Sister Kaylee Brooks: Baptisms aren't planned this way! :) :)

Sister Jensen, Sister Leavitt, Me, and Sister Bray

(I came out with Sister Jensen)

We are emailing in the lobby/office of our apartments.

Hello hello!!!

It was so fun talking (Skyping) with y'all on Mother’s Day yesterday!! Thank you so much for making my day so special. I sure do have the best family, and the most AMAZING MOM in the whole wide world!!! I am so grateful for the amazing support and love that I receive from y'all. Thank you :)

This week has been very good. Monday we had a baptism and oh boy... It was literally the funniest thing. Almost everything that could go wrong did. But it all worked out and Marissa was baptized!! Marissa is 14 years old. Her dad married a member a few years ago and last September the dad was baptized and around February, her little brother Thomas was baptized. So she was the only one left, but her parents wanted it to be her decision. So, our ward mission leader was supposed to go fill up the font around 5:30. The Baptism was at 7:30. We were going to head over around 6:30 and start setting things up. We don't have a font at our building so Sister Bray starts driving to another church building about 20 minutes away. As we drive there, I'm trying to call and text our ward mission leader to see how things are going and tell him we are on our way... But no response. We get there and Sister Bray said, "Oh no, I drove to the wrong church building." We got in the car and start heading to the other building. Our phone battery is flashing, we start freaking out because we still have to get a hold of people. We call our ward mission leader’s wife, praying our phone doesn't die, and she starts freaking out and told us he went to take a quick nap after work and still hadn't woke up! Well, the baptism starts in about 30 minutes and it takes about 2 hours to fill up the font. Our ward mission leader finally called us and said he could not get a hold of the elders, they are the ones with the keys... So we called a few of our sisters (Sister Tadd saves the day) and they had keys and opened the church for us. But, (haha) they didn't have keys to the font. Our ward mission leader called a few people to have them come open it for us. Well, long story short, we had to feel garbage cans with water to help the process go faster. The baptism ended up starting around 8:00, thank goodness, because Marissa and her family were late. Marissa didn't tell anyone she was being baptized and wanted a really small baptism. We were walking to the font area and we passed the boys bathroom and heard water going. We walked inside and a trash can was in the sink and the bathroom was FLOODED!!!!! No one told us they put a trash can there. So we had a nice mess to clean up afterwards. We started the baptism and at the last minute, Marissa freaked out and told us she was too nervous. We didn't take that for an answer. We talked to her and jokingly (but we were dead serious) told her we would pick her up and take her if we had to. Haha but in the end, she was baptized and was confirmed yesterday!! I am so proud of her :) After the baptism we got in the car and looked at our phone, thinking it would be completely dead because it was beeping for 2 hours saying low battery. Well it wasn't, it had two bars... We don't understand that one. All I know is God has a sense of humor. Hahaha, it definitely is really funny now!! Good memory.

Wednesday we had MLC (missionary leadership council). It’s when the STLS and the Zone Leaders get together and get trainings from President and Sister Wilson, the AP's and we had a special guest! President and Sister Wilson's daughter arrived home from her mission on Tuesday night, so she was able to come to our meeting on Wednesday morning, and she was still a missionary (she had not been released yet)! She is so darling and way way fun to talk to. The trainings that we were given were the topics we would be training and giving at zone meeting. So yay me, I got to train at zone meeting. I talked about the importance of working with members. I have come to realize how important it really is on my mission. Members are EVERYTHING in our work. As missionaries, we are here to help the ward do THEIR missionary work. We have been trying get a lot of members out to lessons and have them tract with us. Our ward is VERY receptive to coming out with us. It's so amazing!

It's a tradition to play speed at lunch during meetings.

The girl holding the ball in the middle is "Sister Wilson" President's daughter.

She got home from her mission on Tuesday night.

I GOT TO SEE SISTER SQUIRES AT MLC!

IT WAS THE HAPPIEST DAY EVER!

The sisters I went down to the meeting with.

Of course we had to stop by Cafe Rio on the way home.

I was able to go on my first exchange as an STL. I was with Hermana Schmactenberger and we stayed in MY area. She is darling. She has only been out for 2 weeks now and holy, you wouldn't even be able to tell! I had way too much fun with her and got to know her more. I love getting to know all these new sisters and learning from them. You really gain so many relationships and new friends!

We received a call randomly one evening as we were trying some potentials. It was a gentleman in another ward calling us and telling us about this middle aged couple, probably in their 40-50's, Bob and Lori Hoyt. They aren't members but they have family who is and a nephew who went on a mission and they know that people feed the missionaries and wanted to know how they could do that. He passed our number to them and we arranged to have dinner with them on Saturday. Holy cow!! It was a feast and SO good. They are the sweetest people ever and will do anything for us. They aren't interested in learning about the gospel right now, but hopefully they soften their hearts soon, and it sure didn't stop us from sharing a message :) they are one of our good friends now. They even sent us home with a big bag of food!!

We have been able to see a lot of wonderful miracles and teach many lessons this week. I am so grateful for the wonderful blessing I have to be out on a mission and serve my Heavenly Father and help others come and learn more about Him and our Savior, Jesus Christ.

Scripture of the week: 1 Corinthians 3:16-17- God has given us each amazing bodies. We need to treat them like a temple, well because they are, and let the spirit of God dwell in us. Don't harm our body, take care of it and show God how much you truly appreciate his wonderful creation!

I LOVE YOU ALL SO SO SO MUCH!!!!!!!! Have a wonderful week.

Love Sister Brooks :)