Go Dawgs!

Hello friends and family! I am officially in Georgia! It was quite the adventure getting all of our bags to the airport. But we managed. They choose a trip leader to have all the boarding passes and stuff but the person they chose for the leader was from Myanmar, it was his first time in the US, and he is still learning English. So it was kind of rough. But we got our tickets with our IDs so it worked out. 

Also we got Cafe Rio at the airport and it was the best. I'm so happy to not eat MTC food anymore

 We got here Monday night at like 5 ish. And we spent our first night in the mission home. The mission president is really cool. I like him a lot.

Then Tuesday morning we had transfer meeting! I'm in a trio with Sister Nielson and Sister Ferris. Sister Ferris is from Vegas and Sister Nielson is from Boise. And we are serving in Athens Georgia on the University of Georgia campus. So we are in the YSA. Georgia Bulldogs yall. 

The first night in Athens I slept on a air mattress because they didn't have a bed for me but we got it Thursday so were all good. 

We've done a lot of tracting. Or knocking doors. Everyone is gone for the summer so there aren't a lot of people here to teach so we knock doors a day basically Haha. Also, we are in a full biking area. So I'm going to have strong legs. Even though they're sore all day everyday. But my bike is so nice. Love it. 

Also, they announced in the mission that we would be having a car share. So we would get a car 3 days a week and then bike the rest. So everyone got calls except us. So there are only 2 sets of sisters that are full biking and we are one of them and we don't get a car share. Haha it's okay though we don't really need a car. 

Sister Nielson wiped out on her bike on Saturday. We were going over a train track and her bike whipped out from under her and she fell hard. It was scary to watch honestly. But some miracles were that she was wearing and pants that day and that there weren't any cars coming. She has scrapes and bruises but she's okay thank goodness. 

It's pretty hot here but not as bad as I thought. It's been pretty nice weather this week so hopefully I just got lucky and I missed the worst of it. 

We met with a few people this week. We had a lot of cancelled lessons but we were able to meet with a few people. On Wednesday we met with Emily who is a recent convert. And then we went straight over to teach Elena. She's so sweet. We are trying to get her to be baptized this transfer. On Thursday We had a phone call lesson with another recent concert named Will. We are preparing him for the priesthood. Friday we taught Anothony. He is also a member but hasn't gone to church in a long time so he wants to meet with us and just learn more. He's a funny guy. Then on Saturday we got to go to the farmer's market with another investigator Shania. She's the cutest. They have all these vegan things but they were decent. We had a lesson with her afterwards and she's just so cool and cute. 

Tracting has been interesting. We've had a lot of fun experiences with that. 

● we knocked on the door and the lady wouldn't accept a card because she just woke up and hadn't had her coffee. At 11. 

● this door had wasps all over it. He answers and they start flying in. I ran away because I hate wasps but Sister Nielson was trying to swat them out of his apartment and give him a card. She's braver than me apparently. 

● we went to this place that we think is really creepy. We call it Tuesday the 17th. If any of yall have seen Psych you'll know what that means. But we knocked on this guys door and his next door neighbor yells "I'm coming" because she thought it was her door so we slid over to her door. But then both doors open. So we hurried and shared something with the lady then slid back over and shared something with him. Too funny. 

● we knocked on a door and the next door neighbor thought it was theirs again so we hurried and slid over but he totally saw it happen so my companions camt stop laughing so I'm trying to hold it in and share a card with him while the other 2 are uncontrollably laughing. 

Tracting is fun as you can see. One of my favorite things is that people always tell us they're already saved. Because they got baptized they're already saved so they don't need to talk to us. It's funny. 

We also went to campus for a little while to try to do these surveys that we have. But we got stopped by some mission church. I don't know what they were called honestly. But they were going on about all this stuff that wasn't really making sense. We started off trying to find common beliefs because there were some but then it went downhill. They were shook everytime we tried to share something we believed. Kinda funny gotta love it. 

Our mission president made these cards for us to pass out that talk about families and family history so those are really cool. We have a big push in family history in our mission so we do 2 hours a week of it. I found out that Pocahontas is my 10th great aunt so I'm like basically famous. 

Everything has been going good here. Just trying to get used to everything. Trying to learn how to do everything and how to get around. It will be a lot better when school starts on August 14th because we will actually have people on campus. 

Hope y'all are all having a good week. Yall should read this talk by Elder Craig C. Christensen called An Unspeakable Gift From God. It's good one. 

All the love and blessings,

Sister Coleman

Week 3: last week in the MTC

Hi friends and family!

My last week in the MTC is basically over! In 2 days I'll be in Georgia! Doesn't feel like it's that time yet. But here we are lol. 

On Sunday Sister Jensen and I had to teach Relief Society. It actually went pretty well. But after they had a meeting to teach people how to teach for the next week and we were sad we didn't get that. But it went okay regardless. It was pretty stressful on Sunday though because they just call people up to speak without warning and I was worried it was going to be me. It wasn't though. But maybe this week because all the other districts in our zone just got here on Wednesday. 

This week has been crazy because it went by so fast and we are starting to get ready to head out. We did the last of our TRC lessons this week. It's been so helpful to have those to be able to practice teaching people. We had lessons with Collette on Tuesday and Thursday and both of those lessons went really well. We were having a hard time getting her to open up and we didn't know what to teach her on Thursday so we decided to just go for the Plan of Salvation and turns out that was exactly the lesson she needed. We were pretty excited to get to teach that as well. We've only taught the restoration lesson to everyone so far lol. 

The devotionals are one of my favorite things about the MTC. We got to be ushers for the Sunday and Tuesday devotionals. And it's actually a little scary because I didn't want to get trampled by the elders. There are a lot of elders here that are very tall and it's scary a little bit. But the Tuesday devotional he talked about how to be a happy and successful missionary. And I liked when he talked about forgetting ourselves and focusing on the Lord. 

We've been talking a lot about working with members this week. We had a member TRC where we just met with a member and shared a thought with her. We shared with her Alma 26:11-12, 16. I love these verses. The gospel brings so much joy and that is something that we shared with her. It was honestly the best TRC we've had. Meeting with members is a lot less stressful for me. Y'all should know how important you are for missionary work. Without the members it would be impossible. We saw a graph that showed that with members help, there are like twice as many baptisms. So keep working and try to help the missionaries because they really love and appreciate it so much. 

We had this really amazing activity in one of our classes. For those of you who haven't been to the MTC, there are amazing pictures. Like the most beautiful pictures I've ever seen of scripture stories and of the life of Christ. In one building there's a lot of panels of Christs life with scriptures by them. So we went over there and spent time at each picture talking about how He leads by example and how He is living His purpose. All of the pictures were incredible. But one was a picture of Him healing the blind man. And we talked about how someday we will all be healed from our pains and afflictions. And all I could think about were my Romanian babies. For anyone who doesn't know, when I was volunteering in Romania, all of the kids I worked with at the orphanage were pretty severely disabled. Plus they don't have any parents to care for them. I'm not sure why they are in that situation or why I grew up with so much more than them. But I do know that one day I'll be able to see them in the Celestial Kingdom and they will be completely healed. And I'm so excited for that day. The other thing that impressed me out all the pictures, was how He was always getting on their level. He would sit with them on the ground or wherever they were instead of just towering over them. And I loved that. I am going to try to take pictures of all the really huge amazing pictures in our class building so I might send those if I get them. 

 One of my favorite things is that all of us sisters like to go to the store or vending machine and get snacks at night. It's seriously a party. It's getting really sad because our district is going all over the place so we have to say goodbye to them tomorrow and I'm so sad. We have 2 sisters going to the Mormon Battalion in San Diego. 1 sister going to San Diego proselyting. 1 is going to the Portland Oregon temple visitor center.And then the other 4 of us are going to Atlanta North. 1 of our elders is going to Louisville Kentucky. 1 is going to Las Vegas. 2 are going to Jacksonville Florida. 1 is going to Manchester England and 1 is going to Scotland/Ireland. So we really are spread out all over the place. Also, Sister Smith who is going to the Portland visitor center has to stay an extra week after the rest of us for specialized training. I feel so bad. Our whole district will be gone except her. 

Funny story though. The elders going to England and Scotland/Ireland couldn't get their visas and that's why they are at this MTC. They were supposed to go to the England MTC. But they've been here waiting to see if their visas came in. And last week they got on their missionary accounts and saw that they had been reassigned temporarily until they got their visas. Elder Smith, who is going to Manchester, saw his said Washington DC and was pretty excited because that's a pretty cool mission. So Elder Baldwin, who is going to Scotland/Ireland opened his to see where he would go and it said Omaha Nebraska. I saw all his Hopes and dreams die in that split second. He was pretty disappointed because he was expecting Scotland and now he was going to Nebraska. We thought it was so funny because he would only be there for like 6 weeks and we knew he was going to absolutely love it once he got there. So we went and bought him a mission shirt of Omaha Nebraska. But he just got his Visa so he won't even be going to Nebraska. Still hilarious though. He would have loved it though. 

We have to start packing today and that's so crazy. I honestly don't know how I'm going to get all my stuff together but we will get there. It's kind of a pain because we are too busy on Sundays to do any packing and we leave early early Monday morning so we have to get it done today. We had to say goodbye to one of our teachers Sister Villarreal yesterday and that was really sad. It's weird that we will never come back here.

Okay also. We had a ton of ASL missionaries come in and they are so cool. I literally stare at them all day because they're so good at it. All I want though is to see someone going to Romania. So I can impress them with my skills. But it's okay. 

I've seriously been learning so much. There is so much Spirit here and everyday I realize so many more things that I didn't know. Our gospel learning is really continuous throughout our whole lives. We just have to keep studying and praying every day. 

With all the love and blessings

Sister Coleman

I met Sister Linford's mom at Houston's.  They happened to be passing through. 

Week 2

Okay friends and family it's going to be a long one so buckle up. 

First thing is that we found out the temple is going to be closed the whole time we are here so we don't get to go. Hopefully the Atlanta one will be open still Haha. 

So Sunday. Sunday was the longest best day of my life. No joke. We did more stuff on Sunday than of any other day of the week. It was intense. I think that fast Sundays are busier than normal sundays though so hopefully tomorrow will be a little more chill. So since it was fast Sunday they dont serve breakfast or lunch and no joke I've never fasted that long on my life. It was like 24 hours and I thought I was going to die. It was good though. Also, we decided to try doing the MTC choir and it was not our favorite Haha. It was a lot harder than we thought and in not a singer so it was a struggle but oh well. It was such a good day though. I was a lot closer to the spirit because of fasting and just being her and I cried all through testimony meeting. We talked a lot about how this isn't about me but it's about the Lord and I really loved that. We also watched a talk that Elder Bednar gave called the Character of Christ. He gave it at the MTC on Christmas a while ago. And man it is so good. Like life changing. Unfortunately you can only see it at the MTC though. I wish y'all could see it. 

Monday

So we had our first lesson on Monday. They call them TRCs and we just go and teach a person for 25 minutes. They don't tell us if they are members or non members so we just assume they aren't. We learned a lot about teaching ng through questions and it's so helpful. We had service Monday morning and we cleaned sinks Haha. It was not bad but it was 6:25 in the morning. The best things were that we started playing four square for exercise time and it is so fun. Love four square. Also we found the vending machines and it was the best. 

Tuesday

TRCs everyday this week so we are getting lots of practice and it is so good. We also started running half a mile a day and if you know me, you know that's a lot for me. And it's so hard but at least we are getting exercise. Also we had a devotional today that was like life changing. Everyone needs to listen to the talk by Elder Holland "the first great commandment" I would recommend listening not reading. There was a video that they showed with it that was amazing but I don't think it's released. But I have never felt the spirit that strong in my life. I couldn't stop crying. It was amazing. 

Wednesday we had the best TRC we've had yet. We invited her to read the book of mormon and pray and she did! I was so happy. 

Thursday was just an average day. Except I got a package so I was excited to get some Pepsi. Also our TRC asked if Jesus visited Asia and Africa and Sister Jensen and I were like uhhh probably.

Yesterday was also just an average day. Didn't do a lot. 

But y'all really should read that talk. I'm serious it changed my life. 

I'm having a good time here and learning and growing a lot. 

Also I got my travel information yesterday! We are leaving Monday morning at 6:15 to go to the airport. Our flight is at 11:05. 

So pumped. 

Anyways I hope y'all have a great week. 

Love 

Sister Coleman

Welcome to the MTC!

Hi everyone!

Well I've made it a few days Haha. Things are going well here. We have classes all day long and it's pretty crazy but we are learning a lot. 

Saturday is my Pday which is honestly the best. 

My companion is Sister Jensen and she is really awesome I love her. Our district is really awesome too. We all get along really well. Our district is going to a lot of different places so it will be sad saying bye to everyone. 

Four of us share a room which is nice because there's two extra beds so extra room. All four of us are going to Atlanta. We met some elders going there as well but they aren't in our district. 

So many long days but we found out that we could take a nap today and I'm pumped about it. 

When we got here we went straight to class and met our companions and district. And we had class all day. Also everyone says welcome to the MTC like 500000 times but it's okay. They're being supportive I think. 

We have basically been thrown into the deep end here. We contacted yesterday and set up an appointment with someone and we are teaching her on Monday and we are teaching another girl on Tuesday. Pretty crazy. 

The fourth was pretty fun! We stayed up pretty late and watched the stadium of fire fireworks which was really fun. We couldn't  hear Keith Urban singing though so that's a bummer. 

We got to have exercise time yesterday and we played four square. I love four square. I made it to the king spot so I'm a big deal. 

The food is pretty good. There's plenty that's for sure. I got Navajo tacos on the fourth though so it was basically like being home.

Also good news. They have Coke here. It's not caffeinated but coke is coke. 

I see Sister Soderquist around all the time and I love it. So happy she is here as well. Love you Sister Soderquist 

I don't really know what else to say except that we are busy and learning a lot. 

This 4th of July we should always be grateful for the freedoms that we have and remember what a blessing it is that we have freedom of religion! How amazing they we can practice any religion or no religion. We should always defend others right to believe and show respect to everyone. 

Love and miss you all

Sister Coleman 

Pic 1 My district

Pic 2 my companion

Pic 3 the fireworks

Pic 4 the girls in my district

Pic 5 my companion and I

Pic 6,7 beautiful views here at the MTC

McKenna's First Email

I'm here and I'm alive and P-day is on Saturday