Letter #76 - 2/25/15

Ciao Famiglia! :)

How is everything? :) So crazy how fast time is flying by! Next week will be here before we know it! So weird to think about, but we are so busy I feel like I’m kind of in denial, haha.  I haven’t started packing or doing my customs or anything yet, haha, there’s still time.

So this week was crazy, we did two scmabios, one in Lugano and another with Varese. I got to go to Lugano this time! So I was a missionary in Switzerland for a day. Pretty cool :) Italy and Switzerland are a little different I have to say, haha, you can tell when you pass the border. But it was super fun, and I was with Sorella d'aleo from Palermo. It was super fun and we saw a ton of miracles together.

Also this week was carnevale here in Italy. It’s a little like Halloween, everyone dresses up. We ended up having no appointments that night so we were out doing strada in the pouring rain and we talked to this man and had the coolest gospel conversation ever with him. It was really cool. It brought back a lot of memories from Alessandria being out in the pouring rain doing finding. It was awesome.

Then we did a scambio with the Varese Sorelle. I was with Sorella Richards and we had like the best scambio ever. We were doing strada after one of our appointments and we talked to the first woman we saw and she ended up really liking us and what we were teaching her and when we asked if we could pray with her she said she has a friend she wants us to pray and talk with too so she took us to her friend’s house and we ended up teaching them both the first lesson in the friend’s house. It was so cool.

This week has been so great and next week we have our last scambio and we are going to just work as hard as we can to the very end. My companion is starting to freak out a little bit that I’m leaving, she says she’s going to be an orphan, haha, but she’s so great, she can totally handle anything.

So crazy to think my 18 months are already coming to an end. I’ve loved every single day out here. It’s been the hardest thing I’ve ever done but also the most rewarding and life changing.

Thanks for everything! Talk to you next week! Literally... ;)

Love you!

Sorella Yost

Letter #75 - 2/17/15

Ciao Famiglia!

Come state?? so....this week was a little rough. I had the flu! barf.. literally. We were stuck inside for a few days and I was so bored. We got so bored we watched the old 80's church videos, so yeah. It wasn’t fun. But I’m feeling a ton better now.

Funny story though, we had to go out one morning for Sorella Russell’s fingerprinting appointment for her permesso di soggiorno, and so, even though it felt horrible, I put a skirt on, put my coat on over my pug sweatshirt, refused to put on tights, flats, you get the picture; I looked like a total scrub. So we go out, get to the questura (police station) and they do the fingerprinting and I’m just concentrating on not throwing up in the questura. Then I get up to go collect the paperwork for Sorella Russell and get the instructions from the worker lady for the next set and i just got really light headed and my vision just went black and the next thing I knew I was sitting on the floor, haah. The lady kind of freaked out and helped me get up and sat me in a chair and gave me some chocolate (which i threw up once we got home). i think they thought i was diabetic. Anyways, yeah, it was super embarrassing. and my greenie grounded me to house arrest for the rest of the day, which turned into even longer. It was not fun, but now all is well and we are healthy and get to leave the house and I’m super happy ahah!

Mom, I got your Valentine’s Day cards!!! Thank you so much! I loved them :) oh and I got the kids’ letter too! haha thank you!!!

This week we have a scambio and I’m going to Switzerland this time! So I’ll get to be a missionary in Switzerland for a day which is pretty cool. And then next week we have the last two scambios and then we will be done. It’s been a crazy transfer for sure, lots of scmbios and stuff. But i love it! The Sorelle i get to scambio with are so great, i just love them.

Yesterday I had my last zone conference and we watched meet the Mormons! it was soooooo good. Also I did a training at the conference and I and two other missionaries who are finishing their missions with me all gave our 'dying testimonies'. It was a really weird feeling to be up there bearing my testimony and giving advice to the other missionaries, It’s a little surreal to think that my time here is almost over and some of theirs is just starting.

But i wouldn’t trade a day of my mission for the world. I’ve learned so much and I’m the person and missionary I am today because of the mistakes and lessons I’ve learnt along the way.

I love and miss you all! Crazy how soon I’ll see you all. Just gotta enjoy every last day I have here and I’ll see you before I know it :)

Love and miss you!

Sorella Yost

Letter #74 - 2/10/15

Ciao Famiglia!

Sorry this is going to be short again! Hey, I’ll see you in like 3 weeks right? ;) haha but this week was super awesome! Giovanni gave a talk in church on missionary work and he did such a good job! I was the translator for third hour so it was super funny translating his talk because he was talking about me and Sorella Hawks and just a little bit about his conversion story. It was really cool.

Then we had a big ward lunch after church which was super fun. And Sorella Russell and I survived our four scambio week with new missionary training and consiglio di missione! Haha, It was really fun though. We got to know lots of new sorelle.

And on Monday night we went out on what we like to call 'miracle giro' and we were able to teach two lessons on the street! It was so cool. The people we met were so nice and one of them actually was really interested to learn more and told us she has seen our church name before and had actually been really curious to learn more about it. So we got her phone number and should be seeing her in the next week – huge miracle.

And we did a family home evening with a part member family in our ward for the first time ever and they loved it and want us to come back again next week. So that was a really sweet experience too.

Sorry again his email is so short!

Love and miss you! talk to you soon! :)

Sorella Yost

Letter #73 - 2/3/15

Ciao Famiglia!

Sorry, short email again! I had to send in the monthly report!

Few fun facts from the week, apparently I sleep talk in Italian more than i thought...hahah Sorella Russell informed my I sat up and asked her if we could say a praying in Italian. She thinks I was teaching a lesson in my dream. And she said it has happened a couple times. ahha get ready for that Anna! ;)

Giovanni blessed the sacrament for the first time on Sunday and it was one of the highlights of my mission. It was the coolest feeling ever to see him up there. He looked so excited and happy, so cool.

Also, we are doing like 4 scambio this week so that’s going to be crazy. Plus new missionary training and consiglio in Milano, so that will be crazy – we’ve already done one so three to go for the week! hah

Sorella Russell is a champ. I love her so much.

Vi volgio bene! Talk to you next week!

Sorella Yost