London Calling: February 2012

Monday, February 27, 2012

Pictures

Old Town, Hastings

Battle of hastings

Sister Housley and Sister Allred (Allred goes home WEDNESDAY!!)

Hastings beach

Martyn and Karina!

Hastings beach with the district

Gernot and Undine Frohlich

Last night at our flat :)

Exchange with Weymouth sisters

Exchange with Exeter sisters. Sister Binnie (Scotland) and Sister Kutsevych

this morning at our flat!!

the Turpins -members in Exeter

farewell sister allred

eating curry with our hands. Yum!

Annukka- Finish member in Exeter ward

sister Kutsevych

welcome back to Exeter!

sister corner got pooped on -the one flaw with Hastings, WAY too many seagulls and pigeons :)

Sister Jonutz

My other sister allred :)

More Hastings

Hastings

church

Fairlight

traveling. so tired... can ya tell??

Alec-Exeter

sister Binnie

love london

Sister Corner and Sister Allred

the underground!

Exeter and Back

Moves this week! Any predictions? I can't believe it's transfers already. This last transfer has gone so so fast and I can only imagine how much faster this next one will go.

This week was AMAZING! It was so much fun! We were doing our exchanges with the sisters in Weymouth and Exeter so we were only in our area for one full working day this week. We were a bit worried about our area since we were going to be gone for so long but we saw some miracles right before we left and ended up getting a few new investigators! We have been seeing that happen a lot lately. Heavenly Father is definitely helping us since we're never in our area. the few days we were in our area were jammed with teaches. Yesterday we were so exhausted after all the running around we've been doing.

The exchanges were so so much fun. The sisters in this mission are amazing! First we went to Weymouth. on the train I think it took us about 6 hours or something. We traveled so much this week! I think it was like 14 hours in total or something. Weymouth is a beautiful area! It is right by the coast, it looks a little bit like Hastings. I worked with Sister Jonutz who is actually from my MTC group. I've never served around her before so it was fun to work with her for a day. She is from California and she is an amazing missionary. We had so many cool experiences the whole day. I love moments when I am talking to someone on the street and I start teaching them something I have never even thought of before because the spirit is telling me exactly what to say. That happened in Weymouth and it was so neat. I love it! Sister Jonutz is serving with Sister Naseem who is from Pakistan. She is so funny, she reminded me a lot of Shipon from Bracknell. She is a tiny ball of energy who makes yummy spicey curry :) I'm going to be so curry deprived when I go home. haha

The exchange in Exeter was AMAZING!!! It was soo good to be back. I got to work with Sister Kutsevych again which was fun. She wouldn't really tell me what we were doing that day because she wanted it to be a surprize but I got to see so many people from the ward that day and a bunch of people that I taught while I was there. It was so fun. I felt like I had never left! Sister Kutsevych saved the best for last. She had arranged a teach/dinner with Martyn and Karina!!! She told Karina I was coming but they left it a surprize for Martyn. It was so funny because when we got to their house, right as we walked up to the gate he came out the door to throw something in the rubbish. He came right up to us and he didn't even know it was me, partly because it was dark and I had a hat on. He started walking back to the door so I ran after him and said 'HEY!' and he turned around and saw me and nearly died haha it was so funny. He almost hugged me and then stopped and then just screamed in my face so we were standing outside just screaming at each other haha it was so funny! It was so fun to be with them that night. It was amazing. We taught them about Temple marriage and they set a sealing date!!!!!! it's far away but they are going to get sealed on their wedding anniversary next year. It will be August 20, 2013. Hopefully I will be able to make it back for that because I would love to be there. They are such an amazing couple :) Martyn had asked me to sing Jerusalem at his baptism and I never got to so I sang that to him as well before we left. It was really cool. I love exeter!! I miss it there so so much. It was such a good area. I wish I could have stayed longer.

The whole week while we were gone, sister corner was in Eastbourne with the sisters. She ended up hurting her back really bad after falling down some stairs so she is still there. They live with a member so she was able to stay in with her while the sisters went out. She will be back with us tonight.

The traveling wore us out. It was a lot in such a short time but it was fun and we saw some really cool things. A lot of countryside and we were traveling through London as well so we saw it all!!! It was awesome :) We went on the London Underground. That is nuts. Way too many people crammed on a tiny train, luckily we weren't there during rush hour!

OH! I almost forgot! The Frohlichs (the German couple) came to church yesterday and LOVED it! Too bad they are moving to australia tomorrow..

It has been an amazing week. I loved it! So fun and so spiritual as well. Mission life is the best :)

Thanks for everything! I hope you have a great week! I will probably be skyping you on March 18 cause that is the mother's day here and we get to pick which mother's day we call on so I will see you then! I love you so much! Thanks for everything!

Love, sister gregson

Monday, February 20, 2012

My Life

Hagas for Valentine's Day!

Sisters at the conference in Crawley

Exchange with Sister Preistley

Me and Sister Allred

Fairlight Cliffs

Fairlight

My Tri

Heart Hastings

Sister Corner, Sister Allred, and ME!

Smugglers Caves

One More Adventure

Oh my goodness. Things just never slow down out here! It's so crazy but I do love it a lot. It is fun :) You'll never guess what happened this week.....Go ahead and try but there really is no point! So earlier this week we were in a teach (with our new investigator Claudia who is AMAZING!) and we got a call from president so sister alrled answered. President began with that phrase 'are you two ready for another adventure??!' Of course! I love presidents adventures. It's mad but it is so much fun. President has given us yet another assignment. We are TRAINING TOGETHER!!! hahaha There is a sister who is waiting for her visa to go to her mission in California. It hasn't come yet so they put her in this mission for a while till she gets it so president has put her with us and we are training her. She hasn't even been through the MTC yet. She is really cool. Her name is Sister Corner and she is from up north so she has a great accent! She lives in the Birmingham mission. She arrived in Hastings on Friday. Luckily our flat is huge so there is plenty of room for her but we only have two beds so I've been sleeping on the couch which has been surprizingly good for my back :) We don't know how long she will be here but President said plan on having her for a couple weeks. Transfers are next week so I don't know if he will keep three sisters here or what...who knows. he may just move me again so I may not even be involved haha. I can't believe I'm training again. I was really shocked but I love training! It is so much fun and the newbies always have so much fire. I love it! It will be wierd that both sister allred and I are training but so far we haven't had any problems. It is a lot of fun. All the tri's I have been in have been such a blast. I've been really lucky with companions!

This week has been really good. Things are going so well and the work is really starting to pick up in Hastings. The difficult part is we will be out of our area for most of the week this week so the two days we are here will be crammed with teaches and we'll be running from one appointment to another -if they all go through that is! We did our first 'senior sister trainer exchange' (ugh that needs a new name...) this week. It was a lot of fun! And complete madness for a bit. I brought sister preistley to Hastings and Sister Allred went to Eastbourne with SISTER HOWARD! man I miss serving with sister howard. She was the best. I've done several exchanges with Sister Preistley. This was our third. It was so much fun. She is an incredible missionary. I love her and I wish I could have served with her but it just wasn't meant to be I guess. She is from Lincoln (wherever that is. up north?) She is a convert. She has only been a member for 3 years or something. She finishes her mission right after I do so she came on a mission after only being a member for about a year. It was the same so many of my companions. Sister Mocza, Boleska did similar things. It amazes me when they go that soon after joining the church! Someone didn't want sister preistley and I going to Hastings... On wednesday we had zone conference in Crawley which was amazing! and after the conference we swapped. Sister Preistley and I went to catch a train and we missed it and the next one didn't come for an hour! so we went to eat dinner and then caught the train and we had to swap trains at another station and long story short all the trains were delayed and everything was a mess and trains were leaving from the wrong platforms and trains were delayed again and again. It was nuts. It was getting pretty late and no trains seemed to be going to Hastings anymore. The trains were delayed because of an 'intruder incident' or something. we caleld the office elders and the sister in Tunbridge wells were having the same problem and were stranded at another station so the elders picked all of us up and drove us to Tunbridge Wells to spend the night. The next morning we went finally made it to Hastings!!! And it was a great exchange. We had so many miracles and met so many great people. The area is really taking off which is difficult because we won't have much time to work in it this week.

Sooo...yeah. That was my week. I hope that all made sense. It has been so crazy and I'm running out of time so I have to go. Today we are going to the Battle of Hastings with our District which will be fun!

Thanks for everything! I love you so much and I am so grateful for all that you do for me! I love it out here so much. I nearly broke down in tears about 6 times yesterday because it kept hitting me how soon I will be home. Aahh!

I love you so much! thank you for everything. and thank you for sending that letter that dad had written. that was amazing and just what I needed to hear. Thank you, that meant a lot to me.

I love you!!!

Love, chels

Monday, February 13, 2012

Storm Troopers Need the Gospel Too

Mishins Are Fun!!

Holy moly this week went by way too fast. I feel like I was just emailing YESTERDAY. I wish time would just slow down for a second.

Things have been going so well! I love it out here. The work in Hastings is taking a while to get going. We've been giving out BoM's like mad but nothing seems to be going past that. I just want to grab people and make them listen! No one is safe from me right now :) I've been working harder than I ever have and I think it is just because I know my time is running so short.

I am so scared to come home. I would much rather stay out here forever. I've been talking to President about it recently and we started talking about the possibiliy of me extending my mission. I've been praying about it a lot and I feel really good about it. I would just be coming home to summer so I thought maybe I will extend and then just come home when school starts.. I know you probably aren't too fond of that idea so don't worry because none of that is true. I am still coming home in April unfortunately ;)

Things have been crazy this week. We went to Zone Leader Council which was really fun. All the Zone Leaders were there and then the 'senior sister trainers' I hate that name so much. The training was such a blast. It was at presidents and they just talked to us a lot about helping the other missionaries, especially when you are on exchanges with them. We are doing an exchange this week with the sisters in eastbourne which are pretty much down our street and then the next week Sister Allred and I will be going all the way out to Exeter and Weymouth to do exchanges with them. I get to go back to Exeter for a day! I'm going to tell the sisters to try and set up a teach with Martyn so I can see him and his cute wife. I will probably get to work with Sister Kutsevych as well :) It will be so much fun. I am really excited about it!

The frohlich's are doing really well. When we went to teach them the said their prayers had been answered and it was a little spooky to them. Things that they had been struggling with for so long were solved the day after they prayed the first time. It was amazing! The sad things is they are moving in about 2 weeks so we won't get to teach them much longer. Ollie is doing great as well. He read the whole childrens BOM reader and loved it. His mom doesn't want to push him on baptism yet but he wants to come to church and he's been praying on his own and everything. THings are going great!

Well family. I am completely out of words. Just know that I am so happy and I love the mission so much and I am working so hard that Hastings will probably explode soon :)

Thank you for everything you do for me. I love you so much! Have a great week!

Love, chels

PS random funny- we started teaching this guy who is the equivalent of crocadile dundee. He looked like he stepped right out of australia. Did I tell you about him yet? We went to his house to teach him and he owns about 7 digery-do's (sp??) that he played for us the first time we met him on the street. I think he thought we were coming back for a lesson instead to teach him about the gospel haha Calling him eccentric would be an extreme understatement. He is particularly fond of his thighs and he thinks ostrich's are as well....that is a long story and I didn't even really understand it when he told it but it was funny!! When we went to his house I felt like I walked into a south african pon shop or something. It was crazy! The member we brought with us was pretty stunned the whole time and the entire teach I was trying to think of a way I could get a picture of his house with out him noticing however I probably could have just asked him and he would have even posed :) I love teaching people like that. You meet some of the funniest people on the mission. It is such a blast!

I love you!