11 April 2007

Ciao,

Spring has sprung once again here in Tuscany. Today it is really warm... almost too warm for my liking! We spent the afternoon in Florence just walking around the Duomo area and ate lunch at a burrito place near the duomo. It was really good because I've had a major pasta overload this last week!

Lets see... this past week...

Saturday was Zone Conference in Florence. As always, it was amazing. Sorella Rhien always gives the most amazing addestramenti (talks). She has a way of looking into the Book of Mormon and getting so much out of just a couple verses. She talked about the importance and the meaning "fleeing" has had throughout the history of the church, even all the way back in biblical times....how there's usually a leader that the people follow, the Christlike attributes that are developed as people flee etc. She related it to us and how we as missionaries help people flee in hopes for them to find hope and find a better place. Anyways, it was really amazing and she got it all from the book of Omni! President Rhien gave an great addestramento on motivation and passion for the work and how we need to find ours. After the Zone Conference. We had a sisters meeting. All the sisters in the Zone got together with President and Sorella Rhien and we were allowed to ask any questions we wanted. One of the sisters asked about how he got called as a mission president; brought back memories of how Mom and Dad got called! Then to end it off they took all of us (probably about 6 or 7 companionships) out to eat! It was really fun...especially because I got to see Sorella Roper again! We talked all through dinner and just had a great old time. So this was the beginning of the eating fest.

Sunday morning.......PASQUA....EASTER.....yeah Happy Easter by the way...hope is was good for you all! We woke up and were waiting for the bus.....and then it occured to me that maybe they wouldn't be running because it was a holiday. So yep, I was right. I tried to call a member that lived nearby but she had already left so we had no other choice but to walk! An hour later we arrived at the church... only half an hour late.....mama mia. Oh well, what can you do! In gospel doctrine we always have one of the missionaries translating the lesson into english for our african members. Usualy Sorella Roper would do it in this class and one of the Anziani would do it in Sacrament meeting for them. So... with her being gone... the cup has been passed to me! I translated the gospel doctrine class! It was fun for me. It helped me realize really how much I know and words that I don't know at all! Good times. We got invited by the Ogunleye family to have a pasqua lunch. We ate more pasta with them. They are so great and it was so nice of them to have us.

Monday the ward had planned a pic-nic thing for pasquetta up at the branch presidents house. So we spent most of the day up in Vaiano. We had ANOTHER pasta lunch. For those of you counting that's three big pasta meals in 3 days! Lets just say I'm on a salad diet now! It was nice to visit with the branch president and his wife. They told us their conversion stories which are always fun for me to hear because they are always so amazing. We got home in the afternoon and finished some studies and went and tried to find some inactives.

Tuesday we had our district meeting at the church. It was great. We then went and visited an inactive and then went and tried to contact some people I had met a few weeks earlier doing house. No one was home. The city has been kind of empty lately because of the Easter holiday but now things are getting back up to speed. Tonight we have an apointment with Petra. I talked with her member father on sunday because they were all in church. He said that Petra is almost ready to be baptized! So I'm excited about this appointment tonight and hope that we can help her get ready to make this important step in her life!

Tomorrow we are headed to Rome for a thing President and Sister Rhien call "3 month conference." They hold a conference for all the missionaries who have been out for about 3 or 4 months. So, as me and sorella lederer have both been out less than 4 months we'll be going together! We'll be there wednesday and thursday. I've heard it's really great so I'm excited.

Things are keeping busy and I'm learning a lot. Patience, charity, and all those good things! I love sharing this gospel with people. I decided as I hit my "1 year left" mark in the mission on the 9th of April, that it's going to be hard for me to come home. I love these people who I've met and worked with and I love sharing with them the most important thing in my life... the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. I'm so grateful for this time in my life to dedicate 24/7 to the Lord, it's an amazing ride!

As always, thanks for all you do! You're all such great examples and I feel the power of your prayers. I miss you and love you!

Sorella Boynton

p.s. Thanks for writing me all you maud members...i promise i'm working on writing you back so just you wait! oh and aub i sent you a letter a while back but it got returned to me : ( I'll try to send it again.

Love you grels.