Hey everybody! 

     This week was vital to my life...i learned a lot. All very simple but very important. It was simply wonderful to talk to my family on Christmas day....I'm so so very blessed to spend the rest of eternity with them, they are delightful and fun and loving. I enjoyed very much talking to my dad about the missionary work happening there and here and the things that both areas are working on. My dad shared some insightful things that i LOVED and have shared already about 4 times with different members here in Redmond. The bishops wife Sis Sheldon quoted me in her talk yesterday in church. It was work related thing that my dad related to the gospel of course! "If we cant take care of Heavenly Fathers "clients" that we already have, how are we supposed to take care of new ones?" Doing missionary work you definitely need to go out of your comfort zone right?..ya im right, because i would know haha So the moral of that sentence is that there is all sorts of ways to do missionary work and you should start where you are most comfortable because reaching out to the ones that we already have and the ones that are less active are just as important as finding the new person "because both need conversion" -The Power of Everyday Missionaries. Just because someone shows up at church every Sunday to church doesn't mean they don't need a extra hand extended towards them, smile, hug, "come sit by us today." We all struggle during the week and we all need each other, if you find missionary work to be hard start with your home and visiting teaching start with reaching out to the people that are all around you, don't just assume! Take care...of the ones we already have. 

     We had a zone training meeting this week..i twas the shortest one that i have ever been too and I'm so thankful for that! I'm glad our zone leaders acknowledge that and are trying to change the culture of them, it was probably like 2 hours shorter, to the point and the spirit was super strong. We all learned a lot. The elders are very inspired and spirit lead. They focused on obedience and pride. They had, as always a testimony meeting at the end and i had the opportunity to bare my testimony and a lot of the missionaries did. The spirit was very strong and the part when i felt the spirit the  strongest is when the elder who walked in with service clothes on not in his suit and has struggled his whole mission and was sitting in the back stood up and bore his testimony and tears just fell from my eyes and i was not the only one. I can not tell you how amazing it was to hear from him and that he does know. watching missionaries struggle is hard to watch cause you cant really do anything esp. if they struggle really bad from any kind of depression.
     Funny story so we have been working with this guy named Art Mcallister and he was La for a very long time...I've talked about him before and we now teaching Tami his friend who is getting baptized soon. Anyways so sister Sullivan and i were sitting in front of them at church yesterday and after the first verse of the hymn that we were singing he leaned forward and said "Amen Brotha" and we just start cracking up... and this is something we say to each other "Amen Sista, Amen Brotha" whenever the opportunity comes...and so we are trying so hard not to laugh and then when the hymn is over he goes "Amen to that" Lol and i turn around trying to hold in my laugh and say "stop it" and then turn back around and start cracking up. Oh man it was one of those moments when laughing feels so good!
     On Christmas day that we spent at the Bishop Sheldons we asked him to think about and pray about some people that are in need of spiritual uplifting. He gave us a long list of names the next couple days and so we went to visit one of them and they were not home...kinda feeling poopy that night...idk what it was. But as we looked up the next one we felt we should visit on the GPS we ended being on that same exact street already and very close to the exact house. It is a part member/less active/recent convert home and we met Ashley who is not baptized and took the lessons about 2 years ago from elders and didn't connect. I know that we were set here for her. We met there little brother Garret who has mental retardation and he is the cutest thing ever..i have never met anyone like him before he was so different and made me so happy. Ashley thought we already knew him by how we talking with him because he knows Bro. Herrin and i said "no i just like to talk to people like i have known them for a long time" and he walks up to me really close to my face and says "I bet you don't know my social security number?!" another moment of laughter and made my day. We are teaching Ashley this week! ;)
     I love the being here, even though we have hard moments. We learn from them and grow. I love when i look at all the pictures of the Savior around our apartment and church, He seems so familiar to me. I look at Him and i see Him as my Brother. I love you all and hope you have a great week.

Love Sister Heywood!