The Thanksgiving Spirit in Penza

Well I hope that everyone had a great Thanksgiving and it was a fun-filled, good food day for everyone! This week has been awesome andwe are seeing miracles in the Penza area. We are so excited to workwith our awesome ward and to just have the support of all of themembers. I am seriously amazed by their dedication and love to thegospel every week! Well I need to start out adn say HAPPY BIRTHDAY to one of
my favorite little nieces, LUCY! YEA! i can't believe that she is already 4 and already all grown up. I hope that she has a great birthday filled with princess fun, lots of candy and cake, and lots and hugs and kisses. I can't wait to get my princess shoes on and dance with you ;) Well Monday night was fantastic! We had 2 family home evening's and we loved being able to spend some time with our members and get to know them and their families. Our first FHE was with one of our new converts and it was her first "try" at FHE and it was a huge success. It is such a cool sight to be able to see someone who didn't know anything about the gospel transform and become just... perfect. I was so proud of her for wanting to hold her own FHE, for having a spiritual thought, treats, etc. It was such a great evening and I think that she will continue to have many more successful and fun-filled FHE's! WE then went back to our area for FHE with an amazing family here. BY far my favorite part was the game at the end where I was enlisted to act out a famous RUssian Fairytale (one, that I was not familiar with at all) in the form of a comedy. I was enlisted to be the mouse and so just ended up crawling around nad
trying to understand the story. They then did the same story in the form of a tragedy and it was so funnY! The president of the branch was there and so it was so fun to watch him be the grandma in the story, trying not to laugh and act it out. It was great. We had some great lessons with investigator's this week and so it has
been great to just watch them progress. We also got to work with TANYUSH this week which is always a HUGE treat! i love her and am just so happy when she comes out on the street with us. We were at our investigator's house and we LOVE to be there because we always have really really interesting conversations and we realized that we had to be home in about 20 minutes. Well, she lives about 30 minutes away and
so we finished the lesson and RAN out of there. Unfortunately there was a HUGE storm and the wind and freezing rain was a little bit of a deterrent. We were half running, half walking while trying to see in front of us and singing hymns all the way. I felt so bad for Tanya who was with us because she did not have warm clothes on but we were laughing and having a good time. We had to RUN home by the end because
we realized we had about 3 minutes left. Luckily we made it but I was SOAKED from head to foot. We also had a great lesson with an inactive lady that night and had a really interesting conversation on the atonement and how we can apply it more in our lives. It was great to be able to talk to her about it and we love working with her. SHe has the best sense of humor! Her and Tanya got along great instantly! We
really hope that soon she will be able to come to church! Thanksgiving this year was miraculous and I have to say it was all thanks to our new investigator. We met a really really great lady a couple of weeks ago while tracting and so set up a meeting with her on Thursday. We knew that she spoke perfect English (she is a teacher here) and so planned to our lesson in English (which is always realy
interesting). We showed up for our lesson and she had a whole Thanksgiving Dessert tray for us. It was so cute! She knew that in America it was a big holiday and so had planned for us to celebrate. It was so sweet. We had a greta lesson with her and talked about the Book of Mormon a lot. She had been to Salt Lake City for a teacher's
conference and so we were able to talk about that a little as well. We gave her the BOok of Mormon in English and just had a great lesson. The spirit was so strong and she promised to read. She then came to church on Sunday and it was Fantastic! She loved the meeting and so we are so excited to keep working with her.
We also bought a pumpkin from a grandma on the street and made pumpkin and banana cream pies for the ward Thanksgiving party on Friday. The pies were a huge hit and it was so fun to start with a pumpkin and at the end have a pie. I have to say i felt pretty proud and felt a little like Martha Stewart. The pies were delicious and the ward absolutely loved them!
Friday we had a great Thanksgiving evening where we talked about Gratitude, taught the members how to do the traditional "primary turkey with your hand" and played some musical chairs. There was then a big feast. Everyone loved the activity and there were A TON of investigators there and so it was even better. Overall it was a great evening and we absolutely loved it! The members loved celebrating the
Holiday and loved being able to share their gratefulness. As I said, this week we saw lots of miracles and have been amazed that the work in this area just keeps going on. The church in Penza is GROWING and there is so much success here. We know that the success here is because of the faith and prayers of the members and their
willingness to work with us. I love working here in this branch and I love seeing the changes that are taking place in this area. WOW! Our Heavenly Father loves us and gives us so many blessings. I am so grateful for a fantastic week, for an awesome companion, for the opportunity to serve the Lord and testify of Him and His sacrifice and for all of the tender mercies He gives us everyday. I know this church
is true and it brings HAPPINESS! I hope everyone has a good week and continues to feel the "thanksgiving spirit". I lvoe you! Sister Morris