Time Is Flying!

Hello sweet family,

It was soo good to hear from all of you. Another week has flown by and with it went my 10-month mark. That means that I am half way done with my time in the land. Boo *thumbs down* :(

I miss it already...On the other hand, hearing all about life back home is fun and reminds me that there is such thing as fun times in the "real world". I'm proud to hear that my cougars pulled through against Oklahoma- even if they have to go without my extra-loud cheering on the sideline this year.

The work is still AMAZING in this area. I just love it so much. I am to the point where I really do enjoy the work- part of missionary work. I've always enjoyed the high points and the exciting moments, but learning to truly love the hard, sometimes painful, work has taken a little longer. There's just something very satisfying about being on your feet all day, riding through driving rain and wind, and talking to tons of people everyday who do everything in their power to avoid you on the streets (it’s kind of like a hunting game). In short, it’s a ton of fun! I think training has taught me a lot about hard work. Knowing that I have to be an example for my trainee and show her by my own diligence what the Lord expects from us has helped me to re-evaluate my own dedication to the Lord's work. It has been such a great transfer of growth and learning. I still love Zuster Driggs to death- we spent the last few hours shopping and had a blast trying on really cute shoes that we would have totally bought in a heartbeat in our "former lives" (the European styles are sooo cute ). In the end we settled on some really boring (but practical) black knee high boots for this winter. We're starting to see the signs of fall, which is beautiful, but chilly :)

We had a really funny experience this week. Funny, but a little bit frustrating. We have a new member, Zr. Overweg, who is struggling a little bit with the word of wisdom, so our branch president bought her some grain-coffie (essentially postum) and we were supposed to take it to her. Well, I forgot to take it to her like 2 weeks in a row, and she was getting very impatient with me always forgetting, so I told her I would bring it to church with me. Well, I did, and was very careful to pack it in my bike bags very nicely and I even put it in a little bag for her to carry home. Well, we got to church, and she wasn't there. Apparently she was sick, so we decided to go by later to bring her her drink. During the last hour of church, I set the bag on the floor by the wall of the relief society room, and the meeting was great... until the oldest of old ladies went to walk out of the room and totally STEPPED ON THE COFFIE!!!! The canister totally popped open like a firecracker in the bag and like half the coffie spilled out. Luckily, it all stayed in the bag. But anyways, it was totally unbelievably ironic that after forgetting it so many times, it got ruined before I could give it to the sister. Figures eh? I guess the Lord just figured I would need some humbling. The following task of describing to Zr. Overweg why we didn't have her coffie in Dutch was probably even more of a train-wreck than the coffie breaking (what is the Dutch word for canister anyways?). In the end, she laughed with us about the whole experience.

Anyways, I've got to go, but I love you all!! I hope that you have a wonderful week. Good luck with school, work, and everything else!

Love,
Zuster Cherie Gulliver