This week I finished the Book of Mormon in Russian for the first time! Hooray! The comprehension level from the beginning to the end has changed so much. It is amazing to see the progress. So now, with Presidents permission of coarse, I am reading War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy. It is orininally written in Russian (Sometimes french haha) and so far pretty good. HE is very descriptive with people, which is good because now we are more concerned about the characters. You can see a stark difference between the Book of Mormon or bible and novels.
This week was good in the New investigator department, we found a small family!!! Viktor and Nastya, they are very nice and open to religious views of others, we have been to their house once and they want us to come over as often as we can. Viktor is a diving instructor who sometimes travels to Thailand to do dive excursions with tourists. Nastya is expecting a baby, and they are both excited. They both have children from past marriages.
We made good friends with Mashas friend group this week which was a huge miracle for us. We saw them at the talent show last week, but we had to leave shortly after, and so we didnt get to talk to them very much becasue they were so busy. We were so sad and didnt know how we could get into a situation to talk to them again, but monday night right after an activity we walk out and BOOM Masha and her friends, we surprised them, but we walked and talked for about thirty minutes, one of them is named Zhenya, he is baptist but we hope he will be interested to learn more about Jesus Christ. He is a really good musician and has a really sincere faith in Christ. He even keeps the law of Chastity(I am not quite sure why he and Elder Jarman talked about that) But it was amazing how God arranged for us to be there right then to meet them all and make friends.
Love you All!
Hey buddy,
I am actually typing this at home, so I'm not if Fiji yet, but I will be when you read this! We are all so excited. I'll send a quick email about what we are doing if I have wifi.
First off...YAY!!!! Thanks for a nice long email! That was fantastic! It totally made my week:). I'm glad you are doing better now. Stay focused on your work out there and everything will go well. Keep the long, detailed emails coming:)
We have been busy getting ready this week. Kaestli got a horrible stomach flu so we are praying like crazy that she will get better before we go. Grandma and Grandpa went to a village with Adam and Char and their kids and they took some toys and candy. The Branch President looked at them and thanked them. But then asked if they had any second hand clothes they could give the kids. So they called me today and we packed a huge bag full of clothes and shoes from the boys and sis. I am excited to see all the kids in the villages.
Josh got his ACT scores back. He didn't study at all yet but we wanted to see where he needed to study. When he was testing the teacher in the classroom wouldn't allow them to use the approved calculator on the math. They offered to let him retest but would then not allow him to get the first score. So we just kept the original score. His overall score was 28 so that is awesome. The great news though is that he got a 34 on the reading and on the science he didn't finish it all the way but still got a 28 but when we looked through it he actually scored 100% on the parts of the tests that he did finish. So if he can speed up and finish he could really do well on that too. His math pulled him down with a 22...so if he get the right calculator and finished the test he could be looking at a great score. He will need it to have a chance at BYU because his GPA is around 3.6. So we are pretty excited about that.
I got your package mailed off. We have been super busy getting everything ready and taking care of penny so I only wrote a letter in it. Sorry. But hopefully you will enjoy the package. I got extra big Proactive bottles so hopefully you won't need any more until you get home. Let me know if you do start running out though. I made your ortho appt.s but it was hard because I have no idea what your schedule will be next fall. They are on Tues. mornings. But are you sure you want them on right away? We could wait a few months so you can meet some people without them on first? Just a thought, let me know if you want I can cancel them and then you can make the appt. when we know what your work schedule is.
So the conversation with Kelly Walker. We are kind of friends so I had given her a slight heads up...Ruth Jeffery too, that he was kind of tough. I waited for a few weeks to say anything so I didn't worry her. So at the lunch she pulled me aside and just told me a few things. Same stuff you dealt with. Like when Elder Walker is making a recording to send home EV is in the background making petty remarks about everything he says. EW also makes jokes about his "unhealthy obsession" with bread. He has commented on how grumpy he can be, but he loves EJ and ER and that helps. So pretty much same old story. The funniest part about it is that EV mom thinks he is the most amazing missionary ever and gushes over him. She also got in trouble by the president because she has a public blog for all his emails and he wrote all about his police encounter with great detail. Not very kind about ukrainians as well so he made her take it down and make the blog private. I read the post before she had to kill it. She was pretty put out that she had to make it private again too. So there's the gossip for ya;)
Everything else is going good. When we get back from Fiji the kids will only have 6 weeks of school left!!! Isn't that crazy? Then we will go to powell, start summer and before we know it you will be stepping off that plane! I still miss you like crazy and love you and I am super proud of you!
Discussions-
1-How do you feel about the ortho thing?
2-Are you still happy and positive?
3-Have you sent me a letter recently? Do so please if not;)
4-When will you be sending a package home?
5-What is your favorite thing about Kremenchuk?
6-Do you miss Sumy?
7-Are things still good with your comp?
8-Funny story this week?
9-Spiritual thought?
10-Any helpful advice to get Ethan out on a mission this summer?
11-pics
12-recordings
13-special message for me:)
I love and miss you! Keep being awesome!
Love you
Mom
1 well, if she wont like me cause I have braces, then she isnt quite wife material is she? SO lets just get it done and over with.
2 Yes I am very happy and positive
3 Yes I sent 2 today and a package.
5I love the weather being warm, but I really like how similar it is to Sumy, it is even more simple than sumy though in that we really only need to know one road, and then we can go anywhere.
6Yes I do, I miss Vika and the branch presidency, I miss the members. I miss my swedish pancakes for 50 cents, and all of the great things you can only find in Sumy.
7Yes, we get along perfect, Elder Bates said yesterday "I think everyone but Elder VanBuskirk enjoyed being your companion" (That makes me happy becasue that statement includes him)
8 I got sick and everyone and there dog was my mom this week. I probably took 3 different kinds of medicine on Sunday, becasue there is no good way to say no thankyou to Ukrainians. I sounded like a girl, so at times I just stay quiet and make hand motions, none of the meds are helping the throat, but my nose is better than usual, except Ibueprofen kills the pain in my throat.
9 Tell him I wish I had prepared better before I left. A good thing for him would be to read PMG, and The Book of Mormon. And remind him that girls are great and all, but youre not gonna miss anyone more than youre family, so prioritize correctly.
I love you so much mom you are the best! I hope you like the package, I tried to put a tie in that I felt reflected each persons personality or style. They are labeled so dont worry about that. Tell sister walker that he will survive! There is a light at the end of the tunnel. I dont know if you noticed any difference in my emails with him, but they were a lot less happy.
Yes I noticed your emails weren't as happy!!!
It was killing me. I struggled right along with you that entire time! It seriously made me so sad to know you were dealing with that and I couldn't fix it! But I was also very proud of you for dealing with it so long. I'm so glad it's over!!!!
Love you so much!!!!
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