Happy Birthday to Sis Killian!

Today is my companion's 20th birthday! Woohoo!!!! They grow up so fast.

This week was Zone Conference! Our first with President Williams. That man. So incredibly inspired! He gave a powerful training on the Atonement. It always blows my mind thinking about how real and how expansive the power of the Atonement is... and yet, it can only influence us to the degree we allow it! I love that.

The reason we had a conference was because every single mission vehicle needed to be brought in so the Tiwi devices could be adjusted. (Tiwi is the little box that yells at us when we go too fast or drive aggressively. Our car commander has been known to say that for now, we need to abide by Tiwi's rules... but in the Millenium we'll use Tiwi for target practice!) Usually when Tiwi yells at me, I get all defensive and yell right back... but during conference I felt strongly that I should NOT do that anymore because it was driving the Spirit away! So Sister Killian and I made a new resolution. Whenever Tiwi yells, we clap and do this little chant : "Hey, Tiwi, you're so fine, you're so fine you blow my mind, hey Tiwi!!!" Haha. It's a silly little thing, but it totally WORKS! We've had the Spirit with us a lot more since this recent development!

That's probably the most exciting thing about the week. Haha.

󾓨 This week Karina kinda relapsed into some of her past behaviors and it's been really sad. Last time we saw her, we had a lesson planned, but we just pulled out the Book of Mormon and started reading. She left off on 1 Nephi 4 - when Nephi is commanded to kill Laban in order to get the plates. We read that chapter with her and it was SO COOL to see the impact it had! She LOVED the story and said that she felt so much happier with every verse we read. (And it was about a teenager cutting off some rich mean guy's head!!!!!) THAT'S the power of the Book of Mormon - no matter what or where we read, it can apply to us personally and we can feel the power of the Spirit the moment we open up to a page!

󾓨 The Vandenlangenbergs... well they're doing great and they still want to meet, but it seems that no matter HOW MANY times we teach the Restoration, they don't understand the concept of one true church. I guess because I was raised in it, it's so common sense to me, but for the dad especially it's SO hard to grasp. It all comes back to the Book of Mormon, which they know. It's just a matter of reading, applying, and praying about it! We've said that repeatedly but something always seems to get lost in translation.

󾓨 I got my "trunky papers" in the mail on Saturday. :( Made me want to THROW UP!!!!!!! Haha jk, it wasn't as big of a deal as I thought it would be. Kind of exciting but also a lot happens in 3 months on the mission so I'm trying not to think about it. 

I love Wisconsin! I can't wait for the Fall to hit full-blast! I can't wait to bring my family back here next summer! 

LOVE YOU! Have a great week!

xoxo

Sister K.