Nov 14

hey fam family!  

 

How ya all doing?  hope your doing good!  It’s started to get cold here! haha the coldest this week was -13 Celsius (how in the world do you spell that?)  haha oh well!  Not important, but the other days have been like -3 or -5 or -8. But seriously the coldest is when it is windy!  wooooeeeee that wind bites!  We have wiped out our long very unattractive coats that make you look about 30 pounds heavier! :) But keep you a lot warmer and also its like sitting on a pillow!  It’s funny.  Some people wear the coats that are that long, but not most. But seriously walking outside and in the metro it’s like a wave of fur when people walk by!  its sad kinda.....but interesting.   

 

You all asked what I did for my birthday....haha I did missionary work! haha surprise surprise!  haha but we made sure to do something special everyday! just something small!   

Mon- hung out with the elders at the branch and ate cake stuff

Tues- bought pink nail polish and painted my nails pink. and opened my bday package from you all!! Thanks so much!

Wed- one of the members took us to a small cafe for a quite lunch. The Webbs gave us chocolate and a member gave me a Russian fairy tale book

Thurs. we ate snickers ice-cream

Fri- district meeting with yummy cake. Had a new investigator meeting.

Sat- one of our almost investigators taught us how to make earrings! I made candy cane ones :)

 

So that was my week- well only the non missionary stuff.   Now on Wednesday it was super duper cold! But since it was a special day we knew something special would happen.  we stopped by the office to talk to the webbs and Elder and sister Webb are my new favorite people and elder Webb said to us that he felt that he should tell us that we would find someone to teach today.  He said if we talked to EVERYONE a lot of people would say no but someone would say yes.  We were very very very very obedient in the talking ten people. It was incredible! What a little motivation can do, when someone believes in you?  Interestingly enough we found 2 people that wanted to meet!!! and set up two new investigator meetings!  One with a lady named Angelina who works in the metro and one with a babushka whom we happened to talk to. and plus that day we found 2 inactive members that no one had seen or heard form in a long time who were so happy to see us! It’s nice when people are happy to see you, you know!?  We were so excited and we called elder Webb that night! haha he was so happy and crying haha. I guess he got really nervous for promising us that so he had been praying really really hard all day long that he had followed the spirit in telling us that. 

 

It was interesting, that next morning as I was thinking about this experience we had I had a very interesting thought.  Heavenly Father gives us experiences in live I think so that we can better understand Him, how He feels and our relationship with Him. I have come to love Sister and Elder Webb so so much and elder Webb has become like father figure for me and sister djurich in Russia. I think that Heavenly Father was trying to show me how our relationship needs to be.  He promises me that if I do His work, if I open my mouth and do all He says, I will have success.  He loves us even more than any father figure we have ever had on earth. and we can go to him and "call" Him and tell Him how it went and all that happened and He will be so happy!  anyways. That kinda sounds lame as I am writing it, but it was a very profound thought and realization in my mind for me. 

 

Yesterday we were in the Metro and my heart started pounding really hard. That usually means that the spirit it trying to tell me something really really important so I was looking around trying to determine what that was and I saw a family that I had noticed earlier. It was a big family for Russia- a mom, dad 2 teenagers and a toddler.  They looked so happy and I thought, alright I will go talk to them (even though they were awkwardly all the way across the metro) and I just opened my mouth and out came "You have such a beautiful big happy family!" haha that’s not the normal thing that would come out haha but they responded well to it. I told them we were missionaries etc and the dad told us they were Muslim.  The son I think was about to start an argument, but the dad did something so great!  It was the greatest example to me.  He looked at me and said how wonderful that it was that we both strongly believed in one loving God.  It was incredible.  We are here to help people of course to add to the truths that they already know. But this man was a huge example to me.  We were able to just talk about their family, our families, (America of course) and just what is important to us.  We got in the metro and our conversation kind of stopped, but I think that the spirit was pricking the dads’ heart because he turned to me and asked for our number so we could come visit them.  How great would it be if we could all in the whole world be this way.  Share the truths that we know and help each other grow through loving conversations. It was great. 

 

Met a new babushka like I said, her name is Lucy (kinda) we met her and set a meeting up with her for the next day. It was a great great lesson! Loved it so much!  We were just able to discuss the gospel.  How she views certain principles and how we can add to that and make it more clear for example, how we become clean and worthy through atonement so we can be worthy to live with God. What her daughter (who died) is doing and how she can return to see her again someday.  It was incredible.  Although she thought it very strange we wouldn't drink her black tea "it’s only mildly black!"  She says haha funny funny.  

 

It is beautiful and frozen here! And it has just begun so I have heard! haha the ground sparkles and the air sparkles with all the beautiful white snow!  I like to find all of the ice patches and slide on them! It’s so much fun!  And gets us laughing!  And ps I have only fallen once, for those of you who are counting :)  

 

I love you all so much. I learn every day, not a new principle or doctrine, but a new way to apply it to me, to my life and who I am.  I think that is why the gospel is so great and incredible. We can and should learn every day. The gospel is so simple. We can learn all we need to from primary songs but it is so simple and so deep and so personal that we can be uplifted by it daily.  We just have to apply it to ourselves. It’s incredible. Found a new song I love, it’s called, My Soul Hungered. And it’s about this. It’s about finding out in your heart for yourself what you already knew in your mind. I would suggest you find it and listen to it!

 

I love you!

 

Sister Trottier

 ps. thanks for the great cookie mix! But one problem...there are no instructions! haha what do I have to add?