Family

Dear Family!

This week was awesome! WE HAD A BAPTISM! it went so well and it was really one of those experiences
that i will never forget:) such a miracle! The program went smoothly and the Spirit was so strong! When he
got baptized he came up out of the water with a huge smile on his face and said "woa!" haha it was so cool.
And to know we helped to get him to this point where he could enter into a covenant with Heavenly Father and
be completely clean is seriously such a blessing and amazing experience. Afterwards I asked him how he felt
and he said, "i am so happy. My mind can't even understand how happy i am". And i know that happiness comes
from following the Savior! He is a changed man; and he knew and felt that. To me, that is such a huge testimony
builder that this gospel is TRUE! it changes lives and helps people come back into the presence of God! I know it.
I've seen it. And i will do everything i can to help more people come to this incredible knowledge! And the next day
in church he was confirmed and that too was such an amazing experience. He actually brought his friend too who
was so sweet and she actually became our new investigator! He is already being a missionary! We are going to
start meeting with her starting in March and she is just so special we can already tell! Miracles are happening!

 

such an amazing week! We actually had zone conference at the beginning of this week too! longest meeting of

my life but it was so good and uplifting! it started at 8:30 and we finished at 3:30with a little break for lunch. GO

MISSIONARY WORK!

this last sunday, the 23rd was also a holiday in Russia! it was men's day! where all the men in russia are celebrated!

even in church we sang a russian anthem and then sang to the men and had cake and such afterwards. so cool!

So i am thankful for all the wonderful men in my life! i love you all!!

It is bright and sunny today! it is still cold but this is the first sign of spring we have seen! we are so happy and so

ready for spring! i love my area! there are miracles happening every day!

This morning i was reading in true to the faith and i read some really cool quotes that i wanted to share!

"as a part of Heavenly Father's plan of redemption you experience adversity during mortality. Trials, disappointments,

sadness, sickness, and heartache are all a difficult part of life but they can lead to spiritual growth, refinement, and

progress as you turn your heart to the Lord" "although some of your responses to adversity will vary, one response

should be constant- your trust in Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ" "When you trust in the Father and the Son you are

confident that they love you perfectly- that they want you to be happy and that they will help you grow spiritually"

I love this and it has been a great help to me! also in alma 36:6 it talks about trusting in the lord and mosiah 24 is a

wonderful example and story of a people who took this to heart!

Hard times come, but i know that they are all for our good and that we can learn from them! I loved what President

Monson said in this last conference "You are loved!!! His love never changes. It is simply always there"

Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ love each and every one of you! And i love you all so much as well!

Never forget to trust in the Lord! he knows us all better than we know ourselves and wants the very best for each

of us!

LOVE YOU! and miss you all!

From russia with love!

Sister Yeates

GOODBYE TEENS‏

Dear Family!

I love you all so much! Seriously thank you for the early birthday wishes! I am actually really excited to turn 20! I do feel so old though:) My last week of being 19! Time has seriously flown! 

HAPPY NEW YEAR! 2014, year of the horse! if you all wanted to know. Russians actually

love that kind of thing. They have horse everything, seriously everything. It's hilarious. they also

are very into the whole "birthday star constellation" thing. i actually have forgotten mine at the 

moment. great contacting tool for today! haha.

New Years was crazy! more fireworks then i have ever seen or heard in one week in my life! They

were non stop new years eve and day and are still going off this whole week. In Russia new years

and Russian Christmas are looped into one huge holiday. people are off work for 2 weeks and everything is a bit crazy! we stay obedient and safe though. we had to be inside by 5pm on new years eve and so we had crepes (known as blini) and just relaxed a bit. Outside was NUTS! 

The new year is now here and everyone is making new goals and such! such a great opportunity to restart! 

Since it is a new year everyone in our branch got new callings and such. and since there are not 

enough members my companion and I got called to be relief society teachers for every Sunday! and since there is no presidency I just call ourselves the relief society presidents:) Very exciting! we are so excited to be able to serve even more than just missionaries!

i heard that the boundaries and everything was changed back home! good changes i hope! sounds like everything is going to be so great! 

Work is going a little slower and harder than usual because of the holidays. That has been hard and really frustrating. but we are keeping optimistic and pressing onward! 

Our mission president has given us new challenges for the new year and we will be speaking 100% Russian from 6:30am to 9:30 p.m. WOW is right! It will be hard but SO good for us to be able to learn this language better and faster! I would love your prayers as the language is rough and i need lots of work with it:) i am grateful for this challenge though! 

i love you all! hope your holidays went well! thinking and praying for you all daily! 

love, sister Yeates

Walkin in a Winter Wonderland! ‏ 12/08/13

Dear Family!

The Christmas season is upon us! and I am loving it! :) i hope all of you are doing well and are getting ready for the holidays! It is so crazy how fast Christmas has come! It seems only yesterday we were getting ready for the fourth of July! crazy!

We received our transfer calls this last Saturday! We were actually on the bus on the way back from a zone training and so we were all waiting anxiously! And we are all staying! This will be my fourth transfer in my area! I really love where I am serving, and it's so awesome to focus on an area for so long and really get used to it!

This last week was really awesome! Especially with the constant snowfall it has really just been so fun. The sidewalks are all ice so we have to shuffle/ski around everywhere. It definitely keeps things entertaining. :)
This week we started FHE at the branch and I am really excited to get this up and running! It is going to be so good for people to start getting involved more and having more activities to invite people too. We are still doing English and that is awesome too. In my area there isn't much of a branch so the missionaries are the branch counsel, we planned and set the goals for the branch for the coming year and a big part of that was reacting less actives! They are so important because they have already made the covenants of baptism and already have a testimony but have just fallen away! We are now working hard to help them come back!
Oh! On the way to zone training the ride was so gorgeous. There are forests all over and since it has snowed they are all white, but not only that but the snow has frozen onto the branches and so the trees look like glass! Probably the prettiest thing I have ever seen. I tried to snap a picture but there was no way I could get a non-blurry shot with a Russian driver;)!!! gotta love it! Zone training was really good, we talked a lot about Joy and how to find joy in every moment! I really loved it and I loved a quote that our zone leader said, " you can never beat the man who gets back up". Our zone leader is a football player and very much a "go get your dreams" kind of Elder. haha he really is hilarious but i loved this quote and it's a reminder to be the one who keeps getting up! Keep moving and don't let others take your happiness from you because you decide how your day goes. I have also been learning a lot about faith and hope this week. It's really cool to see that they go hand in hand. in preach my gospel it talks about hope and how hope helps conquer discouragement. I loved that and as a missionary having hope is SO important because you can't be a successful missionary if you are discouraged. We need to always look up! Look for the good in everyday! I also love in Ether 12 when it talks about how faith is the anchor to our souls and how we need to hope for a better world! Hope is how we show our Heavenly Father that we trust Him to give us blessings according to our faith. In the Mormon movie Legacy I always remember the line "let's help God keep His promise" That is so true! we need to have the hope and faith that Heavenly Father WILL bless us if we are doing the right thing and are good and faithful!

I love you all so much! i hope you have a wonderful week and have LOTS of Christmas cheer! Since the ENTIRE month of December is Christmas:)

love, Your Russian Missionary

RUSSIAN WINTER HAS HIT!‏

Family! RUSSIAN WINTER HAS HIT!

It started snowing on Tuesday then melted and then started right back up on Thursday and has been snowing on and off and then at night it all freezes over and then it snows again! CRAZY! but i just love it so much! well, for now! :) This morning there was a crazy wind storm, and my companion and I got up early to run to the store to get groceries and the wind was so strong that we were sliding across the ice! Kinda crazy. So all the sidewalks and parking lots and roads that were slush are now ice, pretty dangerous but I guess the people are used to it here. It is my absolute favorite time right now:) Christmas month! And here everyone wears snow clothes all day everyday or huge fur coats, which i actually think are really cool. The little kids are my favorite though. They are walking around in their huge snow clothes like penguins and can't really move, hahaha it is the funniest thing to watch ever. And the little girls wear these hats that are like beanies but with a puff ball on the top that is bigger than their entire head!! Pretty much the cutest thing i have ever seen in my life. And it's real fur! well, i am pretty sure all the fur in Russia is real. Also the children are pulled around in sleds by their parents instead of in strollers! so brilliant, and the kids just love it!

Thanksgiving was good! I hope you all had wonderful celebrations! We actually had a little branch party and i made carrot cake and pumpkin pie! (well, we thought it was a pumpkin, we are pretty sure it was a squash, but hey it turned out really great!) we also had potatoes and gravy, vegetables and squash, cornbread and cranberries. It turned out really well haha and everything was made from scratch, we were all really scared but it was better than we thought. :) We had a cooking party to prepare and listened to some nice Beethoven which has become my most favorite music! We have yet to find the nutcracker though. it's a great contacting tool since Russians love classical music and are very impressed that we do too! also, funny story. so the elders were in charge of bringing the turkey. and they got instructions from the other sisters how to make it and such, so they showed up and the turkey was tiny and the other sisters were all confused and just laughed at it. then AFTER the party, once all the Russians had made fun of the turkey that they had made the elders announced that it was GOOSE, cause they couldn't find a turkey! WHAT! oh my word it was actually hilarious to see the sister's faces who ate it. hahahaha so gross.

One really thing that has been cool here is that the sky is so clear at night. so we can go star gazing at 5 p.m. cause it is so dark! So that is when we go out to do missionary work at night too is from 6-9 so not only is it absolutely freezing but we are traveling in the dark. And it doesn't really help that many of the streets here are not lit. I have become a pro at navigating in the dark though, so it is a really fun experience.

Transfer calls are THIS SATURDAY! seriously this transfer has flown by. We didn't even realize it until we were planning for this week and it caught us and we had a little bit of freaking out. We call home in 23 days! That is so strange too. I am so excited though!

The work is going well! It is still rough in this area, there is a lot of hardships especially in the branch. We are in a branch where everyone moves away into the city. So it's been left! It seriously is so sad but we are doing all that we can to find people to strengthen the ward! So this transfer has been LOTS of tracting and contacting. In the snow it is a bit difficult but we just need faith to find and it will all work out!

I love you all so much! Sorry for not being as good as i should be at writing! I will be better! Know that you are all so important to me and that i miss and love you all!

love, sister Gigi Yeates

Hello!

Dearest Friends and Family!!!!

 

WOW this transfer is flying by! Well this week was just amazing! We actually reached a lessons goal that we have been striving for, for a long time!! :) And really it taught me that FAITH is so important! And not

only faith but putting your faith into action! Heavenly Father answers our prayers, Prayer works! :) No matter how small or how big what we ask for is, if we put

action to our faith in God, anything is possible!

We had a lot of good experiences meeting with people and helping them come closer to Christ! There was one man we were talking to and he was really just going on and on and on about religion and was kind of bible bashing a bit. And we could hardly get a word in! Yes, it was really frustrating but it was really interesting to hear what he was saying. Most of it was just him bashing religions but he said, "I have faith! but show me evidence that God is there!". When he said that it was really interesting because if you have faith then you don't need evidence that God is there. You just know. It reminded me of the amazing chapter in Alma about faith (chapter 32 or 34 can't remember exactly), when it says that faith is not to have a perfect knowledge of things. And when we show our faith, our faith grows stronger and the Spirit testifies to us and we KNOW of it's truthfulness. It's a beautiful, wonderful process, and it all begins with US! We need to have the faith in God that through Him all things are possible. I really learned that this week. This is HIS work, He will not leave us alone.

We started up English group again this week and had an incredible turnout! 15 people! this was so amazing and we had a lot of younger people there too! Sister and I will be teaching the beginning group! I am really excited and it seems like some might be interested about learning more about the gospel! We will see!

We have Zone conference this week! I am really so excited! It is so good to learn to become better missionaries! :) President called me up and asked me to lead the music, of course I said yes and he told me that the theme of the conference was learning to be a dynamic leader so I need to smile really big and show everyone that i am dynamic while leading!! Haha funny:) so we will see if I get the job done or not:)

We met with our investigators this week, since the split of the area we have had VERY few investigators; but that's okay because we just need to be working a little harder and focusing

more on our new areas! They are all doing well, there are concerns such as icons and such, Actually that is a very big concern here, interesting, that and they have already all been baptized

when they were babies into the orthodox church. So interesting the different challenges in each mission! We are discovering ways to deal with these concerns and learning while we go!

I really just love teaching! It really is the BEST thing in the world. Being able to help someone grow in their faith in God is so incredible. I really just love being a missionary.

The Elders contacted into some Americans the other day! They are here as English teachers through a christian organization, so that is really cool. We all met together the other day and

it was SO weird to talk with people who spoke English. Cause even with companions it's a lot in Russian as well. So funny! but we got to know them and actually they became our investigators

so it will be really cool to be able to go back and talk to them and maybe teach them about why we were here! They already have their "Mormons" impressions from the internet so it will be

fun and interesting to see what they "know" and put some rumors down and teach! :)

I read the October 2013 ensign this week. IT IS AMAZING! i encourage all to read it! It talks all about missionary work and how youth need to be preparing NOW! It really has amazing

and inspirational talks in it and I really learned so much from it! So cool to see the church start to focus on missionary work! God's work is hastening! and we are ALL apart of it! :)

I love you all so much!

Love, Sister Yeates

oh what a beautiful morning!‏ 11/13

Dear Family and Friends,

 

I love you all so much! I am pretty sure that I start my email every week saying that but know that it is SO TRUE! i just love you all! :) This week was fantastic! There was lots of traveling around because I had a visa trip as well as Zone Training! So we were heading to the city a lot! It was so good to see friends and catch up! Zone Training was really good. It was really a great "boost" for all of us to try to be better! We were talking about gossip and how names need to be safe in our mission and i loved this comment by an elder. He said, " We are an uplifted people (being members of the church and missionaries) so let's be an uplifting people"! That was soo cool! and really is a great reminder that we are ALL in this together! We need to be building each other up! in our families in the church, everywhere! We are all on the same side and have the same goal:) Such a good reminder! 

Today is the 11th, which means in exactly two months I am no longer a teenager!! woot woot! It's so weird to think I've been a teenager this whole time! ;) My companions would make fun of me for that haha so I am officially pulling out of the teenage years! Yes, I am very excited!

I can't believe it is already November! And Christmas is next month! I know this is all the obvious but time is seriously flying! I feel like just yesterday I was starting my second transfer!

So last week remember how I was talking about the rain storm that was that day (on Monday). Later that day we were told by some babushkas to stay inside because it was a hurricane! Haha I'm not sure how true that was, mostly because I don't know what a hurricane is like but we were okay and went out doing missionary work as usual! Rain or shine! :)

We got some interesting news this last week that our area is splitting! So right now there are 3 sets of missionaries here and we will be splitting up our area between us all! It's going to be difficult because we are going to be giving up investigators and gaining and such; but it'll be very good because we now get to really focus more on our areas. We were assigned the outer area by our district leader and so we lost all of our investigators. That was really hard; but i know that they are in good hands. Like our President always says, we are all in this together! All united in the work! So it was a good learning moment for all of us!

This next week will be a lot of finding and meeting with new investigators that have been passed over! I am so excited to be able to continue helping these people and continue finding more! The work truly is hastening! I've come to find that I absolutely love teaching. The nights that we don't have lessons are really difficult, but when we have a lesson and can see the change in the person. THAT truly is such an incredible thing. Being able to be apart of that person's life when they are learning about the gospel and knowing that I am in that process is really such a privilege! Being a missionary is so incredible! We are instruments in Heavenly Father's hands, saving souls! I love the scripture in mosiah chapter 2 verse 34 when it says to, "render to Him all that you have and are". And as a missionary we are asked to do that. To give up our normal lives and sacrifice time, family, schooling and everything to come on a mission and bring souls unto Christ. We are to give it all up to be here, and being on my mission, I can see that it is all worth it. This is the most valuable time of my life and I've learned and grown so much! It really is such a blessing to be here!

Thank you all for your prayers and support:) they really make the difference! I love and miss you all! You are all in my prayers:)

Love, Your Russian Missionary

Hello my beautiful family! ‏ 11/03/13

Priviet everyone!

So wow! another transfer down! I can't even believe it! (okay warning, so my space bar on my keyboard is incredibly sticky and very annoying so if there are combined words and such I'm sorry! bear with me! :)). I am starting my 5th transfer in Russia on my mission. How crazy is that! Time is flying! Half of me is relieved I will admit, but my other half is crying! I love Russia So much. And My mission really is the best time of my life so far. I have learned so much!

So this last week was transfer meeting. And my best friend and favorite companion went home! I am going to miss her so much! We had a blast together and I really love her so much! And so just a heads up if you get a friend request from someone you don't know and initials are A.K.(since i can't put names haha), then that's her! and everyone should be friends with her because she is amazing! Letting her leave was really hard! really hard. but i am so proud of her for finishing her mission so strong! she was such amazing example to me and I will forever be so grateful for my last two transfers with her! so i am still in my same area and companionships changed! so now we have two greenies, two 5 transfers, one 3 transfer, and a 6 transfer! we are a pretty young area:) it's good experience though!

so this week has been rain rain and more rain. Right now it is absolutely pouring! the streets are flooding and the rivers are getting so high! I do love the rain though, and being out all day in it, is not the most fun thing ever but it's okay!

Funny story from the elders here.so They were contacting by a bridge and one of the elders saw a babushka lugging her cart (we call them bob carts) up the stairs from the river. He of course went to go help and found that her cart was full of rocks from the river! haha Babushkas are so....special:) we as missionaries seriously love them so much. they are all so peculiar:)

We went to a big store a couple weeks ago and I found very funny that they had a "foreign food" isle. I was curious so we looked at it and it was all nacho cheese and salsa and chips, and tortillas and guacamole. I just laughed. so weird to think that those are "foreign foods" here! I enjoyed that!

Now in the branch where i am serving i am the pianist for every week! so that is exciting! I get to keep up my skills here:) So happy to know that I can help out by using my talents! You really never know when they will be needed! :)

I am very happy to say that I finally started the book Jesus The Christ. For those of you who have not read it I highly recommend it! It is seriously incredible and so interesting! It tells all about the life of Christ and my testimony really has grown so much! I also started the bible and was reading in mark 9 about the man who had a sick son and came to Christ to have Him heal his son. Such a beautiful story. It reminded me of Elder Hollands Talk two conferences ago titled "Lord I Believe" Such an incredible talk! I invite all to read it again when you have the chance! verse 23 really stuck out to me with Christ said "if thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth". I just love that! and really is a testimony that when we believe all things work out! That is a very important thing to remember especially on a mission when really almost everything  depends on the free agency of others! Heavenly Father has plan for all! we just need to be patient and believe in his timing, will and way!

i love you all so much! I absolutely love hearing how you are all doing! It is almost CHRISTMAS! i definitely have a count down and am so excited!

Think about you daily and love you so much!

Love,Your Russian Missionary!