August 28th Letter

Cassie and her first district. 

Dear Family,

Tomorrow is transfers... WOW!! We are getting one more sister then we originally thought and so they have to split one companionship up and I have been so worried it would be Sister Stevens and me, but we didn't get a call this morning from the zone leaders so that is good news :) I can't believe I have been through one transfer! Transfers really do fly by. I love the updates from everyone. Keep em' coming!! I do have to say that I miss you all terribly, so it's nice to hear from you. Highlights for the week...

Tuesday, I got to hear from family! Yay! Also we went to the temple which was so beautiful, but I am pretty sure I already wrote you about that. After we ran and played sports with our zone again. This night we had a couple appointments. We had grabbed some food on our way from sports to our appointments and then at our less-active appointment she made us cookies and then at our next appointment with an investigator, his mom made us dinner! We had no idea. I have never been so full... It was one of those moments where I was just chewing my food and I had to force myself to swallow, haha! The lesson went really well though. We talked to him about the importance of church and he had read the book of mormon! Woohoo! We love when people keep their commitments :)

Wednesday we had our last district meeting this transfer. Two of the elders are determined that they are getting transferred tomorrow because they have been in the area so long. I have loved our district. We had a lot of unity and it has been so fun! I will miss it, but I am excited for new adventures. As part of our district meeting we went out to lunch at Miguels, so delicious! This night Sister Stevens and I were super spontaneous and we cut bangs! She went to beauty school before the mission, so I have bangs now... Sometimes I like them sometimes I don't, haha. Good thing they grow back. 

Sister Stevens and Sister Rasmussen cut bangs! How do they look? 

Thursday we had a really awesome training at the battalion. The sister trainers talked about how each of us brings something to the battalion and they wanted us to figure that out. I gave a Book of Mormon to an adorable Asian couple. We had dinner with a less-active this night. She is a great cook and she gave us the leftovers. Score! We had another great lesson with the Brown family about faith. We asked the dad to pray about a baptismal date, so we hope this week that he will have a date he wants to work towards. We had a coordination meeting with our ward mission leader.

Friday we had a lesson with Dee. He is so great! We are just having a hard time with getting across to him that it is more than belief. He thinks that we just need to believe in Jesus Christ and follow the Holy Spirit and be good people. He doesn't think we need to make covenants and ordinances. We really hope this all clicks in his head soon because he does have such a desire to follow Jesus Christ. He just needs a little faith, but he says that he has a hard time trusting his feelings. Any suggestions on how to help someone who thinks we just have to believe and be a good person?? Our elders challenged us to see who could get the most street contacts. This was a good challenge for us because we actually talked to everyone! It was so awesome, and we definitely won :) Also this day we found a women's bathroom with no doors between the stalls... it was so weird! 

The funny bathroom

Saturday we met with a potential. She said she knows a few Mormon families and she really respects them a lot! She said that the only thing that would probably keep her from joining the Mormon faith is the fact that she loves drinking wine at night, so we know what we need to help her with! At the MOBAT tonight Sister Stevens and I took the best Mandarin tour. They were the cutest family and we gave them a Book of Mormon. They were so nice and excited! Sister Woolstenhulme (senior couple) made us delicious strawberry shortcake because we had cleaning checks and we passed, woot!

Sunday Sister Stevens and I had to speak in sacrament meeting. We spoke on member missionary work. I spoke for 15 min! I think that is a record. I was super nervous, but the Spirit definitely directed me in what to say. Tonight we contacted a potential and we were talking with her and her son and her son is 7 years old. He is so smart! He asked us if God existed or not? He told us that he prays sometimes and he hopes God does exist. He also told us that he feels different when he prays and while we were talking to him he told us that we have twinkles in our eyes! That lesson made me realize how in tune with the Spirit kids really are. It was so neat! 

Monday the MOBAT was really slow. I think it will start to slow down now which is why you all haven't gotten pictures or texts from people coming through lately, haha. 

Today we are going to the zoo!! I am so excited! Also this week was a little harder for me. I still don't have a lot of energy and in those moments is when it's the hardest because I just feel like I can't do anything more... but I am trying to have more faith and work harder and just forget myself and go to work. That line crosses my mind multiple times a day. I just want to be the missionary that the Lord needs me to be. I really do love this work and I love being able to share this wonderful message with others. 

I love you all!! Also I can't remember if I shared this with you, but in one of my studies I was reading 1 Nephi 17:13 and I replaced wilderness with the world and promised land with eternal life. It made the scripture mean so much more to me! So you all should try it out :)

Have a wonderful week!!

Love,

Sister Cassie Rasmussen

August 21st Letter

Family!

I am emailing later than usual because I went to the temple this morning and did a session. Oh my goodness it was SO beautiful and wonderful. I love the temple :) We get to go every 90 days. Alright highlights from this week...

Tuesday, we played sports with our zone again. It was lots of fun! We then went to the pier with some other sisters for Sister Burdens last preparation day. We got something so delicious! It was a hot waffle ice cream sandwich. So goooooood! 

Wednesday, my second time experiencing eating something I didn't like. We went to a less-actives house for dinner and she made this pasta stuff with peas in it. You all know that I really really really dislike peas, so I swallowed my meal whole. Hahaha. I mean I did try a bite first to see if maybe I like peas now, but I definitely don't. We had a great lesson with Brandon tonight and then we met with our new ward mission leader. He is really excited about his calling and I can tell he is going to be great a fulfilling this calling! He has already been a lot of help to us.

Thursday we had a great district meeting and this girl who is a recent convert came and talked to us. We also celebrated two of the elder's birthdays. Our district is great! Today at the battalion I met this cute couple from Hawaii. They knew the Goo's of course. They have been touring the country the past 3 months going to lots of different temples. I think that is so cool! I want to do that someday. I also met a family from Jerusalem! I told them that my brother lived in Egypt a long time ago and loves Jerusalem and the guy asked me what his name is so I told him Rus Rasmussen and he claims he knows you Rus! His name is Jimmy? Or something like that... He owns a carving shop? Or something like that... haha shoot I can't remember. Is that ringing a bell at all?

Friday, we got a new senior couple-the Rockwells, they are great! Mom & Dad you should highly consider serving in San Diego :) especially at the Mormon Battalion. It is so sweet! Sister Newman and I took this adorable couple from China on a mandarin tour. They hardly spoke any english so we had to speak really slow and mostly just play the movie parts for them. They were so nice and gracious about everything though. We gave them a Book of Mormon. We met with the Brown family again and taught about the restoration. We asked Brother Brown if he would get baptized and he said he would! I love that family so much. I learned today that I need to be more bold in street contacting and actually talk to everyone! 

Saturday, Sister Burden left today. She will be missed! We weekly planned outside and then we had temple shift. We just walk around the temple grounds and talk to people who come visit and we show them pictures of the inside and talk to them about temples and the gospel. It was SO AWESOME!!! I loved it so much and I wish we could do temple shifts more often. First of all there were like 5 weddings while we were there and Mikki Platt was the photographer for one of them so I got to talk to her for a minute. Small world! Haha. The weddings were all beautiful. It was just so neat to talk to people about why we have this beautiful building and about the gospel and ahh I just loved it. Also I don't know if I mentioned this, but my companion was originally called spanish speaking, but they switched her to english to train me. Anyways, at the temple some guys from Mexico stopped by and so she talked to them in spanish and I was so happy because I could understand most of the conversation! Now unfortunately I couldn't say anything back, but I am happy that I at least haven't lost all of my spanish. We also met the cutest family from Finland. They were members and were just here in America on Holiday. We got to eat in the cafeteria in the temple and the food was so good! 

Sunday was so good! We went to ward council and the Brown family came to church!! We were so excited. I helped entertain Jerry the whole time. Brother Brown seemed to really enjoy it and the ward was really good at being welcoming to him. I met an Elder Jeppsen (a senior couple elder) and we made the connection that he was one of Grandpa's missionaries!! I loved hearing that. At the battalion I met these two girls from Germany. They were so nice! I gave them Books of Mormon and they were really excited about it and they even asked for one in German for their mom. Tonight we went to dinner at the Rodriguez's. They are the sweetest family!!! She is filippino and she made the most delicious food! Oh goodness... so so yummy! She even gave us the extras and we were so happy! We had family home evening with them and it was a great lesson. The Spirit was definitely present and that family just has so much faith and love for the gospel. They are truly inspiring. For the treats we had mongolia ice cream. Purple yam flavor and also cheese and corn flavor.... I actually liked both of them a lot! 

Monday we had zone conference! My first one. It was so good! Just a great day of spiritual learning and inspiration. We learned about how to better teach investigators about church and how to ask inspired questions. President Clayton is so awesome! I love being a missionary and I love this gospel so much! At the battalion Sister Stevens and I took a couple from Ireland on tour and they were so great. We gave them a Book of Mormon and they were very grateful and excited to learn more about Jesus Christ. I LOVE when people have that desire. 

Those were just some highlights from the week. All in all it was a super week! Oh Tausha and her family came in! Unfortunately I wasn't there, but she left a sweet note. Also, growing up in Utah, I never knew it was normal for wards to have missionaries. Wards love their missionaries! Haha it is so cool. I think I saw missionaries in our ward like twice in my life, and we had them over for dinner like twice in my life. It is so interesting! I also have never realized how important members are in missionary work until my mission. I am just learning so much every day and I love it. I am so grateful for this opportunity.

I love you all!!

Love,

Sister Cassie Rasmussen

August 14th Letter

Sister Miller, Sister Rasmussen and Sister Burden--all in their costumes

Dear those whom I love,

Hola! Last Tuesday after I wrote you, Sister Stevens and I went and played volleyball with the Elders in our zone. It was a lot of fun! And to their surprise, they had to keep up with Sister Stevens and I ;) We are going to play sports again today after we are done with email. I will give you some highlights for each day this week.

Wednesday when I answered the phone at the Battalion, it was Gwen Sedlak! She is so sweet! She said she was planning on coming in the next day, but I never saw her. It was nice to talk to her though! We met with a less active this day. She used to be really active, but then married someone who attends the Church of Christ and so she now goes with him. She is really great and such a nice lady, I really hope we can help rekindle her fire.

Thursday I tried my first California burrito = the most delicious thing ever! It has french fries inside of it. So yummy!

Elder and Sister Stallings with Cassie

Friday we met with Dee. We took a member named Brother Buswell with us. It was so great to have him there! He helped out so much. Dee has such a desire to follow Christ, but he is still so worried about the authority part and worried that one day someone else like Joseph Smith will show up and say no wait follow me I have the 'right' gospel. We are just trying to help him see that first of all that is not going to happen, and second of all, if he has such a desire to follow Jesus Christ, then he needs to act on his faith and ask God if The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the true church. We are trying to help him see that we aren't trying to convince him of anything, but that he needs to find out for himself and we are just guides to help him along the way. On Friday I also gave away my first Book of Mormon at the Battalion! I have tried multiple times, but I usually get rejected. This little family though was so great! They loved the story of the Mormon Battalion and we just started talking about religion and I simply bore my testimony of the Book of Mormon and asked if they would like one. They said yes! And they gave me their email so we can keep in contact and hopefully they will accept to having missionaries come over soon. They were such a wonderful family. This is also the day that I was chilling at the front waiting for my tour to start when I saw Sarah and Ian!!!! I was freaking out. It was so cool and exciting :) I had no idea they were coming. Apparently they were in Huntington Beach and decided to come to Old Town for something and then stopped by to see if I was here and I was. I love seeing people I know :) It's even better when it is best friends! I couldn't convince them to come on tour though. . . . Lame!! Haha just kidding. They said they would come another time. 

Sarah and Ian visit the Mormon Battalion

Saturday we had an appointment with an investigator named Brandon. He wasn't home, but his mom was! We talked to her for a while and she is such a sweet lady. She said she would love to learn along with her son, so we have an appointment with both of them tomorrow! Today at the Battalion I saw Court and Jake!!! Woohooo! Now I knew they were coming, I just didn't know when. So two best friends within two days! I also had one of my tours go off in Spanish today haha oops. Court and Jake came and tour and got to see me in action. 

Courtney and Jake visit Cassie

Sunday we didn't have ward council so we got to sleep in until 6:30am!! Woooot! Haha it was great. Church was wonderful. We got asked to speak in 2 weeks about member missionary work. After one of my tours, a lady in my tour asked me if I was related to a Ric & Tami Rasmussen, haha I got so excited! Apparently she and her husband travel with Ric & Tami sometimes. They were such a nice family! Also this day I gave a tour to a family from our home ward! There names just blanked my mind, but they live in the Stewarts old home. It was the dad and 3 of his sons. One of the sons said he works with Ric in the OR, but it was fun to see them. They said that they would tell you all hello from me :) This night we had a Mission Fireside in Spanish. I understood not that much of it, haha but I did sing in the choir. My companion sang a musical number and they sang it a capella so they had me play their starting note and so of course afterwards some of the elders were teasing me and saying how good my piano solo was, haha oh goodness. 

Monday the Battalion was good as always. We finally got in contact with one of our investigators named Melody. She is so great! She has such faith and a desire to be baptized. She doesn't know what to do though because her husband is atheist and he said if she gets baptized, he will divorce her. It's so sad! I mean first of all I don't understand how people can be atheist, and second of all, I just really hope his heart can be softened. Melody's kids are so adorable! It was also the first time I asked someone to be baptized! I was nervous, but the spirit prompted me and so I did it! Sister Stevens and I love Mondays because it is Milkshake Monday! At Chick-Fil-A if you buy a milkshake (they have the most delicious milkshakes) you get chicken nuggets for free! So great. After dinner we ran to see a less-active, but ended up running into this lady from Hungary. She just moved here from Spain with her husband and two kids. She said she doesn't have religious beliefs, but after talking to her for a minute she said we could come over and share more with her. I really hope the Spirit can touch her heart. This night we had a farewell party for Elder & Sister Stallings, the sweetest senior couple and also Sister Burden. She is going home a week early for school. People say we are twins, haha. 

Sister Burden--people say that she and Cassie are twins

Alright so some other things happening are the fact that our apartment is the hottest place ever. We don't have AC, just a fan. It hasn't been bad until this past week, but it's like every morning and night we are sweating just sitting there. Also the person who owns Golden Spoon is a member and so missionary's get it for free once a week! Best deal ever. Sister Stevens and I continue to have so much fun together. She is such a good example to me and a hard worker and so in tune with the Spirit. I am so grateful to have her as my companion. 

I love you all so much!! Have fun at the Burley Fair & Rodeo this weekend. Eat lots of maple bars for me :)

Love,

Sister Cassie Rasmussen

August 7th Letter

Dear Familia,

Another week? Seriously??? I can't even believe it. This week was wonderful! I experienced many different parts of missionary work. I am understanding why returned missionaries would say that missionary work is hard. It's hard because I am exhausted all the time and it's also hard when people just reject you! If only they knew how wonderful their lives could be if they would just listen to us. Nonetheless, I am loving being a missionary more and more every day.

First of all, San Diego has the BIGGEST spiders. They are soo incredibly disgusting. Thankfully, my companion is not afraid of them so she will kill them. Me on the other hand, I just run away. Okay I wanted to explain kind of how things at the Battalion work. All the sisters at the Battalion live in the same apartment complex and each apt represents an area, so when transfers come if we switch areas then we will switch apts. We have 2 sister trainers that are like the zone leaders of the Battalion, but we also have our own district and zones for our areas. Speaking of districts, we have district meeting every week. Our district is awesome and this past week we had a meeting on the Atonement and it was such a powerful and amazing meeting and the Spirit was so strong. It just reaffirmed why I am out here. I want people to be able to access the Atonement and have this amazing blessing in their lives. Ah goodness, this gospel is amazing. I also couldn't help but think of all the amazing people in my life who have shown me that they get the Atonement. I remember like a month before I left on my mission, Brad Wilcox came and spoke at my institute and he gave part of his talk 'His Grace is Sufficient.' My friend recently sent me that talk and you all should definitely read it. I actually think it is in the ensign this month. It is an amazing talk though and it really puts grace into a whole other perspective, at least it did for me. So everyone go read it :)

I got to experience two things this week 1) I had to eat something I didn't like, just to be nice because they were offering it and that was cheesecake. I still do not like cheesecake, but I ate it, and 2) I got to try something new! We went over to a members house on Sunday for dinner and the lady made waffles and her favorite thing on waffles is cheese sauce! She wanted us to at least try it and you know what? It actually wasn't that bad! Haha it sounds really weird, but I liked it. San Diego can bring some foreign food experience haha. Also yesterday my companion and I got completely lost on our way to zone meeting. We were an hour late and it was a mess, but surprisingly I wasn't stressed out. The plus side is that we drove over the coronado bridge and drove all along the island and it is BEAUTIFUL!!! The scene driving over the bridge was picturesque.

We saw some wonderful miracles this week. We added new investigators. One is a guy named Dee. He loves Jesus Christ so much and has such a desire to follow him, he is just confused how we can know exactly which church is the right one. We are trying to help him see that he has to pray and ask Heavenly Father. He says he can't trust his feelings though and so he is worried he will join one and then find out it was the wrong one to join. He is very open and receptive though and we taught him the restoration and invited him to read the Book of Mormon and to pray and he said he would love to do that and meet with us again. Another is a guy named Jared. His family are all members and he is awesome! He too just wants to make sure that this is the right path for him. Him and his wife have the cutest little boy named Jerry who is about 2 1/2 and he reminds me of Makai so much!! He is adorable. Another is this lady named Lynn. She was on a potential list so we decided to go visit her yesterday and we caught her out on her porch. She is from the phillipines and is such a sweet lady. We told her our purpose as missionaries and taught a little about the Book of Mormon and asked if we could come teach her more. We were so excited! She also said that as soon as we came to talk to her, she knew there was a purpose for us meeting. Ahhh the Lord blesses us all!

The Battalion has been a little slower this week, except for Sundays. Sundays are always crazy! This past Sunday a family from Denmark came! I was so happy and they told me I look Danish :) I proudly told them that I am. After the tour I talked to them about religion a little and offered them a Book of Mormon and sadly they declined. They were such a sweet family though and I hope someday their hearts can be open to the gospel. It made me think of my setting apart blessing though when President Camp said that many people I met on my mission would get baptized after my 18 months of serving and now I can see that is because I am serving at the Battalion. I meet so many people in such a short time and it's just about planting that seed in their hearts at the Battalion so one day they will be open to accepting the gospel.

Well, that is all the time I have today. I pray for you all every day and I hope you are well and happy. Isn't this weekend the Burley Fair? Is anyone going? Let me know how it is! I love you all so much!

Love,

Sister Cassie Rasmussen