Sister Jenna Connell

Xin Chao Gia Dinh va Ban Hello Hello Hello! wow another week has flown by and holy cow it's been a crazy one! We meet a ton of people here and some of them are way funny. A guy came up to us the other day and he's like do you speak English and know the area? we are like yeah! so he asked us where something was and we told him and he starts asking us questions like where are you from are you living here and why. He asked us if we were students and we are like no we actually do service for our church. As soon as we said church he turns around and is like oh I am from Russia good bye. I don't think he was interested in our message. Another guy we met was riding his moterscooter right next to us just looking at us (which happens alot) then we pulled up to a stop and he stops beside me and is like "You are beautiful!" and I'm all "Thanks you speak good English. Want to come to church?" And he said yeah so we gave him a card. He didn't come thoug

Xin Chao Gia Dinh va Ban cua Chi!! What is up everybody!! Holy Cow I got to tell ya the I have had more adventures here in the past week than the whole time i was at the MTC. The mission field is crazy! First off we live in the center of the city of Hanoi! The city itself is gigantic. It takes like 5 hours to drive across and it's all city. Lots of big tall buildings, crowded streets, and lots of variety between very clean rich places that are really really nice and then small dirty not so rich places and then an in between.  On Monday  We watched the Christmas Devotional with the Thomasons (a senior couple who is also from Kaysville!) and it was so good! definitely recommend!! I love the Christmas Season!!! Also we are trying to get the members to do the Light the World activities each day and they are loving it! Traffic here is insane!! I'm just glad I am a missionary here and get an extra layer of protection cuz the amount of times I thought i was going to ge

Xin Chao Gia Dinh va Ban cua Chi Hellooooo everybody!! Guess what I am officially in Vietnam!! It's crazy here! It's so different but way cool! Also these past couple weeks have been crazy! Thanksgiving: seriously like the best day of my mission life! We started out with a devotional by Elder Bednar, then we had a delicious Thanksgiving lunch completely with egg nog, pumpkin pie, and everything else you can imagine for Thanksgiving! its was so good (not quite as good as home cooking but for MTC standards like 11/10)  Then we had another devotional about the service project and then we went down to the parking garage and jammed out to Christmas music while we made breakfast meals to be given to children in Utah in need!  Then after that we had a sack dinner in our class and our district got in a circle and we all went around saying what we were grateful for! It was so fun!  Then we had another Devo but it was more of a concert cuz Nashville Tribute Band came and pl

Holy cow today is my last p-day in America. This time next week I'll probably be stepping off the plane into a totally foreign country where I'll live for the next 16 months! That's crazy!! Anyway this week has been so good! This Thursday we had our first in field orientation to make up for the one we will miss for Thanksgiving! It got me so excited to go out and meet real people!! Even though we won't be able to understand each other (our teachers told us native speakers will probably only understand 50% of what we say haha yay :/) We got our flight plans Friday and holy I am so excited and so nervous haha!! The mission is about to get real! Also if anyone challenges me to a game of 4 square you will lose. All we do for gym time is run, play 4 square and volley ball and then yoga in the mornings. It's fantastic We had an awesome Devotional on Sunday about Thanksgiving and Christmas!!! I LOVE this time of year!!!! Anyway it was the first

Xin Chào Gia Dinh Và Bạn! Wow it has been quite the week so i guess ill just start right in Tuesday : For the  Tuesday  Night devotional you will never guess who came to speak! President Nelson of the Quorum of the 12! it was awesome! We got to sing a beautiful missionary medley with I hope they call me on a mission, iI will be valiant, army of Helaman, and Called to Serve. It was awesome! Our choir teacher told us we have been waiting 6000 years to come on our missions. We were chosen and saved for these later days so we could come to the earth and proclaim the gospel before the second coming of our Savior! Its awesome! Anyway President Nelson talked about how missionaries are an epistle of the Lord. When we have the gospel of Christ written and embedded in our hearts others can see the light in our eyes and our will to do good continually. Then he talked about how God wants our safe and successful return, much like my parents do now, and how we have embarked on a

Xin Chao Gia Dinh va Ban! What is up everybody! I'm just living it up here at the MTC! It's crazy but I only have 2 and half more weeks until I'm on my way to good old Vietnam! I am so excited and also terrified haha! It's weird being here for so long because i see a lot of friends come and go and I am still here. Elder Tredwell officially left yesterday so that's sad, and Elder Sonne leaves  tomorrow  which is crazy cuz he literally just got here! Same with Elder Mendosa, Sister Godfrey and a ton of other missionaries I know (which turns out when you live in Utah you know a lot!) Anyway this week has been good! We got to be the Missionaries who demo-ed "How to begin teaching" to all the little newbie missionaries last Wednesday! It was super fun and it was in English so that rocked! TEACHING: SO teaching has been interesting this week. We taught our less active member Anh Minh and it was the worst lesson I have ever been a part of in my entire

Xin Chao Gia Dinh va Cac Ban! As of  Sunday  I offically only have 4 more weeks until I leave the MTC!! Yay but also AHHH!!! Anyway this week has just been another average week in the MTC. Lots of learning and preaching the gospel! We are now up to 3 investigators and we got one to come to church! Speaking of church I gave a talk in church this last Sunday! We have to prepare talks every S unday  and you don't know if you are going to give them until they call you up to give it! I was excited though cuz it was on the Book of Mormon and I love the Book of Mormon. I thought it went well but our district leader fell asleep while I was talking so maybe it was boring haha idk! Also in church my and 3 other sisters sang "If the Savior Stood Beside Me." I love that song and I'm not much of a singer but here at the MTC you not only have the gift of tongues but the gift of singing! so yeah that was cool! Devotionals: I love the devotionals here! I feel li

Holy cow it has been quite a week!! and guess what! I have offically been here for one month!! which is crazy!! Anyway I started out the week with an awesome devotional from Brent H. Neilson of the 70. His wife spoke about missions and related it to a 10k she ran on the fourth of July this past summer! Oh my maybe it's cuz I ran once upon a time but it hit me so hard!! man it was good! but she made 4 points. She said: 1) "I knew very little about running but I knew enough to run the race".  As a missionary I know very little about being a missionary but I know enough to come out here and serve the Lord 2)"I learned I wasn't the best in the race but I wasn't the worst." I am not the best missionary out here. 'Ill be honest I thought I would (haha) be but it's been humbling to see I still need to improve a lot! But I am also not the worst. I am trusting in God and doing my best 3)"I wasnt running alone." I am not running alone.

Xin Chao Family and Friends! Well it has been another very packed week! The number one lesson I have learned this week is that when we learn Gods way then its line upon line, here a little and there a little. I have learned this as I study Vietnamese! Its frustrating because I just want to know it all right now. I want to be able to go out and teach and share my testimony and say whats in my heart. But that s not how it works. We learn a little bit at a time and if  we accept what we learn and use it the Lord will give us more. Anyway this week was pretty much the same as last week. We studied, we went to 6 hours of class a day, we learned so Vietnamese, we drank some chocolate milk and a whole bunch of other stuff. Although this week we started TRC's which is basically where we get to talk to just your everyday members of the church who come and volunteer at the MTC and we get to teach them little lessons like visiting teaching. Its super fun cuz its real people not just act

Xin Chao friends and family!!! I can't even believe I've been here a whole two weeks already!! the days go slow but the weeks just fly!! Anyway its been quite the week! The beginning of the week was kind of hard because I was a little homesick and stressed but I have learned one of the best things for me besides turning to the Lord in prayer and scripture study is first thing in the morning say "today is going to be a good day and I am going to be happy!" then it starts your day off right and you're good to go! Teaching: We taught our investigator, Anh Thien, 3 more times this last week! Each time got a little bit better and by the last lesson we were able to ask him questions and sorta have a conversation in Vietnamese! Also we found out that that would be the last time we would be teaching him so we decided to invite him to be baptized even though we hadn't really talked about baptism. We just said "Hey since this is the last time we are mee

Xin Chao family and friends! I hope all is going well! i love it here in the MTC! it seriously has such a sweet spirit and i LOVE it!! It is super duper hard work for sure and extremely humbling but awesome! im so glad i have the Lord on my side!! Week 1 Wednesday : got dropped off and all ready to go and as soon as i got into my class room i didnt hear a single word of english the next 4 hours! holy it was crazy. But then we had a devotional (all in english thank goodness) and the MTC presidents wife told us two things that MTC stands for  1) make this count- we have just a small amount of time hear so we must work our hardest 2) make the change- missionary life is so different from normal life and the sooner we can make the change into what the Lord wants us to be the better Thursday : today we had alot of class time and i still dont know much of what was said cuz its all vietnamese but you could feel the spirit. We had one elder in our district wh