AN AMAZING PRAYER!!

Yo yo yo! 

First of all, I only say that because I'm going to train!!  WOOP WOOP!! That will be so exciting! I'm sad to say goodbye to Sister Singleton though because we have had so much together and seen so many miracles! It's always a hard goodbye!  BUT! I'm stoked for her to be headed down to Granite Bay! It's right next to C-Heights and Pres. is so close! So that's always interesting! 

Ah!! So many miracles yet again this week! Not with a crazy amount of new investigators, but with our investigators that we have found starting to progress! It's been amazing. So first I will start with someone who blew me away!! 

Mariah:

She is a member in our wards sons girlfriend/fiancé/baby momma... we aren't sure which one of those yet.. haha. BUT! They have the cutest little chubby baby!  Her name is Julia. She's funny. But the Woodwards (her in laws, I guess you could say), invited us over for dinner and Sis. Woodward told us that she felt like it might be a good time to ask Mariah to meet with us. One of the crazy things about this though. We were standing in the kitchen talking to Sis. Woodward and Mariah walked in and the spirit said to me "invite her to meet with you." I was like hum.. maybe I will! Haha. THEN! Sis. Woodward said that and I was like oh! Okay then!  crazy stuff man! 

We talked about A TON of STUFF!! Started off my sharing Families Can Be Together Forever video. She loved it. Talked about the temple a little and how that's Gods plan for His children. We talked about the Plan of Salvation. She said it all makes so much sense. She loves how we have the Terrestrial, and the spirit world because it's kind of an "in between". No ones else really talks about that part so she appreciated that. She said she always wonders about what happens after we die. She didn't seem scared about it but it was something she thought about. The Plan brought her a lot of comfort.  She said in the church that she had been attending, they haven't been welcoming to her or her daughter, Julia. But she has always felt welcome when she comes with the Woodwards. We started to invite her to be baptized and she stopped us and started to tell us of a dream she had where she saw the temple glowing. Before the dream, she prayed and asked God what He wanted her to do and gave it all up to Him. She had the dream a couple days later. She knew at that point what she needed to do and where she needed to be. We invited her to pray about a date and come to church. It was SO great!!  

She is now on date for July 8th!  please keep her in your prayers because her situation is interesting and needs help to make everything go smoothly.. haha. 

Colby and Linda

We shared Mountains to Climb and the really liked it. We talked about taking steps of faith even though we can't always see what's in front of us. Or how we persevere through hard things when we take it one step at a time. We asked Colby if the gospel standards seemed difficult, looking from the outside in. He said for him, he doesn't get the whole point of church if it's just a social thing. He said if he is going to do something he has to be 100% committed to it. He just does see a need for that in his life right now. We told him that we aren't here to drag him into the font but if that is something he would want in the future, that's what missionaries are there for. We let him know that even though he doesn't want to be a part of the church, we are still his friends and everything. It was really, really good. We were able to figure out where he is at in his progression. Linda brought up the talk "Why the Church" and asked if we could talk about that next time. ️

Sylvia

We had lunch with her and it was awesome.  We brought up how we aren't able to find her records and that means that we would want to just start at square one with everything. She seemed totally okay with it. She said she is even a little excited to feel that feeling of being baptized again! She said she was just glowing and clean. We talked about baptism and how it cleanses us. We tried to set a date, but she said she won't know if they are moving or not for a couple weeks so she said she will get back to us. In the meantime, we invited her to pray about baptism and about a certain date she would like to be baptized if she was staying. She's awesome and she really wants to meet with us and everything. She said it will really help her a lot. ️ 

Pam

Pam is so sweet. We shared the Shiny Bicycle with her. It got her pretty emotional. We asked what stuck out to her and she talked about how Jesus came to make mistakes right again. She told us all about how difficult situations in her early life have caused her to have some struggles which she has to deal with in her daily life. She says she can't get rid of the awful feelings that she felt in her youth. We testified to her that the Atonement of Jesus Christ can take that pain away. We explained that Jesus has felt exactly what she felt and He can take it away. We testified of His love for her. We weren't planning on it, but we brought up baptism and talked about how it's another way we can be clean and come closer to the Savior. We invited her to be baptized on July 24th. She accepted! 

We also asked her if she would like to pray about it. Taught her to pray and she said an AMAZING prayer. It was like she was talking  to Him as if He were right in front of her. She knows He heard her. Helped her recognize the spirit. Told her to pay attention to that feeling because that's what she will feel when she can know that what we say and what she is praying about is good and true. She knew the peaceful feeling she was getting came from God. The spirit was SO strong. Invited her to pray about July 24th and ask if that's what Heavenly Father wants for her. It was so good.. she also she said have been reading a little from the Book of Mormon, it's just hard for her to understand. 

Our P-Day was adventurous! We went on a hike with Linda and Colby! That's always an adventure! Hah! 

Thanks for all your support and everything! You guys are the best! I'm excited to tell you guys about my "daughter"!  keep me in your prayers..... haha. 

Love, 

Sister Hood

SOME PHOTOS FOR YOUR PLEASURE & ENJOYMENT!!

P~DAY!!!
We went on a hike ~ It was so fun!!

SOME OF THE GREATEST MISSIONARIES ON EARTH!!

Sister Hood ~ MY ADOPTED GRANDMA ~ Sister Singleton

BEAUTIFUL VIEW!!
Sister Hood & Sister Singleton

FEAST YOUR EYES ~ IT IS BREATHTAKING!!
Sister Hood

I love this sidewalk ~ Just Say'in!!
Sister Hood & Sister Singleton

LOVE THIS LADY SO MUCH!!
Sister Hood ~ Linda & Sister Singleton 

Cheese Quesadilla's are the bomb!!
Sister Singleton & Sister Hood

SO PROUD OF THESE YOUNG MEN!!
SISTER SINGLETON & SISTER HOOD

I SCREAM ~ YOU SCREAM ~
WE ALL SCREAM FOR ICE CREAM!!
SISTER HOOD & SISTER SINGLETON

TONS OF MIRACLES!!

Hey peeps! 

This week was good!! But, not much happened! Tuesday Sister Singleton totally died. She had a crazy migraine Monday night and it took her out Tuesday too. So I just got up, studied and whatever, took care of canceling things for the day so she could just work on getting better, took a nap. when she woke up, we just watched a couple things on gospel library and went to bed. Haha! It was nice to have a down day, but at the same time I didn't know what to do with myself. Then on Wednesday we were both wrecked because we were messed up our routine. Haha. That was a rough one! Haha. 

Not too much happened this week.. haha. Except for miracles! Ya know, there's not a day that goes by that we don't see tons of miracles! One we saw was with Pam and Stephanie. We found them a couple weeks ago, but haven't been able to really get in contact with both of them. We had tried to visit them but no one was home. we were just about to leave their complex, but Sister Singleton asked if that was everybody there, so I was looking through our Area book and found someone. So we went and parked and as we were about to pray, this bus pulls up and Stephanie and Pam get out!!!! Hah! It was super cool. So here's the lesson we had with them! 

Pam and Stephanie:

We asked what Pam what she remembers about the Restoration. She remember Joseph Smith and told a little of the first vision. Shared Our True Identity with both of them. Pam said the is different from all of her siblings because they each have a different father. We talked about how we all have the same Heavenly Father who loves us SO much. Stephanie talked about how we are tested her and we are here to "earn heaven". Then we talked about the Plan of Salvation; where we came from, life on earth and Christ. Stephanie took it back to where we came from. She didn't know what it was called but she was explaining the veil. She was talking about if we were perfect there wouldn't be a point. Explained that that is the veil. Stephanie asked how we know Jesus' name never changed. Then we got into Fall. Pam knew the story of the Fall. We explained that Eve partook because she knew it was necessary. Stephanie knew that God knew it was part of Gods plan but she feels like Eve could have chosen to fight her temptations and God would've provided another way to have children so they could keep both commandments. We tried to explain otherwise... Stephanie feels like because of Eve, when women give birth it's painful because Eve chose not to follow Gods commandments. We talked about motherhood being a sacred thing. Asked Pam if she had any other questions about pre-earth, earth life and afterlife, she didn't really have questions. We invited them to read the Plan Pamphlet and the intro to the Book of Mormon together and if they are able, to come to church. They said they would try to read and it was up to Pam to come to church. Stephanie said she hasn't gone to her church for awhile and she likes going there because she knows people. Invited both of them to pray at the end. Pam said she would next time, Stephanie said it has been awhile since she prayed and she didn't  feel comfortable doing it in front of us. They were both super awesome!  

We were able to find 8 new 'gators again so that was another miracle! Haha. Especially because the one day we were down and out!! The Beck boys also got baptized! That was great!!! There was a BILLION people there... way more than I have ever seen! It was great though! We're still working with Robbie, but we haven't had a chance to set a date yet because we haven't been able to meet with him. But this week!! Man... haha. Please pray for him... 

We also had the Half Mission Conference! That was really good! 

Spiritual thought for the week! I was reading about Faith today and this is something I really liked!! 

"When the challenges of mortality come, and they come for all of us, it may seem hard to have faith and hard to believe. At these times only faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and His Atonement can bring us peace, hope, and understanding. Only faith that He suffered for our sakes will give us the strength to endure to the end. When we gain this faith, we experience a mighty change of heart, and like Enos, we become stronger and begin to feel a desire for the welfare of our brothers and sisters. We pray for them, that they too will be lifted and strengthened through faith on the Atonement of our Savior Jesus Christ."

Faith IN JESUS CHRIST can get us through anything. There's a reason why it's the first principle of the gospel!! When our faith is anchored in Him, we will get through everything this life has to throw at us. Thats why it's so important to constantly be nourishing and strengthening our testimony and our faith in Him.  

That's basically all.... I'm not super stoked about emailing today, sooooo take what you can get.  I just don't have much to say! I love you guys and thanks for all you do!

love,  Sister Hood

SOME PICT'S FOR YOUR PLEASURE!!

Beautiful Sunset!!

Statue of Jesus Christ in the Cemetery ~ Love it!!

If you seek Him ~ You will find Him!!

Yep!!  There are snakes here ~ Yikes!!

Love these pretty groves of trees
Sunshine in my soul!!

Can You Find Me?  How Cool Is This Sidewalk ~ LOVE IT!!

Don't Worry Mommy ~ The Smith's
Are Taking Great Care Of BEADIE!!

LITTERALLY FULL OF MIRACLES!!

Hey Fam & Friends!! 

Happy Belated Madre's day to y'all! I know for me, it was a fantastic day to remember how INCREDIBLY blessed I am to have my momma and my grandmas, as far back as they go. They truly are a blessing and such a strength because of their testimony and the way they chose to live their lives. ️ I thank my Father in Heaven everyday for my momma! Not gonna lie though, it did make me miss her more than normal. Haha. I guess that's only natural, right! ️ 

It was SO great to see you guys!  it almost feels like you aren't real... I dunno, it's hard to explain but it was awesome to talk to ya!!  

Well!! This week is literally FULL of miracles! Everywhere we look we are being blessed and our eyes are being opened to the Lords handy work! We have been so blessed! This week for our goals it was amazing. So in a District Meeting we set goals as a district. Since Sister Singleton and I have been doing really well in the New 'gators department, we decided to set our goal for 7. (As a district, our goal was 11) So we know that as we set goals to make them realistic and attainable, you want to be able to put names with the numbers. You have to have people in mind in order to make it happen, at least for the majority of the goal. Then there's still room for miracles, of course. 

So we were thinking about our goal of 7 and we know in past weeks we had had people in our minds who were potentials. But now, since we had gone through most of those in our areabook, we were a little shaky on our goal. But I felt strongly that we could make that happen. I knew that if we worked hard and were diligent, the Lord would bless us to reach our goal! Even though I was kind shaky too, I felt like we should keep it. So we did. 

Throughout the week we had none. No one was home, no one wanted to talk to us. It wasn't until Friday that we felt prompted to go to this family's house who we had been trying to catch for weeks. And BOOM!!! She was home. So we talked with her. Then slowly, after that with our tracting, we were able to be lead, inspired and the people's hearts were open and we were able to reach our goal of 7 new investigators once again for this week. It really blows my mind. I can't believe that the Lord literally just puts people there in our path!!! Ah!!! We aren't even doing anything super spectacular to deserve this! We just want to do His work and we are being SOO blessed! To kind of put it into prospective for you, we have been able to find more new people in 3 weeks than the entire Zone did last transfer... WHAT IS THIS!!! I just can't wrap my head around it! ️ so blessed. 

So yeah! That's the miracle of the weekly goal! Haha. There have been countless others. But my personal favorite for this week is with a Less Active/Recent Convert, Thelma. This was in the top 3 of my most powerful moments of my mission. Here's what went down. ️ 

Thelma sometimes calls us randomly and asks us questions. A few days ago she called us and asked if Jesus came down right now, would she "go to hell" because she was smoking again? Well, first of all we were a little shocked because the week before she told us she had no desire to quit again. So we were pretty stoked to hear that the spirit had been working on her. We explained that Heavenly Father and Jesus are the only ones who can decide that, but They wouldn't be very happy with her choice to keep smoking. She said okay and just kinda hung up. THEN! A few days later, she called us again and asked us how to repent. We told her we could come by and teach her. So we read in the Gospel Pamphlet about faith. She understood what faith was. Talked about how repentance means to change and turn to the Lord again. She read through each step of repentance and we talked about it. We explained each step and she told us what she thought it meant.

We talked about obedience to the Lords commandments keeps us happy and safe. We talked about how service helps us replace the bad things with good things. Invited her to church to partake of the sacrament to be cleansed like she was on her baptism day and to say the opening prayer in gospel principles. She said she probably would. We told her how much Heavenly Father and the Savior love her and how much we love her.  The spirit was super strong you could see it working within her. Invited her to go in her room alone and go through the repentance steps with Heavenly Father. She just sat there for a little bit and her roommate started talking to us, Thelma got up. Since I was standing in her way, I just stepped back but she just came up to me and gave me a big hug. It was so tender!  Thelma doesn't do that... it almost made me cry. Haha.

After she just went and did that on her own, she came out and we asked how it went and she was beaming and told us about it. It was amazing!  you could see that she had felt it. She said the closing prayer and it was amazing too! ️ these are the kinds of experiences that make you NEVER wanna take this tag off. After this experience, I sleep with it on because I am realizing how amazing of an experience it is to teach people repentance and to lead them to the Savior. I want to wear this tag as much as possible... this one literally changed my heart. It was incredible to see the Atonement make an immediate impact on someone's countenance. It's one thing to feel it work in your life,  but when you can see it in others lives, it changes you in a different way.  

This one was super cool too!! This is with Erica and Reed. Erica and Reed are together and they are about to have a baby. Erica has 2 little kids from previous relationships. Whenever we visit them, we are usually just standing out on their porch talking. Our goal was to get inside their house this time and share the Plan of a Salvation with their family! Well.... Obviously Heavenly Father was aware because it just fell into place, once again!   this was a really great start! 

It was great! They opened the door and let us right in. We didn't even have to ask if we could come in... We sat down with Erica but Reed was doing the dishes and cooking dinner. He seemed to be listening while he was in the other room. We told Erica that we wanted to share the Plan of Salvation with her. She called her kids in Patience, who is 6 and Daniel who is 5 to come listen too. They have a lot of questions about that kind of stuff. We talked about all of that and they asked really good questions. Erica was listening and helping us a little bit to explain some things to them. We shared Familes Can Be Forever Together video. They all felt the spirit. Invited them to church. Reed came in when we were saying the closing prayer. He said afterwards that he wants to join us next time because he has some questions for us. He asked about where the Book of Mormon came from. We explained that the Book of Mormon was being written around the same time as the Bible. He knew a little about Joseph Smith. But we said we would come back next week and share more. It was really good!! ️

So! We had a lesson with Diane. She is so stubborn.... we are trying to help her realize that it's all about humility. If you're not humble, you won't get an answer.. so that's what we wanted to do with her this time is kind of call her to repentance and try to let her come to the conclusion that she needs to be more humble.. so this is what happened... unfortunately, it didn't have the desired effect but she is slowly having a change of heart. Please pray for her... haha. She's a tough cookie! 

Diane is still busy with work and has allergies that she's dealing with. She hasn't been able to pray on her knees yet, so we invited her again to do so this week and she said she will. We read 2 Nephi 4:16-35. She liked verses 27 & 28 because she said they stood out to her and she liked the wording of it. We talked about what we read with her and related it to being humble. Also related some of the verses to our sins and weaknesses which lead us into reading in the gospel of Jesus christ pamphlet with her.

We went over the 6 steps of repentance with her and invited her to repent of whatever it is she needs to repent of. She wasn't sure of anything besides maybe language. We told her she could pray to ask what she needed to repent of. Talked about how repentance isn't always big things, it's also small changes in life. She was willing to try this. She said the closing prayer and said that she felt the spirit. She said texts are helpful for reminding her of the things we invite her to do. 

Another super cool miracle!! I got to go to a baptism on Saturday for Hannah who we taught for a minute in Colusa!  Linda drove us down to Yuba and took us to lunch at Sizzler! Whenever we are with her, we are always eating!  it's pretty fun! But anyway... it was such a great baptism! She is about to pop too (Have her baby)! Haha. Their story is so cute. Zack (her, now, husband) was less active and they met and started talking about religion. Hannah was looking for a church apparently. Sooner or later they found out there was a baby coming and they both felt like they needed to get their act pulled together. So that's when they started coming to church and then we came in and started teaching them. She was SO solid. Man, she's the most prepared person I have met. Haha. It was awesome to see Zack be able to baptism his new wife though. It was also great to see some of the Colusa people!! ️ 

Something else cool!! I got to see Sister Reid from Corning at the Bishops storehouse!! Ah! It was awesome! She's one of the fav's. ️ she updated me on things. Some things were not good though... I found out that Austin, one of the guys we taught and baptized, is now into into drugs and stuff and involving other people in that.. It actually broke my heart.. it really bothered me. I started wondering if I wasted my time on him and others I had taught there because they were all kind of struggling... After hearing about it, I was reading in the Book of Mormon because I just really needed some comfort. And I felt prompted to turn to Alma 26. I just started reading. It's talking about missionary work but in verse 5 is where it really got me. It uses the words "they are not wasted". Ah. I kinda lost it... I felt such peace and I knew that the Lord's time and my own efforts had not been wasted. Even though those I taught, some of them are really struggling, the Lord is so aware of them. "He numbereth his sheep..". Of course He is aware that they have strayed, but they will come back. It was just such a powerful reminder for me. 

Anyway. That's basically my week!!! It was AWESOME!!  I love being a missionary. What a privilege to serve my Savior and be an instrument in His hands. I hope that I can be who He would have me become, and that we all can choose wisley. We all have the same divine gene.  

I love you all!! Have an amazing week!

LOVE, SISTER HOOD