Monday, July 1, 2013

Summer time and the livin' is easy

Well another week has come and gone. Was it a fast week for everyone or just me? The weather here is insane. It is either burning hot and deathly humid, a little chilly or it's a rain storm. Most days it is all 3 of these things. Thanks for everyone's emails!

Last Monday after pday we went to a lesson we have scheduled with a less active family and they ended up flaming us so we decided to tract their street. We found a really cool mom that has an 11 year old son. She let us teach her the Restoration and we learned that she had been meeting with the West Cleveland missionaries. So cool. She committed to baptism. Their names are Carol and Walter. A few days this week it was so hot. We tried to tract as little as possible so we did a lot of stop bys with little success. We didn't really find any new investigators this week. On Thursday I went on exchanges with Sister Ellsworth. She is one of the new Sister Training Leaders.  It was fun. We went to my area so I was in charge of the day. We found a cool guy named Scott that really needs the church. He committed to baptism. We went back to teach him on Friday and he flamed us. I'm kinda over people flaming us. We have started making these cards that tell people when their next appointment is with us and to call us if they need to reschedule (ya know kinda like doctor's offices do). We thought that would help but it hasn't. I am making this week seem like it was a crappy week but it really wasn't. Saturday night Sister Pop and I got a call and they needed someone to speak in church the next morning. People think that missionaries have all of this time to just write talks and give lessons on the fly. The reason we are so good at giving lessons on the fly is because we practice them 8 hundred million times so then we can just walk up to someone and teach them. It's ok though. We were suppose to talk about America. We were each given 15 mins to talk. It went fine. For the last hour of church the bishop got the whole ward together and talked about a new plan for member missionary work. Whoa our ward is on fire. Have I told ya'll about my ward? My ward consists of 99% young, mid 20's, newlyweds. Everyone either has a newborn baby or is pregnant. Almost all of the husbands in the ward are going to Case Western for dental school. It's a fun ward because everyone is my age. It's really easy to relate to them because they haven't been off their missions for too long. This is what the ward came up with: The assistant ward mission leader is going to be setting up a Google doc that will have live updates each time we get an appointment. We will be texting him whenever we schedule an appt with someone and then again at the end of nightly planning. He has set up a schedule where he will add our appts. Each time something is added it gets texted and emailed to everyone in the ward. He said that he is doing this for 2 reasons. 1. so that members can start coming with us to teach and 2. so the ward can see how hard we are working. I am really excited about this. This guy seems solid! This same guy said that on his mission he was in charge of organizing all of the area books for the mission. He would organize them by where the people geographically live and color coordinate it with where members in the ward live and tons of other cool stuff. We gave him our area book to organize. It's going to be awesome. Also each Wednesday will be social night at the church. Anyone can come and look at the building and hang out and get to know members. This week the ward is going to visit each investigator we have and invite them to join the church. so cool. The Kirtland Pageant starts this week. I bet ya didn't know Kirtland does a Pageant. It is called This is Kirtland. Our ward is going to it on Saturday. It should be way fun. Oh ya!!!!!!! So last night on our way home we pulled over to this field and got out. The field was COVERED in fireflies. It literally took my breath away. It was the coolest thing I have ever seen. I am so sad that their wont be fireflies here when ya'll come and pick me up. I didn't have my camera so we are going back tonight to watch the fireflies. hhmm.. I think that is all that is going on with me. Sister Poppleton goes home in 2 weeks. It is weird having a trunky companion. Weird to see her pack to go home. Transfers are in 2 weeks which means that I will stay in Euclid and a new companion will come to me. I hope everyone is doin good! Have a good 4th of July! I love you all!

Sister Frampton

Almost 9 months out!

Hey everyone! Thank you so much for your emails. I love them! Dall...? You are snoozin on the job. I guess nothing else is new with that. haha

This week was so busy I don't even remember everything that happened. Sister Gee gave me a package that had a big 50 points in it. That was a good laugh. On Tuesday I was able to chat online with Kent. He is still in rehab but he is doing really good. He is no longer having withdrawls! :) He said that he wants to get baptized still. I have taught him all of the lessons so all he needs to do is start going to church regularly and meet with missionaries in person. He went to church 2 Sundays ago and he was suppose to go yesterday (I havent talked to him yet). He committed to meet with missionaries. He is really embarrassed that he is in rehab so he doesn't want the missionaries to meet him there. I called his missionaries and they said they could meet him after church. Hopefully they were able to meet him so we can get him baptized! On Thursday  it was Sister Poppleton's birthday! We had a fun day. We found 2 new investigators. Sawweeettt! Friday was predicted as the busiest day we will have all year at Kirtland. We had 9 bus tours scheduled plus all of the people that just walk in. They had almost every companionship (15 companions) scheduled to work that day. They had us all stationed at certain places and ready to go. 1400 people ended up coming in on Friday. I gave 6 tours. I was dead by the end of the night but it was so much fun!! It has been getting sooo hot here. I didn't think it would get miserable in Ohio because we are up north but I was wrong. It is so humid here. I have forgotten what it feels like to live in a humid place. I don't even need lotion. I am going to shrivel up when I get home. On Saturday we were able to get 7 new investigators! Ok so in order for someone to become a new investigator you have to have taught them a lesson, said a prayer with them and scheduled a return appointment. This week we ended having 9 new investigators. This week and last week combined we have 21 new investigators. It is crazy! We have seen a lot of miracles lately. I love it! Last night we had dinner at the worst house ever! I know at I shouldn't complain. I'm not complaining... I'm just painting a picture so you can see what I went through and then you can be proud of me. I have heard from past sisters that this lady's house is sooo gross (That's nothing new for Ohio). My mindset was oh come on I served in Painesville, the worst of the worst when it comes to cleanliness. She signed up to feed us but we had a better idea. We told her that Sister Poppleton wanted to have a birthday dinner and her favorite food is pizza so we would bring over a pizza to eat. That way she doesn't have to cook for us and we don't have to use any of her plates, silverware. I could not believe what I saw when I got there. It smelt like the worst bad breathe and cats. Her floor was covered in garbage. There were some bloody tissues in the corner, no big deal. Cat hair everywhere. No joke I had cat hair stick to my lip gloss. I couldn't breathe. I got a huge glob of hand sanitizer out of my bag and put it on my hands and then kept my hands in front of my face and wiffed that the whole time. Then there was the kitchen..... no no no no!!! An inch thick of grease all over the wall. Pots on the stove that had mold growing in them. Rotten milk on the counter. It was so bad. How can people just be down with this? I know that I am not a clean person. I know that I am messy but this takes it to a whole new level. I just have a lot of clothes that sometimes are on the floor and shoes that stay at the front door. I would never let my house get like this. Thank you mom for keeping our house so clean. Seriously. People don't get it out here. I was trying so hard to not let her see me dying inside. I was sitting on the very edge of the couch (eeewww I was in my new clothes) and I kept everything that I owned on my lap so it wouldn't touch the floor. We cooked the pizza at the church so we were safe to eat. I took one bite and I couldn't do it. Nope. I forced myself to eat one piece and I thought I was good to go. Nope! They had some moldy soda in the fridge that they wanted to share. We had to think quick how we would get out of this. Sister Pop told them that she had an empty water bottle that she could drink hers out of. That way the couldn't track how much she didn't drink. I told them that I had my water so I didn't want anything to drink. I don't think they heard me say that because they came back into the living room with a big cup for me to drink. No no no!!!!! I looked all around to see if there was a near by plant that I could dump it into or some way for me to ditch this drink. There were black clumps of something around the rim of the cup and I couldn't look inside the cup because I was scared. The lady was watching me and waiting for me to take a drink. I quickly said a prayer asking that I could get through this with out gettin sick. I closed my eyes and took a big old drink. I gagged and spit it back into the cup. It was so embarrassing. All I could think to say was "Sorry I dont really like soda." Ya pretty sure she saw right through me. Sorry but clean your house. Any advice for me folks? Get ready Mccall for this. You always have to have an escape plan for when you go to eat at a yucky house!  Did anyone besides dad watch the broadcast last night? Isn't that so cool? They were really cracking down on you guys. I hope that you take it seriously. It is so important that members help out the missionaries. You will be held accountable for it when you are judged. Don't think that just because you live in Salt Lake that you don't need to help the missionaries. Are there any less actives in the ward that you can be helping? A quote that I loved from last night was "Don't wait for an assignment to start doing something. This is your assignment. Start doing something NOW!" HERE is the new website that has been launched in conjunction with the broadcast last night. Please look at that and start making plans to help the missionaries. Have the missionaries over for dinner please. They will be able to help you fulfill your calling as a member missionary. Will you also look at THIS? If you are looking for blessings in your life this is an easy thing that you can do to get blessings. Something that I love is Mormon Messages. If you don't know what those then look HERE. Those are so easy to share with people. You can also order DVDs of them HERE. Have the Fuocos over for dinner and a game night and then watch one of them. The best way to help a family become interested in the Gospel is to have them see what the church has done for you. It is more than just waving hi at them from across the yard. Have them in your home. Ask them to teach you about their beliefs then teach them that you have more to add to theirs. Ok so that is all with my little speach. I love you all so much! This transfer is going really good. Sister Poppleton goes home in 3 weeks. Weird. We are having 7 Kirtland Sisters go home. That is a huge chunk. Then I step up to be one of the Sisters that has been out the longest. So weird! My half way mark is July 10th!!!!!!!!!! Fireflies are now out. They are so cool. Did we have those in Texas? I feel like we did but I can't remember. Kids here break off the light part and put them on their finger as a diamond ring. Funny and gross. Well I love you all lots! I miss you so much.

Lacee

Short Week!

Hey everyone! Thanks so much for all of the emails. The wedding looks like it was so much fun. Is it a huge relief for it to finally be over now? Hopefully ya'll can take a big nap or something to recover. We had a fun week this week. We ended the week with 13 new investigators! So that's exciting! Mom did you get my father's day present? You didn't say anything. I'm glad you got yours dad. My pday has been changed to Monday now so it wasn't too long ago that I was just emailing you (last Wednesday).

Last Wednesday after pday we went out to our area at 6:00pm. We were outside of an apartment building talking to people and we get a text from the AP saying that a tornado warning has been issued for our mission. We were told to immediately get inside and to call our district leader the minute we were inside. It was so cool! I love stuff like this. It was definitely high action. At that moment we were surrounded by apartment buildings. To get into the buildings you have to have a key so we couldn't go inside any of those. We got in the car and tried to call the closest member to see if they would let us come over until further notice. (Oh ps we live about 30 mins away from our area so we were stuck out in Euclid.) We called everyone and no one was answering. The zone leaders were calling us like crazy because we didn't report back to tell them that we were inside. The weather was getting crazy. It was so so windy and the sky was black and green. We ended up just going to a Mcdonalds until we had another place to go. After about 30 mins of waiting there our district leader told us to go straight home and to make sure that when we get home we find all the flashlights at our house and be prepared for anything. We were stoked! We went home and found some dinky flashlights and we filled up two buckets of water (in case the water went out.) We packed a little "to go" back in case we had to leave on quick notice. The mission and the sisters really knew what to do because they were hit by hurricane Sandy. In our mission power was out for days and lots of houses flooded. We didn't hear any other news about the tornado for the rest of the night. It is really annoying to not be able to listen to the radio in situations like these. We went to bed but we were up all night. The weather was INSANE. I have never seen anything like it before. It was hailing huge chunks of ice, the wind was whippin trees around and the lighting was so crazy. As far as we know a tornado never actually hit anywhere in Ohio but the wind and hail did enough damage. Oh ya and because we had to leave our area early that night we had to cancel our appointment with our super prepared family that we found. That's ok though. (I attached a picture of the sky.)

On Friday a neighboring stake had girls' camp and for part of their week they get to come tour Kirtland. How fun! We didn't get to do that at my young women's camp. We took a large group on tour. I haven't worked with the young women while being on my mission so it was fun to spend some time with them. Friday night all the sisters volunteered to work at booth at the Strawberry Festival (aka Kirtland Carnival aka trailer park heaven). We were in charge of making strawberry shortcakes and handing them out to the people. It was so much fun. There was loud music and tons of people. They had the shadiest rides there. I wanted to ride them so bad but missionaries can't ride rides. Rats! Next time.

Saturday was busy busy for us. (Probably not as busy as the wedding on Saturday but...) I thought about the wedding all day. I searched the whole house for wedding colors so I could wear them but I do not own one thing that is pink. oh well. We had tons of appointments set up. We met a guy on Wednesday that said we could come back Saturday. When we got to his house he wasn't home but his mom and his brother were. We taught them about the Plan of Salvation and we added them to our new investigator pool. We also found two 20 year olds at a bus stop and we taught them the Restoration. We set up a return appointment with them so we also added those two to our new investigator pool. I feel like we have been walking around and picking up new investigators all along the way. We went and met with a former investigator and we taught him the gospel of Christ. We talked about baptism and he loved it. He acted baptism for June 11th. So we added him to our new investigator pool and an investigator with a baptism. 

Sunday was really crazy at sites. A 4 bus tour showed up and we were ready to go. It was a group of historic museum and farm people. The people were either farmers or curators or restorers ... They were an interesting bunch. I felt like an idiot giving them a tour. We were told not to give a religious tour, just historical facts. They were asking if we knew how the floorboards were restored and if we knew the process of getting the artifacts. I dont know! Come on folks! Then we had another 4 bus tour come. It was a youth conference from Michigan. The person that sits at the front desk counts how many people come in each day. At the end of yesterday 778 people had come. That is so many people!!! I was really tired by the end of the day. 

Mom will you start sending me the rest of the clothes that I left? A lady in my ward gave us tons of vacuum pack bags so I am going to put all of my winter things in these bags and then store them in the basement for the winter. I am ready for summer clothes. 

They have started to really crack down on the Visitors' Center sisters. They are telling us that we have to be dressed so nice and look really good. We are no long allowed to wear Toms. Our nail polish has to be skin color. We should plan on wearing a blazer (I bought a hideous black one) a few times a week. The head lady of Visitors' Centers is coming in two weeks to do a 2 day training with us. She wants to take a tour from 8 sets of sisters (that's a lot of tours for her). She is really going to help us be better. I am slightly scared but it will be good.

Thanks for everything ya'll do! I love you all and miss you!

Sister Frampton



A week of ups and downs

Hello family. I have spent most of my email time emailing back and forth with everyone (which is good) but that means I only have a short time to email right now. *** Oh ya, everyone put this in your phones or on your calendar STARTING NEXT MONDAY MY PDAY WILL BE BACK ON MONDAYS. They had to redo our Visitors' Center schedule because of all the bus tours that are coming so I am back to Monday. Wedding seems to be coming to a close. So fun! I am going to wear wedding colors on Saturday. Yippee.

So last Thursday I started feeling really sick. My whole body hurt and my throat hurt and I was super stuffy and had a fever. I was sent home from Sites and I went to bed about 8:00 Thursday night and Friday at 5:30pm I was woken up and told that I have to go next door so that I could be with another sick Sister as temp companions. I went to sleep, wandered over to my house at 9:30pm and woke up Saturday at 4:00pm. I was dead. I had a bad sinus infection mixed with strep. Yuck! Everyone in Kirtland is getting it. I am getting better now so that is good!

Do ya'll remember Tommy? Well his friend that referred him to us when I was in Painesville lives in my new area. I talked with Tommy and his friend and we are going to start teaching Tommy again at his friend's house. Pretty cool!

Also remember Kenton Rennton? Well he has been in rehab for 60 days and hasn't really been able to talk with us. We were sitting on chat a few days ago and up pops a chat from him. So random but so exciting! Perfect timing because if we were on a tour we would have totally missed him. Kent is doing really good. He said that he got 2 hours of off site privledges and he is going to use those 2 hours to go to one of our churches. I haven't heard if he actually made it to church but cross our fingers that he did.

Ok because I am short on time I will jump to the two miracles that happened last night!!!!!! After dinner we went to go find a former investigator. When we got to the address we  had for her it was a huge apartment complex. We didn't know which room was hers. We decided to knock on the first door and ask if they knew her. They didn't. At the door I blurted out "We teach people about Jesus. Do you want to learn more about Jesus?" It was this big old black lady. She was like "ya my kids need Jesus. Get in here! Girls scoot over, these girls are going to teach us more about Jesus." There were two ladies there with 3 teenage girls. They have sweet black girl names- Elisha, Rachelle, Larrisha, Jomika and Janaja. The mom said " I think it would be good for my girls to hear it from ya'll since you are close in age." It seriously was so cool. The 17 year old said the opening prayer and in it she said "help us to learn something from these girls that we don't already know." We taught them about faith and repentance. While we were teaching repentance the one lady stopped us and was like ok girls do you understand what repentance is? Do you really understand it? She kept checking to see if the girls understood what we were teachin them! At the end of the lesson the prayer was sooo powerful! The agreed to have us come back tonight! They all hugged us goodbye and told us that they loved us. As the 17 year old girl hugged Sister Poppleton she said "When I was in Washington I used to have the Elders come over. I have been praying for more missionaries to come back." AHHHHH!!!!!! What the heck. So cool!!! We are going to commit them tonight to be baptized June 29th!

The next miracle: So after that lesson we were obviously on cloud nine. We drove to a street to tract but we weren't allowed to park on that street so we drove around the corner to park on some random street. When we got out I felt like we should knock on this house. We knocked and they let us right in. It was a young family with 2 girls ages 7 and 8. We taught them the plan of salvation and they LOVED it!!!! It was so cool. They accepted baptism and they want to come to church. They even asked us for a Book of Mormon. Miracles really do happen. We knocked 2 doors yesterday and got 8 new investigators. Please pray for them. The names of the 2nd family are Ashley, Ryan, Tyler and Jordan.

Seeing the Hopkins was so fun yesterday. I loved it. I was only able to give them 1/2 of the tour because I had District Meeting. It's always a little boost to see people you know from home.

I love you all so much! Thanks for all your support.

Lacee


Euclid!

Hello Hello everyone. As you can see that my pday is now on Wednesdays so make sure that your emails are sent by then so I can see them. This past week has been so crazy but good. Last Tuesday was my last day in Painesville and Sister Gee made sure that I visited everyone one last time. It was a good but sad day. Sister Gee stayed in Painesville. My whole mission I have lived in Hyrum Smith's home with another set of sisters that serve in Euclid. So my whole mission I have heard all about the Euclid ward and about all the people. Euclid was Sister Gee's last area. Well on Wednesday I found out that I was being transferred to Euclid. I already knew half of the ward so that was kinda fun. My new companion is Sister Poppleton. She is so great. She is from San Diego. This is her last transfer so she is ready to work hard. They decided to mix up where everyone lives so that new sisters can live with new sisters so we moved out of the Hyrum Smith home and we moved a few houses down. I had so much crap and it was hard to move when you are only given 2 hours but i did it. Euclid is sooo different from Painesville. Painesville was really poor and had tons of Spanish people. Euclid is part of Cleveland. It is very city with tons of black people. Literally every single person is black. We are teaching a lady named Mariestella and she is from Nigeria. We spent the other day talking about chapati and she is going to make it for us next lesson!!!!! Painesville was really small. I was able to get around the area with no gps. Euclid is huge!!!! My area doesn't just cover one tiny city like my last area but 10 huge cities- Willowick, Wickliffe, Wiloughby Hills, Richmond Heights, Highland Heights, Gates Mill, Mayfield, Mayfeild Heights and Cleveland Heights. We are teaching quite a few people so we are staying busy. Sister Tok also served in this area so whenever I bring up her name people instantly love me because Tok is so great!!!! That is basically everything that is going on here. Sites is getting really busy. Tons of bus tours. I am giving about 4 tours a day. That is 8 hours total of tour giving. It is a lot of work. Wedding plans are coming to an end. So fun!!!!! Wish I could be there. I got the wedding invite and a few bridal pictures. Love them!!! Good luck with everything. I love everyone! 

Sister Frampton



Ch ch ch changes, turn and face the sun

Happy Memorial Day! Answer me this... I opened my email today and it had a big zero. Did something happen? Is everyone ok? Well for me this week I had a really great fun week and also a really sad hard week. Let's start with last Monday, Pday. Last week I went on exchanges to the Amish country and I really wanted to take Sister Gee back and show it to her. We went with the Jones couple and spent some time with the Amish. It was a blast! The pictures I attached with this email are from the Amish country. There is one more picture (I'll attach it in the next email because myldsmail wont let me send big emails) that we took in Middlefield. There is a famous Amish restaurant called Mary Yoders. We bee bopped over there and had lunch. I will for sure be taking ya'll to Amish country when you come pick me up. We stopped in at a huge quilt shop. Mom,  you and both grandmas would have DIED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! There was a quilt that was made out of tiny yo-yos. It was so cool. It was $1800. We will for sure be going there. The Amish people think that if you take a picture of them or of something they have made a part of their soul is taken away so they didn't allow pictures in the quilt shop. Wednesday we worked at Pioneer School. Remember what that is? Historic Kirtland Visitors' Center is part of the Lake County Historical Society. During the summer the county building puts on different "days camps" or field trip things. The Sisters are in charge of candle dipping. It was our turn this week. It was so much fun. I didn't realize how much I missed teaching children until this week. This week we had 2nd graders. We taught 3 groups for an hour each. It was great. We get to dress up like pioneers and have a good old time. After Pioneer school Sister Gee got a call from President. He asked her if she would train a new missionary that is coming. I cannot tell you how excited I was for her. President asked me if I thought it was a good idea for her to be training. HECK YES IT IS!!!!! Sister Gee is an amazing person and she has come to be my very best friend. These last two transfers I have grown the most and I owe it all to her. She has all the right qualities of a missionary. She knows how to be diligent and reverent but she also knows how to be loud and have fun. Daily we find ourselves laughing to tears together. Her new companion is so lucky! I am also heartbroken to be leaving Painesville. Painesville is my house. I can drive around Painesville without a map or GPS and I can find anything. I can drive down the road and wave to people that are walking around because I have talked to them and made friends with them. I am pretty sure that I couldn't do that in Salt Lake. When I go downtown I def need my iphone to help me get around and I don't know people that are walking down the street. Changes are part of missionary work. Once you learn that things get easier. Learn that right now Mccall. You fall in love with people and then the next minute they are our of your life forever. After Pioneer School Sister Gee and I had a good cry together. It will be good though. I feel 100% confident in leaving Painesville with Sister Gee. The hard part of all of this is telling the people that I wouldn't be coming anymore. We were at Sites the rest of Wednesday so we couldn't tell people in person. I called the Pina family- Cynthia and Fatima. I have been teaching them for almost 8 months. I am literally part of their family. I feel comfortable walking into their house with out knocking and walking over to the sink and filling up my water bottle or driving to their house and asking them if we can use their bathroom while we are out tracting. They are awesome. Cynthia answered the phone she is 13 years old. She was in shock. She kept saying " No no no! Who is the guy that is in charge of you. Let me call him and tell him that you can't leave." Sad! We went over to their house on Thursday and told the rest of the family. A 5 year old girl lives with them and she was so sad which made me so sad. Fatima said the opening prayer and spent like 5 minutes asking God to take care of me and to bless me and to make sure that someone really nice takes my place. Needless to say I cried my makeup off during that whole prayer. The hard thing about being a missionary is you can't ever say, "Ya I know this sucks that I am leaving" or " I'm mad at President for transferring me." (I mean you can say that stuff but not to investigators or people in the ward.) You have to teach them that everything is in God's plan and that you have confidence that the next missionary will be someone that will be great for them. I took a video of the Pina family. I had each of them talking in it. This email won't let me send long videos so maybe I will put it on a disk and mail home all my videos or something..? Or does anyone know how to change the format of a video to a smaller size? On Friday President had a meeting with all of the missionaries that would be training. This transfer there are 3 Visitor Center sisters that are training. They put the companions of the trainers together for the day and kept us at Sites. We were able to give a really cool tour. The Community of Christ has a summer intern program that just started. 6 college students moved out here for the summer and they will be learning how to give tours of the Kirtland Temple. The main CofC guy brought the interns down and asked if we could give them a tour so the interns could 1. learn the history of our church and see how it matches up with theirs and 2. learn how to give really great tours. The three of us were asked to take them out. I was really nervous. I didn't want to say anything that would offend them however I did want to say things that would bring the Spirit. The tour ended up being really great. The CofC people basically have the same beliefs we do they just don't follow the word of wisdom. Since the tour I have seen some of them around Kirtland and it is really great that I can stop and talk to them since we are now friends! We are not allowed to ask anyone from the Kirtland Community of Christ church to let us teach them. They aren't allowed to do it to us either. However if they ask us questions then we can teach them. All we can do right now is be their friends and help them see how great our church is. I'm sure a lot of you have wondered this at some point in your life- Is the church ever going to own the Kirtland Temple? The answer is no. It is better that way. There would be no point. The CofC take really good care of it. They are so respectful and everything they say on tour is accurate to our church. Also if we ended up getting the temple what would we use it for? We couldn't use it as a temple. It is basically the same as the Assembly Hall on Temple Square. It is just a big chapel. The reason the Kirtland Temple was built was so keys could be restored for temple ordinances. Those keys were restored and the purpose of the Kirtland Temple came to pass. (Sorry I am kinda going off about this.) Anywhoo... to sum it all up. Don't worry about who owns the Kirtland Temple. It is being well taken care of. On Saturday we were asked to help with a huge young single adult activity. All of the eastern states get together for a huge EFY like event and they call it Zion's Camp. We were asked to help with breakfast. It was really fun to talk with people our age for once. It was also kinda fun to sit back and watch all of these people try and flirt with each other. We were SSSOOOOOOO glad that we were not in their position. Those cheesy YSA activities can be painful. A bunch of 30 year olds checkin each other out next to the punch bowl. Yikes! The Island of Misfit Toys. Sister Gee and I grabbed one of their schedules and were casually looking to see what they would be doing for the day when all of the sudden my eyes caught the name Alex Boye`. I have come to love him on my mission. He is one of the only church cds that I can listen to without wanting to die. If you don't know who Alex Boye` is you can check him out HERE and HERE. He was having a concert in the Kirtland Temple that night. We ran to our planners and tried to figure out how we could arrange our lessons so we could make it front row to the concert. We decided to be obedient and not go to his concert. (However later that night we might have been peekin out our window lookin for him across at the temple.)  All of Saturday I took a farewell tour around Painesville. We spent the day stopping at peoples' homes to say by. We had lunch with a less active Sister Wheeler. We had a good lesson with the Atleys. She is in her late 80s and started crying when I had to say good bye therefore, I started crying. Geezzz when I said by to all of you at the MTC I was happy as a lark and bee bopped right on it. I've turned into some whimpy crier. You'd be shocked. A member in the ward had a goodbye bonfire for Sister Christian (she is another missionary in the ward. She is going home this week. It's weird to think that missionaries actually finish their missions. It seems like missions go on FOREVER!) and me. It was really nice of him to do that. A few people from the ward came and we had a good time laughing and joking. Man I love these people. I think it will be good that I am leaving because if they ever want to see me they will have to come to the Visitors' Center and that will automatically bring more people out to take tours. Sunday morning Zion's Camp was having sacrament meeting in the temple. Alex would be doin a little number in the middle of the meeting. Sister Gee and I ran over to the temple before our ward started and tried to stop Alex. (Yes I know what you are thinking... You guys are losers! Ya we know. We don't have much out here as missionaries so let us get star struck when a Mormon celebrity comes to town!) We weren't allowed to attend the Sacrament Meeting so we snuck in and spotted Alex on the front row. That was good enough for us but some YSA kid that was in charge grabbed us and asked us if we wanted to meet him. YES!! He introduced us to him and we shook his hand. It would have been slightly inappropriate to snap a photo of him as Sacrament Meeting was trying to start. I invited him to come to the Visitors' Center and take a tour from us. He said he really wanted to but his plane was leaving early. We also told him thank you for making aMormon.org profile because we are able to share it with others. He was really nice. We pretty much are famous because we met Alex Boye. Good times. I didn't really want my ward to know that I was being transferred. I just wanted a clean break. They have seen missionaries come and go so they are used to is. I didn't want to spend all of church taking pictures with people and watching people cry and blah blah blah... I just wanted to go to church. Well I made it all the way to the last 10 mins of church when the relief society president announces that I am getting transferred and she has me come stand in front while they all sing God Be With You 'Till We Meet Again. Ya might as well just rip my heart out and take it home in your purse. The women started crying so then I started crying. What the heck folks! I'm not dying. During the song the R.S. Pres (did I also mention that she is nutty?) was kissing me on the cheek so I had lipstick all over the place. After church people trapped me in the R.S. room. Peeps were cryin and all trying to hug me at once and ask where I was getting transferred. People also had cornered Sister Gee and were asking her who she was getting. Sister Gee ended up kinda being pushed out of the R.S. room and I was trying to weave around people to find her (in case you didn't know companions have to be side by side 24/7). It ended up turning into a mad house. So claustrophobic. Everyone was trying to touch me and get my attention. I started having a mini panic attack so I grabbed Sister Gee and we ran to the car and hid in it until the other Sisters came out. See ya later Perry Ward! I guess people get attached after almost 8 months together. We drove to Sites and it looked like Disneyland. Hoards of people were walkin around. Visiting the Visitors' Center was the last part of the Zion's Camp activity. At one point we had 8 tours out with each tour having about 20-30 people. That is a ton of people!!!!!!!! It was a lot of fun to hang out with peeps our age and ask them about college or what is going on in the outside world. Ok so this email is really long because since it is Memorial Day the libraries are closed so we are emailing at someone's house. Sister Gee finished her emailing in 5 mins and she is currently passed out on the floor which leaves me some time to write. I stayed up really late last night packing up all of my stuff. Man I have a lot of crap. I was able to ditch all of the useless junk and fit everything in my 2 suitcases. Transfer meeting is on Wednesday and that is when I find out my fate. President tends to do anything and everything with Site sisters when it comes to transfers. Site sisters can be sent to the other side of the state and spend a transfer or 2 never coming to Sites (this happens to almost every missionary at some point!! yikes!) or they can be sent to live off campus and come to Sites once a week (that is currently the situation that Kylie is in right now) or he can keep you living on Site and have you at the Visitors' Center 4 days a week.  Right now the sky's the limit for me. I really don't want to go full pros. I would cry really hard. I have come to love giving tours at Kirtland. Sisters that have had to go full pros have said that it is very lonely out there but that it is a good learning experience. Heavenly Father is in charge and he will put me where I am suppose to go. I think that is all that I can possibly think of to write home this week. I love you all. I am sorry about Jack. That is so sad. Plans for a new dog? How is Austin handling it? Also will someone just email me and let me know that you are all alive? I love you all! OHHHH ya!!!! How could I have forgotten this???? I got the wedding invite!!!! Darling!!!!!!! Obsessed!!!!! I think it has gone through each of the Kirtland Sisters' hands. We all approve! I also got your postcard mom. That was really nice of you. I love love getting mail in my mail box. I like it more then getting emails (hint hint!). Have a great week peeps. 

Sister Frampton



Amish With the Amish

Hello Hello! It sounds like this week is busy with weddings and such. I am so excited to get an invite in the mail!! Ok so today I have zero time to write. I am sorry it sounds like I say that every week. Here is some highlights from the week.

1. On Tuesday I went on exchanges with Sister Palmer to the Amish country. It was so much fun. Amish are crazy! I cannot believe they choose to live like that. We were able to say 3 prayers with people as we were tracting.

2. Wednesday was Zone Conference. The Aps broke us up  into groups and had us teach each other different things. President grabbed Sister Gee and I and said I want the two of you to teach me. AHHHHH!!!!!!!!! He wanted us to teach him the Word of Wisdom in 5 mins. Well we did it and we rocked!!! After we finished teaching we went back in the chapel and he went on and on complementing us in front of our Zone. Score some points with President!!!!!

3. The people from the Community of Christ (the church that owns the Kirtland Temple) came through and checked out the art exhibit that I set up. They loved it so much and they asked if I could start helping them at the Kirtland Temple. I got permission and for 2 hours each week I am going to be redoing all of the exhibits at the Kirtland Temple. YAY!!! so fun!!!!

4. Transfers are this week. Please pray that I dont get transferred. Sister Gee and I are doing so well together. I will find out on Sunday if I am getting the boot or not.

5. In about 5 mins. Sister Gee and I are going back to the Amish country. She didn't get to come with me on exchanges so she missed out. I will for sure take you all there when you come to get me. It is so fun! We are going to a big fair that they put on.

I love you all so much! The church is true no matter where you are!

Haaffeenn gaffeenn ubernacken!
Sister Frampton