Hey, It's my Birthday!

...ergo, I'm not going to write an email today because I don't feel like it :) my week has been great, but the coming week will be even better. Stay tuned next week to see how meeting President Nelson goes for us this Saturday. #BESTBIRTHDAYPRESENTEVER

Also, I would like to thank everyone who so lovingly wished me a happy birthday, I really appreciate it! 

Here is a video of a bald eagle at the zoo :) 

Also here is a video of me feeding a giraffe at the zoo last week. 

 Exchanges with Sister Hendricksen in Manitowoc.

 Some of the sisters at MLC, this is actually all of Sister Naughton's companions, besides the two that have finished their missions.

Last district meeting of the transfer.

Elder Xiong, Elder Bauer, Sister Hansen, me, Elder Dold, and Elder Williams

I feel like I finally had a normal week

So we had a lesson with a member referral and we taught her the restoration and it went SUPER well, the spirit was so strong and the lady was like crying her eyes out, so we invited her to baptism and she was like yes, I love the way that Mormon's do baptisms, and we were like SWEET! And then she goes " wait does that mean that I have to join your faith?" and we were like umm . . . . well yes, that is kind of one of the huge points of getting baptized, is becoming a member of Jesus Christ's true church. And she goes "oh . . . well I'm catholic." It was so sad, but not that sad because I know that the spirit can and will change her heart if she lets it. We got a return appointment, so as we keep teaching her I hope that she will recognize the truth. 

We were supposed to have 6 investigators at church this week and none of them showed up, so that was also sad. I'm pretty sure it was because they were all doing so well, so Satan had to step in and mess everything up for us, but we will keep working with them. 

We found out some exciting news this week, on March 11th President Russell M. Nelson will be coming to Madison Wisconsin, along with Elder Ulisses Soares of the presidency of the seventy. We are going to have a whole mission conference that morning with the both of them (I have never had a conference with the whole mission). I am SOO stoked about it!! It is always on the forefront of my mind and is basically the only thing that I can think about, I even had a dream about it this week. So that is pretty cool. 

We had some awesome/horrible freezing rain yet again, if you don't know what that is then consider yourself lucky, basically EVERYTHING just gets covered in a coat of ice. So the tree branches on all of the trees were just covered in ice, and the sun was setting behind them and they looked so beautiful like all of the trees were crystal, so that was pretty cool. It is amazing to see that God's hand is in everything, and that there is so much around us to thank him for, I think that is something that we can all do a little bit more often. And I know that as we do so, that we can be more optimistic and that we can see more of the good in life, and enjoy this journey that we are on. 

Have a blessed week! 

Love,

Sister Koyle

For P-day last week we all went to the wildlife sanctuary 

Me, Sister Hansen, Sister Rasmussen, and Sister Bond 

This little baby deer was licking my hand 

 ​The Elders in their natural habitat

This is a ferret that a less active member let me hold, ferrets are pretty ugly and smelly

Where does the time go?

On Valentines day, we went to see this adorable less active lady whom I love, she has two little girls, and they are adorable as well, the older girl is 4 and she LOVES attention, but when we went to leave their house the little girl gave me a hug and she kissed me on the cheek. It was so adorable and I felt so lucky to receive a kiss on Valentines day.
At church yesterday, we were standing in the hall way with some missionaries and this young kid walks down the hall and says "SOO many missionaries" so I looked and there were twelve missionaries standing in the hall way. That is a lot of missionaries for one building, I could hardly believe it. There are three wards in our building, that is why there are so many of us. 

We went on exchanges with the Manitowoc sisters and with the Spanish hermanas this week, so that was pretty fun, exchanges are always great, and they always go better than expected. 

Three of our investigators came to church this week! so that was awesome, there is this awesome couple that we are teaching, I am so excited for them. Whatever we commit them to do, they just do it. It is awesome! Also the ten year old girl that we are teaching is still set for her baptism on March 11th, so we are excited about that. I can't really remember what else happened this week, I just know that I can't believe that it is Monday again. I feel like I barely get time to breath. 

I have been reading Alma 5 this week, great chapter by the way, but I love verses 15-16 which say "Do ye exercise faith in the redemption of him who created you? Do you look forward with an eye of faith, and view this mortal body raised in immortality, and this corruption raised in incorruption, to stand before God to be judged according to the deeds which have been done in the mortal body? I say unto you, can you imagine to yourselves that ye hear the voice of the Lord, saying unto you, in that day: Come unto me ye blessed, for behold, your works have been the works of righteousness upon the face of the earth?" I know that because of Christ's resurrection that we will all be brought before his presence to be judged of him, but it is according to our actions in this life and our willingness to live the gospel of Jesus Christ (faith, repentance, baptism, the holy ghost, and enduring to the end) as to whether or not we will stay in his presence for eternity. I hope that each one of us will be able to hear those words "Come unto me ye blessed" 

I hope that everyone has a fantastic week.

Love,

Sister Koyle

 We got some Hmong egg rolls #Blessings!!

 Exchanges with Manitowoc sisters

Exchanges with the Spanish Hermanas

I actually love Valentines Day

Hello all! 

Well I can't really remember what happened this week. It wasn't quite as crazy as last week so that is good. We were actually on time to correlation and to ward council #Miracles (Also My ward mission leaders name is Moroni!! he lives up to his name very well) We went on blitz's with the Marquette sisters since they were down here for zone conference, also our mission president's wife went out with Sister Hansen and Sister Wallace, since she was up here for zone conference as well. For those of you who aren't aware, Marquette is like 3 hours away in the upper peninsula of Michigan, so it is pretty hard for us to do exchanges with them. But they got to sleep at our apartment for two nights in a row, it was real fun. Sister Hansen and I got to do a training at zone conference and I may or may not have had a mini anxiety attach about it, but I made it through and it was wonderful, and turned out alright. We have some really awesome investigators, that are progressing really well. We have two baptismal dates for March 11th. One is this ten year old girl, her parents are kind of inactive, but they told us that they don't want to hold back their daughter, because she loves church and has been reading the book of Mormon. The other lady is so cool, she has a 13 year old son and she works at a bakery, and loves to dance. There is a recent convert in our ward, and her son and his girlfriend live with her, and they moved this week to a bigger apartment, and we helped them move so that was interesting, and then they all came to church on Sunday so that was super exciting. Also there is this awesome lady that we tracted into and she is soo open to the gospel and her boyfriend is too, she has opened up to us a lot about her life and she is just awesome, she was committed to coming to church this week, but of course an emergency came up. But she will come next week for sure. I love the people here, I feel like I was sent here for so many people. I love Green Bay, it is wonderful and the ward is pretty great. We also have quite a few hmong people here in Green Bay so that is nice, we had some homemade pho this week #AlsoAMiracle Literally Sister Hansen said I really want some Pho and then the next day a less active Hmong lady called us and asked us if we wanted to eat pho at her house, so we did, it was great. I hope that everyone has a fantastic Valentines Day!! Remember 1 John 4:7-11 "Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love. In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him. Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another." 

I hope that everyone has a blessed day! 

Love,

Sister Koyle

 The day before zone conference we went on blitz's with the Marquette sisters, and with Sister Williams, so that was super fun.

 ​Green Bay Zone Conference

 Sister Hansen and I being silly

GB2

Well first off here is my new address 

445 Laverne Dr. #6

Green Bay WI. 54311

So everyone should write me since you are all running out of time to do so :) 

Serving with Sister Hansen is so fun. It has kinda been a flash back for us because when I first came out on my mission there were so many people training new missionaries, even my Sister Training Leader was training, and she just happened to be training Sister Hansen, so for my first exchange I actually went on exchanges with Sister Hansen in Sheboygan.

This week has probably been the craziest week of my life. I had to figure out how to pack all of my things up, which is always fun. I spent most of Wednesday at the Milwaukee south Stake center doing . . . basically nothing. But I got to meet my granddaughter, so that was exciting. Then the Marquette Sisters drove me up here to Green Bay. I am in  the GB 2nd ward. We had Mission Leadership Council on Friday and that was intense, President Williams is very passionate. I was also able to see Elder Low at MLC because he is a zone leader in Madison, so that was fun. 

Saturday morning I was finally thinking that we were going to have a normal day, it was about 8 and I was sitting at the table eating a nice breakfast, when suddenly Sister Hansen who was in the shower screams my name at the top of her lungs. I thought for sure that she was dying, but turns out that we just had correlation meeting with our ward mission leader at 8 am, and she totally forgot about it. So we were just 30 minutes late, and we both looked like hobo's with out our hair and make up done. #GreatFirstImpression Sunday we had Stake conference and that was exciting because I was able to see a bunch of people from the Shawano ward that I served in over the summer. I was even able to see my recent convert Kayleen. I was so happy to see her. 

Something that I really enjoyed from Stake Conference was when a member of the 70 was talking about how Peter had a crisis of faith. When he walked on water and then he started sinking, he didn't think oh I guess this isn't the Savior, but instead he called out to him to help him and to save him, which is what we need to do, when we have a crisis of faith. Everyone has questions and concerns, but who are we turning to for the answers? I know that as we turn to our Savior that all of our fears, and questions and concerns can be resolved. I hope that everyone has a wonderful week.

Love,

Sister Koyle

 The night before transfers we had a sleep over with 6 girls in our apartment

 I'm a grandmother! my trainee Sister Van Overbeek is now training Sister Brady

​Mission Leadership Council in Oshkosh

Rock my world!!

This week has been kinda crazy, and busy and super fun. Transfers have come, I was only able to train Sister Wilson for 7 weeks, because now I am going up to Green Bay, to be an STL with Sister Hansen. I am SOOO excited. I have heard that Green Bay is awesome and I know that Sister Hansen is awesome. A Sister named Sister Wright will be finishing Sister Wilson's training, I have never met her, but I'm sure that she is great! On Wednesday we had an awesome missionary broadcast, and we found out about the new changes in the missionary schedule and in our key indicator reporting, which was a complete shock to me. But I think that it will be good, the schedule is a little bit more fluid now, so that you can more easily adjust it to the needs of your area. And I think that it leaves more decision making up to the missionary, so it will prepare missionaries better for when they return home. Thursday night we drove up to Fond Du Lac to stay with the sisters for 3-6 week training on Friday morning in Oshkosh. It was really great to go to 3-6 weeks for the third time, it was a lot different this time, and we definitely learned a lot or needed things. I can't believe that it is already a new week, the time is going by so fast. It is really weird to leave Waukesha because I have only been here for 3 months, so I haven't gotten to know the people as well as I did in my past two areas. It is really awesome though when you leave an area you can then see why the Lord put you there and who he put you there for. 

At church yesterday the Bishop talked about the ward goals, and about the 4 missions of the church, and he talked about how each family needs to be making goals for how they can strengthen their faith, do temple and family history work, and how they can invite others to learn about the gospel. I just thought that it was a really cool idea, we should each have a little family plan to accomplish the Lord's work, and it doesn't have to be a long thing, but just 3-5 simple goals, that will stretch you, but that are also attainable, and time bound. So I just invite each of you to set some goals for your family or for yourself to help the Lord in his work. And I know that when we all work together in this work that we can all find joy in it together. As my Mom always says, many hands make light work. I hope that everyone has a happy and safe week.

Love,

Sister Koyle

P.S. A funny quote from a guy in gospel principles when we were talking about the kingdoms or glory: "Why are they called mansions? does that mean that if you are wicked that you go to the ghetto?"

 Bowling with the district for p-day

Elder Lee!

I am the middle one, I was soo close to beating Elder Godfrey 

 ​Lunch after the broadcast: Sister Roskelley, Sister Hess, Sister Naughton, Elder Van Orden, Elder Desantes, Elder Godfrey, Elder Lee, Sister Wilson, and me

It was Elder DeSantes' birthday, so the Elders got him a cake, and we ate it :)

New Schedule!!

The World Wide Missionary Broadcast happened this week and they switched up the missionary daily schedule, soo weird! especially when the other one was ingrained in your head for 15 months, it is pretty hard to change, but all good things! Also we now only have 4 key indicators that we report each week, instead of 9, so that is super weird too.

Feast Upon His Love

So about a week ago, we had some freezing rain, which if you don't know what that is, then consider yourself lucky. It basically puts a thin clear layer of ice on everything, especially the roads and side walks. So we were visiting a lady who lives on a hill, and when we parked the car just slip backwards, until it hit the curb (thank goodness my drivers ed teacher taught me how to park on a hill). Then I got out of the car and just started slipping down the hill, and there is no possible way to get any traction, so I held onto the car door handles and had to pull myself up around the car, so that was pretty fun. On Saturday it was like 57 degrees here, it has been sooo warm here, I have no idea why. We haven't had any snow for quite sometime now, everything is just green, it feels like spring time. 

Anyways, I can't remember what I tell you all each week, but we received a solid referral from a member and we went to teach her this week and it went super well!!! I am so excited for her, she has been totally prepared for the gospel. We had a member come with us and the member was like hey next week you should come to my house for dinner and a lesson, and she was like okay. This is why members are the best!!! they make such a HUGE difference in missionary work, because they can offer things that we can't, like a friend, and life experiences, and their spirit filled home and a wonderful home cooked meal. 

We are doing well, not much else to say, we have a few investigators now, so that is a blessing. I am wondering if I will get transferred or not, I will find out in a week from today. I hope that everyone is doing well, and I hope you all stay safe with the weather being crazy. A scripture that really stood out to me this week was Jacob 3:1-2 " But behold, I, Jacob, would speak unto you that are pure in heart. Look unto God with firmness of mind, and pray unto him with exceeding faith, and he will console you in your afflictions, and he will plead your cause, and send down justice upon those who seek your destruction. O all ye that are pure in heart, lift up your heads and receive the pleasing word of God, and feast upon his love; for ye may, if your minds are firm, forever." The thought of feasting upon his love gave me something to ponder about this week, maybe you all can ponder on it as well. How do we feast upon His love?

I hope you all have a wonderful week! I hope that you all keep reading your scriptures daily, it is so important, and I hope that we can all pray with exceeding faith, just like the scriptures say. Make it a great week! 

Love,

Sister Koyle

Sooo . . . this is Sister Cutler!!! My old mission president's wife. I got to see her at church on Sunday because her son and daughter in law are in the Waukesha ward and they just had a baby, so she came to see the baby . . . . and me of course. It was so great to be able to see her, and to give her a hug, it felt like home, I can't even explain it.  

Sister Wilson's first time eating Pho, She said that it was pretty good.