and a HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

Hello Lovelies! Happy new year! Where the heck did 2014 go hey? Just a blur ha I hope you all had just amazing Christmas'! Such an amazing time of the year!! I never get tired of reading the Christmas Story or singing the Christmas songs. I am so thankful for the Gift of Jesus Christ. Without him we would have nothing.

Our week went by SO FAST.

Monday was our Pday and we drove in to Calgary to go ice skating at the Olympic Oval with our zone. It was a ton of fun! I hadn't been skating in forever so I was a little rusty haha. But Sister Murphy didn't know how to skate so we just took it easy and slowly made the loop. She did awesome! The Whitney's took us out to dinner that night and we had so much fun talking about their mission experiences with them. :) Bro Whitney is our Branch Mission Leader. We spent the night in Calgary so we could be there for District Meeting in the morning.

District meeting was great Tuesday morning! Focusing a lot of the Restoration this transfer :) We then made our drive all the way back up to Canmore. We had an AWESOME lesson with David on the Plan of Salvation and brought Sister Velma along with us. She bore the strongest testimony of the plan afterwards and the spirit just filled the room! It was amazing even made our investigator tear up it was so powerful.

Christmas EVE!! We didn't really have any appointments so we went and got some candy canes from the Dollar Store and then passed them out with He is the Gift pass along cards. Went pretty well! It was pretty chilly. Ha the temperature just keeps dropping up here. Im not a fan of it ha, but the work must go on. We had Christmas Eve Lasagna with Sister Falzon, it was delicious!! And we read over the Christmas story with her in the New Testament and sang hymns. It was actually a lot of fun! I love Sister Falzon, and living in her basement...haha. We ended the night by going Caroling with President Yawney and his family to members in Canmore. We even stopped by our investigator Davids house and sang him a few tunes ha he loved it. I love our branch family up here. And we ended the night of course with me reading "The Night before Christmas" to Murph in my Christmas eve pajamas ha.

Christmas DAYYYYY! I love Christmas! Such a happy day! I absolutely loved skyping with the fam. It was so good to see their beautiful faces! And hear their voices! I can't believe that on Christmas day I hit my 15 month mark of being a missionary! They just keep flying by before my blue eyes!!! And I have no idea how to slow them down! We had Christmas dinner at Sister Falzons with David too! IT WAS DELICIOUS, man I love holiday food. :) We cracked our christmas crackers and just had a great time. Watched some Christmas videos and then I taught David how to fill out a pedigree chart for family history before he had to leave for work.

Friday friday friday! AKA Boxing Day up here. I got to go on exchanges with Sister Heslop, my trainer. I can't believe she'll be done with her mission in 3 weeks! Felt like we both just started our missions back in Queensland. I missed her so much! We just had an amazing time catching up.

Saturday I took Slop up to Lake Louise for us to do some follow up contacting from me and Sister Jones. I forgot how much fun we would have working together ha just talked and laughed the whole day. We met this awesome lady who was smoking outside, I walked up to her and just started to talk, long story short she knows about mormons! Actually knew some missionaries in the Philippines. Loves what we teach. Ha she looked like she was gonna jump out her skin she was so excited when we asked her if she wanted a Book of Mormon. Hopefully some good will come of that :) The rest of our time we went up to the actual lake to do some contacting, so many people! Such a tourist place but there were people everywhere! Louise is Frozen right now so they set up a hockey and ice skating rink complete with an ice castle! Ha it was so cool! We ended our night with another lesson with David about the Restoration. So great. He said the closing prayer and it was the sweetest most sincere thing I had ever heard. I told him how much I loved his prayers and he replied, "Well, you taught me!" Made my heart happy.

Sunday was a good sunday! almost 50 people showed up to church, only 25 actually live in our area but hey we take what we can get ha. It was really cold that day! The kind of cold that hurts your eyes when you go outside ha. Gotta love Canada :)

All in all such a great week! I love being a missionary and I don't want it to ever end. I know that the Gospel is true and that God truly is our Loving Heavenly Father. He knows our thoughts and feelings and wants to help us become our best. I know that Jesus Christ is our savior and that he truly died and suffered for our sins. I know that we can be forgiven through him. He's got our back when we feel like no one in the world does.

Keep being amazing! I love you all always!

Sister Jaynie Connor

Scripture of the day:

“Behold, he who has repented of his sins, the same is forgiven, and I, the Lord, remember them no more. By this ye may know if a man repenteth of his sins—behold, he will confess them and forsake them.” (D&C 58:42–43.)

xoxox

You better watch out....

Things are going great up here! This might be another famous Sister Connor short emails, sorry bout it. :( 

We had a great week! This week was BC exchange week so Tuesday after district meeting in Calgary me and Murphy hopped in the car to drive 5 hours down to a small town called Jaffray. We spent all of wednesday with them helping out in their area. I was with Sister Cunningham, a brand new missionary, fresh out the MTC. She did awesome ha we ate dinner in Jaffray then drove 2 hours north to spend the night with the Sisters in Invermere. Sister Matheson and Sister Shumway, I absolutely love them. We had an awesome exchange and a great time together. We were back in our area by Friday. Lots of street contacting this week and door knocking ha. But it was good, shared a ton of "He is the Gift" cards with people.

Our investigator David is just doing amazing as usual. I admire the faith of this man so much he's so excited to get baptized! Funny thing is, is that he's afraid of water.....so I asked him if he was nervous for his baptism. He said, "Yes, I am, but nothing good was ever easy. I'll be okay" Such an amazing guy!!!! i feel so blessed to teach him. 

I got to see one of my old companions this week Sister Stucki, we served together for a record of 9 days ha. But she's done with her mission now and came back up to visit with her mom! It was so good to see her.

Well fam and friends, I miss and love you lots. I wish you a very Merry Christmas! Talk to you next week!

Peace on Earth and Mercy Mild....

hello Hello beautiful friends and family! I know that I am emailing a little/lot later than usual but don't freak out, all is well in Alberta.... This morning the Wrights from our branch took us SNOW SHOEING and it was SO FUN. I loved every second of it. But we didn't have time to email during the day, so...we're emailing now. :) See no need to panic.

But as usual I don't have a ton of time, shocker ha. And, I left my planner in the car, so I kinda sorta dont really remember that week that well.

David (our investigator) is doing amazing. HE IS SO EXCITED TO GET BAPTIZED. Ha and we're so excited for him as well. He's just been eating up everything we teach. I love it. Definitely prepared by the Lord. Such an amazing man. 

I'm alive and healthy. :) I thank Heavenly Father every day for that. He has given me so much and I am so appreciative. I love him so much, and I know that he loves me, and you. 

Sorry that this email is lame and not really long.

I saw "Meet the Mormons" this week! SO GOOD, if you haven't seen it yet, go. It really wasn't what I was expecting, it was better ha. :) 

We had our branch Christmas party this Saturday and a ton of people came! It was so fun ha, I love our little branch.

Welp, I promise that next weeks email will be MUCH better. 

Scripture of the week:

DC 6:36 "Look unto me in every thought, doubt not, fear not." 

Especially with this Christmas season, direct your thoughts to your Father in Heaven, and our Savior Jesus Christ. :) With out them we are nothing, with them we can do EVERYTHING. 

I know that Jesus Christ is my Savior and Redeemer.

I love you all more than words can describe. Thank you for all you do.

Until we meet again!

xoxo

Sister Jaynie Connor

 

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas....

Hello Friends and Family!

It's that time of year again where every single picture you see me in I have on my beige huge coat. Ha sorry. Basically live in it.

I'm just gonna warn you right now that this email is going to be all over the place and probably really short. Not a whole lot to say this week honestly ha, things were pretty crazy.

It was transfer week!! And sadly me and Sister Jones are no longer. My new companion is Sister Murphy! Yep, me and Lamborghini Murphy from the MTC are reunited once again for round 2. Hmm what else is new? We drive a huge white mini-van temporarily. I call it the Great White Shark, gets us to and from pretty good ha. I feel like a mormon mother in training when I drive though. Super spacious ha.

Our investigator David is doing amazing!!! He just soaks everything up like a sponge! Still on date to be baptized January 10th. He even watched the First Presidency's Christmas Devotional last night and loved it. I feel so blessed to help him come unto Christ at this time. I'm so excited for him.!!

Things are getting busier and busier with Christmas coming up, I hope all of you are doing well! :)

I miss and love you all. Thanks for all you love and support!

xoxo

Sister Connor

Oh! I need a favor!! Well, more like the world needs a favor! We need to #sharethegift. Don't know what I'm talking about? Go on Christmas.Mormon.Org and find out! Then Share!!!

Scripture of the Week:
Romans 5:31-4

1 Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ:

 2 By whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God.

 3 And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation worketh patience;

 4 And patience, experience; and experience, hope:

Keep swimming. You are just learning more than you can imagine.

Oh, the weather outside is frightful.....

My oh my ha, this week was intense ha. Just pure craziness, or I guess I just keep telling myself that its serendipity. I had an amazing week full of happy random events ha. But Im running out of time for my emails so I'll try to summarize it as best as I can.

ser·en·dip·i·ty

ˌserənˈdipədē/

noun

1. the occurrence and development of events by chance in a happy or beneficial way.

   "a fortunate stroke of serendipity"

Monday: Pday, so we were in Calgary for the day and played Volley ball with the Calgary West zone. Then we had dinner with our Branch Mission Leader :) We then drove out to see the Cochrane sisters and to go on splits with them in their area. It was a lot of fun! Ha, I was with Sister Schell, and not one person let us in. But it was fine because she's one of the funniest people I've ever met. :)

Tuesday: District Meeting in Calgary. It was awesome! Focused a lot on the Atonement. Super powerful and spiritual. Then me and Jones head out for Jaffray, British Columbia to go on exchanges. There was a huge storm in Banff so we had to go the long way around, crazy drive! So much snow! But we got there safely in our little malibu. Ha I was so tense from driving ha.

Wednesday: I got to go on exchanges with Sister Clabaux in Jaffray. She was born in France and is the sweetest little thing. Funny story actually, Sister Clabaux and I actually knew each other for a few weeks before our missions! Well, on Facebook haha, and we went into the MTC the same day too. :) We had a ton of fun knocking doors in a small town called Elko in a blizzard. That night me and Sister Jones then drove over to Invermere BC to stay with the sisters there. Also in a blizzard haha, it was coming down hard! But we made it, felt like we were driving for ever! We had an awesome time with Sister Shumway and Sister Matheson.

Thursday: AMERICAN THANKSGIVING! It was so hot that all the snow melted and all I wore was a cardigan, gotta love BC ha. I got to go on exchanges with Sister Matheson. She is AMAZING. Such an amazing little missionary, I learned SO MUCH from her. We had originally planned to then drive back to Canmore that night, but due to weather we had to stay another night. Which was fine, we had thanksgiving dinner that night with their branch. Yep, their whole branch! Ha Elder and Sister Rash made Thanksgiving dinner for everyone. So fun :)

Friday: Friday morning the storm was STILL raging. We were thinking of just leaving but we decided to pray about it since my gut told me not to. Holy Ghost confirmed, so we stayed ANOTHER day. By this time I was starting to run out of clothes ha but we managed. I then got to go on exchanges with Sister Shumway! Who I love dearly, she has become one of my greatest friends out here on the mission. I feel like we've known each other for years. I look up to her so much, such an amazing example. We had a great exchange and I got to meet a huge pig named Roxy. Win win. Ha since we couldn't drive back we stayed for dinner again and ate left over turkey sandwiches with the Rashs, and folded out the couch bed for a 3rd time. Good thing we love those two haha and they love us, I hope ha. 

Saturday: The weather was FINALLY good enough to drive back! Ha we came back to our area to find it had snowed almost 2 feet!!! Like no joke the snow almost went to my knees! We had a good day contacting in Banff and then went and shovelled some driveways in Canmore. WE had an amazing lesson with our investigator David. He is on date to be baptized on the 10th of January and we are so excited! We went over the law of tithing and the law of the fast with him. Went great. :D We finished our night by doing some service for our new friend Monica.

Sunday: IT WAS -37 C. -___- Thats almost -22 F for my Mericans. It was so cold it just hurt to exist. Church was good though! Me and sister Jones both spoke. Jones, agency and opposition, 2 Nephi 2. Sister Connor, endurance and oppostion related to snowboarding (obviously), 2 Nephi 31:17-21. The rest of our day was spent planning and catching up on all the things we missed when we disappeared to a different province for a week. We ate dinner with Sister Falzon (who we live with) and then head out for a lesson with Keven. 

All in all, awesome week. I really learned that Heavenly Father is in charge and that everything happens for a reason. We can choose to align our will with his and just roll with it, OR be stubborn and try to do it our own way anyways. I like the first plan :) 

I love and miss all of you so much and I hope my email wasnt too boring. THank you for everything all of you do continually for me!

Love you miss you Merry Christmas!

Sister Jaynie Connor.

xoxox

You all need to watch this, I'm not kidding, click on this.

#sharethegift