How great it is... To be a Missionary!

Family!

I hope you had fun in Oregon! I finally got mail this week! thanks for the letters and package! AND I CANT believe Pete in going to South Africa! Kate in my ward here is from south africa... she is the woman we make pancakes with! I love her! How exciting! Missions are wonderful! This week has just been absolutely wonderful!

It started off with a scambio...exchange in Italian. I went to Cuneo with Sorella Ryan. It was so great! It was neat to do a different type of missionary work, I got my first taste of casa (tracking). Here in Genova we are just constantly talking to people on the street so I haven't actually knocked doors yet! It was crazy! Also, since Cuneo is small I got to ride a bike! horrah! It was about the size of American fork... I was fun to go up north, It actually looked alot like Utah... the Mountains! And it was COLD! Guess what, the apartment in Cuneo has a list of all the missionaries that have stayed there... and whose name should I behold on the list... none other than Jake Davis! cool huh?! All in all it was a really neat experience to go to Cuneo, and it made me realize how much I LOVE GENOVA!!! I was only gone 2 days and yet I missed my big, crazy, some what dirty, yet oh so beautiful city of Genova! I JUST LOVE IT HERE! It is now getting quite cold. Yesterday... It poured all day! yeah! but today, Sunny and about 70 degrees... what?! Like utah I guess :)

BUT THE BEST NEWS OF THE WHOLE WEEK: CLAUDIA GOT BAPTIZED ON SUNDAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It was so amazing! Wow... and this is why I am a missionary. There truly is nothing better than seeing someones life change and then seeing them come to the Savior and be baptized! We had her baptism after Church. I actually gave the Talk on the Holy Ghost (thank goodness I wrote my talks in the MTC and had one ready to go!) Then i played the piano and Sorella Bowman sang "I Stand all Amazed" and I think its even more beautiful in Italian. And then she got baptized. She was so happy, and the Spirit was soooo strong! I love that Girl! The gospel does change people. It brings a type of Joy that you just cannot find anywhere else no matter how hard you try. The thing is people dont realize this. They try so hard to find happiness in other ways, and it just leads to unhappiness. Yes, we do have trials, but Heavenly Father has promised us more joy than we can comprehend if we just will follow his path! The baptism was just amazing and what I love is that we had a lesson with Claudia last night. She told us she had had a bad day, and so she came home and what did she do... SHE READ THE BOOK OF MORMON!!! She sat there and told us for about 25 minutes how it makes her happy, how the church has changed her life, and how she know that the book of mormon brings comfort. She said that she cant put it down. And that she wants to study it so that if any of her friends ever have a problem she can just say, oh dont worry, I have the answer, its in the Book of Mormon! AMAZING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Its true, The Book of Mormon is the Key. It is what sets us apart!!! We have the truth, and it is all in that Book. I am soo grateful for the Book of Mormon and the comfort it brings me in my life! keep reading it all of you, okay?! Deal, deal!

I am so grateful I get to see miracles everyday! I love you all... I love this work! have a wonderful week and Happy Halloween!

Sorella Nilson

Scambio (exchange) in cuneo! I got to Ride a bike! I was with Sorella Ryan!

Claudias Baptism!!!!! We were soooo excited! Anziano Romeo Baptized her and Anziano Pitt will confirm her next week! She is AMAZING!!

And in Lina Salazar is the lady in the pic with just girls!

Some from the MTC... a few people I ran into!

And so I mangia'ed....

Ciao my family

Here are some updates and stories!

Kerly- So amazing! She is now in Alma in the Book of Mormon! She has been through so much in her life and tells us every lesson how she just wants to do the right thing. We have told her how proud her Heavenly Father is of her and she seems so much happier these days! She gave me and sorella bowman flowers for our hair and scarves! This woman is working here in Italy away from her 3 kids so she can earn money to send back to them! How awesome is she! I cant even explain how much I have learned from her!

Claudia- Her baptism is on SUNDAY yahoo! We are so excited! She is still as perfect as ever. On friday she invited us over for dinner cuz she loves to cook... and guess what we ate... Octupus! YES! and the suckers were totally still visable! And yes... I ate it... ALL! I just popped it in my mouth and chewed..! Then she bought all these desserts cuz she was so excited! We took that pic of all our treats!

The Salazars- Okay... this family joined the Church just 6 months ago and OH are the awesome! They seriously take such good care of us... we have eaten with them 3 times sinces last week! and today, Lina (Sorella Salazar) took us to the market to go shopping and then fed us lunch... and oh can she cook! They are from Equador, they dont have a lot, and yet they are soooo good to us! Last wednesday we did experience something new... A lovely soup lina made us complete with Chicken hearts, liver, and feet... yep, claws and all... THE entire thing was just sitting there in my soup... actually like 5 of them :) WHAT? I didnt know what to do! you actually just eat all the skin, yep that think yellow stuff, off them... I about died... and yet I ate it... (magia=eat in Italian... hence the title of this email) But we ate delicious burritos saturday, Potatoes and peanutbutter (strange, but actually really good) on monday, and chicken, rice and french fries today! Goodness! This family is amazing!

I want you all to know I love you times a million and I hope you are all happy! Email me pics of things like the plays and Jakes dances and the Littles girls stuff!

Have so much fun in Oregon and tell everyone hi for me!

Love,

Slla Nilson

p.S. I have my first exchange this week! I leave tonight to go to Cuneo! Yahoo!

Miracles...what more can I say

Hello my fam!

I am glad to hear things are going good! Things here in Italia are just wonderful! This week was soo busy with lots of wonderful things happening... so i'll just dive in!

Thursday, we had a training for new missionaries in Milan. It was amazing! Just the boost we needed to really throw ourselves into missionary work. We were taught that "things worth achieveing are worth working for!" We watched part of the movie that Brenda sent our fam, "facing the giants" It is a part where one of the players carries his team mate acrross the field on his back blindfolded. He tells the coach he thinks he can make it to the 20 yard line. His coach blindfolds him and tells him he wants him to "give me your best" The coach then cheers the player every step of the way, and the player makes it 100 yards to the opposite endzone. It really was a perfect parallel for our life. We limit ourselves, because we dont think we can do it. Our Heavenly father however, knows our potential. And if we put complete trust in him to guide us and give him our ALL, he will stand by our side through EVERYTHING and help us get back to him! I know that now matter what, If you give Heavenly Father your best, Thanks to the Atonement, he will take care of the Rest! And thats my goal, to give my best as a missionary! Oh I love being a missionary!!

Updates! Claudia is doing SO good! She is so wonderful and since she is just 24 it is so fun to see the gospel change the life of someone near my age. We did have a few mixups this week because the member who introduced her to the church told her about the Law of Chastity and Word of wisdom before we could... Allora, Claudia was really confused and so at our lesson yesterday told us that she heard we arent allowed to kiss before marriage, we have to have tattoos lazor removed before we can be baptized, and that as part of the word of wisdom, we have an organ cut out of us!! Goodness! We had some major clearing up to do! We were laughing so hard as we informed her that we can Kiss, dont have a weird surgery and that you dont have to have tattoos removed! But man even with all that, this girl is still so excited to get baptized!! Miracles!!

Kerly- miracle times a thousand!!! She was able to come to church on sunday!! We prayed and prayed that she could come! She brought the woman who has alzheimers with her and she sat completely quite all through sacrament! We go to teach her on Tuesday, and she said it was a great experience! Also, We go and we hadnt taught the word of wisdom, but when we got to her lesson, she had that she heard we dont drink coffee and had decided to give up coffee!! WHAT?? on her own!! That was friday and she hasnt had it since! She prays and reads so much! Seriously, to see her committment to wanting to do whats right... It just amazes me!

We have had some other wonderful chances to teach members, less actives, and are now teaching a girl who is 16 named Paola. She is sooo fantastic! Her parents are members but she doesnt want to join the church just cuz they did. So it is baby steps with her, but she is a totally sweetie! I love working with the youth!

All in all my family, it was a wonderful week! There are a few signs of halloween here and there, but I am not gonna lie... I am bummed about missing the halloween party! Italians sure dont love Halloween like we do... but now worries, they are awesome none the less!

Love you all times a billion!

Slla Nilson

What a week!

OH goodness my family!

Ciao, Ciao, Ciao! Where do I even start! This week has been so busy and so eventful! Conference.... AMAZING!! Send me the english esign asap cuz, I'm sure it will be even more amazing when I can understand everything :)! I have truly come to have the strongest testimony of the importance and blessing of a living prophet! There are so many people here that don't believe we have a living prophet! Some of the people we have taught don?t believe it! After watching conference, HOW COULD YOU NOT!!! Heavenly father loves us so much there is no way he would just stop talking to us! We have a prophet! And what an amazing leader he is!

This leads me into talking about Claudia. She is doing SOO good. She watched conference and just couldn?t get over the story President Monson told about the 5$ bill. She laughed and laughed and she said she loved how he prayed. When we taught her yesterday, she listed all the miracles she has seen in her life ever since she started meeting with us. She is so happy, and even asked "so when am I getting baptized??!!" What! Perfect! She is awesome, She knows that this is the way to change her life. How awesome it is to see how the gospel brings happiness to people! WOW!

We are also teaching a woman named Kerly right now. We met her last thursday, she is a friend of a New Convert (our ward members are amazing missionaries!) Kerly is a mom from Equador and is her working. She takes care of a woman with Alzheimers. We taught Kerly the first lesson on Thursday. Through tears in her eyes she told us she wanted to change her life. We gave her a book of mormon in Spanish, and left her with a pamphlet about the church and set up an appointment to meet her on saturday. When we came back on saturday, She had read the pamphlet twice, AND Was in 1 Nephi 16!!! As of yesterday, she is at the end of 2nd Nephi. WHAT?? Miracles, I tell you Miracles! Heavenly Father wants his children to come to him and How grateful I am to see Kerly recognize this. We have planned her baptism for the 30th!

The mission certainly is a rollercoaster of emotions. One minute you are just down because you have the most precious message in the world and no one wants to listen to it. Or they listen, but then don't believe it! It just makes you so stinking sad, cuz you know it would bless their lives. But then you have lessons with people like Claudia and Kerly and you hear them say their first prayers ever, and hear them try to describe the feelings they have had (the spirit) and You are the happiest ever!

I had my first experience with being fed on the mission this week. Monday, we had a lunch appointment... I was laughing hysterically as everything everyone has always said was true. The minute you finish something, your plate is full again!! But oh... was it delicious, pasta with pesto, turkey, salad, homemade gelato! the works!! Then we went to do family night at a new converts house and she was like "Suprise, I made dinner!"... They are from equador... We had the most delicious meat, rice, and vegetable dinner... but I have never seen a mountain of food like that in my LIFE! I was about a third done and was completely stuffed... but alas you gotta mangia (eat in italian) so mangio I did! And I am proud to say that I have eaten more tomatoes in the last week than I have in my whole life, you just gotta eat what they put on your plate! Embrace! The members are amazing and soooo sweet to us!

I am happy and certainly love being a missionary! I am still getting used to city life... but oh how I love teaching the gospel! Today for p-day we went to a members house and made pancakes with peanut butter and everything! It was so fantastic! Thanks for your love and support!

Love you all times a million! Sad to be hearing about halloween! I'm gonna be a missionary this year I decided... he he!

Ciao for now,

S.lla Nilson

ITALY!

Hey Ya'll! Here are some pics that Katie's mission president sent of her and her comp when she had arrived at her final designation.... ITALY!!

ENJOY!