A Sweet Goodbye and A New Companion...

Tuesday was my last day with Sister Nelson 

and everything was so perfect. 

We went around and said goodbye to people and gave them a little spiritual treat to leave them with. Sister Nelson has been such a good example of loving everyone and she has gained such a good relationship with everyone here. It was worrying me at first to have her leave thinking I'd be left with people who I haven't truly gotten to know well yet, but this day we both felt that things would be good here in Antwerpen.

There are so many people to love and share the gospel with and it kind of felt like Sister Nelson just passed the torch to me. As we were in the home of a women from Suriname, and Sister Nelson was sharing her favorite scripture and bearing her testimony, I just had this feeling that everything was going to work out. I am so grateful for Sister Nelson! She has been the greatest example of diligence, optimism, and love for others. I'm seriously going to miss her, but I'm glad we live so close to each other! You guys should go to her homecoming! She has some amazing miracles and stories to share.

On Thursday all 6 of the missionaries, Zuster Nelson and her parents, Tom, Sister Van Wauwe and Nadia ate dinner at Nadia's house. It was sooo fun and good to have all the new Belgium missionaries be there and get to know everyone. It was a good way to end the transfer.

And now I am so excited for the things me and Zuster Jones are gonna accomplish. She's been on her mission for a little more than a year now, and her Dutch is super good. She came from Nederland so Belgium is way different for her, but we are super excited.

Last P-day I got a black eye. Woot woot. We played soccer and Frisbee for zone p-day and me and Sister Riley smacked heads!  A few hours later I noticed a black eye. My first one! haha. It's been funny because it's hard to tell if I am just really tired or if I really just got injured. Both is the truth.

We ended our p-day eating fufu and singing hymns at Steffanys house with all 6 of the missionaries in our ward. I tried fufu for my 2nd time and it was way better! The bowls were still huge, but hey fufu isn't too bad.

Family! They do celebrate Halloween here! 

Who would have thought. It definitely wasn't a normal Halloween though. I didn't have to wear a jacket all day it was SO warm outside. I even saw a few trick or treaters and one house was decorated for Halloween. YES. Snoep of Leven! We got Belgium Waffles to celebrate and to make us happy after the fact that we got lost in Antwerpen and didn't get to visit this cute 80 year old lady. Next week though :)



I was thinking about you so much on Halloween, Mom. You ALWAYS made it so fun. I did your little dot to dot you sent me haha and you can see my black eye with it. That was my Halloween costume. Scary!

MIRACLE of the Week:

On Saturday we got permission to travel to Dordrecht/Rotterdam for a baptism that Zuster Jones had put together. We ended up taking the wrong train and we didn't get there until the Baptism was over and they were getting ready to leave the building. It was the most amazing thing to see this cute 60 year old man who has a fake leg, and see the happiness on his face from just being baptized. It was the quickest few minutes of the week, but so many cool things happened in the few short minutes we were there till they closed the church building. I was able to talk to some of the ward members there. One member thinks I have a really good chance of getting called to serve there because most people that start in Belgium do. That'd be cool! Their Dutch was WAY easier to understand than Flemish :)  I met a Greenie at the baptism. She said she thinks she met my parents (in the Seattle airport). Cool that they really did! Geen toeval. No coincidence :)  It was a crazy trip though because we got to see this man that got baptized, then we grabbed some dinner and hopped back on another train home. It felt like we had just run to Nederland! Such a miracle though.

We made soup with some ward members 

for the homeless this week. 

So many veggies and the pot was huge. 

We love soup.

Favorite scripture this week...

I am reading in Mosiah 11 right now. I don't read too much. I think I started on Mosiah 7 at the beginning of the week so 7-11 is about all I've done. I love in Mosiah 10:10-11 where it talks about the Nephites and how they relied on the strength of the Lord, and how the Lamanites relied on the strength of man or their own strength. The Nephites were able to slay so many people and accomplish such great things with the strength of the Lord. This helps me to remember that I can do so much more when I let the Savior help me. I am doing his work so I need to allow him to help me.
Anyone who wants is welcome to read along with me!

Thanks for everyone's love and support! 

I love Belgium.

This definitely feels like my city now

 and I'm gonna be sad to leave it...

but right now Zuster Jones and I 

are having the best time. 

Love you All!
Em