Hello again from Russia!!!
I hope you all are doing great. Things here in Russia are great, but very hot!! The weather has been very beautiful lately. I just want it to stay this way because I know in the near future the temperature will get VERY cold!!!!! So I am enjoying the hot weather while it lasts!!!!!
So I am with my new companion, her name is Lyuda Semenova, and like I said last week she is a mini missionary. She is great. She is 21 years old and was baptized a year ago in another city in our mission. She is the only member on the church in her family but is very strong. I was a little worried to get a mini missionary at first because sometimes it is hard when your companion isnt a full time missionary and just a member because they haven't been through the training at the MTC or the experience of being a full time missionary so they dont understand completely what our role is.... but Lyuda is great and I am so thankful to have her as my companion right now, I think she has already taught me more than I have taught her. I know this will be a great transfer with her. It might not be a full transfer with her though because well first of all in a couple weeks there is a young single adults conference and she will be leaving to go to that for a week and then we heard that maybe after the conference she will be going back to Tomsk where she is from instead of coming back here. So that might happen but at this point we are not sure. So I will keep you updated.
So Natasha who just was baptised is doing great. I was a little worried this last week because when I called her a couple times she didnt seem herself. So i was praying everything was alright. It even seemed like she didnt want to meet with us, but we were able to see her a few times and she is back to normal. She has a pretty hard life and I think she was a stressed with some stuff. She came to church though on sunday and that helped her alot too. It was her moms birthday as well on monday. Her mom is a member and a very kind and sweet lady. Well they dont have really any money so Natasha asked me to help her do something for her moms bday. So we asked the Southams (the senior couple serving here) if we could have a family home evening at thier home and invite some people from the branch. So on monday we had a little surprise bday and fhe and it was so fun. There was about 15 people there and once again it was a good event to help bring unity to the branch. We taught a spiritual thought about friends and why friends are important and that we need to be good friends and love and serve each other. It was a very good thing for Lyudmela (natasha's mom) because she lives a very humble life and it was great for her to feel loved and supported. Its so important for us to love one another. I have attached some pics from that party. One of a group of us at the party and also one of Natasha and her mom. Also there is a pic of me with FRESH strawberries for lake baikal that the branch president's family gave us SOOOOOOOO GOOD. They picked them yesterday themselves and then brought them to us last night. WOW what a blessing!!!!
So I hope you all are reading you scriptures. I love the Book of Mormon. It is such a blessing for us, written for us. We always can find answers to our questions about life. A girl here was telling me about how she will pray to Heavenly Father about a question or concern she has and then right after praying she opens up the book of mormon and just starts reading a random verse. She told me that it is amazing because she always opens up to a verse that is exactly what she needs to hear. Thats way cool! We should all try that, I think that really shows trust in God and it shows our desire to find the answers we need. He will always give us answers, advice, and counsel, but we need to be watching for the answers.
Well once again I love you all so much and I hope all is well for you. Have a great week!!!
Sister Mindy Gneiting
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