This is Sora Ule! She's from Provo she's 19! She's amazing! I love her so much already! We are going to kick butt here!

So loved taking pictures as we were contacting

I can't help it either constanta is just really really pretty :)

The branch this past sunday.

This was just a really cool grafitii thing we found.

Sora Ule again. I took that this morning I told her I Had to send a picture of her home :) hahaha

 

February 24, 2014

Hey everyone!

It has been such a fun fantastical busy week. Yes I know that sentence and those words don't make sense and I just don't care :) That's how this week has been. It's been so great! I love it! 

 

Well, Sora Letinu and I did a lot of cleaning. Why is that always my weakness? Parents I promise I am a LOT more clean than I was before! Still not the best though. Trying. Sorry. Forgive me :)

So Tuesday after contacting for a bit on and eating at Mesapotamia (love that place) walking out of the mall we found a place that has a bunch of toys. Sora Letinu loves kids and one of the kids she adores has a birthday coming up so we went and looked in there for a bit and well I saw this huge stuffed animal Chewbacca. Well Sora Stapley loves star wars. I believe she took 3ish hours one day to explain the entire star wars movies. It was impressive. I had to buy it for her so I did.

That was an important part of this week sa stiti.

 

Anyways, We had a lesson planned out with Alina we really wanted to meet with her one more time before Sora Letinu left. She has just kinda I don't even know. She has been the subject of a lot of my prayers lately. Because she's not really progressing. I've been really trying hard to follow up on her and to my utmost surprise she's read everything that I have texted her. She was even showing Sora Letinu a verse that she loved. Tender. So tender. She still isn't going to church which is a whole other story. We did decide to talk about the restoration again to see how much she remembered. Well she didn't remember much. Unfortunately. Super unfortunate. But that's why we decided to talk about it. We really focused on how the restoration has affected our lives. Andreea was there and I am so grateful she was. SO GRATEFUL! Love her. Love her so much. It was a tender lesson though and the spirit was just so strong. And that is really all I can ask for. The spirit. Something really cool that Sora Letinu said as we were walking home though is that she saw something so good in her eyes. So good and so special. I agree. Can't wait to meet with her again :)

 

Wednesday got up to Bucuresti and it was the longest maxi taxi ride ever. Ughh how I dislike maxi taxis. It was so cramped. So cramped. they had the heat blasting. It was bloody hot. So so so hot. My leg felt like it was going to burn off. I hate small maxi taxis. Okay sorry off of my I hate maxi taxis. We got to Bucuresti and it was so funny. Sora Ralls and Sora Bray came to pick me up at the auto gara because Sora Letinu was staying there to go to Ploiesti. While I was on the phone I heard there is a boy following us. Go faster. Then they hang up. Oh gosh. Haha. So I get there. And Iancu is there. Iancu is this 15 year old boy that was baptized last year in Panduri. He's the coolest kid. Lives so close to the auto gara and when we get lost he always helps us get to the auto gara. These poor soras just didn't know that he was a member and so Iancu had his baptismal program in his pocket that he was going to show them to say that he wasn't a weirdo. This kid who was just baptized last year still carries his baptismal program with him. He carries it with him. Is that not amazing! I just kept thinking to myself. How important the gospel is to him that he wants to remember what he did on that day that he carries it around with him. So special so amazing. Well it was also really funny and Iancu was really chill about it. And walks us close back to the gara so we can do some treaba. Such a cool kid.

Well that was the day I become a mom! So cool. My "daughter" is Sora Ule (pronounced like Sora Ewell). I love her. She's so cool. She's super funny and we just talk all the time :) LOVE HER! She loves to work which is great because hello great week here! I felt so bad though by the time we would get to the 12 week program she would just about be asleep. She is so jet lagged. When we got into our maxi taxi she was just out. I felt so bad she was just so so so so tired!

 

Thursday. We had a lesson with Andreea and with Elena. Andreea said I have a surprise for you! Elena is here! So sweet Sora Ule had a lesson with the two best people ever! :) It was such a good lesson and for having limited amount of sleep on Sora Ule's part she did so good. She really wants to learn Romanian and she is such a hard worker. She's pretty shy and so I was just so impressed with all that she did. Hello gift of tongues here. After out lesson I told them that Sora Ule knows how to play the piano and so Elena begged her to teach her. SO there she was on her first day in Constanta talking to Elena teaching her Piano. It was so tender. Tender mercy. :) Love those moments. Andreea was writing a note in my book of Mormon and so we just sat back and watched them. They were so cute. Such a tender moment.

 

Friday. Lots of contacting. When around the city doing some English contacting. Literally walked across the entire city. Did some competitions with the Elders to see who could pass out the most cards. :) It was so fun :) SO fun. Did the 12 week training program. :) So fun. It was too funny as we were watching a part of the district she fell asleep in the chair. haha. So funny. I was dying. She kept apologizing I just thought it was funny and I felt bad. Let's just say when its bed time as soon as she hits the bed she is out. She's definitely a little culture shocked which is totally normal. Sometimes she'll ask things and I just think well yeah that's just normal isn't it. And then she just looks at me and then I realize... ohhh nope that's just how people do it here. Like buses. As we took the bus the first day and I gave her her ticket she just kinda stared at it... then I realized.. oh yeah. We don't really use public transportation at home Duh... haha. :) We don't have to use 50 bon to use shopping carts and we don't have to bring our own grocery bags. You know didn't really realize how different it is.  :)

 

Saturday. Had district meeting. :) Elder Myler is still here thank goodness. He's such a good leader. We've set some goals for English classes and really trying to have a lot of people come here. That's just how we get most of our investigators. We went over to the park and played Frisbee... I really suck. I need to learn how to catch.. and throw... I just need to learn how to be more athletic... dangit. I decided though even though I can't catch and throw I can be a pretty good defense and knock the Frisbee when they try to throw it :) Andreea and Elena brought some of their friends so that way we can meet them. It was so fun :) There friends were so cute. :) So nice. So NICE! We had to run and eat really fast though and then run to the church because we had a lesson with Daniela and her friend Vali. Taught them 30 minutes of English and then Spiritual thought. We talked about prayer and the importance of using our own words when we speak. They both use fixed prayers. I just don't think I will ever understand fixed prayers. Ever. Sora Ule bore powerful testimony of prayer and how we can feel when we pray. She testified of the Book of Mormon and through prayer she knows it's true. I seriously love my companion :) Love her.

 

Sunday... weirdest Sunday. Lessons were really good... we just have a few members... who well... yeah. Just one... she just thinks crazy crazy things and there was an argument in Relief Society about it. That was crazy. Sora Ule played piano and bore her testimony :) It was so good :) So good :)

Well and that brings us today. :) We have some great goals for this upcoming week with lessons and contacting! Praying that it'll all happen! :) Super excited!

It really was just a crazy hectic fantastic week!

 

I love training. :) It is so much fun and it kicks my butt into super high speed gear of let's get things done! I love it! I love the 12 week program. I think it's amazing for all missionaries not just new missionaries. It really goes over the basics. Why we are here. What our purpose is what we need to do as missionaries. I love it :) LOVE IT! :)

Love you all!
Sora Stewart

Few more pictures of the beach

This is my Alina. She's a member. The branch chorister de fapt and I'm the pianist so we sit next to each other every sunday. :) She wrote a note in my Cartea lui Mormon saying that I am one of her favorite missionaries and that she loves me. Touched my heart. Made me want to cry. Love her. Love tender little mercies of love. \

Draga mea ;) She's my little dog that just comes every single day she hears my voice. Now she always tries to sneak in the door with me :) Another tender little mercy. 

She kept trying to get a picture of me. I just don't do well with the sun in my eyes. Haha it was pretty funny though. I kept trying to open them and everytime in the pictures they were always closed. So I just did this instead :) 

This is when it still was winter and we went contacting. :) I lost those earmuffs... sadddd

Sorry these are all out of order... I just haven't sent a lot of pictures in a while. Sorry bout it.

This was this morning :) 

Us at our relief society activity. :) Super good food :) haha she was so cute we had all empty plates and Mihaiela goes! We can't have empty plates in the picture! She is so cute :) I love her

I had to see if it was frozen... and there goes my planner :( sad day

I love the weather here now :) Even if it with all the melted snow the sand is like thick clay and sticks to my shoes... 

Sunset. I am going to love it here with all the sun :)

Found these puppies on the way to our Relief Society President's house... can I keep them? Please please please please!!!!!!!

Sora Deruvo and me on an exchange! :) Taking a ton of jumping on the beach in the snow pictures haha. Now all of the snow has melted. Showing pictures of that in more.

We had a huge activity a couple weeks. This is one of the games we planned. Tied a balloon onto our ankle and trying to smash other's without smashing ours. There were SO MANY people there :) Hooray for minute to win it games ;) 

This is our branch president trying to eat the cookie without touching it :) So much fun.

they follow me

February 17, 2014

Hello!

Well this week was great and it went by super fast. It looks as if I have survived the winter here because oh my heck it's freaking BEAUTIFUL outside. I think Sora Letinu has taken a picture of the sunset every single morning :) It's literally been amazing :) Which means I can also do other contacting besides Block Knocking. Hallelujah!

Well this week was a good week. Sora Letinu and I really tried to take the streets. We walked a ton this week. I mean a ton. And actually we were contacting in the park. Just so you all know the park has this huge lake in it. So we were contacting and I looked at the lake and parts of it looked like it was still frozen. So of course I have to go and try and throw a stick in to see if it really is still frozen. Well it really wasn't in the part we were in, but right in the middle you can see all these birds just walking around. It was so cool. Sad part of the story though is that I accidentally left my planner there on the ground, next to the lake... so when we tried to go look for it later... yup was not there. Pretty sure it's at the bottom of the lake. :( sadness. Good news though is all the potentials and investigators numbers and names that were written in my planner are all in the area book. Hooray Sora Stewart for being organized! Yeah!
We tried to do a fun contacting activity though in the park around the lake because there are a bunch of swans and a TON of seagulls. We saw randomly an employer at the mall (which is right next to the lake) throw some bread piece by piece into the water and hello so many people were around and they were loving it. So Sora Letinu and I thought! Oh my heck lets go buy some bread and give it to people so they can feed the birds too! It was a great hit and it was so much fun. So many people were laughing and smiling. If you don't know Romania they don't smile very often and they never really laugh. So it was so GREAT! So much fun and we are definitely going to do it again. Need to change up the contacting strategies up a bit!

We weren't able to meet with Alina this week. But I've been really trying a lot harder in following up with her. Because she isn't keeping her commitments. So hard. She's been in all of my prayers this week. She found out that she didn't get the job in Dubai after they told her that she did. She was so heartbroken. I felt so bad and all I could do was just testify my heart out that the Lord will take care of her. If she is doing the things she is supposed to do the Lord will take care of her. He will. I know He will. We are going to meet with her tomorrow and I hope that I can just really speak to her heart. That the spirit will touch something in her heart that will give her more of a desire to read, pray to KNOW, come to church and so on. I love her so much and I know I am here in Constanta because she needs me.

We have a new investigator this week! Amazing! I've been praying and fasting so that way we can find people. Really been trying. Anyways, we had a lesson with Daniela who is in our English class... technically Elder Myler's English class. I teach advance. She is such a sweet heart. She's super quiet and shy and I wasn't really sure exactly how interested she is yet. We had a 30/30 lesson and Sora Letinu and I just felt that we had to get to know her before we tried to really teach her anything major yet. So we did. We did English and then just sat and talked a bit. I'm so glad I did. Because she actually does talk and will open up if she is asked. What's amazing is that she does want to know more. She wasn't to see what we are about. She wants to know more about what we believe. She asked so many questions that go into the questions of the soul which are all answered in the Book of Mormon. I'm so excited to see her again this week!

We had interviews this week which was so interesting since we had interviews Friday and then transfer board was Saturday. I have kind of just had this feeling of peace that whoever my new companion is is going to be great and I just don't have to worry. Usually I'm freaking out because I feel like I'm leaving or I just don't know who I am going to serve with. What's weird is that I've been totally chill... for the most part... So anyways. We go up to interviews and I sit in with President Hill first. Before we even say the prayer he goes," Well Sora Stewart are you ready for a NEW companion." I say," Well of course President Hill. I mean Sora Letinu has to go back home to Ploiesti so I have to have a new one." Obviously I didn't get what he meant. So he says," I mean a NEW missionary right from the MTC." Ummm YUP! haha I'm so excited so here I am! I'm gonna be a momma! (Mission language for I am going to be a trainer and have a newby) I'm so excited and the branch is pretty excited too. The branches always love new missionaries. I think it's exciting for them to see how they grow and are just thrown into this Romanian world. I think of my first Sunday and I didn't understand I single word. Now that I look back they said. Hi welcome to cluj. Gosh how I knew nothing! :) I'm so excited though and I really really am excited that I get to train! Hoping and praying that I'll be a good trainer! I'm gonna have a little baby! So excited! We actually have two sisters from Mexico and one sister from El Salvador. Kind of have been praying to have the girl from El Salvador! Sora Letinu is praying that one from Mexico will come to Ploiesti so she can talk to her all day long in Spanish.

I love my dear companion. I'm gonna miss her so much. She's going to do great things though in Spain in Ploiesti in Romania :) So excited for her :) I just adore her.

Well here is to another transfer here in Constanta! I'll have been here for 6 months! Things are going to change and miracles are going to happen here :)

Love you all!
Sora Stewart

February 10, 2014

Hello all,

Well before I come to Internet I always try to figure out what I am going to say and honestly I forget what I want to say every single time I sit down at a computer... ugh frustrating. 

Well I guess I can start with right now. We were busy this morning. The sun has melted basically all the snow and so the streets are really really wet for the past couple days. Every night it seems we come home with wet feet haha. So Sora Letinu went to go buy some shoes today. And then we went back because they were broken and they wouldn't let her return them. Super dumb. So she went and exchanged it for other shoes. All stores are like that here. Is that the same in the states... I don't remember to be honest. Weird. Anyways. We got a call from our district leader saying that the library doesn't have any power so us and the other elders are at the Internet Cafe. They had a special on women though ahha literally it was if you are a women you get to pay like half it's great :) 

This week has been a busy one though. We've had exchanges, English (normal), lots of contacting, and our super cool activity.

I had a great exchange with Sora Deruvo this week. Sora Deruvo was in my MTC group although she is technically 2 transfers ahead of our group because she served two transfers in the Rome mission. Too much to explain. But it was so great. She is so loving and we had an absolute blast. I just adore all the sisters in this mission they are so amazing and have such a great spirit around them. They have such faith, such strong faith. So Sora Deruvo and Sora Stapley came down on Wednesday night and stayed until Friday morning. I love both of these sisters and it was super cool because we would be speaking in Romanglish most of the time as a group it was super interesting. Loved it. :) 

The night before the sisters got there Sora Letinu made Saramale I helped :) A bit. It was so good. She makes the best freaking saramale. I love it. So we all had a lot of saramale for that day. Totally worth it. 

We had district meeting and took a bunch of pictures in the snow covered beaches :) You'll notice me ninja kicking it ;) Yeah I can do that in a skirt with Cartea lui Mormon in my hands. Then we went out to contact. We didn't get any potentials that day which was sad. But that's okay we'll just keep going :) Just keep swimming :)

Later on that evening because it was my year mark. WHAT?! We went out to Nico's which is like my favorite place ever. I love being close to Turkey and Greece with all of these influences they really know how to make good food.

Friday well my title makes sense after this. We went to internet to do some studies and I always look at my application to see what I need to do and they had already decided if I was accepted or not! Hello! Congratulations you've been accepted! I was kinda freaking out there. I kept looking for the thing that said you've been rejected, but nope was not there. So I will be starting BYU-I in winter so in January! So excited. :) The Lord is blessing me, He really is.

We did quite a bit of contacting this week and because there was still quite a bit of snow on the ground it came down to block knocking. We did find a few potentials and we've called them and they aren't able to meet yet. We're probably gonna go and knock on their doors to see if we can possibly meet right then :) SURPRISE!

We had a really good activity this week that we put on and it really is thanks to one of our members. We had put together a bunch of little games (minute to win it games) and invited a bunch of people. Alina came and quite a few of our English students. :) It was so cool. :) It was a blast. We made a bunch of food. I made Cheesecake and Sora Letinu made an apple placinta that was SOOO good. :) Anyways, we had a spiritual thought and then we started with all of our games. Tibi one of our members works for this theater group and so he had a bunch of his kids over practicing. 90 percent of them stayed and played all the games. It was too much fun and they finally realized we aren't weirdos :) It was so great!

We had a lesson with Alina and it went okay. She isn't sure that she is still going to Dubai because they haven't told her yet when she is leaving... so she was really upset about that. We just really wanted to fill her with hope and I just had to remind her over and over again that the Lord knows what she needs in her life and that things will get better. Things will get easier. I am really just trying to get her to progress. That is so hard. How do you affect their agency without making them do things. Everyday I just learn more about how cool agency is. How beautiful and precious it is for us to really do the right things.

I feel like every study I have goes back to that. Using agency wisely. Be obedient. Keep the commandments. Pray. Read. Serve. Repent. Be humble. Love. It's all about us. It really is. I mean everything Heavenly Father has created is for US! How beautiful and amazing. He just wants our happiness so He's given us guidelines. He's given us commandments so we can live in happiness and prepare ourselves so we can live with Him and like Him. I love it. Love His plan. Love that I can always be better. Love that I can always repent. Love that I can always choose. I can choose to obey His will.

Well that's all for this week. I love you all and keep you all in my prayers!
Love,

Sora Stewart

February 3, 2014

Hello again,

It's been another week... now that's weird. What's even weirder is I hit my year mark this week. That's super weird. Changing subject.

Well, I officially am not a winter person. Just kidding it hasn't been that bad in the last couple days but this week and especially since we live right on the sea it has just been HORRIBLE. Contacting was not fun and more then anything I got chastised again and again for wearing a skirt. Goodness. Haha.

I guess I'll start with the beginning of the week. Monday was so busy.

It was really hard to get around because of the snow. A lot of snow was just building up so it was really hard to get around and the buses took literally FOREVER! So a lot of our time was taken by buses. We went to the store and even the trucks hadn't gotten there so we bought what we could and we decided to just grab a taxi because we had to be in another town in an hour. We had a lesson with one of my favorite families here in Romania the Olteanu family. They are AMAZING! I had given a talk about 2 weeks ago and Fratele Olteanu wasn't there and Sora Olteanu because they have a brand new baby wasn't able to hear it but she heard me mention Satan hahaha so she really wanted me to share it again for FHE. She's so funny. So I did but I turned it more into a discussion obviously. It was really good and the spirit was there.

They made us some AMAZING Apple placinta it was so good. I love there family. They try so hard to do everything they can. And then they ended the night by showing Sora Letinu and I pictures of them last year when they were married in the temple :) So special. So wonderful.

So much love.

Tuesday. It finally stopped snowing but it had snowed all night long so Elder Myler called us to ask if we would like to do some shovel contacting. Hahah heck yes. I was so excited. I mean I've never shoveled snow before and I know most of the time people hate it but it is something other then block knocking so I was so excited! Well we get all together and we have 2 brooms and only one shovel. So lame. We go to the elder's area because it isn't so far from the Church and well the elders will be elders and there was a huge hill and it was completely iced over so they took advantage of that and went "snowboarding" on the ice. I guess I shouldn't really even call it snowboarding. But they would run and try and stay up without falling on their faces. It was a really great laugh though for me :) And they were able to do service because most cars couldn't make it up the hill so they went all four of them and pushed cars up over the hill. Well the shoveling trying to serve people wasn't the best since people either one kept trying to pay us or 2 told us to go away and not bother them. It was really fun though and I'm glad that I was able to help out the people we did help.

Wednesday we were supposed to have lessons but a huge storm. And I mean like a huge storm came in. It was so cold and we had our heat on.

We made a bunch of calls and I mean a bunch. Like 2 and a half hours just of phonecalls. Dang storm. It even ruined phone calls. the people that we called kept telling us that they couldn't meet because of the weather. I didn't mean to meet with them in that moment unless they wanted to of course. We'll be calling a bunch of them again though since it's warmed up a bit. Still really cloudy but otherwise hasn't snowed a ton since.

Thursday. Had district Meeting and our zone leaders were there. It took them 10 hours to get to Constanta that's how bad the storm was on Wednesday. What is normally a 3 hour train or maxi taxi ride turned into an 11 hour ride for them. They left at 5 o clock on Wednesday and didn't get in until Thursday morning around 4. They were so tired I felt so bad for them. We were all asked to think of a time when we were completely out of our comfort zones. I feel like my mission has been a huge uncomfortable thing. Yeah I mean there are times when I am comfortable doing things but most of the time I just learn so much of what I need to do and change to catch up to feel like I am comfortable in everything I am doing. Comfort zones are such a funny thing.

Because we can't really grow in them. I mean I guess we can fill our comfort zones but if we stay in them we can't grow in any other way.

Just a random note while I am talking about this I've been studying a lot in the new testament lately. I never really payed so much attention to the story of Saul/Paul I mean I knew his story duh, but I never really payed much attention to it. Let's look at his story a little bit though. He was there when the disciple Stephen was stoned to death bearing testimony of the Savior Jesus Christ. And we know how he lived after. And we know what happened on the road to damascus.

"Saul, Saul why persecutest thou me?" Something that the Lord had revealed to Anannas (probably did not spell that right) was that Saul was CHOSEN to bear his name and to reveal things to kings and priest, I love the next verse though when he says "For I will shew him how great things he must suffer for my name's sake." I am sure actually I am positive that it was so uncomfortable for Saul to have changed into Paul. It was amazing I'm sure and I'm sure he had the comfort he needed to continue to grow and change from the atonement of Jesus Christ. But I'm sure that it wasn't easy how he had to grow he had to become better he had to turn his back on the things he was doing and completely change.  He had to leave his comfort zone. As I've continued to read about his story and his teachings and when he has proselyted in different areas and it was hard. He received that comfort from the Lord. He received what he needed and then continued to do things that were scary. I mean he was arrested so many times and yet that didn't stop him. And all of this was so worth it. At the end of his cities when it was time for him to leave he cried with those people. He loved them. It was so worth it. All the pains and aches everything. Every uncomfortable moment was so worth it.

Well back to district Meeting Elder Myler challenged us to do one thing that scares us everyday. Whether it's knocking on another 5 doors or one. Whether it's talking to one person about the gospel.

Whether it's inviting a friend over to listen to the missionaries do one thing that is scary to you everyday. Look at how we will grow.

Look at how much it will be worth it.

We had a great lesson with Andreea and we talked about the law of chastity :) I thought it was great. I thought it was so much fun. Sora Letinu was so awkward with it and even Andreea was too. Hahaha I just though it was so funny. We more so after talking about all the little "awkward" things we more so talked about virtue and how we can be more virtuous every day. I love virtue. Seriously such an amazing thing to study!

We also had another lesson with one of the families in our branch Familia Constantin. And they have the cutest 3 kids. Haha it was crazy. We talked about the temple though and the importance of going and the spirit that is there. Since there family isn't sealed yet we really tried to testify of the power and blessings that will come when they will be sealed. And they are actually planning on it in Mayish!

SO EXCITING!

Friday was more contacting and then we went and saw a play that was put on by one of the members here. He was the director and invited the whole branch and so we were able to talk to a few people there. The play well... was a little different... but I loved the little things that I could see that he put in there. The play was put on by Youth and so they did it the way they wanted to. At the end people died and so Tibi asked don't you believe in an after life? The Youth hadn't even though of this and so Tibi put this in. All the Youth were in White clothes and they were all embracing each other. That was really beautiful. The little influences that can be brought about. :)

We also went over to Familia Contantinescu's for a birthday party. It was there daughters 3rd birthday.

Saturday: More contacting and English class. We also had Correlation and then we cleaned the Church. Lots of salty foot steps all over the Church.

Sunday: Fast Sunday. I really really really want Constanta to change.

So I've been really really praying and I decided that I need to put an even extra effort and fast for Constanta. Fast for them that there hearts will be opened and that they will be able to receive us. That is my hearts desire and I just need Constanta to see that I am willing to put in everything I have. Even if it kills me ;) So I fasted for constanta. Fasted for the people here for the elders, for the branch, for our investigators and for those that will be put in our paths. And well...

Today: We went contacting earlier and we found someone :) Haha don't know where it's going to go but it's a step. We went block knocking and about the fifth door that we knocked on a Young girl opened and when I told her that we were missionaries and we had a message about our savior she actually didn't shut the door in our face. :) HOORAY.

She stood there and listened as we talked about the book of mormon and how we can have peace. We asked her if she was interested to know more and she said yes and wants us to come back. I am so excited. So excited! You don't even know!!!!!!!!!!!

I love you all. Wish us look and pray for Constanta! Pray for us missionaries :)

Love you all!

Sora Stewart

My poor draga mea. That's her name and she actually responds to it :) She's so cute. Even when she gets snow all over me. 

this is from the beginning of the transfer. Picking up Sora Letinu at the Gara. 

THANKYOU Aunt Chris and Uncle Carl for the gloves and hat and scarf and chewy bars :) Mmmmm :) haha I have definitely needed them and used them :) THANKYOU!

Well on Sunday after church a family in the branch has 3 kids and two of their kids had birthday's so we had a mini birthday party for them. It was too much fun. Lot's of balloons and excited kids. haha so cute. I love this branch. 

Oh the poor snowy beach.

Poor Criscenti. we had correlation and his feet were soaking so he's trying to dry them on the heater. 

Walking through the park :) On sunday. 0.

Random picture of us cooking in the kitchen... or at least a super random picture that Sora Letinu took. hahah

We can basically tell how the weather is going to be by the waves. Pictures don't do it justice of how insane the sea has been. It doesn't do it justice at all.

Sorry I've been horrible at taking pictures. Here's a few from this past couple of weeks and from today :) 

January 28, 2014

Hello Family and Friends,

First I think I should probably start off that I feel almost perfectly well. Still have a cough but everyday I've just felt better and better. Everybody has been sick these past 2 weeks including Sora Letinu so there is just something going on. I'm trying to just block out people haha. I have been on antibiotics and after a talk with Sora Hill and her telling me to please just take it easy. So we did. Instead we made quite a few phone calls and tried to set up future lessons. Not much success there. I can't tell you how many times I heard," Sure sure I would love to meet just I'll call you when I'm free." Gosh, like I don't know what that means?

We started English classes this week and I thought that we were going to have so many people. We had a few new people but it's basically just the normal people that have been coming for years. Sora Letinu and I are teaching advance class... well I'm teaching the advance class and I have so much fun with it. The people that are in our advance class are very kind of cocky with their English so I kind of like to stump them... is that bad? We went over adjectives this past week and how to describe things. I put pictures up on the board and told them to describe this painting to me without using these words and then I would list a couple of words. It was really hard. I think I need to do this in Romanian. :) That would be super good practice.

We did have a lesson with Alina this week. She's still preparing to leave for Dubai but I'm actually pretty sure that we are going to have Skype lessons because she'll be there for a while and then come back to Constanta and then go back and then return. So I'm praying this works. President is concerned that when she does go to Dubai that she wont be able to connect as well to the LDS people there or that she will really want to get baptized and she wont be able to because of the laws there. So we will see what happens. Kind of hard. Anyways, we talked to her this week about the basics. The basics of the church, the basics of happiness. I really just want to prepare her so that way she will still keep the standards and do things that really will bring happiness into her life. It was such a great lesson and the spirit was there. She told us that she felt a little bit better about going to Dubai knowing that there was a church there that she could go to that had great people in it. I really really love her, and I really pray that she will be able to accept the entirety of the gospel intro zi.

We planned on doing some branch and district contacting. Getting members involved with actual contacting, but the weather was absolutely dreadful. I know it's been snowing a lot here in Romania but I don't know if other places have the impact of the wind. It's literally like a slap in the face. I love living next to the sea but it's also horrible. Walking outside and you can't even walk straight because of the strength of the wind. At first it was just rain which wasn't too bad. I mean I was cold obviously but it wasn't that bad. But then it started to get colder and colder and now we have quite a few inches of snow out front. I feel so bad for the stray dogs and cats. One that adores me okay and I adore her. She was out in the rain and then being in the cold her fur is literally frozen. It makes me so sad. I may have pleaded to keep her. Dang rules. ;) Just kidding I know why we have rules I wont take the dog promise :) Even if she does remind me of Layla!

Walking to the library today was quite funny though and I laughed most of the way here. I have never lived in snow and being here makes me really want to stick to that decision and never live in the snow. It's been quite an adventure though trying to walk. It's hard work! Or I just have never learned how to walk properly maybe? I am grateful that Sora Newell left her rain boots here since all my boots have little holes from walking and just pore in water and make my feet all wet. It's been quite the adventure though. I'm hoping it warms up though so that way we can do more then just Block Knocking this week.

Well a little about what we are trying to do. I really want to get in touch with these members since I am pretty sure I will be here for another few transfers. It'll be my longest area ever! But I really want to help these members and yesterday Elder Myler gave a great talk about missionary work and then President Contantinescu accompanied him and talked about how we can really have happiness through sharing the gospel :) So here we are going to visit the sisters here :) Super excited!!!!

Love you all,

Sora Stewart

January 21, 2014

Hey Family and Friends,

Sorry I'm writing a day late... but well I got a bug again. Isn't that just my life. Pretty sure it's leading to Bronchitis again... Ughhh WHY! But I'm getting antibiotics and it should be okay. I just have no immune system. But no worries I really am fine. Just taking it slow.

Anyways, this week was so good besides me catching a bug and then having it go into my lungs. So Monday regular P-day besides the fact that we had to hop onto a maxi taxi and hitch a 3 hour ride to Bucharest for Zone Training. Literally one of the longest rides ever! It was a super small maxi taxi and I wanted to die. I just kept trying to sleep but it was not working! We finally get there though and we head over to the sister's apartment. I love them. I seriously love all of the sisters in this mission so much. They are all AMAZING!

Next day (Tuesday) we had zone training and it was all in Romanian. President and Sora HIll are really trying to immerze us in Romanian which I think is fantastic I think if it was this way when I came I would been much better off now. Anyways the whole thing was in Romanian and I had to give a presentation with Sora Letinu about contacting in winter. It was good... SPER! No it really was okay. I talked with some of my favorite sisters and Sora Gerhartz told me something about using members in contacting. Which means every time we have a couple hours of contacting call a member to pray in that moment and we pray as well to find someone who will receive us. To find someone who will be willing to talk. Then afterwards we call them and tell them what happens they get more excited and miracles happen!

So Wednesday. We had a lot of contacting to do this day. To get everything ready for English classes put up all of our posters and so on. So we called up one of our members Andreea and asked her to pray for us. :) Oh my gosh. Everybody stopped and talked to us. Everybody was nice. Everybody took a flyer. It was the most amazing time I have ever had contacting EVER!!!!!! Then we texted Andreea after and thanked her for her prayer and she was so excited she was so grateful. How amazing is this!?? PRETTY DANG AMAZING!

Thursday we had district meeting and it went well. Elder Myler is a really really good district meeting (Also this is all in Romanian) and we talked about our goals and then he gives the lesson about prayer. About setting our goals with prayer. It was so good and he told us how he always makes goals with Heavenly Father about one thing he really wants to accomplish that day and then at the end of the day he makes a complete accounting to Heavenly Father. So I started doing this more in my prayers this week. Something that I truly have learned is that I can always improve the relationship I have with my Heavenly Father always. After district meeting we went to the dentist cause Sora Letinu lost one of her cap things for her tooth. Pretty sure they put it on backwards. Oricum. We also had correlation and it was so good. Alin was there and we just really talked about how we can get members involved and people we need to work with and everything. Super grateful that we have an AMAZING branch president. So grateful.

Friday. Lesson with Alina and Andreea. I felt really prompted this week that we needed to talk about Prophets with Alina this week about how the chruch is organized and how true this church is. So we come into the lesson and we sit down and were going to do a bit of a facem cunostinta because Alina doesn't know Sora Letinu and she was really nervous that Sora Newell left. A few seconds later though Andreea knocks on the door and asks if she can join us. I WOULD NEVER EVER refuse a member coming into our lesson especially Andreea. So she came and joined us. One of the first things Alina said though is that she got her job in Dubai and so she will be leaving in like 2 to 3 weeks. My heart literally broke. Literally broke and Andreea's heart. Andreea was so sad. We're both really happy that she found a job but why does it have to be in Dubai. After she said that I had no idea how we were supposed to teach that lesson I just didn't understand. At all. We did progress into the lesson and it was great. Spirit was there and I think it made more sense to Alina about the church. We might be doing Skype lessons with her we aren't really sure though... It's kinda confusing because she can't really be baptized now... We'll see though.

Lesson with Andreea. Amazing great as always. She's amazing. She wanted to know more about the Word of Wisdom. And so we explained it and I just really wanted to emphasize that our bodies are literal temples. SInce we had just had a lesson not too long ago about the temple and the preparation for it it was so good. I Love the spirit and how it just prompts you to say one thing and have one lesson about a certain thing and then a few lessons later it goes into a different lesson. The Lord just knows so much. After the lesson though because I am now the branch pianist... you may all laugh now haha... Andreea asked me if I would teach her a little bit. So I did as much as I knew. I taught her chords and everythign and she wrote it down so that way she would memorize it. I love this girl LOVE HER!

Saturday: Start of my sickness. We did go out contacting as a district though and it was great except none of us got numbers we had one person take our survey and we got yelled at a few times. While talking to people I found mom's suvenier present though! IT'S PERFECT! Haha we decided during that time though that we had to call a member to pray so we called the Relief Society president Sora Ghiman and she prayed for us. After that people weren't as mean and sombody actually took our survey somebody was actually kind. IT was so nice. PRAYERS ARE AMAZING! That's all I have to say. We came home and then finished translating my talk.

Sunday: Gave my talk. ALINA CAME TO CHURCH!!!!!!! I talked about love, the love of God, and how much He loves us. I based my talk off of Moses 7 Which is basically one of my favorite chapters right now. It's so cool! You just see how real and how amazing GOd is. How much He LOVES US! How much goodness he sends us and so on.

Well I think that's about it :) I love you all so much and I'm grateful for your prayers I really am :)

Love, Sora Stewart

January 13, 2014

Hello Family and Friends,

It's been so good this week. Busy but good. It started off busy. We had our regular P-day and then on Tuesday Sora Newell and I had a lesson with Alina. She was definitely said that Sora Newell was leaving but we told her how great Sora Letinu is so she should be okay. The lesson was really good and we are still trying to understand how we can help her keep commitments adica how to get her to church. It's so hard because she does live so far away. We also really wanted to just have her really read the scriptures and realize what she was reading. The spirit was definitely there and I am so grateful that we are promised the spirit when we teach. I kept having this thought of where peace comes from. So I just said it and I asked her how we feel peace in our lives. We were all able to go around and say how we each can obtain peace in our lives which went so well with what we were talking about. We literally went verse by verse and paused and asked questions to understand every part of what the scriptures were saying and by the end of the lesson she really just wanted to keep reading to see what would happen. We're hoping to meet with her this week she is sick with the flu, but I hope she is reading I pray that she is reading. 

Well after Sora Newell slowly started to pack all of her stuff. We also had to buy her new luggage and everything because one of her suitcases broke when she came here! Let's just say we had a lot of stuff to carry down our 4 flights of stairs the next morning. The taxi driver we had looked at me and said you guys aren't going on a trip are you. This is way too much stuff for just a vacation. Hahaha I about laughed and then had to explain why we are here and everything. Hooray for NORMAL PEOPLE CONTACTING!!!!!!!! :) So it was just Sora Newell, Elder Baielli, and me on a three hour maxi-taxi to Bucharest. 

Bucharest was good and normal. It was cold just waiting at the Gara for everyone to arrive and to take our trains back to our cities. I was kinda nervous again to be Sora Letinu to be honest. I mean I LOVE HER TO DEATH! And my transfer being her companion is literally one of my favorites. But this time it would just be me and her together all the time not any other sisters so I was a bit nervous plus it's 100 percent Romanian all the time. I had some major headaches the first couple of days but it has been so great! So great she is such a great companion and I ADORE HER! She is so cute and everyday she reads things and says," Oh gosh I have so much to improve on." She is just always trying to be better and conquer things that she was once fearful of. One of the biggest goals right now is to really help her loose weight. She needs to loose quite a bit to go on her mission and President asked me to really help her. Well... so I had to work. Literally have been working out so much that my body just hurts haha in a good way. Also changing eating habits. It's been so great though.

Sora Letinu had her very first lesson with our recent convert Elena and Andreea and it was so cool. I felt really prompted to have us talk about Prayer even though they both do it. Obviously there AMAZING! But so we both prepared and talked about different aspects of prayer and then I told them about my prayer journal how it really helps me prepare to pray, concentrate on what I am saying to Heavenly Father, and then how Heavenly Father talks to me. It was so cool and I just love it as they both just start to take notes. So cute. I LOVE THEM!!!!!!! The spirit is just so strong I love the spirit. 

We also went contacting this week. Were trying to pass out as many English cards as we possibly can. Some of the greatest investigators we get is from English. So we hope that it'll be more successful this transfer. Not so much in finding potentials this last week but that's okay we have more time this week. :) Pray for us to obtain investigators that would be so great!!!!!

So something super crazy and funny that happened last night. Sora Letinu and I were changing our filters and we can not get this last one off. Literally it would not come off. I all of a sudden saw water just coming out onto the floor and so I just got a towel and put it town because I figured it's just water coming off of some of the water that was in the filter. NO it kept coming where we put more towels down and that was not sufficient!!!! So I go to see the problem and literally the pipe broke and completely soaked me we had a huge pool of water as I tried to hold the water from not leaking everywhere. Thankfully our district leader came over because I could not turn off the water it was stuck but he got it. Still had a huge puddle of water across our kitchen and I took a huge shower but our land lord called a plumber and he came this morning so crisis is now adverted :) Thank goodness. It was super funny after though but it was so crazy. The plumber told us that it was a really good thing we were home because the pipe was literally rusted through and it just broke so it would have been even worse if we weren't home. :) Haha it was too funny!

I think that's really all for this week!!!!!
Love you all!
Sora Stewart

Oh yeah this is us watching the hobbit. By the way SO GOOD!!!! And fireworks!!!!!!

Oh yeah this is us watching the hobbit. By the way SO GOOD!!!! And fireworks!!!!!!