December 23, 2013

This week's email! Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

Hey! MERRY CHRISTMAS!

I am doing pretty good! Sister Bynum is doing much better and is adjusting better this week! 

Well this week has been pretty interesting with everyone getting ready for the holidays. People seem to be nicer during this season but they are so busy that they really don't have much time to talk to us.

We had a big Christmas zone conference on Thursday and it was really amazing and so much fun! The subject was the Atonement and President Weston had a really cool talk and a video that was really amazing. The trainings were all excellent and then we had a huge party, where every district did a song or a skit. Even the AP's got in on it and each sang a song. And then we did a big white elephant exchange and had to relate what we got to the Gospel. A sister serving in this mission and her family had knitted slippers for all the sisters and we each got a book of conversion stories from people in the mission (from missionaries and members living in the mission). It was so fun and really powerful!

We also had a lesson with Jenny that was really good! We just asked her basically why she is still doing this and what she is looking for. It was really just for us to know where she is at and for her to know what she wants out of us coming. She said that she doesn't really know what she is looking for, just more of a relationship with God, and just more than what she has now. I still have hope!

Thanks for everything! Love you guys and can't wait to see you!

UPDATE:

We Skyped with Sydnie on Christmas and it was wonderful to see how well she is doing! She is loving her mission so much and looks really happy and healthy.

December 16, 2013

Here's the latest from Sydnie! Enjoy!

Hey!

We do get to Skype [on Christmas Day]! I am excited! It's a little weird too though, but mostly exciting! We are going to go to a members house (the Orme's) and will be Skyping from there. Not sure on times or anything yet. I have been told that we will be able to call mom and dad Christmas Eve with more exact times. The family's house we are Skyping at has a son who is also on a mission and we are still trying to figure out exact times that we will all be able to Skype.  

It is so crazy that I have been out 6 months! The only crazy thing they do here is when you are 9 months out you take 'pregnant pictures'. It's really weird because you will have 9 months both ways, so I probably won't do that...

It's still a challenge to get to know Sister Bynum. She is very quiet, which is odd to me. Sometimes it seems like you have to pry stuff out of her, but only in lessons and Church. When it's just the two of us she can't stop talking. It's odd. We are working on it. I am trying to give her more opportunities and we talked a lot about if you don't know what to say, just bear your testimony or back up what your companion has said. I just have never had to deal with the problem of having a companion that is too quiet.

It was freezing last week but thankfully it is getting warmer here this week. Last week, we had to tract more than usual. President has challenged us to contact 10 new people every day and we haven't really been getting referrals, so that means that we get to tract. But we had a cool chance last week. In Plattsmouth they have a Christmas on Main celebration where they have carriage rides, hayrides, real reindeer, and all the shops are open and have food. And everyone dresses up in Victorian clothes. It was way fun. We didn't get to spend much time there because we were on exchanges, but it was pretty cool.

We had our ward Christmas party last weekend and this week we had the Relief Society Christmas party and 2 of the less actives we are working with came! We also had lessons with Jenny and Brian (the less-active's husband) and Jenny is still progressing at a snail's pace but still going. And he is ever interested in Joseph Smith. His family is pretty anti-Mormon, so he has some skewed ideas about Joseph Smith but is every interested in learning more about him.

Love you! Merry Christmas!

December 2, 2013: More Pictures

More gingerbread houses!

More gingerbread houses!

Sydnie and Sister Wagher

December 2, 2013

Hey!

Well I am still in Plattsmouth! I was so surprised! I am training again! Sister Wagher is follow up training. So she is helping train someone who has been out 6 weeks already. I am with Sister Bynum. She is from Oregon, still learning a lot about her though.

This week was really crazy with the holidays and transfers and everything. We have pretty much done everything this week! I got the chance to be in a tri-companionship for a day. There was a sister that is in the area next to us who was going to be companion-less until they went and did the rounds, picking up and dropping off missionaries to the outlying areas, so I was surprisingly put in charge of 2 missionaries, one being brand new. That was quite a day we literally were just waiting for the call to go and drop off our 'extra' missionary. Super crazy and stressful to have to take care of 3 people, not just you and your companion. But it was definitely gave me empathy for those that are in them [tri-companionships]. They seem fun, but it would definitely be difficult.

We did get to go to the trail center with an investigator. Sister Harris actually gave the tour and then we went and looked at the Gingerbread displays. They are so immaculate and super cool! And the investigator seemed to think the trail center was pretty cool too.

On Thanksgiving we found out about transfers, so I cleaned while Sister Wagher packed and then I helped her pack. Mostly she just needed help closing suitcases. Then we had our 2 Thanksgiving dinners. The one with the Stichts (the ward mission leader and his family) was really fun. There ended up being us, them, a friend who's husband was deployed, and all of their kids, about 8 kids. So needless to say it was very fun, noisy, and really just like any normal Thanksgiving dinner. They are really fantastic! We got to hang out with Sister Reveillac for a while that night and we actually watched Church Christmas videos to help her choose which one to play for the Relief Society's Christmas program. And then we helped her do a puzzle. It was nice just to have a couple hours to still be productive but to relax. So we had a crazy morning and relaxing evening. We helped a member of the ward move and were just really busy all week!

Thanks, love you guys!

PICTURES:

1. Sydnie, Sister Wagher, and Sister Bynum

2-4. Some of the cool Gingerbread displays.

5. The one Sydnie and Sister Wagher made

November 25, 2013

Hey! 

Sister Wagher is doing good! It's especially fun since we got snow last week! Boy was I wrong with the whole mid-December comment last week! It actually started off with freezing rain and then turned into snow later that day, very interesting and much different than Utah. The wind makes it a lot different too, especially since it rained first. So the roads were icy but then the snow came and the wind blew it everywhere and covered a lot of the ice and it is super patchy! The weather also makes it a lot more difficult as a missionary! You just have to totally change the way you work! We are making many more appointments (and praying they will actually be there for the appointments and still willing to listen) and we can't walk around and try to find people as easily as we did before. Just a lot of adjusting.
Jenny is still coming along still, investigating the Church, and reading the Book of Mormon. Transfers are this week! I honestly do think that I will be moved. I have been here a long time and I feel like I will be, but honestly you never know! It's weird because this week when thinking I might be leaving, it really just made me realize how much I love the people in this area so so much! It will be hard to leave whether it's this transfer or another.
We have been asked to do a lot more with the youth lately. The MTC night a couple weeks ago and then last week we were asked to come to Young Women's for the dinner they were having and to help talk about Personal Progress. I think it helps them realize how important these things are because they see a missionary that is barely 19 and just graduated high school. It makes things much more real. We also were asked to teach seminary this week. I am so glad that I had release time! Having it at 5:30 am is so early! And we had travel time so we really had to wake up at 4:30 am! But we were able to ride with a young woman in the ward, Sister Reveillac's granddaughter, but she is living with her dad who is less active and her step-mom who is not a member. Her step-mom drove so we were able to answer a lot of her questions about the Church, and she was able to see us in a different light than the 'scary missionaries that just want to dunk people'. Haha. 

Have a great Thanksgiving! Drive safe and have fun! Love you!

November 18, 2013

Enjoy another email from Sister Huss!

Thankfully we don't have to tract on Thanksgiving. It actually is the day before transfers, so we have to clean and do all the end of transfer stuff on thanksgiving. But we are also going to our ward mission leaders house for Thanksgiving. It should be lots of fun. I am excited! We also do all the regular study stuff and if we still have time left over we do weekly planning. But we should be pretty busy. The ward turkey bowl has been brought up for us to go to, but I think that is still up in the air. And it actually is really warm. It's so weird to hear that it is snowing there because here we are having an unseasonably warm weather. I don't think it  is even supposed to snow here till mid December. Crazy!
This week was pretty normal. We had exchanges, which is always such a great experience getting to learn from missionaries other than your companion and just to see how other people work is always interesting. Our ward did a cool MTC night for mutual and we got to do a little class. They had classes on packing, clothes, rules/ manners etc. But we got to do a class on Preach My Gospel. It was way fun! They made it a really big deal, which was cool. They assigned everyone to a mission and even got Elders from the area next to ours to come and help, since this area hasn't had Elders for like 4 years. So a lot of the youth had never really seen Elders.  The coolest thing this week was that it finally just clicked for Sister Wagher. It's like everything just fell into place this last week and she is confident and ready. I don't know. It's just cool to see it happen. 

Thanks, love you guys!

November 13, 2013

Hey! 

Sister Wagher still thinks she is going to die in Nebraska because she is going to freeze to death. It's really pretty hilarious. I think that she is just getting used to being cold all the time not as much getting used to the cold.
We had a miracle happen with a less-active. A guy we have been working with ever since I have been here came to Church for the first time in I don't know how long. He had a lot of issues with the Church and actually asked for his records removed, then got baptized again a few years ago but he could never get over some questions about the Church (even though it was explained so so many times to him). Conference really helped and he realized he needed to doubt his fears before he doubted his faith. It also really helped that a lot of members of the ward have been going over without us and helping him a lot. It was amazing. He participated in classes and even called us with some questions after Church and just is progressing and wanting to know more and wants to go to the temple. Thankfully, our members have really stepped up to help with the less-actives we are working with. It has been amazing to see the progress of people, especially when members get involved. They have gotten really involved with the other family I talked about last week too. I never realized before my mission how many members are less-active and how it is our responsibility as members to reach out and to help them, even if at that time it might only be to befriend them. I can't imagine not working with members. Our mission president has really been talking a lot about working with members and how it is the way the Lord wants us to do the work. 

Thanks, love you guys!

Sister Huss

November 4, 2013

Here is this week's email, with pictures!! (:

Hey! 
This week we saw a ton of miracles. Sister Wagher had said that she wanted to try all the less actives on our ward list, so this week we started doing that. We had amazing success. One of the families had been inactive for 15 or more years and we dropped by when they were in dinner. But they came out and talked to us for a minute and were incredibly nice! They said they were trying to  get back into going to a church and that they wanted us to drop by again so we could talk about it. The other one was my favorite lesson we probably have ever had. We tried another less active, but we didn't get to stay long. But he said he had made a lot of wrong decisions when he was young and ended up getting in a fight and he thought he was no longer a member. He said he had never doubted the Church and never even told anyone that story. The entire thing was totally by the Spirit. We talked about the Atonement and how it is never too late to come back. He actually got a little teary eyed and just thanked us and said it was a long time since he had heard that. He said he and his wife wanted to come back. Neither she nor their kids are members. He said they all were very open and gave us a phone number to set up a return appointment. It was absolutely amazing! 

This week we had a zone conference too. We went up to Sioux City, Iowa about 2 hours away,  and the President and Sister Weston both did trainings, as well as other people. I  felt like it was exactly what I needed to hear. We had a little road trip and drove up with some other sisters close to out area. And then we stayed with sisters in Sioux City the night before in this gross apartment that elders had lived in for 10 years before. Sorry Hayden, but it was super gross. We also had a surprise temple trip. This week has been crazy busy!

Thanks! Love you!

Sister Huss

PICTURES: 

 The award winning trunk 

Probably the only time you will see me in a BYU shirt; enjoy it! :)

October 28, 2013

Hey!

Sister Wagher and I are doing good! She does think she will freeze to death, but the whole cold thing is pretty hilarious! And it just gets worse and worse. I will just look at her and she is shivering, but she will have to get used to Nebraska weather pretty quick!

I absolutely loved the zoo and want to go back in the spring when we have more time and all of the animals are out. But I loved it!

Sadly, we didn't get to dress up for the trunk or treat, but we had an investigator come with her son and they were able to meet a lot of other people from the ward. And we won the best decorated trunk prize. We had parked in the middle of the trunk or treat, so a member gave us her candy saying she wanted to go with her kids. Everyone else had a ton of decorations and music, the whole 9 yards. And we decorated with what we had in our trunk: an emergency blanket, copies of the Book of Mormon, Church movies, and pass along cards. But we won, and we passed out 2 copies of the Book of Mormon.

The funniest thing this week was on Friday. We ate dinner with the Bishop and his wife. We were having ribs. He was using a spoon and a knife to get them out of the crock-pot, and one got stuck. He ended up all but throwing them in my lap! They ended up in my drink and I had the sauce all over my shirt. I have never seen his eyes so big. He apologized over and over and they told me they would wash my shirt. It was really not that bad and I told them that, but they wouldn't let me leave until they got the stain out. I had to wear one of the Bishop’s wife's shirts. They are avid BYU fans and they know that I am a Utah fan (sorry). So she gives me this shirt to wear with a sly smile on her face and it was a BYU football shirt. We both just started laughing. She said she just couldn't help herself. We got a picture of probably one of the only times you will see me wearing a BYU shirt. It was hilarious. We ended up spending like two and a half  hours there because they would not let us leave until it was completely washed with the stain out and dried.

Another amazing thing, after the party on Saturday night we decided to try one person before we headed home. It was pretty dark and there were some leaves covering a hole. I almost fell but did drop my purse. When we got home, I was looking for my camera and couldn't find it anywhere. Sunday, we tried to look at the Church and we thought the only place it could be was where I almost fell. It must have fallen out of my purse. While we were looking for it, a lady comes out of her house and asks if we are looking for a camera, that she found one and her neighbor has it. We got ahold of the neighbor and she said she knew people that came to our Church, so apparently Heavenly Father has a plan with these people. We are going to try back this upcoming week. And hopefully we will find a new investigator!

Thanks, love you guys!

Sister Huss

October 21, 2013

Here's the latest from Sister Huss! (:

My first experience with tornado's wasn't too bad. LOL I think that If you sleep through it it doesn't really count but oh well. 

As far as transfers, I am still in Plattsmouth with Sister Wagher! It is so weird to think that after this transfer I will have been here for 6 months! I am excited to still be here! It also turned out to be a good thing because Sister Reveillac broke her arm really pretty bad, enough to have surgery this week.  So she had even said that she was praying that we both stayed. She didn't want to have to get used to new people along with every thing else and have to show them the ropes and everything. We were meant to both stay this transfer.

Not a ton different this week. It is starting to actually get cold now ( like highs in the 40's or 50's) so that has definitely taken some getting used to. Not as much for me as for Sister Wagher! Miss Arizona is freezing to death and sadly it's hilarious to watch. My favorite was this week when she asked me if it was going to be cold again when it had been in the high 50's that day. We don't have snow yet, but we have had some really bad storms. Nothing like the tornado warnings though just lots of rain. It also has made it more difficult to find new investigators because we usually would  just talk to people outside, but it's so cold outside no one wants to be out. The big thing we have been working on is getting people to come to the ward activity. It’s a chili cook-off/ trunk or treat. There have been a lot of people we are working with that are really excited for it and a lot have even said how excited they are to bring their friends too. It's just a nice safe environment for kids to trick or treat, as well as free food. We have been working with members to invite people to that too so hopefully it will be a big success. There are a lot of activities going on. Here the Christmas event is gingerbread houses that they display at the trail center and Kanesville tabernacle and each ward does a gingerbread display. So that has been the big thing that we also have been inviting people to. Almost everyone we talk to has no idea what the trail center is but when we talk about the gingerbread display, they immediately just go “Oh that! We have been going every year since I was a kid..." So it’s a huge missionary tool.

But today we went to the zoo!!! A member and her non-member daughter have year passes (most people in the area do) but we went  with them and they were able to get us in for free! It was so fun! It really is a super cool zoo. They have an aquarium in it along with an entire Jungle house where all the jungle animals aren't in cages or exhibits or anything. They just are free to go to wherever they want, safely though. It's amazing!

Sister Huss

October 14, 2013

Hey! 

They just changed transfers because we would have been finding out about transfers, packing, and cleaning on Thanksgiving and we would travel on Black Friday. So now transfers are Wednesday, so we will find out tomorrow what will be happening. I think we both will still be here.
This week has been a pretty weird week. We haven't had a ton of time in our area. We had a lot of meetings. We had a specific trainer/ trainee meeting where President and the assistants to the president came and we had training from them. We just talked about how to be better trainers, and we kind of just talked about the things we are struggling with and how best to help each other as fellow trainers. President talked to the trainees about how to be a better missionary. It was really good and made me realize that I am not alone in some of the things I struggle with as a trainer!
This week was also weird because on Saturday one of the 8 year old girls in our ward was getting baptized. So we invited a lot of people to come and see that just to help people understand the process and understand more of what being baptized means. So we went and helped  but no one we invited showed up, which was a big bummer, but it was nice to see the service and to be able to help get it together. And the family is super missionary minded and ended up inviting some of their nonmember friends and they introduced us and we got to talk to them, which was cool! So in the end it all worked out. 

Thanks! Love you guys!

October 7, 2013

Here's the latest from Sister Huss!

This week was pretty amazing. We had exchanges, tornado warnings, and conference! We had exchanges this week and it is always so cool to see the miracles that come from going on exchanges. It started off with a phone call from an investigator from a part member family who is trying to get her daughter who is 8 baptized. I guess she had a pretty bad run in with a priest who told her that her daughter isn't old enough or mature enough to be baptized, she asked my opinion and if our church would baptize her if she is 8. I was so excited and told her all about it she seemed a lot more comforted and we have an appointment with them tonight to talk about it. I love getting to know other sisters better and being able to learn from them. I have learned again how the Lord has a plan for us. That me and Sister Wagher being companions is truly meant to be that our differences make us a strong companionship. I have learned so much this transfer! It has been difficult but worth it!

So for the tornadoes’ there was a huge storm on Thursday night we had been under Tornado Watch, basically just to watch out for them , but no one seemed to worried about it. We just went to sleep and when we woke up on Friday we had 3 texts about tornado warnings that we got during the night at like 11 and 12, which means that they predict or have seen a tornado in the area. We asked Sister Reveillac about it and she had said that the sirens were going off and the storm had gotten really bad. We slept through the whole thing. We are supposed to stay awake during a tornado warning but Sister Reveillac said that she knew we were really tired, and didn't want to wake us up, that the way her house is situated there is practically no way that a tornado would hit and so she just stayed awake just to make sure everything was okay. It has been super cold the past weekend it got into the 40’s, but no snow yet, we did see some golf ball sized hail though!

Conference was amazing! We watched the first session with a less active member we have been working with, then we went to Jenny, our progressing investigators house to watch the second. She had a lot of questions about how the Church was organized and who did what with the church and what everyone's jobs were. She took us out to dinner and we helped her paint her bedroom. I think that my favorite talk was Elder Holland's. Everything he said is so applicable to everyone, not just people with depression. I also really liked Elder Uchtdorff's because a lot of what he said is really helpful with the people we are trying to work with.

Thanks! Love you guys!

September 30, 2013

Enjoy this most recent email from Sydnie!

I never realized how big football really gets until here, its crazy! Me and Sister Wagher are getting along well. It's just really difficult trying to figure out the differences you need to make with different companions. Me and Sister Harris were so similar we didn't even need to talk about some things, we just automatically knew that that was how we both wanted to do things. Going from that to where me and Sister Wagher are very different had been a challenge, but i'ts just so different not for the better or the worse, just different. I also feel like different companionships have different strengths and weaknesses and you learn so much from each companion.

This week was pretty normal week. We were able to go and watch the Relief Society Broadcast on Saturday and that was really cool. I liked that  the whole thing was based around covenants. It also made me way excited for Conference this weekend! This week we also were able to have our first church tour with an investigator. We took Jenny our progressing investigator and it was really powerful. I had never really gone around the Church and just looked at the importance of the rooms and the pictures that are in the church before. The most powerful was the picture of the first vision. I think she just doesn't recognize the Spirit as an answer, she can feel and recognize that she is feeling it but doesn't know what to do with it. She is amazing and just wants to learn more and more.

Thanks, love you guys!

Sister Huss

September 23, 2013

The latest! Enjoy!

I am good! The weather has drastically changed and it's getting cooler every day now! It has been different with Sister Wagher. Not better or worse, just different. With Sister Harris, from the very first day we realized how similar we were there were a lot of times that we didn't even have to talk about something because we just knew what the other was thinking and me and Sister Wagher are different  So that has been a big change. We get along really well though. She is from Mesa Arizona and is 19 just barely graduated in May, so that I think is a big reason in has been so different just because she is so young and has never been away from home or anything before. It was quite an adjustment. 

To clarify on the steak, it wasn't an Omaha steak brand but I think it was better, sorry to make you [Hayden] jealous. It was from a different meat packing company that is also in Omaha. I had heard about the game. BYU is a pretty big deal here too. A lot of our ward is military and a lot have gone to BYU,  so I did hear about that. BYU  is not near as big of a deal as the Huskers games though. Everyone is wearing red and we can't really even contact people on game days and if you try to tract you just get yelled at. Thankfully I learned that from other missionaries not from experience. 
This week has been kind of crazy. We had a big zone training, so everyone from our zone (which is our stake) got together instead of just our districts and president had asked us the previous week to give our 5 copies of the Book of Mormon a week, but at the zone training they asked us to pass out one a day. Seems like it wouldn't be a problem, but it has been so cool just to see how big of a difference in has made in less than a week! Since we have been trying to literally talk to everyone we see about the Book of Mormon, it has made a huge difference in how many we actually give out and even with how many people we talk to about the church. Even if they don't want a copy, we usually have a good conversation with them about the Church and it has been so cool. We also saw a huge miracle with another Less-active we had been working with. He has really roller-coasted with his testimony. Probably 4 weeks ago he all but told us he didn't believe in the Church. With the ward being involved, he said on Saturday that he is going to start completely over and go on a quest of sorts to see what Heavenly father wants for him to do in his life. I think one of my favorite things about being on a mission is seeing the change in people like that!

Thanks! Love you guys!
Sister Huss

September 16, 2013

Enjoy the latest from Sydnie!

Thankfully I haven't gotten sick yet. I hope I don't though. It is getting colder. I don't know if we will continue to get colder and go into winter or if it will get warmer. They are predicting a pretty bad winter but hopefully we get to experience fall a little first.

The trainee has been an eye opening experience. It makes me so grateful to have been away before I served a mission. But it's cool to see how much someone can progress in just a weeks time. We mostly drive just because our area is so big, but since it is nicer now and not super hot or super cold. We are trying to park the car and walk around town. We also try not not tract. We never go door to door but we will do inspired tracting about once a week, mostly just if we really need new investigators or if all of our plans fall through. Our investigators are going pretty well, we only have one right now that is progressing a lot and she is so close. I think that she knows the church is true she just doesn't recognize it yet. She also wants to finish the Book of Mormon before she gets baptized, but she talks about when she is baptized not if, so that's really cool. We haven't had any bad or weird food so far. Last week we actually had real Omaha Stakes. A member of our ward works for a meat packing company so they promised we could come over for steak night. And it was amazing.

I loved the festival it was hilarious! Love you guys!

Sister Huss

September 9, 2013

The latest! Enjoy! (:

We learned a lot from Elder Robbins. He talked a lot about having a vision for the entire mission and having a vision for your individual mission. He also did a lot on receiving personal revelation. Surprisingly, he didn't say anything about what technology we are going to be using. I guess we will just have to wait for that one. 

The clinic was really cool but sadly it was probably something I won't get to do again. The Trail Center sisters are the ones that usually do that. They didn't have anyone that could go to the clinic that day so they asked us to go, but it was really cool. The weather has been really hot still, like July heat. I am hoping that it will cool down soon. They are predicting a bad winter. I think that the snow will be similar to Utah but the Humidity will be killer.
I am still in Plattsmouth, and I am training! I was surprised! I was told by Sister Harris, my sister training leader, and President Weston that it would probably happen but still very surprising. I guess I just feel really unprepared but I don't know if you ever could be prepared. Her name is Sister Wagher. She is from Mesa, Arizona and is 19. She is one of the new new sisters and she just barely turned 19, and graduated in May. She is super sweet! She has never been away from home before, so it's way different for her. Our big thing this week was that Plattsmouth had their big Harvest Festival (formerly called the Kass Kounty King Korn Karnival, but people started to shorten it to the KKK so they changed it to be politically correct) this weekend, so we were mostly at that. It was a lot like a county fair, but it's the town's big thing, so the whole town was out for it. 

Sister Huss

September 2, 2013

Here's the latest! (:

Transfers are this week we find out on Thursday what is happening and we transfer on Friday. Both me and Sister Harris are doing well, we are just trying to get everything done before transfers, in case one or both of us aren't here.

Our Zone Conference was amazing! We had Elder Robbins from the 70 come and he gave a 2 hour training on a lot of things, but especially goals and what we want to get out of our mission and what we want for our area. I think especially hit [home] since this transfer is the first where people I know well that are going home and I have been thinking about what I want for me and my mission.

We aren't going to the thrift store anymore. We had a really cool chance to work at a free clinic in downtown Omaha this week though. With Elder Robbins coming, a lot of the sisters at the trail center had to change their schedules and they usually trade off going to work at this free clinic, but they asked us to come help out instead. It was way cool to see the amount of people that they are able to help. And one of the Doctors is investigating the Church, so all the sisters that went were able to answer a couple questions and then he and his wife took all of us out to dinner.

Good luck with school starting, love you guys!

August 26, 2013

Here's this week's email! Enjoy!

It is so weird not to be going back to school or getting ready to go back, but I know that this is where I am supposed to be. 
I feel like you don't realize how much mission presidents and their family do until you are on a mission (at least I didn't),  and I cant imagine what you would do without them! 
We found out this week that we are going to probably stop working at the thrift shop. There were some rules that we weren't aware of, so we are hoping to get the Relief Society sisters to take our shift there. But I am doing good! It is getting hotter. It seems like everywhere is having weird weather. We now are getting the July heat and humidity that skipped us in July. Sister Harris is doing well as far as I know. It's so weird that we are almost done with another transfer! We have like a week and a half left! 
This week will be really cool. We have a member of the 70 doing a mission tour and he is coming to our Zone Conference on Thursday. Hopefully we will find out then what our mission will be doing with all the changes with technology and stuff! 
We are still just trying to get used to all the new changes living in a new town and getting to know people. Louisville is so far out missionaries only got here about once a transfer so we are trying to get to know more people. Sister Reveillac has been so amazing! She is so involved and wants to help in any way she can! 
Thanks for all you guys do. Love you!
Sister Huss

August 19, 2013

Another email from Sydnie! (:

I am really good! This week has been stressful for me and Sister Harris. The move brought a lot of other changes that we hadn't really thought about, but living with Sister Reveillac has been really great so far! Sorry I am not sure what my address is at Sister Reveillac's, but you can always use the mission home and they just send it to me from there too. But I will get it next week. I am really glad that we have a car. I can't imagine how bad it would be having to ride the bus everywhere, especially since our area is so big! We have been working with the same investigators and less actives and one of our investigators came to church yesterday which was so cool! And honestly really surprising. We didn't think that he would come, but it was great! The thrift shop and assisted living center are both good. No scandals lol but it is hilarious. They all are so competitive! And especially hate it when we win!
Thanks! Love you guys!
Sister Huss

August 12, 2013

Here's the latest! I will hopefully get her address soon!

We actually found out where we are moving this morning, We are living with the Relief Society President Sister Reveillac, so we also are moving today. So today has been a little crazy with packing and everything. Sister Reveillac lives in Louisville. She is from Norway and immigrated when she was like 19 or 20. It will be way fun but Louisville is like 15 miles out of Plattsmouth so we are going to have to figure out something with our miles, but it will all work out. This week was really cool. One of the sisters that served in Plattsmouth about 2 years ago came back with her husband to visit. She called us and told us some people that we should try. She wanted an update with some of the Less Actives that she had worked with (some of them we are still working with) and she asked if she could come out with us that night. We had a lesson with an investigator that night and her and her husband both came and it was really cool! It was one of the best lessons that we had with our investigator.  We have mostly been working with Less Actives again this week. We do have a couple solid investigators that we see at least once a week, but there is so much of our ward that is Less Active. And they are starting to bring other people into the church too. Last week, all of the new investigators we got were from Less Actives. We had a lesson with one Less Active and her two friends and this week we will have a lesson with a Less Active and her non-member fiance who has started to get interested.

For the first couple weeks I was out, I was that missionary that thought that we needed to knock doors. But it's just really not very effective. The few people we did get that were interested in the church have lost interest. Like you said Hayd, it's just way more effective to work with members and Less Actives.

Well have a great week! Love you guys!

Sister Huss

August 5, 2013

Here is the latest from Sydnie!

Thankfully neither of us have been sick again! We are still with the Bucksbees until the 15th, and I have no idea where we will be going after that! It's up to the ward to provide housing. Right now it's between the Bishop, who lives 10 miles South of Plattsmouth in a closed community, (so we couldn't knock on doors) or the Relief Society President who lives in Louisville about 20 miles west of Plattsmouth. I am way excited to be with Sister Harris again! It was so surprising! and she has never had a companion for more than one transfer. Our transfers are 6 weeks long. The Thrift store is not super exciting, we just wash the donations that come in and will price them, but the assisted living is hilarious. We help with activities, so we go and just play games with them. They can get super competitive and will gang up so against us so that Sister Harris and I won't win. The most competitive lady has Alzheimer's so she will be super mad that you made a move in the game and she will chew you out. But then like 3 minutes later she won't remember she was mad at all. Our investigator from Africa isn't interested anymore. She refused to read the Book of Mormon or pray about it. She would cancel all our appointments. She just wasn't interested.

The weather has been super nice, in the 70's all week and no humidity! It's been amazing!

Other than that, this week was not much out of the ordinary except yesterday. We had 2 less Active members come to church. One has been coming with her kids on and off for about a month, but her husband is not a member and he came to church. He knows more about the church than most members do but he is too stubborn to admit that it is true. We saw them last right before transfers and when he saw us yesterday he actually yelled "You are both still here!" and came up and gave us a hug. Hilarious but SUPER awkward. Their whole family is so nice!

The other miracle was with the other less active we have been working on. She is working on her PHD and according to her "doesn't have time" to come to church, but she has said she wants to come back now, it's just hard. We talked to her about it last week and she said she would think about it. We didn't think she would come, especially since she hasn't come for almost 3 years, but she came! Everyone in the ward was so shocked! But she stayed the whole 3 hours and actually set up an appointment for tonight for us to teach some of her friends!

Sister Huss

July 29, 2013

Here's the latest from Sister Sydnie! Enjoy!

Thanks so much for all the emails and stuff!

Sounds like you guys had a really exciting 24th! It's weird for it not to be a big deal here. All the other missionaries from Utah were commenting at our meeting last week that it would be the 24th and no one else even really recognized that it was a really big deal. We got a lot of teasing about us 'Utah Mormons'!

Sister Harris and I are both still in Plattsmouth! It was really surprising! I kind of thought I would be staying here but Sister Harris was actually called to the Trail Center,and I was called full proselyting, so they are trying to have the missionaries stay where they are called to. So I most likely won't get to serve in the Trail Center, but that's okay! And Sister Harris had spent time full Proselyting before, so she thought she would go back, and she has never had the same companion for 2 transfers. So us staying together was surprising for many reasons. No one thought we were going to stay together, especially in Plattsmouth. But that just means that we are meant to be together for someone specific. I am glad we are still together!

Not a ton going on this last week. We were trying to find more investigators. Some of the ones we found dropped us or just aren't progressing at this time, but we do have a couple solid investigators. We did a lot of service this week too. We have gotten involved more with places in the community, like at an assisted living center, and a thrift store that is run by many different Christian churches in the community. We now have specific shifts at those places and it is so fun! 

We also were able to be involved with a concert series that the Trail Center put on. It's a concert featuring the missionaries in the local area, about the restoration. So the concerts go all around Nebraska, and are mainly at the stake centers. So the missionaries that go to that stake center sing at that concert and bring ward members, recent converts, less active members, and investigators. It seemed to be really successful. I was just in the choir but Sister Harris and many others had solos and it went really well, especially for the little time we had to practice!

Thanks for all you guys do! Love you guys!
Sister Huss

July 22, 2013

Here is the latest! Enjoy! (:


We are both feeling much better! Thankfully it was just a 24 hour thing, but we stayed in because it was so contagious! 
This week was amazing! So cool to see so many miracles! We found a new investigator almost every day, which is really rare. We usually try to find about 3 per week, but this week we doubled that!  This week we were able to get to see a lot of investigators that we haven't been able to see for a long time and we saw so many less actives and more members that ever. It was like our whole transfer, all the really difficult days, were leading up to the past week! It was amazing to see a miracle every single day, and all we did was just follow the promptings of the Spirit and the Lord did the rest! We have transfers this week, which is a little nerve wracking. We transfer on Friday, but we find out on Thursday what is going on. Just the thought that you could go anywhere in the mission and be with anyone or you could stay right where you are with the same companion [is nerve-racking].  We were able to go to an area that we don't usually get to go to because it's about 20 miles away (Louisville). That is where the pic is from. We also had a trainer/trainee meeting with the President and all the other missionaries I came out with. And we took pictures and the other one is me and sister Harris. The last one is just the classic Nebraska picture right after a huge thunderstorm we had!
Sister Huss

July 15, 2013

Here is this week's email! 

I am glad that all your classes are going well and that you are loving Pearl of Great Price. Hearing you talk about it makes me want to take it when I get back. Sounds like Hayden did really well too! Summer seems like it is dragging, but August gets even worse [heat wise], but I have been told that after August it gets way better! We haven't been able to get ahold of some of our investigators after they go out of town, so that's the hard part about summer.

Other than that, not a lot has happened this week.Sister Harris and I both got the flu this weeks so we were down for a couple days and didn't get a ton done just because we didn't have a ton of time in our area. Total tender mercy that we got the same thing on the same day, but it had been going around our ward so it was only a matter of time before we got it too. But we are both doing much better now. We also were able to go to the temple and do a session, which was really cool! Some members of our ward (that we ate with the night before ironically) were the ordinance workers, so that was really neat too. It was just all of our zone that went and President Weston and his wife. There were only like 3 other people that were walk-ins and one of them was our ward mission leader's wife; their whole family is so great! She drove us to the temple so we wouldn't have to use our miles on our car since we are only allotted so many a month. Then she bought us dinner on the way home. Hopefully we will have more success this week since we will be out in the area more!

Thanks you guys are awesome and thanks for doing Facebook and the blog. That has been a huge help! Love you guys.

Sister Sydnie Huss

July 11, 2013

Here is another email from Sydnie! Be sure to email and write her, I know she really appreciates it! (:

Hey,

The gospel does make so much sense! We have talked to some of our investigators about that, especially with their ideas of the trinity. They will try to explain something and we get so confused. The gospel really is simple and simply makes sense.

Sounds like your 4th was fun! We actually went to a ward members activity on the 4th. It is way more of a community thing. She makes root beer floats and everyone brings desert and all the ward members pitch in to have a huge firework show and they don't restrict fireworks here like they do in Utah. So it is like a city firework show. We only were able to go from 8 to 9 pm since missionaries were actually supposed to be in by 6 pm. We had interviews with the mission president on the 4th and we told him about it, that there were going to be lots of non-members and less active members, and we had hoped and investigator would come. He gave us special permission to go. We were able to meet a lot of people  and they even set off a couple fireworks just for us. We also had a BBQ with our Bishop and his wife.

Our Investigator from Africa isn't back yet I think she gets back this week.

The holiday made it tough to contact because so many people are out of town or they have family in town and don't want to talk to us. And it has been in the hundreds pretty much every day, not counting the humidity. However we had some great experiences that were us just being at the right place at the right time and saying the right things. We had 3 of the less active families come to church which was amazing and 2 of them stayed the whole 3 hours and one of the families had to leave, but said they would stay all of it next week.

Our ward really has been good to us. For a while we weren't sure what they thought of us. The ward has seen a lot of problems and are still recovering from them but each week we can see progress. We send a calendar around for our meals. When we eat dinner with a ward member and their family, it just gives us a chance to get to know them and for us to share a message with them so its a win-win. But the whole time we have been here we would send it around on Sundays and maybe one person would sign up. We taught Relief Society yesterday and we spoke in Sacrament meeting 2 weeks ago and after those I think that they can see us as real people and not pushy missionaries and when we got our meal calendar back at the end of Relief Society, there were 7 families signed up and some of those were the Less Actives we have been working on. We were so so excited.

I don't remember what 70 is coming but I think it is an area 70. I didn't get to see any apostles at the MTC. I think a lot of it was because of the Broadcast that was like a week after I got out here. Right now we have mostly investigators that are just starting out. Our biggest problem is that none of them will actually make appointments with us. They all just tell us to drop by, and they don't really want to commit to a certain day to meet. Thanks so much for your guys' love and support.

Sister Sydnie Huss

July 3, 2013

Here is the latest from Sister Sydnie Huss! Enjoy!

Hey! 

Sister Harris did go to the same Columbine as the shootings. She is actually from Littleton, CO, and she wasn't there when the shootings happened. She was in Elementary but they evacuated the High School to her Elementary school, and she knows a lot of people that were there at the time of the shootings.

I hope you had fun in Ogden and with Dawn! My investigator from Africa actually went out of town a couple days after we talked to her, but we will see her when she gets back. 

 I am not sure yet what all the new technology will mean for me. We have a member of the 70 coming for a meeting with us in August so I think he will let us know how much this will change things at that meeting. But so far nothing yet. I am a little nervous for it as well, mostly because it will be hard to have to be on Facebook but not my own account, so I wouldn't be able to see what my friends are doing and stuff like that. If they do use Facebook I think it will make it really difficult for everyone but my mission President is pretty strict (which is good don't get me wrong) so I am not sure how much he will implement the new technology. 

One funny experience for the week. So as a back-story, there are so many churches around but the local Baptist and Jehovah's Witnesses proselyte pretty heavily around town and one of the new investigators we got this week had just been tracted by the Jehovah's Witnesses. He came out to talk to us and he  was complaining that  we had just been by the day before but we reassured him that was not us, we are the only missionaries in the area, and we are completely different from Jehovah's Witnesses. He was one of the few in the area that would listen to us. So we are now letting that area sit for a little while. 

We were able to take one of our investigators to the trail center on Thursday, to see the Witnesses of Christ exhibit. I think it went well. Her little boy was pretty distracting but I think that they had a good time. The Witnesses of Christ was really cool just because you can feel the spirit so strong and you literally just look at Christ's life chronologically. Her paintings are absolutely beautiful, so that makes it even better. I don't think she had ever heard much about Mormon History, so it was really eye opening for her to see all that they struggled with and how hard it really was. We went to the Cemetery as well and you can't go there without feeling a special Spirit there. It's so crazy to see the graves and the statue of the parents burying a child with the babies graves all around it. It's amazing! She had a lot of questions about the temple too!

Well I need to go but I love you!

Sister Sydnie Huss

June 24, 2013

Here's the latest from Sydnie! 6.24.13

There have been A TON of thunderstorms, but it is so cool! It surprises me how fast they come in and how hard they can be. We are actually having a pretty bad one right now but they are so cool! I have been told that our area of Nebraska doesn't really get tornadoes, which is reassuring! The humidity has steadily gotten worse, but I have been told a lot that it is nothing yet (the people are usually laughing at me too because they know its killing me!).

Sister Harris has been out for 7 months and I am the 3rd sister she has trained. I don't remember where she is from, but I know that it's just a few minutes outside of Denver and that she went to Columbine High School.

I think both my mom and dad have my current address, but I don't know it. Sorry! 

The Bucksbee's house is great! They have a good exercise room for us. Brother Bucksbee is in his 70's and Sister Bucksbee is in her 50's. They were both married before, but I think both their spouses died about 20 years ago. We do sometimes have dinner with them, but it's just if we can't have it with anyone else. But they buy some food for us, which is so nice!

As of right now, I don't  think I need anything. If you do want to pray for anything, pray that the members of our ward will have missionary experiences! This is the first time they have had full time missionaries in years, so they don't really know how to help us and they aren't really sure what to do and how much help we really need. But our investigators are doing pretty well! We do have 2 new investigators that I hope will be able to stay for the long run. One of them we met tracting. She is from Africa and came here to go to school. She is religious (everyone is in Nebraska) and she just goes to a Christian church, but she sounded really interested in the church. She did think that Joseph Smith's story was a little crazy, but most people do. The other one is someone the sisters have been in contact with, but last week we went to her house and she asked a lot of deep questions about death and where we go after this life and about the veil which was awesome! We didn't get to go into it a lot but we are going back this week

The down part of this week was a meeting we had with a new investigator. My first day here we met a couple. The husband had investigated the church in the 70's, prayed about the church, and  felt the ‘burning in the bosom’ as described in the Book of Mormon. He was about to be baptized when a former pastor sent him a lot of anti material. He didn't get baptized, but went to bible school instead. His big challenge to us was to come back. We told him we would but were very anxious all week. Monday night we met with him and it was one of the best and worst experiences of my life. He started off just trying to explain his belief, that you just need to believe in God to go to heaven. We sat and listened but he would not listen to us at all. He asked us multiple times to leave the church. He told us that Joseph Smith was a false prophet and that we would go to hell for following his teachings and the church. We sat there and just bore our testimonies. Sister Harris warned him that he knew the church was true and the reason the missionaries didn't come back is that all the missionaries knew that he knew it is true. He really started to try and Bible Bash with us but we left. As we were leaving, he said that he hoped he gave us something to think about at least with our church and that he hoped we at least questioned some things now. I tried not to laugh as I told him that he actually just strengthened my testimony of the church and he was really mad; but we tried to leave on the best terms as possible. We left him with our phone number and said if they had more questions to call and we would set up a meeting with the bishop for him.

We felt horrible after, just because after that experience the Spirit wasn't with us at all, so we called our ward mission leader and he gave us blessings. It was amazing just walking into their house we could feel the Spirit. Our ward mission leader and his family are so great! His wife is just as much into his calling as he is and she has told us that she wants to be a missionary so bad! Whenever we don’t have a dinner set up he just says "Then you're coming to our house for dinner", and his wife is totally fine with it! Their kids are hilarious! They couldn't understand my name so they called me Sister Hush and yesterday when we were over they came up with Sister Hush and Sister Harry as our nicknames!

Sister Sydnie Huss

June 17, 2013

Here's the latest email we have gotten from Sydnie. Enjoy!

Hey so sorry it was so hard to get in to my Facebook, and the whole email thing has been a mess too! I wrote you an email last week but it looks like you didn't get it because it was sent back to me so again I am so sorry! Thanks for starting the blog I think that will be really helpful and great! I actually had a wonderful birthday all my district made a big deal out of it they sang and made sure all of our teachers in the MTC  knew about it and we sang again in one of our classes. I did get the package you sent as well thanks!
Nebraska is wonderful! I got in on Wednesday and we stayed at a hotel on Wednesday and Thursday, while we had orientation and  all sorts of meetings with the mission President. It is so green here it blows my mind! We were able to go to the trail center, Winter Quarters cometary and we took safe arrival pictures outside of the Winter Quarters temple, it is so beautiful, and it was weird cause I remembered all the pictures of you and your family that were in your wedding video so I felt like I had seen it before. We didn't get to go inside but we get to go to the temple every other transfer if we are close enough. 

My companion  is wonderful! Her name is Sister Harris, she is from Colorado, and we are really similar which so far has been great! She is soo helpful! We are in an area called Plattesmouth, the major town is called Plattesmouth which is about the size of North Ogden. It also has a couple other small towns in it and the South end of Bellevue which is where we live with a member family the Bucksbees. They are an older couple and Brother Bucksbee is in the bishopric. They are so nice and it makes it way easier on us to live with members. 

It is super hot here! The humidity hasn't been too bad yet but it has been pretty stormy. The first night I was in Plattesmouth there was a huge storm with a crazy thunderstorm and tornado warning but we thankfully had just gotten back to the house when all of that started.   

This is the first time our area has had full time missionaries for a couple years because they usually work half of their time at the trail center at Winter Quarters and Half Proselyting and we are the only missionaries in the area, so we have a lot to do but a very small ward. We do have a couple investigators and we have found a couple people we met the last couple days that seem interested, so we will just have to wait and see.

Thanks for everything, love you guys!

Sister Sydnie Huss

Letter from the MTC

Here is Sydnie's first letter in the MTC! We have been having some communication troubles, but hopefully everything will be sorted out now. She left early this morning (6/12/13) for Nebraska! Enjoy!

Thanks so much for the package! I absolutly loved it! and I loved

everything inside the water bottle is great and you cant imagine how

much I have needed one, I was so mad I left it. but the one you got

will be great. I love the bracelet and the meaning behind it, it is so

special, and the address book was so needed I had been wondering how I

was going to get all the contact stuff since I was already here but

you took care of that without me even having to worry about it. I had

a wonderful birthday. My discrict is absolutly amazing and they were

constantly wishing me happy birthday they sang to me during class and

even wrote it on the whiteboard so that all of our teachers would also

know that it was my birthday and everyone was making jokes about it,

but it was great. I dont think anyone realized how big of a deal

birthdays are to me and my family until I opened your package and they

saw all of the stuff you sent but I loved it! You said that you didnt

read Kolby's letter but it was so great I was already crying but what

he wrote made me laugh so hard! he compared having a companion to

having a pet, that you have to keep it living and make sure to feed

and water it. all my roomates were laughing and my companion asked

what I would do if she got thirsty, how I would water her. I am going

to write him a handwritten letter back to what he wrote me and

hopefully it will be there like saturday or latest monday. oh and

guess who I ran into. sister Lexi Redd, she actually has been super

amazing I ran into her last friday and we talked for a minute.she

found where i live and came and saw me that night and we talked and

she wanted to make sure i was doing ok and brought me some snacks.

then on tuesday night she left my favorite snacks and a note for me

for my birthday, then she came by last night to wish em happy birthday

again.

I leave on Wednesday but we leave the MTC at 3 am, which sucks but

from everything I have heard I can call but it will be from the SLC

airport and that flight leaves at 6 am so let me know if you want me

to call it would be between 430 and 530 wednesday morning. I will be

able to do laundry and email againg on tuesday so just let me know.

with the whole email thing. I dont think that my email has been

deleted since its working now. when i got on today I had some emails,

and I have been able to get some dear elder letters from like Alesha

and Corinna so I dont know what is wrong with it. so the letter you

wrote in the package was the first letter I got.

well this week has been such a long week! it has been probably the

longest week ever it has been so hard but also so worth it! my

district is absolutly fantastic everyone gets along so well! its like

we are a family away from our families, every day is so structured and

even in your personal time the teachers have suggestions and things

they want you to do and to read so that has been really difficult as

well as going to bed at 1030 and waking up. we actually wake up at 6

so that we can all get ready and do the things we need to in the

morning. I am pretty sure the time rules were written by a man because

any woman would know you need more than a half hour to get ready.

other than that all the things you have heard about the MTC both good

and bad are most likely true, its been interesting in one way I just

cant wait to leave but on the other I dont want to leave this

enviornment

I do need som things from home but I think I am going to wait unitl I

get to Nebraska to make sure of what I need. but if you could have

Cici get me a bag like one that they have a the sister missionary mall

in provo that would be great. they dont have any here at the bookstore

and I am realizing that I really do need one before I go out. I can

send them money or you can give them money out of my account but if

she could do that and just drop it off here that would be great! I am

staying in the MTC campus so i will be able to get it really easily. I

would just ask Hayden to do that but we both know that would be a bad

idea. if Cici can do that it would be great! and if you can send me

their address or their email that would also be great!

Love You

Sister Sydnie Huss