I've Grown A Foot Or Two!

Family!

Thanks so much first off for all the help and support from you guys!! Especially with all my back pain and my diagnosis of Ankylosing Spondylitis. Same condition as Dad. I am now on meds and Physical Therapy, so it should improve.

General Conference was amazing!! Seriously!! Being on a mission during conference is like Christmas!! My spirit has never hungered so much to be spiritually fed until on my mission!! Loved every second of it and can’t wait till the October session! :)

Sister King's mom made us matching skirts for Easter!

So this week, the biggest challenge was getting our investigators that we are teaching to progress. We have been finding amazing people but then they just drop off the face of the earth. Our plans are just to keep being bold and helping them feel the love Heavenly Father has for them. These are just speed bumps in the road. It all can’t be easy. Heavenly Father has really blessed us though and we have seen so many miracles! Just even within the last couple of days! :)

Opening my Easter Package from family!

To start off this week, the elders in the Spanish ward were having a baptism. So we went to support them. At the same time they were having the ward Easter egg hunt. While we were waiting for the baptism to start, we were talking with some of the members and we met Lisa. Lisa is from Jamaica and while driving home from work saw the Easter egg hunt and decided to bring her kids to it. She has a son who is 4 and a daughter who is 14. They are super cool!! They loved the atmosphere of the church and the people. They said they felt right at home and wanted to learn more about our religion. They said they could feel the Spirit even during the Easter egg hunt. Super amazing miracle because we have been praying to find families! We are currently teaching her and her daughter. She couldn't come to conference but is excited for this coming Sunday! :)

It was a really hard day of knocking.........

Later this week we were knocking in a trailer park, we had been knocking for hours and it was almost time to go home. We thought we would pray for a miracle. Sister King and I both felt prompted to knock on this one house. It looked promising so we went and knocked the on the door. Marilyn opened the door and invited us right in. She is a mother of a little girl who is four and accepted a prayer right away. During the prayer there was so much noise but after we asked her how she felt and she said she felt the Spirit so strongly and knew it was from Heavenly Father and that it wasn't a coincidence that we knocked on her door when she needed us. She is amazing and has such a humble spirit ready to learn about the gospel. God is so good! She and her daughter came to the Easter egg hunt on Saturday and loved it! She couldn't stay for General Conference but super excited to come this Sunday.

......that ended great!

The next miracle happened on Saturday after conference and its super funny. So we went out to knock doors and we felt like we needed to knock in this apartment complex. So we park and I offered a prayer before we started knocking. I had gotten half way through the prayer when we heard a "BANG BANG BANG" on our car. We opened our eyes and there are these two little girls around 3 years old just banging on the hood of our car. Me and Sister King were laughing so hard because it was so random! We got out of the car and the little girls started running away and we thought hmmm, lets follow them. We followed them to their family. We introduce ourselves and they knew who we were right away because some members from the Spanish ward lived next door. They accepted a prayer and afterwards were in tears. They loved it and said they felt the Spirit so strong. They accepted baptism but expressed the concern that Oswald, the dad, works on Sundays. We promised him that if he prayed and asked Heavenly Father that he will be able to get Sundays off so he can go to church with his family. He believed what we said and they are planning to come to church this Sunday! This family is super amazing and humble. They want to get baptized and go to the temple so bad! Excited to teach them!

The last miracle of the week and probably the biggest happened on Sunday. After conference, we went and knocked doors in this apartment complex next to our house and that’s were we found Angela! Angela is from Ecuador and is staying with a friend. She doesn’t have anything except a suitcase and her daughter who is in her 20s. When we knocked on Angela’s door, she let us in to the house right away. Her friend wasn’t there so it was just her. She said she was so grateful we came and said it was like having two angles in her home. She said that she was supposed to go to a party with her friend but felt like she needed to stay home and now she knows why. She said she needed us. We said a really powerful prayer with her and she was so happy and the Spirit was so strong. We invited her to be baptized and she said yes right way. She said that all she wants to do is serve people and feel peace and comfort. She said she knew she could find it in our church! She is amazing!! We showed her the Because He Lives video and she loved it. She says she believes in miracles and knows that she is a daughter of God! Afterwards, we shouted for joy. She is the golden gator we have been praying for!!

This week I studied a lot about Christ’s life leading up to his sacrifice and the resurrection. Thanks to Dad for sending me those stories! It was so interesting to get more into detail about what happened leading up to his death. I felt as I learned more about his life I got closer to him and my love and testimony grew so much for his sacrifice and atonement. He truly came to earth to pay a debt he did not owe because we owned a debt we could not pay. I know that Jesus Christ lives and that he truly is our Savior. I have never felt closer to him this week. I know he is my brother and I am forever grateful for the sacrifice he made and all he went through for me because he thought I was worth it. He thought we were all worth it. He loves us so much! I know that each of our names were engraved upon his palms as they put those nails into his hands. He died for us so he could, as Jeffery R Holland said, like lightning in a summer storm reach out grasp us and pull us up. He will never let us go. That talk was one of my favorites! I am so grateful and humbled to represent such a perfect and loving Savior.

Want to give a shout out to my comp. She is the best and I love her soo much!! It’s so funny. Everyone thinks we are twins. We get asked that like 10 times a day aha love her to death!!