I Have Such a Deep Love For My Family - Oct. 22

Hey Sister Ingalls! 😉
Oh my goodness crazy stuff, I just got my flight itinerary this morning! Like, WHAT?! This can't actually be happening, it doesn't feel real. Do you have it too? Naja a month is still a good amount of time, I can't let myself think about it too much. I told God I would serve for 18 months, not 17 so I have to give everything I've got until the end. Sometimes it sure doesnt seem like enough and other times it feels like way too much, but I know God is happy with me for what I've given. :)

I'm excited for you to go on your trip to Missouri! Was this a spontaneous vacation? You've sure gotten to travel quite a bit while I've been on my mission, that's so fun! I really pray you all travel safe and the weather holds out for you. PLEEEEEASE drive safe!

Tell me about your trip and what you're going to do, I'm interested to see what exciting things Missouri has. Oooh you should go visit the church history sites if they are close! There are young sister missionaries there that give tours I think.

I'm proud of you for surviving your social media fast. It does feel good to unplug! You just notice more about your surroundings and it brings a lot more peace. Sister Walker told me that her sister and her husband traded in their smartphones for flip phones and loved it. I thought that was pretty cool. Now that I think about it, I don't even think I have a phone at home, right? Haha oh well, I can figure that out later.

Your costume earned a well deserved award! I hope to have a tiny bit of your creativity someday :) You would be so proud of me, I sewed something today! I'm on my 3rd purse of my mission and the inside just got shredded for some reason. Well at this point I don't really want to buy a new one, so I finally sat down and sewed it all up! It's slightly ghetto but I'm pretty proud of it. At least I don't have to reach all the way into the bottom of my purse to get a pen now haha!!

Thanks for making me a dentist appt, you're the best. (Like seriously I feel like I still don't know how to make one myself hahaha)

Thanks for the updates on my friends too. I'm still thinking about them and care about them. I'm really lucky with great friends. Rachel still emails me almost every week! Her and her boyfriend are pretty serious! Have you seen pictures?

I forget when Logan and Brianne are coming, is it this week? If so, I wish you the best time and I'm excited to see any pictures or anything! I really wish I could meet her before they are like engaged or something. Just a suggestion, I would love a voice recording with all of you in it, I'd love to hear all of your angel Minnesotan accent voices 😉😁😘

To answer your question, sadly I don't get a German driver's license. Minnesota is one of the only states that it doesn't transfer over well! I'd have to take a big expensive test in German, so I just go without. They do look cool though! I will get a license plate made though. Any ideas what I should put on it?? I was thinking a funny German word.

Yes I will have extra nametags for you, I will not lose these ones! I'm so sad I lost my MTC one, I held onto that so well. I'll have 3 German and 2 Arabic, so I'll have plenty .I'm glad you invited Ruth to the airport. I still can't believe this is actually happening...who else will be there? Make sure to give Rachel the information, she really wants to come too! I'm really excited to see all of you actually, I just LOVE my family! I'm not trunky, I'm just human and am excited to get together with my tribe again soon!!

YOU'RE IN ALMA 20?!?!  Dang you read so fast. I've only read the Book of Mormon all the way through 2 times on my mission! I do a lot of in between studying which is why I take so long, but that's really cool how fast you read it! I love the scriptures so much. I started formally using my German scriptures, even just studying in them in the past couple of months, and it's really caused me to grow and love the scriptures. I really like the scriptures in German and actually prefer it sometimes. It's easily to understand! But because of the markings and how I study them in German, they are my most precious treasure I own. I love the scriptures so much. I wish I had more than an hour to study them!! Some days I get ready really fast and eat while I'm studying so I can get some extra time. I can barely begin to explain how wonderful they are to me.

Oh about the German credit. Yes I am taking the class to pass off the German credit. I do think I might want to study it more and make it into a minor. I LOVE German Mom! Not just missionary German, I just LOVE speaking it and translating and explaining it, I'd honestly be really happy being a translator or German teacher in the future. But I don't want to do that right now. I'll take the class and the test and see how things look after that.

Also, here is the story of this morning. I need to sign up for classes still, but just because of bad luck, the internet is broken at the church. That's fine for emails, we can get wifi other places, but I need a computer to get onto the by website. The library always has computers so I wasn't super worried, but this one I had to pay for AND it had horrible connection AND it was weirdly blocking some add ons I needed! That was a frustrating morning. Luckily I said a prayer and did some research first and felt really good about the major I'm picking! It's been a little stressful back burner for awhile, but it was just plain as day what I needed to do. The major is called Exercise and Wellness. It's exactly what I want to do! It involved overall nutrition (not like all the sciences and molecules I didn't really care about) but creating exercise plans for people and just helping people become healthy! There's a lot more about it we can talk about later, but I feel really good about it. Plus it's a 4 year degree and I don't need to apply, I just go for it! That means I'm not behind in school at all and I don't need to wait so long to get into my major as I would with business or dietetics. I think I will talk to a counselor to figure out the best most efficient way to get it done. My dream is to learn nutrition and business, and the school suggested a business minor with it, so we will see! I know it's not one of those fancy professional huge hard majors, but I feel like that's what I'm supposed to do and I can accomplish it and love it! What do you think? :)

I will look for a little nativity, I think I know a good place to find them.

About going to the temple the next morning, that sounds like a great idea! I calculated it out and when I get to Minnesota, it will be about 2 am for me! Haha I'll try to get a little sleep on the plane but I remember my first day in Germany was SO exhausting trying to stay awake in the temple! If you decide to keep it and work there I'd love to go with you :)

WHAAAT Hannah is getting married?! Well that's crazy. When is her wedding? I'm excited for her!

This is just random, but since coming to Plauen I've lost over 2 pounds easy! We just walk a ton plus I still run for exercise in the morning and we always just cook at home! (Whereas in Neukölln we were never close to home so we'd have to pack something or eat out!) It feels really nice! I don't feel like I look a ton different since the beginning, but probably a little bit. Thankfully I've probably gain under 5 pounds total, not the 40 that everyone scared me about! Also, I ate vegetarian last week and felt great but then yesterday we had an eating appointment and had these HUGE chunks of beef. I have the best comp, whenever they weren't looking Sister Walker would quick stab a piece off my plate and eat  it!😂😂 it was so funny. I still got really sick this morning. It's so weird, it just feels like my stomach is on fire. Red meat is weird.

I feel like I've just talked about really random things, but you know, that's how our conversations go sometimes! You asked me earlier if I feel like I'm just writing in my journal or if I feel like I'm talking to you. I just feel like I'm writing to you, I write very differently in my journal. I cherish the time I get to write you! It's fun to know kind of what's going on at home and to share that with you too.

This week was another slightly hard one, but our hard work paid off! We saw a lot of little miracles I will write about in my group email. We talked to lots of people on the street and I showed a lot of people the picture of my family on the back of my nametag. Sometimes it makes me choke up a little bit talking about eternal families! I have such a deep love for my family and for my God who created this plan of happiness for us to be together. Family units aren't just random or something here on the Earth, but it's the center of God's plan that we support each other forever!

I love you a million hours reading the scriptures! I love you truly deeper than words can describe.

Love, Sister Ingalls jr.