Hello, everyone

Hello,

This last week has been a really long one. But I will tell about that in a minute. First, just to let you know, I can't use this email anymore, but I still want my email to come here, so here's the deal. The new one is the one I will be checking, but since I want all my email to be in my gmail account, when you email me you will need to send it to both this address and my new one. I know that sounds like a pain, but it will be easier for you to do that than for me to have to forward every email that I receive. So, please do that. It will make my life a lot easier. Then my mom will be checking my other email accounts so they keep working and she'll be sorting all that stuff. Thanks for doing that! (not that anyone but my family and ONE of my best friends has emailed me yet, but if you do, please follow this).

Ok, now for what happened. We did a lot of street contacting last week because our pool of investigators thinned out. Some of them we dropped because they have no desire to progress, but other than that, they just got baptized. That's good at least. But, that meant many hours on the street. That is not the easiest thing to do because we walk everywhere anyway, so to be outside on the street for that much longer just makes me more tired. It really wore me out, but rather than helping me to sleep better, it made me start having really weird dreams. I've noticed that before, when I work really hard, my dreams are so strange! (Left - FHE with Valentina and Tatyana, Valentina's son Valentin is in the front) But, at least we were doing things. As a result, we have 4 new potential investigators.
We also received a referral from a lady in St. Petersburg who was baptized earlier this year. Her daughter lives here in Togliatti (Тольятти) so that is really nice. We started teaching her on Saturday. She came to church on Sunday and also attended Family Home Evening with us at the apartment of one of the members here. That was good because they were able to tell her some of the blessings they received from following the gospel, especially in regards to following the word of wisdom. Here, you are really strange if you don't drink at least some of the time. So, she had a little doubt about that, but I think that really helped her to hear things from Russians.

I had an interesting experience in church on Sunday. One of the members was asking me if FHE was held at the помешение (pomesheniye - that's what we call the building where we meet for church) and I was confused. I understood what she was saying, but I didn't understand why she was asking me that, and why she would think that. So, I gave her a puzzled look and didn't respond. So, she said, ah, she's a greenie! (In Russian, of course). It was so funny because I understood every word! Oh well, she can think what she likes.

The members here, the ones that are active anyway, are amazing. They have amazing conversion stories. We are going to see if we can get them to write them all down. That would be so nice to have. For example, one lady Валентина (Valentina), found a Book of Mormon. I don't know where, but after finding it, she wanted to know where it had come from. She tracked through several people until she found a lady who gave her the number of the missionaries. She was baptized not long after. Or, there is Агнесса (Agnessa), she was a Seventh Day Adventist's Witness before, she and her entire family. Well, one of her sons met the missionaries, took the discussions, and was baptized, all behind her back. When she finally found out, she wanted to meet with the missionaries, and she, too, was baptized not long after. They are so strong. Those are the kind of people we want to find. Not the lukewarms who have since become inactive. Though, as President Hickley said, there is no compulsion in the Lord's work, but there must be opportunity. So, that is what we are doing. But still, we want to find those who will remain strong.

I think I need to go now. My companion is done. Hopefully I will have more time to write next week when I won't have to be setting up accounts and all that. From now on I will be sending email from my new address, but, as I said above, send emails to both.

Love,

Сестра Атвуд