Letters From Kristina-California Santa Rosa Mission: Transfers, Octopus, and 50 first lessons...

Last day of my first transfer....

Holy moly where did the time go?!? It's crazy, missionary time is so different. Weeks are days and days are weeks! It seems like just yesterday I was stepping off the plane, but at the same time, that feels like an eternity ago!

So this week has been crazy. Literally so many ups and downs this week! Let's start out with what is happening with transfers tomorrow. So I'm staying here in Santa Rosa! Which I am so happy about! But sister lesser is being transferred to Vallejo.........I am so sad! I absolutely adore sister lesser and we have become such good friends! Since my mom(trainer) is leaving me, I get a dad now(follow up trainer)! Her name is Sister Whimpey! I've met her already! She came and stayed at our apartment last week for MLC(mission leadership conference). She is an STL so that why she stayed here(perks of living in the apartment closest to the mission office, we get tons of sisters staying here all the time!)! But she is super cute and fun so I'm excited to get to work with her! But I'm going to be leading out the area...pray for me! Haha I'm definitely still learning the area so this should be fun! For the other girls in my apartment, sister Poulter is going home tomorrow! I am so glad I got to know her before she leaves! She has been such a huge role model for me! Definitely going to miss her! And for sister Ngawharau, she is staying here but she's becoming a mom(trainer)!! So that means there's going to be another new greenie in the house! I'm excited! Sister Ngawharau and I have become really good friends! We mess around and play jokes on each other all the time. But she's huge and she beats me up...just kidding, but really though, she's huge haha she was a professional kick boxer back home in New Zealand and she's also part of the navy. But she's awesome and I love her! So happy that she's staying here! As for the rest of my district/zone, they pretty much scattered everyone! Which I'm sad about, but change is a good thing! I'm excited to meet new people and make more friends!

So once again this week has been so crazy! So I'll just tell you some of the stuff that happened this week! To start out, PDay last week was so fun! We were suppose to go to the beach, but plans were changed and we ended up just going to the stake center to play basketball, volleyball, and football! Man! I have missed playing sports! It was so great just to throw the football around again and to be in a gym! On Tuesday, I went on exchanges again with sister Reidhead! She came to my area this time, so I got to practice leading out the area! We ended up having an awesome day! We had a great lesson with our investigator Mike! By the end of the lesson, Mike agreed to come to a church tour!! THIS IS A HUGE STEP FOR HIM! I almost started to cry because I was so happy for him! He came on Thursday to the church tour, and we had two members with us. It was amazing. The spirit was so strong and Mike is progressing so well! I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY! Other things that happened this week, I had dinner with the Groesbeck family Wednesday night! Sis. Groesbeck is Michelle Rays sister! They are in the Rincon Valley Ward, but it was so fun getting to know them! Such an awesome family! She is a lot like Michelle haha I love it! Also, this week we had our second lesson with our new investigator Bruce...turns out he has short term memory loss. Haha so he had no idea who we were or who Christ was. So we had to explain to him what the bible was and who Christ is! We decided after that lesson that we probably shouldn't continue teaching him because it would end up like 50 First Dates haha or in our case 50 First Lessons! Haha sister lesser and I had a good laugh about it. We also went to a super sketchy Chinese restaurant this week with a member! Haha they had really weird food there, but we ate it anyways! Haha I'll send pictures :) and a video of me eating mini octopus haha kinda weird!

Part of the downs this week included finding out transfers(because sister lesser is leaving ): ), and our investigator Wally. Wally called us early Saturday morning and told us that he no longer wanted to meet with us....dagger to the heart. He told us that he had written a letter to us explaining why he came to this decision and he wanted to give it to us that afternoon at the church. When we met him at the church, he told us that it was the hardest decision he has ever made and that he just felt uncomfortable pursuing the Mormon religion. Sister lesser and I are still really confused. Wally had come to church last week, his lessons were going well, and he had a baptismal date for the 20th of this month...Wally was progressing so well! He even said that he loved church and learning and ultimately he wanted to be baptized! So we don't know what happened! We told Wally to keep reading the Book of Mormon and to call us if he ever needs anything. But losing an investigator and a friend is so hard! Not a fun experience but we have to understand that everyone has their own agency. It's their choice to accept our message or not. But you just want the best for them because you grow to love them!

So something really cool that is going to happen this week is the stake is putting on a MTC experience for the priests and laurels in the stake! So for three days, a laurel is going to be staying we us, eating with us, going to lessons with us, and just seeing what it's like to be a missionary! So cool huh? I wish our stake had something like this growing up! I think I would have been more inclined to go on a mission for sure if I knew what it was like! So we get a cute little mini missionary with us for three days this week! So excited!

I love California, I love this gospel, I love this work, and most importantly I love my savior! I hope you all have a great week! I love you!

Love Always, Sister Thompson :)

PIX

1. Sis. Ngawharau and sister lesser and I in coordinating colors :) not planned

2. Idaho Dr.!

3,4,5. My zone! Love all of them!!