Sister Ogden is going to be a trainer! Great Halloween costumes, football game and loving the LSU ward

Well... Things have been going great down here in the South!  We have transfers tomorrow so that is why I am emailing today!  We got the confirmation on Monday night that Sister Burns and I are both returning back to our regular areas and getting new companions.  I have loved serving with her and it has been an awesome experience serving in the Spanish Area but I am definitely excited to return back to LSU!  I have missed everyone there!  I also got a call from President this morning informing me that I am going to be training this transfer....  AHHH!!  I honestly have no clue what him and Heavenly Father are thinking because I am so not ready for all that!  She is the only sister coming in this transfer and she is going to be brand spank'in new!  I really hope I don't mess her up!  Definitely keep me in your prayers and even more important- keep her in your prayers because she is going to need all the prayers she can get!!

    

     On to news from the Baton Rouge though!  Things are going great in my areas.  It has been hard having to split our time 50/50 between the two areas but we have been managing well!  We had a lesson with all three of our investigators this week and they are all doing great!  Quynh is up to chapter 19 of First Nephi in her reading and she is so much fun to work with!  Jessica is absolutely wonderful and just takes in everything that we teach.  We are still trying to figure out exactly where she is at and how she is feeling about everything so far but hopefully we will come to understand that more during our next couple lessons.  Lily is still reading the Book of Mormon and seeking for that confirmation of the Spirit.  I'm grateful to know that Heavenly Father knows his children and he has a plan and a time for each of them!  We have a lot of less actives and members from the Spanish Branch who we taught this last week. And when I say "we taught" I really mean Sister Burns taught and I tried to pick out what they were talking about :)  I'm starting to understand a lot more Spanish and I can say a few more words which is exciting.  Everyone has been very patient with me and helps me out when I don't know how to say something- which is a lot!  The hardest part is when we go from a Spanish lesson to a lesson with someone from my area.  I'm so used to not being able to talk to any of the people because of the language barrier that when we go to visit a YSA it takes me while to talk because I forget that I can actually talk to this person :)

     I have coninued to love the LSU ward though and being away from everyone has made my love grow even stronger towards them!  The last two Sundays I have had to ask sisters from the ward to be my companion since my companion(s) where all meeting at the same time in another building for the Spanish Branch.  The sisters have been wonderful in stepping up and being my companion and they are all so willing to serve us!  I feel so blessed for every member of the ward and I'm praying I can stay here at least one more transfer after this next one so that I can spend Christmas with all of them!  It is awesome to see how many of them desire to be missionaries in the ward and share the gospel with their friends!  They make it a lot easier on us, that's for sure!  Sister Burns was completely thrown off by the fact that we can call on almost any sister from the ward to come to a lesson with us if we need or want a member.  She had never been in a member present lesson until now.  It makes me nervous when I do eventually go into a family ward!  That is one advice I can give to all ya'll on how you can serve the missionaries in your area. Ask them if they need a ride to any of their lessons or if they need a member present at any of their lessons.  That is something a lot of the missionaries here struggle with in their areas.  They can't find members willing to go to lessons with them!  You don't realize the difference your testimony and just your presence makes in those lessons!

     I can't think of any other exciting news.  We got to go an LSU football game on Saturday and that was pretty awesome!! We took the time out of our preparation day and it was awesome to be in Tiger Stadium!  Sister Burns took a lot of pictures with her camera so hopefully I can get them from her and e-mail them to you.  It was definitley a once in a lifetime experience.  And don't worry we did some missionary work during the game by talking to the people behind us about the church.  One of the ladies was pretty awesome and definitely let us know she was Catholic.  I think we did a really great job of giving her a good impression of the church though and I'm always grateful for opportunities like that!

  I love ya'll and I'm so grateful for all ya'lls letters and prayers!!

Love,

   Sister Ogden

Sister Ogden & Sister Andrade at Nottaway Plantation

Yikes! They Have Emily Speaking Spanish!

Hola Familia!

   Sounds like tons of exciting stuff is happening with everyone there on the West Coast!  Well, I don't really know where to begin for describing all that has gone on this last week!  Sister Andrade left on Wednesday back to Temple Square and before last Monday night we had no clue what the plans were for her flying out and when I would be getting my new companion.  Finally around 9:30 that night we got a call from the Assistants telling us that Sister Andrade had to report to the mission home by 6pm on Tuesday night and I wasn't getting a new temple square sister.... yup!  There were three temple square sisters that left and we only got two that came in so I got put into a trio with the South Baton Rouge Spanish Sisters.  One of them has been waiting for her visa because her mission call is actually to Argentina and her visa came in a couple weeks ago and she flies out on Wednesday, then it will just be two of us until transfers.  We have been working both areas and that has been crazy, especially because I barely know any spanish so about half our lessons I just sit there and smile because I have no clue what anyone is saying :)  They all really like to have me say the prayer in English though so I've been saying a lot of prayers in all our lessons... both personal prayers and closing prayers!  It's definitely been a big adjustment and something that I was completley caught off guard by.  President really likes to surprise people and he definitley surprised all of us with this!  Hopefully it's just until transfers though and I can go back to just working LSU.  On the bright side, I get to be in a car again and the apartment I'm staying in now is a lot nicer :)  and we get food from members!  I love my new companions though!  Their names are Sister Berns and Sister Judd and we all get along grate!  Sister Berns actually taught a year as the music teacher in an elementary school before she came out so that's super cool!  They also had their investigator get baptized on Friday and I got to be part of that and I loved it!  Her name is Esperelda and she is 23 so we are actually working on getting her to some of the YSA activities since we have a lot of return missionaries that speak spanish and she can be around members who are her age!

    One really weird part of this new trio is that they have church around the same time as us so I go to church with our RS president.  It's really weird because my companion is basically all the sisters in the ward.  I felt so weird sitting without a companion yesterday and just sitting with Kristina (one of the sisters in our ward).  She has designated herself as my main companion during church which is super nice of her!  Our stake president spoke yesterday and he was probably pretty confused when he saw there was only one sister missionary in the ward! 

    That's really the biggest news of the week.  We've been working hard on trying to work both areas equally and that has been a little stressful but stress we can handle so that's good :)  We are still working with Lily, Jessica and Quynh and they are all amazing!  I feel so lucky to be working with them and Lily even came to church this last Sunday and that was really exciting!  She is starting to meet a lot more members of the ward and you can tell she feels a lot more comfortable coming to stuff.  She is still working through a lot of personal questions that she has with the church but I know that she will eventually get there!  We didn't get to meet with Jessica or Quynh this last week but we have lessons set up with both of them for this next week and I'm really excited! 

     The weather is actually starting to look like Fall here and that is FANTASTIC!! It doesn't feel as humid and it's overcast a lot but not raining, it's beautiful!  The only hard part is I have this constant desire to eat pumpkin cookies/bread/muffins because that's what I would always make during this time of year!  I subconsciously trained myself to associate fall weather with pumpkin foods... whoops! :)

    Last week for Preparation day we got to go tour a plantation and that was a blast!  We had another set of sisters from Baton Rouge and we went with two of our nonmember friends Alyssa and Abbigail and it was a lot of fun!  The name of the Plantation was Notaway and it is the oldest plantation from before the civil war that is still standing.  It was absolutely gorgeous and it was fun to tour and hear all the history of the house and also to hear the south's side of the Civil War.  Abbigail took A TON of pictures that she is suppose to e-mail to me so hopefully I can send ya'll some soon!  I have a few on my phone that I will try to attach!  Other than that I can't think of anything else too exciting that is going on.  There might have been a lot of other exciting things and I just didn't understand because someone told me about it in Spanish :)  Kristen- Any key phrases I should know how to say in Spanish.  As of right now I have learned, "Padre Celestial" and "en el nombre de Jesus Christo, Amen".  So I know when we are starting the prayer and when we are ending it! 

   I have continued to love it here in Baton Rouge though!  There is starting to be a slight chill in the air and I am especially enjoying that!  Everyday my knowledge of the gospel and therefore my testimony grows!  I feel so grateful to be in the YSA ward and working around people my age!  I realized yesterday that this is the longest I've been in a ward for a really long time!  Most the time I cap out right at four months and then I move.  I have a wonderful support system in the ward and the members are amazing at coming to lessons and I learn so much from all of them!  I love the Gospel and I am so grateful to be serving as a missionary!  I love ya'll and I hope ya'll have a fantastic week!  Mom and dad- fly safe!  Melynda- GOOD LUCK :)  You're in my prayers! 

 

Love,

  Sister Emily Ogden

I love this mission!

Hi ya'll!

   Well... Where to begin!  So this week has been awesome!  We had a lesson with all three of our progressing investigators and they were all wonderful!  Lily is doing AMAZING and she is continuing to read the Book of Mormon and seek for that testimony that it is true.  She comes and visits us each day at Free Speech Alley and on Saturday we got a few sisters from the ward and we all went and got frozen yogurt with her.  I think it really meant a lot to her that we spent time with her outside of a lesson and it really showed her how much we care about her!  We had a lesson on Friday with Quynh and we taught her the first part of the Plan of Salvation and she was very receptive to it.  She has such an amazing desire to learn for herself whether the message we share is true and I love all of our lessons we get to have with her.  Finally, we had an awesome lesson with Jessica yesterday and we began teaching the Plan of Salvation.  It was really interesting because we taught about our pre-Earth life and afterwards asked her what she thought about it all and she said it was all stuff she had heard before and agreed with.  That really caught us off guard because most people don't think much about our pre-earth life!  She was very receptive to everything though and is excited for our next lesson.  She even came to our dinner and a movie activity last night and gave us a ride home afterwards.  It was great because she hasn't been to church yet but got to meet a lot of the members when she came to the activity and they were all amazing at coming up and introducing themselves to her.  She seemed to have a great time and we are excited for our next lesson with her!

    Those are the most exciting moments from our week!  Free Speech Alley was a blast as always.  The elders couldn't come on Thursday so we called up the Prairieville Sisters and they came and joined us.  It was a blast having an all sisters day and we got to talk to a lot of people!  We also got the ties that ya'll sent so we got to use some of those on Thursday and it was great!!  Thank you so much Dad for donating those!  We used about half this time and are saving the other half for this next week!  And mom, thank you for the fruit strips and sesame snaps!  You know me all too well and I love wearing my yellow cardigan again :)  We didn't have anything else too exciting happen this week.  LSU played Florida here on Saturday and so traffic was crazy all day and that made Saturday pretty hectic!  Luckily, we still survived though!

     I wish I had more the write about our work here but I can't think of anything!  We still have a fairly large group of less actives that we are working with as well and we love all of them!  They are all doing great and I feel so blessed to be working with them!  Working in the singles ward has been a great experience and I have met so many individuals who are amazing people!  I am so glad I made the decision to serve a mission and while each day is still a challenge, I love it!  Heavenly Father never ceases to show me my weaknesses and to push me out of my comfort zone, but I'm growing and learning because of it! Each day I think about where I was when I first came out and how much I have changed and how much more I know I will continue to change as I go forth in this work!  I think the hardest thing is putting all your pride aside and really letting Heavenly Father mold you into the person he knows you can become.  It's a lot easier said than done :)  I love this gospel though and I feel so grateful to have been raised in the church.  It's been a great experience to work at Free Speech Alley and meet so many individuals who practice different religions and to learn about what they believe.  The more I learn about what their religion the more my testimony grows of this being Christ's church on the earth!  I love it and I love that I get to share the message of it with so many students here!  It's so much fun teaching people my age!

    Thank ya'll so much for all ya'lls prayers and your e-mails!  I love ya'll so much and I feel so blessed to have ya'll as my family and to learn from your experiences!  I love ya'll and have a fantastic week!!

Love,

  Sister Emily Ogden

General Conference Highlights

Hi family!!

     Sounds like some exciting stuff that happened this weekend!  Elk hunting and car problems... sounds like typical Ogden excitement!  I'm glad to hear everyone is safe though and doing well!  Nate, I loved the picture!  I'm pretty sure I'm getting it framed and putting it up in our apartment!  And mom and dad, I hope ya'll made it home safely!  Was it the Camry that you were driving?

     Well life is great here at LSU! Conference this weekend was AMAZING!  I loved every talk and we were all really excited about all the emphasis on missionary work.  Mom, you always ask me what my favorite parts of conference were so here we go, 1. "EXCLAMATION POINT", I really wish I could have seen President Monson's face during that talk because it was a pretty interesting subject matter :) 2. Elder Uchtdorf's talk, as always.  3. I loved Elder RichardG. Scott's talk was wonderful and I couldn't take notes fast enough as he was talking! 4.  The fly!  I felt so bad for Elder Vinson.  You finally get your "big break" and you get to speak at conference and this fly keeps attacking your face the whole time!  He gave an AMAZING talk though that I really loved! 5. We had one of our investigators come to the Sunday morning session and that was awesome!  I felt bad because I didn't think about giving her something to take notes with until the end and when I did she started writing down stuff like crazy!  She really seemed to enjoy it though and hopefully she will come to church with us next week as well! 

     We haven't had too busy of a week this week.  We have three of our investigators that our now progressing and that's really exciting!  We had an amazing lesson with Jessica just this morning and she said that if she learns for herself that this is true she will be baptized, so that was extremely exciting!  We talked about the restoration and Joseph Smith.  It's really cool how you can be in a busy area (school cafeteria) yet the Spirit can still be felt and teach.  It really was a wonderful lesson and we are excited to meet with her again later this week!  Quynh is our investigator who came to conference and we had a lesson with her Saturday morning where we read the Book of Mormon with her.  She read it on her own more that day and she is excited about continuing to learn!  She really did seem to have a wonderful time watching conference and I'm excited to learn about her thoughts as we meet with her again later this week.  Finally we had another great lesson with Lily this last week!  She didn't come to conference because she was sick all weekend but there are some talks that I think we'll invite her to watch because they really appeal to her and her questions.  She came and hung out with us at Free Speech Alley on Thursday too and that was awesome!  She met a lot of members of the ward there and it was great to see how comfortable she is getting around us!  She is starting to open up a lot more and you can tell she is finally starting to trust us!

    Those are really the most exciting parts of our week!  We had zone training meeting and that took up all Friday morning and we are now working part of another area (Plaquemine) once a week so we spent the rest of Friday there.  It is across the Mississippi river so Sister Olsen, who works in the office, goes with us and it should be fun! The weather this week is beautiful!!  Yesterday was a beautiful, overcast, fall day and today is gorgeous!  The wind is just lightly blowing and there is a nice fall chill in the air, I love it!  Apparently it will last like this for the rest of the week and they we're back to the heat and humidity :)  Ya'll keep mentioning this hurricane Karen but in all honesty I haven't heard anything about it and we have completely blue skies today (no clouds) which is very rare!  I know there was a tropical storm that was suppose to hit this last weekend but it passed by us and is heading toward Florida!  If there is a hurricane we don't suffer too much from it up here in Baton Rouge.  We will get strong winds and rain but that's it!  New Orleans and the areas more south are the ones who get evacuated and they'll have them come stay with us up here if they do!  Luckily the weather is great though and we're not worried about any storms :)

     Free Speech Alley is continuing to great as well!  We had all sisters on Wednesday because the elders had to go to their leadership meeting and that was awesome!  We LOVED having all sisters and the elders have another meeting on Thursday so we get to have another all sisters day!  We've met some great people and we are meeting with a few of them this week!  It really is a great experience and a lot of people are starting to feel more comfortable with coming up and talking to us now!  I think they're starting to realize that we aren't going to shove the Book of Mormon down their throat and we really do just want to talk to them and answer their questions :)  I'm starting to like it more and more each time.  We are also having a lot more members come and hang out with us there and it is really fun to have them part of it and talking to people about the church as well.  We have some amazing members in our ward and I feel so blessed for all of them!

     That's it for this week!  We're excited for all the appointments with our investigators this week and hopefully we can have all of them at church with us!  How cool would that be?!  Thank you for all ya'lls letters and ya'lls prayers!  I love you so much and I hope ya'll had a phenomenal conference weekend :)

Love,

  Sister Ogden

Sister Ogden and Her LSU District

Lily Came to the RS Broadcast! Bible Bashers & Learning to Deal With What Comes Your Way!

Hi Family!!

   I have to start off by apologizing for not writing to you yesterday.  My new companion has arthritis problems and when it starts raining (which happens a lot here!) her joints get stiff and she can't get out of bed.  So... guess what happened yesterday?!  Yup.... It rained!  Therefore I got to spend all day inside, basically by myself because my companion was asleep upstairs most the time.  It was most definitely the most boring P-day and I was super bummed that I didn't get to write ya'll.  But, president gave us permission to write ya'll today!!  By the way, love whoever sent the e-mail from my "conscience" reminding me to write ya'll.  Just know if you don't get an email from me on Monday, that's probably the reason why!

   Besides boring days locked inside the apartment things are going great here at LSU! The most exciting news of the week was the Relief Society Broadcast!  Not just because of how awesome it was but because Lily came!!  They had a dinner and workshops before hand that she went to with us and then she stayed for the broadcast, and she came to church the next day!  It was so great to have her there and I think she really liked it!  The best part was that for our combined Priesthood/relief society meeting they talked about the priesthood and that has been her main concern with the church.  There were some amazing comments made about the priesthood and I was so grateful that she was there to hear them!  She seemed to really enjoy church and we have an appointment with her tomorrow so hopefully that goes well! We also had two other lessons with investigators this weekend!  One was with a girl that we met at free speech alley.  We taught the Restoration to her on Friday and she was very receptive, especially when we talked to her about the fact that there is a prophet on the earth again! She was really excited about coming to the Relief Society broadcast but something came up and she couldn't come :/  We're hoping she can come to at least one of the sessions of conference this weekend though!  We also, finally, had a lesson with Jessica and it was amazing!  We talked a lot about the Book of Mormon and why we have it and what we can gain from it.  The Spirit was so strong and by the end you could tell she really had a desire to begin reading it!  We have another appointment set up for next Sunday and I'm totally stoked!!!

   Free Speech Alley was exciting this week as well!  I'm super bummed to hear about Devin's ties though!  We're trying to think of new ways to catch people's attention so if you think of any good ideas please let me know!  We had fun this last week with it though.  We are definitely getting a lot better at contacting people and it makes a world of difference!  I had two different people come up to me and try to bash with me and that was interesting.  I just let them say what they wanted and then thanked them and asked if there was anything I could do to help them.  Most the time they just look at me confused by my reaction and then walk away!  It makes it all quite entertaining!  One of the elders had a major bible basher from the the Pentecostal Church come up to him and tell him all this anti-mormon stuff and the elder said he could feel the Spirit leave the second that man started to talk to him.  He handled the situation very well though and I'm sure all of this is just the beginning!  It's nice because most people recognize that we are just there to answer peoples' questions and to let them know we are here, so they're pretty receptive of us!  We are most successful with the "Faith in Christ" pass along cards and we just hand them out to students as they are walking by and ask them if they want a picture of Christ :)  Most students can't turn that down and accept it!  I'm starting to enjoy it more and more each time especially as I get more confident in talking to people!  I have really learned that the key is to focus on them as a person and their current beliefs and connect those things they already believe with the Church!

    I can't think of any other exciting stories from the week!  We are learning how to survive life with no bikes and no car.  President asked the zone leaders to share their truck with us at least one day a week so I will be driving a Chevy truck once a week which actually terrifies me because I haven't driven in so long but I'm excited to be in a car at least once week!  The members have been amazing and are always willing to give us rides.  We've had to cancel a few appointments because we couldn't find a ride and  had no way of getting there because it was clear on the other side of town so that was pretty frustrating, but I'm dealing with it!  This new experience of no car and not able to bike has taught me a lot about myself!  I learned that I love to have control over the situation and when you don't have a car or a bike you hardly ever have control over the situation. Therefore I'm learning how to work with my weakness and you know what?!... It's not too bad :)

   I'm glad to hear everyone has enjoyed their week! Sounds like Devin and Nate had fun up at the cabin and I loved the pictures of Melynda and her belly!  When is her exact due date?!  Also... That's crazy that David is married, I didn't even know he was engaged!  And I am so excited about Spencer and Ashley!  You will definitely have to send me a copy of their announcement and it it's not too late I would love to see Jakes, I'm so excited for them as well! 

    I hope ya'll have an amazing conference weekend and Mom and Dad- drive safe to Utah!!  I don't know where we will be watching conference, probably just at the Stake Center (yes dad, they do play conference here in Louisiana!), but there is a possibility we might get to go the President's and watch it there!!  Either way I'm totally stoked for it because I know it's going to be amazing!!  Have a fantastic week though and mom- could luck with Seminary!!!  I love ya'll so much and I am so grateful for all ya'lls prayers and letters :)

Love,

  Sister Ogden