"A Savior is Born" For Me & You :)

Something Good: Hi everyone!! Sorry it has been a bit, but I will do some catch up!!

The past few weeks have been awesome in Lynn Haven!! This area has been somewhat slow, but with the Spirit's help we are finding and talking to everyone!! Something good about the South...everyone loves Jesus!! It is awesome to be here around the Christmas Holiday because we talk to so many people who think Jesus is awesome, which makes talking about his birth even better! We have been loving giving out this pass along card with a video...christmas.mormon.org (Go watch it!) It is one of my favorite videos ever! The Gospel is the Good news to the World, so thankful for the Savior for giving himself to us. He sure is something good to talk about! Ah!!! My wonderful people in Gulf Breeze, Paul and Paula, have set a BCD (Baptism Commitment Date)!! Ahhhh!! I am so excited for them and so proud! And so thankful to have been a missionary to find and introduce the Gospel to them, to watch them change and to feel their incredible love for us and for the Church develop and blossom! So thankful to have planted that seed and know that it grew into fruit! I hope to see them again and rejoice with them in their decision - maybe they will come to Lynn Haven - only a two hour drive! :) Another good things! I sang in our ward church choir on Sunday! My first time ever singing in a church choir before..ha! It was super fun!

Some other good things! We had a "Half Mission Conference," a Christmas conference in Tallahassee with half our mission, which was so great, it is kinda nice to know other missionaries and get to see them again!Here is a picture of me and my girls from the MTC, Sister Laub and Sister Rinlisbacher!! (Re: April 27, 2015 blog post)

This is a photo with Sister Stewart and I and Sister Kirton and her companion. She was serving with us in Gulf Breeze and was transferred to Dothan. So nice to see her again!

And here is our beloved Sister Smith, our "Mission Mom" at our Christmas Half Mission Conference. Sure love her!

And here is a group of smiling Sister missionaries at the conclusion of the conference, with Sister Smith at the back left. What a great group of friends, these Sister Missionaries! I am so blessed to be here!

Oh yes! Our ward is getting way into Family History! This photo was sent to my mom from Angie Jones, who was at the FH center (Insert texted comments from Sister Jones about Sister Nielson, "I was in the FHC with your daughter when she picked up a magnified plastic. She was so cute!! She IS adorable and we LOVE her! Such a great companionship too. She and Sis Stewart make a great team!") This new emphasis is awesome for us because coming up we will get to go around places and share a short message about FH and we get to have time to work on our own FH! I really am starting to love it. We are helping a lady find her family on Family Search. It has been such a good learning and wonderful experience for me. Thankful for FH! :)

Something Funny: IT IS NOW FALL! It is funny to me how the weather works here! Also kinda weird that there is no snow whatsoever! But we do have our own kind of Florida snow...Sand!? Ha! Well Sister Stewart and I walked ALL day on day..you can imagine me...DYING. Haha, but we found an orange tree with oranges on it...went to the door and asked if we could pick some oranges! The man who answered was so nice and totally let us have oranges! Oh the people in the South...so genuinely kind and generous.

Speaking of kind Southerners, we have a good friend named Tiff, we met her at Chick-fil-a, she is probably one of the sweetest ladies I have ever met. She always helps us and calls us, "My loves." Oh she is just so cute! We always are able to share messages with her. Honestly, we go to Chick-fil-a just for her...:) I just love all these wonderful nice people in the area!

So these past few weeks, one of the things we get to do is walk a LOT with real paper maps. Sometimes we have to duck into a place that sells food and try to figure out where we are and how to get to where we are going!

And we try to be friendly and smile at everyone, and bring a bit of happiness to them, too, even if we get photo-bombed in the process. Something Spiritual: Sister Stewart and I had a cool spiritual experience a few weeks ago which strengthened both of us. During planning we decided to go through our former investigators. So we do, and we see a name...Carolyne. Well Carolyne has a lot of history with the missionaries. Well, one day we felt like we should go see her and meet her, so we do, and we knock on the door. She opens the door and starts freaking out...in a good way! She told us she was struggling a lot and just picked up her Book of Mormon, was about to read it when we knocked on the door. She kept saying, "I can't believe this!" So we go in and have a great lesson with her.We talked about faith and love and humility, and how much her Savior loves her. Carolyne is so awesome. She just knows her Savior, and if someone loves the Savior so much...it would be Carolyne. We are so excited to start teaching her and helping her come to Christ..when actually she helps us come to Him! :) I am just so thankful for her and her open heart to learn!

I am also so thankful for the people who have opened their hearts and homes to us. One is Megan Morse, who invited Sister Stewart and I over for a filet mignon dinner on Dec 22. We needed the strength that came from this good meal and the warmth of the love of her family.

There is something so wonderful about children at Christmastime especially. You feel their innocence and love, their trust and their simple and real faith in our Savior, Jesus Christ.

I am grateful to the families who have fed us, encouraged us, and let us be of service to them. But really, they are giving us service. At Christmas, when missionaries are far from their families, it is really easy to get homesick and miss those we would be with at Christmas at home. So it is so nice when we can be invited into the homes of good people who share their families with us as missionaries far from home. So I just want to say THANK YOU to all the families and good people out there who feed and love the missionaries. Thanks for taking care of each of us. May you be blessed for your kindness and generosity. I am sure the Lord loves you for it.

And speaking of service, Sister Stewart and I got to help Megan Morse decorate for the Lynn Haven ward Relief Society Christmas evening. We even got to go with her to Hobby Lobby to get some decorating things. And good thing that Sis Stewart was there to keep us on track, because Megan and I love decorating, so we got distracted as we were shopping. Here is a little bit of the decorating on the stage behind us. I took this selfie with Megan's phone and she texted it to my mom. Something Learned: As many of you know, I am learning a lot lately...some things are harder to learn than others but I am figuring it out! Missions are definately places where you learn a lot about yourself and about the Lord. One of the biggest things I have learned this month is, Sacrifice. I have always kinda thought this word was scary and all, but really it isn't. I am thankful for a Savior for giving himself to me and to all of us, so that one day we can become and be like him. This Christmas season has been one of my favorites, I have focused more on the Savior than I ever have before and I am so thankful for the time I get to do so. I am so thankful for the best gift given to the world. A Savior. He is kind, he is loving and he is forgiving. So blessed. :) And He is the Light of the World. No wonder we celebrate Him and the way we want to follow him by giving and serving others during this season. He lights up our lives. He gives us reason to rejoice!

Hope y'all had a Blessed and Merry Christmas!! I love each y'all big!! To everyone who has sent me encouraging and sweet words, thank you so much. I love you all. <3 Sis Nielson