FLEAS, BEDBUGS, AND BASHING

Hey y'all!! I'm here in Tennessee absolutely loving life! I don't think I'll ever come home, I love it here. Everyone has an accent and is super friendly (most of the time). God knew exactly where to send me on my mission because Tennessee is absolutely perfect! 

Getting to Tennessee was stressful and I'm never taking three separate trains and buses to get to the airport ever again. And it all happened before the sun was up so that was fun. Me and Sister Maxwell really loved waking up at 3 am haha. The plane ride is very boring when you can't watch anything, but all the missionaries were playing the games together. I bet it was funny to see all of us playing Texas Hold 'Em on the screens. We traveled with a group of 16 I think and everyone was so fun to be around. It made travel so much fun. When we landed in Knoxville, I felt like I could finally breathe haha. So much easier to breathe here than in Utah. AND EVERYTHING IS SO GREEN AND THERE ARE SO MANY TREES!!! I love it. 

Our first night we had dinner at President and Sister Grahms house (they are such amazing people, I love them so much!!) And then got to stay in a hotel. Me and Sister Maxwell got to have one last fun night together before being separated (that was not fun, miss you sis maxwell). We woke up and got picked up by the APs and STLs to go to Knoxville and go street contacting. That was crazy. I just had to embrace the awkward haha. I feel like that's all my mission is going to consist of, embracing the awkward. But anyways, it was cool to see the city. Then we came back and got our comps! My companion is Sister Merritt and she is from Tremonton! We were instant homes and both love rings haha. I love her so much, I really lucked out with my companion! 

So yeah! I'm in a town called Talbott and I love it. Our apartment is super cute and we live in a cool neighborhood. Our neighbors are these old dudes that barely wear any clothes which is funny but they're super nice and tell us to have a blessed day every morning. Gotta love them. One thing the senior missionaries told all of us was that we had to check our beds for bed bugs because that's a mission wide problem haha. I checked my bed and so far everything looks clear. Hoping it will stay that way. 

We jumped right into the missionary work which is awesome! There's been ward activities we got to go to all week, one of them was line dancing which was a blast. We also did a church tour with our friend Charles! He's on date for baptism so hopefully that stays! We taught the restoration and I said the first vision straight from my memory (shout out brother earnest for making us memorize it) and the spirit was so strong it was awesome! 

A scripture I've been reading a lot this week has been one that my good friend Elder Call sent me! It's 1 Nephi 17:51

"And now, if the Lord has such great power, and has wrought so many miracles among the children of men, how is it that he cannot instruct me, that I should build a ship?"

What I really liked from that is the principle that we can do anything with the Lord's help!! And it's so true!! 

Here's my two funny stories from the week:

•we helped a lady with her dog and after we finished getting the dog inside, she told us she has to take it to the vet to treat his fleas. Fingers crossed we don't have fleas haha. 

•Me and Sister Merritt got bashed pretty good on Saturday by a sweet catholic family. We went over to share a lesson but it ended up into them saying that we are naive and are blindly following the church. They also said the spirit told them to teach us catholicism and show us the "truth". But the real kicker is when we were leaving they asked me where my ancestors are from because my blue eyes and big forehead run in their family. That one hurt the ego a bit, haha. Just gotta embrace the big forehead I guess.

Sorry for the long email! I love y'all ! Also I can't use messenger to contact home so please feel free to send an email my way! Have a blessed week!!

<3 Sister Erekson 

186 Britton Drive

Talbott, TN 37877