Week 40: Baptism in a Kiddie Pool in the Snow... and uhhh i guess paper tastes good?

HAPPY THANKSGIVING and HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO LAURENNNNN

A break from school and Lauren is officially an ADULT!

Well, I left my notes at home so hopefully this email isn't all over the place and makes sense.

A little vein-like thing popped in my eye and now its all red. It happened after I got food poisoning last week and I think I was super dehydrated. My eyes were a bit yellow too.. I feel like I'm going to come home looking so different... ha and in not a good way. oh wells, maybe those vitamins mom sent me will help?

Sooo at district meeting we did a flan suck... my first one. Its our mission tradition where you suck up a whole flan and it just goes like straight down your throat.  Of course I did horrible and failed miserably.

Mom apparently your like the best missinoary ever ha. We had a Fiesta at Christy's house this week and she just ranted and raved about how easily you shared the gospel with someone while you were with her. Thanks again for doing all that for us.

Ummm Monday we got to see Lena, she was getting all ready to go for her baptism in a few weeks.. but since then she wasn't at her next appointment and she hasn't been answering our calls... so that.s a bummer dot com. We got to stop by a new american family that moved in and they are awesome; He is like this super cool businessman and tells everyone that he's Mormon. That will end up being a huge blessing because in the Lux business world everyone knows everyone, and it ends up that he knows the assistant Duke of Luxembourg who is stationed in SLC. He got to tell him how much trouble the church has been having here getting permission to build a chapel and he said he'd try to help us out. The chapel is completely filled every week and it's a mad house afterward... people and children running everywhere.

So we had an awesome lesson yesterday at becoming like a child and this most adorable baby was sitting next to me. oh my word it was so spiritual and so uplifting. i just cant wait to be a momma and hold children and get my limits stretched. If I have learned anything on my mission i have learned the importance of family and it truly is only with in the home and the family that we can become like god. i really cant think of any other way to become more selfless, more loving, more temperate, and more Christlike than as a parent.of course you can go to the other extreme and become frustrated and depressed, but that's what the gospel is there for :)

Jennifer// so uh she got answer to her PRAYERS. She had told us that shes been feeling better now that shes been reading the Book of Mormon but we asked her to pray about it and she got an answer. She said she knows its true. She said that she doesn't want to leave her church though and she's having a hard time because she knows that God wants her to make this change in her life but she doesn't want to leave her friends. I think we did a pretty good job following the spirit and helping her resolve her concerns and she decided to set a date for the 15th of December. Too bad I'll miss that by four days but that's okay. It was cool to see. She's been opening up and we feel more like her friends now.

Adele passed her interview with flying colors. She will be baptized next Sunday.

We helped Miriam move into her miracle apartment which is teensy...holy cow, I'm so blessed. She worked so hard for that apartment and it barely fits her let alone her other 2 sons as well....ne of which is 19 and looks exactly like ENRIQUE.

We also had a lunch with an RM who is just awesome. She explained some of her experiences from the mission that i just was like "I JUST EXPERIENCED THAT"; but really she was telling me how she learned that we can have faith and not be naive and blind and also that those picky 19 year old zone leaders are just doing their best and are being formed by god to be the future leaders of the church. ha she helped me see the bigger picture.

One of our investigators... oh poor girl. We met with her on Friday to decided if she wanted to be baptized this Sunday or in Feburary and her husband was just SO emotionally abusive... and she just took it so perfectly. He was saying the most horrible things about her in front of us while carressing her head while she's shedding silent tears. Sister Denning just got home and bawled; He is Chinese, and i think its part of the culture. We would ask our investigator what she thought, and he never let her speak because he was the husband and he'd speak for her... it was sickening and so weird because the spirit was radiating so strongly from Diana and from us as we were reading Mosiah 3:19 (which was perfect because he asked her to stop acting like a child) yet the contention was also so thick from him. Remind me to pray really hard before i get married okay? she is just the sweetest and most self less person i have ever met in my life. I want to become like her.

We were sitting at the bus stop and the girl next to us had a stack of 2 by 2 paper squares that she was EATING. it was so interesting. must taste good. next time we get low on funds ill have to try that one.

Ahmed's baptism was soooo awesome though on Wednesday. it was in the whites home and it was so intimate and the spirit was so thick. It as snowing for the first time outside, and I played the violin and Sister Denning sang because they didn't have a piano. He got baptized in this little kiddie pool outside, and he was just beaming. The water was freezing, but warmer than in was outside because steam came off of him ha. But it was the most beautiful baptism that I have ever seen. He just waited so long for it!

Ahmed at his baptism

Also we were leaving the church from a lesson, and this lady walked up who had taken the lessons years ago from some missionaries. She said she'd been reading the Book of Mormon and has been interested, but every time she and her husband drive by the church no one is there. Luckily, we were there that time and she asked if she could come to church... or if she needed to get like permission or something. Ha. we said OF COURSE you're welcome and ya... we exchanged info and hopefully more will come of this story.

WELL I BETTER GO

HAPPY THANKSGIVING eat a lot and send me pictures OOTAY?

LOVE
soeur KOHLERT