Feliz Ano!

Hola mi familia y amigos!

This past week was crazy! We had a lot of time off because of the New Year- we went in early on New Years Eve and made some flower headbands and tons of treats and hung out with the Carrols and our favorite Senior couple, the Smiths, who live in our apartment complex for a bit! 

The next day on New Years Day was SUPER P DAY! We had the whole day to do whatever we wanted! Including watching a movie :) So we started our day at the Kinley's for breakfast because they're the best and then we watched a Disney movie with them and chopped some wood afterwards. I have learned on my mission that I LOVE chopping wood. Who would've guessed? We went to the church later to check out our big Zone Pday where they were playing games. It was okay, we aren't that close to anyone in our zone here so after a few hours and after they started Monster's University without us we decided to go back to the Kinley's! So we went back and watched Monster's University with them and it was great! I love that family so much!

 Thursday was a little rough because it was my BFF Lindsay's wedding day and I just wanted to be there so bad! The Lord knew I was struggling so he made sure to keep us busy all day! We went and saw our best friend Carolyn who lives in a nursing home and is handicapped, she is the sweetest and funniest person ever! It's her 51st birthday today! Happy Birthday Carolyn! We also went and saw a less active family and in the middle of talking to them their daughter's boyfriend came out of their room and stood behind us and when I turned around I almost had a heart attack from fright and laughter- he was just standing there holding his giant sheath- like grim reaper style! I guess he does a lot of like larping and stuff and so he just wanted to show off his cool props to us! Later that night we had an amazing lesson with Elsa and Angel- these really sweet people with 5 kids. We went in just wanting to get to know them and ended up teaching the Restoration and they said they wanted to know for themselves that these things are true and so they said they would read from the Book of Mormon. I am so excited to go back and visit them this week.

We spent our whole Friday night with one of my favorite couples ever. They are members but have decided that they are atheist now. They are the sweetest and kindest people I have ever met! We had a really good conversation with them about so many things. They have two cats Zooey and Patches who are the cutest things ever! I just love them!

Saturday we had some really amazing miracles.

We tried a bunch of people in the afternoon but no one was home so we went to go check on our favorite widow Sister Duplechain who's 90. Well, when we got there she told us that she was out of a lot of things and was too tired to go that day so she was planning to go on Monday. Well, we had a huge storm coming and it's actually like 8 degrees right now- and so we told her she probably wouldn't be able to go on her own on Monday. We were able to run to the store for her and get some things she needed and it just made me feel good to know that we were at the right place at the right time and were able to serve Sister Duplechain in that way.

That night we went to Walmart because that is where we find a lot of Spanish people. When we pulled up I just felt super emotional and I had this feeling that there was someone in Walmart that we really really had to find, someone was waiting for us. So we walk in and there are like no Hispanics anywhere! We are walking down the isles and I see this mother of 4 little boys walk by and I had a huge feeling that we needed to talk to her. So we tried to figure out how we walked up to her and started talking to her about her boys- who were ADORABLE! One of them is 4 and his name is Shay-Shay and he would not let go of my waist from the moment we walked up until 5 minutes later when we said bye! Well, Lisa is the mom and when she found out who we were, she said that she had been meeting with the missionaries a lot earlier last year and really loved it but when they got new missionaries in the area she stopped hearing from them. She invited us to come over anytime and said she is looking forward to seeing us! Miracle! 

We met a lot of other people that night too and it's just amazing what happens when you simply open your mouth and try to get to know people. I love getting to know people and their stories.  

Sunday was freezing and it was raining and then snowing all day! That night we went to go visit our dear friend Juliana when we noticed our two little pup pups were still outside. Our little puppy friends are these dogs who live across from Juliana- they're just little guys and they are always outside with no shelter and it breaks our hearts. We named them Pheobe and Little-Foot. Well, when we were checking on Pheobe and Little-Foot and about to go to Juliana's this little pug runs up to us and a man is behind her and tells us that her name is Lucy! The man starts talking to us and he was so interesting! His name is Troy and he had bought the house he's in now for $100! Some old lady just really wanted to get rid of it and it had a lot of work to be done on it because it's old so she sold it to him for $100! He gave us a tour of his house with his cute mom sleeping on the couch who had just gotten back from the hospital, poor thing. He showed us pictures of his motorcycles and pictures of his children and grandchildren and really opened up and shared some of his stories with us. He used to be an archaeologist which I freaked out about because that's what I want to do! He said he would maybe show us sometime how to make arrowheads out of rocks with antlers! We also had a really good conversation about the Book of Mormon and the story of Joseph Smith. We gave him a copy of the BOM and he said he would truly read it. 

I am grateful for the people that Heavenly Father lead us to this week. I am so grateful for the opportunity that I have to meet so many people and hear of their unique and amazing stories and really get to see them as our Heavenly Father sees them and loves them. 

I am so grateful for the example that Jesus Christ has given us. To go and just love others with no other intentions and no judgement. One of my goals this year is to find ways to truly love others as the Savior did and take time to truly get to know every person and hear their story. I know that we draw closer to the love of God as we make an effort to love others as purely as the Savior did.

I hope that all of you see this year as a bright new start and have found ways to improve and be happier!

Love y'all!

Hermana Knight