Welp! Here we are! All the way up north! As far as the mission goes! 
I love it here. Redding is amazing, except for the SWELTERING HEAT!! Heat and I, yeah we're not friends... 
I can't tell you though how bad I have missed the view of REAL mountains! And not this "rolling hills". 
it has been pretty smoggy because of the fires and whatnot. That along with the elevation difference makes my body wanna cry when I run in the morning! Haha. But it's still good! I'm not dead yet! Not to mention, when it clears up you have quite the view of Mt. Shasta and the other surrounding mountains. I love it! I makes me feel at home.
So it's cool. We cover the Redding 5th ward and the YSA branch. They say that the branch will most likely dissolve at some point because it's so tiny, but we will see! The work is a little bit slow. A coupe transfers ago, all the investigators decided to drop the sisters! So, the task at had is FIND nations! finding is my jam so I'm pumped to let lose! We have been able to find a 5 new 'gators this week! All thanks to the spirit and the tender mercies of the Lord! The branch is the tiniest thing I've ever seen... it's like sitting in Sunday school, except half of that. 
So it's cool. We cover the Redding 5th ward and the YSA branch. They say that the branch will most likely dissolve at some point because it's so tiny, but we will see! The work is a little bit slow. A coupe transfers ago, all the investigators decided to drop the sisters! So, the task at had is FIND nations!
We live in a nice little apartment WITH CARPET!!!! GAHH! I really love carpet.. no wifi, but there is carpet! So I'm happy! You really learn to appreciate things when you don't have them! Carpet is definitely one of them.. I have missed just flopping out after walking in the door after a grueling day! It doesn't quite have the same effect on tile.. Haha. So that's been nice to jump back into that!
Sister Dee is so cute! I feel like a giant next to her though!
The miracles this week have been super cool! We had District finding time! Which is super cool. I have done Zone finding time for a second, but not too much. In District finding time, everyone in the district goes out finding at the same time for like an hour each week! It was amazing. We had a billion people who lived in this one complex, so we just decided to go wreck it there. And that's what we did!! 3 new 'gators in an hour! That was such a blessing! Thank you to the Spirit!
Book of Mormon class was great! We only had Norman, who is been meeting with missionaries for over a year, and our former bishop, Bishop Freeman. This man is AMAZING! Goodness me, I learned so much from just sitting in on that conversation with he and Norman. Norman is very analytical. He is also a fence-sitter, as he admitted to earlier. Haha. But he has been thinking a lot about life after baptism. It has been interesting. Here's a little snippet of what went down!
We had an awesome lesson with Norman. So we were planning to read Words of Mormon and it totally went Spiritually guided and Brother Freeman started talking about fasting and how powerful fasting is when coupled with prayer, he gave a really good explanation on what fasting was and then we were able to talk about the Holy Ghost and other various aspects of the Gospel, Norman commented how he is thinking a lot more on what it entails to be a member and how his questions were being answered at various points in his life . Brother Freeman bore an awesome testimony about coming to know that the Book of Mormon is true and How Christ is the gate and he won't force us to get to Heaven. He invited him to fast on fast Sunday with him and us as well so it should be and amazing opportunity for Norman.
We had a super cool lesson with our YSA 'gator named Katie. Here's what happened with that!
It was an amazing lesson! We asked her how her Book of Mormon reading has been. She said it hasn't been going well because of her boyfriend's son being in the hospital. Talked about the Gospel of Jesus Christ. She understood it all really well. We asked how she felt with it all. It all goes with what she already believed, just more in depth. Talked a little bit about the Sabbath day and partaking of the sacrament. Amanda (Returned Missionary member present) talked about prayer and how we can feel Gods love and forgiveness thru praying. Katie mentioned that she has been trying to overcome some things with the Word of Wisdom. She understands how it effects the family and doesn't want to deal with that. We related that to a perfect example of repenting. She really liked it all. We invited her to be baptized, she said she would if she knew for sure. Tried to set a date, she made it seem like she wanted to keep learning before she did that. We invited her to pray about baptism. Invited her to church too.
We also had an AMAZING lesson with a member referral. Her name is Dani! Here's the lowdown with that!
She is so solid!!! Dani and her 9 yr old daughter live with Matt, his wife and their 4 yr old. That's how Dani got into the church. She said she hasn't had great experiences with organized religion. She raised Catholic and then was baptized Greek Orthodox. But she really loves what she has seen with Matt and his family. We started off talking about prayer. She feels like prayer isn't supposed to be a repetitious thing but a personal conversation with God. Talked about her coming to know for herself and missionaries will be her spiritual guides. She loved that because church and lots of new people make her nervous, especially knowing basically nothing about what we believe. Taught the Restoration. She related herself to Joseph Smith because she is searching like he was. Matt talked about baptism and the Holy Ghost. She loved the idea of receiving guidance for everything, especially parenting. Matt mentioned Tithing and blessings that come from sacrificing. She liked that the money doesn't go to the "preacher". She doesn't mind giving because it goes to a good cause. Talked about obedience and being blessed according to the commandments that we keep. Matt bore powerful testimony throughout the whole lesson. It was awesome. We invited her to read and pray about the introduction of the Book of Mormon. She loves reading assignments and stuff. She is really excited to know for herself. Talked about the importance keeping commitments when we are away. We told her that that's most likely when the answers will come. Told her it would be best for her to go to the home Ward. She said she agreed and wanted her daughter to come to know for herself and be committed to it since she has already been baptized twice. She said she would be at the 1st Ward. She's amazing!!
It was incredible! It's kind of a bummer we are handing her off, but it's okay. The Elders need miracles too. she did come to church with her daughter! Unfortunately we didn't get to say hi because of all of the other things happening at once.. but she is very good hands. 
️ Sunday we told her that we were happy to see her at church. She let us know that she and her daughter really enjoyed it and SHE WANTS TO BE BAPTIZED!!! 
my thoughts: "well that escalated quickly!" she's so solid! GAHH!!
Another incredible miracle we had!! So we set our goal for Sacrament attendance at 4... well you see, in the past 6 weeks it has normally been 1 or 2, occasionally 3. But we just felt it and had faith that Heavenly Father would help us make it happen! Well.... GUESS HOW MANY WE GOT!! 5!!! 
man... haha. It's so cool!!! Heavenly Father is too good to us! It was crazy because in the YSA this random kid showed up with his LDS girlfriend. He has apparently gone through most, if not all the discussions.. so! That's awesome. And then! This is the crazy part... so! Amanda, who came with us to Katie's lesson, had her homecoming talk. She felt prompted to invite this kid Edgar to her homecoming. Whats nuts is he lives like 3 hours away, they met once before like 3 years ago! AND HE CAME!!!! What the heck!! 
it blows my mind... haha. Ya gotta love Returned Missionary's! 
Oh man! So we went to the first wards Sacrament meeting because of the homecoming, which was amazing! And guess who I saw!!!! Jeremiah and Koren! Haha. It was funny, the Elders told me where they were sitting so I just walked up and they were like "what the heck!". so good to see them! We are also going to be playing soccer on p-day! WOOP WOOP!!
Anyway.. sorry I'll stop now.
I love you all so much! Thanks for everything, especially your examples to me! I wouldn't be who I am without all of you. ️ have an amazing week!
Love,
Sister Hood
PS, they just sent out an announcement that we will be a Facebook mission coming up soon!! Whaaaa? My brain doesn't understand what that would be like. Haha. Pretty cool though!
