Happy New Year

1 Me and our ham...I am not even kidding when I say she gave us an entire ham
2- New Years Eve... I even had a diet coke!!
3 - Ryan's Baptism...that is his family




Hey Family!!

Sorry you didn't get my email last week! I sent it again...so tell me if you got it! Did you all have a Happy New Year?? I hope so! We have started the entire year where I will not see you!! Crazy eh?! Well I had a pretty eventful week...Tuesday we had DDM's and went to lunch with our district. And we emailed that day...sorry again that you didn't get last weeks email...after we studied we had supper with a cute little family and then had a lesson with Ryan and Amanda. We prepared him for baptism and went over the BI questions and qualifications! Of course he passed with flying colors! On Wed we studied and did service and had lunch with Helen. It is really hard for us to teach her...she says she will come to church and pay her tithing but she won't have anything to do with the temple or some of the other commandments...so we don't really know the best way to help her. That day we also taught Dora. We taught tithing and fasting and we thought if she had any problems with the commandments it would be that one...but she was totally ok with it. She told us that they already did that in Ghana so no problem there!! For the rest of that day we did tons of stop-bys...let me just tell you something that wasn't great about this week!! In about 72 hours we had 8 appts cancel on us...it was sooo not fun...but such is the life of a missionary! so oh well...Thursday was Weekly Planning off and on throughout the day...I don't know why, but Thursdays are always some of our busiest days!! So we just squeeze in our planning wherever we can. So that day we also taught Jason P the Plan of Salvation...and guess what he finally came to church! He promises us every week he will come and he finally did come once! But he disappeared right after Sacrament. So one of the lessons we had cancel on thurs was our dinner appt. but they felt bad and wanted to give us money to go out to eat. So that night we went to the closest thing we could get to a Mexican restaurant...there are hardly any here in Canada. We taught Ryan and Amanda and also Sister Paul, a great member, that evening. On Friday we had study and service and of course had more lessons cancel...but we were able to set some up for this week so that was good. Ryan had his BI and of course passed with flying colors!! And we got to do stop-bys all night. Saturday was the BEST day of my mission! We started off our day with a Specialized Training. It was all about planning and it was really good. At the begininng of the training President Archibald surprised us all and said we would have a 10 min 1st and 2nd...guess who got to do the 10 min 1st...you guessed it!! Sister Brower and I!! Sister Brower had never done it before and she did amazing!! Not many missionaries that have been out 2 weeks could do what she did!! I love her so much she is just so great!! So our day started out pretty great and then just got better from there!! After our training we had Ryan's Baptism!! It was the most special day!! I seriously can't even descibe in words how great this day was!!! There was just so much joy! Seriously it was so great!! So Ryan got baptized and I am so grateful I got to be part of it!! Something that was super special was that all the sisters that have been part of his teaching were given permission to come to the baptism...so Sister Hayes got to come...and it was great!! Sister Brower and I sang 'My Sould Hungered' and I have not felt the Spirit so strong in a long time than I did at Ryan's baptism! It was the greatest day!! It was New Years Eve and we had to be in our apartment by 6 so we didn't get to do anything else really. We still had fun though. We had chocolate fondu and all the missionaries got permission to watch 17 Miracles!! I love that movie!! I have so much respect for the pioneers!! It is seriously a miracle that they were able to go through everything they did and live!!! If you haven't seen that movie...WATCH IT!!!! It will change your life! We got our mail that day and I had a few packages so that was fun and we just had a relaxing evening...we didn't want to sacrifice our sleep so we celebrated the New Year at 10:30. It was definitely different from what I am used to, but we still had fun. Sunday was church so obviously it was great!! Sister Brower got to speak in both wards and we got to sing 'My Sould Hungered' in both wards...and we were also supposed to teach gospel essentials, but nobody showed up. We had 4 lessons that night with some members and also Dora! I have to tell you about our dinner appt that day...so it was with a family from the Philippines and they are great! They made ham and some Philippine Spaghetti...which was sweet and super delicous...but we were talking about how good the food was and Sister Cells turned to us and said "I am glad you like it because I made one for you to take with you." She cooked us an entire ham to take home with us...when are we ever going to eat it...I don't know...but it was very nice of her to think of us! So that was my week!! IT was pretty exciting eh?? Well I hope you have a great week!! And a very Happy New Year!!! Thanks for all your love and support!! I love and miss you all!!

Love, Sister Kaitlyn Marchant