Saratov Update

Hi Everyone -

Attached is a picture of all the senior couples in Samara Mission. Great people - all with their individual stories and challenges - and all faithful and willing to serve.  This weekend we watched conference from Salt Lake City.  The members watched it in Russian and we watched it with the younger missionaries in English.  As usual there was lots of great counsel.  Tonight we visited the home of one of our recently baptized men - he is 33-years-old and an engineer.  We met his parents - mom is a retired doctor and dad is a retired engineer.  They are not members of the church.  We had a wonderful visit, they asked lots of great questions about religion which I got to answer and we ate food, of course.  They invited us back for Russian shish kabobs - which apparently are about two feet long and full of deliciousness.  We counter-invited them over for pot roast - which they hadn't heard of.  Instant friends - the dad wants to take me fishing on the Volga.  If I can get permission from the mission president I'm there!  Building relationships, right?

We asked the District President to extend two callings today - one for a Family Home Evening (FHE) coordinator and one for our Scripture Study Night coordinator. He agreed with our suggested names and said he would do so this week. We will have FHE Monday at our home, Tuesday will be Institute class at our home, Wednesday will be Scripture Study Night at our home and Thursday is District Council at the church.  The Zone Leaders asked if we would like to have a Sunday Evening Fireside for the YSA.  Since we had already been planning to do so we agreed.  We're starting to get busy and are very grateful for the support from the young missionaries, the other senior couple, the mission president and the local church leaders.  We know if we do what the Lord is inspiring us to do and use the talents we have - eating and cooking! - the Lord will do the rest.  We are here to do use the talents God has blessed us with.  Life is good.

Tuesday we leave for Kazan.  We saw some pictures of the city tonight - it is beautiful.  We'll take plenty of pictures!