This Week Has Been STUNNING!! ...and Also a Little Crazy.

Let me just say...the weather has been gorgeous down here the past week! Life is great. I don't even know half of what to talk about.

Hmmm...here we go!

Monday I know we had Chick-fil-a with Maddie Becker. It was SUPER yummy!! That night for FHE they had Diana Hoelscher there and we got to stay with a couple of our investigators and learn more about the Atonement and it was just awesome. :)

Tuesday we had a couple lessons in the morning and we helped the institute with a couple things in the afternoon. that night we exchanged with the Bryan sisters and I went there with Sister Sabin.

Wednesday we had a lot of things planned...funny how that turns out. We were able to go to Blinn and do a little finding there. That afternoon we stopped by a few people's house and had dinner. We did some tracting and taught a lesson to a couple girls after mutual.

Thursday they had a special MLC so Hermana Larson joined Sis Goodrich and I up in Bryan. I didn't go home in between these exchanges. So by the time they were done I was happy to be in my own apartment. That day we scheduled 2 dinners. One in Traditions and one in Bryan hoping that Sis Sabin would get back in time! ...that didn't happen. So we got 2 big dinners that night.

Friday we had zone meeting and a bunch of lessons back to back. We taught 3 Chinese girls. It's the best to teach them. The Chinese are so prepared for the Gospel. It's the best. That night we had a lesson with Susana and it was great :) she's growing so much.

Saturday was "the big event" here in town. We did service at Peace Lutheran Church here in town. It was awesome!! There were 6 missionaries there to help them. After the ward had a crawfish boil.

Sunday we did a lot. I'm running out of time....but Sunday was great.

Today. So one of the girls in my ward, Sara O'dell, wanted to take us to lunch today. We had another lunch planned but she seemed like she really really wanted it. So we ended up canceling the other to have lunch with her. The other sisters were with us this morning and we invited them to come with us. Just a normal day. To my shocking surprise (it literally took like 15 seconds to register) there stood Aunt Pam and Jonathan with his wife and kids. OH MY GOODNESS!!! What a great surprise!! So Sara was room mates with 'Johnny's' wife and knew Jonathan when he lived down here. They went to the ward that I'm serving in!!! How crazy is this!!! Wow. What a day so far!

Aunt Pam, Sister Carling and Jonathan Wallace.

Nice Surprise for lunch!

Keep moving Forward y'all!!

--Sister Carling

Spring Break...Not So YIKES Even Though We Had Bikes And It Rained All Week.

Howdy yall!! I can't believe that we are in week 5/6 of this transfer. The time has just flown. Where has it gone?! To serving the Lord.

Fun fact: There's this family history app on familysearch.org and our mission has a little group in it and it turns out that Elder Barlow, one  of the zone leaders, is my 4th cousin. It was fun to see who all and how I am related to a lot of the missionaries out here. Elder Schinn, who's from Korea, wasn't related to anyone...BUT!! I found out today that Caleb was his zone leader in the MTC! Way cool :)

Monday wasn't too eventful.

Tuesday we seriously biked like 10 miles or more. Sis Niedert doesn't believe it but I think we did. We went to the Library to look up a bunch of names and then to go and visit people we didn't know. That night we went to Blythe's house for dinner. It was EXCELLENT!! Her grandma sent her with a bunch of food and i had the best apple-cobbler I've ever tasted (even if it was a tiny bit bad for me).

Wednesday we went to the library with the Elders to go through orientation so that we can volunteer here! It will be lots of fun!! We had lunch with Melane and then after Laci took us to go and to visit Bishop Park in the CS2 ward. Next transfer we will be covering both areas.

Thursday we FINALLY got to do a FULL weekly planning. It was SO great! That afternoon we got to practice teaching the plan of salvation to Sarah. Sis Niedert and I are finally starting to get into the groove of teaching together and how we each teach.

Friday we had district meeting and then it got moved from the institute to the stake center. At the stake center, it got interrupted. Some members asked us to help move boxes out of the bishops storehouse truck. It was great either way!. That afternoon we had a lesson with Rong! She's so great! We taught her the Plan of Salvation and she accepted it. She really saw how God is really merciful and how he provides a place for each of us. She also accepted a baptismal date for July. We are SO excited! 

Saturday we made a lot of phone calls. That night we went to a Vietnamese place with a couple members. It was REALLY yum!! We went finding that night and found a possible new investigator! I'm just super excited about this area. It's so great!!

Sunday we set up appointments to start teaching about 4 different Chinese girls. It is so great to be able to teach someone about God and Jesus Christ. I never knew that just teaching someone about them could bring so much change. Rong invited her friend to church. She told one of her fellow-shippers that "[She] just [wants] her to have the same experiences [she is] having"...HOW COOL IS THAT!!! THAT is true conversion!! 

Today we are going to do a million different things....at least we hope to. :).

Keep Moving Forward!!

--Sister Carling

Spring Break in a YSA Ward...YIKES!

Howdy!!

This week's been great. The past couple of days the weather has been marvelous...like perfect marvelous. And...we hit pretty much all of our goals. It was awesome. EXACT OBEDIENCE BRINGS BLESSINGS!! Spring break is all this week so lets hope things go marvelously!

So Monday we as a district have a tradition of going to Yogurtland to get frozen yogurt. We  were able to teach Susana that night and she's planning on getting baptized the end of this month. It's pretty great! She's awesome and has been able to progress so much!

Tuesday we did a lot. We had lunch on campus with Taylor Jones and did a lot of contacting and talking to people about the LDSSA and inviting them to institute and to meet with us. We did this quite a few days this week. That night Sis Niedert and I went on splits. Sis Niedert and MaryKatherine had and appt that night and we also wanted to go and visit a member in the hospital. So Haylee Young came with me and we got everything accomplished. It was pretty great (as usual)! 

Splits with Haylee Young!

Wednesday we had a lot planned. We went on campus again and talked to a lot of people...like we always do. We had lunch with Kelly Baker on campus. Funny story about Kelly: I was able to help teach her back in October-ish when we were on exchanges. There are so  many of these recent converts that i have taught at least one lesson in their conversion it's so great to be able to re connect with them and teach them more. That night we got to teach someone that we tracted into a couple weeks earlier. His name is Ike and he's from Nigeria. It wasn't untill i got here that i really realized that i'd be serving foreign!! I've met many people from many different places!!

Thursday for lunch we had it in the tower on campus. It had an amazing view of how flat it is. It's really flat. like a table flat. like this place could be called "mesa" in Spanish it's that flat. But i digress...the food there was amazing. Later on we were able to meet with someone who texted the elders. She had met with the elders in the past and decided she wanted to meet again. The elders asked if we wanted to teach her and we really couldn't pass up the offer. So we were able to talk with her, Cortney, and her friend, Mark. It was a really great discussion!! They both agreed to listen to us again. So we will get in contact with them after spring break. That night after a lesson with Kelly and then Susana, the ward missionaries had a dinner at Denny's adventure. So everyone invited someone and we were all able to just talk and get to know eachother. Susana came and was able to get to know a few more people.

Friday. So spring break pretty much started for everyone this week. Campus was dead. We were also on exchanges that day. Sis Powell came with me and Sis Niedert went with to CS2 ward. We had a lesson with Rong (she's from China). We were able to talk more about the Godhead and the scriptures. It was great! That night we did some tracting and life was just dandy.

Saturday Sis Niedert and I made companionship goals and finished our weekly planning. That afternoon, we went to try and visit people in the ward that we didn't know. I also got to meet Breeja Larson!! It was awesome to be able to hear her story and talk to her about her life. We did lots of finding but we were still a few people short of our goal. We got home a little late and decided to go check the mail. We were able to talk to 2 more people and invite them to learn more...therefore hitting our goal!! YAY!! The Lord works in mysterious ways :)

Sunday we had ward council and church. After Church, we had a lesson with someone who was wanting to meet with us. She pretty much was accepting of everything. It was so amazing!! She's going to be in town for spring break so we will get to meet with her this week :) That afternoon we went out to try and find members and to talk to others. It was such a great week over-all. 

Today we got lost coming to the library. We went to the George Bush memorial library and museum. Just got a little confused by that...oh well!!

Keep moving forward!!

--Sister Carling

Daylight Savings for the LAST TIME!!

We got a text from the Elders Saturday night...I totally forgot about this dumb thing. I still don't like it. Can't all states be cool like Arizona and not change their clocks??

The past couple weeks have been kinda crazy...Just so yall know time is blinking right on bye...and I don't have a lot of time. So this will be quick.

Monday we got the bikes and gave the car to the Elders...I feel like it rained like all week. It was humid and warm on Tuesday and we felt the cold front move in that afternoon. Kinda bazaar.

Tuesday Sis Niedert had MLC so I went with some other sisters for the day.  That night we had dinner with some of the sisters in the ward (not exactly sure what to call people here because everyone is just always on a first name basis haha) that night we made a number of calls to people because we have lists of people. We did this often this week.

Wednesday we went on campus and got to talk to a few people...when I say a few I mean more than a few. went back to the institute and taught a few lessons and tried to make a couple visits to people with Melane. She's pretty awesome!! Dinner was with MaryKatherine. She took us out to eat. She'll be going to BYUI in April (Sad!!). That night we had correlation and meeting people at institute. There are things going on every day of the week. It's pretty awesome to have so many activities and events going on!

Paper on campus

Thursday we had an event on campus with helping people make survival bracelets. It was awesome. then we did some weekly planning. After, We had dinner with one of the YSA's Family. It was so great!! I really forgot about how much I miss families. It was a special treat. That night the institute had an open house and we got to talk to a few non members and make some appointments with them.

Friday we had Zone meeting and I got to share a little about my study on the stripling warriors. It was pretty awesome!! that afternoon we helped with a table on campus and had a lesson with Susana, our investigator. that night we had dinner on campus with a member and had Laci teach us the plan of Salvation

Sis. Niedert, Laci & Sis. Carling​

Saturday lots happened.

Sis. Carling & Sis. Niedert at Yogurtland with Laci

Sunday was a big change in time

Today it is raining. Sorry yall. I ran out of time. Gotta run!! Hope everything is going well!! Write me with questions!! haha

​Happy Adventures!

Keep Moving Forward.

--Sister Carling

One Week With Not Enough Sleep

Howdy! (Texas A&M Greeting)

Learning an area with your companion together is pretty intense. It's exhausting.

Monday was crazy. Had a big goodbye party for the other sisters. I started to get to know/memorize the people in the ward. The other sisters were finishing packing and I cleaned stuff out. Altogether, we were up way too late.

Tuesday was transfer day. So we drove down to the mission office and I got my new companion!! :) Her name is Sis Niedert and she's from St George. She's pretty awesome! She's got red hair and is just super awesome all around. Since our zone lost so many sisters this past transfer, I'm not STL, Sis Niedert is. She's 23. If you have questions about her...just ask me later :) haha 

 Sister Niedert & Sister Carling

That day we just drove home and kinda went over the area book and what I knew. Just an information overload week for both of us. We had dinner with a member at an awesome place called Fuego and met the Bishop and the Ward Mission Leader that night.

Wednesday was crazy. We taught a number of lessons at the Institute and did some planning and met with recent converts and then had correlation that night and met more people after the big institute class (Got to see a few people from Brenham!! Whoop!).

Thursday was another crazy day. We met a few more recent converts.  We got to teach a girl named Rong from China. It's so cool to be able to teach someone who is in the beginning phases of believing in God. It's amazing. We will probably get to do a lot of that. We also went on campus and talked to people. Sis Niedert is so great at it!! We also decided that it feels like we restarted our missions. Working with YSA's is like a totally different culture of missionary work. There's like a super fine line between professional and casual. We are learning to find our balance but still keeping our fun personalities :)

Friday we had district meeting had a mini meeting with the Zone leaders about the meeting on Saturday and did a VERY speedy weekly planning. Fastest one I've ever done! We did it in like an hour! Friday night we tried to tract...haha YSA's go out on Friday night's. we were also on call for going and picking a sister's companion up from the hospital. Our phone was on loud and luckily nobody called haha. #SisterTrainingLeader

Saturday we went on campus that morning and then had a quick lunch before our mini zone ysa pow-wow meeting. I got to talk about president's vision for YSA's it's pretty awesome. I mean I still don't understand his whole vision, but I'm excited to be able to keep learning more. That afternoon we had an awesome lesson with A recent convert. Laci came with us. She is also a recent convert. She's really awesome and just has such a STRONG testimony of the church. I am really grateful to be able to work with her and with this ward!! After that lesson, she drove us to the Hafer building (The first time I ever got to go inside of it!) for a baptism. It was pretty great we got home a little late because it was so far.

Sunday was break the fast. That was weird! YSA Stuff is just weird because I've been in family branches/ward my whole mission. This whole adjusting stuff is going well and by the time I'm done, I'll just keep doping what I'm doing. That night we got a ward list and tried to visit a few people. We were successful once!! We also got their RS president to come with us! :) (The ward has 2 RS presidencies and 2 Elder's Quorum) We went to the hospital at like 11:15 last night to run an errand for Sis Hassel and Sis Sabin. (Sis Hassel came out from the MTC with me) She's had a few medical problems and the doctors and president decided that she's needing to go home. So she leaves tomorrow. We went to their apartment to switch laundry and went home.

Today we went to bed at like 1ish. We got up and started cleaning and the normal pday stuff. So yeah. We got frozen yogurt at yogurtland as a district before Sis Hassel leaves tomorrow (we get it free cuz the member owns it). now we are here. It's cold outside.

I also am out of time...

Keep moving forward!!!

--Sister Carling