayers. He still calls prophets and apostles to help us. 

I'm in Racine 12/22/2014

Hey, friends! This email is going to be super sucky because I feel sicker than the hills and any level of motivation and concentration I had previously is completely shot.

Leaving Lake Mills was hard. As I was driving out of town I had to keep telling myself not to bawl my face off. I came real close a couple of times, but I kept it together. I didnt get to see everyone that I wanted to before we left, but thats okay, cause I'll see them again. 

But. Good news! I also Love Racine! 

This place is soooo different than Lake Mills. There's like....diversity. haha. Yeah, it's kinda ghetto, but way less scary than everyone makes it sound. So far we've been able to teach a whole variety of people. 

And we live with members!!! Thats weird. But awesome too cause its like....a home. 

We get to attend the Spanish branch, which is a dream come true. They had their Christmas party on Friday and it was claaaaaaasic and awesome. Lots of good food. Spanish music. Happy people. A pinata. Perfect. We combined with the Milwaukee Spanish branch too, so I got to see some missionary friends. We sang a christmas song with the branch president's family and the Racine and Kenosha Spanish Elders. Highlight of my day. Reminded me of home. Heres a link to watch it:

 https://www.dropbox.com/s/819jzabqht28azw/DSCN0022.AVI?dl=0

We were teaching a recent convert named Kayla and after 30 seconds of being there, her 5 year old nephew grabbed my hand and said, "You're going to be my laaaaady." *insert melted heart here* 

We taught primary on Sunday in the Racine Ward and it was the greatest thing ever. We taught the 7 and 8 year old kids and they were just hilarious. The lesson was on Christmas and the true meaning of it and those kids were spot on. So cute. I asked them why they thought it was important to  celebrate Jesus' birth and one little girl raised her hand and says, "Uhm. Because He's our Savior...?" and so I asked them what they thought the word savior meant, and another little boy raised his hand and says, "Uhm. Someone who....saves...people...?" Gah! So precious. We talked about the Wise Men and how they knew that baby Jesus was going to be someone really important because they probably read scriptures about him coming and they went, "WHHHAAAAAT?! There is a scripture that tells the future?!?!?!?" They were excited about that one. (:

There is NO snow on the ground. And apparently we arent going to have a white christmas. :((( Pray that it snows here, friends. We all want a white Christmas. 

I wish I had energy to write more. But I think I'm gonna go hurl now. Just kidding. Kinda.