Week 69 - Joyeux Noël!

Hello everybody! 

I'm going to be honest I don't really have the desire to write out everything we did this week plus I just saw you (well, mostly Mom Dad and Erik) on Friday so... It's gonna be quick. 

Before Christmas we just did finding. Comme d'habs. 

Christmas was really good! We spent Christmas Eve in Lille with our district. We had a raclette fête and played loup-garou (basically Mafia but with werewolves) and ping pong and just had a good time. 

That evening in Valenciennes we were with some really awesome members and they fed us really well! It was very French haha we got there at 7 and got home at 11. And we were eating pretty much the whole time, except for a little break we took to play a few rounds of Uno before the cheese course and dessert. I love the French. 

Christmas Day we got up late and opened presents. I made Soeur Sabando make us empanadas with paté. Then we went to an amis' for lunch and then Skyped. It was a good day. 

And that's the important stuff! 

This is too short and I wanted to share this story last week but had already written too much so I'll share it this week. It's from a Christmas Liahona from a few years ago and for some reason I love it. So. Enjoy. 

"When I was a member of our district presidency, I helped coordinate an activity in which the members of our district donated toys to poor children living in the city of Soacha, Colombia. We had a wonderful response from all the members. Not all the gifts were new, but most were in good condition. As we finished loading the gifts on the buses that would take us to the city, a young girl came up to me with a plastic ball that had been heavily used and was scratched. I held the ball in my hand, wondering who would have donated such a beat-up ball. With some disdain I tossed it under the seat. When we arrived, our youth began singing Christmas hymns. Their music, along with their Christmas hats, attracted a large group of children. When we started handing out the gifts, those children called other children. Soon we had given out all our gifts. When we were about to leave, I saw a boy about eight years old running toward us, holding his little brother by the hand. When they arrived, the older boy said, “We came for our gifts.” His innocence left me without words and touched my heart. I explained to him that the gifts were gone. He responded, “It doesn’t matter if my gift isn’t here, but my little brother’s must be here.” Then I thought of the ball I had tossed under my seat. I told the boys I did have one more gift but that it was a humble one. “It doesn’t matter what it is,” he said. “That is the one.” I got on the bus and found the ball. When I gave it to the little boy, his joy overflowed. Jumping with gratitude, he said, “A ball! That is the present I asked the Christ child to bring me.” He continued to dance around happily as he and his older brother went away with their treasured gift. I quietly stood there and wept as a warm feeling of peace and gratitude enveloped me. The concern and selfless care the older brother gave to his younger brother touched me, and I silently hoped that I would be as eager to bless others as the older boy was to bless his brother. As the boys happily walked away, I was reminded of the Savior’s love for us. He did not even forget a little boy on a mountainside who had asked for a simple ball for Christmas."

Love you all! Thanks for everything you do!

Soeur Hansen

Week 68 - Four cities, six trains

Hello family et Joyeux Noel!

It's once again Pday and I once again have absolutely no idea what to write you guys about... But I'm going to start anyway and just kind of see what ends up happening.

It was a really good week, we were in four different cities (Valenciennes, Lille, Paris and Cambrai) and took six trains so that's always fun!

First stop on the Valenciennes Soeurs world tour was Lille for district meeting. We actually missed our train and had to wait an hour for the next one, which I was super annoyed about to be honest, but we tried to find the humor and laughed about the fact that we were walking around (trying to find an ATM) carrying a tartiflette that we made for the district meeting meal. And I read a talk by Pres Eyring about adversity and realized that even though we'd missed the train and half of district meeting, we "were not yet as Job". Thanks Pres Eyring.

Wednesday was one of those super fun all day finding days! And that's all I'm going to say about Wednesday. Except that I was wearing these ankle-high rain boots that I found in the closet. Worst mistake of my life. My feet killed me for the next three days. But my toes were dry for the first time in a while:) Those monsters went back in the closet.

Thursday. See Wednesday, minus the rain boots. Plus stop number two on our world tour! We spent the night in Paris to do Soeur Sabando's visa work for her second year in France.

Friday we got to the prefecture and ended up running into a bunch of missionaries, including Soeur Ellis and the Redds! So that was fun! The Lille soeurs were there too and we went over to Consecration Hill together and then went to this crepe/panini place by Notre Dame that the missionaries are obsessed with. It was super fun. Then I took Soeur Sabando to the Arc de Triomphe since she'd never been!

That night when we got back we went to this activity with the ward (mostly for the young men and young women) which was singing in centre ville at the Christmas marché! There weren't a ton of people at the marché despite the fact that it was a Friday night but it was good. We weren't given permission to give cards/brochures or anything so the branch mission leader decided that the best way to do missionary work despite that obstacle was to put the missionaries and "vos jolies plaques" in the very front.... As you can imagine that was a thrilling prospect for me.

Saturday was the final stop on the world tour, we went to Cambrai which is a ville in our sector that is about the same size as (If not bigger than) Valenciennes. But there aren't very many members down there so they're a part of the Valenciennes ward. Our rdvs were both canceled at the last minute so we had no real reason to go but we decided to go and try and see some less actives that we found on the repertoire because Christmas is an easy way to make contact. We found one and we had a good little lesson with her about the real meaning of Christmas and tried to get to know her. It was cool!

That night we had the ward Christmas party which started off with more caroling in centre ville. A lot more people were out so that was cool! There was one lady that stayed pretty much the whole 20 minutes we were singing and then thanked us for helping people remember Jesus! That was super sweet. The party was chaos as Christmas parties, and most ward activities, usually are. But it's a fun chaos.

Sunday we rounded out with some more finding! Yay! Voici ma semaine. [That was my week]. Sorry this is such a freakishly long email. I love you all and I'm so excited to talk to you on Christmas!

Soeur Hansen 

Week 67 - Un Sauveur est Né

Hey family! 

Soeur Sabando and I took Christmas pictures last night so I didn't write this email before hand... It's gonna be a quick one! 

The first couple days were pretty cold and we did a lot of finding, got frudged and we were just super excited for the Christmas conference that was on Friday! It was super fun, the Babins did a lot of really sweet stuff for us and I loved it. Plus I got to see the Redds and some other Liegeois so that's always fun! 

Saturday we taught a couple that have been Amis for almost a year. The wife is really awesome and is basically just waiting for her husband to decide to get baptized so they can do it together. He refuses to progress and its a little tricky, but this week Soeur Sabando and I really wanted to see what their understanding of the restoration was, because if you don't understand that, then you really can't progress. It was so cool! They knew all the parts like priesthood and apostasy and Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon but this time we were able to help them put all the parts together and they seemed to finally get it! So that was a miracle. 

We had another sweet miracle this week - We had about an hour to do contacting, it had been a really frustrating day because everybody we talked to was going through trials that could have been soothed if they'd been willing to hear about the gospel. We stopped a lady who started to tell us about the hard things in her life and we offered our condolences and tried to teach her a little about the plan of salvation, she wasn't interested in learning more but told us she was touched by our compassion and accepted to pray with us. The spirit was super strong during the prayer and I felt God reaching out in love to His daughter through us. That's why we're here! 

So voilà ma semaine. Je vous aime tous et joyeux Noël!

Soeur Hansen 

PS I love the Christmas video but it's way better in French, except for the little African boy who says "for our sins.. For our sadness" that's my favorite part. I watch it like at least once a day. 

#unsauveurestne

[Here is the link to the French version of "A Savior is Born" - the Christmas message on lds.org]:

Un Sauveur est Né

[And here is the English version]:

A Savior is Born

"Batman came to Valenciennes this week"

"What every house in Valenciennes looks like after 19h"

Week 66 - We got a Christmas tree!

Our "sapin de Noël"

Hey team!

So gonna be a little short today, since I'm trying to figure out plans with Dad and Nekel for going to....drumroll....LONDON!! Summer 2016! I'm
so excited!

[Maren found out this week that she and her friend Nekel have been accepted to the BYU study abroad program in London next Summer term]

But, it's still December 2015 and I'm a very focused, consecrated missionary.

This week was good, started off with exchanges, I had Soeur Rasband here in Valenciennes. Little bit stressful trying to get us around when I'd only been here for 6 days but I only got us a little lost... We met a really cool girl, our rdv fell through so we turned up a street to go catch the team and do some porting and we talked to this woman about the retab [Restoration] and she seemed to actually kind of get it! Which is a miracle during a street contact! So that was really cool! She was moving so we couldn't get any contact info for her which was too bad.

Wednesday we went to Lille for district meeting! And then the Redds came to town to bring the elders some paint for their apartment and fix a couple things for us, that was super fun! Little Liège reunion.

Other than that... We started Christmas porting, singing for people. If anyone wants proof that a mission changes you, look no further than the fact that I was willingly knocking on strangers doors asking if I could sing for them. Miracles happen.

Fun stuff. We had a rdv with a member that lasted like over two hours because the member was FULL of stories to share. It was really sweet
of her to come haha.

Church was good! Christmas zone conf this week! Woot!

I love you guys! Have an awesome week!

Soeur Hansen