Christi is in Hawaii!

Well Christi made it to Hawaii last week! She got there on March 6th. This was her half birthday, which was so fun for her. We sent her a package to be there when she got there for her "birthday" we sent candy, a dress, and some random cute fun things and we all sent her a bday card! We did get to talk to her for about 30 minutes on the phone on Tuesday morning when she was at the airport. It was so fun to talk to her! But then sad when she hung up! But we are so happy for her and proud of her for all she is doing! We finally heard from her tonight! We were a little worried with all the storm issues in Hawaii this last week, and we didn't hear from her yesterday! But I guess no news is good news. I am posting some pictures from the MTC she sent us, and parts of her letter from tonight! Sounds like she is doing awesome!

"Anyways so the President was not there at first and then as we were gathering up our luggage he and his wife showed up.. Such an amazing man!!!! Like i loved them both the second I met them! Anyways so we were getting our luggage put together and he is like "so Sister Duke I understand you're from south jordan... and that you know Elder Garritson.." ha ha yes i do!! So he said that our first night was very rare in the mission... not many missionaries get this experience.. so we were going to drive into Laie and attend a baptism.... First night and we get to see a baptism!! HOLLA!!! So we get thee prettiest drive up to Laie and go to this baptism..we got Mickey D's for a quick dinner and then the baptism was up at the church that is on BYU-H campus. After the baptism we got to go into a room and all open up our first assignments and who our companions will be... Sister Smoot goes first and she goes to Maui. Her zone leaders are Garritson and Carrell... lucky. I stayed on Oahu in the Hawaii Kai and Kahala wards(Gary's first areas too :)) And my companion is Sister Fish. After we opened up our letters we went to the Visitors Center cause President needed to talk to someone. So the APs took us up to the temple and we got some pictures and what not! GORGEOUS!!! then we stayed at President's house that night. It was good to finally get to sleep especially with jet lag.. ha ha we got to bed at 11 in hawaii which is 2 in utah... sheesh! so the next day was transfer day... about 100 missionaries were there at the Tab and where the mission office is and we meet out companions. Sister Fish is from AZ and is 23.. We are very much alike and she is very easy to get along with. She's been engaged before, went to snow, plays sports, just tons of connections!! So after the meeting we go to our pad.. we drop off our stuff and get a lesson put together for the appointment we had that night... Marrissa and Tati are two girls investigating the church... Well I gave my first invitation to baptism and they said YES!! but no date is set yet.. we're teaching them again tomorrow and will try to get to that... but it was awesome!!"

"i love being on a mission... I realized that yes this is thee hardest thing i've ever done in my whole life and i could not do it without the help of heavenly father.... but this is thee best thing i've ever done!! i love it so much and time is already going by so fast... 17 more months.... geez. but i love it! i love bringing that joy into people's lives and it helps build my testimony... its changing me for the good and i could not be more grateful to be here. Hawaii is beautiful and is where I'm supposed to be at this time..."

Her missionary tag :)

With Courtnee's "friend" Spencer

Her companion in MTC Sister Smoot

Her roomates!

Her district!

Christi Mission Pics

The Sunday before Christi left, we ran over to Gardner Village to take a few quick pics of Christi, it was snowing and pretty cold, but me and CaRynn got through it! Here are a few from that day!

First Email!!!!

We got our first email from Christi last Monday, and we were all so excited. I am going to post a few of the things she wrote in her email...

"Okay so I told you about my first day! My companion is Sister Smoot, she's from Kaysville and no she does not know any Havens' :) ha ha I already asked her! But yeah she's cool. We are just learning to get along with each other but she really does bring such a sweet spirit to our companionship. Okay so Thursday we taught our first lesson. We have two teachers and they are acting as investigators. We get to teach them lessons so Thursday was our first. We taught him about baptism and got him to accept an invite to be baptized! Ha ha it was crazy cause we planned our lesson to focus on the Plan of Salvation and the Spirit totally took over and we taught about something completely different. It really is such an amazing thing to be able to be used by the Spirit like that. Very surrreal for sure. We've been talking about our purpose as missionaries and its really a cool theme. It goes like this "Invite others to come unto Christ by helping them receive the restored Gospel through faith in Jesus Christ and His Atonement, repentance, baptism, receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost and enduring to the end." Really cool!!! And so amazing how you can totally tie it in to every lesson you give!! "

"I will not look at the scriptures the same anymore. Its amazing how excited I get about the gospel and the scriptures and learning more and more every day since being here. And regardless of how tired I am because we do so much, its bearable because I have the Spirit with me... "

"The Spirit definitely makes it better. I love this gospel. IT really is so amazing and I'm so excited to be able to share it with others!!"

She is doing so awesome, and we are all so proud of her!!!

Here is a picture of Christi with my Grandma Nelson before she left. So cute!

Christi is on a mission!!!

Hey friends and family! This blog is created by me for Christi while she is on her mission. I will try to post a few times a month with updates, pics, and pieces from her letters. We are all so happy and proud of Christi for what she is doing and that she is so awesome and amazing, and is already having an amazing time in the MTC. Before she left we had about 2 weeks of a family party! We went to movies, dinner, lunch, Grandma's house in Heber to go to Chicks, and finally the day she left we had breakfast at my moms with her favorite breakfast then all of us girls smashed in my Dad's truck to take her to the MTC. We first stopped off at the Provo temple to take a few pictures, and say our goodbyes there. We of course are being the Duke girls that we are and were being silly and laughing while my Dad is trying to take our pics! After we did the "drop" off at the curb at the MTC. We pulled up and all jumped out of the truck, we had been teasing Courtnee about her missionary she sent to the MTC in December, Spencer, that we would see him. As we were saying by all of a sudden there was Spencer! It was so funny and awkward, but Courtnee shook his hand and it was so cute. Then after we were saying bye, and hugging her we hear a "Christi" yelled, and we turn around and Jessica Wilcock was standing there with her companion waiting to take Christi inside! It felt much better to send her off with Jess, and know she would take good care of her. It was surreal watching her walk away with her luggage. We jumped back in the truck and all just sat there for a while crying, and wondering what we just did! It still seems weird without her around. But here are some pics of that day. We sure did miss our brother Chad this day, we kept talking about how it seems weird without him there with us! Love him too!

This is our "we think we are models pose" A Duke girl tradition!

Dad and his girls!

5 sisters!

Girl group hug!

My dad is so lucky! And Chad :)

Our family minus Chad and spouses, and grandkids :)