The Polar Express‏

Zdrastvuitye!

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and that you're fasting earnestly to make room for the upcoming New Year's feast. (Just kidding, don't do that). This week was a blast, but along with the "blast-ness" came a lot of running around like chickens with our heads cut off. At the beginning of the week Sister Warnick and I had exchanges in Toliatti before our Christmas Zone Conference. We woke up nice and early on Tuesday morning, took a fast train to Samara, bought our bus tickets to Toliatti, and then finished our traveling adventure with a 2 hour bus ride. Great fun! 

Some areas in the mission definitely struggle a lot more than others, Toliatti is one of those areas, so the duration of our 2 day stay in Toliatti consisted of contacting, contacting, and contacting. A few days prior to our arrival, there was about 2 feet of snow on the ground. When we finally got there, it had been raining nonstop for a couple of days and all of that snow melted. I thought that the super glue that I used to fix my boots had been working up to that point. After wading through 2-feet deep puddles for 2 days straight, it was evident that the super glue didn't glue squat. I had a really great time in Toliatti though. It was fun to switch roles and be the Sister that guides the younger missionaries instead of the one looking up at all of the old Sisters. Kinda strange now that I think about it.

Christmas Conference was so great! Over the past couple of weeks Sister Warnick and I have been trying to hunt down some Christmas Sweaters to wear to the Conference. After much searching, we finally found a couple that we fell in love with! Sister Warnick's has a picture of Santa Clause on it and there's a pom pom at the end of his hat, but her hair's always covering it so you can't really tell that it's there. My sweater has a reindeer on it that I named Voldemort because it doesn't have a nose. His little scarf isn't attached, so it just does it's thing. Our sweaters were a hit at the Conference! Everyone thought they were hilarious!

The Conference itself was amazing! I'm not going to go into detail about everything that was discussed because that would take until next Christmas to go over every topic. There was a part in the Conference where we talked about Sacrifice a little bit and I really liked this quote: "The Seals in the Navy, the Green Berets in the Army, the Blackbelts in Karate, etc. are seen as being elite because of the hard work that they put in and the sacrifices that they have made to get to where they are. All of the tribulations that we face and all of the sacrifices that we make give us more zeal and make us more elite in the eyes of God." Just store that in your little memory box and pull it out when you're going through a particularly hard time in your life.

Shout out to Sister Schwab. She is literally the best! Every year for Christmas Conference she takes it upon herself to make us all a home cooked Christmas Dinner. At every Christmas Conference prior to this one, she has prepared a Christmas ham with potatoes, carrots, rolls, etc. This year, however, due to the sanctions, there was not a Christmas ham to be found in all of Russia. Since Mexican food is a not typically a common thing to find in Russia unless you want a guarunteed stomach worm, Sister Schwab put together a Mexican food feast! She made chicken enchilladas, beef tacos, chips and salsa, the works! It was super good. It's been over a year since I've had any sort of Mexican food aside from a makeshift cheese quesadilla, so it was a great surprise. Sister Schwab was also determined that we have a great Christmas breakfast, so she gave everyone a baggie of pancake mix and ordered us all individual bottles of mapeline from Amazon so that we could make maple syrup! Sister Schwab is the sweetest! 

I think the funniest part about Christmas conference was actually the bus ride back to Samara. Typically, the office will order a big chartered bus to take us all back to Samara, but I guess it was cheaper to order two small ones, so that's what they did. There were 15 seats in the bus and 16 bodies, so the Elders had to take turns sitting and standing so that no one would have to stand for the entire 2 hour ride. One Elder took it upon himself to carry every single Christmas package on his lap, so he basically volunteered himself to get smashed to death. And that's basically what happened. No pity. 

Since we got all of our Christmas packages at Christmas Conference, Sister Warnick and I decided to open our gifts on the train ride back to Penza. We turned our little coupe into a little slice of the Polar Express. There was candy, wrapping paper, gift bags, presents, pajamas, and decorations literally all over everything! The conductor looked a little bit thrown off when she saw all of our stuff everywhere. Whatevs. Christmas cheer! 

After we got back from Christmas Conference, we got to Skype our families! Always an adventure. Super weird that this was my last Skype before I go home. Time flies! Anyways, that night our Ward had a Christmas party and it was hilarious! The Primary acted out the Nativity and the kid who played Joseph was yelling at the 3 Wise Men to give him money... oh children. It turned out really well though and quite a few less actives showed up, so that was a plus!

Welp, that's all for this week folks! Have a great New Year Celebration! Eat some Mexican food and wear festive clothing!

Do Svidanya!

Love,

Sister Megan Wagstaff

Merry Chrismilk!‏

Zdrastvuitye!

MERRY CHRISTMAS ONE AND ALL!!! Unless you live in Russia, in which case your Christmas isn't until January 7th. Sorry. For the first time in a long time, Sister Warnick and I have finally had a normal week on the mission. No traveling, no exchanges, no unnecessary stress. That all ends tomorrow. We will be getting up at 4 in the morning tomorrow to catch a train to Samara and from there we'll take a bus to Toliatti (about 2 hours) for exchanges. On Thursday we'll have Christmas Conference in Toliatti, ride the bus back to Samara, and then take a train back to Penza on Christmas Day. Phew! Should be a fun one. 

On to this week's activities! First of all, Sister Warnick and I had an unfortunate run-in with not one, but two consecutive bottles of sour milk. On Monday, we had been looking forward to ending the night with some cookies and milk, as you do, since we had spent a majority of the day literally hiking through the snow. Every once in a while our milk will start to separate as it sits in our fridge, but normally it's not that big of a deal. As we eagerly poured ourselves some mugs of milk at the end of the day, we noticed that the proportion of cream to milk was at a pretty disturbing ratio. Determined to enjoy my evening snack, I dunked my cookie into the mug and pulled out a cream-soaked pile of mush. Trying not to phase myself out by the slimy chunks of cream dripping off of my cookie, I took the tiniest nibble to test out the waters. Let's just say, this was a cookie that not even the Cookie Monster would want. Flushed that down the sink real quick. Thankfully we had another bottle of milk waiting in the fridge, so we whipped that guy out. A little hesitant to have a replay of the event that had just transpired, I poured the smallest amount of milk into my mug and tested the waters once again. Aside from actual vomit, I've never tasted anything so closely reminiscent of throw-up than this tiny sample of milk. Needless to say, we didn't get to enjoy our cookies and milk that night.

On the flip side, since I missed my baby Sister's Sweet 16 on the 19th, I decided to open up one of the presents that my family sent me (probably meant to be saved for Christmas) to celebrate her birthday! Upon tearing open the wrapping paper and seeing a box of Keebler Jif cookies inside, my companion and I immediately commenced in consuming the entire package. So good! Those cookies were literally sent from above. That definitely made up for the rancid milk and cookies incident. Hands down. 

Oh man, my winter boots are struggling. For the past month or so my boots have been trying so hard to rip apart at the seams, but I refuse to buy more boots since I only have a little over 2 months left on my mission. I have tested out many methods to keep them from getting any worse, and at this point not much is working. A couple of days ago I bought a small container of super glue and emptied the entire thing along the seams of my boots. Seems to be working... kinda. My feet are a little moist at the moment, but nothing I can't endure for the next couple of months. I would much rather have to reapply a layer of superglue to my feet every other week or so, than buy a pair of boots that I probs wouldn't even take home. But who knows. Maybe I'll cave. 

Aight, enough of that. So, one of the less actives that Sister Thomas (the younger) and I had started to meet with fairly regularly finally moved. She refused to meet with us for about a month because she was too busy getting all of her stuff together. Thankfully she gave us her new address and she still lives in our area, but we absolutely cannot find her house! I don't think the address that she gave us was fake, because you can find the street on the map, but we have been hardcore struggling to find her apartment building. On our first quest to find her place of residence, it was full on blizzarding outside. Guess how long we trekked through the snow trying to track her down? Yep... 3 and a half hours. Guess who still doesn't know where she lives? Us. I have never been so physically exhausted after a day of tracting in my entire life. A few days later, Sister Warnick and I decided that we would use another chunk of open time during the day to man-hunt her. 2 hours later, and still no luck. We will find her! Hide your kids, hide your wife! Once the missionaries know where you live, there's no running.

Sister Warnick and I saw an amazing, unexpected miracle this week! There is less active couple that lives in our area that all of my previous companions and I have tried stopping by, but they were never home! Sister Warnick and I felt prompted that we should drop by with a Christmas Liahona to see if they were around for once. As we approached their building, a couple of old people opened the front door and we distantly followed behind them as we made our way up the staircase to their apartment. It wasn't until we were physically in front of the apartment door that we realized we had been following the couple that we were looking for! That was a little bit awkward because the wife kept turning around to look at us as we trekked up the stairs. Whatever. Had we showed up even 30 seconds later than we had, they wouldn't have answered their door (they never do), and had we showed up 30 seconds earlier, they wouldn't have been home. We ended up having a good lesson with them... well... kinda good. The husband, Vladimir, occupies his free time with reading books about how you can heal your body with a positive attitude, so he spent the first 40 minutes of the lesson reading snippets from the books to us. Good times. After that, we talked about the importance of prayer, scripture study, and coming to church, all of which they do minus coming to church. They committed to come to church on Sunday, but they never showed up. Bummer. They will come eventually. I know it!

Welp, that's all for this week folks! I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas Celebration! Check your milk before you dunk and superglue your feet!

Do Svidanya!

Love,

Sister Megan Wagstaff

PoPo Date

Zdrastvuitye!

This has got to be one of the most exhausting weeks ever! This week was jam packed with waking up early, traveling, and stress. My favorite combination! I had a blast though. Lots of memories were made. 

Before all of the stress of the week happened, Sister Warnick and I had a lesson with a crazy investigator named Olga, with Baba Katia (the old lady who yelled at me for falling down the stairs) as our member help. Let's just say that there was a little bit too much crazy going on in the lesson. Baba Katia... bless her soul. I love that lady so much, but she is just so old, she doesn't really think straight anymore. Oh yeah, before I talk about the lesson... Sister Warnick and I went over to Baba Katia's house last night and she was straight up peeing in her bathroom with the door wide open when we came in her front door. She started laughing hysterically and told me to close the door. Yikes. Anyways... This investigator is known for being a tad on the looney side. She randomly gives out big hunks of cash to people like candy and always dies laughing at inappropriate times during church. Nice. She was actually the normal one on the lesson for once. We decided to teach Olga about the Restoration using a bunch of pictures that correspond with each part of the lesson. There are words written on the back of each picture as teaching helps and to help the investigator understand what is being taught. Every. single. time. we would discuss a part of the lesson and then hand Olga the corresponding cutout, Baba Katia would rip it out of her hand while Olga was reading the back and demand to look at the picture on the front. Olga literally almost jumped out of her seat from fear after Baba Katia snatched a picture from her fingers. *Face palm. Unfortunately, Olga has no desire to be baptized, but I think if we keep moving through the lessons really slowly, making sure that she understands everything, she'll come around.

Sooo... the Visa Trip to Kazakhstan. 'Twas an interesting one, that is for sure. Here's the rundown on what happened. Sister Warnick and I woke up at 4am on Tuesday morning and took a train to Samara. We did lots of contacting around Avrora that night. Around 7 in the morning on Wednesday, Sister Thomas (the older) and I got in a surprisingly fancy mini bus and started our 3 hour drive to Kazakhstan. Probably one of the most boring, dragged-on experiences of my life. I think I like flying to Latvia better than driving to Kazakhstan, but it was still a good adventure. Once we drove out of the city, literally all we saw was dirt, dirt, dirt, and, oh... I almost forgot... dirt. No buildings, no civilization, not a lot of cars, just Russian countryside. It was actually really pretty, but it looked very reminiscent of the drive from Boise to Logan... Not that cool. There were only 7 missionaries in the van, but it was a really fun group! The ride consisted of occasional sleeping, eating, and chatting, but not much else. There was some nice Russian folk music playing in the background which added some spice to the ride. Not. I am so grateful that I don't get carsick because I think I would have died! I couldn't even really study because it was too bumpy to read the words in my books. We got to the Kazakhstan border around 10 in the morning and had to go through a couple of Border Control stations before actually crossing into Kazakhstan. Nothing too scary. We were still in the middle of nowhere, so I don't actually know what Kazakhstan looks like. After finally entering Kazakhstan, we turned the van right back around, and crossed the border again. This is where things got a little hairy. After we had our Passports stamped and received our migration cards, a couple of Elders decided that they were going to go search for a bathroom in a restricted building, so we all got pulled in to the coppers office after they got caught. Great. Thank you Elders. We were all pretty terrified at first, but it just turned into a big joke after that. Then it got scary again when the police pulled each of us individually into their office to be questioned. I was shaking a little bit when they called me in, but "flirt to convert" is a real phrase, my friends. They asked me questions like where I was living in Russia, why I was here, where I live in America (so sorry family if you get a pleasant visit from the Russian Mafia), what my phone number is, etc. I tried to play it as cool as possible and by the end we were all laughing and joking about iPhones and politics. Living the dream. Unfortunately no baptismal dates were set, but one of the police men wanted to set up a dinner date. Hard pass on that one. By the end of all of that, we had spent about 4 hours total at the Kazakhstan border. Fun. The ride back to Samara was about as eventful as the ride to Kazakhstan, except that there was a huge car accident on a very congested bridge, so we got home about 2 hours later than expected. We didn't make it back in time for the train that Sister Warnick and I were supposed to take back to Penza, but it all worked out okay. 

The next morning Sister Warnick and I had to get up at 4am to get to the train station on time. Everything went smoothly and we were both exhausted by the time we got settled in our coupe. About 2 hours in to our 7 hour train ride, a random lady showed up at our door and said that we had ordered food along with our tickets. Cool. Then she said some confusing things that I didn't understand and then she left. A couple hours later, I was literally starving and I was determined to figure out where to get this promised food. I kept getting whiffs of food from the hallway, so I was under the impression that I would have to get my food somewhere out there. I grabbed my comp and we started down the hall. Not looking where I was going (as usual) my foot got caught in the cord of an extension cord that was sicking out of the wall and everything that was attached to it came plummeting towards my body. I got karate-chopped in the ankle by two charging cellphones and a speaker that was playing music until I tripped on it... I was so terrified that I had just broken everything since the annyoing music that was coming from the speaker stopped as soon as it hit me. The owners poked their heads out of their coupes and just beckoned us to go away. Super embarassing. Thankfully we heard the irritating music turn back on after about 15 minutes, so we know that the speaker resurrected. After all of that happened and we still didn't have any food, I thought that maybe we'd physically have to go to the restaraunt car to get our food. Don't ever to that. It was super sketchy getting over the platforms connecting one train car to the next and the train conductor gave me a very confuzed, dirty look when we came back into our car. At that point, Sister Warnick and I came to the conclusion that we just weren't going to get our food and we moved on. Yeah, later on our food was delivered to us about 10 minutes before we got to Penza, so there was definitely some sort of miscommunication there. Oh well, we got our food and no one died, so all is well!

Welp, that's all for this week folks! Make sure you flirt with Government Officials if there is a possibility that you could be thrown in jail! Have a great week!

Do Svidanya!

Love, 

Sister Megan Wagstaff

Sleeping Bag Savior

Zdrastvuitye!

Transfer calls are in! I have 3 pieces of news, each varying in importance. First off, I'm staying in Penza with little Sister Warnick for another cycle! Yay! By the end of this cycle, I will have lived in Penza for 5 cycles (about 7.5 months). That's quite a while, but I love Penza with all of my heart and soul, so I'm fine with that. That seems to be a trend in Penza for some reason. There's always one Sister that ends up staying here for a million years whilst cycling through companions. That would be me. Sister Warnick and I just deep cleaned and rearranged our apartment to our liking, so I was actually really relieved that I would be staying. I've definitely nested, that's for sure.

Second item of news, I am now the Sister Training Leader over the Kazan and Toliyatti areas... for now. This morning I was informed that they might be giving Kazan over to the Sister Training Leader in Samara and I would be adopting a different area into my stewardship, but we'll see. For now, this is how it is, and I am pumped! Sister Thomas is still in Kazan, and Sister Warnick's companion from the MTC has taken Sister Wilson's place in the tri-panionship in Kazan, so both of us will be sad for a little while if we don't get to go on exchanges with the Kazan sisters, but life goes on either way.

Third item of news... Please forget all of the release dates that I have sent you prior to this email. When Sister Warnick and I received our transfer call, I had my actual release date cleared up as a result of the following piece of news. FINAL PIECE OF NEWS. So... I kind of accidentally got my extension... emphasis on the "kind of." I didn't officially get my extension, but here's the story: In the coming months, the MTC is going to start keeping the English speaking missionaries in the MTC for a longer period of time. As a result of this, the group of missionaries that will be coming to our mission at the beginning of the year will arrive a week later than anticipated, which means my last cycle will be a 7 week cycle instead of a 6. I'm still not really sure how all of those things correlate, but they do somehow... so that's how it is. Considering that my original release date added an extra two weeks onto my mission, this additional week will make me 6 days short of serving a 19 month mission. Pretty cool. My release date is March 7th, whereas my previous one was March 1st. This news came as a pretty big shock. I know it's only a week, but it was very unanticipated, that's for sure. I am excited about it though! I guess the Lord thought that I needed to get my extension after all:)

So... On a cold and snowy night with no lessons ahead of us, Sister Warnick and I decided to stop by good old Baba Katia's place (the crazy lady that yelled at us for laughing at her singing) and have a little family home evening with her. The lesson went as expected; lots of constrained laughing during the Hymns, and an intense interpretation of Lehi's Dream: Baba Katia Edition. At the end of the lesson, Baba Katia gave us some tea and candy and sent us on our way. At the top of the staircase on her floor, in the process of turning to give Baba K a final wave goodbye, I twisted my ankle on the top step and sent myself plummeting down the stairs. I have never flown (or stumbled, rather) down a set of stairs so quickly in my entire life. I kind of blacked out for a couple of seconds in the middle of it all, but I just remember waking up laying flat on my side with my legs in the air. The only thing that kept me from breaking my arm or dislocating my shoulder was my poofy, fat, sleeping-bag coat. I ended up on the landing beheath where I fell and when I looked up at Sister Warnick, she was literally dying laughing. I heard a pair of legs bolt down the staircase above us and this random fellow peeked his head around the corner and died laughing as well. At that point I was laughing my head off because I was so confused about what had just happened, so I bet the kid was thinking, "Wow, that girl must be hammered." Then, a wild Baba Katia appears. She stood next to Sister Warnick and literally started yelling at me for falling down the stairs. Thank you Baba Katia. I do not recollect this part at all, but Sister Warnick told me that I literally slammed my body into the mailboxes at the bottom of the staircase and ricocheted onto the floor in an intensely dramatic manner. Somehow my legs ended up in a "sticking up" position, not really sure how. That's great. So graceful. No permanent damage was done. My ankle still hurts a bit a week later, but I'm totally fine. Just call me Grace.

It has been 6 months since my last Visa Trip, so guess what I have this week? Mhmm... my final Visa Trip! Yay! This one is slightly unusual though... actually... very unusual. Guess where I will be going for my Visa Trip? You won't be able to guess. We're going to Kazakhstan. Guess how we're getting there? By plane? Nope. Train? Nope. Mini bus? Yep. Bright and early Wednesday morning, me and all of the Visa Trippers will be loading onto a mini bus, taking a 2 and a half hour mini bus ride across the border into Kazakhstan, getting our Passports stamped, and then turning right back around. Sounds pretty ghetto... but I am excited out of my mind. President has sent out about 3 test groups to make sure that this method of "Visa Tripping" is safe, and no one has gotten thrown in jail or died, so it shouldn't be too sketchy. Should be an adventure, that's for sure. 

I want to share a quote with all of you that I have been thinking about nonstop for the past few weeks. I'm sure it originates from somewhere other than where I heard it, but nonetheless, I love it. Sister Warnick and I were watching some Mormon Messages a little while ago and somebody in one of the videos said, "God gives the toughest battles to His strongest soldiers." I'm not going to elaborate on this quote too much because I want you to apply this quote to yourselves. But anytime you are going through a trial or situation that seems too hard for you, or anyone else, to bear, just remember that Heavenly Father knows you and He knows that you can handle it. I would much rather experience a life of trials knowing that I am a soldier in the eyes of Heavenly Father, than coasting through life without any knowledge of why things are the way they are. You are soldiers! 

Welp, that's all for this week folks! Watch your step and take a road trip into a wierd country on a tiny bus!  

Do Svidanya!

Love,

Sister Megan Wagstaff

Thank You, Technology

Zdrastvuitye!

This week has got to be one of the most interesting ones that I've had on my mission. It was one of the funnest, most adventurous weeks, but in the most unexpected ways.
First off... Kazan! The plane ride to Kazan was one of the most unanticipated adventures of the entire week! First of all, I didn't even know that there was an airport in Penza because of how small the city is, so I spent about 20 minutes scanning our giant map with squinted eyes trying to find a tiny airplane-shaped icon that indicates where the airport is. After discovering that it would take at least an hour and a half, probs two hours, to get there by bus, we opted to taking a taki there instead. It took about 45 minutes to taxi to the airport and I hardly recognized it as an airport when we got there. It was PUNY! It definitely isn't an internation airport, that's for sure. The building was the size of a large two-story American home and the waiting area was about the size of a 2 car garage. Cozy! After Sister Warnick and I went through security, we were expecting to be escorted onto a decent sized airplane... nope! We watched this tiny nugget of a plane land on the strip and scoot to the terminal. It was the smallest plane I have ever laid eyes on. After seeing the exterior, I was pretty terrified to see the interior of the plane; I was expecting the seats to be something equivalent to lawn chairs strapped to the floor with some rope and staples. Upon entering this mini 8 passenger airplane, I was pleasantly surprised to discover that it was actually REALLY nice inside. I felt like I was in a fancy private plane, except that you couldn't stand up all the way inside. No complaints though. The ride was smooth, no turbulence, and we actually got to Kazan earlier than expected. The ride was a little under an hour and a half long, so it wasn't dreadfully boring. I am so grateful to have had that experience. It was a blast and Sister Warnick and I had the time of our lives!

After we landed in Kazan, it took another hour long taxi ride to get to the apartment in Kazan. If you haven't Googled what Kazan looks like, do it, but that is completely irrelevant to everything because the area that the Kazan Sisters live in looks pretty reminiscent of Penza. The further you go to the outskirts of cities, no matter how beautiful the city is, the more poopy and boring it gets. We didn't see anything too breathtaking on the ride. The coolest thing that we saw on the way was this huge soccer arena with one of the outer walls made out of a gigantic movie screen. That was cool. Sister Thomas and I had such a sweet reunion when we were finally reunited for the first time in almost a month. I missed that goob so much! It was also fun to see Sister Wilson. She's actually finishing her mission in a week, so it was great to talk to her and hear about all of her plans for "the after life." That'll be me before you know it! Anyways, I don't have a whole lot to talk about regarding our experience in Kazan. Sister Warnick and I worked with Sister Wilson the first night and we met with a super sweet member family. I worked with Sister Thomas and her other companion Sister Nelson the second day and we visited a couple of investigators; both of which are preparing to get baptized very soon, so I was really grateful to have had the opportunity to help teach them before baptism!

Unfortunately, the only return flight back to Penza happened to be on Wednesday, so we were only able to spend one full day in Kazan, but nonetheless it was a blast. All of the Kazan sisters have super blonde, straight hair, Sister Warnick has super blonde, straight hair, and I have crazy brown, curly hair, so of course we had to take a picture of all of the blondies surrounding my curly head before we left. I looked like a black sheep lost in a field of golden wheat. On Wednesday morning Sister Warnick and I boarded our classy 8 passenger plane and flew back to good old Penza.

The next day was a pretty unusual one, that's for sure. It happened to be Thanksgiving, but neither of us remembered that until the next day... didn't even celebrate it. Anyways, everything started off pretty normally. We got up and did some contacting, came home and did studies, and then we commenced in our weekly planning session. Later in the afternoon a HUGE blizzard blew into town. As we were finishing up our planning session, I called a member and set up a lesson with her family and then our phone randomly stopped working. Any time I tried to call or text somebody, a little message saying, "Emergency Calls Only," would pop up and I couldn't do anything. I thought that the blizzard must have knocked over a phone tower or something, so we just waited it out. We aren't allowed to leave the apartment without our phone, so I had to somehow figure out how to cancel our lesson for the night without a cellphone. Great. I ended up having to call back the member from our dinky little fax machine phone and we spent the rest of the night hiding indoors from the blizzard. After calling our District Leader about 20 million times from our fax machine phone, he finally answered and we were able to get the phone-fixing process started. Turns out, it was actually the SIM card that bummed out, not a tower. We tried many methods to get the phone fixed with no success, so we ended up having to go a couple of days without a phone before everything got resolved. Thankfully we were able to go out and work, we just had to be extra careful since we didn't have a working phone. I am grateful for modern technology and that I don't have to use a tiny, baby, fax machine phone to make calls from. How missionaries survived without cellphones, I haven't a clue.
Funny story! So, probably none of you remember this story from the beginning of my mission, but I got a call not too long ago that forced me to reminisce this experience. Read it and then I will elaborate:
 Oct 27, 2014 "[O]ur air conditioner broke at like 5 o'clock in the morning one day. I don't know why my companion, Sister Johnson, had it on in the winter, but she did. Anyways, she turned it on when it had been snowing outside and it started making dripping noises. We thought it was like an animal or something because of how quiet it was. Then the AC full-on started dumping water onto Sister Johnson's bed. Seriously so funny. It stopped waterfalling when we turned it off but it was making horrible crackling noises for the rest of the night. So great. Also, all of the lights in our apartment except for two tiny ones decided to go out. it was the strangest thing. When the landlord came to look at the lights, he got all mad because apparently we're not supposed to have the AC on in the winter... probs broke it forever."
So... yeah... we did break it forever. I got a call from one of our office Elders a couple of months ago asking about what happened with the air conditioner since I had lived in that apartment before. Apparently the Sisters in the Avrora apartment had been sleeping on the floor in a different room with a working air conditioner all throughout the summer because it was too hot for them to sleep in the bedroom with the air conditioner that Sister Johnson and I wrecked. I couldn't even hold a normal conversation with the office Elder because I was busting up laughing the entire time thinking back to when this happened. I never thought that experience would come back to haunt me almost a year later. Lesson learned. Always tell somebody when you break something, and don't turn on the AC in the winter.
Oh yeah, Sister Warnick and I contacted, or rather, got contacted by, a couple of Protestant missionaries this week. They were on their way to a service project somewhere and they heard our weird accents and saw that we were talking about the gospel with a lady on the street, so they interrupted our conversation to talk to us. They ended up being super nice and really respectful, but one of them was getting a little too close to Sister Warnick. Hard pass. They invited us to their church and we invited them to ours. It's always interesting to see missionaries from other churches. I sometimes forget that there are more churches than just the Mormons and the Russian Orthodox.
Sister Warnick and I saw some amazing miracles this week! One of the less actives that we tried to meet with ended up bailing on us earlier in the week, so we decided to drop by another less active that lived close by and say, "Hi!" When we got to her apartment, she couldn't get her own front door open and we heard the voice of a man behind the door egging her on. She lives alone, so we were pretty freaked out by that. When we finally got in, turns out, the guy that was in there was another less active that we've been searching for for months. All of the members of his family are members of the church, and we've been stopping by week after week trying to get in with no luck. He just so happened to be over at this less active's house to help her move. Such a miracle! We were able to have a really great gospel discussion with both of them and I could tell that they both felt the spirit. Also, a random less active decided to show up to church on Sunday, so that was great too.
Welp, that's all for this week folks! Hug your modern technologies and don't break things!

Do Svidanya!
Love,

Sister Megan Wagstaff

Party Potatoes and Planes

Zdrastvuitye!

This week has been a pretty crazy one, that's for sure! Lots of traveling, cooking, and illnesses have ensued over these past 7 days. The weather has certainly jumped on board with the craziness. It has been blizzarding pretty much all week long and we had about 6 inches of snow on the ground for a while. As of two days ago, we've been hit by a pretty big rainstorm, so all the snow is gone now. Sad, but fortunately Russia is known for it's snowy winters, so it'll be back before we know it!

On Thursday, our Zone had Zone Training! Woop, woop! Which means that Sister Warnick and I got to hop on a train and head to good old Samara on Wednesday. The 7 hour train ride was actually really great. I usually just sleep for half of the ride and then stare out the window for the other half. Occasionally I'll whip out my scriptures to seem like I'm being productive, but this last train ride was a pretty intense study sesh. I got a lot done and I learned a lot from them Holy Scriptures. Zone Training was great as well! President Schwab talked a lot about casting out discouragement and the Zone Leaders talked about confidence; two considerably conflicting topics, but they merged together really well. Spiritual upliftment was attained. That same day, Sister Warnick and I hopped on another train and went back to good old Penza. Before going into the train station, we decided to stop by a KFC that was adjacent to the station and pick up some lunch. So good! There was some kind of scary evacuation thing going down at the train station, so Sister Warnick and I just hung out in KFC for a while. I have no idea what was going on but there were policemen everywhere, all of the people inside the building were being ushered to stand behind a barrier of policemen, and there were some firetrucks as well. Pretty weird. Everything was cleared up by the time we finished eating, so I don't think it was anything too serious. Strange, that's for sure. 

I'm not really sure why, but our Ward has a knack for celebrating holidays a week earlier than they're supposed to be celebrated. Which means, Thanksgiving is already said and done in Penza. Our Ward had a Thanksgiving Party on Friday, and I placed upon myself the responsibility of making as many dishes as humanly possible in a space of 3 hours. There is one day set aside each week where we have 3 hours to plan for and discuss all of our investigators, less actives, members, and potential investigators. During that three hour period, we did all of the items listed above, with the addition of me cooking like a frantic caterer. My companion can't cook squat, so I was running around like a turkey with my head cut off trying to get everything ready. Three hours is not enough time to make Thanksgiving dinner, my friends. Not enough. I did manage to make a big old pot of mashed potatoes (the biggest hit with the crowd), some apple crisp, and a pan of banana bread (also a huge hit). My companion was great at encouraging me and testing the food. The activity ended up being super fun! There was a cute skit about gratitute, a few talks about Thanksgiving, and karaoke of course. I'm glad that we decided to bring food, because there wouldn't have been a lot of options without our addition. The Elders tried, but they made some bread sticks that tasted pretty reminiscent of glue. They did their best!

This weekend has been one of the strangest ones that I've had on my mission. I woke up on Saturday morning with a pretty intense pain in my stomach. Sister Warnick and I went out and contacted in the morning, as usual, but it didn't go away. I ate a little bit for breakfast hoping that it would clear up, but it didn't. We ended up having to spend the day inside because I felt like a moldy sack of potatoes for the remainder of the day. Fast forward to the next day, I woke up feeling fine, still a little weird, but great as a whole. I looked over at Sister Warnick after waking up and she was clutching her stomach. Uh oh. She was feeling worse than I did the day before, so she just went back to sleep. We had to miss church because she could barely move. A few hours later she got up to try and eat some food, and ended up throwing up a few times before she could even get settled at the table. Yikes. Thankfully the Elders were able to give us blessings last night and now we are doing great! We think the KFC came back around to kick us in the butt. Who knows!

It is great that we are doing great now because... guess what??... we are FLYING to Kazan for exchanges today! Yay! I went to Kazan a little over a year ago (what?) with Sister Johnson for exchanges when I was still being trained, so I am beyond excited to go back! I cannot even describe how beautiful Kazan is, so just Google it and you'll understand. Kazan is super far away from Penza; I'm talking a 12 hour bus ride away from Penza. We were originally going to have to take 2 buses to get there, total travel time equaling about 12-13 hours, but we got a call from the Assistants a few days ago saying that we would be flying instead! The flight will only be about an hour and a half long, but I'm interested to see what kind of tiny Russian plane we will be flying in to get there... Shall be interesting... I am literally so PUMPED to see Sister Thomas in Kazan! I miss my old baby so much! It will be a grand reunion for sure!

So... the extension news! This is President Schwab's response to my extension request: "Regarding your question about an extension, 18 months from your MTC entry date of August 13, 2014 would be February 13, 2016. Your current release date is March 1, 2016, which is already 16 days past the 18 month mark. Because of that, I don't think we will be able to extend. I compliment you on wanting to serve longer. However, as the Brethren have said, we should have as much faith in accepting our release date as we do in accepting our beginning date. We love you and appreciate all you are doing. Work your hardest and spring to the finish!" I kind of had a feeling that this is how it would turn out, but I am not sad about it! I already get an extra two weeks on my mission, so I'll take that as my "extension" and run with it. Since my release day is March 1st, I celebrated my "100 Days Left" mark a bit too early. Whoops! As of today, I have 99 days left, so it should have been celebrated yesterday, but considering the condition of our stomaches, Sister Warnick and I will not be recelebrating it today... or ever.

Welp, that's all for this week folks! Make lots of food for Thanksgiving and don't eat any Russian KFC.

Do Svidanya!

Love,

Sister Megan Wagstaff

Prophecies and Photos

Zdrastvuitye!

Let's just get the biggest news out in the open. On Sunday, I was blessed to be able to watch, via Skype, the organization of the Saratov Russia Stake! This event has definitely been one of the most cherished highlights of my mission. What a great blessing this is for Saratov, this Mission, and all of Russia! The creation of the Saratov Stake will bless the people of this entire Mission, and this entire country. The future creation of a Stake in Samara, which will just as surely come, will also do so. Here are a few comments that President Schwab made concerning the organization of the Stake: 

"Watching this Stake be organized today made me realize how many people have contributed to it over the years. For 25 years, missionaries in Russia have labored, slowly building up the Church to where it has a strong enough foundation to support the growth which will come. We have often mentioned that the same thing happened in Brazil, where missionaries labored for 30 years, slowly building the Church member by member, and Branch by Branch until enough of a foundation was in place to sustain the incredible growth that suddenly exploded there. Now, there are about 1.3 million members, 34 Missions, and 6 temples in Brazil! 

A Prophet of God has indicated that 'Russia is the next Brazil.' It is interesting to note that we are actually ahead of Brazil's pace, and have more baptisms in our first 25 years than they did in their first 30. But it is not a numerical contest or a race, and we will keep working until the Lord causes such an 'explosion' to also occur in Russia."

This "explosion" is going to happen before we know it! I am so excited to see what the Lord has in store for this Mission and for this Country! Countless miracles have already come to pass in such a short amount of time and I am confident that they won't be stopping anytime soon. Support and sustain the Saratov Russian Stake and pray for a Stake in Samara!

Speaking of new, I have two large, considerably contradictory items of news that I thought I should share with you! First off, at the beginning of last week I called up my Mission President and submitted for an extension on my mission. A mission extension is only an added 30 days on my mission, so it isn't anything too long. Without regard to the extension, if the remaining transfers on my mission play out as normal, my release date will be somewhere around February 23rd. My Mission President told me that it is very rare, if not impossible, to have an extension granted, but if it is, I would be returning home around March 23rd (my birthday!!). I have pondered and prayed about extending my mission for quite some time now and the Spirit has confirmed, multiple times, that this is what I need to do. If it isn't granted, which is what President Schwab warned me will likely happen, I can walk away knowing that everything worked out the way that the Lord wanted it to. I am completely comfortable with whatever happens.

The other piece of contradictory news is that (if my extension isn't granted) I hit my "100 Days Left on My Mission" mark a few days ago! If I find out that I did, in fact, receive the extension, I will be recelebrating this milestone in another 30 days. Sister Warnick and I went all out to celebrate the occasion; I even made a cheesy sign out of pictures from the Liahona to commemorate the event. We basically turned the entire day into a photoshoot and I took goofy pictures with this sign along with my favorite foods, infront of random objects, with my companion, at McDonalds, with other signs, with literally everything. It made contacting go by a lot faster and we had a blast! We'll see whether or not I get to recelebrate this day! 

Let's talk about the weather for a sec. I have never gotten so wet in my entire life! It was pouring rain for the first half of the week, which means... mud. Lots of mud. More than a handful of times, Sister Warnick and I would be walking down the street and then "FOOOSHHHH," a car would drive through a puddle and soak us from head to foot. Multiple times, my friends. After about 4 days of rain, there was one solid day that was as cold as death. No nose drippage there because everything freezes immediately up in your nostrils. As of two days ago, it has been snowing nonstop. It is blizzarding outside as I type this. I'm looking at it through a library window this very second as I type this sentence. Yep, there it is. Majestic. I think this is finally the snowfall that will never melt. There's always one snowfall at the beginning of winter that is the foundation for the rest of the season. It doesn't melt, everything just snows and freezes on top of it. It won't go away until next April or May. That's what we're hoping anyways. 

This week is Zone Training, which means another train ride! Yay! Sister Warnick and I will get on a train on Wednesday and head over to good old Samara. Train rides are the best. I always feel like I'm in Harry Potter. Should be a fun one! The day after we get back from our trip is our WARD (not a Branch anymore) Thanksgiving Party, so that is going to be a blast as well!

Welp, that's all for this week folks! Hug your Stake Centers and do a photoshoot!

Do Svindanya!

Love,

Sister Megan Wagstaff

News and Noobs‏

Zdrastvuitye!

I have some super big news that's going to blow your mind!!! Are you ready??? THERE IS GOING TO BE A STAKE IN SARATOV!!!!!! We got the call yesterday morning that the first Stake in our mission and the third stake in Russia is going to be formed next Sunday in Saratov!! I cannot even describe how excited I am for this! President Porter of the 70 will be heading down to Saratov on Sunday with President Schwab to create the Saratov Russia Stake!! What a great blessing that is, and it is something which has been worked on for many years by missionaries and members. We are all so grateful to the Lord for this and I know it will be such a huge blessing for the whole area. I have my fingers crossed that the construction of the first Temple in Russia will be announced in the coming sessions of General Conference. I'm not exactly sure if I will get to be at the actual Conference where the Stake is being created, but I'll get to watch it via Skype if we don't get to go to Saratov. Penza is in the Saratov Zone, so we'll get to see it one way or another. My excitement cannot be contained!!!

We had an interesting lesson last night with our investigators who agreed to be baptized last week. Everything lesson-wise went great. The weird parts were what was happening around me. First of all, they have these two creepy little dogs that smell like booty and they are always trying to manipulate you into petting them. Nast. We did a short Plan of Salvation review with our investigators at the beginning of the lesson using these little cutouts that help you explain the Plan step by step. There wasn't a table or anything in the front room, so I opted to setting up the cutout map on the floor. The little butt dogs were all over me as I sat on the ground and I almost threw in the towel on the map idea. After about 5 minutes, one of the dogs moved on to bugging my companion and the other one was just chilling next to me. Before I knew it, an overwhelming smell of bad tacos filled my nostrils and I looked down to find the dog that was sitting next to me chomping down on a brown log that previously was not there. Yep, I got up real swift-like and remained on the couch for the rest of the lesson. Yikes. Anyways, our investigators have decided to become noncommittal on the baptismal date, so we are focusing on helping them understand the basics like prayer to give them that desire to be baptized. We keep hoping and praying for them! I have no doubt that they will get baptized in the next month or so. The daughter of our main investigator is obsessed with OneRepublic, so she made us listen to "All the Right Moves" on their computer. It has been ages since I've heard that song, and it kind of freaked me out that I remembered all of the lyrics. I can barely tell my companions what my favorite movies are and what kind of music I like because it's so hard to remember all of that stuff when you've been away from the world for so long. It's a strain in the brain, that's for sure. 

The other day, Sister Warnick and I went on a hunt for less actives and it was REAL cold outside. After walking around for about an hour and a half, we decided to meet with one of the members that lived close by since we could barely feel our appendages from the cold. We stopped by a member named Baba Katia. I talked about Baba Katia in my letter about a month ago. She's the crazy old lady who told everyone at church a story about how she lectured someone for shooing away a dog. She is cray. Anyways, Baba Katia has one of the most hilarious singing voices I have ever heard in my life and we always start off our lessons with her with a song. This being Sister Warnick's first time experiencing the singing of Baba Katia, she was trying so hard not to hyperventilate from laughing so hard. Seeing the hysteria of my companion's laughter made me start laughing during the Hymn as well. Every once in a while Baba Katia would smack me on the arm with her wrinkly hand, but I just couldn't hold it in. After the conclusion of the Hymn, Baba Katia looked me dead in the eyes, well, in the eye since she only has one eye, and said "Why were you laughing during this holy Hymn?" Not wanting to hurt her feelings by telling her that we were laughing at her singing, I made up some excuse about how I was feeling overwhelmed by the Spirit and the joy made me laugh. She then spent the next 5 minutes throwing down about how laughing during Hymns is the work of the Devil and that I needed to repent if we wanted to find success in the work. She continuously referenced this incident throughout the lesson and Sister Warnick and I left feeling thoroughly chastised. Lesson learned. Don't laugh at one-eyed old ladies. 

I had another interesting experience on the streets the other night. Sister Warnick and I were making our way home from a long day of contacting when we saw two drunk 15 year olds goofing around on the sidewalk. As we were just about to pass them, one of them waltzed in front of me and tried to grab me by my shoulders. As he was raising his arms to block me, he told me to stop walking and then went in for a smooch. My companion doesn't understand squat in Russian, so she just said "no" in English and shuffled to the side of the sidewalk opposite from where I was being facially attacked. Thankfully he didn't have time to plant one on me before I scurried around him, but he did manage to get a hold of a big chunk of hair as I was running away. I got a nice, painful yank from that. I was terrified that they would try to chase us down, but fortunately they were too wasted to even figure out where we went. No fear!!

Since our Branch in Penza celebrated Halloween a week early, Sister Warnick and I decided to officially celebrate Halloween a week late! That was mostly due to the fact that we could never find time to buy pumpkins until a couple of days ago. We spent a dinner hour carving pumpkins and drinking apple cider. Good fun! I attempted to carve the Hymn Book organ logo on my pumpkin. Didn't turn out too well, but it could have been worse. It didn't really help that we only had large kitchen knives to carve the pumpkins with. It was still fun, nonetheless. 

Welp, that's all for this week folks! Don't sit by poopy small dogs and never laugh at other people's singing. 

Do Svidanya!

Love,

Sister Megan Wagstaff

Babies and Baggage

Zdrastvuitye!

Crazy traveling week! Transfers are always full of planes, trains, and automobiles, but especially this time around since someone was moving out of our apartment and another was moving in. Sister Thomas and I took a train from Penza to Samara at 6 in the morning on Tuesday. I'm sure our neighbors hated us because we were basically throwing her luggage down 8 flights of stairs at 4:30 in the morning. Sorry neighbors. The train ride consisted of much sleeping and lots of reminiscing about our cycle together. That evening I was reunited with Sister Thomas (the older) and we helped out with the english group in Avrora. Lots of fun! 

The next day Sister Thomas (the baby) went on her Visa Trip to Riga, Latvia so I got to go on splits with a Russian sister named Sister Mateikina. She is such a sweetie-pie and I had such a great time working with her! We had about a million lessons that day and we were running around like a bunch of rabbid rabbits trying to get to all of our lessons on time. We didn't even have time to get back home for dinner. We stopped by the store to get something to eat and I decided to try out some Philadelphia Sushi-Roll flavored chips (there are some weird chip flavors in Russia). It tasted like the smell of cat pee on the first bite, but then it got kind of better after that. Emphasis on the 'kind of.' Probs won't be purchasing again. I had such a fun time working with Sister Mateikina. She definitely knows how to work.

The next morning everyone was scrambling around trying to get everything situated before heading off to the mission office to get the babies. Sister Thomas and I said our final tear-filled goodbyes and then Sister Mateikina and I taxied to the office. There were 10 new missionaries arriving in this batch, and only 3 of the 10 trainers had ever trained before. We had a little pow-wow together with the Assistants just before meeting the trainees and we talked about the dos and don'ts of training. It was mostly just me and the 2 other experienced trainers giving advice on how to train. I could see the fear in the other trainers' eyes as we shared our experiences. Training really isn't that bad, you just have to develop a lot of patience in order to be an effective trainer. A lot of patience. After about 10 minutes of counseling one another, President Schwab called us in to the conference room and we got to meet our babies! My babies' name is Sister Sariah Warnick. She is literally the coolest! She is from the exotic city of Provo and she studied at BYU for a year before her mission (just like 75% of the missionaries that are already serving in this mission). She is super short like me and she has really long, blonde hair like my previous companion Sister Wilson's. Ever since we've been together she keeps telling me that she isn't tired and that she's over her jet lag, but every time I look over at her, she is either dozing off or she's asleep. Super funny! We get along super well and I'm super excited to get to work with her! It is going to be such a miraculous cycle! I can feel it!

Sister Warnick and I took a train back to Penza that night and noisily heaved all of her luggage back up the 8 flights of stairs. Sorry again neighbors. We have only been together for about 4 days and we've already seen some amazing miracles! Sister Warnick has gotten to meet a lot of the crazy less actives in our branch and even a couple of our investigators that we haven't been able to meet with in forever! We actally met with these investigators last night and had a super solid Plan of Salvation lesson with them. These investigators happen to be a mother and a daughter and they are both very receptive to the message of the gospel. Everyone was feeling the spirit super strong during the lesson and we asked both of them to be baptized after everything was said and done, and guess what?? They said YES! I haven't had anybody agree to be baptized in so long, and I honestly didn't really know how to react because I was so excited. You sometimes forget how to express normal human emotions when you're on a mission because you get to used to being turned down so much that you forget what it's like when you find someone that actually wants it. Sister Warnick and I were so ecstatic and now we're working hard to prepare them for baptism! If we keep seeing miracles like this, the Lord is going to help Sister Warnick and I baptize all of Penza before the end of her training. I'm so excited to see what the Lord has in store for this area in the near future. 

Hello, new cycle! Hello, more miracles! Welp, that's all for this week folks! Hug your friendliest friends and ask people to be baptized!

Do Svidanya!

Love,

Sister Megan Wagstaff

Bobbing for Babies‏

Zdrastvuitye!

Transfer calls are in! Momma's having a baby again! I am so pumped to be training another new missionary... in Penza! That's right, I'm staying in Penza. Sister Thomas and I were sure that I would be the one leaving Penza, but that is obviously not so. I love Penza with all of my heart, so I'm not complaining. Sister Thomas is going to be in a tri-panionship with one of my previous companions, Sister Wilson, and one of the Sisters that she came to Russia with. She will be joining them in the beautiful city of Kazan. We are really bummed to be getting split up, but we both knew that it was going to happen sooner than later. Many tears will be shed at our parting. We will be heading out on a train at 5:30 tomorrow morning to Samara and I will spend the next couple of days there while Sister Thomas is on her Visa trip. Then on Thursday Sister Thomas and I will say our final goodbyes, I'll head over to the office to get my baby, and we will be homeward bound once more. Sister Thomas still has a bit of packing to do and our apartment needs some deep cleaning in preparation for the new baby, so this email won't be too long. 

Along with the crazy transfer call, the weather has also been pretty crazy here. At the beginning of the week the skies were clear but the cold was almost painful on my face. As the week went on, it started getting cloudy and then on Friday night the sky dumped about 2 inches of snow in a 3 hour period. The next two days were straight rain and today we woke up to more snow. We are walking in a winter, spring, and fall wonderland. 

On Friday our Branch had a Halloween party. Well, kind of. It was more of just a Fall Night. It was kind of strange, but it was still fun nonetheless. The party wasn't held on the actual day of Halloween because a big group of members from our Branch went on a trip to the Kiev Temple on Saturday, so there would have been a very small turnout had we waited. There were a lot of investigators that showed up to the activity, so that was a very unexpected miracle. There were all sorts of games for the children and adults, there were snacks, and there was a random opera singer that came and performed. We as missionaries got to help out with Bobbing for Apples. It was all fun and games at the beginning until the kids starting spitting in the container of water. You could literally see the saliva floating on the top of the water. It was repulsive. Super entertaining as a whole, though! I think it was an enjoyable experience for many people. None of the investigators that showed up have any interest in learning about the gospel, but we will keep working with them to help them gain that desire.

So... for the past month or so Sister Thomas and I have engaged ourselves on a workout journey that we named "Project Pudge." Neither of us are fat by any means, but we ate a lot of candy at the beginning of our companionship, so we have some baby fat in our cheeks (both sorts) that we wanted to get rid of. Here are some of the parameters that we set: 5 servings of fruits and vegetables daily, no pasta on Sundays and Thursdays (we are inside for a majority of the day on those days), no sugary things, no snacking after nightly planning, no bread, no making cookie or cake batters for eating, etc. etc. Along with that we made individual workout programs for ourselves. Sister Thomas was such a brave soul and tried to follow Project Pudge with exactness. She hardly ever slipped up while I, on the other hand, pretty much only slipped up. She would be munching on her little salad whilst I was downing a bowl of pasta. She picked out apples while I selected an icecream for myself at the store. She would munch on a carrot while I shoved brownies down my shirt so that I could sneak them into the bathroom and eat them without receiving judgement. Let's just say I wasn't winning the Project Pudge game. Thankfully I didn't gain any weight from that failure, but whilst I was reading from the Bible during personal study one day, I came across this scripture in Romans that should be the motto for Project Pudge. 

Romans 14:2-3

 2 For one believeth that he may eat all things: another, who is weak, eateth herbs.

 3 Let not him that eateth despise him that eateth not; and let not him which eateth not judge him that eateth: for God hath received him.

I literally started laughing so hard during studies that I had to stop everything and share it with Sister Thomas immediately. We laughed hysterically for a good 10 minutes. Let's just say I'm not the weak one who eateth herbs. 

Welp, that's all for this week folks! Don't spit whilst bobbing for apples and beat project pudge!

Do Svidanya!

Love,

Sister Megan Wagstaff

Hair and Humility

Zdrastvuitye!

This week was quite the adventurous one. Lots of traveling and bustling around! Thankfully the weather wasn't quite as adventurous as it was last week. As a whole, it was just plain old cold. Jack Frost didn't come to visit, but there is currently a rain storm going on outside. Hopefully the snow comes back so that I can have a white Halloween!

We had Zone Conference a few days ago, which means we got to travel to Samara! The train ride to Samara was great, as always. Sister Thomas and I got some amazing sushi before our ride and then we slept for a majority of our 7 hour journey. We got to Samara pretty late at night, but I still enjoyed seeing my mission birth place once again! In about a week we will be back in Samara for transfers and Visa Trips and such, so that'll be a good time! I never get tired of going back there. The morning before Zone Conference was a lot more hectic than I had anticipated. Heres a little background: About a month or so ago I decided that it would be fun to bleach the ends of my hair to get the "ombre" effect. It looked amazing... for a little while. I had noticed that it was starting to look a little bit more bronzy as time went by, but I just ignored it thinking that it probably wasn't too bad. Sister Thomas snapped a candid pic of me on the train to Samara and I was appalled to discover that the bottom half of my hair was straight up yellow. I'm talking school bus status, here. Horrified by the thought of having to hide my yellow clown hair from two General Authorities, I opted to going out on a hair dye hunt the following morning. After running around Avrora at 7 in the morning like a chicken with it's head cut off, we finally found some hairdye at our last stop. Hallelujah! Needless to say, I was able to enjoy Zone Conference without being preoccupied with concealing my yellow hairs. 

The Zone Conference with Sister McConkie and Elder Kacher  was a wonderful revelatory experience. Sister McConkie and her husband talked a lot about how all of the miracles in the scriptures and all of the miracles in our everyday lives are brought to pass according to our faith. She used the stories in Luke 17 to emphasize this principle, so study that chapter when you have some time. Elder Kacher stressed that if we wanted to reach any of the goals that we set throughout our missions and throughout our lives, we have to change our "mindsets." He said we have to "BELIEVE that God can bless us" and that he will help us achieve our goals. He then asked: "Are you willing to change how you think?" We were invited to ask ourselves if we are willing to do so, because it is such a key. During the conference, Elder Kacher drew a "ladder of faith" on the board which had five rungs. The five rungs were as follows (starting from the bottom): 

1. "This is too hard and I'm no good. Nothing will happen." 

2. "This is too hard and nothing will happen, but I made a commitment, so I'll go through the motions." 

3. "I can make it happen. ­­I can work hard and it will happen." 

4. "I can do this. ­­I'll follow the Spirit." 

5. "The Lord can do this. ­­I can be an instrument in His hands."

The point of this exercise was to emphasize that we cannot rely on "the arm of flesh" if we expect to find success. We were asked to honestly evaluate ourselves and ask ourselves where we are at on this ladder. This ladder can be applied to anything in life; faith, school, callings, work, family, etc. We all need to work toward getting to that 5th step, no matter which rung you are on right now. Change how you think! Require yourself to believe that God can do all things. Remember that "if you do what you've always done, then you'll get what you've always gotten." INCREASE and change what you are doing, and see how you are blessed because of those sacrifices! 

Sister Thomas and I saw quite a few miracles this week as we strived to exercise our faith. First of all, we gave talks on Sunday. That was the first time I have given a talk in Russian, in Russia. I was feeling pretty confident in myself (first mistake... pride) as I prepared my talk. It was on missionary work, so I figured it wouldn't be too hard. As I made my way up to the podium, the Lord smacked me with a big old palm full of humility and I realized just how little I had actually prepared. A wave of panic struck me to the very core as I stood infront of the branch and began to speak. It was hardly intelligible; I literally forgot all of the Russian that I had spent over a year studying. Of course everyone was sweet and said that our talks were wonderful, but one member walked up to Sister Thomas and I and said, "you tried." Then he just shrugged and walked away. Thank you for the honesty. The other miracle was that there were a million less actives at church on Sunday, so they probably showed up and thought, "so this is what it's come to..." after hearing the missionaries speak. Well, the gift of tongues only comes if you ask for it, I guess! Never forget to ask for it...

Also, Betty Crocker is back! There's a pastery in Russia called Samsa that's not really Russian, but I still love it. It's basically just a flakey triangle shaped croissant filled with seasoned sauteed meat and onions. Well, I was craving Samsa the other day so I made little baby bite sized Samsi! They were so good! Sister Thomas and I didn't let them live for more than 5 minutes. I will certainly make them again in the near future. I also made apple crisp, but I'm not going to tell you how quickly we cleaned out the entire pan.

Welp, that's all for this week folks! Hide your clown hair and speak intelligibly.

Do Svidanya!

Love,

Sister Megan Wagstaff