Well hey there my loverly family!  Oh how I love and miss you!!!!  Things were definitely better this week.  I've been doing a few things to try and keep a positive attitude and see more of the blessings that surround me.  I think it has definitely helped me to feel better this week.  I thought I might write this email first since I never seem to get to it haha.  Ok so first there are a couple of things from past weeks that I have forgotten to tell you all.  First is that I ghost rode my first bike!!!  So what that means is I ride my bike while pulling an empty bike along side me.  It's very Dutch haha.  I feel more and more like a Dutch woman every day.  Ok now on to the week.

 

Maandag- Well I got a lot of good sleep and then we finally went and visited our inactive member Zuster Carty who is in the hospital.  We shared a spiritual thought with her in front of her other friends that were there and they were Jehova's Witnesses so that was cool.  Also the Gouda zusters came and spent the night and Zuster Juchau talked to us which helped out a lot.

 

Dinsdag- We had a good district meeting and then we did exchanges.  Zuster Otteson came here and we made an appt. with Gregory.  The weather was beautiful this day.  We met some really cool people knocking on doors.  Christiana a woman from Poland and Paula a woman from Spain.  They are both catholic but I bore my testimony of the Book of Mormon and both said they are willing to recieve a book =).  Then we went and had dinner with Zuster Van Driel Kluit and the Aalse sisters and Tahira.  It was SUPER Gezellig!  It was really a great night!

 

Woensdag- So today was pretty chill.  We exchanged back.  I talked to Elder Peery and then we went and talked to Zuster Wilkens for a little while.  She is currently inactive because of an injury she had.  She is a really sweet lady.  Then we went and tried to do some look ups in Rotterdam and then we had a great dinner with Familie Van Rangelrooy!

 

Donderdag- So we went to Tahira's for her themed lunch with all of the missionaries in our ward and it was French themed!  YUMM!!!  It was so much fun.  Tahira is a really really amazing member who is SOOO bezig with missionary work even though she goes to school full time and works!  She's so great!  I love her.  Then we went and had dinner with familie Van den Herik, another amazing family.  We had lekker stompot and worst.  Echt Nederlandse eten =) 

 

Vrijdag- We started this new thing we want to do with the whole ward.  We do visitng teaching splits where we split with a visiting teaching pair and then visit all of their visiting teachees.  Hopefully this will help the members to become more involved in doing their visiting teaching, but it is A LOT of work to put together.  I did get to work with Christy though who is a YA who is preparing to go on a mission.  We went to our appt. with Gregory but he wasn't there.  Then we went and visited Zuster Stafford the amazing inactive whome we love!  We just need to get her to church.  Then we were going to drop off a book of mormon to Paula the woman we met from Spain with a member who just moved into the ward who is also from Spain.  Her name is Renata.  But she wasn't home jammer.  But we got to know Renata really well and she is such a great woman!  Then we had Ricky (another inactive) take us out to dinner for Chinese.  It was SOOOO lekker haha.  Then we went to ym and yw to practice the song we will be singing with them next sunday.

 

Zaterdag- So today was the start of Sinter Klaus.  So here the kids don't really believe in Santa Clause or Kerstman but they believe in Sinter Klaus.  He's a Saint that comes from Spain in a boat to the Netherlands every year on the 16th I think and then the Dutch kids all put out their shoes in the hopes that he will come and bring them something.  He comes every so often until the 5th of December when he brings all of his presents to all the kids.  He also has a little helper called Swarte Pete (black Pete) and a white horse.  We put out our shoes and I've bought some little treats and made a few small things for Zuster Woodbury for Sinter Klaus.  Anyway so we saw some swarte petes running around this day and they had some big parade or something but we missed it because we did more visiting teaching splits.  We also did weekly planning this day and then went to Zuster Carty again and helped her with her family history.

 

Zondag- I gave a talk in the church so that was ok.  Haha.  It was on Zion.  Today was a miracle day!  We finally got in contact with everyone we've been wanting to!  So we went by this inactive woman Zuster Benschop and she was finally home!  Then we went and had dinner with Aad and Elsje.  We decided to sing to them and it really brought the spirit =).  Then we went to Saba's and got ahold of her!  She wants a Priesthood blessing so we're taking the Elders tomorrow.  Then we went to Jirhee's and she was there!  She didn't seem to intersted but we made an appt. and then before we left her roommate was like can you tell me more about that book?  Bam new investigator!  Laureen.  Then we went to Gregory's and he was there.  We made an appt. with him and I think he'll keep it this time.  Then we went to Benne's and had a really great door appt. with him.  So that was all amazing! 

 

Maandag- Today I took a 6 hour nap haha then we went grocery shopping and then we went and toured a windmill!  There is a member in the ward who owns a windmill and she gave us a free tour.  It was so much fun I'll send pictures! 

 

Well I love you all and hope you have a great week!

 

Love,

Zuster Mizell