Week 7 in Brno? I can't keep track anymore haha

11 NOV 2013 Hi!!! We heard about our Christmas plans and I GET TO SKYPE YOU. hahah I'm sooo excited. I miss being able to just tell you everything. I know it's been almost a year but sometimes I still want to call you and tell you how excited I am about stuff. The rest of the holidays are going to be super awesome too. So the 23rd we have a mission conference so I get to see everyone I haven't seen in forever, and I'm pretty sure they will pass out the Christmas presents then too. And then on the 24th we go around and teach as many 5 min lessons about Christ as we can--to members, investigators, anyone who will listen to us. Then Christmas Day we go and do 3 hours of service with a member, so we can go carolling or something, and then spend the rest of the day with our district and skyping :) We only have 45 min of course, but I'm so excited. And THEN, on the 26th we do singing displays all over the city as a district :) It's going to be so great. And then on New Year's Eve we have to be home by 5 cause everyone will be drunk and we get to watch disney movies. haha. I can't wait. President McConkie is a genius--he didn't like that in the past they watched movies on Christmas, but he knew that everyone loved it so he just moved it to New Years and made sure Christmas was still about Christ! President McConkie is amazing mom, don't worry. I honestly think that part of the reason I am in this mission is because of him. It's such a blessing. And he respects the sisters and doesn't play favorites at all. In one of my interviews he was telling me that at an Area training one of the other mission presidents asked him how the sisters in his mission were, like they were going to be a problem, and he said are you kidding? I've never had a problem with any of them and they lead the mission! haha. Seriously he understands the gospel soooo well and his wife and family are amazing too.(haha mom my companions say that you look like Sister McConkie and she really does remind me of you :) She is awesome. At the end of every training President spends the last 15 minutes talking about one of Christ's titles in the New Testament--last time it was the Great Physician, I learned so much. I really wanted to tell you about it Dad. And he is so wise, seriously everything that comes out of his mouth is so helpful. (Dad-I think about you quoting o be wise aaallll the time). We rode down with him from Prague cause he was coming to Brno anyways and on the 2 1/2 hour car ride he went through all of our investigators with us, how they are progressing and where we are stuck and we came up with lesson plans for their next lessons. We actually tried one of them this week and it was so inspired. She's from Equador, and her mom is a member, but she's living here, and hasn't really been progressing, she's scared to come to church too. So he suggested that we relate the gospel to her mom--and ask if we can just teach her 4 lessons (since she's latin and already has a lot of faith we can teach her a lot more at once)--the same exact lessons her mom learned and then during the 5th lesson have a heart to heart with her about what she's learned and if she believes that it's true. So we talked about this plan with her, and she loved it, AND it turned out to be her mom's birthday that day anyways so she was already thinking about her. Can you say inspired?? And then she said she wanted to learn about the plan of salvation so I whipped out my pictures that I always have in my bag and we had an amazing lesson, completely by the spirit. So we called President after and told him about it and he was really excited. This week really was fantastic. The branch had a bonfire night activity cause the branch president is British (remember remember the 5th of November), and it was super cool. We had 4 investigators show up and Draha just loved it, met a bunch a members and everything. And then they had real fireworks too! It felt like 4th of July haha. And then two little girls got baptized on Sunday and we got to sing at that, that was fun. (I've done more musical numbers on my mission than my whole life haha) They are totally adorable, I'll send a picture. Their parents totally involved us and we got to teach them a couple lessons the last couple weeks, it was so fun. And our investigator Diego came to that and I think he really liked it. I had a really good personal study in Psalms of all places the other day too. I was just letting my fear hold me back from talking to people, and I realized that and repented, and it made such a huge difference. My attitude got way better and now I'm all excited to share the gospel again. Plus I had a lot of tender mercies this week--we had 4 people independently (members and investigators) tell us that they see the light in our eyes, and that when we speak we have the spirit and that it will make a difference when we talk to people. That was so good to hear, because sometimes I really don't feel like we are. So that was really nice. The Branch here is super awesome, it feels like a ward family, it's so nice. Well that pretty much sums it up. We have some pretty awesome progressing investigators now, so I'm hoping that I get to stay next transfer and help them make it to baptism. We'll see! I realized the other day that I've had a baptism in every area so far. Pretty crazy huh? But we are supposed to expect miracles so I want to keep the streak going :) I'll do my best! love you!!!!! Sestra Cooper P.S. Oh yeah and we are teaching this old lady who's husband was famous in the 60s in Hollywood apparently. I'd never heard of him, but his name is Eduard Ingris if you want to look it up. She's pretty cool, we've only had one meeting with her and she mostly just talked about him, he knew all sorts of people, including Hemingway!