Week 3 in Kirtland

Hey.

So it was nice skyping yesterday. I think we're only supposed to talk for like not 2 hours.. We should probably work on that next time. But it was still nice! Send my love to Steve, Tiff and the girls. I hope they make it safe to AZ! Aubree should be there in the next few weeks but I think she's in the mission over soooo maybe I'll just have to go visit Steve and run into Aubree before she comes home! I don't think that's allowed though. AND that's forever away so we'll work on that later. Thank you SO much for my Christmas presents! I love them so much and I took a lot of pictures so you'll enjoy them. Well, maybe. They're just of me and my presents so they might get kind of old :P So question. Can you please look up Mark Maybry (I think that's how you spell his name) He does these portraits called Reflections of Christ that are absolutely AMAZING! We have some of them in our nativity display and they're my favorite. Just enjoy them and their beauty. Did you guys know David Archuleta is going on a mission?! I'm hoping it's not Cleveland cause I don't need the distraction :/ But that's so cool he decided to go!!! I thought he was too famous to go but that's awesome of him. All the sisters here talk about it. Sister Mayer got his cd with motab and we listen to it all the time. It's amazing. And he's inspired me to learn Spanish now too.. I guess that could be a good thing to talk to Heather and stuff :] I'm going to get a BoM in Swedish and Spanish to see if that helps to learn the languages. We'll seeee! I don't know how to pronounce Swedish at all so hopefully it will help with something. I don't have a lot to say today cause I talked to you yesterday but things are well since then. Christmas was really great here. There's just something special about teaching people about Christ on Christmas. No new investigators out of it but it just helps to remember Christmas is about Christ. Did you guys see the new Mormon Message about giving gifts and stuff? It is so good. Even though Christmas is over I think you should watch it again. AND starting on Jan 1st as a mission we are reading through the BoM in 90 days. While reading we're marking every scripture that talks about Christ. Then at the end of 90 days we're supposed to give it away and commit somebody who isn't Mormon to read it. I invite EVERYBODY who reads this to do the same. Starting Jan 1st for 90 days. Mark things about Christ then give it away. Ask the sisters there for a copy to start new. It's going to be really great and strengthen your testimony of not only the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon but also Joseph Smith restoring the true gospel on the earth today and that Jesus is the Christ and our Savior. Apply the things you learn to your life and you will see many blessings come from it.

Love you guys!!!!!

 

2nd week in Kirtland

Email dated 12/19/11

Send me pictures!!!!! I want to see them. My boots are so dorky and I had to get a down coat from the free closet. There's a lot of stuff left from sister's who are gone. I look really puffy and blah but I am staying warm. The primary party/ugly sweater party sounds fun. Send me a pic of Sam's sweater. I can only imagine :P 

Ugly Sweater Party

My favorite skirt shrunk (for some reason I don't like to look at tags..) So I'm going to send it home and if you can find something like it that would be awesome. I got it at salvation army sooooooo good luck. EVERYBODY calls us the M&M sisters. We even got some peanut m&ms (cause they know they're my favorite) so it's been nice. I'm gaining weight. BUT Elder Southwick (one of the senior couples) used to coach basketball so he comes 3 days a week to the stake center and he does basketball drills with us and stuff. This morning was really hard.. I pushed myself too far and I haven't been feeling well ever since but oh well. I have a goal of staying in shape so we'll see what happens :/ Sister Jones was supposed to call you and set up a time so I don't know what happened there. Hopefully she did. Maybe I wrote your number down wrong. I don't remember anything from before my mission and I can't even remember the things I do the same day.. It's getting bad. Did you send my CDs? Or are they in my Christmas package? And how do I know it's for Christmas?! I'm just opening everything when I get it cause it's so exciting! I'll try to not though. But if it's in there then hopefully everything else is wrapped because I want my CDs.  Oh and you probs wont get a Christmas present from me any time soon. What I was going to put together isn't possible for a few more weeks :/ I wasn't thinking beforehand so sorry about that. I got Christmas cards from Gpa and Uncle Reed so that was really nice :] I have like 1000000 letters to write today. I'm not going to get to all of them but it's okay. There's always next week.

So this past week has been REALLY crazy. I swear NOTHING goes as planned as a missionary. And yet we still have 30 minutes of planning a night/like 3 hours of weekly planning a week. But it's great because writing out plans and backups shows the Lord that you're serious about this and when things don't work out it's just Him saying, "Oh girls.. Let me help you get on the right track here.." Then you follow the spirit and things seem to just work out. This past week because nothing was going to plan we thought our numbers were going to be really low and that we weren't going to reach our goals but when we reported numbers last night we had exceeded some of our goals! We don't know how it happened but the Lord has it under control so I guess it's cool. We had a training meeting this past week and the whole morning it was just business like "make sure you drive safe and make sure you complete all this stuff.." but after lunch they paired us up with a different comp and we went contacting in downtown Cleveland! I was with Sister Tokunaga from Hawaii so being cold was a good conversation starter. We gave away 5 BoMs. We got some numbers to call them and it was really fun. Really intimidating though. Talking to homeless looking people with like no teeth and smoking all the time is not in my comfort zone. But it got easier. Especially with sister Tokunaga. She was good at it. After the first person we talked to she was like "alright, the next person is yours." and I kind of froze and let 3 people walk by :/ It was hard! But good in the end. Last Wed was Sister Mayer's birthday and planning the night before wasn't going well and we didn't really have a lot planned but we decided to just sleep on it and we'd figure it out in the morning. So we had been trying to call one of our investigators, Bro Haden, and he didn't answer his phone which is not normal! So we figured he doesn't leave his apt much so we decided to just stop by. It was the first time he wasn't home! So we decided to go see Paul who we had met the previous week. He lived a few doors down and let us right in and we taught him the Plan of Salvation! About half way through his mom came and listened in so it was really nice and they said we could come back!! (I had told Heavenly Father that morning to get Sister Mayer a nice bday present and HE DID!) So we're seeing them tonight. We also found out that day that one of our less-actives was planning on going to the ward temple day to do baptisms! It was so incredible and we were so excited for him. So she had a really good birthday :] Another one of our investigators is constantly drunk and thinks it's okay to come to lessons and church drunk soooo we're having a really hard time with that. We don't know what to do and we're afraid he's going to be offended when we talk about the word of wisdom.. We'll see. We're also meeting with this less-active lady, Sister Clarkson. She is amazing. She has word of wisdom problems but she is so strong and somehow just stopping! I love our lessons with her because she has such an amazing testimony and she teaches me more than I teach her! But I just love her. I read to her 1 Cor 10:13 my first lesson with her and she didn't really seem interested in it but this last time she was like "Every time I'm tempted I think about that scripture and it helps me so much!" Ahhhhh It's just so incredible. Yesterday one of our 8 year olds in the ward was baptized and it was so fun! Her mom is less-active and had to talk on baptism so we went over to help her write it/not stress so much. It was one of the best talks I've heard on baptism. Super simple but perfect for what Hannah needed to hear. I had to say the opening prayer because for some reason somebody was told that I like to pray in front of people.. Ugh. I also get asked to play the piano for some meetings and I just don't understand! I don't know hymns but I'm being forced to.. I'm sure you're happy about that. I still haven't seen Perry which is super weird because he's my dl's comp.. I've never even met my dl! That's not normal but things here have just been really crazy and it's been hard to get on a normal schedule. Starting on Jan 1 we are doing this BoM challenge as a mission where we read it in 30 days and mark everytime it talks about Christ and then when the 90 days are up we have to give it to somebody with our testimony in it. So I challenge everybody who reads this to do the same.. I need to go eat before I die.

Love you, Bye.

Oh, PS. MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!!! I suppose I can tell you that Sunday though. You better have my Rock there!!!

First week in Kirtland

That letter was for Morgan!! Not youuu. That's why I put her name on it.. Anyways. There is no Sister Kim here soooo Idk. How about Sister Lee? There's an option. It sounds like things are well there and that LA traffic is still the same. Traffic here is NOTHING.. Or at least from what I've seen. I'm in Kirtland. It's wonderful. I love it here. Even though its cold. It's been on average likeeee 30. I am freezing but it's wonderful and totally worth it. I probably won't be so positive in Feb but we'll see.

I don't even know where to start!! So Tuesday we got here and stayed at Pres Sorenson's home. There were 2 other Sisters and 6 Elders so it was fun. Wednesday we had to wake up at like 5:15 to get to the Kirtland Temple at like 7:00. Waking up earlier than I have to is horrible. We had to be there by 7 though and it was really nice! We got a tour of the temple and saw where everything took place. At the end we sat in the main place and sang The Spirit of God. I got to lead the music and stand up in front where Joseph Smith would have sat with everybody else. I don't really know what everything was called because I was half asleep the whole time. But it was so amazing to be there! We got to see where Christ appeared and Moses! And everybody else.. THEN we got a tour of the NK Whitney store from Carl Anderson. He wrote a book on Kirtland or something but he was a sweet old man who knows EVERYTHING about Kirtland so it was fun to get a tour from him. Then we ended our tour in the school of the prophets. It was so cool cause it was pretty much the first MTC. It's where the missionaries would go to learn before they went out and a lot of neat things happened there. I don't really know what happened there because I still need to read my Kirtland Guide :/ I should know something soon though.. After that I met my trainer! Her name is Sister Mayer (People are always commenting on how simaliar our names are and it gets a little confusing.) She is from Houston, TX and she is so fun and is an amazing missionary. I got really lucky. I love her and she's teaching me a lot. I should probably take some pictures and send them to you soon.. The computers here at the library are super slow so I'll probably just make another CD.. That night we were at the sites and we went to the school house so a senior couple could go back inside. There was another man in there when we came in and we figured when the senior couple left that he would go with them and he didn't. We were talking to him and after a few minutes the converstation started getting a little personal and it was really uncomfortable. I could see Sister Mayer discreetly looking for the VC # on our phone and she called them and used the code word we have here for help. Sister Black (One of the senior couples) answered and she had no idea what Sister Mayer was asking for so it took like 30 seconds before she realized we needed help and finally 2 of the elders came in and asked if he wanted to see the upstairs. Everything was fine but it was just really funny how everything played out. We won't let Sis Black forget it either haha.

The next day we were in our area so we had a lesson with one of our investigators. He is older, single, kind of looks like a bum, has MS and is the absolute most sweet man ever. He wants to get baptized but has word of wisdom problems so we're working on it. Then we went tracting for the first time. It was freezing and nobody was really interested but it was a good experience. Then we had our last lesson with another single, old man. (for some reason that's all of our investigators..) He is my favorite though!! We met at a members house and were planning on teaching him the restoration but it ended up being taught on the plan of salvation which was fine. But the whole time all of the adults were trying to give him this huge complex lesson and he's really simple minded and I think all of it went over his head :/ Sister Mayer and I only got to bear our testimonies a few times but I think that helped him. At the end I asked him if he would be baptized and he said.....YES! We have a lot to work on though. We set the date in Feb and he said that was too long so we moved it to Jan. I'm really hoping that happens. It's the best. I love being a missionary.

On Friday we were at sites all day again. I don't remember a lot of what happened but it's been a week of firsts.. Even for my comp. Everything that's happened has been really bizzare and out of the norm. But it's been so fun! Oh, we both are from super warm, not snowy places so driving in the snow has been eventful.. Pray for us :/ It really hasn't snowed a lot though! Only one day really and it's not sticking so it's been really nice. Friday night we had our ward Christmas party and it was pretty fun. I didn't know anybody so it was a little overwhelming. I met a man who grew up in TO.. His name is Bro Cardon. I don't remember his first name but his dad (Phillip Cardon) was the bishop in to3. He moved when he was 8 though and he's a little bit younger than you guys. Gpa would probably know his dad..? Let me know.

Saturday we met with some of our investigators and it was really fun. We had dinner at one of the senior couples house. Elder and Sister Johnson. They are a lovely couple from England and I love to listen to them speak :] We had a family there too and we had a little lesson and the mom broke down a little cause some of her children are having a hard time and are inactive and the younger kids (like 9 and 12) were there and I was like ohhhh my gosh! This lady can't do this in front of her kids! I was kind of panicking inside but I couldn't do anything about it. But we know what to talk to them about next time and I think it will help her have more faith and confidence. After that we went to a less active ladies apt to carol and drop off cookies.. She loved it and I haven't seen her smile since I met her so that was nice. We asked her if we could go carol to somebody else and she pointed to another apt building where she had previously lived and told us the number. We got the feeling. She sent us becuase she doesn't like them very much but we went anyways. We started singing and 3 guys in their 20s answered the door and they were covered in tattoos with their pants below their butts and they talked like gangsters or something.. Idk. But they thought it was really funny and we left them our number so they could call us if they wanted  to hear more about the church. Then we asked if they knew anybody we could go see. They said to go up to level 3 and ask for Josh.. Again probably because they didn't really like them. But we went anyways. After we sang we asked if the man was Josh and he FREAKED out. I think he thought we were psychic or something but they were really nice! Except the lady sitting behind the door. She was being really rude and smoking and it was kind of gross but they lady who answered was nice and she politely declined. It was interesting but it was neat to go around and share the gospel with some random people. Who knows.. Maybe someday they'll think back and wonder what it's all about.

Sunday. Church went really well.. I had to give the closing prayer in Sacrament. I'm sure you understand how happy I was about that.. But it was fine. The ward here is really small compared to back home. They think it's big too.. It's strange. At ward council though they were talking about callings and we suggested they use some of the less actives and they kind of shot us down which is so dumb because they need callings or else they'll keep being less active!! So we let it go and then in sacrament one of the speakers talked about the importance of having new converts and less actives have a calling.. So there ward council. Maybe next time you'll listen. Everything was going really well until RS. I was leading the music for the closing song and Bro Householder comes in and looks around the room like he's in a hurry. I thought he was looking for his wife but nope.. He was looking for one of us and since I was leading he took my comp and I had no idea what to do! I was in the middle of leading and she was looking back not knowing what to do but kept walking cause he needed her! One of the ladies jumped up and ran out with her so we just ended up going on splits out of nowhere. Everybody laughed at me and kept telling me how funny my face was. Which I'm sure it was! I didn't know what to do! So I was just waiting for her to come back and this girl comes up to me and starts talking to me about our schedule (which I know nothing about cause it's random when we're in our area/sites) so we start looking for my comp to help and she tells me that she wants to come with us just to see what we do and I was like totally! I started asking why and she told me her brother just left for his mission and he's in the mtc and she just wanted to see what goes on in the life of a missionary. I found out he was going to Sweden and I was like "uhhhh no way. What does he look like?!" He's totally the swedish elder I talked to all the time in swedish! I was so happy! So I'm really looking forward to talking to her. She told me she would dear elder him him and ask him if he remembered me so I'm excited to hear back from her. That night we were making calls to memebers and I got a card from a girl who lives in IF. I was so excited to call her and talk to her about Idaho. I told her I was from the Kirtland VC and she was like uhhh? And I was like I got your comment card and just wanted to see how your trip was! Well long story short. She just got her mission call to the Ohio Cleveland Mission Kirtland VC. She thought I was calling because of that! So I told the other sisters and we were so excited and she'll get here at the end of Feb.

So much is happening. I love it here. Ohio is beautiful and super freezing. We're shopping for boots today so we'll see what happens. I got my package with my bedding (Thank you for all the green stuff.. My comp loved it) and I haven't gotten anything else. I have a new address.

Sister Mackenzie Maynard

7800 Kirland-Chardon RD

Kirland, OH 44094

Please post that and send things there from now on. Thank you so much! I have to go..

 

Love you guys.

Sister Maynard.

Week 3 1/2 in the MTC

Sent to us December 2nd

Hey guys.

I have pday today cause they changed our schedules. It's so dumb. I don't like it as much as the previous pdays, but I love VC training. We started learning how to chat and yesterday we chatted with real people. The first guy wasn't very nice. But it's still so fun. It's incredible the things we can do with technology these days!! Not that I really know anything other than chat but it's still technology.. It will probably be my favorite part of the VC. We also have this thing called TRC where visitors come in and we pretend to greet them like we're at the VC and Tal was there!!! I had no idea. I actually saw him earlier in one of the buildings and it was so great to see him. He got me this really cool journal that has Hebrew on it and it means ponder and I love it. He also engraved my name on it! He's so awesome and I told him to call you sooooo he better have done that.

So on Wed, we ended up going to Temple Square to play the visitor part. Bet you didn't know that!! It was so cool to be off campus and to think that NOBODY in the real world knew where we were. It was so fun though! We took a tour and got to meet a lot of the sisters. One of the sisters giving the tour was Jessi Cumin's last companion I think! She knew a lot of people from TO. Tell Jessi! We still get to go to Temple Square on Saturday too. From 3-like7. I don't really know when we come back. We're going to pair up with another sister and give tours and everything :] !!!!! Tell Chad (her brother) to come see me please? If he can. If not, tell him I love him and Happy Birthday. And to write me. Tell everybody to write me actually. I need to write Elder M. Thank you for forwarding me his emails. I can't ever remember if it's my turn to write him or not.. And thank you for Clayton and Perry's letters too. One of the Elders in Clayton's district has already written me.. He's in SLC though until he gets his visa. He's sweet.

I'm making SO many new friends from everywhere. I love it. I met a girl from Sweden and I try to talk to her a little bit. Jos taught me how to say "how are you?" and "very good" soooo that's about where it ends. But it's still so fun! I'm def studying abroad there when I get back. I NEED to learn Swedish.. Madeleine should see this. I also talk to the Swedish elders all the time. When I first met them I was like "I CAN COUNT TO TEN!!!" So I did it and they were all impressed because they hadn't learned how to count yet. And I tell them I love them all the time in Swedish without realizing it because that's one of the few phrases I know.. :/ I know more now though so it doesn't have to be awkward. I also met this elder from Albania and he's really sweet. A little silly. But he's going to Italy so I was like "Principessa!" (cause it's my favorite word in the whole world) so now he calls me principessa.. I don't know if that's really allowed but ehhh oh well. I'll probs be writing him so keep sending stamps :/ I see Elder Penfield ALL the time. I sent home a cd with all of my pictures on it and there should be one of us in there. His comp was really awkward about it. But print one out and give it to sister Penfield. She would probably like that.

Elder Penfield and Comp

Sister Andrus and Sister Maynard (roomies at BYU-I)

We're guessing it's her district

Elder Jos Mayo

Elder Allen & Elder Mayo

Sister Maynard and Elder Williams ( the awkward can't give you a hug picture)

Now that we have a new schedule I don't have gym with the Tongans and it no where as good. NOBODY here can actually play volleyball apparently. I hate it. I haven't gotten another package from you so I haven't gotten any journal. It isn't snowing here. Sam Warnick got here Wed and I've only seen him once but it was still great. I'm going to the temple today at 2:15 soooo call Hannah, please? I really want to see her! I leave on TUESDAY for CLEVELAND!! I'm so excited. One of my VC teachers served in Kirtland and it's been so fun talking to her. She said I'll probs need a heavier coat :/ So I'll figure it out when we get there. Maybe I'll be fine. I'll give it a couple weeks. After Christmas sales should be pretty good. I'll try to get back on in a little. I only have 10 minutes left on my email so I'll save it to see if you reply. Miss everybody!!

Love, Sister Maynard.

Week 3 in MTC

This was actually last weeks letter.....Not even out a month and I'm already behind

Hey mom,

 

I guess you aren't on right now?? I'll just keep checking. I have 22 more minutes. Anyways. Since Thanksgiving they have turned on the Christmas lights here and it makes everything a million times better. I love Christmas lights more than anything!! Temple Square is on Saturday so I'm really excited about those lights too. Hopefully we'll be there late enough to see them! Thanksgiving was great. I think I wrote about it in a letter so you can read that. BUT Elders Christoffersen and Nelson in 1 week?! Yeah. It's been really great. Are the sisters in your ward yet?? That's funny we get sisters a week after I leave. But that's awesome. I LOVE the elder's Christmas picture so much. I'm sad I'm missing the fun but I'm having a lot of fun here so I guess it's okay. Yesterday President Brown sat with us at dinner and he is just so sweet. He was so interested to know everything about all of us and I guess he remembered because later that night we had a departing devotional (even though we aren't actually leaving for a week..) and he went through all of the missions that people were leaving to and he didn't say mine!! So he asked if he missed anybody and I raised my hand (we were on the front row :P) and he was like "Oh, yeah! Ohio??" And I was the only one to stand up.. Kind of awkward but it was nice of him. Heather and Jos leave this week so I'm really bummed about that. All of our Elders in our district are leaving too. We had to say bye to 3 of them last night and it was really hard. I didn't like it. But I have to get used to it because that's my life for the next 18 months.. Goodbyes. I have made SO MANY friends here though. I'm hoping to keep in contact with them all. People here are just so great and I love them all.  Perry says that it's getting below 0 in Ohio but people are so nice there that they just give him things to keep him warm! I'm not expecting that but it's just nice to know I'll be surrounded by nice people. I was thinking that maybe you could send me some long sleeve downeast shirts? Like a black and white one? They might come in handy. VC training starts Wed and I'm really excited about that. Thank you for forwarding me Aaron's letter. It was really great to hear from him!! All of the Elders from Tonga want me to tell you hello. They're really fun. I play volleyball with them and I love it. I go through withdrawals when we don't have gym. I see them everywhere though and they always sing Tongan songs for us and they're always laughing. Nobody really knows what they're saying so hopefully it's a good thing when they're laughing.

 

Hope that's enough info. Love you and keep deareldering me.

 

Sister Maynard.