Good vibes!!

Salut !! Not a whole lot happened this week so I'm going to just get down to business :)

We had a great lesson with Mary and Bryce, and yes Bryce came this time! We set a baptismal date with him for the same date as his wife. He was so excited, it was a great lesson! We then saw them again Saturday which was a miracle in disguise. They absolutely loved the Plan of Salvation and couldn't wait to hear more.

We had exchanges this week and we had the amazing opportunity to go to Rennes. It is the most beautiful place ever. It really felt like a dream like, I didn't think it was actually real for Rennes to be that beautiful. It was really fun to be there and see my blue again and just have lessons while walking around the amazing city.

Just a quick thought that I'd like to share with you. There is a quote I really like by CS Lewis and part of it says, "Hardships often prepare ordinary people for an extraordinary destiny..." I like this quote a lot because it's a good reminder for me, that whatever I'm going through is going to help and benefit me for the future in some way. Makes me wonder what God has prepared for me. I know God knows everything and wants the best for us.  The trials you face are probably really hard right now but take heart in the fact it's preparing us for something even better. God never gives us something we can't handle, remember that.  Whatever we're facing, we can get through with God's help. If we want to be like God we must work for it, it’s not supposed to be easy. We're going to look back and say, I made it. We did it and now we have peace in the fact that we endured to the end with a few scars as reminders of our strength and power in overcoming all things. It's going to all be worth it in the end. D&C 123:17

I love you all and I hope you have a great week!

Avec Amour,
Sœur Hunt

In Rennes with Soeur Burrup

Exchanges in Rennes- Sarah's bleu (greenie) is wearing the glasses on the right

Exchanges in Rennes

 Rennes, France

Rennes, France

Diagon Alley -Harry Potter inside a mall

"Best ice cream ever"

Soeur Morrison

Nantes, France

Nantes, France

Being trained part 2

Coucou de Nantes tout le monde! (Hiya from Nantes everybody!!) Wow life is so much different here. I'm so incredibly happy to be with my “mom” and “sister” again. Apparently, I wasn't done being trained so I was put back with Sœur Giles.  Haha JK.  Actually, the reason we're together is because last transfer no Soeurs left and only one Soeur came in so there's an odd number so we're a trio for now but Soeur Giles goes home next transfer, then it will be Soeur Morrison and I left here most likely. I love being in Nantes, it's a different life for sure. Much bigger and so many more people. I love it here!

I'd like to skip back a few days to transfer day before I got to Nantes. We were traveling in a group through the métros in an area I wasn't familiar with. As part of the transfer plans I ended up having to travel alone to Nantes. My companions weren't coming to pick me up. I had trouble with my luggage trying to carry it all by myself. Once I got to the trains I didn't know which train it was, so I asked a worker which one was going to Nantes while pointing at one train and the guy who worked there said it was the one I was pointing at. So, I got on with much struggle and finally got into my seat only to discover I was on the wrong train. So, I had to grab my bags very quickly before the train I was on left with me on it. I got out and realized that the train I was supposed to be on had just left 2 minutes prior. So, there I am without a phone or Wi-Fi and all by myself in a huge Gare (train station) ... I mean just my luck. I ended up having to exchange my ticket and waited 2 and a half hours before the next train left for Nantes. I finally got on the right train and it was smooth from there on out. I figured out the Wi-Fi on the train to tell my companions through messenger that I'd be late but that I was safe. Boy what a crazy transfer day it was.

Anyways I'm here in Nantes and I love it. It's so fun to reminisce all the stories from Nancy with Sœur Giles and with my other companion (sister).  We get along super well.  I love her, she's so funny.  We have a lot in common. 

On Friday we met with one of our amis named Mary and her husband's name is Bryce and they have one little girl. They're from Nigeria which means they speak English which is very nice. We met with Mary and were able to listen to a couple chapters in French on her computer because she doesn't read super well.  Afterwards were able to teach her about having the spirit and she said she really wanted to have it. We thought that was a perfect opportunity to ask her to be baptized so she could receive the gift of the holy ghost. We set a date for August 25.  It was super! I haven’t met Bryce yet, but my comps think that he'd agree as well and would be baptized together on the 25 of August! 

It was very fun getting to know the members at church.  It's a pretty big ward. I bore my testimony along with introducing myself in sacrament. Our ward is very diverse. We have Spanish and English and every African dialect. It's exciting! The bishop told us that our district speaks good French which made us way happy. The day before I got the best compliment in the world. When I was introducing myself to a member for the first time she asked me if I was French because I have a really good accent! I was very happy. First time I'd heard that. There is still always lots to learn but I'm happy to hear that I'm on the right track. 

Well, that's it for the moment but I know next week will be awesome and so fun! I love you all very much and I hope you have a great week! Make sure to keep praying and put your trust in him. He's always there for you and will guide you to do the things you need to do. Have a great week! 

Love Sœur Hunt 

Soeur Giles, Soeur Morrison and Soeur Hunt 

Family Reunion - Soeur Giles (far right) goes home in a month

Outdoor cafe in Nantes

"Nantes is so beautiful!!"

Cathedral Saint Pierre and Saint Paul (4 photos)

Nantes City streets

Family Reunion!

Well my time here in Calais has finally ended! So incredibly sad to leave my companion especially with her being such the amazing woman that she is. The ward I'm going to miss terribly as well and our many amis that we've made together. LONG LIVE CALAIS!

Now the big question I bet you all are asking is, where I will be going. Well, let me tell you, it's in the west of France to a city called Nantes! Guess who's going to be my companions! You heard that correctly, I'm in a trio!! And not to mention that it's my trainer Sœur Giles and her blue/my sister, Sœur Morrison!!!! Alors, it's a family reunion!!! Boy am I excited! Going back to live with my mom, maybe in the basement. Hope you're excited mom!

Alright now I'll give you hopefully a fast rundown of my week because there is always so much to say and there is not very much time. There are too many miracles that happen in a week and I can't keep up with them! 

1) We went to Paris to try and do my 2nd year legality (that's right... tried because our train was actually 2 1/2 hours late so by the time we got there it was all for nothing because they stopped seeing people...) We were eating lunch at a cute little cafe when we saw two members! They walked up to us all timidly and said, "Hi sisters! Do you speak English?" It was so fun to see members from the states... and they secretly paid for our lunch haha!! Then, because we were just in Paris and had nothing to do because our train wasn't coming for a couple of hours, we went to the church there, picked up a few brochures & Books of Mormon and went finding for the Paris missionaries haha! It was super fun, we made an ami for them, and we saw yet another member who gave us money to go buy some crêpes haha! 

2) As we got to our rendezvous at the dentist’s office they got me in so very quickly and did everything within 15 minutes! All they had to do was reglue my permanent retainer back down because a part of it came undone. Afterwards we went to the front desk to pay and he told us that it was no problem and that we didn't need to pay!! It was free!! Such a sweet man who was just willing to help us! 

3) We had a super awesome rendezvous with our ami Nicolas who is being baptized July 28th!!!!!! He just hungers to know more about the gospel, it's really awesome to see. He's so excited to be baptized, and he asked to have a priesthood blessing to have more strength to prepare himself for baptism! We were at church and all of a sudden, he wasn't there anymore! We were so sad because we thought he left, but then he comes waltzing down the stairs and said that he was sorry for being late to class, he was busy getting a priesthood blessing... he literally fixed it all up himself! We were shocked! He's so cool!

4) Last miracle is that we were on our way to church and before church, we knock on our amis doors to bring them to church, and then we all walk together to go to church. One of them, he's kind of old so he has a really hard time waking up in the mornings... so he can never come; however, we happened to see him Saturday on the street and we told him that there's never a commandment that God gives that we can't accomplish, so we invited him to pray that night for strength to get up. So on Sunday, we knocked and right when we rang his door bell, he answered and he was dressed in a full on suit, chipper and ready to go to church!! Haha it was incredible! He said that the night before he read a little bit of the book of Mormon and prayed like we said and there he was; ready to go to church! He then proceeded to say that this was not going to be a weekly thing and that he was leaving at 11 to go to his church... but not only did he stay for all of church because he loved the spirit that he felt there, but he said that he's coming next week too!! And he wants a rendezvous and he's coming to see the baptism that the Elders are having on Saturday! God is so good!

This week I've learned about why our church is so helpful and why it makes your life more enjoyable. Its really the principles that we learn from the gospel of Jesus Christ. You can literally find any principle you want and apply it to any situation you're going through in your life and it will help you no matter what. God knows everything, he knows life is hard he knows that we suffer a lot. Sometimes he can't do anything about it, he just let's it happen, and sometimes I think about why he would just let it happen. But when you think about it, because he's our Father I'm sure it's so incredibly hard for him to see us sad or struggling. One thing he has given us, is this gospel. It's always there for us. That's one thing that will never leave again. We got his rock to support us through this life and of course he'll never leave us.

Have a great week and talk next week! Love you! 

Sœur Sarah Hunt

Sarah went to Paris for her second year legality

Cute outdoor cafe where the American couple they met secretly paid for their lunch

Outdoor cafe lunch

Eating outdoors in Paris

The wonderful dentist in Paris that fixed Sarah's permanent retainer and didn't charge her.  

What an amazing act of kindness!!

Retainer all fixed!!

She'll really miss this district

Last district meal together.  Low key American themed cafe

String orchestra in the Paris metro

A few pictures of the beautiful streets of Paris

On exchanges with Soeur Hicken

Squishy car ride with the Dunkerque Elders

We have a winner!

This week was full of surprises, miracles, parties, parades and much more!

First, I'd like to explain what France does when there is a celebration of any sort or in this case the World Cup. Sorry for the lack of information about this subject because it's something that's REALLY important that everyone understands.

First in any given celebration people get in their cars and just honk their car horns. The creativity in France... It’s Impressive. No seriously! They deserve a metal. Usually that's about it though but granted this time it's the World Cup. Here’s an experience we had last week:

Anyways yes, the streets go absolutely NUTS. They just honk their horns screaming and waving their flag around and its quite...Terrifying. I really wonder what the people think as we contact them, here we are screaming above the noise around us, THE SPIRIT IS LIKE THE WIND YOU CAN'T SEE IT, BUT YOU CAN FEEL IT, WHY CAN'T YOU FEEL IT NOW!?!? I bet they think we're a bunch of idiots LOL. The terrifying part is when they throw little firework explosive bombs from their cars onto the sidewalk when you're trying to do some contacting. You can't see the bombs, you just hope and pray that you won't die. Next thing you know, BLAM and then you basically start crying or your heart stops beating. It literally felt like we were in a war zone. So... Yeah, Go France!!

Moving on to our wonderful miracles. Seriously if you were here in the moment of these miracles you'd have to believe that there is a God, if not then I don't know what would.

Miracle #1, #2, #3: we were at a member’s house pulling weeds and eating lunch for a few hours. We left for our bus to find out that we had missed it by 1 minute. Not good. It was 12h55 and the next bus didn't come until 13h56 and we had a rendezvous at 14h. This rendezvous was important because we had been trying to meet with this guy for 2 months. His name is Jean-Pierre and I met him when I was with Sœur Skouson. We didn't know what to do but my comp just thought we needed to wait a few more minutes before we started walking. The thing with buses is that you have to take them in the right direction depending on where you need to go but this particular bus goes in one huge circle, so it doesn't matter which direction you take it because you'll end up where you'll need to be. By waiting a few more minutes the bus came but going the opposite direction but no big deal because it goes where we want! Miracle! So, we took it. We got back and changed super quick (we were in service clothes). The time now is 14h02. Crap! As we walk out I remember praying for the little mini free bus to come by. You never know when that little bus comes because there's no schedule for it. So right as we walked out of our apartment I saw the little mini bus coming right down the street.  We immediately start booking it for the bus stop before it passes it. We made it and hopped right on! Miracle! We got to this man's place and first in case some don't know, if you're a sister missionary you can't teach a man who's alone, so we tried to get some members to come with us, but they were all busy and couldn't come. Before we sonned (rang the doorbell) into his apartment we prayed and also prayed that his girlfriend would be there because he said sometimes she's there if she's not working. If she's there we can teach a lesson and if she's not we just give him a book of Mormon and leave and hope we can meet with him again. Guess what, she was there! Miracle! One right after another! After these I just knew that God wanted us to have this rendezvous. We taught them, and it was a really good lesson. You could see it in his eyes that he understood! He loved seeing how the authority was passed down from Christ to the apostles and then to Joseph Smith. We hope to see him this week again and fix a baptismal date!

Miracle #4: We had 2 amis at church!!!

Miracle #5 We got locked out of our apartment. But this wasn't just a regular oh we left our keys in the house but more like we left the keys still in the key hole on the inside of the door. We called the member who has our spare, but they weren't home! They were in Lille for a family party, but they said that they gave their next-door neighbor the spare to their house so all we had to do was knock on the neighbor’s door and then grab our keys. We got there, and their neighbors weren't home. What do we do now!? Well, we said it would be an absolute miracle if their neighbors just came home right now. Guess what, right as we said that they came home! Miracle! They just pulled right up to their driveway. We got our keys and headed back to our apartment. But get this because our keys were still in the key hole we still couldn't open the door from the outside. So, we called members to help us figure something out. These two members, (the Savasta Sœurs) are the literal best example of ministering. The ward is always thanking them for something because they're always doing their part to help and be good members. Long story short we ended up calling a professional because our door is like security on steroids absolutely no way you can even try to get in. We’re blessed to have members who love us and a Heavenly Father who is always looking out for us as well.

Anyways quick side note. I don't think I'll ever be scared to give talks in sacrament anymore when I get home. I won't have to do it in a broken language and back home they give you a few days to prepare for it too. Last Sunday 2 hours before sacrament started bishop called and asked us to speak (for not very long) because one speaker got sick and couldn't come. We spoke about faith. It went really well. I remember having just a few ideas in mind but the rest I let God be in charge. Seriously if you absolutely hate giving talks in front of large crowds because you get super nervous or whatnot, I want you to remember that fear is of the devil not of God. So, if you place your trust in God and know that everything will work out according to what He wants then it really will. I promise. Ask for courage and he will give it you. He wants the best for the people you will speak to and he wants the best for you. Anyways every time I do that it works so I promise you it really works.

Anyways I love you lots and I encourage you to have faith in miracles and if you do that then you will see them. God will make them known to you according to his will. I love you and I hope you have a miracle filled week and have fun! It's summer!!

Love Sœur Hunt

One of our amis, Nicolas

Our ami, Nour

 Photos of the beautiful city of Calais

Goals Accomplished

This transfer has gone by so fast!! I can't believe it's already the 5th week!

Fun Fact: Soeur Dorton and I started a 2000-piece puzzle last week and we gave up this week.

Alright movin' on, I love the members in my ward. They're hilarious! Just some quick background information basically our branch has a lot of older people and there are 4 people with the same gender neutral name.

1. This lady, one of the 4 with the same name, gave the prayer in Relief Society which lasted 10 seconds. She said (I'm translating), "... Father I thank you that I could be at church today, I love my daughter and the others I could care less about, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen."

2. We were talking about ministering to less actives in the 3rd hour. One member raised her hand saying she didn't even know all of them and then one other member said, "They could all be dead!"

3. (This mostly includes my comp) I was talking to my companion about how this member, another one the 4 with the same name, in our ward was getting married this month.  My comp wanted to know who the person I was talking about was, so I casually pointed to the person not realizing she was standing next to another person by the same name. One was a young man of about 22 and the other was an older woman in her 80s. I guess my bad for not clarifying but you'd think that maybe it’s not the 80-year-old and more likely the 22-year-old getting married, but I guess you never know! My comp goes up to the older lady and congratulates her on her engagement and her marriage coming up! Boy was it hilarious.

As I stated 3 weeks ago, our goal was to get 5 baptismal dates by July 7th... and yesterday, we just made our 5th baptismal date!! So, we're a week ahead of schedule!!! One of them is named Nicolas.  He met the missionaries 8 YEARS AGO!!!! Haha, but he was taught every single lesson and knows more than most members do about the principles and the teachings of this church. We found out about him because he sent us a text last week saying (I'm translating into English of course), "Hello Sisters! I'm trying to stop smoking so I can follow the Word of Wisdom, could you send me a scripture from the Book of Mormon to encourage me?" We were like.... uhhhhh heck ya we can! He was too busy for a rendezvous that week, but then he showed up to church... and he was an hour and a half early haha!!! So, we taught him the restoration of the church again and he accepted a baptismal date! Woot!!!

The other man with a baptismal date is named Nour. He is so Interested in learning more and again, he was interested because he met missionaries long ago. We're so excited to be teaching him and helping him.

I'm so grateful to be a part of this work. Just like President Nelson said in his worldwide devotional for the youth:

"Every child of our Heavenly Father deserves the opportunity to choose to follow Jesus Christ, to accept and receive His gospel with all of its blessings—yes, all the blessings that God promised to the lineage of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, who, as you know, is also known as Israel.

My dear extraordinary youth, you were sent to earth at this precise time, the most crucial time in the history of the world, to help gather Israel. There is nothing happening on this earth right now that is more important than that. There is nothing of greater consequence. Absolutely nothing."

I invite you all (especially my brother Stuart who is leaving for his mission to Pennsylvania Pittsburgh next month) to either listen or read his message because it really changed my perspective of life and this gospel and missionary work especially! We can all do better with missionary work. It's our responsibility as members. He's so inspired and I love our prophet!!

Love you all and have an amazing week!

Sœur Hunt

Zone Conference

P-day fun

Birthday wishes

Her companion decorated their apartment for Sarah's birthday

"Thank you for the birthday package-I love you all!!"