It's been a long time people!! But I'll try to bring you up to speed.
For our last mtc devotional we sang how great thou art, a poor
wayfaring man of grief and Come thou fount and it was BOMB perfect way
to end the mtc
Then our district said goodbye to half our district and the next
morning we got on the plane and flew to Chicago.
President Griffin and Sister Griffin are so cute!!! And he is really
tall and from the south and she is short and from Vegas. They were
very nice and excited to see us. We got to get deep dish pizza which
was really good and we did some training, and then sleep over at the
mission home and meet our trainers the next day.

Sista smith who is my trainer and is so lil and great. She has never
been a trainer before and I have never been a missionary before so we
are both learning a lot. At least once every hour she is like "why did
they makes me a trainer I don't know anything!!!" Which is comforting.
But I've learned a lot about the rules this week bc I keep
accidentally breaking them. and then sister smith always says "oh yeah
I forgot to tell you but we actually aren't supposed to do that.." But
man cannot be held accountable for what he does not know so it's fine.
But also it is making me hate rules. Apparently we aren't allowed to
eat in the car unless we are parked or at a stop sign. Even the
passenger. I just want some fruit snacks!!!! Whatever I will eat them
one stop sign at a time.
The first and only two lessons that I've taught have both been drop
lessons where we basically tell them we aren't going to be teaching
them anymore so that was..fine.
Because we have no investigators we basically spend all our time
trying to find people to teach.  we do a lot of tracting and street
contacting. Which I am becoming GREAT at bc everyone here has a dog
and they walk them everywhere. So I ask if I can pet their dog and
then ask if they have heard about Jesus. My favorite thing is
the people who talk to us just because we are girls and they want to
help ~rescue~ us from this church and polygamy. So now we have 2 kind of investigators.
They both have baptismal dates but they aren't until like the summer.
One is this lady who is so cute and her daughter is a member and is
serving a mission in Korea so she wants to take the lessons and become
a member and get baptized in Korea when she goes to pick her daughter
up this July, which is so awesome and cute. We looked at the map and sis smith
let me/the spirit choose the street and there was one called Collen
(s/o to mom) so I chose that one and someone answered at the very
first door we knocked on!!!! And she was NOT interested.   So we
proceeded down the street and no one else even answered their door
(thanks a lot mom) I guess the oncoming snow has frozen everyone's
hearts here in Glen Ellyn. I am excited for spring. Also walking
around wasn't that bad. All the houses here are really cute and
classy. And look like houses. Does that make sense? I feel like all
the ones in Utah are stucco and boxy they all look the
same. But here they are all different and colorful. I'm sure no one
cares but I'll try and take a picture and send it to you so you know
what I'm talking about.About this place:
We live in this cool old town called Glenn Ellyn but we serve a pretty
big area. Our ward has 3 sets of missionaries and we are the only ones
who are English speaking so you would think we would have more
investigators. But no. Because it's a mixed ward sometimes who ever is
conducting will say whatever they are saying in English and then they
will say it in Spanish. So maybe I will get to learn Spanish after
all.. Jk probably not. I can only hope and pray. for some of the
lessons the Spanish members get headsets and the hermanas translate
what the teacher is saying into a mic and the people wearing the
headsets can hear them. I just want to be an Hermana so bad...! I've
heard stories of people who learn Spanish and they change them to
hermanas during there mission. We will see
our apartment has heated floors. All of them. Heated. So when we come
to get lunch after a cold day I eat on the floor bc it's so nice. I
love it.
This area reminds me of home a little bit because it's full of
religious people and churches which is cool. But they are all
different and not Mormon.
Everyone here walks their dog it's amazing.
It has snowed everyday I have been here. So we had to go and buy some
fleece lined tights bc I guess I didn't pack any? Anyways they have
SAVED me
Sis Smith and I were trying to get PUMPED one day so we were listening
to Josh Groban's Christmas cd and it was awesome. Until we were
driving back home and turned on mainstreet and it was snowing and all
the trees had Christmas lights on and "I'll be home for
Christmas"'started playing and it got a little TOO REAL 🙃 And became
real emotional real fast.I love you all and am excited for what Glen ellyn has in store for me
💛sister madsen💛
Ps I figured out how to use emojis
Pps I forgot a pillow and I have been using a couch cushion instead
all week. I can't tell if this is why I am sore all the time or if
it's bc of our Jillian Michael's workout dvd or the general toll of
doing the Lords work. Either way pray for me
Ppps even though I had been living on my own for a while before this I
still struggle with day to day things. For example I may have almost
killed us. I was making some pasta and I turned the stove on for it to
boil some water and after like a half hour of waiting and the water
still not being warm I started to realize it smelled like gas and then
sister smith immediately woke up from her nap and freaked out and we
had to open all the windows so we wouldn't die. I almost gave us gas
poisoning. IM FINE MOM