"We aren't in Utah anymore Toto"

Greetings from the most beautiful place on earth!

Pictures just won't do it justice. Big sky country? They aren't kidding. My first area is actually a bunch of small towns on an Indian reservation! I spend week days in Ronan and the weekends in St. Ignatius. (By Flathead Lake) Because everything is so far apart we live in two different places in two different members homes. Sooooo I am perpetually living out of a suitcase #thatsmissionarylife. The Krantz's in Ronan let us stay in their basement. Every night when we come in at curfew we are greeted by a large creepy elk head on the wall. Still pondering what to name it. Haha and the Leaftey's in St. Ignatius let us stay in their loft. Love em both :) my companion is SISTER RAMMELL :) she's been out on her mission for 7 weeks now, but you can't even tell! She's a pro. She's from Texas and is THE BEST. I have a feeling we'll both be here in the area for a while. There's a lot of work to do and we want to be the ones to do it here! 

 

I'll recap a bit now. Leaving the MTC was terrible! I loved that place. The spirit was so strong there and I didn't realize how strong until I got on the train to the airport, outside the bubble of the MTC. Those of you who are leaving on missions soon: do not take the MTC for granted. It's hard work, but you learn SO much and they teach you how to have the spirit that you have in the MTC out in the field. When you leave, you have to become your own little MTC bubble of spirit, so enjoy the time you have there :) I had the best teachers EVER at the MTC. Shout out to Brother Hanson and Sister Millward. :) I miss learning from them everyday! The airport was one of the funniest experiences of my life! Picture this. 20 missionaries, with 3 suitcases each, loading onto one of the frontrunner cars, cramming into said car, exiting said car, and THEN riding up an escalator. Hahaahahahaha I was dying. Wish I would have had an extra hand to video it. :) It was awesome talking to my family on the phone at the airport :) sure miss them a lot!!!!!!!!!!

 

We had a group of 11 sisters and 2 elders flying out to Montana. We were on this super tiny plane and most of us missionaries were assigned to sit together. Still taught a few people on the plane anyway ;) We got off the plane in the beautiful town of Billings and met President and Sister Mecham and the AP's. I. Love. The. Mecham's. Sister Cox and I rode back to the mission home with them and got to know them a little bit! They fed us SO much food and we had 2 days of learning from them :) All of the sisters stayed in a hotel down the street, I roomed with Sister Hodgson and guess what! We actually went to sleep on time! Woot! On our last night in Billings we went street contacting with the Assistants downtown. So. Much. Fun. I love street contacting. Granted, most of them were slightly intoxicated, but we gave out a few copies of the Book of Mormon! :) It started POURING rain the last 20 minutes we were there. Sister King and I were Comps and we were sopping wet by the time we got back! I'll try and get the picture of the group afterward. It was great :) 

 

We drove up through Bozeman to Helena the next day and met the STL's who drove those of us going to Missoula to meet our Companions! 8 hours of driving my friends. Prime napping time. Loved every second of it. haha Sad to leave my district though! So many goodbyes in 3 weeks! Ugh. But all is well :) 

 

I'm still adjusting to a lot out here but I'm loving it :) Small towns are fun. Everyone is related in some way.  We work with A LOT of less actives and recent converts and I love it. We had a lesson with Brother H the other night. He's preparing to go to the temple and he feels like he doesn't have a testimony. I could relate a lot to him and so I told him about how I just recently went through the temple and how it's not scary at all, it's actually the most comforting place you could go! We had a good chat about how he needs to go to church in order to prepare for the temple,. so he's working on it. Or so we thought....he didn't come to church -_- And here comes my advice for the week: Guys. Go to church. Seriously. It is SO important! The First Presidency of the Church just started a new little project with the wards and it's called "Giving the Sabbath Back to The Savior." LOVE IT. Sunday is our day to give to him. It might not feel like a day of rest, but it's a day to heal your spirit and to get that knowledge and comfort in the gospel that you need. It's also the day that we renew our baptismal covenant, which is the only covenant we can renew on a weekly basis! It must be important eh? Help your wards out in any way you can. Go make friends. Fellowship. Help the missionaries out! :) haha 

 

I love you all and miss you all so much! I love being a missionary. I'm so grateful for the enabling power of the atonement. I wouldn't be able to be a missionary without it. 

Love, 

Sister Fletcher

Our Closet. (hmmm...2013?)

I Love Them.

Fly to Montana then an 8 hour drive to somewhere over the rainbow.

Happiness.

Plan, Plan, Plan

June 4, 2015

It's so surreal that this is my first email home. It feels like I've been here for years and at the same time I feel like it was just yesterday that I got here! The MTC is a major time warp. I swear every time that I wake up in the morning I've only been asleep for 2 minutes, and yet somehow I stay awake and have enough energy to get through the day! It's freaky. So cool though. Ah. I just don't even know where to start because there's SO MUCH. 16 hour days crammed with learning every single second, yeah. You try and sum that up. haha

SO. I'm in a district of all sisters. 6 of us all going to Montana. We share a room that's about the size of a large closet. hahaha It's fun :) My companion is Sister Linney. She's an adorable, super sweet red head and I spend ALLLLLL day with her and LOVE it :) We have WAY too much fun here. There comes a point at about 9:30 at night where all of us have seemed to have gotten on the crazy train and have ran straight though the wall of insanity. Hahaha Sister Hodgson and I couldn't stop crying last night because we were laughing so hard about literally nothing. Don't judge. The MTC is great :) Definitely not prison, although it might look like it from the outside ;) The first few days were a complete blur! We met our teachers, Brother Hanson and Sister Milward. I. LOVE. THEM. SO. MUCH. They are amazing examples to me of teaching the way that the Savior taught. The spirit is so strong every single day in class with them. 

Let's see...umm... TEACHING. The very first day they put all of us new missionaries in a room (there was about 50 of us) and told us to teach this investigator. Ha. 50 eager missionaries against 1 investigator? Didn't end well. There's a reason the Savior taught one by one ;) BUT. I taught this man named Chad. And it changed my life. It was the first time I really felt like a missionary. The mandate to speak up and share the gospel is SO real. I am currently teaching three "Progressing Investigators." We're not supposed to know if they're real or not...buuuuuuut they tend to give clues and not notice. hahaha So all of mine are just pretending :) It's still an awesome experience and SO real even if they aren't :) Andre is role-played by Brother Hanson, and oh man. The spirit is so strong every single time. He is very honest and asks so many questions and somehow Sister Linney and I are led by the spirit and answer all of his questions. God teaches his new missionaries how to teach through role play, and he gives them the exact same spirit as if it were real. I'm telling you, role play is powerful. 

Mmmm. The branch presidency over our zone is AWESOME. I seriously cry every single time I talk to president Taylor. haha Actually, that's the only time I cry really. Shocker huh? His spirit is SO strong and he always knows exactly what to teach me. The presidency's wives always give us big hugs and ask if we're eating enough and if we're emotionally stable. I don't think they believe me ;) Darn President Taylor. Haha. They take really good care of us. We all had interviews with the branch pres our second night and he called Sister Linney and I as Sister training leaders over the zone. Since we don't have elders, we are basically the ZL's. Pray for us this weekend. We have A LOT to plan. Relief society lesson, sacrament meeting talks, sacrament meeting in general, and PI lessons. Haha, they keep us busy. :) We oriented the new missionaries that came in yesterday. I think we kind of freaked them out because we were so excited.

I've been saving the best part for last. :) MTC devotionals!!! So, we missed Elder Holland by 12 hours...terrible right? BUT all is well because the MTC did not disappoint. On Sunday we got to hear from Janice Kapp Perry. I got to meet her, she's hilarious and SO sweet :) When they tell you to make it til Sunday...they mean it. Hahaha, Saturday was such a crummy day, but then Sunday came and all of the sudden everything was sunshine and rainbows! Anyway! Sister Perry sang songs with us, we sang a medley of her songs and I BAWLED. In a good way? Hahaha, then her and her husband sang a song they wrote for their family. SO adorable.  She was telling us about how they met, and he stood up...walked to the podium...and laid a big kiss right on her lips! Then he fist pumped and sat right back down. Total chaos. Hahahaha all the Elders stood up and applauded. I couldn't stop laughing. :) After Sister Perry, we had "movie time" and my district and I watched The Character of Christ. Wow. President Bednar can THROW DOWN. I was sufficiently humbled. Don't be the cookie monster. Turn outward. It's not about you. 

On Tuesday I got the chance to sing in the MTC choir for....... ELDER CHRISTOFFERSON. :D Love. Him. What an amazing day that was! We had an awesome lesson with Michael, one of our PI's and then we walked into Devo to sing in choir to find out that an apostle was coming, again! :) My favorite part was when he spoke about Elder Perry. He sure loved that man. I was so sad to hear about it. I didn't know til a few days later. He talked about how Elder Perry was always the one to energize and set the pace for the 12. I want to be like that. It's SO important to be that person and lift up and get people excited about the Gospel. He answered a lot of questions. The love coming from Elder Christofferson was unreal. I wanted to sit there all day and just soak it all in. 

Alright. A list will have to suffice for the rest of my email because there is simply not enough time. :)

I get to go to the temple today! I am so excited. I've missed it SO much. 

Gym time is sacred time. Like really. Use it wisely in the MTC because it will get you through the rest of the day. I found an Elder the other day that is a BEAST at volleyball. Thank heavens we're allowed to play volleyball with the Elders. I would have died. 

I love my name tag. It freaks me out a little bit to look in the mirror and see "Sister Fletcher"

Funny story: SO. I'm walking back to my room from class and some Elders are walking behind Sister Linney and I. You'll die. This is so funny to me. 

Elder 1: Do you think your future wife is in the MTC right now?

Elder 2: *ponders for a while* Well, I mean maybe! But I just think I would feel her presence a little more. You know what I mean? Like.. I think if I shake her hand I'll know. 

Hahahaha c'mon elders. Focus ;) 

I fly out on TUESDAY!!! We have to be packed and ready by 5:30 in the morning, and then our flight leaves at 11am!!! SO STOKED. One of my PI's was from Montana, we drilled her with questions. :)

LOVE ALL OF YOU!!! Thanks for all the emails and packages and letters :) I look through them as often as I can. And my photo album. It keeps me going and happy to see all your smiling faces. :) The church is TRUE. I love being a missionary. :)

Love, Sister Fletcher :)