This has been an eventful week! It seems like every week this transfer is a little out of the ordinary! Between zone training, sick companions, trips to the Emergency Room, a flat tire, and the ward nativity, things were definitely different than the typical week.

Funny story of the day:  We were taking out all of our trash this morning on the way out the door.  I had Jonny's birthday present on one of my arms in a grocery sack so we could go out and mail it today.  When we got to the post office, I realized that I had thrown it in the garbage along with all the other garbage bags!  I was in a little bit of a panic!  We turned around and went back home and got geared up to go jump in the huge garbage bin outside.  I climbed up on an old couch and started scanning the piles of garbage for my Walgreens bag of presents, grimacing at the thought of climbing in.  Then I saw it on the lid of the big big bin! There was a big lid that was hinged at one side that could be closed or open, but always attached.  Today it was open and when I was throwing the garbage in, I had over thrown it and it landed on the lid, not in the actual piles of trash!  It was a Christmas miracle!  So I didn't have to dumpster dive and the birthday presents were safe :) phew!

We had zone training this week and I really enjoyed it! It's fun that I'm getting to know more of the missionaries in the mission and that I'm starting to make friends with the other missionaries.  It was great to see Sis Hamilton and Sis Sellers!  It's weird not living with them any more! I learned a lot about good ways to find investigators. We decided that we were going to really try and talk to everyone. So far it's been successful! When we were taking a mormon.org hour, I noticed the man next to me was doing family history work so I talked to him and told him about our family history library and he gave me his information to come back and talk to him more! Another thing that stood out to me in zone training was the importance of working with members. I hadn't been doing that much, so we decided to start. We set up an appointment with a family in the ward and talked with them and they gave us three referrals! We are excited to go contact them soon!

The ward nativity was a really neat event and I would call it a success! It was amazing how much work went into it from all the ward members! We had several investigators come and they all loved it! Our investigator Joe brought the rest of his family who isn't in our ward to come! He's being a missionary already! Joe is doing really well and really loves the church. He came again on Sunday with his son Brandon and I could tell that Joe really felt the Spirit at church. He even teared up during one of the sacrament meeting talks! He and Brandon are so great!

One of the miracles of this week was finding someone to come with us to the stake Christmas devotional. We had one of our less actives ready to go, but then her daughter got really sick and she couldn't come with us. We called and called but no one was able to go. After we said a prayer, Nadiya Mann-- an inactive lady who hasn't been to church in years-- called us back and said that she changed her mind and would be able to go after all and would take us! We asked her out of desperation without much hope that she'd be able to come, but something about the Christmas spirit softened her heart! I think she really enjoyed the evening and it was a good way for us to develop a closer friendship.

I'm so grateful to be serving in West Hills-- they really have become like family to me.

our ward nativity