Week 50

Dear family and friends...

i can feel ive almost made it through the worst of winter...almost. the sun is starting to come up earlier and earlier (about 3/4 the way through morning exercise) and while im wearing the most warm, ridiculous boots i have, its is only because they are the most water proof because as we walk the streets, we walk on more slush than ice now, so my socks get wet if i wear my other boots. its still gets really cold when the sun goes down. but. its amazing what a little warmth can do to an attitude. i think ive found my 'trigger'...something that puts me in a bad mood immediately and thats being cold....so my poor companion has had to deal with the worst of Sister Little the past couple weeks...but hopefully we are not far from some warmer days.

 

ive realized my past few letters have been pretty sub par..and i blame it on the cold weather. but now its a little easier to smile because my cheeks aren't as frozen, and my brain cells can work a little faster because they aren't' as frozen...so i figured i could write a little better letter from a sister who has the privilege of being in Odessa, Ukraine at this moment and be living the missionary life...

 

this week was pretty good. its interesting to think about the progression of the people here in Ukraine. when it first opened up...lots of churches came in, lots of options, people were exploring, interested, inviting their friends here and there so there are now lots of churches in Ukraine who have some pretty loyal followers...Baptists, Jehovah witnesses, ive even run into ...what are those people called in Pennsylvanians?...ya, them. so now, twenty years later, people know who were are when we walk on the street. they know they just have to throw up there hand and walk away and we won't bother them. they'd rather believe what they hear in the media then what we have to say. so...we changed our strategy a bit. we are trying to just get people into our church buildings and meeting our members. lucky, our area actually has one, a pretty one at that, so we are trying to have regular activities at the church throughout the week to get people into our churches to see how we look on the inside-that we don't have icons everywhere, that it is a warm, welcoming place, that its okay to have crazy kids running around. Thursday nights we have an 'English discussion group' on spiritual topics since English it a big seller here. last week we had a really good discussion on faith/miracles/actions. we had 5 people there. not a lot at all, but, we've had worse shows. then Friday night is supposed to be 'fun night' where we play games or something...and when i got here no one was coming, not investigators, not members, no one. every one knows about it but everyone thinks someone else will come, some one else will do it...but then, we end up getting no support. so...we decided to develop it a little better so that its more interesting. we decided that for '4 weeks' and 4 weeks only..Friday would be a 'culinary night' where we showed everyone how to make different American sweets (everyone here through the course of 20 years of American missionaries know exactly what brownies are...but they don't know how to make them)...this way there is 1. free food which is the best way to get people anywhere, no matter what country they are in. 2. there is a time limit on it..only 4 weeks to learn how to do it...better come this week! and 3. its interesting...hopefully members and investigators will be intrigued by it and come and interact and we can build better relationships between our investigators and members.

 

well, the first week, we had like 5 members come...pretty good turn out! but no nonmembers came. we did rice krispy treats and brownies (except they don't have rice krispies here so we used a diff cereal), last week, our second week, we had 6! nonmembers there! (we did fudge and banana bread) but..no members.. but that's okay, it still got some people into our building, interacting with each other, feeling comfortable with missionaries, and showing that we're fun too. i understand its not the best best way to teach people about the restoration or eternal life...but its a start. we got more nonmembers into our building than we have before.

 

so..im doing better, the language is coming back. i gave a talk yesterday in church about Jesus Christ, the everlasting gift of the atonement. it was a good reminder for me to be grateful for the many blessings i do have.

 

i love you all,

miss you like crazy!

thank you for you thoughts and prayers!

sister little