Saturday, January 26, 2013

The House of the Lord

Going to the temple for the first time... WOW! Such a cool experience! I took out my endowments and the Mount Timpanogos Temple and it was amazing! My mom got to be my escort and I was lucky enough to have most of my family attend. The whole experience was overwhelming, but I am grateful that I live close enough to several temples that I will be able to go often before leaving. There is also a new temple in Kyiv, hopefully I will be able to attend on my mission as well. I can't imagine what that would be like in a completely different language!
As most who have gone through the temple can tell you the first time is an experience that you will never forget, nor ever be able to repeat. It was all so amazing! The best part was being in the celestial room with my family. After everything, all the feelings of nervousness, the not knowing or trying to grasp it all at once it was the best feeling ever to walk into that room and have my family waiting for me! That truly is what it is all about, being able to return to our Heavenly Father, our older brother, Jesus Christ, and being with those we love forever!
A nice "warm" day to be going to the temple!

Aunt Sandra, Aunt Jamie, Uncle Russ, Uncle Colby,
Aunt Teresa, Aunt Cherylee, Me and my Mom!
I am lucky enough to be stuck with these AWESOME people forever!

Friday, January 25, 2013

HOW DO YOU KNOW YOU HAVE A MISSIONARY AT YOUR HOUSE?

How do you know that you have a missionary at your house?
The throttle in the car goes out.
A water pipe at the salon breaks.
Karissa gets rear ended in her mom's beloved car.
The battery in the other car dies, leaving us stranded.
...I think that about sums it up!
 
In December the throttle in my mom's car went out, and $400.00 later we got it fixed and it was ready to go again! Thank goodness! That car is my mom's 5th child, heaven forbid anything goes wrong with her car, she loves it!
 
A couple weeks later amidst one of the many "Storms of the year" we have been having lately I took my mom's car to have my interview with the Stake President to receive my recommend. Coincidently when I grabbed my purse I took my car keys with me as well. This left my mom stranded, which would have been fine if she hadn't have gotten a call from the salon informing her that a water pipe had broke and was currently flooding the salon!
She literally got to run to the salon so that she could address the problem. My Uncle Russ and grandpa got to be the heros and fixed the problem with the water pipes, thankfully. No worries though, I did get my recommmend!
 
The next day, as a result of this "Storm of the year" I drove my mom's car to work in Springville, only to get to work 3 hours early! I decided that was a little too early to start working, so I got back on the freeway to head home for a bit. Big mistake!
Long story short... 5 cars total. 1 spun out and hit 2 others, I slowed to avoid the accident and was rear ended by a semi.
Because of the night before and that drama, my mom had turned her phone off. Guess who gets to be the hero again?! You guessed it, Russ and my grandpa! (Man, this blog makes them look freaking amazing! Good thing they are!) Luckly they were working in Orem and were able to rescue me from the side of the freeway. Russ and I drove my mom's car home, following my grandpa, on our way to tell my mom that I wrecked her beloved car.
Thankfully, the car is not totaled, but it did receive a lot of damage. I wasn't hurt, just sore for a few days, I slept it all off over the weekend.
 
After all the drama of wrecking my mom's car and water pipes breaking, my mom decided to take my brother, Rylan, to see a movie and take a break. They took my car to the theater in P.G. and when they went to leave the theater after the movie was over, guess what?! My car battery was dead! So, who do you think we called?! Just my grandpa this time, we decided to give Russ a break, and he lives further away.
 
I think all these trials have made my mom more anxious to get me out in the mission field, and I don't blame her! Thank goodness for my family and our ability to stick together and help each other out! I am eternally grateful for the amazing family that I do have and all the fun, crazy and amazing times we share! Leaving them will be the hardest part of this experience! You know what they say,
"Missionaries leave there families for [18 months] so that others may be with theirs for eternity."
 



 

JOIN IN ON THE FUN!

General Conference Saturday at my house has usually consisted of cleaning out the garage and listening to conference on the radio. The one year we don't have a garage to clean out and we sit down to watch the morning session, my life completely changes! How is that for a coincidence?
 
I received my call on November 28 2012, and opened it about 10 minutes later. I don't like suprises and don't often react very well, if at all. My mom and I were in the kitchen and she didn't think I really would open it; I did. I read it to myself, blank expression, and said "I am going to Ukraine." She thought I was kidding, but when she read it for herself her reaction was, verbatum, "Oh my hell! Wait, I probably shouldn't say that about a mission call but, oh my gosh! Ukraine, where is that?"
 
We then spent the next hour going over all the information in the packet.
Later that night we went to my grandparents to read the call to my family. It was really fun to watch everyone guess where I would be going and thinking in my head, "Nope." "Not even close." "Nice try!" I think the closest guess we got that night was Sweden?
When I read the call to my family is when I started to cry and realized that this was a real thing!
 
 
My official call is the Kyiv, Ukraine Mission teaching the gospel in the Ukrainian language. I report to the Provo, Utah MTC on March 27, 2013.
I started this blog so that those who want to can follow me through this experience as I go to teach the gospel in Ukraine. I will be keeping it up until I leave then it shall be my mom, wish her luck! This should be fun!