July 1st-8th

Hello Everyone! 

Just another amazing week here in the beautiful Біла церква, украіїна! That is Bila Tserkva, Ukraine in Ukrainian of course! Well this week is transfer week. Dont worry my companion and I are staying here in Bila! The other Elders though got moved out. Well Elder Quinn is going home and Elder Droubay got transferred. So now there is just one set of Elders and one set of Sisters here. We are going to have a lot more work to do. We took on 4 recent converts and 2 investigators from the other Elders plus all of ours also. We are going to be very busy!! I cant believe my first transfer in the field is coming to an end. It feels like yesterday I was stepping of the plane so confused and lost. I love Ukraine so much! Well our week went a little like so: 

Monday was P-day of course and we just did all the normal stuff. We went to our normal eating place for lunch with the other Elders, Буфет! It is way good. I usually get pizza. So for dinner we went to a family in the branch, the Офечукс. They are so nice and so awesome. They kinda have been less active but they are coming back to church alot more and the dad should be getting the Melchezideck Priesthood next week and then they will go and get sealed in the Temple! Very exciting for them. But the coolest thing ever happened while we were there. So my name that I have right now has my name spelt as Грокмал (Grokmal) It is very hard for Ukrainian to say because of the G sound at the beggining. So I talked to some natives and they said my name should be spelt Крахмал. It souinds the same but way easier to say. So I ordered some new name tags! Well Obviously we all know our family is from Ukraine. Well when I told this family that my name should be spelt the new way they were like we know people that live here with that exact last name!!! They said they would try to find where they live and we will go knock on the door and be like well we have the same last name, so now be baptized! haha. But really though it is so exciting to see all the members get so excited when I tell them my ancestors are from here and my last name is Ukrainian!! 

Tuesday was a very good day also. We had District Meeting in the morning. It was Elder Quinns last district meeting ever as a missionary! It was pretty crazy! He shared some very good insights with us! It was so cool to serve around him for my first transfer. He taught me so much about how to be a good missionary. 

Well on Wednesday I was on an exchange with Elder Droubay! He is so awesome. We had a lesson with our investigator Иван (Evan)! He is about 16 and way cool. He has been taught quite a bit so we jsut talked to him about the For Strength of Youth panflet and challenged him to read it. At night we had English club. We had game night again which was so much fun. Everyone loved it. We played this fun animal game and everyone was being so funny. After that we went to a sister in our Branches house to teach her. She was telling us about how she has been working in her Celo. It like a little village. We asked if we could help and we went on thursday to help! 

Well that brings me to Thursday July 4!  We went out there and helped Сестра Ольга! (Sister Olga). She is so awesome. We took a bus out there and started to work. I felt like I was back up in Canada on the farm. It looked just like it! We went to her little house that was soooooo old and we got in the attick and cleaned it all out. It took a while then we had a bunch of trash and I was like so where does this go? She was like well we just make a fire and burn it! haha. She then she made us some good Ukrainian Borsch! It was way good. 

Friday was a busy day with lessons! We first taught one of our investigators Руслан (Rooslan)! He is from English and pretty interested. We talked about the Plan of Salvation. He acctepted everything and we hope to set a baptisimal date this week with him! We then had a lesson with a recent convert Sergey. We watched the Restoration movie and talked about it. After that we went to a ladys house and gave her a blessing and then shared a spiritual thought. The church has only been here about 21 years and she has been a member for 20! She is so awesome and so strong! We then finished the night with another member lesson with another member who has been a member for 20 years. She was so nice and so awesome! We challenged he to share the gospel more and invite a friend to church! 

Not much happened saturday. We had a lesson with a recent convert Deema! He is way cool and we just went over the commandments. He is so solid and is going so strong in the church! So for youth game night we had it at the church. You never gonna guess what we played! Our family favorite MAFIA!! I was so happy to play except when I realized we would play in Russian! It seriously brought me back to all the times we have played as family and friends. One round I was mafia and I ended up winning! Everyone was so mad at me cause I totally fooled them all! 

So on Sunday we had the whole branch watch the missionary broadcast finally. It was so awesome. While they watched it in Ukrainian we watched it in English in the Family History room. haha. We then had a testimony meeting after and it was so awesome. So many of the members just talked about missionary work and then the branch president got up there and threw down saying we need to help the missionaries way more! It was so awesome. The members here are so amazing! We had to say goodbye to the other Elders also. That was a bummer! We then went to a members house for a lesson. They were so awesome! The Рабаконс (Rabokon)! We just talked about being better member missionaries and played a fun game with the kids! They were so crazy. 

Well that was basically my week. Sorry it was pretty long! We have been very very busy lately. We have been trying to fill our planners as much as possible with lessons so that we can keep getting referalls from members. It is pretty easy when the members are so awesome and there is about 90 in the branch. Well We have a lesson tonight with a new referall from our branch president. It is at his house so we are hoping all goes well! Well have a good week everyone. I love you all! 

Love,

Elder Grochmal! 

Cleaning!

Borscht!