Try New Things...You Might Just Love It!

Hey everyone! I know that I've MIA for the past few months and I should be better, haha!

Life has been busy, I'll give you that. With school and work AND James and I are now owners of a business. Believe it or not. We became one of those people. We joined a networking company called Life Leadership. James first heard about it from a friend at work, when James told me about it, honestly I thought it was a scam. Later on after learning a little more about the company, it didn't seem that bad. But we were still skeptical. We then found out from a friend, that we look up to very much, that he was in it and that it was real and it really works. After prayer and study, we decided to join. After three weeks we qualified to become something called "PBO" which means, "Personal Business Owner." We had reached a goal that we wanted in such a short time. This company teaches skills and offers financial help to those who want/need to be better with their money. It also offers a lot information on getting out of debt and staying out of debt. You can also be apart of the business and MAKE MONEY in the process. James and I have only been in it for 6 weeks and we've made $50. I know that doesn't seem like a whole lot, but it'll just keep going up. Our mentor makes about $80,000 a MONTH! We love the people too! Everyone is working towards goals and becoming a better person. If you want to know more, let me know!

Any who, where I was going with that was, since James and I are PBO's we qualified for a "PBO Party" where we went skiing, snow shoeing, did archery, and ate bomb food all for free! Our company paid for it! It was awesome! We had a blast!
            

We also had the opportunity to witness the dedication of the 150th temple for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints! The Provo City Center Temple! It was a beautiful meeting and I could feel the Spirit and I learned a lot. It was an amazing experience to witness a building being dedicated to God for His work. A building where amazing things happen, where people strengthen their bond with God, where families become eternal, where blessings are given, where prayers are answered and so much more! I loved every second.

All-in-all, life is wonderful and things are good. School ends in less than a month and I can't wait for that!! Mission reunion next week, OKC trip at the end of April, 1 year anniversary in May, my nephew's baptism in June, temple 5K run in July and then back to school in August. I got some things to look forward to this summer! Bring it ONNNN!!!

It's gonna be hectic, but it'll also be happy!

My hectic happy :).

That New New

Wow, it has been a while since I've posted. Things have crazy busy. You know how life goes haha!
Let's see, what have you missed?

Well, Christmas was fun! It was small, but nice. We opened new pajamas on Christmas Eve and we were excited for Santa Clause to come visit us :). We woke up Christmas morning and it was cold and snowy outside which was PERFECT! We had a big yummy breakfast and then relaxed, went through our stockings, and watched Christmas movies. Santa gave us a lot of chocolate haha! Then we opened gifts. I got a new wallet and a new purse. James got a web cam for his computer, clothes and a pocket knife. Santa also gave both of us the game of Scrabble. We love that game. It was nice to be there together. For dinner we just have snacky finger foods. We were still full from breakfast and chocolate haha! It was fun! Oh and we went to see the Christmas lights on Temple Square! 



Then for New Years, we were super relaxed! Haha! I'm not even going to lie, we went to sleep at like 10:00pm... I woke up at midnight and woke James up and wished him a Happy New Year and then we went back to sleep haha!

Since then, Ive started semester number two at BYU and I'm excited for it! I'm taking my religion class, Sociology 300 (LOVE this class!), Statistics, and Samoan :). I love all my classes!

Work is going great too! I love working at the MTC! Missionaries are the best!

I'm super devoted this new year. I have made some new years resolutions, so my hope to reach my goals! Well here they are:

1. be healthier (like half the world is doing haha)
2. expand my vocabulary
3. do my scripture study everyday
4. complain less!

Well there they are. And so far... SO GOOD! Not even joking! James and I have been getting up at 4:00am Monday through Friday to go to the gym and we plan out our meals and we're eating super healthy! We love it! But today is only day ten of our journey, but we're moving along :). And I haven't missed a day of my scripture study and I love that! It feels like my mission again! I have about an hour every morning to have a little personal study, it's the best! As far as expanding my vocab, I'm constantly writing down new words and looking in the dictionary haha! And I'm still working on the complaining thing. It will get better with time!

I'm really excited for 2016! I seriously feel like this is going to be a great year! The year of change. I like the sound of that :).

I hope everyone is doing great! Tell me your resolutions!

Trip to Ida[home].

For those of you who don't understand my obsession with Idaho, that's alright. I lived in Idaho for a 18 months of my life. I served a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints there in Idaho. And it was an incredible experience!

My husband and I were able to go up to Idaho and visit people and see the sights. It was wonderful!

We started off our trip in the morning and I was sooooo excited! We stopped in Grace, Idaho (a super small town). My last companion (Sister Hunkin) is serving there and I got to see her!!

It was good to see her and for her to meet my husband. She is so great and she is working hard! 

Next was to...THE JOLLEY'S!!!!! Whoooo! I was so excited!!

We met Zoey at her work and she waxed our eyebrows! (I needed that!) And she waxed our noses. That was an interesting experience haha! We stayed in Chubbuck, Idaho! We were able to hang out together with the Jolley family and chat it up! This time in jeans instead of a skirt and no 9:00pm curfew haha! It was amazing!

The next day James and I went to Idaho Falls, Idaho. My first area as a missionary and my longest.

We stopped at Reed's Dairy! The ice cream is sooo good!

Then we went to the see the Idaho Falls Temple and the Visitor Center. My area was right next to the temple!

It's such a beautiful temple!!! 

We were able to see a lot of my investigators and members from the mission! It was wonderful being there!!

Then we went to the Chubbuck 3rd ward Christmas party! It was so much fun! A lot of people were excited to see me and meet my husband! We also went to that ward on Sunday with the Jolley's! So much fun!!

I am so grateful for my mission and all the people that touched my heart there. I will forever love Idaho! Forever.

The Book of Mormon Will Change Your Life

For those of you out there, I want you to know that I LOVE THE BOOK OF MORMON! And I know it is true. And I also know that it can change lives. It has changed my life in more ways than I can imagine.

I'm currently taking a Book of Mormon class at BYU and one of our assignments is a project due at the end of the semester. I wanted to make a short video that could help people know that the Book of Mormon can change lives. Now this video means so much more to me than just a school assignment. 

Watch this video. Share it with others. Help them know truth. 

The Book of Mormon holds truths that can change your life. Just put it to the test. You will see for yourself the positive change it brings. 

The Book of Mormon will change your life. 

Thanks for the Giving

In the season of thanks and gratitude, I wanted to tell you what I'm thankful for. I thankful for my husband and family, my education, the gospel, the Book of Mormon and Jesus Christ.

Our Thanksgiving was small, but fun!

We started the Thanksgiving festivities off as I always had my whole childhood.... WITH DOUGHNUTS! Yum! Then watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade! It was fun! Then here was the change of pace... I was in charge of cooking. My FIRST Thanksgiving meal that I had to cook. No pressure. But everything turned out perfect! It was just the husband and me, so it wasn't too difficult :).  We has a delicious feast and we were sooooo fool. We had apple pie and ice cream for dessert! We napped and watched Christmas movies. It was such a good holiday!

Overall it was a great Thanksgiving!! So grateful for everything!

OH! And here's a highlight from last week:

We went to a BYU basketball game and they did GREAT! WE WON!! Go Cougars!!!

Home Sweet Home

It has been fun living in our tiny little apartment! We moved to this new place and into an apartment that we had only seen on the computer. It was weird at first, but we've really come to love it here :). It may be small, but it's ours. We like it. I posted a while back about moving in and I promised before and after pics of our set up. When we first moved in all we had was a bed and a couch haha! But now that we've gotten more settled, we've been able to make our place a home. We aren't renovating or anything fancy, I guess you could say it's just a little interior designing :). There are still more things to do, but I think it's okay to show you some things now :).

Kitchen:

BEFORE:

AFTER:

Bedroom: This room is small. The only thing that fits in there is our bed, haha!

BEFORE:

AFTER:

Bathroom:

BEFORE:

AFTER:

Living Room:

BEFORE:

AFTER:

 There is still more things we want to do, like put up more pictures! (We love pictures and we have an empty wall). And maybe another place to sit haha! But we have our couch and we both have desks now for studying and working! I pretty excited about that because I got my desk two days ago haha!
Things are good and we'll keep on keeping on slowly. It's been fun to see the place change :).

Because Change is Real.

I've got to be honest. Over these past few weeks/months things have been off, personally. Like somethings missing. I've been trying to figure out what it is. It's been bugging and me and after trying different things I still felt lost. However, it is kind of funny to see how Heavenly Father works with me. It is SO subtle (sometimes I wish it wasn't so subtle). I usually miss the signs the first few times haha! But I know that God is helping me learn something in the process. I remember praying and asking God to help me find the missing piece or make the feeling to away.

As time passed I continued to pray for the same thing and I still constantly felt like something was missing in my life. But what? My scripture study has been super great, I'm saying my prayers (personally and with my husband), I'm attending my church meetings, fulfilling my visiting teaching, school at BYU is going fantastic, I love my job at the MTC, my husband is so supportive, generous, kind and wonderful to me. I even started indexing haha! What the heck was missing?! My life sounded perfect. Why was I feeling this way? I was so frustrated. It made me sad. Why was God ignoring me?

Then just this past week I've noticed small little insights that I've gained and little by little I'm beginning to realize what the missing piece is. I still don't know exactly what that piece is, but I've been inspired by the Spirit of small changes I needed to make in my life and I've been much happier since those changes have been made.

It all started when my husband finally reached a goal he had been working toward! He was so happy and filled with so much motivation. He said to me, "when you have a goal and you work hard to achieve it, then you will." That really stuck with me.

Then a little later in my Book of Mormon class we talked about agency and how we have the power to choose. To choose righteousness or disobedience. I thought to myself that I have the choice to be happy. It's MY choice.

Another little moment was just this past week when I read a blog post from a sister from my mission who had just returned home, (Emily Rawlins--Her blog). She said this, 

"The hardest adjustment is figuring out who I am now. I'm not the person I was before the mission, nor am I the person I was during the mission. Those seasons of life are over. Those time have passed. I need to now become the person I am during this season of life." 

I realized that I totally skipped that when I returned home from my mission. I don't know who I am. I'm not the me I was before the mission and I'm not Sister Faagai either. I guess these past months I was trying to be some combination of the two; I don't know. All I know is that I need to be the person that God needs me to be right now. I know who I want to be, but I'm not there yet.

I need to change.

The next thing that helped me to know this truth happened last night. Al Fox Carraway (if you don't about her, look her up! She's awesome) came and spoke at my school. She talked about change. It was like she was talking to me. I even bought her book afterwards haha! And there's a part of the book entitled "Change." It talks about a bishop that asked a group of young women, "What is the most important part of the gospel." She says that the girls yelled out the answers like, "prayer." "Sacrament." Etc. Those are all awesome answers, but the bishop shook his head. The bishop said... "the most important part of the gospel is that people can change."

BOOM!!

Okay Heavenly Father. I get it. Haha.

Change is real.

I know now that are things that I need to change in my life. That's my next question to Heavenly Father. What should I change? I feel like I have an idea of some things that I need to change. Such as, I need to stop trying to be the person before my mission and I also need to stop living as if I'm still 'Sister Faagai'. I need use the things I've learned and apply them to help me find who I am meant to be right now.

I need to change:

• By having more meaningful scripture study & use the study methods taught by Elder Bednar
• By having better eating habits and a create a healthier lifestyle
• By prioritizing things better
• By having more charity
• By being more humble
• By building my confidence
• By sharing the gospel more often
• By focusing on being spiritually fed
• By finding and KEEPING my motivation
• By NOT comparing myself to others

I know that I'm slowly becoming who God needs me to be right now. Like really slow; before, it kind of felt like I was moving through molasses. But now that I know there are changes that I need to make, it's making things move a little nicer.

I know I'm not perfect and I'll be working toward that my whole life. But I know that I can work everyday to get closer. I'm grateful for Jesus Christ and His perfect example.

I want to share this quote with you by President Henry B. Eyring:

"Most of us have had some experience with self-improvement efforts. My experience has taught me this about how people and organizations improve: the best place to look is for small changes we could make in things we do often. There is power in steadiness and repetition. And if we can be led by inspiration to choose the right small things to change, consistent obedience will bring great improvement."

Change is real. God is good. And I can do this.