May 17, 2015
Dear Sister Kristina,
I know you aren't officially having your p-day until Wednesday, but I wanted to still get a letter to you in case you get a chance to read it. It will be fun to hear about your trip to the Oakland temple. How many in your mission get to go? What work do you get to do there?
We are having a lovely Sabbath. Dad is at work though, so I miss him being here. The girls have been very sweet today. Leah has felt wonderful all day, had a great lesson in YW (the patriarch came and spoke to them) and she wants to prepare for her blessing. She said she can remember you saying that you were preparing for yours, so she wanted to know what she should be doing. I had a nice talk with her about her faith in God, showing that faith by praying every day and reading her scriptures. Those are two things she's not doing now, so I didn't want to overload her with too many changes in life and she's very willing right now. She said she will start praying every day…I really hope she keeps it up and makes it a habit for life. Prayer is really the key to our happiness, to our faith, to our hope and to our ability to receive and act upon revelations. I want her to have that so much that it makes me cry just to think about it. We'll take it one day at a time, but thank you for setting a good example that she is now remembering.
Nikki worked on her Personal Progress today and she's getting fairly close (within a year) to having it all complete. I'm very proud of who she's becoming and how she's willing to change when needed. She was almost failing one of her classes last week. She had just given up basically and was getting F's on everything. I had a talk with her. She was mad at first, but later came to me with a plan for making a better grade. She followed through with everything she talked about last week and even aced a test at the end of the week because she studied for it every day and she did everything without me pushing her at all. Her grade came up dramatically and she had so much more pride in herself because of it. I hope she remembers the feeling and has that desire from now on.
It was so nice not to have to speak in church today and just sit and relax and listen to the seniors speak. There aren't very many of them this year, but they did a good job. The Peery's were out of town, gone to Fiji to pick up their son. Sister Peery's sister was here staying with the kids. She looks so much like Teresa, it was fun to see.
We had a great lesson on the Book of Mormon in Relief Society today. The spirit once again (for the thousandth time) bore witness to me of its truthfulness. I love that I continually get that witness. It means everything to me and it always happens when we're talking about the Book of Mormon. It's a powerful book. We watched a little bit of Elder Holland's video called "Elder Holland's Testimony;The Book of Mormon is the Word of God" from Youtube. If you get a chance, you should watch it. It's so powerful. It would be wonderful to show to someone who has left the church, less active, etc. You could just show the part where he is talking about Joseph Smith in Carthage Jail. I'm using it for a family night lesson tomorrow night.
I saw some really pretty pics of the Cordoba temple on instagram today. It's being dedicated this weekend. It's beautiful and Pres. Uchtdorf said "It brings a light to the city." I know that's really got to be true. I'll be talking with Marcela this week, so I'll get the whole story.
We got a lot of work done in the back yard yesterday, weeding and planting the garden. It's rained so much here that everything looks beautiful and green. We had a great lightning storm the other night and we all sat out on the porch and watched. Dad's trying a new method for the garden this year. We're planting in straw bales. I know it sounds weird, but I'll try to send pics next time so you can see.
Here's a little something Nikki made for me in her cooking class this week. It was yummy and so pretty.
And here's the quilt top I made this week. I'll be taking it over to Tracey's to machine quilt it. I love using my scraps!
I'm only here a few days this week, then I take off with Alex and Savannah to go to SoCal for Hannah's wedding. I'll give Hannah your info when I see her. She'll be so happy to hear that you're kind of close to her.
I hope you have a great week. Here are a couple little missionary tips for you:
1. Companions are Siamese twins joined at the Spirit.
2. Sing "If You Could Hie to Kolob" in district meetings.
3. Take photos of the common, everyday scenes from each area you serve (laundromat, supermarket, apartment, etc)
I forgot to tell you that I finally heard from Bro. Monson and got a copy of you singing your song in the MTC. I loved it! Remember my heart is always with you and I look forward to hearing from you every week!
Love you so much,
Mom xxoo
lymtyk
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