Oct 5 to blava and back again

I feel like this is an accurate adventure picture.

 Hello everyone! We had a real fun week this week. We started off early monday morning and hopped on a train.

OH also, when we woke up, we had such luck because it was dark still outside and there was a lunar eclipse!! It was so incredible! I think that the Lord loves me because I got to see a solar eclipse here in april and now a lunar eclipse. True greatness.

So, we hopped on this train to get to bratislava for a wonderful training, then tuesday was P day, and that was really amazing, because we got to go to the castle and all that jazz and email in Blava, and had a wonderful Pday working with the blava sestry.

OH PLUS, they fed us halušky, which I had not eaten in over two weeks, and my tummy was SO happy. SO happy.

Well, long story short, wednesday came and we woke up bright and early once again in order to go get a visa for Sister Ross. The zone leaders woke up even earlier (Bless their hearts) to go wait in line for us at the foreign police. Then, I was so happy to find that the girl who was helping us all day was the same intern student that had helped me!! It was so cool because I could actually speak slovak with her, when before she was very stressed and uncomfortable because she was trying to speak english with us. It was cool to see that I actually have improved over the last year and that I can communicate!! Yay blessings! I was happy to be with her all day, and she was happy too because I gave her some american granola bars that my mom sent me. We ran around from hospital to hospital (Sister Ross was really a trooper), and then waited at the foreign police for a couple hours. We ended right on time to jump on a bus, buy some bread, jump on another bus, and back onto a train all in less than 40 minutes to get back to Trenčin. And when we got back, I was so relieved to see the Trenčin castle come into sight and to be back home in my wonderful little Trenčin. It is funny how when you are in your area, it always feels like home, even if you love all the other areas as well.

Oh also, I had a cool experience at the foreign police, where I had to wait outside in the waiting room while Sister Ross and our intern friend went in, and I got to help like 4 different people from all over the world! I felt so cool when I was helping someone in english, and two seconds later answering someone in Slovak, and then talking with a czech. Afterwards I looked back and kind of just laughed at the whole situation.

So anyway the rest of the week was an adventure. One of my favorite things that happened, was that we were going to teach a woman a lesson, and our oldest member, sestra Alžbeta, came to help us teach. When the lesson did not show up, we showed Sister Alžbeta how to use the Restoration pamphlet to study and to teach other people. This sweet, sweet 81 year old woman just treasured this precious pamphlet. She kept asking for more, and I have never seen someone read a piece of literature with so much joy and intent. She immediately invited us to go to the kyselka* (*Kyselka. Not sure what it is in english, but it is basically a mineral water spring. The carbonated kind? Yes. Right out of the mountain.) with her, and to teach a less active who was coming and another woman she was inviting. Later, when we showed up in the woods at a little meeting spot, we found her falling asleep on a bench, reading the restoration pamphlet. I LOVE our members!!

Speaking of Sestra Alžbeta, we also had the privilege to go over to her home this week and paint her fence bright fire truck red. Anyway so it was Elder Driskills birthday, and I made him a huge cake (not my fault, I could not remember how much the recipe made for the life of me) and we sang heppy berthday and all that jazz. It was pretty fantastic.

Our favorite vegan friend came back from Nitra for the weekend and she is as amazing as ever. Sometimes I really cannot believe how blessed I am to be surrounded by the people..that I am surrounded by. This girl is so great. Every time we are with her, she just glows. I have never really experienced the "light in the face" thing that people talk about until now. She literally emanates light! We had a little book klub with her and we asked her if she had more questions for us, and the only one was "how can I find time for everything? For scripture study and school and all?" It was a dream. We pray every day for her family to be more open and she is growing so fast. I am so grateful for her every day.

Anyway, I cannot think of anything major, but we have had a lot of small miracles! (Especially since we were out of trenčin for a little while) From talking to tens of families, to having amazing conversations with people about a living prophet and his apostles, we are seeing the Lords hand in our work daily. I love the work and I love these people! I am writing down things every day that I learn from them, and boy, is it a plentiful list.

I am excited to finally watch conference this week and was excited to hear about the new apostles!!

S laskou,
sestra abbott