Washington Everett Mission: 2017-10-08

Hey Family!

I can't believe it has already been a week!? The time is so weird here, it's both slow and fast, considering how much we have done in just a week, it's amazing. I love it here! I have the BEST companion, Sister Murdock, she is so much fun! the funny thing about us is she found me on an instagram account called missionaries coming soon and little did we know we were going to be companions haha. There isn't a day that has gone by without us laughing so hard we can't breathe! We both keep each other motivated during our workout time, so we run and do some cardio, and then go play games with our district. I love our district, whenever we get together, we have the best time. There are 6 elders and 2 other sisters. My companion and I are both going to Everett Washington so I hope we can be companions again! There's only two Elders going to Everett and the rest on our district is going to Long Beach California. It makes me sad we're not all going to the same place because we are all so close. Our Branch President is President Christofferson, he is Elder Christoffersons cousin!

so we have done so much this past week. When we got here, it honestly was a blur, it was so fast paced. We got right into everything after orientation, all the knew missionaries separated into three rooms with an investigator that we could get to know and start teaching. It didn't go very well, they just threw us in with a microphone to have one person at a time talk and we really confused the poor guy. I don't know why they trusted us with an investigator our first day haha. We met our teachers and just started learning. For everyone who is going to serve a mission, get comfortable with role playing now! They go over what you need to teach, and then you pretty much wing it and start role playing and switch you around with elders and other sisters. It was not easy at first, but we do it so much throughout each day, it gets easier. On Friday, we had to "find" two investigators and contact them. The two investigators we talked to our Kaitlynn and Adrianna. They are super nice, and really good actors haha, I don't think they are real investigators, but we definitely treated them real. Adrianna's questions were tough to answer, but Sister Murdock and I work really well together. We taught both of them Monday and Wednesday and will teach Kaitlynn today at a 4. We have to teach each of them 4 lessons and then you contact two more investigators and do it all again the next week. It is a blast, when your just yourself, it goes so much more smoothly.

Our first Sunday was Fast Sunday and it went better than I expected. I didn't have a problem with fasting all day which I thought I would. We had fast and testimony meeting with our zone and then had relief society. I was going share my testimony, but I forgot my name tag so I felt awkward going up, but a lot of missionaries were going up so it was good. We had lots of meetings throughout the day and then we were able to go to choir and it was AMAZING! We sang a song called "Testimony" it was beautiful. After Dinner, we had a Devotional on Elder Holland's talk "Be Ye Therefore Perfect-Eventually" and broke it down. And after we all separated to watch different videos of the apostle's, and all the new missionaries were told to go to the "Character of Christ" by elder Bednar! I was in awe when listening to it, it WILL change your life! It was a great Sunday, and a very long Sunday haha. I'm used to only going to church for three hours and then being home with my family the rest of the day, but we we're doing things all day!

On Tuesday, they told us that an apostle was coming in to speak with us for Devotional! It was Elder Christofferson! He is amazing! I was so sad because we forgot to go to the second choir practice that was for Tuesday nights devotional and weren't able to sing with them in front of Elder Christofferson... It was live streamed so you can probably find it on lds.org and watch it! He talked about Joseph Smith and Martin Harris and all those who sacrificed so much for the printing of the Book Of Mormon. It was an amazing talk, I recommend that you look it up and then you can hear the song the choir sang, it was amazing.

I love being here! It has been life changing, and it's only been a week! I can't believe how much I have grown and will continue to grow. I know this Gospel is true, and as you strive to come closer to your Heavenly Father, you will feel so much more joy in your life, I know I have. I know this journey isn't going to be easy, but I know as I put God first and forget myself and go to work, I will be able to live my purpose here and bring other's unto Christ. I love and miss you all soooooo much! I am aloud to read emails anytime I have time to throughout the week, I just can't respond till P-day, so send me emails anytime about whats going on in your life! I will have to try to find time to write letters, but I barley have time to send out this email! it's crazy!

Oh Yeah! also we are going to the temple today! I'm so excited!! it is going to be a great day! Love you all and I will talk to you in a week!

I will send pictures later today:)

Sister, Stokes