Wednesday, August 31, 2011

August 31, 2011

Hi Family!

I can't believe that people are starting school. We were just thinking about this yesterday, Sister M and I, about how school is starting. Can you believe that tomorrow is September? Crazy. I didn't know Tysha is getting/got? married! Yay! Anyway. It sounds like everything is going well at home, even if porcupines did eat all the corn.

Things here have been going a bit better. We had some miracles phone calls, first from an old investigator who had gone home for the summer and called me, saying she misses me and wants to meet (however, we haven't been able to meet yet and I'm not sure if she will actually progress or not when we meet up, or if she just wants to come back for the social part...). That was so great. It came after a rough day, and I had actually been thinking about her earlier in the day and how she was getting home soon and then she called! We also had a lady call us Sunday night. We had first been going through our phone, trying to clear out a lot of numbers we didn't know. And this lady calls us, saying that we called her or her friend or something (we still have no idea about how she got our number). She knew that we're believers and she knew that we had English club. Sister M was talking to her, but she seemed very pleasant, and she said she wants to come to English Club with her 8-ish-year-old son, so maybe. Plus she also seemed pretty interested in the Church, too. We'll see tonight if she comes to English. 

Also, we had an investigator at church on Sunday for the first time in weeks! I was so happy to see her there, even if our lesson afterwards wasn't the best, and we're not sure when we'll be able to meet with her again. And we've met with some wonderful, wonderful members this week. Our members are SOOOOOO great. I love them. I will miss our branch when I get transfered, possibly in just 2 weeks. Sometimes I want to get transferred, just because I've been here in Kahovski for 5 months now and I'm ready for a change, but at the same time, when I think about leaving, it makes me sad, because I will miss our great members and Sister Mordwinow and our district. Anyway, we'll see what happens. 

So it's getting better. This is just a test to see if I can push through and do things that are hard for me. I have to admit though, when I read Matt's email saying that he had found a big family just by knocking doors, I was pretty jealous. However, we've been doing better with talking to people this week. I actually talked to a VERY nice lady on the metro the other night. We were riding home from the apartment of some of my favorite members, and it was kind of late (however, not TOO late. Don't worry, I don't stay out until Midnight like Matt, haha). We hop onto the metro and Sister M sees this lady sitting across from us give us the biggest smile, plus she kept looking at us and smiling. We knew that if we didn't talk to her we would maybe be the lamest missionaries in the history of the universe. So I pulled out my pictures (I have a few family ones tucked in the front cover of my BoM) and motioned if I could come sit next to her. I showed her my pictures. She asked if we were Mormons--she had heard of the church, but didn't really know anything about it. But she said that she could tell we were believers; because of our smiles, she knew that we had hope and believed in God. That was such a great experience to me. She was really hesitant about giving me her phone number, but we did give her a Book of Mormon and a prig, so maybe something will come of it. I think she really will read. So that was a really awesome experience.

Also, Sister Mordwinow and I are putting together a fireside. It's going really well so far. We're hoping it will be in the next couple of weeks, and it will just be music, so hopefully it will be a great way for members and missionaries to work together to do missionary work and they can invite their friends to something that's not really threatening. And our district has been trying to do service together, picking up trash in a park. There is always a lot of really exciting stuff there--on Monday we picked up so many beer/alcohol bottles that our bag broke--twice. The Elders make it a game to see who can get the most "points."

 Last night we had Culture Night--Elder Bogdanov made us borsh (soooo good) and then our district went and walked around Tsaritsino park. It's beautiful--probably one of my favorite places here in Moscow, plus during the summer they have these beautiful fountains, like the Bellagio fountains in Vegas, that have music and different colored lights. We can't see them usually, since the lights come on too late for us to be out, but it was great to spend Culture Night there just doing something fun, walking and talking with our district and not having to spend a lot of money. However, summer is ending soon. it has been getting dark so early, and the weather has cooled down a  bit to the point of where it is super pleasant almost all the time.

That's about it for things going on here in Moscow! The Church is true!

Love,
Sister Ashby

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