FW:

FW:

Oh it was the best day ever. I LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH! Getting to skype was the best christmas present I could have ever asked for! Oh you all just look so good and are so happy and that just made me so happy! :) I have always said, and say it all the time to Heavenly Father, that I could handle ANTHING on my mission as long as you all are happy, safe, and healthy back home. So it brought so much comfort seeing that you all were so great! and OH MY HEAVENS I could have talked to you all for 5 hours - more like forever - the time FLEW BY! I ended up going over a little bit too... sorry. I know I need to be obedient espeically with ky going to be a missionary I should set an example. So i'll be better next time BUt OH MY GOOD HEAVENS. I just love you all! Mothers day here we come!!! :) And it was so fun to see tyse!! So fun to see all of you but I havent talked to that boy in MONTHS! Oh just give him the biggest hug for me! Love him! and all of you SO much!!!
>
> But thank you as well for such a wonderful christmas. I felt SO BLESSED opening all of the presents you sent! Thank you! I definitely hung up the decorations - mom the sister stockings are the cutest things!!! and tell tyse we loved the ornaments :) , blasted the christmas music, had the sleeping potion and then have been wearing the leggings and all the other warm gear is perfect for this weather! Thank you so much! I really just was so happy and feel so blessed! I took the picture too of everything laid out for you mom so Ill send that after! But it was such a good day! We were spoiled by the ward as well! But oh i just love you all! THank you so much for making christmas so special. It was hard being away from you but the best feeling close to you through opening all of the fun things! Im praying my package gets to you soon! let me know when it does!
>
> I feel like all of the week leading up to christmas is just a blur becuase I got to see you! It has definitely been the highlight of everything! But Christmas eve was really fun! We spent the morning making cookies and brownies and then ran around like crazy people delivering them to our investigators and members and then formers and Recent converts! It was so fun! It was doing that that I really felt the christmas spirit! It was so fun to just have the oportunity to just serve this christmas. Christmas away from home is definitely different - but it was so neat to just have this christmas to be focused on serving and helping others! It was different but so special. After that we went to a christmas eve party at the bishops! We took our portugese friend too! He was alone for christmas so we were excited to get to take him with us so he could be with people as well as meet the ward! It was super great and he is doing so well! his name is Jose and on Wednesday we had the most powerful restoration lesson with him that I have had so far on my mission! the spirit was SO STRONG as we testified of Joseph Smith and at the end we committed him to be baptised. It was the sweetest becuase in his broken english he just kept asking why he couldn't do it right away - he wanted to do it that very day. But we told him it took time and we felt like he could be ready by Jan 16th. So then he went through and counted the days and hours until that day! So he is doing so well! he came to church yesterday and we will continue to meet with him and help him stay strong up to his baptism. he does smoke though pretty heavily so pray for him when we teach the WOW this week...
>
> But CRAZY STORY! The end of this week has been pretty crazy. After I finished skyping you I ran down and found sister stephenson with Joy and Martyn. She told me that she wasn't feeling really well. On christmas eve we had gone to the doctor because she had an infection behind her ear and they had given her some antibiotics that they said might make her a little queezy so we both just figured that was all that it was. BUT oh we were in for a treat! :) Joy made us some more food - the whole eating so much food is such a problem - so I painfully ate a little bit there while Sister STephenson ran upstairs and threw up in the bathroom. She came down in a panic saying she oculdn't breath and was just freaking out! She couldn't catch her breath and was screaming at the pain she was having in her stomach. Then she started throwing up again but this time it was only the bile since she had thrown up all of her dinner from before... all I can say is Thank heavens we were at joys! I would have been a mess but joy just stepped in and knew what to do! So the night went on and things ended up getting worse so around 4 am an ambulance came to check her out. We are thinking it was just a reaction caused by the meds she was taking? Im still not exactly sure what all happened but so we have been sleeping over and joys the past couple of nights while sister stephenson has been recovering. It was a crazy christmas night - really hard for sister steve- but it was fun to get to stay over at joys for me! :) She seems to be doing better today so we will probably just take it easy and hopefully be able to go out and work tomorrow! Fingers crossed. I have really learned that work is the best way to help you stay focused and be happy on your mission. SO hopefully tomorrow is a better day! :) But yeah! How crazy is that!? So its been a great week of christmas celebrations and then hanging out at joys!!
>
> But I hope you all have the most wonderful week! Can you believe that this week it will be 2016? WHere the heck has the time gone?? I feel like every year time just seems to go faster! I have been thinking over how great this last year has been. With everything from finishing my first year at BYU, to deciding to serve a mission, to getting my call and then leaving and then all of the crazy adventures since! I have had so many experiences this year that have brought me closer to my saviour and really helped me see who he is and know of the reality of his love and awareness of what he did for ME! It is such a great time of the year to be able to reflect but then also make new goals of how we can improve! I am SUPER excited to make some awesome goals to help me become even better this next year! i will get to spend 2016 as a missionary and i plan on making it the greatest by really becoming better and who my heavenly father needs me to be! And i hope all of you do it too! KY! this next year you will be amissionary too! Its just all so exciting!
> But i am just so grateful for my saviour who makes it possible for the oportunity to look back and learn and then become better! i am so grateful we have this chance to CHANGE! TO be the people that he needs us to be. Becuase of him and his sacrifice there is always that oporunity to learn from the past! I am grateful for him and his love and patience with me as i am SO FULL of shortcomings but so grateful to know that he is okay with that - that he will make them strengths for me and is always there to help me just to be better! :)
>
> BUT i hope you all have the most wonderful week! And have the chance to look back so that we can be better in the future! We can all do it and then just become even better as a family! I truly love you all so much! IT was the greatest thing in the world to see you! I am just so grateful for you love and support and know how HARD it is to be away from you. I miss you all a lot but know that what I am doing is so important and that we will all be back together again soon!
>
> HAVE THE BEST WEEK!! And I will talk to you so soon!
> NEXT TUESDAY though! Becuase of transfers! :) OH you all are just the best! ITs always the hardest to end these emails and was espeically hard to end skype... but its just cause youre the best! I love you so much! THanks for being the most wonderful family!
>
> Sister GWilliam
>

FW:

> One of the Nepalese members! She is saying the Lord's Prayer...
> This is what I'm surrounded by in Aldershot!:)
> Sent from my iPad

FW:

I get to talk to you on Friday! :)

>
> Hello most wonderful family there ever was!
>
> I hope you have had the greatest week! I love all the updates from pictures of the snow! OH its so great! And looks so christmas-ie! Mom - I hope it snows for you on Christmas day and you can get your white Christmas. It is so weird for me being here without any snow. Even though we are usually in California where there isn't any snow either its just really strange here - and without the lights its really weird. But im loving it! Its crazy to think that I am here.
>
> I remember last Christmas we were at grandma and grandpas and you asked me where I thought I would be next year - this is when I had started papers but was a complete mess becuase for some reason I didn't feel good about it anymore so I was just confused and didn't know what I was supposed to do. So it was that weird time where I didn't know what was going on so then all of you didn't know what was going on either. Haha gotta love it! So I remember you asking me that question and I honestly had no idea. But never in my WILDEST dreams would I think that I would be a missionary here in London England. Its so crazy for me to think back on it and knowing now all the craziness that would happen and things that would take place to get me here - im just so grateful that Heavenly Fathers plans are always better than ours! Even though I never would have thought I would be here Oh I am EVER SO GRATEFUL THAT I AM! The whole Christmas season has been so wonderful but at the same has been really hard with it being my first christmas away and not being with you all but when I really get the chance to think about it, I am just so grateufl to be here. To get to Be a MISSIONARY. A set apart representative of my Saviour and to go around this christmas season to do what he would be doing if he were here. I love it! Im very humbled and full of gratitude for this opportunity and know that there will be LOTS and lots of Christmas' in the future where we will all be back at home together getting to celebrate together again so i am grateful to have the chance to be here this christmas! It is such a blessing and privledge that I am trying to take full advantage of.
>
> I also can't believe that Christmas and skyping you is finally here! I remember when I left thinking how the next time I would talk to you would be skyping at Christmas and how In my head I never thought the day would actually come. that I wouldn't actually make it to this point. :) BUT all the sudden it is here! Its so crazy! I feel like I just left and am still a baby in the mission but now am almost 6 months in skyping you all! Its just super strange. BUT im so excited for it! And glad that I made it! When in all reality I haven't made it - Its all been my heavenly father and saviours help. If I had to be out here doing it alone I definitely wouldn't have made it to this point. No doubt about it! So grateful for their love and mercy and the support they give me everyday! :)
>
> But this week has been wonderful and full of good christmas cheer! It started off with getting the Christmas package you sent! YAYY!!! Thank you so much! i am so excited to get to open it this week! So it all came all safe and sound. Did mine come yet? Im praying it gets there in time without any problems! Fingers crossed! :) But it was a great week! Sister Stephenson and I worked really hard on FINDING! Becuase truly nothing happends until you find people to teach. We do really have a great teaching pool - compared to my 3 months in peckham where we didn't have anyone we are killin it here! :) But we really wanted to find new investigators and people who really needed the gospel! Some really neat experiences we had this week was we went to a town called Fleet to knock a road a member had given us. WE knocked and knocked and knocked and literally I think we actually talked to like 4 people becuase no one was home. But one of the last people we talked to was this man and his family who said he would love us to come back and show the christmas initiative clip! We told him we would stop by again on saturday. Fast forward to friday night durring planning - we were oging through our day to find it really full with everything we needed to do and people we had appointments to see. It was towards the end when I remembered this man and his family. We talked about it for a long time trying to see how we could fit everything in and eventually just said a prayer asking if we needed to go. Even though it didn't seem like it would work I felt SO STRONGLY that we needed to go see this family so we planned things all in and prayed extra hard it would work. WE got to saturday and got to the point where we ran over to see this family - knocked onthe door and of course the family wasn't home. Typically missionary moment right! BUT we knew that we were there for a reason so we started walking and talking to people we passed. We eventually stopped this man named Tim who was very athiest and didn't mind at all telling us why he belived it. We stood there though and both bore bold testimonies about the reality of God and Jesus Christ and by the end of talking to him he took a book of mormon and gave us his address to stop by another time. And want to hear the coolest thing?? He said the name of his road and we both just stopped and smiled becuase HE LIVED ON THE ROAD THE MEMBER HAD GIVEN US! The referral road we were contacting. OH MY HEAVENS. Isn't it amazing? Our heavenly father is just so incredible. There are so many times where things like that happen and I am jsut so in awe. he is just so aware of us and just loves us and has a plan that is always perfect! So I loved that!
>
> We also had a man walk into church yesterday who wanted to come to the service. He was a sweet man from portugal who had had a really hard life the past couple of years. In his broken english he told us how life had really been hard for him and how he just needed direction and peace. It was such a cool thing for me to just be able to promise, PINKIE PROMISE, that he could find that becuase I know for myself that Jesus Christ can give that comfort and guidance and peace that we all are looking for and that we all need. I could see the hurt and pain in his eyes but he saw in all of ours the hope that we had becuase we had our saviour. After talking to him he started crying - poor guy was really just emotionally at a breaking point - but then stayed for the service and we are stopping by to see him tonight! It is just the coolest thing to be a missionary and to bring hope to people. That is what I have decided one of the greatest things about being a missionary is the HOPE that I get to give people. There is hope and peace and happiness becuase there really is a saviour out there who has made EVERYTHING right and who knows you and loves you personally. And it is just the greatest thing!
>
> So those were two really cool experiences this week that I just loved! I also had my first proper fish and chips here which was AMAZING!! OH my goodness you all would love them - even ky and linds! They were so yummy and im sure so fattening. It was great! :) We also had the ward christmas carol which was so fun! The bishops wife was incharge and always goes extreme. I ended up singing oh holy night and a duet with her son and then in the choir which was SO GREAT! I love singing. So grateful for the talent that I have and how it touches people ina way that words definitely can't!
>
>
> It was a wonderful week though! I have been so touched too with all the gifts I have recieved from memebers and our friends here. Its been a wonderful week and this next week will be even better becuase of getting to be a missionary, celebrate christmas, and TALK TO ALL OF YOU!!!!!!! Oh m y heavens i just can't wait! Only 4 more sleeps linds! ;)
>
> I love you all SO MUCH! and can't wait to talk to you ON FRIDAY!!!!!! YAYYY!!!!!!
>
> Love you,
>
> Sister GWilliam
>
> And i hope you all are still singing "in a little stable" when you sing angles we have heard on high in church!:) LOVE YOU!

FW:

Its almost Christmas!!

>
> Hello Family!!
>
> It has been the craziest and most wonderful week over here in england! Lots to update you on and can't wait to finish reading all of your emails! :)
>
> This week was super busy! I feel like it just flew by because of everything going on. On tuesday we had Zone training where we focused a lot on the christmas season and using the christmas initiative! It was so great! Sister Stephenson and I really tried to apply that into the work this week. Everytime we would stop someone or knock we use the videos and it has been amazing to see how it truly has softened hearts and after they have watched it people just really open up! Its been super neat! So that was wonderful and I love getting to just focus on Christmas all the time!
>
> I was able to go on exchange with Sister Aubuchon this week which was a blast! We are in the same MTC group so it was fun to get to catch up and work together! Exchanges are great! Its so fun for me to be able to go and get to know the other areas and mostly the sisters even better! But something that was really fun was we got up for exercise that morning and guess what we did!? Jillian Micheals 30 day shred! haha MOM! Remember when we would do that all the time? Oh i just loved it! We did level 2 and it wasn't even hard. ;) So that was fun! And such a good idea. Maybe one of these times when the post isn't so crazy expensive and crazy with it being chistmas i'll have you send it over if you would! :)
>
> And on thursday I WENT INTO THE LONDON TEMPLE! how crazy is that!? As I was walking up I was literally freaking out to Sister Stephenson becuase I was actually going into the london temple. I never thought in my entire life that I would get to go inside becuase I never thought I would actually be in London. And now look at me! So it was so neat. The temple is BEAUTIFUL! And we took lots of fun pictures that I will send over! I forgot to send pictures last week so I'll catch up and there will be lots this week! :) But it was such a fun day. The temple is incredible. I just felt so much peace and it was a spiritual boost that I needed. After we had lunch with all the missionaries there and president and sister gubler and had a little presentation! It was so fun! And i love getting to be there with so many other missionaries - there is just a fun bond that I feel like we all have right away becuase we are all there doing the exact thing - trying our best to serve our Saviour! So that is so fun! It was a crazy day full of travel becuase in good old england we take trains! Which Initially i thought was so fun but now im to the point where they aren;t as exciting anymore! :) So it was hours of travel to get there and get back but so worth it! Yay for the temple and christmas time! :)
>
> Then on Friday we had our ward christmas party which was SO FUN and on Sunday night we had the stake choral concert where all the wards got together and sang songs and had people perform! Sister Stephenson and I joined the ward choir and then we were asked to do another number with the primary kids which everyone thought was the cutest thing! So it was just such a fun week full of christmas! I can't believe it is almost the 25th! SO EXCITED TO TALK TO YOU!!
>
> This week has been great though! Sister Stephenson and I are to the point now where we are still working with people - we have Rob who is still doing great and a couple others - but we are to the point now where a lot of our Investigators are now recent converts - which is a FANTASTIC problem to have but now we need to make sure to go out and find new people! :) So we went out and did a lot of finding this week which was really good! Showed a lot of people the christmas videos! I think i almost have it memorized! :) And sister Stephenson and I are doing really great! We are getting a lot better at communicating which is wonderful but we really have been getting along which is SO NICE! I am so grateful to be able to spend the christmas time with someone who I like being with! Since I wont be with all of you! Something that I laugh at a little bit is just how much a mission prepares you for being a wife and mom. I always knew it would but just seeing how you figure out how to work with a person with different opinions and how to still love them and apologize for things even when you are sure you are right - its all really great! Im learning a lot! I also have started carrying chocolate with me all the time! (we have SO MUCH CHOCOLATE! its like everyone who ever gives us christmas presents gives us HUGE amounts of chocolate! Its crazy) But so good becuase I have started carrying it with me so anytime sister stephenson is getting a little too stressed or worried I just pull out a chocolate bar out of my bag for her and she'll eat it. It works WONDERS! Haha its so great! :)
>
> Something that I have really reflected on a lot lately is a scripture in 2 Nephi 33:6. As i read that verse for the first time it really stood out how personal nephi was talking about the saviour. he gloried in HIS jesus. He just talked about him as if he knew him so well and on such an individual level. As Ive thought more and more about it I have realized that it stood out to me becuase as I have been on my mission I feel like I can say that about my saviour now too. The more that I have been here and especially over the last couple of months I have felt so close to my saviour. He is SO REAL to me. I have gained such a knowledge that what he did was for me personally - it was for everyone but I feel it for me. I have felt the power of the atonement like I never have before and I am just so grateful for the experiences and hard days and hard weeks and everything else that has gotten me to the point where I truly feel like i know him. I glory in MY jesus. He is real to me and the relationship I have with him now is something that I hold so sacred. I love Him. And am so grateful to have this time to share with everyone around me about Him. Everyone needs this knoweldge. everyone needs HIM!
>
> So life here in jolly old england is just lovely! :) I Love the ward, LOVE the people - it has been cool for me to see how i really just love them. I want to talk to them now becuase I want to help them - not just to get the number. It is about them and they just need this! - but with that I love being a missionary. I mostly LOVE YOU ALL!! so so much. So grateful for you love and support and just so thankful to heavenly father for you all! Its so hard being away but know that I am working hard and praying that all the blessings go your way! :) I JUST LOVE YOU! And CANT wait until Christmas!!!
>
> I hope you have the GREATEST week! Thank you for loving me and being the most amazing family! I am truly just so blessed!
>
> I will talk to you super soon! :)
>
> Sister GWilliam
>
>
>
>

FW:

>
>
> Thank you grandma Warner!! They are a HIT!!! Tell her I love her so much!!!

FW:

Fwd: Megan at the temple

Sent from my iPhone

Begin forwarded message:

From: Mary Warner <maryowarner@gmail.com>
Date: December 13, 2015 at 8:40:01 AM MST
To: Denise Gwilliam <denisegwilliam@outlook.com>, "Gwilliam, bruce" <brucegwilliam@yahoo.com>,  Michelle Olsen <olsen.michelle@gmail.com>, Doug Warner <Douglas.Warner@uvu.edu>,  Scott Warner <scottowarner@gmail.com>, "Warner, Rachel" <rachelmariewarner@gmail.com>,  Lindsey Gwilliam <lindseygwilliam@outlook.com>, Kyle Gwilliam <kylegwilliam@gmail.com>
Subject: Megan at the temple

Mary and Doug...I helped serve at the lunch for the missionaries that
came to the temple today.  Talked for a minute with Meagan and then
she popped her head into the VC to say goodbye...what a sweet girl.
Linda

I love my Family!

>
> Hello worlds best family!
>
> I hope you all have had the most WONDERFUL week!!
>
> THis week here in lovely old england was AMAZING! Miracles happening everywhere. It is still one of those things were I can't really believe it myself... just so much happened and IM just SO excited to tell you all about it! :)
>
> So to start off last monday we started the week with no baptisimal dates. Just keep that in mind! ;) We had a lot of amazing people that we were working with but no set dates. On monday we had a great day, went to dinner with grannie annie which was just hilarious. That woman is a nut! I love her. But then after we went to go see our friend Nicholas who we had only met with once. He is a 16 year old nepalese boy who is so SO SINCERE. I love it. But we had an incredible restoration with him! THe spirit was so strong and then in the end he committed to be baptised on December 19th! Whoohoo!! Then Tueday we had MLC. Oh i just love MLC. It is the longest meeting but the spirit is SO STRONG. It is so fun to be with all of the leaders of the mission and then of course president and sister gubler are there which is the very best! President gubler just radiates the spirit. I just love him and so grateful he is my president! But we had a great meeting! And we decided as a mission to study 3 Nephi the month of december to really focus on the saviour! I have been doing it and it is the greatest thing! You ALL should do it! take 30 minutes to study 1 chapter. Really just study it and study the life and ministry of the Saviour and oh its just the greatest. Ive had some of the most powerful studdies this past week doing it! BUT sorry... little tangent... after MLC we had a lesson with Holly. Holly is the sister of Jack and Fern who were baptised 4 weeks ago. We have really been focusing on her and trying to do all we could to help her be ready to commit to baptism. We had prayed about it and felt like we could extend December 19th to her as well. We walked into their house and before we even sat down she said, "Hey guys, I have something to tell you." PANIC moment. Both me and Sister Stephenson kindof froze, thinking the worst was about to just happen. BUT instead she said, "Ive decided I want to be baptised and I want to do it as soon as possible!" AHH!! MIRACLE!! THere was a lot of screaming and laughing and just being so happy all together! And so guess what!? On Saturday HOlly was baptised!! IT was AMAZING. Such a great night. I just love her and her family. So yes. That was so exciting! And also a miracle with that, at the baptism Holly's mom, Charley, got up and went on and on about how grateful she was for the church and how it had changed her children and how the ward and been so loving and all that good stuff. Charley has never been interested herself. But by the end of the night she was talking about it. As well as HOlly, Jack and Fern have another brother - his name is Alfie and he is the funniest 11 year old! - but he hasn't been in the lesson either. We were joking with him after that it was only 4 weeks after Jack and Fern that HOlly was baptised so we were warning him 4 weeks until it was his turn. And then he just answered saying well at least i have 4 weeks to prepare! WHAT? Uh. So great! But another amazing thing is that we got a referral of a part member family this week. We went by and the mom has been less active for a long time but has recently started coming back and has 4 little kids, 2 of which - Jake and Luke - are old enough to be baptised and want to be! So they now have dates set for February 14th where they will be baptised and then her 2 little kids will be blessed the same day! Oh my goodness. And we are also teaching a man named Rob who is just so great. He will have a baptisimal date by the end of this week as well for sure. He is just soaking it all up and has been to church as well as came to the baptism this last week! Oh man, Just so many amazing things are happening. Isn't it just amazing? THe lord Is SO merciful and just preparing so many people here in England. THe season of Miracles truly is here and I am just SO grateful to be here and to be apart of it!!
>
> So yeah, it was such a good week. This next week will be maddness as well as there is just so many things going on with Christmas. Today is Pday, tomorrow we have Zone training which Me and Sister Stephenson and the Zone leaders are in charge of, then after that Sister Stephenson and I are going on exchange with the Guildford Sisters until Wednesday and then thursday I GET TO GO TO THE TEMPLE!!!!!!!! Its the temple christmas day! :) I spend all day just at the temple, we get to do a session with PResident Gubler, then they feed us yummy food and have a program and we just get to all just be together as missionaries! Im SO excited!, then on Friday we have the Ward Christmas party which should be a blast and then on Saturday we are celebration Christmas with Holly, Jack and Fern and their family since they will be gone over the actual day! So how fun will this week be!? Its going to be crazy! But i am SO EXCITED!!
>
> It is so fun that it is christmas time too! As a mission we are really focusing on the Christmas initiative and trying to do all we can to focus on that. It what we talk about with people on the bus and on the streets and with members. Its just so fun!! I LOVE CHRISTMAS TIME! Especially with being a missionary it is so great to have this time becuase it makes talking to people SO easy. Everyone is already out shopping for christmas or getting ready for it. It just starts off conversations so easily. So i just love it! And yes! The 2 christmas videos are so great! I hope you ALL have already posted them to your facebook of instagram pages! :) Christmas in England is a lot different though. It is weird without the snow. Even though we are in California most christmas's where there isn't snow their either it is just weird not having any of it durring december. THey also don't put up lights on houses here like they do back home which is lame! I love the lights being everywhere. but the towns are all decorated which is so fun!
>
> But the most exciting thing is that It is only now 18 days until I get to skype you!! OH MY GOOD HEAVENS i just can't wait.
>
> But i hope you all have the most wonderful week and have so much fun celebrating christmas! I love this time of the year! Decorate even extra for me, play loads of good christmas music, and eat lots of goodies! :) AND spend lots of time together! I love being here but definitely miss being with you! BUT its okay becuase we will just party extra hard when we are all back together again which will be so soon! :)
>
> I love you all so much!! so so much! Thank you for all of your love and prayers and support! IT truly is you all and my saviour that gets me through all the crazy days! :)
>
> LOVE YOU!
>
> Sister GWilliam

FW:

>
> Inside days!:)
>
>

FW:

>
> I love this family and the Aldershot ward!

Hello wonderful Family!

Sent from my iPhone

Begin forwarded message:

From: Megan Gwilliam <megan.gwilliam@myldsmail.net>
Date: November 30, 2015 at 4:52:33 AM MST
To: Denise Gwilliam <denisegwilliam@outlook.com>, Bruce Gwilliam <brucegwilliam@yahoo.com>, Kyle Gwilliam <kylegwilliam@gmail.com>, Lindsey Gwilliam <lindseygwilliam@outlook.com>
Subject: Hello wonderful Family!

Hey Family!!!

I love hearing from you SO MUCH! It sounds like you had the greatest week! And I am so glad! THanksgiving sounds like it was SO FUN! Oh, how fun to have family over! I bet it was the best. And hopefully delicious! We have one american family who lives in the ward and we guilted them into making us thanksgiving dinner thursday night. It was so great and all night they just kept joking with me saying how they were only doing this for me and hoping this would help me feel at home. It was the nicest of them and I am so grateful for incredible ward memebers. Build strong relationships with the ELders of our ward if you can. I didn't realize until now how much it means to just have members you can turn to! :) So hopefully it was fun to have them over this last week! Probably not as great or as fun as Sister Stephenson and I but im sure they are great! ;)

And mom and dad! You guys are the GREATEST! I got a call early thanksgiving morning here from TESCO telling me that the card hadn't gone through. I tried to get them to call you just to let you know that there were problems but the whole Idea of your number not starting with a 0 (all english numbers do) just really confused them and I eventually just had to cancell it. BUT THANK YOU SO MUCH! Even though the food didn't show up I just can't even say how much it just helped me have the greatest day still! It really is the thought and it was the most lovely thought and I just LOVE YOU! So thank you so much for thinking of me and cute sister stephenson and grannie annie too. You guys are the best parents and I love that you had that fun idea!! so It was a bummer the card didn;t go through but im glad you got the call and there weren't other problems with the card. Just silly enlgand making things complicated. BUT I LOVE YOU!!!! Thank you again! Just knowing what you had planned made it the HAPPIEST thanksgiving! :)

THis week was also really different becuase cute sister stephenson got dealthy ill. Fun english fact for ya: In England if you have the flu or a cold you are ILL - not sick. You are only Sick if you are throwing up! Kinda funny! So sister stephenson was Ill becuase she had the worst cold - we think it actually might have been the flu. But with that we were inside/ not working from pretty much Wednesday until Sunday. She slept a lot of that time and I HAD TO STAY INSIDE TOO. OH my goodness. THe first couple of days it wasn't bad. I finished the book of mormon for the 2nd time on my mission which was really exciting! I LOVE THE BOOK OF MORMON! I hope you all are still reading it as a family and on your own. Are you doing that highlighting thing I told you about from PMG? If you are not START NOW! i PROMISE it will change everything and help you understnad how incredible and powerful the book of mormon can be! So yeah I finished that, went through potentials in the area book, started reading the book of mormon again, organized the area book... yeah. it got a little boring. BUT it was great! I also started the New Testament. I have decided this next transfer I really want to get to know my Saviour more. TO really KNOW him. And so I decided that a good way to do that would be to keep reading the Book of Mormon but also read about his actual life and teachings from the bible. So that was exciting too. I also made her your yummy chilli mom! she LOVES it!! Thank you so much for the cute recipe book you sent over. I use it all the time and love it! THanks so much mom! But yeah. It was an interesting week because of having to be a missionary inside but it taught me so much.

Something that I have loved realizing and remembering being on a mission is realizing how much our Heavenly Father knows us and our needs. He really does understnad and care and his plan is just to help us and love us. The past couple of weeks I really struggled with just being incredible stressed. Which is SO WEIRD for me. I feel like i have always been a laid back, easy going person, but looking back I realized i was just a little bit of a mess. Just the idea of being a leader and so with that I was supposed to have a model area, I wanted to have amazing miracles to be able to share, I wanted these people to progress, I wanted baptisms, I wanted to be EXACTLY obedient, and talk to EVERY SINGLE PERSON, and more times than not I wouldn't measure up to what I wanted and then it would stress me out. It really hit last weekend and I just was praying so hard for help and peace and to help me refocus on what I needed to do and not let things stress me out. And then BOOM. I had a whole week where all I could do was literally build my relationship with my Saviour and have the time I needed to refocus. OH heavenly Father is just so merciful. This week was honestly exactly what I needed. I just had time to be in the scriptures and then REMEMBERING how loving and merciful he was and how he was always there to give me the peace I needed. I was able to realize that I was so stressed out and worried because I was all focused on me! I was trying to do this work so OFCOUSE i was stressed. there is NO POSSIBLE WAY sister gwilliam can do this work. I would fail EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. And so having the time to be inside i realized that I needed to rely on Him. THis is HIS work and HIS people and I am just here to do my best. TO be obedient and talk to people and do my best to talk to as many but when i fall short just try better the next day. I just really am so grateful for a merciful heavenly father who knew what I needed. So i feel super sorry if sister stephenson needed to get super ill so that I could refocus and learn my lesson but either way SO GLAD that i did! I feel like my head is back on strait and I am refocused and leaning on the Lord so life is great! im back to my usual self and just excited to go out and do my best! :)

This week will be a busy one too as it is the first week of the month so that means MLC and DLC again! So a week full of sitting in meetings BUT it will be wonderful! 2 weeks from now too we get to go to the TEMPLE! I CAN NOT WAIT! and then only 26 days until I get to talk to you!! OH I CAN'T WAiT!!!!!!! I love you so much and just can't wait to talk to you all! :)

And craziest ever. Grannie annie is going to america for Christmas - her grandson is getting married in the Las Vegas temple on december 29th so she is taking us out for our christmas present tonight - I guess we are going to this super fancy place to eat and having a traditional christmas dinner! Im super excited! But the craziest ever is we get to choose the main meat we have - like turkey or ham and all that sorts and guess what I chose? SALMON!!! I literally chose that and I SO EXCITED for it. Having it a couple times at members have made me love it and so I chose it. WHO AM I? I don't even know anymore. Haha! SO yeah. THe whole Salmon Sunday will be fine with me when i get home! :)

I love you ALL SO MUCH! and hope you have the GREATEST WEEK!!!!!!

Love you and talk to you soon! :)

Sister Gwilliam

Sent from my iPad

IM SO SORRY!!

FAMILY!

Oh my... I am SO SORRY for the craziness I caused all of you yesterday! haha FORGIVE ME! I mentioned to Sister Stephenson last week how I had forgot to tell you all it was transfers and because of that I wouldn't be emailing until Tuesday... and then I didn't have wifi at all yesterday so I didn't get to see any of your emails... whoops. :) BUT OH I LOVE YOU!! Seeing all of the emails and that you were worried about it just makes me feel so loved. OH I LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH! Thank you for loving me. I'm sorry for the craziness though! i promise that I will be better! I think next transfers are Jan. 5. So just incase.... it should be around then! :) Oh i just love you all and miss you a lot.

BUT with that! YES it was transfers week! Sister Stephenson and I are both staying here in Aldershot as STLs. Sister Stephenson was sure she was moving. After this transfer she will have been in this area - her first area - for 7.5 months! CRAZY! But she ended up staying so next transfer will be all the crazy emotions again... transfers are so fun! :) But yep! I'm staying here which is great! I am so glad to be staying here for Christmas! AND I STILL CAN'T WAIT TO TALK TO YOU! I don't think I have ever been more excited for Christmas than I am this year... and you know how much I love Christmas :)... but just because I GET TO TALK TO YOU! I literally can;t even wait. Only 4 more Sundays!!!!! 

But this week was a good one! First off though, it is FREEZING! It is so so cold. I have never tried to bundle up so much in my life. It even snowed earlier which I guess usually never happens but it was great. And it was a week full of walking outside in it! YAY! But its okay! :) It just makes things more fun! I also got to go on exchange with Sister Hiatt! How fun is that? I took the pictures and everything to show her and we just all got caught up with our families and the stories that we have always heard about each other and oh... it was SO FUN! I would be SOOO HAPPPYYY if we could serve together. I feel like our personalities just work really well together and she is so willing to work so hard and talk to everyone which I LOVE! So fingers crossed one of these transfers she can just come and serve here in Aldershot with me! :)

Something that I learned about this week was EXACT OBEDIENCE truly does bring so many blessings. I have really been focused on being that consecrated missionary that the Lord needs me to be. After Zone Conference I saw a lot of things that I lacked - not that I was being bad but I just saw how I could improve SO MUCH more and wanted to! So this week I have gone and started applying them. There was one day in particular that Sister Stephenson and I just did everything in our power to be EXACT with our obedience - we set the timer for our lunch, we left right after studies in the morning, and something that I decided to do was being better about reading my emails throughout the week so that I stayed better focused so I decided I would only check them at night, not throughout the day! So we applied all of these things and that day we saw SO MANY MIRACLES! Oh my. It was amazing. We had multiple lessons with people and got 3 new investigators. We met a former who welcomed us in and we have a return with! We contacted a great referral which is a FAMILY who now we are having dinner and teaching this next Wednesday! It was incredible. And it was all becuase we were just exact about it all. So KY - you will hear it A MILLION AND TEN TIMES that obedience brings blessings but it really does! When you get out just do everything you can to be exactly obedient and then blessings come - wether that be meeting amazing people or just feeling that you have done your part that day and feel successful! :)

With that though I am working on being okay with not being perfect. As I have seen all of the different ways that I can improve.. I also then realize all the things I am lacking and it stresses me out. Haha i just love my Saviour and want to do EVERYTHING I can to serve him fully these 18 months and see how I constantly fall short. Ha kinda funny but multiple nights this week I have woken up at like 3 or 4 a.m. in pure panic because I am just laying there and I don't have an investigator with me. Obviously my head isn't fully there since it is so early but I just panic and don't understand why I am just laying down when I could be out working and being with the friends we are teaching. Once I wake up a little more I realize that it is night time and I am allowed to sleep so I go back to bed... but yeah. That pretty much sums up the fact I also need to relax a little bit and just trust in the Lord. I know that I am SO IMPERFECT and honestly will never do enough but that is okay because it is HIS WORK! This is all in HIS TIMING and all I am asked to do is try my best. Just work hard to BECOME better each day and that if I do that it will all be great! So that is something I am working on... I am grateful to become the missionary and woman my Heavenly Father needs me to be but I am also grateful to realize that he understands and plans for me to fall short while doing it! And that's why we have the Saviour! OH Our Heavenly Fathers plan is just SO PERFECT!

Another fun thing is I got an email from Sister Barnes who had talked to our Ward Mission leader in Peckham and Anne and Treece - these 2 amazing twin sisters who we had found and taught in Peckham - are getting baptized on SATURDAY!! How neat is that!? Oh it is just so amazing. It is so great to be a missionary.

But HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!! I can't believe it is thanksgiving this week! And it sounds SO FUN with having Karol and family and Keith come over. Oh it will be so great. They don't celebrate thanksgiving over here. HOW SILLY!? I guess it makes sense.... but still. But sister Stephenson and I talked the only american family into making us one on Thursday so we are going over for a DA that night and then Joy and Martyn are making one for us on Saturday! so it will be good! But i hope you know how THANKFUL I AM FOR YOU! OH. I just love you. This week honestly has been a hard one with missing you all. As much as I LOVE this time of year and have so much to look forward to it is SO hard being away from all of you. I JUST LOVE YOU! And miss all of the little things. SO my plan is just to stay really busy and just not let myself think about it! :) There is SO MUCH going on too so that will be easy but I hope you know how much I love you all and how much I wish I was with you but SO GRATEFUL for the chance to be here! I know there will be SO MANY thanksgivings and Christmas' coming up where we will get to be together so I am grateful for this chance to be here for these. Eat extra stuffing and sweet potatoes for me though! those are my favorite! :) And just remember how thankful I am for you! I will FOREVER thank my Heavenly Father for giving me the perfect, most incredible family who I love with all of my heart! Each night I plead with my Heavenly Father to just keep you safe and healthy and happy and that all of the blessings of my work here can go home to all of you! I just love you and miss you but am so grateful for you!

But i hope you all have the greatest week!! Im working hard and we have A LOT Of people progressing towards baptism which is SO exciting! This truly is the Lords work and I am so humbled to get to have this time to be apart of it FULL TIME!

I love you! Sorry again about yesterday! :)

TALK TO YOU SOON! (next Monday! :) )

I LOVE YOU!

Sister Gwilliam

I LOVE YOU!

 Just finished zone conference! It was the greatest. And yes. I'm
siting next to sister Hiatt! We took a picture I'll send on Monday! :)

 I love you so much! I'm so grateful for all of your love and support.
 Nothing brings me greater happiness than this gospel and my family!

 I JUST LOVE YOU and am so grateful for my saviour and to have this
 time to testify of his reality and love.

 And we got to see the new Christmas video. IM SO EXCITED!

 I LOVE YOU! Talk to on Monday!

>Sister Gwilliam

DLC

THE zone leaders and the sister training leaders. These elders are so great and so funny! I love working with them!!!

Hi mama G-William 🇬🇧✌🏻️

Hello!

So I just wanted to send you an email to let you know how thankful I
am to be serving with Sister Gwilliam, or Megan as you know her. She's
crazy and I love her. She's teaching me so much about missionary work
and just giving me to sweetest advise about all sorts of things. I
feel so blessed to have this opportunity to be serving with her and
she really is one of my best friends. We have so much fun together, we
just act like complete loonies half of the time, which is what I
loveeee because I never got that with my trainer. She is simply
beautiful in every way and I can't thank you enough for bringing her
up in such a way that has benefitted me so much. I've been out on my
mission nearly 6 months now and I've learnt more in the last 4 weeks
than I have since being here and that is because of her. She's trained
me. Without her, Jack and Fern wouldn't have got baptised when they
did, because of her great faith and trust in the Lord that He can do
mighty miracles within us, we saw it happen and I really admire that
about her.

I love that she loves yoghurt. Last week we bought 6 tubs of yoghurt
and we've eaten it all. We also bought like 20 bananas and they're all
gone too. It's the best. We have skippy peanut butter and apples as a
snack and that's even better and we are pros and making sweet potato
fries. I just love her. Every time we cross the road she screams,
that's a problem cause now I scream too and it draws attention to
ourselves. Oops. The other night president called, he left us a
message and we both like freaked out and started screaming and
laughing. It was so funny, we don't even know why we were doing it,
but j just love that we can act silly together all the time and she
doesn't judge me. It's great. We wear each other's clothes which I
love! Down east is the best store in the world and when I come and
visit I need to get some of those dresses for my own wardrobe.

I just love your family. She tells me about them all the time. I've
seen videos of Kyle when he got his wisdom tooth out, that was funny
and I've heard about Lindsey eating ward stringed cheese, that's gross
and Tyson eating Mayo, that was funny too. I've also heard that papa
G- William doesn't like it when people crack their knuckles, amen to
that 🙌🏻 (as I typed that she popped it. Of course she did!)

You're family are great, even though I haven't met you, I feel like I
already know you.

Serving the Lord has truly blessed my life and made me realize how
important family is and the gospel. Every great thing I have in my
life is because of Jesus Christ and I don't want to let his sacrifice
be waste. I love my saviour and this work, it's what brings families
together and gives them happiness.

Have a great week, you're all amazing,

Love,
Sister Stephenson, the Brit 💕🇬🇧🇺🇸

4 months a missionary!

Hey greatest family there ever was!!

Guess what!? Today i have officially been a missionary for 4 months! how crazy is that? Part of me feels like it has FLOWN by! LIke what I have even done in these 4 months? But then at the same time its like Ive lived in england forever and everything else before is just starting to feel like it wasn't real. Like it was a dream. BUT its exciting either way! :)

That also means I havent even seen you or talked to you in 4 months. Do you ever think how crazy that is? Sometimes I do. Just the whole idea of the fact I got on a plane to england at 19 and don't have any big contact with my family and all the other things that a mission entitles and i think about it for a minute and think about how crazy it is. But then the crazier thing is that I love it! That it doesn't feel weird to me becuase I just feel so at peace. Its crazy that with everything going on that I am just happy and content and grateful to be here!

But this week was great! The begining of this week there isn't a lot to report on. I really did just sit in meetings. We had MLC which was literally ALL of tuesday! It was great but also really long. Fun to be there though and be with all of the other leaders and president. Then on thursday we had district meeting and then saturday DLC which took most of the day as well! So lots of sitting there but it was all great because at the end of the week...

JACK AND FERN WERE BAPTISED!!! Oh it was the GREATEST night!! They are the CUTEST kids and just so prepared and so happy and the night was just perfect. The ward was so supportive. their mum even said how happy she was and how blown away she was with all of the support they recieved. So it was such a blessing! Ill send over pictures. But it is just the greatest blessing to see these people and how the gospel has blessed them. They just get it. The gospel makes sense to them and that is something that i have loved. OF COURSE IT MAKES SENSE! Becuase it is the truth. and they are just so close to the spirit that they can feel that! Oh its just the greatest blessing to be a missionary and have the privledge of being so aware of the blessing this gospel is and how it truly does change lives.

Another great thing about this week is that we saw SO MANY MIRACLES! president gubler always talks about the season of miracles that is coming to the England London South Mission. he has been talkinhg about it since he came in - pretty much since i have been here. WE have all felt it too! That just like in times before when hundreds of saints were baptised here - that it will happen again! And I can just feel it! there are SO MANY miracles all around us! WE are just finding people that are SO PREPARED and ready to be baptised. A miracle of this week is as we were counting up our key indicators at the end of the week there were a lot of days where we had more new investigators (people who we have a lesson with and then get a return appointment with) then we did actual lessons. People truly are just walking up to us and are prepared and want us to teach them. So right now we are teaching this sweet napalese family as well as this AMAZING girl named isabelle. I love her. So it is just incredible. It is such a blessing and humbling experience to be amissionary here at this time when SO MANY miracles are all around us! The season of miracles really is here and Jack and Fern were just the begining of the baptisms that will be coming! Just wait! :)


So things here in good old england are just the greatest! We have Zone conference tomorrow. another meetting.... i was telling ky I think it is a good sign that meetings are a little hard now. At the begining of my mission i LOVED meetings becuase i could be inside and not having to talk to people... I know. It was the worst. BUT now I really would rather be out talking to people or teaching, even knocking! So I think that is a good sign that Im hopefully progressing and becoming a better missionary and person! But zone conference will be great! And we are singing at it! With president and sister gubler which will be the best! Then on wednesday I am going on exchange with the Stains siters which will be fun! I think i will be going there this time so it will be fun to see a new area and work with another sister!

And fun fact! I just got a haircut! I'll send a picture. I was almost crazy and cut it short again... and then i remembered how rough it was last time and decided that it wasn't the way to go! Plus with the humidity here my hair is just a mess all the time. but it was getting a little out of control so hopefully with it being al ittle shorter it will help! A cute man in the ward cut it for us for free! Yay for members! :)

But I hope you have the GREATEST week!! Please keep me updated on everything and send more cute videos of tyse. I miss that cute boy!

You all are always in my prayers! i love and miss you so much!! Thank you for being the greatest family. Your love and support really is what keeps me going!

I LOVE YOU!!
Talk to you soon!

Sister GWilliam

MLC

It was The greatest day at MLC!!
I love being with president and sister gubler and getting to be with
the other leaders! The spirit was so strong and ohh I just love this
gospel and my saviour!!
 
I LOVE YOU!!!! So so much!
Talk to you Monday!:)
 
Sister Gwilliam

Out to lunch with Joy and Martyn.

Oh happy days.  England's peanut butter is NOT the same and Joy bought this from Costco for us!

We walked these around for Halloween!:)  Pinterest worthy I'd say!;)

The fog here is CRAZY right now.  You can't see anything ahead of you.  And it is SO HUMID and wet.  We walked outside yesterday for about an hour and came back in and my hair was wet.  So...I've basically given up on getting it done in the morning since it doesn't matter after the second I step outside!