New Jersey Week 2 is Complete!‏ November 10, 2014

Hi everyone!

New Jersey has been great! I only have 10 minutes left to write this, so hopefully I can do it quickly.

This week has been great! I finally got to go to sacrament meeting here (I didn't get to the week before because it was stake conference) and the ward is great. It is pretty different from the west as far as that goes. Most of the members are inactive, like a lot more.

Um...what else. I have an awesome zone and district. I'm not sure if I talked about that before, but they really are great. I have already learned so much from them and their dedication. Oh--before I forget. There is a Spanish speaking sister in my zone, I don't remember her name right now, but she knows the Claypools! Like really well! She also knows the Mullens and the husband of one of my MTC teachers. Super crazy right? Oh, and I had my first exchange this last Friday/Saturday. It was great. I tried my first Jersey pizza, which was as fabulous as they say.

We are teaching a few people right now, but I feel like we have had to drop more investigators than we have found. It is pretty sad. I know though that the Lord knows what He is doing.

I love you all soooooo very much! I will try to write more next week...I need to probably write this email before the others just so I can have enough time. I always had more than enough time in the MTC, but now time flies I guess. And it helps that I get more than like five emails each week. I guess I share little experiences in other emails, but hopefully I can work on getting them all on this email!

Love you!

Sister Jensen

Here are some beautiful pictures of New Jersey with all the colorful fall leaves

NEW JERSEY!!!! November 3, 2014

I love New Jersey, but I guess you could call it one of the harder missions. We got one new investigator last week, and she dropped us within 24 hours. That was hard to see. All our investigators with baptismal dates won't answer our calls, their doors, or anything. It is pretty frustrating. Because of that, I have only gotten to meet with two of our investigators. We work a lot with less active members here, and some areas of the ward don't even have any active members. It's really sad. I love it here though, and I love the people.

My companion is Sister Paight. She is great, and I love learning from her. Our area is called Scotch Plains North, and we our house is in Garwood, New Jersey. It is absolutely gorgeous here! This week, I even fell and scraped my knee really really bad. It was pretty intense. The people here generally believe in Christ, but act super nice, and then give us wrong information or call us within 24 hours to cancel any plans, or they just don't answer their phones. Talk about busy, not always friendly east coast people. I still love them though. I really love seeing all the different cultures come together here as well. That is one of the coolest parts. I love it so much!

We do get to go to Ellis Island in a few weeks, so I need to get some information from Mom about that.

Love you all so much (and mom, if I said anything cool in any of the individual emails, feel free to add that to the main email on the blog too. I don't have too much time or a good enough memory to put it all here).

Love,

Sister Jensen

Here is my companion Sister Paight and I at transfer conference--the first day we were companions

Here's my battle wound from falling yesterday and all the craziness that happened with it

Look at the cute dinner that a family in the ward (the Kramers) brought us on halloween.

 It was "bones and maggots" in a pumpkin. Super cute!

I'm Here! October 27, 2014

Oí minha família! 

I just wanted to let you know that I have made it to New Jersey safe and sound. It is just gorgeous here and everyone is so wonderful! I loved seeing the New York City skyline as we flew in. I feel so blessed to be here. Love you!

Love,

Sister Jensen

Last Email from the MTC, October 25, 2014

Hi there!

This email probably won't be super exciting, but oh well. I am so excited to go to New Jersey on Monday. It is going to be such a wonderful experience to meet all the wonderful people there and to get my feet wet in English before I have to worry about Portuguese too much.

So, Emilee asked me a few questions in her letter this week. I am going to answer them before I get too much further into my letter. The MTC is still going great. I love every second of it. Yes, we are pretty tired. One day, Sister Bunch and I caught all of the Elders in our district dozing off at the same time. It is amazing to see that the Lord gives us the energy that we need throughout the day. When Sister Post left, we just had Sister Bunch and I like a normal companionship. Portuguese is going awesome I guess. It is going to be crazy once I'm in Brazil, but I am so excited for that. Spanish is super helpful, but super confusing sometimes if I can't remember if the word I am thinking of is Spanish or Portuguese. 

We had so many wonderful experiences in lessons and TRC (where we teach members) this week. I feel so blessed to have this opportunity to prepare to serve people all over the world.

I guess I forgot to say last week where everyone else in my district is going. Elders Carpenter and Shakespear are going to Omaha, Nebraska. Elders Wally and Camp are going to Albuquerque, New Mexico, and...Sister Bunch is going to Salem, Oregon! We were all super excited because she could still be there when you get there, and she was born there, so she is super excited for that.

I love you all, and will send more emails with pictures.

Love,

Sister Jensen

I found Dylan here too! that was super fun to see him! Sorry, it's kind of a funny picture

Here is a much better picture of Elder Oviatt and I. He is the best!

Here is sisters bunch, bow, gutke and I at the map pointing to our missions in Brazil and Mozambique

It's Jared! I finally found him when I had my camera!

 Here is our district on our last day with the amazing Irmao Gray. 

I was so incredibly blessed to have him as one of my teachers

Here is our district at the map with all of our reassignments. It is so cool to see us go all over the world!

This picture truly tells how much we all love each other!

Travel Plans, October 23, 2014

I just got my travel plans today. They go as follows:

I report to the travel office here at the MTC at 3:35 AM on Monday morning. From there, I go to the Salt Lake airport. My flight leaves at 8:15 from here to Philadelphia. I should get into Philadelphia at 2:30 in the afternoon. From there, I get on another flight at 3:55 to Newark, New Jersey. I should arrive in New Jersey at 5 pm or so. 

I will buy a calling card later today from the bookstore. I don't know when we should talk on the phone, but this is the information. Please email me back ASAP because I have another meeting starting in 10 minutes and I want to talk to you about that.

Love you!

Sister Jensen