E-mail from April 24, 2013

Hello Family, 

This week news: I can officially talk now and I have not passed the cold to my companion Sorella Eaton. Sorella Eaton and I found out that we are fourth cousins. We were doing a lesson on family history and how to use family new search with Jeremy because she wants to do family work and take names to the temple for baptisms and we used our website and we found a name in common. Anyway officially Dad she is your fourth cousin and my fourth cousin once removed, but we just found it really silly. I forgot to write down, but I will get the full name for you guys. Another awesome event that happened is Kevin got baptized on Sunday. We had to get special permission to have the confirmation right after, but he was. And it took 5 hours for the font to fill. We were so grateful that we filled the font up before church. You see we had the baptism right after church at 5:30. Oh yeah we have church from 2 to 5 and next week we are going to be allowed to use our church again or at least we hope.   Third we were moved into a new apartment  Well it is not a apartment we live in a house and our landlords live above. It is awesome and we kind of needed to move. 

  Yes mom I did sing there one time or three I do not remember how many times. I am glad that everything worked out so well with Ivy; that is awesome. I am always excited to hear stories like that.

  Well the other day we had a crazy time. It was raining like crazy a few times and one day we went outside and it was only sprinkling so we took a little ombrello (umbrella) and we were not equipped for the rain. We thought we would return home after. You see we had to be at Cologno Nord (other end of the green line) last Friday to pick up the contract for the house at 10 am and we did not know where we were going so we left earlier. And they said it would take 10 minutes it ended up talking 2 hours or so and right after we had to go to Gessate (end of the greenline). So we went straight to the appointment, our attire were a sweater (not a jacket) each, open shoes and not an ombrello each (we thought we would have time to pick the items we would need for our lessons). Our landlord saw that we did not have a ombrello and gave us his and then at our lesson the member gave us each a jacket so by the end of the day we were okay. It was just funny that after each thing we did it got better. Any way that was a little crazy day. Well I do not know what else to tell you guys, but I love you and hope all is well. 

Love 

Ali 

E-mail form April 17, 2013

Hello Family, 

Well so this week has been good. But on a different note I got a cold on Sunday and then on Monday night I lost my voice. But the funny thing is we had a lesson Monday night and in the middle of the lesson my voice completely disappeared so my companion pretty much had to do the talking. Yesterday we tried to conserve my voice so during our lesson I could not talk, but I think today is a little worse. I whisper or do not talk. Well I am just hoping my voice comes back quickly so I can help my companion more in lessons. 

   Haha well you want to know everything that is going on in the mission. Haha, I do not think strange of you, you are my family. For p-day we ended up going to the museum at the castle. There we are lot of different things there. The funny thing was we ran into one of our investigators that we have been trying to get a appointment with for three weeks. And so we fixed an appointment; which was a blessing. But they had a range of things at this museum and yes I did take pictures, but I forgot my camera today sorry. 

  I am glad that the cards got there. I hope that Parker had a good birthday. Well that will be good that dad will be able to be there. I am assuming that the craziness of tax season is now officially over you are happy.  

  Silvia is doing awesome (one of the investigators who went to the conference with us). Yesterday she accepted a baptism date. We are now teaching her and her husband. Her husband asks more questions than anyone I have ever met in my life. But I am glad he has the questions. Well I would like to tell you some of our interesting experiences that we have been having. Last Friday was a interesting day. We had to take a train out to one of our appointments and then return back at exactly the right time or we could not make all of our appointments. Which we some how did. We meet our member and went to a lesson. We got out of that lesson a little later than I thought we would. Then after that lesson had to  take a bus over to Sesto San Giovanni area. You see we were at Cologno centro and the only way to make it in time for that lesson was to take the bus or it would take over a hour in the metro and walking everything combined. But I thought I recognized the the area that we were at  (I was looking outside the bus; this was on our way to Silvia), but I was wrong. We got off the bus and the street that we were at was not even on the map. I felt worse because we were with a member and we had to walk 40 minutes to find the area that we needed to. Okay here is the funny part because I know that I looked like a crazy person doing this. There was no one, I mean no human soul on that street and then we say someone walking on the other side of the street. And I wanted to know how to get to the street; so I started sprinting for this person. And then I yelled at him to stop and he told us how to get to the street. But my companion Sorella Eaton and the member Susanna they just started laughing and me. Anyways we were only 30 minutes late. It could have been worse. But Silvia still wanted us to come. And if we had not been late her husband would not have been there. So it was a blessing in disguise. 

 Do not worry we will take pictures. Parker is going to the Prom that is a weird thought. I mean I am sorry Parker but I cannot believe it.  Well I love you all and hope that you enjoy your week. 

Love, 

Ali. 

E-mail from April 10, 2013

Family,

Mom at least best buy can save the day. I am gad that you found the games that Conner wanted. What kind of games did he want? I am glad that Conner had a good Birthday!  

  Well today is sunny outside which is nice because it has not been for a little while. But finally we can see the blue sky. Today all the museums in Milan are for free and we are going to another Leonardo da Vinci exhibit. We found out yesterday that it is only open for this week so we are going. 

  So I want to tell you about this amazing experience that happened to my companion and I on Saturday  So we were at General Conference and right before it started we received a call. It was from one of our potentials investigators. She was calling to know when we had church, but because it was general conference we thought we should explain a little before she watched conference so we set up a meeting with her before conference and then went in together after. The thing is three weeks ago we had a appointment with her, but she did not respond so we thought she was not interested and we did not have her full address. But the reason was she left her phone at work,but she is awesome. She said she was looking for something. We will see her tonight. 

  Okay, Kevin, Vivian's brother is getting baptized next week. Sorella Eaton and I cannot believe where the time has gone. I cannot believe it is next week.   I cannot remember which talk is my favorite, because I thought they all were good. I watched it in Italian. It was different and required a bit of my attention, but I understood it. But how was the last hour? Because of the time difference we are not able to watch the last session of conference. It goes from 10 to midnight for us, so that is not possible. 

  I am not sure if I have told you this or not but our church building is going to be closed for the next three weeks or so and we are going to be meeting at Lampugnano. But the really cool thing is our ward mission leader he asked everyone in our ward for hours and times when we would be able to use their houses to have our lessons. Also he is letting us use his and one of our ward missionaries Susana she is awesome is going to let us use her's to. I am just grateful that people are there to help.  Well that seems to be everything that I can remember. I love you all and I hope since tax season will be soon over everything becomes less crazy. 

Love, 

Ali 

Sorella Hanson, Jeremy, Sorella Eaton

Jeremy's baptism

Sorella Gomez and Sorella Hanson

E-mail from April 3, 2013

Hello Family, 

So I have the photos to send, but the computer I am on today does not work for that. :( So I will send them the next time. The photo with all the other sisters was taken when I did the blitz with the sisters at Torino. Because we went up eariler and the sisters at tornino did not have time to go with us around Torino so the sisters at Colegno did. Which I was completely fine with because we got to see the other sisters. We went on top of this tower that shows you the entire city of Torino, that was where the picture was taken. 

  Jeremy got baptized!! YAY, you have no idea how excited I was for that day. When we were filling up the font we had to refill it four times. The first two times it was completely yellow. It was kind of gross. The third time I did not realize that I had put the water on cold and it was freezing. So we refilled it again on hot, but that ended up being a problem later. The ceremony for the baptism everything went well except one thing. We did not realize how hot the water was. Jeremy asked Anziano Bartholio to baptize her so he went first into the water. He told her not to go into the water. He said it had burned his skin so bad it was hurting. We then tried mixing in the cold water hoping it could at least be tolerable. Eventually it was okay that we could do the baptism, but when she came up out of the water she was steaming. But my favorite part of all was when she bore her testimony. She has such a amazing testimony.

  Oh I have another story to tell you.. So the other P-day we were with the sister from Como and when we went to say good bye(oh we were in the metro area) I gave a hug to sister Beus and my hand hit the ice cream cone in her companions sorella Mccann's hand and it goes flying, the chocolate went everywhere on the floor, her jacket, and we just start laughing. Anyway it might have been one of those experiences you needed to see. 

  For easter we went to eat with one of the Italian families in our ward. It was sort of a last minute thing, they asked us right as church ended and it was nice, because we got to be with a family. We did a bit of work because during the holidays the families are always home. 

  Well I am going to send Conner and Parker their birthday Cards. Oh by the way Conner Happy Early Birthday, I love you and I am sorry my card will be late. Well I hope you guys have a wonderful week. 

Love 

Ali