June 17, 2013

Witam moi bliscy!
There are some definite perks of having a Polish companion! I get to use polish... not that I can actually remember what she says to me or use it in our conversations. Hey but I'm trying over here! And Amy I thought you would appreciate that :)

This week was a difficult one for me. And not because something horrible happened, but it was just hard. Being here in Romania, on my own, not really knowing the language, is extremely hard. I love it don't get me wrong. I absolutely love being here. I learn new things about Romania, our investigators, members, the gospel, the language, and myself everyday. And I love that. I love learning, and growing and feeling that I am really changing who I am to the person Heavenly Father needs me to be. But it's hard. I feel uncomfortable and unconfident a lot of the time. And it's stressful. Learning a language here is a little different than if I were to go to a place that all my companions would be native speakers, because we speak English in all of our meetings except for church. So the language comes slower. And that's is SO frustrating! And in those moments of frustration and feeling completely inadequate for our investigators and for this branch comes some intense sorrow. You just feel extrememly alone. Extremely alone. And maybe I am just a worrier, and I want to know the language now. I want to speak fluently and share the gospel with everyone. And I am not patient with myself... I'm not patient in my suffering. And I worry that I wont ever fully understand this language or really speak this language. And I worry that I wont live up to the potential that Heavenly Father wants me to live up to.

 

But it's difficult to do things here in someone elses time and in someone elses way. I like things to be the way that I want them and I want to teach the way I want to teach and I want to do things the way I want to do them. And when your on a mission it's not about me, myself, or I. It's not about me. It's about those we teach and contact. It's those little touches that we do everyday, saying hi to everyone on the street, giving someone my seat on the bus, passing out cards, contacting in the park, helping them understand a little bit more about our Savior Jesus Christ and His atoning sacrifice. It's about doing our Heavenly Father's work. It's about Him. And I knew this before my mission. But you never really fully know what is going to happen, or what you're really going to be doing until you are out here. Working, teaching, contacting, and contacting, and contacting, and contacting. We do alot of contacting here can't you tell? Being here is a huge trial, especially this week and how do I endure. I can tell you in all honesty that I don't know if I have ever been on my knees so much. And Heavenly Father being the great person He is sends me little blessings everyday so I don't just blow up. :) I read a general conference talk this week about trials since personally I felt like my trial was never ending and that in my personal trial I was trying, I was really trying and my desires were pure, completely pure and perfect intentions. Of course I may be a little overdramatic here, but hey I'm allowed to be a little overdramatic sometimes, I can't be completely perfect everday. (Dad I know you're rolling your eyes :))

 

Anyways I started reading the talk "Hope ya know, We Had a Hard Time" by Elder Cook. And in this talk he talks about trials that come into lives, some big some small, but all trials and how at the end of our trial we are able to say to Heavenly Father "I hope you know, I had a hard time." And a part that really stuck out to me was this...

"We know from the scriptures that some trials are for our

good and are suited for our own personal development. 

We also know that the rain falls on the just and the unjust.

It is also true that every cloud we see doesn’t result in rain.

Regardless of the challenges, trials, and hardships we endure, the

reassuring doctrine of the Atonement wrought by Jesus Christ 

includes Alma’s teaching that the Savior would take upon Him our

infirmities and “succor his people according to their infirmities.”

And this really touched my heart. Because I'm prideful. I am. Most of the time I really don't feel like I need help from anyone. And I hate asking for help. I really feel like I can depend on myself most of the time and I have a hard time letting others do things for me. Yes, I am prideful. And this made me really think of how I act. How I am so stuck on my will and my confidence that I really forget all that Heavenly Father has done for me. And that if I just really humbled myself and just say Heavenly Father I will do my best (which I do strive to do everyday) but I need your help. I need your help and my companions help, and my districts help, and my mission presidents help. I need help in my life. I can't do this by myself. I can't learn a language, and teach God's children, and expect to be the person Heavenly Father needs me to be without His help.

Now I'm sorry that so far my letter hasn't been the most upbeat but I promise their have been some wonderful blessings that have come this week! The work still progresses here and we are still striving to bring the wonderful Romanians here the gospel of Jesus Christ. I believe I have told you a little about D and her mother D. We went over last week to teach her English and D was there which was amazing. She works a lot and so all the other times that we have gone over there she was never there. We start teaching D English and D is sitting in. And as things progress and as we get ready to share our gospel message about gratitude we are prompted to ask more questions about what is going on in their lives. and we find out a lot about their life and that they are going through some challenges. With divorce and drinking. So obviously we start to share about the beautiful gospel. Sora M begins to share her conversion story and D stares at us and tell us that she wishes that she could have faith like us. And so we ask her if we could share the restoration with her and her family and she said yes. We were so excited because these two woman are absolutely wonderful. They are such strong and powerful woman. And I can really see them in the gospel. I can see them really taking the blessings that the gospel gives us.

 

We also have been contacting in our own block. We ran into this young lady A and she invited us into her apartment that she shares with her brother. And we had a wonderful discussion. She was a little scared when we gave her a card and told her that we were missionaries. But than yesterday as we tried to meet with her and she told us that she was actually going to church. And so we invited ourselves and she said that we could come with her and her  brother. She is actually Pentacostal which has a lot of the same beliefs that we do. And while we were there we ran into one of our other investigators D who was beyond happy to see us there as she leaves for America this upcoming weekend. It really made them a lot more open to us as we showed that we respected other religions and that we enjoyed their services. So she agreed as we walked home to come with us to church next Sunday. Actually she more asked if we were going to invite her to our church and of course we said yes!

The Pentacostal service that we went to was called Speranta which means Hope. And it's one of the bigger Pentacostal churches here in Cluj. We were in a big meeting room and there were so many people. Over 200 people and Sora M and I just wanted to shout on the top of our voices that you have a great things here but if you follow us you can have something even greater! Do you not realize the potential you have if you were to be members of Christ Restored Gospel on this Earth! There were lots and lots of young people. And the service goes like this we all gather and they have about 6 or 7 speakers and so the speakers go up one at a time and they give there sermon and they tell us to stand and then we all pray at one time for something they tell us to. (To help us share the gospel, help us have strength, asking forgiveness) So everyone stands up and they all pray outloud at once. They all say there own prayers but there is a lot of noise. Then we sit down and they have a guitarist, pianist, drumer, and two singers get up and sing songs of Christ (which were extremely beautiful) and then it repeats itself. They gave wonderful talks about the gospel and there was nothing that was said that was against our beliefs. My thoughts to Heavenly Father at that point was just "Heavenly Father I am staring at your children that want a relationship with you. That have desires to follow your son Jesus Christ. Help us talk to them. Help them be open to our message and see the added truth that we give to them."

We went contacting this week in Parks. And well lets say the weather in Cluj changed a lot in the last week we went from Rainy and gorgeous! To Hot and sweaty. I think I'm just going to have to get used to the feeling of sweat being on my face at all times and my hair just being up in a bun. Hooray for summer!

I think that's all for this week! I love you all and I pray for you all. I know God lives and this is His church. I know that trials come. Believe me I know. But I do know that we are never alone. No matter how much we may push away or want to be by ourselves (speaking from my own experience of course) God will never abandon us. He wants to reach out His loving hands of kidness and embrass us. We went and watched the Emma Smith movie with our new convert S and a part in that movie says, "God loves us even when we hold back" His love is infinite. But don't hold back. Embrass Heavenly Father and His son's atonement. Look to Christ's atonement everyday and see what power it gives us. I love you all so much and I am super grateful to be here. I really really am. I love being here. I love being a missionary even with stressful trials. It's the best decission I have ever made.

Love you all,

Sora Stewart

K had a birthday this week! I made her some banana bread. Which she loves and Sora K made her a cake :)

Me and Sora M

Me and Sora B. (I adore this woman)

It's been super rainy here. WHICH I LOVE!
We have seen quite a few rainbows here

This is our branch mission leader. T and his girlfriend A, and his daughter B

In this middle of Sighisoara. Look how beautiful the buildings are!

Look at this picture that was in front of an Orthodox church. They actually may believe that Christ, God, and The Holy Ghost are separate people... although the Holy Ghost isn't a dove all the time.

Don't worry it's a work in progress over here!

Pretty orthodox church in Sighisoara

They had some gorgeous walkways... I really had a lot of fun with the camera...

Now only if I had dad's camera with me ;)

this is the castle to where we are heading.

Such pretty walkways. Everything was just gorgeous!

There were a bunch of Asian's taking a picture of this wall and i didn't know why until I realized that a dear head was coming out of the wall. How interesting?!

Group of missionaries coming through.

All of the streets were like this. So colorful!

And this builiding is older than america!

The Elders kept joking that they felt that John the Beloved would pop out of anywhere. That's how old the town looked and felt

hahaha Oh Elder B. His camera broke so he wanted to borrow mine.

In some kind of old shop. It was a leather shop... It looked like a place that was used as a shelter... for some kind of wars. It had interesting windows and things that basically you could shoot out of them but they can't shoot back at you. Super interesting.

Elder S and the million mile stairs. They were never ending.

We weren't even close to the top of the stairs... EXHAUSTING!

Graveyard. It was huge. The picture doesn't even compare to how beautiful and fantastic it was. Romanians have a lot of family history to go through

Top of the castle! Hello to Sighisoara

This is just a glimps of what a gypsy mansion looks like. There are lots of gypsys in Romania especially in sighisoara. But this is what their mansions look like. Super interesting. Sorry it's blurry we were in a maxi taxi.

June 10, 2013

Hello again!
I'm running out of things to say to start off my letters. I need to be more creative. Anyways. Tranfer board was in and Sora M and I are staying here in Cluj together for another transfer. President actually told her that she will die here in Cluj. Which I think is great because the branch here absolutely adores her.

We have had another busy week here in Cluj and I am extremely happy with how the work is going here. We have some awesome Elders that are hard workers and all of together we really try to get things done. It's super funny to me, because Elder B acts so much like Spencer. He really could be like a Stewart cousin, it's great anyways. Anytime we go group contacting, knocking on villa's is what we did this week. It's kinda a competition for us. We love to try and see who will be let in past the gate, and who will be able to actually talk to people. So the work is progressing and we are really trying hard to just get as many investigators and inactives to come to church as possible.

 

We have had some sweet wonderful lessons with our beautiful investigator K. She really is progressing towards baptism, and it's fantastic to see how she started off very defensive and very uncertain and now to see her full of questions and telling us that her doubts are minimum. It's really interesting how we teach her, because she only speaks spanish, we have to have our translator Sora K and we use the scriptures a lot. Obviously it's the evidence for everything we teach about! Anyways everytime we have a lesson with her she asks Sora K for colored pencils and then while we are reading she just highlights everything. She loves the Bible and she read the whole Pearl of Great Price within like 3 days! Which was kind of an accident, but she loved it and she told us it really made her understand the Bible a lot more. She is slowly starting to read the Book of Mormon but I have noticed the more and more we use it the more she reads it and is recognizing that it is profound scripture, that it is true. She has a lot of questions. A lot of questions. But she has told us that she really doesn't have as many doubts now.

 

We have started to teach this wonderful bright young girl named D. We teach her half English and half Gospel principles. I don't even know what to do with her. She is so bright, so smart, so dedicated. Everytime we come over she just shows us how much she has memorized and what she has worked on. And I just stare at her, probably because I have a hard time memorizing all those verbs myself, and I just tell her I can just talk to you and help you that way. Haha cause honestly I don't know English grammer. Honestly now it's hard to teach English. We don't really have consistent things going on and it is just super confusing. Super confusing. I don't know how I speak it... well I speak it just not grammatically correct.

 

Anywho, we had a fantastic P-day this week. We traveled a couple hours to a place called Sighişoara it was absolutly beautiful! The streets were all cobble stone which made it kinda hard to walk on... but the buildings and the colors wow. We found this one building that is older than America! Not really that shocking, but it was so fascinating. We traveled around the whole town taking pictures and we walked up to this grave yard which was honestly like a scene taken out of Harry Potter. (It really wouldn't surprise me if this is where it was taken from) We just had an absolute blast together as a district. And of course we went up and saw a castle. They wouldn't let us take pictures inside or they would charge us, No Thankyou, but we got to take pictures all the way at the top of the tower. The whole time I was there I was thinking to myself, "I am having a hard time walking up these stairs and through these doors with flat shoes and a dress. How on earth did midevil woman with the big poofy skirts and shoes walk up these stairs! Also the shoes that they wore the heel was in the middle of the arch! Super super weird to me!" Anyways we have had a great day there. Lots of stares. They don't really see missionaries there. Except for every 6ish weeks haha :) When the next group comes in.

I'm sorry to hear about Andrew... that's horrible and I will keep his family in my prayers. It's definitly strange to hear about things that are going on at home and how things are changing all the time. Aren't we grateful to know the Plan of Salvation and to know our purpose and know who we really are in this life. Our full potential! That's something that I have really been looking at this week and studying. I challenge you all to take out your blessings and read them. Read them over and over again. Look at the blessings Heavenly Father has promised us. Look at the qualitites we can have. Look at the person we can be. How beautiful it is that that is the way Heavenly Father sees us. That is the way He must picture us, with all of the divine potential in the world to be righteous standards and to bring others into the gospel, whether it's directly in our families, or whether it's with people on the street.

I love you all very much. And I'm grateful to have you in my life. How blessed I am. I look at my companion who is a sweet heart and very strong minded. Being a member of the gospel for 2 years serving for a little over a year. Being the only member in her family and out of her friends that she had had. I am amazed at what she has accomplished and the person she is. How strong she is in the gospel and unwaivering. It makes me ver appreciative of her. Of how she wants to go back to Poland and build up the church there. Even though the church there is even smaller than it is here, I didn't think that was possible. Even though she knows that it will be hard and that there is a lot of challenges that will come her way. She wants to be that strength in her country. And for me. I feel so blessed. So very very blessed to be born of goodly parents. To have had an AMAZING ward. AMAZING friends. Amazing stories, and experiences in the gospel since I was a young age. How honestly grateful I am.

 

Love you all!
Sora Stewart

The day of the baptism!



The elders and me. We have some great Elders haha.

and our fun district

and our fun district

Orthodox church

We love cluj!

I love this woman! Sora Boyd!

Sweet Sabina! She hates pictures so this is the only one we could get of her. I'm grateful she let us take this one!

Elder Barclay is from Idaho and he just makes me laugh. He reminds me so much of Spencer. And of course he has to prove his strength. They are some great elders.

This is the place where the future chappel will be!

Sora Modzelewska. Elder Lex was in the tree and he dropped a branch for her to catch.

She didn't really know not to stand right underneith where he was dropping it.

They taste just as good as they look :)

They taste just as good as they look :)

Super beautiful :)

June 3, 2013

Hello to All,

Well I know you all must be so excited to hear or not if we had a baptism! And good news we did! It was absolutley beautiful and our wonderful investigator is the newest member to the Cluj-Napoca Branch here!
Her baptism was on June 1st at 5:00 pm. I was so pleased with what I saw and felt and just really how it all turned out here. They haven't had a baptism here in Cluj for about a year. So the members were all really excited. Sora Modzelewska and I put together the program and called the poeple to speak. We asked this wonderful sister, Sora Condorachi, and she was just tickled pink to talk. When we called her she just about screamed with excitement, exclaming that she hasn't had the opportunity to talk at a baptism for a long time. Most of the branch came to the baptism, which is just amazing, and the elders invited their investigators too. The missionaries and our district decided to sing a musical number, which went really well, since well I will speak for myself and say that I am not the best singer. :) We sang Joseph Smith's First Prayer and one of the members played it on the guitar for us. It really was beautiful. Sabina got baptized by Elder Boyd and we watched the restoration video while she got ready.

We helped clean the church after and Sora Modzelewska and I were just leaping for joy! Our wonderful investigator got baptized!

Later that day we found out that the property that the church has bought for the future place of the Cluj-Napoca Chappel was just down the road and had some cherry trees. And since it rained earlier that day and that was canceled. We decided to go down as a district.

There were so many cherries. I may just be naive on this situation but I think that comes from when you grow up in Las Vegas where not many things grow. It was so beautiful. It was just green everywhere with all sorts of vegetation. And the trees were beautiful. So many cherries. I felt like a little kid because I had never experiences picking things from trees before. So much fun! And now we have a bunch of cherries in our fridge that I now eat for breakfast every morning.

On Sunday Sabina was confirmed a member of the church by recieving the Holy Ghost. President Iepure said a beautiful blessing, I am so grateful that I was able to be apart of this experience with her. It just makes me so grateful!

After church we went to Salvatore and Aurelia's they have a different set of missoinaries over every week. We all rotate. They just like to serve us. And I do not complain since she is a wonderful cook! This couple is just filled with so much life and happiness. They really love one another. When Aurelia was in the kitchen Salvatore was explaining to us that when she cooks he eats it. And vice versa. Sora Modzelewska looks over at him and says I think that if she cooks you should clean. And he just sits there and says now wait a minute. Aurelia pops her head out of the kitchen and tells us yeah yeah yeah! Keep talking! I like the sound of this! It was so funny and so cute! I just love these members so much!

We really have the best branch in all of Romania. :)

We continued to have a few other lessons this week. And so we are still working and progressing here. It rained quite a bit this week. The weather is so interesting here as it will be super sunshiney and then just pour buckets of rain on us! I have had to bring my umbrella everywhere. Sora Modzelewska doesn't like to get wet. And I absolutely love it. Haha she always gives me a look when I stare up at the clouds and say that it is about to rain :)

I love you all so much!

Until next week,
Sora Stewart

May 27, 2013

Bună Dimineaţa,

It has been an incredible week here in Cluj. I am absolutely amazed at the work we have here to do. Sora Modzelewska and I have had a lot of lessons to attend to that every night we just about pass out on our beds. It's truly amazing too because we just run in to people all the time and they are willing to let us in and talk to us and let us teach them. Truly a miracle here. I am just so very grateful that this branch is growing and we are helping them build up the kingdom here. It is absolutely amazing to see.

Sora Modzelewska and I have had some fantastic stories, and events happen this week. On Thursday we had district meeting and our district meeting goes on like always but this time it went a little long. And in comes this lady and sits in on our meeting just in time for the closing prayer. We had no idea who she was, or if it was one of the others investigator, but she came in sat down and just waited. We went up to her afterwards and she looked at us and was like I wanted someone to teach me English. So there Sora Modzelewska and I go and we go into the other room and start teaching her. We like to teach some English and then do like 30 minutes of Gospel Discussion. Which she agreed to. And after we were done with the lesson this sweet Maria looked at us and said,"I don't want you to waste your time with me. And I really like the way you teach me. So please let me pay you." We looked at her and almost jumped out of our seats insisting no no no. Don't pay us! And then we explained that we don't want money. We are Christians. We are good people who want to serve. All we desire is to share our message about Christ and about why we are so happy. We don't want your money. We are happy to do this service. And then we asked if we could just close with a word of prayer. This wonderful woman was so touched that she just started crying. I haven't seen someone in this country be as touched as this woman was at this moment. It was a wonderful moment that was so filled with the spirit, and it was beautiful to see that she could feel it. That this moment of service and charity and the power of our words touched her. Such a tender mercy.

We continued on with teaching Karen this week. Our sweet sweet investigator. Who I just wish I could communicate with. It's so fascinating and irritating to see that after 4ish years of Spanish I don't really remember anything. Anyways our wonderful member Sora Kiss translates for us. We had a wonderful discussion on the Book of Mormon that was purely set on the spirit. We weren't really sure what we were going to talk about when we got there but we just knew that we had to depend on the spirit. We asked her if she was reading the Book of Mormon and if she felt like the things we had talked about were true. She was so uncertain and said she really doesn't think that this church is  for her and just started throwing out a lot of excuses. So we quickly just brought it back to the Book of Mormon where she confessed that she wasn't reading it. But from the chapters we had given her she thought it was good but liked the Bible better. We were just able to bear our testimonies that if she doesn't read the Book of Mormon that she wont know. That what was in her hands was the defining evidence that Joseph Smith was a prophet. We were able to just talk to her and tell her how wonderful and important she is to Heavenly Father, that she can strengthen this relationship with Him, and she can find happiness she has never felt before. It was a BEAUTIFUL moment. It felt like instead of her back tracking and heading the other way she is now turned back around and listening and waiting. Gosh I just love being a missionary :)

Now the title of this email is called the Power of Rain. And now you will know why. After one of lessons with Karen we left our phone at Sora Kiss's house. And well she lives in Floresti which is La Ţară outside of town. And so we had to wake up and head straight there since there are only a few buses that go there every hour. So after the craziness of going there, grabbing our phone, and coming back, waiting for a bus, and seeing about our lessons that day we sat down on a bench just right outside the bus stop. And I'm sitting there just listening to Sora Modzelewska talk about our day and what we need to do and who we need to call. This lady walks by and smiles at us and I smile back and we return to our conversation. The lady turned back around and sat down right by Sora Modzelewska and just starts talking to us. Now my mouth was probably open and my eyes were probably big as saucers because people here don't come up to us and talk to us. They just don't. And they specifically don't come and sit down out of all the benches right by us and are super friendly. So I am honestly already in shock. We start talking to her a little bit, when it starts to rain. I was so mad, and I have never been mad at the rain before I like the rain! But once it started to rain she looks over at us and just said it's starting to rain really bad, stands up and walks away. Ahhh I just felt like we had lost that opportunity. But when she said it was raining hard it was raining hard, no exaggeration here. So we get up and run to one of the blocks behind us just to have some kind of shelter. And what do you know it was her block. And she invited us in. She invited us in to her home and just wanted to talk to us. I didn't understand everything that she had said, but she told us about her life. She told us that a few years ago she had had a stroke in Canada and that she knew that God had saved her life for some reason. That even though a part of her back was paralyzed she had some reason for being here. And of course we are sitting there thinking of course you have a purpose, let's share our message! So we do. We share the message of the restoration and she says that we can come back and she said that she will start to read the Book of Mormon.

Now this is where the power of the rain comes in. I watched as this woman (Anna Marie) comes up to us and sits by us on the bench. And at that exact moment it starts to rain. We just happened to run for cover at her block. Where she had not yet entered. And she let us in. And at that moment we started to talk about the Restoration of the gospel (And I am staring out the window, because I have never seen so much rain in my life) the rain completely stops, the clouds parted, and the sun shine started to beam through the window. There are no coincidences in this work. None. What a testimony builder this was to me, that the Lord has people He wants us to teach. And He prepares these people. And with our faith in Him, He will give unto us mighty miracles.

Our sweet dear Sabina is getting baptized this Saturday! I am so excited and it has been such a sweet experience to teach her. I have loved every moment of meeting with her. From the very first time where she sat down next to us, not really sure what to say or what to do. You could just see this longing she had to be apart of something that just felt like home. She wanted to find this comfort that we know the Gospel can bring in to every persons life. And every time we meet with her. She grows. Her light has changed. She may still be the same person who doesn't like attention, or doesn't like to be around a lot of people. But she is so much happier. Her appearance, the way she holds herself up has changed. I never really understood when people said that they can see the light people have, and how it shines or it dims. I have never understood that. Until now. Because I have seen it. I remember at the begining and at this moment now where she is understanding the principles and applying them to her life. And her light, this essence, feeling, has changed round about her. You can see it. You can see that she feels love and she returns love. :) 

This life is filled with so many beautiful opporunities and experiences that we really don't notice. Or at least I haven't noticed. I can't believe that I have lived most of my life in this gospel, but haven't really used all that I had at my disposal. Or I haven't used all the blessings, opportunities, and experience the gospel gives me. Live FULLY in this gospel. Don't just stick your foot in. Immerse yourself and you will not believe the blessings that come.

I am so grateful and so happy to hear about the things going on back home. I can not tell you how full my heart is to hear that you are being member presents for this wonderful neighbor. And I hope that you will look for more of these opportunities. Don't be afraid to share the gospel. What do you have to loose? And look at what they have to gain. How many people I could have shared the gospel with and I didn't because I was scared. I am super ashamed to say that I was scared to share the gospel. So don't be or do what I did. Just jump in :) It feels absolutely fantastic!

I love you all so much! And I hope that you have a fantastic week!

Sora Stewart

 

ps. Matthew! I don't know if you have watched this Mormon Message but you need to. It just brought tears to my eyes and I hope it brings tears to your eyes as you reflect on your missionary work that you are doing here and the missionary work you have done :)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JLWERGAIdD8&feature=player_embedded

Me on the bus. There was some crazy guy singing and playing guitar. It was quite the sight to see.

This is Karen our Spanish speaking investigator and her husband Marin. She is so adorable

One of our new investigators Damaris. She's super adorable!

 

George, Me, Sora Modzelewska, and Mariana

Hehehehe. She doesn't even know I took this picture of her. Sora Modzelewska cleaning our kitchen.

This is the wonderful couple of gardens that are outside of our balcony. I have named them starting from the left. Farmer Joe, Farmer Bob, and Farmer Billy Bob. Their gardens are turning out beautifully!