Sister Carmen Olson

Kia Ora Whanau  This week flew! Tuesday was my year mark from receiving my mission call! It has been the fastest year of my life! Time just does not exist on the mission. When I recieved my call I felt peace and knew that the New Zealand Wellington Mission was the place for me. Now, a year later, I know why it's the place for me! I have learned more here and had more incredible experiences and come closer to the Savior than I would have anywhere else in the world. The Lord truly does know us each perfectly.  So a big highlight for this week is that we started teaching the most golden investigator ever. Her name is Mina and she lives with her member family. She is 19 and so cool. On Wednesday we taught her about the restoration of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and when we asked her if she believed it she said yes! Then on Saturday and Sunday she came all the way down to Dunedin for stake conference, and on Sunday night she came to a baptism for a ...

Kia Ora Whanau  Its officially been a week since I've moved to Oamaru and it's been interesting. Both wards that we cover are basically made up of one giant family so I already know everyone's name (brother and sister Kaufana) lol.  There were ups and downs. Most of the people that we are working with and Tongan and so for alot of the week I had no clue what was going on because I don't speak Tongan but my companions do.  On Tuesday we had a little miracle occur. We were meeting with a part member family and at the end we asked if we could say a prayer. The father, who is normally against the missionaries, went outside and called all the kids in for the prayer. His attitude did a 180 and he was so supportive of everything. It was so cool.  Tuesday evening, we had a failotu (prayer service) for a recent convert who just passed away. We sang hymns and messages were shared. It was really spiritual and a great missionary opportunity because his non m...

Kia Ora Whanau This week was crazy and not in a good way.  It started off really good, and ended not so awesome. We were in Dunedin on Monday and Tuesday for a combined district council. During the meeting, we did this activity where we talked about what a privilege it is to be able to serve a mission and then we each went and said an individual prayer thanking Heavenly Father for the opportunity to serve. I was so emotional and so grateful to be here on my mission. I honestly don't know what I would be doing if I wasn't on my mission. Coming here has been the best decision I've ever made.  Sister Tu'i'onetoa stayed with us Tuesday - Thursday because her companions went to Nelson for an appointment. It was super fun to be working with her. We worked so hard.  On Wednesday, we went to Temuka (another little town in our area) and walked all day. We had a lesson with a less active and non member and we talked about the Book of Mormon. The less activ...