Mission Vacation

Hello Family!!!

Man this week has been a little bit strange but so much fun! Since we had transfers on Tuesday. and then Zone Conference on the Wednesday 10 days after that, they decided that instead of flying us out to Bethel and then back in about a week that they would just keep us in and send us on a little tour of the mission! Tuesday I met up with my new companion Elder Nelson. Like I said he's from Bountiful and we played basketball in Jr High together. He is an awesome guy and we're really going to have a lot of fun together. (and of course work really hard too :) ) After transfer meeting we made the long voyage down to Kenai with the new Elders that are going to be working there. It really is one of the prettiest drives in the world! The whole time you're driving through mountain passes with glaciers on both sides of you. It such an awesome drive! It really was so much fun to go back there. I miss it so much! I'm really hoping that I get to go back and see the people there.  They are so amazing!  I got to go around and visit everyone again and see what's been going on. It felt like I had been gone way longer than 3 months. While I was down there, I was able to go and see Sister Olson (my recent convert) and her husband. They told me that they had been able to make it up to Anchorage to do baptisms for the dead and that a year from when she was baptized that they're planning on going through the temple to be sealed together as spouses for time and all eternity. This really has been one of the most rewarding moments of my mission. To be able to see the people you work with progress and move towards the temple is such a blessing. As missionaries our goal isn't to baptize. So many people think that it is, but that's only the first step. Our goal is to see everyone dressed in white ready to go into the temple and partake of the blessings it has to offer all of us and to help them make it there. They told me that they want me to be there when they go through so I'm so excited for that!

Yesterday we went to the Jeep dealership in Soldotna to pick up 2 brand new 2014 Jeep Compass's to shuttle up by ourselves from Soldotna to Anchorage. It was SO weird being all by myself for FOUR WHOLE HOURS!! I didn't know what to do all by myself for that long! You'll probably laugh and think I'm weird but it's so true! After we made it to Anchorage and dropped one of the Jeeps off we drove up to Wasilla to visit Elder Nelson's old area. On the way there a huge whiteout storm hit us out of no where. We were driving down the freeway pretty fast when all of the sudden a car appeared out of no where at a dead stop about 30 yards in front of us. There literally was no way that we could have stopped that fast. It was impossible. The roads were extremely icy and slick and everyone was sliding all over the place. But some how when we slammed on the breaks we didn't even skid for a second and were able to stop. We were both freaking out a little bit because if we would've hit them I definitely wouldn't be here right now. It's amazing to see God's hand in your life and to truly see how he is constantly watching over us where ever we go!