Week 80 Love the People 3/22/2021

 Another week! It was so good! Started the week off good with zone conference. The APs called us on Monday and told us, "hey sooo president wants you to do a finding panel in zone conference. " haha well at this point, this transfer we already gave a training at the first zone conference and talked at MLC so we were like "uh are you sure? We've talked sooooo much" and the APs were like "we are SO SORRY! Haha told president that." So we were just kinda dying of laughter. Well that night we had to go up to the mission office to kinda get everything set up for the day. We were expecting a couple more companionships because panel, there had to be more than us. Well no, just us, President and Hermana Cordón, and the APs who were answering the questions. LOL. And one of my comps Sister Bull is still in her first transfer was stressed out of her mind. But she killed it!!! It was good, didn't end up being too bad. And it was a blessing too because it was supposed to be on Tuesday so we drove up, and then we ran out of time. So they had us come up the next day which was Hermana Cordón's birthday! So we "sunflowered" her door and sang to her happy birthday (with Sister Bull's amazing ukelele skills). 

Service wars:

It was one of the district leaders' birthdays so we brought him some stuff too! AND cute  Sister Staheli has slipped notes into my pocket for OUR WHOLE APARTMENT. When I pulled them out I was like huh??? What is this. So cute and sweet. 

We've been playing frisbee in the morning with the elders! And today I learned how to play football!! Way fun.

Spiritual thought:

In zone conference, this cute Hermana that I started my mission with talked about how loving the people is important. She said, if my sister forgot everything and was in LA, I would go find her, and remind her who she is, and bring her back! Well, that's the case with the people here!! We need to go find them!!! I loved that.

IIt's been a good week. I LOVE MY MISSION! there is way more that happened this week I just can't remember haha I love you all!

Week 79 First Exchange Miracle! 3/15/2021

 This week was so good!! Some experiences that hopefully uplift your day:

I went on exchanges with this cute sister, Sister Kaufusi, who I love soooo much. It was a her first exchange and I LOVE first exchanges. They are just filled with so much energy! We were calling people and we were in the mindset that we were going to call whoever we are prompted to, even if they were just called yesterday, even if they weren't interested, etc. Well we came across this lady who hadn't looked like she wasn't too interested in the past. But we called her. She picked up and was a little hesitant at first, but then started opening up about her trails and she told us, "I don't know why I'm telling you all these things, but I feel so much peace telling you guys." And she talked about how the missionaries seemed to reach out at the right time. That was such an amazing experience and Sister Kaufusi is amazing. She was listening so well and ah it was just an amazing experience. 

Went to City Walk/Universal with all the sisters! Also we have been doing service wars in our zone which has been soooo fun!! That's all I have for this week. It's been so fun this week. We are going to have a zone pday! (Finally!!) It's been more than a year and I'm pumped! We're playing sports all together and us sisters are determined to win lol.

Week 78 .... 3/8/2021

Week 77 The Best Two Years 3/1/2021

 Soooo. Story time. We were doing outdoor sacrament with the elders (we still don't have in person church here haha help but also it's fine because we just get together as missionaries and do a little sacrament). Well in the middle of sacrament a car rolled up and we were like huh? Well when we finished sacrament he came out of his car and started talking to us. He asked if this was just a missionary thing and if there were any close by church services. Turns out, he is from utah and came here for work! So we talked with him and he was so sweet! He asked if he could take pictures of us to document, ah this man was just so tender. Well, while he's talking to us, Sister Carr turned to me and whispered, wait, I know his voice. WAIT he's in The Best Two Years I think!! Well 2 days before we had met this person who we were like, WAIT we think he's an NBA player, but WE DIDNT ASK. And then we regretted it big time. So I was like, ask him ask him!! And so Sister Carr was like, "hey, are you in the best 2 years??" And he was like oh yeah! And ALL OF US were like WOW WHAT!! And that was way fun. I'll attach some pictures. Way good times. Ah that was epic.

This week FLEW. It was so amazing!! Some really cool miracles that happened with our friends:

Sharmistha 

She is this cute cute lady and recently she's had a lot of questions about woman and the priesthood. And I was like oookay how do we approach this?? Be cause I'm honestly not great at explaining this. Well we had 2 lessons on it and during our second lesson, she just went all, oh I get it. And something just clicked inside of her and she explained it to us!! It was AMAZING.

Bryan

Every time we teach Bryan he is so down, but never really does his commitments and is usually distracted. Well this week we've been making good progress with him! We taught him twice and they were both just tender experiences. We had read 1 Nephi 1 and he told us he liked it, so we told him he could watch the Book of Mormon video. We sent it and the next time, he told us he LOVED it and said that he will always keep that video in his heart (how cute!!) And then he told us he has a really hard time with reading and understanding and he doesn't like reading, but when he read the Book of Mormon, he likes it. And we talked about how that was the spirit confirming truth to him. And then he was talking about how he knew this book would save him. It just helped me see that wherever people are in their life, if they understand scripture or not, that there are people prepared and if they have that desire, God will help them.

Keith

Oh keith. I love this man. So he is one of those people that loves Jesus and everything with God and sings praises. Amazing man. Sometimes though it's a little hard to get across to him that there was a Great Apostasy and that we needed a restoration and that the restoration is different than anything else that's ever happened before. Well we were going over the restoration, and he was like, where is Joseph Smith's name in the Bible? And we were like oof okay how do we answer this one. Well, we talked about the Great Apostasy in the Bible, and then we read Moroni 10:3-5. And then all of a sudden he goes all (by the way, he's very knowledgable with the scriptures), oh. I understand. I believe what you said about Joseph Smith. Ah the spirit was SO STRONG! Now our next step, helping understanding that this is the one true church(:

This week was so good! I also got to go on exchanges with Sister Perez. She's so sweet, pretty quiet, but she is so kind! 

This email is already pretty long already, but if you made it this far, congrats! I love you all!!!

Week 76 Cutsey Comps 2/22/2021

 It's been a great week to say the least. Quick updates. So usually we get an email on Friday if we are training. So a couple weeks ago when it was around transfer time, me and Sister Carr totally thought we were going to stay because I literally just got midcycled here. On Friday I got an email for training and we were like noooooo we have to stay together!!! So we prayed and prayed so hard for a trio and guess what???? WE ARE IN A TRIO!! So Sister Bull is new and the cutest. She's from St. Augustine Florida. She is SO AWESOME! She's supposed to go to Kobe Japan but got reassigned here. It's been a WAY fun trio. 

In our apartment we also have another new Sister. Her name is Sistee Kaufusi. Her cousin actually plays football at BYU! She is SO cute and oh my goodness HILARIOUS. She is just the best. Ah I LOVE our apartment.

Okay missionary work update. 

Last week our zone doubled in finding! It was a true miracle. It was just so sweet to see all the missionaries exercising their faith. Ah it was so so soooo awesome! I love all these missionaries. Then we met this sweet guy named Bobby that I talked about last time but he is progressing so well. We have a lot of opportunities to teach in this area so I'm feeling pretty #blessed. We are just sooooo busy teaching all the time. I have no idea how, but God is blessing us. We were close to putting a brother and Sister on date, and they are so ready, but we just ran into some hiccups. So if you all are looking for someone to pray for, I would love if you all could pray for them!!!

Funny moments:

-so you know with swivel chairs when you press the lever, the seat goes up? So I pressed that for fun and then the chair got stuck because it was right under a table. So what did I do? Stand on the swivel so I could lower. Well, while I was getting off, I tripped into another chair and flung myself into a wall. That was a lols. We were laughing for so long.

-I asked one of the district leaders if I could join his district council. He said yes and then 2 mintues later he told the district that president was going to attend and Sister Carr was dying she thought it was so hilarious and we were just laughing for 15 min

-the 3 of us are going to have abs after laughing this hard

Spiritual thought: I've been studying about the power of conversion and something I never realized before is that in order for our friends to be converted, they need to feel God's love and mercy. It changed my perspective so much.

I love you all!!

Week 75 .... 2/15/2021

Week 74 Miracle Week 2/8/2021

 So. Crazy week. Oh my goodness it is so fun. I'm not going to lie, I miss Sister Westover like CRAZY. I just laugh and have so much fun with her. BUT. Sister Carr is THE BEST. She is so fun and kind and selfless. It has been an absolute party with her. 

So. Me and Sister Westover worked our hardest until Thursday. We had so many meeting though hahaha but we got to go up to see president! So that was fun! And then on Thursday morning we did the transfer. Hahaha me and Sister Westover couldn't cry but we wanted to so bad!! I seriously didnt want to leave her. But sister carr is so awesome and I've only heard positive things, and so we did the little switchero and we were on our way.

My time with Sister Carr has been filled with miracles!! We have been praying for referrals in every single prayer and we got 5 this week!! That was such a miracle from God. We were blown away by the blessing. But it gets even better! So by Saturday, our zone as a whole had only found 2 friends. We were like, ah what do we do??? So me and Sister Carr were like okay. Let's call all the companionships. And so we called all the companionships and we were like, we want to pray with you. And so we prayed and it was so cool to see the miracles. Sometimes we'd end the prayer, and the companionship would be like, actually it's crazy, we just got a referral. And the ZL set a baptismal date!! And then dropped off a Bible to a referral that never replied, and she was so touched and told them that it made her cry and that no one had ever done that for them before! And then other referrals would come in. It was amazing. During one of the prayers, the name Diane popped into my head and I was like, Sister Carr! We need to call her! And she was the first person we set up an appointment with!! Ah it was such an AMAZING week. 

Other miracles include:

-We went to Balboa park. And we were walking around the park and met this sweet guy. We talked and later called him. He's been through some really tough things. He's heard about our church, but wants to learn it from us!

-this person we called was like, I was not in the right state of mind before, but I am now. And I also want to learn about that guy that found the plates!! Way crazy!!

-we had 4 of our friends come to church(':

-also, this is the best ward, everyone here is just so missionary minded people. I love itttt

Other fun moments:

- I used to hate the youth song (okay hate is a strong word, just highly dislike) the youth song "What does he think about me" but then it grew on me. So every time it comes on, me and Sister Westover stop any conversation we're in and start belting it out

- all the sisters came for fast sunday dinner

- we did a visitor center tour with our recent convert steve and he LOVED it. He was directing the whole thing. He was like "wait wait, go back, to the right" like the whome ti.e. and he kept being like "hold on, left me take a screenshot of that" he is SO SOLID. 

- ummm a lot of other amazing things happened this week but those are the highlights. I hope all of you are good. I just want to share a spiritual thought. I was studying about humility the other day. There's been a lot of good things happening here and I was talking with my mission president and he told me some really nice things too and I was just feeling good. And then I just heard the spirit whisper to me, "remember that it's not you. Give the praise to God." And so that next day I right away started studying humility. When we accomplish things, it feels good. But humility is remembering that it is not about us. It's about God. And that we love Him and thank Him for every blessing. That's it! Bye love you all!!

Week 73 Work Hard. Be Happy 2/1/2021

 This week was crazy!!! Me and Sister Westover just worked seriously as hard as we could and it was a blast!! Also I am getting midcycled again)): I'll talk about it at the end.

Just a highlight list hahaha short on time

-remember our recent convert that we were praying he'd come to church?? And we prayed for rain? Well he finally came to church yesterday!

-met a lady in our parking garage and asked her if she was looking for a church because she just moved in. And she was like, "actually yes! Can I give you my number and you can give me the info?" WE WERE PUMPED 

-We made a billion calls on Sunday and finally got 2 referrals that have been blocked but now they are not and we got to talk with them????

-so we set like 6 RAs this week and we got to Saturday and they had all fallen through or turned out that they were too busy or not interested too. Well on Sunday, our ZLs gave us BANANA BREAD. They were so awesome! They wrote "Phillipians 4:13 You've got this!!" I'll attach a picture. Well Sunday night we finally found this super sweet solid lady AND SHE IS SO AWESOME! She has gone through some really tough things. But is now ready to let God into her life!!

-last thing. *cries* so we really just worked so hard on Sunday and we were sooo happy. We were calling our ZLs and DLs to evaluate the week, and then we got a call from the APs. Me and Sister Westover were just holding hands and scared, but it's true. We are getting seperated )))): I will be going to North Hollywood with Sister Carr. I love Sister carr and have heard AMAZING things. Her and Sister Westover have been out for 8 months and were MTC comps! I really thought I'd end here in canoga park but nope. Going to North Hollywood, and Sister Carr is an AMAZING STL so I know I'll just learn so much from her. Sad. But it's okay. Also I know what you all are thinking. North Hollywood. Oohh movie stars. Hahaha well, North Hollywood is probably the most interesting part of my mission, so probably the opposite of what you are all thinking. Anyways. That was my week. Also, since my dad served here, I asked him to send me some pictures while he was here so I can recreate them. Okay I love you all!!

Week 72 Faith comes through miracles! 1/25/2021

 Hello everyone!! This week was soooooooo good. So first of all I got midcycled on Thursday. Complete surprise. That was on Wednesday, and so I packed my bags and got transferred on Thursday morning. So me, Sister Snow, and Sister Boyden drove up to the temple. I cried. I love those girls. And then I was off with Sister Westover. Haha still an STL though lols. 

We were driving and getting on the freeway and then we went NORTH. I have NEVER gone north my whole entire mission, and even though I was sad to leave but I was SO EXCITED to be in a new place!!!! I saw the mountains with no houses on them, and I am in the valley now!! I am in an area called Northridge, and my zone is called Canoga park. Okay the FUNNEST FACT. My dad served in the Ventura mission and they kind of changed the boundaries so that some of my mission was in his. AND HE SERVED HERE!!!! Like in Northridge. And I talked to him today and he told me some amazing stories about this area. I am so so excited. 

These first couple of days were 🔥🔥🔥. We started doing exchanges thr 2nd day I was here hahaha. They were so fun. I went to the ASL sisters' area and they were signing all day it was so fun!!

And I also have 2 stories. The first is about one of our recent converts. He hasn't been to church recently because he plays baseball on Sundays. But he was like, well, if it rains though I'll be there because we can't play if it rains. Me and Sister Westover looked at each other after the lesson and we were like, it is going to rain. We checked the forecast, it said sunny, but I just knew in my heart it was going to rain. Well that was on Thursday. On Friday, we it started sprinkling, and we were like YESSS. And then on Saturday, it was POURING!!! And we were just cheering!! And then on Sunday it was sunny, and our recent convert didn't come to church. BUT. That was blessing enough for me. I know God just gave us a blessing one day earlier. Also, my mission president told us something I LOVE. He says, God doesn't delay blessings, He just gives them to you in the very moment when you most need them. And so I know the blessings will come for our recent convert!!!

Second story. We were calling people who had been taught in the past. The day before no one answered. And so me and Sister Westover were like, okay what if every single person answers today. And we were like, it's going to happen!! The first 3 people answered!!! And usually they don't!! And we set a return appointment!!!

The Lord blesses when we have faith. Miracles happen because of faith. And they will come exactly when we need them to. So. Faith works. Faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. I love you all!!! I just love being a missionary!!!!

Week 71 .... 1/18/2021

 

Week 70 Hello Friends! 1/11/2021

 Hello everyone!! This week has been really good!!

So this week we moved back into an apartment I've been in before. If you all remember Sister Boyden, she is literally my bestie for the resties!! She is so cute, we both are so happy to be back together. Can't even tell you how joyous our reunion was! And then transfers and me and Sister Snow are staying!!!!! Good times. 

This week we had an amazing lesson with one of our friends, Hoon. We were doing a pass off lesson with some missionaries in Illinois, (shout out to you Sister Maloy and all the missionaries in your zone) and the Lord really gave us a true miracle. Me and Sister snow are so bad when it comes to time differences so we thought the lesson was at 7pm. The elders called us at 2:55pm and were like, so what is the lesson plan? The lesson is in 5 min. And both me and Sister snow were like, oh no!! We knew that we wanted to talk about our life on earth and had picked out a couple scriptures but hadn't really talked too much about it. So we were relying in the doctrinal sequence so much. We were teaching about his purpose and then the elders taught SO powerfully about repentance. Then I could tell all 4 of us felt prompted to invite him to be baptized. We turned to a scripture on 2 Nephi and talked about how to enter in the gate, we have to repent and be baptized, and that we'll receive a remission of our sins. That we'll be forgiven. The elders asked if that was something Hoon wanted and he said yes! I pulled up my calendar and we were thinking Feb 13 to help him prepare for that date, and then one of the elders (who is fire! He's only been out for 2 months, and the other elder has only been out for 6!) Invited him to be baptized on Feb 13! The spirit was so strong we were all sooooo happy. That was a true miracle. It was amazing and we were all just so happy!!

Then one more experience. We have this sweet friend Sheryle, and we taught her about the restoration and how these restored truths can apply to her. We taught her the plan of Salvation yesterday and the spirit was just so strong!! 

I just love my mission so much! Other highlights include:

-our zone leaders. Ah we call them almost every day and just encourage each other. We seriously LOVE them!! I will include some pictures.

-an amazing lesson with our friend Ryan. The spirit was also so strong in that lesson

-we've been teaching free Chinese class and we made a new friend from that! 

-one of our friends we made last week is really progressing! 

Anyways, it was a good week. 

The only pictures I have of this week is our zone leaders. We all say Elder Carson looks like Mall Cop 

Week 69 ... 1/4/2021