"The Lord hath redeemed my soul from hell; I have beheld His glory and I am eternally encircled about in the arms of His love." - 16-2-15

Dear Family and Friends, 

We have had a good week over all. I am working hard to make every single minute count of these last few weeks of my mission. I cannot BELIEVE I only have four weeks left. When did that even happen? About 17 times a day I tell Sister Wilson to use every single minute wisely and that I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY haha. We had some missionary miracles this week. 

We have been trying to contact this part member family for the whole week and a half we've been here. FINALLY they opened the door and it was the husband who is a member. He immediately looked thrilled to see us (which hardly EVER happens haha) and invited us in. He had us sit down and began to tell us his WHOLE LIFE STORY! Haha but we listened and made noises of approval at the correct moments, and then after telling us about how his ex wife cheated on him and now he is remarried to a non member who he is trying to share the gospel with, said wife came into the room and sat down to join the conversation. She proceeded to ask us 10,0000 questions about everything. Mostly the word of wisdom and temple marriage and the Book of Mormon. She asked us how it would go if we came to teach her so we told her we would see her a few times a week and would invite her to do certain things and would set a date for baptism! She was like "Have you taught people in our situation before?" and I said yes many times and she said “Do they usually get baptized?" and I said “Yes every time" haha so she looked satisfied with that. Her husband, who has been less active for a while because of work but loves the Gospel very much, kept piping up and bringing up things that no one should ever bring up in a first lesson haha. I'll tell you what it was when I see you ;)  But anyway we managed to take control of the situation but they kept talking and talking and talking so about between 1hr 1/2 to 2 hours later we left with a  new family to teach! She has been prepared and I am excited to see where it goes! We came away very very happy with that. We let our Ward Mission Leaders know every time we have a success and they are all like "YOU SISTERS ARE AMAZING!! THE LORD IS BLESSING THE AREA BECAUSE YOU ARE HERE” haha!!

We spent time on Friday afternoon making Valentines treats for everyone at Elder and Sister Nelson’s house. We got heart lollipops and m&ms in the bag and put Jesus stickers on them and heart confetti. We put the scripture from Lehi where he says "I am eternally encircled about in the arms of His love" on the label and went around handing them out to every non member we were aware of. When we finished them and stepped back to look at our creation we laughed because it was such a Sister Missionary thing to do! No Elder in the history of time has made heart confetti with Jesus pictures on it haha. But it was very well received. Everyone we gave them to seemed to be very pleased with it. We spoke to some Jews and some Baptists and some atheists haha. We meet all sorts every day here :) It softened lots of hearts and got us into lots of doors and lots of gospel conversations. We are just tilling the ground right now. There are so many part member families here that I can’t wait to see how this area will be in a few transfers once it has all picked up again! It should be very productive! 

We had my last ever Zone Meeting this week :(((( It’s my last because next month we actually have MISSION CONFERENCE because we are getting IPADS!! TEN DAYS BEFORE I LEAVE #mylife #wewould anyway I'm not even bitter. But I'm excited because my posterity Sister Babygirl Wilson will be able to use one every day and it will help so much! Also I'm excited because I'll get to see all my nearest and dearest friends from my mission, no matter where they are serving now right, before I go home!! I cannot wait! Anyway the last ever Zone Meeting was sad. Two days before, the Zone Leaders asked me to do a training on our purpose as missionaries. I cracked out some scriptures and some experiences and was prepared! I stood up to give the training and looked out onto this new Zone, the Cedar Zone, and knew like ONE person haha. And then President and Sister Center were there also, and President and Sister Cornelius. So it was strange to be at my last Zone Meeting and not know anyone. Looking back at me were just a bunch of Elders who I'd never met! I might've shed some tears giving my closing testimony. I've seen missionary after missionary bear testimony as they are leaving and I never thought that time would come when I would have to do it. But it was a great meeting but I felt like I was betraying the St George Central Zone, my home of 11 transfers, being there ;)

After Zone Meeting President and Sister Center took myself and Sister Wilson out for lunch and we talked about the area and our investigators. President gave us some great advice that we are trying to implement and Sister Center actually came out with us after lunch for some missionary fun. When we got to the restaurant that we ate in, Sister Center said to the person taking our order “Now, we are all LDS missionaries so you will be getting talked to a lot ok?" and he said “ That's okay, I like talking!" so after ordering our food at the counter we went and sat down but before sitting down, Sister WIlson and I were talking to a waiter, then Sister Center was talking to a man and a baby, and President Center was talking to an elderly couple. It was so funny how we all just dispersed to divide and conquer! Our man was actually not LDS so we had a good chat. Missionaries are never off duty ;) It was such a treat to spend time with them. Before we got out of their car, President went around and opened our doors because we're all ladies. I need to marry someone like him ;) 

We were having quite a discouraging day, knocking on everyone's doors and no one answering and it felt cold and two people had come to their door, looked out their window at us, and turned off the lights and walked away. So we kept going and working and finally a door opened and it was this whole non member family. She said they'd met with missionaries before and that they want to be baptized!!!! We were like “We can do that!" haha. She told us how they lost a little girl and they want to be a family forever. They gave us a return appointment, so we will see how it goes. I remember right at the beginning of my mission I felt like I would find a family who lost a child who needed to know they would be together again. I feel like I finally found that family. It's just another confirmation that this is where I'm supposed to be, even for just six weeks. I love how Heavenly Father sometimes gives us glimpses of His plan for us and for all His children. If I've learned anything at all on my mission, it has been that He cares for EVERY one of His children and has a plan for their happiness. There is nothing more joyful or nothing I love more than sharing with families that they can be together forever and that God has a plan for them. What am I supposed to do not doing that every day?!?!?!?

We had some funny stories from this week. We had an appointment at 6 and it was in the "back of beyond" area of our Stake. It’s a bigger area than I've ever covered before and it goes right out into farm land behind Cedar City, where you travel for miles between houses and there are NO LIGHTS ANYWHERE so you get super lost. Well............after 45 minutes and 25 miles later, we finally found where we were going. The man had to just come and meet us on the highway! It was so confusing that we would never have found it. This city girl cannot navigate through farm lands haha.  Someone made us elk meat for dinner as well!! Hahah! Also we got home the other night at around 9:15pm and pulled up onto our driveway and Sister Wilson exclaimed "LOOK" and I looked and beheld THREE DEER in our garden! They saw our lights and just stopped and looked, mesmerized. I freaked out that there were deer really close to us because I just assumed they would attack us haha. But they just looked at us and galloped away. They were crowded round by the door to our apartment because it’s round the back of the house thorugh the garden so we knocked on the front door and the family let us walk through to our apartment the indoor way and laughed because deer are more scared of us than we are of them! 

We were knocking around in another farmy part of the area and came across this couple who had met with the Elders a few times before. It was a really positive meeting because they said they want a stronger relationship with Christ and they want to be together forever. They gave us a return appointment for tonight so we will go and see what we can do. We knocked around the area and found this trailer with this little boy who told us he is atheist and investigated every religion and he was so smart alecky and proud and told us that the Book of Mormon is holding up his kitchen table leg right now. He thought he would make us all angry and rebuke him but we just smiled and bore testimony, we asked him how old he was and he said he is 16. It cracked us up that little 16 year old boys think they know everything. After we left we laughed so much about him! 

Well it's time to go! We are off to St George to get some of our eternal investigators a spiritual experience at the Visitors' Center. President gave us permission to take them so we will teach them today at the VC on our p-day! I'm excited to go back but nervous that it'll be hard to leave again. We are praying for some miracle baptisms with them. They've attended church since August, they just need to make the commitment. 

I love you all. Please keep me in your prayers. I pray for you daily! 

Sister Nicholls