Wednesday, April 10, I received my LDS mission call in the mail! Well, my parents received it in the mail. I anxiously went about my day, trying and failing to pay attention in class, and waiting for the minutes to tick by so it could be 4 and I could open this beauty:
Never ever have I been more impatient.
Before we move on with the post, I just have to share a series of memes.
So yeah, there's that. I love them.
4 o'clock came, even though it seemed a million years away.
Thank you to all my friends and family who came!! Props to Andrew who told me he couldn't come, then 5 minutes before I opened it showed up and surprised me big time.
Opening my call was probably the most surreal and crazy moment! My thoughts were literally flying in a million different directions, I don't think I've ever been more scatterbrained. Before I knew it, I had a knife in hand, and was ripping open the famous big white envelope that I had waited a month for.
Drum roll please...
SAN FERNANDO, CALIFORNIA!!!
English speaking, leaving July 17th for the Provo MTC.
WOW. First off, I freaked out and so did the girl video taping me, who is my neighbor, friend, and relief society president! She happens to be serving in San Fernando as well, crazy right??Unfortunately she's speaking Spanish, but it was still a crazy moment!
I was SO surprised. It definitely took a minute for it to set in. I had to translate the words I read into actual thoughts and a place in my mind about where I would be. I was in the middle of hugging people when it hit me, and I burst into tears! I couldn't help it.
I'm just going to dump a bunch of other pictures, I love them all so much. I'd be lying if I told you I didn't stare at them and watch my video at least twice a day. They make me so happy and excited!
It's my favorite to answer the same questions over, and over, and over again. That's not sarcastic though, I really do LOVE talking about my call, and everything associated with it (:
The main one I love is every single person asks:
"Are you ______?" You can fill in the blank with basically anything...excited, nervous, worried, happy, etc. My answer is always yes! I have so many emotions about it all.
I really am SO extremely excited to serve in San Fernando, that's the main emotion I feel. The more I think about it, the more I feel like it is the perfect mission! I'm in love with it already, and I feel so blessed to go there. Big big thanks to the man upstairs.
After opening it, I went with the fam to Brick Oven Pizza.
After that, I went with my roomies to Sammy's for shakes.
After that, I had some visitors over.
Then FINALLY I was able to just sit in my room, read my call again, read every detail of my packet, Google pictures, read other people's blogs who served in San Fernando, start my own mission blog, and everything else I've been waiting to do until I got my call. I stayed up til 5 AM, but it was totally worth it.
There she is, in all her beauty.
The rest of the week has been pretty dull, especially in comparison to opening my call! It's just been the usual, work and school.
I went home for church simply for the fact that I would be able to talk about my call more, because that's my new favorite activity to do.
Facts about my mission:
- It is getting split and the new boundaries will be in effect July 1st. I'll be one of the first missionaries to serve with the new boundaries!
- The bottom half of my mission (where all the people are!) is Los Angeles
- North Hollywood, quite a few recording studios, Magic Mountain, and Six Flags is in my mission
- One of my good friends from high school and the only missionary I'm writing is serving in San Fernando English speaking as well! So crazy.
Speaking of that, here was his response to me telling him about my call: - My good friend Alise's grandparents are serving in San Fernando. They are in charge of housing for the missionaries. They'll be some of the very first people I meet when I get to San Fernando!
- Another kid that I don't know super well but I went to high school with is serving there.
Total number of people I know serving in San Fernando: 6, including me.
Alright, let's move on from mission call (sadly) and talk about yesterday.
We had a great FHE drawing with chalk. Everybody traced each other and we created a family mural! I had a work meeting, so I was a few minutes late and I was already drawn...see how they drew me here:
This video is great too:
Aaaand then my phone died.
I made Genevieve use her phone to take some more pictures though. We got lot's of great ones! This one is my favorite:
Today, I had to go into the bank because my debit card wasn't working.
Turns out, they put a hold on it because of a lot of recent 'suspicious activity.' The activity was actually just me online shopping a bunch, because now that I know where I'm going on my mission, I know exactly what to buy!
It felt like a shopaholic intervention though. They went through each purchase I'd made and the amount to verify that it was from me. Whoops!
My Tuesday work shift is basically the greatest. We've made it a tradition to go after our shift each week to a legendary BYU place and get food. This has topped off my Freshman experience! So far we've gone to The Chocolate, the Awful Waffle, and tonight was the Roll-up. Each place has lived up to their reputations! SO amazing. I have to say, the Roll-up has been my favorite yet.
It was a quaint cozy place with AMAZING music! Each artist that we heard was to die for. I literally was in heaven, eating my crepe and listening to them serenade me. All though I am a die hard Wall fan, the Roll-up might be better, or at least tied.
Side note, I LOVE MY COWORKERS. Seriously though. I would take a bullet for each of them. I'm the luckiest girl in the world. Makes me sad to think about leaving them in 6 days!
After the work festivities, I came home to study.
And by study, I mean I actually snuggled with Jean (yes, she let me! And she liked it. We're improving, people). We talked and talked. I sure do love that girl.
Then I decided my 'studying' should be moved to the kitchen, so I could focus. But Genevieve came, and I sure do love that girl too.
She's pretty convincing. "Tessa you only have one week left with me! Come sit with me! Stay up later!" And the list goes on.
As I was going to go to bed, she had a random urge to eat a giant spoonful of powdered sugar. Of course, she pulled me into it. What started as eating a bit of sugar, turned into this wonderful mess:
I can't even blame the craziness on Genevieve. It was me who first blew some powder sugar on her face!
We looked like Grandmas.
We cleaned up our wintery mess, showered, and here I am in bed, trying for the life of me to finish up this post.
Also, some great news: today was my last day of classes until 2015, holla!!
IMPORTANT INFORMATION:
As I mentioned, I started a blog solely dedicated to my mission and all things related to it! Once I'm out in the field, my letters home will be posted on it. For now, it's still really rough and I've got a lot of re-designing to do, but here it is nonetheless:
Stop by that blog every once in a while to check it out! Right now there's only one post up of one of my journal entries, but I plan to post a lot more on it soon.
Also, I have a mormon.org profile. It's pretty great. Here's the link:
Thanks for reading, peace out.
Studying ends in dying! How come I've never heard that? Love it! Holy cow, what a year you've had--it just blows my mind over and over! I could look at those call-opening pictures over and over and over too. If not for my addiction, sigh..
ReplyDeleteLOVE YOU!!