Hola familia!

Whew this week flew by.  I am super behind on my journal, so I've been trying to catch up on that so that I actually remember what happens from week to week.  But we did move this week!  The woman whose basement we were living in moved out of her house into an assisted living about a month ago.  So we've been living alone in the basement since then.  The housing coordinators for our mission found us another place to live and wanted to move us in as soon as they found it.  So all this week we had been packing all of our stuff up.  On Saturday, the housing coordinator couple, Elder and Sister Kunz, and a companionship of Elders were kind enough to come and move all the heavy stuff like desks and beds out of the apartment and into the new one.  We didn't move far, just down the street.  The new place is a basement apartment connected to a house that a member family lives in.  They have 3 kids and a dog, so this will be fun!  Although our new apartment is smaller than our old one, it's newer, so it's really cute.  Our bedroom is especially tight, so we switched our normal beds out for a bunk-bed, which gives us more floor space.  Well right now we're still in the process of unpacking everything, so our place is kind of a mess.  I'm realizing how munch junk I have, so I'm starting to go through my clothes as I unpack and separate which clothes I'm donating to DI in the next few weeks.  

In addition to moving, we have been working in our new wards, and man some of these apartment complexes in these ward boundaries are goldmines.  The students from different countries tend to live close to each other, so there are some apartments that we can literally just walk around and talk to the people that are going in and out of their apartment.  I love teaching foreign students.  Yesterday we were knocking around this one apartment complex and these two guys from Nepal.  They have a Hindu background, so we just had to start from the very basics of explaining who exactly God is.  It is definitely a different way of teaching when you are trying to explain the gospel to those who have no Christian background.  Really interesting, though. It definitely makes you a better teacher because you have to teach really simply.  Especially when they don't speak English that well.  I hope and pray that they will be interested in learning more about Jesus Christ.  

We also accompanied one of the singles ward Releif Societies to a nursing home.  The Relief Society President wanted us to share a brief message with them, so we talked about faith in Jesus Christ.  As I talked to these elderly people about faith, this one old man piped up, "Fig? What's a fig?!"   "No, Faith!"  I told him. "FAITH."  I almost had to shout.  Haha it was really funny.  

We are teaching a girl named Kayla, who is 18 and just moved out on her own from Blackfoot.  She has been meeting with the missionaries in Blackfoot and had been involved in Young Womens and stuff, so now we're getting her involved in the Singles Ward!  She reads the Book of Mormon every night and is really progressing.  When we first met her, (which was only a few weeks ago, I think it was Dec 28th)  she had some things that were holding her back from baptism that she had no intentions of changing.  However, this last week, we talked to her again of what she would be willing to do in order to receive this ordinance that she knows is so importance.  She expressed that she had decided this week that she would no longer live her past lifestyle, but would instead give that up in order to be baptized!  We set a date with her for February 6th! Please pray that she will have the strength and faith in Christ to resist temptation!

Also, I lost my planner yesterday and after much panic and prayer, Sister Gilbert found it!  God hears even the prayers over small concerns. :)

I love you all so much! Thank you to my lovely family for the love and support and thank you to everyone for the emails, letters, Christmas Cards, and love!

God Bless,

Sister Moreland

Hello everybody!

Well, after a relaxing New Years Eve and New Years day of movies, games, and sword-fighting the Elders with foam swords, the load of work on me and Sister Gilbert has just fallen on our shoulders, and we're pretty stressed.  Actually, I think Sister Gilbert is just fine, but I'm really stressed. haha.  We just acquired 2 more wards from the Assistants.  They will just be covering family wards now, so they won't be working in the same stake as us anymore.  So now we have 7 wards, lots of people to see, records to update, 3 sets of sisters to go on exchanges with, and now we've just gotten word that we are moving.  The mission needs us to move to a different house because the basement apartment we are living in is for sale.  So we've only got 24 hours in a day to do everything, so I'm just trying to work on using my time wisely.  I've gotten really bad about that lately.  No more taking more time than is needed to do things.  Sometimes I wish that we had some kind of "missionary secretary" for us that would take care of all of the logistical stuff so that we could just focus on spiritual preparation and teaching.  That's really where the good stuff is.  I'm still trying to kind of decide and figure out what my New Years resolutions are.   In the mission field, we say that anytime you can't think of what to improve on, you can study "Preach my Gospel" Chapter 6, Section "Humility".  lol.  Haha, I know I'm about 4 days late on that, but there are just so many things that I could improve upon as a missionary and as a servant of Christ. Especially as I'm coming up on only having 2 months left.  I'm feeling a sense of the "sands running out." It's hard to know what to focus on the most.  I'll think and pray on it a bit more and let y'all know when I've got my goals!  I hope that you all have resolutions that make you want to become a better person.  There is a really good video on New Years and it's a good look on what our new year can be like!

I love you all so much!

God Bless,

Sister Moreland

                                                                  Sledding Christmas Eve

                                            Friends (Andy and Brock) from BYU visiting in Pocatello

Hope everyone had a great Christmas!

We saw some Christmas miracles this week! A few days prior to Christmas, we were trying to see a girl named Graciela that we had met outside of her apartment.  When we knocked on her door, her roommate answered instead. Her roommate's name is Kiki and it turns out that she's from China!  She was the only one home and she let us inside.  We showed her the Christmas videos, and although she has no religious background at all, her Grandma in China is Christian, so she's heard about God and Jesus Christ.  The girl that we took with us invited Kiki to the church Christmas program, and Kiki accepted! So yesterday she came to church, and we sat by her and explained some of the things that were happening (the sacrament,etc).  She seemed to really enjoy it!  She accepted to learn more, so we look forward to meeting with her again!

We also had another miracle this week.  This was just the day before Christmas Eve.  It was in the middle of the afternoon, and we stopped the car on the side of a residential street in order to look at our map and figure out who we would try and see next.  I glanced up from the map and saw somebody bundled up and walking in the snow alone.  I didn't even think-----I just said almost automatically, "we need to talk to that person."  I got out of the car, Sister Gilbert following behind me, and we approached the person walking on the other side of the street.  He was a young man named Eric.  Eric told us that he was from California---he had just moved to Idaho that day.  We gave him a pass-along card about Christmas, and he seemed pleased, "Oh! Christan! I just accepted Jesus 2 or 3 years ago."  We talked with him a bit about that, and he accepted our invitation to come teach him about the Restored Gospel!  We are really excited about both of these miracles.  Christmas really is a wonderful time of year!  

We ate with several families and made homemade donuts with President and Sister Hancock! That was super fun.  Went sledding a bit, watch a movie with the zone, and played a very intense version of capture the flag. 

With the upcoming New Years, make it a time to give Christ His "birthday present".  For your New Years Resolutions, you can give Christ a gift by resolving to pray more.  Maybe you can make a resolution to be kinder to your neighbors and friends.  Perhaps you want to make it a goal to go to church, or to focus on the sacrament more as you attend meetings. Your New Years Resolution could be to say "thank you" more often, or even to spend more quality time with family members.  Whatever it is, dedicate this year of 2016 to the God who loves you more than words can describe. I LOVE YOU ALL!

God Bless,

Sister Moreland 

Guess who came home to Pocatello for the holidays?? Andy and Brock!  

Me and Sister Gilbert after sledding!

 

You will only understand if you are a Monty Python fan!

                                                           New Companion, Sister Gilbert

                                                                         First attempt at queso

MERRRRRRRRRRYYY CHRISTMAS!!!!!!

New Companion!!

I can usually tell from the first few days what a companionship is going to be like. And I can already tell that it is going to be a fantastic transfer!

My new companion is Sister Gilbert.  She is from Huntington, Utah and has been out for 7 months. She's a brand new STL, so we've got a new STL training a brand new STL. So this should be fun.

I am excited to work with Sister Gilbert.  We've been sharing a lot of the goals that we have for this transfer and it's looking like we're on the same page--we want to be bold, fearless missionaries who are diligent workers.  Ahhh I'm so excited, Sister Gilbert is great. I don't know if I mentioned this in my last email, but she served in McAmmon while I served in Inkom.  The two towns are really close to each other, so us Inkom sisters would get rides form McAmmon sisters all the time, and vice versa.  So we got pretty tight there.  

All the ISU students are going home for Christmas break, which means, in terms of young single adults, Pocatello will be a ghost town for the next couple of weeks.  Most of our investigators are going out of town to see their families for Christmas.  One of our Investigators, Ali, is going back to his home country for the break. Please pray for him. 

I hope you all have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Yearrrrrr!! I can't wait to Skype y'all and see how you're doing.  Although I will miss hanging with the cousins, eating cottage cheese pie, making a gingerbread house, and going to the theater to see a movie on Christmas Day, I love Christmas in the mission field because of how exciting it is to 'announce' to everyone about the birth of the Savior.  It makes me feel like the angel announcing to the shepherds of the glorious news. Thing this year of what you can give Christ for His birthday.  I love you all so much!

Merry Christmas and God Bless,

Sister Moreland

we tried making homemade queso. Didn't really turn out, but it still tasted good. haha

Don't have a whole lot of time today!

Sister Green is entering the Mission Home today to go home!! So we've got to get a bunch of stuff ready, clean our apartment, which is destroyed right now, before my new companion comes.  Oh! My new companion! Her name is Sister Gilbert.  When I was serving in Inkom, she was in McAmmon, which is right next to Inkom so we saw each other on P-day every week, got rides from each other, etc.  She's from Utah and has been out for about 7 months. So I'm excited to get a companion that is right smack in the middle of her mission, I feel like that's when you're the most completely focused because you've been in the mission field for a while so you don't think about family or anything back home anymore, and you're not in that stage where you're starting to make preparations for coming home yet.  So I'm excited and ready to light the fire of missionary work!

Short and sweet one.  I love the Lord.  His Church is true! 

God Bless and Merry Christmas,

Sister Moreland

ps if you haven't seen the 2 min Xmas video yet, check it out here

It's commiiinnngggggggggggg!!!!!

Christmas.

It's coming.

Soon.

Get ready.

I'M SO EXCITED.

Alrighty here we go.  We had a Zone Conference.  It was full of slideshow goofy pictures, funny talent show shenanigans, and lots of Christmas excitement.  There, they introduced the website.  THE WEBSITE.  Christmas.mormon.org.  This website has a 2 minute video called "A Savior is Born" and it is absolutly wonderful.  I love the African kid.  That's probably my favorite part. He's just so passionate about it.  

So we got Christmas pass-along cards, like they give us every year, and we've been handing them out like candy.  Telling everybody about the good news!  Christmas!  A Savior is born! And not just any Savior, your Savior!  

To see what the world would be like without a Savior, check out this 2 minute video called Why We Need a Savior.

Yesterday we watched the Christmas Devotional Broadcast and that got me super excited about Christmas as well.  I love Christmas music.  It makes me so incredibly happy.

So last week, we went to contact a less active girl named Kate, and Kate didn't seem too excited to have us there.  Her roommate Alexis, however, is not a member of the church and seemed eager for us to return.  We went back yesterday and shared a brief message about the Book of Mormon.  She talked about how she was super open and willing to learn more.  We were doing cartwheels in our heads on the way out!  Miracle, my friends.  God lead us straight to Alexis, I'm sure of it. 

Once you watch the videos on Christmas.mormon.org, post it on facebook, twitter, instagram, pinterest, and any other social media you have! Spread this wonderful message of Christmas joy.

Merry Christmas and God Bless!

Sister Moreland

To my beloveds,

Happy Turkey Day!  So this week we taught a new investigator from Nigeria! I LOVE teaching all of these young adults from different countries and cultures.  We Americans can be so very stubborn sometimes haha.  But the people that I have taught so far that have been from foreign countries have been so meek, so open to God, and so willing to hear and act on this message.  This new investigator has a ton of questions, many of which are very thought-provoking.  We hope that he will turn to God to find the answers to his questions.  

It snooooooooooowwwweeeeddddddddd!!!  I forgot how much I love the snow.  It puts me in such a Christmasy mood.  Even though it wasn't even Thanksgiving yet.  I am loving the snow!  And people like to let us in their house when it's cold outside :))) mehehehehe......

 

Well, for Thanksgiving, we served dinner at a senior center, which was way fun!  Then we went to a member of the stake presidency's house to have Thanksgiving dinner. (No, I didn't do any cooking.  Ain't nobody got time fo dat.)    Oh, man, I miss Thanksgiving in Texas.  They just don't do it up here like they do back home.  No creamed corn and no cottage cheese pie.  Man, I miss cottage cheese pie. In the evening, all of the missionaries in our zone got together and played a game called 'murder in the dark'. It was lots of fun.  

Well, sorry I don't have more info about the week.  But that's all I can think of for now.  Being a missionary is the best.  I love it here in Pocatello and I love teaching this age group. They are just searching for themselves, for their purpose in life, for a direction, and Jesus Christ provides it.  It's just the right time in their lives.  I love you all and hope to hear how things are going for you!

God Bless,

Sister Moreland

I tried to take a picture of the snow in the dark.  Didn't really work. Plus I kind of blinked.

Caught the APs shoveling snow! Haha