November 29, 2011

Hi everyone!

Thanksgiving turned out great! It's amazing to see how we missionaries can manage to pull out a full-on Thanksgiving dinner. The pumpkin pie I made needed to be baked a while longer, oops. But hey, not too bad for not having a recipe. I'm still kinda proud of myself, haha! We watched 17 Miracles, which was the second time I've seen it in 2 weeks. It's a pretty good film! Definitely makes you more appreciative of pioneer ancestors. :) Last week, we did family night with Keili and her cousin Maris came with her husband too. Keili made a superb chicken salad. Like a real American salad with actual lettuce. Oi, it was delicious. Estonians don't really make leafy salads, so that was a treat! Later that night, I realized I accidentally took home their version of Uno so we had to return it to her a few night later. When we did, we just played a few rounds with her and son Remo, and invited her to church, but she couldn't make it :/ She BETTER come the next 2 Sundays! She sorta promised me, so I'll try to use that to convince her to make sure and be there this week. We couldn't meet with Wentao last week because he had lab work to do for school. We've got some finding to do this week because the investigators we have are... well, non-existant now? They tend to get busy and then contact just sorta fizzles out... *sigh*, but oh well. That's what an Area book is for! Other news, I may be doing an exchange in Pärnu by the end of this week, for old time's sake :)

Yesterday was an amazing zone conference. Quite a finale, possibly one of the best I've attended. By the end, I was feeling pretty woozy (sp?), tired, and had a killer headache from tons of tears, but still awesome! Elder Larry R. Lawrence of the Seventy was present with his wife, (they also spoke Sunday here in Tallinn). Surprisingly, Sis. Lawrence's presentation was probably the best part too! She spoke of the the house of Israel, its scattering and gathering and how it's that "believing blood" in the modern descendents that draws them to the Gospel and church. The amount of instruction we received in that hour or so felt like the equivalent of an entire semester of Institute xP Mind-blowing!!! Everybody was just in shock and awe. I couldn't help but think about Dad throughout, because I know he'd love this stuff. Don't worry, Dad, we'll talk. ;) Also from Zone Conference, we received our Estonian Triple Combinations!!! Got 'em before the members too. They are really lovely and will be a great help to the branches and members. This made all of the Russians jealous because they don't have Russian triples yet, but hey, at least they actually had D&C...

Sounds like you had a productive week with all the holiday preparations! I've already been listening to Christmas music for a long time, hehehe :) It hasn't snowed since last P-Day, just really rainy and windy. I'd give it another week, at this rate. But hey, some folks have told me it's not uncommon to have relatively snowless (less-snow?) winters, here. Kinda hard to believe, if you ask me, but now it's really got me wondering! Sorry to give you such a headache with the back-to-school issues. I will get to work a.s.a.p. Oh boy, dealing with logistical stuff is especially difficult long-distance. xP

Hope to give you some more amazing stories next week! Love you all so much.

Love,
Courtney