A Good Christmas Celebration

Hey Mom!

I felt like the Christmas season went by really fast as well. This whole year has gone by really fast. I had a great time skyping with everyones.  I am glad that everyone had  a fun Christmas season.

We had a really good Christmas celebration here as well. We pretty much just had 4 days of relaxing and having fun in the beginning of the week. Monday was P-day, and then we finished the night by making brownies to take to various members. 

Tuesday (Heiligabend) was the ward Christmas service, and it went really well. After that, we were taken to Frankfurt by Bruder Stübe so that we could pick up Sister Bass and then drive back to Langen to have dinner and celebrate. When we arrived, the Christmas service in the Frankfurt ward was still going, so we had to wait in the car for a good 45 minutes before we finally left again, but that was alright. When we got to the Stübes, we had a delicious dinner of Spätzle and this brown meat sauce followed by an awesome raspberry creme and meringue. It was awesome. We shared a short lesson with them about being like little children and then surprised them with Kinder Eggs with the little toys inside. 

Christmas day was great. We went to the Kempeners, of course, where we skyped. We had a simple brunch with them as well as a small gift exchange. We did that same lesson with the Eggs there, and they seemed to enjoy it. We were there for a while, and we had just a simple day of celebration.

The 26th was also a really good day. We were with the Mühlmanns for almost the whole day. We had a turkey lunch with them and they gave both Elder Overall and I a nice tie and a Santa Räuchermännchen. After that, we just talked, relaxed, had a really good ice cream cake sort of desert, and then watched an old, cheesy, animated church film called the 4th wise man. You may have seen it before. 

Friday was kind of back to work, but still was a more relaxed day. We went to Darmstadt for district meeting, and we watched the mission Christmas DVD (a compilation the mission sends out of pictures taken by missionaries throughout the year) and traded gifts with each other. It was really fun, and afterwards, we went to lunch at Vapiano, which is definitely a place we need to eat when you guys pick me up. Later in the evening, we tried to go by on a less-active member in Walldorf, but he was not home.

On Saturday, we did part of our weekly planning, and then took a train to Götzenhain to try and get in touch with two older referrals that we don´t have contact with, but neither of them were home. After we got home, we had a lesson with Schwester Sonn, the less-active sister, and it went really well. We talked about Lot´s wife and how this new year is a great time to look forward and make a new beginning to reach new goals. Bruder Sauer, our ward mission leader, came with us. Afterwards, he took us back to the church and we coordinated missionary work with him there. 

Yesterday was a pretty good Sunday. Carlos came to church, which surprised us. Peter Rojas, our member translator, also was there again. We told him what had happened with Carlos, and he went and talked to Carlos and Schwester Murcia to see what the situation was. He came back up to us after church and said that Carlos never said that he didn´t want to meet or learn anymore, but just that he thought getting baptized on Jan. 4th was too fast and he wanted to know more first. So basically the guy that translated for us either didn´t understand what Carlos said or he changed it on purpose because he is not interested in religion and tried to sabotage us in a way. When we found that out, we were really happy that Carlos wanted to meet still, but were kind of angry that the translator had lied to us and also probably didn´t translate everything we tried to teach correctly. We have a lesson with him actually in a couple hours, and Peter will be there to translate everything correctly. We are just going to start over from the point we left off at when Peter was there the last time to make sure there is no confusion or false doctrine that was taught. Anyways, the rest of Sunday was good. We pretty much just had our studies and then tried to deliver some brownies, but no one was home. 

That is about it for the week. This week is going to be really awesome because we are teaching Carlos again and we have a ton of member appointments scheduled. Transfer calls are on Saturday, and there is a decent chance that I could get transferred, so if this is my last week in Langen, at least it will be a good one. I will let you know the results of transfer calls in my email next week.

I hope you have a great week and a happy new year!

LG, Daniel