Sunday May 29, 2016

  I can’t believe another week has gone by. Thanks to everyone who called or sent us email letters, we love them. I’ve spent the morning making dinner rolls for Sister Schwab. She tweaked her knee last night and has 4 missionaries coming to dinner. I offered to make her some rolls. Hopefully her knee will get better fast as she has a ton of stuff to do to get packed and ready to move back home to Farmington. They are traveling through the mission almost every day.

  So last Monday I told Elder Oldham that I wrote home about how the Sisters went up a notch for my favorite missionary spot because of their comment about me feeling more like an aunt instead of a grandma and he went down because of accusing us of stinking.

Elder Oldham said, “Wait a minute, I didn’t know this was a competition! I didn’t have all the facts.”

The next morning he came in and went right over to me and shook my hand and said, “Sister Stewart, how are you this fine morning?” Apparently he wants to move back up on my list.

  We have District conference and had the adults meeting and the Priesthood meeting yesterday. It was really good. Today we are meeting at 1:30 at the Renaissance hotel because our small church won’t have room for everyone. It’s nice to see a large group of LDS people.

  Sister Graham and Sister Hofmann brought an investigator who has only been studying the church for a month and is already in Mosiah in the Book of Mormon. I’m looking forward to this afternoon. Elder Yuriy A. Guschin, from Novosibirsk, Russia, is an Area 70 and is our guest speaker. He was a Russian gymnast in his youth. He has been a member for 23 years. He has two daughters and one of them is not a member, however her 17 year old son is and is planning for a mission. After the Saturday session we went to dinner with Elder Guschin and another man that I can’t remember the name of and Elder and Sister Zolinger, serving in Siberia and President and Sister Schwab. Dad and I had authentic Russian Stroganoff with potato wedges. It was delicious.

  President Schwab took us out to lunch because it was Elder Porter’s last staff meeting last Tuesday. We went to a corner restaurant where we ordered from the Russian menu using our Google translate. We messed up because Dad and I both ordered the same salad and soup and different entrees. I said I didn’t want the garnishes which is like a side, either cabbage or rice. But I guess she thought I didn’t want an entrée at all. The soup and salad was really good though.

  The new branch building is almost done. They have been working on this for a long time. The completion date keeps getting moved back. We got to go inside and look around. It is three stories high and very beautiful. Two branches will meet there. They are planning ahead for when we have a Stake in Samara and built some offices for them. President and Sister Schwab wanted to put in an elevator but I guess everything they’d have to do to get that would delay the opening to long so they shelved that for now. The older people (like me) will have a hard time with the stairs. My knees handled it okay that day but if I had to go up and down very much I think they would protest.

  Thursday was our Visa trip. We were in a small bus that was air conditioned, sort of. Just as you were about to break a sweat it would come on. It’s a long bus ride but we talked most of the way. President did remind the Elders that they still had to do personal and companion study that day. There were 8 of us. 

  When we got to the boarder we had to go show our passports and visas then we passed in to Kazakhstan. Then turned around and went back in. We have to leave the country to renew our visas. It was a little quieter on the way back. I managed to read 4 Liahona articles which is no small feat. The roads are not very good and you really bounce around a lot so focusing on my phone took a lot of perseverance.

  After lunch we went to get our hair cut at the salon that did Dad’s hair cut last time. I got the girl he went to and showed her a picture of what I wanted and she said Mozna which is like permission or just ok.

She did a great job on my hair. It is a little shorter than what I wanted but it will grow. Dad got the girl I talked to last time. She started with clippers then scissors and then was trying to even things up and then just took the clippers to Dad’s hair. She left about what Dad wanted taken off. It looks good, just not what I’m used to.

 This week a lot of missionaries will be in and out of the office as they go to their new destinations. Being prepared for that plus I have baptisms to record before the end of the month. That may seem a small task but it isn’t, since I have to type everything in Russian.

Our Sunday meeting was outstanding. President and Sister Schwab talked and basically said goodbye to everyone. It was very touching. Then I went to visit with Svetlana and Dad went home with the Schwabs. It’s been a great Sunday.

Love,

Mom

Emergency Crew 

Fire Trucks

  Saturday, after doing the laundry Dad and I walked to the walking street and had lunch. As we were approaching the walking street we heard a bang and saw sparks and while we were waiting to cross the street and fire truck came roaring up. We turned to look and saw that something electrical had blown up. So that was interesting.