Week 7 - Wednesday, March 30th, 2011

Dear family, . So! this week has been intersting. I honestly can't remember anything that happened at the beginning of the week. We met people and talked to lots of people who weren't interested. (Don't worry they will be some day) So it's been a long week. And I got slightly frustrated with people and their lack of care. I wanted to call them all to repentance, but it's not how I'm supposed to do it, so I tried to think of things that I could do to make myself better so that I could get the work done and actually meet people who were interested but I ended up really frustrated and I didn't think I could do it. I knew I was the problem but I didn't know how to fix it. So yesterday, I finally told Sis. Cluff everything that was on my mind and how I didn't feel like I had the Spirit with me and I felt like a terrible missionary. We talked during companionship study and I got it all off my chest. After I felt slightly better. Later that day we actually met with one of our recent converts. He was having a terrible day and was having suicidal thoughts. In that instant I knew exactly what to say to him and I felt the spirit so strongly. I told him about my experience that morning and how because we were talking today he answered my prayers. We helped him call the Bishop for a meeting with a psychologist. He doesn't want to commit suicide, but he has thoughts and dreams about it because his friend committed suicide 5 years ago and he blames himself. Well because Sis. Cluff's dad is a psychologist he actually sent her a letter the Tuesday before that told her what to do in the situation of a person having suicidal thoughts. We were able to help him and he felt a lot better after we met. We know he will feel that way again so that's why he is meeting with the bishop tonight and he was given Sis. Cluff's dad's cell-number just in case. Heavenly Father has told us the worth of Every soul is great in the sight of God, and when people forget their worth or they want an escape from the pains of the world they look to suicide. But Suicide will not help. The same things they deal with in this life will follow them into the next. It doesn't matter if we have bodies or not. While we are here on earth we have a weapon, our bodies. Satan isn't happy with that so he will try any means for us to lose that weapon and he will tell us that death is an escape. Suicide is no escape. . Heavenly Father prepared us well and he helps build us all up through each other. Wards are our families and they are what keep us going. When we ignore others in our ward or when we judge others, that's when people leave and do things that they shouldn't. We should never judge anyone or be rude to anyone for any reason because we don't know how what we say affects them and we are supposed to be a family. Sometimes, the members have no one else but their ward family to build them up and make them stronger. As we do missionary work not only with non-members but also less-actives we are able to build a fire in ourselves to keep us going strong but we build others up and in return they build us up. . Now for the part that made yesterday the best day of my mission so far!!! . So after meeting with this man and making his day better and allowing the spirit back into his life and mine we went in search for less actives that we're supposed to meet. We couldn't get a hold of any of them so we went home for our dinner break and took a well-deserved, and long-awaited nap. We were exhausted. . After dinner we tried a few others without much success and then we went to the Schwarz. They are a less active family that pretty much is composed of a bunch of random family members plus kids who run away from abusive parents and who live on the street. They take all these kids in, with rules that they can't do drugs, smoke, or any other bad things while they live at that house. Many kids have continued to live there because they feel better there. Robbie (who's a girl) and her husband pretty much parent all these kids and last week they were all told that they had to get a job. All of them got jobs! Robbie is hillarious she is a beautician and she loves designing things in her house, so she gives us tips on house design stuff, hair care, and cheap things we can buy that are just as good or better, such as food. They also keep an aquarium of fish in their house and they all have their fish they've contributed in getting and pets that have been rescued from terrible situations. . So I met Socket, the one-eyed cat last night, I met a blind fish and I saw coral and an anenime eat last night. It was cool! They are an awesome family and Robbie is now one of my hero's. She's led a very hard life and so she doesn't judge anyone now, she will take these kids in who she doesn't know and she will care for them and love them, no matter what they've done. Well they're less active bc it's hard for her to get these rebellious kids to go to church (they sit in the foyer in their pj's sometimes just so she can get some of them to church) and because she doesn't want to give up her coffee or swearing and she doesn't like how people judge her because she has eccentric hair colors. BUT she told us as we were walking to our car that she's giving up coffee and swearing and she's planning on going through the Temple this year!!!! It's been her goal for a while, but because her sister gave up smoking to live with her they're working together to go to the Temple! I have never been so excited for someone I don't really know in all my life!!!! We ended up driving home listening to our favorite song and just full of joy! It was AWESOME!!! . As for the other investigators... we haven't seen Alex this week, we're waiting for Sara's mom to leave before we visit her but we send her texts every now and then. (oh yeah, we text, how strange is that) As for the Thomas's we haven't seen them this past week but we will see them on Thursday! Hopefully he sincerely prayed! That's about it on our investigators. We're working a lot with the less-actives in our ward. I don't know if you've heard of Pres. Monson's The Rescue, but it's pretty much each presidency in the ward picks 5 names of less-actives to work on and the goal is to get them to the Temple and to strengthan their families as well. So we've had lots of meetings with the presidencies, especially because 2/3 of the ward is less active. Only 1/3 attends church and less go to the ward activities. We're working on it. . Ok answers... I can't send pictures today bc I forgot the cord, sorry. :( As for my companion, Sis. Cluff, I love her. She is practically my sister, we're very similar and very goofy. :) Which of course I love. We're in charge of one ward and in fact we share it with two other sisters because there are so many less actives and so much work to do. . I'm sorry the girls are sick, tell them to feel better! As for Emmy, YEAH! I'm so glad she's finding friends. And Olivia(and her ladybugs)... I guess she had to have an obsession with something. But you're saying she isn't collecting paper dolls?! I'm shocked. ;) MTE stands for mission training experience? I have no idea. But Pres talks to two zones at once about whatever he feels we need to know. We have that every other month and then zone conferences on the other months. We haven't sung yet, we're singing in Spanish on April 10th.

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We can drive anywhere in our area. If we go out of the area we have to ask President first. Oh and we're allowed 1200 miles a month (we're under 1000 with 3 days left!) We don't serve at the Battalion but we can bring our investigators there, we've gone 3 times so far. I have the song memorized already. :) Last Tuesday we went to the Light House at Point Loma. It was really cool, I'll send pictures next week. Today we're going to have a relaxing day and we're going to have lunch with our district at Mission Bay, maybe we'll even play some Frisbee! ;) hahaha

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We eat pretty much anything. I've had squid and a few other random things so far. :p Don't worry mom I'm eating and most of it is healthy. :) haha

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Oh and because the floors in our shack are wood, we've resorted to using prayer pillows so our knees don't hurt. They're quite comfy! Oh and mom I made mint brownies last week! Every one loved them! Especially our "grandpa" Bro. Bronson who is continuously spoiling us. :)

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Well I love you all! Everything is going well here and the work will be increasing this week. Promise. Sorry for the long letter. And I promise to write your letters back soon. It's a little harder to write those but I should finish them today. Love you have a great week and keep up the missionary efforts!

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Love, Sister Davis

Week 6 - Wednesday, March 23rd, 2011

Ok sooo... In case you don't get on before I leave. I wanted to write you all about what has been happening here.

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Our investigators: Theresa, we're dropping because she refuses to change her religion, it's hard bc we love her and she loves us but we could be doing more effective things then listening to her tell everyone and their dog that she will "never, never, never change her religiono." So after this saturday we won't visit her again for a while, and we just learned that she can't read so we'll have to get a cd of the book of mormon, in portuguese for her. And as for the Fillipino family, well the mom doesn't want anything to do with us and the father, Steven, has decided to continue being Lutheran, so he dropped us. But it's ok bc we know he'll come around when he realizes that he still needs more.

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Well, two p-day's ago we met these two people Alex and Sara while we were doing our laundry. They're best friends and we've taught Alex quite a few times now! Well on Friday, as we were about to teach him, he got arrested, right in front of us. :/ We found out later his parole officer thought he was breaking probation, but he was let out later that night, AND then he texted us and wanted to see us again for real! So we taught him and took him to a baptism! We invited him to be baptized. He said he didn't know yet, but he's thinking about it. We invited him to church and he came! (with his dog) That is the first time I've ever seen a dog in church other than Sis. Anderson's dogs when they were being trained. It was quite interesting, we sat at the very back. He liked church though and we're taking him to the Mormon Battalion on Wednesday. :)

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Well his friend Sara, we've gone to her house a few times to visit her but she was either away, or her mom came to the door and pretty much told us to not come back... but we came back anyhow. We visited her yesterday and she told us that she wasn't ready yet, so we started talking to her and then she began telling us all her problems and how life was so hard. We told her that Heavenly Father loved her and that is why we were there to talk to her. By the time we had to leave she was eager to see us again and we met her 4 yr old daughter and mother... duhn duhn duhn... her mother gave us a death glare then slowly smiled and talked to us. Yeah... we hope her mother doesn't hate us, that could potentially be a problem. But she is awesome and she told us that she was about to come outside and smoke when we showed up. So pretty much she realizes that we're there to help her. It was awesome!

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I'm sorry my writing is a jumbled mess. I'm writing everything that is in my head. :)

Well! Life is going well, sometimes we have hard days but Heavenly Father always blesses us by giving us an amazing experience throughout the day. :) Thank you for your continued prayers. I know they have blessed me and my companion and I loved your letters. They were all wonderful! it was so good to hear from each of you. And we did hear about Japan. There is a teenager in our ward who wants to be the next president... so he naturally studies two hours of government stuff each day. :p But he keeps us more or less updated on everything. It seems like the world is falling apart! And we heard that there was something about nuclear waste that was spreading? Oh dear. Whenever Sis. Cluff and I hear about these things, we pray for the people who need help and then get really excited because the second coming is coming up fast! :) We're really excited but that also means that we have to hurry up and teach everyone so that they have the chance to hear the gospel! oh dear. Well we're trying and we'll try continue to try harder! I don't know what else to say... If I think of anything else I need I'll let you know but I'm doing well right now. :)

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Well I'm tring to send you pictures but I can only send a few at a time bc it takes soooo long. So these are some fun pictures. 3 in the MTC. One with Laura (Sister Bayles), one with my district at the Provo Temple (back row, left to right: Elder Strommer, Elder Saager, Elder Galliher and Elder Iverson [w/ red hair], front row: Sis. McCloy, Me and Sis. Mitchell (she has Bright blue eyes, too bad you can't tell bc they're closed. :) )) and then the last one is Sis, Cluff and I - we were twinners that day, oh and I bought that new shirt from H&M! :)

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Well I love you all and I pray for you each night! Have a wonderful week and I'll write those letters back as soon as I can! :)

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Love, Sister Maureen Davis

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P.S. thanks for the letters from the other elders! :) Love you Mom! I'm glad you had a marvelous birthday!!!

Week 5 - Thursday, March 17th, 2011

Dear Loved Ones,
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Before I answer all your questions I wanted to tell you about what's going on right now. Theresa almost turned us out saying that she didn't want to talk to us anymore because she was getting confused after we left. (We think she is confused because she knows what we're telling her is right and she doesn't really want to change). Thankfully we had a young man with us who just got off his mission to Brazil, so he began speaking to her in Portuguese and she loved it! (she's originally from Portugal) She actually asked us later if we were married - we told her no, then she asked if Jace (the young man) was going to marry one of us. I think Sis. Cluff blushed. We all told her no, that we couldn't get married. She was shocked bc she didn't think we could get married at all! So we told her we'd get married in a few years. She is super sweet and she has practically adopted us as daughters, even though she's in her 70's. We love her.
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As for Bro. Thomas (I don't know if I told you about him yet), His wife is a member and her son happens to be Jace! (we love their family immensely) He is not a member and tons of missionaries have been working with him. We taught him a lesson this week about the Atonement and I know Heavenly Father was guiding that lesson - I went in there not knowing what to say and left thinking that everything that needed to be said, was said and at the perfect time too. I know it is His work and I'm so grateful to be a part of it! Bro. Thomas is more open to baptism now, we're still working with him though. And actually the Thomas's helped us get another investigator, Dove, to church this past Sunday. He's in a wheel chair and can't really walk so they helped him into their van and got him to church! It was a miracle as we didn't know how to get him there. The Thomas's are AMAZING! :)
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Last investigator I'll tell you about it Alex. He's 30 and we actually met him when we were doing our laundry last week. He told us that he was looking around at churchs and we asked if he had tried ours yet, he hadn't so we gave him a book of mormon, asked him to come to church and left. He didn't show up. :( But yesterday, when we couldn't get anything to work out well, we tried calling him. He picked up, asked to meet us right then, so we drove to the church and talked to him! Sis. Thomas was with us and we sat in the Chapel and taught the restoration. The spirit was really strong! I've found out that one of the gifts I've been blessed with is asking the right question at the right time. I know it's not me, but I get an idea, ask a question and with two or three of our investigators, they have told us that we answered their question, or they tell us something that they haven't shared with anyone else and they are then humbled. Well that happened with Alex and as soon as that happened, we bore testimony after testimony, he knew what we were telling him was true, and just kept agreeing to it all. He said he'd read, pray and come to Book of Mormon study tonight!!! He left and Sis. Cluff and I were pretty much bouncing off the walls! (Side note- right before we called Alex, Sis. Cluff pretty much openly asked God to give us a golden investigator because we were having a hard day. I guess he answers us immediately too. ;) )
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Oh yeah, so that Book of Mormon study thing I mentioned, it is the most amazing thing ever! You should start one in our ward. Pretty much anyone's invited, members, recent converts, less actives, investigators, etc. The missionaries head it and we go through and read one or two chapters a night. It's at a members home, so everyone is close and cosy, we read, the missionaries lead discussions, people can ask questions about what they read, etc. We begin with a prayer and song, end with a prayer and have refreshments after - homemade bread in our case. It's amazing and we had a great turn-out last week. It's every Tuesday night and I know I learned a lot last time! You should do it.

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Today I went to the San Diego Temple for the first time! It is absolutely breath-taking! I loved it!!! It really feels like a castle! We can only go 4 times a year, once every quarter. So I'm pretty much going 6 times while I'm out here, and I've seriously considered getting married in this Temple. It's beautiful! :)

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We're also considering an Easter Egg Hunt in our ward so that we can get the neighborhood involved and do some missionary work! Bishop's okayed it so if you have any thoughts on how to organize it Please let us know! :)

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Last thought.... I'm tired. We are on daylight savings now so I'm on the same time as you, but we lost an hour of sleep. :P I officially Don't like daylight savings.... not that I ever did of course. ;) But now I'm even more tired then ever before. We pretty much drop in our beds and go right to sleep. No joke. But I love it, I'd rather be tired than restless at night. OH yeah! So our Bishop, of the 12th ward in Clairemont, he has 6 kids. Forrest (17), Kira (15) Emma (10), Olivia (8), Abby (4), and Asher (1). I thought it was cool they coincided in age and a few names. Haha and last night we visited them and they totally know Kid History and quote it word for word. Poor Sis. Hamrick had to listen to me rattle off with her children pretty much all three episodes. :) They love me. Haha

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OK! Answers: We wake up at 6:30 - excersize for about 20 min's, lately we've been running every morning and my legs wanted to kill me the first week, but I'm doing better now. From 7-8 we get ready for the day. Then at 8 we have personal study, 9 companionship study/practice for 2 whole hours! (it's part of the pilot program). Then we eat lunch and get out and work for the rest of the day. We eat dinner whenever it is convenient and we have to be back to do daily planning for the next day at 9. We update the area book, get ready for bed and go to sleep! We try to have appointments all day long, if we don't though we contact the referrals we receive from this amazing future missionary in our ward. His name is Wesley and he's 17 and known as the mormon kid at school. We're pretty proud of him. :)

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We write a letter to our mission president, and every other month we either have Zone Conference or MTE's (also part of the pilot program). We also have a mission president's fireside every month. Sis. Cluff and I are going to sind a duet at the next one. They're pretty cool! So I've seen my district from the MTC a few times bc of pilot program stuff. Our mission is the only mission that is fully activated in the pilot program although lots of other missions have missionaries who studied it at the MTC. Pres. and Sis. Donaldson are amazing! I love them. The members are awesome because so many of them want to be involved in missionary work! They are fabulous! The first week was weird being in a new family ward but now that I know a lot of the members I love them so much! Most of them aren't judgemental and they're alright at being open with everyone, I think they're slightly shy though. Good thing I'm not right?....

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I eat food. Pretty much I've had squid now :p and I've had Tai food already, and this last Sunday we had roast. :) It's not as good as yours mom. The members spoil us and want to feed us every other day. So we're kept well fed, I have yet to make an actual meal. We've done a little bit of finding but really not much, it's all member missionary work here - which I absolutely Love! Clothes are good, just wish I had more of a variety. The skirt is alright right now, I've learned how to sit with it. If you want to search for more shirts that go with that all brown skirt, maybe another white shirt, that'd be nice. Thank you for praying for me, my companions and our investigators. I know we have all been blessed because of those prayers.
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It sounds like you are all busy but enjoying your time! I'm so happy for all of you and love hearing about what is going on and the cool things you are all doing. Tell Erin not to worry, she will love Premiere and get into Chorale next year! I'm so glad Maddy's enjoying the music program and she better write me soon! So should Erin! I love Emmy and Olivia's letters, they make my day! I just got the bread package today! Thank you so much! We're so excited to eat it! And Olivia's picture of us being missionaries, that's totally going to happen some day. I'd love to have her as a companion. :) Tell everyone I love them, tell them to write soon, I'm so grateful for this gospel and for the blessings of the Temple. I'm so happy for you and dad, that is a really great goal. I'm glad I was able to go every week before leaving. That was a blessing in my life for sure. I'm so excited for you all. You're letter made me smile! I know that the more we put the Lord ahead of ourselves the more we will be blessed and the greater our lives will be.

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I have about an hour to write now, so i'll try to write as much as possible each week! Amy actually wrote me so I pretty much have every address. Oh and I'd love pictures of my room and you are allowed to send me pictures of you all Before I left. I'm waiting a year and a half to see how much you've grown and changed... that's crazy. Well time is flying, sorta. This last week was short anyway, probably because we kept ourselves busy. It's amazing that we can receive revelation for these people while on our missions and the only other people who recieve revelation for others is the Apostles and Prophet! So I want to make the best out of this mission, and out of the time I have here. I am so blessed, I don't know why Heavenly Father blessed me SO much, but I am very grateful for it. I thought coming here and giving a year and a half of my life would make it more equal... but He keeps blessing me more and more. I love this gospel. I love you all! I pray for you all, And I think all of my sisters should serve a mission, it will bless you more than you know! Well I gotta go now, talk to you next week!

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P.S. HAPPY BIRTHDAY TOMORROW MOM!!!! I'm sending a letter but it will be late, so I hope it is FANTASTIC! ;)

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Love, Sister Maureen Davis

Week 4 - Tuesday, March 8th, 2011

Dear Mother, Father and all others at home,

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I love you all soooo much! I'm so grateful to have you in my life. :)

Well... it sounds like everyone is doing well. I'm excited for Erin's call-backs, Maddy going to BYU, Emmy doing flips and such and hanging with new friends, and I bet Olivia loved her Dr. Suess party. :) You are all keeping busy and having fun it sounds like! Tell my Aunts and Uncles Hi for me, Give everyone my love and hugs and kisses!
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Okay and as for the Elders who were late, it really wasn't their fault. The flight time was changed so they didn't know exactly when they could get on the plane, and Elder Strommer got a hold of his dad right when they should have left for the plane so the other Elders felt bad and tried to hurry them along. It was just a very confusing airport and it was hard because there were limited phones as everyone has cell-phones now. So it was stressfull and the Elders felt terrible about it. After they came to the mission home safe I felt 100 times better and President wasn't mad at them at all. They were able to call president soon after they missed the flight and they got on the next flight and arrived safely. So don't be hard on them. They've learned and grown immensely from that mishap. :) They're awesome elders.

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And as for my companions before I didn't want to say anything, they are both wonderful and I got along really well with Sis. McCloy; Sis. Mitchell is fun, she is just a little picky about food, more than me ;) and she is NOT a morning person. But they are both wonderful. Now I have an amazing companion/trainer. Her name is Sis. Cluff and she is from Idaho. She amd I are so similar and Sis. Stenson, our sister coach yesterday, was surprised that we hadn't been companions for more than a week with each other because we work so well together. I love her. She's awesome and such a wonderful example. :) We've also met with President a few times at something called MTE that only San Diego mission is doing because it is part of the pilot program. He is awesome and so knowledgable and he says when he and Sis. Donaldson leave they will give us each a CD that contains ALL his notes EVER. It's called the Disc of Knowledge and I'm so excited to get it. :)

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Well I'm sorry I can't really write more but I wanted to tell you about Theresa and The Filipino family we're teaching. Theresa is special to me because she is the first person I was a part of contacting. We talked to her on thursday night and found out that her family has pretty much all passed away, she's from Portugal and is probably in her late 70's. She's a small lady and sometimes it's hard to understand her with her accent. She was raised catholic and her mother told her on her death bed that she can never leave the Catholic church... so we'll be working on that. ;) We told her that she could live with her family again and she began crying, she didn't think it was possible but we told her we knew she could and asked her to pray about it. We visited her again yesterday and she said she prayed but still didn't know and said she was not going to change her religion. We talked to her again about how families can live together forever, gave her the book of mormon in portuguese, asked her to read it and pray and she said she would that night!!! We are so excited for her and are trying to figure out how she can get passed her mothers dying wish. So pray for Theresa.

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As for the Filipino family, Sis. Cluff actually was supposed to go on her mission to the Phillipines so she was there for a month, got sick, came home and iis now serving with me. So we were referred to them and today we finally got a hold of them and the father, steven, said he was having a really hard time with life and he was trying to be better and at times he would know he could do it but then a few hours later he'd go back to how he was before. So we told him to read Alma 36 about alma's conversion story and even though earlier he said he wouldn't have time to read he said he'd read it tonight!!! We're so excited for them and we told him that we knew exactly how he felt and how he can get through that *hint - 4th article of faith* haha we're super happy for their family, so pray for them as well!

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Well I have to write a letter to president now. I should be writing around 1-3 on Tuesday's since that is my p-day now, so write me before then! :) Oh and Mom if you could track down Becca and Amy's address's that would be wonderful. They're being slackers and I need to know if either of them are engaged yet. ;) Thanks!

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I love you all and I hope you have a fabulous week! Oh and yes I did get my package in time, I live in a shack (but I love it), that pillow is really comfortable, and Mom have you received the pictures from the Mormon Battallion that I sent home? There was one of our District at the MTC minus Elders Galliher and Iverson. And the other picture was of me, sis. Cluff, and our investigator Alex! I hope you got them, let me know! Tell Maddy to track Mark and Dan down and tell them to write me back. As we had MTE today our p-day was changed to tomorrow so I won't get letters till tomorrow but I could still write you today. Life is great, I'm loving the work. :)

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Love you all!

Love, Sis. Davis!
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P.s. I'm eating well, the members love to feed us here, and I've adopted Bro. Bronson as a gradfather. He's the ward clerk and he loves spoiling us with food and treats and he's helping us wash our cars tomorrow. :) Oh yeah we have a car, no biking or walking, yay!

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P.s.s. (i keep remembering things) I'm living in Clairemont, California, right outside San Diego; the member missionary work is really good out here so we never go tracting - we just get referals all the time.

Your daughter has arrived in San Diego

Greetings from the California San Diego Mission!
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Your daughter, Sister Davis has safely arrived in the mission field. We are delighted to have her serving with us among the wonderful people of Southern California. In addition to the tremendous weather and scenery, we have remarkable missionary opportunities.
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Thank you for sending such a wonderful missionary to our mission. We are confident that with your prayers and her hard work that she will have a rich experience here in San Diego that will bless both her and those she teaches.
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I have attached a couple of pictures that were taken this afternoon at the Mission Home.
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God bless you for your sacrifice in sending us your daughter to labor among some of Heavenly Father's choicest spirits.
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Lee Donaldson
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President, California San Diego Mission

Week 3 - Tuesday, March 1st, 2011

Dear All,

Thanks for all the love and support! I'm still not really homesick which I take as a good sign bc I still have 17 months left of being homesick. I'm really surprised at how fast time flies out here! I can't believe I'm leaving tomorrow! I feel like I just got here yesterday and yet with everything I've learned in the meantime it's felt like 3 months. It's crazy! Thanks Emily for posting my letters!

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I can't wait to here about Erin's call-backs! I bet she will get in both. The teachers love her there! And I surely hope Maddy gets into BYU. Lame ASU for being so rude. That's why I left that school. ;) Haha jk. Guess what?! I just ran into Markie! She's in vending and she was just stocking the laundry machine soap dispenser as I walked in the laundry room today. I told her you'd be jealous of her. ;) And yes, I did see Spencer, I mean Elder Griffin. I've actually seen him around a lot since he got here and he's doing well, just a little quieter than usual. :) He misses his friends. Emmy- deary! I love you so much! I didn't mean to make your note shorter - I just happened to write all the good stuff in a short amount of space, you get just as much love as everyone else! Promise. :) Livy-lou - I love you too! I hope you have fun at the Dr. Suess birthday party! I know you'll love that.

I'm glad the sunbeams are doing well. I miss them all.

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I think I got all the letters from you, maddy and erin at least. I haven't heard from any Aunts, Uncles or Grandparents but please tell them all that I love them and miss them soooo much! I'm constantly reminded of the promise I made to Aunt Diana and Alison about swapping mission stories and we actually hear from Pres. Monson's daughter in relief society, Sis. Dibbs. She talked about how much her daughter loved her grandpa and it made me miss My Grandparents so much. I love you all and wish you well in everything! I'll probably call tomorrow at 6:10 just so that I make the plane in time. And you better realize how blessed you are NOT to wake up at 3 AM. I'm frantically packing today, trying to get everything in my suitcases, and the weight distributed so that I don't have to pay a fine.

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Okay, for my investigators at the MTC. We taught a girl from China who didn't know anything about any religion, so we taught her and now we are best friends. She's going to BYU and she says she'll see me in a year and a half and when we get home we all have to be Facebook friends. She wants to write us so we gave her our address and took pictures with her. She is such a wonderful girl, just full of questions and wanting so much to have the happiness that everyone else here feels.

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As for my teacher "investigators," well Drew was "baptized" on saturday so we rushed to teach him everything, thank heavens he didn't have a problem with anything but the word of wisdom and thank heavens he was so willing to change his life to follow God. If we were in the mission field I would consider him a golden investigator...kinda. Well Chris was a bit harder to crack but we got him to accept to be "baptized" in 3 weeks. :) As unreal as these situations are they seem very real to me. I actually can't wait to teach real investigators or how they say in France "ami's." I'm also really nervous but I know if I'm obedient I will have the Lord on my side and with the Lord I can do anything. :) Wish me luck!

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I'll send home some pictures soon but I'm so busy right now I don't have time much for anything. Thanks mom for getting me that stuff and I guess I'll have to get used to this new nickname... we'll see if I get used to it. ;) Haha OH! Yeah, the hosting was a blast! I see at least two of the sisters I took around constantly. It was fun getting to know them and showing them around. I felt cool. haha. The other girl Ihosted is actually going to Tucson on her mission. I feigned excitement. I feel bad, Tucson isn't that pretty. I don't even know if I'm spelling it right. Well thanks for the pictures and thanks for everything else! I'm sending the jacket home so I'll put a letter in there as well. I love you all! Keep up your missionary efforts! And please excuse my messy spelling and grammer.

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Love you!

Love, Sister Maureen Davis