WEEK 82

SALUT TOUT LE MONDE!!!! Comment ça va?? Premièrement, je voulais vous dire que le printemps ARRIVE!!!! Le soleil sort chaque journée et on peut presque sortir sans une veste. C'est merveilleux! J'ai oublié combien que j'aime le printemps. En tout cas, je suis heureux:) ma semaine c'était très bien! Avec beaucoup des expériences qui m'aide à grandir, et je suis reconnaissant pour chaque occasion que mon père céleste me donne pour changer et m'améliorer. Merci pour vos prières envers ma famille et moi. Je peux dire que je les ai ressenti et je sais que j'ai l'aide d'en haut. Merci pour votre foi et pour votre désire d'aider ma famille pendant cette période de la vie. Et, juste pour vous dire, vous avez tous un bonjour d'Emmanuel et Claudette:) ils vous aiment et ils sont reconnaissant pour vos prières et pensées:)  (Hello world!!! How is it going?? First, I wanted to tell you that spring is coming! The sun comes out every day and you can almost get out without a jacket. It is wonderful! I forgot how much I love spring. In any case, I'm happy :) my week was very well! With a lot of experiences that help me grow, and I am grateful for every opportunity that my Heavenly Father gives me to change and improve myself. Thank you for your prayers for my family and me. I can say that I've felt them and I know that I have the help from above. Thank you for your faith and for your desire to help my family during this period of life. And, just to tell you, you have all a Hello from Emmanuel and Claudette :) they like you and are grateful for your prayers and thoughts :)

LUNDI SOIR

So after emailing today, we went home and changed and then headed back to the church to have our family home evening and our weekly meeting with the ward mission leader. Tonight we had a lesson given to us by Soeur Mazy on building a celestial home. She told us that she had felt inspired to do something like that because Emmanuel and Claudette are getting close to doing that. Haha it was really good. Claudette was also asking me all about my family asking how they were doing and all that. She is pretty worried about them all and she told me to not give up. She keeps telling me to be strong cause she knows that everything is going to work out. It was a good family night. I love this ward!

MARDI

Today went by pretty smoothly. Haha there were only a few bumps in the road. First off, I wanna share something funny that happened. So last night the phone started ringing in the middle of the night. I thought it was the alarm, cause when I got over to turn it off, I touched the phone and it stopped ringing. So I thought it was the 6:20 alarm, cause we have one that goes off at 6:20 and one at 6:30. So I opened the curtains and then went and hopped into bed and waited for the second alarm. Anyway when I woke back up I thought to myself, 'it feels like it's been hours since the alarm went off!' So I looked at my iPad and it was 5:55 and I was like what?! So I got up to look at the phone and turns out that some blocked number had called us at 12:30 AM and that was what woke me up last night haha. So that was funny. Anywho, today we had district meeting and so when we woke up we got out the door to catch our train. The normal train that we were supposed to take was canceled and so we had to take another into Brussels and then to the little town of some elders in the district named Braine l'Alleud. We started off the day with some contacting and it went well. Haha no one really wanted to talk to us, and so me and Nelson were just walking around all morning trying to teach people. Then we went and got back to their apartment for the actual district meeting. Today we had a formation given on the importance of planning and being prepared to teach. It was really good, and made me realize that we always have to prepare for the lessons we are going to teach cause honestly no lesson that we ever teach is ever going to be the same, cause everyone that we teach is different. So it was really good! Then we ate and that honestly took forever cause they made home made 'kebabs' but they weren't all that good and so it just took forever but they weren't too good. I'd definitely rather go to the shop and get one;) haha so anyway we were waiting for a long time to eat and then we ate and while we were eating we were watching a bunch of these funny videos that this kid in the district found on the gospel library app. Haha and let me tell you, the church makes some really funny videos! Anyway when the lunch had finally been made, eaten and cleaned up, it was already time for me and Nelson to go back to the gare to catch our train to make it home for our lesson with Emmanuel and Claudette tonight. We got home and hurried and planned for our lesson, cause we didn't have any time this morning and then headed out the door to meet up with Frere Istace who was going to be helping us out with our lesson tonight. We taught them the priesthood and its auxiliaries, missionary work and service and we had a super good rdv with them and the next time we meet with them we will finish all the lessons and they will be ready for baptism!!!!!!! HALLELUJAH! Lol anyway we had a great rdv and there were no problems haha thankfully;)

MERCREDI

Today went by pretty well. My mind has been running all over the place lately, but I think today I woke up and things just seemed to be normal. I don't know haha I feel like everything might have just felt like they were there and I just had to deal with it. So anyway it was good. So I got up and we had our studies and I'm getting so close to the end of alma haha! It honestly just feels like you get to the end of alma in the Book of Mormon and you're gonna be able to finish it;) haha but I'm getting close!! After we'd finished up studies we headed out to go contacting. It went well this morning. It's kind of hard when everyone just shoves you off haha but whatever. It's a bummer but we have to ENDURE TO THE END. So we were contacting for what seemed like a really long time and then we went and got some frites for lunch. On the way in I checked my email and I had an email from mom telling me about the fast that they were doing to be having for dad tomorrow and I thought dang it! We have our rdv with Patrick tomorrow! So I finished up my frites and started a fast for the rest of today and the beginning of tomorrow. After we'd finished up with lunch, we went and we contacted again and taught this one Asian girl who seemed really interested in the restoration and the fact that we believe in modern day prophets and then when we asked if we could maybe meet again sometime she said no.....haha who does she think she is getting our hopes up like that and then nothing...? Lol jk anyway we then went and had to catch a bus up to the church cause we had fixed a *super sketchy* rdv with this potential haha it was like almost not even worth going because we knew she was going to not show up. But because we don't want to the ones ditching out on others, we went! And we were about 20 minutes early, and we left about 30 minutes after the rdv was supposed to be and tried calling her about 3 times....haha but that's ok. We win some and we lose some. So anyway when we left it was already time for dinner so we went in and Nelson ate while I just kind of sat around and played around on my iPad and whatnot. And then we wanted to go porting. So we went out and we caught a bus and while we were on the bus, I remembered that Pauline had told me that if we ever did a family fast that she wanted to know, and so as we got to the neighborhood, I called the Royers and I got to talk to Soeur Royer and Pauline and it was so good to talk to them. I seriously am so blessed to have people like them in my life. So anyway we ended the night by knocking out a whole neighborhood! Both figuratively and literally! Haha we taught 2 lessons but nothing too crazy, they both told us that there was no need to come back...so anyway, like we learned earlier, you win some and you lose some!

JEUDI

Today went by pretty speedily! Haha it wasn't too bad of a day. We saw some good success today. I honestly just love going to lunch with Patrick. It's honestly something that I look forward to each week. It's really good food and it's a really fun time with him. So it's always a good time when we get to be with patch;) haha today we were going to go running, but as I got up and was saying my morning prayers, I remembered that I was fasting and didn't want to go running and come home and be PARCHED for the rest of the morning and so I asked elder Nelson if we could postpone it for tomorrow haha. So we got up and we got all ready and got to studies and they went well. I'm trying my hardest to catch up in my French Book of Mormon, but I'm literally so far behind that it's going to take me FOREVER to catch up haha. I'll get there sooner or later. We got a buzz at the door today that was a package and so elder Nelson answered and the man never came upstairs and so we went down to see him and turns out that he just left and left us a slip that has my name on it and we have to go tomorrow to get it...so thanks to the person that sent me a package!!;) no just kidding, I think it's the Books of Mormon triple combinations for Emmanuel and Claudette for their baptisms that we ordered. But we'll see tomorrow when we can go and pick them up! We then went out and went contacting and made our way to the pasta place with Patrick! It was super funny cause we got there before him, but because we go every week, and we always get the same thing, the people know who we are and they know what we want. So we got there and we were waiting when someone that works there noticed us waiting outside and came and said hello and told us we should come in and get a table while we were waiting for 'the big boss' cause it was going to get busy soon, like it always does. Haha! Then we went and sat down and the cook looked up and saw us and yelled, '2 4-cheese pastas?!' Cause he only saw us 2 haha we told him we were waiting for Patrick and we'd be ordering soon. It was funny. When patch got there we ordered and ate and it went well. I really like spending time with him. Then we had the afternoon to work! So we went and we did some contacting and it went well. We talked to lots of people and taught a couple lessons and one of them looked promising. The only bummer is, when people say they'll give you a call, that always means, I'm gonna forget about you in about 3 minutes haha so that's a bummer. We also had planned to go and see Josiane today cause we didn't have time last week and she got up to hear her testimony this last Sunday and she said, 'I'm a little mad with the 2 young gentlemen cause they didn't come and see me this week.' Haha so we made it a point to try and see her this week. We went and met up with Chung at her place and knocked and.....no answer. Haha she wasn't there sadly....so we turned around and headed out to do more work. As we were talking, we realized that we hadn't even put together a baptismal program to show Emmanuel and Claudette how it would work out so we went to the church and hurriedly put together an example and then went and got some frites for dinner and then went and met up with the Mazy's and finished up our lessons with Emmanuel and Claudette!! The spirit was SO strong tonight as we talked about the temple and marriage and had Frere Mazy, who is a temple sealer, explain his calling and talk about sealings and it was just an amazing night! They cannot wait to go to the temple and be sealed as a family!! I am so excited for them!

VENDREDI

Today was a good day as well. Thankfully I didn't get a phone call from home today;) I just got a lot of pictures. Haha we had a day full of weekly planning, but today during weekly planning we planned a ton for the district meeting that was going to be in Namur, not next week, but the week after and we got a TON planned to have 10 missionaries here:) we're gonna get so many new investigators it's not even funny!! We're gonna rock it. So anyway today we got up and had studies and then we went to go and get those packages that we missed yesterday. One of them was from Julie Jorgensen, Jorgy's mom!!!! It was so nice of her!!! And the other was Emmanuel and Claudette's triple combinations and so I was double happy! And then when we got mail today, the next little part of our order from the mission came and so I had a total of 4 packages that were addressed to me come today!!! Don't worry we got pics;) we then went out and did some contacting and contacted this one girl that was super cool!! She was super nice, from Slovenia and didn't speak a ton of French, but she did speak English and we are going to try and call her next week. It was super cool to talk to someone that cool;) we came in and took lunch and then planned for the week. It was so weird cause this week we had a BAPTISM to plan for! Haha we made lots of calls to different members and stuff and it was really good. We think we have everything planned out and we hope that all is going to work out. Apparently during the last baptism here the water was FREEZING. Haha does that remind you of anything?! Hahaha so we think we got everything figured out for that. We also planned for the district meeting that will be here and thought of all the different areas that we could send companionships and we found some old investigator papers that we are going to give them as they go out and go contacting and we found 5 areas that people could go out to go porting for the night. It is going to be awesome!:) anyway as soon as we figured that out, we took dinner and then we went to our rdv with Emmanuel and Claudette. Today was really chill with them. We just went over to their place and filled out their baptismal records and then watched legacy with them cause they had asked a few weeks ago if there was a movie about the early saints that explains a little bit about their stories and so we told them when we finished the lessons we could watch it;) it was fun. Claudette had predicted the whole movie, except for at the end, when David Walker goes away to war, she guessed he would die and when he comes back *SORRY FOR THE SPOILER IF NO ONE HAS SEEN IT:/* Emmanuel looked at her and said, 'haha! Look you're not God anymore. You didn't see that coming did you?!' Lol it was fun.

SAMEDI

Today went by pretty well....except for the fact that I had absolutely no motivation to work....I have no idea why either...I felt really bad at the end of the day, but like honestly that's just how it was. All I wanted to do was stay in the apartment....I know. #badmissionary anyway. We woke up this morning and we got to studies and halfway through companionship study, we got a call from a member telling us that she was in downtown Namur this morning and that she wanted to take us to get some drinks this morning. So we told her we'd meet her at the gare and that we would love to go and get some hot chocolates or something! So we went out and contacted our way to the gare and met up with her and she bought me a Coke and elder Nelson a hot chocolate and we talked with her for a good half hour at least before she needed to catch her train home. So that was super nice on her part. Anyway we then went and did some contacting til we went in for lunch. So we ate and then we headed back out and went contacting and talked to this one guy who was in the army here in Namur and he was telling us how he might call us one time cause he wasn't sure about anything and he was always posing questions and he might want to learn more. For those of you who don't know, that is the perfect time to talk to someone! When they are posing questions, that is when it's perfect to teach them. So if you know anyone who is struggling with some things in life, or maybe has questions, ASK THEM IF THEY WANT TO HEAR ABOUT THE GOSPEL:) don't be afraid. Something else that I've learned on my mission is that the WORST thing they can do is: Say no. Haha so don't be afraid to share with others. Anyway we then had a rdv fixed with Whitey Tidy man and his wife;) haha their names are the Pesesse's, and so we headed out to their house and their son answered the door saying that his parents wanted to call us, but they couldn't find our card and so they told him to tell us next week at the same time. So we then hopped on the bus and headed out to this one neighborhood we thought might be a good area for work, but when we got their we just saw that it was a neighborhood with houses and apartment buildings. So we knocked a few doors while waiting for the bus and then went back down to downtown for the rest of the afternoon. We then came in and took dinner and then went and ported to finish up for the night. It was a good night. We'd been to an area that we'd never been to and taught one lady on her doorstep and she told us that we could come back in a couple months if we wanted.

DIMANCHE

TODAY WAS AMAZING. Honestly it was such a good Sunday. I ABSOLUTELY love Elder Kearon and his wife. We had a special stake conference today with them as the guest speakers and it was so good to hear from them. They honestly spoke directly to me. Especially sister Kearon. They were honestly just incredible today. But something else that made this day special was the fact that Emmanuel and Claudette passed their baptismal interviews!!!!!!!! THEY ARE GETTING BAPTIZED NEXT WEEK!!! We are all so excited!! So anyway to start off the day we got up and out to E&Cs so that we could all head up to Brussels for the day. We got up to Brussels and into the chapel and the Mazy's were there and had saved a couple benches for us all right up front in front of the stage. So we were front and center of everyone;) we were saying hello to everyone and meeting new people and all of the sudden Elder Kearon showed up right next to me and said, 'ELDER! How are you?! It's been a while!' Haha I love that man! He then went around to say hello to everyone that was around me and when he got to Emmanuel and Claudette I told him that they were our investigators that were getting baptized next week and he goes, 'Terrific!' Just imagine a really nice and proper English man saying that. I love his accent! Haha anyway the messages started and sister Kearon got up and talked about the trials in life and how we can get over them and how sometimes Heavenly Father sends us trials so that we stretch and grow and that we get them because our Heavenly Father knows that we need the experience. She said that sometimes it is hard to accept the plan of God, but she said that when we are thankful and happy, it's impossible for our brain to worry. She encouraged us all to focus on the gratitude that we have in life and to not worry because God's plan is perfect. I absolutely loved that. Then we stood up to sing the intermediate hymn and I was looking down at my iPad looking at the lyrics for the song and all of the sudden, out of no where, someone was right by my side, with their arm wrapped around me, and their cheek touching my cheek and I heard the words in my ear, 'what are your investigators names that are getting baptized next week?' I then noticed that it was Elder Kearon that came down from the stand to ask me haha! So I told him and he said thank you and then went back up. During his talk he talked about the importance of knowing the greatness of God's plan and always being willing to learn more and being like new members of the church like Emmanuel and Claudette. He mentioned them over the pulpit and it was great. They were just smiling!! It was an incredible conference and the spirit was so strong. We then finished and were talking to everyone and I wanted Elder and Sister Kearon to come and say hello to Emmanuel and Claudette again cause I thought it was super cool how he mentioned them in his talk, so I went and told them thank you for their talks and that they really touched me and then invited them over to say hello to Emmanuel and Claudette and they came and it was tender. Claudette told us on the way home that when she hugged Sister Kearon that is was so special to her and she'd never forget that. As we were standing there with the Kearon's I looked at Sister Kearon and told her thank you so much for her talk and that it touched me and then told her about my dad and how I got a call from home last week and told her what was going on and she said, 'Elder, I promise you I'll be praying for him. Everything will be ok. You can grow closer to the savior through this and don't lose your faith. We all know this is a test for you and your faith to grow.' She then grabbed Elder Kearon and they both then told me to let this experience help me grow closer to the Lord. It was tender. Elder Kearon then gave me his email and told me to email him if I ever needed to, not just for fun;) he also told me to not go sharing it with everyone, so sorry, IM BFFs WITH A GENERAL AUTHORITY;) we have emails and everything. I guess you could say things are pretty serious;) #namethemovie as they were walking out, Sister Kearon came and grabbed my hand and told me she loved me and she would be praying for my family and that everything will be ok. I then looked out the door and through a crowd of people, I could see Elder Kearon's face with a thumbs up and a smile. It was an amazing conference! Then Emmanuel and Claudette went for their interviews and Elder and Sister Norby helped me to find some baptismal clothing. Jumpsuits are so much more convenient than dresses and stuff haha! After they'd finished and passed the interviews, we went and took a couple pictures cause they want a picture of all of us to be on the front of their baptismal program;) it's cute:) so then we got in the car and headed home for the day and when we got home, me and Nelson took lunch and then we went out to work. We had a dinner appt with some members tonight and so we went and looked at bus times and then contacted until we had to go. When we got to the Halushka's we ate and had a really fun night with them. They are such a fun family. We shared 'Is It Still Wonderful to You?' And had a really great message and spirit was so strong!

Eh bien. C'est ça! J'ai que 20 semaines qui restent en mission. C'est bizarre, mais ce matin, lorsque j'étais en train de penser ça, je me suis dit que je peux ressentir que c'est presque fini. Je me disais que pendant ces 20 semaines je dois suivre les conseils dans ma bénédiction patriarcale et 'garder les commandements et apprendre de la vie du Sauveur pour apprendre de son véracité.' Je sais qu'il veut que nous nous rapprochons vers lui pendant les temps difficile. Il veut, et il peut nous aider. Je vous souhaite une bonne semaine!!! Continuez d'envoyer les prières et mails!;) JE VOUS AIME!!  (Well. That's it! I have 20 weeks which remain in my mission. It's weird, but this morning, when I was trying to think of it, I said to myself, "I can feel that it is almost finished." I told myself that during these 20 weeks I must follow the advice in my patriarchal blessing and 'keep the commandments and learn from the life of the Savior to learn its truth.' I know he wants us to come closer to him during difficult times. He wants it, and he can help us. I wish you a good week! Continue to send emails and prayers! ;) I LOVE YOU!

Elder Libby

 

 

WEEK 81

Bonjour tout le monde! Vous avez tous un bonjour d'un mec a Belgique! Haha cette semaine c'était bizarre haha. Je n'aime pas recevoir les appels de chez moi pendant que je suis en mission. Ça me semble que chaque fois, ça m'amène les mauvais nouvelles. Mais c'est vrai que nous ne pouvons pas grandir sans les épreuves. Mais bon. C'est la vie eh? Fin bref. Mais autrement, je vais bien. Voici ma semaine!  (Hello everyone! It's a Hello from a guy in Belgium! Haha this week it was weird haha. I do not always receive calls from home while I'm on my mission. It seems to me every time I do, it brings me bad news. But it is true that we cannot grow without tests. So good is life eh? End gloom; otherwise, I'm fine. Here's my week!)

LUNDI SOIR

Well tonight family home evening was really good!! Again, Emmanuel had school tonight and so he couldn't come, but the Mazy's went and got Claudette and she came with Yannick! So we were there and we were all playing ping pong and then we had a lesson given on Coming to Christ. It went really well! We talked about the importance of having Christ as the LIGHT the LIFE and the WAY:) it was a really good lesson. Then we ate all the snacks and then we got a ride home with Emmanuel and Claudette. When we got home we went to make our dessert for lunch tomorrow and came to find that we didn't have a 9x13 pan to put the crumble into....so we had to call around to other missionaries and try to find one....haha that was fun.

MARDI

Today was a good day. We had district meeting and the new way we do district meeting is really fun! Haha today we had district meeting in Charleroi and honestly it's just kind of a gloomy ville. I'm super happy to be here in Namur! Haha so this morning and got all ready and got all the stuff that we needed for our crumble and then headed out. The last time we were with the district leader, we forgot to have him buy our train passes with his mission card and so we didn't have any train tickets and so we had to go early today and buy tickets with our own money haha which isn't a problem, we just need to send in some reimbursements now. So we got into Charleroi and we waited for the district leader and may or may not have snagged some Gaufres while waiting;) we then hopped on the tram and headed to the elders apartment. We had to take a super long tram ride....haha but we got there and then we got assignments for the day and were told to be at the church to eat at 12:30. Then me and elder McDonald were put together again and we were assigned to go and take all the food to the chapel, which was also a SUPER long tram ride haha. By the time we had gotten to the chapel, we had gotten a call from some of the other elders who were a little late getting there who had food to drop off but they didn't know how to get there and so they called and asked us to go meet up with them. We went and found them and when we got to the church, we had 30 minutes left and we still needed to make the crumble...so we just stayed there and I started to peel apples and get the crumble ready! We then started district meeting and had a formation given to us on unity and elder McDonald had blind folded me and another elder and given us each a task to do while blind folded and sorting food but we didn't know each other's tasks. So we really messed up a lot haha then we are food and laughed and talked and had a fun time and then we were going to go out to work, but we found out that it takes a lot longer to get to the gare from their chapel and so we had to leave after that to be able to get to the gare to catch a train home and get home on time. Literally we were on the tram to the gare for 45 minutes. Ah! But as soon as we got to the gare, we had 3 minutes before our train left and so we ran and hopped on and got home. When we got home we came in and dropped off our stuff, and took dinner cause we had a rdv with Emmanuel and Claudette that was going to take up the rest of the night. While we were taking dinner, elder Nelson took some pics of me trying on my new jeans haha I'm excited to wear them! We then went to go and get to our rdv with Emmanuel and Claudette. It was a great rdv!! We talked about prayer and scripture study and it went really well. They are getting super excited about getting baptized!!:) after that we made our way home for the night.

MERCREDI

Today was fun!! Haha it was really bizarre but it was good. We had a good day. So on Sunday we had talked to the Paulus family and asked them if we could go over for dinner sometime this week and they were like ya how about Thursday and so we were like ok, but then today we were getting ready this morning and got a text from Pierrot and he was asking us if we could come over tonight, but we were supposed to have a rdv tonight and so he was like ok we'll have to do it next week then... So I was bummed but whatever. We then went and studied and then we went and contacted this morning. We had to run to the church to download a Mormon message that we wanted to share with the Badoux's because we were having lunch with them today and so we needed to get a little thought ready. So after headed over to their house and we ate. It was a fun time and I'm really grateful for good members who really like to take care of the missionaries. It is always a fun time to go and spend some time with some members. So anyway, we were eating and they were telling us all about how they wanted to take us out to some new places to visit on Pdays and so we are going to be having fun with them cause they really want to take us out to some really fun places!! I guess their is this little town out in the middle of nowhere with this cathedral type thing with like a statue of Satan and it's like legitimately scary and so they are super excited to take us to it? Haha it'll be fun! So anyway we shared the message of expressions of love with them and it was good, and then we bounced out of there. We decided to go and contact our way over to Virginie and Esaïe's place cause we hadn't fixed a date last week cause she was starting an internship this week and didn't know her schedule. So we went over and tried to see if they were home and they were and so we went up and talked and prayed and tried to start teaching them a little bit of the plan of salvation when their buzzer rang, and it was a friend that came up and started to get on their computer and being loud and after that Esaïe wasn't really paying attention and then the buzzer rang again and it was another friend haha.....so there was a ton of people in this little apartment and they were all talking to each other, me and Nelson were just sitting there and so we then left and fixed a rdv for Friday. We slowly made our way home for dinner and Nelson then told me that it was his 6 month mark! So we celebrated by getting frites and heading back to the apartment. We were eating when we got a text from the potential investigators that we were going to see tonight telling us it was canceled. So we called up Pierrot! He told us to come on over and we'd get pizza! Haha so we hopped on a train and headed out. It was a fun night! They had a pet chinchilla and so I got to hold it, and he showed us his new speaker system in his house and he's super excited to meet my family when we come and stay at his place when we come back;) it's going to be fun! When we got home, I got a call from Elder Pratt telling me that he had a dream of me last night and so he wanted to call and say hi haha. So that was fun to talk to him!

JEUDI

Today was a LONG day full of CONTACTING. Haha literally we spent 5 hours contacting today. It was a longggggg time. Normally we were supposed to have a rdv but it fell through at last minute and so that was a bummer.....but it was a super long day haha. But it had its good parts too. We started off with studies and then we went to lunch with Patrick!! This week he brought a friend from work with him and it was fun to get to know him. His friend is a 20 year old college student and is doing an internship at the place where Patrick works and so he invited him just to be nice! I think for the moment that his friend thinks we are kind of interesting for leaving everything behind and coming to talk to people about God haha but maybe it will turn in to something?? We never know! After we left and like I said, the rest of the afternoon was literally just full of non stop contacting. Haha like I honestly was so dead tired by the end of it and my feet hurt and I just wanted to climb into bed haha but Emmanuel and Claudette saved the day:) there isn't a ton to tell about contacting today. Honestly it was just kind of a bummer and there was really no one that stopped and talked to us, and when we were supposed to start making our way to our rdv, he texted us and told us that he needed to cancel so that just meant we needed to fill the time with more contacting until we could go in and take dinner. But it was good. We went on a couple roads that I had never been to before and so I'm just getting into the phase of exploring Namur eh;) so we went in for dinner and then the Mazy's came and picked us up and we headed over to Emmanuel and Claudette's. We taught the importance of being obedient tonight and then went over baptism and confirmation and then went over all the questions for their baptismal interview. We decided we'd cheat a little;) haha JK ITS NOT CHEATING. We are supposed to go over the questions so they know what to expect. As we were leaving, everyone had walked out and I went up to say goodbye to Claudette and said, You have to promise me one thing. PROMISE that you'll invite me to the temple when you guys go and get sealed. She looked at me and got a smile and a little teary eyed and said, would you really come?! It was so cute. These guys are gonna go to the temple!!

VENDREDI

Well tonight was the night that I got the news about dad. I don't think it's quite set in. I've been thinking a lot and praying a lot and reading the scriptures. Just trying to make it a reality. I don't know if it will be until I actually see him in person though. I am doing fine! I would ask you all to continue to pray for my dad. He needs the prayers more than me. Anyway. Today wasn't too special and I'm gonna be honest, it didn't end on that great of a note either haha. We woke up and had studies and then went out to go contacting. It was really windy and rainy and so there weren't a ton of people outside, so after about an hour of contacting we decided that it might be a better use of our time if we went inside and started to make calls from our potential investigator list. So for the last little bit we did that. We crossed lots of names out, but didn't get any rdvs set for this week....so that was a bummer. We then took lunch and then started weekly planning haha. So we were planning and getting all ready for the week and getting everything all planned for with Emmanuel and Claudette, (we are going to have finished all the lessons by the end of next week!!) and then we had to get going because we had fixed a rdv with Virginie and Esaïe. We got to their house and, just like every other time;), they had forgotten that we were coming and so they had to hurry and clean up their apartment and then we went in to talk. We were planning on sharing a lesson with them but we got too caught up in our conversation that by the time we wanted to start something, Esaïe had to leave and because of rules, we can't be alone with women haha so we left as well. We got home and finished up planning which didn't take too long, and so when we had finished we decided to go out and try to see that Belge couple that we found last week that were super cool, that canceled on us the other day. So we went out to their neighborhood and he answered and told us to text him later and we'd fix something and that they would come to church sometime soon. So we spent the rest of the night porting in that neighborhood and trying to find some new investigators, but nothing too amazing happened. When dinner came around we decided to go and get some frites and then head home for the night. I also decided to cut my hair and so as I was cutting my hair, I got the call from mom and dad and spent a good hour on the phone with them. I'm not upset, and I'm not confused, I just don't know if the fact that he actually has cancer has set in. But as I laid in bed tonight, (I like didn't sleep at all haha), I was thinking about how much that has been like that on my mission. As I thought about it, I realized that going home is gonna SUCK. haha! I'm not sure the fact that my sister is married has set in, or even the fact my grandpa passed away, so this is just adding to the 'dream' I call my mission. We'll see if I ever catch up to reality. So anyway, after I talked to my parents I called president Babin and I had an interview with him next week. So we'll see how that goes!

SAMEDI

Like I just said, I literally didn't sleep like at all last night. Too much was going on in my head, and I was just tossing and turning all night. I had gone through the whole grieving process steps 1-7 haha I've finally arrived at acceptance I believe haha I think my heart is at peace and I know things are in the Lords hands and I just need to get ready for that to set in some day. As I got up this morning I made a phone call to Jorgy. Haha he answered and I just started to cry and as I told him what was up he just listened and then everything got quiet and he goes, 'dude your mission sucks!' Haha we had a laugh and then he told me I could call whenever I needed to. So we went and studied and I'm actually in the Book of Mormon at the part in Alma talking all about faith, and how if we have great faith, it will help us through. During comp study the phone rang and I answered only to hear the voice of Pauline Royer! Haha we talked and she told me that if I ever needed anything that she was only 400km away;) haha then I spoke to Gilles and it was good to talk to them. They told me that they would be praying and fasting for my family. So anyway after we finished talking, we went out contacting and it was exactly like yesterday and there was a ton of rain and wind and so after about an hour we went inside and decided to make some phone calls for the rest of the time. We then ate some lunch and it was probably the most healthy thing I've eaten my whole mission!! Haha we made some chicken breasts with steamed vegetables and it was amazingly delicious haha! Then we went and had a rdv with the man and his wife from last week that answered the door in his Whitey tighties haha do you remember him?? When we showed up this time, he was in clothing so that was all the better. He smoked 3 cigarettes and drank 2 beers but it was a good rdv none the less. Just as we were about to get into Joseph smith, someone knocked on the door and it was some family friends and they asked if we could come back next week....BUMMER. So we are going to do that. We then had about 4 hours of straight contacting and so we set out to go and do that. We eventually had made our way to the chapel after a few hours and took a 20 minute break where I looked up a bunch of info on Lymphoma and tried to understand what is really going on at home haha. Then we contacted our way home so that we could fill out a few papers to have for church tomorrow. Then we made our way to E&Cs for the night. We had about 30 minutes before the Mazy's would be showing up and so Emmanuel wanted to play Mancala with us and he kicked my butt haha! Then we taught them about prophets and what they do and why we follow them and shared Thomas S Monson's last talk, Be an Example and a Light and it went really well. At the end of the lesson, I decided to tell all 4 of them what was going on cause I trust them and love them all. I asked them to keep it private and told them I told them cause I love them and that I wanted them to know what was going on in my life. They all told me some pretty great things but most importantly they told me that I needed to be strong and Emmanuel kept saying, 'everything will be ok. It will all work out.' When we got home I got a call from Soeur Redd and she told me she'd found out that she wanted to talk and that she and her husband loved me and they were here for me. She told me that she wants to try and see me once more before they leave, and so we'll see what we can do about that before the end of March;)

DIMANCHE

Sunday's are so great. And Heavenly Father knew that I needed a good sabbath day and a good experience at church this week. I got to church and saw a bunch of fun members and went into sacrament meeting and I was sitting there thinking about how this week was kind of like the world crumbling and I was just so overwhelmed but I was really trying to feel my Heavenly Father's love. As I was listening to the sacrament prayers, I noticed something that I really liked. The French translation of the sacramental prayers saying, 'That they WANT to take upon them the name of Thy son.' Whereas in English it says, 'that they are willing...' So as I was thinking about it, it hit me that partaking of the sacrament is something we really need to want to do and really need to try to be as worthy as we can when we take it, cause by taking it, we are really WANTING to take Christ's name upon us. And me being a missionary, I LITERALLY do that every day! So that was a cool little manifestation from my Heavenly Father. Nothing too crazy, but still, something that touched me:) the rest of our meetings were really good and then after we'd finished them up, Emmanuel and Claudette offered us a ride home. So we left and got home and ate. After we'd finished up our lunch, we got all dressed and ready and then headed out the door. We were supposed to have a rdv with Virginie and Esaïe. So we got to their house and rang the doorbell and called them a couple of times, but nothing happened....so that was really a bummer. So we got a little sad and then left and I looked at the phone and we had 5 hours of contacting and porting left......haha ya. I was a little depressed because that was a long time. But we went and did it. We talked to lots of interesting people including one man saying how he really didn't like how the USA sends people that try to change all these different cultures of different countries and that we should go back to the USA and worry about ourselves cause the Mormons needed to go back where we came from.....in GERMANY!! where did he hear we came from Germany?! And why does he want us to go back to the USA if he thinks we came from Germany?! Haha it was really interesting. Then we went out to this one area and went porting and it was FREEZING COLD. Honestly, I could not feel my hands after....it was so cold and all I had on was a light jacket, a scarf and my umbrella and it was pouring rain for most of the time as well....sadly nobody let us in so it was just a bunch of knocking on doors and talking tonight. We then came home and got all warmed up cause you have no idea how cold it was. I LITERALLY COULDN'T MOVE MY THUMBS....haha

Et voilà! Je vais vous dire tous, merci pour vos prières pour moi et ma famille. Je sais que lorsque je suis ici en mission il n'y a pas beaucoup que je peux faire. Je sais que cette épreuve c'est une preuve de ma foi. Nous allons survivre et tout va finir par s'arranger. Je vous demande de continuer à prier pour ma famille, notamment mon papa, car ils sont dans le besoin. C'est un peu rigolos parce que cette semaine, pendant notre planification hebdomadaire, j'ai fixé le but de me rapprocher au Seigneur. Haha je ne savais pas combien qu'il veut que nous atteindrons nos buts! Mais comme j'ai dit, nous allons survivre et tout ira bien. On se parlera bientôt:) je vous aime!!  (And voila! I'll tell you all, thanks for your prayers for me and my family. I know that when I'm here on a mission there is not much I can do. I know that this test is evidence of my faith. We are going to survive and everything will eventually work out. I ask you to continue to pray for my family, especially my dad, because they are in need. It is a little funny because this week, during our weekly schedule, I set the goal for me to get closer to the Lord. Haha I didn't know how much he desires that we will achieve our goals! But as I said, LIBBYS are going to survive and everything will be fine. We will talk soon :) I love you!)

Elder Libby

 

            

WEEK 80

SALUT LES ENFANTS. COMMENT ÇA VA? Je vais bien:) j'ai passé une très bonne semaine qui était rempli des miracles et les expériences spirituelles. Combien nous sommes béni en tant qu'aux enfants de notre père céleste! Cette semaine j'ai pu voir qu'il y a beaucoup d'entre vous qui prie pour mes ami de l'église et moi, et pour cela je suis très reconnaissant:) ça m'a touché cette semaine de voir comment le seigneur répond à nos prières. Ça m'a frappé cette semaine que mon anniversaire c'est le moi prochain! Et donc je voulais vous prévenir, je vais vous demander tous, au lieu de m'envoyer les colis pour mon anniversaire, je vais demander pour l'argent haha parce que j'ai que 5 mois qui reste en mission et je veux acheter les vêtements français pour attirer les filles;) lol mais oui! Donc ça c'est ce que je veux pour mon anniversaire cette année:) merci à tous!! Voilà ma semaine!  (HI CHILDREN. How is it going? I'm well :) I spent a very good week that was filled with miracles and spiritual experiences. How much we are blessed as the children of our Heavenly Father! This week I have seen that there are many of you that pray for my friends of the Church and me, and for this I am very grateful :) it touched me this week to see how the Lord answers our prayers. It struck me this week that my birthday is up next! And so I wanted to warn you, I'm going to ask you all, instead of send me packages for my birthday, I'll ask for money haha because I have 5 months remaining on a mission and I want to buy french clothing to wear for the girls;) lol but yes! So that is what I want for my birthday this year :) thank you all! This is my week!)

LUNDI SOIR

well there isn't too much to tell about what happened tonight. The Mazy's were sick today and yesterday so not only did they not come to church, but they didn't come to family home evening either. And because of that, Claudette was not able to come either:( Emmanuel has school every Monday and Wednesday night so he can't ever come, but Claudette came last week cause the Mazy's went and picked her up. So that was a bummer that neither of them were there:( but we had FHE still and it went well. Elder Nelson gave us a lesson on Christlike attributes and then we got a ride home with the Badoux's! When we got home we were planning for our day tomorrow and we called Emmanuel and Claudette to see how they were doing and spent a good 10 minutes talking with them and laughing. They're pretty much like family haha they spent the time asking how our families were doing and how our day was and when the next time we could come over was. #friends4ever

MARDI

today was a blast! So a few nights ago we got a call from our district leader informing us that they changed the way we were going to do district meeting. They told us that district meeting would now be held at every ville in the district at least once a transfer, and that after we had eaten that the rest of the district would spend the rest of the day in that ville and do some work! Which is awesome, just in case you are wondering haha cause can you imagine having one area with 8 missionaries??? Haha I was pretty happy about that! So this morning we woke up and got ready to head out to catch our train to Nivelles. When we got there me and Nelson had to go and buy bread for our side dish for the meal and do we went and did that and then got to the other guys apartment and we were assigned a new companion for the day and we went out and did some work until lunch time. I went with elder McDonald and again, like always, we had a blast. Hahah I just love that kid! The whole time we were laughing and having fun. I was telling him how weird it was that all my soeurs went home and he was telling me how weird it is that I go home in 5 months.....haha we had a blast though. We talked to a lot of people and I was honestly surprised how many people actually knew who we were! A lot of times people either think that we are the Jehovah's Witnesses or the Amish, but today every time people were like ya I know who you are, they were like, you're the Mormons! Haha so that was sweet. We then went in for our lesson for district meeting and elder McDonald told us that our district was leading the mission in numbers! EVERY companionship has 1 or more investigators with a baptismal date and so that was fun to know!! He gave us a lesson on baptism and why it is important to help our investigators plan and prepare for it now and it was really good. Then we ate and went out to work again. It was cold and rainy and because of that there was next to no one in the ville and so me and elder McDonald decided to go and do some afternoon porting. We went and knocked doors and during the whole afternoon we were talking about Reims cause he served in Reims, just after I left, for 6 months and we both LOVE it there. Apparently they had quite the fun apartment too....I guess all the elders were like best friends and they all had a blast all the time together and so I was a little sad that I missed that, but oh well. I STILL LOVE REIMS!! We then went and got kebabs for dinner and while we were ordering I got a call from the ZLs and they were telling us that they were very impressed with the numbers that we got last week, (like our lessons and all that stuff) and they wanted to tell us that they were proud of what we were doing. So that was cool! Then we went back to their apartment and we ate and then me and Nelson had to go and catch a train home for the night. We contacted our way back to the apartment and planned and then I called Emmanuel and Claudette to see how they were doing and we talked and there is a funny thing to tell, and a cool thing! Funny thing: Emmanuel asked if we had eaten fries today and I said I hadn't but elder Nelson did and that I got a kebab and Claudette goes, 'LIBBY. That is not good for your health.....' And Emmanuel responds, 'it's ok!....... We all are going to die.....' HAHAHAHAHA lol. Cool thing: last night while I was praying, I asked HF to help me know how to help Claudette find a new job and immediately the grocery store just in front of their house came to mind. So I asked Claudette if she'd ever thought about working there, to which she responded, 'That is a GREAT idea!!! I didn't even think about that! I'm going to go in tomorrow to see if they are hiring!' Hahah so we'll just have to see!! The Lord will answer prayers!!!

MERCREDI

Well today was a decent day!! I love it when I see that I've been able to help people out and see the spirit work in people. It's just a great feeling, and if you haven't experienced it, I highly recommend that you find someone and let it happen. So today we had to get up and have our studies.....or at least some of them! Haha we had a rdv with this potential investigator that we met a few weeks ago who is a lawyer at the university here. He told us he works and the only time he would be able to see it would have to be at his work during the morning hours. So we went out and met with him. We got there and he invited us into his office and we started to talk. We asked him all about how he had met with the missionaries before and he had the Book of Mormon to prove it! Haha he said that he'd read a little bit but that he thought it was a bummer how there was no proof of the plaques still on earth. He was all, how do we know that this Joseph Smith didn't just make this story up?? Haha I was all that's where your faith comes in brotha. Anyway we asked him if we could come back and have some more rdvs and tell him more about our message, and he said that he wanted to read and that work is super stressful for the moment and that we could call him around the end of March........so we'll see what happens. We then came home and had somewhat of a comp study and figured out what we needed to do for the day and then we went off to lunch with Patrick. It was really fun today. Honestly eating with him is something that I honestly look forward to every week haha. It's such a blast and the pasta really is the best pasta in the world!!! Anyway, after lunch with him we had to go home cause we needed to call the ward missionaries and ask if they could come to a rdv with our recent convert and they needed her address so we went home and found that and then we went and contacted until our rdv with her. We got to her house and the ward missionaries showed up and then we walked up to her apartment and got to her place and walked in and guess who was there??? Chung......haha he had come to sit and drink some drinks from her and ya.....so we were like ummm ok. So there were 5 of us in her apartment to teach her....so we tried to talk about our life on earth and the atonement, but we couldn't get past our life on earth cause she kept talking hahah so after about an hour and a half, we left her to get home for dinner. We came home and ate and then I got a feeling we needed to go to this one area to port. So we went and hopped on a bus and got out to this one area and started knocking doors! During the time we were porting, we got: 2 lessons taught, 4 passbacks, and 2 new investigators! The 2 new investigators are a married, middle-aged couple who were super nice!!!! They let us in and were asking questions about Joseph smith and it was super cool!! As we were explaining prophets, the wife was like like, 'that makes sense. God needs a prophet on the earth. That is totally true.' And I was like WOOOO!!! Then they asked us about church and how it worked and so we explained it all and when I explained about priesthood and relief society and how in the family men and women have different roles, again, the wife goes, 'I LOVE that! I totally agree and I want to come and see that. I can't this Sunday, but I am coming to see that.' Haha! We are going to see them next Wednesday:) the lord prepares souls!!

JEUDI

today went by so fast. We had so many rdvs and it went by so dang fast. But that is how you have a good day and I'm always grateful for busy days. So this morning we got up and we went running haha........then we got home and we started our studies and for the first time this whole week, we got a whole session of NORMAL studies!! Haha that honestly is the best, you all have no idea. We got all of our studies out of the way and then we went contacting. We went on this one road and contacted like everyone and got a couple numbers and even got to pray with one lady on the side of the street!! So that is always a good day. We contacted this one girl who was on her way to the pool cause she was a swimmer and I was like hey I was a swimmer for 10 years before my mission and she was all well come with me and we can go do some laps in the pool!! I was like.....haha I wish......words can't explain how much that pool misses me and how badly I just want to jump in somewhere and start to swim again!!!! AHHH THE TEMPTATION IS SO REAL. Anyway, we got home and ate lunch and then went to our rdv that we had with our new investigator from last week, Virginie! Her and her boyfriend were both there today and so it was cool to teach them both. We just re-taught the restoration and it went well. We also answered all their questions and then they told us that next week she is starting an internship and he is going to be looking for a job so we couldn't fix an exact rdv for a next week, but we'll see when we see them again if that turn out to be anything. After that, we went and contacted and then had another rdv with this investigator that we found a long time ago and had always forgotten to fix a rdv...but we finally got one!!! So we got to his apartment and taught the restoration all the way up to Joseph Smith and asked him what he thought and he told us that he was convinced that that was true! He said that everything we were saying to him rang clear and that he had no questions!! Then....we asked if he'd be baptized if he came to know the truth and he didn't say yes or no....he said that for the past few years he'd been thinking of baptism and so he'd been thinking about it and then left us off like that. So we'll see next week when we go back!! Then we contacted until dinner and came in and ate and then went to Emmanuel and Claudette's for the night. They had heard something about some missionaries writing their testimonies in the investigators Books of Mormon and so they asked us to do that and Claudette told us that she was keeping that in her 'Heritage' which I think means like personal affairs and she said she's gonna keep it forever and pass it down to her children when she dies. It was honestly kind of touching haha. We then taught them tithing and explained why it was important and why we do it and they both accepted and said that they were excited to be able to get the blessings like members when they pay tithing. It was a good rdv! It touches me how they are so willing to change. Claudette always tells us, I know it's true, so I'll follow it. It's amazing! Miracle of the day!!: thanks to YOUR prayers and the help of our Heavenly Father, another prayer has been answered and a new opportunity has arrived!!!! This whole time, we have been praying for Claudette to find a new job, cause Emmanuel isn't yet legal in Belgium, so he can't work. He found, from a friend, an agency that took refugees and put them through a training for a few weeks, and then guaranteed a job, if they qualified for the training! So he went and looked into it and starting March 7, he starts training and gets a guaranteed job in this program after a couple weeks of training!!!!!!!!!!! That's not even the best part. Because of this, Claudette can quit her job, they can BOTH come to church on Sunday's, AND his training pays him, covers travel cost, AND will support a nursery so that Claudette can go and get a job when she needs to!!!!!!!!!!!! God is too good!!!!!!!!! Thank you all for the prayers on their behalf. I can't tell you how great it is to see the lord preparing their way to enter into his church here on earth!!

VENDREDI

Today was a day full of planning.....hahah so that was fun I guess....weekly planning is not always something that I look forward to. If you haven't been able to tell from the past year and a half haha! At district meeting this last week, we were told that president Babin wanted us to go through our area books and update everything and put ALL old information into one area book and make an area book for 2016. So we were to have 2 area books. So me and Nelson decided that today was the day that we did it. So not only did we weekly plan, but we got our area books started.......but anyway we got up this morning and we did some studies and then we bounced out to go and try to do some work for the day, cause we knew that besides our rdv with Emmanuel and Claudette we would be inside the apartment all day haha. I was determined to find someone!!! Sadly we only got a couple of phone numbers, but you can bet your bottom dollar that I am going to call them!!! On the way inside, elder Nelson decided that he wanted to run to the little convenience store behind the apartment and get a baguette for lunch. So we went and did that, and as we were checking out, you will never guess what I saw..... Haha I found a French version of AIRPLANE!!! Haha so OBVIOUSLY I couldn't not buy it. And plus it was only 5€ so...It's currently sitting right next to my bed. Lol don't worry I won't watch it til I get home! So we then came in and ate some lunch and then got to weekly planning. We had a really good session and got all planned for for this next week that we needed to and we are going to have a great week. We then went in and started to attack that MONSTER of an area book! I kid you not. Cleaning out that thing was close to death haha! We had to sort through EVERY paper, looking to see if there was an address or number, seeing if it needed to go in the new or old area book, sorting through old investigators and new, and recent converts and less actives, trying to find baptismal records..........AH. It was fun. I would totally go back and do it again. And lucky us! We didn't even get to finish cause we had to go down and meet up with the Mazy's for our rdv with Emmanuel and Claudette. Tonight we taught the word of wisdom and we were really worried about this one cause we know that they drink tea and coffee and so we were worried, but thankfully the Mazy's were there and were able to testify along with us of how much it helps and why it's a good law! They told us they'd start to live it:) after the rdv they mentioned going to get frites and I was all oohh! We'll come with you guys! And they were all ok! We'll buy since you guys have bought the past couple times! Haha so we went and got frites:) it was a fun night. As we were walking in the door elder Nelson goes, 'this is getting to be a problem. It's getting to be that I don't even have to pay for frites anymore. They just come!!!' Haha I died I thought it was hilarious.

SAMEDI

Today went by like a blur!!! Haha it was really good though. I guess. Haha now that I think about it, we just had one lesson, but that's ok haha #everbodyhasthosedays #namethesong haha well anyway we woke up this morning and got our studies done and then we went and did some contacting. So during studies today we heard a BANG. And we turned around to look and see and it just so happened to be that my bag had died. He lived a good life. My bag was a saint. But he's in a better place now. We felt a little sad and mad at first so we made a crime scene out of it and left it for the rest of the week. Gotta have fun sometimes eh??;) We had to go and renew our bus passes for the month of March, which is super weird. Can you believe that I've already been here in Namur for 2 months?? That is so crazy! So ya we went and did that and then we went and contacted home and came in to take lunch. After lunch we had fixed a rdv with Emmanuel and Claudette and the Mazy's and today was the fun lesson;) haha we used the BIG BOY words today, cause we were teaching the law of chastity, and I told Nelson that he could use them if he wanted;) (for those of you who don't know, the big boy words are things like pornography and masturbation and stuff like that, cause we need to explain to them that those things are against the law of chastity and the first time explaining it is REALLY awkward saying those words. Now I just think it's fun;) lol) so anyway elder Nelson told me he wanted to try it;) HAH ITS SO FUNNY. I know I'm like 2 years old. Anyway we had a really good rdv with them and taught them the law of chastity and talked about priesthood as well. It went really well. A couple days ago, we had told them about the movie meet the Mormons on YouTube and so today they told us that they had watched it and that they loved it and Emmanuel was talking about Gale Halverson and how that was his favorite story and how he thought it was really cool how he threw the chocolate out the airplane and then he goes, 'then he got the idea to put the chocolate in parachutes! THAT is an idea from god if there ever was one!' I died. So anyway after all that, we taught the law of chastity and we got talking about the importance of the priesthood and Emmanuel and Claudette are just getting so excited for Emmanuel to have the priesthood. Haha Claudette is so excited to be able to ask for blessings. It was a great rdv! We then came home and we went and tried to get all the area book cleaned out but it didn't really happen.....we were so close, but yet so far! That thing is a beast. So after we'd been doing that for an hour or so we went and had dinner and then went out to go and port up a neighborhood. It was alright tonight. Haha there was this one lady who yelled at me through her door telling me that I was a crazy for being out so late....it was 8:05 hahaha we then came home for the night.

DIMANCHE

Well today was ward conference and it was really well! We almost missed the bus this morning when we were headed out to church, but we ran! Haha we looked at the phone in the apt at 8:25 and the bus passes outside at 8:30 so we ran! Lol we got to church and Emmanuel and Claudette showed up early and we went and got our seats and then conference started. It was a great conference and we had a really good talk given by our stake president. It was great! It's been 6 years since we got a new bishop and so we all kind of thought that we were going to get a new bishop today, but that didn't happen. So church went really well and we had some good lessons throughout the day. In the investigators class we learned about obedience to the commandments and then in priesthood we went and had a lesson on the temple and it was really good as well. After church we were talking to members and got a few of them to invite of over this week! So that rocks haha. I really do like the members here. It has been so much fun to be here! So anyway after that we went and got a ride home with E&C and then came in and took lunch. We weren't really that hungry, so instead of eating we watched a bunch of the 12 steps to change videos that I had downloaded on my iPad during church. It was fun haha then after we got changed and then headed out to go contacting until we had fixed this rdv with this potential investigator at the gare and so we went and waited there for about a half hour and tried to call him a couple of times but he never answered and so when we'd waited for such a long time, and nothing, we just left and I guess we'll wait to see if he calls back another time. We left and hopped on a bus and went out to a neighborhood to go porting in this one neighborhood where we have a less active that we'd met once before and so we went and knocked on his door and he didn't answer and so we just went and knocked on some doors! We weren't really having any success and then on the last door we knocked on this last door we had this one guy answer.....IN HIS WHITEY TIGHTIES! Hahaha I was all this is going to be great, and then he let us in to pray! Hahaha and then, him and his wife invited us back next Saturday! Hahaha so that is going to be really fun. We came home and I made a few calls tonight cause I wanted to:) I called Sylviane, Jean Parfait, and Soeur Foutrein from Dunkerque. It was fun to be able to hear from them all. They are all doing well! Jean Parfait's papers were all accepted and he's getting through a big internship where he's going to be a firefighter/ambulance dude! He's so funny. As soon as I was like its elder Libby, he goes, LIBBY!!! YOU LEFT ME FOR A WHILE! What's up?! Lol I died. He's a great guy and was SO happy when I told him of E&C haha!

Bien! C'est comme ça. Une semaine est déjà passée! Il est un peu difficile à croire! Ceci est déjà la troisième semaine du transfert ... comment cela est possible! Eh bien merci encore pour toutes vos prières et votre soutien. Le temps passe! Continuer à garder la foi :) souvenez vous que notre Père céleste vous aime. J'ai entendu une citation qui me plaisait aussi. La région où j'ai commencé ma mission, Metz est dans une région appelée la région Lorraine. Les gens là-bas sont connus pour être froid et difficile à se faire des amis, mais j'ai entendu une citation qui dit: Vous n'êtes jamais seul dans la vie si un Lorrain vous aime. Haha sachez donc que ce Lorrain vous aime!:) passez une bonne semaine! :) (Ok! It is like that. A week has already passed! It is a little hard to believe! This is already the third week of the transfer... how this is possible! Well thanks again for all your prayers and your support. Time passes! Continue to keep the faith :) remember that our heavenly father loves you. I heard a quote that I liked also. The region where I began my mission, Metz is in a region called the Lorraine region. The people there are known to be cold and difficult to make friends, but I heard a quote that says: you're never alone in life if a Lorrain loves you. Haha so be aware that this Lorrain loves you! :) have a good week! :)

Elder Libby