Hey, mom

Hey, mom, (don’t share this letter w/ Sara right now).
I guess you get another personal letter since I have yet to receive one from dad and Elizabeth and I wrote Sara an individual letter in response to her last one. Please remind dad and Lizzy if they haven’t sent me one yet, that I have faith they can do it if they put their mind to it.
Thanks for writing to tell me about Jordan’s call. I actually got a letter from him the day after I got yours, but it was nice to hear it so quickly. I didn’t know until I got Jordan’s letter that the San Fernando, California mission is the same one Nathan is in. Crazy, huh? They could end up being companions on their mission! How strange would that be?
You should have heard me when I found out what day he was entering the MTC. I said, “SAD!” I said that because he is coming in the same day that I am leaving! Most people leave in the early morning hours, so I probably won’t see him. Unless we end up leaving that night, on the 21st, highly unlikely. Thanks for telling Becky to write me. I sent her a letter several weeks ago, but I haven’t heard from her. I don’t think she’ll ever write me.
What dessert did I give Sara a recipe for? I don’t remember doing that. I guess you know you’ve been in the mTC for too long when you can’t remember a time before you were here.
I think it is good for Elizabeth to get Visiting teachers, even though she is still going to Young Women’s. That will hopefully make her feel more welcome when she starts going to Relief Society. Here is something I just thought of. I’ve never had visiting Teachers in Bismarck. Hmm. That is interesting.
So much has happened this week, I don’t even know where to begin. Our other sisters left this week. We woke up at 3:45 in the morning to see them off. We now only have 4 sisters in our branch. We may be getting new sisters this coming Wed, but we won’t know until tonight. Only 38 Russian speakers are coming in. That is a big contrast from the 80 that just left and the 70 that came in with me. Who knows if there are even any сёстры in that 38. In our branch we only have 36 missionaries right now, but there are 2 other Russian branches that must have around 18 or so each in them, since those who came in with us are the only ones left right now. It is kind of weird to think about. One of the districts in another branch was split in half. I really hope they don’t do that to us.
Let’s see, I also began my responsibilities as coordinating sister. I feel burdened by this responsibility. I kind of had a rough time one day this week. One of the things I was asked to do was bring a bond of sisterhood about. When I was first asked to do that, I thought, that’s all? That’s easy! But then, the night after our сётсры left, I realized what the true extent of the work was going to be. That night I was up for at least an hour, unable to sleep, worrying about what I was going to do. To be fair, that wasn’t the only thing troubling me. I was also thinking about Sara’s letter. I have to admit, it made me king of mad. No, that’s an understatement, it made me REALLY mad and it kind of hurt. She said, “I’m not about to tell you everything that happens to me.” It probably was not meant the way it sounded, but the problem is, she hasn’t told me anything that happened to her except she didn’t go to Youth Conference because she was sick. So, for her to say she wasn’t going to tell me what happened to her told me that things ARE happening, she just doesn’t care enough to share with me. That is why I don’t really want this letter shared with her. I write very personal things in my letters, and if she isn’t even willing to share 1 thing that happens to her, I don’t want to share these personal things.
Anyway, that at that time didn’t really help how I was feeling. I prayed and prayed to know what to do to solve this problem that I saw but nothing came. Finally, I decided I needed to sleep, so I ended my pleading and tried to sleep. The next day I was doing ok, but I felt like I needed to talk to my companion. We had MDT that morning so after teaching брат Снег (one of our teachers) in the TEC and doing OTW, I asked her if we could talk. I mentioned to her what Pres. Fillmore had asked of me and I asked for her help in knowing what to do. I think she might have felt like I was attaching her because part of the problem (even though it shouldn’t be) is that she and сестра Egan have a good relationship and сестра Egan’s companion, сестра Christensen, sometimes feels left out and not a part of things. So, it didn’t go as well as I had hoped, but she suggested I bring it up to the whole group. I didn’t really want to do that because I thought they might not want to say what was really on their minds, but I decided it was a good idea anyway. This problem stayed on my mind through lunch and into our next class. Брат Снег (Brother Snow-sorry, I don’t remember if I’ve mentioned that before, or not) came to teach. We started with BoM study. While I was studying, I kind of forgot my worries, but towards the end, I started thinking about it again, and I was hoping to be able to find an answer in the scriptures. My companion needed to use the bathroom, so I went along, bring my BoM with. When we got in there, I kind of sat down against the wall and put my head in my book. The thought kept going through my head, what am I doing? I don’t know what I’m doing, I can’t do this. When сестра Вилсон came out she asked me if I was ok and I kind of just lost it. I told her maybe Pres Fillmore would release me. She tried comforting me by telling me this is good for me and that I CAN do this. It didn’t really work, because that didn’t solve my problem. Then she said maybe I should talk to Сестра Christensen to see what she would like done. Well, I started trying to compose myself to go back to class. While I was doing that, Сестра Egan and Сетсра Christensen came into the bathroom. They asked me what was wrong, but I couldn’t really tell them at that time. That day I was wearing a skirt that I loved that Сестрв Nielson had had. The first time I saw her wearing it, I was so surprised because it was almost exactly the kind of skirt I had wanted to find but hadn’t found. Anyway, I actually took a picture of me in the skirt so I could send it to you to see if you could find me one like it. Then, Sunday morning (this last one) I found it in a box w/ a note from her telling me she wanted me to have it. Anyway, I was really excited, but I felt bad because everyone else loved it, too, so I didn’t really show anyway. Well, this day I had decided to wear it. After the сётсры came into the bathroom and asked me what was wrong, сестра Christensen noticed my skirt. She asked me if сестра Nielson had given it to me and when I said, yes, she asked me if she could wear it. I said yes, but not right now. Сестра Egan said, why not? And we all ended up trading clothing before going back to class. We went back to class, but even though we had switched w/ the сёстры, we figured everyone would think we had gone back to our room to change. We walked in, trying to keep a straight face and not laugh. Брат Снег looked at us, and started to say something, but then he ignored it and continued on. We had set up a time to switch clothes back, 1 hour later. We went to the bathroom at the allotted time. Well, my district was in the lab at the time. During lab time, our teachers do interviews. Брат Снег was in the hallway, so he saw our сёстры before they went into the bathroom. He gave them a funny look. He later told me that he was like, “Hey! Those are the сёстры’s clothes!” We switched back and went back to class. It was really funny because just before that брат Снег had asked us if we had changed clothes and Сестра Вилсон denied it outright. It was really funny. We pretty much confused everyone.
It was interesting though, while I was worrying about what to do to build a bond of sisterhood, my prayer was answered and something was given to me. We couldn’t have planned that, but it helped a lot. Things aren’t perfect, but now I have proof that if I just have faith, Heavenly Father will help us to build this bond, to become united, and to love one another. It was interesting because the next day, I found an answer in the scriptures as well. Like I said, everything isn’t perfect and we are starting to do spot lights to try to bring us closer, but I don’t feel as overwhelmed or burdened as I did before. There is still a lot of work to do, and I don’t know how that is all going to work, but the answers will come.
I don’t really have anything else. Oh, I’ll send more pictures later.
Love,
Сестра Атвуд
P.S. You haven’t really answered any questions I’ve written in my letters. You should go through them and do that.