"MERRY CHRISTMAS 🎄" (Week 68: 12/19-12/26/16)

What an amazing week! I just wanted to wish you all a Merry CHRISTmas! 

This has seriously been such an amazing Christmas, especially with it being on Sunday and being able to go to church! I love being a missionary. I am so grateful that I have been able to be a missionary for these two Christmases, because He is the reason for the season. The world is so caught up in it being so commercialized, and we truly forget the real meaning of the season. Being a missionary, we just get to go tell everyone about the reason and what a joyous thing to proclaim! 

This week we had our Christmas Conference with all of the mission. And so that was fun! 

The rest of the week we did service and taught a couple people over Skype. (A new tool that our mission has to teach people). The work is hastening! How great is that. 

And last night I was able to see my family over Skype. The last time until I get to see them in 3 months in person. How crazy! Time is seriously flying. And I do NOT WANT TO COME HOME! 

Oh and on Christmas Eve, we played Pickleball with an investigator! Super fun! 

I know that Jesus Christ is our Brother, our friend, our Counselor, and more importantly Our Savior. How great is that. Without the restored gospel we would not know about the great Plan of Happiness! 

I am so grateful for you all and for all of your wonderful gifts. Thank you sooo much! Have a wonderful New Years! And Stay Safe! 

Pics below! Sorry there are a ton! 

Till 2017 ! 

I love you! Have a great week!

Love,

Sister Pewtress

MUG SHOT

Merry Christmas 2016 from Sister Olson and I

THUGS

Merry Christmas from Sister Pewtress

Sister Olson and I

Charlotte (member), Sister Olson and I. 12/25/16

Christmas Eve tiredness

Christmas Conference special... CAFE RIO.

Sister Johns, Sister Olson, and I. (left to right)

FROST

Santa called us his helpers.... we told everyone to change and be nice!

Breakfast with the Hermanas. Hermana Winterton and Hermana Eddington

"JOY TO THE WORLD ✨🌎 "(Week 67: 12/12-12/19/16)

What a wonderful week that we have had! We have worked our heads off and seen so many miracles. :) Sister Olson and I have been able to help so many people this week come closer to Jesus Christ. We were able to teach Joseph every single day except on Saturday but that was okay! 

I am so grateful for this Christmas season. One of my goals that I had this year was to finish the Old Testament by Christmas. And I DID IT! It was soo cool to see how the things we do here in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, went on long ago in the Old Testament times. I am so grateful for the scriptures and how we can continue to learn and grow to become more like our Savior Jesus Christ. This week I just wanted to share a scripture out of the Old Testament! 

In Isaiah chapter 9 it reads;

"6 For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace."

How wonderful is it, that we have a Savior who brings us peace, allows us to feel good, is our Father of the earth who we can pray to daily, our God, a Counsellor who we can turn to when we are struggling. How Wonderful the baby boy, wrapped in swaddling clothes and laid in a manger. 

I am so grateful for my Savior Jesus Christ and for his redeeming love. Without it there would be no Christmas season or any of us at all! Through the Atonement of Jesus Christ we can grow and become like Him! I invite you all to draw closer to Jesus Christ by focusing on the REAL meaning of CHRISTmas! 

One cool thing that I was able to do this week was go to an Addiction Recovery Meeting with someone we are teaching. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints has a wonderful program for anyone who is struggling with an addiction. It has parts of the 12 Steps in the Alcoholic Anonymous program. Well we studied out of step 2 about Hope, and it was really cool. One of the people there talked about how hope is a feeling. I know as we have hope in things that our faith in God and Jesus Christ will grow and we will be able to draw closer to him! 

Oh and we (mostly I) was able to give blood at the Red Cross blood drive. It was soo cool! Donated in 7 mins! Whooohooo!!! 

I want to wish you all a Merry Christmas! 'Tis the Season!  

I'll be home for Christmas NEXT YEAR! 

I love you! ️ 

Love,

Sister Pewtress

Donated Blood for the first time :)

TRACTING IN THE COLD!

We turned into zombies.. YIKES!

Sticky CHEX MIX!

Face Masks! :)

"BELIEVE🎅🏼✨" (Week 66: 12/5-12/12/16)

Wow, faith is such a amazing thing. We have had to have so much faith this week. This week at UVA was pretty dead. We had been contacting and no one was listening. Rough life, but that's okay. Everyone was going through Finals, right before Christmas Break and so a few people listened but we got no return appointments. It was a pretty hard week. 

We did see some cool miracles. We were riding the bus back from grounds and we were coming close to our stop... and I see this lady who was sitting across from us and she looked all warm and so I just commented on her scarf and beanie and we talked for a while. She had asked us if we were students, and we nicely stated that we were missionaries. She then stated that missionaries a while ago came and knocked on her door!!! Ahh, well we invited her to listen again to the message and she said she would, so that was a huge blessing and a lovely miracle that we saw this week!

Sister Olson and I sadly.... hit our (gulp ) 15 Month mark, which was sooo crazy. So to celebrate we went and ate at Sushi  we even took lots of fun pictures! It was soo crazy to think that we have been out for that long, because it sure doesn't even feel like that. 

I am seriously sooo grateful for the Atonement of Jesus Christ. I know for a fact that we are not perfect.. we are anything but perfect, but because of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, we can be made whole! I love this gospel sooo sooo much and am soo grateful for this time to serve! 

I love you all soo very much! Have a great week! 

Love,

Sister Pewtress

:::PICTURES:::

How our moms feel about our 15 months 

How President Smith feels about us leaving. 

How we feel at 15 Months.......

Another sleep over with the Hermanas! 

A cold winter night! ️ 

Christmas Lights at the Rotunda!

SUSHI!!! 

"BABY, ITS COLD OUTSIDE!!!" (Week 65: 11/28-12/5)

Wow, the weather has started to get cold. And I am not ready for that. I hate the cold. Lol! But I am so very grateful to be out here in Virginia teaching people about the love of Christ. 

This week has been kind of crazy. We seriously spent one whole day in our area, and all the others days we were doing other things. We had exchanges on a Tuesday. We spent Wednesday in our area teaching the gospel. Thursday we drove down to Richmond, where we had trainings all day! Friday we had Zone Meeting up in Harrisonburg so I got to see my old stomping grounds which was sooo fun! And we had to stay the night at some of the Sisters houses up there because it was to late to drive back. Saturday we had our own Zone Meeting down in Charlottesville. Then we had the adult session of Stake Conference. We then drove back home to Charlottesville! On Sunday we had Stake conference, so that was cool! I was honestly sooo tired of sitting. So it was kind of hard to focus.

Anyways so that's kind the week that I have had. But there are so many miracles that have happened in our area! We were able to teach so many people, which was really cool! Especially the fact that we haven't even been in our area. :/ but hey it's sooo cool!

I am seriously so grateful for the gospel and all of the things that we go through to make us better. I seriously can't believe how fast time is going. I don't want to ever not be a missionary. Being a missionary has been the best thing that has ever happened. Not only being able to change other but being changed myself. 

I invite y'all to change and become more like your Savior Jesus Christ. Turn to him see how he can change you! 

So last week I also forgot to give you the link for the #LighttheWorld, so here you go. Mormon.org

There is a little advent calendar, as well. And I invite y'all to turn to that if you want to become more like your Savior! 

I love y'all and hope y'all have a great week! 

Love,

Sister Pewtress

The Rotunda

Pic from last week

Said goodbye to the Binghams 😭😭

Got to see some familiar faces. Sister Hebdon

The beautiful leaves🍂🍁

"#LIGHTtheWORLD"(Week 64: 11/21-11/28)

HEY EVERYONE!

It honestly feels like it was two days since I last emailed, but yet there has been so many great and amazing things that have happened this week!

Are you ready for the craziest/wildest ride in the WILDERNESS??

So it all started Monday, we had to do a lot... Sister Prach needed to send a ton of stuff home, so that all of her stuff weighed under 45 pounds for the plane! So we went and did that. We also went with an investigator and played Pickleball! And wow!! That was soo much fun! :) later that night we had a going away dinner with some of the members of the Ward, and well Sister Prach said goodbye to all of them. Sooo sad!

Tuesday morning, we had transfers! I said goodbye to Sister Prach :/ and I then got a new companion!!! AND GUESS WHO IT IS!!!!!!!!!! The WONDERFUL SISTER OLSON! Ahhhh! We have seriously wanted to be companions for the last 14 months of our mission, and our mission president finally put us together!! YAYYY!! When she first got here, I seriously FREAKED OUT! Haha! Well she has been out the same amount of time as me, and well we get along soooo welll!!! We are so excited to work s hard this transfer :) 

This whole week.... there has been but a few people on Grounds at UVA. And so we needed to do something productive, as well as work with some of our investigators that didn't go home for the holiday break, so we decided to be a part of the Christmas Initiative, which is called #LIGHTtheWORLD. And if you haven't already seen the video I will put the link in the email, towards the end! But to get into what we did, is we went and chalked beautiful signs on grounds during the week! And so below are a few of our signs! (No it isn't bad to do this, all of the students do it as well!) 

This time of year, is a time to be so grateful for what we have and to share it with others, and so the church has provided an advent calendar for people to do each day, starting on a December 1st. I invite y'all to go and check it out.

I am so grateful for the opportunity to serve again over the holidays. I know that it is but a small sacrifice to be away from my family, but I know it is a sacrifice that I was willing to take and I am honestly so grateful for it. 

I am so grateful for Jesus Christ and all that he does for us, and I pray that we can continue to use the atonement better in our lives. 

I love you all, and I am so grateful for what y'all to do help in the work of the Lord. 

Until next week!  

Love,

Sister Pewtress

"GRATEFUL!" (Week 62: 11/14-11/21)

Wow what a great week! Though I feel like I say this every week!! Haha. It was a really great week! 

There were so many miracles that I was sooo pleased and grateful to be apart of.

We had a really cool experience this week. So flashback to Tuesday last week. Sister Prach went to the temple, so I needed a companion. So Sister Olson an old MTC buddy, came down to Charlottesville with me! So we were doing some contacting on this little shopping mall close to UVA and well we try to talk to everyone, if they seem interested. So we were walking and we see this guy sitting on this comfy chair with his  pit bull dog, not doing some good things, such as breaking the word of wisdom. (Aka, alcohol and tobacco) so we kind of just walk by thinking that he isn't prepared. And come to find out he stops us, and asks us if we taught people about Jesus Christ.? The fact that I even thought that he wasn't prepared was so sad. I thought about it later.... and I thought that if I were Jesus Christ (not saying that I was perfect) but if I was p, I would talk to him, and not cast the first stone. I believe by that experience that I learned something I never would have learned. I learned that we can not just walk by those who are struggling! Those are the ones who need the most help! 

I am so grateful for this opportunity to serve a mission for my Savior, because we are truly His HANDS & FEET! He needs us for this great cause. Not just missionaries but members as well. We can't do it alone! We, as missionaries, need the help of those who aren't wearing a name tag. That is what we promised our Savior to do when we were baptized! He asked to help others. So are you? 

This week, we have the wonderful opportunity to be of service to someone else.  Whatever you can do be grateful for what you have! :)

One quick quote, as well as a beautiful scripture in honor of this wonderful week of being GRATEFUL! 

Someone once said, "Having gratitude but not expressing it is he same as wrapping a beautiful gift but never delivering it."

Alma 34: 38 That ye contend no more against the Holy Ghost, but that ye receive it, and take upon you the name of Christ; that ye humble yourselves even to the dust, and worship God, in whatsoever place ye may be in, in spirit and in truth; and that ye live in thanksgiving daily, for the many mercies and blessings which he doth bestow upon you.

As we live in Thanksgiving daily, we will be humbled and we will see all of the mercies and blessings that he does give us! 

I am so thankful for you all. And I love you all so much! Keep the faith! 

Love,

Sister Pewtress