Week 41: April 7, 201

So the first picture is of Sister Nikolaeva and I in Riga with a pillow, randomly. We love pillows?

The second picture is of Sister Roy and I on the train from Daugavpils to Riga. Can I tell you how much better trains are than buses? So much less crowded and clean. We had exchanges there with Sister Benson right after zone training was finished. It was fun to see a few of the missionaries that I haven't seen for a while. And actually, a perk of serving in Latvia is that President Boswell sometimes comes for zone training. He gave me permission to do an art class and told me to call Sister Suisse, who's part of a senior couple in Vilnius. She's been teaching art for quite a few years and she gave me a lot of ideas on what to do for it. We're printing the fliers and starting advertising tomorrow, so yaaaaaaaaay!

We also went to eat at the famous Muffins & More right next to the church. It's one of those place that missionaries have been going to for a long time and it's delicious.

Our exchange in Riga was so good though. It was funny to be back with Sister Benson after a few transfers and to see how we've both changed but at the same time how nothing was different. We were able to teach a babushka named Nadyezhda, as well as her niece, Tanya. I've never met someone with so much spunk. Well, first of all, we walked in and she immediately showed us this door mat that she was sewing upside-down bottle caps to. She was pumped because if you step on it for twenty minutes or so, it's a free massage. So funny. She also tried to talk us into marrying guys from Latvia so she can see us more often, haha. She's a super loving person and I felt so at home with her. We talked about the Restoration of the gospel of Jesus Christ, focusing on the love of God. It was cool to teach someone like Tanya that because she told us that the love her parents gave her was very conditional. The whole time it was obviously an interesting topic to her, but she was busy sewing the bottle caps onto the rug and her son stopped by the apartment and a few other distracting things happened. I sat there pleading with Heavenly Father in a silent prayer that I would be able to communicate just a small portion of the love that He has for her, and it was cool to see what happened. I turned towards her and testified that I know that God's love is unchangeable; that there is nothing we can do to make it increase or decrease. I told her that because He loves her, she was born with a potential so great that she can't even comprehend it, but that Heavenly Father is more than willing to reveal it to her line upon line, and that process starts with simple steps like daily prayer and scripture study.

She had set down her sewing while I spoke and when I finished, she came over and gave me a hug with tears in her eyes. It's an amazing thing to tell someone exactly what Heavenly Father wants them to hear. 

But anyway, Daugavpils is so good. We have been working a lot on creative ways of finding and teaching. Sister Roy and I both love to figure out different and more effective ways of doing things, so it's been a funny few weeks of testing out new ideas and laughing at the things that went horribly wrong.

We ate at President Spalvens' house with all of the missionaries, which wassooo good. It was classic Latvian/Russian/European cuisine: potatoes, pork, dill, onions, pickles, a salad made of cabbage and carrots and those white carrot things. All of our plates were spilling over with the grease and meat but it was delicious. I've learned by now how to eat a massive amount of food. The trick is no liquids until after the solids have been eaten, just in case you were wondering.

Anywho, the Spalvens are awesome. As a tradition, they have missionaries sing three hymns before eating but we only had one hymn book in Russian so we all tried to pick ones that we knew. It was hilarious too because Elder Hansen and his eyes-closed-100%-serious-serenading face was on the whole time. Can't get enough of it.

Something kind of funny that happened yesterday was when we were teaching by some train tracks and we went to approach this lady when she starts running at us and just snatches the Book of Mormon out of Sister Roy's hands. I don't really understand why it happened but I guess she stole the best thing that she possibly could have.

Life is really good here in Dpils though. I'm loving it more with each day that I'm here and Heavenly Father has blessed me especially lately to find the humor in the situations that I'm in. One of which was that in a lesson last night with the elders, one of us accidentally said, "When Christ was born, there were three forks that we know of that brought him gifts." Forks, wise men...it's all the same.

I love you all and hope you have a lovely week!

С любовью,

Сестра Гуч