November 5th

Hello Everyone!  This week has been super fun. On Halloween we had dinner and the family made the food look like kitty liter it was really gross. It didn’t taste bad, but it sure looked bad. After that we stopped by a family’s home that we have been teaching, The Faws, and went trick or treating with them. It was so much fun and Apryl, the mom, introduced us to all of her neighbors. It was great to spend some fun time with them. They really are some of the best people I have ever met. The great news is that they accepted the invitation to be baptized. Well the mom and the one of the son did the dad and the other son will soon. There is just no way that they can’t when they live in a home where the sprit in so strong. It is the biggest treat when we get to go over and teach them. Just a warning to my family, there are some new faces that you are going to have to make room for because you are going to love the Faws.  After that we went to another dinner with a less active family, I ate so much! I don’t this I have been that sick on Halloween since I was really little.

I also have a really cool story to tell you but first, I want you all to know that I have been doing my very best at being exact in my obedience!

On Friday I was just walking and I sprained my ankle really bad. After a little while I couldn’t walk so I iced it and once it felt a bit better I kept on going with our day. The next day it hurt a little to walk on so I raped it up and just went on with my day. We did all kinds of stuff, including helping with a really cool project called Living Bethlehem where they are putting together a live show of the Christmas story. While we were there we met so many great people who could have their hearts open to the gospel soon.  

Well not too long after we were just walking and I DID IT AGAIN! Man I really need to learn how to walk one of these days. This time I did it really well and it really hurt to walk on but of course I didn’t stop doing missionary work I kept going. After we stopped at three more houses and no one was home, Sister Billing and I decided that Heavenly Father was telling us that I need to go home and take care of it.  We went home and I put it up and I still hurt. So Sister billings called the elders and asked if they would come give me a blessing.  

They were there in no time. Now this has been one of the coolest experiences I have ever had with a blessing.  This is the first time that I have literally felt the power of the spirit.  The moment the elder put their hands on my head the spirit just rushed though my body and filled me from head to toe. I knew this could happen with and blessing but I think this was the first time I was in tune with the spirit in a way that I could really feel the power. Wow The priesthood really is a power and a wonderful gift.

The next morning I got out of bed expecting to be hurt and I was fine I could walk on it and bend it. It was so cool to see another miracle happen, as Elder Judd would say “ a tender mercy”.

One other cool thing that happened with my blessing is that the Elder called me Carol when he referred to me in the blessing. I thought it was really cool. When he did I was also filled with love and I know it was another tender mercy.

I love you all and miss you tons, but there is just so much to be done as the Lords servant. Keep working hard wherever you are at. –Sister Cannaday

Halloween Pictures

I got these cute picture in the mail yesterday!

 I just love Jill and miss her tons! : ) 

Look how much fun she is having while she works hard doing the Lord's work! 

Little Red Riding Hood, Grandma, and The Big Bad Wolf

Eating donuts off strings!

Having way too much fun with some of the kiddos!

These girls didn't want the Sisters to leave so they gave them a ride on the chair!

Jill was really cold while they were doing their planning! 

October 28th

      Hello hey every one HAPPY HOLLOWEEN!!!!  Man I wish I could be there to go trick or treating with everyone! Next year for sure I will be home wow... that’s weird to think about! I hope everyone had fun this year. I'm expecting pictures of everyone’s costumes! I will be greatly disappointed if I don't. Just saying. My companion and I dressed up for our ward Halloween party. We did set up a car to do trunk or treat. My companion was little red riding hood our car was a wolf and I was Grandma. It was so much fun and I really love dressing up for Halloween. I'm sending pictures home this week for you all to see.

We are teaching this great family The Faws, they came with us last week to the fireside and this week they came with us to the party. They have a son who really wants to serve a mission. Well he dressed up as a missionary! It was so cool and all the boys in the ward thought it was too. I love this family! I just can't wait for them to partake of all the blessings that the gospel has to offer them. They have so much all really but there is just so much more waiting for there family.

It really has been a great week and every thing has just fallen in the place as we have been working hard and not giving up us time get hard.

Something that hit me and hit me really hard this week is  Alma 26 And now behold, I say unto you, my brethren, if ye have experienced a ^achange of heart, and if ye have felt to sing the ^bsong of redeeming love, I would ask, ^ccan ye feel so now?

There are, I hope, many times like this where we can feel the spirit so strongly that we couldn’t even think of doing something that would displease our Father in Heaven  because we are so close to him. But I think the trick is to always feel that way. To never let ourselves start drifting away from our Father in Heaven and that is when we are going to find the most happiness. So when you are upset or low ask yourself "can ye feel so now?" then change whatever you need to because it really is that easy.

 I love you all and hope that everything is going well please stay strong and never forget there might be a miracle just around the river bend (I sang that in my head)  - Sister Cannaday

October 23rd

Wow what a week! This week has been so much fun and so wonderful. I feel like the joy of Christ is just flowing though my veins. To tell you the truth I might just have a heart attack for how full it feels right now. I had the chance to go do something called an outgoing fireside where all the missionaries that are going home get to bare their testimony about there mission. It was wonderful and Sister Taulogo my first companion was one of the missionaries that was going home and it just filled my heart to hear her bare testimony of the great spirit she has felt.

       We were able to go because we brought a family that we are teaching with us. Well more like they brought us :) but it was so great to watch their faces just light up as they listened to the words of these great missionaries. They were crying the whole time. This family is just great and if I could I would just move in with them and never leave. You know how you meet someone and you just know that you were great friends with them in the life before this well I have felt that way about this family from the first day. It was so great to spend the whole night just talking with them and feeling their love. It's really the neatest that their son who in 12 has decided that he wants to go on a mission and just dose everything he can to prepare himself. But the really cool part is that the parents of the family where asking questions about WHEN they can serve a mission and they aren't even members yet. IT WAS SO COOL.

         Another really cool thing happened that just made me cry. I got to see a family that I got to teach in Morgan Hill. We were helping them get ready to go to the temple. Which is one of the coolest things I have had the chance of doing on my mission. Last night the mom and daughter of the family came up to me and said "We have great news to tell you" at first I said "What?” but as soon as it can out I knew to ask "WHEN?"  This amazing family will be getting sealed on the 11 of November. They will be making to best choice that they could ever make. I'm so happy for them that just thinking of them all dressed in white bring tears to my eyes and I know that this is why we serve missions!

     I also got to see three people that I guess really love Nina Clymer and mam & pap Escobare, and many others. I was so good to see them all there it reminded me of what it has going to be like in heaven seeing all the people that you love and cherish coming up to you one by one give you big hugs and never wanting to let them go. But in heaven there is going to be so may more people that we have grown with in this life. 

     So I will be staying here in Livermore for another six weeks and I'm so glad that I get to stay here with these people that I just love so much! I feel spoiled. I know that this feeling I have in me right now is the spirit and this is truly what the scriptures mean when they say "Men are that they might have joy" This is pure joy and I know that everyone can have it and should and that is why I'm here sharing the gospel with all! This is the greatest gift I have to give. I love you all and I hope that you will always seek after these things. 

- Sister Cannaday

Oct 6th, 9th, and 15th

OCT 6^th        

         OK, sorry everyone that I'm writing so late in the week. We had our P-day moved to Friday to go to the temple. It was great! The temple is the best place in the world truly the feeling there is undeniable and so real I just want to run thought the halls I was so happy and at one point was jumping up and down in the dressing room. Wow I love the temple! 

   After the member that brought us to the temple took us out for ice cream at this place called Fenton's. It the ice cream place where the little kid and the old man go at the end and sit and eat ice cream and count all the red and blue cars at the end of UP it was way fun and I can't wait to take you all there.

    Can you believe that they moved the age that you can serve a mission? That is so crazy!  Jon that means you can serve a mission in a little over a year. 18 is so young and 19 for girls wow I would already be home when I left if I would have gone at 19.  This is so cool I can't wait to see all the sisters and elders that come out on their mission in the next few months. Truly my mouth was hanging wide open when Pres. Monson announced the change. Yah woo! Lets get this missionary work done.

       So this week in Livermore was great we had so much fun and got so much work done even with a lot of things taking up our days. We have a baptism this next week for a girl named Kaia. She is so wonderful and comes from a not so wonderful family, but has just risen above it all to become this wonderful young woman. We taught her a lesson this week and the spirit was so strong and just filled the room and testified to her of the goodness and truth of everything that we were teaching her. Being a missionary in the BOMB! It’s the neatest thing to see the light in people grow.

     We are also teaching a great family with a 12 year old that wants to already be a missionary and has started to write Elder J. Faw on everything he can. It's so cool to teach this family because they have already come so close to the spirit. IT'S SOOOOO neat to walk into a none members home and feel the spirit before we even open our mouths. They will be getting baptized soon!

       Life is going so great here on the mission I really don't think I could ask for anything more at this point. To be the Lords servant has been the most fulfilling thing I have ever done in my life! Make severing a mission a goal and then go do it!!!!

 Love you all keep up the great work and stay strong -Sister Cannaday

  

OCT 9^th 

     Hello everyone! This week was great! Happy Birthday Ethan! I'm so excited about you getting baptized soon. It’s really the best thing you can ever do! 

    This week or the last 3 days have been great. It always really throws me off when our P-day gets moved.  We have been working with this wonderful girl Kaia that is getting baptized this Saturday. It has been so much fun and she has asked Sister Billings and I to sing with her at her baptism, it's going to be great!

   We are have also been working with a lady that started come to church as soon as we started teaching her, months ago, but wasn't sure that she wanted to be baptized. Well yesterday we went over there for a lesson and she told us as she walked out of the room that she wanted to be baptized. Sister Billing and I sat there with a puzzled look, like "did you just hear what I heard?". She then came back and explained to us that she has been praying and thinking about it for sometime and just made up her mind. I was so cool and she can't wait to start working towards being baptized! Yah!

      We have also been teaching a man named Lloyd for sometime and he told us today that he wants to work towards being baptized also. And that he is getting answers to his prays everyday about the things we have been teaching him. He has a long road ahead of him but this is exactly what he needs.

         The Lord is truly waiting to bless us if we will just prove ourselves worthy to him. I feel a little like Pocahontas always wondering what coming just around the river bend (I really want to sing this as I'm typing it but I'm in the library so I can't). If we will keep going and hold strong just around that bend there is so much waiting for us. If it's a test of our strength or a time of peace it will be what we need on this river of life. 

    Everyone keep going the Lord is by your side he will never leave you even if you walk away from him. I love how the scriptures tell us that he will sucker us. The word sucker means to run to. The Lord is running to us, so stop running away from him. He loves you and so do I. - Sister Cannaday

OCT 15^th

Hello everyone!

This week was amazing! We had a baptism for a 15 year old girl named Kaia. She is so sweet and has been such a joy to work with. Her baptism was last Saturday night at 6pm and there were more people there to support her than there are in church on a good week! The chapel was full to the rim. They love in the room was so powerful that I couldn't help but cry. Kaia's whole family is LDS but her dad and mom had her in high school and fell away from the church and took her with them. But by a tender mercy of God this summer she end up living with an aunt and uncle that were a great example to her and she decided that she wanted to be baptized. Kaia, her cousin, Sister Billing, and I all got to sing at the baptism and it was great! The spirit was so strong! 

This Sunday was also amazing you know how sometimes testimony meetings turn into “thankimoy meetings” when something cool happens in the ward. Well this was the most powerful testimony meeting that I have ever been to there was this undeniable strong sprit the whole ward could feel. Even to the point that our investigator felt like he needed to bear his testimony about the Holy Sprit and it was only his second time at church. I wish I could bottle the feeling send it home to you all and keep it in my bags of tricks when someone has doubts or fears. IT WAS THE BOMB!!!!  I feel like I spent a Sunday and Saturday in heaven.

This week went almost without flaw it was amazing, sprit guided, and filled with so much hope and love. Oh... and yesterday was also my companion’s birthday so it was a part-ay...  I love you all and hope that everything is going great! - Sister Cannaday

Jenni congratulations on the new baby boy I cant wait to meet him he is one big baby!

Sept 25th

This week was like a good piece of peach pie. Hot, sweet, worth the work and I can't wait to have it again. It's been crazy cool and I would love to tell you all about every little bit but there is just way too much to tell you all of it. First I'm companion rocks! I love her so much already and she is fun and crazy just like me. It has made for a lot of fun! She even sings all the time just like me. (Jenni I think you would go crazy if you were with us!)

   It has been wonderful to be able to teach with her as well she in a great scriptorian, but the funny thing is that her whole mission she has been in the singles ward so working with little kids and old people is a big change for her. Going from teaching people that had an attention span of a few hours, to a few seconds, is a big change.

   We have taught a lot of really great lessons this week by following the spirit and listening to what people have to tell us. I did have a heart breaking moment this week when some one we had been teaching got dropped because it just wasn't time for him yet. I truly broke my heart. It is so weird how much you grow to love the people you teach and how their happiness means the world to you. The Lord really does open up your heart to them.

     I'm so excited for conference that is coming up! I'm so excited to share with all the people that we are teaching the words of the prophet of our day, and to watch the prophet teach. What a wonderful gift it is to have a prophet guide us today.

         Everyone, the Lord wants us to be happy!  He really does and he will stand by your side no matter what! I know that he will not only give us what need but also give it to us at the time that we need it the most.

        I had one of those great moments this week where things just clicked. We were teaching about the spirit and how we are feeling the love of God, and how we all feel it differently because we are all different. As I was teaching this the 5 love languages came to my mind and how we all feel love different. And it clicked, most of you know that you that I show love through physical affection, like hugs or biting people.:) Well in the times that I'm in the most need that is how that spirit talks with me. I get those moments where I get a big hug of love and a warmth that feels my body. Well I think once we know how we show and feel love we can better understand how the Lord talks with us. So the challenge this week… get online and take the love langue test and try to work on the way you feel and show love, to your Father in Heaven. As you do I know that you will become more in tune with the spirit, because "God is Love". 

 Talk to you all soon

Sister Cannaday.

September 10th and 17th 2012

September 10, 2012

Hello everyone,

I hope every thing is going well in Utah, or where ever you are reading this from. I cannot tell you how much the Lord blesses you when you are having a hared time, if you only ask.  I know that is what has happened to me. This last transfer hasn't been the easiest on my mission so far, or the one that I have felt like I have been helping people much. What this transfer has been is the greatest chance I have ever been given to lean about love, hope, and relying on my Savior. It hasn't been the easiest but I have grown the most, so that makes it the best.

       The biggest lesson I have learned that I want to share with you this week is that the Lord is waiting and willing to help if only we ask!  There are so many good examples of this in 1 Nephi. Here is one of them: After Lehi has the dream about the tree of life he tells his sons. Nephi wanting to know more about what this meant went to the Lord and ask and he was shown. Not only that but he was told what it meant, because he asked he was showed so much more. After Nephi was shown the vision he found his brothers thinking about what their fathers dream might have meant. Nephi ask them if they had asked the Lord? Their response showed their faith. They told him No, for the Lord dose not show such things unto us. Now Nephi knew better then his brothers, Heavenly Father loves them all the same. The only reason why they were not shown the vision was because they did not ask!

    How many times in our lives do we miss out on blessings or our load being lightened because we want ask? "Did you think to pray?" We need to ask in faith knowing that the Lord will answer our prayers. I know that with every bit of my testimony that the Lord hears and answers your prayers. The Lord will not remove our trials from us but strengthen us to bare them.

        I'm losing my companion this week. I have grown to love her so very much. Se is so full of spunk and energy. I know the Lord put us together for a reason and I'm very sad to see her leave.

  

         I want you to know that we are getting a lot of work done here in Livermore and that we are working our tails off and I will keep working this hard until the very end. There is so much joy in this work. Look around for an opportunity where you to be a missionary I promise they are there. I love you all stay strong or I will kick you booties when I get home.

 Love Sister Cannaday

September 17, 2012

Hello everyone! This has been one of the best weeks ever! I got a new companion that is from Orem Utah; she is super nice, kind, and talkative. It’s been a nice change up and we are getting a lot of work done. The Lord is also putting so many people in our path that are ready, it’s crazy. I have found more people that want to learn in this last week then in my whole time here in Livermore.  It has been great! If you can't tell I’m a little happy right now! : )  If I was there telling you this in person I would be jumping up and down. I know that there is so much to be done here I really hope that I will have the time now to do it.

    We started teaching a family this week with a great 12-year-old boy that wants to serve a mission more than anything and get baptized as soon as possible. He has been watching all the missionary movies that he can get his hands on and just can't wait to be an Elder. He is helping his whole family understand how great this gospel is. 

     One other miracle that has happened recently is with a man that we met last night wile talking with people on the street. He was walking by while I was talking to someone else and I just felt like I needed to talk him. At first he told me that he goes to another church. I kept talking to him and after a little while he told us that his dad was a member and that he would like to learn more! We set up an appointment to teach him and then kept talking to people. Not to far down the street he walked up to us again and without saying anything just handed me a cell phone. I didn't know what to do so a just said  " Hello this is Sister Cannaday" It was his dad I was so excited that we met him that he called his dad to tell him. His dad didn't believe him so he found us to talk to him. His dad was so excited that he was in tears when we said goodbye.  Not too long after we had left we got a phone call from him asking if we could move our time to meet to the next day he just couldn't wait. 

     I so happy to do the Lords work and find the people that are ready! I love being a missionary! : )

         I love you all, be good, and keep looking for the missionary opportunities where you are they are there don't be scared the Lord is on your side.

-Sister Cannaday