SISTER NEILSON | SCOTLAND/IRELAND MISSION

Week 16-i ate chicken feet and two flies..

This week was a week of miracles i'll tell you that.

We had our usual P-day dinner with Tadeu last week and his food is always so good, so we were excited to see what he would bring out and what he brought out completely surprised me, it was chicken feet... i was like whaaaat?! Sister Khoo and elder Rocha wouldnt eat it but me and elder Alfonso manned up and ate the chickens feet. hahaha the taste actually wasnt too bad but the feet has so many bones in it and you have to spit out the bones before you can swallow it. so after i spit out the bones it was just a pile of skin in my mouth and it was really hard to swallow when i realized that haha

Since we have all these flies out because it has been so warm i was yawning one day and one fly flew directly into mouth and i could feel it in the back of my throat and it was disgusting!! and then it happened the next day again!

Me and sister Khoo were Gqing and when we GQ we walk the same street just in circles because our town is so small and as we were walking i was like,"sister Khoo lets stop and think where we should go instead of going on the exact same path." so as we were standing there pondering where we should go this guy walked up behind us and we started talking to him and it took a little bit of convincing but next thing i know we were in a cafe teaching him an on the spot lesson. God's timing is amazing. it's amazing when we see God's hand helping us in our missionary work when we are being obedient. It wasn't just a coincidence that we stopped at the right time to talk to him but it was Heavenly Father helping us. He was very skeptical at the beginning and he is a born again (which do not like mormons) but the lesson was the most spiritual lesson i have ever been in. we were in the noisiest cafe but 2 minutes into the lesson i honestly didn't even hear anything going on around us. it felt like it was just the three of us in there. (plus the spirit lol) and at the end of the lesson the man we taught, Neil said, "I honestly really like what you guys have to share and you have helped me so much already and i would love to meet more and learn more." i was so happy dude. So he is one of our new investigators now! so exciting.

On Sunday the best thing happened. so our friend Valenitna who i have been teaching for about the whole time i have been in Portadown finally said she would come to church! So we picked her up at 9:15 and started walking to church. and this other friend of ours named Aladin (we have been trying to get him to church for about 5 months now) said he wanted to come to church and we picked him up at 9:30 and as we were talking with him we found out he is from Romania also! so Aladin and Valentina were just talking together in Romanian as we walked to church. then we all got to church and sat down. and i have never been so happy before in my life. It was better than any day at the beach, winning a volleyball tournament, or eating pancakes. this topped them all.

There are so many other miracles that happened this week but these two were the best by far. I am so grateful for the experiences i am having out here. I know that this church is true with no doubt in my mind. Love you all!

Peace

this is a members front yard its insane, he always asks the elders to mow his lawn while we wait for dinner.

this is on the street we walk everyday

This is Barry our recent convert and stphen another recent convert the one who baptized him we were teaching him in his home and it was so nice out that we had a little picnic out back haha

Week 15

So on Tuesday i flew to Edinburgh to pick up the chick that i am follow up training. i had to travel there all alone and i am the worst traveler. i was so worried the whole time haha. i looked so lost all alone haha.

i had to go to a trainers meeting which was like 3 hours long and there was only three trainers including me in there so it was some good one on one time with the president haha.

My new companions name is sister Khoo and she is from Singapore and is 23 years old. i was sitting in the lounge of the mission home all by myself while i was waiting for my new comp to arrive and it was so nice and peaceful actually being alone for once. and then president walked in and we talked for a little bit and i was so nervous to meet my trainee. then i heard my new companion walk into the front door of the mission home and she walked into the lounge and she is a fireball and i am not at all so it was a big surprise. haha

It was very hard saying by to my last companion, harder than i thought it would be, but i am excited to serve with sister khoo! It is a whole new experience training her. We have to do language study for an hour every day which is cool and i am trying to learn more mandarine and porteguese while she studies haha. i feel bad for her sometimes because i have such long spider legs that i walk really fast and she has short legs and i always have to rememeber to slow down haha. we are working very hard though this transfer and we are always so tired, which is so good!

The weather here as been so nice lately. it has probably been in the 50s and that means short sleeves! the sun never comes out and we had like 2 days where there was sun all day, it was a miracle! i have never seen so many people outside in town before haha. But with the heat brings lots of bugs and gnats! so we are always covering our nose and mouth with our book of mormon because they get into our mouth. its gross haha.

Training is making me learn new things about myself everyday. i love learning new ideas from her but it is also a very humbling experience. i thought i was pretty humble, well i guess im not that humble if i just said that i am humble lol. but i also have to be very patient which is very hard for me to do. But i am excited to try to be better at those things. definitely things i want to improve so im excited for the challenges. It is also a very stressful thing because i have more resonsibility now haha. But its all fun and i am learning a lot even though it can be frustrating sometimes. i happy to learn and improve!

It is funny because sister khoo can be innapropriate sometimes with her jokes and i always have to tell her she cant talk like that. and if you know me pretty well, i am usually the innapropriate one so the fact that i have to tell her to calm it down is pretty funny.

I am so excited for this transfer! me and sister khoo have set some good goals and have a lot of things we want to accomplish! its gonna be rad!

on the ferry going back home to portadown

me and my companion in edinburgh

this is how we hold the book of mormon because its been so warm and there are bugs everywhere and they get in our mouth haha

Week 14

we had a dinner appointment this week and i was eating super slow and everyone finished before me and then bro marques, the person feeding us, was like sister neilson you have twenty seconds to finish what is on your plate right now. then he started counting down from 20 and i was like what.. so i had to shove all my food in my mouth. then after dinner we had eaten so much i felt sick. then sister lough while we were going home after threw up because she ate so much hahaha

barry got baptized this week, we are so excited for him!

we went on exchanges this week and they made me and my comp run for morning exercise. we were not happy about that at all but the night before we ran i was praying that i would be able to run because i literally cant run and i swear God gave me some strength because i made it half way. it was a miracle. my testimony of prayer for sure strengthened after that.

President nelson came and spoke to all the missionaries in the UK and it was so cool! he was super strict or anything he let loose and he seems like a cool guy. he just talked about missionary work i can’t really remember because i am in a rush right now. but man is that guy inspired! so amazing

We taught a woman named angela and her family they are from portugal and they are so great! we taught about the book of mormon and she said that she has been praying to God about the next step in her life that she should take and that she is excited about the book of mormon and will read it and pray about it. the spirit was so strong. she is so in tune with the spirit, it was amazing. she doesn’t speak english so a man from our ward pedro translates for us. but i can’t wait to continue to teach her. i love teaching about the restoration and book of mormon.

moves calls! i am staying in portadown but i will be follow up training a chick from singapore! so i am going to fly to scotland for a training meeting tomorrow morning! se speaks mandarin and english so we will be able to teach chinese people. i am so excited about that!

me eating an apple, which is weird but i like apples now

another apple pic

and another pic with leslie

barrys baptism

a man named michael

WEEK 13

conference was good! the first sessions we went to the stake center in belfast which was an hour train ride and barry came with us and loved it! so that was cool! then the next sessions we watched the next day at this mans house named tadeu! he is the sweetest man. we always go to his home on pday and he feeds us lots of food. he doesnt speak english though but is so kind to us. he is half my size. hahah president nelsons talk was so good!

nothing really happened this week so i wont be sending a big letter but here are some pics...

we froze snowballs from when it was snowing and saved them

this street is named corcrain hahaha

this is rodney the nicest guy in portadown. he always gives us candy and a fizzy drink

elder rocha and elder alfonso they are serving in the town with us

barry our investigator has given us so many gifts. this is one of the pens he got us. it has our names written on them. then he wrote poems for us, then he gave us compasses that say "so you can always find your way back home siter neilson" engraven on it, and then he literally named a star after me hahha

this is tadeu

wearing our st patricks day pins on st patricks day

this is liliana, one of our investigators. she is about to have a baby in 4 weeks

WEEK 12

We had zone conference in dublin this week. which takes 3.5 hours to get to Dublin by bus which is usually alright but on this morning i woke up pretty ill with a cold and the flu. but i was not about to miss zone conference! it was a pretty rough bus ride but the conference was so good! we learned about the importance of the sabbath and how we must always keep the sabbath day holy which was cool. and it was super cool to see all the homies and catch up with everyone.

then the bus ride back home was just terrible i got way more sick but it was all worth it because the conference was so good. but right when i got home that night i literally passed out i was so sick lol.

Barry our investigator that is supposed to get baptized this week is still doing great! we had to push back his baptismal date to next week sadly but he is doing so well and we are so proud of him!

General conference was amazing and it was so great to hear president Nelson speak and to see him get ordained was super cool and the spirit was so strong!

Sis Neilson

WEEK 11

In the Subject line she wrote: The beginning of the week we go into it excited and running and then you trip and fall but its okay you dust yourself off a little and then you trip and fall some more and then you're just over it and its still only tuesday haha that is missionary work

Her letter:

missions totally suck but they are the best but they can really be hard but literally be the best thing ever. Oh boy, this week was rough not gonna lie. Sorry i couldn't email last week! but last week our investigator Barry committed to a baptismal date! we are so excited for him. He has a bit of a smoking problem but says he would be willing to quit because he knows this church is true. He has read almost all of the Book of Mormon which is crazy! We were kind of nervous at first because me and companion were like what if he is only getting baptized to be our friend and to make us happy? So we went into one of the lessons and i just was like why do you feel like getting baptized is what you should do? and he bore his testimony on the book of mormon and the spirit was so strong we just knew he was getting baptized for the right reasons, it was so amazing.

In one of our lessons we were teaching him about the commandments and we talked about Thou shall not steal, and he stopped us and was like "well i stole something one time.." and we were like "what did you steal?" he said "when i was younger i was down by the river with my friend and there was a van near us and inside the van there were 24 creme eggs and i thought to myself i want those creme eggs” so he stole them. it was so funny hahahah. it reminded me of the SNL skit with Chris Farley the one where he lives "in a van down by the river!"

But this week we visited our Romanian friend Valentina. we love her so much. she is going through a lot of hard things in her life right now that we are trying to help her through. she expressed to us that she really wants to get baptized. and we were so happy. Then we asked her if she knew the book of mormon was true and she said "i don't even have to read this book to know it's true. You two sisters were angels sent from God to me so anything you guys tell me i know is true." she is so amazing. we read the book of mormon with her and she reads it in Romanian to us, the spirit is always so strong. There are a lot of things we have to work through with her but we are so excited for her.

i gave a talk in church on Sunday. Then Tuesday came a long and i just woke up in a terrible mood and was just so miserable and was so over everything. i had been praying a lot to do what i can do to get out of this funk and i was expecting this big answer from God. but then i was reading this general conference talk and it was talking about the Book Of Mormon and how we can't take it for granted and i realized that that was exactly what i was doing. This book is literally the word of God and i am so lucky to have it my life to guide and direct me. I am grateful for all the trials and troubles that i am having even though they totally suck sometimes. we have to trip and fall a couple a times or a lot of times and we can either choose to stay down and give up or get up with the help of the Lord and be stronger and better because of it. read Mosiah 24:14,15 it talks about how our burdens and trials wont be lifted all of sudden and permanetly go away but that the lord with strengthen us so our burdens will be a little easier.

It is cool serving here because we meet people from all over the world and so we get all types of different foods. i set some Word of Wisdom goals, i am addicted to chocolate and i have been trying to cut down and i am happy to say i have been doing it for the last three weeks. Miracles do happen when you serve a mission hahah

i dyed my companions hair again. she went from blonde to black, it looks pretty rad.

We taught a true Irish man the other day and he said he wanted to be baptized and we were like yes thats great! and then he said but i wont change my catholic religion and i was like then why do you even want to be baptized bro? and he couldnt answer that. it was so weird. but he wants to continue to meet so that is exciting!

My companion really wanted to go running for exercise time and i keep telling her no but finally i was like i okay we can go and i’ll just tell you i am never doing that again. it was pretty dang rough hahahah

Sis Neilson

WEEK 9

Hi!

So Monday night last week we went chapping (when we knock on peoples doors they always shut it on us and never let us in). so we were knocking door to door and this one girl answers the door and we gave our little missionary speech and she says, "well do you want to come in?" and me and my companion were shocked. so we went inside and we didn't have anything prepared because nobody ever lets us in! so we just went with the flow of the spirit and she said she wanted us to come back and said that she had been praying to God to show her a sign that He hasn't forgotten about her and she said that we were the answer to her prayers and that God sent His answer to her, literally on her door step. It was so amazing! So we are still teaching her and she loves it! she is from Romania and is 21 years old. we love her.

Me and my companion had our first big fight this week, it was over something very stupid but we were both hungry, lost and tired and were both very stubborn so neither of us would apologize. then my companion bought me a cookie and made it all better. It's amazing what sweets can do for you.

We visited some awesome cathedrals in Armough this week. they were beautiful. Then we went to a planetarium which was pretty crappy. it was only one room haha. We had exchanges in Belfast with the STLT’s. it was great and i learned a bunch of new ways on how to find people.

We taught Karilos this week. we went into the lesson pretty sure it was gonna be our last with him but he told that he prayed and had felt something and that he was thinking about reading the book of mormon again (mind you this was the guy that tried to give us back the book of mormon last time because he said it was literally like torture reading it). We were pumped!

The ward i am in is awesome hahaha Brother Mac got up to conduct and said that the youth had youth conference this weekend and we would like to have them come up and describe their experience. so he invited one of the young men to come up. the kid was straight up and called out to him, "I am not going up" and then Bro. Mac was like we can wait all day for you. and the kid was like no i'm not going. and so they had a showdown in the middle of sacrament. haha it was so funny.

we had this dish last night called fishwada and it is straight up all the parts of a pig cut up and thrown into a stew. i literally got the tongue and my comp got the ear with all the hair on it. the food is such a struggle here. please pray for me in that aspect. and idk if my stomach is handling it well. i keep getting sharp pains in my side and my farts don't sound the same hahahaha

one of the greatest things about serving here is i come home every night and smell like cigarettes. haha all my dresses reek! everybody smokes here. i'll be talking to people and they just smoke right in your face and everybody's house reeks of cigarettes. but really the best part of missionary work is seeing the small tender mercies of the Lord. me and my comp were really struggling teaching with unity and we have finally figured out how to teach together. and we were having a hard time finding people to teach. we can find people but then they never show up. its just a hard. but then people like our friend from Romania make it all worth it, you know?

love,

sis neilson

one of the cathedrals...

this is Leslie, he sits on this bench almost everyday and feeds the birds, i love him!

the elders we serve with

WEEK 8- Beast from the East

i'm glad to hear that katie is feeling better about school! and anna! so exciting, big things are happening in the neilson household. i'm glad me serving a mission has helped anna finally learn to braid her hair. hahaha (I gave her a few little updates on the girls and also told her we have been blessed because she is serving a mission. haha)

On p-day last week we went to Belfast and just walked around and shopped a little. Then we went to a recent converts house named Filomena. she is from Africa and i love her! We talked about the importance of reading the Book of Mormon with her and she bore her testimony about it and it was so awesome. she also had the great idea of setting up one day a week to read it with just whoever in the ward wants to come and she said she wanted to invite her non member friends so were gonna try to set that up.

We had distrcit meeting on Tuesday and it was all about having unity, it was so great. if we aren't unified with our companions we can't do anything.

On wednesday everyone was talking about this huge storm that was gonna hit our town and everyone was like you better stay inside tomorrow its going to be crazy. its called the Arctic storm (Beast from the east) and wednesday was so cold! its so cold in our flat. every morning we just sit in front of the heater and always bring our blankets down with us. haha

Thursday the beast from the east hit. we woke up to a ton of snow and it was freezing outside. and the one day we had no scheduled appointments was during this storm/blizzard! hahah we had 7 hours of straight finding people in the streets. Then we got a text from the zone leaders at about 2 pm saying that the storm was so bad that all the missionaries in Ireland had to stay indoors the rest of the day. The greatest news ever, ill tell ya that!

Friday was pretty rough. me and companion were both very tired but we still went out to find people even though almost everyone ignores us. hahah it's the best. but we had a first lesson with a guy from poland named patrick and he said he wanted to meet with us again, so that was pretty awesome. When you're tired out here you just have to suck it up and keep working. sister lough slipped and fell on the ice and so i just sat down next to her on the sidewalk and we just sat there and talked about the day and how we were feeling. hahaha everyone was just looking at us in skirts sitting in the snow. but we gave ourselves pep talks and went back to work.

Saturday sam got baptized!!! It was so amazing! Sam is a huge example to me. He speaks little to no english but still goes to church every sunday and that is how powerful the spirit is. the church got this brand new piano that plays by itself and no one in the ward knows that. at the baptism the elders were like can you be in charge of the piano? all i had to do was push one button then it would start. i just pretended like i was playing and all the members bought it. it was pretty awesome. haha

I have to go. I love and miss all you guys so much! and i miss chimi too. haha

sis neilson