I'm TWENTY-TWO years old now and 16 months in!

A BIRTHDAY PACKAGE FROM HOME!! YAY

Ahh Chocolate I can eat!!

Happy P-Day, and 16 month mark to me!

I turned 22 this week. Weird. Someone asked me in a lesson this past weekend how old I was and I about choked on my words as "twenty-two" exited my mouth. Mom, Dad, you are the parents of a 22 year old... Who's old now!
Thanks for the packages! I had so much fun getting and opening them! Especially thanks for CD's! Sister Petersen and I have been jammin out to Christmas Motab with David Archuleta for days! Who thought I would ever be a David Archuleta fan? Hey when all you get to listen to is Mormon Tabernacle Choir for a year and a half, any voice will melt you.


We had MLC (Missionary Leadership Council) this past week with all of the Zone Leaders and STL's in the mission. It was a 7 hour long meeting! That was fun. I got to spend a whole day with Sister Petersen and Sister Whimpey. We have all 3 been companions with each other and are the best of friends! It was so fun. We got to meet Elder Brent H. Neilson of the 70 there. Being instructed by him was amazing! It was so neat to be in the presence of a general authority and to feel the spirit and the Savior's love emanate from him. Just being around him made me want to be a better person.

Sister Petersen and Sister Whimpy!!

Guess what?! I get to go back on Facebook! I'm so excited. President and Sister Alba are only putting the Zone Leaders and Sister Trainer Leader's back on for now to see how it goes. We are no longer teaching outside of our mission though, instead we will be completely focusing our efforts in our own areas. I am so excited! I'm not sure exactly what will happen with friends and family outside of the mission but I think we will be deleting them... We will see.

We picked up another family to teach this week. Miracles are happening. One of our families are absolutely adorable. They have so many questions and can't wait for us to come back. Let's be honest, I'm the one who can't wait to go back. There is something so special about teaching a family the gospel.
Since the Woodd's have gotten baptized we have taught two other families who they have invited into their home to meet with us. They are on fire with missionary work!


Well, time for me to go. Have a wonderful week!
Sister Carter

Always good to Harass my Roommates!

So fun to get to see some some my favorite missionary friends from various areas I worked in. Love all these girls!

Being a Sister Trainer Leader with a best Friend!

Hey fam jam and friends!
I LOVE my new companion. We get along so well. It is so fun being an STL with her. It's like being with a best friend all the time. She is awesome. She has been out for almost 9 months. I am learning so much from her! She is so humble and so stalwart! This whole STL thing is a little bit scary and and very intimidating, but I'm grateful to have her doing it with me.
We live in a new apartment now which is an exciting adventure. We have 3 bathrooms too. What more could a sister missionary want? One of them was so disgusting though! Since we moved in I have avoided using it as much as possible! Today I scrubbed that thing to a pulp and now it sparkles. Now we have three sparkly bathrooms. What more could a sister missionary want? I have met and grown to love so many wonderful girls from around the globe. Being a missionary is such a blessing!

Not my new companion.. But a Sister Missionary I love!!

Since moving in we have killed 8 black widows. I have only ever seen those things on TV and I wish that was the only place I was ever going to see them. Turns out they love our house. We claim them as our pets... Even though they are all dead. We named them all Peve.

I turn 22 on Thursday! Weird.

I got accused of breaking a guitar string at a members house for dinner this week and then they called me a lair and made me cry... That was sad.

We picked up the most incredible family ever this week! I can't wait to go back and teach them!

This week was awesome!


Love,
Sister Carter

Transfers and new assignments

So many great things happened this week. I have been basking in the
spirit and having so many "wow" moments where I felt so blessed to be
a missionary. Lately my greatest joy of missionary work is seeing
blessings of the gospel pour into our investigators and recent
converts lives. So many moments my joy has been full. One of my
favorite moments was watching one investigator tell another
investigator at church that she was in the right place, that she was
welcome there, and that this church was going to change her life.
Everything is bringing me to tears these days.

Sister Harper is transferring to Davis, and my new companion will be
Sister Peterson. I've heard so much about her so I'm really excited.
We are also moving into a 4 man pad that all the missionaries call the
mansion, we are moving into a 2 bedroom house, and will be living next
door to my favorite senior missionary couple the Seeley's they have
been my Mission grandparents. I'm so excited. Sister Peterson and I
will both be STL's (sister training leaders) together, which should be
a lot of fun.

An older lady rode by us on her bicycle this week and glared, with a very mean look on her face and said, "you disgust me." That was nice.

Sorry, not much from me today. Love you lots
Sister Carter

The dreaded pink slip and flirting 4 yr olds

This week I got what no missionary looks foreword to in the CA Santa Rosa mission, the dreaded pink slip. Every missionary gets a bright pink pierce of paper in the mail when they are coming close to the end of their mission stating the date I will be flying home and wanting to know my official travel plans. Worst day ever. I waited until I was at my favorite members home (the Woodds) before opening it, so that I wouldn't get depressed. It helped a lot. I officially fly home the 3rd of February 2015. I now have 2 transfers left. The next one is only 5 weeks long instead of 6 so that missionaries don't have to get transferred on Christmas Eve, but my last transfer will be 7 weeks long.

Oh yeah, happy late Halloween. I have decided that I hate Halloween more than I already did before because it just reminds me that I can't eat chocolate anymore.... Only my favorite kind of junk food... Woe is me.

I'm a combo missionary... Elder/Sister combo (its the best I could do)

Stapling on the costume!!

Mike got his first calling as the Young Mens secretary. SO COOL! We were over there the other night singing hymns with Vanessa in the Kitchen. Mike and Olivia walked into the room and stopped dead in their tracks and said  "wow." when we asked what, they said "our home is so different now". Mike and Olivia both said that their home has never been a place where people sat around the table singing hymns and feeling the spirit. They loved it. Music is so powerful. It can either take away from the spirit which is what they have been used to their whole lives, or invite the spirit. 

Vanessa came with us this week to a crazy old guys home to help us teach him for the first time. It was an awesome experience. He is pretty cynical and doesn't like religion much, but after we we left what we call a harvest blessing with him (praying as servants of Jesus Christ for the Saviors peace and blessings to be in his home and for all other blessings he needs in his life) he told us in his own words, "wow, that was a very spiritual experience." He was right. The spirit was so strong in his home and he ended telling us that what we were doing was very good and that we were real and sincere about what we do. He then invited us to come back whenever we wanted. I would have to say my favorite 2 things about that night was when he was telling AND showing us all of his yoga posses. He has to be like 75 years old. So imagine with me an old guy sprawled out on the floor giving us yoga demonstrations. It took all my willpower to not laugh. THEN, he was telling us how he has to get his toe amputated and when Vanessa heard that she got all excited and said, "are you going to keep it?!" I laughed pretty hard when he got even more excited and said, "I really want to! Don't you think that would be a great gift to my grand kids to remember me by? My big toe floating in a jar?" He was such a crack up. I was about ready to adopt him as my own grandpa. Who wouldn't want their grandpa's big toe in a jar?

We met another guy who must have been about 20 years old. He was more golden than a golden investigator could ever get. He basically told us the entire plan of salvation that he feels is true and all we did was confirm to him the truth of what he was saying and attach the correct terms to them. It was so cool! I felt like I was floating on a cloud the whole rest of the night. Sadly he will be getting passed off to the YSA sisters, But that's okay, as long as he gets taught!

I have been getting all sorts of strange dizzy spells the past few days. It has been really weird.

Moment of the week:

Actually i have two of them...

As we were leaving the Woodds house the other day I went to give little Zachy a handshake.
"Zach can we get a hand shake before we go?"

"NO!"

"Hmm okay then can we get a high five before we go?"

"NO!"

"how about we pound it then?"

"NO!" then he gets this devilish look on his face and says, "How about kisses?"

Haha. Take note that he is 4.

Then while contacting on the street this week we met some guy who looked higher than a kite. As we got talking to him we asked. "Do you believe in God?"

"No I'm an atheist. Actually I'm a devil worshiper. actually I'm agnostic" He obviously couldn't make up his mind. "okay can we just give you a card then?"

"No i'll probably just roll a blunt with it," at least he was honest.

"okay well you have a nice day" 

"unless you put your number on it, then I'll take your card."

"Have a nice day!"

Being a missionary is so entertaining sometimes...

Love,
Sister Carter