Top Ten Things I Should've Taken on My Mission

Thank heaven's my mother packed my mission bags, because if she hadn't, I would've never had the stuff I actually needed in the mission field (I wanted to bring like 3000 journals and 6 pairs of shoes with me...) But, although we did pretty good packing wise, here's some things I should've taken:

1.) Photo of my baptism: This would've been nice to show to some of my investigators as they were preparing for baptism. Baptism is honestly a weird thing to ask a person to do, if you think about it, especially if they have no concept of what baptism is. Showing a physical photo of my baptism would've helped them realize, hey, I'm asking you to go do some strange thing. Baptism is a normal step in drawing closer to Christ.
2.) Photo of my family: I brought only one in my suitcase. The people who sent me Christmas cards in the MTC had the pleasure of being put up on my wall for my whole mission. I should've brought more pictures so that I could've introduce people to my family by proxy. Showing off family pictures is also a nice way to get to know someone. It makes a missionary seem like a real person with real interests and passions that has put all on hold to serve God. The sacrifice they make becomes real.
3.) Completed booklet, "my family" The Church of Jesus Christ has a cool little booklet that encourages you to put on paper important dates and stories of your ancestors up to 4 generations back. I had some companions that completed the booklet and then decorated every free space with pictures of their families and ancestors. It served as a great conversational starter, a nice way to introduce the topic of family history with members and non-members, and also a personal reminder of familial stories of faith. I should've completed the booklet at home and had it laminated or fake-laminated with clear tape.
4.) Recipes: Although I learned to cook without recipes on the mission, I would've appreciated a simple pancake recipe, cookie recipe, and a metric unit conversion chart (you buy and cook with kilos and grams instead of ounces and pounds). Popular baked items in my mission were pancakes, banana bread, and chocolate chip cookies. Most people in Argentina and Paraguay had never tasted such things, so it was nice to be able to occasionally cook something like for that for them.
5.) An extra SD card for my camera: This is why

One of my good friends bought this off the street. It supposedly had 32 GB but ended up having only 8. Also, it didn't work at all! I would recommend buying an extra one in the states (you'll definitely take a lot of pictures!) and then you won't have to worry about quality checking your tech purchases.
6.) More no-show socks: I never used no show shocks before my mission, but used them every day in the mish. When it's sooo hot and humid, you just can't go walking around in shoes without socks. I wish I would've bought a couple more pairs in the states. I had a very hard time finding truly no-show socks in Arg/Par (they usually tackily covered half my feet), and when I did manage to find a pair, they started wearing out in a week. I highly recommend REI's no shows, just for their durability (see link). You'll still get holes in them though.
7.) Anti-bug bites itch cream: One of my companions gave me a bottle, and it saved my life! She had one specifically for bug bites. Sometimes, we would have so many bug bites we wouldn't be able to sleep through the terrible itching. The medicine she had really helped!
8.) Master list/calendar of friend and relative's birthdays/other important events: As a missionary, although your life will completely change, everyone else's lives still pushes on. I liked being able to feel involved still in my family and friend's lives in an appropriate way. It would've been nice to have a list of everyone's birthdays so that I would've been able to send them a quick birthday email on p-day
9.) Health journal: I wish I would've kept a bit better record of my health problems on my mission. I was blessed with lots of health while I served, but I should've been better at recording the problems I did have so that in the event that the problems reappeared (which they did) I would have a record to refer to. It would've been nice to just have a small place to jot down symptoms, emotional and physical, to try to abate them. Examples can be found in the booklet Adjusting to Mission life. By doing this kind of record keeping, you might be able to catch early on if a certain food or water source doesn't sit well with your stomach or if certain situations make you especially anxious.
10.) Extra water filtration system: In my mission, the water would make you sick. So I NEVER drank from the tap. I had to buy, boil, or filter all my water. Although I received water filters in my mission, I broke/used out all the ones I received (maybe that's just a Kaila problem but... whatever jaja). I ended up having to boil water every day and carry around a two liter water bottle... every day. I made it work, but it was not convenient. I know REI has lots of water filters designed for camping; if you think the water might be a problem, you might want to look into buying one of those water bottles with a built in filter.
 

And bonus #11: A good-sized collection of loose change. A lot of missionaries start up a coin collection in the mish and will swap coins from their home countries. Personally, I liked giving pennies and dimes to the little children of Argentina and Paraguay. It was a cool momento for them, and I felt that I could give them piece of Hermana Douglass' home. Unfortunately, I had very little American change with me, so I asked my mom to send me more change in the mail, which she did. They never arrived. So if you think you might like that tradition, make sure to stock up on pennies before the field!