Christmas

hello family and Merry Christmas to you all!

Hope you are enjoying the christmas holiday, i am so excited to see you all tomorrow! so this is how this is going to work. i will call home at approximately 1pm wisc time (11am cali time), sorry that the earliest i can get it in. i will probably just call the home number cause i know you all will hear that one ringing. this call will be short as i want to spent the hour video chatting you all on google plus. yes i will use my gmail account so the set up will be just like we have always had. please try to trouble shoot to make sure your webcam/mic/etc is working so we dont have to waste precious time. oh this is all so exciting to be on the other side of this anticipated christmas call for the first time.

well what happened of late...

im sick. dont judge me if i sound manly tmr. i dont think ive taken this many drugs or gotten sick this many times in my life than on my mission. guess im just falling apart. what else is new haha.

the world ended on friday. didnt you hear. bahaha we had SO many people ask us about it. and it was good cause it lead right into gospel principles. friday we had a wonderful temple conference which included a endowment session, so yes we were in the temple when the world ended,  couldnt have planned it better. ALSO ROBBY BUSCH WAS THERE! bahahaha hes a friend of mine i met through natalia. hes one of natalias bffs. that was so funny. ironic a few weeks ago i trying to brainstorm people i might know who live in this mission. robby was one of those names and i was trying to remember which part of sac hoping maybe we could beg his family into feeding us dinner one night. haha yes deaf branch sisters sometimes go to extreme measures to get fed. but yeah there he was in the same endowment session as me. we got to chat in the celestial room for a bit. kind of a different experience. i tried introducing him to sister wilson whos going home soon... haha :]

we met a wonderful WONDERFUL man this week. his name is ronnie. hes in his 40s. it is so neat to be an instrument in the lords hands as he does this marvelous work! ronnies parents are deaf and we knocked on their door having never knocked the door before. ronnie answered and we asked for his deaf parents. they were not home so we said we would come back tmr. there was a little awkward stumbling over each other sentences and as we walked away we were a little confused why that was kind of awkward. we go back the next day and ronnie again answers. he lets us in and chat with his mom for a bit for but soon he interrupts us and started asking a thousand questions. well pretty much in turned into me have a lesson with ronnie for an hour introducing SO MUCH and sister wilson signing with his mom trying to give me more time. hahaha it was awesome. hes hearing so we have to pass his off to the elders, luckily the elders are in our zone so can hear updates about how hes doing and if hes progressing or not. so excited. Ronnie is seriously a golden investigator. he wants to learn so much and he had such a light in his eyes. so cool when the lords uses us asl missionaries to help with the hearing work too!

and im already out of things to write home about. sorry this is difficult... i forgot my planner with all my emailing notes.

this christmas season has been different not being home for the holidays but oh so wonderful the christmas spirit is everywhere. i feel like i have truely focused on the christmas season everyday, almost every moment since thanksgiving ended. its been wonderful to make the birth of the savior as my #1 christmas focus. its been a wonderful month as ive learned so much about that simple nativity story. saturday evening they delivered all our christmas packages to all the missionaries and we have a little christmas devotional which included some christmas stories and testimonies. the spirit was so strong and although i was sucking on cough drops and blowing my nose i felt the power of the spirit in that little room just as powerfully as everyone else did. i barely could muster out words when president asked me to say the kneeling closing prayer. this christmas season ive come to know deeper that it is not just a nativity story but something that truely happened so long ago. one little boy was born so we call could live, and that same boy died that we might all overcome death. it has truely been a wonderful christmas season full of opportunities to give and serve, what this season is so really about. so many people have been so generous to give to the missionaries during this christmas time too. our apartment is full of lots of candles, lights, way too many sweets, and presents around our tree. it will be a merry christmas.

see you all tmr.

love,

sister oliphant

DAD  CONGRATSSS!!!! i want to hear about everything!!!! how exciting! let me know when you know more! ohhh yay cant stop smiling for you dad!

okay the costumes are fabulous. those will be nice for future christmas' to come too! terrill you sure are standing aweful close to sophie there... bahahaha kind of funny seeing she looks 9 months preggo. hold old is sophie now? she looks so old! maybe its the pregnant part haha (ps do the kids read  these emails? do you read them at fhe like you did with richards?) okay i need a reminder on who is in the bishopric. the pic is too small all i can make out it bishop schaefer on the right.

this week was one of achievements but also trials.

the branch had its christmas party of which 64 people were in attendance. the largest activity the deaf branch has had in ages! with much hard work and publication were were blessed to have over half of them non-members! it was a miracle! hopefully they were able to feel the spirit as they came into the church building and it gave the members also a chance to fellowship and be missionaries! i know many of them stepped up to this! it was quite a success!

we were also able to add a new investigator named Anna. Anna is Ukrainian  she is deaf but knows Ukrainian sign language, different than american sign language. we hope to teach her but know the language barrier will be difficult. serving the deaf community we really run into so many cultures (mexican/spanish, armenian, hmong, ukrainian, iranian, british are just a few of them so far!) its so fun!

yes that was Molly and her son in that pic i sent last week. yes this is now kathy #2. she is deaf and we are teaching her up in carmichael. more fun stories to come about her.... ;]

it was also birthday week for sister wilson and myself. thanks so very much for the many birthday wishes! we indulged quite a bit this week and had way to much unhealthy food. we had homemade pf changs, papa murpheys pizza, i made cupcakes!, cheesecake, etc. the members were very nice here and we were privileged to be in the homes of members on both of our birthdays for dinner. one sweet woman even gave us birthday gifts: homemade hot pads! they are so cute. Ramiro even made us a birthday dinner saturday with awesome authentic mexican food homemade. delicious and so nice to stay in contact with them. i just love Ramiro and Sandra both so much!

my roommates are all a little frustrated with me... because I received a ton of packages this last week!!! thanks to everyone! i feel so loved from home!

mom you spoiled me rotten! thanks so much for everything! wow what a birthday package! i dont think you missed a thing! the candles smell amazing! they are also on my desk and are great christmas decorations. i lit up the rose that night and had fun being a pryo and playing with the flame and wax :] the russian refresher tea i have all the time and the cup cake in the mug was such a cute idea. too bad sister wilson is allergic to citrus or i would have shared.... oh well more for me ;] the cds and cheeseboard came too!! not sure if i was supposed to open the last one but i got it confused for the amazon package. i will save it for christmas to eat tho. makes me feel right at home, thanks for bringing a little wisconsin to me :] im sure the cheese will be delicious! do i have to refrigerate them tho? ive never heard of non refrigerated cheese. the rest i will open on christmas.

kassie your package came! oh my goodness i love it!!!! best idea ever! seriously how did you know thats exactly what i was hoping for! my roommate in stockton had one and i thought it was just the best idea ever. but it distracts me all the time during studies haha. now when people email me pictures i can just upload them on it! perfect! thanks for the package again i will open the rest on christmas :] dont think ill be able to open them on video chat tho. let me know anyone if you want me to save it to open when we chat.

amanda that thing is disgusting! oh my goodness youre crazy. crazy awesome. i love it. have no idea what to do with it but i love it. am i really supposed to eat it!? ps ive already worn the belt! thanks so much!

alecia!!! cute elephants!! and i am currently wearing the necklace! just got it in the mail today :] its shineyyyyy haha. thanks. the silk scarf is cute too thanks. im trying to figure out the best outfit to wear with it! so soft too. also ps that black shirt you wrapped it all in made me really confused! sister wilson and i had some good laughs and had a little fashion show. hahaha passing it along for laughs. ALSO we all enjoyed the homemade cookies! they made it all whole just fine! no crumbs!

thanks again! everyone!!!!

this week we have a temple conference which means we also get to attend the temple!!!! woopee! excited to go again... i forget how grateful i should be to go the byu where there are so many temples so close.

mom thanks for your note about the funeral. i didnt know her right? what was her name? i just remember the McCormicks as the only relatives to the Reyes... right? Funny you just finished Luke this week, CAUSE SO DID I! haha it was perfect timing with the christmas season too. yes now on to John which is a good one. looks like ive caught up. repenting for all my seminary slack back in the day ;]

i am truly grateful for this opportunity to serve. my eyes have been opened far wider than i ever imagined. i am learning to rely on my savior.

sister oliphant

ps: terrill or stu?! does ms straughn still work at LHS?
pps: oops forgot to attach this long ago.

THIS IS OUR TITLE OF LIBERTY WE MADE! i havent sent this home yet have i?

we changed one word. any guesses? hahaha

 

 

baptism and birthday week

i would like to tell a story about my friend named Kathy:

When sister wilson and I met Kathy she proclaimed to us "I for sure dont want to join your church, ive been baptized 4 times already and im done. im just a little curious as to what all-ya'll believe." Kathy previously in her life given up christianity, what she was raised with, and decided to become a witch, and practice the religion wiccan because it brought her the most peace. In our first lesson she prayed to the great goddess diana and the great horned god. although it might been have been addressed to a name a little different than our heavenly father i think that might have been one of the most sincere prayers i have EVER listened to. The spirit came into the room with such power we were all so very moved with how much sincerity she expressed. The entire transfer sister wilson and i had the privileged of sharing the principle that God is our loving heavenly father from about 8 different angles. thats all our lesson plans ever consisted of. Kathy needed to understand and hear one principle. My last sunday in the Stockton Brookside ward has Kathy's first. One of the talks mentioned that the word of wisdom included tea and that as latter-day saints we sustained from drinking it. she turned to us and told us "I will never give up my tea." oh we laughed and laughed about this later. Sister wilson simply said "Kathy we havent asked you to." Kathy slowly started to feel the love of her heavenly father in her life, began to trust in Him more, and began to prepare for something she had no idea was happening to her. Kathy glowed. Kathy always had a glow but when i saw her again about a month later she shown more than i had ever seen her. That evening she announced she was ready to commit to baptism. the sisters had challenged her just the night before. Her baptism date approached and after many hardships that satan always threw her way, including the loss of a job, she managed to over each one of them. One of these also included a baptismal font that refused to fill up. minutes before the baptism we were using water pitchers, trashcans, and mop bucks to fill the font. Satan did not win and Kathy was baptized on saturday december 8th. Wiccan to Mormon in 4 months. Kathy has been such an example to me of why it is so important to understand who you are and that you have a heavenly father who loves you. when we understand and feel this love it becomes the greatest power.

sister wilson and i are staring together again for another transfer!! woopy. which means yep- we get to celebrate our birthdays and christmas together. sister wilsons birthday is the day after mine! thursday the 13th!

sister druyon took us out to eat at... THE ELEPHANT BAR!!! yes it was awesome. sister D is seriously amazing! we almost asked if we could get a discount cause my name means elephant haha. and of course they served us free dessert. yummm.

our current progressing investigators are two. molly and kathy. more stories to come. but its so obvious how willing these two are to learn and do all they can to keep commitments. they are such blessing to the deaf work and while we know their teaching process will be slow we are excited to be able to be here as it happens. this week we taught molly for the third time the simple principle that there is a spirit inside her and that she is literally a daughter of heavenly father. this week it finally clicked and the light that shone in her eyes when she understood was remarkable. the gospel is so simple and brings so much joy. we are excited for her to learn so much more and foster that beautiful light she has.

molly is hmong and made is cake for our bdays too! so sweet of her! ps do i know anyone hmong is sac from the second ward?

we have another girl we have been trying to teach. she is an animal hoarder. she calls them her sons and daughters. a few times we dont have the guts to knock on the door when we arrive because the stench is so bad. one day this week we toughened up and knocked. turns out as well as being deaf she cant smell either. (deaf nose she called it haha) it explains alot.

things are beginning to look like christmas :] we have a mini christmas tree and fun decorations up around the apt. we even have a fireplace! we are trying to find firewood to make a fire on christmas morning! we already got approval ;] we are still preparing the the branch cmas party on friday. i swear we invited everyone and their dogs. literally. we have many who have promised to come so hopefully lots of missionary work will be done! yes ramiro is coming! and bringing a friend :]

the hudnors our missionary senior couple in the deaf branch are doing amazing! we again are so blessed to have them! sister hudnor is now signing prayers and elder hudnor is on to sentences in sign! we know learning a language especially later in life is not easy work but we are grateful for their positive attitude and willingness to serve where the lord has asked them to be. elder hudnor was nice to have sacrificed his football game to drive us to stockton for kathys baptism as well this week. they serve us so much and i dont know how we ever survived without them previously.

its stopped raining. for now. 

ill keep you posted about christmas. i think google+ would be best. were flexible as to time, we have yet to ask a member still.

YES wasnt that lesson in RS amazing! oh my goodness best lesson in the deaf branch so far. felt the spirit. i have much to be retentive of still.

sister worrison, my bestest friend from the mtc is serving in NJ! so i have heard about whats going on there. crazy huh?! (sister mo do you know bishop matthew woll?)

as to the packages. i got alecias cookies!!! thanks alecia! and the big bday/chistmas one. thanks so much! im excited to open :] also the achievement days sent me a cute package of christmas cards. so nice of them! thanks too lydia!!!

merry christmas to all. we'll chat soon :]

love sister oliphant

ps thanks for all the happy birthdays

With Kathy on her baptism day December 8, 2012

Sisters with Kathy on her baptism day

With Molly and son

Birthday twinners- sisters Oliphant and Wilson

At the Elephant Bar

[Brief preface ... as the "editor-in-chief" of this blog, I have been - up til now - editing Sister Oliphant's letters home to include capital letters where they should be, apostrophes where they should be and so forth.  But knowing I need to do the editing slows me down from posting right away.  Therefore, I am "ceasing and desisting" with the editing, although I am still trying to catch typos.  The blogs more correctly reflect Crissa and how she writes.  :)  ]

good morning :]

here are thoughts from the week:

so last pday we went to the mall cause we had to return something and on our way out santa clause in his little elf village land calls out to us "hey sisters." we were kind of taken back not sure if he was trying to sell us something or just being friendly. so after a little contemplation we decided say hello to santa. oh my funny. so we asked if he was lds. his response: "well of course silly, didn't you know santa is a member!" oh my goodness it was hilarious. but i should have guessed im sure hes had his temple work done for him by now ;]

i think my new approach to people when i ask them if they are members or not will simply be, "so have you been baptized?" haha santa included.

so as an asl missionary we get to drive practically wherever and talk to practically whom ever the lord places in our path. sometimes we call ourselves the phantom missionaries cause we pop up almost everywhere for small moments. this week upon our 6 hour extravaganza all over sacramento area we only ended up meeting one deaf person but had 3 lessons with other hearing people. so many times deaf move so we find hearing people behind deaf doors. its a great opportunity to still testify of the restored gospel. we try to make sure we are where the lord wants us to be cause we know he can use us for almost anything.

we had the chance to say hello to ramiro and sandra this week. stopped in for a hello. they are having us back for dinner for our birthdays. (did i tell you sister wilsons birthday is the 13th!? hahaha we are twinners and if we dont get transferred next week we will have a fun birthday week together.) sandra  makes jewelry so i picked up a little something im mailing home to kelsea for christmas (kelsea i hope your reading this... its coming your way soon :] )

my hair finally fit into a pony tail this week! woo-hoo for hair that grows! did you see my pics of how short it is? im dying for it to grow back out again.

this week we had zone conference. they split up the mission in thirds and have three big conferences. the first was for the south half of the mission but they asked us to attend to interpret for sister sellers. that was neat to see a few of the stockton missionaries again. interpreting is hard. especially when it is for a 70, who is standing 3 feetin away from you. blah. we also got to attend our own zone conference because we all know how much you get out of the meeting when you interpret... aka close to nothing. (you turn into more of a machine and dont comprehend much). our conference was in the afternoon the following day so we got to say hello to the missionaries leaving from the morning conference and all the missionaries at our conference. anyways between it all we saw every missionary in the mission in 2 days. thats pretty hard to do but it was nice again to see some friends and familiar faces.

our 70 was elder Porter and his wife! they had some amazing insights. and all we discussed was the doctrine of christ, or the first principles of the gospel. its amazing how simple the gospel truly is yet how much you can get out of it. love it :]

you are right, we should be very grateful for our car. she is a beaut. did i tell you we named her chery cause i miss read chevy and thought she came with a name. bahahaha we spend a lot of time with chery and cause im the driver it can be kind of hard. all those miles everyday can easily equate to 6 hours of practically non stop driving. with 5 minute breaks when we get to stop and have a little lesson at the door. im growing to really appreciate dad and his 24 hour long drives through the night. your shoulders and head can tend to hurt.

but im truely excited to make the hour trip to stockton and back this weekend! we are all so excited for kathy! shes still set to get wet on saturday :] its been amazing to see her transform and it was such a privilege to be there at the beginning and now at the end. to see how the gospel can transform someone is amazing! ive never seen someone change so much so fast. she is such a wonderful example to me.

its been raining like crazy!!!!! and we have been having flooding all over the area. (im in dying need of rainboots!) luckily it dried up a bit yesterday and today but i heard we are going to get more this next week. this past week the lights have been flickering in many different neighborhoods because of all the rain. our roommates and a few other elders had their church meeting canceled because the electricity was out so they put on jeans after a short sacrament meeting in the dark and went out doing flood damage control. lots of trees have branches down cause of the wind too. luckily our apt has been safe and only one of our branch members have had flooding problems. (most live in apt complexes and on second floors). sunday when the lights went out i was in the shower. haha so fun. except not. pitch black. the thought crossed my mind i had gone blind. instantly. haha

we are currently preparing for what we call a "white christmas" in reference to those we love being dressed in white as we humbly have the opprotunity to give our savior something special this year for christmas.

the deaf branch is preparing the a christmas party on dec 14th. its our BIG event for the year. so we are passing out many fliers and inviting all. hopefully we plan for enough food ;]

it should be fun and the missionaries of course have something planned up our sleeves for the event as well.

yes we do get to skype or google+ video chat! but actually i think most missionaries get to do that now, its not just limited to asl. maybe you can set up a big projector on the living room wall so i can see everyone :] 

terrill you look like a stud. keep it up good lookin' ;]

and dad arent HUNGER GAMES AMAZING! so glad you read them. sorry you didnt enjoy the movie as much as i did. maybe it was the midnight premier madness but i LOVED that movie. for a book to movie conversion i thought it was quite well done.

hope all are well at home :]

merry merry christmas season. hope you still put up my ornaments on the tree ;]

LOVE!

sister oliphant

ps: elvera thats bomb you got to hear from holland! and so close! im trying not to be envious you got to hear him speak. funny quick story. our deaf investigator came to general conference and watched the asl for hollands talk. afterwards we turned to us and with wide eyes simply signed "power" hahaha it was amazing. he is such a wonderful man. i wouldnt be surprised if he was our prophet during the second coming ;]