Oh hot dang! Yesterday was the 8 month mark until MY BIRTHDAY!!!!!! I AM SO EXCITED!!!!!
P.s If you want to buy me a present for my late/early birthday or Christmas…here’s whats on my list.
A really cute black sweater cause I am FREEZING!
The Nashville tribute band CD that has the song “Im gonna go”
AND or an Ihome cause my speakers eat my batteries and batteries are expensive. Just thought I would share….. 🙂
I LOVE MY COMPANION! Holy canoli is she so awesome! We have seriously bonded so hardcore these 6 days we’ve been together, it’s awesome! I love her!!!
Wednesday after PDAY
We shopped in Show low at Wal mart and it was exhausting. I’m officially broke and have been eating candy for every meal. OKay, not really but still! By the time we got home, we had one hour left of pday! BUMMER. So that’s why I didn’t write letters!! Ah! President Sweeney came up for the temple on Halloween. All the missionaries got to go to the Snowflake temple on Halloween and do whatever they wanted to do! We were there from 3-9! CRAZY! Because I can only do baptisms, I knew I had to make it worthwhile! AND I knew mom had like 100 names sitting on her desk at home. I asked President if he would call her and ask her to email them to me, and he said, “No I cant, but YOU can!” WHAT?!?!?!?!?!? That’s right! I called Mom Wednesday night. It was so funny! She was like “Hello” and I was like, “Hi…Mom? This is Sister Crai….um this is Haylei!” hahaha! Im so used to Sister Craig now!!!! P.s The lady in one of my wards, her son is Blank Allan, from Kingswood Park! Ya know, Stephanie Allan? CRAZY! I WAS LIKE OH MY GOSH! She was my Young womens leader for like a month! hahaha! Small world. But don’t worry, it gets smaller! 🙂
Thursday
I honestly don’t remember a THING from Thursday. We went to El Cupidos and I ordered a Big Jake. Cost me 6 bucks and wasn’t even worth it. DUMB. We went to a hs soccer game. We weren’t allowed to proselyte though, so we just chilled and cheered them on in a dignified manner. A boy was like, “WOW! I DIDNT KNOW THERE WERE GIRL MISSIONARIES!” haha
During companion study Sis Flake was like, “So my first day at the mission office there was a board of all the new arrivals for September. And I saw your picture and the spirit was so strong and was like “you’re gonna train this girl!” and then I saw you at womens conference and the same feeling and then BAM! Here we are as companions, and I am so excited!” Shes awesome. Fo’ rizzle.
Friday
TEMPLE DAY!!!!!!!!!! I was nervous for my companion cause I HAD to do baptisms the whole time! And I didn’t want her to be bored. It sucks SO much going in and having to explain why Im a missionary and not endowed. I couldn’t even go print my names off, I had to wait in the waiting room. LAME. Blarg.
But finally we got the okay to start baptisms! Elders aren’t allowed to baptize sisters, So the Senior couple Elder baptized me! He would get so choked up each time he read a new name! I was so excited for my turn! I LOVE BAPTISMS SO MUCH! He dunked me 20 times, I went and changed, and then got confirmed. I asked the Senior Sister if she would be my companion cause I didn’t want Sister Flake to be bored all night. It was perfect! She got to do a sealing and I got to stay in baptisms!!!!
President Sweeney then came in and was like “I wanna baptize Sister Craig!” So I got back in the font, and he started to baptize me for my ancestors! It was so awesome. He was like “You’re the easiest person to baptize ever. You’ve got the leg and the rock thing down perfect! You should give a training on it!” haha. Then he continued to dunk me, and as I came up he was like, “Sister Craig, these are all your family names aren’t they?” And tears came to my eyes and nodded my head yes. It hit me! I was helping my family!!! He dunked me 30 times and I finished all 50 names for my family!!!! SO AWESOME!!!!! I got out, changed, got confirmed and AGAIN I WAS BAPTIZED!!!! 10 names this time for the temple. I got dunked 60 times that night and it was amazing. I just pictured all these spirits lined up on the other side crying! Not because I’m amazing and blah blah blah, but because they finally get the chance to accept the Savior and bear His name! Ah!!
The senior sister Christenson put her arm around me and was like, “I am SO proud of you!” GUYS!!!! That means I’ve done 166 names in a year!! AH!!!!! So cool.
The wind was blowing like CRAZY! But we walked around the temple. An elder walked around with a bag of candy so we got to “trick or treat” haha. The Temple is gorgeous. You can see it from our church building! BEAUTIFUL!
I was waiting for my companion when Sister Taylor came out and OH MY GOSH! I love her! She hugged me and was so excited to see me. We’ve been apart for 4 days at this point and it was SO awesome to be reunited! Ah! ❤
We took pictures out front of the temple and she said to me, “I feel like we were best friends before we came to earth.” oh man. Melted my heart! I LOVE HER! AND AND AND!!!! the best part? SHE and sister Flake and the Senior couple, GOT APPROVAL FROM PRESIDENT SWEENEY TO COME TO MY ENDOWMENT!!!!!!!!!! WOOT WOOT! He was like, “Gilbert is out of our boundaries but when they ask just be like ‘oops we aren’t? Well we are already here!'” hahah. And I invited him as well. SO NEAT! I cant wait to go through!!!
Saturday!
We had dinner with Bishop Burt in one of our wards. His wife is so nice! This is where the world gets a little smaller!!! So she was like where are ya from. And I said Surprise. And She was like, oh so do you know Greg and Dottie Nielson? And I was like..hmm sounds familiar but Im not sure! And she was like, “well their son Tatum is in a mission in the Philipines..” and then it hit me.. I fangirled like CRAZY. Brother Nielson was my freshman seminary teacher! And he was AMAZING! I was so sad when he left! He was awesome! So she of course was excited and took a picture of me and FLake and sent it to him with a , “look who’s serving up here!” hahaha AWESOME. He was the best seminary teacher ever, other than Sis Butler of course!!! 🙂
Saturday night was stake conference and GUESS WHAT?!!/ I GOT TO SPEAK AT STAKE CONFERENCE!!!!!!!!!! Their chapel was smaller than ours, but it was completely filled! I had to speak on missionary work and how FUN it is! I took the word SHARE and broke it down. Study the scriptures is S. H is humility. A is ask for missionary opportunities. R is for reach out to others and E is for be an example. It was AWESOME! I had people laughing and then crying! I shared the mission commission cause it applies to ALL of us! Missionary or not, YOU are a member missionary. It was AWESOME! People came up and thanked me for my talk. Sis Flake is an awesome speaker as well! Love her. I met a lady who is related to Mackenzie Berry! So awesome!
So when it was done all of a sudden I saw this guy in the back who looked super familiar but I was like there is NO way its him. And it was. It was the Walkers from KP!!!! Jessica ran up and hugged me and it was SO awesome to see her! Oh my lanta. Brother Walker was like, “I saw you and wanted to stand up and be like HAYLEI HAYLEI! OH MY GOSH!” hahaa It was SO awesome seeing someone I knew!! Ah! 🙂
I cant remember what night this week but we taught Alfonso and his 10 year old daughter. The Beecrofts came with us, and it was pretty cool. It was my first time meeting all of them so I was a quiet, but it was awesome. We walked out and the beecrofts have the same Honda pilot we have at home! AH I miss driving that thing! Anyway, I knew as soon as she walked in we were going to be friends and BAM!!!! I’ll tell that story in a second!
Soo still on Saturday we went to another family. She had elephant ear leaves in her front yard. And I asked her if I could have one, and she cut off 3!! THEY ARE HUGE!!!!! Pictures to come! 🙂
Sunday
Stake Conference! I was SO sick. Head flu cold thing. Oh my gosh it was bad. I had to stand and greet people but I looked horrible and sick. So gross. I day dreamed the entire conference about getting my endowments. They turned off ALL the lights so I was like ‘DUDE! I COULD FALL ASLEEP HERE!’ I stayed awake but don’t remember much about what was said! Darn cold! I came home and slept for 2 hours, it was rough!!!!
We went and talked to Jeff who is a recent convert. His temptations are getting to him and he is giving in. We are doing tomorrow to delete a number out of his phone. Ah! Jeff!!!! I wanna thump him on the head!
I was so sick yesterday I don’t remember much about what happened.
OH EXCEPT FOR! Saturday our toilet stopped working. I had to snake it with a hanger and it over flowed, but nothing but water came out. We asked the elders to come over and fix it, talk about AWKWARD!. Still nothing but water came out. Dumb! I shouldn’t be afraid to pee in my own toilet! Lame! haha
Sunday night we had dinner AT the beecrofts and invited Alfonso. We had breakfast for dinner, but I was so sick!! I had to be polite and eat a little bit. Shouldn’t have, but I did! Ah
We taught the word of wisdom! I was so sick and didn’t get the chance to go over it, so Sis Flake took the lead. Then I felt prompted to share my story. I shared how both my parents had to choose what path they wanted to follow. Mom is awesome and decided to give up the harmful habits, but unfortunately my Dad did not. I’ve NEVER cried during a lesson when I talk about my dad but last night I did. And it was rough. I went into a little more detail with them, and just got so choked up and ready to sob right there. Sis. beecroft was crying, and so was her husband! The spirit was strong though, and I wanted that. I wanted them to understand how important it is, for him being a single dad to NOT do those bad things!!! Ah!
Afterwards I hugged everyone goodbye, and I hugged Sis B. I just sobbed in her arms. I was like,”Im sorry but Im just gonna hug you a little longer” And she started to cry and was like, “Cry and hug as long as you want! I miss hugging my missionary”(her son left a month ago) and she hugged me tight. It was awesome.
COME TO FIND OUT! She is related to my FAVORITE person in Show Low! She is cousins with tenney!!! Ahhhhhhh! ❤ No wonder why I loved her so much! They are BOTH amazing!!!
I seriously killed my talk at conference. People were like, “thanks for your enthusiasm! You should try to come out of your bubble more ;)” It was awesome!!
Do me a favor. PLEASE invite the missionaries into your home. For a lesson, for dinner, for a spiritual thought! They have the spirit with them and its awesome. Invite a non member over to hear a lesson! AND when you do this, take a picture of the missionaries and send it to their mom! Sis hatch and Brady did that and it was AWESOME! Please?
ya know whats cool? Is if you have a non member over and want a lesson, I could totally Skype with you and teach through Skype! BOOYA!
I love you! I have been here 7 weeks! I am so excited to go through the temple! Its only 5 weeks away! I cant wait to be with ALL of you in the temple! I’ve decided on Gilbert! Just so ya know.
I love you.
I love you.
Be strong. Remember who you are.
Make good choices. Know that I love you and feel the support from your prayers!
The world according to me 