The Miracle of Hot Chocolate

Before I forget, I want to tell you a quote that I heard from Elder Allison about Scotland: "If you don't like the weather in Scotland, blink twice and it changes." So true. Love it here.

Last P-day, I told you that I was going to a castle. We were going to go to Blackness Castle, but Brother McGowan got confused and told Sister McGowan the wrong directions and we ended up at Linlithgow Palace. That was cool. Wrong directions and still got to a sweet building. It was super old and super high and we ran up and down the stairs looking at stuff. If you get the chance, take a look at some pictures. I took some videos and pictures that I will put up when I figure out how. I wore my Team Amanda shirt as well. Gotta represent the Diabetes.

Later in the evening, they made us haggis dinners. Apparently everybody here makes it differently, but it was mash and veggies and then the haggis meat. It was pretty decent, mostly mixed in with everything else. They really like to mix their food here. Sometimes you'd get a bite of something hard in the haggis, but I'd just quickly swallow it and get more potatoes in the next bite.

Adam told me that I should write the things that we eat a lot here, so I will.

In our flat: quesadillas, pasta, and cereal. We love Iron Brew, which is a soda and the sugar free is really good. I absolutely love it and crave it throughout the day. We also love Dilute, which is squash stuff that you add to your water. It's sugar free and is delicious. Members always serve this and we have it at our flat as well. We drink it cold and hot with water from our kettle, which we love. We have a lot of Crunchy Nut cereal, because it's delicious. We eat a lot of carrots as well. So that's good. And Rhubarb Crumble, obviously. We eat lots of yoghurt.

At members’ homes: A lot of times they start out and feed you soup and then a meal. So either they have soup or salad (mostly like weeds but I still like it) and then always potatoes and usually some minced meat and veggies. One lady gave us ham and pineapple—that was good. They always do dessert as well, but I haven't figured out a "usual" dessert yet. Pudding, brownies, biscuits, donuts, they have it all.

Stuff they don't have here: Good cereal besides two kinds that I like. We have good cereal in America. Also peanut butter isn't as good here. It's okay, but definitely not as good. They don't have fruit snacks here, so I've been getting juice boxes to raise my sugar which is weird. I haven't seen any root beer or Dr. Pepper here, but who needs it when you've got Iron Brew? Those are the only things I can think of, but I'm sure I'll figure out more as time goes on.

We continued washing each other's hair in the beginning of the week. We didn't have enough money to top up our gas, so we just heated water in the kettle and then mixed it with cold water and washed our bodies and then would dump water on our heads to wash our hair. Hahaha. It was kind of miserable but so funny that it was a good experience. We figure we will be good moms now.

We were at District Meeting and I mentioned to Sister Vance that we didn't have any money (yes, I know, it was dumb of me but sometimes I talk before I think as we are all well aware) and she handed us £20 to get food and then Sister Brown took us into their kitchen and gave us tons of food. Talk about a tender mercy. We got all sorts of food to last through the week before yesterday when we could get more. Sister Brown and Sister Vance are so great.

We met with the guy who gave us his dog's card, K--. He is a solid guy. He says that he wants to learn and has an open mind, and I think he does. But he also kind of just wants to welcome us to the country. He is taking us out to lunch this next Saturday, which is fun. Another guy that Sister Rindlisbacher and I met on the street, S--, is taking us out to lunch tomorrow. Ha. It's like a date but with a companionship and instead of making date small talk, we're going to talk about Jesus! SWEET! Okay, anyway, K-- is awesome. We keep teaching him, but he is already set up to be baptized into the Church of Scotland on June 2. So we have a couple of weeks to try to change his mind!

We got W-- to set May 25 for a baptismal date, and I was so stoked about it!!! I don't know that it'll happen though. He hasn't been to church yet and won't come out to anything because of his health. He does say that he believes what we teach, but I'm not sure how much he is retaining. We had a really discouraging visit with him where he just talked and I'm starting to wonder how much he gets, but I am trying to keep a positive attitude. Once we get him at church ONCE, he will be hooked. We just can't get him to want to come enough to get down the stairs to the lift we've gotten for him and get to church. Can you tell I'm a bit frustrated with him? Ha. It's only because I love him so much and want him to make the covenants to get closer to God. He thinks he is on the downhill and might be either dying or have cancer. But then he also told me how to cure cancer if you do treatment at the proper time of day for our body clocks. He has all sorts of funny ideas about things. I love him though. And even if he doesn't get baptized, we have planted the seed that can be reaped in the spirit world. God knows what he is doing, and we just need to play our little part in the great scheme of life.

We met this sweet lady, F. S., who has been less active for a long time but was so sweet. She gave us a loaf of bread just because she thought we would need it. How sweet is that! She is so solid. She lives very near to our apartment, so that is great. I guess someone did something mean to her at church and so she doesn't come anymore. We literally have pages and pages and pages of less-actives in our area. Most have been offended over something someone else did to them. Moral of the story: People are not perfect. We can always choose to be offended. There is always something that will offend us. And sometimes people mean things offensively. We can't stop them. What we can do is change our attitude. If they say something that offends us because it's something that's wrong with us, we can choose to change that thing or brush it off. What we shouldn't do is jeopardize our relationship with God because of something as silly as our hurt feelings. Shpeal over, sorry. I just hate that people aren't coming to church :( It makes me sad for them.

We talked to this crazy lady who was baptized and then never came to church that much, I guess. She was nice but then when we started talking about religion she said she doesn't believe because when she did, she stopped using birth control and stopped wearing makeup (I guess she thought those were doctrines) and then she got pregnant but had a miscarriage. So she stopped believing in the God of the Mormons. Now she believes that pain and sickness and loneliness, along with good and health, come from God. She believes in praying to Heavenly Mother. She believes in all sorts of things. She's a bit nutty, but very nice and super fun to talk to.

On Friday, we went out to see Sister McF-- because she had been in the hospital. We ended up running into some members on our way to the bus, so they gave us a ride to her. She wasn't there (well, she was but she didn't make it to the door because she's sick) and so we ended up with a bunch of extra time that we weren't planning for. We didn't have enough time to do our backup (because that was on buses) and so we just said we would find in City Center on our way to a less-active in Camelon, D--. The problem was this: it was absolutely pouring rain. At that moment, we just wanted hot chocolate. We said that finding was the last thing we wanted to be doing. But then we decided to chuck our negative attitudes and be obedient. So we were! We had some very productive street contacts, and then we got to D--'s soaking wet. They had just pulled in and were thrilled to see us. L-- got us some towels and gave me a hair dryer for my hair (it was really wet.) They were so sweet. But then the miracle happened--hence the title of the e-mail. She offered us some Belgium Hot Chocolate. At that moment, I really do know the Lord had his hand in our lives. We had wanted hot chocolate but had chosen to be obedient, so he gave us a really sincere blessing. I know that sounds silly, but I almost cried when she offered. It was delicious, especially because we had obtained it obediently. Ah! D-- almost came to church, but then his hip replacement prevented him from it. It was awesome though.

C-- and M-- fed us lasagna which was delicious. She had decided to come to church again because some members had come to visit her! There was a world of difference in her between her not wanting to come at all and her deciding to come. She didn't come, and we don't know why, but she is on the right track, and we're thrilled about that. The work is moving forward, and I'm so happy that it is!!!

On Cinco De Mayo, the Falkirk Missionaries all wore blue--blue sweaters and blue ties. And Sister Nicoll and I ate rice and beans for dinner. Haha. The Scots don't know what Cinco De Mayo is, but they thought the blue sweaters were cute. And some Young Women in our ward made us necklaces out of daisies and dandelions. How sweet. We also went and taught K-- with Sister Kew, a member of our ward, right after church. After we taught him, she said I am a really good teacher, especially for not being out for very long! That made me feel so good. We also just barely met a man on the way to the library and he said, "You two are very confident, you must have been out for a long time." He was very surprised that I've only been out for a month. That made me feel so good. Tender mercy. God knows that I'm still scared and so He is sending me people to boost my spirits.

When we were in City Center finding with the elders on Saturday, they talked to this man for about 2 minutes and told him when church was. Anyway, he showed up!! We couldn't believe it!!! He said that he felt the Spirit and we're just all going to meet with him and take turns teaching him, I think. His name is V--r and he is so sweet. I'm so excited about him and the potential he has. He sat next to this forever-long investigator, A-- who is really enthusiastic but also kind of crazy. He claps and improvs his way through songs. He shouts "Amen!" and "Praise the Lord!" during church. He got up to play a piano song for his testimony until the Branch President stopped him. He is so funny.

For P-day yesterday, we went out to the Mission Home because Elder and Sister Rasmussen had a surprise birthday party! We had a little barbeque and we all did stuff for them. Sister Nicoll and I made up a little song about them to the tune of "Count Your Many Blessings." It was awesome and it was fun to just hang out. Then we got to stay in Edinburgh for the night and we went finding with the Corstorphine sisters. That was fun. And we got to stay in their super posh flat. They have 3 rooms, a kitchen, a huge study room, and a giant hallway. Whoa. It was sweet and it was fun to be with them.

We had Zone Meetings this morning. Some of the Elders were singing and asked me for help and it ended up being a little a capella thing of "How Great Thou Art" with me coming in on the 3rd and 4th verse with some improv piano stuff. It was so fun and they sounded awesome. We also talked about some new approaches to finding and that was helpful. We have a sweet zone. Crazy that moves call is coming this Sunday, when I get to talk to you all! So excited!

Okay, I realize that this e-mail is all over the place, but I wanted to end with this. We did this activity this week with some members, but Sister Nicoll had me do it first. We made 16 boxes. In the first four, she told me to put four people that I care about. In the second row, things I couldn't live without. Third row, things I want. Fourth row, life goals. Then, 3 at a time, she made me cross them off. It hurt crossing off things like, "Have a successful career" or "Having children." It was weird crossing off different names. But the final thing that was on my list was gaining celestial glory and living with God again. Although I had to cross off things like "Seeing my family" for things I want, my main goal is to live with God again! And when our priority is right and our main focus is to get there, giving up seeing my family for 18 months doesn't seem so tough. Because I will get to live with you for forever!! I love that. Thinking about that makes me very happy.

The Church is true! I know it is!

Love,

Sister Ricks