Thanksgiving...mexicanized haha

This has been a great week! We just barely got back from a zone activity...everyone in this zone is really cool. we played soccer, went to a pizza buffett and went to the Pipila...a really cool view of the entire city of guanajuato!

Thanksgiving doesnt exit here so On thursday I forgot it was thanksgiving until really late, but I made up for it on Friday!  I bought a bunch of tacos, some tamales, some butterscotch candies that I love and like 15 little cookies from a lady in the street...it was the tastiest, most mexican thanksgiving that ive ever had haha.

This week ive been thinking about the thinks that im grateful for and the first thing that came to mind was my dad :) everytime something crazy or funny happens hes always the first person  I want to tell and I always wish he was here with me to see whats going on. one of the first things i wana do when i ge home is eat mexican food and tell funny stories with my dad in spanish haha

2. my mom :) I have nooo idea how my mom does it. She is an example to everyone! she has a testimony and knowlege that i will never have and the only way ive been able to cath up to her a little bit by being here in the mission. my mom is amazin in eveything she does...as a mother, wife, friend, church member, worker...literally everything! when i first got to the mission i was really struggling and I asked one of my best friends (who is a freaking super missionary) how he did everything so well. He told me that he thinks about what his mom would do in his place and that always helps him...that helps me now too. I think about what my mom would do in my place and everything just seems to work out :)

3. my sisters....i miss them so much...they are always in my dreams and we are always having fun haha. they are both younger than me, but they are the real examples in this sisterhood. I cant wait to go to college with ashley and watch a bunch of movies with g-race!

4. all of the people ive met on the mission

eeeeeverybody...the members, investigators, homies, leaders...they have all permanently impacted my life and i never would have met any of them if i hadnt come to the mission.

5. the gospel (of course, because im a missionary haha)

but honestly knowing that families can be togher forever and that if we can just do our little part we will recieve blessings beyond measure is a huge blessing.  I am also extremely grateful that all of my family are members and sealed together...because it would honestly break my heart coming home  to a family that couldnt be eternal after preaching and testfying to everyone everyday that they can be with their family eternally if they can just follow the commandments.

love you allll, take care! happy thanksgiving!!!

(sorry for all of the errors hahahh...this keyboard is really hard to type on and my brain is always in spanglish mode)

Dolores crazies

things are good here. there is nothing to do on pdays...we just stay in our house and then eat and then email haha. there are other sister misisonaries here, but they are boring.

the people here are really coool. an investigator should be gettinng baptized in december.

other people here are crazy. a crazy on the bus kept touching my hair so i turned around and loooked at here and she said sorry it was a speed bump hahah, but then she touched my like 4 more times...

theres an old man who just got baptized and he keeps asking me to marry him...ithough he was joking, but hes still talking about it so i dont think so hahaha

today an old lady came up to me and grabbed my hand and asked my comp if i belonged to here hahaha she said to be careful because there are crazy people here who will try to steal me hahaha. these are some of the reasons this place is not my favorite area.

i have found some the inactives that i loved here and hopefully they are going to come back to church.

Dolores 2

SOOOO...I was super happy in Tequis with my companion and district and the people there, but the second week of the transfer the took me and my comp out of tequis and put us in Dolores. Dolores was my second area and i hated it hahah, and now it has a lot of problems, so its a little bit hard.

Now that I have been here for a week, I still cant tell if being here is the worst blessing that Ive ever received or a curse with a silver lining haha. All of the members and everyone remember me and they really like me, they think its cool that i speak spanish now. At church yesterday I saw one of my converts and he came up to me and said that its a miracle to see me again!! hahaha.

I dont know what happened here...i think that the members had some problems with the missionaries because now they only feed us 3 days a week. The branch presidents wife refuses to feed the other set of missionaries here, but she said that she would feel my comp and i hahahah. also, a bunch of the people that i loved here before are now inactive...i think thats the reason i got sent here again haha, we have to go bring them back.

The work is kind of hard because we only have 1 investigator. all of the people i remember belong to the other sisters here, so we have to find all new people haha.

but things are good! im still with my comp and shes awesome!! last week i spent a whole day with my fave comp in queretaro. queretaro is like 4 hours away from my area but we have to go there again on wednesday to take care of my visa, so i think ill see my friends again!

This week I got to talk a lot with my mission president and i love him! he is so great! I think he is the only homie i have that is from utah haha.

love and miss everyone!

UN AÑO

On October 14 i completed an entire year in the mission! It´s weird haha. I feel exactly the same as I did a year ago, but when I look at how much I have changed, I realize that I have progressed a lot. I understand spanish now, I can actually teach a lesson or contact someone and not feel super scared, I have gotten used to having change in my life haha. When I first came to the mission field i DREADED going to the meals with members...i usually ended up liking the food, but i was always super stressed about it...and now its my favorite part of the day haha! 

There is a manual for new missionaries thats called ¨Adjusting to Missionary Life¨ and it says something like ¨over time youll get used to being a missionary and youll find that the things that are hard for you right now will become easier and enjoyable later on¨ i nevvvver believed that that could be true...but it is haha.

I remember a about year ago i was suuuper stressed out and my dad told me that everything would get better, that time would fly by and that in the end i would miss everything about the mission. I didnt believe him either...but now i completely understand and he was so right haha. I am 100% sure that I will miss everything about mexico. the food, the people, my areas, my friends, having a goal/purpose everyday.

My view on the church and life has changed a lot too. I have no idea when it happened, but my testimony has grown a ton! I dont know if i should say it has grown, or if now i actually have a testimony. I think that it took me 20 years of being part of the church and a year of being a full-time missionary, but now I can honestly tell you that I know that the church is true. I know that we have the complete restored gospel and that if we can endure to the end allll of the troubles of this life will be worth it. This transfer I have learned a lot about the plan of salvation and i love it because it is perfect. Any time you have a problem about life or the church, please study the plan of salvation haha. I think that if we can better understand where we came from (that we are literally children of god and have the potential to become exactly like him), why we are here (that every decision we make actually matters and has an eternal consequence), and where we are going after this life (hopefully to live in eternal happiness with everyone we love)...we will see things differently and make an effort to do better. HAHAHAHA if i ever go menos activa you can all use this email against me ;P

Its weird being one of the older missionaries now...i still feel new. It feels like I just got here, but also like Ive only been a missionary my whole life. In all of my dreams im a missionary haha.

Everything is good here in Tequis. My comp is cool, the area is pretty and the people are progressing! On sunday we have transfers...i think illl stay here with my comp for 6 more weeks, but well see!

I love and miss everyone! Hope you have a great week! Say hi to my family for me :)

-Hermana Knudsen

11 MONTHS

I got a new companion! Shes great, her name is Hermana Nestoso, shes 24 and from vera cruz. We are from the same generation (we came to the mission field on the same day!) Im still here in Tequisquiapan, which im really excited about! Pres said that here we are on a specail mission because this area is giganitc! He said that if we can baptize some people in the parts that are really far away from the church, we can make and extension of the branch in those parts!

On saturday we should be having a baptism! Our 12 yr old investigator, brenda is really excited! Normally the investigators have to go to church 5 times to get baptized, but we got permission to baptize her with only 3 asistences because of general conference!

On friday Elder Valenzuela, from the quorem of the 70 came and spoke to the mission. He talked a lot about working with members ( so please help the misisonaries haha), repentance and baptism. The last bit of advice he gave our misison was that we should try and be more converted to the gospel...everything in life and in the mission works out better when our testimonies are strong! Our Pres also talked a little bit and I really like him, he is soooo loving!

I have officially been gone for 11 months now! Time is so crazy!

11 things i have learned so far are:

1. Going to church is acutallly important

    -hahah if you knew me before the mission, you would say that the mission has            done its job 

2. How to talk to people-I dont get stressed talking to people anymore! its a miracle!

3. how to be (more) patient

4. how to do a rubix cube!!

5. how to speak spanish (mas o menos haha)

6. that god loves EVERYBODY and only wants us to progress and do our best

7. how to make friends...with all kinds of people!

8. that families are important...i dont even understand how i didnt know that before haha

9. how to work alllllll day, everyday haha

10. how to talk on the phone (very different than just talking to people haha)

11. how to eat allll kinds of food!!

im so greatful that i could come to this misison. the people ive met are so writh all of the difficult parts of being a missionary!!

love and miss everyone!

HOLAAA!

Sorry I havent written in a while, haha!

This week was really cool...i have lots of cool pics...but this computer lab doesnt let me send them haha :(

From tues-thurs i went on splits with an hermana in queretaro! The famous arches are part of her area and it was great! She´s american (gringa) too, so one night we bought a kind of taco called a gringa and took pics because we are gringa eating gringas jajajaja.

We have lots of great investigators here and we should be baptizing this month!

On sunday we had stake conference (like an hour from our house) and we stuffed 22 ´people into the branch presidents van hahahaha, it was so crazy!!

Today I went to the soccer fields in queretaro and saw allll of my homies!! they are so great!

my comp is stressing me out...im trying to love her though haha. I had finally stopped biting my nails! i had gone like 2 months without biting them and they were so long, but she stressed me out too much and now i have nubs for nails again haha. we have transfers on suday though...so pray for me!!

i love and miss everybody! next week ill send pics to show all of my adventures that are too cool to explain haha!

TRANSFERS!!

So...our entire mission blew up last night with the transfers haha. We used to have 14 zones and our new pres combined a bunch and now we have 6 zones! They closed lots of areas and everyone was freaking out!

I dont know if I could have come to the mission if i would have know how hard the goodbyes are :( this transfer a ton of my best friends went home :( I got to talk to my trainer and my first district leader on the phone last night for the last time and then this morning we went at 5 30 am to saygoodbye to 2 missionaries from leon who are going home and one of my other best friends got transferred to the other side of the mission and only has 2 transfers left so I will probably not see him again either :(

But...I have good news! I finally got transferred to Queretaro!! and i am in the area that my trainer just left so she left me a lot of stuff! haha I felt like i was welcomed like a hero to leon! our bus entered the station and all of my friends (who are still on the mission haha) were here! I hadnt seen most of them for like 5 months and it was awesome! All of the missionaries in queretaro on mondays can go to the fields and play soccer, so i think ill get to see them a lot!

My new area seems pretty cool...they just barely opened it last transfer so we dont have a lot going for us here but there is potencial! Im a little worried about my companion though...she is an old comp of my 2 favorite comps and neither of them said good things...but well see what happens haha!

Love and miss everyone!!

I finally saw my homie, Ramirez for the first time since Feb!