Big news this week for Slovakia

Hey everyone, things are going fine down here this week was pretty interesting because it was a full week and it was still full of surprises number one being that Elder R has problems with his back and so he can't do a lot of things right now and so for one of the days we didn't really go outside except for teaching and the other day I took Elder D with me to Vrutky and Martin to teach a ton of lessons there. It was still a fun week and it was amazing and I learned a lot about what I want and how to get it haha.

Well the beginning of this week was pretty normal, we took to playing basketball with the other elders in the morning near their apartment and we run over there so it doesn't take too much time but we stopped doing that because of Elder R's back but that was fun regardless. We were able to get in touch with our Norwegian friend and we went to his house again this week so that was exciting. I asked for a blessing this week from Elder Sharp and I learned a lot of things about what I want and my priorities and where they should stand and all that and I decided I don't want to leave, but of course I will. I think my mission has been too good for me and that no one deserves this much joy and happiness from their mission, but I suppose it can be the same for everyone. It was simply a very enlightening week.   To top it off, came a visit from someone in the District presidency who I really like. His whole family came to church and their daughter is really good friends with Emma so it was a good thing. This week we're also doing a homemade lunch and I'm pumped for that because it's going to be amazing like it always is.

With investigators this week it was pretty good.  We taught lessons to the family about family home evening, it's hard for them because their kids are young but they like the idea and promised to try it and I think they will. They're so very cool and they're so open to learn, we just need to get them to come to church. We had a really good meeting on Tuesday with our scripture study.  Our friend was there, the one planning on coming to the conference, and he really enjoyed it and is excited about coming to Bratislava.  We're just finalizing all the details. I found out that Sister Jones and Sister Baird will be attending the conference too.  They decided to come back to Slovakia together and didn't know the conference would be then apparently, but they're glad it is. T-minus 6 days until big news. We also met with our Norwegian friend and he was way cool and always very generous. We actually did a fair bit of finding with Elder R being down.  On Sunday this guy just came up to me and we had an awesome talk together and he said we could meet again, so it was really cool. He was a little inebriated but that's okay, I suppose  the church needs all kinds of people haha.

Yeah, basically this week I thought about whether I was happy.  It's a question that many people ponder or at least say they think about over their lives and it was honestly the first time I ever thought about it. I thought, well of course I'm happy, I'm in Slovakia! I really am grateful to be here and I really am not dying to go home. Some missionaries are  excited to go home and so are a lot of other missionaries but I can honestly say that I'm not, it's just another thing that's coming. My mission has been wonderful and I would never trade it for the world.  Would I stay another 3 years?  Probably not, but I would stay in Slovakia as not a missionary and be a member-missionary. I really love it here and I love the people. My desire as I get older is be somewhere where my presence can be used, whether it be in a ward of 300 people or a branch of 12 I want to just help out. Anyway thanks for listening to me ramble, I've gotten good at that lately and have a great and successful week!

Elder Ferrell