Monday, April 25, 2016

One year left. :)

Hey again everyone! This week has just gone by so slowly, and quite tiring. It is still so cold too, I thought I got out of Norrland weather but it literally just snowed down here again! What the heck, does summer even exist in Sweden? lol. For P-Day last week me and Syster Adamson decided to hit up IKEA. Adamson never has eaten there before so I insited we get lunch there. :) We got some tradtional köttbullar and explored around and did a little shopping. Det var roligt. :)

We had zone training this week too! Äldste Liddle and Svensson did a great job. It's fun being in Äldste Liddle's zone again, he's the best. We watched the short Little John Tanner Movie and it was SO good. I cried during it. I recommend it to everyone, it should be online somewhere! After, we had this yummy lunch and socialzed for alittle bit with our new zone.

Seriously the days this week went up and down. We had all these Amazing lessons one day and so many nice people coming up to us and talking and then other days where it was just cold and wet and everyone was mean to us and depressing haha. It is so bipolar and hard but we're enduring. ;)

We met up with the cute Chinese people this week too. They seriously are the most adorable people. I just wish I could speak Chinese!! I just wanna talk to them without having to use google translate lol. We crack jokes to eachother now and then. During Church this last sunday Teng wrote to me, 'Take a look at that sleepy old man over there.' We all looked and started cracking up. Love them so much!

We did a lot of swingbys this week too. Down here in Stockholm literally every building is port-coded so that's jobbigt. I make the most of it though and make friends with the neighborhood cats lol. They are everywhere and they lift our spirits. ;)

We had a fun Meet the Mormons night too which was a blast! The Täby systers put it together and all the missionaries in Stockholm were invited and we brought investigators. For fika we had this yummy banana bread with CHOCOLATE CHIPS Hallelujah. They don't sell chocolate chips here so you have to buy them at the black market lol, (same with macaroni and cheese!). Missing my American go-tos haha.

On Sunday we had dinner with the cute senior couple Syster and Äldste Robinson! They made us this yummy White gravy chicken curry and rice. We also did a fun Little scripture chase game with them. They have been on their mission for about 18 months and go home in October. They have been in Jakobsberg the whole time. :) They invited us over again for Italian night in a week so I am stoked for that. They are the sweetest!

All and all, this week was hard not going to lie. I've been feeling a little home-sick and the days have been so draining. I miss my family so much. Even though it's difficult, I'm grateful for it. It's a huge growing experience and I don't care how hard it is, there is nothing that will stop me from sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ. No matter how many mean people tear us down, those one or two people who willing to listen are the reason I'm here. I know this is His work and I'm grateful to be apart of it. It's weird to think in exactly one year I will be back home. I'm going to make to most of every single day I have left as a missionary. It's probably the hardest, but most amazing thing I've ever done in my Life. I love you all and thanks for all the support and love you send me. Until next week. Vi ses senare och kommer ihåg att rakna din många välsignelser. :)

Kärlek,
Syster Davis
Middag with the Robinsons :)
Little Picture of our Town.
Flower Power.

Monday, April 18, 2016

Jakobsberg and Emilliano's Baptism!

Hej hej! This week has been crazy. Me and Syster Hong packed our bags, cleaned up our apartment and headed for the train station! Sweet Cassi and Melanie came to say goodbye to us and we took some last goodbye pictures with the district. It still feels weird not being in my first area anymore. Sundsvall will always have my heart. ❤

We arrived in Stockholm Central station and there where missionaries EVERYWHERE. Apparently that's how it is on transfer days haha! I saw so many friends and my new companion Syster Adamson. :) She grew up in Texas but moved to St. George, Utah. This is also her last transfer as a missionary before she goes home so I'm going to make it the best for her! ;)

She helped me with my luggage and we arrived to our cute little apartment in Barkarby. Super adorable and tiny and homey. And they have an entire cabinet full of godis so that was incredible. Jakobsberg is so cute and it felt surreal being there. It felt almost as if I left on a mission again, saying goodbye to my family in Sundsvall and not knowing anyone in this new place. ;) Gotta love missions and all the change that happens all the time lol.

Lots of people here speak Spanish too which is really cool! I wish I would of remembered my Spanish from high school but oh well. We went to a Peruvian families house for dinner and they made us these amazing tacos. The mom is going to the temple soon so she is really excited about that and we have been teaching her the temple classes. :) We also met with this amazing guy named Emilliano. He is this 15 year-old boy from Columbia who just walked into church one day and was super interested. Syster May and Adamson taught him everything and he agreed to be baptized!! I was super lucky to get to be in Jakobsberg and witness his baptism. :) Syster May and Syster Wilson in Jönköping got to come too! It was such a fun day. Emilliano has such a light about him and he says the most powerful prayers I have every heard.

While we were kontakting this week too its been hard, because people are a lot more busy here (har bråttom) in Stockholm to talk than they are in Sundsvall lol. But, we came across this one lady who was sitting alone on a bench. We came up to her and started talking to her and we started talking to her about hope and she got very emotional and started crying and telling us some things she went through. I don't even know why but all of a sudden I started bawling too. It was so weird because I only just met her but I had this burning feeling in my heart full of love for her. She said she felt like she could never be loved or forgiven for things she'd done in her life. I assured her that that was not true and that God loves us infinitely no matter what we've gone through in our life. She smiled and said maybe someday she will be Chrisitan again. It was such a powerful experience.

But yeah, it's been such a great first week! We also have bikes so thats super fun. I am getting so pumped for the Swedish Summer holidays coming soon. Valborg and Midsommar!! It will be fun to be able to be with all the Stockholm misisonaries for that. :)

My first Sunday was also great. The cutest couple from China came to church! Their names are Teng and Na. They only knew Chinese so I translated the entire 3 hours of church for them with google translate and they were so happy. :) I had a lot of experience with that in Sundsvall with the Persian speakers so it was a piece of cake. ;) They loved everything and were so interested in the Book of Mormon and asked so many questions.They are so prepared! ❤ I am going to take good care of them. :) Just need to find another Chinese speaker. We set up to meet them this week so I am so excited!

Anyways, its been a good first week and I'm excited to see what else Jakobsberg has in store this next transfer. Lovin' every second of it here. ❤ This really is the best work. Love you all and until next week, hej då för nu. :)
​Hejdå Sundsvall Distrikt. Love you all.
Same Distirkt as Syster McClatchie = TOPPEN!! :)
Emilliano's Baptism.
​First Companion selfie. ;)

Monday, April 11, 2016

Norway border and Transfers!

Hey everyone. :) This week was crazy busy. We got transfer calls this Saturday and sadly I will be leaving Sundsvall tomorrow. I can't even describe how much I love this place and I'm going to miss all my amazing friends here so dearly. I'm coming back for you someday Sundsvall, I promise!! I will be transfering to JAKOBSBERG! (pronounced Yaw-cubs-berry in swedish) I am so excited for this next adventure. This is the area my favorite MTC Comp Syster May started in. :) It is a little place just 15 minutes out of Stockholm. SO EXCITED.

Syster Hong crazily enough will also be leaving Sundsvall for Trollhätten for one transfer and then be coming back! So there will be no Systers in Sundsvall for 6 weeks. So sad! Syster Hong's Greenie didn't get her visa so hopefully they get them soon.

This was our last week together so me and Syster Hong decided to buy matching skirts and wear them our last Sunday here! Glad they have an H and M at every corner here. ;) They call it 'Ho-em' though haha. We also watched the rest of conference for P-Day. It was sooo great. Elder Holland's talk was just exactly what I needed to hear.

We then went to go visit Armin and Shirin one last time before we leave. They made us these yummy sandwiches and signed my buddy book. :) All of a sudden their sweet Persian next door neighbor came in and they all went off in Persian. When he left Armin informed us that he just invited us all over for fika and that they wanted us to teach them everything about the gospel!! What the what. So crazy cool! They are so prepared. ❤ We went over and just talked and answered all their questions and they loved everything. Wish I could stay and continue teaching them. Never going to forget them. :)

We were with Cassi, Celine, and Melanie a lot this week too. When we told them we were both leaving Celine started crying. It made me so sad! They seriously are like my sisters now and it's gonna be weird not being able to see them. Melanie is thinking about being baptized soon too! I wish I could be there for her baptism but I'll make sure to get pictures. :) They have family down in Stockholm so they said they would come visit me in Jakobsberg someday. Love them to pieces.

We had a funeral (misisonary funeral) for Äldste Pearson this week too. Since he is finishing his mission! We laid blankets on the table and laid him on it and put flowers all around him. We read him letters and poems that all his past companions sent us and sang 'God Be with you will we meet again.' It was sad but also fun. We had waffles and bacon too! Gonna miss Äldste Pearson so much! He was the best fun uncle ever. ;)

Me and Syster Hong then made a trip down to Täby for the night. Syster Hong had a meeting with the other training systers so that meant I got to go on splits with the Täby systers. :) So Fun! I got to be with Syster McClatchie and Syster Lund. :) It was such a blast! I went off with McClatchie and Lund went off with Syster Crawford. I can't tell you how much I love Syster McClatchie. She is friends with my friends in my stake back home! She knows Perry, Jamie, and Kendal! We were just talking about them all day and how we all need to meet up back in college next year. :) We had so many laughs too because were basically on the same level of Swedish and there were just so many funny awkward moments while kontakting people lol. She showed me all around Täby and she is already such an amazing missionary. I hope I get to be her companion someday. :)

We took a train back home to Sundsvall and started packing up our apartment. My last Sunday was testimony meeting and I went up and bore my testimony. I did a good job at holding back my tears, and then we then sang my favorite Swedish church hymn for the closing song. (pg. 156 Blott en Dag ett ögonblick i sänder) and I just started bawling. I was sitting next to Celine and she gave me hugs. Armins neighbors were at church too. :) In Sunday school we had no teacher so I volunteered to wing the whole lesson. I think it went alright haha thank goodness for the spirit. We went to Mashid's house after church and she made us the most amazing Persian pasta ever. She is so adorable.

Yesterday was our last P-Day in Sundsvall and our amazing mission leader Arto Kartanen told us he wanted to take us missionaries on a huge sight-seeing roadtrip! We all happily agreed. :) He came to pick us all up at four in the morning and we started our journey. Our first stop was a ski resort in a town called Åre! We weren't allowed to go skiing lol but Arto paid for all of us to take this trolly up the hill and explore the whole resort! It was sooooo fun and beautiful! We tooks tons of pictures and explored the snowy mountains. Afterwards Arto was like 'Do you guys wanna go to the Norwegian border?' :) And we were like YES!! It was such a great adventure. :) We made a few quick stops on the way back to some cool old swedish churches and camps, and then Atro dropped us at home. We said tusen tack till him for everything and went back home.

When we got to our apartment, there was yarn EVERYWHERE! The young women got our spare key and Yarnified our whole place haha! There was a note at the front door saying we had to roll up the yarn and it would lead us to a prize! 😆 After an hour of rolling it all up we finally got to the end of it will sweet letters from all of them and Marabou chocolate! It was the sweetest thing ever. I've said this like 10 times already but I'm gonna miss them SOO MUCH.

Phewf, that was a long letter. Thanks to you who actually took the time to read all of it haha. But yeah, my last week in Sundsvall was pretty much the greatest. I will cherish the memories I've had here forever and ever. I've made some of the bestest friends here and I know I will be back someday. :) This mission is honestly is the greatest thing I have ever done in my life. I'm so grateful for this possibility to be a missionary for the Lord and to be able to meet the people he has prepared for me to meet. I'm stocked to see what adventures lie ahead in Jakobsberg. :) Love you all and talk to you next week. Mee Bee Namet. (See you soon. :)

Kärlek,
Syster Davis

​Sys Hong, Cassi, Celine, and me.
​Sys Hong, Cassi, Celine, and me.
​BEST MISSION LEADER ARTO!
​Ski Resort!!
​Norway Border! :)
Squad goals. :) Me Melanie, Cassi, Celine and Syster Hong.

Monday, April 4, 2016

I love you Sundsvall.

Hey again everyone! This was a good week. Last P-Day was a very crafty day. We decided to bring all our swedish liohonas to the church and make scripture cases for our skrifter! We all cut out cute swedish phrases and glued them on to our boxes. Äldste Frankman just put a bunch of old ladies on his case to be funny lol so creepy. We also had a cereal party and ate tons of cereal!

It was a pretty sad week too though because I had to say goodbye to some really good friends. Sadly, I am leaving Sundsvall next week. Syster Hong got a training call last night so that means she's going to be training a cute little greenie up here! So excited for her! This means I'm getting the boot. So ledsen. Sundsvall has been so good to me these past 4 months and I couldn't imagine starting anywhere else. :) I'm so excited to see where I'll be going next! I find out this Saturday so I will keep you all posted next P-Day.

We had a few crazy lessons this week too. This one guy we taught wanted us to basically show God to him. We were like, 'uhh, sorry we can't do that haha.' And he was like well then he's not real. He told us he would only believe if his pillow started floating and letters started writing on it that God was real. We taught him about the holy ghost and prayer but he kinda just was playing devils-advocate to everything we said haha. He was nice though nonetheless.

We also brought some peeps from my family's Easter package to this sweet little girl in the ward who loves American things! She was super happy and grateful.

April fools day was this week as well. ;) We met up with Cassie and Celine and brainstormed what we could do to the elders while we talked to people on the street. We came up with a few funny things and as we went back to our apartment to get some things,we found them already in our apartment with our spare key pulling a pranking us!! Caught them red-handed! haha. It was funny.

This week was Äldste Frankman's year mark too so we had a mini bonfire outside of the church and roasted korv for dinner. He also burned a white shirt (misisonary tradition). It was so fun and reminded me of the good ol days back when I had bonfires at home.

Saturday and Sunday were just wonderful as well. We had General Conference at the church and had fika with the members between sessions. I had a mini panic attack because I couldn't find my bus card anywhere. I thought I dropped it somewhere in town or something. I said a mini prayer and we retraced our steps all the way back home. We got home and I looked everywhere and it was no where to be found. Syster Hong was then like is it in any of your pockets? And I was like no I don't think so. I looked through all my laundry and it was right there in my sweats pocket! Wooo! Prayer answered haha. Later in conference there was a talk about a family that lost their car keys and me and Syster Hong looked at eachother and chuckled. ;)

It was great watching the morning sessions of conference live though! It was cool knowing my family was watching at the same time as us. It made it just that more special. :) My favorite talks were Uchtdorfs (as always ;)) and President Tomas S. Monson's quoting Alice and Wonderland. Everytime they talked about missionaries too I got chills. You could feel them really talking to us, it was incredible.

Anyways I love you all and hope you all had a fun Spring Break and General Conference week! I'm not sure if I'll be on next week because a member is taking all us missionaries sight-seeing our last P-Day before transfers! Hope you all have a great week och jag är så tacksam för evangeliet och hur mycket det välsignar vårt livet. Jag är tacksam att jag kan vara en missionär i det här vackert land. Vi ses snart. :)
Kärlek
Syster Davis
Spring has sprung! (with snow still on the floor lol)
Saying Goodbye to our best friend Patrik from Lund.
April Fools...lol