8/26/2014 #3 Mission Letter

I can't believe it's been three weeks! I'm half way done with my MTC experience! I remember everybody telling me how their mission was the hardest, yet most fun time. I didn't fully understand it, but I feel like now I know. This week has been hard, but at the same time I have had some great memories! Everybody asks us if time goes by slow or fast here and to be honest it's both... the days feel like months but the days are just flying by! It's crazy to think that in three weeks we will be flying to Canada!

This past week we got four new districts in the French Speaking zones which was super exciting but sad to see our friends leave.

I wish I had some super exciting
story to share, but this week was just like last week, we go to class and we teach, we eat, and we study the scriptures and meet new people. The only difference was that we spoke a tad bit more
French and less English than last week. I leaned how to say the "struggle is real" in french...haha! Went to the temple with the girls in my zone and it was amazing.  Had to pray during sacrament meeting...in French... but it went well!

During dinner one of the elders made a wrap, but they were out of a lot of things so he had a tortilla, salsa, peppers, crutons and feta cheese....it was hilarious to watch him eat it.

During gym we decided to play volleyball with some of our friends, and near the end of gym time I hit the ball and I popped a blood vessel in my thumb! (don't worry mom, I got ice and it was healed in the morning.

I don't know if I shared this with you but me and Soeur Willis were teaching our first lesson to Bruno aka Frere Kunzler and we invited him to be baptized. He told us that he had already been baptized as a child, so we turned to a scripture and he read it and it was my turn to explain what the scripture meant, so I started by saying babies don't need baptism because they are pure and have no sins... so sins in French in peches...with some accents above the e's but I pronounced it wrong and instead I said, "babies are pure and have no peaches....." lol. My teacher cracked a smile, and I eventually correctly pronounced the letter.

 Well that's my week in a nutshell....

Love Soeur Rawliings

P.S. I have two pictures of my district at the Provo Temple and a selfie at the temple.

8/19/2014   #2 Mission Letter
Well hello everyone!

      I can not believe that I have been here for two weeks, the days just seem like weeks but the weeks just feel like days! Me and Soeur Willis taught a lessons yesterday...in English to one of the golden tag investigators and it went amazing! We taught Lance,and it went really well and
really just recharged my battery to testify to him how much Father in heaven truly loves him. 

      The language is coming but I wish I knew more, I think that it will be one of the biggest challenges for me.  On Sundays we have to have talks ready in French on various subjects, and I just pray that they won't call on me because I can't pronounce half of the words-haha! But I read a scripture this week about how God qualifies who he chooses, and that if God needs me to speak French, than that is what will happen. But I have seen an improvement, which is good. The other day we were learning numbers in French, all the way to 100 and we were playing a game where we would go in a circle saying the next number. As a group we were trying to get to 100 but if just one person messed up we would have to start over. As you may know, before I left I could could count to 9- lol! So it was a struggle for me. But as we would go around everyone was so supportive and cheered when we would say the difficult number it was great. As a group we're very supportive.

Four groups of French Missiionaries left this week! So were getting new French missionaries tomorrow, which will be fun!

For devo. we had Jenny Oaks come and play/sing for us-which was great!

  Besides that, it's been a very similar week. We're in class for about 9-10 hours. I love meeting everyone and hanging out with all the missionaires, there are about 28 of us going to Montreal, in three districts!

Hope everything is going well!

Love Soeur Rawlings




Here is my stash of goodies!

We dressed up and did a mash-up for the sisters leaving.

Matchy, matchy!

With our sisters before they left for France.

8/12/2014 #1 Mission Letter
Bonjour!!!

I can't believe I'm here! This past week has seemed like a month because so much has happened! 

I know they say that Disneyland is the happiest place but I beg to differ...the MTC has it beat.

So I guess I better just start from the beginning.... So my companion is Soeur Willis, She's 20 and from Hawaii, we're pretty much best friends already. We both like macaroni and cheese, Reeces and we just love to meet new people and laugh. It is such a blessing that we just click. We started language training the day we entered....it was a little overwhelming since out of everybody in my district I've had the least French, but something that I've already learned is to not compare yourself and just try your best. 

The third day (or technically second and a half day here) we taught our first lesson......IN FRENCH!!! Ha ha ya.... it went or as they say in french, Ca Va.

 Yesterday we just taught our third lesson to our investigator, William, and it was amazing to see the progress that we are making in the language, I definitely feel like my mind has been opened. I've already learned more than I learned in my one semester in high school. We've already started praying in French, speaking as much as we know in French, and testifying. It's sometimes a lot to take in when were in our language class for about 5-8 ish hours but it makes it all worth it when in the lesson, were able to testify, and teach the gospel. It helps that everyone is so nice here and so willing to help. All the French speakers sit together for meals, this includes the missionaries going to France, Canada, D.C. and Tahiti. Everyone in my district is going to Montreal(9 of us), than one elder who is going to D.C. There are also two other districts with people going to Montreal. 

I've been able see a few familiar faces here, Soeur Carpenter who I knew in college rooms with us and Soeur Azemi-Tabriz who I also met from the fb site. Many are called but few are chosen. Than Herrmma Vasquel, Elder Thueson, going to France, and Elder Dicky who I went to high school with.  It's really exciting to see familiar faces now and than.

So me and Soeur Willis joined the Choir!! It was amazing....even though we both can't really sing, we learned of the story behind Nearer My God the Thee. Something that really stood out to me that the choir director said to us was... You're a tool in the Lord's hand. Your a Wrench, Just be the best wrench that  you can be because the Lord is in charge and you will be the tool to help others.

 I love you all, and I know that your Heavenly Father loves you and that you can turn to him for anything. 

 Love Soeur Rawlings

P.S. I appreciate all the packages and letters,I feel so much support and love!

Sister Willis and me at our first MTC meal!

 My district sisters at the Provo Temple.

 My roomates at the Provo Temple.

 My companion!

 Montreal Missionaries at the "famous map"!

Studying hard!