Fun Fotos!

Waiting in line to sing in the choir when Elder Nelson and Elder Holland came.
Singing in the choir  = reserved seats : )

Good- bye Hermana Ferguson, enjoy the Texas San Antonio Mission!

Good-bye Siser Schroeppel, enjoy the Alabama Mission!

Our Elders decorated our desks for Valentine's Day

All of the Hermanas in our Zone the night before Hermana Schroeppel and Hermana Ferguson left.

We have a mirror in our classroom and our Elders always draw pictures on it.
As you can see I am way bad at  making it line up because I am so short - haha!

More Valentine's Fun!

Our Threesome - Myself, Sister Cottrell and Sister Marcum.

Week #9

Hola!

     Sorry my letter is coming so late in the afternoon. The email system has been down all morning, which was a little bit on the annoying side because you have to be in missionary attire when emailing, so I  had to change a couple of different times. But that is okay! Because they finally got it up and working! We went and did sealings at the temple this morning and I loved it. This has been a pretty strange week for me actually because my whole district (except Hermana Cottrell) is heading out to the field. So we have had a lot of talks about going out into the field, what to do at the airport, when to pack etc... but I'm like ahhh don't talk to me about that! I can't be getting excited yet! haha. But it's fun. I'm going to be so sad when all the Elders leave. There's something about being in the MTC together for nine weeks that makes a district grow so close. We love them so much and I know they are going to be awesome missionaries. four of our elders were supposed to be heading out to Tijuana, Mexico, but they haven't received visas yet, so last night they received their temporary reassignment. They are going to the Colorado Colorado Springs Mission, which would be absolutely fantastic, except that they have been called English speaking. They are pretty bummed because they are worried that they will forget all the Spanish that they have been working so hard to learn, but they're trying to stay optimistic. Things will work out! On Tuesday morning Hermana Marcum leaves for Ogden, and Hermana Cottrell and I go back to being a normal companionship. We received a little bit of information about our visitor's center training that starts next Wednesday. We get to drive up to Temple Square for a couple of days to practice giving tours and such. I found out that Sister Andelin (a friend from my ward this past semester) is going to be one of my teachers, so I was pretty excited about that. It's kind of a bummer to have everyone leave a week before I go out to the field, but I think that it should be a fun week. So yeah... we'll see!

      Every week in the MTC you have to prepare a talk for Sacrament meeting in your mission language. And then when they are announcing the talks that are being given, you find out if you are actually giving your talk or not. Well as you may have guessed by now, I was called to talk this past Sunday. When they called my name my heart just started racing, but I went up there and it went pretty well. The topic was on prophets and I focused on the importance of having a living prophet. I read from President Monson's Sunday morning address this past October. It was good. And it's always good to remember that most of the people in the room can't understand you and don't know when you mess up! (most missionaries haven't been there as long as I have... and only one member of our branch presidency speaks Spanish!)

    

We have a workshop every Wednesday afternoon and this past topic was on commitments. We invite, They commit, We follow up. Pretty much just issuing commitments to people and the importance of them keeping their commitments. Not just on you issuing them. Something Brother Black asked was what do you when people do not follow up on... what do you say. And half of the people just said "esta bien." Like "oh it's okay." He was like "NO". You don't just tell them that it is okay. You are devastated! They missed out on that opportunity to come closer to Christ. So that just kind of hit me that if I do so oh esta bien then they won't really see the importance of doing it next time. If that makes sense. 

       I'm doing so well here. I'm just happy to be here and can see the light at the end of the tunnel of my stay here at the MTC. I have such mixed feelings about leaving. I'm going to be so sad to leave the people I have met... but I am more excited to get out to Arizona and share the Gospel of Jesus Christ with REAL PEOPLE! haha. I feel like I am ready as far as my Spanish goes. I still have so much to learn... but I feel like I can get by with what I have while I continue to learn more. Tomorrow (Friday) all day we have in field orientation. I don't really know what we do during it, but everyone always has good things to say about it! So I'm looking forward to it. It's a change in the routine at least! 

      Sorry this letter is all over the place! I love you all! I love hearing from you! And I miss you tons, but I am doing so well and am loving what I am doing. 

Love Love Love,

Hermana Holly Larson
     

Week #8

Buenas Dias!

        This morning has been good thus far! We had the opportunity to go to the temple which is always nice. I hadn't been in two weeks because Hermana Cottrell was sick last week. When I was in the dressing room I saw a friend from BYU, Dillon! She is a Physical Science Teaching major, so we had a lot of education classes together. She, apparently, has her mission call to New York! So that was so fun to see a friend. She doesn't come into the MTC until way after I leave, so I probably won't see her again, but it was fun nonetheless!

         This week has been a little weird in that we are now the oldest district in our zone. I still have two and half weeks left here... but the rest of my district only has a week and half left! (because they don't have visitor's center training!) So it's just been weird realizing how fast it's coming! At first it was really freaking me out... I'm not ready to be thrown into the real world! ha ha   But then during one of our lessons this week nuestro maestro told us some fun stories about his mission and it just got me really excited to get out there! Which is good... but kind of bad as well because I still have a couple of weeks here...

        Last week we got a new district that had  three  hermanas. It was fun to have new hermanas... but we could pretty soon see that their companionship was pretty difficult and something wasn't right. One of the Hermanas threatened suicide a couple of times...  she got sent home. The mission is not the place to be dealing with issues that serious... but it was still really sad to see her get sent home.

         I got my language results back... they weren't absolutely fantastic, but I'm already past the point that you have to be at to go out to the field, so that was exciting. We baptized both of our investigators this week which was exciting. Now we are working on door approaches and that kind of thing.

         Relief Society here is totally the best! We always have a fantastic speaker come and talk to us. This week it was Mary N. Cook, the First Counselor in the Young Women's General Presidency. She shared the Mutual theme this year, " Arise and Shine Forth," from  D&C 115:5. She talked about the enabling power of the atonement. At the very end of her talk she shared the Mormon message "When Lightening Strikes." It is absolutely fantastic and you should all go watch it. Also if you watch it, you will understand why what I'm about to tell you is so intense. The lights were dimmed because we were watching this on the projector, and in the middle of the clip a sister fell to the ground and had a seizure. (The Mormon Message is about being worthy to use the priesthood at all times so that you can help when you need to.) Sister Cook's husband and a security guard gave the girl  a blessing while the ambulance was on the way. It was just really interesting the whole timing of it. It was a neat/scary experience.

      The Sunday night fireside was given by Richard I. Heaton who is the Administrative Director of the MTC. He had the newest converted missionaries form a panel and just asked them questions about how church attendance played a role in their conversion. It was so incredible to see how people that were baptized 13 months ago are already serving missions. How cool.

      The Tuesday night devotional was by Don R. Clark of the Seventy. He talked about tons of things, but my favorite was talking about being happy on the mission. He said that the moment you begin to love the people in the area you are serving more than you love yourself... that is when you will be happy on your mission. I'm so excited to get out to Mesa!

       Yesterday we got to "host" new missionaries, where you greet them as they get dropped off, get them checked in, to their dorm, their textbooks and meet their companion. All that kind of stuff. It was so fun to see all of these new missionaries and to just tell them about how awesome the MTC is. So fun.

       Our Valentine's Day here at the MTC was actually seriously fun. We (my threesome) made goodie bags for the eight Elders in our district, and then we decorated an envelope for each of them, and wrote notes to each of them and put talks and quotes in them and gave them to them. They of course didn't do anything for us (we didn't expect them to! haha) but they felt so bad... when we got back from gym they had crazy decorated our desks. It was fun. I'll send pictures! We were like okay that was cute of them... but like we knew they had done it because they felt bad that they hadn't done anything. But then later that night as we were heading back to our dorms they gave us each a t-shirt. The second week that we were here all of our Elders had gotten matching t-shirts from the bookstore and wore them to gym time. So it was like our whole district... except the hermanas... So we had kind of given them a hard time, but we were kidding. Anyway, they had bought us the matching shirts and all of them signed the back of it. It was pretty cute and actually thoughtful. We were surprised. hahah. But we have good elders! It'll be sad to leave them!!

     Anyway, I am doing really well! Missing you all. I am happy to be here. I said that one day to Hermana Cottrell... and really meant it. I'm happy to be here. It's incredibly difficult. But I'm learning tons.

 

Love Love Love

Hermana Holly Larson

Week #7

Buenas Tardes!

       Sorry that my letter is later this afternoon. Last night Hermana Cottrell started feeling really sick. It was actually in the middle of a lesson when she thought she was going to pass out... so we quickly ended the lesson and headed back up to our room. So we've been hanging out in our room pretty much most of the day today. We didn't go to the temple this morning, because even though she is feeling much better, she wasn't sure if she was going to be able to sit though a whole session. And while that was a bummer because I love the temple so much, it was pretty nice to have a relaxing, chill P-Day... because for the most part they never are. They are always so busy!

      This past week has been fantastic. Being here at the MTC can be a rollarcoaster, some weeks are great, others are really difficult. Luckily this has been a pretty great one. I've been asked to play the piano in Sacrament meetings, so it has been fun to spend a little bit of time practicing. One night every week Hermana Cottrell has a meeting that all coordinating sisters go to. So we go, drop her off and then Hermana Marcum and I went into a different room so that I could practice the piano. I was playing when Hermana Marcum told me that she was just going to go in the hallway right outside our room to fill her water bottle up. She was like don't stop... I can hear you. So I kept playing until someone walked in the room from a different hallway. I stopped playing and looked to see who it was. It was President Brown... The MTC president. He was like you play lovely... but you are alone, Where is your companion? I was like uh... well she said she was just filling her water bottle up.. she said she could hear me. haha I sounded so dumb. Anyways we got a short little talk about how important it is to always be within sight of your companion.. oops! We learned our lesson. It just HAD to be from the MTC President and not just a district president or something!

       Teaching our investigators has been going extremely well. Trino got married this past week and has a baptismal date of next Saturday, and Alex is getting baptized this Saturday. We also picked up two new investigators. We've only taught them once but it seems to be going well. It is so insane that I have been here so long. I honestly feel like I'm not preparing for the field, but that this is my mission. It doesn't really seem like I'm going to leave here! I'm excited, but I think I might have a freak out when I actually do leave here! And have to talk to real people that speak real Spanish! haha. Yesterday I took a Language Speaking Assessment where they ask you all sorts of questions and you have to respond to them in Spanish. They record you and then someone rates you and kind of just lets you know where you are and if you are on track. That sort of thing! So I should get that back sometime this week, and hopefully it is good news :]

       Remember when I talked about the "mock" sacrament meeting that we had a couple of weeks ago? Well this past Saturday we had a "mock" baptismal service for our other investigator so that they would know what to expect at their own baptism. I don't know what it is with our district... but anytime we "act" things just end up being really funny. They like kind of pretended to baptism "Tommy" (Elder Anderson), without saying the words... and then when Elder Mallard went to dunk him... it was a little different than in water and we almost lost Elder Anderson. He totally fell to the ground. At first it was like ahh. are you okay? but then it was just funny. Our investigator was like uhh I don't want to drown! So funny. I have grown to love my district so incredibly much. It's going to be weird when we all split our separate ways.

       So while I have been here I have learned a little bit about how the visas work for those that are serving internationally. You are put on a list and I'm not sure how they determine who and when you are accepted, but when you are you are called to a specific consulate somewhere in the United States. And the church pays for your day trip to fly to the city and get your visa. We have two roommates that are headed to France that left this morning at 4 AM to go to Los Angeles... they'll be back tonight by 7! Well apparently getting visas to go to Mexico has been a bit of a problem lately. The district in my zone that has been here just longer than us was supposed to leave last week for Mexico, but none of them have received their visas. So they are all just hanging out here in the MTC. Yesterday 3 got reassignments until they can receive visas, but the rest are flying out tomorrow to get their visas. The elders in my district that are headed to Mexico are starting to get a little worried...

       Every fast Sunday the MTC has a mission conference in the morning where the presidency of the MTC talks to us. It was a great meeting... long but great. President Nally's talk I feel was written for me. He talked about having patience when receiving answers to our prayers. Our answers rarely come in our time frame, but in the Lord's. And in the meantime we just need to be faithful and act. You can't just sit around waiting for an answer. Do what you know you are supposed to do! President Brown was the last speaker and gave a very intense and very serious talk about the atonement. I couldn't imagine sitting in that audience and having unrepentant sins. It would have been very difficult. I am so glad that I was able to be at peace through the entire meeting. He read Alma 11:37 and said that while we cannot be saved in our sins... we can be saved from them. Through the atonement. It was a great talk.

      The Tuesday night devotional was given by Richard C. Edgley, the first counselor in the Presiding Bishopric. His talk was all about becoming a missionary, the messages that we teach as missionaries, and about how we will not meet one person on our mission that God doesn't know personally and doesn't love tremendously. He summed up everything we teach as missionaries into three different lessons. 1. God lives and Jesus is the Christ. 2. Joseph Smith brought about the restoration and is a Prophet of God. and 3. Christ's grace can save us all if we do what we are asked to. We are saved by grace! It was wonderful.

       With that said... my time is up! It has been a fantastic week. I love you all so much!

Love Love Love,

Hermana Holly Larson

Week #6

Buenas Dias a mi familia y mi amigos!

        I feel like I say this every week, but I feel like I need to say it every week; Thank you so much for the letters I get from you all. It means a ton :] I look forward to hearing how everyone is doing!

        It's been a hard week here. The MTC is a spiritual and emotional rollarcoaster; I suppose my whole mission will be like that. I've never been so focused on the Gospel in my entire life. I've never tried to feel the spirit as often as I am now. And sometimes when answers don't come right away, or you feel like you aren't getting any direction, it's really tough. I admit that I had some doubts this week. But as I have come to realize that this is a trial of my faith, I am staying strong. Ether 12 has been my rock this week. The witness won't come until after the trial of your faith. I also was reading in the Bible Dictionary under "conversion" and something really stuck out to me. It says, "Complete conversion comes after many trials and much testing." It doesn't say that it comes after many witnesses and confirmations. It comes after many trials and tests of your faith. I was also reading in the Bible Dictionary under "prayer" and it said that prayer is work. And I hadn't thought of it like that before. Real prayers take real work. If you really want got to know how serious you are about this, you have to put the work in. And I'm trying.

        The Tuesday night devotional was the 50th Anniversary Celebration of the MTC. There had been many different rumors about certain people being there, but as always you never find out who is there until they walk in the door. I was in the choir (I am every week... it's pretty fun) so I was certain to have a seat. There were over 200 guest invited, so many missionaries did not get a seat. So I felt really lucky to be in the room when Elder Nelson and Elder Holland walked in. It was a great meeting. Elder Holland's talks always are so powerful. He really talked about the covenants that we have taken on in the temple, and that we are obligated to work as hard as we can. And Elder Nelson talked a lot about missionary work, and past missionaries. There were some really incredible missionaries in the early days of the church. I hadn't heard a lot of the stories. He closed his talk but stayed at the podium. He then continued to tell us that he was going to dedicate 5 buildings on the MTC campus that were either new, or had been refurbished. It was beautiful. I realized at that moment that we rarely get to hear an apostle pray. I think the only times I have heard them pray is during a dedication. It was a fantastic experience to just hear them dedicate these building to God. That they are here to serve him, and for his purposes. He blessed them that the Spirit would dwell there, and that the missionaries minds would be quickened in them.

         Wednesday morning a district in my zone that I have grown really close to left for the field. It was really sad to say goodbye to them, but I know that they are going to be fantastic missionaries. It's kind of crazy being in the MTC for so long because you really grow attached to the missionaries around you, and then they all leave for different places all over the world. I'm so grateful for the Elders in my district. They can be a little crazy at times, but really they treat us Hermanas really well and are really kind. Two Elders in our district were made zone leaders (E. Kener and E. Mallard) and E. Erickson became our new district leader. (all 3 of these are the ones headed to Houston mom!) But anyways, Wednesdays are always fun because new missionaries get here! (and they have creamery icecream at lunch! haah) But yesterday a friend of mine, Ryceejo Nordstrom came into the MTC! So it was fun to meet up with her and talk to her for a while. I think she's going to be such a great missionary. She's going English speaking so she'll only be here until February 20, but it's always fun to see familiar faces.

         They have started having P90X classes everyday during gym time, so Hermana Cottrell and I went on Wednesday. It was pretty fun, and definitely a good workout. I can feel it today!  The longer I am here the harder it is to make myself workout on my own. So going to the classes is becoming more and more important. That makes me a little worried for when I get out in the field... haha.

         Teaching our investigators is going so well. On Monday we went into a lesson having planned to teach about faith and repentance, but as soon as we got into the lesson we knew something was wrong. Trino told us that his tio had just passed away and so we knew that we had to teach the Plan of Salvation. And the most incredible thing is that we did. In Spanish. Not having prepared for it. And like we knew what we were saying and it was just so fantastic. My Spanish is coming. I'm going to make it!

        This morning we had the oppurtunity to go to the temple like we do every Thursday morning, but this week we decided to do sealings. I had never done sealings before, and I am so glad I did. It's beautiful. The promises are real. I don't feel like I need or should say anything more about it. Families are so central to God's plan. Families are what it is about. It is so incredibly important. I loved it.

        And I love you all. My time is up and I have an appointment to get my haircut!! Don't worry; I'm won't do anything toooo crazy! hah.

  Love love love,

         Hermana Holly Larson