BOO!!!!

How was everyone's Halloween?! Hope you all got boatloads of candy so that you get super fat and all of your teeth rot out!!! Just kidding that is probably going to be me because Sister Roundy's family sent us a package FULL of candy and popcorn and goodies and fun Halloween stuff! And we didn't get to do any trick or treating or anything because on both Friday and Saturday our whole mission had to be inside their apartments by 6. Apparently New Jersey has this thing on the night before Halloween called Mischief Night where a lot of people cause trouble and pull pranks, and in the sketchier areas it can get pretty bad. So we watched a ton of The District training videos and did weekly planning in that time... It was pretty rad.

But guess what the HIGHLIGHT of the week was? ALEXIS GOT BAPTIZED AND CONFIRMED!!!!!! Wednesday night was her baptism and it was absolutely just soooo beautiful! Her parents both came to support her and the spirit was sooo strong! Everything went so well and so many people came for it! Then Sunday was her confirmation, and even though it was a little bit harder to feel the Spirit and stuff because of all the CRYING BABAIES it was still awesome. And an added bonus was that our other investigator Chris came to both the Baptism and Confirmation too!! It was so funny because the Bishop was teasing him after the baptism and said that if he wanted to jump in to, there was still some water in the font! But then Chris told us later that afterwards when he was driving home he remembered that and almost turned around to take up the offer!!!! THE FRUMPY?! Heavenly Father blessed me with a really special experience though, because when we went to see Alexis a couple days after her baptism and talk about the Gift of the Holy Ghost, the craziest feeling came over me. She was just sitting there talking to us about the experiences she had at the baptism, and I just started to leak tears out of my eyes!!! It kept happening the whole lesson every time she would start to talk!! At one point she even asked if  I needed a Benadryl for allergies or anything, but the spirit was touching me so strongly! It was as if Heavenly Father was giving me a glimpse of how precious she was to Him, and how much He loved her. He has some truly wonderful and honorable things planned for her in His kingdom, and He was so overjoyed that she was able to get baptized and access the blessings He has for her. I cannot wait to see  how she continues to progress, because I know that she is one of His elect and chosen daughters. It was so amazing!!! I don't know what I am going to do when I leave this area... hopefully that will never happen haha

Oh! And btw I forgot to tell you about an amazing miracle we had last week! So it was our walking day where we can't use our car, and we couldn't get a ride home from one of our appointments, so we were walking for days back to our apartment. Well, we were probably only a few minutes from home when we passed this lady with two young children. We kept walking, but then I felt the nagging!! So I knew we had to go back, but I should have followed that prompting earlier, because right then we crossed the cross walk and then had to wait for the little white walking man to light up again before we could go back to find her. BUT SHE WAS GONE!!!! She had disappeared from off the face of the earth! And I started panicking because this had happened before where I didn't heed the prompting right away, and then we could never find the people again! So we started walking and looking, and we ended up at the crossroads of a couple stores, and we had no idea where she would have gone, but standing there wouldn't do anything, so we decided to go in the biggest store right in front of us, and we were just PRAYING that we would somehow find her. So we walk in, and start walking and looking down the isles, and then she was there right in front of us with the two kids!!! We went right up to her and started talking. Her name is Barbara and she is a nanny for those two little kids. She was raised Catholic, but was really receptive when we told her who we were and about what we believed. Meanwhile, this random lady passes us having this conversation in the store and says "Hi, Sisters!" And we were like WHAT??? Because unless you are a member, no one in Jersey calls us "sisters" like that. But we were like oh hi whatever and kept talking to Barbara. The spirit prompted us to tell her that we passed her on the street a while ago (and she nodded like she remembered) and that we felt like we needed to come back to find her and talk to her because Heavenly Father wanted us to tell her that He loves her very much and He is aware of her. At that point her face kind of turned red, and she said that was amazing and really meant a lot to her because she had been having a really hard time lately. Just then, that lady that passed us came back up behind us and handed Sister Roundy and I both $20 bills, and said have lunch on me tomorrow and then walked away!!!! WHAT?!?!?! WHAT IN THE FRUMPY JUST HAPPENED?!?!?! We were like wait what what do we do? We didn't want to chase after her and leave Barbara, but what just happened? We had never seen her before, and have never seen her since, but it was a miracle. We turned back to Barbara and she was just like woah... what was that.... we have no idea.... But then we left a Book of Mormon with her, our phone number, and the address to the church, and invited her to come to church on Sunday. She seemed really positive about it all, but I had the prompting to do more and ask for her contact information so that we could set up a time to go and see her.... but guess what... I didn't.... For some reason I kept telling myself that we had done enough and that was good.... But NO!!!! We left the store to look for that one lady who gave us the money and couldn't find her, but decided to kneel down on the grass and say a prayer of gratitude. When we looked up, I saw Barbara and the two kids walking again, and AGAIN I go the prompting to get her information, but AGAIN I ignored it. WHY??? WHY DID I IGNORE IT?! I don't even know... I have no excuse... I guess I thought that I had followed enough promptings for the day, and we had seen enough miracles... but we haven't seen her or heard from her since... she said the street she lives on... but we contacted half of it and no one knew her... hopefully the other half will allow us to find her. Moral of the story: NEVER go halfway!!! Heavenly Father knows what you are capable of, and that is why He guides you in what to do in His work. ALWAYS follow through with whatever you start, and never tell yourself the lie that you have done enough to be satisfied with, because in the end, you will know that you could have given more. It is like running a race, when you finish with energy still in you, you will always regret that you didn't give more to run faster.  Believe me, I know exactly how that feels... It is scary to give all, but when we do, we find the greatest rewards. Moral of the story number 2: Your desires to follow promptings will always be satisfied as you practice acting on them. Even though I had a delayed reaction to following the prompting, He still blessed us to find Barbara again. It is never too late to start following the promptings of the Spirit!

Anyways, sorry I have taken up 8 hours again, but I am loving the work here!!! It is great and I am learning so much! Thank you for all of you who have written me and prayed for me! I truly feel it, and Heaven knows I definitely need it! I love you all sooooooooooOOOOOO much and pray for you too! But I mostly pray that you are all spiritually safe and close to the Lord. Now I know how Alma felt when He saw the sons of Mosiah again when he was most joyful when he found out that they were all still his brothers in Christ. PLEASE DONT EVER LEAVE CHRIST!!!!!! Or else I will be really sad and have to beat you with the Iron Rod. Ok anyways I love you so much and hope everything is well!

BT THE WAY!!! In 3 days I will be 3 months old!!!! WHAT?!?!?! when did this happen!??!?! Time is going WHEY to fast.... I am going to start getting wrinkles...

Love you alllllll!!!!!!!