Warmin up, Speedin up! June 27th, 2016

Hej fam! 

It is POURING rain here in Zagreb...rather odd because the rest of the week was blazing hot. Summer has officially begun as well as the awkward missionary tan lines. 

However despite the heat, we had an awesome week. Per president's orders, all of the zone leaders and sister training leaders had to do 'blitz' exchanges with everyone in just over a week. So I went for just over a day to work in Karlovac again. They have a really beautiful river and we talked to some great people. I also introduced the sister I worked with to coconut ice cream King bars...so now the rest of her mission will be different. 

The morning before I left however, we had a lesson with Baka (the grandma.) We went over to her place to teach the plan of salvation. The best part was that her granddaughter the new convert was on the lesson and she was SO AWESOME! She explained things very clearly without us asking and talked about how she can really be ready for baptism and shared her own experiences...she even helped get things on tract when Baka would talk about random things or worry about the Burek (the lunch) that she put in the oven. My favorite part was to see how much she helped in the lesson and to hear how confident she was in what she was saying! So cool! 

The lunch was also fantastic...Burek is a traditional Bosnian (maybe turkish as well) breaded dish, stuffed with meat or potatoes or cheese, ect. that is everywhere here. The reason I tell you this is because late in the week Baka taught Sister Grant and us how to make it! It was a very very funny evening and there is no type of recipe involved...it all comes from the heart.

We also talked about her baptism and when that would be. Her family is going out of town at different times and then she is going to the sea later this summer. She wants her family to be there so they talked about it and decided on the date...August 13th. The Saturday before I leave. I did not even tell her when I leave so that was a little miracle! She and I are glad that I will be here. Then she will go to the sea the Sunday after she gets confirmed. Until then we agreed on lessons twice a week, so we will have plenty of time to teach her and make sure she understand everything! 

I already told this to mom but Sister Pratt sent this quote in our mission newsletter and I thought it was pretty fantastic: "If this world didn't suck, we would fall off!" Haha, so as hard as it may seem, those difficult things in life keep our feet grounded and teach us what we need to learn. I am trying to learn all I can and pic of the pace of the work, the whole mission is and already see miracles on a daily basis. 

I love you all and hope you have a fantastic week! 

xoxoxo

Sestra Rhodes 

Surprise Soup and Surprise Lesson - June 20th, 2016

Bok everybody! 

This week was really fantastic. We got some new missionaries in our district and had a great district meeting to kick it off. I never really talk about district meeting but they are great. There is a lot of support in numbers and after you have worked hard all week, it is great to get together and share success, build some more spiritual stamina for the week. Plus we had two birthdays in the district so the senior couples brought twix, snickers, and .....my favorite. .... BOUNTY ice cream bars. I am aaaaall about the coconut these days and I did not know that my favorite candy bar came in the form of ice cream. Score. 

I also share the Rhodes family tradition of 'birthday memories!' We have all served with Sister Pratt for a while and it was fun to have a little Rhodes family in the mix of the week. 

I forgot to tell something awesome that happened last week...and the week before. There is a new convert in the branch (who found the gospel online) and he is soooo great. However, his mom is really really sick. She just went into the hospital for the 7th time and before was just in a hospital bed in their home. Well she loves music and loves to sing. So all the young missionaries got together and went over to sing to her....one of the most priceless moments. She wept and her sweet husband just sat holding her hand and cried. So we decided to make it a weekly thing right after church. When we went over last Sunday, right as we all walked in the door...the waterworks started and she just kept saying, "Thank you for coming! Oh let God bless you, thank you for coming! You guys are angels...etc. etc." There is nothing better than making someone feel good. It was my favorite part of the week (aside from the baptism.) She is so sick and just laying in bed, but she still made jokes and sang along. Such a great example of a positive attitude. 

This week we couldn't get a hold of Baka to teach her a lesson, but she came to church and we had Sunday school all combined. (Usually we have a beginners, investigators and new converts class, seperate from the others.) Needless to say, talking about the reign of judges in the book of mormon was not exactly entreguing. Then she asked if they were going to ask her those types of question at her baptismal interview about Lamanites and Nephites...etc.So we put her fears at ease and for the third hour taught her the restoration and a member came in on the lesson. It was a last second thing but the member that came was absolutely perfect, it was not a coincidence that we asked her and not another. 

We set up a time for our lesson this week and will go for the baptismal date! She has definitely been guided through her family here and seems very solid. She also said she will teach us how to make Burek this week! Dreams do come true!!! 

I hope you all have a great week. Send pictures of yourself. That is my favorite. :) Love you all! 

Sestra Rhodes

Some very short, very fantastic people. 

Krštenje plesačice - June 13th, 2016

Pozdrav!!! 

She did it! The dancer got baptized. It was so fantastic. We had a lesson with her and her mom and Wednesday and finalized everything, we made programs, put together musical numbers, brought the clothes and towels and then she came. One of the coolest parts was that her brother who was baptized a couple months ago was the one who baptized her. I sat by her during the service and through the first talk she just cried, and she was slightly worried about the testimony at the end and what she was allowed to say and she did a great job! She told a cool experience about answer to prayer and it was wonderful.

Sestra Davis, Anja, me

The second coolest part is that her grandma drove back from Bosnia to come to the baptism (and woke up early to make Burek for it....sooo good.) She introduced herself to everyone as 'Baka'. Which means grandma, or just a general term for an old lady. She is so funny! That was the first time she had been to the church and she really felt the spirit. By the time she came back the following day, she announced to everyone that she had decided to be baptized. It has been sooo amazing to be in Zagreb long enough to see this family come back from inactivity, watch the kids get baptized, soon the Baka, and see them prepare for the temple. It has been a blessing to be a part of it! 

So that was a great end to the week. Other than that, the normal apartment to apartment, talking to people on the streets went down. :) It is also transfer week this week... very weird to be entering my last transfer. I will be spending it in Zagreb. surprise. ;) I love it here and the members and I am excited to work with Baka and teach her the gospel!! 

 As I am entering this last transfer I have been thinking a lot about change. Have I changed enough? Have I seen other people change because of the gospel? What do I still need to change? Well here is a great quote by Winston Churchill  "to improve is to change, to perfect is to change often." Our God works gloriously in the work of perfection. I am so so grateful that his goal for us is progress. I continue to learn that as serve that Heavenly Father gives us all we need, that we might change, become better and closer to Him. What an amazing plan He has for us. 

I love you all and hope you have a fantastic week! 

xoxoxo

Sestra Rhodes 

The Zagreb Bunch! - June 6th, 2016

Bok family! 

Greetings from the Zagreb bunch from the first church in Zagreb (an apartment) which is now the office. The very same building that (now) President Monson stood in to dedicate the land of Yugoslavia for the preaching of the gospel. Normally they do it outside, but since they had to do it indoors they threw open all the windows during the dedication. This is however only half the district. Here are the rest. 

A pretty great bunch!! And a pretty cool building right in the heart of Zagreb. 

This week was a good one. Like every other. Our dancer came back from England!! She and her mom told us aaaaall about it and she had her baptismal interview on Sunday. The baptism will be on Saturday followed by a branch palačinke (aka pancakes...aka crepes) activity. She has grown a lot I feel and is ready to take this step, but my biggest desire is for her to be strong in the church forever. As a missionary I did not expect to be this impatient. I want each individual to accept the gospel, accept it quickly, and have a testimony of steel. However it took me 20 (almost 21:) ) gradual years to learn all that I have and the learning never stops! I am so grateful for that, that God's goal for us is PROGRESS. Eternal progress. And that is my pray for Anja, that she will continue to progress, a lot. 

We have also taken over two investigators from the Elders. They are neighbors, two single older women and we always teach them together. One of them is a self referral and the other she just brought along. I have never met two people with so many questions in my whole life. They shoot out questions in our lessons like two fiery machine guns.  Soooo...we are currently trying to find a balance of teaching and them asking questions for 45 minutes. They are both very sincere however, which is obviously key. 

Another cool thing from this week: we had a district (aka Croatia) wide relief society meeting and I accompanied a really cute non member girl who sang. She and her mom came and they are SO AWESOWE. They do not live in our city, but they invited us to theirs! They are good friends if a member there and there is no way they did not feel the spirit in that meeting or during the song. High hopes for them.  She has a picture but will send t later. 

Overall a great week. This next week is transfer announcements. I am perfectly happy to stay in Zagreb. I love this place and the people and genuinely love Croatian. I thought my heart would forever be in Slovenia, but it grew!!! This place is so great and I can't wait to make the best out of the time I have left. 

Love you all! Have a fantastic week! 

Svako dobro, 

Sestra Rhodes 

Check Out That CHEESE! May 30th, 2016

Bok everybody. 

What a week we all had. Congratulations to everyone for enduring, birthing, and all the other things that happened. 

Here is what happened on this side of the world.

Our dancer has been at her competition all week in England but has sent us pictures and we have been in contact all week. Before she left it was her birthday so we pulled a classic, girly-missionary gift. (Thanks to all those years of young women's crafty handouts for inspiration.) We gave her multiple envelopes to take on her trip that told her when to open them..when she is scared or nervous or happy or at the beginning of everything bla bla bla. THEN, the good part, it had a scripture to match when to open it. In an effort to keep her reading the scriptures while she was gone. She really liked it and we are hoping that she has still been reading and praying and all the important things while in London because her baptism is really coming up quick! 

One benefit about being in one place for a while is that you get to know the members really well and I am really enjoying that lately. One awesome member has been offering and taking us to church with here, more have offered to come on lessons, and we are now going into primary weekly to help with singing time. I love going to church so much and these people are very strong and unique and they are the number one way that the church will grow out here. 

We had zone conference again this week. They come SO fast! For the past few months our whole mission has been focusing on becoming master teachers and I LOVE it. We are learning how to teach better and practicing and it makes me feel a lot more confident going into lessons. (Surprise, knowing everything and being a flawless teacher does not just happen when they give you the name tag.) 

We also had some guest sisters at our apartment this week because one of them was in the hospital again during zone conference. We were supposed to go on exchanges but instead they both came to Zagreb and we got to switch companions up a little bit to proselyte. 

We got to skype with the France, Leon mission this week! Shout out to my French speaking siblings! We skyped with a really cool guy from Serbia who they thought was really interested . . . turns out they just could not communicate very well in English because he had a reeeeeeeally difficult time accepting the book of Mormon. But we asked him to read the introduction before he decides NOT to read it and pray about it. It was a good teaching opportunity and sister Davis and I are continually progressing in teaching unity.

We also had two great p days, last week and today. Last week we had some things we needed to get for our apartment (mainly a stool for my comp who could not see in the mirror due to height challenges....haha) and some other things. Well who else needed to run errands? The senior sisters! The Davenpratts. So once again we went to Ikea, only this time in a lot nicer car and enjoyed lunch together and getting all the things we needed. We also stopped at Metro (the closest thing to costco but still not even close. However their cheese selection was pretty remarkable.)

                  

Driving Presidents car to IKEA!

Notice the change in missionary attire! 

Then today we drove to Rijeka with the Elders to do a service project of unloading a ton of beds and materials for refugees. We are also going to make an article out of it for mission public affairs use. It was the first time I saw the coast line of Croatia!!!! (Which is what people tell me 5 times daily that I need to go see and swim in . . . ) Then we ate on a boat restaurant. IT WAS A DADDY'S BOAT!!!! I even ordered fish since we were so close to the sea:) 

I was reading in Mosiah this week again about the Atonement and a particular phrase hit me that I had never given much thought to: Acquainted with grief. 

Acquainted. Having personal knowledge as a result of study, experience, etc. Jesus Christ has personal knowledge of grief through experiencing every type of grief we have, are feeling, or will ever feel in this life. He is acquainted with OUR grief. Thus of course He is extremely well acquainted with us and our lives. I am so grateful for that knowledge. He knows what is going on and the most comforting . . . He knows what we need to get back home to our Heavenly Father. 

As Joseph Smith taught, 'a religion that does not require the sacrifice of all things never has the power sufficient to produce the faith necessary unto life and salvation.' 

I love you all and pray for you daily. Let the work go on! 

Sestra Rhodes 

Haleluja for free tee shirts! - May 23rd, 2016

Hallo everybody! 

This week was really great because it finally stopped raining!!!! Call me mortal, but contacting in the rain is not quite as fun as contacting in the beautiful Croatian sun. Well this week the sun reeeeally came out and gave me flashbacks to last summer tracting outside of Maribor in the blazing heat. Wonderful times they were and wonderful times ahead! 

We have officially taught Anja all the commandments and now she is headed off to Blackpool England to the worldwide ballroom competition! Maybe Richard Gear and J lo will make an appearance... We asked her to read something out of the book of Mormon every day and something out of the 'for the strength of youth' every day on her trip. That little book is a wonderful wonderful tool. She will be getting baptized in the beginning of June and I am praying that she gets a deeper understanding of the truthfulness of the gospel throughout the next couple of weeks. 

This week we also had the opportunity to help out at the annual Kresimir Cosic basketball tournament for the mission. The members each got a team from their country (Slovenia won) and came to Zagreb to play in this tournament to remember Kresimir. Hugh Nibley taught Kresimir when he went to play basketball at BYU and instead of continuing professionally like offered, Kresimir came back to his country to bring the gospel here. His story is really amazing it is was really neat to see all the members come together, playing basketball in the same gym because of this one man. Though it was a game of basketball, there was a huge gratitude for the gospel among all these members . . . and free t shirts. Win win. Here is me in mine helping keep score. My very first time... you can imagine it went very well. ;)

Cool story of the week. We pass out a lot of cards and pamphlets (and this week we hit our goal of Book of Mormons passed out!), all of which have our number on it. Well Saturday afternoon we got a call from a random number and she said that she found this pamphlet at a friends house and took it home and that it kept tugging at her to go to that church. Well she forgot about it but on Saturday she was cleaning up and found it again and that something kept tugging her to go there. So she called the number to get better directions. I talked to her and she sounded really great and I am hoping that she follows that prompting and comes next Sunday! (If not, we have her number and will prompt her further :) ) It was just really comforting to know that it does good to hand out  things like we do. Maybe that person won't directly benefit from it, but a friend, a family member, who knows. Well, actually one person knows. But we don't so we have to keep working and handing out things and talking to people! It also gave me comfort to remember that Heavenly Father is working on people. The holy ghost still prompts them to pick up a phone, to read that pamphlet, and I know that by these simple things, GREAT AND WONDERFUL things will happen! 

Also my 60 year old English class student invited me again to come stay with her this summer in her 'vikenica' or her little get away house on the coast of Croatia. So if you don't see me in August...you will know where to find me. :) 

 I love you all a lot and hope you have a wonderful week! I am rooting for you all and appreciating your prayers in my behalf as well. 

Lijepi pozz

Sestra Rhodes 

Return of the Worldy Music - May 16th, 2016

Bok bok everybody. 

We had a very busy week as usual; but now busy with the usual. I'll start with the people we are teaching. Our dancer friend is doing great. We meet with her twice a week and she usually has training on Sundays and has to leave after sacrament meeting but this week she stayed for Sunday school! We taught the Sabbath day and (drum roll) law of chastity. Both went over really well actually and her mom has been staying for the lessons, which is a blessing, considering they both need to be taught. She is preparing to go to Blackpool, the international ballroom competition in england and we will not see her for two weeks. She leaves at the end of this week and gets baptized shortly after her return. Two weeks is a lot of time for Satan to work while she is away so we are trying our best to help her be prepared and continue to prepare for baptism without us. 

We got to teach our baka investigator. Though 66 she is very spry and filled with energy. She also loves to talk. Welcome to almost every investigator I have ever taught. She has felt the spirit multiple times and feels like she belongs with us. We committed her to a soft date for baptism and she said that that is her biggest desire. Never bad words to hear when you are a missionary. We will be meeting with her this week and are practicing a lot so we can teach clearly and simply and answer all her questions. 

This week we also had our David Archuleta events missionwide. David, his fantastic accompanist Kendra, and his traveling manager Carrie all came. In Slovenia he had a concert with Paul Cardall in the Ljubljana opera house as a fundraiser for the 25th anniversary of a heart foundation in Slovenia. Seeing we have worked a lot on helping these events come together on the media we were invited and I got to see some of my Slovenian member friends and sit next to my former comp Sis. Duffy!

David hit it home with Imagine and some of his other popular ones INCLUDING 'The Prayer' with a members daughter who one Slovenia idol. They NAILED IT. 

He had a missionary fireside in Slovenia with Paul Cardall as well, then he went to Serbia (we did not) and then he came to Zagreb. Sunday night we had the church the fullest I have ever seen it. Members brought friends, nonmembers brought friends, AND two Hungarian people who saw it on social media came and loved it! They are now going to take the missionary discussions in Hungary!! Yeah! Then Monday morning we had a missionary breakfast with him and his crew and they each shared some wonderful missionary thoughts and then he treated us with some really great primary songs and a repeat (per my request) of 'He lives in you' from the lion king. Very, very enjoyable. What was not so enjoyable, when President Grant made me and sister Davis roleplay the gospel of Jesus Christ lesson to David and his manager (who is baptist) in front of all the other missionaries . . . in English.

David also shared some nice thoughts (from Brad Wilcox actually) about Christ's first miracle of changing water to wine. While some may think 'why was Christ drinking wine' or 'who's wedding was it?' and a plethora of other thoughts, Christ was announcing himself to the world with a divine message "I can change things." 

Christ can change things. I am striving to change every day and it is my sincerest desire that I can help someone else recognize that that change is possible through Jesus Christ. Let us not get comfortable where we are, but let us constantly strive to use the atonement of Jesus Christ to change! 

Love you all. Have a great week. 

Sestra Rhodes

Glad I got to show Sis Davis a piece of Slovenia!

Long Time No See - May 9th, 2016

BOK FAMILY. :)  

Long time no see. It was too great seeing all your faces and hearing your voices and seeing everyone getting ready or already at church! What an amazing place to be. Honestly there is nothing I would rather do more on Sunday than go to church, learn and feel the spirit, and then skype with all of you! Shout out to mom for making that skype happen. Without her there would be no us. I love you mom! And to top it off we finished mothers day with two other fantastic mothers. Sisters Davenpratt. (Davenport and Pratt)

Sister Pratt, me, Davenport 

We made them a traditional Balkan meal and a really really heavy banana cake . . . but we wrote their team name on it, so either way it was a victory. I love serving with these two! They are a riot, truly. 

I already told you, but our dancer is on date for baptism for June. And her brother who just got baptized over a month a go is going to baptize her! She is really sincere and we had a great lesson on Saturday where she cried and pretty much bore her testimony to us on how the feelings that she has gotten have come from the Holy Ghost. I have prayed for a long time to have some feel and RECOGNIZE that they were feeling the Holy Ghost so that was really neat for me. There are still commandments to teach and repentance to be done, the path will not be easy for her but now that she has that first foundation of a testimony, it is all possible. Repentance is such an amazing gift and I know that a change is possible for her! 

This afternoon we got to skype with someone who was here a while ago from Frankfurt and it was good to get some more advice and council  and direction. Sister Davis is picking up fast and we are getting ready this week for three events of David Archuleta. One of my friends that has worked with the church before (who I did service with and who I desperately want to investigate) will be going to the concert in the ljubljana opera house and they will be catering the event here at the church in zagreb. I am excited to have some contact with her and hoping that she will feel something amazing in the church and want to investigate. It will be more of a missionary fireside there and at the end all the returned missionaries from our countries and current missionaries will sing with Archuleta in a good old rendition of Called to Serve. There is no WAY she will not feel the spirit.  

We have a few lessons lined up for this week and I am hoping they all go through because teaching is my favorite part of being a missionary. Also the most stressful, but I find a lot of comfort knowing that if I prepare and am worthy, I will not get in the way of that person accepting the gospel from language or flat out teaching mistakes. Heavenly Father is always in charge and that is SUCH A COMFORT. 

No, I hope you all have a great week and that you enjoy the end of spring! Until next week! 

Sestra Rhodes


Another highlight of the week: After months of collecting little tiny stickers with our groceries, we got 120 and have purchased for 3 dollars, four fantastic juice glasses. Hard work pays off everybody!

My comp is going off breads and noodles so I made the most adorable lasagna . . . for one. Well, it ended up for multiple meals still, but look how cute it is! Cottage cheese lasagna actually. :) #stilladdicted 

Just a view of our kitchen . . . IT IS SO FANTASTIC and the light comes in that window in the morning and makes it so much easier to get up. 

And the front Baka room. Feels a little bit like we are going back in time . . .

Also last p day we went to a modern art museum . . . . . not my favorite. The kind of art supplied? Puzzling. Genius. 

As fun as it was walking through looking at this kind of work . . . they had an optional slide to leave the building. Hands down the best part. Good old Elder Porter going appox 3 mph. What an adrenaline rush eh? 

Bok everybody! 

My classy friends Sister Gloria Pratt and Ralf Grunke.

It has been a very busy week. We had zone conference last monday, a young single adults conference in Zagreb that required our assistance, a fantastic man from Germany come in, and a change of apartments in about 24 hours. 

I was in charge of ordering food for zone conference, when suddenly we found out that a giant group of students was coming to have a presentation and we needed MORE food for about 20 people. So I hurried and called and got more sandwiches....lots more. Well guess who did not stay for lunch? The students. And guess who ate a lot of sandwiches this week? Shout out to el mundos for helping us out AND giving us free palačinke. 

We had a lesson with our dancer this week that went pretty great. She has narrowed it down to two dates of baptism. We showed here the 15 minute restoration video and used some cards to talk about the blessings of the restoration. (Restoration two lesson for all those former ANMrs who know what I am talking about.) She loved the video! AND she said that when something is true she has a special sign with horses. . . and guess what was in the movie? Horses. Bingo. I had to double check what she said though to make sure I didn't mix up my Croatian vocab with horses and holy ghost. But I heard right. The horses were the sign of truth. Works for me! I might invest in one of those giant horse printed t shirts now. 

The man that came from Germany was great. He came to give a social media presentation to the young single adults and how to write articles. At the end of his presentation he challenged them all to do something for the social media cause: write an article, post something, etc. However it was not just a challenge, but it was fun! Hence, he ended his presentation with a funage. That word pretty much describes my mission. This is one of the people that works with the Public Affairs for Europe in Frankfurt and works with all the other people that came before for training. It is so cool to meet all these people! 

And finally, we moved. We switched areas as well so we are no longer by the church, but right in the center of the city. Our neighbors are Sisters Davenpratt! (Sisters Davenport and Pratt) Only four minutes to their house!!!!! It is a big, grandma apartment. Very old things and a squeaky cupboards, but I love it! The kitchen is big enough for 2 people to fit in AND there is a close rack that hangs outside off the wall. So European.

Kitchen had only one pan, so breakfast was a giant omelet!

First time hanging clothes over the building outside....Step back in time!

Park near new apartment!

 This is our district currently. A pretty fantastic, weird bunch. 

Hope you all had a great week as well. I read Jacob 5 twice through in detail . . . so that explains how my week was. 

Love you all and will talk to you and Sunday! 

Sestra Rhodes 

                                            

                                           

                     

Your's Truly - April 25th, 2016

Bok family! 

Another great week for them Croatian books. We finally had a sit down lesson with our 66 year old investigator. More like she had a lesson with us...she looooves to talk. We have little cards we use to explain the restoration, there are about 10....we got through two. Then the second one stayed in her hand until the end of the lesson. However, we came out of there learning a lot. All three of us. She also knows very clearly that we will start and every lesson with a kneeling prayer, that we will teach new material for about 10 minutes and THEN she can ask questions. I feel that she actually understands our purpose as missionaries. Which is great! She knows we come to teach the gospel and that is step one. She is looking for peace and wants to be with her husband again. Check check. 

We also met a really great mom when street contacting! She took her headphones out to talk to us and she said that she is going through a phase and thinks this is a sign. Yes. Yes it is a sign. It was very quick but she said "I WILL come to church." I have never heard anyone that confident about coming to church right on the street. We had contact all the way up to church and she was excited...then some family stuff came up the morning of. Blast. But she says she has time every day this week, so we will definitely be meeting with her and showing her the church. I am really excited. I feel good about her. 

Dancer is making very very slow progress. And dances in not a lot of clothing...her dad showed us a video clip this week at church. SO. We will cross that bridge ... asap :) 

Also last pday was AWESOME. We rented bikes and rode around the lake then leisurely got a COCONUT KING CHOCOLATE ICE CREAM BAR. All caps for emphasis. All while wearing fanny packs. Because why not? I think it is a fantastic invention and you will all be seeing a lot more of me in one. 

Love and pray for you all. The church is true. Joseph Smith was a true prophet of God. And missions rock. 

Yours truly, 

Sestra cottage cheese addict. 

Mormon's Book - April 18th, 2016

Bok fam!!! 

It was a great first week with Sister Davis! We were buuuuuuuuusy. Lots of things to do and not a lot of time but we are getting things done! We also had a great week in passing out the Book of Mormon to people. We order a whole new box full of them and have a goal to give them all out. We are going to do it. One girl we met on the street and only got to talk for about 2 minutes, but she was super energetic and had never heard of mormons and loves Jesus Christ and said she would like to learn more. We called her and she was still excited to get together! So we will be meeting with her this next week. 

I also love the translation of 'The Book of Mormon' . . . Mormon's book. A lot of people asked us this week who is Mormon? And some of the members still say mormon's book when they speak English. It is my favorite. 

Also a cool story, this week all the new missionaries came AND they all got to come to a baptism here in Zagreb. They got to see a baptism their first day in the mission! This man is a self referral and really great. He had been looking for answers and guess where he found them . . . ONLINE. Like many I am positive. He bore a sweet testimony at his baptism about how he came across mormon.org and the book of Mormon online and called the missionaries up. The Lord prepared him and he accepted the gospel very quickly. He also wrote an article about his story and how important the internet is and we are going to put that on all our church pages. So great. 

It is always interesting to me getting used to living with a new person who you don't know that well. All my companions have liked contacting different types of people. Sister Christensen liked groups. Sister Allred was all about the bald people. I myself like talking to moms. And my current comp sister Davis likes talking to old people. We have had some pretty fantastic contacts as a result of that. I have also learned why she actually goes to Harvard: She has squeezed her toothpaste from the bottom of the tube her whole life. That is skill many of us are not smart enough or patient enough to acquire. She is a really hard worker though and we are enjoying missionary life! 

We had an interesting lesson with our dancer investigator. I think the mix of new people there (we also had a member on the lesson) and one wrong question made her a little uncomfortable and maybe upset? It let to us talking for an hour an half . . . my brain hurt after that one. Still hurting a little bit. But it ended on a better note and she is still slowly progressing to baptism. It is always fantastic having members on lessons! They speak this language so well . . . and they have all been right where the investigator is. 

A Balkan specialty made right in our own kitchen!
Stuffed peppers

That about sums it up for this week. The weather is great. I am already showing the first signs of missionary tan lines . . . bring it on. 

I love you all and hope you have a fantastic week! Keep studying the general conference talks because they are AWESOME. Awesome I tell you. 

Love,

Sestra Rhodes 

The purple people. Go team. #shoutouttosisterallredshirts #thatisallweworethisweek 

More Balkan goodness. Gifted to us by a very very Balkan woman. 

                                                                         

                                            

How did they know we were gonna be in town? I love a good welcoming party via graffiti.

Back to TWO! April 11th, 2016

Hello family! 

S. Davis, Allred, Marijana Zanze, me

It is official! The trio has ended. We dropped sister Allred at the office this afternoon and she gets on a plane tomorrow morning! It is officially just Sister Davis and I! We are going to get work done this transfer! She is a hard worker and (maybe I already told you all) but she went to Harvard and played on their rugby team . . . so, I better be nice. She could beat me up for sure. Haha. However I have one advantage: There is 6 feet of me and about 5 feet of her. Quite the image with the two of us. I am officially the tallest sister in the mission and she is the shortest. Here we are together. It reminded me of that picture of Dad on his mission with his super super short companion!

So this week a couple of other things happened . . . our Russian investigator met with us and asked if she could pray with us because she had something that was hard to say. . . aka, she dumped us. She came to a choice and she could not chose to leave her beliefs and ideas behind and knew they could not coincide with hers. She also told us that she has to wear shorts in the summer not long pants and that the other members would look down on her . . . then I informed her that we wear shorts. She still did not change her mind. But I have confidence that the gospel will come her way again and we will still be in touch and I know she will accept it one day!!! 

We got some good trio tracting time and are helping in the planning for archuleta and cardall to come to the mission. It will be a great opportunity for some good missionary work and for the members to invite their friends! 

We still have three other people we are working with that could not meet this week but we will  week. Actually one of them we had a dinner with and talked a lot about the plan of salvation and it went really well. She told us that her husband gave her a note before he died that said they would see each other again and on his grave stone it says 'here he waits the resurrection' . . . so it was amazing to teach her about the resurrection and we are hoping to officially start meeting with her this week! 

Well we are going to go get some groceries now. We are collecting stamps at Konzum. I am going to get some fantastic juice glasses for 20 kuna. Just 60 stickers to go!!!!!

The church is true. It is all worth it. 

Love you all and have a great week!! 

Love, 

Sestra Rhodes

Johanir, me

My friend from Christmas that asked us to come help her do service and raise money for kids with heart problems event. She is SO COOL. I wish she would take the lessons. 

Test riding our bikes in skirts!

And an even shorter companion

Sister Davis and myself! So good. Also . . .
yay for Spring!!!!! I have been wearing
tights for 5 months!! Wahoo!!