Week 53 (4/7/14)

General conference was THEE BEST!!!!

You all probably already knew that, but really! If you didn't watch

it... Well get off reading this email, and watch it! It will change

your life! I think being a missionary really helps you understand

better the significance of conference... I love it SOOO much!!! I

can't even explain how excited all the missionaries get ;) GC weekend

is like better than Christmas and a birthday party combined (it's the

on 19th.... My birthday... You can start sending your cards now in

case you forgot ;) haha also- my companions birthday is on the 24th so

I feel like everyone should send her a hilarious card as well :) it'll

make her day) We have a living prophet and apostles. What they say is

SCRIPTURE for our day. They are speaking directly from our father in

heaven! Ah! Talk about the coolest thing EVER. I'm pretty sure if

Moses or Abraham were here we would all drop everything to hear them.

Saaaaaammmmeeee thing :) I know I can't tell you how important it is,

you've got to figure that out, but i sure do have a testimony of our

prophet and the power that comes from hearing him speak and listening

to the things they say. It's so powerful! I went in with 3 questions

and the first 2 were answered within the first hour of conference and

continued to be answered as the sessions went on. I know I'm being one

of those missionaries right now, but I just wanted to make sure you

had a formal invitation. Remember- there's no excuses ;) watch them

all! If you don't watch every single one you'll miss something that

you need, or you might even miss Elder Hollands AMAZING talk. Pretty

much, he shattered my bones and made me want to cry, it was so

powerful.

Love. The world is all about love :) that is the main theme I got from it! :D

I'm gonna get off my little soap box now... Haha sorry I know everyone

just LOVES those emails from missionaries where they get chastised. I

promise I didn't want to chastise you! I just care so much about

everyone and I want you all to know how you can receive the peace and

answers you're looking for :) we showed one of our investigators a

clip from General Conference explaining to her what it was, and she

said their voices were so peaceful and brought her comfort :) we

explained to her that was the spirit because they were the Lords

representatives on the earth today :)

We had a cool lesson with Sister Maraj, our less active who's now been

coming back!! she's the greatest :) our little grandma away from home

:) I can't tell you how much I miss my grandmas by the way! But we

just sang hymns with her :) the spirit was so strong even though I'm a

horrible singer haha but music is just so powerful! It's like with

that one woman we got a referral for in Lakeland. We just sang to her

on her porch "I am a Child of God" the first time we met her and she

cried as we sang. At her baptism Sister Beck said she said 2 angels

were sent to her to sing to her and bring her comfort :)

We picked strawberries with Mikayla and the young women's president.

:) that was fun! I've never done that before! But both Sister Upshaw

and I did not have good effects afterwords from eating those berries

right off the vine... On or way there Terri Tadle texted us telling us

she wanted to move her baptism up to the 19th!!!!!! We were

ESTHETIC!!!!! Best. Birthday. Present. EVER!!! I cannot even explain

my love for her! She is one of the most amazing women I have ever met

:) she has so much faith! We decided to call Sister Lazenby (who is

actually my cousin Danny's aunt who's in my ward here) and ask her to

give a talk at her baptism cuz Terri said that she'd love that! She

was her visiting teacher a long time ago and Terri just loves her.

Sister Lazenby has been going through a really hard time lately. She

has a lot of Heath issues and it's been so hard for her. But she's

such an amazing example of pushing to the end and never giving up!

When we told her Terri was getting baptized she cried and said this

was the news that she needs right now to help her keep going because

she'd been really discouraged lately. You never know how much you can

effect someone else's life!

In conference they told you all to tell us (the missionaries) what

you're learning in Preach my Gospel :) I would LOVE to hear what

everyone's learning! I have studied it every single day of my mission

and I still get stuff out of it every day! It's helped me teach

simpler and with more power. It's the perfect thing for everyone to

study so we can all be better missionaries and not tell people we meet

about Outer Darkness, Kolob, and becoming Gods.... Studying PMG will

help a lot more with member teaching I think ;)

I hit my 1 year mark. Of course, we partied. That went by so quickly,

yet I feel like I've been here my whole life! While we were sitting at

our birthday lunch with our grandmas I was just thinking how normal it

all was and then realized that this was totally not normal and I

haven't been doing it forever. It's so weird.

Cool story- while on exchanges with our STL's we were contacting in

downtown Sarasota. We met these two super awesome gay men. They said

they had sen the BOM play and liked it a lot and then they had

researched Mormons a lot. We told them about the temple open house in

Ft. Lauderdale. They said they wanted to see it, you know.... A lot of

the time people don't do what we tell them to haha but we fb friended

this couple annnnnnnddddd they posted a picture of them at the

temple!!!!!! They told everyone how beautiful it was and they shared

how anyone could go and see it even when they were getting ridicule

from their friends comments. Ahhhhh :) so cool.

They mentioned Florida twice in conference.... Just sayin'....

Also- listen to the spirit. Remember my email last week? Well Sister

Upshaws mom emailed her and said that she needed to hear what I said,

even though I thought it was funny that I was writing that in my email

but I just felt like I needed to. I love the spirit :)

Also- we get to hangout with Ernie and Ashley all day today at the

beach :) we are pretty excited :)

The church is trrrrrrrrrrruuuuuuueeeeee :D

I love you all. A lot :) party whenever there's something to

celebrate... It will make you happier.

Love, Sister Calder :)

Picking stgrawberries

creepy

How we party. One year mark

I got to see Ernie and Ashley last night. :) They came down to see me! We are going to the beach all day today! I love them so much!

Old Lady Lunch

Florida Sunsets