2016 Is Almost Here

Hello Everyone, I hope ya'll had a very Merry Christmas, because I did. I really think that Christmas this year has been the best Christmas I have ever had. There is something about brightening someone's day that really just brightens your own (I hope that makes sense). This week was not the most productive week with Christmas and my companion being sick, but I was able to get a little more organized, so that was nice.

Tristan is doing so good, she came to church again and I think she is really enjoying it and getting used to it. And adjusting to leaving her boys in primary and not worrying so much about them. She has such a strong testimony of prayer and scripture study it is the coolest thing, because I feel like if you have those things down, then everything else about the gospel and the church naturally falls into place. 

We spent a good chunk of our Christmas day at Bennett's (the nice pastor who is reading the Book of Mormon) parent's house. So I got to know his parents and his siblings really well, so that was quite nice, their family kinda reminds me or my family, except mine is way bigger and way more loud, no offence to anyone, I love my family, A LOT. Also Holly came to all three hours of church on Sunday so that was pretty cool to see her there. 

We didn't do much tracting this week, but one of the houses that we did tract, we met this sweet girl named Kelsey, at first she was super skeptical, she said that the only book of scripture was the bible and if it isn't in there then it isn't scripture, she said that she had learned about "the Mormons" in a class at Lutheran High and that we had some pretty weird ideas, but then we told her the truth about us, and we recited the first vision, which ALWAYS brings the spirit and we had her read the famous Moroni 10: 3-5 and she started to get a little bit emotional as she read it. After she read it she handed the Book of Mormon back and we kept talking to her about the church and Joseph Smith but I could tell that she wanted the Book of Mormon, she kept looking at it, so before we left I asked her if we left it with her if she would read it and she said yes and then she said where is your church at? so we told her and I would like to say that she came to church on Sunday, but she didn't, but it was still a really cool experience to see someone's perspective change like that so quickly. 

Also just a funny story, the Pollock family has this incredibly stupid tiny dog, normally I like dogs pretty well, but their dog is just plain dumb. So we were visiting this former investigator named Valerie about half a block away from the Pollock's and we were just standing at her door talking to her and all of the sudden out of no where this dog bolts between me and Sister Carlini, through the door that is barely cracked open and it jumps on Valerie's couch and pees on her couch and her clothes and her phone. It was the funniest thing, I could not with hold my self from laughing, me and my comp were just busting up. Brother Pollock comes up and is just so sorry and embarrassed and mad at this stupid dog and Valerie didn't really say anything, but I can imagine that she wasn't super happy about, but it gave us a great laugh and a good story. So ladies and gents that was my week, I hope you have a very happy new year and you make some awesome resolutions! 

Love,

Sister Koyle

​Made this awesome ginger bread house all by myself, I had to, it's just a tradition you know.

Christmas morning, opening presents. Thank you to everyone and anyone who sent me anything for Christmas, including Christmas cards, I really felt loved and remembered.

Merry Christmas!!!

Hello everyone, I hope ya'll are ready for Christmas. This week was pretty great, Heavenly Father gave us about four referrals about thirty minutes away from us, which is a lot of miles when you only get so many miles every month, but we figured we needed to go out to the Plymouth Glenbeulah area for some reason or another, so we did and some of the referrals weren't interested, or home, but one of them is an 11 year old boy named Shawn who lives in Elkhart Lake and he wants to get baptized, his whole family is baptized, but they have just been less active for about 7 years, but he has decided to get baptized, so we are going to teach him and hopefully get his Dad ready to baptize him, and hopefully reactivate their family, I am pretty excited about them. 

Tristan is doing pretty good, she came to church again with both of her boys, and also this week we taught her law of Chastity and she has already been living it . . . she is SOO prepared. She watched Meet the Mormons this week also and I think she liked it, the last lady on meet the mormons reminds me of her because Tristan has two black boys and she is a single Mom, but I hope (like on Meet the Mormons) that someday she can find an awesome Mormon man to marry and maybe someday her sons can serve missions. Obviously I have high hopes for her and her family, but that is a good thing right? 

Being a missionary around Christmas time is pretty much the best thing ever. I have really been enjoying it, you can be so much more creative around Christmas time with how you share the gospel, because you can carol, or wrap books of mormon, and give out Christmas cards and Christmas pass along cards, and people really are much more receptive. Also it is just great to testify of Jesus Christ and his birth. We were tracting and I asked this lady why she celebrated Christmas and she said because it is a national holiday and I was able to explain to her that it is because Christ was born. People, make sure your Children know the true meaning of Christmas, that it isn't about Santa Claus, but someone so much greater. Have a Very Merry Christmas! 

Love,

Sister Koyle

​You know your in Wisconsin when . . . there is a giant statue of a cow on the side of the road.

Decorating the Christmas tree at the Bingham's house.

Making cookies at the Relief Society President's house

Exchanges! back is Sister Kelley, Sister Carlini, Sister Dunlap, and front is me and Sister Hansen.

 District pics on the beach

me, Sister Carlini, Elder Low, Vang, Casagranda, Stokes

Proverbs 32:21

Well this week flew by sooo fast. We had zone conference all day on Tuesday in Oshkosh and so that was fun and motivating and all, but unfortunately we didn't get any work done that day. Wednesday was a great day we were able to see Tristan and set a baptismal date with her for the 23rd of January so a ways away, but that is the day she feels like she will be ready on Friday we were able to go on exchanges with the Sister training leaders, this time I went to Menasha with Sister Kelley and Sister Hansen and Sister Dunlap came to Sheboygan with Sister Carlini. They are in a trio right now because Sister Kelley is leaving 2 weeks early so that she can make it home in time for school. Exchanges were pretty fun, it is always nice to see how other missionaries do things differently and it was so nice to be able to get some good tips from Sister Kelley, she is so awesome. 

Saturday was so great we were able to teach a lot of people and to see a lot of people and we volunteered at this thing called Making Spirits Bright it is where they have a light show that goes to the music on your car radio and you just drive through it, it is pretty awesome and then afterwards you can go see Santa, and so that is the part that we were helping with. We also saw Bennett and Holly on Saturday and we found out that Bennett actually wanted to be a rock star at one point in his life and he actually made a legit CD, so he gave one to me and Sister Carlini and we had him sign it, you know in case he becomes famous someday. He is actually quite good, we told him that he could drop his job as a Pastor, join our church and become a musician like David Archuleta, or Alex Boye. 

Also on Saturday we saw Sister Pollock who has been a member for 15 years, but has only been active for about a year and a half, her husband also just became a member about a year ago. They are the most amazing people ever, they have been through everything, heavy drugs, criminal activity, jail, teenage pregnancy, and a whole lot more, but they have completely and totally used the atonement in their lives and they have come such a long way. Sister Pollock was able to receive her patriarchal blessing this week and in it it said that she would be sealed to her family in the temple, and she is so looking forward to that and striving to be able to make that happen, she puts little pictures of temples all over her house. And they are making a special trip to Salt Lake in February to see the Salt Lake temple, I told her that if she is going to see it then she needs to see the inside of it, because it is the most amazing thing I have ever seen in my life, so that is what she is striving for. 

We were able to teach Tristan about tithing on Saturday as well and I was really pretty nervous about it because she is a single Mom and she is always saying how hard it is with money. But I had received a prompting to teach her about tithing, so I prayed that she would receive it well and she did it was awesome, the Lord had prepared her way before hand, and she was ready for it. She willing accepted the law of tithing because she knew that it would bless her and her boys. 

Also sorry this is so long, but there were just so many awesome things this week. But Sunday there was a little 8 year old boy getting baptized from the ward and we invited Holly and Bennett to come see it, and Bennett was able to come and watch it, and watch the boy get baptized and receive the Holy Ghost as well. So that was a really cool experience and the spirit was really strong. Now we just need to get Holly and Bennett to do the same, he is reading the Book of Mormon, which is the converting power, so it will happen eventually. 

But I hope you all have a wonderful week and a very Merry Christmas and I hope everyone is enjoying the snow for me. 

Love,

Sister Koyle

Please pray for it to snow in Wisconsin

Dear Everyone,

I hope ya'll are doing great. Wisconsin is treating me well, except there isn't any snow :( But other than that it is great. This week Elder Miller left, but we were able to have some fun times with him before he headed off to Kenosha, so that was good. There is a guy named Joe that Sister Carlini used to teach. He had cancer and he was really into the gospel, but his wife, Adelle, didn't like the missionaries teaching her husband, so they quit teaching him. This week Sister Carlini felt like we should go visit Joe, so we did and turns out that he actually passed away in September from cancer. So that is super sad and we totally didn't expect that, but now Adelle has agreed to have us teach her and her children, so we are excited to teach them, I think they will be really receptive because they are at such a hard time in their lives right now. 

Also we went to Tristan's on Thursday night to have a lesson with her and as soon as we walked in I could tell something was wrong, so after the prayer I asked her what was wrong and she went off. She said that she didn't want to do bible study (lessons) with us anymore and that she just feels really alone and she doesn't have any friends and that she doesn't even know if God is real and that she just wants to go back to where she was ten years ago, and the only reason that she didn't cancel on us is because she is a woman of her word. So thank goodness Sister Carlini and Tristan are soul sisters and Sister Carlini is awesome at following the spirit, she was so inspired and said the perfect things to help her out. We also showed her a video called Why we need a savior, so good by the way, and we just let her know that satan is working really hard on her right now, because she is so close to making a covenant with the Lord and this is where he does his best work is when people are so close. And we committed her to reading and praying and coming to church. By the time we left, we were laughing and she was crying tears of joy, and she was so excited for church. We checked on her on Friday night and Saturday night to see how she was doing and she was great, and she said that she had read her scriptures and prayed and wrote in her journal and that she felt so much peace and she came to church on Sunday!!! TRISTAN CAME TO CHURCH! it actually happened. and she stayed all three hours AND SHE LOVED IT! It was seriously the most perfect church meeting ever, she said that she couldn't believe that everyone there is going through the same things that she is and that they are all so nice. She was so scared to come to church because she thought that people were going to judge her, I was just like, only satan would tell you that, because he didn't want you to come see how awesome church is. So ya that was pretty sweet! 

I hope ya'll were able to watch the Chirstmas devotional because it was great, and if you didn't, well guess what? it was recorded! so you can still watch it on LDS.org. Have a great week!

Love,

Sister Koyle

This is our Christmas decor, it brings me lots of joy.

I decorated my planner with the two most over used LDS pictures ever, but I love it.

Saying our goodbyes to Elder Miller.

​The bars here have the silliest names, there is another one called "that place on 8th street" I guess when there are so many of them it is hard to come up with a name that hasn't been used yet.

Time For Snow and Christmas Music

Hello to whomever may read this,

Thanksgiving was great, we had so many appointments to go to all day we were just running from place to place, and then for our last appointment we had dinner at the Devenish's house, they are young empty nesters and they are soo cool. They met on their mission, so they told us a bunch of good stories and showed us pictures from that. When she first met her husband on her mission as she was shaking his hand for the first time the spirit told her that she was going to marry him, or else she wouldn't get married, so that was pretty alarming. Sister Devenish is a convert so she told us her conversion story and it is AMAZING. But anyways so it was nice to be able to just sit and chill for a bit and not think about what I was going to do or say next. On Friday we had a family home evening with Holly and Bennett at this awesome families home, so that was a pretty good experience. And sometime last week we were able to start teaching one of my favorite people, her name is Amber and her husband is inactive, and they have the cutest little boy. Things are going pretty good here. We got the transfer text on Saturday and Elder Miller, my stellar district leader is going to a different area. But sister Carlini is staying, by the time this next transfer is over she will have been in her first area, Sheboygan, for half of her mission . . . crazy! 

Everyone keeps telling me that there is a ton of snow in Idaho and Utah, I wish there was some here, but all I see is green grass. I'll just keep praying for some, Sister Carlini hates the snow, she is from Arizona, but it makes me so happy! Also check out the new Christmas video atchristmas.mormon.org, and share it with your friends! Do it, I dare you. I hope ya'll have a great week ya know! 

Love,

Sister Koyle

Isn't this the coolest sign ever!? They also have signs like this here with snowmobiles and tractors on them.

Thanksgiving at the Devenish's with the district

Our last district meeting of the transfer

The elders like to mess with our car and put pamphlets on it from the 80's

Just some surfers and paddle boarders on Lake Michigan on November 24th . . . no big deal.

I Have A Lot Of Thanks To Give!

Hello everyone!! 

Happy Thanksgiving, I get to go to like three or four Thanksgiving dinners on Thursday so that should be fun. But anyways this week was seriously the best week ever. So many great things happened. We had a lesson with a member referral at the members house, so that was amazing and we are going to see her again on Thursday actually, so we are excited about that because when investigators have friends who are members it makes all the difference in the world. Her name is Sharrea and she is a friend of the Pollock family who I LOVE dearly. Brother Pollock was just baptized last year, but they have actually been inactive recently, but they just started coming back to church, and now they had this great missionary opportunity. Also on Friday we had a mission tour in Green bay (yes Mom I drove) and Brother and Sister Schweitzer (sp?) of the seventy came to our mission and talked to us and it was so great, the most important message that I learned from them was that I need to teach conversion not theology. We can teach what our church believes all we want, but if they don't find out for themselves that it is true than it doesn't matter. That pretty much took up all of Friday, but before we left Green bay my district and I decided that we had to go to Lambeau Field where the Packers play, so we got some pictures there. On Saturday we had Stake Conference in Nina and we had a member drive us there so that was nice. Stake Conference was so good, all of the missionaries in the Stake sang, which is a lot of missionaries, we made up a good sized choir. We sang As I have Loved you in Hmong, Spanish, and English it was pretty cool. On Sunday we actually went to Bennett's church at 8 for kicks and giggles. He did a sermon for everyone, which doesn't usually happen, so he invited us. It was actually really good he read from Habakkuk in the bible and he talked about how happiness and joy are different. We aren't going to be happy all of the time or else we would be robots. But we can feel joy all of the time. Joy is much greater than happiness, we are able to feel joy even during our trials. Joy is basically having the faith and the knowledge that everything will be okay and that God is with us at all times and will not forsake us. After Bennett's church was ran into a guy there that we had met before named Jay, and he invited us over for dinner, so that was awesome. Then we had our church and after church we visited some people. Tristan didn't come to church again, so we stopped by her house and she wasn't home, but her two boys were and the little boy is 7 and so cute, as we were leaving he yelled out the door "I LOVE YOU GUYS" haha it made me so happy. We had dinner with the bishop and some of his friends who are not members, and we had a really good dinner and a really good lesson with them, the spirit was strong so that was good. Then we had another dinner with Jay and Bennett and their families and Jay and his wife and kids are SOO nice and hospitable as soon as we walked in the girl took our bags and coats and the son asked what we wanted to drink. They have such strong values it is awesome to see people of other faiths that still see the importance of having strong families, we just need to figure out a way to help them understand that there is so much more. So it has been a wonderful week! I just wanted to thank everyone who emails me, and I am sorry if I don't email you back, I really do appreciate all of the support and emails and words of wisdom that I have received from you all. Have a great week! and a Happy Thanksgiving!

Love,

Sister Koyle

​They have pretty sunsets here too.

​My attempt at a snow angel.

This is basically the celestial kingdom of bathrooms, at the Kohler Design center. Kohler is a big deal here, like half of the people in Sheboygan work at Kohler, there are actually a bunch of their workers on strike right now, so that is fun.

 Super blurry picture of me at Lambeau field!

 ​I might as well be a cheese head.

My first tears in the field have been shed.

Until Friday this week was pretty boring, I did make some apple sauce on Thursday, which was awesome. On Friday we had 3 to 6 week training in Oshkosh, so that was a blast! I was able to see Sister Roskelley and Elder Riley Lott (from Logan), which was so exciting, we conversed and told each other mission stories. Then we had a lesson in Sheboygan at 5 and after that we had to drive back to Fond Du Lac for exchanges. I went on exchanges with Sister Hansen from Salt Lake, she is so sweet and adorable and we had such a great day on Saturday, we were able to visit quite a lot of people. Saturday night we exchanged back and I got Sister Carlini back. Sunday Tristan didn't come to church, I have no idea why, but it seriously broke my heart.

A couple of weeks ago we met a guy, who just happened to be a pastor, that was watching the world series so he didn't want to talk to us right then, but he begged us to come back later. So Sunday night one of our lessons fell through, so I was like hey lets go visit that pastor that we met that one time. So we did. I voluntarily knocked on his door and shook his hand and went into his gorgeous house and sat on his perfect white couch and met is wonderful wife and his tiny dog named Lucy . . . and then he tore us apart limb from limb. And Sister Carlini was a complete champ and she was so Christlike and loving and she explained everything wonderfully. But I just sat there, literally, visibly, shaking. I felt exactly like Joseph did in Joseph Smith History verse 15. I had so many emotions going on inside of me, I was scared and mad and confused and I had so many verses I wanted to yell at him and my heart was pounding, but I just sat there. When we left I was so mad at myself that I didn't say anything, I was so disappointed with myself. I felt like I didn't do my part as a missionary, like I let my savior down by not defending his church. But I learned from this experience, that I must always bear my testimony. Hopefully I won't ever come across someone as heartless as that pastor, but if I do I know exactly what to do. Anyone can try to disprove the doctrine of this church, but nobody can tell me what I do or do not know. And I know that a fourteen year old boy had a question about which church to join and I know that he received an answer because Heavenly Father is the same yesterday today and forever and if he talked to his children yesterday then that means he talks to them today and he will continue to talk to them. I know that Joseph was a prophet of God and he restored the original church of Jesus Christ along with the priesthood power of God. And people have doubts about this, that is why I know the Lord provided evidence of this, and that evidence is the Book of Mormon. I know the Book of Mormon is the most true book on the earth, and that it can bring great peace to those who read it. I invite you all to read it and to pray to know if it is true, with the intent to act on the answer that you receive, and you will receive an answer that it is true. Have a great week!

Love,

Sister Koyle

Just a sign with lights that spell Sheboygan, so I had to take a picture by it.

This is Sister Hansen, and she is awesome!

​This is one of the many typical red barns that are found EVERYWHERE in Wisconsin. . . also silos. 

What on earth is Hardee's?!! . . . It is called Carl's Jr.