BEST CHRISTMAS EVER!!!!

 HIIIIIIIIIIII!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Let me just say, I HAD THE BEST CHRISTMAS EVER!!!!!!! I am so happy that I was able to Skype y'all and see all those cute and happy faces! Man I have the best family. And boy did I get spoiled this Christmas. I can't thank y'all enough! That was really so sweet of all y'all to get me such amazing gifts, Thank you everyone!!!!!!!!!! I wish I could hug each person individually. Don't worry, I only have a year left and then I can! :)

This week has been so much fun. On Tuesday, we had a Christmas Conference. Our whole entire mission got together and we heard some very good talks and a lot of good musical numbers. We had a wonderful little lunch. We were eating these really good Oreo fudge things and president came over, grabbed my fork and started eating mine and just left. Our table was laughing so hard. It was so funny and random. It was fun seeing some of the sisters I have already met and talking with them and it was fun being able to meet some new sisters!!  It was fun and helped bring the Christmas spirit in a little more and learn more about our wonderful Savior Jesus Christ :) Aren't we so lucky to have such an amazing Savior who has died for us and loves us so much!? It blows my mind sometimes, we are truly lucky,  Some times I took the atonement for granted, but as I have been on my mission and learned more and have come closer to Jesus Christ, I feel so blessed and lucky to have someone who loves me that much to go through so much pain for each of us. I could talk about this all day, but I will go on with my week hahaha

We decided to stop by Monica's house on Wednesday and see how she was doing. Sadly, she relapsed and isn't doing very well right now, but we are still working with her. IT WAS POURING. it was seriously raining so hard this day. Monica had to take her dogs out to go to the bathroom, so being the wonderful and nice missionaries that we are (haha yeah right) we took her dogs out for her. We didn't have anything to put over our heads to save us from this rain storm, so she gave us grocery bags. hahaha I have never gotten more funnier looks in my life. We were outside for at least 5 minutes and we were drenched!!

The weather has been so strange here the past week, it has been raining like crazy but it has been around 70-ish degrees and humid. Then today its 40 degrees and really windy and cold, it is very bipolar. We never know what to wear each day because everyday it is so different. We had the BIGGEST rain/thunder/lightning storm the other day. It just made me think of mom so much because we both love them. It was awesome!! The power even went out during one of our lessons. Thank goodness for Ipads and the bright screens ;)

We met these little boys the other day, ages 9, 11, and 13, as we were tracting, they were jumping in rain puddles. We went and talked to them and explained who we were, after that, they started taking us to houses who they thought would be interested. Sadly, none of them were, but it was so funny. We became best friends with them and they followed us everywhere for the rest of the night. 

Christmas Eve we went with some of our ward members and went caroling at the Care Center.  It was so fun to see all the old and cute people. They were all singing along and even a few of them cried, tears of joy of course!! It was so hot in their room we were singing in we all were about to pass out!! But it was still fun. As we were leaving the center, and walking to our car, that was only 100 yards or so away, it decided to POUR as we walked outside, needless to say, we got soaked again. 

THEN OH MY! CHRISTMAS WAS THE BEST DAY EVER!!!!!!!!!!! Skyping y'all was seriously the best. It made my whole entire month :) After Skyping, we went and visited some ladies that were alone on Christmas. We made them cookies and just talked with them!! Then we went back to Zaira's and hung out with them for a little bit until we had to go home. 

 Christmas day at Zaira's house (with her family)

Zaira's little girl- so cute!

We were tracting all day yesterday, not even exaggerating. We were tracting this one street and ran into a family from Afghanistan. They invited us in and Sister Tadd and I got a little scared cause, come on, they are from the Middle East and this crazy isis stuff, but we went in anyway. haha We started teaching him and talking with him. He was very firm in his beliefs but very nice and listened to us. Then he started talking about isis and how everyone judges their family and thinks they are apart of isis. He told us they believe that anyone who kills someone, its like killing multiple people and you will be in jail for life and even be killed. Then he started using an example. He said, "it's like if I went up to you right now and killed you, I would have to go to jail." Sister Tadd and I looked at each other and we were like, can you not use that metaphor please, we are already freaked out. But everything was great and they were very nice and we got out of their house safely. haha 

WE HAD THE COOLEST MIRACLE YESTERDAY!!!!!! We had a member bring us over dinner because they weren't able to have us over after all.  We hurried and ate and took a little cat nap. This was the weirdest thing ever, but I'm serious, I had a dream we were tracting around this neighborhood that was on the very top of our area. When I woke up, I told Sister Tadd about it and we decided to go do it, why not right? So we get on the street, we pray for a miracle and start walking towards this house. We knock on their door and this nice guy opens the door.  We explain who we are and what we do. He stops us and says he needs to go get his wife because she would like this. (This either means its going to be really good or really bad because she will come out and yell at us and tell us to leave. But we decided to have faith.)  She came to the door and got really excited and listened to EVERYTHING we had to say. She started to explain how she was looking for a new church for her family to join and for her to raise her young children in. WHAT!!!??? It was so awesome!! We are going back on Wednesday afternoon and we are so excited!! That made our whole day, that's for sure :)

Scripture for the week: Doctrine and Covenants 121:7- its says that our adversity's and afflictions will be such a small moment in life, we just need to continue to have faith in Jesus Christ and know that everything we have and will go through, he has as well. He knows exactly how we feel and we can always turn to Him prayer when we need Him.

I love y'all so much and I am extremely thankful for the love and support I get everyday. Have a wonderful week and NEW YEAR!!!!!!! I LOVE YOU! :) :)

Love Sister Kaylee Brooks 

When we went caroling.  Favorite girls in our ward. :)

We are wearing our new Christmas clothes.

 Peggy, she is in our ward and gave us stocking and tons of food.  

She is so cute!!  She is the one we helped decorate Christmas with.  

Skyping on Christmas Day with Sister Brooks

(written by Mom)

Sister Brooks was suppose to Skype at 12:00 (noon), our time.  All her family would be at our house to Skype with her.  We were excited, to say the least!  She Skype called us at 11:20 and the call was coming in our office computer, of which was not set up to receive a Skype call because it did not have a camera.  Because she tried twice and we did not answer, I received a text message that said, "ANSWER!"   I texted her back and said that the whole family was planning on noon and they were not here yet.  She asked if she should wait to call.  Not wanting to tell her, yes you need to wait, I said, "I don't know."  She said she would wait and call at noon.  At 11:40, she text me again and said, "Can I Call Now?"  I said, happily, "YES!"  We had some time to talk before all the family was here.  When we first answered her Skype call, and saw her beautiful face, LIVE, we started getting quite emotional. We controlled ourselves really quick and had the BEST SKYPE EVER!  We talked for two wonderful hours.  BEST CHRISTMAS PRESENT EVER!!!!!

 Getting ready to Skype with Sister Brooks.  EXCITED!

 Mike and Teria sent her a jumbo Snickers! :)

Sister Brooks' nephew, Dayten (7), had no trouble talking to 

 Aunt Kaylee through the computer screen!  

 Nephew, Nixon (2) was a little bit apprehensive-

 talk to a screen?  I don't think so!

 Nephew, Easton (1) wasn't sure about Skyping either. :)

Niece, Kate (2.5 months), met Sister Brooks for the first time.  

Sister Brooks is in love!

 We met Sister Tadd through the Skype.  She is awesome!!

 We also met Sis. Tadd's parents.  This was way fun.  

Sis. Tadd was Skyping her parents at the same time!

 Our traditional "I LOVE YOU" goodbye.  As much as we love to express our love,

 we hate to say goodbye!

Chris leaned over to me and told me that we need to hang up now.  I told him, I know but I could not do it.  I put him in charge of that and he got up right away and said, "We need to say goodbye now so I am going to hang up.  Sister Brooks said she knew it was time to hang up but it was hard to do!!!  We tried not to cry- tried really hard- it hurt.  But we could not hold it in.  We said GOODBYE, I LOVE YOU and Chris hung up.  He was the brave one!

It was a FANTASTIC, SPECIAL, 2 hours and 2 minutes!

Can't Stop! Won't Stop!

Hello Hello!

I hope y'all have had a wonderful week and enjoy this week off school and have a wonderful Christmas :) This week has been another great week of missionary work, a few miracles and a lot of disappointing times, but oh well, the good overtakes the
bad and that's the best part!!

The Mechanicsville Elders gave us a referral a few weeks ago and we tried to contact him, but he has been so busy with work and wouldn't text or return our calls. We decided to drop by his house one night and we finally were able to contact him. He was a really nice guy and had tons of really good questions about the restoration. He knows he needs to change his life and believes a lot of what we said, he just doesn't like "changing" his life and doesn't feel comfortable going out of his comfort zone. We explained to him how you don't grow if you're comfortable with where you are. We will see if we will get to meet with him again.

We went over to Vicki's house to see how she was feeling and to teach her. She has been in a ton of pain lately, it’s so sad.  We ended up making jewelry with her. She doesn't have money at all, so for Christmas presents, she is making everyone jewelry.  It’s actually really pretty and it was so much fun. We then had to leave
and go pick up one of the Sister missionary (Sister Hendrickson) who lives right by us. Her companion wasn't in Virginia yet because she was called to work at temple square for her mission. They give them 3 months (2 transfers) to go somewhere
else and do missionary work besides the temple! So we had Sister Hendrickson with us Tuesday and Wednesday! It  was really fun, but really weird to be in a trio again!  

Wednesday we had dinner with Sister Mullins, our stake president’s mom.  She is in our ward and is the cutest and sweetest thing!  She is famous for her fried chicken, so she made some for us! The thing with her, she doesn't like leftovers, so she makes us eat it all. Thank goodness we had an extra sister with us and we
invited Monica to come as well. So that helped. Sister Tadd and I were trying not to eat too much because our new investigator, Sherri, invited us to come over and have dinner with her and her son that just got back from college. We were STUFFED by the time we left Sister Mullins’ house.  We had no idea how we would
be able to have another dinner in another hour. Sister Hendrickson left because her companion was in town. We got to Sherri's house and she had her table all set and it looked so cute. Her son grilled up some chicken and we had salad and potatoes,.  Holy Cow, I thought I was going to throw up. They probably thought I
ate like a bird but honestly it took everything Sister Tadd and I had to get our food down. It got really awkward because Sherri seemed like she was trying to "hook us up" with her son. Sister Tadd and I felt really awkward but tried to laugh it off.  She wanted him to show off so he started playing his banjo and guitar for us. The awkwardness just kept coming. Then to try to stop the awkwardness, I asked to play his banjo and started strumming some random chords and singing, which everyone started laughing and lightened the mood a little. I did learn two chords though on the banjo.  I’m sounding like a pro. We left and got in the car and
started laughing on how awkward it was and how we were so full we thought we were going to die. We learned our lesson and decided to never to do that again. 

We met this amazing family who just moved from Ghana, Africa. We knocked on their door and they invited us right in. We started talking about the restoration and how we had a prophet on the earth today. Barbra, the mom, got a little emotional and said that it would be so wonderful to have a prophet. We gave her and her family a Book of Mormon and she was really excited to read and learn more
from us. 

We then went to another apartment complex to contact a potential investigator.   Sadly they weren't home but we felt inspired to knock on another door. We did and this teenage boy answered. We showed him the “A Savior is Born” Video and he loved it. He told us he didn't feel very good that day and decided to come home
from school, he said that doesn't normally happen and he wasn't sure why he came home. He realized that he came home probably to meet us. He was really cool and definitely a miracle. 

Saturday,  was the longest and probably one of the most frustrating times. We got a call from the Elders in our ward Friday night and they told us Monica told them she was going to be done with smoking. We decided to fast for her Saturday. We didn't have any appointments so we just tracted all day and tried potentials. NO
ONE ANSWERED THE DOOR.  Those that did open the door, were super rude to us. We were getting so frustrated and it didn't help that we haven't had anything to eat all day. After what seemed like 5 years, it was finally 5 o clock and time for us to eat. We didn't have a dinner appointment that night, so we quickly drove
home and ate as fast as we could. WE felt a little more energized and ready to go. Still we didn't have any plans so we just tracted.... BUT it went SO MUCH BETTER this time. We found this sweet lady named Nanette and her cute little kids. She just moved here and needed to find a church. She loved the Christmas Initiative
video (A Savior is Born). She invited us to come back tonight and talk with her a little more. She definitely lightened our mood and is our little miracle for the night. 

Sunday was the day Monica wasn't going to smoke. We have tried this plenty of times and we were really nervous about it. She came to church and she was very grumpy, but that was a good sign because we knew she didn't smoke!! The Elders and us decided that she needed to be kept busy and be with us all day, because the
first day is the hardest. She went tracting with us and it was so much fun. She was really happy,  surprisingly. But she went a whole 24 hours with out smoking! :) She is currently at work and texted us and told us her friend offered her a cigarette, she took two puffs and started coughing really bad and said it was so gross she
made up her mind she will never smoke again. WE WERE SO HAPPY!! We are praying like crazy she doesn't smoke or even take anymore puffs ever again. She really wants to go to the temple and this is the only thing keeping her from going. She can do it!!!

Scripture: Luke 2:11- It is such an amazing and wonderful time of the year.  We are so blessed to have a Savior Jesus Christ and to celebrate His birth this Christmas season. I love Jesus Christ and couldn't thank him enough for his life and sacrifice that he has made for us. Keep him in your heart and mind during this
wonderful Christmas season! 

I can't wait to Skype with y'all on Christmas day and see y'all :) :) I hope y'all have an amazing week and always remember how much I love y'all!!!! I pray for y'all constantly!! 

Love Sister Brooks :)

You experience every emotion in one week as a missionary!

Hello Family and Friends!

This week has been fun, crazy, weird, frustrating, spiritual and tiring. You experience every emotion in one week as a missionary I swear. haha. To get the fun news out of the way, we had transfer calls Saturday. We were scared out of our pants. The AP's will call you between 6-10. If they call you, you are getting transferred, if you don't hear anything from them, you're safe. So we had 4 hours of completely horror, lucky us WE DIDN'T GET THAT CALL!!!!! We are so happy we are both staying here and get to spend another transfer and Christmas together :)

Last Monday, we had lunch at our Stake President's House. He is so funny and he looks exactly like Mr. Bean. Ahh man, too funny!! But it was a lot of fun, we had it with our whole zone. We had chicken and hamburgers and all those expensive things missionaries can't afford. It was great! After we ate, we had zone p-day. We just went to the church and played a bunch of different games. Not to brag, but I smoked everyone in speed.. twice. holla! 

On Tuesday, we went to the care center, We went and sang Christmas songs to random people. We sounded awful but we made a few people cry. I don't know if we sounded that bad or they were touched, we will pretend they were touched and loved it haha. 

Vicki, just had shoulder surgery, so we have been helping her out a little bit with cleaning. She tore her rotator Cuff and has been in a lot of pain for over a year and just decided to go for it. We have been helping her get meals from the ward and doing everything we can to help her. She is so sweet and doesn't ever ask for help, but us missionaries can get the job done fast ;)

On Thursday and Friday, we had Sister Fuhriman come and spend the day and a half with us. Her companion went to her mid-mission meeting (a training/meeting you go to when you're half way done with your mission) so she needed someone to be with, so she came with us! it was fun to be with her again but really weird to have 3 people in lessons and sleeping in a tiny room. It was really fun though.

Friday night we had our ward Christmas party. The girl in charge went above and beyond. I will send pictures. But she did a polar express theme and wow it was amazing. We helped decorate almost all day. The party was really fun and great food of course! 

We met this guy named Wayne the other day. He is around 40 years old. We went back the other night to teach him, he was excited and ready to learn more, but his girlfriend that he lives with is atheist... haha. He invited us in and his girlfriend was sitting in the front room on the couch, and she started yelling at him and us saying we weren't allowed in the house because it was her house too. She was not nice at all.  He told us we better leave so he could calm her down. ugh. He was so interested in learning but we just need to soften his girlfriend up-  my dream is to baptize an atheist. Oh and Wayne was the first white guy we have taught in the last week. I love Virginia. hahaha

We had two AMAZING miracles this week. We were teaching this girl named Nicole and she was looking for a church. We were teaching her the restoration and came to the part about Joseph Smith. She sat there with a stunned look. We paused for a second and she was like "no way, I'm just like Joseph Smith, I have the same question." Then we started talking about the Book of Mormon and how it's another testimony of Jesus Christ. She looked at it and said, "no way? I have that exact book in my Amazon cart." We told her she could have the book and she was so excited and said she would start reading it that night. It was so awesome. We hope she continues to have this much excitement as we continue to teach her. 

We then were tracting and getting very frustrated because people were not interested at all and were starting to get more rude as we went along. We were about to give up and go somewhere else but I saw this house and knew we had to try it. This sweet lady answered the door and let us right in. We just sat there looking at each other and didn't know what to do, this doesn't happen often. haha But we walked in and talked with her for awhile. She told us she has met with missionaries before, 8 years ago, but they were transferred and she moved a few years later and hasn't talked with them again. She was so excited to see us and gave us a bunch of food to take home and invited us over Wednesday to come roast marshmallows and be with her kids that are coming home for college. It was awesome. We are excited to meet with her again. She is best friends with David Osmond, I think that's his name. But it was so amazing and definitely little Christmas miracles! 

Scripture: Doctrine and Covenants 104:80- it just says and means to me, if I am diligent, humble and exercise faith in prayer, the Lord will soften the hearts of those around me and deliver them to me so I will be able to share this wonderful message and Gospel with them! 

I love being a missionary, it is the best thing in the world!!! 

I love y'all so much, I hope y'all have a wonderful week and know I love y'all so much :) :)

Love Sister Brooks :)

Great week! Pro Window Jumper! :)

Hello again,

I feel like I just wrote an email home, and here I am again. Brace
yourself, its a weird and busy week this week. Those are the best
weeks though, because times just zooms by and you feel so good at the end of the week. Man, missions are the best!

I just want all ya’ll to know, if you ever try to lock me out of a car,
think again. haha.  Sister Tadd decided to lock me out of the car and rolled down the window to make fun of me, next thing you know, I jumped through the window and landed successfully in the car. Don’t mess with me. I don’t think I have ever seen her laugh so hard in my life.

On Tuesdays, we go to the care center and visit people for our service. It was so much fun. We helped decorate the center and just laughed at the older people, they are sooo cute!! I cant wait to go back!

We have this couple in our ward that just got called to be mission
presidents. They will be finding out in a few weeks where they will be going!! Saint George is open.. :) That would be awesome if they went there. They seriously are the sweetest things. We had dinner at their house and wow... I was speechless. It was the biggest and most beautiful house I have ever seen. They win, hands down. After dinner, Sister Lansing came out with us and asked a million questions about missions and how nervous she is to be a presidents wife, but she will be so good! They just have the "Mission President" look.

We were tracting the other day and found this cute little Muslim
family. Muslim families are everywhere around here. They asked if we wanted some water, duh, and next thing you know, the wife comes out with these nice glasses with some apple juice. She was carrying it on a platter. It was so funny, we felt like royalty. They were very sweet. We gave them a Book of Mormon and he couldn't believe we were giving it to them for free. They were really nice. Muslims are very set in their ways, but we will definitely try back soon, even if we just get the juice ;) haha just kidding.

We have a Book of Mormon class every other Thursday.  We were
asked to teach it this week.  Luckily it was 1 Nephi 1-3 so it was really easy and everyone knew what was going on, because, lets be real, we have read that multiple times and if we get farther than that, we are good... haaha it was really fun though.

We have this sweet lady in our ward who LOOVVEESS Christmas.  We spent 2 hours getting all of her Christmas decorations down and sadly we didn’t get them all down before we had to leave. Her whole living room was packed!! (picture to come) it was so funny we couldn’t stop laughing. She just kept handing us boxes!

We had a zone meeting this week. One thing I have learned and really thought about lately is how our work is put all in the Lord’s hands. Sometimes it is so frustrating to keep dropping people and setting people on date and they don’t do anything you want them to do. I have learned this past week that this work is in the Lord’s hands and he will make it all work out on His timing.  One of our Sister Training Leaders gave a training and I loved the quote she said. She said "Have faith and just move forward, don’t focus on the things you can’t control, but the things you can." (Chris doesn't she sound like great wife material? hahahaha) It really stuck with me and I’m going to try everything I can to continue to apply that to my life.

We had stake conference this week.  It was so awesome and even
better to see my old ward!  It was so fun. On Saturday night, there
was an adult session. It was so amazing. As a missionary, you REALLY learn to love meetings and church, or maybe that’s just me. But after the adult session I heard "Sister Brooks". I turned around and guess who it was?? DAVID MILLER!!!!!!! I was so happy and excited I couldn’t contain myself. We talked for awhile and I got a picture, but the lighting is really bad. but oh well!! It was so fun to see him and some people in my last ward!

Sister Tadd had a wonderful idea (not at all) to walk to church for the Stake Conference broadcast. A mile and a half later, we arrived at the church. Don’t worry, we got a ride home haha.

Investigator wise, we have been doing pretty well. We have found some new people who are interested and we will be visiting them this week to see if they are serious or not, let’s hope and pray they are.

Our Stake President made a goal for us to get 60 member presents
(discussions that we take a member with us) a week ago and we did it! So today we are going over to his house to have lunch!! I like free lunch.

Scripture of the week: Alma 37:6- It says- by small and simple things, great things will come to pass. I know that Heavenly Father has a plan for each and everyone of us. When we receive answers to prayers, they might not be these huge answers, but they can be so soft and small, but something big will always come out of it. Even with tracting and going out and finding people, just saying Hi or giving them a card, something can always happen out of that. 

Have ya’ll seen the new Christmas initiative? If you haven’t, go watch it, it is so cute!!! The little boy who says (all our sins and sadness, or something like that, is the best) go to christmas.mormon.org. Its the #ASaviorisBorn

I love ya’ll so much, I pray for you all the time!! Have a wonderful week:)

Love Sister (pro window jumper) Brooks