Dear loved ones,
I can honestly say that this Christmas was one of the best in my life. It is always hard to be away from beloved family and friends, but it just felt so special to be a missionary and to have that personal relationship with Christ my Saviour. Let me start with some special experiences of this week before going into the Christmas shenanigans!
So we knocked on the door of this YSA Hispanic boy who lives with his family and miracle of miracles he was home. (This was actually last week on Sister West's last night but I forgot to include it last week). It was about 8:50pm so the last ten minutes of Sister West's work as a missionary. We were thrilled to go inside and he started telling us that he doesn't believe in organised religion and that he is spiritual but not religious, yada yada yada heard it all before, and we showed him He Is The Gift. He liked that and it brought a nice spirit in. He said that he would believe what we were saying is true if God told him. We asked him if it would be alright if the Holy Spirit told him instead of God and he said he could deal with that so we offered to pray with him and I offered the prayer. After invoking the blessings of heaven upon him and the household there was the sweetest feeling of peace in the home and at the conclusion of the prayer he looked thoughtful and said "I already feel it" and it was such a beautiful moment! He committed to seeing us again and said he would definitely be there. I love being a servant of the Lord and sharing His blessings with His beloved children. It was a great high moment for Sister West to go home with!
We had another miracle. We were one person away from making our monthly goal and we had five minutes left on Sunday evening when the Elders told us that they have a new investigator for us who lives in our area and is on date for baptism in January and went to Church. It was so perfect! I've learned how Heavenly Father truly does want us to meet our goals and it's important to us so it's important to Him and He loves His children and all we have to do is pray and work and He provides everything else.
I've seen lots of Visitor Centre miracles this week too. I had a non member woman come in who was so moved upon by the Holy Spirit she could barely step foot into the Christus room. She just cried and said she sees the Holy Spirit within my eyes. It was a very special moment. I also had a Chinese family come in who took a Book of Mormon and asked us lots of questions. That Visitors' Centre never ceases to amaze me that every day we have miracle after miracle. We get the most non members in any VC other than Temple Square in Salt Lake City and we are the biggest apart from Temple Square. I am so blessed to serve there and see the miracles come day after day. We have had lots of German non members too this week which Sister Lipke has been happy about!!
So here are my Christmas tales! On Christmas Eve we visited all of our Bishops and took them Christmas treats made at the Stake President's house with his wife! We drove out to their homes with one of our member friends and we sang Christmas songs to them and delivered the treats and talked about goals for their Ward for 2015 and thanked them for all their work. It was very nice to see them all! We also got invited out to Golden Corral with one of them so it worked out very nicely indeed ;) After we'd driven around beautiful St George as the sun was setting and seeing all our wonderful Bishops we made our way over to the Ekins in Little Valley who had invited us over for the evening. We made gingerbread houses, my first one ever!, and ate great food and we shared a Christmas message. I love that family so much! They gave us Bath & Body Works gifts which makes me love them even more; ) There was a beautiful feeling in their home. I really love their family. Their daughter just got home from her mission and so was happy to have Sister Missionaries there. I heard so much about her while I served there and now it feels like we're bffs and have always known each other. Anyway we left their house and walked around their Ward visiting all the non members I could remember and taking them treats and singing to them, It was just so perfect and beautiful to be walking around this area that I love with people that I love singing hymns that I love. There were Christmas lights everywhere and it was so calm. It really was like the hymn Silent Night. No one was out, no cars were out, it was very peaceful and we were the only ones out walking seeing all the lights and singing hymns. I truly felt the love of the Saviour and Heavenly Father. It was the best Christmas Eve of my life just taking gifts to non members and spreading the love of the Lord.
We then went and sang to the senior people in Morningside (so I guess I just visited all my old areas) in a rest home with the Morningside Sisters. We visited widows and sung to them and it was so beautiful and sweet. They cried and gave us chocolate pecans haha. Just a beautiful spirit that night. Then we played Apples to Apples with two other companionships of Sisters which is always fun ;) We had such a laugh. Then we all prayed together and sung O Holy Night together. The spirit was so strong and we prayed thanks for our Saviour. Then Sister Lipke and I went back to our house and continued the singing and the praying until 10:30 when we went to bed! 
Well this is my last email for the year of 2014. I cannot believe where it has gone. I feel like just yesterday I laid in my Washington apartment's rock solid, freezing, bed and set goals for 2014, the only year of my life when I would be a missionary for the complete year. I set the goal to work hard every single day, to love everyone put in my path and to change myself and others every day. I cannot believe where the time has gone and I continue to set goals and become the person the Saviour needs me to be for Him and for my future family and life. I LOVE this year. It has been the best year of my life and I have learned and changed so much. I wouldn't change a single day of it because it has moulded me and my testimony. I love every single person I have met and need all of them. I have been blessed SO abundantly it brings tears to my eyes to think that He has strengthened me enough to have brought me through a year of missionary service. I feel so indebted that it makes me want to serve more and longer! I absolutely love my mission and I have loved 2014 and the hard times and the blessed times. How can I ever show my thanks truly? I love you all and can't wait to see you next year ;) I will be thinking about you ALLL day on New Year's Eve. I'll say a little prayer for you at 5pm here when it's the new year for you. I love you all SO MUCH and pray thanks for you every single day!
Signing off for 2014
I love you all
Sister Nicholls
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