week 34

Hola!! So yes... I moved! Bracknell is nice.. it's actually really posh. ha ha but it isn't as beautiful as Devon, that's for sure. This is the city, that was the country side. ha ha but this week has been so so good because guess what? We went to the temple!! We had our Christmas conference, so we left the flat at 5 am ha ha and traveled to the temple with all the other missionaries around these parts and then we went through a session at the London Temple and then we all did little Christmas skits! Ours. Was. Hilarious! Oh my gosh. Elder Dearing and Elder Cross had a member in the Farnborough ward where they are serving tell them about this youtube clip so we reinacted it. We dressed up as monks and instead of singing Motabs version of Isaiah 9:6 we made cards with the words on it and  when they would sing the words we would hold up a sign... ha ha it was so funny! I had someone record it on my camera so I'll send the memory card home soon so you can see it. 

But I'm so excited for Christmas! Lately I have been thinking about the spirit of Christmas. The spirit of Christmas, the reason we feel so much warmth and peace at Christmastime is because it is truly the spirit of Christ. The warmth comes from the Holy Ghost testifying to us that Jesus is the Christ! I am so grateful to be celebrating Him at this time of year as a missionary! I get to share His message with people everyday. I love it. This is Sister P's 4th Christmas and Shipon's FIRST CHRISTMAS EVER! So we got permission to take him to the temple visitors centre on Wednesday and teach him all about Christ and the true meaning of Christmas there :D hooray! PS on lds.org there are some beautiful videos of Christ's birth. The girl that plays Mary is from a ward here in our mission so I guess in January we are going to have a conference and she is going to come speak to us about playing the role of Christ's mother in the new church clips. I'm excited! 

So this week Sister P was pretty sick so we spent some time in the flat. She slept and I studied. But I'm so grateful for that extra time I got to study! And then I got a phone call from Exeter, it was Sister Gregson, for the past week she has been having weird pains and the last few days the pain has been RIDICULOUS so they took her to the hospital and then when she came up for their Christmas conference (the day before ours) they took her to the hospital again and they started doing tests and such, we think it's kidney stones but the NHS has to do more scans but she has to wait to be admitted into the hospital... so for the past 3 days she has been at the accomadation centre just WAITING... ugh. So anyways she got permission to call me so she did... like 8 times ha ha and I guess she was alone, they put her companion with other sisters so she could go out and work but that meant sister gregson didn't have anyone there with her (obviously) and the way she described these "fits" to me was that they come on all the sudden and the pain is so bad she can't breathe, she can't move, she is throwing up because she is in so much pain... so anyways I called the APs and asked why in the world she was alone Saturday night and of course they can;'t stay with her, they were doing everything they literally could but I told them if they needed they could bring her to Bracknell so she wouldn't be alone! ha ha So yesterday night she called before she went to bed and said that her new companion was going to be with her last night- GOOD! ha ha anyways I thought it was cool that because we were in the flat for Sister P to get better I was able to just be on the phone and talk with Sister Gregson and try to distract her from her pain and such as well whenever she needed. Pray for both of my little sickies! ha ha 

 Also, our ward mission leader is from South Africa he was in the Vereeniging ward? He is really cool, we always have correlation meetings during the week on his lunch break so he will take us to a really nice restaurant and we will have our meeting there ha ha it's very official.

*our exchange with Paignton (me, Sister Gregson, Priestley, Cabrera!) 
*sometimes we share the word of God with storm troopers...
*our cute neighbors Jen and Tim (the ones I got the brownie recipe for! she told us she was pregnant right when I got to Exeter and she was due the week I left)

*the sisters I have served with so far! Christensen, Gregson, and Fekete!

*Ok you see the elder on the left? His name is Elder Jones and he is from Chihuahua, Mexico. Remember how I stayed with Wendi Jones when I went to Mexico? Ya that's his aunt. ha ha and he went with our group when we layed cement floors and such!! I'll have to go through those pictures when I get home and see if he is in any of them ha ha- so crazy!
*Guess who is in my district now? Elder Kory Cross! The district leader bought us all matching bracelets/ties for Christmas!
*Me and Sister P right after we did a session at the London Temple :)
*This family went all out for Christmas! Check out that huge bag, a recent convert called Jon gave us that and it had a few wrapped packages inside for Christmas! :)

*happy christmas from me and sister gregson! yes my mug says i'd rather be in bed, hers says i'd rather be in the pub haha Jo gave us these when she moved!

*me and sister p!
*the haircut
*me and gregs with martyn!!
*sister terry (the sister from temple square :) )
*this post box was literally overflowing! we love post!!