CIAOWDY

(Ciao + howdy... that greeting has become quite a hit here haha)

This week was SO GOOD!!! And I was SO HAPPY!!! Honestly I was trying to be positive in my last email but my first 3 days here were rough haha. It was a hard transition, but this week I have tried to focus on all the GOOD in my life and how I can see God's hand. And trying to approach it with an optimistic attitude has made such a difference. I love Kansas! There have been 2 times this week where I just felt so much love for kansas and felt so happy. Friday we were walking outside because the other sisters had the car. And we were passing these big fields of corn and plants and cows and everything... and I just felt so much love for Kansas! And then on Saturday, Sorella Wirick and I were driving to pick up some food coloring from the Elder's apartment haha and it was POURING rain (the weather is so weird here i will explain in a bit). And the BIGGEST and most vibrant rainbow appeared! A DOUBLE rainbow! And it was just so pretty! And this is so silly but I just felt so much peace. I felt this extreme love for Kansas and the people here and Manhattan and know that I am supposed to be here! I still have hope for Italy, but I know this is my mission too! Here's a scripture that goes along with this:
Alma 58:11 - "The Lord our God did visit us with assurance that he would deliver us; yea, insomuch that he did speak peace to our souls, and did grant unto us great faith, and did cause us that we should hope for our deliverance in Him."

I'm trying to put my best effort in and GO and DO! Anyways there's my little rant there! Here's some highlights from the week :)
- took a little Facebook finding break to make cookies and doorbell ditch them with a pass along card lol. Haven't had success with that yet but just you wait
- the church started to flood in the middle of one of our lessons haha
- service at Bread Basket!
- PANDA EXPRESS
- More service at this guy named Mike's house with basically my whole district! We were chopping all these branches and trees and spreading mulch and weeding, and you best believe I was so in my element. And then he fed us PIZZA. So good.
- we called this guy to ask if he had met with missionaries before or if he was interested to etc, and he responded with "I am a Satanist". We both paused for a sec and then were like "oh... *no response*... well have a good night!" So funny
- "member dinner" + bonfire! And a good game of soccer and volleyball. This was also at the house where I got 59 mosquito bites last week... but dont worry I DRENCHED myself in bug spray and came out clean of all bugs! No more skeeters for me lol. Also this member lived in Italy for a few years so I told him he better freshen up on his vocab and we will speak. Yay italiano!
- SUNFLOWER FIELD :))
- district break the fast dinner last night. I love my district they are so fun!
- OZ MUSEUM TODAY!!!

Just tryna give myself the fullllll Kansas experience! All we need now is a tornado! As I mentioned earlier the weather is so weird. It switches like everyday and multiple times in the day between pouring rain and sunshine. And all within like 5 minutes of each other! We'll be at our apartment and it is pouring rain. And then we drive 5 minutes away and there is like nothing haha. This all just comes to make me hope that we'll get a tornado soon because it changes so often! We will see... But we did do a tornado simulator at the Oz museum today so that was fun!

This is so long but I am so happy and so grateful to be here!

Ciao i miei amici!!

Sorella Nydegger