Hey family!!

Another day, another dollar...oh, wait never-mind. 

Anyways, can anyone believe this transfer has flown by? (I'll admit I think my brain is permanently programmed to only think in 6 week periods)

I feel like Sister Merrill and I have only been companions for like a week. I guess the statement, 'time sure flies when you're having fun', is really applicable here. We've been staying busy with missionary work and office work.

Now that the end of the year is over we have finished all of our yearly reports but we finished just in time to start working on things for transfers. It is a little weird working in the office because we know everything that is going to be happening next transfer before any of the other sisters. So the nervousness, anticipation, and stress isn't really present this transfer, which really is just a blessing I think.

But aside from all the boring office work, we had a great week!

The sisters all got their outbound assignments, Sister Merrill is going to Louisiana! It's crazy, a huge group is going out this time because we don't need as many sisters on the square right now since it is a lot slower. So like all the sisters who have just been out a transfer longer than me...and like all the sisters who came out with me are leaving! Crazy! I feel like we all just here yesterday, well I still think we did, but now they are all leaving me. So that will be the weird thing about next transfer. Sister Mahoney and I are both in an assignment that is at least 2 transfers long so we are both staying, and we are speculating (which president doesn't like when we do that) that we will probably go outbound next transfer. Crazy! Another transfer, another thing to learn.

We had some great experience this week. Some not so spiritual ones would be that we helped President Harmon and Elder Skanky (members of the Mission Presidency) with two seperate problems. I've learned that being an Office Assitant means that everyone assumes you can fix everything, be it technical or whatever. So President Harmon came in saying that his mouse for his computer wasn't working, so we went into his office and played around with a few cords, unplugged something here and plugged something in there, and would you look at that we fixed it! Elder Skanky came in another day saying that he needed his folders all organized again for the new year. So we did, we got it all done in a day. Anyways they now both owe us dinner :) Isn't service just wonderful.

So that's been fun, we get to work a lot with them and they are just funny.

Oh, I also learned that Elder Skanky remembers Becca Fluckiger serving here. He has been here for a couple of years and I told him that we were cousins. Small world.

As for the spiritual experiences, we were able to meet a lot of awesome people who had amazing stories to tell and beautiful testimonies. Throughout the week we met a lot of recent converts who had just moved here to attend school and they were working on preparing for their missions. Each one had their own unique experiences with the spirit, but what I learned that even though each one of us takes a different path, our Father always finds a way to get us all where we need to be. He sure does always know what is best. :)

This week we also had the privilege of taking around a new senior couple who will be serving as a director of a visitor center. Apparently, each visitor center has a director and then our mission and Nauvoo are the two that have mission presidents. They are all just two years of service and so each year they call new directors to serve over them. And just like sisters who get called to a visitor center come to Temple Square as part of their training at the MTC, so do the directors and their wives. So we were asked to help out in the training. We got paired with a couple and we took them on a tour, we didn't role play or anything. We just did the tour as we would have done it for any other member of the church. We taught, bore testimony, and invited. It was a very cool experience. The couple that we took around got called to serve at Hill Cumorah and they were just awesome! They taught us so much! They were actually serving in Africa recently but their mission was shut down so they were sent home and released. And they just got a phone call like 2 days before they needed to report to the MTC saying that they had a new assignment to serve on Hill Cumorah.Crazy. Well we took them around, and then we dropped them off in a classroom to have lunch and then to continue their instruction and we picked them up later in the day and they came back onto the square with us, but instead of taking them on a tour they wanted to teach with us. So we walked around and explained a bit of how the mission goes, the difference between online teaching and teaching on the square with tours and things. And then just told them that we would walk around and if they felt prompted to talk with anyone, then that was what we were going to do. Man, did they just dive right in! It's was awesome. We approached the first man who walked on the square as we walked past the gate and they were awesome. They followed all the steps in Preach My Gospel and we ended up taking him on a tour. We were meant to be there to help them with the history and to help them with the little things like 'How to Begin Teaching', 'Asking Inspired Questions' and other teaching skills from Preach My Gospel, but they got it all. They even remembered all the history from the tour that we shared with them. We were able to have a great spiritual, converting tour and it was because of their awesome testimonies. I don't feel like we helped them with anything but we were definitely uplifted and strengthened from spending the day with them.

Oh, and because I'm in the office I already know who my next companion is going to be. I am super excited, I don't know too much about her but I think it will be really fun. She is just a transfer below me and is from Germany. Sister Fingerle, gotta love those German names :D

Oh, and next week is transfer week, but I already know that my p-day will stay the same, so no worries there. :)

I'll let you know all about the crazy transfer stuff next week.

Love you all!

XOXOXOX

-Sister Fluckiger