Crotone Transfer 6 Week 1

I'm staying!  Beautiful Restaurants! Baptismal Dates! 

What a week we've had here in Crotone! Miracles are happening and the Lord's work is PROGRESSING! 

Monday night we had a HUGE Gesso which is the chalk thing where we draw on the sheet and everything... we had the whole District plus the Anziani from Cosenza so there was 8 missionaries on the street and we centered it on the church being Christ's restored Church. We wrote "Is Christ's Church still on the Earth today?" And we shared the story of the Restoration with so many people. I was talking to one guy and Anziano Saffer came over and I asked this guy if we could meet him another time and explain the full restoration. He said or you could explain it now... and so we did, we taught him the whole Restoration together and I noticed two things! Anziano Saffer and I have never worked together or taught anything but with the Spirit's guidance we were able to teach smoothly and work together to explain everything clearly. The second thing was how strong the spirit was, we both felt it and we know that he did too. Unfortunately he isn't ready to accept the Gospel right now, we offered him a copy of the Book of Mormon and he said he wasn't interested in learning more right now. So I actually learned a lot from this guy about missionary work. We can teach perfectly and with the spirit but if people aren't ready to receive it then they won't understand the message and they won't accept, but that's not our fault and we shouldn't get discouraged! We just have to get out there and find those who are ready! Then of course there is this Pizzeria here that on Mondays any kind of pizza you could want is just 3€ so we ordered a TON of pizza and w ent home to eat! While we were waiting for our pizza the phone rang! It was Cosenza's phone... they are staying together but ey found out that the Sorelle were being "blown out" so both of them were leaving and no sisters were coming back to the area for this next transfer and the Anziani were added to our District. So we get to see Anziano Saffer and Anziano Oswald every week for District Meeting! One by one we all got our transfer calls and found out that the whole District is staying the same for this transfer! I'm excited to do another 6 weeks with Anziano Allen! He's doing great and really picking up on the language quickly! 

Tuesday the Sorelle from Cosenza came down for District meeting so there were ten of us! We had a great District meeting and then I made lunch afterwards. Southern Italy has water problems... so the city water sometimes cuts out or goes down to a trickle. Well Tuesday was a trickle day. So I was making Pesto pasta with chicken and it took me 20 minutes to fill the pot for the water... and we made so much pasta that I couldn't stir it all and it burned to the bottom of the pot, there was no water to wash the dishes and it was a total mess! The Pesto turned out good though and everyone was happy!

After DDM we stayed in the Church for a while and then helped a member clean a little bit. There's like a patio thing behind the church and it's filthy so we helped her and her two kids clean it up so hopefully we can do a Branch activity out there eventually! We prepped for English Course and then taught about "Going to the Auto Parts Store" it was definitely more interesting than going to the Hair Salon last week! Afterwards we had an appointment set with Marco & Rita but they weren't able to come... 

Wednesday was a day of finding because we got cancelled on by literally everyone... even back up plans fell through... so we did a little finding, we ended up doing a quick grocery shopping run, we were out of bottled water so we had to get some of that and we needed some American food so I made roast chicken and mashed potatoes for lunch! We spent a good minute catching up on some training videos for Anziano Allen.

Thursday was a better day! Hair Salons in Italy are closed on Monday unless they're run by the Chinese so we got haircuts on Thursday and passed by some investigators in the morning. Then we went home and made some homemade chicken wings (our new tradition!) and then we taught English Course in the evening! We read the "I'm a Mormon" profile for Lindsey Sterling with them and they did a great job! It was really cool, if y'all know who Lindsey Stirling is you check out her profile on Mormon.org, there's a little video on there that explains a little about her story and it's really interesting!

Friday... let's just talk about Friday for a minute... we started off great, we spent the morning weekly planning and getting ready for this next week, we have lots of appointments set up so hopefully we'll be busier. While we planned I made a ragù pasta sauce and it was so good! We ate our weight in pasta and then we went to relax because we were about to explode. We both fell asleep but not for a little nap, we were both out which hardly ever happens, I usually wake up within half an hour if I fall asleep but we were gone. Two and a half hours later we woke up... we went and saw Sorella Grande, we visited with her and shared a message, we talked about how she felt when her daughter went on her mission to Temple Square and the blessings that she received as her daughter served. It was really cool! We taught English to our friend Samuel, he is moving to Canada with his wife in a few months, he was asking us about fast food in America and we started to explain the joys of Chic-fil-a and Carl's Jr. and Subway and Anziano Allen and I were about drooling haha The things ya miss! 

Saturday was great, we met with a few less active families in the morning and then went to meet our investigators Marco and Rita because they wanted to take us to lunch! They invited the Sisters as well! We went to "La figlia di Annibale" and WOW was it amazing! This place was way out of my league... we all felt a little out of place but it was so nice! I ate Clams for an appetizer and they were so good! Well seasoned and then they had a piece of Bread from Cutro which is amazing... then round two was a risotto with pumpkin and shrimp , it was heavenly. Round three I got some weird fish that came with a tomato, onion and fresh basil salad. All good. You guys should all go check out the restaurant on line! 

Then we taught seminary and Antonio stayed and we went and hung up English Course Posters with him and passed out about 500 English Course Cards with him! We  got a little competitive so we would talk to people and we ended up having a lot of fun. I was behind because they gave me a bigger stack and so I went up to a group of 15 high school kids and caught up real fast! We actually had some really good conversations. Working with members is where it's at! 

Sunday we had a great  Sacrament Meeting, we had a visitor from Taranto that spoke during the meeting and he talked about the promised blessings that come when we obey the commandments. It's so true! Afterwards we had a lesson with our investigators Antonio, Oriana, and Luigi at a member's house. It went so well! So last time we taught the Plan of Salvation to them and they understood it super well and this time we explained the Restoration! We gave them all copies of the Book of Mormon and at the end we both felt like they were ready for the baptismal invite. We invited them to be baptized and they all said yes! Their baptismal date is the 11th of March! So it's going to take a lot of work and a lot of preparation on both our part and theirs so we could use your prayers! 

That's the week for us, today we are at McDonalds and headed to the mall for a little bit! Should be a good day! 

Just FYI we have Zone Conference next Monday so we will have P-Day on Wednesday! So don't worry if no one hears from me from Monday, I'll be back! I love y'all and I hope you have a great week! 

Anziano Bellucci