It's been quite a week! I can't even begin to tell you all the things that have happend or what my new area is like.

 There's too much!!

I guess I should probably start out by telling you where I am though...

I am in the Traditions YSA ward up in Temptation Station! Oh, I mean, College Station TX. Do you know what that means?! It means I'm in probably the greatest place ever. I'm on Texas A&M Campus for Fall semester and football season and it's gonna be crazy. People here are super intense about their football. The first home game was Saturday and everything shut down for it. Everywhere near Kyle Field was crazy. Aggies are pretty legit. They've got so many cool traditions and amazing things going on and everyone is super nice. There's about 55,000 people at the school, but in a lot of ways it reminds me of my the college I went to, BYU, mixed with a healthy dose of Texas. I'm going to go day-by day with some stuff so I don't miss anything. Ready, go.

Tuesday: was transfers, I got here with my new companion, Sister McLean (said Mclane) and took the spot of my old MTC companion Sister Maughan. I am in the same ward as one of my recent converts and an investigator from my last area who just started school up here. It's pretty fantastic. I am on a bike! Which while being super hot and sweaty is actually pretty fun. This ward, although still a YSA is a little different from my last one, so it's been fun seing similarities and differences. Campus is a gold mine of people to talk to and work to be done! Which is why there are now 3 sets of missionaries in this ward. Us, the elders, and the other elders. So we're going to have fun coordinating efforts. There's also another campus of a community college called Blinn nearby that we'll be working with too.

Wednesday: This is the first week of school, and my first day on campus. It was a little overwhelming. I didn't know where anything was and felt like a freshman (good thing I have a companion to teach me the ropes). There were so many people running around to classes, getting books...It's impossible to talk to them all, so figuring out the best way to do it and engage someone in conversation is a trick. Pass a long cards are amazing, and people here are suuuper nice. I think people turn down the offer of a card maybe 2% of the time. Also "howdy" is the common way to say hello to people here.

 I lie not! It's for real. I was slightly shocked and quite pleased. I am in true Texas territory. There are a bunch of Institute classes here, and it's been so cool to see how LDSSA works and what life on a non-BYU campus is like. It's really great, and Wed night institute is the biggest one. We have some investigators that we take to that and it's a really great class!

Thursday: There's an ultimate frisbee group comprised of several members, less actives, and non-members. Are we there? You betcha! Super fun, super hot, and great time to meet people who we can help come closer to Christ. The group is about 1/4 the size of the one we got going in my last ward, but don't worry, it'll be good :)

Friday: Our district is made up of all the missionaries in our YSA ward. It's interesting. I rode a bike through a rain storm and got soaked, but it was super fun, and I got to meet a couple of our super awesome investigators, Melane and Brook. They are probably some of the funniest people ever and have been learning about the church for a while. They both have baptism on their minds but have some family opposition, so we're trying to find the best way to help them. We decided to all fast together on Sunday for them, and they are doing so great. I'll tell you more about what happens this week!

Saturday: First home game of the season and boy was it insane. People here take football seriously. It's ingrained in the culture. The whole town shut down for the game. Aggies have a lot of traditions with that too. They don't have cheer-leaders, they have yell-leaders who campaign for that position. The whole student body learns these yells and stands through the entire game as the "12th man"... We set up a tent with a table with a big board we made for big events. It's has "Because of Him" in big letters accross the top and pictures of Jesus. It then says "What do you have because of Him?" and then you can write something on a notecard and pin it to the board. They used it for the first week of school and we had a table on campus, so we used it and offered free water to people headed to the game and had some good conversations with people!

Sunday: was even more intense in terms of talking to people. Sunday they had the MSC (Memorial Student Center) open house. For you BYU people out there, MSC=Wilk. The whole point was that any group, club, organization...anything could come and tell people about themselves during this time. Campus was packed! And there were a bajillion people walking around wanting to learn more about everything. So LDSSA (Latter-day Saint Student Association) had a booth in the religion room and we used the "Because of Him" board and all 3 sets of the missionaries and a bunch of ward members were there for  4 hours or so. We handed out schedules for the institute classes and pass-along cards and ran out of everything by the end of it. It was insane!! Sooo many people. We got some numbers out of it and hope to teach some of the people we talked to. There's so much to do here it's amazing.

I love this area, I love my companion, she's super sweet and great, I am happy to be a missionary! Anything exciting happening in your life? Thanks for the letters and updates!

Love,

Sister Andreason

P.S. I'm sure I missed something of all that happened this week, but it's been pretty busy. I'm exhausted in a good way.