Miracles

Time is FLYING! Literally, I have no idea where this week went. It was such a good week though so I'm not complaining. :)

Monday: Just a normal p-day. Laundry. Eat. Write. Eat. Sleep. And, we may or may not have watched "17 miracles" again. Haha we love that movie. That night, we had dinner at our Bishop's house again with our Elders. So fun! After that, we just had a chill night walkin.:)

Tuesday: Such a great day! We did our usual morning routine, and then headed into Winterset for our weekly bingo fun. After bingo, we headed over to see 2 of our investigators Karma and Karissa. We met the relief society president there so that she could join in on the lesson. Karma's other daughter Alyssa was there with her friend Keyera and we ended up teaching them as well. Biggest miracle... they accepted the invitation to be baptized and they all accepted a date of December 14!!! We are so crazy happy!! We just see how much it will bless this family. They are wonderful! That night we had dinner with the Penners.  We loved it. :) That night we saw our other investigator Deloris and committed her to come to church again, and she said yes! WOO!

Wednesday: Another great day! Haha we had a lot of those this week... We had to come into Winterset again cause we had crafts with the oldies. So we did that, and then had mormon.org time. Seriously the best ever! If you are ever bored, go onto Mormon.org and just watch the videos. You will be hooked. That night we had dinner with the Christensen's and they are just amazing! Such a great member missionary family. They also have 2 little boys that I just love. :) Makes me not so homesick for my own boys.

Thursday: Earlham day! WOOO! Earlham is one of the towns in our area but we don't get there a lot cause it takes a lot of our miles. We decided though that it was time. Heavenly Father knew we needed to be there! We were able to see so many less active members who we have never been able to see before. We also did a little bit of exploring and realized that Earlham is actually quite amazing. We though it was just some run down little town. Well, it is. On one side. On the other side of town, it is gorgeous! It reminded me of Cedar Hills. Haha it was sweet. Just very new and clean. That night we were supposed to have dinner with a member but they ended up cancelling on us so we decided to go see Sister Costello instead. She is a single member and she is a little bit older. She has some health issues so we go check on her every once in a while. She also had some food she wanted us to pick up, so we decided that was a perfect time to go see her. So we get there and ask her if we can share a message with her. Of course she says yes so we all go into the living room and we sit on the couches and she sits in her recliner. Sister Barker starts saying the prayer and says amen and we both realize that Sister Costello didn't say it. We both look up... she is gone.. snoring and all. We both of course burst out in uncontrollable laughter. We kept trying to wake her up and she would for a sec and mumble something and then she would fall asleep again. Eventually, it got the point that I was YELLING my testimony of prayer at her to keep her awake. Haha it was probably one of the funniest moments on my mission. We felt bad cause we were laughing so hard, but we figured she couldn't hear us anyway. :) Haha we headed home after that and the member who we were supposed to have dinner with actually dropped dinner off. The Barbers are the best.:)

Friday: Today was fun cause we got to do something different than our usual. Normally, we have weekly planning on Friday but today we had Zone training instead. BEST TRAINING OF MY LIFE! They talked about helping our investigators and not hoping. They also emphasized the importance of our investigators, reading the Book of Mormon, praying, and attending church. That was exactly what we needed to hear! They also showed us an amazing video. They put together all the pics of the baptisms the mission has had this year to a song. Bawling. It was amazing to see my Brothers and Sisters who have been found and to think of the many more who will be. Such an amazing feeling. That night we were able to meet with a less active member who has been dodging us for a while. We had an AMAZING lesson on the Temple and on the Endowment and the spirit was super strong. That night, we didn't have a dinner appt., and we figured that since it was closing this weekend, Frostees was the only clear choice. I am going to miss that place... Coming home that night just topped the day off. A letter from Pops (my grandpa), and a letter from my sister with pics of my boys. I was in letter heaven people. Just sat and cried... and laughed... and cried some more. Saturday: Since we didn't do weekly planning yesterday, we got to do it today. Every weekly planning session we have about an hour set apart to do companion inventory. Basically, we just evaluate our companionship and fix our problems. We have never really had a comp inventory cause we have never had problems. This week, Sister Barker and I actually took the time to look deep and see if we had any. We concluded that we are competitive little buggers! Haha we wrote down a list of all the things we are competitive about and decided to be better. It is working so far! :) After that, we were able to see Tyler our recent convert. We taught him about the priesthood and I had found a really cool video about the priesthood during my Mormon.org time that we showed him. It is a Mormon message called. "Power of God." You should all go watch it cause it is wonderful! So we had a good lesson with him and then headed into Winterset to see our investigators and remind them about church. Good night!

Sunday: Miracle day!! Church was just amazing. I was able to give a talk in sacrament. Elder Kay and Elder Tappen also spoke and their talks were amazing! Best part though was that our investigators Deloris and Karissa came! I cant even begin to tell you how happy that made me.  And the ward literally just took them under their wing. Karissa was swept off to primary and Deloris was taken to gospel principles class. We didn't have to do anything..it was awesome!  After church, we talked to Deloris about it and she said it was a lot easier for her today. She said she actually knew what to expect and everybody was so nice and she had a great time! Karissa loved it as well. :) YAY! After church, we just sat outside and talked to our Elders for a little bit and ate Vanilla Wafers. Haha  We went home after that and did our studies and then headed out. We went to Winterset first to see a potential and it was good. We just talked and got to know her a little bit better. I will keep you updated. That night was the best though! We had dinner with the Hancocks. 10 Children. no joke. Ages 14 to 7 months. And they are all adopted! They are such a fun family! We love the kids and the kids loved us! Haha it was a great night! Although I wasn't able to hold any of the kids, we still just played and laughed. And, we named all 47 of their fishes. Playing with their 7 month old baby was nice cause my Zander boy turned 6 months old today so at least I got to play with A baby. :)

Today before we came to the library we did some exploring. We went to City Park and saw Clarks Tower and a covered bridge! It was so fun! It is absolutely gorgeous up there! Cold...but pretty none the less.

Well folks, that was my week. It was a fantastic week for sure! The Lord is blessing us here in the Winterset area. We are finding the people who are being prepared and it is amazing. Since I am a missionary and all we do is invite, I want to leave an invitation with all of you today! Go onto LDS.org and go to the Mormon Messages channel. Watch "Mountains to Climb." It is an amazing video that reminds us that Heavenly Father is always there for us. No matter what our circumstance, he is there to protect and guide us. He loves us. We are His children. He will never leave us. There is also an amazing quote by President Eyring that goes along with that video and I invite you to read that as well. Just always remember that YOU, are loved. He knows you individually.

Well guys, I hope you all had a wonderful week full of good things. I love you all and I will continue to pray for each of you! Also, I have to give a shout out to my cousin Stephanie and her husband Kevan. They are expecting a little girl soon and I have a feeling it might be this week... so in case it is... CONGRATS!  I love you guys and I know you will be wonderful parents. Don't forget to take lots of pics! :)
I LOVE YOU ALL!!!

-Sister Jensen

"Is this Heaven? No, it's Iowa."

Covered Bridge. Obviously we had to go see it cause that's one thing Iowa is famous for! :)

With Frostees closing, of course we had to get a pic with the sign. :)

Clarks Tower. Soo COOL!