12-12-12

Ciao Tutti!

     Wow it truly is hard to believe that December is almost halfway over and Christmas is right around the corner!!  I am excited to be here, even has alittle taste of home with all the snow!  The internet defiantly lied when it said the weather here was like Southern California! haha  But this week was so sick!  In many different ways.  First off last P-day did turn out to be incredible!  Saw tons of things and it was my first real P-day of getting out and seeing a ton of sites.  Cant wait for y'all to see pictures.  Just wish y'all could have been here to see it!  Then Thursday and Friday we did a scambi (exchanges) and I got an Italian comp. so it was sweet!

     Then Friday night we got to head back to Rome because on Saturday they had a huge service project to clean up and fix up a huge park area.  It was near the temple site so that was cool for those people to see us helping that community.  Another cool thing is last P-day another companionship went to the Vatican, and they went to the top, and when the Temple in Rome is done, you will be able to see it from there! How cool is that?!  But the service project was a lot of fun!  The first half of this week the work wasn't great, one we didn't have a ton of time with being in Rome so much, but then it was back to finding and one of our investigators that is awesome, Mirella, has 2 houses that they live in because she is moving, and there was confusion and we went to the wrong house so we missed that lesson.  But on Tuesday we got a lesson with her.  It was one of the most incredible things I have been apart of.  We are really starting to see the miracles here, first of all she is the one we found after our dinner appointment got cancelled, but then we didn't get to meet with her for a long time.  But she told us yesterday after she met us that first day she just had a feeling she shouldn't smoke anymore, and that night she said a prayer and hasnt smoked since!!  She is one of those people that you feel like you were called here to find them specifically.  And she really opened up during our lesson and we invited her to be baptized and she really wants too!  He husband is against it right now, but we will see.

     Monday was another incredible day!  We had 3 lessons!  Which basically matches what we had our first transfer!  It is so true if you are obedient, work hard, and have faith, you will see miracles.  Another interesting thing that happened Tuesday morning, we were doing street and we came to a park where there was a ton of people, unusual because it is freezing outside.  We were trying to figure out what was going on when we saw and heard a huge group of people on the road marching and protesting something.  We saw that and the cops starting to close in and so we figured it wasn't the best place to be, and we heard a huge BOOM and so we decided it was time to leave right then. haha 

     After English course yesterday we had the opportunity to be apart of 2 newish members (that are awesome) receiving the Melchizedek Priesthood!  It was way awesome!  Mattia is leaving to go to the M.T.C. this next week, and we have another who has his papers in, pretty cool.  We re-watched a little movie you watch the first night you get here of a bunch of pictures missionaries have sent in of the different areas, I have decided I have to serve in Napoli, Sarracusa or Palermo, Malta, And Rome! haha  I love yall so much and hope yall have an incredible week!

Love,

           Anziano Bird

December Already!

Wow! It is so hard to believe that it is December already! But it sure feels like it! We are in a mountain town and there has been snow in the mountains for a while now. And a couple days ago there was finally snow on the ground! Something I was not expecting to see in Italy. My letter wont be very long today because we are in Rome today and we are actually going to get some things done today! haha Planning on the coliseum and some other things close to it! Should be alot of fun! This past week I bought my first Italian tie! It is beautiful! And at Christmas Zone Conference yesterday we got a little gift pack and it had a super sweet tie it in also! Zone Conference was awesome, always is! It was way cool cause the Napoli zone came up and got to see my mtc comp and a ton of other people! Did some more finding this week, got to teach a couple of lessons, but we went through the area book the other day and found some awesome people we can hopefully teach! I read an awesome story in the Liahona about a missionary in France and the branch he was in was in the same situation ours is in and for Christmas he got them all Preach My Gospels and the work there exploded! So we are going to do the same and I am super excited!! I ate a hot dog this week! We saw a place and it said chilly cheese dogs, so we went back cause those sounded delicious, but they were just hotdogs. The best part was when I asked the guy what they put on them and he said "I don't know, you tell me cause I have no idea what to do with these" haha Also ate at McDonalds this week and got a burger they only make in Italy, it was super good! Did not taste like a burger from there! haha It was sweet this week we went for service at the shelter, and it just so happened they were having a party that night so they had pro chefs there and so we got to eat some amazing food! Really hoping to get the work going during the holiday season because this branch needs it. We have not had corolation in 6 weeks and it is a little frustrating. In will be nice when we can get a baptism! We had a party this week for Mattia who is in our branch and he is leaving to go on his mission to Portugal in a couple weeks! He is going to the Provo mtc and is super excited and is going to be a great missionary! Love yall and hope yall have an amazing week! Love, Anziano Bird

{Last week in November}

Hey! This week has been great! Thursday was Thanksgiving of course, and they do not celebrate it here, but Thursday nights is one of the nights we do English course and so we had a big activity with our students and the branch. It went awesome! But in the morning we got a lesson, which was a huge blessing! It went great, she is Romanian, so she doesn't speak or understand Italian super well, I can relate! :) We made brownies for the activity because people here LOVE our brownies, and they aren't very good. haha With students and members there were about 40 people there. And everyone brought a TON of food! We had turkey and it was delicious! But mostly Italian food! One of the students made cheesecake, and all the students wanted us to eat their food, so had to eat a ton of everything!! So I had to try this cheesecake and actually really liked it! I know I'm growing up so fast! There are so many awesome people that come to English course, I know the Lord is preparing them, so hopefully we will get the opportunity to teach some of them! There is a store in town called Lidle. It is a German store I believe so they have more "American food" I was hoping to find cheddar cheese but they didn't have it. They have an American section, but it is pretty gross. haha They put a picture of the statue of liberty on something and call it American. But they have cheeseburgers! And frozen buffalo wings! And last week my companion and I picked up some advent calenders!! So I am excited about that! We also found something there called Spuma. It is a drink that they make and bottle in Sicily. My companion had heard it was good, so we got some. It was delicious!!! Hard to explain the taste, but is kind of like Jim's guarana drink. A fun thing that happened this week was our water heater thing broke! They have been redoing our roof and they blocked something and it stopped working, and they couldn't get it fixed for about 3 days! Sponge baths it was!!! My first time with sponge baths, I think I prefer normal showers, but they finally got it fixed. Ready for them to get done with our roof also because we are on the top floor and they are always really loud and looking in our windows. haha We got the chance to do service with one of the members on Saturday, helped him move some furniture and it was a nice change of pace. Wish we could do no service. Then on Sunday they invited us over for lunch. Had the normal, salad and bread, pasta, fruit, then gelato! No complaints here! We didn't get as many lessons this week as we had hoped for, so we did alot of finding. Still trying to find that referral from Spain. And did a lot of street also. You really get the opportunity to talk to some really.... really interesting people! haha We had a lesson last night with an awesome lady from English course, we had an awesome lesson prepared, but of course nothing went as planned. We had some members with us and they tried to take over and it did not go well at all. This lady is so ready for the gospel too, so hopefully we can get another chance to teach her. I love ya'll so much and hope ya'll have a great week!! Love, Anziano Bird