·         Last one from the MTC!

Callie's mission email callie.horton@myldsmail.net
	Thu 5/30/13 4:32 PM

Hi family!

How are ya'll doing?? Everything is wonderful here in the MTC! I have had a really really good week! My district has grown really close this past week so it will be hard to say goodbye to my MTC family, but I am very grateful for the experience that we have been able to have together! Time is flyin! I can't believe I'll be in Virginia so soon! Its so exciting but so intense! My Spanish is no where near ready to help save people's salvation, but I know I have the Lord on my side so hopefully a miracle will take place when I get out there! I can't wait to get out in the field! I hear time gets even faster once you get into the field which is hard to believe. I will be leaving Wednesday morning at like 7:28 so get ready for a phone call bright and early in the morning! I'm not exactly sure what time I will be calling at, but I'm guessing it will be some time between 6 and 7. I have to be at the travel office at the MTC at 4!! Yuck. So early. But esta bien! I will be flying to Atlanta Georgia first and then to Virginia. They said I should arrive in Virginia a little after 4. I can't wait! And try to have little Lillie awake and happy because I would love to talk to her as well but I know how grumpy she is in the morning.

My companion and I had a really cool experience yesterday. We have been teaching an "investigator" named Jorge and we have been having a hard time knowing what he needs to hear. Yesterday we were teaching him about the gift of the Holy Ghost and Enduring to the End. In the middle of teaching about enduring to the end, I felt that I needed to let him know how much the Lord loves him and that He knows him and is there for him. So that's what I did! It didn't exactly seem to make sense with what I was talking about, but the Spirit was so strong. After that, my companion felt that she should ask him if he has been reading the Book of Mormon and we found out that he hadn't been. She was telling him how he NEEDS to read it and she bore such a strong testimony about it! It was awesome! Oh how I love being a missionary! I am so grateful to have the Spirit so close with me so that I can get promptings in lessons, even if they are to fake investigators.

We had a really good devotional on Sunday. His name was Stephen B. Allen. He actually spoke my first Sunday here and it was super funny and awesome! I was really excited to see that he was speaking again. He got up and started talking and he was saying how he had all these old Mormon messages to show us and it would have been funny and such, but he said that the Spirit was telling him that he needed to talk about something different but he wasn't sure what. So this guy is just going completely on the Spirit! In the middle of his talk he all of the sudden says, "Another prompting." He has the people pull up the Mo Tab singing "Come Come Ye Saints". First he has us listen to it and then he has us sing a long with it. He related the words to missionary work. I had no idea how great this song was for a missionary! He let us know that "all is well" and that the Lord did not send us on a mission to set us up for failure. So "all is well" because we have the Lord helping us out.

Our devotional on Tuesday was really good too! It was by W. Craig Zwick from the seventy and his wife. His wife said, "If we can't feel His presence, we need to move closer." If we aren't feeling the Spirit, we need to move closer to Him instead of us expecting Him to move closer to us. Brother Zwick also talked about developing Chirstlike attributes and how we need to give our whole souls to the Lord. That is one of the biggest lessons I have learned since I have been here! I am so grateful to serve the Lord for the next 17 months and that I can grow closer to Him by giving my all to Him.

I hope all is well at home! All is well here! I am very sad to say goodbye to my companion, so pray that my next companion will be as amazing as she is! Thanks for all the treats and love that you send! I appreciate it so much! And just because I'll be in Virginia doesn't mean the love needs to stop! Oh! And tell Nick congrats!! Or tell him to write me. Crissy is such a cute girl! Thanks for all that you lovely people do!

I love and miss you all so much! Te amo!

And now I close mine epistle. I am Hermana Horton.

 

My how time flies!

From:	Callie Horton (callie.horton@myldsmail.net)
Sent:	Thu 5/23/13 3:46 PM
To:	hortma@msn.com

Hola!!

Hi family! How are you all doing? I hope that all is well! Time is flying here at the MTC! I can't believe that tomorrow it will be a MONTH since I left! Wow! That is crazy! This has definitely been the fastest month of my whole entire life! I am so excited that I will be in Virginia in 2 weeks! Only one more email from the MTC and then the rest will be from good ol' Virginia!

Nothing too exciting happened since I last wrote you all an email. We had some great devotionals! The one on Sunday night was by a lady whose name was Mary Ellen Edmunds (I think). It was really awesome! She was super happy and funny. She talked about how great is it that we are missionaries and how we need to be positive every day. One thing I loved that is "You need to wake up every morning no matter what the conditions, and love your mission with everything you've got!" It was a very uplifting message that she shared. The one on Tuesday was by Marcus B. Nash of the seventy. Wow! I think everyone needed to hear the wonderful words from him and his wife. He told us "Don't waste a minute of your mission!" And "Don't hold anything back from the Lord." That reminded me of wise words of advice I got from a friend some time before I left. They said "Never hide your emotions when you're baring your testimony to an investigator." A part of not holding anything back from the Lord is telling our investigators our testimonies without holding back anything. Another thing I loved was he told a story of when he was on one of the missions with his wife and he saw this boy at church who he knew wasn't very active and he asked him if he was going on a mission. The boy told him that he wasn't really planning on it. Brother Nash said that he had the prompting to tell him "Your life will not be complete until you have returned home from an honorable mission." This is true! A mission is the absolute best thing that anyone could be doing if they are of the right age. After being here, I have realized that the saying "A mission isn't for everyone" is far from true. It IS for everyone! Unless you have some sort of health issue or a man you're going to marry, then everyone this age should be on a mission! I am so grateful for those missionaries that came to the primary activity when I was like 4 that talked about their mission to Guatemala! Little did they know, they sparked something in a 4 year old girl that affected the rest of her life. I wish I knew who they were so that I could thank them! I owe them so much!

Thank you for all of the delicious treats! I don't think it is the MTC food that makes missionaries gain weight. It's definitely the treats that their family members send them! But I am so grateful for the love!

I'm so excited to hear that Laura is having a girl!!! YAY!! I called it! That is so exciting! Start telling the baby about me know so that we can be friends by the time I get home! Poor Rushy doesn't have a boy to play with yet haha.

My companion got laryngitus (or however you spell it) over the weekend so that was interesting! She had to write everything down when she wanted to say something. Another Hermana had to help me teach the lessons, but it was actually a very good experience because I couldn't rely on my companion's amazing Spanish during the lesson. I was very grateful for it, but even more grateful when her voice was back so that we could start quoting Finding Nemo again everyday! But now we have both been affected by the germs at the MTC and are getting some nasty colds so hopefully it will pass soon.

I love you all very much!! I am grateful for you everyday!

And now, I close my epistle.

-Hermana Horton

Half way!‏

Callie's mission email

3:58 PM

 

From:	Callie Horton (callie.horton@myldsmail.net)This sender is in your contact list.
Sent:	Thu 5/16/13 3:58 PM
To:	hortma@msn.com

My dearest family!

I can't believe its already time for me to write you guys an email again! This week flew by! The MTC is great. Its wonderful in fact. I think I might miss it just a little, but I am so super eager to get out there and spread this amazing Gospel to the people of Virginia! This week especially I've been feeling that way! My Spanish isn't ready, but if I got a call to leave for Virginia tonight, I would be more than happy to go!

Russell M. Nelson came and spoke to us at our Tuesday night devotional this week! It was so awesome! The power of an apostle in the room is so cool! I wish I had a copy of the talk that I could just send to you guys! He talked about how much of a privilege it is to be a missionary and how we have people on the other side of the veil that are praying for us. His wife said something so cool. She said that we are praying for our people in our missions, while their ancestors are on the other side of the veil praying for us. And Elder Nelson said that when we pray we should call an angel by name to help us out. I instantly thought of Grandma and Grandpa Poulsen! I can feel how proud they are of me every single day. It is truely amazing! Something else that Elder Nelson said that excitement comes from serving and preaching the Gospel to others. I have already known this to be true! After we teach one of our "investigators" its like an adrenaline rush! Thats either from the Spirit or the fact that I was able to teach the Gospel in an unknown language without crashing and burning. Either way, he is right! His talk was so awesome. Its so funny to see the difference between an apostle at conference and an apostle in the MTC. They are so relaxed here so so much of their hilarious personality comes out! It was so great to hear him! Everyone in the room was just hanging on every word he said. And I'm in the MTC choir so he's heard me sing before. I think my voice really made a big impression on him.

Also, Janice Kapp Perry came and spoke to all the Relief Society last Sunday! She is one amazing lady. She wrote so many of my favorite church songs. And she wrote this song for sister missionaries where she changed the words from "As Sisters in Zion" to "The Sisters of Zion." She changed all the words to fit sister missionaries and we were the first people to sing it. It was one of the most amazing things that I have ever participated in. There wasn't a dry eye in the room by the end of the song. It made me appreciate being a missionary so much! So keep your eyes out for it and please send me a CD when she publishes it! I'm pretty sure the whole CD is dedicated to sister missionaries.

Its been fun to see Jordan here sometimes! He is having such a wonderful time and he is the district leader which doesn't come to any surprise. I'm so glad he came and visited you guys before he left!

Thank you so much for the letters and packages! I'm glad to see my room has a floor finally! Probably the first time in years! When are Mike and Sashana moving in? Hopefully they're reading this so that they can send me a letter or something... preferrably a package...

My Spanish is coming along! Or so I thought. But we started learning all of this future and past tense stuff this week and its completely crashed all of the stuff I was good at before. We do these things called TRCs every Monday. I think I've talked about it before. But we teach members that know Spanish and its way fun! We taught this cute old couple about Joseph Smith and I was able to bear one of the strongest testimonies I've ever been able to bear in Spanish before. I am so grateful that I can bear my testimony is Spanish! It has saved me so many times in lessons when I don't know what else to say.

So my companion and I decided that we were going to share our testimonies with our families this week and I decided that I wanted to do it in Spanish!

Yo se que esta Iglesia es verdadero. Yo se que El Libro de Mormon es la palabra de Dios y que es verdadero. Yo se que Jose Smith fue un profeta. Yo se que el tradujo el Libro de Mormon por medio la poder de Dios. Yo se que Dios es nuestro Padre Celestial y el nos ama muy mucho. Yo se que Jesucristo es el hijo de Dios y que El sufrir por nuestro pecados. Estoy agradecido por esta Iglesia. Necessito esta Iglesia!

I'm sorry for those of you that understood and knew how bad my grammer was but just love it.

I love you all! The church is true! Thanks for everything you do and all of the support you give me!

-Hermana Horton

From:	Callie Horton (callie.horton@myldsmail.net)This sender is in your contact list.
Sent:	Thu 5/09/13 4:03 PM
To:	hortma@msn.com

Hola familia!!

I hope all is well with you guys on the other side of the mountain!

This week has been wonderful of course! I have had so many miracles! One in particular was really cool! So at the end of last week I started to get really discouraged about the Spanish. I could barely understand anything and it was getting really discouraging. So on Sunday I fasted that I would be able to understand more of the language. And I promised Heavenly Father that I would work really hard if He would help me understand the language better. Monday morning came and it was a very tired and stressful morning. Later that day, I was obedient in a situation when it was not a popular move, if that makes sense. It was something so little, but I was still obedient. And later that day, Heavenly Father blessed me with the wonderful opportunity to participate in TRCs! Its this thing where members come in and speak Spanish and we're supposed to just get to know them and teach them a short lesson. They taught us so much more than we taught them! They were these cute old people that were just so full of the Spirit! They gave us great advice, brought the Spirit so much, and my Spanish was better than it had been since we got here! My companion and I just came out and hugged each other because we were just so grateful for the experience! Then the next day, I understood so much more of the Spanish! It was incredible! It was like night and day compared to how I was understanding it before! There is still so much that I don't understand, but I am able to get more of the idea of what they're saying. I am so grateful! We taught 2 "investigators" in one day and my Spanish had improved immensely! My Spanish grammar is horrible, but it works for now. My teacher even commented that she thought that I had improved so much this week! I'm one step closer to fulfilling my dream of being a Latin lover.

Another cool experience happened just yesterday. My companion had told me this story that she had had this friend who told her that when you're on a mission and you're trying to teach the lesson of the Restoration, there will always be some sort of distraction that comes up because Satan knows how powerful of a message it is and he doesn't want us to teach it. So yesterday, we were practicing our lesson for our "investigator" on the Restoration and my companion started to have a little breakdown and had no motivation to study for our lesson. We prayed that everything would work out and our lesson went great! We were ready for anything that would come our way to distract from us practicing teaching this wonderful message. My companion and I have also been working on some things to help us in our lessons and it has helped us to improve so much!

Last Sunday, I was called to be the Sister Training Leader in my zone! Some of you might know it as the Coordinating Sister, but they just recently changed the name of it. I'm pretty excited about it! And one of the Elders in my district got way sick this week and he had to go to quarantine so now we all have to take this stuff called Tamiflu for 10 days so that every in the MTC doesn't die from the influenza. I was pretty grateful because I was feeling a cold coming on, but since we've been taking it my cold has been going way so that's awesome! Today I did initiatories and sealings today for the first time and that was really great! Nothing else really happened this week. Just same ol' same ol'. I'm still having such a wonderful time! My companion is amazing and I am so grateful that I have her as my companion! I haven't seen Jordan yet here, but I did see Bre's roommate yesterday which was fun!

I miss you guys mucho and I love you so much! I hope all is well! Keep sending letters and packages! I love them so much!! Love you!

-Hermana Horton

P.S. Attached are some pictures! I can only do 3 at a time so they will be in a couple different emails.

 

 

FIRST LETTER!!!

·         FIRST LETTER!!!‏

From:	Callie Horton (callie.horton@myldsmail.net)This sender is in your contact list.
Sent:	Thu 5/02/13 4:14 PM
To:	hortma@msn.com

Hola familia!

Don't get too excited, but this is your first letter from your favorite daughter/sibling/person! I'm sorry it took me so long to write you! My P days are on Thursdays so that is when you will be getting emails from me! I'm guessing that will now be your favorite day of the week!

First I just want to say... I love this place!! If I would have known that it was going to be this wonderful, I would have never been nervous! My companion is amazing! Her name is Hermana Hiebert and she is from Canada. She is so nice and so funny! We get along and work together very well! She is one of those people that I feel like I was supposed to meet at one point or another in my life! And my district is so wonderful! They are my family away from home. I feel so very blessed to have such amazing people in my district. We have all been able to open up and express our testimonies through tears (suprisingly mostly the Elders) and grow so close in such a short week. I know that Heavenly Father was definitely watching out for me on that one because He knew I would need it so I am feeling so incredibly blessed. The other Hermanas in my district are so much fun! We have lots of fun together and we are always looking out for each other and lifting each other up.

The Spanish is very very hard. But I am loving it because it is my dream language! We had to teach our first fake investigator the first friday I was here in complete Spanish!! I thought it was some sort of sick joke when they told us that. But alas, they were being serious. We taught a man named Erasmo. He was very patient and understanding through everyone's language struggles. My companion is a linguistics major so she is learning the language very fast and is really good at it! She has definitely been a big help to me, but I also wish that I could be learning as fast as she is. But the fact that I could teach little Erasmo anything is a miracle! The Lord is definitely by my side through this all. The Spirit here in the MTC is like nothing else! It is so constant and such a refreshing feeling.

In this short time that I have been here I feel like I have learned so much! They just drill you day after day with new information so it is going by so fast! But at the same time, I can't believe I have only known these people for a week! Someone told me something that is so true: "The days feel like weeks and the weeks feel like days." That statement is truer than true! And I heard that quote from the lovely Kayla Hansen! I was going through my first day looking all over for her and I hadn't seen her but when we arrived at our residence she comes running out of the bathroom and it was so fun to see her! And it was even better when I found out that she is in the room right next to mine! It has been so great! So we are able to have a nice talk every night and sometimes throughout the day when we see each other. I also saw Melissa the first day and we were able to have a nice chat. And we got a picture together at our temple walk on Sunday, but I forgot to bring my camera to the computer lab so you will recieve pictures next week. There are so many people here!! Everywhere! All the time! I feel so blessed to be a part of this generation where there are so many missionaries! We are all here for the same reason and it just is so powerful! I have seen so many people here that I didn't even know were here! Kayla will be leaving next Tuesday, but then Jordan and Bre's roommate will be coming in Wednesday! I was so glad when I could finally tell someone about Bre's call! I told the girl that helped me carry my suitcases because I was so eager to tell someone! She wrote me and told me she is super excited! I am so happy for her! I have met soo many people that are going to her mission! There is a district in my zone that will be sending a group of Spanish speaking Hermanas to her mission. I'm pretty sure that every other person I met the first days here were going to Spokane so I told all of them about her. I can't believe that Garrett has to wait 6 months!! Poor guy! That is so long! Tell him that I am very excited for him!

Even though I am here teaching fake investigators, we have already had a missionary experience! When we were doing our Sunday temple walk and there was this couple walking around that looked kind of out of place, so one of the other Hermanas decided to say hi to them. We were able to find out that there were from Canada traveling in their RV to different places. They asked us if it was a graduation because there were so many missionaries everywhere. We found out that someone told them that they had to see the temple while they were in Utah, so they went to Manti, Provo, and next was Salt Lake. We were able to talk to them about temples and about missionary work and it was so awesome! They were so nice and so interested in our church, but they were kind of confused why they didn't open up the temples to the public. First missionary experience! It was awesome!

I am so grateful to be here! It is wonderful! The biggest things I have learned while I am here in 1. Obedience brings blessings, but EXACT obedience brings miracles. Miracles are definitely what I need right now if I'm going to learn this language in 6 weeks so I am doing my best to be exactly obedient. 2. I need to put complete trust and faith in the Lord. I have no idea how to speak this language and I have no idea what Erasmo needs, but He does and I need to put trust in Him that He will help me. That has been such a cool thing to experience. 3. Live in the moment! Thinking about the future kind of stresses me out, but then I realize how happy I am in that moment so I just love that happiness and stick with it. 4. Be positive even through the bad! Its easy to get discouraged so I am just looking for the positive in everything!

I miss you all so much! Mom, thanks so much for the packages! They are delicious and always bring a huge smile to my face! Keep 'em coming! Thanks to all for the advice and Dear Elders you have been sending! Mail makes me so happy so keep 'em coming! I hope all is well at home! Tell the chillins to draw me pictures or something! I love you all!

Love,

Hermana Horton