January 03, 2011

Sretna Nova Godina!!!
Had a good week, it mostly just went by really fast and very uneventful -- except for new years eve, of course. So I'll start with some things from Christmas, even though that seems like a century ago, that I meant to write about last week and I'm not sure if I did or not. Mom sent CDs as part of the stockings to Sister Dillender and me, one for comp and two for me. And I wanted to mention that they are GREAT. All three are really pretty and there are a couple of songs on mine that I really wanted! Yeah! And Sister Dillender likes hers, too. Really really. Thanks a bunches. Also in the stockings were APRONS! We use them all the time, they are so much fun and really cute. Every pday morning we make a big batch of scrambled eggs, and this morning it was my turn to make them because it was Sister Dillender's turn to shower first, and I wore my apron this morning for that. So it is very useful and very great :D And at our zone meeting a couple weeks ago we got a copy of the Book of Mormon - maybe some of you have heard of the thing where you take a blank Book of Mormon and read it marking all the times it mentions Christ or God. Everyone got a copy for that purpose, and Sister Hill, the mission president's wife, explained that she started reading it and only marking the doctrine from it - as in the things that we teach in lessons. And how great that was going for her, so she encouraged us to pick one of those things or basically read the book of mormon again and mark it in any way that we want. So I was in 3 Nephi when they did this for us and they asked us to start reading in the new year. And so I got to the point this week where I needed to read the end of 3 Nephi, and the last four books in four days to finish the Book of Mormon in time to start doing this new thing on the first of January. And I did it! It was a blitz, I read at night, in the mornings before showering, at meals and I finished in time. I like having goals like that. And now I've started my new Book of Mormon and am having a great time reading it! I chose to circle the mentions of the Godhead, and mark the doctrine from the lessons at the same time, which is going well. I'm doing different colors, too. Blue for the material from the first lesson, orange second lesson, green third, purple fourth, and yellow fifth. Which are the colors that correspond with preach my gospel, which makes it easier to remember. And I discovered that I really like reading the history stuff and concentrate more on that, so I hope this shifts my focus to the gospel! Yeah! It's been going good the last couple of days. And I've come up with lots of ideas for other things I would want to mark when I read it again. Like just marking Christlike attributes or just marking when it says the word "sign." I'm looking forward to all the time ahead I have to study the Book of Mormon! Last thing related to Christmas, I still haven't gotten my package from Mom and Dad that they sent straight to me, but there's good news attached with that! Sister Dillender had a companion who is from Finland, who sent her a package, and whenever the companion got packages from home it only took one week for them to come. And the package that Sister Dillender just got this week took three weeks to get here! So if mail is that backed-up with stuff coming from Finland and Europe, than it's no wonder it's taking this long for things to get to Croatia from the U.S. All is well! I wanted to be able to say that it got here, just so there was no worrying, but not yet. And I got the letter from Mom, that Dad sent. It worked. So thank you! Don't worry, Mom, I mostly thought it was funny. I figured you didn't forget to write, but I thought maybe something technical went wrong with the computer or something. And it did :) kinda.
Another funny thing that I thought about telling you all was that I forget to set the alarm a lot - and we use the phone for the alarm so it's my job to set it - and I forget and fall asleep and every time that I've forgotten to set it I've woken up at 5 or 5:30 or 6 and laid in bed thinking, Why am I awake? And realized that I didn't set the alarm and set it then and fall back asleep. It has been a really funny thing for me. I'm glad that it happens, though, because otherwise we would be sleeping in and breaking the rules!
And I keep writing "anyway" instead of "anyone." I don't know why, but I've done it a couple times in journal or planner, and so I'm guessing something is wrong with my brain. I dunno, though. It's funny also.

So the crowning event of this week was of course new years! On New Years Eve our mission president gave us the option to stay up until midnight if we want and so we did! Maybe not a great idea, but it was fun. We talked and chatted and I finished the Book of Mormon, and we played cards. And we'd been hearing fireworks going off all day long. No one really cared about waiting for a grand finale or anything, I guess. And actually we've been hearing fireworks since before Christmas, every so often, and since New Years, too. They don't have laws about not setting off the real ones, so a lot of the fireworks have been the actual live real go up in the air and explode fireworks. Croatia is firework-happy. So what we did, we went upstairs to the gazda's porch, because they have a much better view than we do, and we got to watch with them! And what happened, around midnight fireworks were going off all around us! It's really hard to describe but it was incredibly cool! On the right, straight, left, and left there were fireworks being shot into the air and we just sat and watched it all! And then it's traditional to shake people's hands and kiss cheeks for the new year so we got to experience that with our neighbors, which was fun, and then we went back downstairs and fell asleep really fast and the next day there was NOBODY outside! More than we expected, because we heard from other missionaries that there's nobody outside on new years day, but not very many people up and about, and none of the stores are open or anything so we didn't have a lot to do with missionary work. We made it work, though. So that was fun! It made me think that it's stupid America does fireworks once at the fourth of July and that's basically it. Silly America. But if we could buy fireworks it would be like the second coming every new year, because of our consumerism. It was really fun.

There's one thing I could use a little bit of help with: I have a talk on the 16th about Justice and Mercy and I'm having a hard time finding like a talk or sources for that! If anyone reads anything good about justice and mercy and wants to pass along the talk that would be great! If not then don't worry about it!

Jesse, that's super cool that Jude is saying Mom! When he turns one that means I've been in Croatia a whole year! That's crazy!
Kelsey, I can't believe Olivia is in primary! And that video you recommended, I didn't go to youtube, don't worry, but it was attached to your e-mail!! I don't know if you did that on purpose, so if you did thanks and if you didn't technology is amazing! I didn't watch the whole thing, but what I saw was really good.
Amelia, thanks for all the great pictures! I can't believe Tylie was sitting under the tree! Did you put her there or was she just hanging out? AndI got the ones that you just sent, it's fun knowing that we're both online at the same time!
Michael, thanks for the letter last week and the updates!
Parents, thanks for being amazing and sending me things from home for Christmas and now birthday. I don't have any wishes, so don't worry about sending anything big! Thanks for the homemade cookies and the treats and clothes and letters and all that jazz!

Love you all!
Sister Laws