Welcome home Sister Kendra Knudsen

Welcome Home Sister Kendra Knudsen.  My parents actually came and picked me up on my mission and we got to spend over a week in Italy touring and seeing all the sites.  When we all came home my family and extended family were there to meet us all.  It was a nice welcome home at the airport. 

Death Letter

Cozenza

This is COSENZA. It is the most beautiful little city.

Cozenza

 Well...this is my last letter home that I will write as a missionary. My eyes might've teared up as I wrote that. I can't believe that my mission is almost over. When I came to Cosenza I decided to keep it a secret that I was almost done and I asked the other missionaries to not tell anyone. Yesterday was my last Sunday in Cosenza and so I had to tell everyone that I was leaving. Although Sorella Hansen and I have only been here a little while, we've made a big effort to befriend the members and get them excited about missionary work. I feel like we've done a lot of good in this time and our ward mission leader told us how we've brought a new excitement to Cosenza about missionary work. Everybody told me how sad they were that I was leaving and how they wish I could've stayed longer here. I would've liked to have more time here too. But it is ok. 

This is Giandomenico who is one of my favorite people in Italy. He's hilarious and always says ''GRANDE''

This is a fig. It's one of my favorite fruits in the world.

Zuchini flowers. You cover them with batter and fry them up and they're the best thing in the world. My companion thought I was really weird for eating a flower, but then she loved it.

This week has been really great! The sisters from Taranto came down and we had a great scambio. We got 3 new investigators this week! One is this couple that I met last week as I was coming home from zone conference with my mission president. We made a pit stop and ended up talking to this guy who doesn't really believe in God and has never received an answer before. President Waddoups promised him that if he met with us that he would receive an answer. We scheduled an appointment and had this member, Sorella Lopez, take us out to see them. They were very nice, although the lesson was a little interesting. But we shared the restoration and they promised to read the BOM. Speriamo bene! 

The famous Lopez family and the other missionaries!

 When Sorella Hansen and I first got here, we did a lot of contacting on the street to start us off and we got a lot of contacts and investigators at first. But since then, it hasn't been too successful and I think because God wanted us to try other things. Our ward mission leader decided to get really into missionary work this week and gave us all these contacts and less actives to visit and who to visit them with. We called up everyone and we set up quite a few appointments! He also told us to go through our area book and contact everyone. We did that too and we found a few people who want to meet with us! Also, English course here is HUGE! I don't know where all these people came from, but it's awesome and some of them seem really interested. We've been trying to make friendships and invite as many people as we can to listen to the gospel. We've had some success with this! On Thursday, this lady came in early and our ward mission leader turns to us and says I feel good about her...go get an appointment! We go and talk to her and she seems really awesome and interested! We had a lesson on Saturday with her and she completely understood everything. After we explained the prophets and the apostasy...she said ''We need a new prophet! Do you think God will call another one?'' I just smiled and told her how god already has!

This guy works at this shop under my house. She loves us missionaries and always gives us free food.

We spend last Pday at the beach.

The work is progressing and I am so grateful to be a part of it! I'm happy to be able to leave Cosenza better than I found it and leave Sorella Hansen lots of people to teach! This mission has been the best decision I have ever made. I have learned so much on my mission and I have changed a lot too. I have been blessed to serve in 1 ward and 3 branches. The members and other missionaries that I have met here have changed my life and have taught me so many things by their examples. My companions have been some of my biggest blessings on my mission. They have become my best friends and I have learned so much from each of them. I've learned to LOVE the scripture and love gaining knowledge. I've learned how to apply the atonement so that I can overcome my weaknesses. I've learned to use my talents to bless others and to gain more talents. I've learned to follow God's will for me and always be content with what happens. I've learned to love to obey the commandments. I've learned courage and faith. I've learned to love and serve others. My testimony of the Restoration has strengthened and I know that it is true. And of course, these past 18 months have taught me so much about my Savior and all that he has done for me. I am so grateful for every day on my mission. 

Rodica! She took us into the mountains this week for a picnic.

Well this last week is going to be a busy one. I have a ton of appointments planned, but also I need to find time to pack and write notes to everyone. Ce la faccio! This Saturday I take a train up to Rome and will spend my last weekend up in Rome. Hey do you remember my first companion from the MTC? Sorella Perkins from Australia? Well we haven't seen each other ONCE during our missions--we've always been on the opposite side of the country, but we've stayed in contact--and I get to spend my last weekend as a missionary with her! I am so excited! On Monday I get my last Pday in Rome and then dinner at the mission home.

VI VOGLIO UN MONDO DI BENE!!!!

BACIO BACIO BACIO. 

SORELLA KNUDSEN

Ciao. Ciao. Ciao. CIAO. ciaociaociao..... ciaociao . ....ciao.....ciao........ciao.

ciao. ciao. ciao.

AHHH I only have two weeks left!!! I can't believe it!

Zone Conference

This week was great! We spent most of it in Taranto for zone conference. My last zone conference :(. I had to give my death testimony (or departing testimony as Sorella Waddoups calls it). That's where you get up in zone conference and bear your testimony about the things that you've learned on your mission. I was kind of in denial that I had to give it and I procrastinated deciding what I wanted to say until the morning of. But I think it went pretty well. Zone Conference was really good besides that! 

Have I told you that everyone thinks Sorella Hansen and I are twins? We are about the same height, we both have light skin and freckles (hers a bit more than mine) and we both have big, think, curly, reddish hair. When we stop people, they don't only ask if we're sisters...but everyone asks if we're twins! We find it funny. So for zone conference, Sorella Hansen and I decided to match the whole time hahah! We even bought these dresses from a Chinese store that match. It was actually a lot of fun! My mission President and his wife gave us a ride home from zone conference so that was fun spending three hours in the car with them. 

Rodica is doing awesome! She is so prepared and is accepting everything! On Thursday we taught her the plan of salvation with a member named Sorella Spizziri and the spirit was really strong and I feel like she really understood it. She came to church too and on Sunday and loved it! Shes working a lot so she doesn't have a ton of time to read the BOM, but she is really making sacrifices to read it before each lesson. She is just great. She is so getting baptized!

spray painting mostra

spray painting mostra

One of the Elders here is really good at spray painting planets and stars on paper. Missions are all about using your talents so this week we've tried doing a mostra (shows, demonstrations...whatever they're called in English) with it. We find an open area in the city, he sits down and starts painting, crowds start to form as they wonder what he's doing, and then we have all these people wondering who we are to share the gospel with. We've done it two times and it has worked really well and we've gotten some great contacts. It's a great way to get people to stop and listen and then this anziano gave out these paints for free. 

By the Sea

 Sorella Hansen is doing really great! I'm a proud mom! Sometimes she's scared to talk to people or be bold...but she is improving each day! Sometimes I'll be walking along and I'll be like ''wait where did my Sorellina go?'' And then I look behind and she's back there talking to some people. I'm excited for her to get a new companion, she's going to do great without her trainer. 

On Friday we had these two appointments planned, but when we got there...no one was home. Our back up plan also didn't work out so we decided to pray. We knelt down on the ground in the middle of this street, asking where we should go, then we got up, and both started walking down this one street. We started talking to this family when this member family, the Favres, walked by. We asked them where we should go and they told us to go visit their mom. The mom was very catholic, but we shared a nice lesson. Moments like these are probably the best in the mission. My favorite times are when everything goes wrong and you're just wondering what can you do now. Then you pray, follow the spirit, and the Lord leads you to someone who needs it that you never would have thought of. I've really learned that God's plan is perfect. It is amazing how every night I think about what happened each day and I can see how much God has guided us into finding certain people, helping someone, or maybe it's even us that's learning something. I love serving a mission and I am so grateful for the miracles that God shows me everyday!

Playing soccer on P-day

Don't worry, I'm not trucky or sad with coming home. I decided that I was going to be really cool about it and accept everything. I only have two weeks left and I'm going to love them and make the best out of them. Then I will go home and it will be fine. Luckily you guys are coming to get me, otherwise I probably would never get on that plane home. 

Till next week, 

Sorella Knudsen 

Physical and Spiritual Strength.

 PS- Tomorrow I'm off to Taranto for Zone Conference!

Congrats to Lydia on her baby!!! You didn't even tell me she was pregnant!! Hahah! Also shoutout to Ashley M. who just got engaged!!! Give them a big hug from me! 

This week has been AWESOME!! So many great things have happened!! First off, let me tell you about RODICA!! She is awesome!! She calls us everyday to see how we're doing and tell us what she has read and asks if she can come to church before we can even invite her. We invited her to be baptized on the 1st of November and I think she will really make it! She came to an hour of conference (sadly she couldn't stay longer) and loved it! She keeps telling us how she feels so good when she is with us and she is really liking everything so far! She also has made a really good member friend who is going to come to our lessons now. Also, she is the nicest lady ever! We went over to her house and were talking about recipes (because I'm always trying to learn how to cook) and suddenly she was giving me all these books and food! I told her to stop, but she insisted on it! Then she brought us all this stuff at our lesson. She is too good to be true. I love this lady. 

 

Cosenza

Cosenza

 The zone leaders and Presidents have been focusing on having good planning sessions lately. They asked us: ''How often is planning a spiritual experience?'' I definitely try my hardest to plan each day and follow the spirit so I can't really say that I've had a great spiritual experience from it. So this week we tried to listen to the spirit more. One day we didn't have any planned appointments but a lot of potentials to pass by and we didn't really know when or who we should visit. We knelt down and prayed, asking for guidance and this girl named Rossella came to my mind and Giovanna came to my companion's mind. The next day we sent out to find these two.  Rossella is a new investigator, but after the second appointment we haven't had any luck finding her at home...but she was home this time!!! We had a great lesson with her! Then we went to find Giovanna (this lady we met on the street and who is actually the mom of a member) and she was home too! We had a great lesson and she became a new investigator! So I learned how important it is to have the spirit during planning so God can tell you exactly who and when to see them! His plan is perfect! 

 

Sorella Hansen and I

 

On Friday we met a new convert who got baptized a couple months ago, but lives really far away and can't come to church every Sunday. Her name is Maria and she is soooo nice! Although her husband is really against the church. We went over there and first thing she asked if we would like some tea. My heart just dropped...shoot she doesn't know we don't drink tea. I told her we don't drink tea. She looked at me and said no we can't drink hot drinks...but this is cold and is of fruit...so it's okay right? I started explaining to her about how we don't drink green or black tea, but we can drink some herbal teas, etc. I admit, I was kind of confused if we could drink this or not because it was a different type of drink and it looked like it just came from fruit so we called the Elders just to make sure. They told us they weren't sure what type of tea this was, and told us to pray about it with her. So we prayed about whether this drink was about to drink and after discussing it, we decided it was probably better if we didn't drink it. I think it was actually a really good experience for this new convert to pray about something and make a choice to be obedient. Also the lesson happened to be on obedience which really enforced the principle! 

 

All of us sister trying to wear our hair like Sorella Hansen

Funny Greenie culture shock moment of the week: Sorella Hansen is super weirded out by how often Italians touch each other. Italians are very touchy and are always hugging and kissing each other. Sorella Hansen is just not used to having all these Italian ladies hug and kiss her all the time. Haha I find it funny. Get ready to be kissed from me all the time when I come home!! 

Also, Sorella Robinson and Sorella Chandler from Bari have been here all weekend because Sorella Robinson has to get her permesso (permission to live in the country) today so it has been fun having more sisters! 

 

Watching conference in the church

Conference with the Favre!

 Spiritual strength: Conference was awesome! We watched it in church and also this amazing member family named Favre invited us over to eat and watch conference with them! The spirit was so strong and I learned so much! It was really enlightening to me, I got some really good insight with what I want to do with my life. I still need to research and think a lot, so I'm not going to give you details yet...but the mission has really changed me a lot and I want to do something else with my life. So when I come home, I'm changing my major...and it will probably require more schooling, but I think it will be good. Anyway I loved conference! Also, in case you were wondering...they're not announcing any more temples...because the Rome temple is taking so long to be finish and they're going to focus all their efforts on that before they can announce new temples (that's my guess at least). 

 

I love Gelato

Also, I finished Jesus the Christ!!! There you go dad! Dad has been emailing and bugging me to finish it for over a year now every week. I really loved the book and learned so much about Christ! But my goal is to finish the New Testament, Doctrine and Covenants and the BOM for the fourth time (3rd in Italian) before I come home so that's why it has taken me so long. Haha silly dad! Are you happy now? 

Physical strength: Sorella Hansen has this program to do 100 push ups in a row in 10 weeks and as a joke we decided we were going to try it. Then the Elders decided to challenge us to a push up contest at the end of the transfer to see who can do the most push ups. We were like..that's stupid...you guys are boys. So now they have to do double the amount of push ups that we have to do. So everyday Sorella Hansen and I try to do as many as we can each day. On Saturday...I successfully did THIRTY in a row!! I have never been able to do more than 5, but now I can do 30 man push ups in the row! Pretty impressive no? I'll let you know how the contest goes! 

Anyway! Love you all!!! 

Sorella Knudsen! 

Cosenza

Calabria is beautiful!!

We went to this castle last pday

 Calabria is BEAUTIFUL!! It is full of all these hills and fields and mountains and just everything you would want in an Italian city. This week has been great! We've been working hard and we got 3 new investigators! 

The first one's name is Pina. She works at a pizzeria, has lived 12 years in Australia, is catholic (but doesn't practice too much), etc. She is really nice and tells us how she feels really good when she is around us. We gave her a BOM and she seemed really interested and told us how much she wanted to read it. 

The second is Rossella who is this 30 year old girl, who is divorced, doesn't have a job, and is trying to change her life at the moment. When we did the restoration, she was very interested at the thought of a new prophet and asked a lot of questions. 

Cosenza.

Us

 

Then there's Rodica! Rodica is from Romania and we actually met her through English course pubblicità. She asked if she could come to English course, and then asked if we could come over and explain our religion to her! We really didn't do anything, she was so prepared! We met up with her yesterday in the church and she just wanted to know everything and we had a great restoration lesson and she accepted the invite to be baptized! When we explained the BOM, she kept saying how much she wanted to read the book. She kept thanking us again and again for meeting with her and how happy she was. I feel so good about her and I feel like she is definitely prepared! 

Anna Filipelli 

 

We've also are trying to work with the members a lot and get them excited for missionary work! We met with this member named Anna Filipelli who is a new convert of 3 years and is so sweet. When we invited her to pray for a missionary experience, she was kind of sad because she said she has invited a lot of people to church, but no one has ever come. We gave her some comfort and encouragement. She lives in this town named Domanico which is on a top of a hill and I thought to myself about how we need to get an investigator there that this member could help out and give home to. Then we found out this Pina (our new investigator ^) is from Domanico and knows Anna! They are already friends and Anna is going to drive Pina to church one day! It was an awesome miracle! 

 

On Saturday we visited this member family who live in a city named Saracena, which takes a few hours to get out there. Going out there was going to be an all day event so we prayed that we could make use of our time and teach lessons on the bus. God definitely answered our prayers! We shared the gospel with many, but there was this lady named Lucia who was really interested in the BOM. When we got to the city...the dad of the family came to pick us up from the bus stop...but he came alone and we can't go in a car with only a man...so we ran all the way to his house behind his car. Luckily it wasn't too far and he was impressed that we were obedient. This family was really nice, but they too were also a little scared about doing missionary work. The grandpa told us how he has given a BOM to everyone in the city, even to the Priests! But no one has ever read them. We talked about miracles and the effects of our efforts. On the bus stop home, we met one of the ladies who they have given a BOM to. We talked with her a lot and she mentioned how she is trying to find her faith again and wants us to come back and meet with her! Also, at the station we met this other guy to teach and taught him the whole Restoration and he told us he thinks that the BOM comes from God. So we now have 3 appointments in this city.The member family, the Di Leone, were so happy that we had some success and want us to come back next week to teach these people! I think showing members that miracles really do happen will help them be excited do to more missionary work. 

Training has been really fun! I love Sorella Hansen! She is so fun and we get along so well. I feel like we were a supposed to be together and that she needed me to be her trainer so I had to wait to have her. It has been especially funny to see Sorella Hansen adjust to the Italian lifestyle, which to me has become so normal. We went shopping, and she thought all the Italian food was so interesting...and I was like ''wait...this isn't normal?!'' How will I survive at home without all this cheese, bread, pasta, meat, and juice? I've been a good Italian trainer and made lots of Italian dishes for her to try, which she loved all of it. She's surprized how many vegetables we eat here (Italian do eat A LOT of vegetable, which is really good). It was also funny when we went to a member appointment and they gave us Italian rice (rice with olives, peas, and mayonnaise) and eggplants--Italian food which is weird and usually missionaries do not like (by now I'm used to them and I actually really like eggplant! I can't wait to cook it for you muahha!) and she thought it was really strange. 

 

Beans that I cooked from a old man we met on the street

It is also interesting seeing her struggle with the language...it brings me back to my good old Greenie days. Learning a language is TOUGH!! I remember how hard it was at the beginning and I was so jealous of English speaking missionaries. It can be so hard at first when you can't speak or understand anything and you just want to share the gospel, but you can't. Sorella Hansen is awesome and she is learning so fast, but she still doesn't understand everything and can't say everything she wants to say. After every lesson, she turns to me and asks...okay so what just happened? I remember her struggles oh so well. We had this lesson and this guy went on talking for 40 minutes without stopping and at first Sorella Hansen was trying to understand and was following it and then she just got completely lost and spent the next 30 trying so hard to look like she was paying attention. Poor girl. But it is cool for me, at the end of my mission, to see how much progress I have made. I've actually gotten a lot of compliments on my Italian this week and it just feels good to know that I have worked really hard on my mission and that I have changed. Parlo italiano. :) 

Vi voglio bene!!!

Sorella Knudsen 

My companion is the girl from Brave!

Thanks mom for getting my card done! You saved my life for transfers! Plus, it was cool that I got to say hi to you! Ah cute little Kelsey is in Florida! I've been thinking about her all week!! 

Goodbye Battipaglia!

I left dear Battipaglia which was filled with a lot of sad goodbyes (but luckily I'm going back in six weeks so it wasn't too bad). I packed up all my heavy suitcases and went to the Napoli train station to wait for my train that my Greenie would be on. I made a huge sign that said "VERDINA (GREENIE)", I got on and asked who was being trained by Knudsen, a redheaded girl answered and I attacked her. Her name is....SORELLA HANSEN!!!!!!!! She is the BEST! She is 22 years old, has lived in Texas, Louisiana, Kanas, and is recently from Wyoming. She has studied at BYU, Hawaii and did the Disneyworld program. She has crazy red hair and looks like Meridth from BRAVE. She is super funny and cool. I love her so much!

SORELLA HANSEN

My sleepy Greenie.

Also, Sorella Gates was on the train down so I did get to see and talk to her! We have both heard from each other from our moms so it was funny. She is going to Sicily and being trained by someone in my group named Sorella Kippen so that will be fun for her! They traded who I would train at the last minute. 

Sorella Gates!

Being "blown in" or ''whitewashing'' as some people call it has been a really fun adventure! First, we had to trade trains and get to Cosenza where the Anziani (elders) were a supposed to meet us. We accidentally got off on the wrong stop and then had to get back on the next train and we had five suitcases to carry and it was fun I'll just say. We got to Cosenza and the Elders were not there....we had no phone and no place to go...so we just waited. Finally I found a working pay phone and called the mission office asking if they were looking for two lost sisters. They said yes and asked where we were. I told them the Cosenza station and they actually sent the Elders to another stop so they had to call them and tell them to come to the Cosenza station to pick us up.

Getting stuck at the train station.

We ended up waiting almost two hours in the station laying on our stuff to keep these gypsies girls from stealing our stuff. Finally the Elders came and they took us to our apartment...only to find out that the Elders turned our whole bedroom upside down! Haha I love mission pranks! They even made a cheesy sign that said "we hope you turn this town upside down". We unpacked everything, I got my Greenie her first Italian pizza, and then we went to bed. We live right by a very busy street and we kept hearing people outside all night long and then in the middle of the night...someone started hammering on our wall! Why would someone hammer a nail into the wall at 12 am?!?! 

Friday was spend doing weekly planning and trying to figure out everything about the area. So it turns out....we don't really have any investigators. They had a lot of work, but like last week all the investigators were dropped so basically we need to start from the ground up. Okay honestly, I am actually enjoying being blown in!  We have a whole new start on this city without any bad impressions and I've made a lot of plans to try. We have a branch here with about 15-20 members who came to church on Sunday (every city I go to the branch just gets smaller and smaller haha). All the members are very nice and welcoming to us and willing to have us come over! By the end of church, I got an appointment with almost every member! 

Finding!

We've done a lot of finding in these past couple of days and we've seen a lot of miracles and found a lot of people! We were able to have 6 lessons with a prayer on the street. I want to tell you about some of the miracles and people we have met. 

On our first day, we were doing finding and at first I was stopping everyone and then I told Sorella Hansen to talk to someone. She told me that she likes talking to people, but she was so scared. I kept encouraging her and finally she stopped this lady to invite her to English course. This lady stopped immediately and started asking questions about who we were. She found out it was Hansen's second day in Italy and insisted on buying us gelato. We exchanged numbers and hopefully we will be meeting with her on Tuesday! Her name was Sabrina and she was seriously the nicest lady ever! It gave Sorella Hansen a lot of confidence and I was so grateful that God showed us that tender mercy. 

We got a referral from a member in Crotone who asked us to meet with her husband who was in Cosenza. We had a lesson with him and he was a really nice guy, but not really willing to listen to us at all. We met with him by this bar and I noticed that there was a worker who kept passing by and watching us. After, we talked to her and we were able to do a whole lesson with her. She really admired us for what we were doing and said we could come back another day to talk to her more! We are going tonight! 

We met this really nice old man on the street who is evangelist and invited us in to talk to him and his wife. We told them about the BOM and they told us about their church, very good people.

Sunday night we had four miracles in the row. We first stopped this lady named Rodica and was telling her about English course when she asked if she could give me her number. Then she asked if we wanted to come over next Sunday to explain our religion to her (in my head I was like...WAIT I'm a supposed to ask you that first!)....we were like ''yeah we could do'' haha! Then we went down a street, but I felt like we needed to turn around and go the other way and we met this girl Rossella. We explained who we were and asked if she would like to learn more and she said yes and we're meeting with her tonight! Then we walked down a couple streets without any luck so we stopped and said a prayer and asked for someone who is prepared to received this message. We stopped this girl named Francesca and told her about the BOM and asked if we could meet up and explain more. She said yes and we have an appointment for Tuesday. Then we met this guy named Massimo and talked to him a long time about God, we're planning on passing him to the Elders though. 

Anyway we already have one new investigator and five appointments set up this week (who will all hopefully become investigators once we get to teach them a lesson). We definitely feel like there are a lot of prepared people here and there is a reason why we were sent here! I have to say...this is all Sorella Hansen's work...she has just great faith for finding people! I just do the talking. 

My companion doesn't really know Italian at all...so I get to teach her! It's fun hearing all her mistakes! Like she keeps saying about ''the woman of tongues'' instead of ''the gift of tongues''. Also in Italian there are two ways to say ''you''--unformal (tu) and formal (Lei). Excepts lei also means ''she''. In the MTC they teach the missionaries to all use the formal lei so Sorella Hansen kepts talking to me formally...which is kind of weird because I'm her companion. She will say ''Cosa lei vuole fare?'' (what does she want to do?). Every time I look around the room and ask ''who is this other woman?'' It's fun :)

I really love my companion and I feel so strongly that I had to be her trainer. She's a little fireball. She gets a little nervous to talk to people, which is normal, but once we stop someone she has no fear at all. She has a great desire to learn Italian and tries to practice it always. She doesn't seem to feel like missionary work is too hard or anything, but has a lot of energy and wants to go out and talk to everyone. She has the coolest life and we get along so well.  I am so sad that I only have six weeks with her. Can I PLEASE extend my mission!??!?!?!?!?!??!?! 

Vi voglio bene! 

Sorella Knudsen