Snowwww!

January 17, 2018

Hey y'all! I hope your week was great! I'm moving today! My address will stay the same, but it'll be apartment 607.

For those of you who don't know my address:

100 North melrose ave

apartment 607

Natchitoches, LA 71457

I'd love to get letters from Y'all!

Wednesday we went on exchanges, because Sister Brown and Sister Beck are STL's, they leave, and me and Sister Pfeiffer stay. This is her second transfer, and this is my first. When they leave I feel like they let a three year old loose in a grocery store to buy food for the week. It's pretty overwhelming and we mostly just tract. It was sooo nice outside! Sunny and warm enough to not wear a jacket, so we visited a few less active members. Right after we got inside of someones house, it started pouring rain. We get as much rain here in an hour, as Utah does all year. But when it rains in Utah it smells so clean and nice, when it rains here, it smells like straight trash. It poured like that from like, 2 pm to eight and it was still raining when we woke up the next morning! I love the rain, but the smell is so bad. We finished doing what we were doing, had the best dinner at a members house, and then went store contacting, which is like tracting in the store, which is the worst thing a missionary can do, and then we called it night.

On Sunday we woke up at four am to Sister Pfeiffer screaming! We quickly found out it was just her sleep talking, but she had earplugs in, so she couldn't hear herself, so she was screaming. Two hours later we had to rush to get ready for a regional broadcast for the south eastern states at our stake center an hour away in Alexandria. It was pretty cool to be at the same stake conference as Sister Beckstrand! But in my haste to get out the door, I forgot my name tag. I didn't realize until I was in the car and on our way. We got a ride with a rm in our ward who actually served in Natchitoches twice, and luckily she had her tag with her. So I was Sister Neilson for two hours! We met other missionaries in our zone, and now they all think my name is really Neilson, I really hope I never have to see them again, because that would be awko taco. Elder Bednar's talk so amazing. He is always so bold, I love learning from him. He talked a lot about repentance, and repenting with real intent, something I will never forget.

Monday Morning we woke up, and put on our volunteer tags to go to the nursing home! It was pretty nails day! We got to paint the residents nails! Oh it was sooo fun! We also got to sit in on their bible study. It was a bunch of Old ladies singing to baptist hymns. That was an absolute blast. I wanted to put scrubs on and go to work! I love talking with them and being around them. Can't wait to go back! we went tracting in Campti later that day and we knocked on two doors and now one answered. The third house we went to had a little boy and his dad outside so we talked with them and then went inside to teach the restoration. This has never happened to me before so I was pretty pumped. The spirit was so strong the whole time. We invited him to be baptized and he said he wanted to, but that he's already been baptized. hopefully we get to meet with him soon to talk a little bit more about the priesthood. It was such a magical missionary moment.

SO on Monday we heard that there was going to be a snow storm, which is super great because i really wanted snow, but it sucks because people don't open the door if it's colder than forty outside, so we knew we were going to have a lot of cancelled appointments and unopened doors. we didn't really realize how bad it was until we went to Walmart that night for our dinner hour and it was poppin. People were stocking up for this storm with packages of water bottles, food for days, blankets. I was like, guys, it's just a little snow. And it literally was, barely an inch of snow, but no one is out and our mission pres has told us not to do anything or go anywhere either. It's just kinda funny.

Yesterday was p day, but the libraries were closed because the town is shut down due to the snow, so we went to President Defords house to watch the Prophet's press conference, that was really cool! Then us, our roomies, and the elders from Many and the Elders from Deridder loaded up in the stake president's van, and headed out to Kaisatchie for a mile and a half hike. it was so beautiful!

I got to finish the Book of Mormon the other day and I just want to share my testimony with all y'all.

I know this book is true. And because I know that I know that Joseph Smith is a true prophet called of God and that we have prophets on the earth today that receive revelation from God. I know that I was called by a prophet to bear witness of the truthfulness of this book. I know that Christ lives. I know that he loves me, and that he loves all of you. I know that families are eternal and I am so happy I can share that knowledge with the people of Louisiana. I love this gospel and I love my Savior. I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.