Camp Hill is Very Hilly!

Hello everyone!

I don't have a whole lot to say today. This week was much better than last week. We were much more organized and set up in the area so we were able to really just get to work and work and work this week. My area is super full of hills, and we live in the very top of a tall building with no elevator as well. My calves are going to be huge when I get home....Oh well! We have been figuring out the bus/train system around our area. It feels really weird to be traveling around by bus and train again because we didn't have any of that in Toowoomba. It is really nice though a major bus line runs from our place (which isn't in our area) to the train line which basically runs across the whole north end of our ward, and it also runs us up to a major bus line that goes right through the south half, which is my area. So it's been good we are blessed And even though it's hilly we haven't had to bike much because of the buses and trains. We still don't really have anyone to teach beside all the families that the ward wants us visiting, but we are always finding and talking to everyone we meet. I'm sure that Heavenly Father will lead us to those people who are ready here shortly as long as we continue to work as hard as we can. Anyways hopefully you all have a great week and you enjoyed General Conference. We get it this next weekend which should be great. I'm really looking forward to it. Another chance to receive heaps of revelation and have our testimonies strengthened by our living special witnesses of Jesus Christ. It's pretty great. 

Love you!

Sister Rasmussen

Week 1 in Camp Hill

Well I've been here nearly a week now and I'm starting to know my way around things a bit better. We had our first Sunday with the ward and President and Sister Henderson came and spoke! So that was really cool, they stayed for the whole 3 hours and then there was a luncheon for all the recent converts and returning less active members of our ward and the ward that meets after us at 1 and then they both spoke again in that ward. I've been to 6 hours of church once on my mission and it was pretty intense but I'm sure they are used to it. Anyways so that was really good. The ward I'm in now is so different from Toowoomba ward, much younger, much more technological, and much more fast paced with everything. They are putting us to work, and have given us heaps and heaps of families and people to start visiting. We are going to be going on splits 3 nights a week, which is awesome as well. I'm excited to work with them. It's cool sharing a ward with elders as well because now we can involve the entire ward more between the lot of us. This week was a bit slow because we were spending a lot of time going through lists and area books and splitting things up and organizing ourselves and getting our maps and stuff but we are super organized now and should be ready to roll for this coming week. The biggest problem we have at the moment is we have no one to teach at all. So knocking on doors on doors on doors this week until we find those people that Heavenly Father has prepared for us. Hopefully by next next week we will have lots of people to teach. It's always slow like this when you open an area, which frustrates me but I know it will get better. Have fun watching general conference live this weekend! We get ii one week delayed but that's alright. I'm really excited for it anyways. It's always good to hear the Prophets speak to us. 

Love you all, 

Sister Rasmussen

Welcome to Camp Hill, Sis. Rasmussen!!

Well it finally happened and I've been transferred away from Toowoomba. I will miss that place so much, but Heavenly Father knows how to direct his work and he has sent me here to Camp HIll. I couldn't have left Toowoomba on a more positive note than I did. We had 7 investigators at church last weekend, we had a baptism in Dalby with a family that I absolutely love, we went on splits twice in one week with the ward, and had more lessons than we have had probably in the whole 6 months that I was there. There is so much potential in that area now. I feel very blessed to have been able to serve there and I am happy that I did put my all into building up that area into what it now is because it was pretty dead when I got there and now they have so many wonderful people to work with. By the end my companion and I were able to accomplish pretty much every goal we had set for the area and I know it was made possible just because we worked really hard. So as usual I come in to build an area up as best as I can and then I get transferred to a new area as soon as it gets going, so I can build the new place up haha. I may not see much fruit myself by working that way but I feel really good about it all the same.

I was a bit confused at transfer meeting but I think I've sorted out what is happening. I'm moving to an area where they are taking two sisters and two elders and switching us over so that there will be a set of elders and a set of sisters in each of these two neighboring wards. So my companion has already been living in the flat that I'm moving into, and she was expecting to pick me up at the meeting and introduce me to everyone she has been teaching in Holland Park ward but next minute we found out at transfer meeting about the switcheroo and now we know that we are basically opening a new area in the neighboring ward, and two elders are taking over her old area. I think she is a bit sad about that but as for me I am stoked to be starting a new area off from scratch.  That's all I've done my whole mission is open new areas so I don't really know any different. One thing that is weird is that I am in the heart of Brisbane now.  It's like a big city here! so different than Toowoomba. Way faster paced, way more humid! and smaller areas with trains and buses and all of that kind of stuff. It will be a whole new adventure. I can't wait! My new companion is Sister Semaia, from Samoa, so all the Samoan I learned off my wonderful sisters in Toowoomba will come in good handy. She's been out maybe 6 or 7 months now I think. Sister Fesolai got sister Hwang from Korea to take my place in Toowoomba which will be so fun for them. She is cool and goes home with me so I am glad for them there. I know they will see miracles, and I will too here in my new home. Oh and my new flat is sooooo nice. It's like brand new and compared to the flat in Toowoomba it's like a palace. I'll hopefully know a bit more about everything that's going on next week, but just remember Heavenly Father is in charge.  He will direct our paths for good if we allow him to, and I can't wait to see the good that comes of this. I'll send some pictures home from the baptism!

Alofa Atu,

Sister Rasmussen 

Maybe My Last Week in Toowoomba?

This is maybe my last week in Toowoomba. I find out on Sunday and I'll let you know on Tuesday. 

I will be sad to go because I love it here, but you never know I could end up staying as well.

I've got like no time this week at all to write but we had a great week. Nya's baptism is on Saturday so we are going out to Dalby and that should be fun. I can't wait for Nya to be able to make that step towards returning to be with her Father in Heaven. She is a very special daughter of God. I love the whole family and it will be great when they can all be baptized, it's just this thing in Australia where it takes forever to process the paperwork to be legally married. WAY DIFFERENT then home haha drive-thru anyone? But anyways that is what I have to look forward to this week and I hope everyone is doing well at home. I love hearing about all the people joining Heavenly Father's army of missionaries right now it's pretty cool to see how the world's youth are rising up. Anyways Love you all!

Sister RAsmussen

Zone Conference and lots of Driving!!

Howdy,

Well this week was a really good week. It felt like we had a lot going on. We had zone conference on Wednesday which was in Raceview (2 hours away) and then we had the sister training leaders come up to go on trade offs with us and the other sisters  for two days. It's always fun when they come because then we are cramming 6 people into our little flat instead of just four. Besides that we have been driving a lot, like to zone conference and out to Dalby and down into the far reaches of our area where we have a part member family who lives on a property with horses and things (I think I've sent home pictures before). Anyways I'm getting to be professional at driving on the other side of the road and the car and I think when I get home I'll be utterly confused for a while. But we are seeing miracles occur in the lives of our investigators as they keep the commitments we leave with them to do the small and simple things. I love teaching! I just love taking something complex like the gospel and breaking it down to it's beautiful simplicities. One thing I love teaching people is that our spirit is like our bodies and that it needs nourishment and food and water just like our bodies do. If we starve our spirits for too long they will die just like our bodies will. And if we have an emergency and our bodies are dying we give them CPR, and that is what we can give our spirits as well when they are dying, only it stands for church, pray, read. We have been helping our investigators understand that this week and those that take that challenge and start that process have been like a starving person who gets into a buffet. Truly "feasting" on the words of Christ. And you can just see their spirits fill up with the word and then hunger for even more. It's pretty amazing. I really know that as we do those 3 simple things they will make more of a difference in our lives than anything else. Also in this day and age we have all that feast right at our fingertips. If you haven't got the gospel library app on your phone or tablet you should go get it because it is awesome. The videos and messages on there are truly inspired and there is one for any topic. Those short mormon messages really bring the spirit and so if you're planning a lesson for anything in church definitely go check those out. 

Anyways someone let me know how march madness is going. 

Ofa Lahi Atu,

Sister Rasmussen

It's a New Day!

Aloha!

Well, last week was a pretty hard week. Lot's of our lessons fell through and just things kept cropping up and disrupting our plans and what not. It got a little frustrating. Then we went to the temple and that was awesome. I love the temple. That made me feel better but the rest of the week ended up being a bit more of the same with things messing up our plans and then not even happening and just all sorts of frustrations. However that's why I love Sundays so much, especially fast Sunday. It's just a fresh start! a clean slate! a new day! I really felt that this time around taking the sacrament. The past week is now in the past, and we have a new hope to move forward and do better and be better. The Atonement of Jesus Christ is so hopeful and the way that his Gospel is organized helps us to feel that hope. We can wake up everyday to a new day and when those days still just add up and bring us down we have the Sacrament to take every week and just start off new and fresh. It's cool too because as soon as we were finished with church we road tripped it out to Dalby to visit the family we are teaching out there and we had a really nice lesson with them. The spirit was felt strongly, and we had fun drawing the plan of salvation in chalk in the backyard. I find that when we teach the gospel really simply in kids terms that the spirit is always there and the simple truths are so beautifully played out in their minds when they answer our questions and ask their own. It was so fun! And the 12 year old Nya is preparing to be baptized on the 22nd of MArch so we are really looking forward to that! Anyways I don't have heaps of time today but I love you and hope you all have a great week because I know I will! And if I don't that's ok because there is a new week coming up after this one anyways.

Ofa Atu,

Sister Rasmussen

Temple Day

Aloha!

Today was temple P-day so we got to travel to Brisbane and go to the Temple. I love the temple so much! My companion and I were really looking forward to going to the temple too especially because the last few days have turned out to be extremely hectic and just stressful. Everything that we have been planning has been falling through. A few of our most solid investigators seem to be faltering, and we are trying to do all we can to encourage them to carry on. And especially yesterday when every one of our five appointments fell through and one of them even fell through twice in the same day and then we just decided to start knocking on doors with the remaining time we had and a crazy lady let us in her house and started ranting and raving about being the most intelligent woman on earth and how she is persecuted and how she was "cleaning" her house which was very verrrry not clean at all and telling us all this whilst cleaning her feet in a bucket of dirty water. I just about lost it. And once we finally got out of there after telling her she was a daughter of a Heavenly Father who loves her and leaving her a pamphlet (because she is after all even if she's off her rocker) then her upstairs neighbor came out with no clothes on and was extremely intoxicated. After that we went to another appointment which also failed. And we couldn't wait to get to the temple today and then our ride got sick and we had to scramble around everywhere to get another one or else wake up at 3 in the morning again to get the train. I really almost lost it then. But the Lord provided a way and we got a ride and we went to the temple and I feel Oh so much better now. So that's the story of how the Temple can calm a troubled mind. But now we are back in Toowoomba and ready to move forward no matter what the adversary might be throwing at us. 

One cool thing since last week is that we are now teaching a family that lives about an hour farther west into the great Australian outback, in a town called Dalby, that is tiny and has a tiny branch but no missionaries. So we were nominated to go because here in Toowoomba are the closest missionaries to them, and because the family has two daughters, 12 and 14, and I am the only sister who can drive. So we lucked out on that one because this family is awesome! The 14 year old was baptized at 8 but has been less active nearly all her life and doesn't know much, the 12 year old wants to be baptized! The Mom who grew up in the church but fell away in her teens wants to come back to church full force and the boyfriend of the mom is a very interested non member. So we are very excited to be teaching them! We are teaching them every Sunday after church so we get to roadtrip every Sunday as well. And maybe more often as we help the 12 year old get prepared for her baptism.  So that is exciting. Our other investigators are all starting to kind of hit roadblocks at the moment but I'm sure with the help of Heavenly Father and some faith we will make it through. This transfer is already nearly half way over and I'm starting to feel like I'll never leave Toowoomba! But I'm loving it most of the time anyways. It's starting to get cooler and their fall season is coming on. It was 16 Celsius the other morning and I was freezing haha that's like 60 Fahrenheit but you know how I deal with cold. 

Hope everyone is excited for March Madness. 

Ofa Lahi Atu,

Sister Rasmussen