French letter to Andrew

Andrew: 

Bah, tu parle bien comme même. Je suis fière de tes efforts d'apprendre les 2 langues au même temps. Le Mandarin est pas facile de tout. Il y a quelques missionnaires ici en France qui doit apprendre français, et au même temps Mandarin. Oh c'est difficile pour eux. J'appris quelques mots en Mandarin, mais je connais pas beaucoup, seulement, "Bonjour, je m'appelle Sœur Stevens" et je suis missionnaire. Haha. 

Je vais très bien merci. Je suis toujours heureuse à faire l'œuvre missionnaire ici. Bien que quelques fois c'est dur, et nous nous posons les questions, bah pourquoi je suis en mission, mais, je sais que se m'aider à grandir. Je voyais beaucoup des épreuves des personnes ici, et comment ils ont surmonté ses épreuves, et pour le plus part, comment je peux aider les autres à trouver le bonheur dans cette vie. Cela est la plus difficile pour la franchise je crois. En fait, j'ai rencontré un homme sur le métro quand j'étais à Paris qui me disait "je vous voir touts les temps avec un sourire, et vous êtes tous en train de rigoler. Comment vous avez trouvé le joie en France, c'est quelques choses que j'étais cherché pour toute ma vie." On a expliqué pourquoi on est ici et ce qui on fait. Mais, je suis le plus heureuse dans toute ma vie. C'est magnifique la France, je crois on doit tous travers les moment difficile, les moment dur, pour comprendre le joie qui viens de la vie si on garde une attitude positive. Il y a un citation qui j'aime beaucoup, "be willing at any moment to give up what you are for what you can become" c'est la clef pour la succès. C'est qui on peut deviner dans cette vie? 

Ah fin, je t'aime très forte et aussi pour répondre à ta question. Après je rentre aux États-Unis, le premier chose que je vais faire.... Je vais vous donner un embrasse  tu me manques, et dit une grande bonjour à Ru pour moi! Et je veux les photos d'elle! 

-Ashley

Life!

Folding baby clothes at an activity, sewing project, and participating in the Ward activity!

Parents picking up their missionary sent us a personal message and pics of Ash!

Ashley translated in Sunday School for them, they said Ashley was just darling. She really looks radiant!

Contacting and baptism dates… a great week!

Hello!

So this week happened really well. It went by fast, but it was an awesome week. 

On Monday we had a bunch of appointments and helped a less active family move, so we didn't get to do a ton of stuff, but we still got some food and were able to email you last week! 

Tuesday: my favorite day of the week. We went to Tours for district meeting, and I have to just start this off by saying probably one of the top 5 best days of my mission. We went early and made the train this time lol, and rode with the elders from Blois down to Tours and met up with everyone from the zone, so the missionaries from, Tours, Le Mans, Alençon, Blois, Bourges, and us. So there were 14 of us in total. We went to the church and proceeded with our DM, in which somehow our DL was able to tie in a golf tournament and march madness lol. I love my district and their creativity. Then we all got to have a pizza party thanks to the Zone Leaders because we completed our Bucket list finding goals! And then we all got to play "loup-garou" which means "werewolf." It's a super popular game in France (and especially among missionaries we play it a lot), it's kind of like mafia, but there are cards with characters on it. It's really fun and with 14 people it was just a hoot. And all of the things are in French too, oh man it was so funny. But, with fun and games comes work, so we decided to try something new, kind of like the Paris missionaries and set up a stand and contacted around it. So we did, and they split half the missionaries going out of centre ville and the others stay by the sign, I was put to stay by the sign. But it was so fun! I contacted and taught tons of people and it was the most success of my entire mission in one day! It was crazy! We were all just contacting together, I got to contact someone with one of my zone leaders, which was really cool, he speaks super good French, and had an awesome conversation with this person. We contacted so much that day! Haha. It was so awesome! But man when you contact in France you really have to know the bible. One piece I would give to any prospective missionary, study the bible before you leave! My zone leader knew the bible front and back, and let me tell you it helps! Anyways, it was just the coolest finding day ever, and we got to keep that spirit of finding through out the rest of the week. 

Wednesday: 

The baptismal date we have for Vanessa we changed to the 26th because we have stake conference the 19th and 20th in Évry. But she is super excited and invited her 2 friends to the FHE we had at the bishops house! It was awesome we ate dinner together and we had poulet de les Pyrénées. It was really good! One of my favorite French dishes. So far I have found my favorite French plates are durning winter from the east and the summer more so from the Pyrénées (Toulouse/Bordeaux). Anyway. It was really nice and everyone got to know each other. 

Thursday:

We got to set a baptismal date with our other Amie. Marie, for September 26! It was awesome and soeur Penverne was there and made it awesome with her testimony! 

Friday: 

We had another exchange in Orleans and so I met with the other sister and the DMP and his wife taught with us our new ami Marc-Antoine. So it went well, and we are going to see him again which is cool. And we got to see Vanessa again!

Saturday:

We went to the church to get news of the new transfer! Guess what! I'm in another trio. Lol. More blessings come with more missionaries right? Lol. Her name is Soeur Welters. She is a lot younger in the mission I think she's been here for 4 months. So we are excited! Get some young blood up in this dying equipe haha. So yay! Excited, and I think I will leave next transfer, ah bizarre quoi. Anyway, yep and still no elders in the ville. So yep, but the best news came when soeur Ericsson called me and guess what?! SHE IS A TRAINER! There is only 1 sister coming in and she gets to train her! Ah I'm soooo excited for her. 

Sunday:

We had our Amie come to church Alexia. We had a super bomb lesson with Soeur Javoy and our amie Mme. Simone. We taught more about Joseph Smith and the restoration. It went super well, and Soeur Javoy talked about her conversion story, the spirit was super strong, so we are excited for the follow up appointment! 

Monday: 

Today we got ready for the new week and the new sister who is coming to Orleans! And in France they have a "Braderie" the best think I could liken it to would be a Saturday market, but it's like everywhere! A lot of sales and stuff so we got to go check it out, and there are people everywhere. It's something I will miss about France, there are always people I'm centre ville just all around, with someone always playing music, it's a very inviting atmosphere for the most part. It's always fun, especially during the music festivals! 

Ok something I learned this week:

Well during contacting on Tuesday it was actually just really cool to see everything happen, but there is some stories. So as we were setting up the table and putting all the books on it this woman came up and looked at us and the Book of Mormon and stuff, and my zone leader looked at me (I was the oldest Soeur my "comp" was in their 3rd transfer) and was like, go talk to her! Haha so I did and I explained what the Book of Mormon is and asked if she had questions, and just did a normal contact and in the end gave the woman a Book of Mormon, our card and stuff about Jospeh Smith from what I had explained. My "comp" just starred at me and when the woman left, was just like, "how did you do that?!" That was insane! Haha I literally laughed, but we worked together for a bit longer, then we all had to switch. But then I got to listen in a couple of contacts with my zone leader, and after I asked him in amazement, "how did you do that?!" Haha right after I said that I was like, "oh I see God", bien joué. I guess we are continually growing and progressing, and it's amazing to watch the missionaries around you grow and see how they do missionary work, how God really uses each one of us differently, but needs each of us, it's kind of very true. "God doesn't call the qualify, He qualifies the called." I have truly seen it. We all start out as missionaries who get extremely humbled, and finally the lord is able to work through us as he molds us into clay and watching these missionaries who have just come in, or who are going to leaving in a couple weeks, gave me just an awesome experience looking at the Lords handy work, and how He is changing us all into the people He wants us to become. 

Love you,

Soeur Stevens

Mission life!

Archery at the Chateau

Bourges excursion….

Hey!

This week was uber awesome, but super tiring! 

On Tuesday we decided to do a "finding day" in Orleans, we needed to find some new people! We contacted all day and taught a couple lessons, met some very interesting people lol.

Then Wednesday we had a bunch of rdv. And met with the DMP. I got an email from the mission stating I was officially departing Dec.10th...weird. 

Thursday we went to Bourges and had district meeting in their chapel. It was good and while we were in the meeting this guy walks in and the elder who is in Bourges went to go see what was up, then the district leader left, and we sat there for like 10 minutes, finally I popped my head out only to see them teaching the garbage man who came to give them a flyer lol. So then the zone leaders we're like, Ahhh... I said lets just continue with the meeting, so I got up and pretended to be the district leader and continued with the lesson making up random stuff that went with the topic they were all laughing so hard. Then like a minute later the district leader came back and was like what the heck is going on here? Haha. It's ok the zonies were there laughing too. But, because of that stunt the DL called me Sunday night and is making me do the formation Tuesday hahaha. Karma. So, I have to give a training on "what it means to me to be a successful missionary"... In French. I think we're the only foreign mission that has to have all of our meetings in the mission language because we have a French president. But it's good, it keeps us on our toes with the language. And word on the street is that the France Paris mission speaks on average better French than the Lyon mission lol. Anyways, then we went out and did contacting and we were walking down a street and there was this sign posted to a pole, so naturally I had to read it when there was a picture of a cat, well me reading this poster I guess was super rare in France because then everyone wanted to see what I was looking at hahaha, so we attracted people! We got to teach a lesson. Then after the contacting session we all met back up and ate at the BEST Chinese place! Dad it gives Shanghai a run for its money. Like it was Good. I think this is my favorite district ever! We are all super close friends, and not one of us is from Utah! Can you believe it! Soeur kemp is from so California, Merrill is from Idaho, dudfield from Australia, Williams from Oklahoma, omohundro from Kentucky. So it's pretty surprising! 

Then Friday was absolutely hilarious. We went to go see a less active who lives on a river boat an hour and a half away. That was a day to remember, and best part we are going back to help work on it. She has a little 12 week old puppy too! Reminds me of when Kona and Moki were little. Anyway, after the mission I have to tell you about her, she is awesome. 

Saturday we did the coolest thing too, the relief society wanted to do a bonding activity, which here I guess means going to a chateau, picnicking, and playing 1700's games lol. We went to chateau Meung sur Loire. It's pronounced like if you say "man" then drop the "n" and make a nasal sound at the end of the a, you've got it, just add a "sir" and "Lowar". Voila you can speak French. Haha the tour was so cool it's super hands on chateau and you can touch everything, and they have so much stuff, they show you how they lived in the olden days. It was probably one of my favorite chateaus I've ever been to. Almost everyone agreed it was better than chambourg, just because it's so interactive, and the people that work there are so cool. And we got to play archery haha. On top of it two of our less actives were there and one of our amies! 

Sunday we had 3 amies at church and finalized baptismal plans for Vanessa for the 26 of September. We're so excited! Also mini miracle for us, we had no money because our reimbursements from Paris trajet haven't come in yet, so we were super worried about groceries this week, and as we were standing talking to our amies after church a member came up to me with a huge bag full of groceries! What! Literally coolest thing of my life, I thanked him profusely for it, but he was like, sister, like no problem! I wish I could do more. Oh man I love the members here! They really take such good care of us. We went shopping today and had just enough money for the week! It was so cool. 

Learning opportunities this week. Comme d'habitude..

I have thought a lot about my entire mission all in perspective, as we are both approaching our 14th month on the mission. We have been reminiscing on our "blue" days (when you are being trained) and then when we trained, our other towns, and companions, the MTC, etc. and now both getting our departure questionnaire. It's been a roller coaster year that's for sure, but one I would never take back. There have been days where you feel you are tried beyond your capacity, and days when you are on top of the world and nothing could go wrong. Recently during our interviews I was waiting and only the blue in our district was standing there waiting with me elder Dudfield. I asked him for real how he was finding the mission? How he was doing with everything, and being trained. He said, "I've been preparing my entire life, and always knew I would serve a mission, but even with all of that, it's still been the hardest thing I have ever done. And the only way to know what it is like, or why it's so hard, is to serve a mission. But, I would do it again all over." Well said my friend. It's just been such a crazy year of ups and downs, but this is my most precious year, one I would do over again, because malgré nos épreuves, we find happiness in who we are, and the gospel principles that we found our lives in. One of my favorite quotes ever, "be willing at any moment to sacrifice what you are for what you can become"

Bonne semaine! 

Soeur Stevens