Almost December!!

Dear Family and Friends!
Well I hope that everyone had a great Thanksgiving and Happy Birthday to dad again! Mom it sounds like you prepared a delicious Thanksgiving feast, way to be, hopefully you watched the Macy’s Day Parade. It’s just not Thanksgiving without it. Thanks everyone for the emails this week, Devin you always seem to know exactly what to say;) Taylor, stop fouling people, and K-dawg congrats on the engagement! So cool! I want to see pictures so send some.This week was pretty good. A little crazy but overall good. It turns out that my companion is now serving in Samara and I got a new companion. Her name is Sis. Stolyarova and she is from the St. Petersburg mission. She has been serving for over a year and she is a GREAT missionary! It has been really fun to serve with her for the last week and get to know her and see how she does missionary work. We had a great week with a lot of lessons and… we set a baptismal date!!! HUZZAH!Monday after we finished mailing the assistants called and said that I would be getting a new companion and I needed to be home and have everything done by 4 so I could let her in. We were out in Dochney and still needed to buy their food so we ran and got all of that done and then ran to my area, bought food and made it home just in time to welcome my new companion. She had been serving in Samara and her and my companion switched places. I am just glad to be in my area and to have a companion! That night we went and visited a less-inactive family and it was interesting to talk to them. Hopefully we will keep working with them and they will come back to church with us.Tuesday and Wednesday were pretty normal days. Lots of contacting and talking with people. We did have a great lesson with Valentina, our landlady, about the Plan of Salvation. She seems really interested in it and asked a lot of questions. I am very excited to see how she progresses. Thursday was Thanksgiving. We had a normal day of contacting and talking to people but I did make chocolate chip cookies for the special occasion and they turned out pretty good. We were able to convince Valentina to go to a concert at the Branch building with Luba the opera singer. She loved the concert and we were able to teach her before the concert which was great.The weekend was filled with contacting and tracting- every missionaries dream;) and then of course Sunday. Saturday night we did have a great lesson with our investigator Sasha and we set a baptismal date!!! He will be baptized December 12 and we are so excited for him. He is such a great kid and is very excited to come to church and participate. He is only 13 years old and reads the Book of Mormon and prays with his mom. I am so excited and it is truly a blessing from our Heavenly Father we were able to teach him.My companion did make me real borscht this week which was AMAZING and belini. She is an excellent cook and I am so excited to try lots of real Russian recipes with her. She is going to make piroshky today!!! I wanted to make pie on Thanksgiving but we just didn’t have time so maybe some time this week.As I think about my blessings from Heavenly Father it really is amazing everything that he gives us. He is so aware of us and what we need and sometimes…what will make us grow. I am grateful for the opportunity to serve on this mission. It is teaching me so much!!! Everyday I learn something new and I am grateful to be able to serve in Russia and with these Russian people. I love them! My companion and I also realized how thankful we are for P-day! Sounds funny but seriously. We had such a crazy, tiring week that last night we wanted to have a party because it was going to be P-day! Oh the tender mercies from Heavenly Father. Well I hope all is well with everyone! The church is true, help the missionaries and talk with your friends and family about the Gospel. Especially in this Christmas season it is so easy to talk about the Savior, our blessings, and everything we have. I encourage everyone to have a Family Home Evening with a family in their neighborhood and share the Gospel message. It changes lives. It is a gift from our Heavenly Father! I love you all!Whitney