Christ is in the bindings of Christmas

**Questions for our Missionary**

You've been sick this weekend?  Are your feet staying dry in all that rain?  Let me know!

I'm doing well with the cold, we are trying to just stay warm because unless we are dead there is no way we can stay inside haha and yeah I have medicine. My boots get wet everyday haha I am still figuring that one out, they probably will just have to dry each night until it snows, then it will be easier.
I thought about what you said about sending Amazon food. If you are also able to send like noodles and canned things that would be a blessing too :) 

**I went to your friend Hannah Eaton's mission call opening last night!  It was awesome**

I just got back from Hannah ' s house where she opened her mission call. It came yesterday and she held off until tonight to open it! Can you imagine W.a.i.t.i.n.g? Wow. Okay....drumroll.....
Jackson, Mississippi. English speaking. She reports FEBRUARY 10TH.  She leaves in like 44 days....! Anyway, I thought you would want to know.

Oh my goodness thank you so much for telling me! I was wondering when she was leaving! She will be so close to me in the field! Yes if you are able to get her email I would much appreciate it! 

And thank you for the Christmas package ! It was so great to stretch out Christmas even longer :) 

Dear Fam,
This week was a long and odd week. It was full of fun moments and miracles.
On Tuesday we worked so hard that we ended up talking to 45 peopleyay! We set up return appointments and ended up running into somereally nice people!On Wednesday we had the ward Christmas bowling party! It was so fun!We brought our investigator Gary to the party and he bowled with themembers and it was so much fun! I would have won but one of the elderswon by having had previous experience in bowling in high school :/haha oh well!Thursday was an interesting day because it was Christmas Eve! No onewas here for Christmas Eve but we walked down a road and tracted alittle bit and we're finding no success so we walked back to our bikesand a truck pulls into a driveway and two men get out. We go up andask if we can share a Christmas video with him. He accept and said hehad talked to Mormons and has a Mormon best friend who has shared thegospel with him! So cool! He accepted a pamphlet and said to stop bysometime. It was very cool! Also we had district meeting and ourdistrict leader helped us to understand the purpose of our study's andhow it prepares us for helping our investigators for salvation. It wasso inspiring that my study's have been so much better and we have beenable to have meaningful study's :)And on Christmas! It was so fun! We got to wake up and after westudied and opened gifts we skypes our families! Yay! I missed myfamily so much! My brother grew 5 inches since I have been gone andnow I'm the dwarf of the family haha :) I told my family that I lovedthem and that I would see them in about 4 months :)( may 4!) . Afterskyping we were invited over to the walkers' and they served us lunchand we played a picture ha,e with them. Then cute old sister walkersays "I have so many dolls up in the attic that I just don't know whatto do with them!" So we asked if we could see them and we ran right upstairs. There were 7 boxes of porcelain and other types of dolls. Ikept telling sister Ferrell that this was the reason I did not likedolls, was because they are super creepy! Haha we had a good laugh atsome of the really old ones she had that the eyes were yellowed andone eye would fall by the other stayed normal....creepy Christmasmoment! :)Then we were invited to visit with the Thompson's for dinner! It was ablast, the Stephan family was also there and we all ate some deliciousfood and played 'Mormon mouth' which is the LDS  version of mad gab! Ikept getting my tongue twisted and then just spouting off randomphrases as I couldn't even guess what the phrases were! We laughedmost of the evening until the girls lost and the boys won, dang it! :)then we went home and just started our normal evening of planning! Itwas fun while it lasted!

This is THE ONLY picture we received this week.  Katelyn has been sick - so a bowl of soup was probably the best she could do, or perhaps the best Christmas gift (card) from Olive Garden we could have sent to her.  {Never mind that it was Christmas}

We both are currently sick but we refuse to stay in unless we can'tclimb out of bed. Last night we got home around seven because weneeded to layer up from a lot of rain fall and chill. We both havefelt terrible but started walking to a potentials house. It was a farwalk but that was okay because a log the way we found potentials thatwere willing to meet with us for return appointments. As we keptwalking I was complaining in my head that I was sick and cold and wetand tired and that I just didn't want to keep going but that I wantedto go home and sleep. I kept walking because I knew it was was whatHeavenly Father would want me to do and for some reason my feet didnot cease to move so I went where my feet took me. Just as I pushedmyself to get over my trials and move on I felt an impression to knockon the door of a house I had been curious about. My feet definitelymoved first and as we knocked on the door a woman answered. She saidshe wasn't in the mood to talk and that she had cancer. We offered topray right then for her. We did and at "amen." We looked up and shewas crying. She said she was about to call a friend but decided notbecause of how depressed she was and then we knocked on the door. Shesaid we were angels. As we kept walking, and it must have been likeanother mile and a half I think my boots were completely wet throughthe sole. Of course I started to worry again about how we would gethome this late after seeing this potential. Got to the neighborhoodand to the potentials house. They were not home so we decided to knockon a few doors. One was willing to meet with us so she set a time tocome back. We kept walking and we felt impressed to knock on a door.We did and this old couple invited us right in. They were in theirnineties and still spry. We share about the Book of Mormon and thehusband was not interested and said so. Then we testified of the truthand bade them farewell before we were about to leave when they askedus where we were heading and we said to home. And then the husbandoffered us a ride with his wife. It was pouring rain and we weredrenched and I wanted to cry, I know that the spirit answers prayersand that our testimonies softens hearts. It was a miracle and Istarted sobbing when we got home... :)Well this week was absolutely crazy b fun and we spent it with some ofthe best people in the world! I really enjoyed myself and I know thatthe purpose of the season was Christ. He was here in between the roughand happy moments; He never failed us. I know He was born because weneeded to know what love and kindness and happiness were and that wemight be a means of giving those irreplaceable things to others. I amgrateful I could be serving the Lord during this time of year, it hasmeant so much!

I love you all and pray your week was full of joy and splendor!
Love, sister Jones

Led By the Spirit & a New Companion

Dear Friends and Family!
This week has been kinda crazy but a great crazy! The kind of crazy that makes Satan whizzed and shake in his boots! Sister Ferrell is my new companion! Yay! She has been out on her mission 15 months, almost 16, so she will be going home soon! Crazy! She is from Virginia and is a convert of about four years, I love her to death! she and I have worked so hard this week.

Meet Sister Ferrell!

We talked to a lot of people( 83 to be exact), everywhere we went we talked to people and oh man we picked up investigators when doing so. We were biking and started talking to this man and he said we could come by but he has short term memory loss so he may not remember us. However, we stopped by at the appointment and no one answered the door. We waited and then left to continue working. Maybe five minutes later we get a phone call and its this man! He said that he was waiting for us and that he couldn't get up in time to catch us at he door and that he wanted us to come back! He remembered the appointment and everything! This man is incredible! He was jumped when he was younger and it was an attempt of murder and they damaged him so bad that he is partially crippled, has a speech impediment and short term memory loss. He has had it for fifty years and just about seems normal now. When we shared our message with him he said he felt the spirit and believed Joseph smiths experience happened. He has been remembering everything that we have taught him so far and especially our appointment times! We just love him so much, he is very inspiring! We set a baptismal date with him for January and we are going to get him baptized :) 

We had our annual Christmas conference and this year it wasn't so big because it was only a third on the mission this time! We had a wonderful set of missionaries sharing their talents and a great training of our purpose from our mission president and then we had a HUGE dinner created by the relief society in the stake! It was a huge feast. Then games! All sorts of games were there! The best one was I got to use chopsticks and feed marshmallows to an elder.... Awkward. Haha I was so nervous I couldn't keep the chop sticks straight. And it was just yeah, awkward but fun! Then they had several other games and the best one is they had us take panty hose and stuff them with balloons to make reign deer antlers! It was hilarious and then we put them on our heads and we couldn't keep back the laughter and tears rolling Down our faces!

 Elder Gould(he was in the MTC with us) is right behind me, I'm with sister Schultz

I even got to spend time with my best friend, love ya sister Hannah!

Sister Ferrell is doing so well, I love her so much. I feel like her and I are so similar that we work so well yet we are very opposite. She has so much courage. Yesterday a man was walking his dog and she gracefully walked over and in her natural quiet voice she told him about the Christmas card she was handing him. This man did not want anything to do with us but he couldn't hear her very well and kept angrily yelling "what?!" And she walked across the street and handed it to him and he said " no, not from you all I believe in Christ but my Christ is different from your Christ!" He stormed off as though we had punch him in the nose (we obviously didn't) and we yelled back " we believe in the same Christ, have a merry Christmas!" And smiled. Then she just turns around with a huge smile on her face and we go on to our appointment! She is just a bowl of light, I really love her a lot :)

God leads us on missions. This experience hit us so hard. We were biking home from an appointment and the thought came to turn at the light and check on one of our investigators because she had the flu. I thought that was a ridiculous thought because we had to go home for lunch. So like a bad missionary I kept biking. As I did the impression became greater and greater to turn around. Finally I squeezed my brakes and turned to sister Ferrell telling her that we needed to turn around. We biked to the investigators house, knocked on the door and of course she wasn't home but someone else answered. It was her aunt that lived there. She invited us right in and we asked if we could shared a Christmas video with them. They a lived and I asked if they could turn off the t.v. And the grandma with a huge sour face begrudgingly turned off the television . We showed the video and then after the aunt turns to us and asks who we were. We explain and then invite her to read the Book of Mormon. She kind of steps off a bit and then says "Oh, I have my own bible, thank you." We explain that we believe in her bible but that we also believe in this book as a second record. She then rapidly asks that we explain more to her and help her understand. We do. She then agrees to read it and have us come back! The words at that time had just fallen out of our mouths and oh boy it was an incredible lesson led literally by God, don't underestimate the opportunity to act on a prompting!

We had an opportunity for a random act of kindness. We were walking in a neighborhood trying potentials and a man was taking his leaving. We asked if we could help bag them. He stops and says "but ya’ll are girls!" Ha ha and we told him we wanted to help anyway he would direct us. He then said he could pay us and we refused. After going back and forth with him trying to give us something we started raking and bagging. He asked what we wanted in. Return and we told him that we just wanted to serve him and give him a Christmas card. He was so touched the entire time he was asking us questions about our church and then he about died every time we mentioned the standards we as youth have and that the church has. We ended right in time and gave him a pamphlet and invited him to church. He didn't end up coming but it was probably one of the coolest experiences because he was saying the entire time that he was looking for a church and that it was a blessing that we came by. I know God leads us in certain paths for a reason, and it was so cool to watch this man’s heart be melted little by little.

We are sure working with a less active/returning member and he is amazing! He is preparing to go to the temple! Yay! He met with the Bishop and even came to the fireside last night! So cool! We are super proud of Brother Coffin!

So my sister just got in her first mission area this last Wednesday and she is in Caerphilly, Wales!

It's been a long week of exciting events and now off to Christmas! We have a Christmas Eve bowling party and then we have wonderful members ready to take us under their wings!

I love you all! Stay happy and cheerful all the year long!

Love, Sister Jones

Sent from my iPad

This is my excited face!!!!!!!

CONGRADUATIONS MOM!!

Ah! I am so unbelievably proud of you!! I just keep thinking ask to those times in your first year when we were helping each other with chemistry, hahahahahahaha! I just am so grateful to have you as my role model for success! I just know that you are so loved and so precious to both me and my sister in Wales! And also two the two other men in our lives but let's be honest the three girls in this family are best connected by the hip! ;) I love you so much and I am so peeved that our family sucks at showing support and love! But the best part is we have opportunities to take higher ground, I know you and I will take that higher ground and be happy that YOU HAVE BEEN DILIGENT IN YOUR EFFORTS! 

Ahhh! I really love that it's Christmas again, it doesn't look like it here, it's cold but rainy. No snow, I'm kinda sad. It whispy snowed once this week but didn't stick and then it was 60 degrees one day and I was in awe! 

So I got permission from my zone leaders to have TWO SKYPES! I am allowed to Skype with you all at home in the morning 10 a.m. On Christmas and then at 1:30 a.m.that night. I can three way skype with you all and syd in England!ahhh! I was so grateful! They said that the skyping has to be under forty minutes each! :)
I sent a package and I sent exactly what Jaden and Dad wanted and since you didn't ask for something I got you something anyway ;) I hope you like it. I sent it today so it won't get there until Saturday so ya'll can open it when you want :)

I love you and miss you and I will see you on Friday, twice!

-Sster Jones

Stake Conf, Zone Meetings, and my Home Girl -- Sister Hannah!

Dear Family & Friends,

We have had an incredible week! We have seen the fruit of our prayers and our labors! We have picked up baptismal dates and investigators and now we can start using most of our time for teaching yet still continue to find!

On Tuesday it was literally miracle after miracle, after miracle! We first had lunch at Arby's more downtown because that was where we were meeting our next appointment. We ordered our food and went to sit down. Sister Reed went to the bathroom and I sat there and waited to eat. Then the cashier came up to our table and he asked "are ya'll trying to be nuns or something?" Haha I laughed and then said no and explained who we were? He was so excited and then asked what our purpose for sharing gospel was. We told him about the Book of Mormon and his purpose in life. He shared his story about going to prison and now he was working for .25 cents an hour and that he was looking for greater truth in his life. He was so awesome that he wanted to learn more so we gave him a pamphlet and our phone number and a Book of Mormon! He said he would gladly read it and let us know what he thought! He was really excited about! So cool!

Then we had an appointment at a coffee shop with some guy that really didn't want anything to do with our message but we shared the gospel anyway. He had a lot of questions and sat there and concluded that the Book of Mormon wasn't true, even though he had never read it-go figure! Well we promised blessings and answers from doing so and left, it's all we could do! We biked home in the rain and we had plans to contact a less active that sister Reed had been trying to see for months! She ended up being home!  And welcomed us in warmly! Sister Reed was so excited! We talked with her and ended up setting time to go back and serve her! :D yay!

 Then that same night we saw brother coffin (a less active returning member) and taught him the law of chastity which then Led us into a word of wisdom lesson and brother coffin finally told us what substance was holding him back. It was one of the most powerful lessons that we had ever had with him. He almost cried but as Sister Reed and I bore testimony, we were crying ourselves :,) as we started walking home for the night we realized that we had a miracle day and had made every single goal that we had set up to have! Then not even a moment later Satan steps in and has a random person call a crude name from his car while driving past! Haha we laughed and said 'oh Satan, trying to ruin our happiness, not going to work!'. Two minutes later the bus literally pulls up and we realize we are able to get home on time! Yay! Loved that day!

We have been applying as many of the trainings as we can remember and trying to also be obedient as well, and as we have done so, every time we have repented some sort of blessing or amazing thing happens and we knew it was from the hand of the lord. Also it has helped us with following the spirit better and that even in itself has been a great blessing. We have applied he Book of Mormon training in all our lessons and most of the people we talk to and it has really invited people to really understand the purpose of the Book of Mormon. We used it at a dinner appointment and sought for a refferal and after we asked them who they knew they said they know of quite a few people and proceeded to ask our advice on how they could approach their friends and neighbors! It was awesome! They are now working on their friends and we plan to follow up!

The leadership training was awesome! I know Elder Kepishka was definitely inspired to say what he said. The entire time I wanted to over step my boundaries and say exactly what I thought should happen with the wards, etc.(that's my bad side, haha) but I knew that I wanted to say something and put my voice there and silly enough I was kinda praying to Heavenly Father and asking him what I should say and if I could have an opportunity to say it. Then elder Kepishka asked for missionaries to come up and recite the missionary purpose and oh man that was all I needed haha. Kinda funny how something so simple and small of our desires does matter to God! I know He answers righteous prayers.

We also had stake conference yesterday and that was awesome! Elder Kepishka talked about the few things we can do to be betters members of the church and make the work go along faster. Here are some of my notes:

When it comes to the gospel of Jesus Christ we have two key messages: Jesus Christ our savior and the living son of the living God; and that he has overcome every obstacle that we will ever go through. "If only in This life all we have obtained is hope in Christ, we are miserable" but Jesus Christ gives hope to salvation. 

The second thing is That Joseph smith is a prophet of God and that we have the

Reason we praise Joseph smith, is because the things that we know about Jesus Christ is because of Joseph smith. We would not have any of it if it were not for Joseph smith.

-If we ever have any questions, we should go to the source.

-He does not leave us in a dark world without any light!

-Behold, your house is left unto you deselect=behold, I will leave your house (German translation)

-what other stones do we throw?

      - Stone of indifference

      - Stone of rejection

      -Stone of selection--> pick what we like and apply those and blend out the other things (am I stoning the prophet right now?)

-1. We will be safe and 2. Our faith will increase as we follow the prophet

As we serve others we come to know the master

Life eternal is to come to know God the father and his son Jesus Christ.

Memories=a life of service, a life of love

AFTER (it's been about seven months)

Also I got to see all of my favorite members from the Richmond ward! They were at stake conference so that was pretty fun :) I love all of those members! :) Also, I saw my BFF SISTER HANNAH TWICE IN ONE WEEK!

April 2015

December 2015

We found quite a few new investigators this week as well but we went over to the Wilson's for dinner and they were pleased to share that they had some referrals to give us on who we could teach! We are going by this week to see them! We were teaching a recent convert yesterday and after we got done we got the thought to ask her to come to our next lesson :) so we all went to our appointment, knocked on the door and likely she was asleep and her granddaughter answered the door and we asked to teach her! She said yes and we did so. She was awesome! We set a baptismal date with her for January 16- she then said that that was two days before her birthday! Inspire!

This week was just incredible! I was so excited for all that the lord blessed us with and now we are ready for another crazy one!

Idaho Initiative & Thanksgiving Miracles

Dear mom! :)
I am seriously excite for Syd! She is so awesome! And thank you for sending her address I was wondering where I could send a letter to. Thanksgiving was great! We spent our first meal at the Hale's home! They are my favorite family here! Brother hale is this 68 year old man that is just super funny and is like my grandpa out here! He is like an Elder Thaxton! I just adore him!

**WHAT ARE YOUR PLANS FOR WHICH SEMESTER TO START SCHOOL WHEN YOU RETURN, SO I CAN HANDLE YOUR BYU-I SCHOLARSHIPS?**
OKAY IN REGARDS TO MY RETUNRING HOME PLANS I HAVE BEEN THINKING A LOT ABOUT WANTING TO WORK AT THE INN UP AT JACKSON HOLE WHERE THE KUNZ'S OWN IT? I FEEL AS THOUGH WORKING THERE FOR THE SUMMER AND DELAYING MY COLLEGE ENTRANCE UNTIL THE FALL IS SMARTEST TO DO. HOWEVER I AM WONDERING IF DOING THAT WOULD TAKE AWAY MY COLLEGE SCOLARSHIP? 
But yeah that is kind of my plan! So I am kinda just going to go with one to benefit the other so it should hopefully work out, haha I have no idea and we live with very "trunky"(=home worrying and lazy) Hermanas... So I am determined to not be that way and still focus on the work because it's the only time I really have to serve God. :) I really am excited to see everyone once again and move forward with my life plans but that is really all the thoughts that I have.

**TELL US ABOUT SISTER REED**

Yes, Sister Reed is awesome! I love her to death! She is just down to
earth and super funny! She is incredible though. Her mom is half Blake and half Mexican and her dad is black (Cajun too) and he is also a convert to the church. Sister Reed went to Utah state (not graduated yet) and had be inactive for two or three years and then started coming back to church when her sister came back home from her mission! Sister Reed loves to draw just like me! She LOVES STAR WARS and STAR TREK( so if you happen to see any Star Wars stuff that you could get for her for me and send it out as a Christmas gift, that would be incredible!) she is super funny and can do impressionable voices! Especially the Grinch ;)

Dear family and friends! Happy thanksgiving weekend!
We had a great Thanksgiving Day and week! We first went to the Hale's and they had their family there. Brother hale was whipped and ready to eat a lot of food. We stayed there and ate for a few hours and then came home and slept and then we went out once more for dinner at the church with the elders and the members of the church for a very wonderful evening of playing on the piano and listening to Christmas music and stuffing ourselves silly! It was really the funniest day ever!

A Church Referral results in a Baptismal Date set
Sister Reed and I have been praying hard for more investigators and we saw a fruit of our labor and we received a referral from headquarters a week ago and we went this week to contact him and he is incredible! We ended up teaching the restoration and setting a baptismal date! He has read the first two books of the Book of Mormon before but that was fourteen years ago! He believes that he church has all of the truth from the things he has researched already about the church. His name is David Boling and he is awesome!

Awesome Member Brother Hale
We also found two more investigators that we are working with! Brother Hale stopped by this week and he had picked up our bike to "look at it" and end up taking it to get the frog wheel fixed from my bike accident -_- he is so sweet but he does way too much for us! I graciously thanked him and he neglected to even tell me what the cost was so I could repay him! But his kindness served well because we have been able to bike again!

A 40 minute Conversation Changes Lives

This whole week we haven't been able to do much and we could finally talk to people and share the gospel! We ended up running into a man who was religious and we ended up taking forty minutes to share the gospel with him, then after a wonderful forty minute talk with him he starts to throw out as much false doctrine and anti at us as he could muster. I was annoyed but we both kept our faces bright and attitudes happy and bore our testimonies. He couldn't argue no more and we offered to say a prayer with him and he said "Well, to be honest I would rather not because the way you pray and the way I pray is completely different and I don't want to jeopardize anything. We asked him how he prayed and he said "It’s not necessarily how I pray, it's more who I pray to. You all don't pray to the God I pray to." I looked at him square in the eye, I think a little roughed up not but still kind, "My parents have always taught me that if I pray to God that he loves me enough to give me an answer to that prayer. We pray to the same God." Then he set a return appointment with us and we ended up leaving! We know when we do go back this week that our testimonies will be the only convincing evidence for this man, nice guy just not yet too humble :) it'll come later on though :)

Sister Reed found a glitter pumpkin!

It’s All Uphill

Friday we had district meeting and Saturday we had our own coordination with the elders because our Ward mission leader was gone. It was heavy raining, as it has been all week and we had to walk there. Haha so we started our two mile walk to the church and boy was that fun! There was a Louisville vs. Lexington football game that had just ended and the fans were walking home. Obviously Lexington lost, haha, and the fans were either drunk or angry or combined as angry drunks. Sister Reed and I walked through these crowds of people, through the rain and up the hill. When we finally got to the church we were soaked and sore haha but we were able to have a good coordination and help earn the trust of our bishop more fully. 

Ward Council with our President Brough & the Idaho Initiative!

Yesterday President Brough came and attended our ward council! It was awesome! We heard from him about the Idaho initiative! Yay! Idaho is making headway for the church! Good job guys!;) the ward council members didn't look to excited about it except for us missionaries, the Bishop and President Brough! I know though that this will help the ward continue to grow.

Visiting Seventy Elder Kenisha
This week has been awesome and we are looking forward to more! Elder Kenisha of the Seventy will be here for our stake conference and I will get to see Sister Hannah! Yay! So excited :)
I love you all so much and have a great week!
Love, Sister Jones

Us mimicking Mariah Carrie's singing haha or even Christina Aguilara's too funny....