Getting Robbed, Investigators Earning us Over, Found an Inactive!‏

Well the funny story of the week is only funny because ...I got robbed blind! ha ha Yes...THAT actually happened. I was just minding my own business returning from our slamming P-day in Pisa and WHAMY in the La Spezia train station some goon apparently thought it'd be a chipper to unzip my backpack and nab my wallet. It wasn't until we got to the bus stop that we noticed my backpack was unzipped. I panicked and felt completely violated but after filling out some papers with the police (all in Italian, which was fun) we just went to branch FHE and pretended it was all a bad dream. End of the day my companion and I are learning a lot about budgeting! We've been using her credit card and we make awkward comments to each other like we're a poor newly-wed couple when we buy things. "Babe I don't think we can afford the expensive tuna this week." Ah man. Despite the fact that it had my credit cards, bus pass, permesso, I was more upset about the fact that they stole my cute H&M wallet that I bought in Rome. Come on buddy. At least leave the wallet! ha ha I don't know if I told you last week but we received some sweet revelation for the Acevedo family that has been working like a charm! We have struggled with them to make progress and act. Also it doesn't always seem like they appreciate our time when we're there for appointments SO we came up with this brilliant plan! We made them a poster for their fridge that has three columns: Come to church at 9 as a family, read a chapter of the BOM as a family, and pray together as a family. They get a sticker on their poster every time they do one of these things. They get 3 stickers if they all come to church! (we really wanted to emphasize that one.) So basically we won't go to their house for appointments until they earn 5 stickers. Isn't this a fun game?! So this way THEY decide how often we see them. We could come twice a week or once every two weeks--just all depending on them and their commitment keeping. And...it must have done something because they were ALL in church on Sunday--the first time this whole transfer. So we're loving that. We just call them every night to see how they're doing and ask if they got any stickers.Our transfer of non-stop finding continues! This week the fun adventure is we were doing house and discovered an inactive member from Ecuador! She joined the church there, came here 13 years ago and only came once. She now has a son that's 11. She said, "Maybe God's telling me I should come back to church." We just smiled at her and nodded and said, "We agree." So we'll probably start teaching her son and we're hoping for good things there.Well I hope you all had a beautiful week. The sun has started to come out a little bit this week which I have hardly been complaining about. maybe I can get rid of this milky skin of mine. (Thanks Judy!!) Make good decisions, know that I love you like crazy, and...hold on to your wallets! Italian Kisses, Sorella Hansen

Fakin' it, answering the peoples prayers, Celebrating the existence of women‏

Oh my stars can we just talk about the awkwardness that made up my Sunday?! So our dear Acevedo family decided to invite the branch president and his wife over for lunch. Sparing you some of the painfully awkward details (because you're not missionaries so you shouldn't have to deal with it. ha ha) they put on QUITE a show. Oh mylanta it was brutality. I love this family. I've been working with them for 5 months but they are a quirky bunch and I am well aware. But they pulled out some stops for this meal with the branch president and his wife. First off, Judy (the mom/wife) told us that she couldn't come to church on Sunday because she would be preparing lunch for them. She was like, "Oh sisters, I think that Jesus will understand." I was like, "Err...Judy, I daresay that Jesus wants you in church." But alas, she didn't come and just Leo came to church. So we went with to their house after church and please picture this in your minds: where there used to be a pull-out bed, there are now two fancy sitting chairs. They have a fancy table cloth, AND on a shelf they have the Bible opened...like as a decoration or something. I was just dying inside about this big fancy show that they were putting on. In the end it was fine. They really like Presidente Margheriti and his wife. Obviously because they're marvelous. I was so glad for that meal to be over though. It was such an event and it was just SO not them. ha ha Oh dear. One for the books!We went and saw Giuseppina Maiello yesterday. We haven't seen her since week 2 of the transfer. We tried so hard to prepare ourselves for that first appointment. She told us that she was going to have her son do the communion in the catholic church even though she knows that it's wrong and I think we were depressed for like 2 days. It was all that we could think about. Well we've been praying about her and we called her last week to see her. When we first sat down she told us that she had read the book of Mormon last week. ---which is MASSIVE because she told us at our last appointment that she wouldn't read it because she didn't want to confuse her son. Then she said that after she was done reading the book of Mormon one night she said a prayer and asked God to have us come back and see her again. Well we called her that night! So when we were sitting at the table she was like, "How did you do it?" We were just like, "You came into our minds." And she was like, "At what time?" ha ha and we said, "in the evening". And she goes, "That's when I was reading the book of Mormon." It was really crazy. We answered her prayers!It was really cool. We're going to go back next week and listen to a talk with her and her kids called "Cast Not Away Therefore Your Confidence". It's an amazing talk by Elder Holland (who rocks my socks every time I listen to him). It should be good. In the meantime we bore our testimonies to her about the importance of being an example for her family. Praying, reading the scriptures...we told her that when her family--and especially her husband--see her doing these things, it will leave a very strong impression on them. She really liked that. So...from the last appointment it was definitely a step up! :)So...you know how Italians are always celebrating right? Well little did I know (Or...I forgot since last year) that March 8th is a holiday here!! It's called La Festa della donna. Or...Women's day. Yup, it's a day celebrating women...just the fact that we exist pretty much. Obviously we partook in the festivities. Why would we NOT?! ha ha They have these beautiful little yellow, puffy flowers that you give to women on that day. Some old lady gave some to my companion on the bus. It was a delightful little holiday. I just might try to make it big in the states. Good times...I should probably scadaddle. We're spending p-day at a little city that you might have heard of...Pisa!! There's really nothing in this city but the leaning tower but somehow I still find myself 124% amused and entertained every time I come. No complaints!! Well it's been another week of hard work but there's more that we want to do. Hope you're all having the time of your lives! Loving ya lots from all the way over here in La Spezia, Sorella Hansen

Run-in with pin lady, France in Florence, New investigator!!‏

BUON to the GIORNO guys! I hope you all had a marvelous week in the homeland. I'll just take a couple of minutes to tell you about this last week here in the mish.So...as I mentioned my companion and I have been doing oodles of finding. It's pretty crazy, we see a lot of crazy stuff, but we always come home nice and tired and have the marvelous good feeling of knowing that you worked really hard that day to share the gospel. Also, I don't complain about the fact that all of this hard works makes me sleep like an infant. Oh man missionary work is the best sleeping pill in the world. Love it! ha ha So with all of this finding that we're doing we get all kinds of funny situations. One day this last week we were doing some house and ringing some citof's. A woman left the building as we were ringing the citofs. My companion started talking to her and the woman waiting until I finished talking on a citof so that she could talk to both of us. She was an older woman with a bright pink hat that had like 7 different pins in it. We told her who we were and what we were doing there. Half-way through she gave a grin like, "that's cute and all, but I've got news for you"...you know what one I'm talking about or have I just seen it a time or two? She then proceeds to give us this big marvelous speech that went a little something like this, "There's really nothing for you to do here. No one wants to hear what you have to say. We're ALL catholic. Or...there are some people who are Buddhist. OR....there are also some who are Jehovah's witness. And then there are some who are atheist. Therefore, you should just stop what you're doing because nobody cares." ha ha Good thing we know what we're doing here and we don't rely on the people on the streets to tell us if we're doing something worthwhile. Excuse me ma'am, we work for God. We're just trying to give you the opportunity to be happy out of your mind. If you don't want to take it, well I can't stop you, but nor will you stop us from giving the same opportunity to your friends. Ah, yes...gotta love house. :)We had Zone Conference in Florence yesterday and it was marvelous! Elder Paya came and spoke to us. He's a member of the seventy and...I didn't hate the fact that he's French. :) He was delightful and I learned so much. I love zone conferences because they're always such an amazing opportunity to see ways that I can improve and be more effective. I enjoyed this one especially because I didn't feel like I got bashed in the face with all of the things that I need to change, but Elder Paya taught and told missionary stories, and the spirit was able to tell us what we needed to change and apply. It was nice.We got a new investigator this week! His name's Daniele. He's so cool. I've seen him on the bus a couple of times since I've been in La Spezia and I got his number a couple of weeks ago and we finally were able to set an appointment and we taught him about the restoration. It was so rad. He has so many questions! I love questions! It means that he's thinking and pondering and searching. Those people are nothing but a joy to teach because they'll do the work to find their answers. Yeah, It was such a blessing to meet and teach him after all of the hard work that we've been doing. God is really blessing us. it is ever so clear and we are just so thankful for His help.Welp, that's all for this week. I hope you're all doing well. Go do some fun things with your beautiful families. Love your lives k? Everything is more beautiful and happy that way. You are very loved and blessed and don't ever forget it. All my love, Sorella Hansen

Awkward rejections, Looking for happy families, Do what you know is right already!!

Well, doing a lot of finding like we've been doing lately gives us many opportunities to laugh at all of the excuses, mean things people say, and unavoidable awkward moments. Ah yes, welcome to missionary life. We ring citofonos and people will poke their head out of their shutters 4 floors up and say, "Who is it?". Really? Are we actually HAVING a conversation from this ridiculous vertical distance? All right!! We've received an awful lot of "No's" but Heavenly Father has been giving us plenty of opportunities to laugh and remain upbeat despite the rejections. Finding work has just been getting more and more fun. But we have done an awful lot of it. My stars! This last week we've had like one appointment a day and the rest of the day...we just find people! We've been working really hard and we both feel very strongly that the Lord will bless us for our efforts and we know that He's helping us out big time.We were able to set a return appointment with an ITALIAN FAMILY. woot woot!! Can one even complain about that?! I think not! They were a beautiful family and were great, happy people. I almost have forgotten what it's like to be in a home where the family is happy. I have seen so many jacked up families in my mission all I have to say was a happy, loving family was entirely refreshing. We taught them the first lesson and they asked lots of questions. However in the end they just ended up telling us that they were Catholic and were going to stay that way. We gave them a Book of Mormon and we've been praying in every single prayer that they'll call us. I know for sure they felt the spirit when we were talking about the restoration. And...if they don't call us back, the great thing about doing house is...we know where they live! They were seriously such a beautiful family. I think I fell in love with them. I feel like Lucy from While you were Sleeping. I know what you're thinking, "How many times in a 1 year and a half can she reference that movie?!" Great question. Don't put it past me. Bah, if nothing else, I know we were a first step for that family. That man is gonna be a bishop or something I just know it.We taught the Maiello family this week. We have prayed for that family in every single prayer just wanting so badly for them to recognize the spirit and the need for them to change their lives and remember the testimonies that they have. We went to the appointment. Only the wife--Giuseppina--was there. We prepared a whole lesson using Helman 5. We talked about the spirit and light---how she had it. She had it in her home. She knew what to do to keep it there. She saw the differences in her family, her relationship with her husband when the spirit was in their home. We read a bunch of verses with her from Helaman 5 and then we had prepared three questions for her. 1. Do you recognize differences in your home since the missionaries haven't been here/since you all called off your baptismal date? She said yes. She then answered question 2 before we even asked her. It was 2. Have you felt the spirit since we've been with you today? She said that she has. She recognized it when we came in and she felt it during the lesson. Question 3. Do you want it back? Oh man I wish I could accurately describe the look on her face. Her eyes looked so tired and so much differently then they have in past lessons. She looked like she was going through such a hard time. But she responded to our last question: Yes. Bam. That was it. This is just what we wanted. This was the purpose of the lesson! To get her to recognize the spirit and the need to have it back again. Well, that's when little dinkus Satan thought he was completely hilarious and it was so clear that he has been messing with this family. We were talking with Giuseppina about the things that she could do to bring the spirit back into her life and back into her home. We asked her to start by reading the Book of Mormon everyday. She said no. What?!? You just said that you want the spirit back. Why would you NOT be all over this?! Welp she continued to tell us that her son was about to do Communion in the Catholic church and she can't let him see her reading the Book of Mormon because it will confuse him. THEN she continues by telling us that she knows that this is the true church and she'll never deny that. She know that the Catholic church isn't true and that the communion doesn't really mean anything....but she's still doing it. It makes zero sense, she knows that it doesn't make sense and she wanted so badly for us to rationalize with her that it was okay, that her situation was different. Well, we work for God. We can't do that. It was so not how we saw the lesson going but we've been prayin a lot about it and we really feel like we need to stick with this family. But it also gives us a lot of inspiration to do finding work and find people who are searching and are prepared.WELL there's my week. It's been completely nuts but as always it has strengthened my testimony and made me more grateful for the gospel in my life. And in closing: How is Italy doing in the Olympics? :) Lemme know! Italian love, Sorella Hansen

Milky white, Last minute talk, Praying about going under the water!!‏

Oh my stars. Let me just welcome you into a moment of my life that happened in our appointment with the Acevedo family. Out of nowhere Judy (the mom) looks at me and says, "Wow Sorella, sei troppo bianca. Sei come il latte!" Yup, she said, "Wow sister, you are too white. You're the color of milk!" haha Oh my dear it was just a moment that I thought, "WHEN do I get to go back to the island? At least I looked NOT like a dairy product when I lived there." Ah yes, good times...So this week has been nothing short of bizzanging. I love my new companion. We have only been together a week but it has been one of my favorites in the mission and I couldn't be more stoked about the time we'll have together. We get along really well and have so much in common it's frightening...and yet entirely enjoyable. We have set some really great goals and I'm so stoked about working hard and accomplishing them. We have been doing a lot of finding. We do a lot of bus, a lot of house, we've even stopped people on the street and it has just been so wonderful as far as that's concerned. I'm just so grateful that I get to be companions with her. We work really hard together but we have so much fun too. Many times we'll be laughing about something during lunch and just say, "What was president thinking?!" I hope I get to be with her for the rest of my mission because things are just going so good.On Saturday the branch president called me and asked me to give a talk the next day. That's the joy of serving in a small branch is they can (and do) just call ya last minute and ask you to give a inspiring jolly ol' talk. I think it went well. I totally conjugated something wrong in my talk and I knew it and I made a face...and the girls in the front row corrected me. It had potential to be embarrassing but...I just like to think of it as "Well, it shows that everybody was listening!" ha ha We had a great appointment last night with our girl Miriam. She's an amazing, strong woman who loves Jesus. We taught the plan of salvation with a couple from the branch. I think we emphasized the importance of being baptized in this life like 5 times. And in the end when we invited her to pray about being baptized on March 20th she understood and said that she'd pray. Not complaining!! It was a really cool lesson. The spirit was there. My companion did fabulous and the members were a great help. I love those appointments!Well I hope you all had a fabulous Valentines day. I think it goes without saying that my Valentines day was filled with...love of all mankind. Welp, have a splendid week and ...make good decisions. ha ha My advice is hardly inspired....but it comes from a good place. Love you tons. La Spezian love, Sorella Hansen

Transfers, the priesthood rocks my socks, A place called Liberty‏

Well, well, well...how's everything going? It's been quite a crazy week. It was my companions last week as a missionary so there were lots of saying goodbye, pictures, and that kind of stuff. On Tuesday morning we had to take a train at like 5:15 a.m. to come to Florence where my companion dropped me off so that I can do an exchange with the sisters until I get my new companion. Sorella Skabelund went to Rome and is flying out...today actually. I've been doing an exchange with Sorella Dalia and Sorella Hughes. It's been fun actually. I'm kind of in love with Florence, really, like it might not be healthy or normal. But whatever. I'm embracing it because that is my life. So it's been cool to go to a couple of appointments with them and talk to some of the people on the buses here. It's been a fun change. We got transfer calls yesterday and President said that I'm staying in La Spezia and I'll have Sorella Dalia as my companion. It was funny that we had spent the whole day together and talked about how we wanted to live at BYU-Idaho together...and then President called us and told us that we were going to be companions. It was funny. I'm really excited. She's really fun and we are a lot alike--for better or for worse! ha ha Nah, I'm excited for this transfer. It should be slammin.So...as far as the work goes, do you remember the cookie lesson from a couple of weeks ago? Yeah well....there was kind of an explosion this week with that family. It was really hard. They are kind of known for calling us the day of our appointments, like a couple of hours beforehand, and cancelling. So long story short, something happened that made them get really mad at us and they called and told us that they didn't want to see us anymore and didn't want to have anything to do with us. Yeah, it was killer. I've never had anyone do anything like that to me. It made me think of those stories that I heard before the mission about how missionaries would go to an investigators house and there would be a book of Mormon in a bag hanging on the door with a note saying that they didn't want to see the missionaries anymore. Yeah, I remember hearing those stories and thinking, "Well crikey that's the worst." Well this week I got the opportunity to understand first hand how much it is a complete bust! It was brutality BUT with lots and lots of prayer and gaining a greater testimony and appreciation for the priesthood, we were somehow able to go talk to them and they're still going to let us go over and teach. I have spared you the fun details but just trust me, MIRACLE!!!Also guess how delightful this little moment of my life was. So I went to English class and this man Antonio told me that he brought me something. He's just this sweet Italian man. He's married and has a daughter my age. But last week was his first week at English class and we were talking about books and I hadn't ever read his favorite book. He BROUGHT me his favorite book, all wrapped up in this cute and awkward lawn gnome wrapping paper. It was the sweetest thing. The book is called "Un luogo chiamato LIberta" or in English "A place called Liberty". Have you guys ever read it? It's a big book and it's in Italian! I'm stoked to read Italian books when I get home. How cool is that?! AND to make things cooler, he plays the mandolin! He has like 5. Scratch that, he does have 5. I told him who my favorite mandolinist was and he's gonna check him out this week. What a fun little moment right? Who would have known 2 years ago that I'd be here, in La Spezia, Italy, just talking mandolin music with some guy named Antonio. Sometimes I have moments that I just back up and look at my life and just think, "Man, didn't see that happening 2 years ago...or even a week ago." hahaWell, I don't really have anything crazy rad to tell you about this week. I'm still in Florence for today and we'll probably go back to La Spezia tomorrow morning. Forecast for the next six weeks of my life: La Spezia! Then after this transfer...I'll just have one measly transfer left. Yuck. Too fast. I've been talking a lot with Sorella Hughes yesterday and today about how she's feeling and how her mission's going and stuff. It's been so nice to talk to someone from my group and see what's up. I feel less crazy at the fact that we're feeling a lot of the same things and it's been nice. Anyway, I hope you all have a marvelous week. I'll let you know how everything going week 1 of transfer 11 next week. Take care. Lots of Italian love, Sorella Hansen

Homemade Pasta, a CHASE, Fasting for Referrals‏

Hey fellas! Sorry I really don't have a lot of time to write this week so it will be brief. This week has been good. A member taught us how to make homemade pasta which was a delight!! I was hardly complaining. On the contrary! It was a solid good time. and it wasn't even that difficult to make is the kicker. Why don't we all just make homemade pasta like the Italians? It was pretty good. I took plenty of notes so hopefully I'll be able to conjure up something that resembles pasta when I get home. I make no promises though. :)Well I got to go pick up my Permesso di Soggiorno this week. I have tried to explain this several times but the name of whatever it is in English has vanished from my mind. Oops? It's the document that makes it legal for me to live here. So we went on Thursday and waited in this lengthy line and my companion and I noticed someone in the line. Well...if I have to be honest we were playing a game that we were trying to guess where everyone in the line was from. ha ha racist? Hope not! Anyway we noticed someone who totally looked Italian. He was like 7 people behind us in line. He stumped us. So...me being the random person that I am, I suggested that we should guess what his name is, what he's doing here, etc. What is this guys story? (If you think this is 300% creepy, it really wasn't, but permission granted.) I just find myself fascinated with people sometimes. I just want to get the whole scuttle on who they are. I dunno. I can't explain it. Anyway, so we played this little game, I got my permesso, and then we left to take the bus. As we were waiting for the bus I was like, "Sorella, we need to talk to him about the church." She kind of laughed because I don't think she thought I was serious. She was like, "Well, if he gets out in time and takes the same bus, then we'll talk to him." So we got on the bus and he still hadn't come out of the building where we just were. I was panicking and was like, "Seriously Sorella we need to get off this bus." The bus pulled away!! I rang the bell to get off at the next stop and we were both kind of nervous because we didn't know what to say or do really. We got off at the next stop and ran back. ha ha I'm sure we were quite the sight. We got back to the building and he was still in line. My companion was like, "This is creepy." She wasn't really stoked about what we were doing. I really couldn't even explain it but the more I looked at that guy in line the more I felt the desire to talk to him about the gospel. So there we were standing there trying to think about what to say and then ...he came out! He walked on a different staircase and was going in the opposite direction. Nice. I just looked up at the sky and smiled and thought, "So this isn't going to be easy for us huh?" ha ha So we started walking after the guy. My companion was still saying things like, "this is creepy." And I was just like, "Dude, you go home in 2 weeks. You will never see this guy again. We're here to share the gospel. We are confident, happy people with something to say. What is creepy about that?!" So....we may or may not have run after this man and stopped him at his car to talk to him about the gospel. ha ha It was an adrenaline rush because I've never done anything to that extent. I remember thinking in my mind, "You know all of those "open your mouth" scriptures...well I'm gonna do just that but oh buddy somebody had better put some words in there because I've got nothing." And I dunno. It was really cool. He was totally nice and wasn't weirded out at all about the fact that we kind of chased him down to talk about the church. He originally told us that he isn't super religious but we were able to bear our testimonies to him and give him a pamphlet with our number on it. He was really great. I'm really glad that we took that leap. I'm so thankful for the faith that we were given to do that because I was a bit nervous but ...it was crazy cool. By-the-way, his name's Pablo. He's from Argentina and he's here to play rugby. I was way off. :)Last week my companion and I fasted and prayed over our ward list and decided on a family that we wanted to ask for a referral from. We went over to the family's house that we felt strongly to ask and presented the message. It went really well. They were really excited that they were an answer the missionaries prayers. And they're really excited to fast and pray for a referral. We're going back this week to see what they've come up with.Anyway, sorry this is a random, awkward letter but...why then is it different from anything else that I send home? Hummm....WELP! I really gots to skedaddle!! Thanks for your letters and love. You're in my prayers...even if they're in Italian...they still totally count! Read your scriptures. They'll kind of rock your socks...daily. Italian love from my heart to yours! Sorella Hansen