The Ukrainian Bear: July 15th-22nd

Dear Family and Friends!

Just another another week has flown by here in Ukraine! I cant believe how fast time is flying here! This week is already going to be my 4 month mark of my mission! I cant believe it! Welll first off there was something that I forgot to tell you from last week! So as I have mentioned every week we write our mission president's wife an email in Russian. So last week I wrote about my family. In my letter I was writing that my sister has a husband named Justin! So I wrote У Меган ест муж. So It litterally translates to At Megan is a husband. But I spelled the word ест incorrectly and it should of been есть with a little b at the end. So the word ест means eating. So I literally wrote to her Megan is eating her husband!!!!!! haha. It was so funny. My mission president's wife wrote me back and was like you make a little mistake and told me and she was making jokes about it. It was pretty funny! Just cause I forgot the little b.

Well my week went a little like this: Monday was really cool. So remember Elder Quinn that was serving here but it was his last transfer. Well his parents came and picked him up. So on monday they came down here to Bila for the day. We went to a members house with them and had lunch! It was so cool to see him with his parents and also to see some people that speak English! haha. After that we had a way exciting FHE set up with our Branch Mission Leader. He was inviting over a family that they had gone on vacation with. So we went over there and had an awesome lesson with them. It was so cool and they were very interested. We then had dinner with them and they just loved us. They were so interested in why we are here and just everything! It was very cool!

So on Tuesday we had a lesson with our investigator Иван! He is doing awesome! We commited to ask his parents again if he could be baptized! We havent heard back yet but we should meet with him tomorrow I think! We then taught our recent convert Sergey. He is so awesome! He is doing so well and is so strong in the church already! We then went over to another investigators house, Володимер (Volodemear.) But before we got there we were like 45 mins early and we were walking and it started to drizzle a little bit so we started to walk fast and then it started to absolutely pour! We ran and got cover in a cafe! It was the hardest I have ever seen it rain in my entire life! It was so crazy! It rains here like everyday. Pretty wild. But back to Володимер so he has been taught a bunch and we just wanted to teach him a simple lesson about the priesthood and baptism. We did so and then we asked him to be baptized. He said that he would pray alot this week and continue to read and then next time we meet he will let us know. He is a great guy and loves us.

Not much happened wednesday. We helped an older lady in the branch who is in a wheelchair go to the park. THey were having this big convention thingy for people in wheelchairs. It was really cool. It was a bunch of Americans putting it on. We talked to them for a while. They said they saw us and first thing they thought was Mormons but then were like no way there are Mormons here! So when we told them we are they were shocked and they were really nice. They were all from California. So after all of that we had English like normal. We had about 30 people show up. It was so awesome. They people just love coming and it is such a great opportunity for us to find investigators!

Thursday - MY BIRTHDAY!! Well basically is was just like any other day here in the mission field. We started the morning by going and doing some service for Коля Товмаш and we helped dig his hole again. IT was way fun. We then were sitting in his house after eating some food and I mentioned it was my birethday and he started singing me happy birthday then opened the fridge and gave me a big super snickers! It was so funny and so nice of him! He is so amazing! Well for lunch/dinner we made my favorite, Spaghetti and Meatballs! It was so good and reminded me of being back home growing up my whole life eating that meal on my B-day! All of our lessons fell through that night so we just contacted and tracted around the streets of Bila. At night we made a cake that my mom sent me which was so good! Also I opened my big package that my wonderful mother sent me! It was so much fun to have something to open and get on my birthday. By the best gift goes to Hyrum for sending a baseball bat pen. It is the best. THe members love it so much. I always show them and they are obsessed! I love it! That was basically it for my birthday! Kinda weird to be here on my 19th birthday. Never thought it would be like this!

So on friday we went out the American man in our Branch's farm to help him. He needed help laying concrete! So we were about to start and he looked at me and said you have done this right? and I said of course! He was like good grap the wood and lets beging to level the concrete. It was really my first time ever doing that! haha. I just followed him and it worked out good. We ended up meeting some of his other workers that might be interested in the church so that was awesome! We then came home and taught another recent convert Deema. He is also doing so good and is very strong in the church!

Saturday was good. We had English like normal and had another great turnout! We then had youth night. There was this kid Игер (Eager) who came. We invited him to come to church on Sunday and he did! IT was so cool. We want to start teaching him really bad. He is a great young kid who loves coming to english and youth night. So at youth night we had a little ping pong tournament going on and our branch mission leader came and he was so cocky that he would beat us all. He beat everyone and then had to play me. I whooped him and it wasnt even close. HE was so mad. He is going to come to the church today and we are going to play some more since it is P-day!

So yesterday was really good! So our mission president came out with this booklet about how the branch can do better working with the missionaries! It is way cool! We went over it in Branch Councel and our branch is so stoked! I am way happy and I know that it will help us alot. We also met a family last night that was way way nice and wants us to come back in September and teach them. They are going away for like all of august so they wont be here. But they are some elect potentials!

Well that was basically my whole week! IT was way good and I had so many good experiences! I love being out here being a missionary! This church is true and has helped me in so many ways in my life! THanks for the birthday emails for those of you who sent them! It meant alot! Love you all and hope you have a great week!

Love

Elder Grochmal.