INTENSE MIRACLES THIS WEEK!!

Well Hello!! 

It's been a great week!! Kinda weird though. We have had everything from amazing miracles to food poisoning to meeting our new mission president to roofing adventures to transfer calls!! Haha. Busy busy week! 

So! For the 4th we had fun... I guess. Haha. We had to be in by 7 pm. So we did our normal thing all day until about 5:30ish then we went to din din! They had a BBQ outside and it was fun. The food was good! Until about 12:30am...... I wasn't affected but Sister Whitesell got wrecked. She was up from about 12:30-7:30... I didn't even know all this was happening because I was dead to the world! I woke up at 6:30 and saw that she wasn't in her bed and I about had a heart attack!!!  but of course, I was mostly asleep still at that point. Haha. I went looking for her in the bathroom and sure enough, there she was laying on the bathroom floor on a ball.  I was very confused.... haha. She explained what happened and asked for a blessing. So we called Elder Call and Elder Grayson over and they gave her a blessing. It was one of those times I was super grateful for the priesthood, more so than normal. ️ other than that though, our 4th was quite exciting! We really wanted to do something fun. So we went to the store to see if we could find any sparklers or anything chill like that. Well, we asked the guy and he said that sparklers were illegal in Chico.....  what.. haha. Sparklers... illegal... in Chico... yes. That makes sense.  goodness me. So, we just bought some popper things and had our own little party.  I'll send a little video of our adventure with that! 

So this all happened the morning that we were supposed to meet our new mission president and his wife! Well, it was a miracle we made it there. Haha. I love getting together with the other zones because I get to see some of my favorite missionaries!!  so many super good friends!  It was also a great meeting! President and Sister Ward are amazing!!! Ahh! So much wisdom! Not to mention, they are both HILARIOUS!  I also really love the accent. They're from Chicago so they say things funny! I love it!! When he said consequences it sounded like caaansequences.  yeees!!  I look forward to my 3 transfers left with them. ️ something amazing that he taught us was what he learned as he was in the MTC. He talked about the weight of callings. So a pillar it seems like it holds up a roof. But the roof makes the pillar stable. That's how a calling works. The weight of a calling stables is in our spirituality and in the church. I thought that was amazing!! So think about that! How does your calling stable you?  

We helped Linda this week!!! It was awesome. We helped her take off part of the roof on one of the homes she is working on! So that was awesome! We attacked that sucker. I enjoy manual labor. ️ we also got to take off paneling inside the house. My destructive self came out a little...  the Elders were like "whoa Sister Hood!"  it was funny! 

Oh man!! There have been some INTENSE miracles this week! I'm pumped to tell you about them! Here ya go! 

Ron:

Ron is the guy we met last week who didn't leave!!!! That was a miracle alone... but he met with us at the church on Friday! AH! It was incredible! Here's our lesson report: 

Asked if he had read from the Book of Mormon. He skimmed over some of it. He said he is really looking for direction in his life. He was never religious until recently. He knows God has a plan for him and he is willing to do whatever it is God wants him to do. ( GREAT START!!) He told us a lot of his background which was really rough. He has come lasting mental effects that he is overcoming. He really wants to be accepted and feel loved (crazy because that's what we got when We studied for him that morning! ) He wants to come to church but won't until he has some nicer clothes so he can feel more comfortable. He is super smart. He has studied about Joseph Smith and Brigham Young. When talking about the Saviors ministry, he knew what happened when and where. He loves history. We taught some of the restoration but he interrupted us and told us that he really feels like he can trust us and feels super comfortable with us. It was really cool. He was telling his friend he thinks he is going to join the LDS church and he felt like she was looking down upon him for it. So he said he is going to drop her. He is really serious about this whole thing. He feels joy with us and like he can be himself. He is awesome!! Super solid! ️ 

Okay... well. This alone is UNHEARD OF!! I wish you all coulda been flies on the wall.. that woulda been alotta flies.. so maybe not. But it was amazing! He is most solid new investigator I have ever taught in my missionary lifetime!! But, the catch is that he is actually in the Elders boundary... so they will end up teaching him unless he feels more comfortable with us. But, it will most likely be them. So that's great because we know they have struggled and we are all on the same team anyway! But ah!! He's so amazing! I'm so excited to see where this all goes! Please keep him in your prayers! 

Mariah

She was one of our investigators on date, but unfortunately, due to the situation we had to take her off for a minute. It's okay tho. She should be back on soon!! That part of the miracle!! So she is the one who is living with members and had a baby with their son, Will. Will wasn't at all into getting married. So our dilemma was that Mariah needed to find a place and get a job or marry Will. It has been rough because she is in school, can't really find entry level jobs in a college town because they're reserved for the college kids and she has to take care of Julia all the time! So! It's been interesting. Here's the lesson report for this week! 

It was a good lesson. We talked about her life and how things have been. She said she still has not had any luck with the living situation or a job. We talked about the Importance of doing our part and working hard. She let us in on a couple things that have been hard for her. She has a really strong desire to be baptized because her life isn't easy right now... that's what she told us. We talked about Satan putting hardships in our way, especially when it's something very necessary for our salvation. Talked about fasting (again, what came to us during studies), the purpose of it and the power it brings to our lives. Sister Woodward bore her testimony on fasting. Invited her to fast with us for 2 meals on Sunday to have confidence in the Lords plan and to make everything  work out okay. She agreed. Also invited her to read the Book of Mormon daily. ️ she's awesome! 

So!! We reminded her to fast and everything. She unfortunately wasn't at church.... but we did go about our day fasting as well for the same purpose. So around 5 or so we felt like we should text her to let her know we missed her and ask about her fast. She said all went well so we asked if anything had changed since Thursday. Then she hit us with it!!! Her and Will are getting married!!!!!!!!!!! What the what!!!! This is NUTS! We were freakin out! Fasting absolutely works... man! Nothing super insane like this has happened like this when I have fasted because, I guess I never had a strong enough need before! So that was a huge testimony builder for me and SUCH a huge answer to our prayers! Such a miracle! ️ 

Are you ready for more!?!  Can you handle the MIRACLES?!!! Because I can't! HAH!  

Stressly

I don't know if y'all remember Stressly! This is Rebecca's boyfriend. We have been teaching them both with the Elders, which apparently has been going great! So! We went over with the Elders this week and Rebecca had a crazy migraine so she didn't come out. So we just taught Stressly! So, his situation is interesting. Rebecca is a Less Active. That's how we met him And he was only really there with us because of Rebecca. But slowly his heart is changing! We have been reading the Book of Mormon with them and they have on their own too. So we asked Stressly about what he read. He asked some very good questions! It was impressive. He said that the Book of Mormon really intrigues him because it's about his ancestors, since he is Native American! Later in the lesson, HE brought up baptism...  WHAAAAAA?!?!? Okay. Now this doesn't happen people!!! Especially with this man! Ha! So he said that he remembered when we invited him to be baptized but he said he wasn't really interested. But he said that he would be interested in following through with that in the future!! Hah!  guys! This is amazing!  Then Saturday we stopped by because it was his birthday and Rebecca told us that he had been reading the Book of Mormon out loud! She said he read like 3 and a half chapters!  this is nuts.. haha. 

Ok!! Last big one! 

Pam! 

Aww.. she's just the cutest! ️ I love her so much! We hadn't seen her in a couple weeks and if was kinda freakin us out! But luckily we ran into Stephanie who told us she wasn't home and to stop by later. (Miracle!) But when we did stop by, Pam gladly let us in! So we planned on just reading the Book of Mormon with her. So we read the intro to her and she really liked it. We talked about the promise of the Book of Mormon and what it means to have real intent! We invited her to pray about it right there since the spirit was strong! Man... it was the simplest prayer I have ever heard... this is what it consisted of: "Dear Heavenly Father....(jumbling of words..).... is it true?........ in Jesus name.."  the spirit was SO strong at this point. So we asked her if she felt different. She said she did and we asked how. These are her words: "like it's true.." that really got me. Man! She knew. The spirit was there and it was so powerful. we bore testimony and promised her that that feeling will deepen over time as she reads it every day. So that's what we invited her to do. I made her a cute little prayer rock to help her remember to pray. ️ so cute! I love her so much! She is such a pure and special spirit! ️ we changed her date though because we need to make sure she gets everything she needs. So that's no on Aug. 5th, at least that's what we're shooting for.  this was also something that has never happened on my mission. I have never seen someone receive a witness that the Book of Mormon is true like this. It was amazing. Sister Whitesell's jaw literally dropped.  it was awesome. 

We have been SO blessed! It's been such a great week. I'm so grateful to my Heavenly Father for blessing us so much. Man. It's incredible. ️ too much. 

Well, I'm really sorry this is so long! If you are reading this part, you're a champ! Hahahah!! It was worth the read tho, eh? ️ thanks for everything! Love you guys! 

Love,

Sister Hood

 Let Him shine through you!

SOME PHOTOS FOR YOUR PLEASURE & ENJOYMENT!!my

HA! ALL THAT ROOFING AT HAMMA'S & GRANNY'S PROVED USEFUL!!
SERVICE DAY AT LINDA'S HOUSE

WE GIRL'S KNOW HOW TO WORK!!
SISTER WHITESELL & SISTER HOOD

OFF WITH THE SHINGLES!! HAHA!!
SISTER HOOD & SISTER WHITESELL

OH YEAH!!  WE FOUND A GUN SHOW IN PARADISE!!
SISTER HOOD & SISTER WHITESELL

CHICO ZONE
WE ARE THE BOMB!!

UMMM!!  I JUST REALIZED I'M WEARING
DIFFERENT SHOES AT CHURCH ~  HAHA!
SISTER HOOD

WOW!!  WORDS CAN'T EVEN DESCRIBE HOW BEAUTIFUL THIS FLOWER IS!!

HAPPY 4TH OF JULY EVERYONE!!

Hey Everybody!! 

Happy 4th!!!  🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🦅🦅🦅🦅 

Well!! It has been quite the week! It was interesting because these past couple weeks we have been in the middle of one of those blocks you just get sometimes as a missionary. It was hard for Sister Whitesell because that was her first one and she blames herself. But really, a block sometimes just happens as part of a challenge of a mission! So I reminded her and myself, of course, that it happens to the best of us and it's not because we are doing things wrong or being disobedient. 

It's just happens sometimes. We both felt like we were in a weird funk because of it though and felt like we needed to talk to Heavenly Father and get everything off. As a missionary, at least speaking for myself, I tend to just take on everything and hang on to it till I explode... haha. 

Obviously that's not the best solution! But, I was able to unload everything and feel SO much better! Now we have been working so much better. The day after we both did that, we saw SO many miracles! Ah! It was amazing! We also found 4 new 'gators with a couple weeks of minding 1 each week. So it was awesome! Here's some of the adventures of this week! 

So first, we tried to visit this lady who lives in a members laundromat. Yes, very strange I know. Driving there, I had passed the road.. as always. I really didn't want to do one of my famous U-turns.. and I almost didn't. I said out loud, "eh.. we can just see her later." The spirit jumped in and said. "Oh no you won't. You're gonna turn around." Yes sir!! Haha.  

Anywho, we got there we didn't find her. As we were walking out, there was a lady sitting right by the door reading a book. As I walked past her I observed this and made the assumption that she enjoys reading! Novel thought I know... (no pun intended! ) Well, the spirit and I often have conversations in my head! As noted earlier. (I'm not insane, I swear! It's just thing that I have developed!) I was thinking, "Hmmm. She obviously likes to read!" 

The spirit just jumps in, "you have a book! Give it to her! Don't you dare walk out that door!" This was as we were half way out the door. I stopped and Sister Whitesell basically ran into me. I told her to go give her Book of Mormon to that lady who is less than an arms length away! She's awesome! She's just like okay and interrupts a random lady who obviously enjoying what she is reading. 

We got to know this lady a little. Her name is Patty. She does indeed love to read. She was super open about taking the Book Of Mormon. We left her with our number and told her how much the Book mean to us and a little about what it is and carried on! It was awesome. That was one of the first strong promptings I had in awhile. Right place right time!!! WOO WOO!!

The next one happened like 5 minutes later! We were driving down the road. We found a roundabout! Oh man! If you know me at all, you know I love me some roundabouts!  so, naturally we went around a few times just because sometimes you need to have fun! 

I didn't know which way I wanted to get out though.. but Flume St. caught my eye so we headed down there. I remembered a referral lived on that street. We hadn't contacted her for awhile so we stopped by. I had to park a little down the road. So as we were walking up to this apartment building thing, this guy was sitting on a bench outside. We just kinda watched us walk up. We said hello and proceeded to push the button and talk to the lady. 

We were treated by a "WHO IS IT!?" "The Sister Missionaries" "DO NOT COME BACK!!"   typical! We just told her to have a good day and started talking to this guy in the bench. Well, it was super cool because he said he was interested in religion and that he was kind of looking for something but he doesn't really know what. He told us he would love to talk but his ride was going to be there any second. 

So obviously, we were so stoked! Then, this old guy comes out of the building and starts talking to us. He told us that the Book Of Mormon doesn't go with the Bible at all. He asked us what happens after we die. I told him we go to what we call the spirit world and tried to explain more but he WAS NOT going to hear it.  goodness me. 

Then he was like well! Jesus, after He died, went to "hell" and taught spirits to release them. Then He was resurrected! *MajorFacePalm*  I kinda laughed to myself because he literally just confirmed everything we tried to explain. But he was not going to have it. We tried to get away a million times. Meanwhile, the guy who actually wants to learn, is slowly moving away and a car pulls up. Sister Whitesell and I both just prayed that it wasn't his and that he would stay close enough. 

Well, after we got done talking to that lovely gentlemen... we went back over to Ron (the guy who was actually interested) and walked with him over to the corner away from the other guy. We gave him a BOM and exchanged info. It was super cool!!!! Again! Right place right time! The best part is Satan did EVERYTHING in his power to make us lose Ron! BUT WE GOT HIM!!! Hah!!!!  So satisfying!  huge miracle! ️

Then! We met Alicia! We had tried to see her mom earlier. We met her last week but she missed our appt that morning. So we felt like we should go back! So we did! We didn't find Diane,  it we met Alicia!  she's super edgy! Green and purple hair, piercings, tattoos, ya know! All that stuff! She was like the nicest person ever!! We shared a message with her. She said she hasn't found a church because she feels like none of them accept her and come look down upon her because of her appearance. Well! We told her ours is very welcoming and don't care what you look like on the outside! What matters is what's in your heart! She seemed super grateful for that. She said she would come, but unfortunately, didn't make it.  but! It was a miracle that we met her. ️ we have an appointment this week with them.

Last but not least, is Don and Jonella! Sunday we were finding just before din din. Something about an former investigators background info caught my eye. Weird because everything about it woulda normally turned me away! So we found this complex. It didn't have a number so we were planning on just tracting it because it was like 10 apartments! No biggy! Since it was fast Sunday, we were both a little less than energetic and weren't really feeling it. So I was going to look up another address, but my google maps just died on me! 

Sooo! We talked about it and realized this is where we needed to be. So we started tracting and no one answered for the first couple doors. Then across the parking lot, a lady comes out. Well, you see, you don't have a second to lose! So I basically yelled across the parking lot to her!  she was super nice! We talked and got to know her and then Don came out and he was hard core Catholic but SUPER awesome! We talked to them about things but they were just headed out. Jonella was like yeah!! Please come back! We want to know what you guys have to say! Don agreed so we set a time with them! After they left we knocked on a few more doors, no one answered except a guy who wasn't interested! So that's where we needed to be! ️ 

We taught Mariah this week! She is really struggling with her living situation.. She isn't able to find a place to live because she only gets 50 bucks a month, she's trying to find a job but no luck, going to school, taking care of Julia basically all the time.. so I think she is probably a little discouraged because if she isn't keeping the commandments she can't get baptized until we talk to President Ward about it! So that's the plan! We are praying that it will work out since they are not even together anymore.. so. Yeah. Pray for her. It's hard for her right now. She's so solid though! ️ 

Fun tracting story! So a week or 2 ago we went to this complex, knocked on this door and this lady answered and seemed interested. She asked the man there and he was super not nice... Haha. So we really wanted to go back to see if we could catch just her. So we went back. Welp, it was just him.  for heaven sakes, it was so dramatic! So he opens the door and sees it's us and he's like "I don't believe I'm your (insert word here)!!! (Insert more words here.....) Go kick rocks!!!" Slams the door and punches it! 

 Wooooow! It was so amazing to me that two 20 year old girls with a certain name tag could make a grown man SO mad.. it was unbelievable! We just laughed it off though! Haha. It was the first time I had had the F bomb thrown at me 4 times within 10 seconds at the door.  welcome to the mish!  good rejection story though! Haha. 

Well!! That's probably all the stories for this week! Everything else is going really well!! Mija and I are getting along great! We have deep gospel conversations all the time and get so much out of it! We have so much fun! I'm so grateful for her! 

My spiritual thought today! Something I read last night triggered this thing I heard in Gospel Doctrine a couple weeks ago. (We go there when no 'gators make it...) We were talking about the kingdoms of glory. They talked about who is going where. Something really struck me. We talked about how not all members of the church will make it to the Celestial Kingdom. There will be some we know, perhaps very well, that will not make it to the Celestial Kingdom. It made me realize on a deeper level that making and keeping covenants is essential. 

When we are able to do our best to keep our covenants, which includes repenting when we fall short, we will be worthy to enter into the rest of the Lord! It is only through diligence, obedience, meekness and humility that we make it to our Father's presence. It's a scary thing to think about that just because your a member of the true church doesn't mean you get a free ride... OH no! 

You are held to a higher standard! Now that you have the truth, you are expected to live it to the best of your ability! And of course we will mess up and fall short. Heavenly Father knows that and that's why He called our Savior, Jesus Christ in our pre-mortal existence. It's all part of the plan! But we have to pull our weight in The Plan to make it work how Heavenly Father intended it. My goal when I come home is to continue to be an instrument in the Lords hands and not take things for granted, as we so easily do as members.. anyway! Just food for thought. It really struck me and I felt like sharing. ️ 

I love you guys! Have a great week! 

Love, 

Sister Hood! 

 Let Him shine through you!

PHOTOS FOR YOUR PLEASURE & ENJOYMENT!!

Linda sicked us on some weeds!!
Sister Whitesell & Sister Hood

Ready to take it DOWN...HAH!!
Sister Hood

GETTING IN SOME SERVICE TODAY!!
Sister Hood & Sister Whitesell
The Elder's and Linda's family

GOD BLESS AMERICA!!

HAPPY 4TH EVERYONE ~
BLESSED TO BE AN AMERICAN!!

She thinks she is so TOUGH!!
Sister Whitesell & Sister Hood

SERVICE DAY ~ THE CHICO ZONE