Week 4: Merry Christmas from Canada!

Greetings from the North Pole! 

I just want to start off by saying, my mission is literally the North Pole, and it's cold.  It's also very white here. I am in Okotoks, Canada. It's a smaller town and a super cute place!  But yeah... it's cold.  As a child, this is where I imagined Santa would live. 

We come outside in the mornings and look outside our apartment and all over our lawn is deer poop! Ha.  The deer here aren't afraid of people. They chill in the town with us but no one approaches them because they are mean. Also, there are lots of all white bunnies! They blend in really well with the snow so we have almost ran over a few. They just run around in the streets and in the town.  I tried to get a picture with one but that was a fail. Ha ha. I hope that gives u a little picture of how it is up here at the North Pole. 

My first week in the mission has been great.  I don't have time to tell you everything I want to, so I will tell you as much as I can...

I arrived Wednesday and my flight was great.  After the longest day of my life, we finally made it to the Mission Home at about 7:00pm and had interviews with my Mission President, President Keung. He and his wife are from New Zealand and have the coolest accents! They LOVE culture, so all the new missionaries are learning Maori hymns. It's pretty awesome. We are a singing mission and literally sing all the time. Ha ha. 

The next day I got my companion/trainer. Her name is Sister Neild.  She is from Missouri and she's super sweet. She's awesome and we get along great.

Thursday was my first day proselyting. That was so scary! We had a dinner appointment at 5:30pm so we tracted for an hour before that.  To tract, we went to the neighborhood where we had our dinner appointment, so we were close. Sister Neild was like "Ok Sister Wilson... I'm gonna start off. I'm going to do the first door and then you will do the next and we will just switch on and off." So, I was pumped to teach some people and I'm feeling like, "Ok-ok lets do this!" So Sister Nield does the first door and they just nicely decline by saying "Oh - not interested. S-ooo-rr-ee!" (That's how Canadians say "sorry." It's funny).  So my turn is next and I knock on the door... they open and before I can get a word out, they see my name tag and slam the door right in my face!  I got THREE doors slammed in my face right in a row. I was so sad ! As a missionary I knew I was going to get rejected, but I wasn't prepared for that. I let it get to me and I was down in the dumps and sad that no one would even give me a chance to open my mouth and say something good about Jesus Christ and share a Christmas message. 

Sister Neild helped me along the way and pushed me through the very long hour. I'm learning to make tracting fun, so it's going better! President says all the time, "We love "No's". They are stepping stones to yes!".  I'll try to remember that. 

We have two families we are teaching right now and they are Filipinos! Calgary has sooooo much diversity - so many Filipinos! We have a couple Tagalog speaking Elders in the area. We are still able to teach those we run into because  they speak enough English, but seriously they are the most humble and sweet people I have met here in Canada. They always open their home to us, and even though they are the poorest people here they offer us such sweet things and just making sure we are doing good. They call us "Women of God". Ha ha.  We invited them to a Tagalog Sacrament Meeting we are having next week.  We are having a big lunch afterwards with Filipino food and will roast a big pig, which is called "lechon" or something like that.  I hope the people we invited will come. 

So, I'm getting the best of both missions! Braden, I have a piece of you here in Canada. :)  I told this lady that you are serving in the Philippines and she said "Oh...you write him and say 'I love you' (except she said it in Tagalog) and I replied, "Yeah, you know it Jewel!". Ha ha. We started laughing and she was saying some other stuff after that but I couldn't understand because she spoke in very broken English.  Anyway, it was funny and she's hilarious now she teases me about that!

Oh, we also teach English classes to a couple families from Vietnam.  It's really hard but pretty cool.  

Christmas was so fun here! We spent the day with members and visited a senior care center and visited the people who didn't have family.  We sang songs to them and the spirit was so strong!  The members here are amazing! They LOVE the missionaries and there were five families who gave me and my companion Christmas gifts to open with their families.  It was just so nice and I was so grateful. It felt at home. 

I was able to Skype my family for about 40 minutes on Christmas and it was so great! After that, we had dinner and then went to the Osberg's house to play games to finish off the night. I love the Osberg family so much! They are my family away from family. They are so hilarious and tease each other (and us) like crazy and I fit right in. They take us to do so many fun things.  The mom, Sister Osberg, is like our mom too.  She got us the cutest pajamas yesterday and always makes sure we are fed and are doing well. She's the best! My first night here she made me potato soup just like you always do Mom.  It wasn't as good as yours... but it was still good and I was grateful. :)

On Monday and last Thursday we ran the Calgary Nativity, which is hosted by the church.  It was AMAZING. It's a play about the birth of Jesus Christ and it's a huge event.  Everyone in Calgary comes! Sister Neild and I were in charge of the photo booth and were also tasked with herding the sheep.  Ha ha. It was FREEZING and by the end of the night, I was sure that my toes were gone. It hurt to walk on them (no joke) but it was still so fun to be apart of that. 

Today is BOXING DAY! It's pretty much like Black Friday here, except Canadians do it the day after Christmas. I thought Americans went hard on Black Friday...  but I think the Canadians have us beat,  eh?!  They are so hyped about it and it's a party here.  It's also our P-day today so we are going to go to Costco and get some good deals on poutine. 😉 Also, I tried the ketchup chips and they are actually really good, so don't talk down on them until you've tried them! ha ha. I think I'm a true Canadian now!  Also we get to watch a MOVIE today! Like, an actual movie...and were all so excited! I don't know what movie we are watching yet, but I'm good with whatever.  It is going to be fun! 

I have to go now, but I'm loving my mission so much! Despite the cold, Canada-land is the place for me!  I'm still learning so much.  I love serving the Lord and love being a missionary!

I hope everyone is doing great and had a awesome Christmas with friends and family! I love you all so much and I'll get back to you next Wednesday! 

Love,

Sister Wilson

Canada Christmas pajamas from Sister Osberg

Canada Christmas pajamas from Sister Osberg

The Nativity

The Nativity

European Christmas Eve Dinner 

We had a big snowfall last night, so this is me this morning scraping the ice and snow off our car. Ha ha!

We got to play Santa and deliver some presents to a family.  It was so sweet! 

Guest Post: Look Who Arrived!

The following was received from President and Sister Keung...


"Look who's new in the Canada Calgary Mission! We are pleased that your missionary has arrived."

Sister Keung, Sister Wilson and President Keung. 12/19/2018

Guest Post: Bon Voyage!

Guest post by JaLae Thompson (Sister Wilson's Aunt) 

I "bumped" into Sister Wilson today at the airport before she departed for Canada.  She looks blissfully happy and full of light.

I told her a story of leaving the MTC when I was a missionary (so long ago!) and going to the airport to see my family before I got on a plane to New York City.  As I exited the MTC bus at the airport, there was my dad standing with open arms and I vividly remember rushing into them with a flood of emotions I didn't know that I had.  

As Sister Wilson saw me from across the airport, she put her backs down and walked quickly into my waiting arms.  It was a really, really long hug and in that moment, I was blessed to be her dad.    

She is going to light Calgary on fire! 

#LighttheWorld

Aunt J and Adrianna

Week 3: Goodbye MTC... Hello Canada!

So final week in the MTC! 

Tuesday: last temple trip with my district, then dinner and devotional and that’s it !

Wednesday: oh man..Wednesday was pretty rough hahah. Honestly not gonna try to explain everything, but it just started off bad. We woke up and sister reed was just pure tears because some elders in our district were being disobedient. They bought our teachers sister Bingham and brother gee some gifts off of amazon but we’re not supposed to be on amazon so they said no. (Also me and sister summers were on splits together so we didn’t even know this was going on cuz we were some where else) anywho..the elders got the gifts anyways and long story short it made sister reed have a panic attack. She has really bad anxiety..and our “white bible” aka missionary handbook is sister reeds bestie. Haha she loves the rules and she loves to let us know she loves them even more. Which is awesome because obedience brings lots of blessings but she’s very intense about it. And so when she saw the elders on amazon it made her so upset and was crying throughout the whole day and it was just out of hand and me and sister Palmer didn’t really know what to do. So after dealing with this all day, we had comp-i  and we we sat down and just tried to understand why this was such a big deal because we had nothing to do with it. And sister reed just opened up to us and told her about her anxiety and I still don’t know why it set her off the way it did but me and sister Palmer just hugged her and tried to understand where she was coming from and we’re trying to get her to see that this wasn’t effecting her, so she had her crying sesh and got over it the next day but anyways all day it was just putting all of us in a weird mood and me and sis Palmer were getting annoyed but we were just waiting for the day to be over haha.

Thursday: better day/ normal day! Yeah just good classes, studies, and that’s about it  

Friday: another good day, just finished up our TRC with Margaret. I wish we were able to still work with her but our time has come to an end! I learned a lot from her and she’s so interesting but honestly she just needs time. She keeps the commitments we give her and absolutely loved meeting with us too but there’s things that make her doubt because of some situations in her life. And I think she knows that the things we taught her are true and we asked her if she would pray about it to know and she said “ I want to...but I’m scared of the answer I’ll get. I feel peace when we meet and that this is good but before meeting with the missionaries I was content in knowing that I was just another person in the world. But now that I’m learning about god I’m scared I won’t measure up to things he asks of us. “

So yeah she’s scared of commitment not measuring up and she was going on about how she’s 40 years older than us but how she felt we were so much wiser than her and it made me sad when she said that! Cuz she beats herself up and so we just explained that the truths have been restored upon the earth and we want to share that message with her. So she’s amazing and I wish I could keep teaching her but We can’t so a  new set of missionaries that came in this week and took over. But yeah Friday was good just finished off the day with classes!

I also met sister Wilson !! Haha funny story...at the end of the day when we were all showering and getting ready for bed I was washing my face and sister Wilson comes up to me and just asks how my day was so I said good and asked about hers and she honestly looked like she was gonna cry ! She just looked overwhelmed and she just spilled all her emotions to me and Shared a funny story but very unfortunate. So she got here last week and her mission is the Portland Oregon visitor center mission and some how they got her mixed up with another Sarah Wilson and so they threw her out to the field in temple square visitor center for training cuz I guess that’s what they do if u are going to a visitor center mish, anyways, her FIRST day here at the MTC she gets thrown into the field at temple square...gets her companion and her companions like okay sister Wilson...were going trackting!!! So they hop on a bus and sister Wilson is trying to tell them this is her first day and she can’t do this and they think she means first day out of the MTC and she’s just scared but they don’t know it’s actually her first day ever haha so her trainer is just like follow my lead it’s fine it’s fine, so they get to this lads house and teach her a lesson and I guess it went good but sister Wilson was just pure tears and had to follow all these rules she hadn’t even been taught and finally they figure out that she wasn’t supposed to be there...so they send her back to the MTC and she wanted to go home so bad..so it was only like her 2nd or 3d day out and mind u the first 2 days at the MTC is hands down the hardest...so she got a double whammy and had to deal with the hardest days here right after that experience 😂    

But she’s ok now !! We just laughed about it together and bonded over the fact that we are both sister Wilson (; so yeah funny story there I felt so bad though haha! 

Saturday: BROTHER GEES SPOTLIGHT NIGHT: Saturday was the last day of classes we all had together and we were all looking forward to this day for a long time because our teacher brother gee is the funniest thing ever and he was getting us all so excited because he had this great class prepared for us..and he’s so passionate about literally everything so we were pretty much just expecting him to make us all cry cause we love him so much and knew he was gonna be super extra one last time. Haha so anyways yeah Saturday night class comes around and as expected he gives us all a wonderful last lesson. Three and a half hours straight of just how to be a good missionary, letting the mission change you, and just how there’s gonna be some really tough times but just reminded us that Jesus Christ has our backs 110%. So yeah it was awesome and we were all so sad because our time together has come to an end. 10/10 day 

Sunday was great !!! (Official last day together as a district😢) if u can’t tell by now I’ve come to love my district so much. Coming in I was scared I wasn’t gonna bond with anyone, but now as I am leaving this sounds dumb but it’s felt like saying goodbye to those I love all over again. We have all gotten so close, come to know each others backgrounds and it’s been really interesting to see the different parts of the world we have come from but have all come here together for one purpose. 

So we started out the morning with church from 8am until about 430. Then dinner and then a departure devotional and then a regular Sunday devotional. It was long but really fun. And at the devotional the Utah valley institute choir came and sang to us Songs about Christmas and Christ and we were all TEARSSSS it was sooooo good ! Seriously the best thing I’ve ever heard. After they were finished I looked around and there wasn’t a dry eye in the room. And after that we had our final testimony meeting as a district and sat in a circle and prayed together to finish off our goodbyes. So sad, But they will be great and we’ve already planned our reunion after the mission! We all brought something different to the table and learned something from each person and I know I was sent here at this time with these people for a reason. Elder Taunnu’u from Samoa, his dad got diagnosed with bad liver cancer a couple weeks before he left and doesn’t know if he will come home to his dad in 2 years. But his testimony has been so awesome to hear and he’s just such a cool guy. It really makes you stop and think...what would I give up for Jesus Christ? I don’t know if I could do that..but it’s just been way cool to hear about that and just some other background stories from the rest of my district has been inspiring. 

Monday: said goodbye to the sisters in our room at 4 am, got up and had our last day of class with the last couple people here still, and then just packed a little and that’s about it!

Today (Tuesday):  I’m just doing all my laundry, packing everything, cleaning the place up and getting ready to leave bright and early tomorrow .We have to be at the travel office at 6 am, and from there we will ride down to the airport and then my flight leaves at 11:15 am. Get to Canada around 230, meet my mission president and he will assign me my new companion and my area and all that good stuff. I’m so nervous, scared, pretty much anything u can think of I’m feeling hahah. This week has been a very anxious one. I’ve enjoyed my time at the MTC overall and I have to go out and apply everything I’ve learned into the field now ! I know it’ll be fine, but it feels like going into a new country blindfolded by yourself with your luggage in one hand and ur scriptures in the other hahah. Scary stuff! Just nerves though. 

Yesterday we were doing a Book of Mormon read in class and was reading in Alma chapter 17 about when the sons of mosiah went out on their missions for 14 years I think it was. Anyways, in verses 10, 11, and 31 are great. It really gave me comfort ! Here it is;

10 And it came to pass that the Lord did visit them with his Spirit, and said unto them: Be comforted. And they were comforted.

11 And the Lord said unto them also: Go forth among the Lamanites, thy brethren, and establish my word; yet ye shall be patient in long-suffering and afflictions, that ye may show forth good examples unto them in me, and I will make an instrument of thee in my hands unto the salvation of many souls.

31 And it came to pass that he flattered them by his words, saying: My brethren, be of good cheer and let us go in search of the flocks, and we will gather them together and bring them back unto the place of water;

I’m in search of the flocks who need to be led back home to our savior Jesus Christ.

I’m happy that he has trusted me to do this work, and excited to get to Canada tomorrow and to start !  

I love you guys and I hope everyone is enjoying this Christmas season ! I heard Christmas in Canada is pretty awesome. I’m excited to tell u all about it !

Sorry about the long email I like to let all of you know what I’m up to, so if u read all of this congrats.

Love, 
Sister Wilson

Last week temple trip on P-Day

Sister Wilson and Sister Wilson!

My District

My District (Canada, Baltimore and Alaska)

Our MTC Teachers Brother Gee and Sister Bingham

My MTC teachers Brother Gee and Sister Bingham

Last class 

So Sunday was our last night all together, and our first week here there was a group of sisters leaving that weekend and so they gave us a glass of sparkling cider because they couldn’t take it with them. So we saved it for our last night here and popped it open to celebrate our survival of the MTC!

Sister Summers and I enjoying our last “sleepover” together 

FYI: A Guide to Shipping to Canada

Here is some information to help you navigate exactly what, how and if you can ship your package to Canada.  Click on the link below to read some important information. to ensure Sister Wilson doesn't have to pay "customs" on packages received (which can cost her a lot of money if we don't do it right)...

A Guide to Shipping to Canada


To avoid Customs your package has to be declared as less than $60.00 in value and weigh no more than 20 lbs.

Also, be prepared to declare everything in the package and be as descriptive as possible (example:  don't just write "Clothing".  Write "Clothing - winter socks, scarves, and hats for a 20 year old female")

Week 2: MTC Fun

Hey hey hey !! It’s me again!! Second week down here in the MTC. nothing crazy happening,And I can’t tell which day is which..so I will try and remember to let u all know what I did this week! 

Last Tuesday: finished off the pday with the temple, devotional, and just a bunch of other stuff to prepare for the following week.

Wednesday: class, class, more class, devotionals, personal study, comp study, prepared a lesson for Taryn and taught her. Then class until 930. Nothing crazy. 

Thursday and Friday: haha honestly same thing ! Finished teaching taryn and she let us know she was a member. I kinda started to figure as our meetings went on but it was still so cool and she’s just the sweetest thing and I loved getting to know her, so she gave us feedback so we are able to get better at teaching ! 

Saturday: we got new TRC’s . And we go into this big room and there’s a bunch of people sitting throughout it and me and my companions just pick a random person and introduce ourselves and get to know them. Our new person we have been teaching is Margaret. She’s in her late 50’s and she’s DEFINITELY NOT a member, she is sooooo interesting! Her religion is intelligent design. Which pretty much means she believes this world is too beautiful to not have a master creator. She loves nature and she can pretty much live outside. She has some hard things in her and life and she is ultimately looking for peace in a crazy world. It’s been so cool getting to hear about her life and her interests and coming to understand her needs. She’s more of a logical kinda person, so everything we teach her she needs proof, which is kind of hard but me and my companions are trying our best and we are learning lots. I’m so excited to teach her more. She’s just GOLDEN !! and she doesn’t know it, but she believes in a lot of things we do as well. So she’s just great And im happy to come to know her. Anyways the rest of the day we prepared 5 talks, because our branch president was picking random people to give talks on Sunday and it could be anyone so we all had to prepare talks just in case, I didn’t get called on which was alright, but I wasn’t nervous to at all ! And u guys know I don’t like public speaking but I was chillin like a villain. And right before sacrament on Sunday we had relief society and I taught a lesson to all the sisters in my whole zone on the role of the Holy Ghost and why we need it so much, especially as missionaries. And it was great !! It was chillin then too ! It was awesome. 

Sunday: church, then lunch, then a couple more classes, then a devotional and at the devotional the BYU men’s choir came and sang to all of us and put on a show and it was AMAZING! they are so good, it’s crazy how much u can feel the spirit through singing ! 

and then after that we had Movie night, where we get to pick what what classroom we want to go into and we get to watch someone of the presidency speak about certain topics. The one me and my district watched was “one by one” by bednar and it was so good. He just talked about how the savior knows us one by one, and it was just awesome. There was some scripture references that he gave in 3 nephi chapters 11-17 when Christ came to the Americas and blessed the people one by one and it makes me cry every time!! If u haven’t read it..10/10 recommend u should 

Monday: same old classes, we got a little break, and then we studied and prepare to teach Margaret and then we taught her at 330 and the lesson went great !! We didn’t know how it would go cuz we were still trying to understand what she needed but the spirit guided us all the way through it and me and my companions left the room jumping up and down right when the door closed cause the spirit was nuts and we were spitting straight FACTS at her and then bearing testimony and it was just awesome. And then rest of the day just class, and we go into Book of Mormon reads at the night time class and it gets intense, our teacher brother gee is soooo Intense and he’s hilarious and he just gets so into it. But we pick certain chapters in the BOM to read and we get SO deep into it, and we get lost in this portal of the Book of Mormon and the atonement of Jesus Christ and our role in it, Jesus Christ’s role and how we make it back and I can’t even explain it all I probably am not even making sense right now but all I can say is mind =blown. The Book of Mormon is the truest book on the face of the earth, I know that as we read it our faith is Jesus Christ will strengthen and we will become closer to him!

So nothing to crazy happening, just learning more and more!! I love being a missionary ! Still hard tho, but still grinding it out. Haha we are still trying to learn how to handle all our emotions, yesterday in the middle of class at around 830 sister reed just starts crying and me and sister Palmer had to pull her outside to ask what was going on and it was just one of those times when discouragement creeps and and you are CONVINCED u cant do this. It sounds kinda dumb but it’s so real. I’ve done that already, sister Palmer did that a couple days ago and honestly it just hits u out of no where. I think it’s the tiredness mixed with sitting all day in class, mixed with stress. but it’s alright we just rub some dirt on it

So I don’t end on a tough note.....(and also I was asked to keep u guys updated on the stories)

as for the illegal romances, they have stopped kinda ish. the other elders and sisters in our zone flew out to the field on Wednesday and we were all saying goodbye to each other our ZONE LEADER comes up to me and tricks me into giving him my email. He says “sister Wilson, what’s your first name?” And I told him Anna, and he’s Spells it out to me and asks if that’s correct and I said yeah but since he was my zone leader I didn’t know if he was asking for something important so I say my real name and he writes that down and he was like okay great !! So Adrianna, as in Adrianna.wilson@myldsmail.net  and then I got it and then he shook my hand and left. And apparently he ran up to sister kahigas afterwards and yelled “I got sister Wilson’s email!!!!” And she told me that when we got into our beds that night and then she said she thinks I have some sort of spell over the elders in our zone.  Haha it’s but pathetic if we’re being honest hahaha. Most of the elders are like that and it’s just funny cuz the sisters don’t give a rip. Really the sisters are just here to learn and we’re not impressed by the elders😂Also something that happened before the temple today....(Incase that first story wasn’t enough) haha I was in the laundry finishing up my laundry and an elder let me use the washer he was using and bleh bleh bleh and anyways 30 mins pass and I’m sitting on the floor waiting for the washer to stop and he comes and sits down next to me and says hi sister Wilson, I would love to get your email ! Maybe we can keep up while we’re gone ? 

Haha mind you I look like a MESS, on p day I roll out of bed and sprint to laundry, grab breakfast, and just curl up in a ball in the laundry room and wait for it to be done. And apparently some are still interested in getting my email. Hahah I don’t know why but it makes me laugh too. 

Oh also!! I just ran into Megan’s bestie aka companion on her mission here at the MTC!! So we took a picture together and hopefully she sent it to Megan.  And then she said that she’s bringing her here tonight actually. So we’re all meeting up in one of the buildings in about an hour. I’ll try to email a pic to you guys, but have her show u Incase I don’t !! 

I have one more week here in the MTC, so I’m trying to soak up as much knowledge as I can hahah !! Itll be good. Anyways hope u guys had some good laughs like I do while reading this email! I love u guys and thanks for the emails throughout the week!! ❤️

Here’s some pics from this week 

Representin' Canada!

Representin' Canada!

Ran into Megan at MTC (she was visiting her roomie/best companion Jessica who is a teacher)

My companions

The Best District

First Week Down!

Dear Family,

Hey y'all! I hope you all are doing well. Let me know how you are.  I'd love to hear from you all. Here in the MTC I have an iPad, so in my free time (which is like 10 seconds a day) I am able to look at the emails you guys send me.  So shoot me one when you can and let me know how everything is going. As for me, I'm doing great honestly, this has already been the hardest thing I have ever done. I'm learning so much here and making progress everyday. I still have a LONG way to go, and so much to do, but one day at a time. The days here are very long. We wake up at 6:30 am on the DOT, not 6:31, not 6:35 but 6:30 and wake up eat breakfast, workout, get ready and have classes, personal study, companion study, workshops, and then two 3 hour classes back to back and meals throughout the day. And then finally shower and bed time and lights out at 10:30pm. My roomies love sleep time so we never stay up past 10:30pm because we are all so tired. This work is so mentally, spiritually,and emotionally exhausting. I'm still getting adjusted and I'm sure it will still take a lot of time to, but just in this one week I am already able to see the great joy that this work brings. Here I am learning my purpose as a missionary and how to teach people. We do this thing called TRC and its when members and non members come to the MTC to learn lessons from us missionaries. And our teachers don't tell us if they are a member or not so we treat everyone like they are a non member and we teach them. My girl that me and my companions (i'm in a trio) are teaching her name is Taryn.  I'm really not sure if she is a member or not because I can't tell... but teaching her the first couple lessons has been amazing! She's so sweet and I just love getting to know her and help her with what she needs as much as I can. In one of our devotionals they told us "As you listen to the people you are teaching with love, you will never have to guess what to say next to them" and that is so true! Just genuinely listening to Taryn, I've come to love her already and I'm so happy I'm able to help her. 

Like I said, I'm in a trio companionship. My companions are Sister Reed and Sister Palmer. They are so great and we all work together so well. It's still taking some adjusting to get used to having someone with me literally EVERY hour of the day. Ha ha.  The only time I'm "alone" is in the shower and bathroom stall. And not really even then because Sister Reed sometimes stands right outside our stalls and waits for us.  Me and Sister Palmer have to tell her it's okay to not do that. Ha ha. She is interesting.  She's actually 30 so maybe it's a motherly instinct thing? Who knows, but were all helping each other and I'm learning that we are all one, with one purpose and its important for us to be united. The first couple nights were hard for Sister Palmer though.  I absolutely love Sister Palmer, she's amazing and we are so much alike so we are able to get along so well. The first night was rough though. Sister Palmer was really homesick and I'm on the bunk bed above her and I could hear her crying when we crawled into bed and I felt so bad because she was trying not to be loud. So I went down there and just hugged her until she stopped crying. After that we talked it out and she is doing a lot better.  No more crying (at least that I've seen).  But last night I think I did hear Sister Crawford crying a little bit I couldn't really tell though. (Shes one of my roomies, in my district).  But anyway,  this has been really tough, and we all get really discouraged because its a huge responsibility and it's hard not to think "can I really do this?".   We watched a devotional on Sunday from Elder Bednar that was so good, and he just talked about how our missions are not about us and they never will be. It is about helping all of God's children come unto Christ, so forget ourselves, and stop thinking "poor me, this is hard!" , "I can't do this!", etc.  If we forget ourselves, lose ourselves in the service of others, and focus on our purpose and use the atonement of Jesus Christ everyday, then it is there we will find ourselves. I am confident that I can have a happy and successful mission! I just have to do it right.

Also, I joined the choir here! Not my thing if you know me but  my companions are these musical, Broadway lovers and they sing their hearts out and it’s so pretty.  So it’s out of my comfort zone but Sunday we had our first practice and it was great! There are over 600 missionaries joining together singing “The First Noel” (little background, it means “happy birthday” in French) so we were all singing “happy birthday, happy birthday, the Savior is born ! Let’s us all sing with one accord!”  And it is amazing and the spirit is so strong. We get to sing for a General Authority today so I’m pretty pumped about that. Today I’m also going to the temple with my District. I absolutely love my District. On Friday I think was that first snowfall here and Elder Aldopho from Hawaii and Elder Duncan from Florida had never seen the snow before so we were in class and they saw it in they got soooo excited so we went outside and enjoyed it for a minute. It was fun! 

Also something super funny, Elder Aldopho apparently has an eye for me and he kind of got in trouble for it! On Sunday we had a Christmas Devotional and we sat with our District and he sat next to me and he didn’t see this senior couple that was sitting right behind us.  They were teachers or a Branch President or something, but Elder Aldopho was flirting up a storm and at the end he grabbed Elder Aldopho and pulled him aside and asked where he was from and asked if he had known me before the mission.  Elder Aldopho said "No" and then he told Elder Aldopho to pretty much knock it off and stay focused on the purpose. It was awkward and he’s focused now (fingers crossed) but it was weird and it made all our other activities we do together as a district weirdish! It’s funny though. I just laughed it off, and our district gives him crap for it... but it’s funny. Ha-ha.  Anyway I love you guys and I’m so busy and I’m learning a ton which keeps me from being homesick. There’s a scripture we read about that with our Branch President that really gave me comfort about homesickness. It’s in D&C 100. Go read it it’s amazing. I’ll share a couple versus that I just love and I think it’d be great for you guys to hear too!

 “Verily, thus saith the Lord unto you, my friends Sidney (Sister Wilson) and Joseph, your families are well; they are in mine hands, and I will do with them as seemeth me good; for in me there is all power.

Therefore, follow me, and listen to the counsel which I shall give unto you. Therefore, I, the Lord, have suffered you to come unto this place; for thus it was expedient in me for the salvation of souls.

Therefore, verily I say unto you, lift up your voices unto this people; speak the thoughts that I shall put into your hearts, and you shall not be confounded before men; For it shall be given you in the very hour, yea, in the very moment, what ye shall say.”

I know you guys will be watched over as well as I am away. I love you all so much and I’d love to hear from you so let me know how u all are and how things are going on at home! 

Until next week. Hugs from the MTC! ❤️

Love, 

Sister Wilson