I can't believe I've already completed a whole transfer in the mission field. I still feel like the baby in the district (I mean, I AM but... like... I feel like I should be fresher or something. Not a whole transfer old.)
It's so funny how the mission works. Everything is a family. Like Sister Tolman is my trainer so that makes her my mom. And Sister Chavez trained Sister Tolman so that makes Sister Chavez my grandma. Then how "old" you are depends on how many months you've been out. So I'd be 2 and 1/2. Is that crazy?
Missionaries are so weird.
But a new transfer means that I get to drive now! I was driving around this morning! I am so happy and so is Sister Tolman. She HATES driving. Wins all around.
So here's some of the things that happened since last week.
Pday was legendary. We went to the Chakmakov's with the Elders and played catch phrase for an hour and a half. It was so funny because we couldn't stop laughing. I haven't laughed that hard in a while. I don't know how many of you have played the game before, but I highly recommend it. So one round we were playing boys vs. girls. Brother Chakmakov had the word and it was "dress" and to describe it he said, "Something a girl wears." A good description, right? Well to this day we are still unsure about what Elder Cluff THOUGHT he heard but heimmediately answered with "GROCERY STORES!"
I couldn't stop laughing.
I'm still laughing.
Later that night while we were eating dinner, Sister C. was describing what she had cooked. It was a traditional bulgarian dish, kind of like a meat loaf. I'm still not sure what the real name is but I misheard her when she said it. "It's called Little Stephanie? Don't you think that's kind of morbid?"
Everyone at the table was silent and just stared at me for what felt like an eternity. Then we just bust out laughing. The whole night they made fun of me, "Sister Bills, would you like some more little Stephanie?" "Who can eat another slice of little Stephanie?" hahaha. I can't even describe to you how red I was.
Then (Because Sister C is a winner every day of her life) we made s'mores indoors. She lit this little flame thing and we roasted marshmallows from the kitchen table and listened to Christmas music because we're that awesome. We love the Chakmakovs.
After that, Sister Tolman and I went for a bike ride in our skirts... just to try it out.
Let me tell you. If any of you want a real workout, go for a ride with flat bike tires and you will be feeling the burn for days.
I had a picture but I left my camera at the apartment. Whoops. I'll have to remember to bring it next week.
In other news, we've been doing our family history this week and I followed one of my lines back to ABRAHAM and Sister T was able to go back to ADAM. It was so incredible! We caught the spirit of elijah hardcore.
We got 4 new investigators this week! It's been incredible to see the Lord hastening his work. I won't go through all of them, but one is named H. and he is so cool. I might have written about him last time? Now I can't remember... the weeks all blur together. But he was super hesitant about coming to church. He said he's tried numerous other churches and didn't like them. But at the end of the service, he leaned over and said, "Can you find me a ride every week?" It was so cool! Through him, we are hoping to start up a class where we can teach English to him and his friends once a week. We're planning to use that as a way to find more Spanish speaking investigators! We feel very confident that it will work.
In other news, S. is busy being awesome and he's so excited to be baptized on October 11. We are having a baptism for W. THIS SATURDAY! She's getting Married on Friday and then baptized on Saturday and Confirmed on Sunday. She's so excited. She's been struggling with the law of chastity and wouldn't keep it for the past 3 years and they finally decided to tie the knot and live the commandments! She's so excited! She's pretty much been an active member for the past 3 years. The only thing that's missing is the baptism. ;)
Thursday this week was crazy. We had back to back to back appointments, and somehow we accidentally scheduled someone for our dinner hour, so we didn't even have time for dinner! I had the first opportunity that I've had on my mission to sing during a lesson and that was awesome. I was really nervous, but it went super well and now we'll be singing every time we go over to that less active's house. I'm happy. :) Then we kept on going through the day and we were starting to get really burned out when something fell through so we ran to a pizza place really quick and ate super fast before our next appointment.
When we got home that night, our DOOR WAS OPEN to the apartment! I don't know how that happened because we always lock it when we leave. But we were a little scared and didn't know what to do. So I said a prayed in my heart and told Heavenly Father how tired I was and how I just wanted to plan and go to bed so we could have another good day on Friday. I felt this incredible sense of calm like "You must not have closed the door all the way when you checked the mail. Your apartment is safe."
But Sister Tolman was still scared so haha I kicked the door in super hard and flipped on the light and yelled "POLICE! PUT YOUR HANDS IN THE AIR!!" and then I grabbed one of the crutches that was by the door (don't ask me why we have those cause I totally don't know) and I searched the apartment. It was clear. Haha, it was so funny.
I just have one more story for y'all from this week. We were over with the elders (George and Cluff) at a members house last night for dinner and their daughter was sleeping on the couch (remember this for later). They fed us this awesome copycat recipe of a soup from Olive Garden. I was in heaven. Anyway, we shared a though with them about member missionary work and were just getting ready to leave when their little girl (her name is Varsity...) woke up and walked over to the table. But you know that state where you just woke up and you're not really awake? Yeah, that's where she was.
So haha she walks up to Elder Cluff and just snuggles right into him, thinking he's her dad. Elder Cluff's face went BRIGHT red... it was hilarious. Brother Jones was trying not to laugh and he was like "Varsity, honey, that's not me. I'm right over here." But it was just not registering and she like tucked her little face into Elder Cluff's shoulder and he got redder and redder and at this point we're all just laughing because of Elder Cluff's reaction. Like... the situation wasn't even that awkward but his reaction was just so priceless. We finally managed to get her to go over and snuggle with her DAD.
We were still laughing as we walked out the door. We renamed him Elder Cuddles.
So it was a really good really busy week! I can't believe how fast that flew by! We caught another mouse! (UGH) and I have some pictures to send that I hopefully will not forget next week.
I want you all to know that I have a testimony of the truthfulness of this gospel. I love my Savior Jesus Christ and I know that we can receive personal revelation every day through our faith in him! This mission is so good for me! You are all so good to me! Thank you for your support and prayers and, as always, I love you all very much! :)
Love, Hermana Bills
