Wanna Hear A Joke? 😏

Knock knock. Who's there?

"THE SISTER MISSIONARIES FROM THE CHURCH OF JESUS CHRIST OF LATTER-DAY SAINTS!" (Ya better open up) jk :) but really. 

Hahaha. I just made that up. Good one, right? ;) HAPPY MONDAY!!

Monday was so oober fun!! Is oober a word? Haha I don't even know. We had our zone activity at the Huntsman's house which was so funny! It's always such a blast to be with the Huntsman fam. They have the most beautiful family too! Gah. It's unreal. It was raining most of the time so there wasn't the usual volleyball tournament, but we all ate good food, they had pumpkin pie (BLESSINGS) from Costco too ;) (THANK YOU SISTER HUNTSMAN!) we talked and played games, emailed, and sister Bennett and I rode their bikes! It was a fabulous p day! And it got even better from there! We had dinner with the Clark family, which literally feels like home being with them! Sister Clark is HUH-LARIOUS. She definitely reminds me of the Aunties on dads side of the family. Haha, and brother Clark is like a chef so we ate wayy good! He makes the best rolls ever. It reminded me of your good food MA ;) That night, we contacted a referral from the Lakeridge 1st sisters.... And they are SOLIDDD!! Pam, the mom became a new investigator, and her two daughters have been going to church in the Lakeridge Ward with their neighbors for 2-3 years. SAY WHATT?! The daughters love the church and young women's! They even went to girls camp. What the?! Plus, the family has a ton of LDS friends. Sis B and I kept thinking, how have missionaries not been over here?! It was a HUGE miracle guys. MAN, day after day, my testimony just grows and grows. I KNOW that God works miracles. He is always there. I am so eternally grateful for His love and blessings.

Tuesday we had district meeting! IN A FOREST. Yep. That's right. In a forest. haha It was so awesome!! And super peaceful too. We had it in one of the elders backyard forest because the elders don't have cars, and we use a ton of miles to pick them up and drive them to the church and la di da di da.... So we got permission to have it in their backyard. Which is a forest haha! SO SO FUN!! Later we called this number of our investigator, but turns out it was the number of a man who lives in Hawaii! His name was Nate and he was very nice. We tried to share the gospel and get missionaries over there but he said he wasn't very interested. Ahaha after I finished the conversation with him, Sister Orr, one of the sisters we live with, was like "you should be a receptionist!" Haha maybe I'll look into that! ;) just kidding, not for me haha. We stopped by the library to prepare for the activity Thursday night, and we had an AMAZING lesson with Kendall and Alana!! Sister Clark and her daughter were able to come and it was just so miraculous. We invited them to be baptized once they feel this message is true, and they said maybe! I sure hope so, I mean come on they've been going to church for like 2 years now and they love it! I'm telling ya... They are SO PREPARED. They were a complete miracle sent from heaven. Testimony builder: THERE ARE PREPARED PEOPLE everywhere! All over the world. In every area. We just gotta put in the effort to find them, and God takes care of the rest. :) Later we had dinner with the Franklin family and then knocked on their neighbors door. We met Bill, who has a super cool life story and a strong faith in Christ. He has such a GOOD heart!! He wasn't very interested in switching churches, but he said he had heard of the Book of Mormon, but has never had one. We happily gave him one! ;) and he was so grateful to receive it, it was so cool to see that. 

Wednesday was so great! Started out right, with morning studies! As always ;) nothing better to start out your day than by reading the Scriptures. Especially the Book of Mormon. Seriously. I. LOVE. THAT. BOOK!! Love IT!! In comp study, we were sharing what we learned in studies and I shared how I read about Ammon protecting King Lamoni's flocks and I said "okay sister. Ammon is BAE." Sister Bennett thought that was funny ahah. But it's so true! There are so many spiritual STUDS in the scriptures. I can't wait to meet them all one day! Then we had to mow the lawn. Which is seriously kind of fun! Haha living in this house is preparing me to do all these housey things when I have my own home! It's great! :) The rest of the day we saw so many miracles! We were blessed to talk with so many amazing people. We contacted Melanie, who we've been trying to meet with forever. We contacted a few referrals, people were so kind and actually talked WITH US for more than a few minutes about God. We set up two return appointments with people we hadn't had the chance to meet with yet. Had a DE-LISH dinner at the Storey's home! Which they have the cutest grandkids ever. The little two year old wanted to sit as close as she could to me when we were eating, and she just wanted to talk to me non stop haha she would keep tapping my arm with her sticky hands to try and get my attention haha CUTEST. I LOVE KIDS! They make you feel so loved :') THEN we met an awesome woman named Rita who lives across the street from our dinner appointment. She was a 72 year old crack up! She didn't look a day over 60. She wasn't interested in converting but she sure showed us great love and respect. We had a great conversation. We asked if she knew anyone who might benefit from our message about Christ and she mentioned her neighbors but they might be busy, and they were pretty religious. Then she said "but you could try! There's nothing wrong with knocking!" AMEN TO THAT RITA!! Then she said this, "If you don't knock, you don't learn. If you don't talk you never know where you're going in life." Wise woman, wise words! I love her she was so sassy and fun-loving. I seriously just love people.

Thursday sister Bennett was not feeling well so she slept the majority of the day and I finished preparations for our YW lesson and listened to Mormon messages all day! It was really peaceful and relaxing. Then we went out to dinner with Sister Cuesta! She took us to Moes. Kinda like Costa Vida! She was hilarious. She's from Columbia and she just is so funny! Then we went to young women's! The Prince William Ward asked us to conduct a "district meeting" for their young women. It was SO FUN. Oh my lands! It was a blast! We recited our purpose, sista B and I each did a training, I taught about the restoration and we did practice teaching, they even got their own name tags! Light bulb moment: It's so cool because the only thing that I remember from my setting apart blessing (I wrote down some other things from the blessing too but pretty sure I left that list at home. Nice one sister Hymas haha.) is that I would work with a lot of youth on my mission. And it's SO TRUEEE!! I have worked with a ton of youth on my mission so far, and it seriously so fun. I love teaching them. It's cool to see specific blessings come to pass..!! :) and then at the end of the activity, we had like a question and answer missionary panel where some return sister missionaries came and the girls all asked us questions. Throughout the whole time they were talking about their missions and how it was a huge blessing and it changed their lives... I was just thinking to myself: soon it's going to be ME saying "oh I remember when I was on my mission..." It's just so crazy that missions really do fly by. I can't even believe it!! Being with those young women and hearing the stories and testimonies of those RM sisters strengthened and uplifted me so much. It reminded me to live in the moment and of how grateful I am to be serving a mission and to have this sacred opportunity to be the Lords full time missionary for 18 months. Tears just welled up in my eyes and my heart burned and I just felt overwhelmed with gratitude. I seriously love my mission. I cannot explain how beautiful and wonderful it's been, every up and every down has made it the most glorious experience. It is so true that the experiences you have on your mission are to help you become the person God needs you to be. I can testify of that, in the name of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, Amen.

Friday was super great! We planned and finally finished planning! Usually never happens. Then we went to go drop off invites to people about general conference women's broadcast!! We stopped by Kate's and then went to go knock on her neighbors door. The guy was super uninterested and his little dog started yapping at us. We left and the dog followed us nipping at sister Bennetts ankles! I was thinkin" get yo lil dog off my companion!" I felt super bad for her. He wasn't very nice. Reminded me of how much dad loves those dogs hahah. ;) NOT! Then we stopped by one of our investigators, Tami. Her house was super dark like all the other houses in this area. We were planning on knocking or sticking the invite on the door. Well we almost get to the porch, it's pitch black when all of a sudden we hear, "oh my goodness! Y'all scared me!" Oh my I BOUT HAD A HEART ATTACK and went ninja status. She was sitting on her porch stairs smoking. And that is why you use flash lights boys and girls. So ya don't die. Lesson learned. Haha the rest of the evening was safe no worries :) we just got barked at by a ton of dogs again. Dogs just really don't like me in this area. Whatevs.

Saturday we cleaned the Eng's home in the morning, it needed to be done! And they were coming home for the evening. It was so fun too! We played music and everything, it was just like Saturday morning chores in the Hymas home :) never thought I'd love cleaning so much! ;) ma and dad taught me well. Then we went and got.... FLU SHOTTSSS! Tis the season everyone! Get your flu shots! :) then we went finding and met the kindest people! We met a woman named Josephine who I KNOW and could feel she was prepared, even if she didn't know it. She said she would read the restoration pamphlet and let us know but.... You betcha we are going back anyway :) haha AND she gave us water!! So kind :)

We were able to go to dinner with Serena and other ladies in the Ward right before the general women's broadcast. We ate Chinese food and I DOWNED what I got haha man I was so hungry. Who knew! I sure didn't know I was super hungry. Sometimes ya just want to eat a whole feast. No big deal haha. Then.... The best part of the day. We got to watch the general women's broadcast. IT WAS SOO GOOD. MAN. and I just love President Monson! He is the cutest ever. He is looking thin, but that didn't stop him from blowing a kiss or two and waving goodbye like he's usually does. :) I know he is a prophet of God. I know the apostles and leaders of the church are called of God. I absolutely loved Pres. Uchtdorf's talk on Faith. He was so bold, but so loving. It was something I needed to hear, especially as a missionary. 

Sunday was so wonderful. Church was just amazing as usual! I love the Bristow Ward. They seriously have your back like no other. It's one big family!! They take such good care of us. We also were able to go into primary and talk about missionary work with them! We did a little practice teaching and had the kids be missionaries with us, it was awesome! Then we had lunch with the Roderick fam, FUNNIEST family ever. We ate breakfast for lunch=CLASSIC. And then we contacted a few referrals! We had member present lesson, but then the investigator dropped us. She will come around one day though :) it's a part member family. Then we tried to contact Josie, a NI, but she wasn't home. However we met her two daughters who became new investigators! We shared the plan of salvation pamphlet with them and how families are eternal and ordained of God. I think it is one of the coolest things to watch people's countenances change from when you first start talking with them compared to the end of the conversation. It's amazing what the Spirit does. He softens and changes hearts. It's miraculous. The same thing happened with Sister Cooper! Who we popped on over to, she's their neighbor who is a less active we have been trying to contact this whole transfer. Well guess what. SHE WAS HOME. THAT never happens!! It was so amazing and I know that where we needed to be at that time was in that neighborhood at those two homes. We talked with her for a few minutes because she was in the middle of a conference call. We talked about general conference and invited her to watch it and she said she had never missed one! Isn't that amazing?! I was like: Say WHAA?! So so cool :) 

We have seriously seen so many miracles this week. It makes me want to cry and just burst into song because of all the miracles we have seen! There really are wonderful things that happen each day. It's so easy to look on the downside of things and work yourself into a Negative-Nelly mess. That is exactly what Satan wants you to do. However, no matter what evil is going on in the world, and how dark it may seem in life sometimes, "there is no darkness so dense, so menacing, or so difficult that it cannot be overcome by light." -Elder Vern P. Stanfill. Light always overcomes the dark. Good always overcomes the bad. Counting your blessings and looking for miracles WILL always cheer you up. 

Dearest family and friends, I can tell you and testify to you that GOD IS GOOD. He works miracles in our daily lives. He is kind and loving. He is merciful. He is sweet. He is our Father in Heaven and He truly wants us to be happy. Because of Him and His son, we can be. 

Look for the miracles daily! They are ALWAYS there, I promise you. :)

In the name of our Savior, Jesus Christ, amen.

Xoxoxox

LOVE LOVE LOVE,

SISTA HYMAS :)

Quote of the week-

"The refiners fire is real, and qualities of character and righteousness that are forged in the furnace of affliction perfect and purify us and prepare us to meet God." -Elder Quentin L. Cook

The trials we go through are meant for us. They are preparing us to meet God again. Its kind of weird, but I am so grateful for them. :)

We had to take a serious picture. Turned out kind of scary. It looks like it should go on a scary movie cover haha.

Just a sista and her machete