This weeks letter theme..Moroni 7:29 (read it!!)

"han cesado los milagros, mis queridos hermanos? Os digo que no!"

ok i dont have my eng BOM with me but the theme is miracles! I
have an amazing companion!! Hermana Anderson rocks!! She is an
incredible teacher and we have a great time together. We have alot of
work to pick up in this area together which has been dead for a
while. We have both been out 5 months! :) Working at the VC is great. I
have seen some incredible miracles there. It is fun being able to give
tours. I guess what makes this VC different than others is that we give
tours. The mission president encourages all the missionaries to take
all of our investigators there when we being teaching. Theres a really
good statistic that i think, not exactly sure, but 30% of converts had
a good experience at a visitors center. We give tours to people who
walk in and it is great. OH something really crazy happened. when we
get to the VC, we also work in the calling room, we call our referrals
we receive from the VC and send the missionaries if they accept. well
since i a m new, the sisters gave me some older referrals. I opened my
bag and i had one from Meagan Ricks referring her friend Crystal. I was
like...wait this must be super old because shes been out a year i
think! And someone had brought it from the MTC. How crazy is that?!!?!
So i called her and only chatted for a couple minutes because she was
busy but wanted me to call her back! coincidence, i think not! haha.
my first tour i gave was an unscheduled tour, a latino family walked in
and i was working on the floor greeting, which means i can give them
tours when they walk in. SO it was a member family from virginia and
the mom had her brother there that wasnt a member. He wanted the
missionaries to come :) it was a tender mercy that happened! i was
just excited i was able to teach the restoration by myself :) I am so
so grateful for the gospel. We are all so blessed to have the truth in
our lives, to receive many many blessings!


Today we went to the city and up to the Washington Memorial :) we
were able to spot the temple from the north side. It is huge! Im
grateful to have temples, and to work at a Visitors center. We went to
the Smithsonian of the natural history! Super cool!!!!! it was
beautiful. DC is s super cool area!!


love you sooo much,

Hermanita Tav

This is Chelsies new web site-PICTURES TOO!

http://www.missionsite.net/sisterchelsietavernier/main

When the Lord calls....He qualifies

BuENAS!!!!!!

Well I thought i would start off with that sweet scripture because
this week was A MIRACLE WEEK :):) Rony got baptized on Sunday!!!!!!!
:))) So we found him about 6 weeks ago and taught him everything, and he
bailed out of his b date. He didn't call us for about 3 weeks-so
weird!!! BUT he continued coming to church...yes very strange. So we met
with him after not seeing him for a couple weeks and finally did last Wednesday night. Me and Hna Gomez extended baptism date for Sunday and he had
concerns...we resolved them and he got baptized!! it was the coolest
thing ever and soooo precious because he was my first find :):) What a
miracle, I have truly witnessed through prayer and fasting the miracles
the Lord will provide!!! Fernanda is AMAZING!!! i did get transferred,
so hopefully I will go back to her baptism, but her crazy husband agreed
to come to the Visitors center with us. He was not open at all, but
poor Fernanda just wants to have her husband and her be baptized
together. This is just something that she has to do, and something that
will take time for her husband. It was sad saying bye to my
investigators. :( i started crying LOL. But what happens is we get call
outs Monday telling everyone in our zone where we are going. I am
serving now in Glenmont. My comp is Hermana Anderson. SHE IS LEGIT!!!
Ive been blessed with the most amazzzzzzing comp's ever! SO fun and cute,
all of them :) I really cannot complain! She is from Idaho-so we are the
only Spanish companionship of sisters here that are both American LOL.
Everyone was like "uh oh you two are together?!" lol. I guess they
think were both a little hyper?? hmmmm. But she is a lot like me. she came out 4
transfers ago, and i met her in the MTC lol. We are both babies still.
she has known Spanish her whole life and taught in Guatemala for 1 ano.
:) pdays are Thursday. I started my FIRST DAY at the Visitors Center
yesterday! It is so different. Most likely I will be working there 4
days a week either AM or PM shift. we gave a couple tours so it was
nice. Still getting used to it all. Im sure many miracles are to come
there too :) its getting a little cooler here-wish i was still on bike
lol. Its weird to have a car. Our area is HUGE. we have a pretty good
size teaching pool as far as i know. Im used to full-pros and always
filling the day, so it will be a big change now. Spanish
is......great!!! i feel soooo blessed that i can speak now without
problems. it totally came out of the blue within a couple weeks ago.
:))))its sweet! i have a quote i really want to share. It is about
service from President Monson. It is so great. "The Savior taught His disciples,"for whosoever shall save his life shall lose it, but whosoever
will loose his life for My sake, the same shall save it." I believe the
Savior is telling us that unless we loose ourselves in service to others,
there is little purpose to our own lives. Those who live only for
themselves, eventually shrivel up and figuratively loose their lives,
while those who loose themselves in the service to others grow and
flourish and in effect SAVE their lives" I LOVE THAT. Do we get so
caught up sometimes in our lives that we forget about others? I know
that as we continue to step back and evaluate our works, if we see we aren't as happy as we could be or there are problems upon problems,
something is wrong with us and we must change that! I know through the
Savior we can change and become more like Him as we incorporate His
attributes into our lives and strive and live to be like him. i have a
testimony of this incredible work. I know it is true. Share it with
everyone!! That is our purpose in this life is to progress and I know we
can progress and feel of that gozo when we truly live the gospel and
tell everyone about it. I know for me personally, I am the happiest ever
when i am sharing the gospel!!!! :) continue serving others, find every
way :) The Lord will bless us, I know that!!!


love you all so much-

Hermana Tavernier

The mission is SAWEET!!!

Hola madre y padre y todos!
loved getting all the emails about Chase's...I mean "ELDER" Tavernier's !I just write him a letter and mailed it off. That first week letter that I know he will want to hear next week. lol. The mission is SAWEET!!! Wow times are hard right now, sometimes it doesn't seem like anyone will listen! But the Lord knows the desires of our hearts and blesses us with knowledge and tender mercies in our companionship that seem to shake us a little, like a too good to be true companionship. She is incredible and man we have been getting good work done. We met with Fernanda, she has a testimony!!!!!! We found her about 3-4 weeks ago and man was she prepared already. I started balling in the lesson when she told us she knows the church is true, that this is the best feeling she has ever had. Shes been repenting and feels something change in her life, like she wants to just go around doing good!! Her husband is the problem. The BIG problem bc he is anti! He hates mormons...yikes! The funniest part is he called us a couple days ago and was like you guys should come to my mass and have a little "chat" over the web with my friends in Mexico....omg! we were like...um we aren't he to bible bash! You can just imagine two smiling happy giddy girls talking to some big crazy macho mexican guy lol..he was suprised because we just continue to bare our testimonies. SO we saw her yesterday and she apologized for her husband calling us. She said they got in the biggest fight ever is their marriage(been married for 1 yr and have a 5 month yr old girl) SOO we feel awful of course bc this is not the point of the Gospel to tear apart families of course!!!! We have been praying forever for him and guess what? He agreed to go the the Visitors Center @the temple with us!!!! he only met us once at church too and talked to us for probably 30 seconds. We met her a Friday, and she was like yeaaa id love to go to church and bring my husband. When they got there, her husband was like, I think this is the Mormons....she was like yea i think it is too..wink wink. LOL Soooo pray for them!!! She is incredible!!!!!!!!! Rony finally called us back!!!! me and menendez(my mom) found him last transfer and he stopped contacting us for about 3 weeks, and he had a baptism date too!!!! So we found him in his car last week and hes like..see you at church!! we were like...can we meet? he kept dogging our appointments, but continues to go to church! so weird! So we pulled him out of class (pushy sister missionaries) and talked to him and found out everything under the "iceberg." Hes been missing church and so forth...so we are meeting him tonight and extending bdate for 2 weeks. Our investigators have really gone through heck and back since we have taught them, and Satan knows they are INCREDIBLE people. They will be the future leaders of the church, they are both in their late 20's. my testimony of the power of the Book of Mormon has grown so much. Me and my comp teach the Book of Mormon as our first principle now because we prayed and felt inspired to teach that first. Since then, we have really seen a great change in our teaching pool. When people gain a testimony of the Book of Mormon and recieve all of the wonderful promises listed in the end of the B.O.M, they really change and have that desire to be baptized. The church is true, and I am soo grateful for it. Since being on my mission, I knew things were true before and had a testimony, but it never felt that strong, but when nurtured properly by study, ponder and prayer, it grows and there isnt a day that goes by that the Holy Ghost has touched me and told me yes, its true! Im grateful for the witness of the Holy Ghost. This transfer comes to and end this week!!!! :( but I have received a testimony of prayer this transfer. My comp has taught me through her testimony about prayer. She is a convert of a couple years. She is incredible and the people are touched by her conversion story, especially the Latinos bc they are ALL Catholics like she was too. She has helped me so much strengthen my testimony. I am grateful for my wonderful parents who taught me to read my scriptures and gain a testimony of them when i was a small child! I have always known they were true because of that feeling I felt when a child, and I have had the opportunity to share that with a lot of people this week :) I think my english is getting worse! I gave a lesson at our District meeting, and could barely get out the words! ey ey...and praying!!! i dont even want to try out loud in english!! haha. It is funny! they say when I go to the VC(probably this next transfer) i will be using lots of english and spanish, so that will be good.
Love you all and take care. There is an awesome gen conf talk by Wirtlin, april 2009 conference called the one or something like that, read it!!!! its is incredible!!!!!!
Love you alll!!!!! la iglesia es verdadera!!!!! good news!!!!

Love,
Hermana Tav

my companion have been really working hard the past week

Hola!!!!
Well this week has been great! We had our Zone Conference on Monday and wow it was incredible. There are a lot of new changes in the mission, some new curriculum, but it is excellent. We will be seeing a lot of success now from it. Me and my companion have been really working hard the past week and have been really asking and praying for answers to help our investigators. This morning we had a really neat experience. We were sharing what we read about the Book of Mormon. We shared how we new it was true and the experiences we have had through prayer. The power of the Book of Mormon is incredible. There is a triple promise if we read and ask if it is true! One, we will know Jesus is the Christ, two, we will know Joseph Smith was the prophet who restored the church, and three, we will know that The Church of Jesus Christ is the true church. It is so important for others to gain a testimony that this Book is true. The words help, inspire and uplift others to do GOOD!! To want to be better and to change, that is how it has helped me so muuuch. I know that it is true and the words are for our days!! I know that id we pray before we read and ask our Father in Heaven to help give us scriptures to apply to our lives, they will indeed come out to us and come to life!! So amazing! We have 3 steady progressing investigators who are great. We had an incredible lesson last night and in the afternoon with two of them! I am learning the importance of testifying and how important it is to help them gain their own testimonies, and not just teach lessons, but to teach to people. I feel so privileged to have this Gospel of GOOD NEWS!!! It is wonderful, and no matter what goes wrong, Heavenly Father is waiting for us to just pick up our phone and dial in, because he will give us what we need if we really ask for it! love you all and pray for our investigators that they will be able to gain testimonies and enter into the waters of baptism!!!!!
Con mucho amor,
Hermana Tavernier :))

Holocust Museum today-INCREDIBLE!!

HI :) how are you!? thanks for the emails and letters! I know things are hard, things are really hard always! Heavenly Father, I know this for surety that He tests us for a reason, and its because He knows already that we can handle it! We volunteered to come to earth and to pass the test! And its our job to ask. With everything that has gone on, rejection and rejection, canceled baptisms a couple days before here in the mission field, I KNOW that if we ask and tell Heavenly Father please "I cannot do this!" he WILL answer us and help us. One thing I have really learned is that He does not want us to be confused, we aren't here on the earth just to WORK, Work, WORK, make money, spend it, that cycle which I have seen in pretty much every person I meet. He wants us to become like Him, and LIVE the gospel of His Son. It is incredible some of the experiences I have, well i might say all of them, which truly test my faith, and I feel most of the experiences I have are for me.
So today, we were heading back from the city-we finally went!!!! Visited the HOLOCAUST MEMORIAL-again-it was INCREDIBLE!
On the Metro home we got off our stop and were walking up to the car, all of the sudden at the bus stop we see Jose(a recent convert) waiving in the bus driving by! We have been praying praying praying to find him. About 3 weeks ago we saw him in the street and he told us that he didn't want anything to do with the church because of some of the things he had done, etc. He doesnt have a phone number, and the place he lived at was empty the past couple weeks. Basically he didn't feel the atonement would work in his life. It was a MIRACLE in the middle of some random street we saw him. He got off the bus and headed towards us.We talked with him and helped him realize it doesnt matter what you did, as long as you are williing to repent and never go back. So we got his new address. Wow it is incredible how the Lord truly knows the thoughts and intentions of our hearts and answered our prayers. This gospel is a gospel of truth and miracles, it completes and edifies people in a way that we would never see possible without someone who sacrficed His life for us. On my planner i have a saweet picture of a blind man and Christs hands touching his eyes and I cut out in the Liohona this "El puede curar TODA HERIDA" which means "He can heal any wound." I love that. I have really seen that throught the Atonement of our Savior, wow when we sin, he will help us, if we have weaknesses, he will make them stronger, if we have sadness, he can really make them go away. The Atonement isn't just for sin, its for times of sadness, and weakness, trials and frustration. We have to act right? thats the only way! We can really feel of that love after we submit our will. It is the best feeling. I am grateful, so grateful for the happiness and comfort of this gospel, of the message of LOVE that it is. I have learned that love and charity are essential and if we illuminate this Christlike attributes into our lives and live them, we will become more like him and change. Change is good! I think a lot of people don't accept change well, a lot of missionaries don't wanna see that "change" in themselves, but hey, that's what we are here for on this earth, to change and to become more Christlike, to accept the downfalls and learn from them and grow from them :) My theme i write in all my planners is "let the mission change you!" I dont want to go back to where I was before and if i do, then wow I really didnt learn anything on my mission, and it would deny the existance of our purpose here on earth. I love this area. Its been tough but I know that the Lord always provides, and it may not be always in the way we want it to be. Its super humid still! Today a little rain, which was a nice refresher. My comp is excellente!!!! we have such a fun time, she is really funny and we enjoy every minute together, i really just love her with all my heart. She is helping me so much with Spanish, I wont let her speak English with me lol. We have had a lot of funny things happen to us just the couple weeks we've been together. Its saweet!!!!!


Well g2g time is so short!! I love you all and pray for everyone! ::)
take care
Con Amor,
Hermana TAV :)

I LOOOVE missionary work. IT rocksss!!!!!

Im STAYING :) in Olney South-they are keeping it FULL-PROS :)wahooo and BIKES:) my new comp is sooo great! Hermana Gomez. She is from here-but yea she is from slavador i think. :)We had our second baptism this past Sunday!! Luis got baptized(the one with the lower leg amputated.) The baptism was incredible and the spirit was so strong. He brought his walker into the font for stability. It was so cool. I love this area. Its gonna be great this next transfer. We are finding a lot of potentials. I have really loved working with Hermanna menedez. she taught me a lot, hard work and obedience. I love her sooo much..shes my "mom" :) haha. There arent any new sisters this transfers. Im so excited to work with Hermann Gomez. she has strep right now though :( it is a little sad :( and i stil have the "death cough" as my roommates call it. I was sooo sick on thursday. I had to sleep during my studies it was awful then i was like..i cant do this anymore(sick thing) so i took a shower, said a prayer with my comp and got ready and i felt better that night and since then its been better. For about 2 days my body was soo weak. I hated those days. But im better :)
We are working with Rony right now, he is so great and is really progressing a lot. We took him the the VC last night and taught him about lesson 3-the gospel of Jesus Christ. Wow the spirit was so strong and we were watching a talk sobre the importance of baptism and everything. I love this work and the opportunity I have everyday to share my testimony and see the light in other people's eyes. I am grateful for the comfort and happiness I feel through the Atonement and through this gospel. I have really learned so much about who I am, and what I want to be :) I am grateful for faithful hardworking members of this church who really make things possible because members of our ward are incredible and really are dedicated to helping us. :)
I love this gospel, I LOOOVE missionary work. IT rocksss!!!!!
G2g LOOOOVE YOOOU
Hermana ChelsieTavernier :)

Had our FIRST BAPTISM this past week

We had my first BAPTISM on sunday!!! wow it was so amazing. Miguel :) He is so great and the spirit was so strong at his baptism! It was so cool. We have ANOTHER baptism this sunday with Luis! It is so good. The work is finally coming up in our area, wheras it was dead for a while. We have a couple other investigators who we will be extending dates to soon this week. :) It was an eventful week. Particularily because there was a huge storm/tornato like downfall. The power was our for a couple days, thankfully not in our apartment because ours has its own plant system. BUT everywhere else=NO power. And still they dont think it will work until saturday in most areas here in this county. It is sad! There was an earthquake about 2 weeks ago too! And they have never had one here before. But the storm was sunday around 3 right after we left church. We were going to go home, but thankfully members invited us to eat at their home so we werent on our bikes :) close one there! So things have been kinda rough for a lot of members here. Other than that everything is great! We have transfers next pday already! I cannot believe it! That was the fastest 6 weeks ever!!!!!!!! It feels like I just got to the mtc still. Well...everything is coming along and I finally feel adjusted to everything, time the streets and places, the bike, the culture and the weather! :) I am so grateful to be here at this time, to have my companion who continues to help me progress and learn how to be a great dedicated missionary. Spanish is comin along. :) So I was reading in the Gen Conference ensign from may 2009 the talk by E. Eyring called "Adversity." It is such a wonderful talk. Please read it! It is a wonderful talk that will help anyone with any issue or circumstance that seems unfair. It is powerful and motivating! I am grateful for our prophet and apostles who tell us exactly what we need to hear. They are incredible, inspired men! i love this quote by Uchdorft..."as we extend our hands and our hearts towards others in Christlike LOVE, something wonderful happens to us! Our own spirits become HEALED, more REFINED, and STRONGER. We become HAPPIER, more PEACEFUL, and more receptive to the whisperings of the Holy Spirit." Wow i love that. I mean isnt that what we all want right? To be happy and peaceful and strong? I know I do! lol. And as we do a self check daily of who we were that day and what our actions where...do we resemble Christ? I know that when we act as He would act, we feel His love, and nothing else matters, because we are focused on Him and who we want to become. I am so grateful for this gospel and its message of happiness, love and truthfulness! How fortunate we are to have it in our lives.
I love you all veddddy much :) Hope everyones doing excelllent. hugs to all :)
Love always,
Hermana TAV :)

When people accept Christ in their lives, nothing else matters.

Hola mi familia!
Thank you for your wonderful emails, I especially enjoyed dads haha. He cracks me up! I look forward to all the emails on wednesdays.
Mission life is terrific! It is going great and I continue to see many miracles everyday. Days are sometimes really long, but the days that start out rough-really really get good near the end of the day, so I like those days. :) Mom got your package Gracias! :)
Sooo this week was good! We are planning the baptism for Miguel Angel!!!! We are SUPER stoked! I feel so lucky to see a baptism within my first transfer in my area-i guess it was dead for a while-onyl about 2 baptisms for 4 transfers. But Miguel is wonderful and has a lot of support from his sister and brother in law who are recent converts. Part member families are the best! His baptism is sunday after church-also his birthday :) What a wonderful day! Luis is getting baptized in about a week and a half too :) His sister has been a member for a while and he finally came around. We gave him a powerful testimony about baptism and faith and how he needs to get baptized! My comp layed it down!! She is the bomb! haha. So he is great. We have been teaching someone new-Rony who is around 25 or 30(dad-maybe I can hook him up with babbs-hes pretty cute lol) He is funny-he tries to speak english for me haha. Im like-dude just speak spanish I understand it, just cant speak it well enough yet haha. He came to the VC last night with us to watch the Joseph Smith movie. That movies brings me to tears every time! It is so powerful and strong. He also went to the "Why I believe" night at the VC on sunday and really liked it. Pres and Sis Matsumori were there and spoke-they are sooo rock solid! It was a wonderful night.Yesterday we witnessed a grand miracle! Aw... it was HOT on our way out-HOT!!! And we were checking up on our referrals-NO luck! wow it was a long and hot couple hours. We started walking out of the building and saw a door-(mainly all apartments in our area) so we both were like-yea lets knock why not. And opened the door-freddie-who is the brother in law of Lopez family in our ward-Miguel angel is brother too) and we met freddie once during FHE at their house when he was picking up his daughter. We knew the previous situation with his wife who was in the hospital last week because of her liver. Some of the members went and gave her a blessing a couple days ago. She was happy to see us and we were excited to finally meet her. We had NO idea they lived there. The Lord really put them in our path. We taught their family and we are going back tomorrow night :) THey are really humble! Wow that was a great experience. :) I am so grateful for this gospel. I have been learning so much just the few weeks I have been here. Learning so much about faith, and how important it is to have a sure foundation of faith. This morning during my personal studying I started readying "our search for happiness" by Ballard. I read it in the MTC but wanted to read it again. I LOVE the beginning where he talks about the story of his father seeing Christ. WOW it is incredible and put me to tears. As I am going through ups and downs, I realize how much I am putting my everything to the Lord. SO much prayer and fasting. It is incredible how close we can be to the Savior, it is up to us to put ourselves close enough to Him, so he can guide us. I am so grateful for the scriptures! I am just eating them up in my personal study and am almost done with the BOM again. WOW i have learned so much. I feel so lucky and blessed to be here. I am grateful the Lord has put people and things in my path to lead me to my mission. There are a lot of things that had happened before my mission and I know if I had made other decisions that I would have not been here. There is a scripture I found that I adore. "And thus we see the great call of diligence of men to labor in the vineyards of the Lord; and thus we see the great reason of sorry, and also of rejoycing-sorrow because of death and destruction among the men, and JOY because of the LIGHT of CHRIST unto Life!" Alma 28:14. That scripture hit me! We see that so many times-the rejecting of the word, but the joy when they see the light of christ into their lives! When people accept Christ in their lives, nothing else matters. There could be tragedy, sorrows, pains and sins, yet with the Lord, nothing else matters! I love this work! It is fantastic and it has changed my life! I love you fam sooo much!!! :) thanks for the support and updates :) me and my comp are doing great. She continues to push me and help me.
Hope to hear from ya sooon :)
Con Amor,
Hermana Tavernier :))

Slip & Sliding at Zone Confererence today!!!

HOLLAAAA!
WE had our Zone activity this morning and we just got done. It was sooo fun!!!! We played kickball with water-home base was a slipin slide! I was soo pumped to see that bci have been dying to do one. It was soo fun and i got drenched!! At the end i just jumped on that slide-gotta take every opportunity to get wet right?! HAHA we palyed soccer for a long time-got a good work out. Our zone is sooo fun. We had our zone conference yesterday. President was there. We had our interview. It was sooo good We had a wonderful conversation. He is great!!!! Wow so powerful, professional and kind. ME and my comp are doing good. Yesterday we had a bit of a problem bc our investigator who is supposed to be getting baptized Saturday is "re-thinking" things. Satan is really working hard. So he met with other amazing elders and talked. We meet tonight-hopefully things go good. The mission is wonderful. I am having fun and really trying to eat up every moment of goodness. I have a small miracle journal I keep and record the miracles. I think there is one every day weather they be small or grande! I love this area. We have some amazing members in our ward who accompany us in our lessons. Though our ward is very small for a Spanish ward, it is wonderful. I have learned so much about myself and have really seen why Heavenly Father has placed me here in this mission. I love that confirmation! If I could only say one thing about how much the mission has changed me, it is that being Christlike is the way to go. If we are more like Him, nothing else in the world matters, no worries, no struggles-even though there will always be hard times, but they won't be as bad! Reading scriptures everyday. WOW. What a blessing! The scriptures enlighten us and make us stronger and we know our purpose! I have come to appreciate the power of prayer. As a missionary, wow we pray a LOT. It is incredible. What a blessing! Spanish-is good! Its getting there. I am working on patience. Patience is a virtue. HAHA. But wow I love spanish-I cant wait until that day when i can speak without thinking. LOL. I am so grateful for my wonderful parents who taught me so well, who always taught us children gospel principles and doctine, and to read the scriptures and to pray. I was talking to a lady who was brought up in the church and she is less active. She has a son who is 3 and says she doesnt want to force him to go to church. I told her how I was SO grateful for my parents who took me, and encouraged me to go to church, thats why I am here. :)
biking is fun! it was raining hard yesterday morning but cleared up at night. Thank goodness :) It was a cool night. Today isnt bad either. :) I love this work, I am grateful for this opportunity to learn and grow and preach this wonderful message to everyone!!!!! It is FABulous!!!
Love always,
Hermana Tavernier

picture looks like she just won the lottery????

Chelsie in DC w/first companion

Met my new Mission President Pres. Mastumori & his wife

HoLA from DC :) How are you?
Everything is GREAT!!!! I am loving the work! Man i can really see how the Lord has prepared me the past couple months, and years with people in my path to help me for this mission!!! I have seen so many great miracles since being here. It is incredible! I actually was reading about that during my studies this morning. Faith is the reason we have miracles right? So if we want a miracle-we much trust and have faith in the Lord. Like Ether 12:12 says too-and 2 Nephi 26:13. Those are GREAT verses. I am just loving everything. I love BIKES-1.stop and talk to everyone! 2. a lil cruz never hurt anyone 3. good exercise lol. I love my COMPANION 1. She is a hard-worker 2. she is so sweet 3. can teach the gospel and touch the hearts of many people in spanish. i love this MISSION 1-people from everywhere! we have investigators from Chile, Nica, Salvador, Panama, Mexico. everywhere! I love the NEW mission pres. 1-we met with him monday for our zone conference. WOW HE IS INCREDIBLE and so is sister Mautismori!!! She spoke and WOW she is incredible. They are powerful and bold, yet funny and tender. We don't have cars so we had to get a ride home from the Senior couple missionaries and so we got to stay after and eat lunch with president and the senior couples- we were lucky missionaries that day! haha. So we chatted with them, it was great! Anyways there have been so many wonderful experiences thus far, and I am truly blessed to serve in this area. President Matsumori told us we are the luckiest group of missionaries bc the First Presidency said they only send the best missionaries to the Capitol of USA to represent the church. We were all very emotional. It was a great moment and it boosted my confidence. I feel privileged to serve here! We are teaching about 4 investigators who i am just coming to love so much. Well g2g-im going to write a letter because not a lot of time left.
I love YOU all soooo much.
Thanks for prayers and everything!!! I attached 2 photos :)
Con Mucho Amor,
Hermana Tavernier

First Emails tracting in Wash DC!!!

Dear Family-

I AM GREEEAT. Tracting is SO GOOD. It was incredible! We have 3 investigators-Tayna is from El Salvador-she works with Manuel(recent convert) at some country club-they are cleaners-very humble and amazing!-Manuel convert a month ago-his wife Hermana Lopez converted 5 years ago-SHE IS INCREDIBLE-even though i can barely understand them lol. So we meet her Saturday-she is a referral-member referrals are the best. We took her on a tour-the spirit was SO strong-she didn't know anything about Mormons. We watched the Joseph Smith movie-she loved it. :)

It is HOT! and HUMID!-we sweat SOOO much lol.

We eat at members houses about 5 times a week. Sometimes more or less. GOOOD food!
My companion Hermana Menendez is from Ecuador-she speaks very little English-that is why it is so hard for me-because im like-OK so who can understand how i feel-cuz it is hard to communicate!! But I am understanding A lot of Spanish-it is incredible!!!! :)

We don't have to wear knee highs :) wahoo

LOVE-YOU!!! Thank you for that quote. It was GREAT! I LOOOOVE that talk-His Hands. My favorite one from conference. I LOVE what you described about prayer. It is true! He does know what we need. ASK and YE SHALL RECEIVE!!-but the part I love most is-KNOCK and it shall be opened-We must do-act in all things right?

Ok so my first night tracting-was SO cool. We had an appt with Luis-he is about 65. He lives with his sister who is a member. She is so nice. Anyways she is really pushy with the church on him. He had his foot cut off about a week ago-gangrene. sad. but my comp has been in this area-Olney South for about 2 transfers now-and her compa dn her taught his about 4 times-like 3 months ago. BUT be was in the hospital for 6 weeks.He has been humbled now-so we extended him a bap date for julio 30. :) he accepted! First day! So cool!! I was like-wait is this really happening? this is missionary work!? haha. I didnt know what to expect. I didnt know that the Lord prepares the people too-we cannot convince and keep teaching until they are ready. We teach people-but they dont want it. Some people are coming to us! Like Alfanzo-he calls us all the time! HAhaa.I think tonight or tomorrow we are extending a bap date!!! im excited. So last night was great. OK the whole day was great. sun was so hard bc we didn't get into any doors-i felt awful! we talked to so many people too. BUT yesterday we went into about 5 or 6 homes. We taught Jovino who was baptized in December-hes 25- his story is incredible. baptized in 3 weeks. He lives at Dinaminas house who is 29-divorced has 2 kids-SHE IS INCREDIBLE! and speaks English! haha her story is great too-missionary's knocked on her door instantly after praying-she said she was going through hell at 18 yrs old. She married a great Mormon guy at 21...etc. didn't work out. She is from Dominican republic, moved here to Maryland when she was 10? So pretty Americanized. But she takes everyone into her home-has a heart of gold. anyways we were teaching them last night and then her friend asked to be taught! it was incredible.! It is hard for me to speak Spanish-but my comp is INCREDIBLE and is sooo diligent and hardworking. But Jazmine said that when i bore my testimony it was so clear and bold, powerful and she said sure.She wanted hers to be sure too. I told her everything is because of the Savior! It is true-the only reason I can understand Spanish in about 3 months is because of the Savior! Man it is incredible-the power I feel everyday-I have never felt this spirit so strong ever in my life-it is a HAPPY, comforting feeling. I cannot describe it. I LOVE this work! It brings me peace and assurance that this is where I am supposed to be. This is the greatest thing that could happen to me. I love it. I hope that everyone is well. Everyone is always in my prayers. :) I love you all so much and have loved this rocky yet joyful taste of my first week here. I love the culture and the language.

I love you all so much!!!

Con Amor Siempre,

Hermana Tavernier :)

Chelsie arrived in Washington DC!!!

Hey mom and dad!
before I forget-didnt get chases email..?? What is it?
Anyways!! HOLA! Im here safe and settled in DC :)) WAHOO! Today(Wed) is our Pday :) Talking to you all was sooo great!!! Yesterday we got in around 9 and the President and his wife picked us up:). They are fantastic people. So kind and hilarious. I can tell they are about ready to go(next week.) So they picked us up and drove us to IHOP. LOL. It was so fun.But don't you worry-it gets BETTER. lol.Oh and it is SO HUMID! It was about 90 degrees yesterday and is today too. They drove us straight to the temple to "check in with the Lord" :) It was a very good spiritual experience. The temple is AMAZING. It is huge!!! We spent a little bit of time, and then met some of the missionaries at the VC.:) We next went to their home and took naps:) yes a splendid 4 hr nap. :) Then we had a training meeting mainly about driving and emergencies. We ate dinner then had a testimony meeting. It was terrific. We had some dessert, played ping pong(yes sister Mansell played too lol) went to bed :) This morning we all got up(15 missionaries stayed) Then went straight to the VC to meet our trainers. My trainer is fabulous. Her name is Hermana Menendez-she is from Ecuador. She has been our for 9 months :) Luckly, the three of us Spanish sisters got natives :). My prayer was answered :)Yes! I had a great chat with President last night and he asked if I knew how to ride a bike-of course that was hinting that I would probably be starting in a bike area-which is totally fine! This morning he said that one set would be going full-proselyting, and I had a feeling last night I would, and we are! It is a lucky opportunity to go Spanish full-pros! Im SO excited. I guess there are a lot of sisters who dont ever got full-pros. Which means no VC for a transfer or two-but we can always bring our investigators there! Im so excited to go to a Spanish area and learn Spanish quickly! What a blessing! My trainer is great! After we went to the temple and did a session. We get to go every transfer. It feels like home here! When I flew in I knew exactly this is where I am supposed to be. :) We ate some wonderful lunch here then picked up all of our stuff at the stake center. Oh and I wont be needing blazers until I am at the VC. There are about 30 Sisters-14 Hermanas-spanish speaking. Everyone is so nice-a lot of Sisters from various places in the world-Italy, France, tons of South American countries. The senior couples are SO nice. I am excited to get to work! Our area is supposedly really big-southern Maryland-but that just means a good work-out right?! haha. I am so excited and happy right now! I know that my comp is going to do a great job. She is so cute and so diligent and hardworking. I can already tell. I got the bedding :) Gracias! I love you so much and dont forget to email me Chase and Babbs emails. thanks for everything :) write me to the mission home this week!!!!!!!!
Love,
Hermana Tavernier :)

Hola!!!!!
Como estas?!!
This week has been excellent! I am lovin the missionary work! ha so whats new? It continues to bless my life everyday. I love learning from my amazing teachers and companion everyday. It is a privilege to preach this gospel everyday. I REALLY love it. 8 WEEKS!!! wow time flies. wowwwie. We get our flight plans tomorrow!!!!!!! WAHOO! I am anxious and excited to leave. Hopefully I will understand what people are saying haha. Tonight me and my comp got asked to help the new missionaries be "their missionaries." What happens is the first day here,about 30 missionaries get called into a room with a investigator and they have to teach him. But they have help of a companionship who sits in on them and get to know and tell them who we are and so forth. We get to do it tonight for 4 hours. Im pumped to do it for all the new missionaries!!! What a wonderful opportunity. Robert D HAles came last night to our Devo!!!!! So thats 4 apostles! Incredible!!!! His talk was so wonderful. Everytime they come, the spirit is soo strong. He talked about obedience, sacrifice, and baptism. I love hearing about those topics because they really go hand in hand. Something that has really been on my mind is how much faith we must always have in Christ all the time, not just as missionaries. He promises us that he will tell us what we need to say in the moment. Also if we just ask, it shall be given! How incredible! I can testify that this is so true. I have exercised this faith and it really works. We had a great Sunday this past week. Our district all got to bear our testimonies in Spanish(usually the oldest district does it in spanish, but it is optional). And I LOVE our elders, the 5 of them are incredible. They are going to do amazing in Nicaragua. They are legitimo-lol... They leave monday :(. So I wont have pday next wednesday-it is next friday. Me and Hermana Gleason have training starting wed-with all the temp sq missionaries :). Im excited! Then we have pday friday. :) We get to go to temple sqaure and practice a day next week. Im excited!!!!! So i wont be able to tell you exactly when i can call until next fri-but prob leaving mon or tuesday?? Im not quite sure! sorry. Teaching in Spanish is going a lot better. At first it was hard, but now we got the hang of it. It is still hard, to figure out all the vocab and verbs and seeing if they are right, but we usually leave the lesson and we sya, we dont know how we were able to say that!!! Its really neat how the Lord is always helping us. I love missionary work! Its the besssst! I love my comp, she rocks and we have learned a lot from each other. My teachers are incredible and I hope to become like them when I get home. Oh our branch presidency is SO awesome. President Krueger is THE MAN! He is hilarious. He said to us..staring and smiling...."Your looking good...your good lookin." HAHA. He always is just smiling and has a quiet demeanor. He write Good on the board. He said he was thinking all about what he should say and that is the word that came up. Then he wrote a smile face in the o's and a smile under it :) he rocks! They help us so much and give us SO much love and express it often. Their wives are INCREDIBLE. They are so awesome. They come up to our dorm and chat and help us since we dont have our moms :)
Well Love you all very much!!!!!! Love hearing from you all!!
Le quiero mucho!!!!!!!
Con Amor,
Hermana Tavernier

Hola Fam :)
Thanks as always for all the letters :) How is everyone?! I miss ya all! This week has been great. Im finally over the "hump." There was a time a couple weeks ago when I was just like-when are things gonna pick up?! And they are! We have taught the 1st lesson in Espanol about 5 times now. Its so good to practice. Chase should practice spanish so hes not so confused when he gets here. Like what Josh is doing will help. Its better than nothing. But spanish is picking up. When we teach, dont ask me how I do it, but its probably the Lord. Then after im like Wow I dont remember anything I just said HAHA. me and my comp laugh. She is struggling through the language so its hard for me to stay positive sometimes. A lot is going on at home too so i try to help and encourage her, plus thinking about home wont help at all. I think she is sick of all the pep talks i give her. haha. But its only because i know she has the potential to do it. SOO guess who came last night. Elder D. Todd Christoferson. We are so blessed to come at the "rush" of all the apostles! His talk was amazing. I have been thinking a lot about the little miracles Heavenly Father gives us. There have been days when Im super "unconfident" and things dont always go the way i hope they do, then the Lord comes into play by giving us these tender mercies. How grateful I am for them. I am so grateful for the Atonement and the tremendous influence it has on us if we are only willing to come unto him. :) He talked about how the Lord answers us through the scriptures. It is TRUE. Whenever I am seeking an answer, I go straight to the scriptures, and I find my answer. I feel so close to the Savior being on a mission, studying this Gospel all day is such a privileged, sometimes I feel like I do not deserve all the blessings i have received since being here. (if that makes sense) We are still teaching Phil. He was out of town so we only called him twice last week. Its so hard teaching someone over the phone, but the missionaries there cant get a hold of him. I think that me and my comp are suppose to be teaching him. That is another incredible blessing I have seen. This rare opportunity has taught me so much. It gave me hope and a little glimpse of what will go on on the mission. I dont think I will ever want to not have this lifestyle. Cant I just be a missionary my whole life? HAha i told my teacher that and they laughed. We have a progressive investigator Bobby, i think i already told you about him last week. He volunteers here(its weird he is actually a member because he plays his part SO good) but we asked him to be baptized last weekend and he said he would pray about it. When we went back yesterday, he said he had a bad experience. He told us that he felt some dark feeling and it wasn't good. So we shared Joseph's story and that really helpe him realize the power of Satan. He wanted to pray, so we prayed there and I have never heard a more powerful sincere prayer. IT was incredible, i was crying. ITs funny because He isnt a real investigator, but he received his answer after that he god wanted him to be! We are stoked! and get to plan a baptism in about 1 or 2 weeks. ITs SWEET! haha. We have 3 other progressive investigators we are teaching in Spanish. IT is really hard, but its such good practice and that is how my spanish is improving. we have only 2 more pdays! WEIRD. Time flies. How is eveything at home? I loved the packages :) gracias. I havent heard from Kim or Shannon :( its okay though i understand they are busy.Please tell them hi and i Love them :) i dont have anyones address lol. I got a package from aunt lori-please tell her thank you!! She is so sweet and I love hearing from her :) So kenz is done with school today? WOW! lucky duck!! So how is Chadog??? Im so proud of my lil bro!!! ok so our trio(the other sisters in our zone) met a hermana going to DC! We tracked her down and she is SO legIT!!!! Shes from Concepcion Chile!!! So i told her my bro was going there and she was so excited!! She is learning english though, she is so cute and i think 24 or 25? she is amazing though and she will fly out with me and hma. gleason to DC.! She said she met 2 sisters from
africa going to DC north too-but english. isnt that awesome!!
Babbs! Hola! como estas? what is new? did you go to glee too? hows the singles ward?
I love you mom and dad so much. Thanks for all your support and advise. Your da bomb!!! :)
Tell everyone hi and that everything is tremedous ova in provooo !
Con Amor,
Hermana Tavernier :)

Sup?!

Hola Fam :)
Thanks as always for all the letters :) How is everyone?! I miss ya all! Everything is excellente here, I am loving pday today. IT is nice to relax a little. How was GLEe?! LUUUcky!!! haha Ill have to see it when i get home. :) I heard babbs is going to Dorthoy now? Shes takin my place :) nice! Tell her Hi for me and i miss her killer workouts. This week has been great. Im finally over the "hump." There was a time a couple weeks ago when I was just like man when are things gonna pick up?! And they are. We have taught the 1st lesson in Espanol about 5 times now. Its so good to practice. Chase should practice Spanish so hes not so confused when he gets here. Like what Josh is doing will help. Its better than nothing. But Spanish is picking up. When we teach, don't ask me how I do it, but its probably the Lord. Then after im like Wow I don't remember anything I just said HAHA. me and my comp laugh. She is struggling through the language so its hard for me to stay positive sometimes. A lot is going on at home too so i try to help and encourage her, plus thinking about home wont help at all. I think she is sick of all the pep talks i give her. haha. But its only because i know she has the potential to do it. SOO guess who came last night. Elder D. Todd Christofferson. We are so blessed to come at the "rush" of all the apostles! His talk was amazing. I have been thinking a lot about the little miracles Heavenly Father gives us. There have been days when Im super "unconfident" and things dont always go the way i hope they do, then the Lord comes into play by giving us these tender mercies. How grateful I am for them. I am so grateful for the Atonement and the tremendous influence it has on us if we are only willing to come unto him. :) He talked about how the Lord answers us through the scriptures. It is TRUE. Whenever I am seeking an answer, I go straight to the scriptures, and I find my answer. I feel so close to the Savior being on a mission, studying this Gospel all day is such a privileged, sometimes I feel like I do not deserve all the blessings i have received since being here. (if that makes sense) We are still teaching Phil. He was out of town so we only called him twice last week. Its so hard teaching someone over the phone, but the missionaries there cant get a hold of him. I think that me and my comp are suppose to be teaching him. That is another incredible blessing I have seen. This rare opportunity has taught me so much. It gave me hope and a little glimpse of what will go on on the mission. I don't think I will ever want to not have this lifestyle. Cant I just be a missionary my whole life? HAha i told my teacher that and they laughed. We have a progressive investigator Bobby, i think i already told you about him last week. He volunteers here(its weird he is actually a member because he plays his part SO good) but we asked him to be baptized last weekend and he said he would pray about it. When we went back yesterday, he said he had a bad experience. He told us that he felt some dark feeling and it wasn't good. So we shared Joseph's story and that really help him realize the power of Satan. He wanted to pray, so we prayed there and I have never heard a more powerful sincere prayer. IT was incredible, i was crying. ITs funny because He isnt a real investigator, but he received his answer after that he god wanted him to be! We are stoked! and get to plan a baptism in about 1 or 2 weeks. ITs SWEET! haha. We have 3 other progressive investigators we are teaching in Spanish. IT is really hard, but its such good practice and that is how my spanish is improving. we have only 2 more pdays! WEIRD. Time flies. How is everything at home? I got the meds-GRAcias! I loved the packages :) gracias. I havent heard from Kim or Shannon :( its okay though i understand they are busy.Please tell them hi and i Love them :) i dont have anyones address lol. I got a package from auntLori-please tell her thank you!! She is so sweet and I love hearing from her :) So Kenz is done with school today? WOW! lucky duck!! So how is Chadog??? Im so proud of my lil bro!!! ok so our trio(the other sisters in our zone) met a hermana going to DC! We tracked her down and she is SO legIT!!!! Shes from Concepcion Chile!!! So i told her my bro was going there and she was so excited!! She is learning english though, she is so cute and i think 24 or 25? she is amazing though and she will fly out with me and hma. gleason to DC.! She said she met 2 sisters from
africa going to DC north too-but english. isnt that awesome!!
Babbs! Hola! como estas? what is new? did you go to glee too? hows the singles ward?
I love you mom and dad so much. Thanks for all your support and advise. Your da bomb!!! :)
Tell everyone hi and that everything is tremendous ova in provooo !
Con Amor,
Hermana Tavernier :)

Yipee Chase got his mission call!!!!

Hola! Como esta?! Life is great here! Pday is excellent! We are doin laundry right now. :) Thanks for the letter yesterday mamma and dad! They were sweet! Sounds like the concert was fun! :) And im sure your laurels loved their quits! thats so awesome, your the best! Tell babbs hi and that im sending her a letter today :) IM SOOOOO excited for chase!!!!! WAHOO! I knew he was going somewhere down there and spanish haha! So i wonder if he is in Carols mission? I have been writing Carol too! Ill have to let her know. I love having sister missionary friends! :) and I have been writing Sister Samia(from Hawaii) shes is Phili. She is awesome. I cant wait to get the package from you! Thanks so much. My comp gets packages like everyday haha. But its all good. Her fam lives 10 mins away lol. I told chase what my teacher said about that mission chase is going to-he is jealous! he went to santiago and LOVED it, but some of his friends went to south concepetion and they say it is the prettiest mission there. :) haha. im so stoked for him. Jake!!!! Im so excited, and to Veirs mission?!?! Crazy! they will be BFF haha.
Man this week has been rockin! Me and my comp have been teaching Phil from Boston(i think i told you about him last week). He is a real person too haha... Here we usually don't get to teach real life people except at the Referral Center.(call center) and some elders passed him on to us-they only found and taught him a couple times) But we taught him the restoration and MAN hes so amazing. He is the coolest man. Hes about dads age and lives with his 2 brothers. He is on disability bc of his back injury at work. So he is home a lot. But we call him about every other day. Yesterday he wasn't in the mood to really talk, so that was really hard for us because Saturday we had the most amazing conversation. It was about 45 min long. Phil was flipping through the tv and came up on BYU sat morning before we called him :) He watched a little bit about Joseph Smith. He believes that Heavenly Father and Christ appeared to him! We practically started crying, it was amazing how the spirit can be so strong over the phone. He had lots of questions and doesnt know a lot about our church. I told him my favorite chapter is 3 nephi 11, when Christ comes. He loved that. He said he thinks its great when they compare Christ to the hen gathering his chicks. I was like, REALLY, o MY goodness this is incredible. It is just so amazing to share our testimonies to others, and truly the great power that the spirit can have with us and tell us exactly what to say. Man Saturday was excellent. The missionaries should be going over(we have been trying to get them over there the past week or two, but the lady at the office is so slow and crazy, I was telling my comp how i wanna ring her neck! haha. get the elders over there! HAHa. He couldn't make it to church(though he wants to go) bc his ride didnt show up :( Man Phil rocks though. He is an amazing person who deserves the gospel so much like everyone else!!!
We are also teaching a progressive investigator in the TE. We get to see him about 3 times a week. We LOVE him!!!!! :) he is this older man who's from Boston and its sooo nice and kind. He loves me and my comp haha. Hopefully we can commit him to baptism soon! We are super busy teaching different people, its great practice for the mission. We teach about 6 lessons a week, now transitioning to spanish. But bobby and phil are english. Its so great!!!!
My comp and me are great! we have been teaching in Espanol. Its crazy! ITS hard!! we speak "caveman Spanish". it is funny to hear us. haha. Im getting used to the schedule here. My teachers ROCK. They are incredible RM's who devote so much to us. We are so lucky. There's an elder here from Corona, Ca. in my district, he reminds me of Chase :) He is the Distict Leader, so when he talks, he is exactly like Chase. I feel lucky to have him here bc its like getting a little tast of my bro!!.
Last night the presidency came for our devotional review(we do a mini testimony meeting after) and after we finished the elder asked the lakers scores. Hes obbsesed too like Chase with the Lakers! HAHA me and him were SO pumped they are doing good. everyone else hates us Californians cuz there form UTAh HAHA.
Im great though. Healthy and happy!!! :)I love our new Hermanas! They are so sweet! they are going to Canada and Argentina. :)
I have been here for 5 weeks! WEIRD! its going TOO fast. It used to go so slow, bow its cruising by. I will call you at the airport and will give you details later. But maybe I can just swipe my CC there they said? or should i buy a calling card? idk. we will figure it out. Ok so i think i will upload all the pics onto CDS here at the photoplace. good idea? Then you can upload to your computer. perfect :) cuz the cards and flash drives might be too much work. Theres no time anyways! :)
Man i love you mom and dad, chase and kenz and babbs! will write you all more later :)
have FUN at GLEE! :) miss ya all and love your letters :)
El Evangelio is verdad, no?! thats what we say all the time(The Gospel is true, no?)
Love you all,
Hermana Tavernier!! :))

Another great email!

Hi! How are you mom and dad!?
Today is pday! YAYA! We had a great morning, got most of our studying in :) We are going to the temple later and going to eat in the cafeteria with our district :)
So last night we had a VERY special guest come. Elder Holland came! We are so fortunate here to hear apostles! It was so incredible. Nobody thought we would get one especially because we had Elder Perry come 2 weeks ago. Also Sheri Dew came on Mothers day to our RS! And we got to meet her afterwards. I came at the right time! :)
Elder Holland's talk was touching. It was firm but loving, you know how he is. The room was filled with the spirit. He told some funny jokes too. Patricia Holland is a gem. What a sweetheart. She told us to teach with love, as Christ would. That is what me and my comp are striving to do, and when we do teach as Christ would and by the Spirit, man our lessons ROCK. He told us how proud you were of us (since we couldn't be with our moms on Sunday-Mothers day!). :) He told us how important this time is, that there is literally nothing better than preaching the gospel. He told us never to come home with regrets, and to step it up. His man message was to "Never go home and walk away from this" because he has seen so many bad missionaries just act like there mission was nothing, where it should have been the foundation of their lives. He talked about Preach My Gospel and the old way they used to memorize the discussions. I cant even imagine that. He told a story of 2 missionaries who were in a rich part of South America and a lady answered the door and spoke in English. They were shocked. They started to teach in Spanish, but she said, no teach from your hearts. You can guess what they said. They couldn't do it. She was very disappointed. After this experience and many others, President Hinckley felt that missionaries need to teach by the Spirit. We find what someone needs and teach them that principle along with whatever we feel they need to hear. The new PMG is for missionaries just as much as it is for investigators.! Cool huh?! D&C 50 is amazing. Me and my comp read it this morning. Read it! :) verses 13-14 tell us that the gospel must be preached by the spirit, or there is no other way. When he told us all this, I was so touched!He said "This isn't Burger King, You cant have it your way" HAHA. thats the BK slogan. LOL
We must trust in the Lord! and to "knock their socks off!" My fav thing he talked about was Christs love. My heart ached with love as he told us how much we mean to Christ.In Matthew it says "Lovest thou me?". That was the theme. Then it says "Then feed my sheep." I don't think it had ever crossed my mind until I entered the mission that if we love him with everything, we must preach the Gospel. Out of everything he askes, he askes to teach and to love others. What a kind, merciful Lord he is! I felt the power of an apostle when he said "I did not give my life for a fairytale!" He speaks for all the 15 men. They have gone through hell and back and if they didn't know it was true, they wouldn't be here today, giving everything up. I realize I must give up everything I have for the Lord while Im here. My pride, any judgments I have of others, and become like Christ. We can do ANYTHING or everything through Christ, if we serve diligently and keep the commandments, and give everything to our callings whatever circumstance we may be in, and I know this is true because of the strength I have seen here on my mission. Sure I miss things at home, like you all and all the good times, but this, this work is undeniably what I am suppose to do! I have confirmation every day and I know that if we put God and Christ first, we will be HAPPY :) I love missionary work! it rocks lol. So me and my comp have a real life investigator! some elders from our zone left and they happened to call at the RC(resource center) and contact someone who is interested in the gospel. He signed a pass along card a couple years ago and they finally go a hold of him. They left this weekend, so they felt they should pass it to me and Herm. Gleason. We felt so fortunate. We haven't talked to him yet(he got in a bad accident) BUT we are talking to his Brother Doug. Doug seems Golden, hopefull it will last that way! We are calling him in a bout an hour. :) I shared my testimony yesterday and told him a little about missionaries and my family. He doesn't have a fam but lives with his 2 brothers. they are around 50 and live in Boston. We sent the missionaries out there this weekend, but one didn't talk to them. We will see how everything goes. Im excited! I LOVED talking to a real life investigator and we are so privileged to teach someone right now, this is rare i guess. coolio!
Well everything is just dandy :) We get tres hermanas today!! :) We are excited to meet them!
I love you SOO much and hope everything is welll at home!
Let me know when Chase gets his CAll! WAhoo!!
thanks for the letters! :) love you all very much! :)
Love always,
Hermana Tavernier

Chelsies week 3 email-whooo hooo!

hey fam!
I love you all so much!! How is everyone?! I am excellent! Thanks for all your letters :) i love them. Im so glad the wedding went great! Lindsay's friend Ally asked me how is was last night, she is hilarious! Today is p-day! saweet! we went to the physical therapist this morning for my companion so we could have more time to study this afternoon so we are not so rushed. Im doing laundry right now too. The other Hermana's left a couple days ago to Guatemala! I was so jealous, I wanted to leave too! So now its just our district and one other one, but they are leaving Monday! We also get a new set today and me and my comp and the zl'a get to welcome them and give them all the low down. haha. So we will be the oldest district for a while (and no Hermana's are coming :(..) But things are good! I am loving my life and loving learning about the Gospel and new lessons that help me everyday. We went to the TE(teaching evaluation) yesterday to get some feedback. We are now introducing ourselves and talking about work, school and other everyday activities in Spanish. We are carrying on a 15 min conversation before our 30 min lesson. So every Friday(for the real lesson) we are preparing throughout the week to do that. We got good feedback, but we don't know Spanish HAHA. We laugh every time we leave bc we say..will we ever be able to get this?!) Thankfully the other elders that have been here almost 9 weeks say the same thing. HAHA. But nevertheless we still have faith and hope that the gift of tongues will be with us..hopefully! :) I have been so fortunate to have been prepared to be here. I have totally noticed this since I have been here. With everything I went through before and in Hawaii, the Lord was testing me.....So I guess I am somewhat passing-haha saweet! lol- but for reals, this work is SO great and, it makes me feel awesome! Thanks for your prays mom and dad cuz they are working! We had an awesome fireside last night. Elder Gibbons from the Seventy came and gave the best talk! It was about preparing ourselves for questions to come from people. For instance why did Joseph have to restore the church? or are God and Jesus separate beings? Faith or Works? Etc.... It was awesome to hear his cut and dry, to the point answers. He reminded me of Elder Holland and was able to back up everything! It was amazing. After all that is said and done, he told us about an experience he had on his mission in Holland with his comp. They were going down a river and he was a "greenie" of about 4 months. His comp leaned over and told him how the Holy Ghost talks to him and how the spirit makes him feel. He was a little envious so he prayed and had a great experience. From then on, he has never in his life felt anything more clear and concise than the Holy Ghost testify that something is true. Isn't that so true? We can logically search and search but until we ask and feel the comforting feelings of peace and joy that the Holy Ghost brings, then "the witness of the Holy Ghost is the most powerful witness ever. More certain than anything your eyes can see, your hands can touch or feel". I just love that. I know that is so true in my life. When me and my comp teach and when we start to talk about how we know something of the gospel is true, the spirit is burning in the room!!! I love it! It is so amazing to teach! At the MTC, we must seek first to obtain the word, then will we be the most successful. This is true. How can we testify and preach about principles if we haven't felt them for ourselves? I'm grateful for experiences and trials that brought me to ask if this were true. That is why I am here! My FAV quote in PMG is "Once you've felt the power of the atonement in your life, you will have the greatest desire to share it with other" something like that.... BUT for me that is why I wanted to serve! Until I knew that was true, nothing was stopping me from serving. I LOVE the Lord and our father in Heaven. This whole plan is because he loves us so much. WOW so awesome! I love sharing that with others, and yes I do get really excited to tell the "fake investigators" that too HAHA. ITS saweeet!
Ok off the soapbox LOL. FAM your DA best! I love you all!!! :) Whens the mish call coming chase?!!? I'm writing Chase and aunt Lori asap today :) aunt lori sent me an awesome letter! I miss her! And LOVE her desire to share the gospel too! She is changing lives too. Ok well keep me posted on the call...Im thinking Central America???? HAHA We will see if Im right, prob not hhaha
sorry I didnt write a separate email to others, just cut and paste I guess lol. No time here to do anything!!! gosh!
Love dads letters, they make me laugh hard :)
Thanks baby for your letters :)
Mom thanks for the tights and candy, u rock! miss you and love you.. oh i cant call on Sunday-Mothers Day :(BOOO!!! But I do get a "couple"
hours in the airport when I leave in June! :)
LOVE YOU,
Con amor,
Hermama Tavernier :)

the girls......Ill miss!

Ill miss Andrew & Pricillia!

Chelsies 2nd email

Hola everyone!
I am about to start my 3rd week here! Time is flying! Everything is really great. I love being here in the MTC. It has blessed my life and knowledge of the gospel unconditionally and I cant imagine what it will be like after 18 months. I love my teachers. They are the most amazing people and has solid testimonies. Last night we had the privilege to hear from Elder L. Tom Perry! I guess its been a long time since an apostle came. He was incredible! The spirit was so powerful and my heart was full of love. He talked about the Book Of Mormon and Joseph Smith. He was funny and has a sincere personality. What a sweetheart.
The days are long! They are SO worth it. I love learning Spanish! I learned how to testify and pray in Spanish! We contact people here, just as we would in the MTC. So we introduce ourselves and get to know them and bear our testimonies at least 4 times a day to different companionship's.
My Zone is way cool. There is one district of 4 Elders leaving soon to Hondorus! Maybe Pres Veirs mission! They are so smart and excellent missionaries.Then there is one other district of all elders (12) all going to the same mission in Argentina! They have been here 7 weeks so leave next week. The two Hermanas in our district leave on Tuesday for Guatemala (there is a MTC there) :( We have gotten so close to all of them so it will be sad) but i hear we get some new hermanas next week! :)Hermamas are da best.
I have had such a great time here. I am reading in Alma right now for my personal studies and started it when I got here and am finishing up Alma soon. It is my favorite because it is all about missionary work! The Sons of Mosiah and Alma the Younger are incredible missionaries! I hope I can have that drive and desire like them. I am so grateful for my experience in Israel. It has prepared me for my mission in ways I cannot even imagine. I love missionary work and have a passion for this gospel. we are fulfilling the Lords purpose! This is what we are here to do! It brings so much comfort into my life. I have never been happier in my life! :)
I love getting mail especially the dearelder.com-hint hint... Love you all and muchisimos gracias for all your support!

Con Amor,
Hermama Tavernier!

Hermana's first email

HOLA!!!! Como Estas?!
. Well I LOVE being a missionary. I love it so much :) My companion is so awesome. Hermana Gleason. She is from Utah. She is spunky and fun! She reminds me of Lesley a lot. :) We are just starting to get the hang of things here. She is going to DC Temple Visitors too! We will be here for 10 weeks because our 10th week if temple training week. We will go to temple square I believe that Friday :) I love learning Spanish! It is hard, but a challenge hopefully I will master. I know how to pray in Espanol and Testify in Spanish, even to ask little questions like "how are you", "Where are you from" where are you going" and what do you like to do" :) There are 2 other Hermanas here named Hermana Robles and Hermana Ralphs. They are from Oregon and Utah. We all get along great. We all arrived the same day and live in the same room. So there are the 4 of us Hermanas in our district. There are5 Elders. A threesome and a 2some. They are awesome. One reminds me of Chase :) The Elders are all going to Nigaragua and the other Hermanas are going to Guatemala, they will leave in 2 weeks because there is a MTC in Guatemala. :( The Elders will be with us all 9 weeks. My teachers are great! one is Hermana LeBarge who served in LA! She is SO good in espanol and is SO NICE! Hermano Swenson is awesome! i think i cry every one of his classes haha! He brings the spirit SO strong to class in the mornings. He teaches in the morning, then LeBarge late at night. Then during the day we have 3 hours of study, one for personal, one for companionship study and one for language. Then there are always a fireside, large group meetings or devotionals in between. Our Zone has 4 disticts(each district has about 10 people in it) But one left today for numerous parts of the US and South America. Some where going to Hondrus so i told them to look out for Pres. Veirs HAHA. We are the only Hermanas in our whole zone of lots of Elders! haha. I loved your dear elder!!!!! :) i love getting those so keep them comin! :) Devotionals are so great! we had a member of the 70 come last night and MAN he was so legit! They really come down hard on the missionaries here. Its so hard to change my ways of thinking and acting! Im trying to be more professional and reserved! They have gym classes in the morning from 6-6:30! A teacher teaches different classes every morning, today was STEP! there are yoga, pillates, kickboxing, toning and weight classes for a half hour every morning! :) so i drag my companion out of bed every morning haha! Then we always have 50 minutes for gym every day. The field just opened last week so we go up there and pay different sports or run! it is very fun!I see Ali almost everyday! I saw her this morning and made a "contact" with her :) that mean i introduced myself and testified :) I haven't seen Melissa. I am the coordinating Sister! Its like the zone leader but for the girls! So i get to help the new sisters when they come in and get them settled :) My branch pres is AMAZING. He is SOOO great :) Every sunday we have to prepare a 3-4 min talk IN ESPANOL! its hard! haha. I had a tutor help me translate everything for this past Sunday, but thankfully I didn't get called on! I see Grant Payzant all the time! Yay for Linz and Jon another cousin getting married!!!!!!!! :)) I will miss the wedding :( The food is okay.
Thank you for all your cards and for the package too come soon, I haven't gotten it yet but am excited to get it! :)
Mom and Dad, I love the spirit here. It is amazing. It just confirms to me that this is EXACTLY what Im supposed to do in my life right now. I have never been happier and spiritual and emotional than here. I ball every day! I am getting better because we talk so much in our class and I am able to share many experiences that happened in my life that truly converted me. I feel so strong here, like the Lord is really watching out for me. We have taught "investigatios" in Spanish already and it is amazing how the spirit speaks to your heart and mind and tells us what to say. I think after "how did I say those things??" IT is great! I couldn't be happier! The schedule is demanding! It is mentally and spiritually demanding so it makes me physically weak, but I remember there are 2000 missionaries here in the MTC that are here & feel the same way. I understand why I need to learn Spanish! Since i have learned so much of the gospel in English, it is easy (from Israel, Seminary and BYU) to learn the gospel in Spanish. It is hard to speak though! I hope I will be able to one day!!! There are 2 sisters here from Jerusalem and 2 from BYU Idaho! Its fun to see familiar faces. I have Spanish dreams already haha! people are constantly speaking it at the table where we all eat together (our zone) and the 2 other disticts have been here for 6 and 7 weeks so they got it down! Everyone is so fun! P-day is here! Today we get laundry time to write. Email only 30 mins. And then lunch, then temple time at 4! :) we have class tonight!

First Day at the MTC Provo Utah

my "other moms"

Kim & Chels!

cousin Krissy & hubby Tyson!

Aunt Lori, cousin Erin & the Bradster

Doug!

Britt & Bri my best twin sis in the whole world