WEEK 27 IN STRAIGHT-UP HEAVEN!

This week was simply wonderful!

 

Sister Brems turned 22 on Wednesday! For a special treat, one of the families in the ward had us over for dinner and made CAFE RIO because they have the recipe! It was SO GOOD.

 

This week, we got to go to a wonderful baptismal service for a woman the elders taught. It was such an amazing day! Her husband has been a member his whole life but was less-active. He just recently became active again and was able to baptize his wife! Their family will be able to be sealed together in the temple in a year! They have two adorable kids. The Spirit was so strong. It made me so happy to see her making the decision that will change her life forever! It was amazing.

 

Okay so I have some numbers for this week....

 

Number of dead mice we saw this week: 2

Number of frozen toes I had: 10

Number of walls we painted: 9

Number of birthday packages Sis. Brems got: 16

Number of dreams I had about Daft Punk: 3

Number of prayers we had answered: infinity

 

OH ALSO something terrible/hilarious happened this week. Tom is the older man in our ward who we read the scriptures to every night because he has bad eyes and can't read them for himself anymore. Anywho, this week he needed us to read him this packet he got in the mail about insurance and stuff. It was like 10 pages of dense, dull, material. But Sister Brems really wanted to read it, so I let her go ahead! Meanwhile, I'm sitting in this really comfy recliner, listening to her read about insurance policies, conditions, etc. Next thing I know, Sister Brems is waking me up! I FELL ASLEEP FOR 30 MINUTES. They had finished reading the packet, said the closing prayer, and everything. It was terrible and hilarious. Well, at least now I can say I've fallen asleep in an appointment. NEVER AGAIN, THOUGH!

 

This week was full of miracles as usual, but one thing that I really was reminded of this week was that life is fragile. We had two members of our ward pass away this week, and it's been really hard on everyone. However, we are so blessed to know that death is not the end for them or for anyone. I am so grateful to have that knowledge and to be able to share that good news out here in Michigan! Life is fragile, but it's WONDERFUL. Make the most of it! And even with all the incredible experiences we have, this life is just a blip in the timeframe of eternity. There is so much more ahead!

 

Well, I love you all and hope you have a fantastic week!

 

<3 Sister Christiansen

 

P.S. MERRY CHRISTMAS. You all need to watch this video. It's INCREDIBLE!

http://www.mormonchannel.org/video/mormon-messages?v=1337791375001

 

P.P.S. Please enjoy this adorable, fat cat that we met this week.

 

 

Week 26! BREAKING NEWS

This week has been hilarious and wonderful. Sister Brems and I got to tour the local TV station this morning because a member of our ward is an anchor there! Check it out!

MISSIONARY NEWS ANCHORS!

BREAKING NEWS: THE BOOK OF MORMON IS TRUE.

 

It was awesome. We get to go back next week and play with all the green screen stuff and actually click around on the weather maps and stuff!

 

Okay, sorry for that tangent. Time for missionary news!

 

It's been a wonderful week in Holt. I feel like I say this every week but the Lord truly is hastening His work. The members are getting so involved with and excited about missionary work. People keep referring us to their friends who they feel are ready for the gospel and it's been amazing to teach them. I love Holt!

 

The day before Thanksgiving we got to visit a family that has 10 kids and 10 puppies!

 

 

Cutest puppies ever!

 

I can't believe Christmas is coming! I am so excited. Sister Brems and I found a fake Christmas tree in our apartment that we're going to put up tonight. Yay!

 

One spiritual truth that has really been manifesting itself this week is the principle of GRATITUDE! Gratitude gives us the strength to resist temptation, to acknowledge our blessings, and to continue on with hope! Check out this awesome video as a late Thanksgiving treat!

http://www.mormonchannel.org/video/mormon-messages?v=911161818001&cid=HPWE112713180

 

I love you all so much and am so grateful for all the support you send me each week!

 

<3 Sister Christiansen

Week 25!

This week I hit my 6 month mark! CRAZY! This is going by WAY too fast. I can't believe that I've been out that long. It seems like two days, haha.

 

So church yesterday was pretty awesome. Sister Brems and I gave talks in sacrament meeting which was nerve-wracking but also exciting. We talked about doing good to others. Yay!

 

Last General Conference, Elder Nielsen invited everyone to pray for the missionaries in the ward by name. Well, Brother Dale, being hilarious, decided to print out the names and pictures of each of the 5 sister missionaries in the ward and hand them out. So now everyone has a little slip of paper with my face on it! Crazy, haha. But it's cool to see the members getting so excited about missionary work!

 

A member just got back from Hawaii and gave us ToffeeMacs, which are toffee and macadamia nuts covered in chocolate. DELICIOUS. I don't know why I'm including this. It was just exciting.

 

We had a bunch of investigators at church on Sunday! It was so cool! We've been praying to know how to help people get to church, and those prayers are being answered! Prayer is so cool. As Thomas S. Monson said, "What an amazing source of power, of strength, and of comfort is available to each of us. He who knows us better than we know ourselves, He who sees the larger picture and who knows the end from the beginning, has assured us that He will be there for us to provide help if we but ask. We have the promise: “Pray always, and be believing, and all things shall work together for your good.”"

 

Well, for some reason my mind is just blank this week about other exciting things that happened. I love you all and hope you have a great Thanksgiving!

 

<3 Sister Christiansen

Week 24 of Serving the Lord!

This week was so exciting. There is so much to write. I'm going to have to do this in bullet point form!

• First of all, Elder Golden from the First Quorum of the Seventy came to our mission! He spoke last April in General Conference if you remember. He's the guy with the cool South African accent! He talked to us about a ton of brilliant things. My notebook is FULL of scribbled notes. I loved how he talked about the most important restored truth that came from the First Vision was the restoration of the true nature of God. Everything we teach comes back to our relationship with God. It's so important!

 

• After the Half-Mission Conference in which Elder Golden spoke, we were driving back to our areas in a van of 12 missionaries, and the sunset was SO GORGEOUS. It was bright red and orange and pink. It seemed like every time you looked back at it, it had changed completely. Michigan is gorgeous. We were all filled with so much joy. A bunch of 19-22 year old kids were just so excited about the sunset and about all the eternal truths we had just learned from Elder Golden... it was just a really awesome moment. Where else in the world does that happen? Missionaries are so weird, but it's the best thing ever. PURE JOY.

 

• WE HAD OUR FIRST TORNADO WATCH YESTERDAY! There was a TERRIBLE storm but luckily no tornado! But we were asked to stay inside for a bit to stay off the roads. The tornado was headed our way! As a result, I ended up crouched in our bathtub reading the Book of Mormon. Haha we were so excited and overdramatized everything. It was terrifying and awesome. Here I am! Sister Brems said that when I am in a storm I turn into half Keira Knightley, half wet rat. Hahaha what. I can see the wet rat part FOR SURE. We were freezing. P.S. I AM READING HELAMAN 5:12 LOL.
   
  • I MADE A PUN THIS WEEK. The state of Michigan kind of looks like a mitten, and everyone uses their hand to point out where they live. But anywho, this week we realized... We're MITTENARIES!!!
   
• OOH I have a request. This might be kind of silly, but I want to put together a photo album that I can have with me here, and I was wondering if kind of as a belated birthday present you guys could each send me a picture of us together or something! Or just a picture that will remind me of you! 4x6 is perfect! If you can, that'd be awesome! If not, I guess I just won't be able to remember you... haha just kidding! If you can't, no worries!

 

• I ALMOST FORGOT. Transfer calls came and Sister Brems and I get to STAY TOGETHER IN HOLT! WOOO! So my address will be the same for the next 6 weeks (2141 N. Aurelius Rd. Apt. 64 Holt, MI 48842). YAY!

 

I love you all so much and I hope you have a wonderful week!

 

<3 Sister Christiansen

• 
  

Week 23 - I turned 20!

 

Hi everybody! Sorry I didn't get to email yesterday - it was Veteran's Day so the library was closed. But we get to write today! But we only get half the time we normally get so this is going to be very short. Sorry!

 

Not emailing yesterday was okay though because it meant MORE TIME AT THE ZOO! It was amazing. I will attach pictures at the bottom instead of explaining everything but just trust me when I say it was THE BEST DAY EVER.

 

For my birthday dinner, we got to eat at that awesome family's house who makes us all the delicious natural food. They made me an Oreo cheesecake with organic Oreos and healthy enough ingredients that I can EAT IT FOR BREAKFAST. Yesss.

 

This week I met an 8 year old who's in 8th grade! He and his family are in our ward and they fed us dinner. He's crazy smart! We talked about outer space for like, 30 minutes.

 

We've seen so many miracles here in Holt! One of our investigators wants to get baptized! She is so cool and keeps talking about how the gospel answers questions she's had all her life but hasn't been able to find answers to until now! It is so awesome to meet with her. Plus she has a tiny baby girl who is just adorable and SO HAPPY!

 

I feel like this week was so so incredible but I can't remember everything right now!

 

Transfers are on Friday and I'm pretty sure I'm staying in Holt, but just in case, you can send anything this week to the mission office address and then resume sending stuff directly to me next week. Haha thanks so so much! The mission office address is

1400 Abbot Rd. Ste. 310

East Lansing, MI 48823

 

I hope you all have a great week! Here are some pictures!

 

This is our district at our last district meeting of the transfer! Crazy missionaries. 

 

 This is me and Sister Brems!

 Another picture of me and Sister Brems. Can you spot the difference? (HINT: IT'S THE TIGER IN THE BACKGROUND.)

 The snow stuck for the first time yesterday! YAAAY!

 Birthday dinner with the coolest family ever!

 And now for my all-time favorite picture ever... Me & my baby!!!

 

Love you!

<3 Sister Christiansen

 

Week 22! I love all of you!

First of all, I got like, 12 emails asking me more about what an Amish chicken is haha. It's just a chicken that was raised on an Amish farm. We have a ward member here who gets all her food from that farm and so we get raw milk, fresh vegetables, and more every time we eat at her house!

 

Okay so this weekend was incredible. I got to go back to MSU on exchanges!!! I saw Bruce AND Yifan!!! They are both doing so well! Bruce (who was only baptized 4 months ago) just got the MELCHIZEDEK PRIESTHOOD! I was really sick when I was there, and there were no other missionaries around to give me a blessing of healing, but then we saw Bruce! He ended up giving me a blessing with our old ward mission leader! It was his first blessing and was such an incredible experience! The Spirit was so strong, and I am now completely recovered and healthy!

 

We got to have a lesson with Yifan and every time I see him I just get so happy! He is so strong in the gospel and is being such a great example to his friends all around them. I am so blessed to know both Bruce and Yifan!

 

Being at MSU was tons of fun. Sister Smith, our sister training leader, was my companion for those days and we had such amazing adventures. We talked to tons of people on campus, and tried all the berries we saw on the trees. It was just really hilarious for some reason. We'd see a berry tree, run over, nibble at a berry, and throw it on the ground in disgust. They all tasted awful, but for some reason, every time we saw a new type of berry, we HAD to try it.

 

This week we also got to carve pumpkins at a member's house! Sister Brems carved a temple into hers and I carved the sun, the moon, and the stars into mine! Halloween was really fun.

 

So we thought that each companionship would be getting an iPad for Christmas, but as it turns out, we're each getting our own! Crazy! There are also rumors about letting us keep them when we go home. The Church leadership thinks that 18-21 year old missionaries will take better care of them if they know they're theirs to keep. Exciting!

 

On Sunday, a General Authority, Elder Dunnigan, came to visit our ward! He talked about aligning member missionary work with full-time missionary work. He and our mission president, President Hess, came to our ward's sacrament meeting. Sunday was so awesome.

 

Also, a less-active recent convert who's 19 came to church for the first time in months! He is awesome! He got up and bore his testimony about staying strong despite tons of peer pressure. He's a sophomore who's pre-med at MSU and he sees people do a lot of reckless things there... He was talking about how he was grateful for his standards, especially after seeing people do such crazy things. He was like, "I'm not saying I'm better than them... But the way they act makes me feel like it!" The whole church burst out laughing. Everyone at church loves him because he's like their adopted son. He's adorable. We're hoping he goes on a mission!

 

I feel like I used TONS of Mormon-lingo so far in this email, so I'm sorry if none of it makes sense.

 

Now for the best news ever... President Hess said I can go to the ZOO for my birthday!!!! Since my birthday is on the 11th which is a p-day, I AM GOING TO THE ZOO!! I am so stoked. I can't wait. I will take TONS of pictures.

 

I hope you all have a fantastic week! I love you all!

 

<3 Sister Christiansen

Week 21!

This week was WONDERFUL!

But I don't have much time so I'll try to keep things brief.

 

First of all, that less-active deaf member came to church again on Sunday and wants to come every week! That is awesome but it also means that I am now interpreting with another member who signs every Sunday in church! Scary! It's been really fun though and I'm learning a lot.

 

I ate an Amish chicken this week!

 

I had my first Michigan snow on Wednesday!

 

I went to a baptism on Saturday! It was for this guy the elders are teaching. He's been investigating the church for 15 years! He's gone through 31 elders! When he said that, the bishop's wife said, "Maybe it would've only taken 1 sister!" It was funny. He's AWESOME.

 

We taught a lesson to an investigator WHILE SHE WAS IN LABOR! She was having contractions every 5 minutes and she thought they were just false alarms so she had us keep teaching. But apparently she went into the hospital after we left and had the baby that night!

 

I don't know what else to say because my mind is racing all over the place right now! But I will write a better letter next week, I promise!

 

I love you all!

 

<3 Sister Christiansen

Week 20!

The work is hastening in Holt!

Sister Brems and I have seen a million miracles this week! I'll just share a couple.

 

Last transfer, they wanted to shut down our scripture study class because no one ever came. Sister Brems and I decided that we wouldn't let that happen, and this week we had 7 investigators there! Sister Brems and I work so well together and it's been such a blessing to see that hard work and strict obedience pay off. The Lord has His hand in every single aspect of this work, and I am so grateful for that!

 

Also this week, we kept meeting people who had been looking for missionaries! One woman had been meeting with missionaries in Detroit and hadn't been able to find them again since moving here. We were lucky enough to be led by the Spirit to knock on her door that day!

 

In church on Sunday, a less-active member who is deaf came to church! I was able to help interpret, and he had a great time. Turns out, a lot of members in the ward know sign language, and he made a lot of new friends!

 

Also, we just got this announcement from our mission president:
"We have been asked to become one of the first electronic missions. This means you will have electronic planners, area books, progress reports, and teaching records that can also be accessed real time by Stake Presidents, Bishops, Branch Presidents and Ward Mission Leaders. This will help them to immediately know about the people you are teaching. We will also be doing some online proselyting."

 

Whaaaat! This is so exciting! Our mission will be getting mini iPads for Christmas! One per companionship! This will make reporting our work so much more efficient, which will allow us to spend more time out working! I can't wait!

 

This week we also got some fun food. I tried durian! Durian tastes like how feet smell. It is the worst food in the world, basically. It's a fruit, that tastes like sulfur. But I couldn't turn it down! I love weird food adventures (last transfer I tried fermented fish oil which actually wasn't that bad!).

This week we also learned that Michigan is OBSESSED with apples. We've had apple cider, dried cinnamon apples, apple dumplings, apply taffy, apple crumbles for atop your ice cream, apple butter, and just plain old apples. All of those tasty treats were homemade, too! The food here is great!

NOW FOR SOME PICTURES!

 

I FINALLY GOT KFC!!!!

 more kittens! and this is my new companion!!!

I love being a missionary and I love you all! Have a great week!

 

<3 Sister Christiansen

Week 19!

Oh my WORD. This week had been full of so many miracles!

 

First things first, I GOT MY NEW COMPANION! Her name is Sister Brems and she is so beautiful and happy and wonderful! She came straight from the MTC but you would never guess it! We work so well together! She is from Portland, OR and went to BYU-Idaho for 3 years before coming out on a mission. She is so much fun! Being happy about the work changes everything so I'm so stoked that she's already got that down! I am beyond excited for this transfer!

 

This week so many great, amazing things happened.

 

On Sister Brems' first day, we didn't have much time to go door-knocking, but everywhere we went, people just approached us! One guy came up to us and asked us if Mormons really believe that God talked to a white salamander... Haha we quickly corrected any misconceptions. He was like, "Yeah I didn't think that was right. That's just what my preacher told me." Then he went on to say that he had studied the religion before and that he believed it truly was the restored gospel of Jesus Christ and that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God! We will be meeting with him again this week!

 

Right after that, a girl was walking by us on her phone, and she hung up the phone so she could talk to us! She said she was looking for a church and asked if she could come to ours. She then asked if our church had copies of the King James Version of the Bible. I had one in my hand! I gave it to her, and then we taught her about the Book of Mormon and she asked if she could have one of those as well! She's coming to church this Sunday!

 

It's just been really amazing to see how when you are happy and work hard, miracles happen. We are so excited to be working together here in Holt. When I first got assigned to train Sister Brems and met her and everything, I was just so happy I thought I was going to cry! This work really is where I have found the most joy and I love every single day!

 

Some random things that happened this week!

 

We door-knocked into a lady who's house was on Extreme Makeover: Home Edition! It was BEAUTIFUL! Later we found out that a bunch of members from our ward helped build the house! It was really cool.

 

Also, one of the new sisters who came to the mission came up to me and was like, "This might sound weird, but you were my TA for Geography 120 last year!" Haha what are the odds?! It was so funny! I remember her distinctly! Well, her name and her papers at least!

 

This week the sister missionaries also got to teach a lesson at Achievement/Activity Days (activities once a week for 8 year old girls). It was so fun and such a cool experience! It's funny, because Sister Parmenter said that this week in Macie's class, they had a missionary lesson, too! I loved talking to all those girls and seeing their excitement about missionary work. We had them all make their own nametags and they were so excited to pin them on and wear them home. We also asked them what they could do to be missionaries now and they shared some great ideas like inviting people to church, serving their friends, and being excited about the gospel! It's awesome to see that those are principles of missionary work that apply to everyone!

 

I know this is a long email, but it's just been such a fantastic week. I love and miss you all! We gotta go because we're making a polka dot cake with an investigator! I'll send pictures next week. I hope you all have an amazing week!

 

Love, Sister Christiansen

Week 18!

Hello hello!

 

This week we had transfer calls! Sister McElvany and I were both super nervous but we ended up being ecstatic about the news. Sister McElvany is going to the area right next to ours (Mason) so I will still see her at church! She will have 2 companions! The Holt ward is going to have FIVE SISTER MISSIONARIES!

 

So as you may have guess, I'm staying in Holt!!! But get this... I am training a brand new missionary! I am super nervous but mainly very, VERY excited! I can't wait to meeet her and get her stoked about spreading the gospel. I can already tell she and I are going to do some great work together!

 

So that said, my address for at least the next 6 weeks is still:

2141 N. Aurelius Rd. Apt. 64

Holt, MI 48842

 

I am so excited for this new transfer! I meet my new companion on Thursday! Ahhh!!!

 

Okay now can I talk about how great General Conference was?! It was incredible. My favorite talks were Dieter F. Uchtdorf's from the Saturday Morning Session, Jeffrey R. Holland's from the Saturday Afternoon Session, and Richard G. Scott's talk from the Sunday Morning Session! SO GOOD! I encourage you all to read those!!!

 

I am now going to attach some long overdue pictures!

 

THIS IS A KITTEN THAT I GET TO HANG OUT WITH ALL THE TIME. One of our investigators, Marge, has like 30 cats and about 20 of them are kittens. ALJKGHSDKLG I CAN'T HANDLE THE CUTENESS.

These were the missionaries in the Holt ward before the transfer! That's Sister Dean, one of my all-time favorite members! Elder Fox (on the right) has a removable front tooth which makes me happier than almost anything in this world.

This is us and Bill! I won't get to teach Bill anymore since he's in Sister McElvany's new area (the area split) but I will still get to see him at church on Sundays and go to his baptism! He is SO AWESOME. 

Last but not least, here is a somewhat non-goofy picture of us Holt missionaries. We're going to miss serving together but I'm really excited to see what it's like to be in a ward with 5 sister missionaries!

I promise we're not as crazy as we look. We work HARD!

 

I love being a missionary. I've said it before and I'll say it again - there's no place I'd rather be right now! I love you all but I know God is taking care of those I love while I'm gone. Have a fantastic week!

 

<3 Sister Christiansen

 

 

 

Week 17!

Hello friends and family!

Wow, this week flew by. What even happened?

Well first of all, Marge came to church! She’s someone we’ve been teaching for a while now but has never come to church. Well yesterday she showed up! She cried during the first hour because she felt the Spirit so strong. It made me so happy to see her feeling even closer to God than she had before! I love church. AND NEXT WEEK IS GENERAL CONFERENCE!

So I will skip ahead to my invitation to you all. WATCH GENERAL CONFERENCE! And while watching, have a specific person in mind and pray about what message they need. I can promise you all that a talk in General Conference will stand out to you as something that someone close to you in your life needs right now.  Sorry for the wordy sentence. I hope it makes sense. It will brings great blessings into your life! Listening to words of living prophets and apostles always does. Here's the info!

http://www.lds.org/church/events/october-2013-general-conference-dates-announced?cid=HPTH091213090&lang=eng

This week I got to hold a lot of kittens and teach a lot of lessons. What more could a girl ask for?

We met so many cool people this week! One guy had been praying for an answer right when we knocked on his door! Another guy used to go down to Alabama for KKK meetings but had a near-death experience and changed his whole life around and became Christian! One lady saw us walking in her neighborhood and ran outside waving a picture of four Mormon missionaries who had taught her in Detroit! And then there's Bill, our AWESOME investigator who probably knows more about the Church than we do because he's been researching it his whole life. We didn't meet him this week, but we met WITH him this week! It was a great lesson and the Spirit was really strong. He's planning on getting baptized in November! Bill is probably my favorite person ever. He's totally rad and hilarious and reminds me a lot of my dad!

Transfer calls are on Friday! Ahhh! I'm freaking out. You can always send mail to the mission office address during these potential moving times and they will forward it to me. The info is on my blog page (lettersfromcarly.blogspot.com). Thanks for all the support!

I know there's probably something more I need to write about but we are out of emailing time. I hope you all have a beautiful week!

<3 Sister Christiansen

Week 16!

Hi everybody! This week was AWESOME and since I've been writing super short emails I will try and give more details today!

 

First of all, there's a less-active member here WHO HAS MET SHEPARD FAIREY AND HAS A SIGNED PRINT OF HIS FROM 1999. This guy is super cool. He and his wife don't go to church anymore because they don't always feel welcome. SAD. So I took it upon myself this week to help them realize that the church is for EVERYONE. It is truly God's church, and He restored it for every single human to be able to benefit from it if they want to. We go to church so we can learn how to be better, more decent human beings. Everyone could use that! I was not going to let anybody feel like they weren't able to go to church for fear of being judged. No thank you!

 

Anywho, we visited him and his family this week and it was the first time I had met him (last time only his wife was home). He opened the door wearing a shirt of my favorite (worldly) movie so I was like, 'Yes! We instantly have something in common!' Turns out he is from OAKLAND/SF and used to be really into street art! We talked about our favorite artists and spots in the city for a while, and then started talking to them about church. For months (maybe even years), they haven't been at church despite being invited by missionaries. But by the end of the lesson, the dad was just like, "I think it's time we start going back to church." THIS IS A HUGE BREAKTHROUGH!!! I almost started crying it made me so happy. We will continue to meet with them because I just love them so much. Yay!

 

Another thing that happened is that I FOUND 4 FOUR-LEAF CLOVERS THIS WEEK. FOUR OF THEM.

 

I also got to hold newborn kittens. Ahdjksghk.

 

I ALSO GOT TO RUN THROUGH A LEGIT CORNFIELD. We had dinner at a family's house last night who has 10 KIDS! I felt like I was in a movie. Anywho, after dinner, we went outside to watch this member shoot his potato gun... Lol I know. It was rad. BUT THEN, we went right up to the edge of this corn field. The stalks of corn were at least 9-10 feet high. I was gazing up at them in awe and peeking my curious missionary face between the leaves when the dad was like, "You can go inside..." I WAS SO EXCITED. I have never been in a cornfield before! I just started sprinting down the lines, whacking leaves out of my face as I went. I felt ON TOP OF THE WORLD! It was so cool.

 

OKAY NOW FOR THE MOST IMPORTANT PART OF THE EMAIL.

 

I have a mystery that needs to be solved....

This week I got a package from Amazon with no note or return address or anything. It was simply a box of Ginger Lemon Engligh tea cookies. I thought it was odd, but figured I'd get an explanation from someone in my email today. Nope! BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE. A day after I got the cookies, I got ANOTHER package from Amazon with a HUGE BOX of Swedish fish. What?!!! I am so intrigued. Still no note or explanation. This could just be some accident or something, but that's too boring of an explanation so I've turned it into a mystery to be solved. Right now I think it's either from one of my redheaded friends (because of the GINGER cookies) or maybe one of my Swedish friends (which, I can't remember if I even HAVE Swedish friends). Or MAYBE the English cookies and Swedish fish have something to do with geography. WHAT IS GOING ON?! Feel free to send any ideas you may have! But if whoever sent them is reading this, thanks for the treats! OH WAIT. Maybe it was my dad. Thanks, Dad! And if it wasn't you, then maybe you can help me solve this mystery!

 

Now for my invitation! My invitation to you all is to meet the missionaries in your areas!  This nifty website will help you! http://mormon.org/missionaries

One thing I've learned since being on my mission is that missionaries will do ANYTHING they can to help you out. If you have weeds you need pulled, let the missionaries help you! If you have questions about the church or what the heck Mormons even believe, ask the missionaries! I know it would make my day to be able to visit someone who requested missionaries online. We've done it a couple times before and it's always super fun. So go make another missionary's day and invite them over! Even if you're not interested in the message they share, missionaries are always looking for opportunities to serve. Then you can also get kind of an inside look of what I do here on my mission!

 

Have an awesome week! I love and miss you all know that you are being watched over while I'm gone!

 

<3 Sister Christiansen

WEEK 15!

Hi everyone!

 

I have very VERY limited time today, sorry!

 

A quick summary of my week!

 

-Yesterday was stake conference so I got to see Bruce and Yifan! Bruce gave a talk and made me cry! It was so sweet. Yifan translated the whole conference so that the Chinese people who came could listen to it in Chinese through headsets!

 

-Believe it or not, I WAS A TRANSLATOR TOO! It was crazy. There was a deaf lady there and we couldn't find anyone else who knew sign language so I sat up front and interpreted during stake conference! It was nerve-wracking but also such a cool experience!

 

-We saw our friend George with the gold grill again this week!

 

I have SO MUCH to write, gaaah. I wish I had more time. I love you all. The church is true. Sorry I have to go.

 

Thank you for all the support!

 

<3 Sister Christiansen

Week 14 in the field! (Sorry for skipping week 13!)

Last week was Labor Day so we had very limited email time and I couldn't send out a mass email. Sorry! But I will give you all a quick update now!

 

My new area is SO RADICAL! I miss MSU a ton, but I feel so blessed to be in Holt. I also get to see everyone from the MSU ward this Sunday at stake conference! Yay!

 

So much has happened since I emailed last that I don't even know where to begin! I have a new companion! Her name is Sister McElvany. She is from Las Vegas! She knows the area really well because she's been here for 4.5 months. That is a blessing!

 

Some fun facts about Holt! Our room has 142 glow in the dark stars all over the walls! We've had a dinner appointment almost every night since I got here! There's a street here called Christiansen Street! We have a minivan!!! Everything is awesome. I love this area.

 

I wish I could think of more to write but my mind is so frazzled right now. Hopefully by next week I'll have my thoughts more organized before coming to email!

 

We're almost out of emailing time but I just want to let you know how much I love and miss you all!

 

Have an incredible week!

 

<3 Sister Christiansen

Week 12 at MSU

Hi all! First things first, I got transferred! I'm leaving MSU :( When I think about leaving all the wonderful people on this campus and in our ward, it makes me want to cry! Especially when I think about leaving our recent converts, Bruce and Yifan. They are so great and all the elders say they are the most solid converts they've ever met. It's so true. They have such strong faith. It's going to be hard to leave them but I know that they are in good hands because Sister Dixon is staying at MSU and she is a pro.

On Sunday, Yifan was able to baptize a Chinese girl named Lina that the elders have been teaching. It warmed our heart! When she came up out of the water, he said, "Welcome to the kingdom of God." IT WAS SO AWESOME!

My companions and I sang at that baptism, too, and all the elders were crying which made US want to cry! It was an emotional day. I'm going to miss this ward so much.

But guess where I am being transferred! HOLT! That's the area I visited last week on exchanges! I am sad to leave MSU but so happy to go to this area that I've already fallen in love with! Holt has kittens, ice cream, and A KFC RIGHT BY OUR APARTMENT. For those of you who don't know, KFC is like, my favorite restaurant. What more could you ask for?! 

I will also have a full-time car and be in a family ward. So many changes! I liked walking around campus and going to church with people my own age, but it will be nice to be able to drive to visit people far away, and also to have church with little kids and older people! 

One of my favorite things about the Holt missionaries' apartment (from when I visited) is that at night, when you turn off the lights in the bedroom, there are hundreds of glow in the dark stars on the wall! I can't wait to fall asleep surrounded by that every night!

Another perk is that Holt is only 15 minutes away from East Lansing and in the same stake as the University Ward! This means I'll get to visit everyone again in 3 weeks when we have stake conference! I'll also be able to come back if any of the people I've helped teach get baptized!

Looking back at my time at MSU, I feel so blessed to have been able to serve here. In my 12 weeks here, we've talked to 775 people from a total of 53 countries. Crazy! I love MSU so much, especially its massive amounts of diversity. However, I know that Holt is where God needs me right now, and I can't wait to get there and start serving with all my heart!

Before I forget, my new address is:
Sister Carly Christiansen

2141 N. Aurelius Rd. Apt. 64

Holt, MI 48842

Now I want to attach some pictures! I don't know what I'm doing in this picture but this is my district trying to think of funny faces to make. The guy on my right is our district leader, Elder Lyman. He is so rad! I will miss all of them!

This is me and Dennis!!! I love him SO MUCH! He is from Uganda and is on date to be baptized! I can't wait to come back to East Lansing for his baptism!

 

I AM GOING TO MISS THIS AREA SO MUCH!

In the Living Center, our neighbors are this adorable family with two little girls. We knew we needed a picture with them before we left!

My favorite picture ever. From left to right: Sis. Dixon, Sis. Probert, Bruce, Yifan, and me!

I will miss these people so much!

 The East Lansing University Ward missionaries! The elders are the Assistants to the President (APs). They're awesome (Elders Snow, Masters, and Larsen). We've loved serving this ward!

 

Thanks for reading my updates! And thanks for all the continuing support! Missionary work is hard sometimes and I really appreciate all your letters and love! This work also brings you the greatest joy in the world. I am so blessed to be on a mission!

I love you all! The Church is true!

<3 Sister Christiansen

Week 11 in Heaven!

Hello all! This week was incredible.

From Monday night to Wednesday morning I was on exchanges (where you swap companions with other sister missionaries) in an area called Holt. I can sum up that experience with some numbers...

Number of cats at this one investigator's house: 15

Number of kittens I had on my lap during that lesson: 4

Number of scratches I got on my face from a kitten trying to play with my hair: 3

Number of Daft Punk bumper stickers I saw: 2

Number of scoops of ice cream I had: 5

Number of fingers I jammed from trying to catch a frozen loaf of bread thrown down to me from a third floor balcony: 2

Number of minutes I spent meditating about what my spirit animal is: 30

That's right, I officially have a spirit animal. Sister Smith is who I was with for exchanges. She is our Sister Training Leader and she loves helping people find out what their "spirit animal" is. It's just a funny activity we did to find out what animals represent us. We jokingly take it way too seriously. Anyways, after much contemplation, I discovered that I am a COCKATOO!!! Woohoo!

On a more spiritual note, Bruce (our first baptism) gave an amazing talk about God on Sunday and he is ALSO speaking about his conversion in stake conference next month! He is SO COOL.

Yifan is doing so great as well! This week he surprised us with two videos he'd made for us!!! I will paste the links at the bottom. They're super embarrassing because they both involve me singing but hopefully the beautiful voices of my companions drown me out!

Also, I got Chinese names this week! One of our investigators, John Ni, gave them to us! Mine is Jia Li which is the Chinese name of Scarlet from "Gone With the Wind" and means "beautiful girl".... He chose Chinese names that sound kind of similar to our American names.

THEN Bruce gave me another Chinese name that represents me! 

Bruce's Chinese name for me is sounds like "Uu Jo" and it means HAPPY UNIVERSE!!! 

Anyways, I guess I can end it there. Michigan is amazing. Here are the Youtube links to Yifan's videos!

http://youtu.be/v1pBsv8xzd0

http://youtu.be/nP8mgCxNqU4

Have an amazing week!

<3 Sister Christiansen

 

ps Sorry for the millions of emails but I just saw this and thought it would be cool for those of you who want to know what a day in the life of a missionary is like!

http://www.mormonnewsroom.org/article/mormon-missionary-life

Week 10? No way!

I love MSU so much!

I don't have much time this week to email, so I have to make this quick, but just trust that this week was incredible!

Our friend Yiming got baptized! The elders were teaching him. He's from China and is so awesome. Soon at church, we are going to have headsets and a translator so that during sacrament meeting, the talks can be translated into Chinese for all our new members! We are also starting up a Sunday School class taught entirely in Chinese. This place is so awesome. I'm trying to learn Chinese but I'm really bad at it!

We've seen so many miracles in this work. I love being a missionary and talking to strangers every day! People really open up to us. We are in such a unique position as missionaries. I never want to take off my name tag!

The highlight of my week was when Frank (a recent convert from China) made a comic for me and my companions. I am "C," Sister Dixon is "D," and Sister Probert is "P." I'm attaching a picture of it below. It is the best thing ever. It is what would happen if we met a robber in the park!

I'm sorry I can't write more but know that I love you all and miss you a lot! I am in love with East Lansing! Have an amazing week! Watch this video!

http://www.mormonchannel.org/video/mormon-messages?v=911104789001

It's AMAZING!

This week, TELL SOMEONE YOU LOVE THEM!

Here's Frank's comic!

 

<3 Sister Christiansen

Week 9 in Michigan!

Once again - Amazing week!

Yifan passed the sacrament and Bruce blessed it! I love them so much!

This week we had another baptism! Brooke is AWESOME. She's kind of been a group project with the missionaries since her schedule is crazy. We've all been able to get to know and love her and on Saturday she was baptized! She has an AMAZING story. 

She's had ideas about the nature of God and stuff since she was 5 and her preachers used to just shut her up and tell her not to talk about it. However, when she was 15, her dad told her she could join any church she wanted so she left her church and started exploring. She investigated so many religions including Baptist, Muslim, Buddhist, Catholic, and more. 

One day, she was walking by our church building and just decided to walk in. She immediately felt the Spirit. She found the first person she could and asked them how she could learn more about the Church because it was the first place she had felt that Spirit of God. She started meeting with the missionaries and told them her ideas about God. 

She felt like she had lived with God before coming to earth, and that's what her preachers had always told her not to talk about. When the elders taught her the Plan of Salvation, she burst into tears. We know that we lived with God before we came down to this earth. She had known it too, her whole life, and finally could express her feelings about her divine nature. She continued to pray and ask if this was the true church, and developed an unshakable testimony. At her baptism, she talked about how this church has no gaps. She knows it is truly God's church and that while she felt some truth with other churches, this is the only church that has the fullness of the truth restored.

I love Brooke! I'm attaching a picture of me, her, and Sister Probert into this email. My companions and I sang at her baptism and Bruce played the piano for us! Brooke started crying as we sang, which started a domino effect and by the end of Brooke's baptism everyone was crying tears of joy! It was incredible.

This week we also had dinner appointments! Those don't happen super often in a Single's Ward, but when they do we are SO GRATEFUL! This week we had authentic southern food from a guy who served his mission in Georgia. It. Was. AMAZING. Dry rub chicken, collard greens with bacon, strawberry cornbread, and fried okra... YUM! We also had Burmese food! It was delicious. I love food!

Sorry this email was kind of long but this week was just an amazing week! Michigan is beautiful and every single day we have our breath taken away by the gorgeous scenery. The sky and clouds are always especially lovely! 

My invitation for you all this week is to look up Vocal point's version of "Nearer My God To Thee" on YouTube! Do it!!! You will NOT regret it!!!

I hope you all have a great week! 

<3 Sister Christiansen

P.S. Brooke is the one in the middle. I LOVE HER!

Week 8 in the Great Lakes State!

Okay, AMAZING week.

Bruce and Yifan are such solid recent converts. Everyone in the ward is so impressed by them and their testimonies are so inspiring. They are rekindling everyone's excitement about the gospel!

So we keep track every time we talk to someone new (on the bus, on the street, on campus, etc.) and get to know more about them and invite them to learn more about the church. We added it up this week and since getting to Michigan I have talked to 475 people! I love talking to strangers. You meet people who are at all sorts of different places in their lives. I love also being able to see how the gospel relates to every single person I meet. It's amazing.

This week we sang in church with the ward choir and it was actually such an incredible experience! I can't sing at all, but I was luckily drowned out by the beautiful voices surrounding me. I might be biased, but holy cow it sounded amazing. It was so cool to look out at the people sitting in the congregation and watching their reactions to our voices. Yifan got so excited and had a huge smile on his face the whole time! 

This week our miracle was Dennis! He has been taking the lessons from the missionaries for almost a year but has never committed to be baptized. This week, we got to know him better which was a blessing. He is from Uganda! So I got to talk to him about how I used to tutor girls in Uganda over Skype. He got really excited about that and started telling us all about Africa. It was such a tender mercy because he finally started opening up to us as missionaries. And get this - HE COMMITTED TO A BAPTISM DATE! I was so grateful to be able to apply my past experiences to my missionary work here. Another blessing of tutoring those girls is that my companions have never been able to understand Dennis's thick Ugandan accent on the phone, but I have a lot of practice with that! So now they just make me answer every time he calls, haha. We love Dennis.

Overall, it's been an incredible week and an incredible mission. I am learning so much and at such an accelerated rate! There's no place I'd rather be right now. I love Michigan!

For this week's spiritual message, I want all of you to check out this AWESOME article from the August Ensign. IT TALKS ABOUT SPACE! I was freaking out when I saw it. Here's the link! http://www.lds.org/ensign/2013/08/worlds-without-number?lang=eng

Have an amazing week!

<3 Sister Christiansen

Week 7 in Michigan!

This has been a truly incredible week!

YIFAN WAS BAPTIZED ON SATURDAY! Bruce baptized him! They are both from Shanghai. The Spirit was SO strong at the baptism. Everyone was crying tears of joy. Yifan bore his testimony at the end even though he was really nervous about his English. But he was amazing! For those of you who know the story of Lehi's dream from 1 Nephi chapter 8, you will love this. Yifan looked out at everyone and said, "I will always hold to the iron rod and happily wave goodbye to those guys in the strange building." It was so awesome!

This week has just been FULL of miracles. I try to keep these emails short so people will actually read them, so I won't go into detail, but just trust me when I say that GOD IS REAL! He hears our prayers and always answers them when we have faith.

One quick funny story - There's a recent convert in our ward named Frank. He is from central China and is HILARIOUS. I think I sent out a picture of him from Bruce's baptism where his mouth is open SUPER wide. 

Anyways, the weather has been really warm here and the sun is out every day. Frank rides his bike everywhere and doesn't like how bright the sun is. He doesn't have sunglasses, so instead, he's been riding around town wearing a Darth Vader mask. He just figured it was the most reasonable thing to do. WE LOVE HIM SO MUCH! He is awesome.

Also, can we talk about how HOSTESS IS BACK?! TWINKIES HAVE RETURNED!!! At the grocery store this morning though, the three shelves they had designated for Twinkies were empty :( But alas! Below it, hidden on the very back of the shelf, was a box of HOSTESS CUPCAKES! MY FAVORITE!!! Needless to say, I was very excited.

I hope you all have an amazing week!

Make every day an adventure!

<3 Sister Christiansen

P.S. This is Yifan! We love him!

WEEK 6 IN MICHIGAN!

Amazing. Week.

Bruce passed the sacrament in church on Sunday. The three people passing sacrament were all converts from China who got the priesthood within the last month. Woohoo!

Also - GET THIS! We have another investigator getting baptized! Yifan is from Shanghai. He is amazing, hilarious, brilliant, and is going to be baptized on Saturday!

Guess who is going to baptize him.

...BRUCE!!!!

We are so excited! The Lord truly is hastening His work! Also, Bruce wrote us a song this week and it was the best song ever! He tells the story of how we knocked on his door and how the Book of Mormon changed his life and how happy he is now! We love Bruce.

Yifan also did something so great yesterday. After our lesson with him, we walked outside and saw all these fireflies. I caught one for him and he was so excited! He didn't know that they were called fireflies, he just always saw them at night while riding his bike home from class and described them as "the stars coming up from the ground." I gave him the firefly to hold and it glowed in his hand. He was so happy! He brought his cupped hands close to his face to look at the awesome little glowing bug inside and just whispered excitedly, "Thank you Heavenly Father!" It was the best thing ever!

We also had a ward BBQ that was a MAJOR success! There were about 25 members there and 45 nonmembers!!! It was so great to be able to have that many potential investigators in one place! Some people wanted to learn more about the church so we're meeting with them this week. I am so grateful to be in such a missionary-minded ward.

I just realized I never really update everyone on my companions! They are AMAZING. We work so well together. Hopefully Sister Dixon doesn't get her visa anytime soon and can stay with us a little longer. She's such a hard working missionary. Sister Probert is an amazing trainer and I wish you all could hear her sing. She has the voice of an angel! So does Sister Dixon! Too bad they got stuck with me... but when we sing as a trio I just let their beautiful voices drown mine out! 

I hope you all have an incredible week! 

I love you and miss you all!

<3 Sister Christiansen

P.S. I'm attaching a picture of my district! Some of them are gone now because we just had transfers but luckily my companions and I get to stay at MSU longer!

PPS.

Also, I just watched this new Mormon Message and it's SUPER RAD. It shows how the words of Joseph Smith are still so applicable today. So many people we meet (specially on a college campus) are asking the same questions. People are seeking truth everywhere we turn. We should always be actively seeking knowledge in our lives. I love how this encourages people to "go to the source" and ask God. God truly does answer prayers. We see it every day here. He loves you all and wants to hear from you. Have a great week!

http://www.mormonchannel.org/mormon-messages-for-youth?v=2505987918001

WEEK 5 IN MICHIGAN!

This week was amazing as usual!

4th of July was pretty fun! My companions and I ran around and caught fireflies while watching fireworks. We also ordered delivery from a place called Insomnia Cookies... Best decision of my life. They deliver hot, freshly-baked cookies to your door and a scoop of any type of ice cream you want and you make a cookie ice cream sandwich. It was the most delicious thing I'd had in a while.

Some fun, random information - Our apartment is in a place called the Living Center which is right across the street from campus. The cool thing is, it was built by the church as a place for LDS students, couples, and other people (as long as they follow the rules-no alcohol, smoking, etc.) to live! I love being surrounded by members of our ward. The property manager is the bishop (Bishop Solomon - this awesome dude from Hawaii) and it is a dedicated building! I always feel so safe at our apartment!

I love my area so much. I can't say it enough. We've been doing a lot of "bus finding" since we don't have a car. That basically means we get to talk to tons of different types of people every single day. I met this really cool guy from Zambia this week, and also another really cool student named... get this... Lemuel! We told him there was someone in the Book of Mormon named Lemuel. He was like, "What?! I definitely have to buy a Book of Mormon now!" and we were like, "Here, you can have one!" It was really funny. What are the odds?

Being a missionary is one of the coolest things I've ever done. I love being here and meeting so many people. It's also been incredible to see how much the gospel blesses the lives of those we teach. We are able to watch them change so much and the happiness they feel because of that change is so contagious!

Thanks for all the emails, letters, packages, and support! Have a great week!

<3 Sister Christiansen

 

Also, this week I wanted to encourage you all to watch this video about civility and kindness. ALL OF YOU! It's so awesome. A lot of you have probably already seen it, but I love it and think it's incredible! Have an amazing week!

http://www.mormonchannel.org/video/mormon-messages?v=1101417666001

Week 4 in MICHIGAN!!

BRUCE IS OFFICIALLY BAPTIZED! His baptism on Saturday was incredible. He bore such a strong testimony at the end and the Spirit in the room was almost tangible. I will post pictures in this email because it was such a great night! The next day at church, he was confirmed a member for the Church and received the gift of the Holy Ghost. An RM who spoke Chinese on his mission gave the prayer and blessing in Chinese! It was so awesome.

The baptism almost didn't happen though! Our church building here in Lansing has been through so much. A couple years ago, it was burned down and everything was destroyed except for a picture of Jesus Christ. Then, on Thursday, someone pulled the fire alarm and the sprinkler system flooded the church! Talk about Old Testament-status! Fires and floods! But we prayed SO HARD and everything was cleaned up in time for the baptism on Saturday. 

We met more people from all over the world this week! We taught people from Rwanda, Nigeria, France, India, Yemen, Togo, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, China, and Ethiopia! I learned some Ebo, which is the language one of our friends from Nigeria speaks. I'm also learning Portuguese from my companion before she leaves for Brazil!

Oh my goodness. As I'm typing this email, we just got a call from an investigator named Leandre asking us if we could bail him out of jail! We weren't able to help him out but what the heck! Haha East Lansing is awesome.

Overall, this week was just amazing because of Bruce's baptism. He was so happy, and his happiness was just contagious for everyone who was there.

 

 

This weekend was amazing! Hope everyone has an awesome week! 

<3 Sister Christiansen

 

  Here's me and my companions with Bruce!