Apartments and Frozen Eggs

Dearest Family type peoples-

So this is the second p-day and it’s been an interesting week. As we were getting settled in our new apartment, up the hill from the old one where I’d lived all my other transfers, we get news that we get to move… again. Day before yesterday sister Fellmann and I had our president interviews and while sister Fellmann was in hers, one of the Assistants pulled me aside and informed me that we would be moving, and so would our roommates, and the sisters next door, because the porch needed to be renovated. Exciting, no? So yesterday we worked hard at moving our things, and got mostly everything moved, we just need to do some last minute cleaning things so that the next people to inhabit the place don’t have to. Where do we move then? Even further up the hill! Plus stairs! Whee! Kinda.

The apartment is nice. It’s MUCH bigger than the one we had just been living in. Both the rooms are good sized, unlike the one we were in, and the kitchen living room, etc, are larger as well. Thank heavens. The only down side is that the sisters who were living downstairs last transfer, when the apartment we moved into was empty, had had a scary experience with hearing someone upstairs. When we got to the apartment, we went to all the different windows and made sure they were all locked. Our roommates slept over in the new apartment before us, and one of them swore that she heard something in the apartment, and was thoroughly freaked out by it. Last night we had a roommate prayer before going to sleep, and I don’t know about the other sisters but I didn’t hear a thing. Then again, we’ve only been there one night.

I mentioned to sister Fellmann more than once that I get my imagination from my dad, and that sometimes, like my dad, that imagination is used to worry. I try not to let it overtake things, so I prayed and relaxed, and everything worked out fine, and will work out fine.

Earlier in the week we were introduced to Mission/Guest services, where people call to schedule tours, or anything else under the sun. We get some interesting questions in there, most of which we’re able to answer… one of the most unique that I got was a man calling in and asking what the nutritional facts were for a product called Atmit that we talk about on Welfare square (and probably the Humanitarian center too.) . I told him to call Welfare Square since they have some there in little packets with the information on the back of it. It’s something that is given to countries that are starving, or who’s people are struggling etc, to make it so their bodies can accept real food when they get into t he advanced stages of starvation. It was started in Ethiopia, and it’s an Ethiopian word that means Nourishing Porage. The government over there wasn’t able to make enough for the people who needed it, so they turned to the Church and asked us to help, we accepted. The original stuff was made of oatmeal, honey, and goats milk, or something like that, and they took some over to BYU and they fixed it up so that it could be a dry product and got it back over to Ethiopia within a month or two. It’s pretty amazing how the work of God goes.

Another fun experience in Mission/Guest services was due to a mix up. People are able to call in and reserve theaters for special occasions, etc, and I was reserving one for a leader to work out a ward youth activity. I wrote down all the information he gave me, but since some of it was missing (my first time doing it, so I didn’t know what questions to ask) I had to take it over to some other sisters while I waited for him to call back later.

He did call back, and I thought the sisters had the paper still, so I didn’t take down his phone number again, but unbeknownst to me, they had thrown it away because normally you’d take down their number again if everything wasn’t there, etc. So I hung up. Then I asked them for the paper… then we all started scrambling trying to find it. We searched using the information I had remembered, to find his bishop, but I had remembered the ward name incorrectly. Eventually we did find his number and all was well, but it was crazy for a few hours. Kind of like Grace. We are given it after all we can do. I’d done all I could do, so I turned it over to the lord and he provided. Thank Heavens. By the way, that was during the same time I found out we were moving, so it was exciting in more than one way.

Something also fun is to see how God answers prayers, especially when we plan prayerfully. On Monday we had planned for 2 language tours, one French one German. We had 2 French and 1 German, and both of the French tours had 2 people, the German had 4, and one of the French Couples referred. A tender mercy and a blessing. Since things are slowing down, and we are in Mission/Guest services, and the Referral (Call) center a lot, we don’t have much time to contact people on the square. So it’s really good to have those experiences when we do.

It's amazing how the Lord takes us and stretches us in ways that we never thought we could stretch. I mentioned to Sister Fellmann one of the first days we had together that I felt like being on a mission and with different companions was like being thrown into a mold with another person for 6 weeks, and then after the 6 weeks you pop out, and look a little different, but still the same, only to be thrown into the same mold, but with a differently shaped person for another 6 weeks. Some of the people you fit well in together, but some, you have to make room for, or make room for yourself so that you two can stand to be together in the mold of Christ for that amount of time. By the end of it all, everyone changes at least a little bit, and hopefully you keep the mold of Christ more than anything else out of it.

One funny experience in the RC(Referral Center) This morning. In Mission/Guest services, we normally answer the phone, "Temple Square visitor’s Center" and then our name (for me, Sister Durtschi) So when I had my first call in the RC, I had to stop and think about what to say, and I’m sure the guy on the other end thought I wasn’t quite all there. Normally when someone calls us in the RC I say something like, "This is Sarah with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, how can I help you?" or something like that. It was funny. After that I made the calls instead of having people call me.

Another funny thing earlier t his week- In our old apartment our fridge liked to… well you could say; pretend it was a freezer. So occasionally when I would cook something, I’d have frozen eggs. My companion took pictures for me. I’ll just send one. It was quite a unique experience. I always wondered what would happen if you froze eggs… now I know! They kind of have a funny texture after the fact, but they’re fine in baking.

Something about my companion that’s kind of fun is that she loves to Role play. Meaning with the dice and Table top and things like that, so we discussed when we last had our weekly planning on how to use that to figure out how to improve what we do on temple square… it’s kind of funny, and we’re going to have fun with it I think…

Any way, I love ya all!

Be happy and all that fun stuffs!