Sister Emily Hawkins' Mission

Another great letter from Sister Hawkins. She loves her new area and has caught the "missionary bug!" Shortly after receiving her email this morning I was able to call the misson home so they could tell Emily she is an aunty again. Her sister, Melanie, had a baby girl today. Both Rylee Ann and Mom are doing great. Emily has been anxiously awaiting this call! Our family is so blessed. Enjoy the lastest letter and pictures!

Monday, January 10, 2011

Hey Mom,

Wow so much to tell ya'll today. I hope I have enough time to type everything out! I sometimes get so excited and I try to type fast and I keep messing up my typing so anyways!!! I just love La Porte!!! It's a great area, the people are so nice and caring in the ward and the area so far looks nice! I'm just having so much fun with Sister Singleton!!! She is so cool! I have been laughing so much more and just having fun. I am just starting to love the work and just enjoying what I am doing. Ya, there are some days where I am like uh, I don't want to do this because it could come out bad or we could get hurt. I say that to myself and hesitate on that but in the end things just totally work out so great! Tracking is kinda getting easier but not so much. I still struggle because there is times where I feel confident and say ya, I can do this, then the door opens and I totally get scared and then really fumble with words to come out of my mouth! But some things are getting better. Sister Singleton is trying to help me with that. It's funny, when we get to doors and we are ringing the door bell or knocking she says, "Okay it's your turn." I just laugh and say, “I know” but then she kinda starts talking. So sometimes I talk and sometimes I don't. It's funny!

I saw Ken this week and it's so fun to talk with him and to let him know how I am doing and what has been a struggle for me. This last time he gave me an assignment to share with people in District Meeting because I had to talk on "How to gain a Testimony of Reading the Book of Mormon." He told me to bring up that I really struggle and have anxiety over tracking and to ask the missionaries if they ever had fears or anxiety over tracking and how they overcome them with reading the Book of Mormon. So I did and I got a really good outcome. Only a couple spoke up but one of them said that there will be a great outcome when you go tracking knowing that it will bless their life. And that yes, it is scary, but in the end it's gonna bless someone’s life. I just know that to be totally true. So my talk at District Meeting went really well on Friday. When my District leaders ask me to talk I just get so nervous and so worried of what to prepare for and what to look up to share to help them become better missionaries or what I can do to maybe help one of them that day. So I worry when I get asked to speak. Which by the way, I get to speak at the end of the month in the ward, so that's gonna be interesting. But I know the Lord will prepare for me and help me know what to speak on.

Well guess what? I got totally super exciting news mom!!!!! Guess what our mission will be doing at the end of January?!!!!!!!!! The best mission ever of the wonderful, coolest, miracle mission of the Texas Houston East Mission are going to go to............... NASA!!!!!!!!!! Isn't that the coolest thing ever? If we memorize "How to Begin Teaching" in Preach My Gospel, we get to go tour NASA. I basically have it memorized, I just have to recite it to my District leader then I can go. It will cost about $15-25 dollars, something like that to go in and see all the cool things that we are going to be seeing!!! I'm so excited. So mom if you and dad could have money in my account so I can buy some cool stuff from NASA like a t-shirt or a magnet or something from NASA that will be so cool!!! I’m gonna have to write a super long letter that week to tell ya'll about NASA!!! I just can't wait!!!!! I'm so excited and it's cool that all of the missionaries in our mission are going only if they get "How to Begin Teaching" memorized. So we will see how many get to go eh! But it's gonna be so cool!! Who would ever have thought that I would ever be going to see NASA that is so crazy!!

Now to tell ya'll a little about La Porte. Well it’s cold now and it rains off and on and we are so close to the sea. When we go running in the morning, we see the sunrises and man they are so beautiful!! It is cool to watch the sun come up on the water!! I keep forgetting my camera to take pictures so one day I will send ya'll a copy to see the beautiful ocean!!! But the people are nice down here, well sometimes; it depends on who you run into when you are tracking. They are still a lot of different religions where I am at. But it's okay, they are still awesome people!!! They are all God's children. But the area is a great area to work in. My whole mission is a really great place to work in. I know I am gonna love all my areas!! It's gonna be so great!!!

Oh guess what I did last week? Sister Singleton and I got to wash a dog for a member because she wasn’t feeling too well and the dog really smelled. So I got to bath a pit bull named Clark and it was so funny! The member told us it was hard to get Clark in the tub, but once you get him in the tub you will be okay to bath him. Well Elder Tracy just picked up Clark and carried him into the tub and we started the water and we were all good. It was funny when Elder Tracy did that. He is a greeny and has only been out for 7 weeks in the field but he is super cool! But when we were rinsing Clark, he started to shake and we almost got wet but I told Sister Singleton to pull back the drapes of the shower and we didn't get wet … but the second time we did. LOL!!! But it was fun washing a dog; we smelled like dog afterwards but it was so worth it because it helped someone out who wasn’t feeling well.

Oh and we went to a soccer game with a less active family. We are hopeing to reactivate them and baptize her husband. We had so much fun at the soccer game eating the yummy popcorn balls the wife had made us. It was fun to watch soccer and to hang out with them and to build a relationship with them.

We also helped a member move from her mom’s house to an apartment and that was fun. I wish we could do more service as a missionary because people recognize us more which is a good thing because then they will want to learn more!!!

OH my goodness, I almost forgot, silly me! We went to a less active member’s house, which there are so many less actives, and when we walked into the door guess what I saw!!!!!! I saw a DALMATION DOG!!!!!! Ya for real and she is the cutest thing ever!! Her name is Little Girl, even though she is a fat Dalmatian dog. But she is old and she went into a different room to sleep and so I didn’t' get a picture with her but don't worry, we plan to go see her next week so I can get a picture with a Dalmation Dog!!! It's so funny because some things on my mission are totally reminding me of Wade and the things he had experienced like the being cold with a candle picture then a member having a Dalmatian dog. So it's cool that Wade and I are experiencing the same things!!!

Well mom things are just going so good for me right now. I'm loving my new area and I am having so much fun with Sister Singleton and I am learning so much of the Gospel. I don't know if I told ya'll that we started the Book of Mormon over again with the whole mission reading it together only certain chapters a day. And boy it's so neat to see the things that I missed before and my testimony of the Book of Mormon is growing everyday when I read it. It's great to read the book and to learn so much from it. How are you and dad on reading the Book of Mormon? I hope you both are reading it and even together. You just learn and grow so much and even grow closer to our Heavenly Father because He answers prayers when you are reading from the scriptures!!!! It's just amazing that I am a missionary and to see all the wonderful things that I am learning and how much my testimony has grown!!! It's just WOW!!! LOL! :)

Being a missionary is such a blessing to do in your life. I just still can't believe that I am here doing the Lords work! I know that He is helping me everyday to be able to overcome challenges in my life and to share with people the Gospel of Jesus Christ and to have their lives be blessed with the Gospel and to watch them learn and grow from reading the Book of Mormon and to change their lives to come closer to our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ! It's just amazing to experience and to see how other missionaries change and to watch myself change little by little. I know I am making small changes every day and mom I am going to be totally different when I come home and you are just gonna wonder what happened to Emily!!! But it's gonna be a good change and it's' going to be such a huge blessing in my life and for my future family. To be a better prepared parent and to be able to teach them the Gospel and to help them in this crazy scary world that it is becoming. It's gonna be scary to come home with the new music and with new movies and new technology that will come out. It's just going to be so overwhelming. But it's awesome to know that the Lord is gonna be with me every step in my life to help lead and guide me every day like the prophets in the scriptures. I am so grateful that we can have that Faith and that Knowledge and Guidance to know what to do in this life.

I'm so grateful to have such a wonderful family that is such a great support to me every day and for the friends that I have that write to me. And for all the prayers that gets said every day for me and for missionaries all over the world!! I'm just so grateful to be a part of the Lord's work and to see how it changes lives and to see how much it blesses my life and my family’s life! :)

Well I love you all and I miss ya tons! Thanks for all the letters and the wonderful support. I will write to ya soon and I hope things are going well with the family and with my wonderful cute dog Buddy at home! Love you and Write to ya soon!

Love Sister Hawkins