December 12, 2016 - Jimmy is a goner!

Dear Friends & Family,

Well this week has been as eventful as ever! Let's just start off with the fact that we have had a mouse in our apartment for the last 2 weeks named jimmy. He have had all sorts of traps and poison out trying to catch him but we were unsuccessful... UNTIL THIS MORNING! Poor little jimmy got stuck on a sticky trap and Sister Fransen decided to be super brave and put him in a plastic bag and throw him in the dumpster! Goodbye Jimmy! Now I can actually sleep in peace without thinking about little mice nibbling on my toes in the middle of the night haha !

The highlight of the week was being able to go to the temple on Saturday afternoon! One of the Spanish speaking sisters is going home right after Christmas, so all 6 of us got permission from the president to go do a session together in the temple... in Spanish! It was one of the coolest experiences! First of all the temple is absolutely gorgeous! Inside and out! Being in the temple was just such an incredible reminder of why I am here on a mission. I love the church with all my heart and know that the gospel is true. There is no doubt in my mind that this is Christ's church on the earth! I want to share that knowledge with everyone I meet and share that same happiness that I felt inside the temple! 

It has been so incredible preparing for Christmas because we are trying to focus more on service. Serving just makes everyone happier. Being on the mission has changed my attitude about a lot of things in life and every day I want to wake up and find some way that I can serve. I absolutely love the Christmas video that the church has put called "Light the World" which is all about following Christ's example and serving others as he would. I hope everyone watches it and finds some way to serve others this Christmas season. 

So many other things have happened this week but overall the most important thing I need to mention is that is so dang cold here. When we leave our house at about noon after lunch, it is usually -25 degrees Celsius which is danggggg cold. Lots of coats and gloves and hats ha ha! But I love it. We can always see our breath in the car ha ha! Lots of snowball fights too! 

Random but funny story... I ate fried cactus last night at dinner! We get fed almost every day by the members of our church Branch which means we get to try all sorts of cool food! A lot of the Latino people in Canada have migrated from other countries so we get a big variety! I have never eaten so much in my life!!!! I love it! Every day the members tell me I need to eat more ha ha!

Well that's about all for the week but thanks for all the love and support! 

-Hermana Thorstenson

Here are some fun pictures from the temple! My comp is crazy and wanted to take a pic without her coat hahaha 

If you would like to email or write to me, my contact information is below:

Mark Mail (Send via USPS - NOT Fedex or UPS)
Mark boxes as "Missionary Supplies"

Hermana Rachel Thorstenson

Canada Calgary Mission

7044 Farrell Rd. SE

Calgary AB T@H OT2

Canada

Email Address

rachel.thorstenson@myldsmail.net

Calgary Temple of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints

 Rachel and her companion in front of The Calgary Temple.

It's Winter in Canada! And well below ZERO!

December 5, 2016 - I LOVE CANADA!!!!!

I LOVE CANADA!!!!!

So I have successfully survived my first few days in Canada and life could not be any better!!!! I absolutely love being a missionary! I have the best trainer in the entire world! Her name is Sister Call and we are already best friends! She is from Colorado and she went to BYU for a year before her mission as well! We have the best time together! 

We had our first snowfall this week and let's just say I'm not a big fan of the cold ha ha it's been below freezing for the last few days and it's continually getting worse. It's going to be a long winter! Good thing we have a car! Hydroplaning is kind of the worst and hopefully we don't do too much of that anymore. Also the Spanish speaking missionaries cover a huge area so we have to drive... a lot. 

The branch that we work with is seriously the best and I love all of the members already! They feed us all the time and help us out so much! It's the best. The best part of my week was when some random guy paid for our food at Costa Vida. Wow what a blessing. I don't think I've ever been so happy in my entire life!!! 

On the other hand, there is a mouse in our apartment that we have been trying to catch for the last few days... his name is jimmy and he needs to go. 

We had a baptism for a little boy in the ward this week and the font wasn't filling up fast enough so we had to carry huge pots of water back and forth from the kitchen to fill it... for an hour and a half! It all worked out though! 

All of the missionaries in our branch are the best and I love every second here! 

Well I gotta head out but thanks for all the love and emails!!!

Love, 

Hermana Thorstenson!

PS they don't have Chick-fil-A in canada and it makes me very sad...

If you would like to email or write to me, my contact information is below:

Mark Mail (Send via USPS - NOT Fedex or UPS)
Mark boxes as "Missionary Supplies"

Hermana Rachel Thorstenson

Canada Calgary Mission

7044 Farrell Rd. SE

Calgary AB T@H OT2

Canada

Email Address

rachel.thorstenson@myldsmail.net

Week 5 of the Missionary Training Center November 19, 2016

Sorry for the lack of email last week! There has been so much going on here at the MTC!!! I only have 3 more days until I head out to Calgary so these last few days have been jam packed with tons of studying and activities! We had in field orientation on Friday which was probably the longest meeting of my life. 9 hours of sitting and talking. But now that's over so I can head into the field!! Yay! Can't wait! Oh also we had the amazing opportunity to hear from Gary E. Stephensen on tuesday at our devotional! He talked about gratitude for the gospel and boldly inviting others to come unto Christ. The spirit was so strong as we all sang called to serve to an apostle of the Lord! Other random things that happened this week: -It was elder rencher's birthday on thursday so we had a big celebration in class! Highlight of my week! -Last class with our two teachers! gonna miss them tons! Running out of time to email but next time you hear from me I will be in Canada!!!!

Love you all!

Hermana Thorstenson

If you would like to email or write to me, my contact information is below:

Mark Mail (Send via USPS - NOT Fedex or UPS)
Mark boxes as "Missionary Supplies"

Hermana Rachel Thorstenson

Canada Calgary Mission

7044 Farrell Rd. SE

Calgary AB T@H OT2

Canada

Email Address

rachel.thorstenson@myldsmail.net

Week 4 of the Missionary Training Center November 5, 2016

Well this week has just flown by! So much has happened this week so I'll just give a few highlights! Tuesday was probably the best day ever because the president of the quorum of the twelve apostles, Russell M. Nelson came to speak at our devotional! It was seriously the best! His wife started off by asking the question "What do we know that the rest of the world doesn't know?" Let me tell you, within 10 seconds I had a list in my head about a mile long! There are so many gospel principles that others are missing and it is out job as missionaries to bring the truth to everyone! Also, I was singing in a choir of over 1000 missionaries and we preformed the song "Praise to the man" IT WAS INCREDIBLE! President Nelson told us that "millions shall know brother joseph again" because of our work as missionaries! So crazy to think about it that way. Another thing that he said that was interesting was that God has 3 divine objectives 1. Gather scattered Israel 2. Seal those families in temples 3. Prepare the world for the second coming. He also mentioned that God has quickened his pace and we are expected to maintain that pace. Finally one thing that I loved was when President Nelson said that the evidence of our missionary work will be when the 2nd and 3rd generations of our converts are endowed and sealed in the temples. Our work will bless the lives of so many people to come! I'm so excited to be a missionary! Ok another highlight was being able to host some of the new missionaries who came in this week! Our district was assigned to some international missionaries and I ended up helping 2 girls from Hong Kong. They arrived at the MTC with hardly a carry on sized bag but they were ready to serve! I helped them check in and go to doctors appointments and all sorts of stuff! But the best part was going to the missionary assistance office. I had no idea about this place but we showed up and these ladies went through these huge lists of items with the girls and made sure that they had everything they needed from shampoo to running shoes. It was honestly such an incredible and humbling experience. I sat next to an elder from Taiwan who is headed to my mission for a while and chatted with him the best I could. I wish you all could have seen his face light up as they brought out a brand new winter coat for him and he just looked in aw and asked "Is this for me? I can keep it?" It was so sweet. Then he asked the worker for her name and explained the best he could in his broken english that he would write about her in his journal that night and what a blessing she was. I had to hold back the tears as I watched all these missionaries from across the world stand there receiving baskets of items they needed for their missions! Missionary work is the best and I know that the Lord watches out for all of his missionaries! On a funny note, I ate some spicy Korean ramen noodles as a dare from an elder and I don't think I've ever been in so much pain in my entire life! There were like 20 different kind of peppers in there and I wanted to cry but I held back the tears. I haven't been able to taste anything for days. Well I don't have much time left to email but I know the church is true and I am so incredibly grateful to be a part of God's work! Love you all! -Hermanita Thorstenson

Week 3 of the Missionary Training Center - October 29,2016

Week 3 out of 78! Can't believe I'm almost half way done with the MTC! This week has seemed like an eternity to be honest. Just a very repetitive schedule of class, eating, more class, eating, and more class. By the time I go to bed, I can't remember that I ate for breakfast. The spanish is coming along though! Slowly but surely I'm able to speak more and more every day! The gift of tongues is real for sure! Also, all of the other missionaries that were in my zone before I got here have left and it was hard saying goodbye to all my new friends! Most of them went to Ecuador and Nicaragua! Kinda glad I won't be joining them over there haha but we got 2 new districts on wednesday to replace them so that was pretty fun welcoming everyone in! All the new missionaries have a little orange dot on their nametags so every time we pass someone with an orange dot, we yell "bienvenidos a la CCM!" (CCM is MTC in spanish) So now there are roughly 60 people in my zone which consists of 6 districts! You kinda get used to running into the same people 10 times a day haha It's been fun to meet all sorts of new people here and makes new friends! It's also so fun to run into people from BYU too! One of my best friends from BYU is here for another 2 weeks before she heads off to Denmark and it's so nice to talk to her every day! Also, shout out to all the people who send me dear elder letters! I absolutely love them and it's so nice to be able to read them throughout the week! Well, I gotta go but thanks for all the love and support!! Adios! -Hermana Thorstenson

Week 2 Saturday, October 22, 2016

October 22, 2016 Hey everyone! It's crazy to think that this is my second week as a missionary! It really is true when they say "the days feel like weeks and the weeks feel like days!" Everything starts running together haha I feel like a sponge that's being sprayed by a firehouse. So much to take in and so little space in my brain. It's great though. My spanish is coming along though! I say "Lo siento" almost every other sentence haha I have more flash cards than I know what to do with! Ok funny story. So in my district, there are 8 elders along with my companion and I. Everyone is going stateside spanish except for me. All of our departure dates from the MTC were supposed to be Around Novemeber 22nd. Well our district leader came in the other day and announced there had been some changes. He would be leaving on October 31st along with a few other elders and everyone elses dates had been changed too. The worst part was, he told me I wouldn't leave until December 8th!!!!! I started freaking out. Like pure horror and confusion. Then he announced that my companion wouldn't be leaving until december 26th!!! That made absolutely no sense so we were both having minor panic attacks! Then they started laughing and told us it was just a joke and we would be leaving on November 22nd. I was so angry but I have to admit it was pretty funny haha I sit in a classroom with the same 10 people for 9 hours every single day so you could say we are all getting pretty close haha the only time you take breaks are to eat or exercise. I am so tired some days but thats when I just pray extra hard! The spirit is so strong in the MTC and I'm so grateful to be here!!! I know that this is where I'm supposed to be! The Lord knows each of us individually and knows our worries and concerns. He can help us through anything! Also shoutout to all my friends that I run into at the temple on sundays!!! It makes me so happy to see a familiar face every once in a while!!! Much love from the Provo MTC! Adios! -Hermana Thorstenson

Sister Thorstenson enters the Missionary Training Center

October 12, 2016 Sister Rachel Thorstenson entered the Missionary Training Center at 1pm MST.