Hello everyone!

I feel like this week has been the craziest of my life and yet I can't list very many details. So many little stressful, yet wonderful things have been going on to prepare me to invite others to come unto Christ in France.

I was sick this week, but I managed to avoid feeling really crummy by drinkning a TON of water. I really just had to deal with a stuffy/runny/chapped nose. It did keep me from getting a good night's rest a couple of nights, which as a missionary I needed.

I found some gloves, softballs and bases at the field during gym and was soooo psyched! A few elders in my zone were nice enough to throw the ball around with me for a while. I tried to teach them pickle, but they didn't get it. I got a lot of excercise trying though! Then we played a great game of kickball, one of the few things that Elders and Sisters can play together.

I've been having a great time in the TRC. The TRC is where we practice giving the lessons to people acting like investigators, but sometimes they are real. Real people have been baptized because of the TRC!! Even when they're members pretending to be investigators they still use their real life situation/experiences when we talk to them and teach them. We've been teaching a progressing investigator named Hely (if she's fake she's really good). She's a wife and mother who recently moved from California. She has good, responsible children, but still worries about them as every mother does. One of them has disabilities and she and I were able to connect over the fact that I have taken care of Kate. She's told me amazing stories about all the different places she's worked and how she always shows kindness to others. Including bonding with a patient that was totally paralyzed except for his eyes! When I bore my testimony about the Joseph Smith story and the BoM I could feel the spirit so strong! I hope that happens when I'm actually in the field!

In really big news. I'm leaving for Paris this Monday!!!! Everybody else knew when they were leaving a week ago and nothing ever came for me. I kept asking, but the travel office kept saying my departure date wasn't until september. Then on Wednesday a member of the MTC presidency told me I was leaving on Monday. I had a feeling I should make sure they really did have my visa. They did, but they didn't know I was on the 3 week program so it isn't valid until September!!!! They said they were wondering why I kept coming in to ask them and didn't realize I was leaving so soon. Luckily, they caught the problem in time to put the correct date on my Belgian visa, which French law says I can use to get into the country. Of course, I have to bring bunch of other documents to prove that law to them when I get there. At least I'll get there on Monday, actually Tuesday!

I also got to call my family last night for 5 minutes to let them know that I would be calling them monday afternoon while I'm in the airport. I have a 500 minute calling card that I plan on totally using up. I'll be traveling with 14 other missionaries so if anything goes wrong they can tell the mission president.

I'd like to tell a powerful story I heard during In-Field orientation (a friday, all-day meeting for all missionaries leaving the following week). One of the teachers who served in Taiwan said he was serving in a ward where an 92 year-old woman who recently joined the church bore her testimony. She said that in her patriarchal blessing that it told her if Elder White had served a mission she would have been bapitzed 60 years earlier! That story says so much!! Each missionary has a specific purpose and skills that only he/she can bring, if you feel inspired to serve a mission do so! I would hate to be the one accounting myself to God and realizing I could have done so much more to build the Kingdom.Young Men, go on missions! Young Women, pray do see if Heavenly Father has it in his plan for you and if he does..go on missions!!!!!

Today I get to go to the Temple for my only time in the MTC! They've been cleaning it all month. My last time before I leave for France, where there is no temple...yet.

A plus!

Soeur Paxton