May 30, 2011

Dearly beloved,

I had my first ride in an ambulance today! :D Whee~ Let's hope that'll be the only one too! Poor Sis. LeDuc hurt her knee quite badly while we were playing sports with the other missionaries, and we were going to suck it up to go in a taxi, but then the workers at the sports complex went ahead and called the ambulance, ha ha. The competition was getting rather intense since today we had a couple more players than usual. The Pärnu district stayed overnight after District Conference (like Stake Conference) so that the new missionaries could take care of I.D./visa/whatever work today. Since Sis. Lamar and Sis. Christopher had to do that, I went with Sis. LeDuc to the hospital. We spent about 2 1/2 hours there and they still didn't really do a whole lot for her, but now she's on crutches. At least we met a really awesome couple who spoke English because he's from Italy and she's Estonian! He too, hurt his foot after he decided to play just 5 more minutes with his son, ha ha ha! Sis. LeDuc got their info while we got her crutches and x-ray developed, so I think they may actually live in our proselyting area here in Tallinn, yay~

My next 2 preparation days will be on Tuesdays, because on the 6th we'll be in Riga for Mission Conference and then the 13th will be zone conference here in Tallinn. Lots of fun events to look forward too! Recently, I've been thinking a lot about our Staycation and looking at the pictures of that on my camera since that happened a year ago now. It's almost unbelieveable! We found out that July 4th falls on preparation day, so we missionaries are going to have to plan something fun. One of the Russian sisters, Sis. Uibel (pronounced Yu-bel. Strange, I know!) started making an American questionnaire to see how American you really are. I helped her with it when we did exchanges on Thursday :) It's still a month away, so we've got time to work on it, but I'm pretty fond of the first question. Maybe not quite American history persay, but "How many thingamabobs does Ariel have?" :P Go ahead and sing the song!

We ate dinner with some members and the Perrys last week, and so I think we'll try to schedule another appointment this week. It was really lovely. Tonight we have family night with the branch president and his cute little family. District conference yesterday was really grand! President Dance spoke about how many people say that their family is their #1 priority. He'd like to rephrase that as "the salvation of my family is my #1 priority". When we understand that, then we look at the world very differently. Simply spending time with family won't save them. That comes through serving others, fulfilling callings and responsibilites and covenants. (Good work, big bro, in helping your ward members :) He cited examples of Lehi and President Monson in working for their family's salvation. I hope the members can take that to heart in helping their own families. There are many amazing members, but many of their children are straying from the strait and narrow. I don't know if it's because they're afraid of influencing their children's agency too much? Everything that inviteth and enticeth to do good is from God.

Well, I hope you all have another lovely week! Rumors are going around that this week will finally heat up, so I'm excited for that :)

Thanks for all the prayers and love.

Much love,
Courtney