Ludwigsburg - Week 8

Hey all, Thanks for the birthday wishes, it was a great day. We had tons of fun.

 

Montag 6 Juli 2015

Today we had P-Day. We started out the day by having studies. Then we went to Ludwigsburg with the S-Bahn. We got a bus with a member and went to a Chinese Buffet with a member for the heck of it. It was so good. We had a great time too. I get along with this member really well. He and I had a great conversation for about 2 hours. Afterwards I emailed all of you and that was pretty much the day.

Dienstag 7 Juli 2015

Today we had a great district meeting. It was run really well and people really did great with their assignments. We got to talk about the Zone Goal and get moving forward with it. I'm excited for that. After district meeting, the Ehepaar had made a cake. Turns out Sister Bishop and I share our birthday on 7/11. Jawohl!!! It was awesome of them. Then, we came back to our apartment with Pforzheim elders and did language study, then we went and taught a lady together who is moving into our area soon and wants us to help her find a house near the church. Little did you know, I'm not really a missionary, just a real estate agent. We see this allll the time. She's excited about the church though. So that's good. We'll see where it leads. We rode a Bahn afterwards for 40 minutes over to another appointment. A less active named S from Greece. I really enjoy the Greek people I've met. There would be a nice vacation spot. Note to self. He's the one having problems with his liver. He played professional soccer and was a big weight lifter. Kinda what I've been settling into lately so we have some fun talks. He was missing his book in Greek so we got him a new one and he was really grateful. He's leaving to Hamburg tomorrow for therapy. He'll be gone for a week or so, we'll have to keep in contact with him this week. When we got done there he drove us back to Asperg Bahnhof and we rode home from there. We got a text from a member about a tornado warning and the sky got super dark and it has been hailing golf balls and pouring. There was a super cool looking funnel cloud, but it hasn't touched down and I don't think it will. That would be fun though! Crazy. We really needed the rain. We've been absolutely dying in this 100 degree weather. Super happy. Prayers get answered.

Mittwoch 8 Juli 2015

It was nice and chilly 60 degrees today. What a blessing! Turns out there was a tornado in Heidelberg about an hour away from us. About 100 houses destroyed and a few hurt. Scary! That does explain the weather though. We went to Landratsamt this morning and now I'm officially a licensed German driver, woooo. I had a couple problems with it because Offenburg (my last area) lost the original Utah license, which ended up in Berlin somehow. Berlin destroyed my license, and they told me I was out of luck, but I talked with somebody different and he was really nice, so I got it! Yay. Afterwards, we had lunch with the Rohrers! I love them. She can really cook I tell you. We had mushroom soup to start out. Then salad. Then, she brought in noodles with potatoes, frikadelli, which is like German meatballs... I don't know how to describe them, and vegetables, specifically peppers and zucchini. It was unreal. Then for dessert, we had Quark, which is illegal in America because of the high bacteria count in it. But it's good. (: we went straight after to the W’s to teach L, but they had tons of family over, it was a madhouse. We couldn't pull L away from her cousin haha. But R, L's mom, who has been less active for years, was really happy to sit down and talk with us for a while. It was nice to meet her. She's down for L's baptism, so we need to start moving forward. After that, we went and visited R. She's doing well. Really happy. Then we went to the church to prepare our spiel for Gemeinderat, ward council. We had a wonderful Gemeinderat, I really enjoy our Bishop and the leadership of the ward. We worked through a few names and got the members on board to help us. It was a great day!

Donnerstag 9 Juli 2015

Today has been a long day. We were out the door at 6:30 am to go help a member move. His name is Bruder H and he's moving to Singapore. Crazy. He's one of our best members. That will be good for his family though. We did some crazy moving though. We had to move a bunch of stuff to storage. But the storage was in an attic with one of those little tiny ladders that comes out from the ceiling. It sucked getting couches and boxes up there! It took us hours and by the time we were finished, my shoulders and arms were on fire. We got done at about 3, and he brought us back home. We got showered and dressed into missionary clothes and studied for a while. Then Bruder W picked us up for GMK at his place. He's our ward mission leader. He was never on a mission, because he's a convert of about 5 years now. He has 4 kids, his wife played on the German national hockey team. He's so busy, but he's an unreal mission leader so far. He definitely puts his calling up high on his priority list. I think with him we are really going to get things going. He's new with the calling too, so we're learning together. I love his family too. They're great. Afterwards, we came home and planned for tomorrow. Basically just with members all day, but it's a nice thing to do to improve your German and your relationships with members! Fun day. 

Freitag 10 Juli 2015

Today was great! We got our weekly planning done for the next week and afterwards we rode the train up to Pforzheim for an Austausch with them. Elder Bates and I went back to Bietigheim and Elder Wahl and Sorensen stayed in Pforzheim. Elder Bates and I got back and did Language Study and then went to a members house. The Steins had invited us over. I love them a lot. They really are awesome. He made us some stir fry and all the family complained about how spicy it was, which is general among Germans. They can't handle any spice. It was really good though. We didn't have any problems eating, trust me. (: We then came home and did the Austausch tradition of trading stories about stuff.... Hahah. It was great. Super fun day, and Elder Bates is a boss! 

Samstag 11 Juli 
Woo, birthday. I never pictured myself this far into my mission. But today was 10 months since I left. Double digits. Insane how time flies.... Somebody give me another year! Today we woke up and studied. Sister Kohler called around 10 to say happy birthday, her little tradition among missionaries. She's like our mom, we love her! After studies, we went out to do Vorbei's. I updated my emails so I could get the Heimlehrer list from our GML, and I had a surprise email from my best friend and that was really great. Shout out to you, you know who you are. So we went out and we accidentally ran into a less active by dooring which is super duper rare. That was nice, we had a lesson with him. He seems interesting. His name is C S. He drinks and smokes and has porn pasted everywhere around his room.... So that will take some work. But he's friendly with the church! There's a starting point yayyy. Afterwards we went by on a couple people and set up appointments. We met Bruder C on the street so we had a lesson with him which was good. Afterwards we went back to Bietigheim and met up with the other elders to Tausch back. Then we all went over to an American restaurant with J, our member. He gave me a birthday present and kind of set up a party. It was great. We had tons of fun, and it was a super birthday. As I was thinking about it, today has also been one year since I received the gift that has shaped my life in the past year, that gift being the Priesthood of God. The Priesthood has blessed my life in so many ways in the past year, and I have received a vision of how it is meant to be used to build my family and help Heavenly Fathers children. I've had the special experience of being called on in a time of need to give a blessing. I remember the first time and how scared I was, and I also remember just shaking as I stood there, and I remember words just flowing out of nowhere and the shock of realizing I was acting in God's name. Imagine that for a moment. The power to act in the name of the creator of the world. What an astounding blessing today in our world. Not many people can say they enjoy that blessing, only a very small percentage of people. I could go on and on I'm sure, but I'll save you the reading. I'm just really ecstatic for the blessing of it and the fact that I have the chance in the future to raise a family based on the principles of the gospel and the power and authority of the priesthood. Cool stuff!

Sonntag 12 Juli 2015

Today we had church and afterwards,we were invited over to a member's house for lunch. The Schlien family, to be exact. We had a blast with them. They lived in Palmyra for 3 years, so they had some cool stories. I enjoyed them a lot. Afterwards, we got home and studied and worked on our plan for the week once more. It was a good productive day. I enjoyed it.

Have a good week, you're all the greatest! 

Elder Sam Hadfield

Stuttgarterstraße 125/1

74321 Bietigheim-Bissingen

Deutschland