Viva La Vida

 Well this is it, I'm typing this up as I'm sitting in the hotel with my parents, my mission is actually over. I have officially completed my 18 months as a representative of Jesus Christ. I can't believe its come so fast.

I decided to name this email in a very fitting way, still keeping to my theme of song titles I landed on naming it Viva La Vida which means "Live Life." Which is exactly what I've been doing, and now what I'm about to do again. The mission gave me the exact 'Reset Button' for life that I always knew I needed, and now, I get to push it again and step into the rest of my life... how absolutely terrifying. 

I was listening to a missionary devotional and I wrote down at the top of my paper, "Sometimes it has to be us" after looking at it for a minute I realized, "Sometimes it gets to be us" Sometimes I got to be the reason someone changed their life, sometimes I got to be the person someone ran to, sometimes I got to be the savior for someone else. That was something I got to do. And now I get to do that for the rest of my life because I have finally learned how to be the tool God can use.

These past 18 months will always be in my heart and have led me to the people I know I will spend the rest of my life with and around. Thank you for always supporting and encouraging me to get this far. 

I have grown so much, I honestly barely recognize the person I have become but I know that I am exactly who God knew I could be. I will be eternally grateful for all that He invested in me, and I hope to continue everyday to invest in His children to try and pay Him back. 

So don't forget about me! Even though you won't see me around, or you don't get to read every week about my life, I still love and care for each and everyone of you. You were on this journey with me, in a big or small way you changed my life!

Please please come/watch my homecoming this Sunday at 9 am!! Go check my Facebook and Instagram if you want the link and/or address! You can also message me and I'll send it to you! 

To quote a previous missionary, "I'm off to The Land of Endless Pdays on the Transfer Bus in the Sky"

I'll see you all in the afterlife!

Keep in touch!

Email: cartersavanna@gmail.com

I love you all lots and loads

Remember God is in the details

And for the very last time,

Sister Carter

WHELP

 WHELP 

Another weeks past and here I am again reminiscing about the good ole times. It'll be a good weekly this week so make sure you tune into the end!

So to start off the week I attended my final Zone Conference last week, which was such a bitter sweet moment. I don't think that it has quite set in that I am never going to attend another Zone Conference as a missionary. During my departing testimony I stood up and said, "Well I guess this is it, its finally here" I went on to talk about how my very first transfer I remember a sister who was going home stand up to give her departing testimony and I was SO upset. I remember thinking, this has got to be some sort of punishment because here I am... just starting... and I get to see someone who is DONE. I then said, "Now I understand why they have the departing missionaries give their testimonies" I finished my testimony and I looked at my Mission President, who I have looked up to spiritually for the past 18 months. In that moment, he looked at me like any proud father should. That is when I finally realized how much I had changed and accomplished on my mission. He looked at me just smiling, and it helped me to know that he was so proud of who I had grown up to be during these 18 months. That was the best feeling in the entire world.

After Zone Conference finished one of my good mission friends came up to me to talk about this being my last Zone Conference. I then said, "Honestly I remember looking at departing missionaries and hating that they got to leave!" (half joking) and she said, "That's how I feel about you!" then I said when I finally learned, "They don't have us stand up to show off that we are done, its because we are who you can be at the end of your mission. You can be me, so do it" 

SO that's what I learned, that we need to look at those who are "better" or "farther in life" or are "more spiritual" and see them as a goal for ourselves, because there is absolutely nothing that is holding us back besides our own self doubt. So do it, be the "better" be the "farther in life" be the "most spiritual" I dare you.

This week I also had the chance to join another lesson with Lilly, who we found a few weeks ago and passed her to the missionaries in her area. She is someone that I specifically felt connected to and I was so blessed to be part of her continuing conversion story. So we joined the lesson and it went pretty normal, (The Elders were leading the lesson and tbh... even I was bored but the information got across) and at the end they asked, "So Lilly do you have any questions?" and she goes, "Not about what you talked about today but I do have a question about the date we set because....." At this point in the story I couldn't listen because I realized she had a date set for her to be baptized and I started screaming. So finally when I stopped screaming and clapping really loudly she said she wanted to be baptized on December 5th and I LITERALLY AM SO EXCITED. She has honestly changed her life. She knows now what brings her eternal joy and you can see it in her face. She will be one of the best stories of my entire mission. So everyone please pray for her!

So that's it! Another weekly in the books! There is only 2 more of these things left so stay tuned! These next two will be huge!

I love you all lots and loads!

Remember God is in the Details!

Sister Carter

You are the music in me

Here I am again typing out another weekly email trying to hold back the bundle of emotions I've felt this past week. Don't worry I'll hold back the tears for this email ;) *already crying*

This weeks episode on the Sister Carter Show will focus primarily on my love of the Savior, as this week I've been specifically inspired about my connection to Him. So cue the theme music

*insert Havana Ooo Nah Nah music changed to say Savanna Ooo Nah Nah*

All jokes aside I was touched multiple times this week as I realized how close I have grown to my Savior Jesus Christ over these past 18 months (yea I hit my 18 month mark this coming Sunday... wild right?) During my last Zone Meeting this week my Zone Leader asked us all what the Savior means to us. I raised my hand and said, "He is everything to me" Now I know that may seem super generic but then I continued, "There is a song that is supposed to be a love song but it perfectly explains what I mean when I say He is everything to me" The song goes something like this but I am going to change the words slightly to fit Christ.

He is the air I breathe

He is the song I sing

He is the war that I can't win, 

this is my white flag in the wind

Every word He speaks

is the air I breathe

I didn't and I still don't know how to express my thoughts more purely than that. Christ has given me everything I have. In my past apartments I had a picture wall filled with pictures from my life, my baptism, clogging pictures, vacations with friends, lots and lots of mission pictures, basically my whole life was shown on that wall. One day I was sitting in bed looking at all of these pictures and I realized that every single good thing, every single picture was because Christ gave them to me. They were all because of His church on this earth. I would have never gotten into clogging if my mom hadn't been looking for a studio that had modest costumes. I would have never met my roommates if I didn't decide to go to BYU. I would have never met some of my closest friends if I didn't go to YSA. Christ was the reason behind every single one of my pictures. He was there for it all, how could I not be forever indebted to Him.

The next thing I wanted to talk about is the healing that comes through the Savior. Just a few days ago I woke up and my brain was foggy. This happens every so often, usually when I am under a lot of stress (who would have thought going home would be so stressful ) So I spent most of the day, very silent, trying to just wait out the fog. Well I went to a lesson with an older couple who I love so so dearly. They have been members all their lives and even served a couple's mission in the early 2000s. After chatting with them for a bit we started talking about what the Atonement has meant to us. Brother Hardy said, "There is a quote from last conference about the Atonement that has changed the way that I have viewed it. It is something along the lines of, while the Atonement is infinite in nature, it says, 'although infinite and universal in its reach, the Lord’s Atonement is a remarkably personal and intimate gift, suited to each of us individually'" Then he looked up at us, with tears in his eyes, and in the sweetest, most angelic voice, says, "I've always thought of the Atonement as something that covers everyone, but after hearing that I realized that Christ paid a personal Atonement for me."

After hearing that I about lost control of my tear ducts but I held on as I replied, "I am eternally grateful for what Christ did for me and for my family. There are things that I know can only truly be healed after the resurrection and knowing that Christ made it possible for those to end, for me, that is indescribable." We finished talking and left and that heaviness I had felt that entire rest of the day was lifted. I know it was because I was able to connect to someone who had a special ability to heal and calm. Whether it was Brother Hardy, or Christ, it is the same.

If you are a missionary PLEASE go listen to the devotional by Bishop Waddell, it was SO amazing and definitely made me learn so much more about Christ and my dedication to my mission, I promise, it will change your life.

If you aren't a missionary, I've decided his devotional will be the topic of my homecoming talk in a few weeks so you will have to come and listen to me talk about it then!

I love you all lots and loads

Remember God is in the details

Sister Carter

Not too many pictures this week, but I'll take more soon!

Final Countdown

 As a preface... yes I am fully aware that I am a few weeks behind in emailing... and there is a lot to catch everyone up on so here we go!

To start off I would like to say, last week I started my very last transfer of my mission, which means, I only have 5 more weeks left until I get to see my family, my friends, and every single one of you! But its also an insanely bittersweet moment as well. Its hard for me to wrap my brain around the idea that I will not be a missionary for much longer. I will never get the chance to serve the Lord in the way that I am doing now, and most importantly, I will not get to be the Saviors representative. These next few emails will be a lot of reminiscing and thinking about how far I've come, so sorry for all the nostalgic things coming at you soon. So this is really it.... I'm in the final countdown.

Well lets start talking about the miracles I have seen recently! Just last week Sister Klingseis and I were invited to do a Question and Answer activity for a different ward, so after getting permission from our leaders to go, we made a 30 minute trek all the way to South Platte River (lol I know no one really cares about that detail but you got it anyway ;) While we were there I could tell all the young women were engaged and were asking all sorts of questions about the life of a missionary... and let me tell you.... I was honest. I talked about how long the days are, how stressful the work is, what it is like to not see much success, and I also talked about the miracles I've seen, how much it has changed my life, and all the things in between. Towards the end of the Q&A one of the girls asked what our greatest miracle from our mission was. I felt specifically inspire to share how I saw God touch my family members, specifically my sister. This was a story that was so sacred and special to me, I typically don't share all the details, but I knew that it was something I needed to share. After sharing and then bearing my testimony I looked at all of the girls and said, Please Serve a mission, it was the best thing I have ever done, so please please go, it will change your life, I promise. We closed the Q&A and one of the girls walks up to us with tears in her eyes and says, "So I'm not a member but I was really touched by what you said" then everything starting clicking in my head. She had asked a lot of basically questions about missions during the Q&A and even asked if you had to be a member your whole like in order to be able to serve a mission. That's when I realized why God had sent us here. She went on to say that she had been going to church for over a year and attending seminary all without meeting with missionaries. We asked her if we could meet her sometime that week and talk more about the church. We met up and she asked how she would be able to be baptized. This was one of the biggest miracles I've ever seen on my mission. I don't know how, or why, God directed us to be there but I am forever grateful that I was able to be the instrument in His hands in bringing one of His elect daughters into the gospel. 

There has also been the exact opposite swing from miracles this week. Just yesterday I learned about some miscommunication that led to people saying really negative things about me. In all reality, it broke my heart. I care so much about people, and about making sure they feel loved and needed at anytime they need, so when I heard some people who I trusted, were thinking I was the exact opposite, I was shattered. I learned an incredibly important lesson, words do mean much more than you might imagine. They are powerful and they can either build a person, or completely wreck them. I was exhausted in all aspects, spiritually, physically, emotionally, and everything in between but I am happy to say that Gods not done with me yet. All of this is teaching me something I wouldn't be able to learn any other way. 

General conference was absolutely amazing. All the Sisters in the zone got together and watched it at the church, it was a weekend full of tears, laughing, jokes, and of course lots and lots and lots of snacks. Like a lot of snacks.... I'm pretty sure I gained like 10 pounds, so no one judge me if I come back slightly more round because of it.... yikes 😅

I have seen God more these past few weeks than ever before, maybe it's because I have 17 months of experience that has taught me how to recognize Him, or maybe it because He's trying to reward me for a mission well served, either way I am privileged to be able to represent the Savior. 

Not too long ago I was in a lesson with a girl who experienced extremely similar trials that I have. She is living the exact same thing that I did, while I was sitting across from her I saw myself 3 years ago. I looked into her eyes and felt all that same pain again, and that's when I realized, God had taken that pain away from me and I was now my job to promise He could take it away from her. I looked at her right in the eyes and said, I promise you, this pain will go away, and this isn't just a Sister Carter promise, I represent the Savior so this is a promise in the name of Jesus Christ that you will get better. I now understand what power and authority can come from my calling because as soon as I felt that leave my mouth, I was completely exhausted because I knew, for a small moment, I was speaking the words of the Savior. I can also promise you all the same thing, I promise that it will get better, you will feel better, and whatever pain, plague, sickness, weather, or situation you are under in right now will be swallowed up in the Atonement of Christ. I cant promise you it will be soon, or even before you leave this life, but I can promise you it will happen, the relief will come, borrowing from my spiritual role model Elder Jeffrey R. Holland from this past General Conference, "When will these burdens be lifted? The answer is “by and by.” And whether that be a short period or a long one is not always ours to say, but by the grace of God, the blessings will come to those who hold fast to the gospel of Jesus Christ. That issue was settled in a very private garden and on a very public hill in Jerusalem long ago."

The price was already paid; the deal has already been settled; my life and your lives have already been walked. All the pain and sadness I or you could ever experience has been felt a million times more. Again borrowing from Elder Holland, "The road to Salvation always goes through Gasthemone and will always require a journey to the summit of Calvary" and our lives, if we are to be followers of Christ will require us to follow Him, "At least to the borderlands of Gathemone and at least somewhere in the shadow of Calvary" there simply is no other way to become like Him. So I looked at that girl, who I love in a way only a representative of Christ Himself can and as someone who experienced the same experiences she is having, and saw she is living in the borderlands of Gathemone right now and said, it will get better, whether it's now or in a few years from now, it will get better. Even Christ, who suffered all we could ever imagine, was Resurrected and given eternal, celestial peace. That day will come for everyone of you, that is an Eternal Guarantee, a Celestial Promise, and a heartbreaking answer, but it will come.

I love you all, thank you for taking the time to read my small experiences about my mission, I hope they changed you as much as they changed me

Remember God is in the Details 

Sister Carter 

I also have no idea what pictures you have and haven't seen sooooooo sorry if there are repeats.

Weekly Pictures

 

Pictures from Savanna from the end of September:

One step at a Time

 Hey everyone and welcome to one of the last remaining emails seeing as I only have 7 more P-Days after this... my weeklies are slowly dying off!!

So today instead of boring you all with the ins and outside of missionary work, I've decided to share with you a spiritual moment I had just yesterday. As a preface, you will all learn a lot more real details about where I am currently at so just be prepared for a whole lot of the "Real Life Sister Carter"

Let's dive in

So over the past month I have realized that my current companion and I just don't click. Not that there is any problems or anything issues, we just aren't having as much fun as I would have dreamed to have had my last 2 transfers of my mission. So I started really asking God why I was put with her because I knew there was a reason but I just didn't understand. I felt like I couldn't relate to her and that I didn't feel like I was helping her hardly at all, but I really wanted to find the reason I was supposed to be her companion. I have been praying and praying and asking and praying and so far nothing. Then yesterday happened.

I have been struggling with some other internal battle and it all combined together yesterday and after lunch I just looked over and said, "I really don't want to do anything" and she said, "I don't want to either" and I looked at her kind of confused because my reasons were pretty obvious but I had no idea what she was going through. So I asked her, "What's going on?" She's like nah I don't really want to talk about it and then I asked her again and she started going into it. 

She talked about how she wasn't ready to let her old life go. She just wasn't ready to give it all up and start a completely new life. In that moment, I remembered I had felt that same way. I had struggled with the same thing. When I came out on my mission if felt like I wasn't ready to give up the person I had built from day one, I LOVED myself. I had worked and worked and worked to become the person who I wanted to be and I was so proud of who I was, but when I came on my mission I lost it all.

Then I compared what i had gone through and what she is going through with a room. That before I left on my mission I had designed and filled this room with all the things I wanted. All the music, dancing, YouTube, Netflix, and everything that I really really wanted. Then I came on my mission and it was all ripped out. Everything I had loved was completely torn out of this room. So I just sat and looked at this empty room and thought, what just happened, I loved this old room.

Then slowly God puts in the stuff that he originally intended to be in the room. But sometimes it's only a lamp, and it's the perfect lamp and you love that lamp, but then you look around and it's still an empty room. But you just have to keep waiting for the next thing to file in, and it it's so hard to just sit and wait for that next thing when the room is still empty. But it does fill up. 

So I told her this while thing and I realized that was why I was with her, that part of me had just fulfilled that purpose in helping her along her mission and I was so grateful God had let me do that, and figure out that one why. 

Then later that night I had asked to have someone re-tap my clogging shoes so I could film my auditions for my team. So I sent them with a member and she called us saying that they weren't able to re-tap my shoes, so instead they gave me brand new clogging shoes. I haven't gotten brand new clogging shoes since my freshman year of high school. In that moment that was God saying thank you for doing what He wanted me to do  even if I didn't really want to. So He had a member I'd never met, give me brand new clogging shoes. Even though I didn't deserve it, even though all I did was tell the story God told me, and did it through the Spirit He gave me. He STILL thanked me for it. I don't really know why God did, but He did. 

So that's the parable of the clogging shoes. Hopefully that all makes sense and you learned something from it too. 

It's funny because all I'm trying to do is pay Him back for what He's giving me and He gives me blessing for trying to lay Him back. It just shows that I am forever in debt to Him for all the things He keeps giving me.

I love you all!!

Remember God is in the Details!

Sister Carter

Poison

Wow just as an FYI for everyone... don't eat wild berries.... ever.... it's a bad idea... if you need more details read until the end.... also big BIG news will be dropped in here too so stay tuned!

So this week started off with a HUGE bang and we had mission tour last week *pause for dramatic effect* and we didn't get roasted!! Yes if any of you have stayed tuned in my whole mission, you will remember the last mission tour we were insanely chastised.... like my companion and most sisters in the zone cried kind of chastising.... it was rough. But this year was honestly all rainbows, not once did I feel like we were in trouble or weren't doing things right. We talked mostly about fish oddly enough, and all the different analogies around them.

The biggest thing I wanted to share is something that personally touched me. It's about our story. Each of us has a story, big or small, as to why we are who we are and how we got here. Elder Jones (one of the general authorities) specifically said that we shouldn't be wasting our time talking about the meaningless things such as where I'm from or what I want to study, he said that when people ask us to tell them about ourselves we need to tell our real story. That lit a fire in me. My story is a long complicated story starting with birth stumbling though cancer and ending up on a mission. It comes with a lot of tears, sadness, trials and heartbreak, but results in me becoming the women God always intended me to be. I had to fight, and not just regular playing around fight but a getting down, heavy hitter, full on war to get here but I made it. It changed me. He talk about how we needed to make our story their story. That one day we all will experience similar trials, and events in our lives so if we can somehow make our story their story, they will also know what I know, which is that God is real, He loves us and He will only allow things to happen in our life that He knows will be for our own good, no matter how bad it may seem. So that's my new goal, make my story your story. Hopefully you can get the same results as me just minus all the bad stuff, but if not I can help you through that too. So in an effort to be better about telling my story, email me if you want the full thing, and then my story can become our story. (Also for all of you that are not currently on a mission, you should go listen to Good parts by Andy Grammer, that song is exactly what Elder Jones meant by share your story.... btw I only)

Moving on in the week, Sister Petter and I went to a lesson and while we were outside she saw some wild berries *I think you know where this is going* so she popped a few in her mouth and a few hours later was paying for it.... yep she had food poisoning. Ot was so bad that she ended up not going to MLC on Monday because of it. I felt so bad for her. She was in a lot of uncomfortable situations for those few days.

Then

The thing happened

Transfers

I was called late Monday night and asked to be a trainer!! I was super sad to be leaving Sister Petter, she has become one of my closest friends so leaving her behind was so so hard. I have a new companion named Sister Klingseis who was an Olympic weightlifter 👀 not even kidding she literally when to the Rio Olympics in 2016.... wild. I picked her up on Tuesday last week and made our way to Severance BUT my new area is a legend. I'm splitting the area with the APs. Aka they created a new area inside their area thats just for us... kind of wild. I'm just excited to be in a new place and I'm really looking forward to seeing why God put me here. I was honestly incredibly surprised that I would be going to Windsor but I'm excited about what is ahead. I have big plans for the upcoming weeks but we will see what happens!

Well there is a lot of other smaller details I'd love to tell you about but you'll have to email me to find out more 😉

Love you all lots and loads!

Remember God is in the details!

Sister Carter 

P.S. I kissed something this week *see pics below*, don't tell my mission president 😉

Burn

Wow what a week I just had, just so everyone is fully aware, it's been wild and boring all wrapped up in one week so get prepared. It might also help if you have an oxygen mask, just in case you cant breathe well... but more on that later.

So to start us off Fort Collins is literally on fire. Not even joking. Well I guess I'm exaggerating a little bit. About 15-30 miles away (depending on who you are asking) are two wildfires that have been burning for the past 2 weeks and it has made me absolutely miserable. In all honestly I am finding it hard to breathe most days. Fun fact: I am apparently allergic to smoke because my eyes have been puffy, my nose has been stuffed up/runny, and I have felt my eyes literally burn everyday.... I'm miserable. The miracle though is that I am able to take benadryl at night to keep me asleep and some other off brand allergy medication during the day. So far I've only resorted to taking the benadryl during the day once! I'd count that as a miracle.

This week we also moved apartments and let me just tell you... HOLY THIS NEW APARTMENT IS AMAZING. Not even joking I cried the first night I sat on the balcony because I was so grateful to be able to live in such a nice place. Sitting on the balcony before having to go to bed is the nicest part of my day by far. The only crappy part is that now that the smoke is really bad, I can't do it as often or for as long as I usually do. But I'm grateful none the less. It's been a blessing to live there, even if it's only for a short time.

With all of the moving it took most of the day to move everyone in the zone and by the end I was a gross sweaty mess who barely had time to eat but we had lessons. So we quickly changed out of my sweaty clothes, put on a dress, and drove to the lesson. It was with someone we are teaching who has read almost the entire Book of Mormon, he said that he was in Alma right where Moroni made the title of Liberty and I was 10/10 impressed. There are full-on members that haven't even gotten that far. He has lots and lots of questions all about Tithing, the wording of the Book of Mormon, and just strange details most people wouldn't think of but he genuinely wanted to know so he could more fully understand it. And truly it was a miracle that we were able to make it through such a complicated lesson while still being able to testify to him of the truthfulness of what we teach and asked him to keep studying the Book of Mormon and pray to know if it is true. His testimony has a long way to go but his progress is all I could ask for!

I have been thinking a lot this week about what we have lived through this year. I, in a very real sense, lived through a global pandemic. I was on a mission when church was closed, temples shut down, missionaries were sent home and reassigned back out, I had to stay in my apartment for 3 months, with little to no contact with other people... and with all of this I realized that Christ is coming back. If I had been at home I probably would have just brushed it off like it was nothing. Just said something along the lines of, "Woah this world is getting crazy, hopefully it'll calm down soon" but now, because I'm a missionary, I am confronted with the reality of the second coming of Jesus Christ. This is the winding up scene to His glorious return. It is happening. And it's likely that it is very soon. It has given me and extra big push to become a disciple of Christ because I need to be ready, and I have to be ready for when He comes. 

I love you all and I hope that you all have a great week and the air where you are is completely smoke free!

Remember God is in the Details 

Sister Carter 

4 minutes

My weekly isn't sending, could you send this out?

Sad news for everyone, this email will be on the shorter end because I've had an insane day so I'll hit the big points!

Joe wont be able to be baptized this week which is really really sad. Hes struggling with a lot of things but we are hoping and praying that soon he will be able to overcome them and be baptized!

We might be moving apartments this Friday!! We have been working hard rearranging all the missionaries housing and it'll all happen (ideally) this Friday. Half of the zone will be moving apartments all on the same day *big stress* but hopefully it will go smooth without any hiccups!!

We also started teaching 3 new people this week which is a HUGE miracle!! God is really blessing me in everything. Even when I have bad days, He makes it possible for me to still work and see success, which is something I never expected 

Sorry this email is so short but just know God is taking care of me as much as He can!!

Remember God is in the details!!

Sister Carter