The Last One!

Sister Hanson, Carla, and Sister Fenn

I have been saying this to everyone! But I never thought this day would come!!!!! It is crazy how fast things happen when you are having fun!!!! I have enjoyed my mission and all the things that I have been able to go through!

 

Some things that happened this week!

• We met with Kellie and Monica and we brought Kellie's seminary teacher! We taught them the Word of Wisdom! We had a really good lesson with them! Let me just tell you members are wonderful to bring to lessons! They just have something extra special to add to the lesson!!!! So we committed Monica and Kellie to live it and Monica didn't know if she could give up coffee. But she did it and she has not had coffee since then!!!!! I am so proud of her!!!! Those two are just on fire they are doing so well!!!! They will be baptized on April 16th!!!! Maybe I can go??? Who knows!!! hahah
• We also met with Carla!!!! (the Italian exchange student!) We started teaching the Restoration but then it turned into a Word of Wisdom lesson also!!!! Hahaha Carla has lots of good Questions and we tried to answer all of them but it didn't work!!! We discussed the culture here compared to Italy. She has a friend in Italy that is Mormon and I am excited for her to go back there and talk more with her!
• We also met with Rebecca this week!!!! She is moving slowly! She finished the Doctrine and Covenants! I have not even done that! hahah One day I will! But she made a special effort to come to church! But she didn't make it, but I know her husband will be okay with it!!! I know she will get baptized because that is what she truly desires!!!!!! I love Greenwood!

Sorry I didn't have a lot of time this week but I just wanted to say that I know The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is true!!!!! This is where I am supposed to be! I know the Book of Mormon is the Word of God! I know Joseph Smith is a prophet! How could it not be true!!! I have had so many witnesses that this is the true church and I cannot deny all those miracles!!!! I love all of you.  Thanks for supporting me through this wonderful journey!!! I have loved every one of my companions and I still do!!!! Last of all, I love my Savior Jesus Christ and my Heavenly Father! I am a Daughter of God!

Love Sister Hanson

The Cox's

The Sisters going home Fowler, Hanson, and Fenn

Kellie and Monica and Sister Hanson

Missionary Leadership Council with Sister Fenn!

The District!

Miracles!!!!!

All the sisters that attended Ronn's Baptism!

Hi family and friends!!! This week has been wonderful!!!! You probably expected that from me! haha But no really, this week was wonderful!!!!!

So many things happened but I am only going to tell you about a few of them because typing is not my favorite thing!!!!

• So this week! We taught Kellie and Monica about the Law of Chastity! It actually went really well!! At the beginning we were making crafts with them because we like to make crafts and it was service! We made cards for children at the Riley Hospital. I wish I had pictures but I don't. Then Monica's mom (the grandma) says that we should probably start the lesson. But she doesn't leave. So we started the lesson off with a video. This video is called "Chastity: What Are The Limits?" I remember my dad pulling us kids aside and showing us this video. Pretty cool video. They loved it. After the video was done the grandma left. So it was kinda cool. The grandma has never shown interest until now! So that was a good lesson! They are on track to getting baptized!!! Oh, and Monica even mentioned that their grandma was looking through the children's Book of Mormon!
• We had a Family Home Evening last week! It was really great! We talked about the commandments and why we need to obey them!!!! We invited some active families from our ward as well as Kellie and Monica and some recent converts! We also invited an exchange student that is from Italy!!!! Her name is Carla!!! She is the sweetest!!! We are going to teach her this week! She has been coming to church for at least 1 month now and she goes to seminary every morning!!! Love her! I'm pretty sure she will get baptized in Italy!!! With her parents permission! But she really does love the gospel so much! So we are excited.
• This week Ronn got Baptized!!!!!! I was able to play the piano at his baptism!!! He bore his testimony!!! It was full of the Spirit!!!! I am so excited for him! I went on an exchange this week with Sister Wilkinson!!! We had a good time!!! We pretty just went tracting the whole day! We passed a less active's house. And after 20 minutes of getting no one to talk to us we decided to go there! We ended up talking to the son that has not been baptized yet and his 7 year old sister. His brother is on a mission right now!! So we talked a lot about missions. I felt the prompting the whole conversation to promise him that if he read the first 3 chapters of the Book of Mormon and prayed about it with real intent he would know if he needed to go on a mission and know if the church was true!!! I am pretty sure he felt the Spirit really strong at that moment because I did! 

So I would say that this week has been pretty fantastic!!!! 

Love Sister Hanson

Ally and Sister Wilkinson

Allyson, Sister Fenn and Carla (Italian exchange Student)

These are the days!

And a cute picture of me because I know you like pictures!

Guess What?!?! This week the weather got up to the 60s!!!! That day was so wonderful!!! I wish it could be like that everyday!!!! Wow I love being a missionary! All those times that are hard seem to melt away when you help someone!

So this week I would say it was pretty normal!! or what you would call missionary normal Here are some highlights!

• We went to the temple on Saturday!!! That was fun! We did an endowment session! Sister Fenn's convert took out her endowments and it was a great session! During that same time we were going through that session it was the Mission Temple day! So I bet a lot of people were doing names!!! We are trying to get our converts to go back to the temple. So far they all want to go back.
• We taught just Monica this week! Kellie had work. But we will be teaching both of them a lot this week and next week! We taught Monica about the Gospel of Jesus Christ and of course she knew a lot about it! I think my favorite part in teaching that lesson is when we teach them about Repentance!!! Repentance is so much more than saying sorry!!!! Repentance is CHANGE. When you repent you change your human nature and turn to God! And Monica totally understands it!!!! She told us that she read the pamphlet 3 times! ahaha I love her! She is just so prepared and now she is trying to work on her husband!!! He might come next week!
• Loraine! We only got to teach her for about a half an hour this week! We read the Book of Mormon to her! She told us that she has been on a low this week. What instantly went through my mind was that she did not get to come to church! So we just kept asking her questions so that she could get to her own conclusion! She told us that she has not been reading her Book of Mormon as regularly as she did in past weeks and she also said that not going to church didn't help! So I have concluded that going to church and reading the scriptures on a regular basis make a big difference in our daily happiness! So hopefully she can come to church this coming week! I know it will really help her! Now she just needs to have the desire to make it there again!
• Coolest experience this morning!!!!!!! We decided we could give up an hour of our P-Day to go visit a less active! So we did just that! We visited this woman named Diana.... She is amazing. She had an accident happen a year ago. Because of this accident she lost her memory of everything. Except for the time before she was 9. So we just listened intently and she told us that she has had to relearn everything. She has amazing faith. She does not remember that she was a member of the church. But her ex-husband and kids are active members in another ward!! But she is interested in learning more about it! I bet her kids have already told her a bunch of stuff!!! So we are meeting with her next week on Monday before we email!!! I will tell you more about the meeting next week!!!

Love you all and hope you have a great week!!!!

Love Sister Hanson

Sister Hanson and Sister Fenn at the Indy Temple

Went on exchanges this week with Sister Zschokke! She is from California

Happy Valentine's Day and Happy Snow!

Here is a picture of me and Sister Fenn by a cool brick wall!!!!!

Happy Valentine's Day to all of you wonderful people! Other than having a really crazy blizzard in Greenwood I think I had a pretty good Valentine's Day!!! We were in church and we got out of Sacrament Meeting and looked out of the windows. Guess what we saw!  SNOW..... But we just continued walking to Gospel Principles!! haha But the snow kept making a menace and we had to have 3rd hour cancelled.... Sad I am glad I got to take the sacrament!!!!

Some updates for the week!!!!

• Angel and Dievon (recent converts) came to church and like always enjoyed it. Last week Angel invited her brother and his fiance to church. They didn't get to come last week but they came this week!!!! Her brother loved it. He participated in the class and was looking all over the gospel principles book! So I am excited! They are both really good at sharing the gospel with everyone!!!
• We taught Monica without Kellie this week because Kellie was working. But it was really good!!!! We taught Monica about the Plan of Salvation!!! She said it was really familiar to her. Which makes a lot of sense!! Because our spirits know it already we just have to be reminded of it! Monica and Kellie will be getting baptized in April so hopefully I can Skype them for their baptism!!!!
• Other News!!! Ronn in the last ward I was in. His baptismal date has been moved to February 27th!!!! So I can go!!!! I am so excited! His baptism is next week and he has been able to attend church the last two weeks!!!!!
• Something that has been a trend in the past month of me and Sister Fenn being together is that all the less actives that we see, none of them have read the Book of Mormon. Crazy right!?!? So I know if you want to be converted to the Gospel you need to read the Book of Mormon. The Book of Mormon is the KEYSTONE of our religion for a reason. We would not have a religion with out it!!! Today I was reading in Helaman chapter 3 or 4 not sure, but the cool thing about this chapter that I was reading was that it promises that if you hold fast to the teachings of Jesus Christ you will be able to withstand the Gulf of Misery.... Crazy!!!!! We just need to hold fast to the rod!!! Which is the Word of God!!!!! Don't forget about our daily conversion that is what will hold us when we are being tempted!!!!

Love you all hope you have a good week!!!! 

Love Sister Hanson

Sunday is the best day!!!!

Me and Sister Santiago (she is from Puerto Rico)

This morning I woke up and it snowed. Sad.... But this week has been wonderful!!!!! We had so many miracles! Just to give you a sneak peak on what happened this week, we got 2 people on date for baptism and 3 people came to church!!!!! My Sunday was filled with joy!

This week was amazing!

• So we started visiting a lady that is pretty much stuck in her home... It is sad. But she is the funniest person I have ever meet! Her name is Shirley! She tells us stories of her life every time we go over! She can't write anymore so we are helping her write her story down for her family history! She has been though a lot and she is just the sweetest lady!
• So we went to visit Loraine this week! You know how last week I said we just didn't know what to do with her anymore! Well....... drum roll........ she said that she got out of work this week so that she could come to Church!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!   We got so excited! So she came to church and brought Ashley her 8 year old daughter!!!! It seemed like Ashley loved primary! She always distracts us during lessons. So we were worried about her during church! But she did amazing!!!!
• Okay and even better! Monica and Kellie came to church!!!! This was fast Sunday mind you! We also taught both of them earlier this week! We taught them about feeling the Spirit! They loved it! On Sunday Monica got a blessing from the elders! Then during church she got up and bore her testimony! You know that feeling when people get up and you don't know what they are going to say! Well I had that feeling. But she said her testimony so beautifully and her daughter Kellie was crying! Then to make it even better Kellie got up and bore her testimony!!! Yesterday was just icing on the cake.
• We also went on exchanges this week! I went with Sister Fowler! We had a good time! We went tracting this week! knocked on a door and this lady just signals us to come in! So we did. She tells us how she and this other lady go to jails and tell people about God and get their lives back in order!!!! They are so cool! Then we gave them a card before we left! and They (both the ladies) tell us that they went to the temple open house! They loved it! So maybe we will go back over sometime!!!! Love those little tiny things that happen!

I love you all! Hope you have a great week!

Sister Hanson

Me and Sister Fowler at the library right now!

God is watching over us!

Sister Hanson and Sister Fenn

This week was really good!!!! There has been no snow yet. Which I am grateful for! This week a lot happened!!!! I just don't even know where to begin!

• We taught Kellie and Monica (Monica is Kellie's mom and she used to be anti). We taught the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ to them. It was an amazing lesson! Monica even pointed out that she could see that she had been prepared to hear our message a long time ago. We invited her to baptism and she accepted. She knows this gospel is true and she is ready to make that commitment. We told her to pray about it with her daughter. We hope to have another lesson with her this week! Kellie made it to church but her mom lives kinda far away. Because of car problems she didn't make it this week. But that is okay. She is coming next week.
• We brought our Ward mission leader to our lesson with Loraine this week. We are stuck this week with her. We have no clue what to do. We know her job is the thing that is holding her back from being baptized but she does not want to give up her job. So we are trying to see what she is willing to do. So please pray for her. I know one day she will get baptized just not sure when...
• This week we also got to go to the temple with Susan and Tom!!!!! That was the most amazing thing ever! Most of the pictures this week are from that. They got to do some ancestral names. Even though Tom is in his 70s and Susan is in her 60s it went very well. When Susan had her own baptism the water was really cold. But she was really happy this time because the water was warm!!!!!

At the temple with Susan and Tom

We had a mini zone meeting this week and our zone leaders came up with a theme for the transfer. "Like unto Moroni!" so we made a banner! (as you can see in the picture). So we are trying to all be good leaders and help our zone get lots of baptisms!!! We hope to have some this transfer especially since it is my last transfer! I would love to end helping others follow Christ! God really has his hand in everything!

Mini Zone Meeting

Love Sister Hanson

Indianapolis Temple

This Week's Quick Email

Sister Fowler, Sister Hanson, and Sister Fenn

This week I don't have much time! We have a lot to do and little bit of time to do it! Right now I am in a trio with Sister Fenn and Sister Fowler. Sister Fowler's companion went home today so we had to take her to the mission office today! But we have been enjoying it! I was in the MTC with Sister Fowler! I will send some pictures! We didn't get much snow this week. Most of the snow is melted so it is nice a brown everywhere!!! haha

Here are a couple highlights this week:

• First off Kellie and her mom Monica came to church this week! Amazing and Monica was even going around telling people that she was an investigator. hahahah! Love them! So we will start teaching Monica this week and we hope she will accept the things we teach and I hope the Holy Ghost will bring it unto her heart!!!!
• Lorain is doing well. We are trying to work with her to get her a new job. We have talked a lot about it and we feel like that is what is holding her back! So pray for Lorain! She did attend a baptism this week and felt the spirit confirm in her heart that she will one day be baptized!!! So exciting!
• Rebecca is doing well! We had a great meeting with her and helped her with concerns about bringing up the church with her husband. Hopefully she will come to church next week!!! 

Love you all and hope you have a wonderful week! I will be staying in Greenwood first ward for the rest of my mission! I love this ward and especially the people!!!!

Love Sister Hanson

Allyson's visit to the mission office with President and Sister Cleveland

Sister Fenn and Allyson in their fireman hats

Painting a member has in their house. They painted it! Thought that was cool

The Week Miracles Happened! (they do happen every week!)

Sister Hanson and Sister Fenn

So it was frigid cold this week! But we did the best this week than we have ever done!!!!!!!! A mission is amazing! God has really given me some amazing things to remember! I probably say this every week, but this week has been the most amazing week ever! I have seen God's hand everywhere I go.

This week we met with a sort of recent convert named Chloe! She is 13 (she kinda reminds me a Katie and she even has really curly hair!). She is not excited at all about reading the Book of Mormon. So we read a story in the Book of Mormon with her and made it come alive and she loved it! I am so happy that she can see a little bit more of the what the Book of Mormon can do for her!

We had a double booked appointment this week. So we went on exchanges! I went with Angel's visiting teachers! and Sister Fenn went with another member to teach an investigator! So I had the visiting teachers teach part of the restoration! They did an amazing job! They made it relate to her a lot more than I ever could! Visiting teachers are amazing! Sister Fenn taught Lorain with another member who knows her quite well! It went wonderful! She will be attending a baptism tonight with us so she can see how her's will go! We both have had the impression that Lorian will be baptized this year and at least be ready to be baptized when we leave.

We met with Rebecca when we went exchanges! She has been struggling since we last met with her! We know why she has been struggling because she has not been reading her scriptures and praying like she used to! She missed us a lot. She recognized that when she was meeting with the missionaries that her life was going well and when she was not meeting with them her life started to slowly go downhill. We committed her to come to Sacrament Meeting but things stopped her from coming. I hope she will come soon!

Tom and Susan are doing wonderful! We went with their home teachers and had a spiritual meeting with them! Brother Bober shared his conversion story! It brought the Spirit so strong!

One of our investigators came to church on Sunday! She brought her mom!!!! They both got priesthood blessings! Kellie, the investigator, had recently got into a car accident and the only places the car did not get crushed was the place where the Book of Mormon was sitting and where Kellie was. Her mom asked us for a Book of Mormon because of that! Now her mom is going to start coming to church with Kellie!!!! She will start meeting with us soon! This is a miracle!!!!!! God's plan may not be what we want to happen but all of his purposes are for our good!

So as you can tell! This week was amazing! I hope you can all see the hand of God in your life daily! Most of the time it is the small things that make the biggest difference! Today I also read Alma 41. Verses 4 and 5 really spoke to me! They talk about God's kingdom is endless happiness and if we are happy in this life we will be happy in the next life but if we are evil or unhappy we will be the same in the next life!

Love 

Sister Hanson

It SNOWED!!!!!!

 Letter originally received 11 Jan 2016

A delicious cupcake from The Flying Cupcake

This week was a crazy week! We did so much stuff and on top of that is snowed yesterday. I went on 2 back-to-back exchanges with the sisters in Shelbyville and the sisters in Columbus.

So here is an update on investigators!!!

• We got back in contact with Rebecca!!!! She has been reading and praying since we saw her last!!!! She has been pretty busy and that is why we have not been able to meet with her. So we have an appointment with her this Wednesday!!!! So excited!
• Kellie. She has been struggling a bit but we will also be meeting with her this week. It seems the holidays just mess up everything about missionary work! hahah. 
• Lately we have been doing a lot of tracting so we have been finding some new investigators. We also got a referral from a member that is Japanese in our ward. Mia is 16 and she has a Japanese friend who doesn't know anything about God or Jesus Christ. Her name is Miho! She is the cutest girl ever! So we will teach her again in the coming weeks about more things that she has questions about. We talked a little bit about the sacrament and baptism also!!!
• Lorian!!! She has been working on Sundays still but she is trying to get off so she can come to church!!! I hope she will soon. This will be a pivotal moment in her conversion when she can experience this!

Recent converts!!!!

• Susan and Tom are doing great!!!! They continue to come to church and to be fellowshipped more and more! Susan wants to understand and read the Book of Mormon. She has great desires
• Angel and Dievon!!!! They have continued to just reach higher expectations than I even thought they could!!!! Angel shares the Gospel all the time!!!! Dievon used to be afraid of praying out loud but now he prays out loud and does wonderful!

Greenwood 1st ward is a great ward and I love it here! I love you all and hope you have a wonderful week!!!! I love helping people come closer to Christ!!!

Love Sister Hanson

Sister Hanson and Sister Bradshaw

Busiest week of my life! Happy New Year!

Allyson's visit to the local White Castle. She looks excited!

This week I went on 2 exchanges.... One in the picture below with Sister Allen. We were in Indy 1st Ward. Aka my last area! So that was a lot of fun!!! 

Sister Allen and Sister Hanson

Then in the picture below  is Sister Lunt. She is so funny and we were on exchanges in my area Greenwood 1st Ward. We had some great exchanges! Lots of fun!

Sister Lunt and Sister Hanson

I don't have much time today but here are some wonderful things that I did this week!

• A member took us out to nasty White Castle! I am glad i did not throw up!!!! Ewwwww. Never go. I will send pictures!

Mmmm. White Castle

• The day before New Years Eve, some one backed into our car. But all is well. Our car can still move so we still drive it! We even taught the guy a lesson!
• New Years Eve we had Mission Leadership Council! That was a lot of fun! I got to see President and went to the mission home! Loved it and I took a lot of notes! Basically we just talked about being a example for our stewardships! We also talked about working with members more!
• New Years Eve we also went to a member's home and had some wonderful Chinese food and played a really fun game!
• New Years day was fun. We went and watched a bunch of elders play football at IUPUI. It was really cold outside. But fun!

New Years Day...and football!

• The Gosbin's (recent converts) They are doing great! We had a really spiritual lesson with them this week right before our car got hit. The mom during sacrament meeting even got up and bore her testimony this week! They are just doing wonderful! I love this ward.

I really love being a missionary! I found this scripture; Romans 15:4

"For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning, that we through patience and comfort of the scriptures might have hope."

This scripture really spoke to me because I have been able to find hope and comfort in the scriptures!!!! READ your scriptures everyday! Love you all!

Love

Sister Hanson