LAST WEEK IN MTC!!!

Jou sahn! :) (good morning!)

WHO CAN BELIEVE THAT AT THIS TIME NEXT WEEK I WILL BE IN THE SAN FRAN AIRPORT WAITING TO GO TO HONG KONG CHINA?!!! Not me! But I couldn't be more excited about it! :) We got our travel plans on Friday!! Oh my gosh I haven't been that nervous since I actually got my mission call. We knew they were coming after lunch, so during lunch my stomach was doing backflips. I couldn't even eat. Our whole district wolfed down our food and ran to the mailbox. We all wanted to know who we were traveling with so bad. We had heard that they hardly ever keep everyone together, so I was terrified that they were going to split up our district, or worse.... me and my tuhngbuhn! (companion). WELL GUESS WHAT?! We are ALL traveling together! All the Cantos! I could not be more happy!!! We have to be at the travel office at 3:00 AM on Monday, June 3. Yeaaahhhh... 3:00 AM. I just threw up. Anyway, our flight to San Francisco is at like 6:15, we get to San Fran at 7:15ish Cali time, then have a 5 hour layover in San Fran. Get this. We leave San Fran at about noon on Monday.... don't get to Hong Kong until 6:30 PM on TUESDAY (HK time). How weird is that. 16 hours on a plane... hmm..... that should be interesting! But I am SO THRILLED! We are actually going to Hong Kong! It finally feels (sort of) real! As for calling in the airport.... I AM SO EXCITED TO TALK TO MY GATIHNG!! Seriously. You have no idea. I am stoked. Sooo I will probs be calling around 10 your time? 11? I'm not really sure how long it'll take us to get through customs and get settled and everything. But plan on that. Monday morning sometime, be expecting a phone call from meeeee! Should I call Dad's cell? That's what I'll plan on right now unless you tell me otherwise. I won't call from the SLC airport. Unless you want me to call at 4:30 AM. Which, I don't think ya do ;)

Now that's out of the way.... how are you all this week?? :) I didn't hear from you very much but I know how busy the end of the year gets. Dad and Whit, how was speaking at seminary graduation? I'm sure you both did AWESOME! I wish I could have been there! Whitney, when the heck is your graduation? I assume this week but I don't even know! Sorry I feel like a bad sister... and that's way weird that I won't be there :( I will be there in spirit! I will be thinking of you on.... Wednesday? Thursday? Friday? Whenever it is :) How bout I just think of you this whole week, then I'll be sure not to miss it ;) Mom, how are you doing? What's new with you? I really miss you! I miss talking to you about things. Sometimes I get in bed a lil early and just look at pictures of you guys and have conversations in my head with you. Haha. I wish you could come here, sit on my top bunk with me, and we could just talk for hours and I could tell you everything I'm learning and everything I LOVE about being a missionary. Daddy, thanks for your dear elder! Parker, how's driving? have you been on a date yet? I hope you've taken Mom out on a date! :) Jaren Baren! How are you dude?? YOUR BIRTHDAY IS THIS WEEK! I almost had a freak out the other day. I've been telling everyone that I have 2 brothers, one that's 16 and one that's 13. Because you're almost 13 and that's just easier. But the other day I got kind of confused and thought you were turning 14 this week... I about died. No way can my little bro be 14 already!!! And then I remembered. Nope, you're not 14. Just 13 :) haha. And I'm glad!!! I hope you have a wonderful, wonderful birthday!! I love you so much fam!! Pleasetake advantage of the last week you can dearelder me! hehe. I love your mail so much!!

Also, Hay! Your birthday is this week!!!!!!!!!!!! HAPPY BIRTHDAY YOU'RE FINALLY 20!! :) i love you soo much and pray for you in every prayer i say! We are SUCH GREAT friends! Haha I hope you have a great birthday!!

Annnnnnnnnnnd Marianne! Your birthday is this week! Check it out, 3 of my favorite people in the world share May 31 as their day of birth :) Mare Bear, I hope your day is great too! YOU ARE A LEGAL ADULT! 21! That is so weird. I love you!! (Mom or Whit, will you put that on FB or something? Or text her to let her know I remembered her? I don't have her email..)

Misti and Matt and Caleb! I pray for you every night! Today is little baby girl's due date! I hope everything works out. I love you guys so much and have been thinking about you a lot lately!!

G&G Waddoups - thank you SO MUCH for the cookies! That was so sweet and I LOVE THOSE COOKIES. Oh man. So did the elders in my district :) And they loved the way you packaged them. I opened the package thinking, how uncharacteristic of Grandma to send me a can of Pringles! But hey I'll take it! Then I looked inside. Cookies!! :) Mmmm they were so delicious! Thank you so much! I love you both so much!

I got thinking this week... If this was the end of my mission, or if I had to go home for some reason, I'd be completely devastated. I would miss everyone here so much, but more than that, I would miss the feeling of being a missionary. This is the greatest work and the greatest feeling in all the world... and I am a part of it! How did I get so blessed?? In a week, I will be laboring with my might and helping the Lord nourish His vineyard. There could not be a greater feeling in all the world. I know when I get to Hong Kong, it will be discouraging. It will be difficult. I will be challenging. But I am so ready to get out there and be the most optimistic, positive person I can about this, because I honestly love it. I have never been so happy. This past week was another amazing week at the MTC. I wish I could tell you everything!

First of all, earlier in the week Sis Morgan volunteered us to do the musical number in sacrament meeting! (Us means our roomies - Sisters Johnson, Palmer, me, Morgan, Probst, and Tidwell - all the Canto sisters). We decided to sing Lead, Kindly Light. Wednesday night we were practicing in our room. Our choir director, Brother Eggett, is always telling us that when we sing, we need to be teaching through our singing because that is when the Spirit is there. So that's what we decided to do. We sang through it and then went through and broke down the lyrics and talked about what the song meant to us. It was awesome. We talked about how the light of Christ should shine in our faces. We are putting on Christ's hands as his missionaries. Why did Christ make sure to keep the marks in his hands and feet and side after He was resurrected? So that we would know with a surety when we saw Him that HE IS THE CHRIST, and that He truly did what He did for us. As missionaries - representatives of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ - we should be doing all we can to help others have the experience of touching Christ's feet and hands and side. We are there to help our investigators come unto Christ as those Nephites did. We should be doing all we can to be examples of His light. We are going to Hong Kong as the Lord's light to bring light to His children there. And who is ultimately giving us that light? Jesus Christ, the Light of the World. We also talked about how we need to let Christ lead us. It is time to let Him take hold of our lives.

Lead, kindly light
Amid the encircling gloom
Lead thou me on
The night is dark
And I am far from home
Lead thou me on!
Keep thou my feet,
I do not ask to see
The distant scene -
One step enough for me.

Heavenly Father, lead us on. We are putting our trust in you, because we know you will lead us where we need to go. We don't need to see the big picture. You know the big picture, and you'll lead us one step at a time, and that's okay with us. It was a really powerful experience, sitting on the floor in a circle in our pajamas - 6 sisters that have never met before, but now sharing a bond as missionaries of Jesus Christ. It was such a sweet moment. Sis Probst said, "Our room feels different now." I loved it. This is what makes missionary work worth it - sweet, sweet moments when you get to know the Savior a little better and the Spirit bears a strong witness: yes, this is right. It's sometimes difficult and exhausting, but oh my goodness I'd never trade it. Never. I love it. I love Him.

Saturday, we had the BEST TRC lesson. (TRC is different from our regular lessons with our "investigators" = our teachers. TRC is when they have volunteers come in that speak Cantonese and we teach them 20 min lessons. They are not pretending to be investigators, they are just members, so basically we share a 20 minute spiritual thought with them in Cantonese. Super fun!) But Saturday, they didn't have enough volunteres. So Sis Morgan and I just taught Sis Palmer and Sis Johnson, and then they taught us. The topic this week was prayer (it's always assigned). During our lesson, I shared an experience we had with Vina. (remember Vina? one of our investigators?) We had showed her a picture of Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane and asked her what she thought it was. She'd said, "Yeh Sou Gei Duk jouh keihtou?" (Jesus Christ saying a prayer?) At the time, I had smiled and thought it was so funny and cute of her to say something so simple. But as time has gone on, I have thought about it more and more. I have realized that Vina was right. That WAS Jesus Christ saying a prayer. He was praying for all of us. He was pleading with the Father to allow Him to perform the Atonement any other way - but He also said, "Not my will, but thine be done." Jesus Christ was prahying right then in behalf of all of us. In behalf of me. I underestimate and take for gratned sometimes the opportunity I have of being able to do what Jesus Christ did in the garden of Gethsemane - say a prayer. Prayer is soo powerful! We then asked them if they had any powerful experiences with prayer they'd like to share. Sister Palmer shared her experience of joining the Chruch. She started sobbing and said that she felt like she didn't want to join because she didn't want to leave her parents behind. But she prayed about the decision to be baptized and felt the overwheliming feeling that Jesus Christ was there with her and that He would NEVER leave her. It was really a powerful testimony and had us all in tears. I was sitting there in that tiny TRC room thinking, you can't get these experiences anywhere else. Sharing the things that are most dear to our hearts with each other is such a priceless and beautiful thing. I never want to miss out on an opportunity like that. I think about the many times I said, "I'm not going on a mission!!" and shudder. I can't imagine not being here, not knowing these wonderful people, not knowing the Savior like I do now, not growing and getting to experience this beautiful, wonderful life of a missionary. I love it so much!

Sunday, I had to speak in sacrament meeting. Remember how I told you they tell you right before? Yep. It was so nerve wracking. President Capik stands up after the sacrament and says, "We'll now hear from Sister Shaylee Wilcox." Okay! Haha guess that's me! I spoke on the gift of the Holy Ghost and how much it meant to me and what it means to be sanctified by the Holy Ghost when we receive that "baptism by fire." I hope I did alright. I really felt the Spirit prompting me to share certain scriptures or say something. I was glad I had that opportunity. And then two seconds later I was singing with the Canto sisters hahaha I felt like I put on sacrament meeting yesterday. I should have said the closing prayer too! Our song went great. We sang a cappella - 3 sopranos, 3 altos. It sounded really pretty. Sister Hanson (one of the branch presidency's wives) was sitting in the back just crying. She told us after that she felt like angels were singing with us, and I really believe they were. It was awesome. :) Later, at choir practice, we found out that the song this week is Lead, Kindly Light. What a tender mercy for our last song we'll sing in the MTC choir! I think I'm going to make that song my mission song.

Aw, fam, I wish I could share everything!! But I have to get off. I hope they let us email on Saturday afternoon so we can verify when I'll be calling, all that jazz. Mom, if you don't get all that stuff sent, no big deal. I'll survive :) If you can, the most important things are ribbons for my suitcases, a portable CD player, and pictures of you all! Lots of pictures! Can't get enough of my family! :) I love you so much. So, so, so much. I'm so thrilled to be a missionary! On to Hong Kong! With the Lord on my side, who can be against me?!

With all the love in the world,
Shaylee K

GWOK

xoxo