Kacylia: Merry Christmas & Happy New Year

I had an awesome Christmas spending time with some of our investigators, ward members, and 英会話Eikaiwa students. No better way to spend Christmas than while serving the Lord. It was such a great Christmas. I am surprised it wasn't super hard for me. I mainly think it is because they don't really celebrate Christmas in Japan and there was no snow or Christmas lights really. I did get a Christmas Card from Kasumi with a family picture in it. とてもかわいい. She is so sweet.

This week wasn't super busy besides Christmas. We really enjoyed spending time with ward members and investigators. We were unable to meet with さいとうさSaitou San this week because of work, but we will keep working with him. We had a 3 Zone Conference this week and talked about this upcoming year. I am pretty excited for it. I always learn so much from conferences and stuff. I don't know if you follow the Tokyo Mission blog, but it talks about how things are going in the mission. For the White Christmas Miracle we were doing, of the 40 areas, 31 of them saw baptisms. So, for the year, December had the most baptisms. He said it has been a LONG time since Japan has seen that many baptisms in a month. We are going to keep working hard as a mission to see that each month. If you don't follow that Blog, find it on google by googling Tokyo Mission. (I think)

On Saturday, I was on exchanges in Kiryu. It is an area with 4 sisters in an apartment. It was fun spending time with them. Of the 4 sisters, Sister Snow, from my MTC district was there. It was way fun catching up with her. She is doing awesome and always working hard.

Yesterday, we had dinner with a Japanese family, The Hamada 家族kazoku from the ward. I would have to say it was one of my favorite meals. They made us Hamburger Helper (it tasted like macaroni and cheese), Cambell's Cream of Mushroom soup with chicken in it, and a Ceaser salad. It was an AMERICAN MEAL!!! おいしかったです！

So that was basically my week. For New Years, everyone gets a week off from school and some days off from work. Usually what they do is beginning of the year cleaning. They eat a lot of traditional food (gross...) and go to temples to worship. So, for New Year's as a mission. We are doing something fun. On the 31st, we are given a WHOLE DAY to deep clean our apartment. Then, once it is completely clean, we can dendou．I am pretty excited to get the apartment deep cleaned. Elders lived here before us, so it is pretty nasty...Then on the 1st, we are having a day to just read the Book Of Mormon. A WHOLE DAY! いいね！How awesome is that!? It is going to be nice to focus and have a LOT of time to study the Book of Mormon.

It is fun to hear about all the girls leaving on missions. They are going to love and it and they will be such amazing missionaries. I am glad they are all choosing to serve.

Anyway. I better get going. I have a lot of pictures I still want to send you. Please have a safe week and have TONS of fun for New Years. Eat some Japanese food and think about me. :)

Love you all and thank you for all that you do.

アイボリー姉妹