"...And out of small things proceedeth that which is great.": Miracles Everywhere and finally lots of pictures!!

MIRACLES EVERYWHERE!!!!!! (Picture me saying that in the voice of the lady from that nutrigrain commercial............ BABIES EVERYWHERE!!!)

We have been so busy we pretty much are having to schedule time to breathe! No joke! We only had 1 cancelled appointment this week! That's a MIRACLE! MIRACLES EVERYWHERE! We pretty much leave our flat at after lunch, and then don't get back until 9:30pm (and we literally sprint from the bus back to our flat!). CRAZY! I love it so much!!!!!!!!

Miracle 1:

Remek's English is getting SOOOO good! We are now able to have 40-60 min conversations with him before we actually start our lessons! His English is still very broken, but we are understanding him wayyyy better and he is learning fast! He also has completely given up coffee (that was a big struggle for him- he was drinking 3-5 cups a day before). He's been off coffee for almost a week!!! Remek is still our beam of sunshine in the middle of rainy/windy Telford! Always so kind to us (I swear he is trying to make us gain 50lbs off of the chocolate and candies he gives to us every time we come over) and loves seeing us! He loves church and loves coming to all the ward activities! We are taking him to the British pageant (along with the Cleary's-- a less active family-- and their non-member family friend). I'm so excited!!!!

Miracle 2: Adolf wants to be baptized!!!!! He is our investigator from Eastimor! His faith is mind-blowing!!!! He just doesn't feel worthy to be baptized, so we are working with him to feel confident in himself and the power of the atonement. He expressed this desire to be baptized in only our 2nd lesson! We are now working on getting him out to church, as his testimony of the BOM and Joseph Smith and the plan of salvation is extremely strong already!

Miracle 3: Tanwaa wants to be baptized and also wants her 2 little children baptized!!! She has struggled to have the faith to go to a church (she feels like God has forgotten her) but said she is ready to go back. She wants her children to have nice clothes before she takes them to church (we tried to tell her it doesn't matter, but she respects God so much and wants to give him her best), so it'll be a couple weeks before she will start attending). She was a Muslim when she lived in Nigeria, but converted to Christianity in England. She really wants her family to have the gospel, and has asked us to start teaching her 8 yr old son- Abdul- the lessons as well. Her children are ADORABLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'm so excited to start teaching them, as I have never had the chance to teach children yet!!!

Miracle 4: We found a less active family that we have been trying to find since the 1st day we got to Telford!!!!!! We took a bus out to their village (40 mins away) and THEY WERE HOME!! They were so friendly and were happy to book an appointment to have us come back (they were excited that Telford has sister missionaries!). They have 4 kids- all of them are not members of the church- and the parents are absolutely lovely people...so there is HUGE potential here!!

Miracle 5: Like I said, we had only 1 cancelled appointment this week, and even this led to a miracle. Because Remek's appointment fell through, we were able to stay longer at the Badger's home after tea. They are a part-member family (mother is a member and children--19 yrs and 11yrs old-- are not). We got to have a really long talk with them and they REALLY opened up to us.....the elders have been struggling to get them to open up and work with them, so this is a miracle. I particularly connected really well with the 19yr old daughter, and she asked if she could meet with us sometime just to talk! We will be doing a scripture study and a FHE with them soon, so hopefully that'll strengthen their faith!

Miracle 6: I can proudly say that I'm super sneaky! So Cindy (21 yr old less active who we found and met with last week) is a new Avon consultant. I plotted and told her I'd loveeeee to order something from her. The real truth is, I really never cared that much about Avon (it's fine, but I'm perfectly happy buying whatever cheap, drug-store rubbish I can find) but I knew that if I ordered, we would be guaranteed 2 more appointments with her: 1 to order the product, and another to pick it up ;) BAZINGA! It worked. Our 3rd appointment with her (to pick up the cheapest hand lotion that I could find in the Avon booklet) is this Saturday! Who knew me being such a girly-girl would help in missionary work! Cindy is doing well- we had a scripture study with her, her boyfriend and her house-mate. Turns out the house-mate's sister and nephew are Mormon and she's been really interested in learning more. She loved scripture study and took a BOM. She is now our new investigator!!

This week was the never-ending stream of less active and member appointments! Highlights:
Philippa Davies: 78 years old going on 20! She reminds me soooooo much of great-grandma Gall! Her mind is sharp as a tac! She looks so frail though that if you blew on her, she would probably fall over! She faithfully tottles off to church every Sunday and sits right in the front row! I love her! She literally just talks your ears off the whole time and it's so hard to leave her home (she tries to keep you as long as possible....poor woman is very lonely). She is hilarious and so easy to talk with! I would happily visit with her all day!!!

Our members are crazy! It's been such a struggle this week to get out of appointments on time. All appointments are going like 45-70 mins overtime, because they all just want to talk and talk and talk and talk!! Sis Shchur and I joked that we should start picking our noses, or plugging our ears and screaming "LALALALA I CAN'T HEAR YOU" to see if that'll help get us out on time!! At least we know that all of this talking is helping them in some way to come closer to Jesus Christ, so we'll take what we can get!

Sister Shchur's birthday: I was so determined to make her birthday amazing. So I snuck out of bed after she fell asleep and hard-core heart attacked our living room and wrote her a massive letter about why I loved her. Then I made her breakfast. Then I made her a cake. Our entire zone sang to her over the phone, then the assistants sang to her, and then our sister training leaders also called and sang to her.

I made huge secret plans for her, and it all went perfect!! We had tea at a members home, where they had tons (like 6) presents for her and a lovely cake (their daughter is on a mission, so they knew what missionaries like to get). Then at our ward sport night, our district surprised her with a cake and a card from us. Then Rachel Bridgewater (a member who leaves on her mission to France next month) came with a gift basket that I asked her to arrange (all Sis S's favourite things- nutella, chocolates, flowers, etc.). Then when we got home another member (Sis Benson....amazing lady!!) came by with another bouquet of flowers!. We now have about a 2 years supply of chocolate, and a 1 yr supply of shampoos and lotions! Sister Cleary gave both of us the cutest matching handbags (we call them purses in Canada haha). She LOVED her b-day, and I think she felt so special!!!!!!!!!!! I sent a picture home of all of Sister Shchur's bday gifts. ......We are going to get SOOOO fat from all of this chocolate!! HAHA

I have so many more experiences to share, but not enough time!!! MIRACLES EVERYWHERE!!!! I'm soooo exhausted, and just want to die, but I am so happy! It's so rewarding to be so busy and to see the work just exploding in Telford!!!! Our district is so close, and we are working in such close unity with our elders here. Sis S says we have a very special district.....compared to other districts she's been in, these elders are particularly kind, diligent and are amazing missionaries!! I just enjoy every second of this mission!!!

Fun note! It has been realllllllly windy this week!!! I have now officially started to experience sister missionary skirt mishaps! I'm pretty sure my skirt has been blown up past my head about 50 times in the past week! Good thing I always wear spandex shorts under my skirts haha! Good ol' England (have I mentioned yet that I LOVE England........maybe 50 times?? Well, another 12 times won't hurt! I LOVE ENGLAND!!!!).

I'm sooooo excited!! This week we have a zone meeting (THESE ARE MY FAV!! I get to see all my wonderful friends here!!!!!!), the pageant, AND WE GET TO LISTEN TO APOSTLES!!!! I cannot wait to tell all about it next week!!!!

That is all for now!!!!!!!!! Until next week!!

From the realllllly rainy/windy Telford

Sister Martin :)

A bit of Canada...