Family! Hey! Happy December!
I honestly don't even know how to summarize this week. Sr Hopkins and I were talking last night about some things we did at district meeting on Tuesday and we were both like "That was this week?" It feels like this week took about a month to be honest.
Monday -- we just got a bunch of stuff done and then went to a birthday party! We went to one for this family's daughter, Anya a couple weeks ago and then it was Kateryna's (the mom) birthday. Her husband isn't a member but he's really nice so he invited us to come. It was just the five of us again. Really yummy cake!
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| Taking pictures of Thanksgiving meal |
Tuesday -- we had Thanksgiving district meeting!!!! Elder Peterson did a Thanksgiving themed formation- using the acronym "Turkey" but he couldn't think of anything for the K so he went with "Konsecrate" we were all like "uhh... keep the commandments, keep the law of consecration?" like there were other options here, but we stayed with Konsecrate.
Then we had our meal! I can't call it dinner because it was at 11 am but it was super super good! Sr Hopkins and I spent all our extra time Monday night and Tuesday morning getting the stuffing and mashed potatoes made. SO GOOD.
The Bourges elders brought dessert -- brownies and apple crisp -- and the ZLs brought a rotisserie chicken from Carrefour and carrots. They were adamant about bringing carrots. And we all brought apple juice. We all bring our own drinks every time and we all brought apple juice. Spent the rest of the day being pleasantly full - didn't eat dinner.
That night we had soiree familiale and only Sr Taylor and Julian came, so we looked at about 1000 pictures that Sr Taylor brought. Some of them were SUPER cool, she and her first husband lived all over the world and she has had a really incredible life. And the rest were of dogs. She bred dogs for a while so she has had a lot.
Wednesday -- crazy busy. Running all over Tours. Met with "B", the ami who stopped taking the lessons a while back, she told us she wants to be baptized but she has some questions. We tried to help and just be there so she could feel the spirit but when we got home we realized that "B" had read more of the brochures than we have... Probably should get around to reading those commandment ones we just don't really use them a whole lot.... yay missionary work!
Thursday -- we sort of forgot that it was Thanksgiving until a member texted us to invite us to come to this activity that she was hosting for the neighborhood where she works. We got there on time but they were running a little behind so we had to leave before they actually served dinner but they didn't want us to leave without eating so we just scarfed down some food in the kitchen like a bunch of animals. But I had turkey and pumpkin pie on Thanksgiving! I didn't realize it was pumpkin pie until like a couple bites in though, I was just like "okay this is on my plate I am going to eat it" and then I was like "I think this is pumpkin!!" and then it started to taste like pumpkin. I wish I would have taken a picture- I think they took actual pumpkin pumpkin and somehow made it so it was like a light orange color. Texture kind of like jello. Safe to say it wasn't Dad's.
Friday -- meant to do planning but ended up walking alllllll over Blvd Grand Sud trying to find a package that got delivered but we weren't home so it went to a pick up location. And no buses ran anywhere near it. We took the closest one and then walked for EVER. by the time we found it- at a gas station, which is apparently a safe place for a package pick up place, it had taken like 2 hours. Then we kept walking because we didn't want to turn around and walk all the way back to where the bus had dropped us off, and we ended up almost walking on to a freeway on ramp but rerouted and wandered through a neighborhood, and the kicker was that we could SEE our apartment building in the distance. We could literally SEE it but there was a freeway in the way of us getting there. We MIRACULOUSLY found our way through this neighborhood without getting lost and ended up about two bus stops away from chez nous. We looked at our map that night and realized that we'd walked about 5 kilometres. Chouette.
Saturday -- actually did our planning. And we've started doing our Christmas contacting! Basically the same as regular contacting but when we go porting we offer to sing Christmas carols!
Sunday -- Primary program! We sang "Ces mots d'amour" [Love is Spoken Here] with them so they could do the boy/girl parts and Marie-Agnes (the member who invited us to the activity on Thursday who is the RS president but used to be the Primary president) thanked us so genuinely, she told us it was a dream come true to have them sing the song the right way. Such a sweet moment. Another member also told us thank you for participating and told us that we have strong spirits and also told us something about our souls. Not entirely sure what he was telling us but he calls me "la viking!" because of my last name. I will never forget him.
During Sacrament meeting President Mayima read a letter from President Babin asking the members to take advantage of Noël to invite the missionaries to share a Christmas message with them and their friends and also reminded them of the way Christmas works- we can spend the day with a member family and just encouraged them basically to just remember that we're away from our families and it's hard. It was really sweet but also made me super homesick.
That night I had my first Mangez-Vous!! [dinner appointment] We had crêpes and bourguignon (beef and potatoes and carrots and it was AMAZING) she taught us how to flip crêpes by tossing the pan and I felt so cool. We shared a little Christmas message with her and her husband and their friend who's from Angers but he's a member and was visiting them. It was great.
We were at the church that evening to meet the office elders who were delivering these books that we are using for our Christmas program- it's a little story written by Elder Anderson called Room in the Inn, but I haven't read it yet... but its supposed to be good!! We ran into Frère Djemi there- he'd forgotten something at the church- the Djemis are AWESOME they moved here about the time that I got here and he works for the church and their daughter is the only young woman and is also the pianist and is super cool. He invited us to come to their home on Wednesday and then when we were leaving he was like "hey do you have somewhere to go for Christmas yet?" and we were like "pas encore..." [not yet] and he gave us this big smile and said "we want it!" Answer to prayers, we wanted to go there so bad. Well, Sr Hopkins won't be here but it feels so good to have that set up.
Sorry that this email is like a thousand miles long but love you guys so much and thank you for EVERYTHING- you are the best.
Soeur Hansen
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