Penguins and Tigers and Bears (Oh My!)

Hello family!

This week has been pretty great! Lots has happened :) On Monday, after I e-mailed, the zone went to the Calgary Zoo!!! It was so much fun!! I saw penguins, and tigers , and bears, oh my! (no lions though haha) it was really great just to get some time off and be social and have fun and relax :)

On Tuesday we had zone training meeting which was really great :) we were able to receive wise counsel from our stake president, president Craig... honestly he kinda thrashed us haha told us what’s what! The whole time I was trying to imagine president Weckesser so bold and forthright, direct and merciless haha I couldn’t. President Craig is awesome, Im playing it up, he just wanted to make sure we were reporting back to him properly :)

On Wednesday we had exchanges! Sister Carter (my trainer) went to foothills with one of the STLs and Sister Halliday came to Legacy with Sister Dewsnup and me! For those of you who don’t know, Sister Halliday was a missionary in the Cardston YSA ward when I lived there and I was actually one of her ward missionaries!! It was so awesome to be with her- so, so much fun!! :D that was pretty much tied with the zoo for highlight of the week :)

On Friday we went to retrainers meeting* and it was very nice :) it just really helped me be confident and comfortable with the progress I have made here in the field. I feel like sometimes my comps and I kinda get caught up in the work, we get too stressed, we don’t take time for ourselves. We don’t really laugh or have fun. I liked how President Miles said that was important! I knew it was haha sometimes it was hard to convince my comps of that hahaha- we’re kinda of opposites but were learning and growing together! We’re figuring out how to compromise and have charity for one another and use our differences to an advantage!

The General Women’s Meeting was so dope! Oh my gosh it was awesome, and I’m so stoked to hear more inspiring messages this weekend!! I love President Uchtdorf! He’s so awesome, for reals!

I love you all so, so much! I’ll send like a ton of pics today so I’m sorry lol

Love, Sister Holt​.

* from President and Sister Miles' Post:
Friday we had our Retrainers Meeting where we met with all the brand new missionaries and their trainers.  We love that meeting.  The new missionaries have now been out about 4 weeks and they are more settled in, and it is so fun to see what they have learned.  Steve always has a session in that meeting where he asks, "What have you learned in the last 4 weeks?"  We hear a lot of answers such as-"we've learned that Preach My Gospel really works, we've learned to be patient, we've learned to love people, we've learned to rely on the Lord more, we've learned to communicate more, we've learned to be a better listener, we've learned that it is great to have a companion because they can fill in for you in a lesson when you don't know what to say, or they can back up your testimony, we've learned that everyone has strengths."
It really is amazing what they learn in such a short time.  What they learn on a mission is invaluable for life! 

Visa!

Hello! 

This week has been super great, but it’s always so hard for me to remember everything...first of all; I’m so blessed to have such a great auntie living so close by! I got some tights to protect me from the cold Canadian wind :) I also bought some boots. They’re really cute haha!

We had zone conference on Tuesday and it was so good! I loved being spiritually nourished and enlightened with the missionaries in my zone and a couple zones around me. My mission Pres. and his wife are so sweet, caring, and hard-working! They want this to be the very best mission in the world! We also had a mission wide fast. It was humbling to give up something to benefit others, to find people to teach, and to strengthen our investigators!

On Saturday, we did the food drive! Apparently, it’s the biggest food drive in Canada! It was insane! The missionaries were all at the chapel unloading cars- I wish I took a picture! We would have about 15 cars at a time being unloaded! We filled 3 huge 18 wheeler trucks full of food! They say that we collect around 1 million dollars’ worth of food every year. This one collection sets them up right until Christmas! It was so crazy to be a part of something like that! haha When we were getting everything ready, we were setting up all these boxes ( that could probably fit 5 men in them) and we were challenged to try and stack them as high as we could! We called it the tower of babel haha- I’ll try to send some pics!

later that night we also went to a member's little girl's birthday party haha- that’s why you may have gotten a picture from that mom... it was nice :) there were a couple non-members there we got to talk to!

Yesterday, we taught in YW about keeping the Sabbath day holy. It was really awesome how a lot of the times preparing for a lesson, you learn so much for yourself! I'm going to try and recommit myself to setting Sunday aside to reflect upon the Saviour more fully! It can actually be kinda hard to do this sometimes because Sunday often ends up being out busiest day! It’s important for me to remember that it is a day of rest. Not necessarily physically, but always spiritually :)

Funny thing happened last night actually! our dinner canceled before church (by the way mom, we’re being fed every night, don’t you worry haha) and so we were really hoping we would get a dinner for that night- and we communicated this to our ward mission leader- who is awesome by the way. So we took our calendar and at the end of church it had a name on it! We were so excited! So I called the family and left a message asking when they wanted us to come over and thanking them for saving us!... she called back and said neither she or her husband put their names on the calendar........ awkward... haha someone else signed them up! But they were happy to have us over anyways and it was really great haha!

Oh yeah! I also got my visa! I’ll be heading to Long Beach October 11th :D woot woot!

Love you all so, so much!

Sister Holt.

p.s.  I'll be eating dinner with Uncle Ron and Aunt Linda in a little while :) also Darren Gardner is in my ward and I saw Aunt Natalie yesterday! :)

Lukewarm

Hello family!

All the days of this week have kinda melted together to be honest! Lots of work, not lots of sleep, haha! We finally (kinda) have an investigator or two... they’re both former investigators. One is a super sweet Nigerian lady with 2 beautiful little baby girls. Her husband is in Nigeria, he got laid off and had to go back for work... so she’s all alone here in Canada. The ward is so awesome- sweetest members ever! I'm so happy to get to know them more, they are so willing to help! So that's mostly what we've been doing... meeting with members and a couple less active people. Meeting with all these different people is so inspiring! Everyone's situation is so crazy different, and yet the gospel is able to work for them! It truly is one size fits all, haha! The atonement is so universal, and so complete! It must be divinely appointed, nothing made up by man could ever be so perfect!

It's definitely getting cold here... it was 6 degrees this morning. I have a California wardrobe so we'll see how long I last before I give in and buy some tights, etc... but I do love it here! I am so blessed to have such a wonderful area! We got to do some service with some members, which was a super great relief from all the tracting haha. We taught the lesson in Young Men’s on Sunday, about commandments. We really want to get to know the youth, keep them strong! There were 2 Deacons and one Priest haha but it was great :) Also it was my 1 month anniversary on Saturday! My comps and I went and got Timmies to celebrate - were going to make it a monthly tradition :)

When I first got out here, it was so hard for me to be immersed in this work. I was always thinking about either before or after the mission, not concentrating on the time I have here, now, to serve the Lord. I was not feeling happy, not feeling joy in the work I was doing. It was feeling like a chore. I realized I had one foot in my 'home' bucket and one foot in my 'mission' bucket. I wasn’t willing to commit to either, being 'hot' or 'cold'. I was the very definition of 'lukewarm.' I have decided to give my all to this work! I have had 19 years to focus on me. I will have decades after this to focus on my future. I only have now to focus on this "great and marvelous work." I am not perfect, but I'm doing so much better! I am here for everyone but me right now! I am here for my companions! I am here for the memebrs! I am here for the investigators! I am here for less active Saints! I am here for my Saviour. My purpose is clear and my path has been made straight!

I love you all so much, and I know this church is the true, fully restored gospel of Christ!

Sister Holt

Alberta Bound

Hey!! I’m alive! I made it to Calgary- I honestly couldn’t help but sing Alberta Bound on the plane and in the airport when I got here haha! I am in a trio with a girl from my MTC zone named Sister Dewsnup and an awesome trainer named Sister Carter :)

So I guess I’ll tell you my area....... I am in the Fishcreek zone in the Legacy area :) It’s a brand new ward and a new area and we were all white washed in... so that has been interesting.. the work is kinda slow but the members are amazing! So willing to help and I think we’ve had dinner every night so far and are booked up for a long while :) so don’t worry mom! 

We only had one investigator and we actually have to give him over to the YSA sisters... but I have a really great feeling about this area! Everyone keeps saying that they’re so excited for the sisters to be here (there were elders before) and that sisters and can work miracles that elders can’t haha... so here’s hoping!

We have a brand new apartment which is really nice! It even has a washer and drier in it!

I made my first street contact the other day- a guy names Peter; super sweet and has a real belief of God and our Saviour... dosn’t believe in organized religion though... but it was really great to meet him, discuss with him, and offer up some service!

It’s been interesting in a trio- but nothing unmanageable! We’re getting the hang of things, planning out how we will teach and stuff.

The members are legit so awesome! So, so sweet and they love us so much already- it’s nice to feel at home somewhere :) We’re really working on getting to know them right now since we don’t really have any investigators.

Yesterday was pday, but we didn’t get to email because the library was closed for the holiday... but we got to go shopping at value village, which was nice! I was able to get some retail therapy, get rid of some built up stress haha

Im really learning right now that I can not do this on my own. That is really hard for me. I like to feel in control of the situation, to be self-reliant. I know that I won’t get anywhere without leaning heavily upon my Saviour and my Father in Heaven; not only them, but also my companions. I kept thinking that I could handle everything on my own, but I cant! My first week out here has truly been a humbling experience, and I am so grateful for it!

Love you all dearly! Sister Holt.