HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!! (Brooke's Letter)

Hello friends and family that I am so thankful for!!! I would love to hear how the Thanksgiving celebrations are going and what fun traditions you do with your families :)

Some highlights from this week: 

~ tried the spiciest flavor at Buffalo Wild Wings and survived! 

~ ate probably a million oranges 

~ studied a lot about the Atonement

~ a new missionary handbook came out! 

~ had a bomb Zone Conference 

~ the light the world is out for 2019! And also a new video called "The Christ Child" and it is SO GOOD! PLEASE WATCH IT! 

~ got to teach some people how to pray :) 

~ got people to come to church! 

~ had a lot of laughs especially with my companions 

~ one of our new found friends came to our volleyball and soccer activity! :) 

~ felt the power of prayer 

~ went to a bahywah

~ spoke more Karen! Understood more Karen! :) 

~ had Sacrament meeting in Karen! :) 

~ found new people to teach :) 

~ Sister Maloney did yoga while I did the modified haha

~ ate some goooooood food

~ held puppies and played with doggos :) 

~ said goodbye to a dear friend :(

~ played games at an old folks home and had the time of our lives haha

I am so grateful for this opportunity that I have to serve here in St. Paul with the Karen people! I am grateful for my family and my ward family back home. I'm also grateful to have a ward family here and every where I go! I am grateful for my friends back home and here and for all of the people around me. The more I think about and learn about God's plan, the more I see how this all came to be and how everything fits together. I am grateful for God's plan and for His never-ending love for all of His children! I know tough times hit and bad days come but God can and will strengthen us through it all! So just hold on and hold out! I love you all! 

Love, Sister Freeman ဖီပြံဝါ

P. S. Seriously watch The Christ Child! It will make you bawl! In a good way!

Also P. S. S. Some new youth songs came out and they are SO GOOD! Definitely worth adding to your play lists ;)

Pictures:

1. The district. 

2. Said goodbye to Kho Meh ;(

3. Held a bunch of cute puppies!

4-5. Got the hang of using chopsticks

6. WHITE CARROT PHO IS SO GOOD! (prob my favorite thing so far hehe)

7. The Zone.

8. The front picture for our Karen Sacrament meeting 

9-10. Our new friend!

11. Killed it in our soccer game even though we lost 

12-13. One of our friends gave us a fun drink! 

Thanksgiving Blessings! Gobble 'til You Wobble!

It was such a nice Thanksgiving day!  We were smaller in numbers, but still just as fun!  We all contributed dishes and ate over at Mom's house so that she could be comfortable!  Allison, Jordan and Joshua came, Robin came and Mom and our family were all there.  (We were missing Todd and Megan and of course, Brooke, so we definitely felt their absence...)  The food was yummy...below is what I brought...Katelyn also made 5 dozen of her rolls!  (I didn't get a picture of those-- dang!)  Everything tasted SOOOOO good!  We enjoyed conversation and lots of Shanghai Rummy!  It was a fun, fun day!  (Pictured below is apple and chocolate banana cream pie, and our traditional yam and apple casserole!)  It had just started to rain and was super windy when we took this family picture!

Todd is LOVED by His Teachers Quorum!

Todd just got called into the Teachers Quorum in his ward and they all came over to bring him cookies and help him feel better!  This is so cute!  I love it when boys are compassionate!  So cute!

Todd's Bandages Came Off!

It was a good day today!  Todd got to take off his bandages and SHOWER!!

SMHS Swim and Dive Awards Ceremony!

Tonight was the Award's Ceremony for the SMHS Swim and Dive Team 2019 season!  Katelyn (and Drew Maskovich) were recognized again for their awards for the District Academic Team and then they were also recognized with 3 others for having a 4.0 GPA.  Katelyn and Drew were selected to be on the Academic Team because they had the highest class ranking... pretty cool!  Katelyn was also recognized tonight for her achievements on the District and State teams, her Mighty Mustang award for perfect attendance at ALL practices and meets, and for earning another Varsity Letter!  (Her Varsity bar is not shown.)  The team was also given these cute visors as a team gift this year.  It was a great season for Katelyn and she grew a lot both athletically and mentally!  Great Junior Year season Katelyn!  We're so proud of your accomplishments!

5 Months! (Brooke's Letter)

Hello :)

Wow it seems like this time is going by so fast! 

Some highlights from the week:

- ate lots of yummy food 

- met our goals! 

- strengthened my testimony of "finding when you teach and teaching when you find" 

- learned how to give good hugs from one of my favs, Mae Paw (tbh they are all my favs haha) 

- PUT UP OUR CHRISTMAS TREE :) hehe 

- drove in the snow for the first time and learned what it feels like to slide and what to do 

- got to teach part of the Restoration in Karen to a sweet pee (grandma) in our ward :) 

- NEW WHITE HANDBOOK came out!! 

- Friday volleyball nights 

- New Karen missionary (making 12 total missionaries in our little ward) 

- parallel parked for the first time! (I nailed it) 

- SO MANY CUTE KIDS 

- Witnessed again the power of priesthood blessings 

- PRIMARY PROGRAM (I couldn't stop smiling the whole time!) 

- MISSION PRESIDENTS FIRESIDE! (so many amazing testimonies were born as people shared their journey of coming to the gospel) 

-realized Sister Maloney goes home in a month :( 

Spiritual thought:

1 Samuel 16:7

"... For man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart."

The world has expectations for how we should look and what we should wear and how we should act and what we should do but if you achieve all of that and lose your heart, it isn't worth it! Keep your heart focused and dedicated to God! He can change us and make us beautiful but He works from the inside out! He loves us beyond what we can even imagine because He sees us as our potential!

I love you all! As always, I would love to hear from you! I am on the hunt for language learning ideas if you have any :) Also I would love to hear about a time when you have followed a prompting from God to do (or not do) something :)

ယအဲာ်သု! 

Love, Sister Freeman ဖီပြံဝါ

Pictures :) 

1. One of my favorite pictures from the new white handbook! 

2. Christmas tree part 1

3. Christmas tree part 2 

4. Right after I nailed the parallel park 

5. All the missionaries in our ward right now (not including the senior couple) 

6. Always gotta do the jumping picture 

7. All the Karen Missionaries (who knows what the Elders are doing) 

8. A funny video 

9. My wonderful companions :) 

10. MPF! 

11. Sister Campos! :) 

P. S. Also, my pday next week will be moved to Thanksgiving instead of Monday :) Talk to you then! 

Todd's Surgery Day...

Todd's surgery went well today and he is finally on the road to recovery!  It will be 9 months until he can play sports!  We're praying for quick healing!!

It's the simple things (Brooke's Letter)

Hello Friends and Family :)

It's been another great week!

I've been studying a lot more about faith this week and some of my favorite Bible stories came up in my studies :) 

One of my favorite stories is the story of Leprous Naaman. He goes to a prophet who he believes has the power to heal him and the prophet tells him to go wash in a river seven times. I think Naaman may have expected this powerful prophet to just snap his fingers and show that power and heal him. And I think he may have doubted in that power when that didn't happen. He didn't see the point in washing in a river seven times when he had probably washed in a river more than seven times throughout his life, so why would anything change now? But it took one of his servants to humble him and help him remember that his pride was preventing him from the possibility of being healed! Eventually, he does what the prophet asks and he is healed! This story teaches us how important it is to just trust in God and in His power! No matter what! A lot if times we prevent ourselves from being healed or from being blessed because we let our pride and our ideas get between us and God and doing what He asks. Please do the SIMPLE THINGS! They are so vital and so LIFE CHANGING!

Another story that I really like is the story where Joshua and his people come to a river carrying the ark of the covenant and the river parts so they can cross. Elder Bednar talks about this story in his talk, "Seek Learning by Faith." He talks about three components of faith used in this story. First, the people had to have hope and belief in the power of God. They had to trust in that power. Then second, they had to act and show their faith; they had to step into the river. Then their faith was confirmed as the river parted and God's power was shown and their faith became stronger. Let your faith lead you to ACT and then it will grow stronger and stronger! 

I love that we have the scriptures and that we can learn from the teachings of prophets from ancient and modern times! I am so so grateful for what God teaches us when we come to Him with an open heart and a desire to learn! 

Sorry for not much of an update on the area but things are going great! I got to learn a lot more about the Karen Culture this week and I think it is so cool! I really just love these people and their culture! :)

I love you all! I would love to hear from you and see how you are doing! 

Love, Sister Freeman ဖီပြံဝါ

Pictures 

1. A mural in Frogtown

2. "I'm trying to be like Jesus".  My companion translated it into Karen and we posted it on Facebook and people have gone crazy! Haha we went viral sharing the gospel! lol

3. This picture is from Halloween 

4. Its getting colder and colder 

5. Volleyball!!! 

6. This is Longan fruit and it is very interesting looking and tasting haha 

7. Matching with Eh Soe! 

STATE!! Finals...

Went at the end of the meet today to see Katelyn and her 400 Free Relay team...they are pictured below here with Coach in the warm up pool before their race.  Katelyn swam the first leg.  They were in lane 7 with a time of 3:51.12, which is the fastest they've swum it this season!  They came in 12th or 13th overall-- a team have have been disqualified... so I'm not sure how it ended up.  We went to Chili's with the team after the meet and enjoyed a nice visit with the coaches and the kids had fun too!  I can't believe the season is OVER!!!  That was the fastest one yet!!!