October 16th Letter

 Dear Family,

 Hello! First of all, parents going to Hawaii!? You lucky ducks! Second of all, Happy birthday to Eden last Wednesday and Makai on Sunday!! And to Celia Jane this coming Sunday. All my kiddies are growing up! So here are the highlights . . . Tuesday night I was assigned to take one of the new incoming sisters out to my area. We picked all the new MoBat sisters up at the mission president's home and then we split up! Sister Jarrett came with me. She is from Nevada! She is awesome. We went and taught a less-active and it was a really great lesson! It was fun to get to know Sister Jarrett.

Sister Rasmussen and Sister Davies

Wednesday I thought about Eden and hoped she had a wonderful, beautiful day! In the morning was transfers! All of the piano players have now left because Sister Stevens was the last good one and so guess who has to play the piano now?? Me . . . haha I got to start practicing again. Transfers were great! President talked about how every transfer should be a new beginning and a time to try harder to be better. I love motivational talks! My new companion is Sister Davies! She is awesome. She is from Alpine, Utah and we actually came out together! I love learning from people and she is great so I have much more to learn from her! It's weird taking over the area . . . haha I am surprised with how well I remember how to get around, that is definitely because of the Lord's help. Sister Stevens told me that would happen :) She is so wise, haha I miss her. We spent Wednesday morning getting all organized and tried to visit a few potentials. MoBat has been crazy busy this week because of Arizona and Utah fall breaks. I took this huge family on tour from Arizona and there were 5 brothers and all their kids and they all live really close to each other in Arizona, haha it reminded me of our family! I loved it!  Thursday was my first chilly day in San Diego! A whole 65 degrees.. haha. It rained too though! It was awesome! We tried to go visit a former and actually ended up talking to his son who is in his late 20s and in the navy. He is married andh is wife is also in the navy and they have a little 2 year old son. We talked to him about the gospel and the priesthood and how it could really bless his family and his son and bring them closer together and he wanted to learn more! So we have an appointment with him this week. I love when people want to learn more :) He just had this light in his eyes and I really hope his heart will be open and he'll desire to progress! We had dinner with a member tonight and she made us delicious mexican! Her little boy Christian who is 5 is the funniest little kid! He could talk for days I am sure. We practiced teaching the restoration with them. Next we visited Sister Scott, a recent convert who moved into our ward, she is soo amazing! She said before she got baptized she was called a dry mormon because she basically lived how mormons do, she just didn't know about the church. I love that! She is such a good member missionary.

Sister Rasmussen with the Fab Five (5 sisters came out in the mission at the same time)

Friday we had district meeting. We have a new district leader named Elder Wise. It's interesting how different district leaders are, haha. After we weekly planned and then had the MoBat. We got to clean the courthouse down at old town state park today. There were a ton of asians who kept asking to take their picture with us, haha it makes us feel cool, but we know it's because they just probably think we are crazy wearing those pioneer dresses. Tawny Christensen and her family came in! They are so awesome! It was fun to see them all and catch up with Curtis. I haven't seen him since he's been home. Sister Christensen said she emailed Mom some pics, so mom I hope you enjoyed that. Sister Kunz who went home last week already came back with her family so we got to see her again and in jeans! Haha it's weird seeing sisters in jeans after you've seen them in dresses and skirts every day! I can't wait for Sister Stevens to come back!

 Saturday we stopped by this guy's garage who Sister Stevens and I had initially contacted. He was finally there! We asked him if he'd been reading and he said he's read like half of the Book of Mormon. He was just getting ready to leave so we just talked for a minute and were able to get his number and make an appointment for this coming week. We then went to visit a former and wow. . . . that was one of the most interesting experiences I have had... he just did not make sense with anything he said. He kept talking about how God, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Ghost are all the same . . . and so I asked him to explain John 3:16... he just stumbled through some words and tried to change the subject and bring up something else that didn't make sense. Haha he just kept contradicting himself . . . He says he's Christian but then he told us that 'us mormons believe in a totally different God.' So that was weird... He was nice, just confused. He said he's happy where he's at though so hopefully sometime he will be ready to listen. We had a really great expectations lesson with Brandon today. We just asked his expectations in meeting with us and then told him ours. He really does have a desire to change and we got him to commit to another date! November 10. We told him he has to come to church if he wants that to happen though so he said he will come! We are praying for him. We also brought a kid from our ward with us. Also earlier this day we had an appt with Amy and we went and she wasn't there and then as we were walking back from Brandon's I saw her hiding from us so I purposely walked over to where she was and she was like why didn't you come earlier? And we were like we did . . . but then we set up another appointment so we hope she can realize what we have to offer can really help her! Because she is struggling with some things right now. We had dinner at a member's and it was delicious!

Sunday I thought about Kaisy (Makai) all day! I love that little munchkin. The MoBat was crazy today! Like summer busy. I took tour after tour and there were at least 25 people on each! It was awesome! I love when it is like that. We had dinner with members and then we tried to go see Amy again but she wasn't there. We got to talk to her sisters though! One of them was super into what we were saying but the other one just thought it was funny.. Next we stopped by Brandon's because he wasn't at church so we wanted to see what was up. He said he ended up going to his Dad's house. We decided to read with him in the Book of Mormon so that was great! We then contacted a former and he was so nice and awesome! His business partner is a member and he said he really respects him. We invited him to learn more and he was like 'you know, why not! We could all use a little more of Jesus Christ in our lives!' We were like you are right!

A vandalized car they saw in the street

Monday we had a full day in our area. Full day's are always so interesting. We spent the morning trying to contact potentials and formers. No one was home... Actually one lady who was home pretended she couldn't speak english when she saw who we were, haha we knew she did though because we could hear her talking before she answered the door. We were kind of at a loss because we had visited so many people and no one answered so we decided to go park our car and just walk around. We contacted quite a few people and out of all of them, one person wanted to learn more! Woohoo! His name is Fernando and he just moved here from Jamul. He was such an awesome guy! He just kept asking question after question and was really interested! So we are meeting with him later this week :) yay! Oh also funny story, this morning we were both talking about how we wanted to have one of those experiences where someone saw us and was like, "Missionaries! I've been waiting/looking for you!" And then today when we were walking around this guy came up to us and was like 'hey! I've been looking for you!!" And we got all excited and then he was like oh wait, not you! Hahaha. He thought we were part of a newscast. Boo. But it did make for a funny story! There were some insane car vandalizing in Chula. It was sad! I have a pic that I will hopefully send you. I just don't understand why people would do something like that... Next we ate and then tried contacting a few more people and then we had an appt with Brandon. Another guy in our ward came and it was about the Word of Wisdom. He is so great! We are going to meet with him more frequently now in hopes that that wil help. Next we had an appointment with this lady who just moved in our ward who is a less active and wants to come back to church. She has such a sad life... It was one of those situations where I was just thanking Heavenly Father for the family that I have. Seriously family, you are the best! And I love you all so much. Then we had dinner with some members. Her sister actually went to high school with me so that's cool! Their family was so cute! Then we visited a less active and helped her help her kids do homework. It was definitely a full day! Haha I was so ready for bed, but it was wonderful. I am continually grateful for how Heavenly Father gives me strength each day and blesses us with miracles.

Life is wonderful! I am just continually trying to learn and grow... each day I am so so so unbelievably grateful for the restored gospel. I printed and went over President Uchtdorf's talk from conference and Elder Holland's. Wow. There is something in each day to embrace and cherish. Also, Elder Holland's talk is just so powerful and makes me think if what I am doing really shows my love to the Lord. I hope it does! I always want it to, because I do love Him.

Thanks for all your love and support! I truly love you all so much!! Have a great week!

Love,

Sister Cassie Rasmussen