Littleton 2

First the most important thing is that Liam Payne's Birthday is this week so you guys need to party it up for me.

I made it a month YAY.  My companion wrote a nice message on the mirror congratulating me.

This week we had a meeting so I got to see my companion from the MTC that was great.  My companion is also a STL so I get sent on exchanges a lot.  I only went on one this week. 

This week two sisters had to be sent home so that is super sad.  It also means that we have a new sister in our zone and she is super fun. 

I found out that my companion is in a Mormon message. "What family means" you should all watch it.  It's super cute. 

 I do not really remember what happened.  I know I am boring :/

I mean I knocked on some doors.

 

Littleton 1

Ana has arrived in Colorado :-)  Her Mission President and his wife sent a letter and two pictures of them with all the new missionaries.

Dear Parents (and Bishops of Missionaries without a home e-mail),

We wanted to let you know that your missionary arrived safely in Denver this morning. They are at the mission office now for orientation and will have dinner and a devotional at the mission home tonight. They will meet their new companions early tomorrow morning and will head off to their area to start working!

We're grateful for their desire to serve and hope that you will continue to encourage them as they make the transition into the mission field. The work is amazing and challenging and we hope that you will remind them that they can do hard things. Please encourage them to be exactly obedient--miracles and great blessings are in store for them as they obey the mission rules.

With love,

President and Sister Gifford

Here's Ana's first letter home from Colorado: 

 I don't really remember what happened this week.  I remember that It was really hard to say good bye to my district.  Also my new companion is super nice.  I already smell like weed no matter how hard I shower and it is a struggle.  I am in a suburb of Denver in the Bowles Grove ward which is in Littleton Colorado.  Our ward has some super poor areas and some super rich areas.  The Elders are more in charge of the poor areas.  The problem with the nicer areas is that it has more gated communities that you cannot tract in.  The houses are super nice though and it is interesting to eat in the richer parts of town and get to see all their fancy houses.  I am like 20 minutes from the mission home.  This means the APs are in my district so we went to their place the other day to grab something.  We get there and it is a gated community.  We drive in and there are some lion statues.  My companion is like "well you know it is a rich area when there are lion statues."  I was like "well not as much as gargoyles then you know you made it."  She was like "true."  Then about 10 seconds later we found a gargoyle statue.  She was like "you know what might top this if there was a lady holding a pot in a fountain statue."  Soon after that we found one.  We finally pull up and we tell them "well this is a nice place you got here."  They were like "yeah the bathroom reminds me of the celestial room at the temple, the problem is you cannot talk to people about the church in here otherwise you get arrested." 

When we first got here we did not have a place to stay because the member that the sisters had stayed with before did not want them back.  The mission office did not connect that so we were homeless.  The ward mission leader was really nice though and let us stay he is super nice and great.  We were going to go hike a 14er today with him and a few other RMs that used to serve in this area but we had too much we needed to do so we did not have time. The member that was housing the sisters said she would take us back for a transfer.  We went over and she turned to us and was like I still have not touched the room since they left.  We walked in and you could tell why she did not want missionaries anymore.  It was a mess and that is saying something since it is coming from me.  We finally got it all organized on Thursday. 

We are whitewashing an area so basically neither of us had been here before.  My companions name is Sister Davies.  We are probably the most directionally challenged people.  We keep getting lost.  We have not driven out of our mission yet but we were close one time.  We are the ward that's right on the edge about.  We ran into the mission president and we said we kept getting lost.  He said, "well have you driven out of the mission yet?"  We said we were close.  He said well at least we hadn't gone out so we are good. 

There where 7 girls in relief society that go to USU and were on there way there so that was super exciting.  Even though it made me miss USU a little.

Mission related we were going through the area book because it was mess.  We decided to call some people to see if we could meet with them.  One of the people we called had changed his number but the new owner wanted to learn more about the church.  Then we were going door to door and we met this guy. he had met with the missionaries a few years back.  We found out he drove past Fort Collins to get to work.  We said we would come back the next day to give him an invite to the temple open house.  We left him a few scriptures to read.  When we went back the next day he said that he read the scriptures we gave him and all of the chapter headings in the book of Mormon.  Then he had started to follow all the footnotes in the verses we gave him.  He said it took him a while but now he wants to read the rest of it.  He also got out his Bible and would look up the footnotes from the book of Mormon referencing the Bible. He found that while he was doing that his Bible made a reference to the fact that who are we to say that Christ didn't visit his people in other places in the world and why wouldn't there be a record for it. He said he found it ironic because he was reading about Christ coming in The Book of Mormon. 

Love

Sister Holcomb

Something I totally forgot to write about. 

The guy sitting next to me in the library is blasting one direction and is jamming out singing along and everything.

Also we have the nicest car in the mission.  The APs were supposed to get it but then they needed a better car for traveling out west.  It is a Bright Blue Ford Fusion it was brand new when we got it.  It had been driven from the dealer to the church so it only had 10 miles on it.  I will have to send a picture next week.  It has a button to start it.  And to put in park and stuff it has like this nob instead of a lever.  It has heated seats.  I think it might be the nicest car I will ever have. ;)LOL

Love 

Sister Holcomb

(some extra notes from Ana to our family)

You will have to let me know all about the pop culture things when I get back because I will have no idea what is happening.  I am glad William had fun at camp.  Also that the house is going well. 

My companion just came from Grandma Sharp's ward so she was super excited, she was really sad to leave that ward.  She said it was better though because she gets to train me and I am related to someone in that ward so it makes it better.  Here is a picture my companion took.  She is the one on the left.

Love

Sister Holcomb

 

MTC 5

Ana sent a whole bunch of pictures from her ipad since she had to hand it in.  She won't have an ipad in Colorado (but I'm still hoping they get them before she's done).  Here's a great picture of her with her friend Andrew West and their companions.  

We got to talk to Ana on the phone right before she left for Colorado on August 15. It sounds like there is still one pay phone at the SLC airport and the missionaries line up to call home before they head off and don't call again until Christmas.  Since there is a long line kind people recognize them as missionaries and offer to let them borrow their cell phone to call home.  I love the simple gestures of kindness so many people give in the world.

Ana didn't get to talk long.  She mentioned feeling sick, thinking she ate something that didn't settle well.  I asked if it was nerves and she said, definitely different from nerves.  We talked and joked about a few things, but the one thing I remember is she was a little dissappointed all the girls in her district are the "no touchy" (Emporer's New Groove reference) type, but Ana is a hug type of person.  She said all the guys in her district are the hug type, but mission rules are no hugging, holding hands, etc with others of the opposite sex.  Maybe now that she's in Colorado she'll meet more people that are the hugging type. :-)

Here's a bunch of pictures from the MTC.  Like, seriously.  A bunch.  They might not mean much to anyone else, but I figure Ana will want them together when I print this as a book when she gets home.