Finally...AN UPDATE!

Hey everyone! We thought it was about time for an update on Hermana Christensen.

Katelyn is doing great and enjoying her mission in Texas.
We know from the weather maps that it is very hot & humid down there, but Kate rarely complains about the weather. There are not very many spanish-speaking sisters in her mission. Because of this, she doesn't move around as much as is sometimes common. So far, she has been in the same area for the past nine months. She has really gotten to know and love the Latino people who attend her spanish ward in Bear Creek. This is located just North of the suburb of Katy, Texas. She has had three companions in her time in Houston: Sister Lillywhite, Sister Bastian, and now Sister Smart. On the home front, Kate has been excited with the news of her close friends accepting calls to serve missions as well. Although she would love to be able to attend their farewells, etc., she shares in their enthusiasm. She is currently looking forward to her visit with the Noftle Family, who will be in Houston for a couple of days this next week. Kate is also always trying to spice up our life with new formats to her letters. haha. A recent one was titled "The Katelyn Kronicle" and was filled with exciting headlines. It is an exciting time for our missionary:) We are all pretty sure that Jace's letters will not be quite so informative and creative to read.

Here are some excerpts & stories from her latest letters:

Katelyn's ward mission leader, wife, 2 kids and grandma, the Guillens, traveled to Salt Lake a few weeks ago. Before they left, Kate actually offered them Grandma Marilyn's house to stay at. My mom was SHOCKED to think that Katelyn thinks she can just offer Grandma's house to someone, especially for a whole two weeks! But it all worked out of course. They got a hold of Grandma & enjoyed their stay. Grandma Marilyn reported that they were the sweetest and most respectful family ever. However, Katelyn's plan backfired on her a bit upon their return as they shared glowing reports of spending time with all of her aunts, uncles and cousins.
she said, "Ok seriously....i am OFFICIALLY 'TRUNKY'. I am not even going to hide that fact. I spent an entire HOUR yesterday after church listening to Hno. and Hna. Guillen brag about my Grandparents, and my family in general.
Hno: I LOVE your grandma's house....it has so many memories and pictures....
Me: Yeah....it is a nice house. My grandma likes pictures.
Hno: Do you go there alot? It seems like you and your grandma are close.
Me: She let me stay there all the time in college. She's one of my best freinds.
Hno: I didn't know that your entire family got together every Monday to play soccer...
Me: Yup. They do.
Hno: MAN...that was really fun
Me: ...Yeahhh
Hno: Your Grandparents love you very very much...
Me (to Hermana Bastian): Do we have a dinner appointment? PLEASE?"
Sounds like hearing about home made Kate alittle homesick! We know she misses us and we miss her too, but Kate's always pushing through with a smile.

She also recently said, "I am glad that the Utah family is doing well. I have the Christmas Picture in my scriptures from us at the Brighton Ski Resort last summer, so when people ask about my family I can just whip it out. I like looking at it too. I was thinking of 'yall this week. It is good to know that everyone is happy and healthy. I was also thinking about Kenzie this week. Grandma Jean wrote me and told me she started school. MAN that was probably the funnest time of my life, as far as being carefee and flat out crazy. I miss it. I guess there are good things about every phrase in life and I am so glad I am serving a mission. It is hard, but TOTALLY worth it."

OTHER CLIPS OF KATE's LETTERS-
"Cute little Olivia's baptism day finally came. The baptism was awesome. It started out a little tense because she called us and asked us if we could come get her and give her a ride to her own baptism. There were beer cans over the yard and it was pretty obvious that everyone in the house except Olivia and the kids were still recovering from the wedding the night before, if you catch my drift. She is a pillar of strength though. She had her little bag of clothes all ready to go and was simply beaming. Her sister was like "Where are you going?" Olivia said- "I told you. I am going to be baptized." Literally her sister, who was laying on the couch, said "Don't drowned."" Many sacrifice so much to accept the gospel.

"Our Zone Leader came to us while we were eating lunch and said that President Hansen wanted to meet with JUST OUR ZONE after our tri-zone conference! we were scared that we were going to get yelled at because we were low on numbers or something, but he just told us that he was reading in D&C about how preaching the Gospel can be an "effectual door" to others and when he read that phrase he thought immediately of the Houston Zone because we are his Spanish Speaking missionaries. He said that we are a very small minority in the mission, but we make up for half the Baptisms. He said he felt inspired to share with us that we should be prepared because big things are about to happen to our Zone and we should pay attention to every prompting that we get. He said he has never met with a specific Zone like this before, but he was inspired to do so with us. When we left we were all kind of looking around like 'WHAT? what just happened??'"

"We had a great experience this week. On Wednesday, we decided to walk to our appointments because we were running out of miles for the month. It was super hot and miserable. The heavy bag we carry all day doesn't help either. This particular day, we happened to be fasting for the Tates family, and especially for Hermanita Tates. By the time we got back to our apartment around 7 o'clock to freshen up and get ready to drive to our appointment with Welfredo, I had pretty much had it. I was exhausted, dehydrated, starving, and sweating. I wanted to call and cancel the appointment with Welfredo, take our dinner hour (even though we were not going to eat), and crash. I didn't complain to my companion, but I could tell she was thinking the same thing. We both wanted to cancel, but we were both too stubborn to be the one to say it. We ended up going to the Cita anyways. We sang and prayed out of habit, because that is how we always start a lesson. We asked if he had been reading and praying because we always ask our investigators that. We were kinda going through the motions and getting through the lesson. He stopped us dead in our tracks by saying that yes, he stayed up until 3:30 reading the Book of Mormon. And yes, he had not only prayed, but had had a dream and he knew with all his heart that Joseph Smith was a prophet. It was crazy!! He now has a baptismal date and came to church yesterday. Tell Jace when he is sweating to death and tired and sick, and wants to quit, to keep going. When his companion wants to go home and call it a day, knock on a few more doors. Push yourself. You never know when God is going to prepare people."

"The mission and mission rules are changing a little church wide. We are no longer going to have interviews with President every transfer and we are not going to have Zone Conferences every transfer either. We are only going to have them 3 or 4 times a year. Predicad Mi Evangelio is coming out with a chapter 14 and will be reprinted with more footnotes to keep us from preaching false doctrine." Basically the spirit of these new changes is for us to stop being babysat by President and stop relying on him alone for spiritual strengthening. We are supposed to be conversing more with our Heavenly Father and less with our mission president, because he knows what the people need FAR better than even our mission president does. They want us to be in less meetings and out teaching more and to rely on the temple and Zone Conference to recharge our spiritual batteries once a transfer."

"My converts are doing well. I as so glad that I have stayed in this area for awhile because I have been able to see them progress in the gospel and witness the changes it is making in their lives. I now have them teaching their friends which is very exciting. What an amazing little flock of sheep."

Kate is so oblivious to the outside world around her, that when my mom told her that my dad got an "ipad", she thought that she had just done a typo and meant to say "ipod", until she was at a member's home and they were using one. She had never even heard of it or knew they existed. That's funny!!!

It seems like we can always get something out of reading Kate's letters. And as we get ready to send another missionary off, we'll remember her words. This week especially, I MISS MY SISTER! But she continues to remind us that she is where she is supposed to be.

We'll try to work on getting the posts up more often :)
-Lindsey

missionary moments

We're not doing a very good job of keeping everyone updated on Katelyn's missionary experiences. We love getting her emails every Monday and because of the time difference, they're almost always here first thing in the morning, which makes it nice. No waiting, checking and rechecking the computer for the highly anticipated update. Her letters are always upbeat and positive with plenty of humor, so that is fun for us.

She is still with Sister Lillywhite from Murray, UT and seems to enjoy her companionship. She says she hopes she gets to stay with her at least through the next transfer. They live in a cute little apartment. (emphasis on cute and emphasis on little) At one time, she said, "We have seven current investigators, What a cute little flock they are!". Most of them can't quite fit it in their schedule to make it to church, but Hermana Christensen is not discouraged by this, she considers it just a minor little detail. When one investigator pointed out to her that she was actually of another faith, Katelyn, wrote, "She's mormon, we're all mormon, she just doesn't remember and we can help her with that." Pretty idealistic and funny!!!!

She got the approval to start driving, which was exciting and scary to her, considering she hasn't driven in three months, she is in a huge city as well and she wasn't all that confident of a driver in the first place. After doing it for a couple of weeks, she said she doesn't know which is harder, being the driver or being the navigator in the passenger seat. Either way, I think this makes me more nervous than two cute, young single girls living alone in a big city. Image two, or at least one, young single small town inexperienced driver out on the roads of the city of Houston. Prayers for safety, please!!!!!

As far as the Spanish goes, Katelyn says the language is coming along. "Some days we go into lessons and the person will talk very fast for like five minutes and I will just look at them and think, I have no idea what you just said. On these occasions, Hermana Lillywhite reminds me that I am so much farther ahead than she was at the same point in her mission and that I am basically fluent, which is FALSE, but I love her for it anyway. I am not afraid of speaking though. I know I have grammar problems, but I am not letting that stop me. They are always so good to correct me and I am trying to stay humble and praying for the El don de Lenguas EVERYDAY of my mission."

Of a really "golden" contact, Katelyn said, "Isn't amazing how Heavenly Father has just prepared some people to join the church before we even contact them?" It really is and we all need to remember that. It is strange she says being the only blonde haired blue eyed person in the ward. "I am Hermana Rubia...The blonde sister" and one of our investigators wives calls me Munecita (little doll), she thinks it is so funny and cute when I speak Spanish. She also doesn't believe that I am 21.....wierd.

Of all the support she is receiving, Katelyn said, "Tell everyone I love them and thanks for the mail and prayers, I can really feel them. I am so grateful that Heavenly Father sent me my own little Kate Fan club to love and support me. You are the Best!" MUCHO AMOR

Hermanita Kate's Current Mailing address Hermana Katelyn Christensen
Green Tree Place Apts. #509
4211 Clay Hill Drive
Houston, TX 77084

Happy at Home in Houston

We got out first letter from Katelyn after arriving in Houston!

Before I address that, We didn't get to speak to Kate right on Christmas day because the missionaries in the MTC do not get to call their families (something my mom was really sad to find out). However, we DID get to talk to Kate just a few short days later before she flew out of the Salt Lake Airport. We happened to be in Utah and were tempted a bit to just "happen" to show up at the airport; we decided that no one would buy that. Katelyn did actually run into a couple from our ward and was able to talk with them and introduce her companion. Great reports were given when we talked to her. She said she missed listening to Christmas music but had a good time either way. The sisters hung out and talked about family traditions. Kate was unbelievably excited when L. Tom Perry visited the missionaries on Christmas...a great Christmas overall.



In Kate's first letter she said that she loves Texas. Everything is flat and she feels wierd without her Utah mountains. When she arrived, the mission president took them to the Mission Office for dinner and it appears that Katelyn isnt a big fan of "Real Texas BBQ" :) I guess she'll have to get used to it. She does admit that everything IS bigger there and "cant they see that she's under five feet tall" and doesn't need a sandwich "as big as her head"??
Kate said- " After we ate, we went out with a campanionship for a couple of hours. The hermanas I went with took me to a ward party. It was SO fun! One thing about those Latino People - THEY SURE CAN THROW A PARTY! They are adorable. I always knew that I would love the people here, but I never imagined that it would happen so very fast! The moment I walked in they were hugging me and kissing me - which was REALLY strange after coming out of my MTC bubble, but SO nice."

Katelyn missed her sisters from the MTC right off the bat. Spending 24-7 together and then being separated wasn't easy. Kate said that they are the only two people in the world who understand what its like for her right now and shes glad that she'll be able to see them around.

Lastly, Katelyn said that she LOVES her trainer! Her name is Hermana Lillywhite. She is from Murray and speaks spanish amazingly! What more could Kate ask for? She had an "Amy Dot" pillow case, designed by Kate's aunt. Hermana Lillywhite couldnt believe that her aunt drew the fabric design. They are getting along great and had a chance to go to the Houston Temple. Kate says its unique and really pretty; definitely one of her favorites.

Randomly, KATE RAN INTO A FAMILY FREIND AT CHURCH! A great girl who Katelyn has known for a while and recognized Kate within seconds. The ward that Kate is serving in shares the building with her ward. It was great for Kate to talk to her and her parents and even discuss when they visited little Royal City. :) Prayers were answered when the girl's mom called our house after church. My mom talked to her for quite a while and enjoyed hearing that Katelyn looked happy as ever.

That's all I got. Katelyn would like me to tell you all thank you for the amount of support you have given her. She is so thankful and could not feel more loved. She sent home her letters and we were shocked at how many there were! Thank you so much.
Her new mailing address is:

HERMANA KATELYN CHRISTENSEN
TEXAS HOUSTON MISSION
16623 HAFER ROAD
HOUSTON TX 77090-4401

I'll keep you posted!
-Lindsey <3

Holiday Spirit in the MTC

Hola Y'all:

I thought I had better start speaking Texican since Kate is three short weeks from heading south. We heard this week that they actually had SNOW in Houston, but I don't think that even with snow it will compare to the 'single digit' weather they are having in Provo right now. Kate is getting stir crazy in the MTC and is ready to head out into the mission field, but has a good attitude and a patient spirit.

Kate had a wonderful Thanksgiving experience in the MTC, as Elder Jeffrey R. Holland of the Quorum of the Twelve came to visit the MTC. He told them that since they were away from their families on this holiday, that he and Sister Holland had come to be their family. We love Elder Holland, and in the spirit of Thanksgiving I am indeed grateful that he visited my daughter in the MTC and touched her heart with his tender words of love and support when I could not give them myself. Sister Holland spoke to the missionaries about the eternal nature of our spirits and bodies. Kate was deeply touched by both talks and was on a spiritual high. Thank you Elder and Sister Holland.


I would like to introduce you to Sister Maylett...Kate's companion. They are a dynamic duo and Kate has the privilege of spending 24/7 with Sister Maylett. She is from Washington DC, so between the two of them the have the Washington's covered. Katelyn describes her as quiet and very sweet. She has helped Kate with the Spanish language a lot. I sense they are starting to teach well together and are a good support for each other.


This is Sister Bullock, who Katelyn describes as AMAZING! She is pint-sized like Kate, so they are known as the Hermanitas (Little Sisters). To give you an idea of how pint-sized Kate and Sister Bullock are I have included this picture...


I don't know how tall this Elder is, but these two sisters make him seem about a foot taller than he actually is. Kate has met a lot of wonderful Elders and Sisters during her stay and I'm sure that although she will be excited to head down to Houston, she will miss many of these new found friends

Katelyn was excited because last week she was able to be a Hostess and greet the new Hermanas as they arrived at the MTC. She wondered if she had the same 'deer-in-the-headlights' look that they did that first day at the MTC. I'm sure she did,,,but look at her now.

I suppose that's all the news from 'Camp Katelyn' for now. We appreciate all of your support for our daughter and she often speaks of the cards and letters she receives and how appreciative she is to hear from all of you.

Muchas Gracias

Week Three A Success!

Lindsey here. Not really sure this is going to turn out AT ALL because i have never done this blogging thing but i am the official blogger now. I guess i'll learn as i go. :)

The first sentence of Katelyn's latest letter happened to be "This week has actually been REALLY great." and how could you say it better? Katelyn has a great attitude the entire time she writes these letters and i admire her for that.

She goes on to say that all the missionaries seemed a little frustrated with learning the language last week. One of her teachers asked some of the missionaries what had been bothering them and Kate was the only one to say (in her blunt way) "Hermano, we just can't speak spanish very well." haha! sounds like Katelyn. Her teacher went on to tease them about their being in the MTC a grand total of two weeks and he definitely thought they should be speaking fluent Spanish. Kate made sure to add in that he was kidding. He also made the sisters and elders a promise that they would be speaking and thinking wonderful spanish by April 15th.

Moving on - Kate mentioned that she also had to give a talk in sacrament meeting - without warning - in Spanish! The Branch Pres. usually gives the topic for sacrament meeting the week before and asks everyone to read up on it during the week. Katelyn greeted the president before sacrament meeting and he complimented her on her yellow scarf.
Katelyn - "Why thank you! It brings a little bit of sunshine to everyone."
Pres. - "Well you don't need a scarf for that. I wish all my missionaries were as bubbly and happy as you."
He then asked about her thoughts on the topic for sacrament meeting, which was humility. She told him and then they moved on. But as the meeting started, he got up to speak and without warning said "Before i begin, i would like to have Sister Christensen give us her thoughts on humility." I CANT EVEN IMAGINE! and to do it in another language just blows my mind! :) Of course Kate did great.

The last thing i want to mention is the thing that made Kate super excited. A week ago they lost one of her favorite teachers, so now she has a sub in one of her classes. She was pumped to learn that the sub, Hermano Rivera, served his mission in Spokane!! He even knew where Royal was because he served in Mattawa for nine months. He talked about our Aunt Karen and how she ran to Tri-Cities when the elders wanted Panda Express. And he said that my dad's cousin Del used to take them to the temple every week (he said he was cool). During their first lesson Hermano Rivera said, "A very wise man once told him to expect miracles EVERY day of your mission." He then asked Katelyn who she thought that was. Katelyn said that it sounded like a President Leavitt quote. Turns out she was right!!!

There you have it. That's about all there was from Katelyn this week. I'm so proud of my sister and hope i can keep up the blogs. I ran out of time but i'm going to up load pictures maybe tomorrow.

<33 Goodbye till next week!

Adiós Hermana

As you are probably aware from earlier entries, Katelyn left on her mission two weeks ago, and as such will not have access to her blog for the next 18 months. So, in an effort to keep you all abreast of her happenings, we (her family) will try to keep this blog updated with the latest and greatest from Hermana Christensen!

Katelyn entered the MTC on Wednesday, October 28th at 12:45 p.m. We actually thought her drop off time was an hour earlier but fortunately we called earlier that morning to ask some last minute questions and were informed that the time had been changed. (Apparently a letter was sent to Katelyn's school address, but it never made it to us...oh well). Kate was anxious to get there and get to work, so she was disappointed about the delay, but we were grateful as it allowed us an additional hour with our daughter.


The Sunday before going to the MTC Katelyn talked at church and did an exceptional job teaching us about having Hope in Christ. It was a great meeting and we were all grateful to be present. Later that afternoon we had an Open House for her and close to 100 friends and family converged on our house to wish Katelyn farewell and good luck. After the Open House, Katelyn was set apart as a missionary and the final countdown began.

Monday was spent driving to Salt Lake...Tuesday was dedicated to final preparations, a trip to the Salt Lake Temple and a family gathering. Wednesday dawned bright and beautiful. We were all well aware of what lie ahead of us in a few short hours, but I must say that there was a sense of peace and rightness to the day. We headed to Provo and the plan was to meet Kate's older brother Riley and her good friend Stephanie at 11:00 and they were going to go with us to drop Kate off at the MTC. When we learned that she wouldn't report for another hour we decided to go to lunch, but Riley had a class at 12:00 so he wasn't able to go with us. : (

As 12:30 rolled around we headed up to the MTC. It used to be that you went inside for a presentation and said your goodbyes inside, and that is how it was when we dropped Riley off at the MTC nearly four years ago. But recently they changed the procedure to "curb-side delivery". As you pull into the MTC parking lot they ask if you are dropping off a missionary, then they direct you around the parking lot to a designated stall where a couple of missionaries are waiting to grab your bags and assist your missionary to the appropriate location. And I must say that I enjoyed it better than the previous time. There is still the sadness associated with saying goodbye, but it reduces the anxiety of waiting. We gave Kate our final hugs and kisses...a few parting words of advise...and watched as she followed her two escorts through the doors of the MTC. We were grateful that Stephanie could be with us as we said our goodbyes to Kate and we are even more grateful that Stephanie could be there for Kate these last couple of years. They are true friends!


Now on to the the MTC. Kate has had a wonderful, rewarding, challenging, exciting, fulfilling, tiring, and spiritually maturing two weeks in the Training Center. The rest of this post will be excerpts from her letters home. You will see her personality coming through in these entries...

"A typical day the MTC starts with personal study at 7:00 AM, followed by breakfast and Companion study. Then we have class. Then lunch at 1:00. After lunch we have more class...then an hour of personal Language Study. After dinner we have gym and then we get to plan and do it all over again. This is a pretty rough idea of how my days go. My teachers are students at BYU so we might have gym right after lunch if they have a class or we might have companion study at night and class in the morning if that is when they can teach...you get the picture."

"Our Spanish lessons are usually done in Spanish, while our teaching techniques and PMG lessons are usually done in English - for now. After week three it will pretty much be spanish all the way. IT IS SO HARD. I am learning alot though. I think your prayers are helping. I go to a Spanish tutor once a week on top of all my other studies and he give me really hard homework. It is a really fun language to speak though. Right now we are learning all about irregualr verbs and past tense and my head is about to explode."

"I LOVE MY TEACHERS! Hermano Jensen is AMAZING! I am not just saying that. I know all the teachers at the MTC are probably really great...but Hermano Jensen is in charge of teaching and training the teachers. He is great. Hermana Tymoschenko is so sweet and nice and really good at helping us with our Spanish. Eighteen hours a day studing might seem like it would make you want to kill yourself, but I like it. We keep it interesting."

"The food is...yeah welll...I will just leave it at that! : D It is actually not so bad. They have yummy wraps and good soup and salads and fruit and toast and most of the meals are not so bad. We have gym for 50 minutes everyday. Mostly I either walk on the track or play volleyball. If it is nice I get to go outside and play BEACH volleyball. I LOVE IT! AND THIS JUST IN: I am REALLY good at Volleyball. I am ALWAYS picked first. The elders make it pretty easy to look good I guess."

"STORY TIME! Every Tuesday we have a devotional. This week Elder Rasband from the Presidency of the Seventy came. He Spoke on being a bold missionary. He had a bunch of mics set up and asked if he could have a few volunteers to read some scriptures. A few elders got up and I thought..."I am right by the mic and I gotta represent the Sistas!" SO I DID. A couple of elders read some scriptures and He said thank you and they sat down. Along comes my turn. I read the scipture. Everything is good. Suddenly he pauses, and I am like OH NO. He says : What is your name, Sister? I told him I was Hermana Christensen. He asked where I was serving. I told him Houston, Texas. He then proceeded to ask me a series of Questions about being bold and brave and what that had to do with missionary work. He did not ask anyone else. My face was on the big old screen. I WAS FAMOUS. Everyone knew me. That WOULD happen to me."

"We have to teach the first lesson in Spanish in a week and we all practiced it for the first time the other day. FAIL! EPIC FAIL! I just don't see how any amount of preparation could compensate for speaking english natively. I dont see how I am ever going to teach the people as well as I could in English. I love the languguage. It was awesome to learn Spanish. I just hope that I will be able to teach the people of Houston. I am doing really well though. I am reading and reading a TON of Spanish from Preach my Gospel everynight so that I can get a feel for it and I think that it is helping. We also get to listen to conference talks in Spanish, which is really fun. Did you know Elder Scott actually Speaks Spanish?"

"Thank you so much much for all the letters and all of the updates from home. I get so excited when I get mail. I wait impatiently as my district leader unzips the mail bag each night, my heart beats faster as he walks towards me with the stack of letters...then I hear the best three words in the world...I HAVE MAIL...FROM YOU! Please note the clever movie reference (You've got mail) THANK YOU."

Well, that should be enough updates for now. We will post more pictures and updates in the coming weeks and months. She leaves for Houston December 30th so she will be in the MTC for Thanksgiving and Christmas. If you are interested in dropping Hermana Christensen a line I know she would love it. Her MTC mailing address is as follows:

Katelyn Michael Christensen
MTC Mailbox # 274
TX-HOU 1230
2005 N 900 E
Provo, UT 84604-1793

Thank you for all of your prayers and support for our daughter. We look forward to these next 18 months.

Princess (Number 2)

- THAT'S ME! According to Princess Number One, the Head Princess - MELISSA! Missy came to stay for a couple of days. I am going to miss this girl so much. THINGS I LOVE ABOUT HER: A) we are exactly the same size- I don't have very many friends as miniature as me, but she is. B) She thinks I am so funny and laughs at ALL of my jokes C) She sings Disney and quotes movies with me. PLUS she already wrote me my first mission letter - YOU ALL LOST. Sorry.



I had my last Sunday Night at Pa and Grandma Jean's house. I love them so much and I am going to miss their love and support. YAY FOR GRANDPARENTS



Speaking of Grandparents...ONE MORE DAY TIL I GET TO SEE THESE GUYS!




THREE DAYS TIL THESE GIRLS!!!



...and this boy comes home




FOUR MORE DAYS TIL MY REUNIFICATION WITH THIS GIRL! FINALLY! It's about bloody time :D




FIVE DAYS TIL THESE PEOPLE







and most of all - ONE WEEK TIL THIS PLACE!!!!!.....