Transfers

Hello Family!

It's been a pretty crazy week. Last Thursday we went to Firenze for Zone Conference combined with the Firenze Zone. It was a very long day on trains, but the conference was very good, if a little different without Presidente and Sorella Dibb. They were in the states for a few weeks for health reasons, but they came back last Saturday, and just in time for transfers this week.

Presidente Dibb called us Monday afternoon to inform us that Sorella Bucco is transfered to San Remo! That was pretty exciting because it's really close to San Remo where I served a year ago. My new comp is Sister Clawson who is coming from Como to serve her last transfer here in Rimini.

We've spent the past few days visiting members and investigators for Sorella Bucco to say goodbye. Today we had a lunch appointment with a member family. In good Italian style, they feed us a huge plate of tortellini followed by a second corse with a thick round of chicken and potatoes followed by a big bowl of fruit and gelato. It was proprio buonissimo, but I was feeling full after the first half of the tortellini dish. We were dying as we left. We waddled out to our bikes and then we oh so slowly peddled to our second lunch appointment with a lady from our english class. We arrived and explained that we weren't feeling all that hungry, because it's so hot and humid that we don't really feel like eating alot of food. Which she took to mean that we weren't eating at all, so she gave us the biggest piece of lasagna I have ever eaten in my life followed by another piece of chicken, more potatoes and desert. I literally was falling into a giant food coma as I stuffed more of it in my face. 

Afterwords we biked up to the church and just laid on the ground groaning for a while before we started emailing.

This next week we're planning a missionary activity for the ward- a Gara di Cucina aka. a Food Contest. Us missionaries will be the judges. I'm not sure my stomach can take it any more. The cool thing is that we're going to start the activity with a rendition of Lehi's dream. So on Sunday we spent a good while at the church testing out our maze of an iron rod (made of yarn) that will eventually lead to the tree of life (the food contest). It was awesome and I can't wait for that activity. 

Yesterday we had the most amazing lesson with C!!!! She came to church on Sunday and didn't exactly love it, so we wanted a really powerful spiritual lesson. We talked about the temple. She lost her husband a few years ago to cancer. It was amazing to sit on the couch with her, show her pictures of the temple, and feel that special spirit. She has the strongest desire to go to the temple, and her testimony is slowly growing. She's still not completely sure if the Book of Mormon is true, but she's come a long ways. It's so cool watching the road everyone takes on their journey back to Heavenly Father. We all have our different experiences we face, but hopefully they teach us to rely always more on the Lord.

One of the things that Anziano Lee talked about in Firenze was consecration. It's so cool to think that we all have the choice to consecrate our lives to God or not, but only through that process can we succeed in life.

I love you all!!! Have a wonderfull week!

Sorella Pace

Last week we had a zone conference in Firenze. The Rimini Zone with Anziano and Sorella Lee on the left. They were our substitute mission president and wife while President Dibb was in the US for a surgery.

Members of my MTC group

The pizza we made the other day

Bikes

So last Wednesday we headed out to a small town close to Rimini to visit a less-active. We rode our bikes to the train station, locked them up, and caught our bus to Sant Archangelo. The lesson went really well and we were able to talk with her non-member mother. Afterwords we caught our bus home and went to grab our bikes and head home for the night. We turned the corner,when low and behold, Sorella Bucco's bike was missing it's front tire! And that is why, even when there are absolutely no empty spaces for the bikes at the front of the station, you never go around to the super sketchy area behind the building to lock up your bikes. Lesson learned. 

We were left with the problem of carrying the bike home, roughly 25 minutes on foot. We tried carrying it for a while, but quickly decided that that wasn't worth it, so we put her front over my back tire to create a tandem bike and walked it that way. haha. 

No worries, we took the bikes in Friday and got a new tire.

We also found some awesome new simps this week! One of which stopped us in the Bologna train station a couple weeks ago as we were doing scambi. The other is Peruvian, and accepted a baptisimal date yesterday!

Next week are transfers, so we'll see how that goes. Time really does fly.

Love, 
Sorella Pace

Our poor bikes!

Happy Birthday Sorella Pace!

Hello Family!

Thanks for all the birthday wishes! My comp’s great and spilled the beans to our district so in district meeting on Monday we had cookies, lemon bars, and banana cake. It was delicious. We also have a full day planned on Thursday, so hopefully all goes well and no appointments cancel. That would be the greatest birthday present ever.

This past week has been amazing! I had a couple great scambi, we found some awesome new investigators, and yesterday we reset C. con a baptism date! She originally had one for next week, but then she went on vacation for ten days, and then she asked for a week before we contacted her again. We were pretty nervous about why she didn't want to see us. We had just taught her the Word of Wisdom with a very powerful spiritual lesson and she accepted to try living it, but then she kindof backed off. Last Saturday we had a really good lesson with her and she asked us why she always felt guilty when she smoked and drank caffè. WELL, we were more than happy to explain that to her. We were more than happy to expain why. Yesterday we taught her the gospel with a member. It was an incredible lesson. At the end we invited her again to be baptized and she accepted 25 Luglio for a date! We all agreed to work together to help her prepare. We promised to do our part, and she promised to do hers. It was an incredible miracle.

On Sunday there was an area wide stake conference broadcast from Bern, Switzerland. Sister Reeves, Elder Andersen, and Presidente Uchtdorf were all there. Sorella Uchtdorf also gave a talk. She’s the cutest German lady ever! The conference was incredible.

I love you all!!! Have a great week!

Sorella Pace

Scambi

So it's been a pretty crazy week!

Last week we had back to back scambi. First was Thursday with Reggio Emilia. The sisters were supposed to arrive Thursday morning and then Sorella Bucco and Sorella Hallum would return to Reggio while I would stay with Sorella Jackman in Rimini. They called us that morning to say there was a strike and their train was cancelled. We immediately we scrambling to figure out how we could meet up. They eventually were able to catch a fast train down, so we make the exchange and then Sorella Bucco camped out at the station for a while trying to find a train back to Reggio. 

Then on Friday Sorella Jackman and I headed up to Reggio so we could meet up with our companions again and then we would go to Bologna. We made it about 45 minutes out of Rimini before our train broke down and we sat for an hour straight. It was kind of stressfull, but everything worked out in the end. 

I was able to spend a day in Bologna, Dad's first city of his mission! So that was pretty cool. And both scambi were really good! I was with two young missionaries for the first time since I was a young missionary. They had so much energy and desire to work hard! I learned a ton from them. 

Have a great week!!!

Sorella Pace

For p-day we went to a city named Urbino. It was beautiful, even if bus schedules left us with only two hours to see the city. There was a cool museum, but we went through it in about twenty minutes. The workers thought we were crazy!

Prayers

Sunday evening we were having a rough finding session. We were in the park stopping people, but no one wanted to listen. We walked up to a lady on a bench and asked her what makes her happy. She said at first she wasn't really happy. We continued talking to her and ended up sitting down with her and starting with a prayer. The Spirit was instantly very strong. We taught her the Restoration. Because of hardships in her life she had lost her faith in God in the last few years. At the end we invited her to say the prayer. She was hesitant at first because she knew only how to recite a memorized prayer. We explained how to pray from the heart. She gave the most beautiful prayer. Afterwords she sat there for a few moments with her eyes closed. She told us that she felt such peace at that moment. She said, "I can pray at any moment. Why don't we know this?" It was a very sweet moment, as she realized and felt that she has a loving Heavenly Father who she can talk to at any moment, and she can feel that peace each time she does. 

On Saturday there was the baptism of a thirteen year old boy in Ravenna. We had an appointment that morning with an investigator, A. We've been teaching him and his girlfriend for a while, but they've only recently started making progress. His girlfriend was down in Rome for a week, but we decided to invite A. to come to the baptism. And he agreed to come! He took an hour train ride to Ravenna to watch it. And he really enjoyed it. We're seeing them tomorrow and hopefully setting a baptism date with them. Keep them in your prayers! 

Tomorrow we start our scambi for the new transfer. It's been a couple weeks since our last scambio, and it's been really nice to fully focus on our area. We're starting out with a double scambio with two Reggio Emilia and Bologna, so I'll be separated from Sorella Bucco basically until Saturday. We hoping to get all of our scambi done sooner in the transfer so that we don't feel so rushed at the end. 

I love you all!!! Have a great week and a great start of summer! 

Sorella Pace

Investigators

So this week has been amazing. 

We have this investigator E, who had come to church once and we had taught once. Our second appointment was for after church on Sunday and we really wanted to set her with a baptism date for June 20. She loved church- during gospel principles, she made some really good comments about prayer. Then after Sacrament Meeting we went to a classroom to teach her a lesson. We had planned to teach her the Restoration, but then she started asking questions about baptism, and told us that she wanted some sort of goal in her life. Hmm. Perfect! So we taught her the gospel instead. At the end we invited her to be baptized on the 20th. But then she said that she'll be out of town because she's going home to Moldava for a month. So we then asked her to be baptized June 13 and she accepted! She said she'd pray about it to know if it was right, but she accepted the date as a goal to work for! We're super excited for her! She is so elect and ready for the gospel.
The only problem is that we had thought the 20th would be pushing it to teach everything to her beforehand. Especially since we now have to teach the fifth lesson before baptism. She has a job that keeps her super busy and can meet with us max. twice a week, and sometimes only once. Then you add in our crazy schedule because we're traveling to to scambi, and setting appointments gets a little trickier.  But we're super excited for this date, and are putting it in the Lord's hands. Somehow we'll have the time and ability to teach her everything.

Our other baptism date C. is doing well as well. Earlier in the week we went with a member to teach her the Plan of Salvation. At the end she asked us why we were against coffee. We told her we'd talk about it the next time. 

At first she was pretty defensive, after all, what's a cup of coffee? But as we and a member bore testimony, she calmed down and accepted to try and live the Word of Wisdom for a week!

I love seeing the blessings of the Lord in our lives. It amazes me everyday that I'm able to serve Him and do His work. It doesn't matter my fears, my faults, my weaknesses, or my mistakes. He takes my best effort and magnifies it into more than I could ever do.

You all are amazing! 

I love you!

Sorella Pace

The Stake of Firenze!

So it's transfer week again, but all's well. I'm staying here with Sorella Bucco. She's only a transfer above me in the mission, so we're both crossing our fingers to finish the mission here.

Fun stuff happened this weekend! We went to Firenze to create a stake! We caught a ride with some members so we spent Saturday in Firenze and then went to the conference that night and Sunday morning. It was soo good! Anziano Dykes came and gave a really good talk Saturday evening about missionary work. He had all us missionaries in the new stake go and stand up front, and there was a sack load of us. Then one of the new converts that Sorella Bucco baptized a year ago stood up, bore a powerful testimony, and thanked Sorella Bucco. 

We stayed the night with the Sorelle in Firenze along with the Ravenna Sorelle, so we had a blast talking amongst ourselves.

Last Friday we had a lesson with a potential that the anziana found. She had come to church the week before. In between then and Friday she had checked out the church's website and had read the Joseph Smith story and started reading the Book of Mormon online. She had a lot of questions. It's amazing to see her desire to learn more.

I love you all!!! Have a marvelous week!

Sorella Pace

This weekend I was in Firenze!!! It was so hot (Hence the sunburn) but we became a stake! :)